Appius Claudius Caudex

Roman consul of 264 BCE, brother of the censor Appius Claudius Caecus. Commanded the Roman expeditionary force that crossed the Strait of Messina in 264 BCE, the first time a Roman army had ever deployed outside the Italian peninsula, and the formal beginning of the First Punic War. The cognomen Caudex (a "block of wood") is reported to have been earned for his role in organizing the makeshift fleet that carried the legions across the strait. Lifted the Carthaginian-Syracusan siege of Messana, expelled the Carthaginian garrison, and conducted early operations against both Hiero of Syracuse and the Carthaginian forces in Sicily. Less prominent in subsequent Roman politics than his more famous brother but central to the structural moment when Roman power crossed the strait.