My thinking is that they are heavy spearmen but their equipment is probably distinctly italian. Like, you wouldn't look at Messapii hoplites and confuse them for Greek hoplites.
Their shields probably have more in common with the Scutum than with the Hoplon as an example, and their helmets are open faced with crests.
They delivered the ones they caught, and there is no guarantee that others wont rise up with dreams of salt fairies dancing in their heads.
Its like living next to a field of gold and forbidding anyone from going out and scooping up nuggets. Its not going to happen and the people who live there are going to resent you from restraining them so. Even if you kill the ring leaders, its not just the nobility who would benefit from the salterns. The common folk would have lots of money to make from building the salterns, harvesting and transporting the salt, selling it to their neighbors, and they know it too.
That is why he is bringing us an offer of peace so that he can open up the salterns again and remove the reason for the nobility to rebel. They are probably a constant distraction, and he doesn't have the ability to simply impose his will or raze or relocate the cities away from the marsh. For one, we are right next door and he knows we would jump at a chance to seize the salterns. So he needs Salapia and Herdonia on board if he is going to mount any kind of effective resistance.
The primary reason we were even interested in Salapia and Herdonia as vassals was to get at the salt marshes in the first place.
And I am not saying that the Dauni would go for total war scorch the earth. I am saying that the King can make a war more of a headache then it already is, and that IF we wish to go to war, we should not do so right now. We have an opportunity to remove a distraction and focus on the adriatic, the Messapii, and Athens. We should take it and wait for things to settle before bullying the Dauni around and taking those two cities.
You seem to be ignoring the fact he's gave those truly loyal to him their lands, I agree with you he didn't kill the entire opposition, but he's now using the shock of their death to stop us from coming to their aid.
This is what the peace treaty is about, forcing us to back off so he can consolidate his control, clean house then come back for a chunk of our Empire the minute our back is turned.
His men are likely loyal, likely value the land and their position in his court over Rebellion for coin, especially as they literally just saw, and likely will participate in, the butchery of those who wanted to use the salt trade.
Yeah, it's valuable, but the Kingdom has been able to restrict people from trading it or even building infrastructure for decades, hell they destroyed the infrastructure themselves, and after what happened, if they get breathing room, they will purge what's left of the Pro-Salt Trade Faction rather easily once they have our word that we won't interfere, which raises the question why anyone would rise up for the sake of two middling cities? Especially when salt could turn them into true rivals.
You say he's doing this because he suddenly wants to open trade. But that just shows you haven't looked at what the Pro-Salt Trade faction wanted or did. They were willing to welcome back to his control and make peace themselves, leaving behind the idea of Eretria annexation in return for the salt trade being reopened.
That's what the Peace was, and why they were at that feast.
Killing them for wanting trade, because he wants to open trade? That one doesn't make sense to me, could you expand on what exactly you mean with that? Because wither you've missed the pint entirely or I have.
Finally, the idea of other concerns making war an issue. Yeah not at this point.
Athens won't immediately jump us, more likely just turn to alternatives for grain. The Illyrians are beaten for now. Taras doesn't hate us and the current vote to deny Athens will definitely improve relations. Colonisation is largely passive unless we decide to start a new colony.
Overall we have no enemies outside our borders and no pressing issues. This is likely one of the last times we'll get to pursue a war like this for decades.
The only enemy at the moment is the Dauni, and they are showing us the heads of those who helped us in the Salentine war and telling us to let their treacherous King do what he likes until he's ready to plunge a dagger in our back.
