Story of Spartacus, Softly Retold for Sleep | A Calm Bedtime History for Adults | SleepWise

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Good evening and welcome back to
Sleep.

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Wise to Night.
We drift back across 2000 years

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into the long, warm afternoons
and lamp lit evenings of ancient

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Italy.
We will follow the story of a

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man whose name has reached us
from a world that is otherwise

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mostly silent.
He was born somewhere in Thrace,

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in the rolling lands north of
Greece, and he died on a

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battlefield in southern Italy.
Between those two facts lay a

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brief, extraordinary rebellion
that shook the most powerful

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Republic of the ancient world.
His name was Spartacus.

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The story is not only his, it
belongs also to the 10s of

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thousands of unnamed people who
walked beside him out of slavery

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into the open countryside, and
to the Rome that pursued them

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across mountains, rivers and
seasons.

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We will not need to remember
every name or every battle.

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We will move slowly, letting the
shape of the tail rise softly

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out of the dark.
War passes through this account

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as war pass through the time we
are visiting, but we will not

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linger over its edges.
We will linger instead over

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endurance, over the strange
order of a Republic built on

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unfree labor, and over the way a
single revolt grew large enough

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to alarm the masters of the
Mediterranean.

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To meet Spartacus, we should
first sit for a while with the

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Rome that made him possible.
Picture a city of marble temples

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and red brick tenements, of
crowded fora and quiet country

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villas.
By the early 1st century, before

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the Common Era, Rome had already
become the master of an immense

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world.
It had defeated Carthage in

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three long wars.
It had absorbed Greece and

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Macedonia.
Its legions had marched through

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Spain and along the shores of
Asia Minor.

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Its senators argued in chambers
whose decisions could move

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fleets across the sea.
Yet beneath that grandeur lay a

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quieter strain.
The Republic, which had begun

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centuries earlier as a careful
balance of magistrates and

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assemblies, was bending under
its own weight.

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Generals returned from distant
provinces with personal armies

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and vast fortunes.
Old families competed not only

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for honors, but for survival and
the work of empire.

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The planting and harvesting and
building, the carrying of stone

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and water and grain, rested
largely upon the backs of people

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who had not chosen to do it to
night.

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We will follow the revolt of one
of those people.

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We will trace his path from a
gladiator school in Capua into

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the open countryside, his
strange and luminous campaign

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through the Italian peninsula
and the long quiet that

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followed.
We will move through ancient

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cities and across Green
Mountains.

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We will sit beside small fires
in the camps of escaped slaves

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and listen for a while to the
heavy considerations of senators

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in distant marble rooms.
As we settle in, let your

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thoughts loosen a little.
There is nothing here to solve,

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only a road to walk gently into
the past where one figure still

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moves quietly through the warm
air of southern Italy.

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Before we meet our wanderer, we
should sit for a while with the

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institution that shaped him.
Slavery in the ancient world was

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not unusual.
It existed across the

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Mediterranean and far beyond, in
Egypt and Persia and Greece,

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long before Rome rose to
dominance.

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But by the late Republic, Roman
slavery had grown into something

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on a scale unseen before.
Some modern historians believe

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that by the 1st century, before
the Common Era, perhaps one in

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every three people on the
Italian peninsula was enslaved.

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The exact figures cannot be
known with certainty, but the

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impression of an immense unfree
population is consistent across

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the ancient sources.
Most of these people had been

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captured in war as Roman armies
pushed outward.

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Defeated populations were often
sold in great markets.

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The conquest of Empirus alone in
the 2nd century before the

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Common Era was said by ancient
writers to have produced 150,000

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slaves in a single season,
though such numbers should

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always be held lightly.
Pirates added to the supply,

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raiding coasts and selling
captives at busy ports such as

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Delos.
In the Aegean, children born to

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enslaved women remained enslaved
themselves, and debt and

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exposure could thread a few
unlucky free people into the

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same condition.
The lives of the enslaved varied

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enormously.
Some served in city households,

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where they cooked, taught,
copied books, dressed hair,

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accompanied children to school,
and sometimes earned the

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affection of the families they
served.

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A few rose to remarkable
positions, managing estates or

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businesses, sometimes
accumulating savings and one day

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buying their own freedom.
To be a Freedman in Rome was a

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recognized status, and the
descendants of freed slaves

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could, over generations, fully
enter Roman society.

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But many others lived under far
harder conditions.

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On the greatest states of
southern Italy, the latifundia,

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gangs of enslaved laborers work
the fields, the vineyards and

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the olive Groves.
They were often housed in

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barracks at night, sometimes
chained, watched by overseers

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who themselves answered to
distant landlords.

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Mining, far from the eyes of
cities, could be still grimmer.

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The work was long, the air was
poor, and the men who entered

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such places often did not see
another life.

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Roman law recognized slaves as
property.

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They could be bought, sold,
given, inherited, and

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disciplined with a degree of
severity that varied from

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household to household.
Yet they were also very

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obviously people they thought,
dreamed, loved and remembered

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the lives they had lost.
That uneasy knowledge ran

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beneath the surface of Roman
society like an underground

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river.
Most of the time it stayed

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hidden, but every so often,
somewhere along its length, the

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river would break open into the
daylight.

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The revolt of Spartacus did not
come without warning.

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Twice in the previous century,
Sicily, the great bread basket

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island just South of Italy, had
erupted into prolonged slave

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uprisings.
These earlier conflicts are

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often called the 1st and 2nd
Servile Wars, and although their

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details are blurred by time,
they remained vivid in Roman

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memory long after their fires
had been put out.

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The first began around the year
135, before the Common Era.

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A Syrian born slave named
Eunice, said by ancient writers

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to be a kind of Mystic and
showman, claimed visions and

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miracles, breathing what looked
like fire from his mouth through

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a hidden trick with kindled
walnut shells.

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Around him gathered other
enslaved laborers, especially

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those held in chained gangs on
the great Sicilian estates.

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They rose against their owners
and seized the town of Enna, an

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ancient city perched on a high
plateau at the heart of the

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island.
Yunus took the title of king,

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modelled in part on the
Hellenistic kingdoms of the

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eastern Mediterranean.
He was joined by another leader,

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Cleon, who commanded a separate
force in the South.

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For several years, this strange
Kingdom held parts of Sicily

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against repeated Roman armies.
Slaves from across the island

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reportedly flocked to its
banner.

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The fighting was uneven and
slow, and the Republic lost more

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than one general before the
consul Publius Rapilius finally

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crushed the revolt.
Yunus died in captivity.

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The numbers given by ancient
sources, sometimes as high as

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70,000 or 200,000 rebels, should
be taken as impressions rather

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than precise counts.
The point is that the rising had

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been very large and the trauma
to Roman pride had been deep.

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A generation later, around the
year 104, before the Common Era,

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Sicily rose again.
This time the central figure was

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Salvius, who took the royal name
Trifon and his ally Athenian.

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Once again, vast estates
emptied.

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Once again, Roman armies
struggled in the rough Sicilian

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countryside.
Once again, the revolt was

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eventually broken, this time by
the consul Manius Aquilius.

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The survivors were sent to face
wild beasts in the arenas of

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Rome, although tradition
recorded that some, refusing to

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provide a spectacle, took their
own lives instead.

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By the time we approached the
year 73 before the Common Era,

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the memory of these earlier wars
had faded somewhat from public

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conversation, but it had not
been forgotten.

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Roman planters in the South
still feared the possibility,

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however distant, of another.
Rising Roman generals still

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understood that a slave army, if
allowed to gather and to learn,

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could become formidable.
So when far from Sicily, in the

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city of Capua on the Italian
mainland, a small group of

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gladiators began to whisper
among themselves, the dry leaves

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of an old danger were already
lying ready, waiting only for a

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careful spark.
Among all the institutions of

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Roman life, few have remained as
vivid to later imagination as

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the gladiator.
The image of armored men

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fighting in a sand floored arena
while crowds of citizens cheered

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or jeered above them has
travelled through paintings,

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plays, novels and films across
2000 years.

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The reality, like most
realities, was both more

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ordinary and more strange than
the image suggests.

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Gladiatorial combat in Italy
began as a private custom, not a

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public spectacle.
Its earliest recorded form was a

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funeral rite said to have
entered Roman practice during

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the 3rd century, before the
Common Era.

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When a wealthy man died, his
heirs sometimes arranged for

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armed combat to be staged at his
tomb, perhaps as a relic of

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older sacrificial customs.
Over time, these private funeral

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games drifted toward public
entertainment.

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Magistrates and ambitious
politicians began to fund larger

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and more elaborate displays,
partly to honor relatives and

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partly to win the favour of the
Roman crowd.

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By the late Republic,
gladiatorial games had become a

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recognized feature of public
life.

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Specialized schools called ludi
had grown up to train the

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fighters.
The largest were in Capua, the

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chief city of Campania, where
the climate was warm, the land

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was rich, and the market
supplied a steady flow of

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weapons, oils and bodies.
A successful school could sell

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or rent its fighters to
magistrates planning games, and

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a particularly skilled gladiator
might become known by name.

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Across several cities.
Most gladiators were enslaved.

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Some were captives of war,
others were criminals condemned

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to the arena, and a smaller
number were free men who, for

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reasons of debt or desperation,
had sold themselves into the

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trade.
Their lives in the schools were

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strict and physical.
They trained daily with wooden

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weapons, learned specific styles
of combat and were fed

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carefully, sometimes on a diet
rich in barley and beans.

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Surviving skeletons of
gladiators examined by modern

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researchers suggest a body
conditioned for endurance rather

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than spectacle.
More wrestler than warrior.

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The fights themselves did not
always end in death.

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Many bouts concluded with the
surrender of the loser and the

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decision by the sponsor of the
games, often guided by the mood

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of the crowd.
A skilled gladiator was a

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valuable possession, and his
owner had little wish to see him

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destroyed without cause.
Yet death was always near.

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The career of a gladiator was
usually short.

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The wounds were real, and the
sand of the arena absorbed many

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quiet endings.
The men who walked back to their

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cells at the end of a day's
training carried with them the

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knowledge that the next time the
gates opened to the public might

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be the last morning they would
see.

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It was within this world, behind
the high walls of a school at

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Kapua, that the story of
Spartacus truly begins.

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He had not chosen the trade, and
the trade did not choose to

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release him.
The origins of Spartacus are

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known to us only in fragments.
Roman writers who composed their

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accounts after his death, and
not always with sympathy, agreed

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that he was a Thracian.
The Thracians were a people who

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lived in what is now roughly
Bulgaria, northeastern Greece,

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and the European edge of modern
Turkey.

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They were known to the Greeks
and Romans as fierce horsemen,

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skilled metal workers, and
worshippers of older gods,

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including a great rider deity
who appears on many surviving

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carvings.
Their land lay along the

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Borderlands of empires, often
crossed by armies and traders.

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00:17:49,440 --> 00:17:54,440
The historian Plutarch, writing
roughly 150 years after the

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events, described Spartacus as a
man of intelligence and dignity,

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more cultivated than one might
expect from his condition and

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gentle in his bearing.
Another writer, Appian, called

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him brave and strong.
These portraits were composed

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long after his death and surely
shaped by hindsight, but they

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suggest that even his enemies
recognized something unusual in

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him.
According to one tradition,

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00:18:30,560 --> 00:18:35,800
Spartacus had once served as a
soldier in the Roman auxiliary

230
00:18:35,800 --> 00:18:39,360
forces.
The auxiliaries were units

231
00:18:39,360 --> 00:18:44,760
recruited from non Roman peoples
to support the legions, and many

232
00:18:44,760 --> 00:18:50,040
Thracians with their reputation
for horsemanship were drawn into

233
00:18:50,040 --> 00:18:53,440
such service.
If the tradition is accurate,

234
00:18:53,800 --> 00:18:57,240
then he would have known
something of Roman military life

235
00:18:57,520 --> 00:19:01,400
from the inside.
He would have understood how

236
00:19:01,400 --> 00:19:06,480
legions camped, how they
marched, how they fought.

237
00:19:07,520 --> 00:19:11,400
He would have seen, perhaps, the
discipline that made them so

238
00:19:11,400 --> 00:19:16,840
formidable, and also the moments
when that discipline could fray.

239
00:19:17,240 --> 00:19:22,480
How he passed from Roman service
into Roman captivity is unclear.

240
00:19:23,160 --> 00:19:28,320
Some accounts say he deserted.
Some suggest he was on the wrong

241
00:19:28,320 --> 00:19:34,160
side of a frontier conflict.
What is recorded is that he was

242
00:19:34,160 --> 00:19:39,600
eventually sold into slavery and
trained as a gladiator.

243
00:19:39,920 --> 00:19:45,360
The school where he ended his
journey was the Lutus of

244
00:19:45,360 --> 00:19:50,560
Lentilus Batiatus in Capua,
where the gladiators were

245
00:19:50,560 --> 00:19:55,240
drilled in various combat styles
for the games.

246
00:19:55,640 --> 00:20:00,480
There was also in the tales
handed down to us a companion.

247
00:20:01,360 --> 00:20:05,640
Plutarch wrote that Spartacus
was accompanied by a Thracian

248
00:20:05,640 --> 00:20:08,280
woman.
Said to have been a priestess of

249
00:20:08,280 --> 00:20:12,760
Dionysus, the wine God in his
older, Wilder form.

250
00:20:13,560 --> 00:20:19,080
According to the story, she once
observed a snake coiling itself

251
00:20:19,080 --> 00:20:23,520
peacefully around the sleeping
head of Spartacus and

252
00:20:23,520 --> 00:20:28,720
interpreted it as a sign that
his fate would be remarkable,

253
00:20:29,160 --> 00:20:34,000
both great and grave.
We need not weigh whether this

254
00:20:34,000 --> 00:20:38,720
happened literally.
Such omens were a familiar

255
00:20:38,720 --> 00:20:43,640
feature of ancient biography,
woven around important figures

256
00:20:44,000 --> 00:20:47,160
to give shape to the strangeness
of their lives.

257
00:20:48,120 --> 00:20:54,080
What the story tells us is that
even in his own time, those

258
00:20:54,080 --> 00:20:58,000
close to him sensed that he
carried something more than the

259
00:20:58,040 --> 00:21:03,560
ordinary weight of a slave.
The city of Capua, where

260
00:21:03,560 --> 00:21:09,000
Spartacus would soon become
legend, SAT in the warm plain of

261
00:21:09,000 --> 00:21:12,840
Campania, north of the Bay of
Naples.

262
00:21:13,600 --> 00:21:19,040
It was old and proud, with
ancient temples and a long

263
00:21:19,040 --> 00:21:24,160
history of its own, having once
briefly sided with Hannibal

264
00:21:24,880 --> 00:21:27,080
during the wars against
Carthage.

265
00:21:27,440 --> 00:21:32,480
By the time of our story, it had
long since returned to Roman

266
00:21:32,480 --> 00:21:37,880
authority and become a hub of
trade, agriculture, and

267
00:21:37,880 --> 00:21:42,880
entertainment.
Its weather was mild, its land

268
00:21:42,880 --> 00:21:48,880
fertile, and its public works,
including a famous Amphitheatre,

269
00:21:49,280 --> 00:21:53,000
made it a natural home for
gladiator schools.

270
00:21:53,400 --> 00:21:58,840
The ludus of Lentilus Batiatus
stood somewhere within or near

271
00:21:58,840 --> 00:22:02,160
the city.
Of its physical layout we know

272
00:22:02,160 --> 00:22:08,040
little, but we can reconstruct
from other surviving schools the

273
00:22:08,040 --> 00:22:11,960
general pattern.
There would have been an inner

274
00:22:11,960 --> 00:22:18,320
training ground, a courtyard
ringed by small cells, kitchens

275
00:22:18,320 --> 00:22:23,120
and store rooms, and perhaps a
modest residence for the owner.

276
00:22:23,520 --> 00:22:27,680
Guards walk the corridors.
The men trained under

277
00:22:27,680 --> 00:22:33,040
specialized instructors called
doctores, each teaching a

278
00:22:33,040 --> 00:22:38,360
distinct style of combat.
Days followed a steady rhythm of

279
00:22:38,360 --> 00:22:41,440
drill, meal, rest and drill
again.

280
00:22:41,760 --> 00:22:47,040
For the men inside, life was
both ordinary and unbearable.

281
00:22:47,680 --> 00:22:52,320
They were fed, clothed, and
treated as valuable property,

282
00:22:52,800 --> 00:22:56,520
and yet they knew that the
months of training LED toward

283
00:22:56,520 --> 00:23:01,760
arenas where they would be
displayed wounded and possibly

284
00:23:01,760 --> 00:23:06,280
killed for the pleasure of
crowds who did not know their

285
00:23:06,280 --> 00:23:09,720
names.
Some accepted this fate with a

286
00:23:09,720 --> 00:23:15,080
grim professionalism.
Some sought ways to die well or

287
00:23:15,080 --> 00:23:19,160
to win their freedom through
extraordinary skill.

288
00:23:20,000 --> 00:23:25,080
And some began quietly to
imagine another future.

289
00:23:25,480 --> 00:23:29,440
According to Plutarch, around
200 men in the school of

290
00:23:29,440 --> 00:23:33,000
Bhatiatus formed a plan to break
out.

291
00:23:33,240 --> 00:23:38,800
The reason given is simple.
They had committed no offense,

292
00:23:39,400 --> 00:23:44,680
and yet they were being held to
a violent destiny they had not

293
00:23:44,680 --> 00:23:48,440
chosen.
The plot, however, was betrayed.

294
00:23:48,760 --> 00:23:51,720
Word leaked.
Perhaps through a careless

295
00:23:51,720 --> 00:23:55,520
remark, perhaps through a
calculated whisper.

296
00:23:56,680 --> 00:24:00,680
The school's owner began to take
precautions.

297
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:06,760
Knowing they could not delay any
longer, the conspirators acted.

298
00:24:07,320 --> 00:24:12,120
About 70 of them, perhaps a few
more, broke out of the kitchens,

299
00:24:12,360 --> 00:24:14,760
snatching whatever they could
find.

300
00:24:15,120 --> 00:24:20,240
Cleavers, spits, knives, the
heavy iron tools of food

301
00:24:20,240 --> 00:24:23,240
preparation.
They forced their way through

302
00:24:23,240 --> 00:24:27,640
the streets of Capua.
By chance, on one of the nearby

303
00:24:27,640 --> 00:24:32,720
roads, they came upon a wagon
carrying gladiator weapons,

304
00:24:33,360 --> 00:24:36,760
possibly intended for a coming
spectacle.

305
00:24:37,440 --> 00:24:41,000
They seized it.
Now they were no longer escaped

306
00:24:41,000 --> 00:24:46,320
slaves with kitchen tools.
They were armed. 70 men with

307
00:24:46,320 --> 00:24:50,520
stolen weapons would not on
their own threaten Rome.

308
00:24:51,120 --> 00:24:56,760
But these were not ordinary men.
They had trained in arms.

309
00:24:57,360 --> 00:25:02,280
They had nothing to return to.
And among them, by accounts that

310
00:25:02,280 --> 00:25:07,480
came later, were three leaders
whose names would soon be known

311
00:25:07,480 --> 00:25:15,840
across the peninsula, 2 Gauls,
Cryxus and Oenemaeus, and a

312
00:25:15,840 --> 00:25:20,000
Thracian whose name was already
beginning to gather.

313
00:25:20,000 --> 00:25:23,920
A quiet wait.
Spartacus.

314
00:25:24,200 --> 00:25:29,280
What followed in those first
days of freedom must have seemed

315
00:25:29,760 --> 00:25:33,920
unreal.
The escapees moved through the

316
00:25:33,920 --> 00:25:38,680
Campanian countryside, gathering
followers as they went.

317
00:25:39,760 --> 00:25:43,080
Other slaves on the great
estates, hearing of the

318
00:25:43,080 --> 00:25:46,160
breakout, slipped away to join
them.

319
00:25:46,600 --> 00:25:51,160
Within weeks, perhaps a few
months, what had begun as a

320
00:25:51,160 --> 00:25:56,160
small fugitive band had grown
into something larger, perhaps

321
00:25:56,320 --> 00:26:02,680
several 100 or even a few 1000.
Their composition reflected the

322
00:26:02,680 --> 00:26:07,320
human geography of Roman
slavery, Thracians, Gauls,

323
00:26:07,320 --> 00:26:13,960
Germans, men from Asia Minor,
men from northern Italy, mixing

324
00:26:13,960 --> 00:26:17,440
dialects and customs around
shared fires.

325
00:26:17,760 --> 00:26:21,960
In those early weeks, there was
much that had to be invented.

326
00:26:22,120 --> 00:26:27,800
As the band moved, they needed
food, and so they began to raid

327
00:26:27,800 --> 00:26:33,360
the great rural estates whose
granaries lay open in the soft

328
00:26:33,360 --> 00:26:37,840
Campanian air.
They needed weapons, and so they

329
00:26:37,840 --> 00:26:42,480
took what they could from
villas, from forges, from any

330
00:26:42,480 --> 00:26:45,480
traveller who happened to cross
their path.

331
00:26:45,920 --> 00:26:50,720
They needed a leader's voice,
and Spartacus, perhaps along

332
00:26:50,720 --> 00:26:54,120
with his Gallic companions,
provided one.

333
00:26:55,120 --> 00:27:00,480
Decisions had to be made quickly
which road to take, which town

334
00:27:00,480 --> 00:27:04,520
to leave alone, which valley
would shelter them by night.

335
00:27:05,400 --> 00:27:11,760
Mistakes in any of these choices
could end the rebellion before

336
00:27:11,760 --> 00:27:15,720
it had truly begun.
The chroniclers who rode of the

337
00:27:15,720 --> 00:27:21,400
revolt long afterward emphasized
one quality more than any other.

338
00:27:21,720 --> 00:27:26,320
In this early phase, the rebels
showed restraint.

339
00:27:27,320 --> 00:27:32,600
According to Plutarch, Spartacus
tried to keep his followers from

340
00:27:33,000 --> 00:27:37,400
indiscriminate plunder.
Knowing that wanton destruction

341
00:27:37,400 --> 00:27:41,360
would harden the local
population against him, he

342
00:27:41,360 --> 00:27:45,040
sought to take what was needed
and move on.

343
00:27:46,120 --> 00:27:49,800
Whether the policy was always
followed in practice is another

344
00:27:49,800 --> 00:27:52,520
question, but the intent
matters.

345
00:27:53,040 --> 00:27:56,840
He understood that an army
moving through occupied country

346
00:27:56,840 --> 00:28:01,600
lives or dies by the goodwill of
those it passes.

347
00:28:02,000 --> 00:28:06,640
The countryside of southern
Italy in those days was full of

348
00:28:06,640 --> 00:28:10,720
people whose loyalties were less
than warm toward Rome.

349
00:28:11,680 --> 00:28:15,920
Many shepherds in the southern
hills were themselves slaves, or

350
00:28:16,080 --> 00:28:21,400
near slaves, set free upon the
land to tend flocks for distant

351
00:28:21,400 --> 00:28:25,320
masters.
Some were rough men, used to

352
00:28:25,320 --> 00:28:29,520
hardship, used to making their
own decisions in the empty

353
00:28:29,520 --> 00:28:33,680
places.
When word came of an army of

354
00:28:33,680 --> 00:28:38,080
former slaves moving through the
region, more than a few of them

355
00:28:38,080 --> 00:28:42,560
simply walked away from their
flocks and joined the column.

356
00:28:43,040 --> 00:28:47,480
Their numbers, their familiarity
with the land, and their

357
00:28:47,480 --> 00:28:51,640
willingness to fight all
strengthened the rebellion.

358
00:28:52,080 --> 00:28:56,040
By the end of those first weeks,
the rebels were no longer a

359
00:28:56,040 --> 00:29:00,600
curiosity.
They had become a problem.

360
00:29:01,440 --> 00:29:05,640
Local authorities tried to
gather forces against them and

361
00:29:05,640 --> 00:29:09,600
were repelled.
Wealthy land owners began to

362
00:29:09,600 --> 00:29:15,600
send their valuables N away from
the gathering trouble, and

363
00:29:15,600 --> 00:29:20,440
somewhere among the rolling
hills of Campania, the leaders

364
00:29:20,440 --> 00:29:24,880
of the revolt began to consider
where they might make a more

365
00:29:24,880 --> 00:29:30,440
lasting refuge, A place high
enough and wild enough that the

366
00:29:30,440 --> 00:29:34,280
legions of Rome would have
difficulty reaching them.

367
00:29:34,640 --> 00:29:38,480
The first refuge they chose was
Mount Vesuvius.

368
00:29:39,120 --> 00:29:43,640
To later generations, that name
carries a different weight,

369
00:29:44,120 --> 00:29:50,880
because in the year 79 of the
Common Era, more than 150 years

370
00:29:50,880 --> 00:29:56,160
after our story, the volcano
would erupt and bury the cities

371
00:29:56,160 --> 00:30:00,600
of Pompeii and Herculaneum
beneath ash.

372
00:30:01,000 --> 00:30:06,440
But in the time of Spartacus,
Vesuvius was quiet.

373
00:30:07,120 --> 00:30:11,800
It rose green and forested above
the plain, its slopes covered in

374
00:30:11,800 --> 00:30:17,040
vineyards lower down and dense
scrub higher up, with hidden

375
00:30:17,040 --> 00:30:19,920
hollows and rocky outcrops near
the summit.

376
00:30:20,760 --> 00:30:26,240
It was a place where a small
armed force could disappear into

377
00:30:26,240 --> 00:30:31,800
the landscape, watch the roads
below, and keep the surprise of

378
00:30:32,120 --> 00:30:36,200
higher ground.
The Romans initially did not

379
00:30:36,200 --> 00:30:41,520
take the matter very seriously.
The early Republic had often

380
00:30:41,520 --> 00:30:46,680
dispatched small forces to deal
with local disturbances, and a

381
00:30:46,680 --> 00:30:51,880
band of escaped gladiators on a
wooded mountain seemed at first

382
00:30:51,880 --> 00:30:54,640
more an embarrassment than a
danger.

383
00:30:55,720 --> 00:31:00,160
The first detachment sent
against them was led by a prater

384
00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:05,920
named Gaius Claudius Gleber with
about 3000 men.

385
00:31:06,760 --> 00:31:11,760
These were not full legions.
Gleber's force was thrown

386
00:31:11,760 --> 00:31:16,680
together quickly, and his
soldiers were less seasoned than

387
00:31:16,680 --> 00:31:18,760
the gladiators they were
chasing.

388
00:31:19,160 --> 00:31:22,840
Gleber climbed the mountain with
the obvious plan of trapping the

389
00:31:22,840 --> 00:31:25,800
rebels at the summit and
starving them out.

390
00:31:26,640 --> 00:31:30,800
He arranged his troops along the
only known path leading up.

391
00:31:31,720 --> 00:31:34,720
From below, the situation looked
simple.

392
00:31:35,320 --> 00:31:40,160
The rebels, hemmed in by sheer
cliffs on all other sides, would

393
00:31:40,160 --> 00:31:43,160
soon run out of food and have to
surrender.

394
00:31:43,880 --> 00:31:47,680
Days passed.
The Roman camp grew confident.

395
00:31:47,920 --> 00:31:50,560
Watch fires burned in the lower
glades.

396
00:31:51,120 --> 00:31:54,080
The siege seemed almost a
formality.

397
00:31:54,440 --> 00:31:59,280
But Spartacus, according to
ancient accounts, had been

398
00:31:59,280 --> 00:32:03,840
studying the mountain.
He noticed that wild grape vines

399
00:32:03,840 --> 00:32:08,840
grew thickly on the cliffs,
twisting around the rocks under

400
00:32:08,840 --> 00:32:12,680
his direction.
The gladiators cut long lengths

401
00:32:12,680 --> 00:32:16,200
of vine and braided them
together into ropes.

402
00:32:16,880 --> 00:32:21,880
By night, while the Roman watch
tended its fires below, the

403
00:32:21,880 --> 00:32:26,320
rebels lowered themselves down
the steep face of the mountain.

404
00:32:26,640 --> 00:32:32,520
On these green ladders they
reached level ground, crept

405
00:32:32,520 --> 00:32:38,000
around the unsuspecting Roman
camp, and fell upon it from the

406
00:32:38,000 --> 00:32:42,640
rear.
The result was a route Glaber's

407
00:32:42,640 --> 00:32:47,160
men, surprised in the dark by
enemies they had thought safely

408
00:32:47,160 --> 00:32:53,080
above them, broke and fled.
Roman weapons, baggage and

409
00:32:53,080 --> 00:32:56,600
standards passed into the hands
of the rebels.

410
00:32:57,480 --> 00:33:02,840
With one improvised descent, the
escaped gladiators had won their

411
00:33:02,840 --> 00:33:06,720
first real victory.
There is something striking

412
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:10,880
about the imagery of that night.
A volcano sleeps.

413
00:33:11,520 --> 00:33:17,680
Wild vines grow on its old lava.
A handful of men, born in

414
00:33:17,680 --> 00:33:22,800
distant lands and brought
together by chains, weave away

415
00:33:22,800 --> 00:33:25,280
down the Cliff with their own
hands.

416
00:33:25,920 --> 00:33:30,240
They reached the level fields
and turned the careful Roman

417
00:33:30,240 --> 00:33:37,080
plan inside out, all in the soft
light before dawn.

418
00:33:37,440 --> 00:33:41,960
Whatever else the revolt would
become, it began with that

419
00:33:41,960 --> 00:33:47,720
ingenious descent on a mountain
that had not yet learned what it

420
00:33:47,720 --> 00:33:53,320
would one day be remembered for.
News of the defeated Vesuvius

421
00:33:53,520 --> 00:33:56,880
travelled quickly to the Senate
in Rome.

422
00:33:57,320 --> 00:34:00,120
It came as an unwelcome
surprise.

423
00:34:00,800 --> 00:34:05,360
The Republic at that moment was
already absorbed in two distant

424
00:34:05,360 --> 00:34:10,639
and difficult wars.
In the East, the formidable King

425
00:34:10,639 --> 00:34:15,679
Mithridates of Pontus was
challenging Roman power across

426
00:34:15,719 --> 00:34:21,000
Asia Minor and the Black Sea.
In Spain, the rebel general

427
00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:26,520
Quintus Sartorius, a former
Roman officer turned outlaw, had

428
00:34:26,520 --> 00:34:30,560
been holding off Roman armies
for years.

429
00:34:31,800 --> 00:34:35,800
The very best Roman commanders
were fighting on those fronts.

430
00:34:36,040 --> 00:34:41,080
The disturbance in Italy was
treated at first as a secondary

431
00:34:41,080 --> 00:34:45,400
problem.
Still, something had to be done.

432
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:49,960
A second prater, Publius
Verenius, was sent against the

433
00:34:49,960 --> 00:34:54,960
rebels with a larger force.
Verenius divided his army,

434
00:34:55,560 --> 00:34:59,440
hoping to pin Spartacus from
multiple directions at once.

435
00:35:00,120 --> 00:35:04,720
The plan went badly.
Spartacus and his lieutenants

436
00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:08,800
moved with surprising speed
across the countryside,

437
00:35:09,200 --> 00:35:13,040
attacking Roman detachments
before they could combine.

438
00:35:13,720 --> 00:35:18,240
Subordinates of Verenius were
defeated in turn.

439
00:35:19,200 --> 00:35:23,560
According to one account,
Spartacus even captured horses,

440
00:35:23,680 --> 00:35:28,640
lictors, and the personal
Insignia of a Roman magistrate,

441
00:35:29,040 --> 00:35:33,800
symbols of authority that no
escaped gladiator should have

442
00:35:33,800 --> 00:35:38,600
possessed.
Verenius himself only narrowly

443
00:35:38,600 --> 00:35:41,920
escaped.
After these victories, the rebel

444
00:35:41,920 --> 00:35:46,000
host swelled.
Estimates from ancient writers

445
00:35:46,000 --> 00:35:51,000
vary widely, suggesting 10s of
thousands and rising.

446
00:35:51,480 --> 00:35:56,720
The figures are imprecise, but
there is no doubt that the

447
00:35:56,720 --> 00:36:02,320
movement had grown beyond a band
of fugitives into a recognizable

448
00:36:02,320 --> 00:36:06,120
army.
Spartacus seems to have shown an

449
00:36:06,120 --> 00:36:11,560
unusual gift for organization.
He drilled the new arrivals in

450
00:36:11,560 --> 00:36:15,640
basic discipline.
He insisted, according to the

451
00:36:15,640 --> 00:36:20,520
sources, on a rough sharing of
plunder which kept the host

452
00:36:20,520 --> 00:36:23,600
together against the temptations
of rivalry.

453
00:36:24,280 --> 00:36:28,640
He moved his people through the
countryside in winter quarters,

454
00:36:29,000 --> 00:36:32,880
rested them and prepared for
what would come next.

455
00:36:33,240 --> 00:36:38,280
Around this time, the rebels
also began to manufacture their

456
00:36:38,280 --> 00:36:42,240
own arms.
Captured Roman weapons formed

457
00:36:42,240 --> 00:36:47,680
the corps, but iron was gathered
from forges and farms, and tools

458
00:36:47,680 --> 00:36:51,080
were beaten into spear points
and shield rims.

459
00:36:51,840 --> 00:36:57,120
Wagons, animals and supplies
followed in long columns.

460
00:36:57,680 --> 00:37:01,280
The gladiator school had been
left far behind.

461
00:37:01,880 --> 00:37:06,320
What was emerging was something
with the structure, if not the

462
00:37:06,320 --> 00:37:12,200
Polish, of a real military force
for the people in their path.

463
00:37:12,560 --> 00:37:17,360
The experience was complicated.
Some great estates were

464
00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:21,280
stripped, some towns closed
their gates.

465
00:37:21,920 --> 00:37:26,320
Yet many of the rural slaves,
hearing of the host, simply

466
00:37:26,320 --> 00:37:31,800
walked away from their masters
and joined free.

467
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:36,040
Shepherds from the southern
hills drifted in as well.

468
00:37:36,360 --> 00:37:41,000
The cultural and linguistic
mixture inside the camp must

469
00:37:41,000 --> 00:37:45,840
have been astonishing.
Latin, Thracian, Celtic

470
00:37:45,840 --> 00:37:51,760
dialects, dialects of the German
lands and various forms of Greek

471
00:37:52,320 --> 00:37:56,000
would have been heard around the
same evening fires.

472
00:37:56,320 --> 00:38:00,760
A Republic that had once
dispatched 3000 men to crush

473
00:38:00,760 --> 00:38:05,000
this movement was beginning to
understand that the matter

474
00:38:05,000 --> 00:38:10,480
required more than that.
For a brief time, in the wide

475
00:38:10,480 --> 00:38:16,000
spaces of southern Italy,
something strange and almost

476
00:38:16,000 --> 00:38:21,560
without parallel had come into
being. 10s of thousands of

477
00:38:21,560 --> 00:38:26,200
people who only months before
had been the property of others,

478
00:38:26,760 --> 00:38:31,720
were now living together as a
kind of mobile community, with

479
00:38:31,720 --> 00:38:36,400
their own rules, their own
counsels, their own punishments

480
00:38:36,400 --> 00:38:41,120
and rewards.
It was not a state in any formal

481
00:38:41,120 --> 00:38:44,960
sense.
It produced no coins, no

482
00:38:44,960 --> 00:38:52,000
constitution, no recorded laws.
But it functioned for season

483
00:38:52,000 --> 00:38:56,720
after season, against everything
Rome could send against it.

484
00:38:57,040 --> 00:39:01,840
Inside this rough polity, the
divisions of the old world

485
00:39:01,840 --> 00:39:05,480
softened.
A man who had been a household

486
00:39:05,480 --> 00:39:10,520
slave in a Roman city walked
beside a herdsman who had been

487
00:39:10,520 --> 00:39:16,680
free in his own homeland.
A Thracian who had served in the

488
00:39:16,680 --> 00:39:22,320
auxiliary marched next to a gall
whose grandfather had fought

489
00:39:22,320 --> 00:39:27,160
against the legions.
Languages mixed in the kitchens

490
00:39:27,160 --> 00:39:33,200
and around to watch fires, a
common cause, held them together

491
00:39:33,200 --> 00:39:36,480
more reliably than any shared
tongue.

492
00:39:36,880 --> 00:39:41,600
Spartacus seems to have taken
some pains to maintain order.

493
00:39:42,000 --> 00:39:46,040
He divided the spoils, according
to ancient accounts, on a

494
00:39:46,040 --> 00:39:50,560
pattern that gave each follower
A roughly equal share.

495
00:39:51,240 --> 00:39:55,840
He forbade certain kinds of
plunder, especially of gold and

496
00:39:55,840 --> 00:39:59,960
silver, which he considered
useless burdens that would slow

497
00:39:59,960 --> 00:40:03,440
the army.
There is even a tradition that

498
00:40:03,440 --> 00:40:08,920
he tried to limit the use of
money inside the camp so that no

499
00:40:08,920 --> 00:40:12,560
one could grow rich at the
expense of others.

500
00:40:13,520 --> 00:40:17,080
Whether this is a later
embellishment by sympathetic

501
00:40:17,080 --> 00:40:23,280
writers cannot be known, but it
is plausible that he understood

502
00:40:23,360 --> 00:40:27,560
instinctively.
That an army of escaped slaves

503
00:40:27,560 --> 00:40:32,360
could only hold together if it
did not become too quickly a

504
00:40:32,360 --> 00:40:36,360
small Kingdom of its own.
There were certainly tensions.

505
00:40:37,120 --> 00:40:42,320
The decisions of where to March,
when to fight, and what to do

506
00:40:42,320 --> 00:40:46,600
with prisoners must have
produced disagreement.

507
00:40:47,680 --> 00:40:53,160
The leaders Co operated, but
they did not always agree, and

508
00:40:53,160 --> 00:40:58,880
beneath the surface unity ran
the natural strain of any large

509
00:40:58,880 --> 00:41:02,920
heterogeneous force.
Some accounts suggest that

510
00:41:02,920 --> 00:41:07,920
Spartacus had a longer view,
while others among the leaders

511
00:41:07,920 --> 00:41:12,480
preferred immediate plunder and
short marches.

512
00:41:13,320 --> 00:41:18,000
These tensions would eventually
shape the course of the war.

513
00:41:18,360 --> 00:41:22,720
For the ordinary follower,
however, the days had a strange

514
00:41:22,720 --> 00:41:26,920
new shape.
Where once there had been only

515
00:41:26,920 --> 00:41:31,840
the labor demanded by an owner,
now there were watches to keep,

516
00:41:32,040 --> 00:41:36,080
weapons to clean, formations to
learn.

517
00:41:36,760 --> 00:41:40,760
Where once there had been the
steady fear of arbitrary

518
00:41:40,760 --> 00:41:46,040
punishment, now there was the
harder but more bearable fear of

519
00:41:46,040 --> 00:41:48,800
battle.
Where once there had been

520
00:41:48,800 --> 00:41:54,880
silence, now there were songs in
many tongues told around fires

521
00:41:54,880 --> 00:41:58,280
and valleys whose names few of
them knew.

522
00:41:58,720 --> 00:42:03,280
The Romans, observing from a
distance, called this band an

523
00:42:03,280 --> 00:42:07,320
insurrection, a slave army, a
swarm.

524
00:42:07,960 --> 00:42:12,320
It was all those things, but it
was also briefly and

525
00:42:12,320 --> 00:42:17,280
incompletely, something none of
them quite had a word for a

526
00:42:17,280 --> 00:42:22,560
community of the formerly
enslaved walking under their own

527
00:42:22,560 --> 00:42:26,680
banners through the heart of the
Republic that had once owned

528
00:42:26,680 --> 00:42:30,360
them.
Among the rebels, Spartacus did

529
00:42:30,360 --> 00:42:34,320
not stand alone.
The accounts that have come down

530
00:42:34,320 --> 00:42:40,000
to us, though incomplete, name
two other leaders, especially

531
00:42:40,960 --> 00:42:46,520
Crixus and Oenemaeus, were both
said to be of Gallic origin,

532
00:42:47,320 --> 00:42:50,760
born in the Celtic speaking
lands that stretched from

533
00:42:50,760 --> 00:42:55,560
northern Italy across modern
France and into central Europe.

534
00:42:55,960 --> 00:43:00,680
They had likely been captured in
earlier Roman campaigns, sold

535
00:43:00,680 --> 00:43:05,120
into slavery and trained as
gladiators alongside Spartacus

536
00:43:05,440 --> 00:43:09,080
in Capua.
Their names alone tell us

537
00:43:09,080 --> 00:43:13,840
something.
Crixus is a Celtic word related

538
00:43:13,840 --> 00:43:16,520
to ideas of curling or WAVY
hair.

539
00:43:17,120 --> 00:43:22,480
Oh in Emmaus may have borrowed
his name from a figure in Greek

540
00:43:22,480 --> 00:43:28,560
mythology, perhaps adopted in
the school as a stage identity.

541
00:43:28,920 --> 00:43:33,360
The presence of these Gallic
leaders matters because it

542
00:43:33,360 --> 00:43:36,280
reveals the layered nature of
the revolt.

543
00:43:36,960 --> 00:43:41,080
The Rising was not simply a
Thracian rebellion under a

544
00:43:41,080 --> 00:43:45,880
Thracian leader, nor purely a
movement of Italian rural

545
00:43:45,880 --> 00:43:50,400
slaves.
It was something more like a

546
00:43:50,400 --> 00:43:54,640
coalition.
Different peoples, different

547
00:43:54,640 --> 00:43:59,000
languages, and different
memories of homelands lost moved

548
00:43:59,000 --> 00:44:06,080
together, sometimes harmoniously
and sometimes with friction.

549
00:44:07,120 --> 00:44:12,000
Decisions about where to March
and what to do next were not

550
00:44:12,000 --> 00:44:16,520
always easy.
Some ancient historians, riding

551
00:44:16,520 --> 00:44:20,760
centuries after the events,
tried to organize the army's

552
00:44:20,760 --> 00:44:26,720
behavior into clear factions.
According to one tradition,

553
00:44:27,080 --> 00:44:33,520
Spartacus wished to lead his
followers N toward the Alps in

554
00:44:33,520 --> 00:44:37,280
the hope that once they crossed
into the Celtic and Germanic

555
00:44:37,280 --> 00:44:42,840
lands beyond, those who were
Gauls or Germans could return to

556
00:44:42,840 --> 00:44:47,400
their homes, while others could
disperse into the wide

557
00:44:47,400 --> 00:44:53,240
territories of Europe.
Crixus, by some accounts,

558
00:44:53,760 --> 00:44:58,360
preferred to remain in Italy,
raid the richest states of the

559
00:44:58,360 --> 00:45:02,200
South, and live on the spoils of
the peninsula.

560
00:45:02,600 --> 00:45:06,960
The accuracy of this neat
division is uncertain.

561
00:45:07,720 --> 00:45:12,800
Real councils of war among large
groups of fugitives are rarely

562
00:45:12,800 --> 00:45:16,080
so tidy.
But the broad sense that the

563
00:45:16,080 --> 00:45:20,080
leaders did not always agree
fits the pattern of any large

564
00:45:20,080 --> 00:45:25,120
heterogeneous army.
What is clearer is that for much

565
00:45:25,120 --> 00:45:29,040
of the war the leaders Co
operated effectively.

566
00:45:29,600 --> 00:45:32,080
They divided forces when
necessary.

567
00:45:32,680 --> 00:45:37,880
They reunited when threatened.
They moved across the Italian

568
00:45:37,880 --> 00:45:42,160
countryside with a fluency that
surprised Roman commanders

569
00:45:42,480 --> 00:45:44,880
trained on more conventional
opponents.

570
00:45:45,840 --> 00:45:51,080
Spartacus seems to have been the
principal voice in strategic

571
00:45:51,080 --> 00:45:57,240
matters, though his authority
rested less on formal title than

572
00:45:57,240 --> 00:45:59,000
on the trust of those around
him.

573
00:45:59,400 --> 00:46:03,760
The composition of the rebel
host raises a quiet question

574
00:46:04,040 --> 00:46:06,960
that historians have asked ever
since.

575
00:46:07,600 --> 00:46:10,800
Was this a war for the abolition
of slavery?

576
00:46:10,800 --> 00:46:17,240
As such, the evidence suggests
not, at least not in the form

577
00:46:17,440 --> 00:46:22,920
later eras would recognize.
Ancient sources do not record

578
00:46:22,920 --> 00:46:26,880
any clear program to dismantle
the institution.

579
00:46:27,320 --> 00:46:31,400
The rebels seemed to have
wanted, above all to escape

580
00:46:31,400 --> 00:46:36,920
their own bondage, to reach
freedom for themselves and their

581
00:46:36,920 --> 00:46:40,520
companions.
That goal was already

582
00:46:40,520 --> 00:46:43,240
revolutionary enough in the
Roman world.

583
00:46:43,600 --> 00:46:46,480
It needed no theory to make it
dangerous.

584
00:46:46,880 --> 00:46:51,440
By the spring of the year 72,
before the Common Era, the

585
00:46:51,440 --> 00:46:55,880
Senate had decided that the
matter required more decisive

586
00:46:55,880 --> 00:46:59,480
action.
Two consular armies were

587
00:46:59,480 --> 00:47:04,920
dispatched against the rebels.
The consuls of that year, Lucius

588
00:47:05,000 --> 00:47:10,560
Gelius Publicola and Gnaeus
Cornelius Lentilus Claudianus,

589
00:47:11,000 --> 00:47:14,640
were experienced men of
standing.

590
00:47:15,520 --> 00:47:20,040
Their soldiers were proper
legionaries, not hastily

591
00:47:20,040 --> 00:47:25,400
gathered local levees.
The intent was clear.

592
00:47:26,120 --> 00:47:29,640
The revolt would be crushed
before the year was out.

593
00:47:30,040 --> 00:47:35,120
The campaign, however, did not
unfold as the Senate had hoped.

594
00:47:35,720 --> 00:47:40,600
Spartacus, by this point was
already moving N toward the

595
00:47:40,600 --> 00:47:44,960
Apennines and beyond.
He may have hoped to reach the

596
00:47:44,960 --> 00:47:50,160
Alps, cross them and dissolve
his army into the open lands of

597
00:47:50,160 --> 00:47:54,280
Sisalpine, Gaul and the
territories beyond.

598
00:47:55,080 --> 00:48:00,800
To do so he had to pass between
the consular armies before they

599
00:48:00,800 --> 00:48:04,440
could combine into a single fist
against him.

600
00:48:04,760 --> 00:48:09,640
It was at this point that the
army of the rebels divided.

601
00:48:10,600 --> 00:48:15,440
Crixus, who may have preferred a
different course, separated from

602
00:48:15,440 --> 00:48:21,800
the main host with a substantial
force, perhaps 30,000 men, drawn

603
00:48:21,800 --> 00:48:25,520
largely from the Gauls and
Germans among the followers.

604
00:48:26,040 --> 00:48:29,520
The reasons for the split are
not entirely clear.

605
00:48:29,880 --> 00:48:34,240
He may have wished to remain in
southern Italy and continue

606
00:48:34,240 --> 00:48:36,320
raiding the richest states
there.

607
00:48:37,000 --> 00:48:41,800
He may have been left as a rear
guard against Roman pursuit.

608
00:48:42,640 --> 00:48:47,280
He may have disagreed with the
decision to March N toward the

609
00:48:47,280 --> 00:48:52,960
cold, unfamiliar mountains.
Whatever the reason, the host

610
00:48:53,080 --> 00:48:57,720
had divided, and the two halves
would now face the consuls

611
00:48:58,200 --> 00:49:03,200
separately.
Crixus was caught first near

612
00:49:03,200 --> 00:49:07,280
Mount Garganus, A wooded
promontory jutting into the

613
00:49:07,280 --> 00:49:10,040
Adriatic on the eastern coast of
Italy.

614
00:49:10,640 --> 00:49:15,880
The consul Gelius engaged him.
The fighting was severe.

615
00:49:16,160 --> 00:49:20,120
Crixus and many of his followers
were killed in the battle.

616
00:49:20,800 --> 00:49:27,120
The defeat was a serious blow to
the rebels, both in numbers and

617
00:49:27,120 --> 00:49:30,440
in spirit.
One of the original gladiators

618
00:49:30,440 --> 00:49:34,240
of Capua, who had made the long
journey from a single act of

619
00:49:34,240 --> 00:49:38,520
breakout to the leadership of an
army, was gone.

620
00:49:39,360 --> 00:49:44,280
The hills of Garganis, with
their old oaks and their view of

621
00:49:44,280 --> 00:49:48,600
the Adriatic, kept his last
stand to themselves.

622
00:49:49,040 --> 00:49:52,840
The news must have reached
Spartacus while he was still

623
00:49:52,840 --> 00:49:58,520
moving N through the Apennines.
We can imagine the silence that

624
00:49:58,520 --> 00:50:01,840
fell upon the camp when the
messenger spoke.

625
00:50:03,040 --> 00:50:07,080
A leader who had stood beside
him in the kitchens of

626
00:50:07,080 --> 00:50:12,440
Bhatiatus, on the slopes of
Vesuvius and across the long

627
00:50:12,440 --> 00:50:18,040
campaign of the previous year,
was no longer in the world.

628
00:50:18,880 --> 00:50:24,040
The bond of the original
conspiracy was beginning to

629
00:50:24,520 --> 00:50:27,840
thin.
When Spartacus learned of the

630
00:50:27,840 --> 00:50:32,480
death of Crixus, he ordered an
unusual ceremony.

631
00:50:33,240 --> 00:50:38,640
According to the historian
Appian, he selected several 100

632
00:50:38,640 --> 00:50:43,400
Roman prisoners of war and
forced them to fight one another

633
00:50:43,840 --> 00:50:49,520
as gladiators in honor of his
fallen companion.

634
00:50:49,960 --> 00:50:53,600
The grim symbolism would have
been unmissable.

635
00:50:54,200 --> 00:50:57,920
The very right that had once
been used to entertain Romans at

636
00:50:57,920 --> 00:51:03,280
the funerals of their wealthy
was now being used by an escaped

637
00:51:03,280 --> 00:51:10,120
gladiator to mourn another.
Whatever else this gesture was,

638
00:51:10,640 --> 00:51:15,600
it was a careful statement.
We have not forgotten what was

639
00:51:15,600 --> 00:51:20,160
done to us, and we know exactly
how to return the form of it.

640
00:51:20,600 --> 00:51:25,000
The episode is one of the most
striking in the whole story, and

641
00:51:25,000 --> 00:51:27,280
also one of the hardest to
weigh.

642
00:51:28,280 --> 00:51:32,560
We do not know how many
prisoners were forced into these

643
00:51:32,560 --> 00:51:37,120
combats, nor under what exact
circumstances.

644
00:51:37,440 --> 00:51:42,040
Some modern historians have
wondered whether the number was

645
00:51:42,040 --> 00:51:47,960
inflated by ancient writers who
wished to underline the savagery

646
00:51:47,960 --> 00:51:51,040
of the rebels.
Others have suggested that the

647
00:51:51,040 --> 00:51:55,920
gesture, however severe, was
meant in part to discipline

648
00:51:55,920 --> 00:52:01,000
Spartacus's own followers,
reminding them of what awaited

649
00:52:01,000 --> 00:52:06,200
them if Rome won.
What is certain is that the

650
00:52:06,200 --> 00:52:10,520
symbolism was understood by
everyone who heard of it.

651
00:52:11,400 --> 00:52:15,360
The arena had been carried out
of Capua and into the hills.

652
00:52:15,640 --> 00:52:20,080
After this dark rite, Spartacus
turned upon the consuls

653
00:52:20,080 --> 00:52:24,520
themselves.
He met Lentilus, first defeating

654
00:52:24,520 --> 00:52:30,000
him in battle, and then Gelius
defeating him as well.

655
00:52:30,760 --> 00:52:35,960
The details of these engagements
are lost to time, but their

656
00:52:35,960 --> 00:52:39,600
cumulative effect was
extraordinary.

657
00:52:39,920 --> 00:52:45,280
Within a single campaign season,
the rebel leader had defeated

658
00:52:45,280 --> 00:52:50,080
the armies of two consuls of the
Roman Republic, the highest

659
00:52:50,080 --> 00:52:52,360
serving magistrates of the
state.

660
00:52:53,280 --> 00:52:58,160
Few foreign enemies in Roman
memory could claim such a record

661
00:52:58,920 --> 00:53:02,240
now.
An escaped gladiator leading a

662
00:53:02,240 --> 00:53:07,280
multilingual host of former
slaves had done it without the

663
00:53:07,280 --> 00:53:10,240
resources of any Kingdom behind
him.

664
00:53:10,600 --> 00:53:15,800
The Senate's mood grew darker.
Whatever embarrassment had

665
00:53:15,800 --> 00:53:20,640
earlier been felt now hardened
into something closer to alarm.

666
00:53:21,640 --> 00:53:26,080
Speeches in the Curia spoke of
the danger no longer as an

667
00:53:26,080 --> 00:53:30,840
inconvenience, but as a serious
threat to public order.

668
00:53:31,800 --> 00:53:35,680
New levees were considered, old
allies were called upon.

669
00:53:36,160 --> 00:53:41,720
The image of the runaway slave,
once a figure of ridicule, took

670
00:53:41,720 --> 00:53:45,160
on a sharper edge in the popular
imagination.

671
00:53:45,480 --> 00:53:51,320
And still Spartacus marched.
His great column moved steadily

672
00:53:51,320 --> 00:53:55,520
up the spine of Italy, toward
the high passes of the north,

673
00:53:56,080 --> 00:54:00,240
where the air would soon grow
colder and the white walls of

674
00:54:00,240 --> 00:54:06,080
the Alps would rise into view.
Behind him lay the Adriatic,

675
00:54:06,400 --> 00:54:11,760
where Crixus had fallen.
Ahead lay mountains he had

676
00:54:11,760 --> 00:54:17,480
perhaps known only by report,
ridges he must have heard the

677
00:54:17,480 --> 00:54:21,960
older soldiers speak of in his
auxiliary days.

678
00:54:23,000 --> 00:54:27,280
Beyond those mountains lay
something that, from where he

679
00:54:27,280 --> 00:54:30,880
stood, might have looked very
nearly like home.

680
00:54:31,280 --> 00:54:36,360
By the late summer or autumn of
72, before the Common Era, the

681
00:54:36,360 --> 00:54:41,160
rebel host had reached the broad
valley of the Poe, the great

682
00:54:41,160 --> 00:54:44,760
plain that stretches across
northern Italy between the

683
00:54:44,760 --> 00:54:50,560
Apennines and the Alps.
This was a region of fertile

684
00:54:50,560 --> 00:54:56,280
farmland, of growing towns, and
of a population that included

685
00:54:56,280 --> 00:55:01,600
many Celts whose ancestors had
settled there centuries earlier.

686
00:55:01,960 --> 00:55:06,040
To Spartacus, it must have
looked like the gateway to

687
00:55:06,040 --> 00:55:10,280
escape the Alps loomed on the
horizon.

688
00:55:10,800 --> 00:55:16,720
Beyond them lay the wide world
of Gaul, Germania and the steppe

689
00:55:16,720 --> 00:55:21,240
lands stretching E toward his
own birthplace.

690
00:55:21,680 --> 00:55:25,760
In this northern country,
another Roman army was waiting.

691
00:55:26,560 --> 00:55:33,280
Gaius Cassius Longinus, the
governor of Sisalpine Gaul, met

692
00:55:33,280 --> 00:55:37,280
the rebels near the city of
Mutina, modern Modena.

693
00:55:38,120 --> 00:55:42,680
The forces he commanded would
have been a mixture of regional

694
00:55:42,680 --> 00:55:46,600
levees and any veterans
available in the province.

695
00:55:47,480 --> 00:55:52,560
He intended to block the rebel
advance and hold the line until

696
00:55:52,560 --> 00:55:55,400
reinforcements could arrive from
Rome.

697
00:55:55,840 --> 00:56:01,000
The battle did not save him.
Cassius was defeated.

698
00:56:02,120 --> 00:56:06,840
Mutina was the last great
obstacle between Spartacus and

699
00:56:06,840 --> 00:56:11,680
the foothills of the Alps.
With its commander beaten, the

700
00:56:11,680 --> 00:56:14,680
rebel host was effectively
unopposed.

701
00:56:14,680 --> 00:56:19,360
In the north, the road to the
mountains lay open, and a

702
00:56:19,360 --> 00:56:23,760
careful observer might have
thought that the war was about

703
00:56:23,760 --> 00:56:30,240
to end as quietly as it had
begun, with thousands of men and

704
00:56:30,240 --> 00:56:35,160
women slipping over the high
passes and dissolving into the

705
00:56:35,160 --> 00:56:39,080
lands beyond.
We can imagine, although we

706
00:56:39,080 --> 00:56:43,000
cannot know, the mood of the
camp in those weeks.

707
00:56:43,920 --> 00:56:48,120
Some among the followers may
have been Gauls and Germans

708
00:56:48,120 --> 00:56:51,360
whose homelands lay just over
the Ridge.

709
00:56:52,240 --> 00:56:56,720
They would have known the names
of distant rivers, the shapes of

710
00:56:56,720 --> 00:57:01,280
their own valleys, the half
remembered words of their first

711
00:57:01,280 --> 00:57:05,360
language.
To them, the Alps were not

712
00:57:05,360 --> 00:57:11,680
merely A barrier, but a doorway.
The journey of the past year,

713
00:57:11,880 --> 00:57:15,720
with all its danger and
improvisation, was about to

714
00:57:15,720 --> 00:57:19,040
bring them within sight of what
they had lost.

715
00:57:19,480 --> 00:57:23,000
Others in the Host had no
homeland to which they could

716
00:57:23,000 --> 00:57:27,400
return.
They had been born into slavery,

717
00:57:27,640 --> 00:57:32,920
or had spent so many years in it
that the memory of any earlier

718
00:57:32,920 --> 00:57:38,040
life had grown faint.
For them the great mountains

719
00:57:38,040 --> 00:57:43,000
promised something simpler and
more uncertain, a wide unknown

720
00:57:43,560 --> 00:57:48,600
where they might disappear from
the eyes of Rome and begin

721
00:57:48,720 --> 00:57:52,240
again.
Whatever waited beyond the

722
00:57:52,240 --> 00:57:57,040
passes, it could not easily be
worse than what lay behind.

723
00:57:57,400 --> 00:58:03,480
For Rome, the moment was tense.
If Spartacus crossed the Alps,

724
00:58:04,120 --> 00:58:07,920
the Republic would have to live
with a vast and humiliating

725
00:58:07,920 --> 00:58:13,400
dispersal of fugitives into
territories where its arm did

726
00:58:13,400 --> 00:58:18,480
not easily reach.
Even if his army never returned,

727
00:58:18,800 --> 00:58:21,880
the political damage would be
considerable.

728
00:58:22,160 --> 00:58:26,160
Yet there was little the Senate
could do at that moment but

729
00:58:26,160 --> 00:58:30,400
watch and prepare for whatever
would come next.

730
00:58:31,160 --> 00:58:37,120
The mountain passes themselves,
indifferent to politics, simply

731
00:58:37,120 --> 00:58:42,280
waited under their own slow
seasons of snow and wind.

732
00:58:42,680 --> 00:58:47,880
And then, for reasons that
ancient historians never fully

733
00:58:47,880 --> 00:58:55,000
explain, Spartacus turned South.
This is one of the great puzzles

734
00:58:55,000 --> 00:58:58,840
of his story.
If his goal had truly been to

735
00:58:58,840 --> 00:59:03,760
lead his followers across the
Alps and dissolved them safely

736
00:59:03,760 --> 00:59:08,600
into the lands beyond, he had
reached the moment of decision.

737
00:59:09,360 --> 00:59:15,320
His army was at peak strength.
His most recent victory had

738
00:59:15,320 --> 00:59:18,760
cleared his path.
There was nothing immediately

739
00:59:18,760 --> 00:59:23,280
stopping him.
And yet he turned around, the

740
00:59:23,280 --> 00:59:28,360
host wheeled back, and began to
March once more down the spine

741
00:59:28,360 --> 00:59:31,960
of Italy, away from the
mountains, away from escape.

742
00:59:32,360 --> 00:59:37,000
Various explanations have been
offered, each only partial.

743
00:59:37,640 --> 00:59:43,240
Perhaps the army itself refused.
Many of his followers may have

744
00:59:43,240 --> 00:59:47,600
preferred the richest states of
the South to the unknown lands

745
00:59:47,600 --> 00:59:52,720
beyond the mountains.
Perhaps Spartacus believed Rome

746
00:59:52,720 --> 00:59:58,680
itself could be threatened, or
its rural population could be

747
00:59:58,680 --> 01:00:02,520
roused.
Perhaps the cohesion of the host

748
01:00:02,800 --> 01:00:07,560
depended on continued plunder.
Perhaps he calculated that

749
01:00:07,560 --> 01:00:13,000
crossing the Alps in late season
with women, children, the

750
01:00:13,000 --> 01:00:18,760
wounded and so many wagons.
Would simply destroy the army by

751
01:00:18,760 --> 01:00:23,040
exhaustion.
Perhaps the Gauls and Germans

752
01:00:23,040 --> 01:00:26,640
among his followers, who would
have had the most reason to

753
01:00:26,640 --> 01:00:32,000
cross, were fewer in number or
less unified than the older

754
01:00:32,000 --> 01:00:36,720
sources imply.
All of these reasons may have

755
01:00:36,720 --> 01:00:41,720
played some part.
None of them is recorded in any

756
01:00:41,720 --> 01:00:45,880
source we still have.
There is a thoughtful kind of

757
01:00:45,880 --> 01:00:50,600
mystery in this moment.
The leader who had moved his

758
01:00:50,600 --> 01:00:55,360
army with such patience across
the peninsula, who had defeated

759
01:00:55,360 --> 01:01:00,520
praters and consuls, who had
refused to let his men be drawn

760
01:01:00,520 --> 01:01:06,200
into easy battles, paused at the
foot of the mountains and chose,

761
01:01:06,400 --> 01:01:11,080
instead of the long prepared
escape, to walk back into the

762
01:01:11,080 --> 01:01:16,320
country he had just crossed.
Whatever passed through his mind

763
01:01:16,320 --> 01:01:22,040
in those days, it has been kept
by the silence of 2000 years.

764
01:01:22,320 --> 01:01:27,400
What is recorded is the change
of direction itself.

765
01:01:28,320 --> 01:01:32,720
After the victory at Mutina, the
great rebel column reversed and

766
01:01:32,720 --> 01:01:37,480
began to move southward again.
They followed one slope of the

767
01:01:37,480 --> 01:01:42,480
Apennines for some time, perhaps
wintering in the plains of

768
01:01:42,480 --> 01:01:46,120
Pishnum.
Then they continued on through

769
01:01:46,120 --> 01:01:49,600
Lucania into the Deep South of
the peninsula.

770
01:01:50,280 --> 01:01:55,800
Once again the towns watched
them pass with a mixture of

771
01:01:55,800 --> 01:02:03,080
dread and confused awe.
Once again the rural slaves

772
01:02:03,080 --> 01:02:06,880
watched their backs and wondered
what came next.

773
01:02:07,240 --> 01:02:13,120
For Rome, the turning S was both
a relief and a new alarm.

774
01:02:13,920 --> 01:02:18,680
The rebel host had not crossed
the mountains and dispersed into

775
01:02:18,680 --> 01:02:25,240
nothingness, as some had feared.
Instead, it was coming back deep

776
01:02:25,320 --> 01:02:30,240
into Italy, and the Republic now
had to decide who could be

777
01:02:30,240 --> 01:02:34,560
trusted to deal with it.
The commander so far appointed

778
01:02:34,960 --> 01:02:38,560
had failed.
Something different was needed,

779
01:02:38,880 --> 01:02:44,080
a man who would set aside other
ambitions and dedicate himself

780
01:02:44,400 --> 01:02:49,080
with whatever means it took to
ending the long embarrassment.

781
01:02:49,480 --> 01:02:55,200
The man chosen to face Spartacus
was Marcus Licinius Crassus.

782
01:02:55,920 --> 01:03:00,600
He was perhaps the wealthiest
man in Rome, said to own a large

783
01:03:00,600 --> 01:03:04,440
fraction of the city's
properties, with extensive

784
01:03:04,440 --> 01:03:08,280
interests in mining, trade and
real estate.

785
01:03:08,720 --> 01:03:12,240
He had built much of his fortune
in the proscriptions of the

786
01:03:12,240 --> 01:03:16,440
dictator Sulla a decade earlier,
when the property of the

787
01:03:16,440 --> 01:03:21,600
dictator's enemies had been
auctioned off to his supporters.

788
01:03:22,200 --> 01:03:27,880
He was politically ambitious,
conscious of his lack of a great

789
01:03:27,880 --> 01:03:32,640
military reputation, and acutely
aware that any general who

790
01:03:32,640 --> 01:03:37,800
finally crushed Spartacus would
gain immense prestige.

791
01:03:38,240 --> 01:03:45,000
Crassus was given an unusual
command, raising 6 new legions

792
01:03:45,000 --> 01:03:51,280
to add to the surviving consular
forces, perhaps 40,000 men in

793
01:03:51,280 --> 01:03:55,760
total when fully assembled.
He moved methodically.

794
01:03:56,560 --> 01:04:00,920
Rather than rushing to engage
the rebels, he first drilled and

795
01:04:00,920 --> 01:04:05,480
disciplined his army.
He understood that the recent

796
01:04:05,480 --> 01:04:11,120
defeats had damaged Roman morale
as much as Roman numbers.

797
01:04:12,160 --> 01:04:16,200
The legions had to remember how
to win.

798
01:04:16,560 --> 01:04:21,160
It was during this period that
Crassus is said to have revived

799
01:04:21,160 --> 01:04:25,520
an old and severe punishment.
According to several ancient

800
01:04:25,520 --> 01:04:29,840
accounts, when one of his
subordinates engaged Spartacus

801
01:04:29,840 --> 01:04:35,640
against orders and was defeated,
Crassus subjected the offending

802
01:04:35,640 --> 01:04:39,560
unit to a procedure called
decimation.

803
01:04:40,360 --> 01:04:46,040
The soldiers were divided into
groups of 10 drew lots, and one

804
01:04:46,040 --> 01:04:50,880
in every 10 was put to death by
his comrades.

805
01:04:51,960 --> 01:04:56,400
The practice was old, terrible,
and rare.

806
01:04:56,720 --> 01:05:01,640
Its purpose was to restore
discipline by making the price

807
01:05:01,640 --> 01:05:04,400
of disobedience unbearably
visible.

808
01:05:05,000 --> 01:05:09,880
Whether this happened in exactly
the form recorded is debated by

809
01:05:09,880 --> 01:05:14,880
modern historians, but the
substance of the story that

810
01:05:14,880 --> 01:05:19,360
Crassus chose to enforce
traditional Roman severity at

811
01:05:19,360 --> 01:05:23,480
the start of his command fits
everything else we know about

812
01:05:23,480 --> 01:05:26,600
him.
The lesson was meant to travel

813
01:05:26,600 --> 01:05:30,200
through the army faster than
rumor could carry it.

814
01:05:30,960 --> 01:05:35,200
From that day forward, Roman
legionaries fighting under

815
01:05:35,200 --> 01:05:40,160
Crassus would be more afraid of
their own commander than of the

816
01:05:40,160 --> 01:05:44,600
strange wandering host they had
been sent to destroy.

817
01:05:45,560 --> 01:05:50,800
It was a hard calculation.
It was also, in the cold

818
01:05:50,800 --> 01:05:54,800
accounting of Roman warfare, an
effective one.

819
01:05:55,200 --> 01:05:59,640
Around the same time Spartacus
had reached the southern tip of

820
01:05:59,640 --> 01:06:03,720
the Italian peninsula, he
brought his army to the region

821
01:06:03,720 --> 01:06:08,200
of Brutium, the toe of Italy,
near what is now Calabria.

822
01:06:08,960 --> 01:06:14,960
There, across a narrow Strait,
lay the island of Sicily.

823
01:06:15,960 --> 01:06:20,360
To Spartacus, this geography
offered one last great

824
01:06:20,360 --> 01:06:23,960
possibility.
Sicily was the site of the

825
01:06:23,960 --> 01:06:29,480
earlier slave wars, the place
where Eunice and Salvius had

826
01:06:29,480 --> 01:06:32,200
ruled briefly over restless
thousands.

827
01:06:32,840 --> 01:06:37,360
If he could cross to Sicily, he
might rouse the rural slaves of

828
01:06:37,360 --> 01:06:43,000
the island, build a new base,
and continue the war from across

829
01:06:43,000 --> 01:06:48,080
the water.
The plan was bold, but no bolder

830
01:06:48,160 --> 01:06:51,200
than the road that had brought
him this far.

831
01:06:51,520 --> 01:06:56,080
For the second time in his great
campaign, the rebel leader stood

832
01:06:56,080 --> 01:07:00,680
before water, looking outward to
make the crossing to Sicily

833
01:07:00,840 --> 01:07:04,240
Spartacus open.
Negotiations with Solution

834
01:07:04,240 --> 01:07:09,040
pirates, the sea born Raiders
who at that time roamed the

835
01:07:09,040 --> 01:07:13,160
eastern and central
Mediterranean almost at will.

836
01:07:13,960 --> 01:07:18,080
The Solutions had been a serious
power for generations,

837
01:07:18,760 --> 01:07:23,560
controlling sea lanes from their
bases on the rocky southern

838
01:07:23,560 --> 01:07:28,680
coast of Asia Minor.
They sometimes even traded with

839
01:07:28,680 --> 01:07:35,560
Roman cities and sometimes
raided them to an army at the

840
01:07:35,560 --> 01:07:39,000
edge of the sea.
They were the only realistic

841
01:07:39,000 --> 01:07:41,600
ferry.
According to the accounts that

842
01:07:41,600 --> 01:07:45,440
have come down to us, the
pirates agreed to carry his men

843
01:07:45,440 --> 01:07:48,480
across the Strait in their light
ships.

844
01:07:49,320 --> 01:07:55,040
Payment was made, plans were
laid, the sails were promised

845
01:07:55,040 --> 01:07:58,640
for a particular shore on a
particular night.

846
01:07:59,520 --> 01:08:04,320
Then the pirates sailed away to
make ready, and they never

847
01:08:04,320 --> 01:08:07,760
returned.
Whether they had been bribed by

848
01:08:07,760 --> 01:08:11,920
Rome or simply preferred to keep
the gold already in hand, the

849
01:08:11,920 --> 01:08:17,399
exact reason has not survived
whatever lay behind it.

850
01:08:18,000 --> 01:08:23,000
The agreement was broken.
The wading army on the shore

851
01:08:23,120 --> 01:08:27,720
would have to remain in Italy.
When Crassus learned that

852
01:08:27,720 --> 01:08:32,200
Spartacus was now caught in the
toe of Italy, he saw an

853
01:08:32,200 --> 01:08:37,000
opportunity that few Roman
commanders had ever enjoyed.

854
01:08:37,760 --> 01:08:42,720
The peninsula at that point
narrows considerably, and the

855
01:08:42,720 --> 01:08:47,800
natural geography forms a kind
of corridor with the sea on

856
01:08:47,840 --> 01:08:51,479
either side.
Crassus decided to seal off the

857
01:08:51,479 --> 01:08:55,279
entire neck of land.
His soldiers built a great

858
01:08:55,279 --> 01:08:59,640
defensive line, a ditch and a
wall stretching from coast to

859
01:08:59,640 --> 01:09:04,439
coast, perhaps 50 kilometers or
more in length.

860
01:09:05,000 --> 01:09:08,800
The work was extensive,
methodical, and very Roman.

861
01:09:09,439 --> 01:09:14,359
It turned a difficult landscape
into a closed enclosure.

862
01:09:14,680 --> 01:09:19,319
Behind that wall, Spartacus and
his followers found their

863
01:09:19,319 --> 01:09:22,200
freedom of movement suddenly
taken from them.

864
01:09:23,359 --> 01:09:27,720
The countryside was finite,
supplies could not arrive

865
01:09:27,720 --> 01:09:31,160
easily, and the season was
turning toward winter.

866
01:09:31,960 --> 01:09:37,760
What had once been a fluid host,
capable of ranging across

867
01:09:37,760 --> 01:09:42,760
hundreds of miles, was now
compressed into a single region,

868
01:09:43,359 --> 01:09:47,600
watched and waited upon by a
patient Roman army.

869
01:09:47,960 --> 01:09:52,920
The siege, of a strange and
elongated kind, lasted through

870
01:09:52,920 --> 01:09:57,400
the cold months.
Skirmishes were fought along the

871
01:09:57,400 --> 01:10:00,000
line.
The rebels tried at various

872
01:10:00,000 --> 01:10:03,360
points to breakthrough, and were
turned back.

873
01:10:04,120 --> 01:10:08,000
Crassus, for his part, was
content to wait.

874
01:10:08,880 --> 01:10:13,480
Time was on his side.
Hunger could do what swords had

875
01:10:13,480 --> 01:10:15,960
not.
There is something quietly

876
01:10:15,960 --> 01:10:20,760
devastating about that line.
It was not a great battle, not a

877
01:10:20,760 --> 01:10:24,280
stroke of genius, not a heroic
stand.

878
01:10:25,000 --> 01:10:30,240
It was simply earth and stone,
dug and piled by ordinary

879
01:10:30,240 --> 01:10:34,640
soldiers, drawn carefully across
a narrow piece of land.

880
01:10:35,320 --> 01:10:40,760
Yet behind it, slowly, the long
campaign that had carried so

881
01:10:40,760 --> 01:10:44,920
many thousands of people from
Coppua to the PO Valley and back

882
01:10:44,920 --> 01:10:48,840
again was being pressed toward
its conclusion.

883
01:10:49,800 --> 01:10:54,760
The geography of Italy, which
Spartacus had used so freely,

884
01:10:55,280 --> 01:10:58,520
had finally been made to enclose
him.

885
01:10:58,880 --> 01:11:04,240
Yet Spartacus had reserves that
Crassus did not entirely

886
01:11:04,240 --> 01:11:08,480
understand.
By night, in the dead of a

887
01:11:08,480 --> 01:11:13,880
winter storm, the rebels chose a
section of the line and went at

888
01:11:13,880 --> 01:11:18,880
it with concentrated force.
They threw earth branches and

889
01:11:18,880 --> 01:11:23,000
the bodies of slain horses into
the ditch to fill it, and they

890
01:11:23,000 --> 01:11:27,480
pushed their column across.
The line was breached.

891
01:11:28,120 --> 01:11:32,760
By morning, perhaps 1/3 of the
rebel host had broken out into

892
01:11:32,760 --> 01:11:37,880
the open countryside again.
The rest, less fortunate, would

893
01:11:37,880 --> 01:11:42,960
be cut off behind them.
For Crassus, this was a serious

894
01:11:42,960 --> 01:11:46,640
set back.
The neat trap had been turned

895
01:11:46,640 --> 01:11:50,520
into a leak.
He set out in pursuit, his

896
01:11:50,520 --> 01:11:53,440
legions moving quickly along the
same paths.

897
01:11:54,120 --> 01:11:59,200
He knew now that Spartacus was
not going to be ground down

898
01:11:59,200 --> 01:12:02,960
passively.
The escape forced him to fight

899
01:12:02,960 --> 01:12:07,120
in the open once more.
Word of his predicament also

900
01:12:07,120 --> 01:12:11,760
began to reach Rome, where there
was now a new concern.

901
01:12:12,880 --> 01:12:18,000
The Senate, growing impatient
with the prolonged campaign, had

902
01:12:18,000 --> 01:12:22,840
considered recalling other
commanders to assist Pompey.

903
01:12:23,240 --> 01:12:27,400
The brilliant young general who
had been campaigning in Spain

904
01:12:27,400 --> 01:12:32,640
against the rebel Sartorius, had
concluded his work there and was

905
01:12:32,640 --> 01:12:36,120
on his way home.
There was talk of granting him

906
01:12:36,120 --> 01:12:38,480
part of the command against
Spartacus.

907
01:12:39,040 --> 01:12:43,640
Crassus, jealous of the glory he
had spent so much money and

908
01:12:43,640 --> 01:12:50,880
discipline to earn, now had two
enemies at once, the escaped

909
01:12:50,880 --> 01:12:55,240
slaves ahead of him and the
rival approaching from behind.

910
01:12:55,680 --> 01:13:00,080
The pursuit through the Deep
South of Italy quickened.

911
01:13:00,840 --> 01:13:05,880
Roman columns and rebel columns
wound through valleys and along

912
01:13:06,240 --> 01:13:11,560
old shepherd tracks, sometimes
meeting in sharp, unplanned

913
01:13:11,560 --> 01:13:17,240
engagements, sometimes glimpsing
one another at a distance

914
01:13:17,240 --> 01:13:22,000
through the winter trees.
The land itself, the rolling

915
01:13:22,000 --> 01:13:27,120
Lucanian hills with their oaks
and beaches, the small streams

916
01:13:27,120 --> 01:13:32,560
that turn to ice in the
mornings, became a slow witness

917
01:13:32,920 --> 01:13:35,440
to the closing chapter of the
war.

918
01:13:35,720 --> 01:13:40,200
As the spring of 71, before the
Common Era began to soften the

919
01:13:40,200 --> 01:13:45,120
landscape, the rebel army was no
longer the unified force that

920
01:13:45,120 --> 01:13:47,520
had crossed Italy two years
earlier.

921
01:13:48,360 --> 01:13:53,000
Some of those who had broken out
of the wall had taken separate

922
01:13:53,000 --> 01:13:57,320
paths.
Skirmishes wore down the host.

923
01:13:57,680 --> 01:14:03,160
A force led by lieutenants,
whose names sometimes reach us

924
01:14:03,600 --> 01:14:09,160
as Castus and Ganicus, was
caught and defeated in a fierce

925
01:14:09,160 --> 01:14:13,320
battle, with great losses on
both sides.

926
01:14:14,320 --> 01:14:18,480
The careful coordination that
had carried the rebels through

927
01:14:18,480 --> 01:14:22,800
so many earlier victories was
beginning to fray.

928
01:14:23,080 --> 01:14:28,400
Spartacus himself remained at
the center of the main host.

929
01:14:29,240 --> 01:14:33,320
He understood, as everyone in
his army must have understood,

930
01:14:33,720 --> 01:14:38,000
that the great campaign was
nearing some kind of conclusion.

931
01:14:38,960 --> 01:14:44,320
His scouts brought him news of
Roman columns drawing closer.

932
01:14:44,680 --> 01:14:49,440
His counsels must have been
heavy with the awareness that

933
01:14:49,440 --> 01:14:53,840
the wide spaces of Italy were
narrowing around them.

934
01:14:54,680 --> 01:14:59,880
One last battle would surely
come, and he was now preparing

935
01:14:59,880 --> 01:15:03,680
in his quiet and resolute way to
meet it.

936
01:15:04,200 --> 01:15:08,120
According to the surviving
accounts, on the eve of that

937
01:15:08,120 --> 01:15:13,000
final battle, Spartacus
performed A striking gesture.

938
01:15:13,800 --> 01:15:19,760
He had a fine horse brought
before him, perhaps the best in

939
01:15:19,760 --> 01:15:23,640
his camp, with his soldiers
watching.

940
01:15:23,920 --> 01:15:29,600
He killed the animal himself,
declaring that if victory came,

941
01:15:29,880 --> 01:15:35,480
he would have all the horses he
wished from the Roman side, and

942
01:15:35,480 --> 01:15:40,480
if defeat came, he would no
longer need any.

943
01:15:40,880 --> 01:15:44,960
It was the kind of theatrical
moment that ancient writers

944
01:15:44,960 --> 01:15:51,360
loved to record, and like the
snake omen of his beginning, we

945
01:15:51,360 --> 01:15:57,200
cannot be sure that it happened
in exactly the form described.

946
01:15:57,640 --> 01:16:03,040
Yet the gesture, real or
polished by tradition, captures

947
01:16:03,200 --> 01:16:08,760
something essential a leader who
would not lighten his own fate

948
01:16:09,000 --> 01:16:12,200
by holding back a means of
escape.

949
01:16:12,760 --> 01:16:18,600
The battle itself took place
somewhere in Leukania, in the

950
01:16:18,600 --> 01:16:21,720
rugged interior of southern
Italy.

951
01:16:22,680 --> 01:16:27,160
Crassus's legions met the rebel
host on open ground.

952
01:16:27,760 --> 01:16:33,000
The fighting was hard.
Spartacus, said to have sought

953
01:16:33,000 --> 01:16:37,960
out Crassus directly in the
line, fought with great energy

954
01:16:38,560 --> 01:16:43,800
and is reported to have killed 2
centurions before being struck

955
01:16:43,800 --> 01:16:47,200
down.
His body, according to one

956
01:16:47,200 --> 01:16:53,560
account, was never positively
identified afterward, lost among

957
01:16:53,560 --> 01:16:59,200
the many fallen, there was no
triumphal display of his head.

958
01:16:59,880 --> 01:17:05,120
No captured leader paraded
through Roman streets.

959
01:17:06,160 --> 01:17:10,880
He seemed simply to have
vanished into the Press of

960
01:17:10,880 --> 01:17:17,000
bodies on a southern field.
The rebel army was largely

961
01:17:17,000 --> 01:17:20,480
destroyed.
Some who survived the field

962
01:17:20,720 --> 01:17:26,200
tried to flee northward, only to
be intercepted by Pompey, who

963
01:17:26,200 --> 01:17:30,440
was returning from Spain at that
very moment.

964
01:17:31,600 --> 01:17:36,400
Pompey wrote to the Senate that
while Crassus had defeated the

965
01:17:36,400 --> 01:17:42,000
slaves in the open, he himself
had cut down those who escaped

966
01:17:42,440 --> 01:17:47,480
and so deserved to be considered
the man who finished the war.

967
01:17:48,480 --> 01:17:51,520
Crassus did not forget the
slight.

968
01:17:52,040 --> 01:17:59,320
The aftermath was severe in the
cold Roman style. 6000 prisoners

969
01:17:59,320 --> 01:18:04,320
captured from the rebel army
were crucified along the Appian

970
01:18:04,320 --> 01:18:11,520
Way, the long Roman Rd. that ran
from Capua, the city where the

971
01:18:11,520 --> 01:18:18,520
revolt had begun to roam itself.
The bodies were spaced along the

972
01:18:18,520 --> 01:18:24,680
verge of the road for a distance
of perhaps 200 kilometers.

973
01:18:25,640 --> 01:18:31,920
They were left as a warning,
very Roman in its precision,

974
01:18:32,600 --> 01:18:36,160
very unmistakable in its
message.

975
01:18:36,600 --> 01:18:41,040
Travellers passing by, including
those who had nothing to do with

976
01:18:41,040 --> 01:18:47,240
the revolt, would have walked
beside that long, quiet line for

977
01:18:47,240 --> 01:18:51,400
many days.
The scene would not have been

978
01:18:51,400 --> 01:18:54,760
gentle.
We will not linger on it.

979
01:18:55,720 --> 01:19:01,320
It is enough to know that the
Republic, once embarrassed, had

980
01:19:01,320 --> 01:19:07,880
answered its embarrassment in
the harsh language it knew best.

981
01:19:08,400 --> 01:19:13,880
The servile War, as it would
later be called, was over.

982
01:19:14,720 --> 01:19:19,320
The host that had begun with 70
men and kitchen knives, and

983
01:19:19,320 --> 01:19:24,680
Capua that had descended
Vesuvius on ropes of green

984
01:19:24,680 --> 01:19:30,720
vines, that had defeated praters
and consuls, that had marched

985
01:19:30,720 --> 01:19:35,880
almost the full length of Italy
and back again, was scattered.

986
01:19:37,080 --> 01:19:41,840
The wide camps with their many
languages were silent.

987
01:19:42,920 --> 01:19:47,320
The road once again belonged to
Rome.

988
01:19:47,800 --> 01:19:53,880
In the months and years that
followed, Roman societies slowly

989
01:19:53,880 --> 01:19:56,480
absorbed the shock of what had
happened.

990
01:19:57,480 --> 01:20:02,760
Crassus, having crushed the
rebellion, was awarded an

991
01:20:02,760 --> 01:20:08,320
ovation, A lesser form of
triumph appropriate for

992
01:20:08,320 --> 01:20:13,680
victories over slaves.
Pompey, despite arriving late,

993
01:20:14,160 --> 01:20:18,800
was granted a full triumph for
his Spanish campaign.

994
01:20:19,840 --> 01:20:25,120
Their uneasy partnership would
later become part of the famous

995
01:20:25,800 --> 01:20:31,960
First Triumvirate alongside
Julius Caesar that would

996
01:20:31,960 --> 01:20:35,880
dominate Roman politics for a
decade.

997
01:20:36,320 --> 01:20:41,880
Rome did not abolish slavery in
response to the revolt.

998
01:20:42,880 --> 01:20:48,000
The institution was too deeply
woven into Roman economic life

999
01:20:48,520 --> 01:20:54,480
for that to even be imagined.
But certain quieter shifts may

1000
01:20:54,480 --> 01:20:58,440
have followed.
Roman writers urged greater

1001
01:20:58,440 --> 01:21:03,000
caution in the treatment of
large slave populations.

1002
01:21:03,840 --> 01:21:09,840
Some senatorial families reduced
the size of agricultural slave

1003
01:21:09,840 --> 01:21:15,360
gangs on their estates.
Others moved toward employing

1004
01:21:15,400 --> 01:21:20,760
tenant farmers called Colony,
who would over the centuries

1005
01:21:21,040 --> 01:21:25,200
become an increasingly common
rural figure.

1006
01:21:26,160 --> 01:21:32,120
The change where it came was
slow, but the memory of

1007
01:21:32,120 --> 01:21:37,080
Spartacus seems to have nudged
it along in places.

1008
01:21:37,480 --> 01:21:42,560
The figure of Spartacus,
meanwhile, began a slow journey

1009
01:21:42,560 --> 01:21:46,680
through memory.
In the immediate aftermath,

1010
01:21:47,280 --> 01:21:52,400
Roman writers tended to treat
him with a mixture of reluctant

1011
01:21:52,400 --> 01:21:58,880
respect and political distaste.
He was acknowledged as brave and

1012
01:21:58,880 --> 01:22:04,120
able, but the very fact that he
had nearly succeeded made him

1013
01:22:04,120 --> 01:22:07,600
uncomfortable to celebrate
openly.

1014
01:22:08,760 --> 01:22:13,000
Over the centuries that
followed, he faded somewhat into

1015
01:22:13,000 --> 01:22:18,960
the background of Roman history,
mentioned in summaries but

1016
01:22:18,960 --> 01:22:24,120
rarely placed at the center.
It was much later, in the modern

1017
01:22:24,120 --> 01:22:32,680
era that his name would rise
again with new force. 18th and

1018
01:22:32,680 --> 01:22:36,440
19th century writers,
philosophers, and

1019
01:22:36,440 --> 01:22:42,680
revolutionaries discovered in
him a symbol of resistance to

1020
01:22:43,080 --> 01:22:47,520
oppression.
His story was retold in plays,

1021
01:22:47,520 --> 01:22:54,400
novels, ballets, and eventually
films, often shaped to suit the

1022
01:22:54,400 --> 01:22:57,360
concerns of the age that retold
it.

1023
01:22:58,360 --> 01:23:01,720
Whether any of these later
portraits would have been

1024
01:23:01,720 --> 01:23:07,560
recognized by the man himself is
impossible to say.

1025
01:23:08,440 --> 01:23:12,800
He had become by then, more myth
than memory.

1026
01:23:13,200 --> 01:23:20,280
What remains beneath all the
retellings is the simple fact of

1027
01:23:20,280 --> 01:23:24,760
what happened.
A group of people who had been

1028
01:23:24,760 --> 01:23:29,240
told by the world that they
could be owned chose, for a

1029
01:23:29,240 --> 01:23:33,760
brief and luminous time to walk
free.

1030
01:23:34,640 --> 01:23:39,800
They organized themselves.
They survived several seasons

1031
01:23:39,800 --> 01:23:42,960
against the strongest state in
their world.

1032
01:23:43,680 --> 01:23:48,480
They marched under stars that
look much the same to night.

1033
01:23:49,640 --> 01:23:56,560
And then, like all human things,
they passed to night.

1034
01:23:57,280 --> 01:23:59,960
Perhaps that is the feeling to
keep.

1035
01:24:00,480 --> 01:24:06,000
Not the dates, not the names,
not the exact map of every

1036
01:24:06,000 --> 01:24:10,520
battle, but the quiet weight of
endurance.

1037
01:24:11,160 --> 01:24:14,600
The world Spartacus knew has
long since gone.

1038
01:24:15,240 --> 01:24:19,960
The fields where he camped now
belong to other crops, other

1039
01:24:19,960 --> 01:24:26,040
languages, other lives.
And yet, when the lamp is dimmed

1040
01:24:26,040 --> 01:24:31,800
and the night settles, the long
story of those who refuse to be

1041
01:24:31,800 --> 01:24:39,800
silent still moves somewhere in
the patient memory of the world.

1042
01:24:40,280 --> 01:24:45,240
The world slows, and so do we.
Good night.