Third Servile War

Third Servile War, (73–71 bce) slave rebellion against Rome led by the gladiator Spartacus.

Spartacus was a Thracian who had served in the Roman army but seems to have deserted. He was captured and subsequently sold as a slave. Destined for the arena, in 73 bce he, with a band of his fellow gladiators, broke out of a training school at Capua and took refuge on Mt. Vesuvius. Here he maintained himself as a captain of brigands, and he recruited as his lieutenants two Celts named Crixus and Oenomaus, who like himself had been gladiators. Other escaped slaves soon joined the band, and the Romans moved to eliminate the growing threat.

A hastily collected force of 3,000 men under either Claudius Pulcher or Claudius Glaber (sources vary) endeavoured to starve out the rebels. In an audacious move, Spartacus’s forces clambered down the precipices and put the Romans to flight. Groups of hardy and desperate men now joined the rebels, and when the praetor Publius Varinius took the field against them he found them entrenched like a regular army on the plain. Before the Romans could act, the rebels slipped away, and when Varinius advanced to storm their lines he found them deserted. From Campania the rebels marched into Lucania, a region that had opposed Rome in several significant conflicts, most recently the Social War (90–88 bce). The country there was also better suited for the kind of guerrilla warfare tactics that favoured Spartacus and his band. Varinius followed, but was defeated in several engagements and narrowly escaped being taken prisoner. The insurgents reoccupied Campania, and with the defeat of Gaius Thoranius, the quaestor of Varinius, they obtained possession of nearly the whole of southern Italy. The cities of Nola and Nuceria in Campania were sacked, as were Thurii and Metapontum in Lucania. The Senate at last despatched both consuls against the rebels (72 bce). The historian Appian suggests that at this point, Spartacus’s army numbered some 70,000 men.

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A force of escaped German slaves under Crixus was soundly beaten at Mt. Garganus in Apulia by the praetor Quintus Arrius, but this defeat did little to check the revolt. According to Plutarch, Spartacus, with the main body of his army, defeated the consul Lentulus and then pressed towards the Alps. A force of some 10,000 men under Gaius Cassius, governor of Cisalpine Gaul, and the praetor Gnaeus Manlius was defeated at Mutina. Freedom was within sight, and Plutarch characterized Spartacus as holding realistic views about his army’s chances of defeating a fully mobilized Rome. Rather than crossing the Alps and returning home, however, Spartacus marched towards Rome itself. Instead of attacking the capital, he passed on again into Lucania.

The conduct of the war was now entrusted to the praetor Marcus Licinius Crassus. Upon taking command, Crassus is said to have carried out a decimation of the consular armies that had taken the field against Spartacus in an attempt to restore order; one in ten of the men were selected by lot and killed. Spartacus defeated two legions under Crassus’s legate Mummius and withdrew towards the strait of Messina. There he intended to cross to Sicily, where the first two Servile Wars (135–132 bce and 104–99 bce) had been fought. Spartacus hoped to reignite these rebellions and to bolster his forces by recruiting freed slaves to his cause. The pirates who had agreed to transport his army proved untrustworthy, however, and Spartacus quickly found himself trapped in Bruttium (modern Calabria). While Spartacus was attempting to carry his rebellion to Sicily, Crassus endeavoured to end the war by effectively besieging the entire “toe” of Italy. In short order, he erected an impressive ditch and rampart fortification system that stretched some 40 miles (60 km) across the neck of the peninsula, Denied both the ability to maneuver his army and ready access to fresh supplies, Spartacus saw that his situation was desperate. Under the cover of darkness and in the middle of a snowstorm, Spartacus’s army bridged the 15-foot- (5-metre-) wide ditch, scaled the wall, and forced the Roman lines. Once more southern Italy lay open to Spartacus, but disunion had gripped the rebel army. A force of Gauls and Germans, who had withdrawn from the main body and encamped some distance away, were attacked and destroyed by Crassus.

Crassus was now compelled to bring the war to a close on his terms and on an accelerated timeline. He had prevailed upon the Senate to reinforce his campaign by recalling Lucius Licinius Lucullus from Thrace and Pompey from Spain, but quickly realized the danger of such a move. Pompey was already a formidable force in the capital, and he had just completed the Roman reconquest of Spain by crushing a rebellion under Quintus Sertorius. By affording Pompey the opportunity to return to Italy with an army at his back, all the glory for defeating Spartacus would almost certainly accrue to him and not to Crassus. In Appian’s account, Spartacus acknowledged this rivalry in the Roman command and attempted to make a separate peace with Crassus, but his terms were rejected.

Spartacus took up a strong position in the mountainous country of Petelia (near Strongoli in modern Calabria) and inflicted a severe defeat on the vanguard of the pursuing Romans. His men, their confidence bolstered by this small victory, refused to retreat farther. Anticipating the decisive battle to come, Spartacus is said to have slain his horse, stating that if his army carried the day, he would have his choice from among the fine horses of the Romans, and if he lost, he would no longer have need of a mount. In the pitched battle which followed, the rebel army was annihilated and Spartacus was killed in combat. A small body of rebels escaped from the field, but they were met and cut to pieces at the foot of the Alps by Pompey. The remnants of the rebel army were captured, and thousands were crucified along the Appian Way as a warning to those who would rise against Rome. As Crassus had feared, Pompey claimed the credit of finishing the war, and received the honour of a triumph, while only a simple ovation was decreed to Crassus. Both men were jointly elected consuls in recognition of their victory.

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Spartacus was a capable and energetic leader, and he did his best to check the excesses of the men he commanded. He is also said to have treated his prisoners with humanity. His character was often misrepresented by contemporary Roman writers, who invoked his name as a source of terror through the age of the Empire.