Makers of Ancient Strategy: From the Persian Wars to the Fall of Rome (42 page)

bridge University Press, 1996); F. H. Thompson,
The Archaeology of Greek and Roman Slav-

ery
(London: Duckworth, 2003); Thomas Grünewald,
Bandits in the Roman Empire: Myth

202 Strauss

and Reality
, trans. John Drinkwater
(London: Routledge, 2004); Nial McKeown,
The In-

vention of Ancient Slavery?
(London: Duckworth, 2007); and the col ection of documents

edited by Thomas Wiedemann,
Greek and Roman Slavery
(London: Routledge, 1981).

Studies of individual subjects include Karl-WilhemWelwei,
Unfreie in antiken Kriegs-

dienst
, 3 vols. (Wiesbaden, Germany: Steiner, 1974–88); Peter Hunt,
Slaves, Warfare, and

Ideology in the Greek Historians
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998); Paul

Cartledge,
The Spartans: The World of the Warrior-Heroes of Ancient Greece, from Utopia to

Crisis to Collapse
(Woodstock, NY: Overlook Press, 2003), and his more detailed
Sparta

and Lakonia: A Regional History 1300–362 bc
, 2nd ed. (London: Routledge, 2002); Nino

Luraghi and Susan E. Alcock, eds.,
Helots and Their Masters in Laconia and Messenia:

Histories, Ideologies, Structures
(Washington, DC: Center for Hellenic Studies and the

Trustees for Harvard University, 2003); Nino Luraghi,
The Ancient Messenians: Construc-

tions of Ethnicity and Memory
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008); Alexan-

der Fuks, “Slave Wars and Slave Troubles in Chios in the Third Century BC,”
Athenaeum

46 (1968): 102–11; Kyung-Hyun Kim, “On the Nature of Aristonicus’s Movement,” in

Forms of Control and Subordination in Antiquity
, ed. Toru Yogi and Masaoki Doi, 159–63

(Leiden: Brill, 1986); Jean Christian Dumont,
Servus: Rome et l’esclavage sous la république,

Collection de l’École Française de Rome 103 (Rome: École Française de Rome, Palais

Farnèse, 1987); J. A. North, “Religious Toleration in Republican Rome,”
Proceedings of

the Cambridge Philological Society
25 (1979): 85–103; P. Green, “The First Sicilian Slave War,”
Past and Present
20
(1961): 10–29, with objections by W.G.G. Forrest and T.C.W.

Stinton, “The First Sicilian Slave War,”
Past and Present
22 (1962): 87–93; G. P. Verbrug-

ghe, “Sicily 210–70 B.C.: Livy, Cicero and Diodorus,”
Transactions and Proceedings of the

American Philological Association
103 (1972): 535–59, and idem, “Slave Rebellion or Sicily in

Revolt?”
Kokalos
20 (1974): 46–60; N. A. Mashkin, “Eschatology and Messianism in the

Final Period of the Roman Republic,”
Philosophy and Phenomenological Research
10, no. 2

(1949): 206–28; P. Masiello, “L’ideologica messianica e le Rivolte Servili,”
Annali della

Facolta di lettere e filosofia
11 (1966): 179–96; and Barry Strauss,
The Spartacus War
(New York: Simon & Schuster; London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2009).

notes

1 For these terms, see Yvon Garlan,
Slavery in Ancient Greece
, rev. ed., trans. Janet

Lloyd (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988), 24, 87.

2 On this subject, see Karl-WilhemWelwei,
Unfreie in antiken Kriegsdienst
, 3 vols.

(Wies baden, Germany: Steiner, 1974–1988); Garlan,
Slavery in Ancient Greece
, 163–76; and

Peter Hunt,
Slaves, Warfare, and Ideology in the Greek Historians
(Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 1998).

3 Aristotle
Politics
1269a36–b6.

4 For an introduction, see Paul Cartledge,
The Spartans: The World of the Warrior-

Heroes of Ancient Greece, from Utopia to Crisis to Collapse
(Woodstock, NY: Overlook

Press, 2003), and his more detailed
Sparta and Lakonia: A Regional History 1300–362 bc
, 2nd

ed. (London: Routledge, 2001); Nino Luraghi and Susan E. Alcock, eds.,
Helots and Their

Masters in Laconia and Messenia: Histories, Ideologies, Structures
(Washington, DC: Cen-

ter for Hellenic Studies and the Trustees for Harvard University, 2003); Nino Luraghi,

Slave Wars of Greece and Rome 203

The Ancient Messenians: Constructions of Ethnicity and Memory
(Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 2008).

5 Thucydides 7.27.5.

6 Thucydides
Hellenica Oxyrhynchia
17.4.

7 For an overview of the era of slave wars between 140 and 70 BC, see Brent D.

Shaw,
Spartacus and the Slave Wars
(Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2001), 2–14; for a more

detailed account, see K. R. Bradley,
Slavery and Rebellion in the Roman World, 140–70 b.c.

(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989).

8 Appian
Civil Wars
1.9.36.

9 See J. Vogt,
Ancient Slavery and the Ideal of Man
, trans. T. Wiedemann (Oxford:

Blackwell, 1975), 40; Bradley,
Slavery and Rebellion
, 1–15; Peter Garnsey,
Ideas of Slavery

from Aristotle to Augustine
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 75–86.

10 Constantine, Porphyrogenitus, Excerpt 4, p. 384 (Diodorus Siculus 34.2.38).

11 Appian
Civil Wars
1.116.539.

12 Strabo 14.1.138, 34–35.2.26. See Kyung-Hyun Kim, “On the Nature of Aristoni-

cus’s Movement,” in
Forms of Control and Subordination in Antiquity
, ed. Toru Yogi and

Masaoki Doi, 159–63 (Leiden: Brill, 1986).

13 Diodorus Siculus 2.55–60.

14 See the recent argument by Theresa Urbainczyk,
Slave Revolts in Antiquity
(Stocks-

field, UK: Acumen Publishing, 2008), 31–34, 75–80.

15 On the messianic aspects of the Roman slave revolts, see N. A. Mashkin, “Escha-

tology and Messianism in the Final Period of the Roman Republic,”
Philosophy and Phe-

nomenological Research
10, no. 2 (1949): 206–28, and P. Masiello, “L’ideologica messianica

e le Rivolte Servili,”
Annali della Facolta di lettere e filosofia
11 (1966): 179–96.

16 Athenaeus
Deipnosophistae
6.266d. The sole ancient source is the gossipy Athe-

naeus,
Deipnosophistae
6.265d–66d. For a modern account, see Alexander Fuks, “Slave

Wars and Slave Troubles in Chios in the Third Century BC,”
Athenaeum
46 (1968): 102–11.

17 Diodorus Siculus 34.2.46, 36.4.4, with Jean Christian Dumont,
Servus: Rome et

l’esclavage sous la république
, Collection de l’École Française de Rome 103 (Rome: École

Française de Rome, Palais Farnèse, 1987), 263–64.

18 “Enormous strength and spirit”: Sallust
Histories
frag. 3.90 (my translation).

19 Wife or girlfriend: Plutarch
Life of Crassus
8.4.

20 Plutarch
Life of Crassus
8.4.

21 Claudian
Gothica
155–56.

22 Aulus Gellius,
Attic Nights,
5.6.20, trans. Shaw,
Spartacus and the Slave Wars
, 164.

23 We depend largely on ninth- and tenth-century Byzantine summaries of the ac-

count of Diodorus of Sicily, who in turn relied heavily on the Stoic philosopher Posido-

nius; see Thomas Wiedemann,
Greek and Roman Slavery
(London: Routledge, 1981),

199–200. For the theory of nationalist rebellion, see G. P. Verbrugghe, “Sicily 210–70

B.C.: Livy, Cicero and Diodorus,”
Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological

Association
103 (1972): 535–59, and idem, “Slave Rebellion or Sicily in Revolt?”
Kokalos
20

(1974): 46–60.

24 Constantine Porphyrogenitus, Excerpt 4, 384f. (Diodorus Siculus 34.2.48) (Loeb

translation).

25 Photius
Bibliotheca
388 (Diodorus Siculus 36.6.1) (Loeb translation).

204 Strauss

26 Appian
Civil Wars
1.116.540 (my translation).

27 Revolt of Selouros in Sicily: Strabo
Geography
6.2.7; nascent slave rebellion in

southern Italy in AD 24: Tacitus
Annals
4.27; possible slave revolt under Bulla Felix in

Italy in AD 206–7: Cassius Dio
Histories
77.10.1–7.

28 Augustus
Res Gestae
25
.

Slave Wars of Greece and Rome 205

9. Julius Caesar and the General as State

Adrian Goldsworthy

In the early hours of January 11, 49 BC, Julius Caesar led the Thir-

teenth Legion across the Rubicon and became a rebel. The river—in

reality little more than a stream, and now impossible to locate—marked

the boundary between his province of Cisalpine Gaul and Italy itself.

North of that line he was legally entitled to command troops. To the

south he was not. Nineteen months later, while surveying the corpses

of his enemies at Pharsalus, Caesar claimed, “They wanted it; even af-

ter all my great deeds I, Caius Caesar, would have been condemned, if

I had not sought support from my army.”1

Caesar was more successful than any other Roman general, fighting

“fifty pitched battles, the only commander to surpass Marcus Marcel-

lus, who fought thirty-nine.”2 Yet there was an ambiguity about his rep-

utation because many of his battles were fought against other Romans.

For more than a year before crossing the Rubicon, Caesar and his op-

ponents in the Senate had engaged in a game of brinkmanship, each in

turn raising the stakes. Probably both sides expected the other to back

down. There was no profound ideology involved. His opponents were

determined to end Caesar’s career, and he was equally resolved to pre-

serve it. The price was a war fought all around the Mediterranean that

cost tens of thousands of lives. However unreasonable his opponents

had been, it was Caesar who crossed the Rubicon and started the civil

war of 49–45 BC. Cicero believed that fighting this war was unnecessary

and foolish, but was still scornful of Caesar’s behavior: “He claims that

he is doing all this to protect his dignity. How can there be any dignity

where there is no honesty?”3

The rebel won the war. Caesar became dictator for life and held su-

preme authority in the republic. He also had effective control of the en-

tire Roman army. His rule was not especial y tyrannical. Enemies were

pardoned and many promoted, while his legislation was general y sen-

sible. However, the republican system was supposed to prevent any one

individual from permanently possessing so much power. For this and

other reasons, a group of senators stabbed Caesar to death on March 15,

44 BC. Just over a decade later, Caesar’s adopted son defeated his last rival

and became Rome’s first emperor. Augustus created a system that would

endure for centuries, and was a monarchy in al but name. “ Caesar” even-

tual y went from being simply a family name to a title synonymous with

supreme power. Caesars would rule Rome for 500 years, and the Eastern

or Byzantine Empire for nearly a thousand more. The name would sur-

vive into the twentieth century in the forms
kaiser
and
tsar
.

Caesar conquered Gaul and raided across the Rhine into Germany

and over the English Channel into Britain. By Roman standards these

wars were all justified and for the general good of the state. Success-

ful commanders were expected to profit from victory, and Caesar did

so on a massive scale, matching the scope of his campaigns. He was a

commander of genius who then turned his army against opponents

within the republic and made himself dictator through force of arms.

His career was that of a talented man who began as a servant of the

state, but then subverted it and became its master.

In a modern democracy, the armed forces are supposed always to

remain fully under the control of civil authorities. This has been es-

pecially important in Britain since the civil wars, which had led to the

rule of Cromwell and the Major Generals. Memories of this same rule

by the army influenced America’s founding fathers, and George Wash-

ington earned almost as much praise for his refusal to stand for a third

term as president as for winning the war with Britain in the first place.

The United States was to be a better version of the ancient republics,

avoiding Rome’s slide into military dictatorship and imperial rule. In

contrast, France’s revolution led to the rise of its own Caesar in the

form of Napoleon. At his coronation as emperor in 1804, Napoleon

himself placed the crown on his head to emphasize that he had taken

power rather than been given it.

The General as State 207

Dictators have seized powers in military coups in many countries,

although since the Second World War the problem has afflicted only

Third World countries and has seemed a distant one in the West. It is

important to remember that Caesar did not spring from nowhere. He

did not single-handedly destroy the republic, nor did he subvert a de-

mocracy that was functioning well and essentially stable. The conflict

from 49 to 45 BC was not the first civil war, and others were as willing as

he to resort to violence. Sulla had already fought his way to the dicta-