Karl-J. Hölkeskamp, Reconstructing the Roman Republic: An Ancient Political Culture and Modern Research (Princeton University Press, 2010), p. 17 online.
The Second Samnite War was a crucial period in the formation of this new elite; see E.T. Salmon, Samnium and the Samnites (Cambridge University Press, 1967), p. 217, and Erich S. Gruen, "Patrocinium and Clientela," in The Hellenistic World and the Coming of Rome (University of California Press, 1984), p. 163 online.
