the father of C. Pontius, was an old man living at Caudium, when his son defeated the Roman army in the neighbourhood of that town in B. C. 321. The Samnites sent to ask his advice how they should avail themselves of their extraordinary good fortune. The reply which he gave is related at length by Livy (9.1, 3; comp. Appian, Samn. 4.3.) It would appear from Cicero (de Senect. 12), that there was a tradition which supposed Herennius Pontius and Archytas of Tarentum to have been friends; and Niebuhr supposes that Nearchus had written a dialogue in which Archytas, the Samnite Pontius, and Plato, were speakers. (Hist. of Rome, vol. iii. note 373.)