Appendix I
As noted earlier, one of the most notable features of Rome’s First Civil War was her ability to conduct both civil warfare and external warfare simultaneously. Whilst the earlier chapters have covered the external wars of the 80s, the 70s BC saw a greater military effort on Rome’s part, and an actual expansion of Rome’s empire. Although the full details of these wars fall outside the scope of this study, some detail is important if we are to understand the full impact on Rome of fighting both civil wars and external wars at the same time and the tremendous strain that this placed on her resources. As Orosius himself states, at one point in 78–77 BC, the Romans were engaged in four wars at the same time: the civil war in Spain, and wars in Illyria, Cilicia and Macedonia, all of which put a huge strain of Rome’s manpower resources and ensured that the civil war would not receive the Senate’s full attention.¹
Cilicia
Asia Minor saw a considerable amount of Roman military activity in this period and was the source of an expansion of Rome’s empire. The earliest military activity of the 70s BC came in 78 BC, the year of Sulla’s death, and saw P. Servilius Vatia, the consul of 79 BC, launch major offensives in southern Asia Minor centred on Cilicia. Unlike previous campaigns in this region, this does not seem to have been another campaign against the pirates of the region but a major assault on the peoples of Cilicia and surrounding areas. The timing is interesting, coming after Sulla had left office, and it seems that’s Sulla’s resignation and death saw a major expansion of Roman military effort. Both Eutropius and Orosius preserve accounts of Vatia’s campaign (in fact, they are almost word-for-word), and both show the extent of his campaign:
Publius Servilius, an energetic man, was sent, after his consulate, into Cilicia and Pamphilia. He reduced Cilicia, besieged and took the most eminent cities of Lycia, amongst them Phaselis, Olympus, and Corycus. The Isauri he also attacked, and compelled to surrender, and, within three years, put an end to the war. He was the first of the Romans that marched over Mount Taurus. On his return, he was granted a triumph, and acquired the surname of Isauricus.²
Thus the regions of Cilicia, Pamphilia, Lycia and Isauria were subdued in a three-year-long campaign, which saw Roman forces cross the Taurus Mountains for the first time in their history. This campaign is often described as one against the pirates of the region, but Servilius’ actions seem to have been aimed at something far greater, namely securing the region to Rome. Cilicia, or a portion of it, seems to have been made a Roman province around the time of Antonius’ campaign against the pirates there (102–100 BC), but this is far from clear.
Even if it had been technically declared Roman territory, Rome never had the chance to subdue the whole region in the intervening period, and it was only now that they choose to do so, again highlighting their post-Sullan expansionist policies, even though civil war raged in Spain. Again, we are not clear whether the region was formally made into a province under Servilius, but it formed part of Pompeius’ eastern settlement in 64 BC.
Ironically, Appian informs us that Servilius’ campaign did little to stamp out the piracy problem, but then he seems to have been rather busier subduing the interior of these regions. Certainly, the pirate attacks continued in both frequency and boldness, reaching the coastline of Sicily and Italy itself. This in turn led to the campaign by M. Antonius in 74 BC (see below).
Bithynia
As well as increasing their territory in southern Asia Minor, the Romans annexed the kingdom of Bithynia in the north. In 74 BC, Rome’s old ally King Nicomedes IV of Bithynia died, bequeathing his kingdom to the Roman people. Given that Mithridates VI was his neighbour and had annexed the kingdom on several occasions, this bequest provided him with the opportunity not only safeguard his kingdom but to thwart Mithridates’ plans and possibly provoke him by bringing Roman territory right up to his border. If this was his plan, then it failed in the short term but succeeded in the longer term. Given the danger which Mithridates posed, the Senate acted quickly and voted to annex Bithynia as a Roman province. Mithridates, however, acted equally as quickly and invaded and annexed Bithynia, sparking off the Third Mithridatic War (see below), the ultimate conclusion of which saw the creation of a new Roman province of Pontus and Bithynia on the north coast of Asia Minor, giving Rome a presence on the Black Sea for the first time.
Pontus and Armenia
Although the details of the Third Mithridatic War fall outside of the scope of this work (see Chapter 10), this new generation of Roman commanders was unwilling to follow Sulla, who on two occasions had come to a negotiated settlement with Mithridates. The war drew in Mithridates’ ally Tigranes, and the Armenian Empire, and saw Roman armies penetrating the regions of the east to a far greater extent than ever before, reaching as far east as the shores of the Caspian, into the Parthian Empire and ultimately into Syria and Jerusalem. By the settlement of Pompeius in the 60s BC, Rome had acquired Pontus and annexed Syria, creating a permanent presence in the Middle East.
Crete
In 74 BC, the pirate problem of the eastern Mediterranean had reached such a stage that the Senate created an extraordinary command, with imperium infinitum being awarded to M. Antonius, whose father had commanded a similar campaign against the pirates in 102–100 BC. His initial campaign focussed on the west, in Liguria, Spain and Sicily, perhaps to break their alliance with Sertorius (see Chapter 10). By 72 BC, his focus had shifted to the island of Crete. Appian states that the Cretans favoured Mithridates and gave the pirates a safe haven. When his embassy to the Cretans was rebuffed, Antonius seems to have gone to war with the Cretans as well as the pirates infesting the island. Appian also states that he did not achieve much of note, but was awarded the title Creticus anyway.³ However, other sources, such as Florus, state that Antonius was actually defeated by the Cretans, in either late 72 or early 71 BC, and forced to conduct a peace treaty with them.⁴ Soon afterward, Antonius died and the campaign petered out, leaving the pirates to be dealt with by Pompeius, and the Cretans by Q. Caecilius Metellus Creticus in the 60s.⁵
Cyrene
The Ptolemaic kingdom of Cyrene had been bequeathed to Rome in 96 BC, but beyond securing some royal estates, Rome had left the kingdom to its own devices.⁶ However, in 75 BC, this seemed to change, and one of the Quaestors, P. Cornelius Lentulus Marcellinus, was sent to the kingdom to organize it as a new Roman province.⁷ This extended Rome’s holdings on the northern African coast and took Rome’s empire to the borders of Ptolemaic Egypt, whose own independence came under close Roman scrutiny during the 60s.⁸
Macedonia and Thrace
By the early 70s BC, once again, Macedon appears to have been invaded by Thracian tribes, in particular the Scordisci, who had fought a bitter war against Rome at the time of the Northern Wars.⁹ C. (Cn). Cornelius Dolabella (Cos. 81) was dispatched and fought there between 80 and 77 BC. He returned to Rome to celebrate a triumph, but we have no other details of his campaigns. In 78 BC, the Roman proconsul Ap. Claudius Pulcher was dispatched to Macedonia, and by 77 we are told that he scored a number of victories over the tribes, especially around Mount Rhodopa, though no details are given.¹⁰ However, Claudius seems to have caught a disease whilst in Macedonia and died in 76 BC. His successor, C. Scribonius Curio, crossed into Thrace. Eutropius has the following excerpt:
Cnaeus Scribonius Curio, on the termination of his consulship, was sent to succeed him. He conquered the Dardanians, penetrated as far as the Danube, and obtained the honour of a triumph, putting an end to the war within three years.¹¹
Thus Roman forces took the offensive and drove deep into the Balkans, defeating the Dardani, who were the regional power, and reaching the Danube for the first time. The Dardani had been humbled, and Roman power extended into the Balkans, though without any formal annexation of territory. Syme himself states that ‘the march to the Danube was a spectacular achievement, not to be repeated for fifty years,’ and that the conquest of the Dardani has been ‘undeservedly neglected in the historical record’.¹²
Curio returned to Rome in 72 BC to celebrate another triumph for this theatre of war. His replacement was M. Terentius Varro Lucullus, who continued to extend Roman power throughout the sub-Danubian region. He defeated the tribe of the Bessi, captured the town that would become Adrianople (Uscudama), and advanced towards the shores of the Black Sea, reducing the Greek cities of the region. Thus, despite the ongoing civil and Mithridatic Wars, Rome took great strides towards subduing the Balkans between Macedonia and the Danube, without annexing any territory, but taking Roman influence to the western shores of the Black Sea.
Illyria
Illyria also seems to have been the site of a major war fought by the Romans. In 78 BC, C (Cn). Cosconius began a two-year campaign on the Dalmatian coast.¹³ We posses no other details as to why the war was fought, nor details of the campaign, except for an excerpt of Eutropius:
Cnaeus Cosconius was sent into Illyricum as proconsul. He reduced a great part of Dalmatia, took Salonae, and, having made an end of the war, returned to Rome after an absence of two years.¹⁴
Summary
Thus, we can see that the 70s saw a massive expansion of Roman military activity across the Mediterranean, greatly extending both Rome’s physical empire and its regions of influence. It was in this period that Roman armies reached the Danube and crossed the Taurus Mountains for the first time, and the two additional provinces of Bithynia and Cyrene were annexed, from bequests. It is noticeable that almost immediately upon Sulla’s resignation as dictator, the Senate launched three major campaigns, in Illyria, Macedonia and Cilicia, all confirming and extending Roman influence in these regions. Although the timing may have been a coincidence, it is tempting to see Sulla as having adopted a passive foreign policy during his tenure, with the focus being on internal (re)integration of Rome’s existing territories. Furthermore, all this military activity put large armies under the command of others and allowed them personal glory in the form of triumphs, both of which seem to foreshadow aspects of the Augustan Principate. It may well be that with the experience of Pompeius fresh in his mind, Sulla did not want to encourage unnecessary military activity. With Sulla out of the picture, however, it seems that the rest of the Senate were eager to gain military glory and pursue an aggressive foreign policy.
One other interesting aspect is the effect of the lack of a surviving detailed narrative source for this period. As can be seen, there were a number of other important wars taking place, yet our narrative is skewed towards Spain, with Pompeius and Sertorius, and the east, with Mithridates. Having examined the other fragmentary sources, it is clear that our whole view of Roman military activity in this period is unbalanced by the random vagaries of which ancient sources survived.
The final aspect to note is that whilst all of these wars were continuous with the civil war still raging in Spain and also in Italy, it largely explains why the Spanish campaigns seem to have been under resourced. It also helps to explain the reluctance of some members of the oligarchy to serve in these wars, when there were far more glorious foreign adventures to be had, which perhaps sums up the general Roman elite’s attitude to the civil wars. If nothing else, it seems that this expansionist policy channelled the efforts and ambitions of a number of the Roman oligarchy into what was a far more beneficial outlet than that found in the 80s.