I.
Meliore fato fideque partium Flavianarum duces consilia belli tractabant. Poetovionem (Poetovionem: today’s Pettau, or rather Ptuj, in Styria on the river Drava, southeast of Graz, formerly in Austria, now part of Slovenia.) in hiberna tertiae decimae legionis convenerant. illic agitavere placeretne obstrui Pannoniae Alpes, (Pannoniae Alpes: the Julian Alps between NE Italy and Slovenia) donec a tergo vires universae consurgerent, (donec …consurgerent: donec + subjunctive to highlight intention or design) an ire comminus et certare pro Italia constantius foret. (agitavere placeretne …an … foret: indirect double question with –ne …an, ‘whether …or’, introducing the first and second part respectively) quibus opperiri auxilia et trahere bellum videbatur, Germanicarum legionum vim famamque extollebant, (quibus … videbatur … extollebant …: short for [ei] quibus … videbatur … extollebant …) et advenisse mox cum Vitellio Britannici exercitus robora: ipsis nec numerum parem pulsarum nuper legionum, et quamquam atrociter loquerentur, (quamquam atrociter loquerentur: subjunctive after quamquam in indir. speech introduced by extollebant and extending to the end of the chapter) minorem esse apud victos animum. sed insessis interim Alpibus (insessis …Alpibus: example of abl. abs. replacing a conditional clause) venturum cum copiis Orientis Mucianum; superesse Vespasiano mare, classis, studia provinciarum, per quas velut alterius belli molem cieret. (per quas velut alterius belli molem cieret: per quas refers to the nearest noun, provinciarum: ‘with whose help he would raise, as it were, the vast forces of a second war’; alterius is usd by Tacitus in preference to the genitive alius.) ita salubri mora novas viris adfore, ex praesentibus nihil periturum.