In three separate engagements, Spartacus first defeated Lentulus, who had attempted to surround the slaves, and then both Gellius and the praetor Arrius, who had recently slain Crixus and his Gauls. The vaunted Roman legions had been defeated, their noble standards captured. Why he did this is a mystery.“Many theories have been proposed, but the best explanation was already hinted at in the ancient sources.
Additionally the Roman governor of Sicily, Gaius Verres, had fortified some of the best landing spots.Spartacus needed two things, good boats and good sailors, to be able to land an advance party of his troops across the strait. They also had lots of weapons and armor from defeating the Roman troops. …
While several noted Roman writers applauded the games as invigorating spectacles, the writer-philosopher Seneca abhorred them, commenting: “I come home more greedy, more cruel and inhuman, because I have been among human beings….Man, a sacred thing to man, is killed for sport and merriment.”A number of gladiator training schools sprang up throughout Italy, concentrated near the town of Capua, north of present-day Naples. It had defeated several Roman forces, but the rebels had not yet faced the rugged veterans of wars in Spain, Gaul and Germany. This left Spartacus with no choice but to take his force north to face a Roman leader more ruthless than any he had encountered before.By the time Spartacus had reached the straits a new leader named Marcus Licinius Crassus had taken command of the Roman forces. News of atrocities against slaveholding landowners dominated conversation in Rome’s marketplaces and public buildings. Lots were drawn in each group, with one unlucky soldier chosen for execution. He also revived a practice called “decimation” where units that ran away from the enemy would draw lots and have a random number of soldiers killed by being clubbed or stoned to death.Needless to say discipline tightened under Crassus. Almost the entire gladiator army was annihilated, its remnants scattering to the nearby hills. By Marco Margaritoff. Field hands and house slaves, many armed with farm tools and kitchen utensils, declared their own freedom by joining the gladiators.As word of the insurrection spread, Spartacus led his force up the slopes of the dormant volcano Vesuvius.
Back in Rome, the senate grew impatient and sent a large army led by the consuls Lucius Gellius Publicola and Gnaeus Cornelius Lentulus Clodianus. Spartacus led the biggest slave rebellion Rome had ever seen — but his motivations may not have been so noble. Spartacus was killed, but his body was never found. Stung, the gladiator army limped through Bruttium on the toe of the Italian peninsula, finally reaching the coastal city of Rhegium across the Strait of Messina from Sicily. The Roman and the remnants of his column were brought to bay and slaughtered.Slipping southward, Spartacus’ army continued to grow. A dissident group led by Castus and Gannicus, which included many Celtic and German troops, broke away from Spartacus and set off on their own. Spartacus (approximately 100–71 BCE), was a gladiator from Thrace who led a major revolt against Rome. To appease the ghost of Crixus, 300 Romans were sacrificed or forced to fight each other as gladiators.With Cassius’ army demolished, the path to freedom over the Alps now lay clear. The defeat became a rout, as Romans streamed away by the score.News reached the slaves that Pompey and Lucullus had been dispatched with their legions and were at that moment marching to put an end to the insurrection.