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Spartacus
Spartacus by Denis Foyatier, 1830
Born	c. 109 the area around the middle course of the Strymon
Died	71 BC battlefield near to Petelia
Battles / wars	Third Servile War

Spartacus (Template:Lang-el; Template:Lang-la) (c. 109–71 BC) was a famous leader of the slaves in the Third Servile War, a major slave uprising against the Roman Republic. Little is known about Spartacus beyond the events of the war, and surviving historical accounts are sometimes contradictory and may not always be reliable. He was an accomplished military leader.

Spartacus's struggle, often seen as oppressed people fighting for their freedom against a slave-owning aristocracy, has found new meaning for modern writers since the 19th century. The rebellion of Spartacus has also proven inspirational to many modern literary and political writers.

Origins

The ancient sources agree that Spartacus was a Thracian. Plutarch describes him as "a Thracian of Nomadic stock". Appian says he was "a Thracian by birth, who had once served as a soldier with the Romans, but had since been a prisoner and sold for a Gladiator". Florus (2.8.8) described him as one "who from Thracian mercenary, had become a Roman soldier, of a soldier a deserter and robber, and afterward, from consideration of his strength, a gladiator". Some authors refer to the Thracian tribe of the Maedi, which in historic times occupied the area on the southwestern fringes of Thrace (present day south-western Bulgaria). Plutarch also writes that Spartacus's wife, a prophetess of the Maedi tribe, was enslaved with him.

The name Spartacus is otherwise attested in the Black Sea region: kings of the Thracian dynasty of the Cimmerian Bosporus and Pontus are known to have borne it, and a Thracian "Sparta" "Spardacus" or "Sparadokos", father of Seuthes I of the Odrysae, is also known.

Enslavement and escape

According to the differing sources and their interpretation, Spartacus either was an auxiliary from the Roman legions later condemned to slavery, or a captive taken by the legions. Spartacus was trained at the gladiatorial school (ludus) near Capua belonging to Lentulus Batiatus. In 73 BC, Spartacus was among a group of gladiators plotting an escape. The plot was betrayed but about 70 men seized kitchen implements, fought their way free from the school, and seized several wagons of gladiatorial weapons and armor. The escaped slaves defeated a small force sent after them, plundered the region surrounding Capua, recruited many other slaves into their ranks, and eventually retired to a more defensible position on Mount Vesuvius.

Once free, the escaped gladiators chose Spartacus and two Gallic slaves—Crixus and Oenomaus—as their leaders. Although Roman authors assumed that the slaves were a homogeneous group with Spartacus as their leader, they may have projected their own hierarchical view of military leadership onto the spontaneous organization of the slaves, reducing other slave leaders to subordinate positions in their accounts. The positions of Crixus and Oenomaus—and later, Castus—cannot be clearly determined from the sources.

Third Servile War

The response of the Romans was hampered by the absence of the Roman legions, which were already engaged in fighting a revolt in Spain and the Third Mithridatic War. Furthermore, the Romans considered the rebellion more of a policing matter than a war. Rome dispatched militia under the command of praetor Gaius Claudius Glaber, which besieged the slaves on the mountain, hoping that starvation would force the slaves to surrender. They were surprised when Spartacus had ropes made from vines, climbed down the cliff side of the volcano with his men and attacked the unfortified Roman camp in the rear, killing most of them. The slaves also defeated a second expedition, nearly capturing the praetor commander, killing his lieutenants and seizing the military equipment. With these successes, more and more slaves flocked to the Spartacan forces, as did "many of the herdsmen and shepherds of the region", swelling their ranks to some 70,000.

In these altercations Spartacus proved to be an excellent tactician, suggesting that he may have had previous military experience. Though the slaves lacked military training, they displayed a skillful use of available local materials and unusual tactics when facing the disciplined Roman armies. They spent the winter of 73–72 BC training, arming and equipping their new recruits, and expanding their raiding territory to include the towns of Nola, Nuceria, Thurii and Metapontum. The distance between these locations and the subsequent events indicate that the slaves operated in two groups commanded by the remaining leaders Spartacus and Crixus.

In the spring of 72 BC, the slaves left their winter encampments and began to move northward. At the same time, the Roman Senate, alarmed by the defeat of the praetorian forces, dispatched a pair of consular legions under the command of Lucius Gellius Publicola and Gnaeus Cornelius Lentulus Clodianus. The two legions were initially successful—defeating a group of 30,000 slaves commanded by Crixus near Mount Garganus—but then were defeated by Spartacus. These defeats are depicted in divergent ways by the two most comprehensive (extant) histories of the war by Appian and Plutarch.

Alarmed by the apparently unstoppable rebellion, the Senate charged Marcus Licinius Crassus, the wealthiest man in Rome and the only volunteer for the position, with ending the rebellion. Crassus was put in charge of eight legions, approximately 40,000–50,000 trained Roman soldiers, which he treated with harsh, even brutal, discipline, reviving the punishment of unit decimation. When Spartacus and his followers, who for unclear reasons had retreated to the south of Italy, moved northward again in early 71 BC, Crassus deployed six of his legions on the borders of the region and detached his legate Mummius with two legions to maneuver behind Spartacus. Though ordered not to engage the slaves, Mummius attacked at a seemingly opportune moment but was routed. After this, Crassus' legions were victorious in several engagements, forcing Spartacus farther south through Lucania as Crassus gained the upper hand. By the end of 71 BC, Spartacus was encamped in Rhegium (Reggio Calabria), near the Strait of Messina.

According to Plutarch, Spartacus made a bargain with Cilician pirates to transport him and some 2,000 of his men to Sicily, where he intended to incite a slave revolt and gather reinforcements. However, he was betrayed by the pirates, who took payment and then abandoned the rebel slaves. Minor sources mention that there were some attempts at raft and shipbuilding by the rebels as a means to escape, but that Crassus took unspecified measures to ensure the rebels could not cross to Sicily, and their efforts were abandoned. Spartacus's forces then retreated toward Rhegium. Crassus' legions followed and upon arrival built fortifications across the isthmus at Rhegium, despite harassing raids from the rebel slaves.

The rebels were under siege and cut off from their supplies.

At this time, the legions of Pompey returned from Spain and were ordered by the Senate to head south to aid Crassus. While Crassus feared that Pompey's arrival would cost him the credit, Spartacus unsuccessfully tried to reach an agreement with Crassus. When Crassus refused, a portion of Spartacus's forces fled toward the mountains west of Petelia (modern Strongoli) in Bruttium, with Crassus' legions in pursuit. When the legions managed to catch a portion of the rebels separated from the main army, discipline among Spartacus's forces broke down as small groups were independently attacking the oncoming legions. Spartacus now turned his forces around and brought his entire strength to bear on the legions in a last stand, in which the slaves were routed completely, with the vast majority of them being killed on the battlefield.

The final battle that saw the defeat and death of Spartacus in 71 BC took place on the present territory of Senerchia on the right bank of the river Sele in the area that includes the border with Oliveto Citra up to those of Calabritto, near the village of Quaglietta, in High Sele Valley, which at that time was part of Lucania. In this area, in the past decades, there have been finds of armor and swords of the Roman era.

The eventual fate of Spartacus himself is unknown, as his body was never found, but he is accounted by historians to have perished in battle along with his men. Six thousand survivors of the revolt captured by the legions of Crassus were crucified, lining the Appian Way from Rome to Capua.

Objectives

Classical historians were divided as to what the motives of Spartacus were. While Plutarch writes that Spartacus merely wished to escape north into Cisalpine Gaul and disperse his men back to their homes, as depicted in the 1960 film "Spartacus", Appian and Florus write that he intended to march on Rome itself. Appian also states that he later abandoned that goal, which might have been no more than a reflection of Roman fears. None of Spartacus's actions suggest that he aimed at reforming Roman society or abolishing slavery.

Based on the events in late 73 BC and early 72 BC, which suggest independently operating groups of slaves and a statement by Plutarch that some of the escaped slaves preferred to plunder Italy, rather than escape over the Alps, modern authors have deduced a factional split between those under Spartacus, who wished to escape over the Alps to freedom, and those under Crixus, who wished to stay in southern Italy to continue raiding and plundering.

Legacy

Politics

• Toussaint L'Ouverture, a leader of the slave revolt that led to the independence of Haiti, was called the "Black Spartacus" by one of his defeated opponents, the Comte de Lavaux.
• Founder of the Bavarian Illuminati, Adam Weishaupt, often referred to himself as Spartacus within written correspondences.
• Karl Marx listed Spartacus as one of his heroes, and described him as "the most splendid fellow in the whole of ancient history" and " great general ( no Garibaldi), noble character, real representative of the ancient proletariat."
• Spartacus has been a great inspiration to revolutionaries in modern times, most notably the German Spartacist League, a forerunner of the Communist Party of Germany, as well as an Austrian anti-fascist organisation in the 1970s.
• European communist regimes in the twentieth century encouraged the image of Spartacus as a fighter against oppression (see "Sports", Spartacus#Sports below).
• Noted Latin American Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara was also a strong admirer of Spartacus.

Artistic

Film and television

• Anthony Mann initially signed on to direct the film Spartacus (1960), which was executive-produced by and starred Kirk Douglas. The film was based on Howard Fast's novel Spartacus. After Mann and Douglas had a falling out over the style and content of the film, Mann was replaced by Stanley Kubrick. The phrase "I am Spartacus!" from this film has been referenced in a number of other films, television programs, and commercials.
• An unofficial sequel to Kubrick's film was made in Italy under the title Il Figlio di Spartacus (The Son of Spartacus; English cinematic title: The Slave) in 1963. The titular character, played by Steve Reeves, first appears as a Roman centurion, but eventually learns his true heritage and takes revenge on Crassus, his father's murderer.
• A 1970 episode of Up Pompeii! entitled "Spartacus" featured Shaun Curry as the rebellious slave.
• The title character of the 1985–1987 cartoon series Spartakus and the Sun Beneath the Sea is loosely based on Spartacus.
• In the 1995 film Clueless, Christian uses Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of the film as part of a subtle campaign to reveal his homosexuality.
• In the 1996 film That Thing You Do, Tom Everett Scott's character Guy 'Shades' Patterson refers to himself as Spartacus.
• In the 2003 film The Recruit, Colin Farrell's character writes a computer program called Spartacus that attracts the attention of the CIA.
• In 2004, Howard Fast's novel Spartacus was adapted as a made-for-TV movie by the USA Network, with Goran Višnjić in the main role.
• One episode of 2007-2008 BBC's docudrama Heroes and Villains features Spartacus.
• The television series Xena: Warrior Princess had an episode in its first season that gave a brief account of the story, including several clips from Stanley Kubrick's movie.
• The television series Spartacus: Blood and Sand, produced by Sam Raimi and starring the late Andy Whitfield, and later Liam McIntyre, in the title role, premièred on the Starz premium cable network in January 2010.

Literature

• Howard Fast wrote the historical novel Spartacus, the basis of Stanley Kubrick's 1960 film starring Kirk Douglas.
• Arthur Koestler wrote a novel about Spartacus called The Gladiators.
• The Scottish writer Lewis Grassic Gibbon wrote a novel Spartacus.
• Spartacus is a prominent character in the novel Fortune's Favorites by Colleen McCullough.
• The Italian writer Rafaello Giovagnoli wrote his historical novel, Spartacus, in 1874. His novel has been subsequently translated and published in many European countries.
• There is also a novel Uczniowie Spartakusa (The Students of Spartacus) by the Polish writer Halina Rudnicka.
• The Reverend Elijah Kellogg's Spartacus to the Gladiators at Capua has been used effectively by schoolboys to practice their oratory skills for ages.
• Spartacus also appears in Conn Iggulden's 'Emperor' series in the book The Death of Kings.
• Spartacus and His Glorious Gladiators, by Toby Brown, is part of the Dead Famous series of children's history books.
• In the Bolo novel Bolo Rising by William H. Keith, the character HCT "Hector" is based on Spartacus.
• In the novel Flip by David Lubar, one of the legends Ryan becomes is Spartacus, specifically when he is challenged to a fight by the school bully.
• Amal Donkol, the Egyptian modern poet wrote his masterpiece "The Last Words of Spartacus".
• Steven Saylor's novel Arms of Nemesis, part of his Roma Sub Rosa series, is set during the Third Servile War.
• Max Gallo wrote the novel Les Romains.Spartacus.La Revolte des Esclaves, Librairie Artheme Fayard, 2006.
• In 2010 Peter Stothard combined an account of Spartacus's uprising with elements of autobiography, in his memoir On the Spartacus Road.
• In 1972, Badal Sircar produced a theatrical version of Spartacus, performed in the round and heavily coloured by his egalitarian vision. Originally in Bengali, it has been translated into and performed in several Indian languages.

Music

• Spartacus is a ballet, with a score by composer Aram Khachaturian.
• Australian composer Carl Vine wrote a short piano piece entitled "Spartacus", from Red Blues.
• The German group Triumvirat released the album Spartacus in 1975.
• The UK band The Farm released the album Spartacus in 1991.
• Jeff Wayne released his musical retelling, Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of Spartacus in 1992.
• Phantom Regiment, a World Class (formerly Division 1) drum corps of Drum Corps International, performed a show entitled Spartacus depicting the show through music and visual movement for their competitive field show in 1981, 1982, and 2008. Their 2008 program won World Championship Finals.
• "Love Theme From Spartacus's'" Swing of Delight Carlos Santana, Wayne Shorter, 1980
• American hardcore band, The Fall of Troy, wrote a song entitled "Spartacus".
• Quotes from the movie Spartacus are used in the opening of performances in Roger Waters' 2010 The Wall tour

Games

• The board game "I Am Spartacus" covers the 3rd Servile War and includes Spartacus as one of the game pieces.
• The board game Heroscape features Spartacus as one of the game pieces.
• The RTS game Age of Empires: The Rise of Rome features the slave rebellion from the perspective of the Romans.
• The iPhone fight game Spartacus: Blood and Sand based on the Starz TV series.

Radio

• In "The Histories of Pliny the Elder"—a 1957 episode of the British radio comedy The Goon Show parodying epic films—Spartacus is used as a pseudonym for Bloodnok after he has an affair with Caesar's wife and has to escape from Caesar; "You know that saying, 'Caesar's wife is above suspicion'? Well I put an end to all that rubbish!".

Sports

• Numerous Bulgarian football clubs bear the name of Spartacus: the most popular are PFC Spartak Varna, FC Spartak Plovdiv and PFC Spartak Pleven.
• One of the oldest and the most popular football teams in Slovakia is Spartak Trnava.
• Russian sports clubs named FC Spartak, of which FC Spartak Moscow is the most well-known, and Spartak sport society are named in honor of Spartacus.
• The Spartakiad was a Soviet bloc version of the Olympic games. This name was also used for the mass gymnastics exhibition held every five years in Czechoslovakia.
• Swiss professional Cyclist Fabian Cancellara has been given the nickname Spartacus.
• Spartacus 7s is the name of an international rugby sevens team created in 2006.
• The Ottawa Senators mascot is a lion named Spartacat, a play on Spartacus since the team logo is a Roman Centurion.
• The University of Tampa Spartan's mascot is named Spartacus.
• The Spanish basketball player Felipe Reyes is nicknamed Espartaco, Spanish for Spartacus.

Places

• Spartacus Peak on Livingston Island in the South Shetland Islands.

References

1. http://www.marxist.com/spartacus-representative-of-proletariat.htm
2. Plutarch, Crassus 8
3. Appian, Civil Wars 1.116
4. Florus, Epitome of Roman History 2.8
5. The Histories, Sallust, Patrick McGushin, Oxford University Press, 1992, ISBN 0-19-872143-9, p. 112.
6. Annuaire de l'Université de Sofia, Faculté d'histoire, Volume 77, Issue 2, 1985, p. 122.
7. The Spartacus war, Barry S. Strauss, Simon and Schuster, 2009, ISBN 1416532056, p.31.
8. The Cambridge Ancient History: pt. 1. The prehistory of the Balkans; and the Middle East and the Aegean world, tenth to eighth centuries B.C, Cambridge University Press, 1982, p. 601.
9. The Assyrian and Babylonian empires and other states of the Near East, from the eighth to the sixth centuries B.C., Volume 3, John Boardman, Cambridge University Press, 1991, ISBN 0521227178, p. 601.
10. Diodorus Siculus, Historical Library Book 12
11. Diodorus Siculus, Historical Library Book 16
12. Theucidides, History of the Peloponnesian War 2.101
13. Tribes, Dynasts and Kingdoms of Northern Greece: History and Numismatics
14. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:116; Plutarch, Crassus, 8:2. Note: Spartacus's status as an auxilia is taken from the Loeb edition of Appian translated by Horace White, which states “…who had once served as a soldier with the Romans…”. However, the translation by John Carter in the Penguin Classics version reads: “…who had once fought against the Romans and after being taken prisoner and sold…”.
15. However, according to Cicero (Ad Atticum VI, ii, 8) at the beginning his followers were much less than 50.
16. Plutarch, Crassus, 8:1–2; Appian, Civil Wars, 1:116; Livy, Periochae, 95:2; Florus, Epitome, 2.8. Plutarch claims 78 escaped, Livy claims 74, Appian “about seventy”, and Florus says “thirty or rather more men”. “Choppers and spits” is from Life of Crassus.
17. Plutarch, Crassus, 9:1.
18. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:116; Florus, Epitome, 2.8.
19. ' Plutarchwe46', Crassus, 9:1–3; Frontinus, Stratagems, Book I, 5:20–22; Appian, Civil Wars, 1:116; Broughton, Magistrates of the Roman Republic, p. 109.
20. Plutarch, Crassus, 9:4–5; Livy, Periochae , 95; Appian, Civil Wars, 1:116; Sallust, Histories, 3:64–67.
21. Plutarch, Crassus, 9:3; Appian, Civil War, 1:116.
22. Frontinus, Stratagems, Book I, 5:20–22 and Book VII:6.
23. Florus, Epitome, 2.8.
24. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:116–117; Plutarch, Crassus 9:6; Sallust, Histories, 3:64–67.
25. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:117; Plutarch, Crassus 9:7; Livy, Periochae 96.
26. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:117.
27. Plutarch, Crassus, 9:7.
28. Spartacus and the Slave Rebellion
29. Shaw, Brent D. (2001). Spartacus and the slave wars: a brief history with documents. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 0312237030.
30. Plutarch, Crassus 10:1.
31. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:118; Smith, A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, "Exercitus", p.494.
32. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:118.
33. ^ Plutarch, Crassus, 10:1–3.
34. Florus, Epitome, 2.8; Cicero, Orations, "For Quintius, Sextus Roscius...", 5.2
35. Plutarch, Crassus, 10:4–5.
36. Contrast Plutarch, Crassus, 11:2 with Appian, Civil Wars, 1:119.
37. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:120.
38. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:120; Plutarch, Crassus, 10:6.
39. Plutarch, Crassus, 11:3; Livy, Periochae, 97:1. Bradley, Slavery and Rebellion. p. 97; Plutarch, Crassus, 11:4.
40. Plutarch, Crassus, 11:5;.
41. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:120; Plutarch, Crassus, 11:6–7; Livy, Periochae, 97.1.
42. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:120; Florus, Epitome, 2.8.
43. Appian, Civil Wars, 1.120.
44. ^ Plutarch Crassus, 9:5–6.
45. Appian, Civil Wars, 1:117; Florus, Epitome, 2.8.
46. Plutarch, Crassus, 9:7; Appian, Civil Wars, 1:117.
47. Douglas Reed (1 January 1978). The controversy of Zion. Dolphin Press. p. 139. Retrieved 21 July 2010.
48. Karl Marx's "Confession"
49. Letter from Marx to Engels In Manchester
50. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057060/
51. http://www.tv.com/shows/up-pompeii/spartacus-390879/
52. http://tvblog.ugo.com/tv/spartacus-comic-con-2009
53. http://spartacus.ausxip.com/2009/06/
54. History of Spartak, fcspartak.ru Template:Ru icon
55. Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd edition, volume 24 (part 1), p. 286, Moscow, Sovetskaya Entsiklopediya publisher, 1976

Bibliography

Classical authors

• Appian. Civil Wars. Translated by J. Carter. (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1996)
• Florus. Epitome of Roman History. (London: W. Heinemann, 1947)
• Orosius. The Seven Books of History Against the Pagans. Translated by Roy J. Deferrari. (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1964).
• Plutarch. Fall of the Roman Republic. Translated by R. Warner. (London: Penguin Books, 1972), with special emphasis placed on "The Life of Crassus" and "The Life of Pompey".
• Sallust. Conspiracy of Catiline and the War of Jugurtha. (London: Constable, 1924)

Modern historiography

• Bradley, Keith R. Slavery and Rebellion in the Roman World, 140 B.C.–70 B.C. Bloomington; Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1989 (hardcover, ISBN 0-253-31259-0); 1998 (paperback, ISBN 0-253-21169-7). The Slave War of Spartacus, pp. 83–101.
• Rubinsohn, Wolfgang Zeev. Spartacus's Uprising and Soviet Historical Writing. Oxford: Oxbow Books, 1987 (paperback, ISBN 0-9511243-1-5).
• Spartacus: Film and History, edited by Martin M. Winkler. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2007 (hardcover, ISBN 1-4051-3180-2; paperback, ISBN 1-4051-3181-0).
• Trow, M.J. Spartacus: The Myth and the Man. Stroud, United Kingdom: Sutton Publishing, 2006 (hardcover, ISBN 0-7509-3907-9).
• Genner, Michael. "Spartakus. Eine Gegengeschichte des Altertums nach den Legenden der Zigeuner". Two volumes. Paperback. Trikont Verlag, München 1979/1980. Vol 1 ISBN 3-88167-053-X Vol 2 ISBN 3-88167-0
• Plamen Pavlov, Stanimir Dimitrov,Spartak - sinyt na drenva Trakija/Spartacus - the Son of ancient Thrace. Sofia, 2009, ISBN 978-954-378-024-2

External links

• Spartacus Article and full text of the Roman and Greek sources.
• "Spartacus"—Movie starring Kirk Douglas and Sir Peter Ustinov
• "Spartacus"—TV-Mini-series starring Goran Višnjić and Alan Bates l
• Starz Mini-Series airing in 2010

Template:Persondata

• Use dmy dates from June 2011
• 71 BC deaths
• Rebel slaves in ancient Rome
• Roman gladiators
• Thracians
• Ancient Thracians killed in battle
• Deaths by blade weapons
• Roman-era Thracians
• 1st-century BC Romans
• Spartacus