_Read the passage through carefully._ As you read--
(i.) Make all the use you can of your previous knowledge of History, Geography, and Antiquities.
Thus, +Hannibali+ suggests an episode in the Second Punic War.
+M. Centenius+ is clearly the unfortunate subject of the episode.
+in Lucanos ... substiterat+ helps to fix the date as later than +Cannae+, 216 B.C.
(ii.) Observe carefully all phrases that will require special care in translating--_e.g._ +bene gerendae rei+--+inter primipili centuriones+--+perfunctus militia+--+operae pretium+--+ad id locorum+.
You will now have a sufficient general idea of the form and general sense of the passage, and may begin to translate sentence by sentence.
+I.+ +Hannibali alia in his locis bene gerendae rei fortuna oblata est.+
+oblata+, cf. _ob-lation_ = _an offering_ and _of-fer_.
+oblata est+ shows that the subject must be +fortuna+, with which +alia+ must agree, and +gerendae rei+ is dependent genitive. So you may at once translate literally _Another fortune (chance) of carrying-on the matter well in these parts was offered to Hannibal_. But you must not be satisfied with this, for though literally correct it is neither good History nor good English. So render: _In this district Hannibal had another chance presented to him of achieving a success_.
Here notice especially the use of the word +res+,[12] a remarkable example of the tendency of Roman writers to employ the ordinary and simple vocabulary wherever possible _instead of inventing a new word_. As a writer well says, ‘+Res+ is, so to say, a blank cheque, to be filled up from the context to the requisite amount of meaning.’ Cf. ‘+Consilium erat quo fortuna rem daret, eo inclinare vires+,’ where +res+ = _victory_.
[Footnote 12: Cf. Introduction, p. 11.] [[Introduction 13 (2)]]
+II.+ +M. Centenius fuit cognomine Paenula, insignis inter primipili centuriones et magnitudine corporis et animo.+
+primipili+ = the chief centurion of the +triarii+ (the third, veteran line of the legion), the +primipilus+, or +primus pilus+. So Livy vii. 41, ‘+primus centurio erat, quem nunc (centurionem) primi pili appellant+.’
+cognomine+, _i.e._ +co-nomen+, a name _added_ to the +nomen+, a title, epithet, _e.g._: