Lucullus

  58. Vita Sullae 11. There is a helpful edition of the Greek text of the life with notes in H.A. Holden, Plutarch’s Life of Lucius Cornelius Sulla (Cambridge, 1886), of use both for reading the original Greek and for the historical problems (there is no English translation).

  59. 12.29.

  60. And so the annotations of the Loeb edition of Plutarch’s Cimon opts for as late as 74 BC.

  61. Another problem is the question of the legal authority of Lucullus to remove the troops.

  62. For a convenient overview of the matter, see Telford, 2014, pp.117–18. ‘Lucullus, commanding an advance force, met with Sura and ordered him to withdraw, as the sole command had been given to Sulla, an order which he had no choice but to obey.’

  63. Not surprisingly, financial problems were a serious threat to Sulla’s success in Greece; cf. the narrative in Plutarch, Vita Luculli XII. Lucullus would earn just praise from some for his financial and economic reforms in Asia; he would ultimately incur the undying enmity, however, of the publicani or public contractors and their supporters in Rome. It was those very publicani who would back the eventual place of Pompey in settling the Eastern wars: regarding the Manilian Law that gave Pompey command in the war against Mithridates and Tigranes, Leach, 1978, p.75, notes: ‘[I]t had overwhelming support from the people and from the equites, whose financial interests in Asia were once more in jeopardy. The threat of war and the collapse of confidence were as fatal to the commercial world in 66 as they are today.’ Leach, we might note, argues that the Eastern threat was not as great as Cicero presents it in his speech Pro Lege Manilia; still, ‘The Pompeians had a strong case.’

  64. Plutarch, Vita Luculli II.1–2. The coinage is discussed by Keaveney, 2009, p.27, citing M.H. Crawford, Roman Republican Coinage (2 vols) (Cambridge, 1974), Vol.1, p.80 n.1. Van Ooteghem, 1959, provides convenient illustration opposite p.23.

  65. Cf. the detail recorded by Cicero (Academica II.1.3) that Mithridates was the greatest king since Alexander, and that said king considered Lucullus to be a greater general than those of whom he had read in works of military history.

  Chapter 2: The First Mithridatic War

  1. A helpful overview of the progress of the Mithridatic wars is A.N. Sherwin-White’s chapter in The Cambridge Ancient History, Volume IX, The Last Age of the Roman Republic, 146–43 BC, Chapter 8a, ‘Lucullus, Pompey, and the East’, pp.229 ff.

  2. Vita Sullae II.2.

  3. For an overview of the relatively little we know about Roman naval warfare practices in this period, see W.L. Rodgers, Greek and Roman Naval Warfare: A Study of Strategy, Tactics, and Ship Design from Salamis (480 BC) to Actium (31 BC) (Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 1937/1964), pp.424 ff.

  4. XII.33.

  5. See further Keaveney, 2009, p.18, with particular reference to the clear friendship between the two men.

  6. The embassy of Lucullus to Cyrene is also referenced at Josephus, Antiquitates

  XIV.114.

  7. Vita Luculli II.3–4.

  8. Vita Luculli II.5–6.

  9. For the problem, note Keaveney, 2009, p.33 n.20.

  10. II.2.4.

  11. Philo of Larissa (154/3–84/3 BC) is celebrated as the last Academy philosopher who could claim direct lineage from Plato.

  12. McGushin, 1994, pp.213–14, provides a convenient overview of the pirate problem in the context of the Third Mithridatic War, with consideration of the ‘acts of audacious arrogance’ of the pirates in launching raids on Italy, and in threatening the Roman grain supply. McGushin highlights the extraordinary extent of the command that was eventually awarded to Pompey according to the provisions of the Lex Gabinia: proconsular imperium over the sea east of the Pillars of Hercules, the territory of all islands and even up to 50 miles inland on all coasts, Italy not excepted.

  13. Vita Luculli III.2–3.

  14. Vita Luculli III.3.

  15. Vita Luculli III.3.

  16. The exact status of Fimbria is in question. See further A.W. Lintott, ‘The Offices of C. Flavius Fimbria in 86–5 BC’, Historia: Zeitschrift für alte Geschichte 20.5/6 (1971), pp.696–701.

  17. The historian Memnon (chapter 24) notes that the senate had sent both Flaccus and Fimbria to make war on Mithridates (on Memnon cf. below on n.122). They were commissioned to work with Sulla, if he was willing to listen to the senate – otherwise, they were to attack him before they engaged the king. Flaccus was annoyed with Fimbria because his men preferred his leadership; Fimbria was credited with being a more amenable, tractable commander. While attacking Fimbria in words, two of his soldiers murdered Flaccus. The senate is said to have been angry with Fimbria on account of the whole matter – but they arranged for his consular election all the same, and allowed him to command the entire force.

  18. There seems to be no compelling reason to assume with some that the ‘real’ reason for Lucullus’ unwillingness to join Fimbria was the fear that his forces would not be adequate to the task of a blockade of Pitane.

  19. Cf. Spann, 1987, p.102.

  20. ‘Indeed, had Sulla done his job properly in the first there would have been no third Mithridatic war. So if Sertorius allowed the Pontic king to occupy Bithynia this was hardly more treasonable than the kiss of Sulla at Dardanus or the far greater gift of life and liberty which the recalcitrance of Lucullus bestowed on Mithridates at Pitane’, Spann, 1987, p.102. Memnon (chapter 25) makes clear that Sulla sent envoys to Mithridates to propose a truce precisely at a time when he expected that he might need to tend to domestic, civil affairs.

  21. See further here L. Keppie, The Making of the Roman Army: From Republic to Empire (Norman: The University of Oklahoma Press, 1998), pp.76 ff. (original edition, B.T. Batsford, 1984). ‘The “Valerians” were … a group of near professionals who joined in the aftermath of the Social War, and by wish or circumstances prolonged their service. It seems clear that their service was, and continued to be, extremely profitable financially.’

  22. On the role of Lucullus in the diplomatic wrangling, see Telford, 2014, pp.143–45. ‘[T]he two antagonists [i.e., Sulla and Mithridates] finally met face to face at Dardanus. Mithridates had come in from his hiding place at Mytilene, while Sulla had been taken over by Lucullus to the meeting place in Asia, in the ships he had brought for Sulla’s use.’ Lucullus would soon be commissioned to serve not so much as diplomatic aide as financial executor of Sulla’s dispositions for Asia.

  23. Memnon also notes that neither side scrupulously followed the edicts of Dardanus; the Romans imposed ruinous fines and taxation, while Mithridates almost at once started trying to rebuild his lost empire.

  24. On certain aspects of the financial initiatives and practices of this time and place, note P.A. Brunt, ‘Sulla and the Asian Publicans’, Latomus 15.1 (1956), pp.17–25.

  25. See further Keaveney, 2009, pp.39–40, on how Lucullus’ loyalty to Sulla was placed above his natural instinct to make fewer demands on the inhabitants of Asia than his mentor was inclined to impose.

  Chapter 3: The Aftermath of War

  1. For a laudable effort to provide a coherent and logical timeline of events in Asia from 81–79 BC, see Keaveney, 2009, pp.245–53 (a detailed appendix on the many problems of chronology). Keaveney also has an appendix (pp.255 ff.) on the problem of when exactly the Third Mithridatic War commenced.

  2. Vita Luculli IV.2–3.

  3. The siege is also cited in Epitome LXXXIX of Livy’s history.

  4. Keaveney, 2009, p.251 n.30 argues that the slaves could have been taken from the territory of Mytilene, not the city proper. But what was the population of the island at this time?

  5. Suetonius, Divus Iulius II.

  6. Plutarch’s life of Caesar makes no mention of his military experience on Lesbos.

  7. Allen M. Ward argues that Thermus left the ‘field command’ of the siege to Lucullus in his brief paper ‘Caesar and the Pirates’, in Classical Philology 70.4 (1975), pp.267–68.

  8. Vita Luculli IV.4.

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p; 9. For how Pompey would prove something of his own loyalty to Sulla in the matter of the latter’s public funeral, see Keaveney, 2009, p.51. When the consul Marcus Aemilius Lepidus – a reconciled Marian – was of a mind to deny a state requiem, Pompey was instrumental in guaranteeing that Sulla would be buried with full republican honours.

  10. ‘Given the heterogeneous nature of the coalition which Sulla led to power it is hardly surprising to discover that there was a corresponding diversity of opinion among those who now made up the ruling oligarchy of Rome. Leaving aside those disaffected or about to disaffected, we find, at one extreme, men like Lucullus who were passionate partisans of the dictator, at the other, the likes of Pompey, who, despite quarrelling with Sulla, were prepared to work his system for his own advantage’, Keaveney, 2009, p.50.

  11. Dio’s history is a major source of information for the Lucullan age. Dio was born c. AD 150 and died in 235; his father was the governor of the province of Cilicia, which may have made the region of special interest to his historian son. Dio would eventually become governor in his own right, of Pergamum and Smyrna; he would serve in other major posts before meeting his death in Nicaea. Dio’s history was written in eight books; the surviving portion starts in Book XXXVI, just where we may begin to read of Lucullus’ adventures in the East (there are gaps, however, in Books XXXVI and LV-LX). The most convenient edition of Dio for anglophone readers is the Loeb Classical Library edition in nine volumes, with translation and some brief notes. The Budé volumes that have been prepared to date offer a French translation and more extensive commentary, as well as a critical text of the Greek original.

  12. It is uncertain whether Lucullus’ refusal of Sardinia had anything to do with the revolt of Marcus Aemilius Lepidus. After the death of Sulla, Lepidus had supported anti-Sullan rebels in Etruria; after he failed in his revolutionary initiatives, he eventually made his way to Sardinia, where he died of illness. Most of his followers joined the Sertorian cause.

  13. ‘Plutarch’s silence probably indicates he found nothing to report’, Keaveney, 2009, p.54 n.18.

  14. On Lucullus’ wife and her family, note W.C. McDermott, ‘The Sisters of P. Clodius’, Phoenix 24.1 (1970), pp.39–47; also T.W. Hillard, ‘The Sisters of Clodius Again’, Latomus 32.3 (1973), pp.505–14.

  15. Cf. the passing references at Vita Luculli XXI, XXXIV and XXXVIII; also Dio 36.14.4.

  16. Cicero alludes to his charge of Lucullus at Pro Milone 73. The oration is a tour de force of rhetorical skill, all at Clodius’ expense; the crime of Clodius in desecrating the rites of the Bona Dea is rehearsed, as well as the appropriateness of Clodius meeting his end at Bovillae near a shrine of the goddess. Clodius is depicted as a petty criminal, a thug and a vandal.

  17. On this most famous Clodia, note M.B. Skinner, Clodia Metelli: The Tribune’s Sister (Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, 2011).

  18. See further here Keaveney, 2009, pp.64–65, with consideration of both political and amatory possibilities.

  19. For a convenient overview, note the aforementioned P. Matyszak, Sertorius and the Struggle for Spain (South Yorkshire: Pen & Sword Military, 2013). Also useful is Christopher F. Konrad’s Plutarch’s Sertorius: A Historical Commentary (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1994), with much helpful information. Philip O. Spann’s monograph Quintus Sertorius and the Legacy of Sulla (Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 1987) is good on explicating the Sertorius phenomenon in light of the larger realities of Sullan Rome.

  20. ‘Lucullus had been allotted Cisalpine Gaul as his province, an appointment that would deprive him of his chance for glory. When Octavius, governor of Cilicia, died early in 74 … Lucullus realized the opportunity it presented’, McGushin, 1994, p. 74.

  21. See Keaveney, 2009, p.87, for Cotta’s own ambitions in the East; he remained more or less loyal to Lucullus, and was perhaps all too aware of the limits of his talents for war. A harsh but reasonably fair critic would conclude, in fact, that Cotta was incompetent in the military arts, and ultimately more possessed of avarice than of tactical or strategic brilliance. ‘Cotta was content to let his colleague conduct the main fight while he conducted a side-campaign. This, it is fair to say, was characterized by incompetence, cruelty, treachery and an unslakable thirst for loot. A fitting climax was reached on his return to Rome when Cotta had to face a charge of repetundae and expulsion from the senate in consequence.’ On this and other ‘classic’ criminal charges of republican Rome, Riggsby, 1999, is helpful. ‘The Roman plan for the opening campaign of the war was that Cotta should hold Mithridates in check in Bithynia, and with the help of a fleet collected from allies, close the Bosporus against Mithridates’ navy. Lucullus was to add the veteran legions of Servilius in Cilicia and the Fimbrian legions in Asia to the fresh legion he brought with him and advance through Phrygia against Mithridates’ flank. Delayed by problems in Asia, Lucullus had only reached the river Sangarius when news reached him that Cotta, who had been foolish enough to offer battle to Mithridates’ main force and had suffered total defeat, had been forced to fall back on Chalcedon’, McGushin, 1994, p.75.

  22. Fr.2.86.11–12 Ramsey.

  23. Vita Luculli V.3.

  24. For commentary on the decision, see especially Telford, 2014, pp.237–38, with ample catalogue of all the reasons why Lucullus’ loyalty commended itself to Sulla. Enemies of Lucullus might long have remembered that he was also to give the eulogy for his mentor (cf. Telford, 2014, p.240).

  25. On this theory, see Keaveney, 2009, pp.69–70.

  26. For how Lucullus was ‘creditable and more than creditable’ up to this point in his career, were one only to judge him by the standards of the ‘mass of his contemporaries’ and not Pompey, see Keaveney, 2009, p.57. It is reasonable to speculate that Lucullus felt increasingly overshadowed by the brilliant young Pompey; what is more difficult to assert definitively is how much of their relative achievements were the result of innate talent versus opportunity and luck.

  27. Cf. Keaveney, 2009, p.71.

  28. Appian X.68.

  29. Sertorius also had a mystical side, even if affected; cf. Plutarch, Vita Sertorii XI.2 ff., for the story of the white doe that allegedly communicated the wishes of the goddess Artemis to Sertorius. See further Konrad’s commentary ad loc. for Plutarch’s thinly veiled admiration and enthusiasm for someone who was so skilled at manipulating the superstitutious beliefs of those around him.

  30. X.67.

  31. X.68.

  32. We may compare the account of the Greek historian Memnon of Heraclea, who notes that war initially broke out between Rome and Mithridates because of the king’s seizure of Cappadocia. Memnon’s account (chapter 22 of Jacoby’s standard edition, see below) emphasizes Mithridates’ brutality: he killed his nephew, mother and brother. We are indebted to the Byzantine polymath Photius for his preservation of precious remains of Memnon; the ninth-century scholar’s Bibliotheca is a vast treasure trove of passages and epitomes of otherwise lost works. Memnon is conveniently found in the Budé edition of Photius’ Bibliotheca, Volume IV (René Henry, ed., Photius: Bibliothèque, Tome IV: Codices 223–229), where what remains of Memnon is given in codices 225–227 (with French translation and a few notes of commentary). Memnon is also contained in Felix Jacoby’s monumental Die Fragmente der griechischen Historiker (1923–), a work left incomplete at the time of the editor’s death in 1959, but which new editors have sought to finish (Memnon is found in t. III B, pp.337–68); the Jacoby chapter numbers are generally considered standard for citation. Photius notes that he was not able to find a copy of Books I-VIII of Memnon’s work, or of anything after Book XVI; Memnon would be unknown to us were it not for Photius’ preservation of the remains.

  33. Vita Luculli VI.1.

  34. Breviarium VI.6.1–2. Eutropius was a fourth-century AD historian who wrote a compendium of Roman history in ten books; the most convenient edition is the Budé text of Joseph Hellegouarc’h, with critical text, French translation
and brief commentary, Eutrope: Abrégé d’histoire romaine (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1999). Eutropius accompanied the Emperor Julian against the Persians, and dedicated his Roman history to the Emperor Valens. His work is in ten books, and the simplicity of the Latin style has made it a popular choice for early readings for students of the language.

  35. Keaveney, 2009, pp.72 ff., considers the domestic landscape on the eve of Lucullus’ departure for what would be the Third Mithridatic War.

  36. Quinctius focused on the question of jury reform and alleged bribery of jurors; Lucullus apparently tried at first to persuade Quinctius not to pursue the matter, and then stood firm against him in public debate. There were no jury reforms in 74 BC – but Lucullus would pay a heavy price for his political and oratorical victory.

  37. Helpful on this topic is the article of B. Marshall and J.L. Beness, ‘Tribunician Agitation and Aristocratic Reaction 80–71 BC’, in Athenaeum 65 (1987), pp.360–78.

  38. Leach, 1978, p.55.

  39. Modern scholars have debated the significance of the Praecia episode, with particular attention to the question of whether or not Lucullus is deserving of criticism for the means by which he won his Cilician appointment. What is clear enough is that for Plutarch, the whole affair was to Lucullus’ discredit; it was an expeditious way to achieve what he wanted, but in no way deserving of merit or credit. Of Praecia we know nothing other than what is recorded in Plutarch. We do well to remember that it would have been easy to read back into the story something of the criticism that Lucullus would suffer later in the accusations of hedonism and ill-timed pursuits of pleasure and decadent living.