The Romans had many virtues, and conspicuous amongst these was the
virtue of impartiality. They treated everybody with equal inhumanity.
They were as pitiless towards the humble as towards the proud. The
quality of mercy was utterly unknown to them. Their motto,
"Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos,"
Powell Buxton has happily translated, "They murdered all who
resisted them, and enslaved the rest."
But it was as slaveholders that the Romans most clearly exhibited
their impartiality. They were above those miserable subterfuges that
are so common with Americans. They made slaves of all, of the high
as well as the low,--of Thracians as well as Sardinians, of Greeks
and Syrians as readily as of Scythians and Cappadocians.
The consequence of the modes by which the Romans obtained their
bondmen,--by war, by purchase, and by kidnapping,--affecting as they
did the most cultivated and the bravest races, necessarily made
slavery a very dangerous institution. Greeks and Gauls, Thracians
and Syrians, Germans and Spaniards were not likely to submit their
necks readily to the yoke. They rose several times in great masses,
and contended for years on equal terms with the legions. Some of
their number exhibited the talents of statesmen and soldiers, at the
head of armies more numerous than both those which fought at Cannae.
One of them showed himself to be a born soldier, and caused the
greatest terror to be felt at Rome that had been known there since
that day on which Hannibal rode up to the Colline Gate, and cast his
javelin defiantly into that city which he himself never could enter.
The treatment of their slaves by the Romans was not unlike that
which slaves now experience. Some masters were kind, and there are
many facts which show that the relations between master and slave
were occasionally of the most amiable nature. But these were
exceptional cases, the general rule being cruelty, as it must be
where so much power is lodged in the hands of one class of men, and
the other has only a nominal protection from the law. Even where
cruelty takes no other form than that involved in hard labor, the
slave must experience intolerable oppression. Now the Romans were
the most avaricious people that ever lived. They had a hearty love
of money for money's sake. They would do anything for gold. Such men
were not likely to let their slaves grow fat from light tasks and
abundant food; their food was light, and their tasks were heavy. So
ill-fed were they that they were compelled to rob on the highway,
and were encouraged to do so by their owners. Indeed, much of the
private economy of the Romans was founded on cruelty to their slaves.
Some, who have come down to us as model men, were infamous for their
maltreatment of their bondmen. The life of any foreigner was of but
little account with any Roman, but enslaved foreigners were regarded
as on a level with brutes. Many anecdotes are related of the
ferocious disregard of all humanity which the world's masters
manifested towards the servile classes. There is a story told by
Cicero, in one of the Verrine Orations, which peculiarly illustrates
this feature of the Roman character. The praetorian edicts forbade
slaves to carry arms. There were no exceptions. A boar of great size
was once given to Lucius Domitius, who was a Sicilian Praetor. Its
size caused him to ask by whom it was slain; and on being informed
that the hunter was a shepherd and slave, he sent for him. The slave,
not doubting that he should be rewarded for his bravery, hastened to
present himself before the Praetor, who asked him what he killed the
animal with. "With a spear," was the answer; whereupon the Praetor
ordered that he should be immediately crucified. This was but one of
thousands of similar acts that were perpetrated by Romans through
many generations.
The slaves, as we have remarked, occasionally revolted, and the
efforts that were found necessary to subdue them rose sometimes to
the dignity of wars. The first Servile War of the Romans occurred in
Sicily. There were various reasons why this fine island should
become the scene of servile wars sooner than other portions of the
Roman dominions. Upon the final expulsion of the Carthaginians,
about the middle of the second Punic War, great changes of property
ensued. Speculators from Italy rushed into the island, "who," says
Arnold, "in the general distress of the Sicilians, bought up large
tracts of land at a low price, or became the occupiers of estates
which had belonged to Sicilians of the Carthaginian party, and had
been forfeited to Rome after the execution or flight of their owners.
The Sicilians of the Roman party followed the example, and became
rich out of the distress of their countrymen. Slaves were to be had
cheap; and corn was likely to find a sure market whilst Italy was
suffering from the ravages of war. Accordingly, Sicily was crowded
with slaves, employed to grow corn for the great landed proprietors,
whether Sicilian or Italian, and so ill-fed by their masters that
they soon began to provide for themselves by robbery. The poorer
Sicilians were the sufferers from this evil; and as the masters were
well content that their slaves should be maintained at the expense of
others, they were at no pains to restrain their outrages. Thus,
although nominally at peace, though full of wealthy proprietors, and
though exporting corn largely every year, yet Sicily was teeming with
evils, which, seventy or eighty years after, broke out in the
horrible atrocities of the Servile War." [2]
[Footnote 2: Arnold, _History of Rome_, Vol. III. pp. 317-318,
London edition.]
The Sicilian Servile War began B.C. 133, only a few years after the
destruction of Carthage and Corinth, and when the military power of
the republic was probably at its height, though military discipline
may have been somewhat relaxed from the old standard. It lasted two
or three years. The chief of the slaves had at one time two hundred
thousand followers, inclusive, probably, of women and children. He
was a Syrian of Apamea, named Eunus, and had been a prophet and
conjurer among the slaves. To his prophecies and tricks he owed his
elevation when the rebellion broke out. According to some accounts,
he was rather a cunning than an able man; but it should be
recollected that his enemies only have drawn his portrait. The
victories he so often won over the Roman forces are placed to the
credit of his lieutenant, a Cilician of the name of Cleon; but he
must have been a man of considerable ability to have maintained his
position so long, and to have commanded the services of those said
to have been his superiors. Cleon's superiority was probably only
that of the soldier. He fell in battle, and Eunus was made prisoner,
but died before he could be brought to punishment,--no doubt, to the
vast regret of his savage captors.
In the year B.C. 103, another Servile War broke out in Sicily, and
was not brought to an end until after four years of hard fighting.
The leaders were Salvius, or Tryphon, an Italian, and Athenion, a
Cilician, or Greek. Both showed considerable talent, but owed their
leadership, Salvius to his knowledge of divination, and Athenion to
his pretensions to astrology. They were often successful, and it was
not until a Consul had taken the field against them that the slaves
were subdued, the chiefs having successively fallen, and no one
arising to make their place good.
The next great Servile War was on a grander scale, though briefer,
than either of the Sicilian contests. Its scene was Italy, and it
was conducted, on the part of the rebels, by the profoundest military
genius ever encountered by the Romans, with the exception, perhaps,
of Hannibal. We speak of SPARTACUS, who defeated many Roman armies,
and disputed with the all-conquering republic the dominion of the
Italian Peninsula, and with it that of the civilized world. This war
took place B.C. 73-71, while Rome was engaged in hostilities with
Sertorius and Mithridates; and it was brought to an end only by the
exertions of the ablest generals the republic then had,--the great
Pompeius having been summoned from Spain, and it being in
contemplation to order home Lucullus from the East. In the war with
Hannibal the Romans showed their fearlessness by sending troops to
Spain while the Carthaginian with his army was lying under their
walls; but they called troops and generals from Spain to their
assistance against the Thracian gladiator. He must have been a man
of extraordinary powers to have accomplished so much with the means
at his disposal. It has been regarded as a proof of the astonishing
powers of Hannibal as a commander, that he could keep together, and
in effective condition, an army composed of the outcasts, as it were,
of many nations, and win with it great victories, scattered over a
long period of time; yet this was less than was done by Spartacus.
The Carthaginian, like Alexander, succeeded to an army formed by his
father, next after himself the ablest man of the age. The Thracian,
without country or home, and an outlaw from the beginning of his
enterprise, had to create an army, and that out of the most
heterogeneous and apparently the most unpromising materials. The
palm must be aligned to the latter.
To what race did Spartacus belong? We are told that he was a
Thracian, his family being shepherds. The Thracians were a brave
people, but by no means remarkable for the highest intellectual
superiority; yet Spartacus was eminently a man of mind, with large
views, and an original genius for organization and war. Plutarch
pays him the highest compliment in his power, by admitting that he
deserved to be regarded as belonging to the Hellenic race. He was,
says the old Lifemaker, "a man not only of great courage and strength,
but, in judgment and mildness of character, superior to his condition,
and more like a Greek than one would expect from his nation."
It is not impossible that he had Greek blood in his veins. Thrace
was hard by Greece, had many Greek cities, and its full proportion
of those Greek adventurers, military and civil, who were to be found
in every country and city, from Spain to Persia, from Gades to
Ecbatana. What more probable than that among his ancestors were
Greeks? At the same time it must be admitted that the Thracians
themselves were capable of producing eminent men, being a superior
physical race, and prevented only by the force of circumstances from
attaining to a respectable position. They were renowned for
soldierlike qualities, which caused the Romans to give them the
preference as gladiators,--a dubious honor, to say the best of it.
How, and under what circumstances, Spartacus became a gladiator, is
a point by no means clear. We cannot trust the Roman accounts, as it
was a meritorious thing, in the opinion of a Roman, for a man to lie
for his country, as well as to die for it. Florus states, that he was
first a Thracian mercenary, then a Roman soldier, then a deserter
and robber, and then, because of his strength, a gladiator from
choice. But, to say nothing of the national prejudices of Florus, he
writes like a man who felt it to be a particular grievance that
Romans should have been compelled to fight slaves, and particularly
gladiators. This is in striking contrast with Plutarch, who was a
contemporary of Florus, but whose patriotic pride was not wounded by
the victories which the Thracian gladiator won over Roman generals.
Indeed, as he was willing to admit that Spartacus ought to have been
a Greek, we may suppose that he was pleased to read of his victories,--
a not unnatural thing in a provincial, and particularly in a Greek,
who knew so well what his country had once been. Plutarch says not a
word about the Thracian having been a soldier and a thief, but
introduces him with one of his good stories. "They say," he tells us,
"that when Spartacus was first taken to Rome to be sold, a snake was
seen folded over his face while he was sleeping, and a woman, of the
same tribe with Spartacus, who was skilled in divination, and
possessed by the mysterious rites of Dionysus, declared that this
was a sign of a great and formidable power, which would attend him
to a happy termination." She was the Thracian's wife, or mistress,
being connected with him by some tender tie, and was with him when
he subsequently escaped from Capua. In the bloody drama of the War
of Spartacus hers is the sole relieving figure, and we would fain
know more of her, for it could have been no ordinary woman who was
loved by such a man.
The passion of the Romans for gladiatorial combats is well known.
Not a few persons followed the calling of gladiator-trainers, and
had whole corps of these doomed men, whom they let to those who
wished to get up such shows. There were several schools of gladiators,
the chief of which were at Ravenna and Capua, where garrisons were
maintained to keep the pupils in subjection. According to one account,
Spartacus, while on a predatory incursion, was made prisoner, and
afterwards sold to Cneius Lentulus Batiatus, a trainer of gladiators,
who sent him to his school at Capua. He was to have fought at Rome.
But he had higher thoughts than of submitting to so degrading a
destiny as the being "butchered to make a Roman holiday." Most of
his companions were Gauls and Thracians, the bravest of men, who
bore confinement with small patience. They conspired to make their
escape,--the chief conspirators being Spartacus and two others, who
were subsequently made his lieutenants,--Crixus, a Gaul, and Oenomaus,
a Greek. Some two hundred persons were in the conspiracy, but only a
portion of them succeeded in breaking the school bounds. Florus says
that not more than thirty got out, while Velleius makes the number
to have been sixty-four, and Plutarch seventy-eight. Having armed
themselves with spits, knives, and cleavers, from a cook's shop,
they hastened out of Capua. Passing along the Appian Way, they fell
in with a number of wagons loaded with gladiators' weapons, which
they seized, and were thus placed in good fighting condition.
Shortly after this they encountered a small body of soldiers, whom
they routed, and whose arms they substituted for the gladiatorial,
deeming these no longer worthy of them.
They were now joined by a few others, fugitives and mountaineers,
with whom they took refuge in the crater of Vesuvius, then, as from
time immemorial, and for nearly a century and a half later, inactive.
Thence, under the leadership of Spartacus and his lieutenants, Crixus
and Oedomaus, they ravaged the country; but it is not probable that
they caused much alarm, their number being only two hundred, and
such collections of slaves being by no means uncommon. The Romans
little dreamed that they were on the eve of one of the most terrible
of their many wars. Claudius Pulcher, one of the Praetors, was sent
against the "robbers," as they were considered to be. He found them
so advantageously posted on the mountain, that, though superior to
them in numbers in the ratio of fifteen to one, he resolved to
blockade them, and so compel them to descend to the plain and fight
at disadvantage, or starve. But he was contending with a man of
genius, against whom even Rome's military system could not then
succeed. He despised his enemy,--a sort of gratification which to
those indulging in it generally costs very dear. Spartacus caused
ropes to be made of vine branches, with the aid of which he and his
followers lowered themselves to the base of the mountain, at a point
which had been left unguarded by the Romans because considered
inaccessible by the red-tapist who commanded them, and consequently
affording a capital outlet for bold men under a daring leader. In
the dead of night the gladiators stole round to the rear of the
Roman camp, and assailed it. Taken by surprise and heavy with sleep,
the Romans were routed like sheep, and their arms and baggage passed
into the hands of the despised enemy.
Spartacus saw now that it was time for him and his comrades to
assume a higher character than had hitherto belonged to them.
Instead of a leader of outlaws, he aspired to be the liberator of
the servile population of Italy. He issued a proclamation, in which,
while calling upon his followers to remember the multitudes who
groaned in chains, he urged the slaves to rise, pointing out how
strong they were and how weak were their oppressors, maintaining
that the strength of the masters lay in the blind and disgraceful
submission of the slaves, at the same time declaring that the land
belonged of right to the bravest,--a sentiment as natural and proper
when uttered by a man in his situation as it is base when proceeding
from a modern buccaneer, who has taken up arms, not to obtain his
own freedom, but to enslave others. The whole address is
contemptuous towards the Romans, though somewhat too rhetorical for
a man in the situation of Spartacus. It is the composition of Sallust,
but we may believe that it expresses the sentiments of Spartacus, as
Sallust was not only his contemporary, but was too good an artist to
disregard keeping in what he wrote.
Italy was at this time full of slaves, many of whom must have been
men of quite as much intelligence as the Romans, having been made
captives in war. The free population of the Peninsula had almost
entirely disappeared. Two generations before, Tiberius Gracchus had
pointed to the miserable condition of Italy, and to the fact that
the increase of the slave population had caused the Italian yeomanry
to become almost extinct. In the years that had passed since his
murder the work of extinction had gone on at an accelerated rate,
the Social War and the Wars of Sulla and Marius having aided slavery
to do its perfect work. In this way had perished that splendid rural
population from which the Roman legionary infantry had been
conscribed, and which had enabled the aristocratical republic to
baffle the valor of Samnium, the skill of Pyrrhus, and the genius of
Hannibal. Even so early as in the first of the Eastern wars of the
Romans, immediately after the second defeat of Carthage, there were
indications that the supply of Roman soldiers was giving out. An
anecdote of the younger Scipio shows what must have been the
character of a large part of the Roman population more than sixty
years before the War of Spartacus. When he declared that Tiberius
Gracchus had rightly been put to death, and an angry shout at the
brutal speech came from the people, he turned to them and exclaimed,
"Peace, ye stepsons of Italy! Remember who it was that brought you
in chains to Rome!"
The country being full of slaves and the children of slaves,
Spartacus had little difficulty in obtaining recruits. Apulia was
particularly fruitful of insurgents. In that country the vices of
Roman slavery were displayed in all their naked hideousness, and the
Apulian shepherds and herdsmen had a reputation for lawlessness
that has never been surpassed. Yet this was the consequence, not the
cause, of their bondage. It is related that some of them having
asked their master for clothing, he exclaimed, "What! are there no
travellers with clothes on?" "The atrocious hint," says Liddell,
"was soon taken; the shepherd slaves of Lower Italy became banditti,
and to travel through Apulia without an armed retinue was a perilous
adventure. From assailing travellers, the marauders began to plunder
the smaller country-houses; and all but the rich were obliged
to desert the country, and flock into the towns. So early as the
year 185 B.C., seven thousand slaves in Apulia were condemned for
brigandage by a Praetor sent specially to restore order in that land
of pasturage. When they were not employed upon the hills, they were
shut up in large, prison-like buildings, (_ergastula_) where they
talked over their wrongs, and formed schemes of vengeance." [3] The
century and more between this date and the appearance of Spartacus
had not improved the condition of the Apulian slaves. He found them
ripe for revolt, and was soon joined by thousands of their number,
men whose modes of life rendered them the very best possible
material for soldiers, provided they could be induced to submit to
the restraints of discipline. They were strong, hardy, athletic, and
active, and full of hatred of their masters. It shows the superiority
of the Thracian that he could prevail upon them to act in a regular
manner. He formed them into an army, the chief officers being the
men who had escaped from Capua in his company. This army had some
discipline, which was the more easily acquired because many of the
men were originally soldiers, captives of the Roman sword. But the
hatred of all in it to the Romans, and their knowledge that they had
to choose between victory and the crudest forms of death known to
the crudest of conquerors, made them the most reliable military
force then to be found in the world.
[Footnote 3: Liddell, _History of Rome_, Vol. II, p. 144]
With such an army, thus composed, thus animated, and thus led,
Spartacus commenced that war to which he has given his name.
Bursting upon Lower Italy, the most horrible atrocities were
perpetrated, the rich landholders being subjected to every species
of indignity and cruelty, in accordance with that law of retaliation
which was accepted and recognized by all the ancient world, and
which the modern has not entirely abrogated. Towns were captured and
destroyed, [4] and the slaves everywhere liberated to swell the
conquering force. Spartacus is said to have sought to moderate the
fury of his followers, and we can believe that he did so without
supposing that he was much above his age in humane sentiment. He saw
that excesses were likely to demoralize his army, and so render it
unfit to meet the legions which it must sooner or later encounter.
[Footnote 4: These ravages seem to have made a great impression on
the Romans, and were by them long remembered. Forty years later
Horace alludes to them, in that Ode which he wrote on the return of
Augustus from Spain (Carm. III. xiv. 19). He calls to his young
slave to fetch him a jar of wine that had seen the Marsiaii War,
"If there could be found one that had escaped the vagabond Spartacus."
The manner in which he, the son of a _libertinus_, speaks of
Spartacus, is not only amusing as an instance of foolish pride, but
is curious as illustrating a change in Roman ideas that was working
out more important results than could have followed from all the
acts of the first two Caesars, though, perhaps it was in some sense
connected with, if not dependent upon, their legislation.]
Much as Spartacus had done, and signal as had been his successes, it
was not yet the opinion at Rome that he was a formidable foe. The
government despatched Publius Varinius Glaber to act against him, at
the head of ten thousand men. This seems a small force, yet it was
not much smaller than the army with which, three or four years later,
Lucullus overthrew the whole military power of the Armenian monarchy;
and it was half as large as that with which Caesar changed the fate
of the world at Pharsalia. The Romans probably thought it strong
enough to subdue all the slaves in Italy, and Varinius sufficiently
skilful to defeat their leaders and send them to Rome in chains. But
they were to have a rough awakening from their dreams of
invincibility, though some early successes of Varinius for a time
apparently justified their confidence.
The army of Spartacus numbered forty thousand men, but it was poorly
armed, and its discipline was very imperfect. It still lacked, to
use a modern term, "the baptism of fire,"--never yet having been
matched in the open field against a regular force. Its arms were
chiefly agricultural implements, and wooden pikes that had been made
by hardening the points of stakes with fire. Spartacus resolved upon
retreating into Lucania; but the Gauls in his army, headed by his
lieutenant Crixus, pronounced this decision cowardly, separated
themselves from the main body, attacked the Romans, and were utterly
routed. The retreat to Lucania was then made in perfect safety, and
even with glory, apart from the skill with which it was conducted.
Watching his opportunity, and showing that he understood the military
principle of cutting up an enemy in detail, Spartacus fell upon a
Roman detachment, two thousand strong, and destroyed it. Shortly
after this, the Roman general succeeded, as he thought, in getting
him into a trap. The servile encampment was upon a piece of ground
hemmed in on one side by mountains, on the other by impassable waters,
and the Romans were about to close up the only outlets with some of
those grand works to which they owed so many of their conquests, when,
one night, Spartacus silently retreated, leaving his camp in such a
state as completely deceived the enemy, who did not discover what had
happened until the next morning, when the gladiators were beyond
their reach.
This masterly retreat was followed up by a brilliant surprise of a
division of the Roman army under the command of Cossinius. The night
was just getting in, and the soldiers were resting from their day's
march and from the labors of forming the encampment, when the
Thracian fell upon them. Thus suddenly attacked, they fled, without
making any show of resistance,--abandoning everything to the
assailants. Cossinius himself, who was bathing, had time only to
escape with his life. The Romans rallied, a battle ensued, and they
were routed, Cossinius being among the slain. This action took place
not far from the Aufidus, which had witnessed the slaughter of Cannae.
Spartacus now considered his army fairly "blooded." It had routed a
Roman detachment, and defeated a small army. Two Roman camps had
fallen into its hands, under circumstances that gave indications of
superior generalship, and several towns had been stormed. Though
still deficient in arms, he resolved to attack Varinius. Sallust
represents him as addressing his army before the battle, and telling
them that they were about to enter, not upon a single action, but
upon a long war,--that from success, then, would follow a series of
victories,--and that therein lay their only salvation from a death
at once excruciating and infamous. They must, he said, live upon
victory after victory,--an expression that showed he had a clear
comprehension of the nature of his situation. In the battle that
followed, Varinius was beaten, unhorsed, and compelled to fly for
his life. All his personal goods fell into the hands of Spartacus.
His lictors, with the _fasces_, shared the same fate. Spartacus
assumed the dress of the Roman, and all the ensigns of authority. He
has been censured for this; but a little reflection ought to convince
every one that he did not act from vanity, but from a profound
appreciation of the state of things in Italy. The slaves, of which
his army was composed, were accustomed to see the emblems of
authority with which he was now clothed and surrounded in the
possession of their masters alone; and when they beheld them on and
about their chief, they were not only reminded of the governing power,
but also of the overthrow of those who had therefore monopolized it.
Spartacus was a statesman; and knew how to operate on the minds of
the rude masses who followed him and obeyed his orders.
The defeat of Varinius left the whole of Lower Lucania at the mercy
of the gladiators. Spartacus now established posts at Metapontum and
at Thurii. Here he labored, with unceasing energy and industry, to
organize and discipline his men. Adopting various measures to
prevent them from becoming enervated through the abundance in which
they were revelling, he prohibited the use of money among them, and
gave all that he himself had to relieve those who had suffered from
the war. Some of his officers are said to have followed his example
in making so great a sacrifice for the common good.
Towards the close of the year Varinius had succeeded in getting
another army on foot. With this he resolved to watch the enemy,--
repeated defeats having made the Romans cautious, though they were
not even yet seriously alarmed. He formed and fortified a camp,
whence he kept a look-out. There was some skirmishing, but no
fighting on a large scale. This did not suit Spartacus, who had
become confident in himself and his men. He desired battle, but
wished the Romans should take the initiative, and was convinced that
the near approach of winter would compel them soon to fight or to
retreat. To encourage them, he feigned fear, and commenced a
retrograde movement; but no sooner had the elated Romans advanced in
pursuit than he turned upon them, and they were compelled to fight
under circumstances that made defeat certain. This second rout of
Varinius was total, and we hear no more of him.
Never had there been a more successful campaign than that which
Spartacus had just closed. His force had been increased from less
than one hundred men to nearly one hundred thousand. He had proved
himself more than the equal of the generals who had been sent
against him, both in strategy and in arms. He had fought three great
battles, and numerous lesser actions, and had been uniformly
successful. Like Carnot, he had "organized victory." A large part of
Italy was at his command, and, under any other circumstances than
those which existed, or against any other foe than Rome, he would
probably have found little difficulty in establishing a powerful
state, the origin of which would have been far more respectable than
of that with which he was contending. But he was a statesman, and
knew, that, brilliant as were his successes, he had no chance of
accomplishing anything permanent within the Peninsula. He was
fighting, too, for freedom, not for dominion. His plan was to get
out of Italy. Two courses were open to him. He might retreat to the
extremity of the Peninsula, cross the strait that separates it from
Sicily, and renew the servile wars of that island; or he might march
north, force his way out of Italy, and so with most of his followers
reach their homes in Gaul and Thrace. The latter course was
determined upon; but the more hot-headed portion of his men, the
Gauls, were opposed to it, and resolved to march upon Rome. A
division of the victorious army ensued. The larger number, under
Spartacus, proceeded to carry out the wise plan of their leader, but
the minority refused to obey him. We have seen, that, at the very
outset of his enterprise, Spartacus encountered opposition from the
Gauls in his army, who were ever for rash measures, and that,
separating themselves from their associates, under the lead of Crixus,
they had been defeated. Crixus rejoined his old chieftain, and did
good service; but he and his countrymen, untaught by experience, and
inflated with a notion of invincibility,--on what founded, it would
be hard to say,--would not aid Spartacus in his prudent attempt to
lead his followers out of Italy. Rome was their object, and, to the
number of thirty thousand, they separated themselves from the main
army. At first, the event seemed to justify their decision. Meeting
a Roman army, commanded by the Prætor Arrius, on the borders of
Samnium, the Gauls put it to rout, and the victory of Crixus was not
less decisive than any of those which had been won by Spartacus. But
this splendid dawn was soon overcast. Crixus was a drunkard, and,
while sleeping off one of his fits of intoxication, he was set upon
by a Roman army under the Consul Gellius. He was killed, and his
followers either shared his fate or were totally dispersed. This was
the first great victory won by the Romans in the war.
The defeat of Varinius aroused the Roman government to see that their
enemy was not to be despised, and, revolted slave though he was,
they were compelled to pay him the respect of making prodigious
efforts to effect his destruction. The Consuls Gellius and Lentulus
were charged with the conduct of the war. The former overthrew the
Gauls. The latter followed Spartacus, and came up with him in Etruria.
Here a contest of pure generalship took place. Lentulus was
determined not to fight until Gellius--whose victory he knew of--
should have come up; and Spartacus was equally determined that fight
he should before the junction could be effected. He succeeded in
blocking up the road by which Gellius was advancing, unknown to
Lentulus, and then offered the latter battle. Supposing that his
colleague would join him in the course of the action, the Roman
accepted the challenge and was beaten. The victors then marched to
meet Gellius, who was served after the same manner as Lentulus.
Spartacus was the only general who ever defeated two great Roman
armies, each headed by a Consul, on the same day, and in different
battles. Hannibal's Austerlitz, Cannae, approaches nearest to this
exploit of the Thracian; but on that field the two consular armies
were united under the command of Varro.
These great successes were soon followed by the defeat of two lesser
Roman armies, combined under the lead of the Praetor Manlius and the
Proconsul Cassius. This last victory not only left the whole open
country at the command of Spartacus, but also the road to Rome, upon
which city he now resolved to march. It would have been wiser, had
he persevered in his original plan, the execution of which his
victories must have made it easy to carry out. But perhaps success
had its usual effect, even on his mind, and blinded him to the
impossibility of permanent triumph in Italy. He winnowed his army,
dismissing all his soldiers except such as were distinguished by
their bravery, their strength, and their intelligence. In order that
his march might be swift, he caused all the superfluous baggage to be
destroyed. Every beast of burden that could be dispensed with was
slain. His prisoners were disposed of after the same fashion. In a
modern general such an act would be utterly without excuse. But it
was strictly in accordance with the laws of ancient warfare, and
Spartacus probably felt far more regret at sacrificing his beasts of
burden than he experienced in consenting to, if he did not order,
the butchery of some thousands of men whom he must have looked upon
as so many brutes.
Proceeding to the south, Spartacus fell in with a great Roman army
led by Arrius, and a battle was fought near Ancona, in which victory
was true to the gladiator. The Romans were not only beaten, their
army was utterly destroyed; a result which they seem to have felt to
be so shameful, that they made no apologies for it. Why, after this
signal victory, Spartacus did not forthwith carry out his grand
design of attacking Rome,--a design every way so worthy of his
genius, and which alone could give him a chance of achieving
permanent success after he had abandoned the idea of forcing his way
out of Italy by a northern march,--can never be known. It is
supposed to have been in consequence of information that
circumstances had now placed it in his power to effect a passage
into Sicily, a project which he had regarded with favor at an
earlier period.
At this time the Cilician pirates had the command of the
Mediterranean, which they held until they were conquered, some years
later, by Pompeius. It was by the aid of these men that Spartacus
expected to carry his army into Sicily. They had shipping in
abundance, and in a few days they could have conveyed a hundred
thousand men across the narrow strait that separates Sicily from
Italy. This they agreed to do, and were paid in advance by Spartacus,
though it is probable that he relied less upon that payment for
their assistance than upon the palpable fact that their interests
were the same as his own. The pirates were on the sea what the
gladiatorial army was on land. They were the victims of Roman
oppression, and had become outlaws because the world's law was
against them. A union of their fleets, which numbered more than a
thousand vessels, with the army of Spartacus, in the harbors and on
the fields of Sicily, would perhaps have been more than a match for
the whole power of Rome, contending as the republic then was with
Mithridates, and bleeding still from the wounds inflicted by Marius
and Sulla, as well as from the blows of Spartacus. Sicily, too, was
then in a state which promised well for the design of the Thracian.
Verres was ruling over the island,--and how he ruled it Cicero has
told us. Had the victorious Thracian entered the island, both the
free population and the slaves would have risen against the Romans.
A new state might have been formed, strong both in fleets and in
armies, and compelled from the very nature of its origin to contend
to the death with its old oppressors. Whatever the result, it is
certain that a long Sicilian war, like that which the Romans had
been compelled to wage with the Carthaginians, would have changed
the course of history, by directing the attention and the energies
of such men as Crassus, Pompeius, and Caesar to very different fields
from those on which their fame and power were won.
But it was not to be. There was work for Rome to do, which could be
done by no other nation. The power that had been found superior to
Hannibal was not to fall before Spartacus, or even to have its
course stayed materially by his victories. He marched to the foot of
Italy, on the shore of the strait, where he expected to find his
supposed naval allies. He was disappointed. They, impolitic no less
than faithless, broke their engagement after they had pocketed the
sum agreed upon for their services. It was impossible for Spartacus
to carry out his design; for not only had he no vessels, but his
followers were, it is altogether probable, incapable of building them.
The Romans, too, must have had ships in the strait, and a very few
would have been found enough to keep it clear of the unskilful
gladiators, even had the latter had the time and the means to
construct boats.
After the defeat of the Romans under Arrius, the Senate had called
Crassus to the chief command, resolving to make an herculean effort
to destroy their terrible enemy. The accounts are somewhat confused,
but, according to Plutarch, Crassus commenced operations against
Spartacus before the latter marched for Sicily. He sent one of his
lieutenants, Mummius, to follow and harass the gladiators, but with
orders to avoid a general engagement. The lieutenant disobeyed his
orders, fought a battle, and was defeated. Not a few of his men threw
away their arms, and fled,--an uncommon thing with a Roman army. The
victors continued their march, but, as we have seen, failed in their
main object. Spartacus then took up a position in the territory of
Rhegium, which is over against Sicily. He must have been convinced
by this time that the crisis of his fortune had arrived, and though
he would not even then entirely give up all idea of crossing over
into the island that lay within sight of his camp, he prepared to
meet the coming storm, which had been for some time gathering in his
rear. Accordingly he faced about, and commenced a game of
generalship with Crassus, who was now in person at the head of the
Roman army. [5]
[Footnote 5: It is probable that justice has never been done to
Crassus as a military man. Roman writers were not likely to deal
fairly with a man who closed his career so fatally to himself, and
so disgracefully in every way to his country. It was his misfortune--
a misfortune of his own creating--to lead the finest Roman army that
had ever been seen in the East to destruction, in an unjust attack on
the Parthians. Had he succeeded, the injustice of his course would
have been overlooked by his countrymen; but they never could forgive
his defeat. Yet it is certain that this man, who has come down to us
as a contemptible creature, having small claim to consideration
beyond what he derived from his enormous possessions, not only
exhibited eminent military ability in the War of Spartacus, but,
when a young man, won that great battle which takes its name from
the Colline Gate, and which laid the Roman world at the feet of Sulla.
Pontius Telesious had marched upon Rome, with the intention of
"destroying the den of the wolves of Italy," and Sulla arrived to
the city's rescue but just in time. In the battle that immediately
followed, Sulla, at the head of the left wing of his army, was
completely defeated, while the right wing, commanded by Crassus, was
as completely victorious. Talent must have had something to do with
Crassus's success, which enabled Sulla to retrieve his fortunes, and
to triumph over the Marius party. One hundred thousand men are said
to have fallen in this battle. The avarice of Crassus and his want
of popular manners were fatal to him in life, and his defeat left
him no friends in death.]
Of all men then living, Crassus was best entitled to command an army
employed in fighting revolted slaves. If not the greatest
slaveholder in Rome, he was the most systematic of the class of
owners, and knew best how to turn the industry of slaves to account.
He was the wealthiest citizen of the republic. One can understand
how indignant such a person must have felt at the audacity of the
gladiator and his followers. As a slaveholder, as a man of property,
as a lover of law and order, he was concerned at so very disorderly
a spectacle as that of slaves subverting all the laws of the republic;
as a Roman, he felt that abhorrence for slaves which was common to
the character. Here were motives enough to bring out the powers of
any man, if powers he had in him; and it does not follow that
because Crassus was very rich he was therefore a fool. He was a man
of consummate talents, and at this particular time was probably the
most influential citizen of Rome. The Romans had confidence in him,
as the embodiment of the spirit of supremacy by which they were so
completely animated. The event showed that their confidence was not
misplaced.
The army of Crassus was two hundred thousand strong, and having
restored its discipline by examples of great severity, he marched to
meet Spartacus; but on arriving in front of the latter's position,
he would not attack it, while Spartacus showed an equal
unwillingness to fight. The Roman determined to blockade the enemy.
As they had the sea on one side, and that was held by a fleet, he
commenced a line of works, the completion of which would have
rendered it impossible for the gladiators to escape. These works
were on the usual Roman scale, and consisted principally of walls and
ditches, a hundred thousand men being employed in their construction.
So cleverly did Crassus conceal what he was about, that it was not
until he had almost accomplished his design that Spartacus
discovered the intention of his foe. The emergency was suited to his
genius, and he was not unequal to it. He began a series of attacks
on the Romans, harassing them perpetually, retarding their labors,
and drawing their attention from that point of their line by which he
purposed to extricate his army. At last, on a night when a terrible
snow-storm was raging, he led his men to a place where the Roman
works were yet incomplete, the snow enabling them to march
noiselessly. When they reached the line, the immense ditches seemed
to bar their further advance; but they set resolutely at work to
fill them. Earth, snow, fagots, and dead bodies of men and beasts
were hastily thrown into them; and across this singular bridge the
whole army poured into the country, leaving the Roman camp behind,
and having rendered nugatory all the laborious digging and
trenching of the legions.
It was not until the next morning that Crassus discovered what had
been done, and how thoroughly he had been out-generalled by Spartacus.
But he had no room for vexation in his mind. He was so frightened as
a Roman citizen, that he could not feel mortified as a Roman soldier.
He took counsel of his fears, and did that which he had cause both
to be ashamed of and to regret in after days. He wrote to the Senate,
stating that in his opinion not only should Pompeius be summoned home
from Spain, but Lucullus also from the East, to aid in putting down
an enemy who was unconquerable by ordinary means. A short time
sufficed to show how indiscreetly for his own fame he had acted; for
Spartacus was unable to follow up his success, in consequence of
mutinies in his army. The Gauls again rebelled against his authority,
and left him. Crassus concentrated his whole force in an attack on
the seceders, and a battle followed which Plutarch says was the most
severely contested of the war. The Romans remained masters of the
field, more than twelve thousand of the Gauls being slain, of whom
only two were wounded in the back, the rest falling in the ranks.
Spartacus retreated to the mountains of Petelia, closely followed by
Roman detachments. Turning upon them, he drove them back; but this
last gleam of success led to his destruction. His policy was to
avoid a battle, but his men would not listen to his prudent counsels,
and compelled him to face about and march against Crassus. This was
what the Roman desired; for Pompeius was bringing up an army from
Spain, and would be sure to reap all the honors of the war, were it
to be prolonged.
Some accounts represent Spartacus as anxious for battle. Whether he
was so or not, he made every preparation that became a good general.
The armies met on the Silarus, in the northern part of Lucania; and
the battle which followed, and which was to finish this remarkable
war, was fought not far from where the traveller now sees the noble
ruins of Paestum. Spartacus made his last speech to his soldiers,
warning them of what they would have to expect, if they should fall
alive into the hands of their old masters. By way of practical
commentary on his text, he caused a cross to be erected on a height,
and to that cross was nailed a living Roman, whose agonies were
visible to the whole army. Spartacus then ordered his horse to be
brought to him in front of the army, and slew the animal with his own
hands. "I am determined," he said to his men, "to share all your
dangers. Our positions shall be the same. If we are victorious, I
shall get horses enough from the foe. If we are beaten, I shall need
a horse no more." [6]
[Footnote 6: When the Earl of Warwick, the King-maker, killed his
horse in front of the Yorkist army, at the battle of Towton,
(fought on Palm Sunday, 1461,) he little knew that he was imitating
the action of a general of revolted slaves, more than fifteen
centuries earlier. Warwick is said to have done the same thing at
the battle of Barnet, the last of his fields, where he was defeated
and slain, fighting for the House of Lancaster.]
The battle that followed was the most severely contested action of
that warlike period, which, extending through two generations, saw
the victories of Marius over the Northern barbarians at its
commencement, and Pharsalia and Munda and Philippi at its close. The
insurgents attacked with great fury, but with method, Spartacus
leading the way at the head of a band of select followers, thus
acting the part of a soldier as well as of a general. The Romans
steadily resisted,--and the slaughter was great on both sides. At
last, victory began to incline towards the gladiators, when
Spartacus fell, and the fortune of the day was changed. He had made a
fierce charge on the Romans, with the intention of cutting his way
to Crassus. Two centurions had fallen by his sword, and a number of
inferior men, when he was himself wounded in one of his thighs.
Falling upon one knee, he still continued to fight, until he was
overpowered and slain. The battle was maintained for some time longer,
and ended only with the destruction of the insurgents, thirty
thousand of whom were killed;--Livy puts their killed at forty
thousand. The Roman slain numbered twenty thousand, and they had as
many more wounded. Only six thousand prisoners fell into the hands
of Crassus, who caused the whole of them to be crucified,--the
crosses being placed at intervals on both sides of the Appian Way,
between Capua and Rome, and the whole Roman army being marched
through the horrible lines. A body of five thousand fugitives, who
sought refuge in the north, were intercepted by Pompeius on his
homeward march from Spain, and slaughtered to a man.
Thus fell Spartacus, and far more nobly than either of the great
republican chiefs whose deaths were so soon to follow. Pompeius, who
boasted that he had cut up the war by the roots, ran away from
Pharsalia, without an effort to retrieve his fortunes, though the
force opposed to him in the battle was only half as large as his own,
and he had still abundant resources for future operations. Crassus,
who claimed to have conquered Spartacus, and who not unreasonably
resented the pretensions of Pompeius, fell miserably in Parthia,
after having led the Romans to the most fatal of their fields except
Cannae. Wanting the nerve to die sword in hand in the midst of his
foes, like Spartacus, he consented to adorn the triumph of those foes,
and perished as ignominiously as the great gladiator gloriously.
* * * * *