Main Page | See live article | Alphabetical index Porsenna, king of the Etruscan town of Chiusi, was given many young Roman girls to hold as his hostages. One of these women, Cloelia, escaped her captors and led many of the other Roman girls to safety. Porsenna was furious when he learned of the escape, but came to admire Cloelia's courage. He granted her a promise of safety in his camp if she would return and even swore to return her to her parents when his troops had left Roman territory. Cloelia returned and stayed with the camp, selecting other hostages to be returned home and requesting that the male children who were also held hostage be released to their families. In later time of peace, Rome celebrated her courage by building a statue of her on the Via Sacra. This article is from Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.