Spartacus

“ The personality of Spartacus revealed through his effort to inspire his fellows with the spirit of liberty.
The theme which Spartacus presents is of universal value—the spirit of liberty, dear to all mankind. ”

“ Here he was soon joined by large numbers of slaves, who flocked to him from all quarters. He was soon at the head of a formidable army. The desolation of the Social and Civil Wars had depopulated Italy, while the employment of slave-labor furnished Spartacus with an endless supply of soldiers. In addition to this, the war with Sertorius was not yet finished, and that with Mithridates, of which we shall speak presently, had already commenced. For upward of two years Spartacus was master of Italy, which he laid waste from the foot of the Alps to the southernmost corner of the peninsula. ”

“ Towns were captured and destroyed, [3] 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.
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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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." ”

“ All captured slaves were put to death. Spartacus compelled three hundred Roman prisoners to fight as gladiators at the funeral games held for a fallen slave captain. Farms and country houses were plundered and burned.
A THRACIAN GLADIATOR
The growing success of the slaves filled people with terror: they dreaded a general massacre of the rich. Yet it seemed impossible to crush them. Spartacus showed rare qualities as a general and organizer; and after he had defeated both consuls, in the following year, and began to move northwards, there was 126 something like a panic in Rome. ”

“ Spartacus, after defeating the prætor himself in many other battles, and at last seizing his lictors and his horse, now became great and formidable: but still he formed a just judgment of the state of affairs and, not expecting to get the advantage over the power of the Romans, he designed to lead his forces to the Alps; thinking that it was advisable for them to cross the mountains and to go to their several homes, some to Thrace and some to Gaul. But the gladiators being strong in numbers, and confident, would not listen to him, and they went about ravaging Italy. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Chaffing under the tyranny of the Romans, who forced him to fight in the arena with men and beasts, he revolted against his masters, and with a band of some seventy followers, fled to a mountain fastness in the crater of Vesuvius. Proud Rome sent a few men to recapture him, with scourges for his punishment, but they were beaten by Spartacus. Every day dissatisfied men like himself escaped from the Romans and joined his ranks. Rome sent a larger body of men against Spartacus, but they also were beaten. ”

“ There, under their leader Spartacus, they gathered together every gladiator slave or who could run away to them, and Spartacus wanted them to march northward, force their way through Italy, climb the Alps, and reach their homes in Thrace and Gaul; but the plunder of Italy tempted them, and they would not go, till an army was sent against them under Marcus Licinius Crassus—called Dives, or the Rich, from the spoil he had gained during the proscription. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Some slight successes enabled them to arm themselves with the weapons of their enemies. Their number at length increased to one hundred thousand men. For three years they defied the power of Rome, and even gained control of the larger part of Southern Italy. Four Roman armies sent against them were cut to pieces. But at length Spartacus himself was slain, and the insurgents were crushed.
The rebellion was punished with Roman severity. The slaves that had taken part in the revolt were hunted through the mountains and forests, and exterminated like dangerous beasts. ”

“ But the war raised by the efforts of Spartacus I know not what name to call, for the soldiers in it were slaves, and the commanders gladiators; the former being persons of the meanest condition, and the latter men of the worst character, and adding to the calamity of their profession by its contempibleness. ”

“ 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. ”

“ His army increased to 100,000 men, whom he sought to induce to march across the Alps and to seek their old homes, but the fever of revenge and conquest was upon them, and Spartacus continued his fight with the Roman authorities. ”

“ The senate at last despatched both consuls against the rebels (72) . The German slaves under Crixus were defeated at Mt Garganus in Apulia by the praetor Q. Arrius. But Spartacus overthrew both consuls, one after the other, and then pressed towards the Alps. Gaius Cassius, governor of Cisalpine Gaul, and the praetor Gnaeus Manlius, who attempted to stop him, were defeated at Mutina. Freedom was within sight, but with fatal infatuation the slaves refused to abandon Italy. Spartacus led them against Rome, but their hearts seem to have failed them ”

“ His character has been maligned by the Roman writers. “Accident made Spartacus a shepherd, a freebooter, and a gladiator; nature formed him a hero.”
19. ludō: ‘the gladiatorial school.’ The gladiators were mostly slaves, and were the property of the individuals who trained them and leased them for the games. This school belonged to Lentulus.
20. paene nōn levius: ‘not much lighter.’
22. armātōrum: many slaves joined them.
23. victī sunt in Āpūliā: they were conquered on the river Silarus, which flows between Lucania and Campania. Spartacus was slain in the battle. ”

“ Is the old Grecian spirit frozen in your veins, that you do crouch and cower like base-born slaves beneath your master's lash? O comrades! warriors! Thracians! if we must fight, let us fight for ourselves; if we must slaughter, let us slaughter our oppressors; if we must die, let us die under the open sky, by the bright waters, in noble, honorable battle."
Biographical and Historical: This is a supposed speech of Spartacus written by Elijah Kellogg, a New England clergyman. Spartacus was a Thracian by birth, who served in the Roman army. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Peasants when slaves are seldom rebels. Spartacus has won a place in history by being the exception to the rule, a rule well known to men who never read a book, but feel instinctively that they themselves are helpless to redress their wrongs. ”

“ 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. ”

“ His men, who were not actuated by the same personal motives as himself, saw the insufficiency of their force, and, being seized with a panic, ran away, without stopping to draw their swords from their scabbards. Spartacus formed the idea of passing into Sicily, and proceeded to Rhegium, where he bargained with some pirates to supply him with vessels ”

“ Thus the fight went on until the Roman populace was glutted with butchery and blood.
Gladiators were chosen from the strongest and most athletic among slaves and condemned criminals. Thracians, Gauls, and Germans were captured and enslaved for the purpose of being sacrificed in the arena. They were trained with the greatest care in gladiatorial schools. The most famous of these institutions was at Capua in Italy. It was here that Spartacus, a young Thracian, of noble ancestry, excited an insurrection that soon spread throughout all Italy and threatened the destruction of Rome. ”

“ He escaped and gathered about him a large army of slaves and gladiators, with whom he intended to push northward and allow them all to return to their homes. They, however, after attacking many towns, were finally overcome. Spartacus himself died in battle, and six thousand slaves were crucified on the road from Capua to Rome.
Capua was a city of great luxury, containing an amphitheater nearly as large as the Coliseum at Rome. The ancients attached great importance to the rites of burial, and believed that the soul could not reach the Elysian Fields unless the body had been buried. ”

“ In the most general cases riot issues from a material fact, but insurrection is always a moral phenomenon. Riot is Masaniello; insurrection is Spartacus. ”

“ Political life in Italy was not so much tranquillized as stunned by the massacres and confiscations of Marius and Sulla. The scale upon which this history is planned will not permit us to tell here of the great adventurers who, relying more and more on the support of the legions, presently began to scheme and intrigue again for dictatorial power in Rome. In 73 B.C. all Italy was terrified by a rising of the slaves, and particularly of the gladiators, led by a gladiator from Thessaly, Spartacus. ”

“ Spartacus, a gladiator, excites an insurrection of slaves, 202; devastates Italy with a large army of slaves, 203; defeated by Crassus, 203; slain in battle, 203. Spolia opima won by A. Cornelius Cossus, 43. Statius, P. Papinius, 344. Stilicho, 339. St. Chrysostom, 311. Suffetes, 68. Sulla, C. Cornelius, early life and character, 167; Quæstor with Marius in Africa, 168; gains over Bocchus, and entraps and makes a prisoner of Jugurtha, 167; in Social War, 180; Consul, 181; rivalry with Marius, 182; enters Rome with his army, and takes possession of the city, 183; leaves Rome for the East, 184 ”

“ Estimate of the Spartan Institutions.—That the laws and regulations of the Spartan constitution were admirably adapted to the end in view,—the rearing of a nation of skilful and resolute warriors,—the long military supremacy of Sparta among the states of Greece abundantly attests. But when we consider the aim and object of the Spartan institutions, we must pronounce them low and unworthy. The true order of things was just reversed among the Lacedæmonians. Government exists for the individual: at Sparta the individual lived for the state. ”