Meh. Still more historically accurate then the actual Spartacus series.....
WI Spartacus emerges victorious?
- Thread starter Velasco
- Start date
Meh. Still more historically accurate then the actual Spartacus series.....
Ancientone
Banned
What else would you call them? Spartacus' people were initially gladiators and were then joined by fieldhands, labourers, kitchen staff and a handful of more sophisticated house slaves. Not just workers, but mainly low-level workers and all, servants.
It may be hard for a modern mind to get around, but most jobs, even those with skills, were handled by slaves (i.e. servants). For example, the modern habit of treating musicians as "stars" only dates from the mid 18th Century. Any visit to the great houses and palaces of Europe will reveal minstrel galleries, often screened off so that the masters of the house and guests did not have to suffer the vulgar gaze of the hired help. In Roman times one would dictate letters to one's Greek secretary, invariably a slave; send messages to one's friends by sending a slave messenger, have one's bath prepared by a slave girl (or boy as preference dictated) and be entertained by slaves who hacked each other to death in the arena or did things in the bedroom that only someone hoping for advancement could imagine.
However, slaves could not be trusted. An intimate connection to the Master's and Mistresses' activities and assets often gave them ideas above their station ( read of the problems with Claudius's slave Polyibius) and they were always tempted to steal and run away. As an Israeli you will be familiar with the book of Exodus that tells us how the Hebrew slaves "borrowed" the finery, gold and jewels of their Egyptian owners before doing a midnight flit, despite the conditions of their employment contract. They also nicked all the pack animals to cart it away. They just couldn't run off, they had to steal all the stuff as well!
If it was a certain king of Pontus, he'd probably enlist them into his army and used them in another one of his schemes for unholy retribution against Rome.
Now we have to find a way to get Spartacus and his companions to Pontus. Maybe help from pirates could do the trick?
Well, Mithridates did give aid to pirates in Cilicia. I can't quite remember whether he gave aid to Spartacus or not, but his actions in Anatolia show that he wasn't above helping slaves kill their masters. All in all, he was a naughty enough boy to try a stunt like this in some other timeline.
Now we have to find a way to get Spartacus and his companions to Pontus. Maybe help from pirates could do the trick?
just wondering here, I have seen some posts that suggest that Spartacus might try and flee to Gaul. As I remember Spartacus was near Brundisium when he was finally defeated and Marcus Licinius Lucullus had just landed there, fresh of defeated Mithridates. So wouldn't he have to fight his way up the entirety of Italy?
First he moved north. They were in north Italy and Spartacus wanted to get out of roman territory but his men wanted to stay and plunder Italy. So they moved back south and Crassus corned him in brundusium eventually.
I want to know what happens AFTER he wins, not how he could win. He defeats Crassus, Pompey is defeated/dies, whatever. What then? Does he become King and found a new dynasty? Does he attempt a takeover of the Republic, sort of like how the Ottomans named themselves Caesars of Rome?
I'd place my bets on eventually, at some point, he gets the heck out of Italy and Roman territory if he manages to win. As someone previously mentioned here, a great idea would be to have him team up with Mithridates. Mithridates would have a lot of uses for him and his "army" and he had no qualms allying with enemies of Rome (as he had actually just done with Sertorius).
If you want to get really creative...
Sertorius kills Pompey in an ambush. Metellus takes over command. The war continues, and Sertorius is not assassinated when he was OTL. Or just have Sertorius not get assassinated.
Spartacus's revolt breaks out as it did and goes how it was going early on. After defeating several Roman forces sent against them, they make it out of Italy, into Illyria.
Mithridates, who already has Sertorius as an ally, approaches Spartacus and offers an alliance. Spartacus accepts and Mithridates is able to employ some pirates to ferry them over to him and bolster his force.
With this new addition to his forces, Mithridates is able to make life hell for Lucullus and Cotta (Lucullus the governor of the area, Cotta tasked with tying down Mithridates fleet). He defeats Lucullus, forces Lucullus and Cotta out of Anatolia.
That's all I got.
My apologies, I thought you were referring to Spartacus beating Crassus
But he cant win. The best he can hope for is to last long enough to slip out of Roman lands and set up a kingdom in barbarian lands, and even thats really unlikely. The carving out a kingdom, not the escaping.
If you claim otherwise, you got to make a plausible case, or this belongs in asb. Sorry.
I'd imagine their language was from wherever they were from. Spartacus probably spoke Thracian and Latin, other's Gallic, etc.
It is not physically impossible for him to win. History is replete with sudden turns of fate, reverses, catastrophes, coincidences. Macedonians in India, Gauls in Asia Minor.
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It would seem Spartacus' best shot would require 1) continued warfare in Hispania and 2) the cooperation of Cilician pirates. The pirates would allow him and his troops to land, for example, in Asia Minor, rape and plunder to their heart's content, and then be enfranchised by Mithridates.
Alternatively depending on how much damage the legions take in Hispania he could make Sicily his base and hold onto parts of southern Italy perhaps?
The longer he stays in Roman territory the less likely his chances of survival become.
Winnabago
Banned
Pirates ferry Spartacus to slave-infested Sicily, where pirates/slaves/Spartacus smash Crassus. Pompey comes home from Spain and conservatives, scared of his popularity, send the optimate Lucullus instead to Sicily and send Pompey to Cicilia, where he defeats Seleucids/Pontics/pirates and Lucullus gets smashed by a last-ditch slave ambush.
Pompey returns to quash Spartacus, leaving Caesar to battle Easterners, where he traps Spartacus in Syracuse, his allies having largely abandoned him due to the slave army's objective pretty much being completed.
The Senate, having failed at every turn and having no possible available foil to Pompey, sends assassins like they did to kill the Gracchi, who kill him. His furious army returns to Rome for an extremely popular coup.
Spartacus's surly Gallic lieutenant Crixus leads a pirate faction (Crixus broke off from Spartacus OTL), which captures many fleeing proscription victims.
Caesar returns to Italy, and tenaciously allies Spartacus to smash Crixus, free the senators, and lead a slave army to Rome where he meets various Samnite and private armies to smash Pompey's forces and return Rome to a Republican state, defeating them by offering the city's slaves freedom if they join Caesar's side.
Ending 1: Spartacus makes a secret deal with the Samnites to seize the city from the senators, taking their property and killing many. Caesar flees to some Roman colony or other, Spartacus's men settle down, and Spartacus wins the war!
Ending 2: Caesar and Spartacus are made consuls, and his army is given Roman citizenship, as it's one of the few armies actually loyal to the Senate by now. The grumbling tribunes lead revolts against Rome, leading Spartacus to declare emergency powers, after which he butchers Rome's citizenry with the Republic's treasury. He then forces Cato, Cicero, and Caesar to flee Rome, re-establishes the slave class as a citizen class, and wins the war, as the Roman people are a shattered lot!
Pompey returns to quash Spartacus, leaving Caesar to battle Easterners, where he traps Spartacus in Syracuse, his allies having largely abandoned him due to the slave army's objective pretty much being completed.
The Senate, having failed at every turn and having no possible available foil to Pompey, sends assassins like they did to kill the Gracchi, who kill him. His furious army returns to Rome for an extremely popular coup.
Spartacus's surly Gallic lieutenant Crixus leads a pirate faction (Crixus broke off from Spartacus OTL), which captures many fleeing proscription victims.
Caesar returns to Italy, and tenaciously allies Spartacus to smash Crixus, free the senators, and lead a slave army to Rome where he meets various Samnite and private armies to smash Pompey's forces and return Rome to a Republican state, defeating them by offering the city's slaves freedom if they join Caesar's side.
Ending 1: Spartacus makes a secret deal with the Samnites to seize the city from the senators, taking their property and killing many. Caesar flees to some Roman colony or other, Spartacus's men settle down, and Spartacus wins the war!
Ending 2: Caesar and Spartacus are made consuls, and his army is given Roman citizenship, as it's one of the few armies actually loyal to the Senate by now. The grumbling tribunes lead revolts against Rome, leading Spartacus to declare emergency powers, after which he butchers Rome's citizenry with the Republic's treasury. He then forces Cato, Cicero, and Caesar to flee Rome, re-establishes the slave class as a citizen class, and wins the war, as the Roman people are a shattered lot!
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