Cincinnatus, Lucius Quintius

, was a celebrated Roman, who was taken from the plough to be consul and, a second time, to be dictator, 458 A. C. when the army of the consul, Marcus Minutius, was on the point of being forced in its entrenchments by the -/Equi and Volsci. Cincinnatus conquered these enemies, made them pass under the yoke; and, having triumphed, returned to his plough. He was created dictator a second time when eighty years of age, vanquished the Praenestians, and abdicated twentyone days after. The time of his death is not known. From the leading trait in his history, a society was formed in America at the close of the revolutionary war in 1783, called the order of the Cincinnati, but it met with some opposition, although it still subsists, principally in the form of a charitable institution. ²