Lucullus

by Lee Fratantuono

  6. There may have been an implicit challenge in this remark, at least in the way it would likely have been interpreted by Lucullus. Lucullus had certainly not merited the title imperator for anything having to do with Armenia. The story after Tigranocerta would be different.

  7. Keaveney, 2009, p.138.

  8. Cf. Tigran Vartanovich Petrosian (1929–1984), the Armenian/Soviet world chess champion.

  9. Memnon (chapter 31 of Jacoby’s edition) also notes the salutation problem; in his account, Tigranes wrote a letter to Lucullus that contained the same substance as his conversation with Clodius: he would be censured universally if he handed over his father-in-law. One wonders if Lucullus was moved at all by the pietas that Tigranes was displaying toward his relative by marriage.

  10. Vita Luculli XXI.6.

  11. Vita Luculli XXII.4.

  12. Vita Luculli XXIII.7.

  13. Vita Luculli XXIV.3.

  14. Cf. Sallust, Historiae fr.IV.52 Ramsey.

  15. Historiae fr.IV.32 Ramsey.

  16. Cf. Sallust, Historiae fr.IV.53 Ramsey.

  17. The alleged favour of heaven is also attested at Sallust, Historiae fr.IV.54 Ramsey.

  18. ‘From Tomisa Lucullus marched south-east to Amida on the upper Tigris. The news of his advance was greeted with incredulity’, McGushin, 1994, p.171.

  19. Cf. Eutropius’ insightful account: Susceptus tamen est Mithridates post fugam a Tigrane, Armeniae rege, qui tum ingenti gloria imperabat, Persas saepe vicerat, Mesopotamiam occupaverat et Syriam et Phoenices partem (Nevertheless Mithridates was taken up after his flight by Tigranes, the king of Armenia, who then was ruling with great glory, who had conquered the Persians often, who had seized Mesopotamia and Syria and part of Phoenicia) (Breviarium VI.8.4).

  20. Vita Luculli XXV.1.

  21. XII.84; Vita Luculli XXV.2.

  22. XII.84.

  23. On the vexed question of the exact location of Tigranes’ showcase city, note especially T. Rice Holmes, ‘Tigranocerta’, The Journal of Roman Studies 7 (1917), pp.120–38; also T. Sinclair, ‘The Site of Tigranocerta. I’, Revue des études arméniennes, n.s., 25 (1994–1995), pp.183–254; L. Avdoyan, ‘Tigranocerta: The City “Built by Tigranes”’, in R. Hovannisian (ed.), Armenian Tigranakert/Diarbekir and Edessa/Urfa (Costa Mesa, California: Mazda, 2006), pp.81–95.

  24. Naturalis Historia VI.9.26; cf. VI.31.129 (on the local River Nicephorius as a tributary of the Tigris); also B.W. Henderson, ‘Controversies in Armenian Topography: 1, The Site of Tigranocerta’, The American Journal of Philology 28 (1903), pp.99–121. At Annales XV.5.2, Tacitus locates Tigranocerta with reference to Nisibis: apud oppidum Nisibin, septem et triginta milibus passuum a Tigranocerta distantem – Nisibis is said to have been 37 miles from Tigranocerta.

  25. XII.85.

  26. Cf. here Keaveney, 2009, p.146.

  27. XII.85.

  28. See Keaveney, 2009, p.139, for the argument that Lucullus was generously disposed toward Greeks – like a true phihellene or lover of Greek culture and art – but fundamentally contemptuous of eastern potentates like Tigranes, who were expected simply to obey Roman orders. I would argue that the salient point in the Armenian war is that Tigranes was in a position where the surrender of Mithridates must truly have seemed impossible. The king may have been less than competent in the prosecution of his war against Rome – too slow, too inexperienced and ultimately ineffective – but one imagines that Lucullus realized that Mithridates would not simply be shipped off to the Romans with nary a question, and that if the king could be provoked into a ‘traditional’ battle in open country, then total victory would be achieved. Tigranocerta was the obvious place to head to test fate.

  29. On this cf. Keaveney, 2009, p.142 n.12.

  30. Vita Luculli XXVI.6.

  31. The sources strongly emphasize the importance of the cataphracts to the power of Tigranes’ force; cf. Sallust, Historiae fr.IV.57 Ramsey.

  32. Some scholars argue that the battle was fought on 7 October (cf. the Cambridge Ancient History).

  33. Cf. Keaveney, 2009, p.148 n.18.

  34. XII.85.

  35. Vita Luculli XXVIII.3–5.

  36. Matyszak, 2008, p.135.

  37. Stratagemata II.1.14. Frontinus also credits Lucullus with excellent wisdom in the matter of choosing a place for battle, noting that he was able quickly to seize an elevated point with a portion of his force, from which he could launch a devastating flank attack against enemy cavalry. The cavalry broke and were thrown into confusion, and Lucullus was able to chase them down and to achieve a significant victory.

  38. Memnon (chapter 38 of Jacoby’s edition) notes that Lucullus was careful and skillful in the arrangement of his army, and that he gave encouraging words to his men before battle. He proceeded to rout the right wing of the enemy, and once those troops gave way, there was a domino effect as the army took general flight. The Armenians were soon in full panic, and the army was destroyed. Memnon gives a figure of 80,000 men for the force that Tigranes brought to his besieged city; he also preserves the contemptuous comment about there being too many Romans for an embassy, and too few for a war. The story of the rescue of the concubines is also related, with the detail that the Romans and Thracians attacked bravely, and that there was a widespread slaughter of the Armenians, with as many captured as were killed – but that the convoy with the women did reach Tigranes safely.

  39. For a detailed account of this episode, note A. Mayor, Greek Fire: Poison Arrows & Scorpion Bombs, Biological and Chemical Warfare in the Ancient World (Woodstock/New York/London: Overlook Duckworth, 2003), pp.243 ff.

  40. XXXVI. 1b. 1–2.

  41. Historiae fr.IV.55 Ramsey.

  42. XII.86.

  43. Vita Luculli XXIX.2–3.

  44. XXXVI. 1.3 ff.

  45. Vita Luculli XXVIII.5–6.

  46. Memnon (chapter 38 of Jacoby’s edition) notes that Tigranes handed over the diadem to his son; he also records the report that Mithridates soon enough appeared to console his son-in-law and to boost his spirits, complete with new royal apparel and words of encouragment. But it is at this juncture that Tigranes agreed that his father-in-law should take overall command of the operation. Memnon records that the two kings had not been in each other’s presence for a year and eight months after Mithridates first arrived as a fugitive in Armenia; the Pontic king had risen once again in his fortunes.

  47. See Mayor, 2010, pp.307–09, for commentary on how the Romans failed to appreciate the ‘guerrilla tactics’ of their foes in the aftermath of such defeats as Tigranocerta.

  48. Vita Luculli XXIX.1–2.

  49. VI.3.6.

  50. Breviarium VI.9.1. Frustratingly, Eutropius characteristically gives no insight or detail into how Lucullus achieved his victory; at once, the Roman force is off to the conquest of Nisibis. A breviary, after all, is a breviary.

  51. See especially Keaveney, 2009, p.152, on the question of the legality of Lucullus’ war on Tigranes. Keaveney argues cogently and persuasively that the war was indeed legitimate; Tigranes was guilty of offering aid and comfort to an avowed enemy of Rome.

  52. Keaveney, 2009, p.153, gathers the evidence for a charge he considers unfair.

  53. For what little we know precisely of Lucullus’ actions in the immediate wake of his departure from Tigranocerta, see McGushin, 1994, pp.199–201.

  54. On Parthia, the work of Debevoise, 1938, remains valuable.

  55. The king’s dynastic name was Arsaces XII; his personal name was Phraates III. He ruled Parthia from 70–57 BC; he would be murdered by his two sons, Orodes II and Mithridates III. The brothers would eventually have a falling out (to put it mildly); Mithridates III would be killed in 54 on orders of Orodes. Orodes would see the great victory over Crassus and last in power until 37 BC; he would be slain by his son Phraates IV, who also took care to kill his thirty brothers. As for the present overtures to the Parthians, Memnon (chapter 38 in Jacoby’s edition) once again provides more confirming evidence; Ti
granes sent an embassy to the Parthians, promising Mesopotamia, Adiabene and more in exchange for an alliance; Lucullus also approached the Parthians, who perhaps wisely played both sides against the other. Keaveney, 2009, pp.156–57, makes the reasonable argument that Lucullus never planned a war against Parthia, even in the face of legitimate provocation in the matter of Parthian double-dealing; ‘to embroil Rome in a war with yet another great power would amount to nothing less than an act of breathtaking folly.’ Lucullus no doubt realized that the Parthian question would need to be settled sooner or later.

  56. On the subject of espionage in the ancient world, note especially N.J.E. Austin and N.B. Rankov, Exploratio: Military and Political Intelligence in the Roman World from the Second Punic War to the Battle of Adrianople (London/New York: Routledge, 1995).

  57. A helpful popular overview here is G.C. Sampson, The Defeat of Rome in the East: Crassus, the Parthians, and the Disastrous Battle of Carrhae, 53 BC (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Casemate, 2008).

  58. Historiae, fr.IV.60 Ramsey.

  59. See further here F. Ahlheid, ‘Oratorical Strategy in Sallust’s Letter of Mithridates’, in Mnemosyne 41.1/2 (1988), pp.67–92; also E. Adler, Valorizing the Barbarians: Enemy Speeches in Roman Historiography (Austin: The University of Texas Press, 2011), pp.17–36; cf. the same author’s article ‘Who’s Anti-Roman? Sallust and Pompeius Trogus on Mithridates’, The Classical Journal 101.3 (2006), pp.383–407. The commentary of McGushin, 1994, pp.173 ff. offers a detailed appraisal of what it concludes is ‘an extremely skillful exercise by Sallust in the genre of deliberative oratory … the letter conforms to the principles of ancient rhetorical theory’.

  60. Vita Luculli XXIX.6–8.

  61. ‘This was a venal age, a time when bribery was virtually commonplace in public life. So the financiers simply dipped into their large money-bags and bought themselves some tribunes to add their voices to the initial protests’, Keaveney, 2009, p.154.

  62. For a good overview of the Alexander question, with consideration of contemporary attitudes toward Lucullus, Pompey and Crassus in terms of their respective reminiscences (real or imagined) of the Macedonian conqueror, see Keaveney, 2009, pp.306–07. It could be argued that while Lucullus was certainly no dreamer with monarchical ambitions in the mold of an Alexander, he was likely all too well aware that his Roman army was treading in much the same country and direction as the storied Greek monarch; it would have been impossible not to remember the lore of Alexander as one entered the territory of Mithridates and Tigranes. And this would have been the case even for someone of such steadfast republican sentiments as Lucullus. Alexander imagery would be all the more poignant in retreat; in the case of both Alexander and Lucullus, army decisions played a significant part in the decision to return home.

  63. XXXVI.2.1.

  64. Historiae fr.IV.62 Ramsey, imperi prolatandi percupidus habebatur, cetera egregius. Fr.61 goes so far as to refer to alleged bribery on the part of Lucullus to see to it that he would have no successor in Cilicia. Certainly some of the discontent about Lucullus came from no other source than his own men, who were tired of spending multiple winters in distant Asia – or at least tired of spending them under Lucullus.

  65. XXXVI.2.4–5.

  66. II.33.1.

  67. We are in fact uncertain who made the celebrated (not to say notorious) quip; it may have been the Stoic philosopher Tubero. There may have been a deliberate play on the notion of Lucullus as Alexander – his enemies and critics may have preferred to compare him to the Persian monarch.

  68. For an appraisal of such charges, and more generally of the significance of the appellation to an understanding of Lucullus, see Evans, 2007, pp.104 ff., ‘as Xerxes togatus Lucullus embodies foreignness: an easterner in a thin veneer of Romanness. The joke then is particularly barbed, as it suggestes that Lucullus’ inner core is not Roman at all, and that if he were to remove his toga, his Romanness would disappear. But clearly Lucius Licinius Lucullus’ ethnicity is fixed by his name, his lineage and his role as a public figure, so that the corollary is that even in his native Roman dress, Lucullus perverts the national costume by acting as a foreign tyrant in a toga.’

  69. Keaveney, 2009, pp.151–53, offers an extended account and analysis of the process by which gossip reached Rome and was amplified into anti-Lucullan slander.

  70. Vita Luculli XXXI.3.

  71. Vita Luculli XXXI.1–2.

  72. XIII.87.

  73. XXXVI.4.2.

  74. See further here Keaveney, 2009, pp.158–59. Keaveney assigns the narrative of Dio XXXVI.5.2 to earlier in the campaign, arguing that ‘it looks like the skirmishing tactics of Mithridates’.

  75. Vita Luculli XXXI.4–8.

  76. XII. 87; Vita Lucullli XXXII.1–2.

  77. Despite his victory there, it would in fact be the locus of the reception of more bad news. ‘Great as his achievements had been, he had failed to capture the enemy kings, and he was worried by the disturbing reports which had been filtering to him from Rome. In 70 Lucullus had been proconsul in Asia, Cilicia, Bithynia and Pontus, but as a result of tribunician agitation Asia had been taken from his control in 69. And now news reached him in Nisibis that Cilicia had been transferred to the control of his brother-in-law and rival, the consul Quintus Marcius Rex’, Greenhalgh, 1980, pp.75–76. By the time Rex would refuse to aid him, and his men would show little interest in defending Cappadocia, the fugitive kings would have achieved much in their efforts to run amok unfettered.

  78. Vita Luculli XXXII.2.

  79. Mayor, 2010, p.309, speculates that the gold caches that Mithridates had hid – and that Callimachus promised to reveal to Lucullus – may still await discovery. If Lucullus really did ignore the pleas of Callimachus to spare his life on condition that he reveal the treasure hoards, it is another example of the ability of the Roman to stand fast against the temptation of luxury. Evidently, Callimachus’ life would not be spared by recourse to bribery. No doubt episodes such as this explain why Lucullus would have been so resentful of the accusation that he was prolonging the war merely to enrich his own coffers.

  80. XXXVI.8.

  81. Spann, 1987, p.104, notes indignantly, ‘High treason should be made of sterner stuff ’ as part of his general argument of questioning the charges made against Sertorius, while men like Lucullus emerged comparatively unscathed in the court of legal and public opinion.

  82. Breviarium VI.9.1.

  83. XII.88.

  84. XXXVI. 9.1 ff.

  85. Vita Luculli XXXV.1.

  86. There is dispute over the question of why Triarius engaged Mithridates. The evidence of Plutarch and Appian is that Triarius wanted to steal the glory from Lucullus; this is exactly the sort of ancient argument that causes some modern scholars pause. See further Keaveney, 2009, p.167 n.48. The main objection to the ancient narrative is that Triarius asked for aid – but it is not entirely clear when the call for help went out, and it is also possible that Triarius may have summoned ‘help’ in the form of an audience to witness the aftermath of his own victory. It was hardly the first time that Lucullus had responded to a distress call; he may well have felt that he rarely received proper credit for the speed and efficacy of his responses.

  87. XXII.89.

  88. Vita Luculli XXXV.1.

  89. XII.89.

  90. ‘One wonders whether Lucullus gave any thought to the masses of wandering Cappadocian refugees, who had been transplanted to Tigranocerta by Tigranes, and now had been liberated by Lucullus and sent back to their homeland – just in time to meet Tigranes’ reinvasion’, Mayor, 2010, pp.311–12.

  91. XXXVI. 14.

  92. Epitome XCVIII.

  93. Historiae fr.V.2 Ramsey.

  94. Dio XXXVI.17.1.

  95. Cf. the assessment of C. Steel, The End of the Roman Republic, 146 to 44 BC: Conquest and Crisis (Edinburgh, 2013), p.142.

  96. Vita Luculli XXXIII.1–3.

  97. On this oft-repeated judgment of Lucullus, cf. McGushin, 19
94, pp.202–03.

  98. Keaveney, 2009, p.162.

  99. XXXVI. 15.1–3.

  100. A valuable look at Lucullus’ relationship with the masses is the essay of N. Tröster, ‘Struggling with the Plêthos: Politics and Military Leadership in Plutarch’s Life of Lucullus’, in Nikolaidis, 2008, pp.387–402.

  101. XXXVI. 14.4.

  102. XII.90.

  103. Keaveney, 2009, p.230.

  104. See further the commentary note of Jacques André in his Budé edition of Book XV, Pline l’Ancien: Histoire Naturelle, Livre XV (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1960). The cherry may well have been taken from the modern Giresun in Turkey, the ancient Cerasus, although it is open to question whether the name of the place originally had anything to do with the fruit – the city was not known as Cerasus when Lucullus was in the region. For an interesting study on the role of botany and plants in ancient political life, see L. Totelin, ‘Botanizing Rulers and Their Herbal Subjects: Plants and Political Power in Greek and Roman Literature’, Phoenix 66.1/2 (2012), pp.122–44. Tertullian (Apologeticus XI.8) sarcastically laments that it is a pity for Lucullus that he was not made a god on account of introducing the (sweet) cherry to Italy, given that Liber was essentially made a god for introducing wine.

  105. Vita Luculli XXXV.7.

  106. Historiae fr.V.13 Ramsey; cf. Dio XXXVI.15.1. ‘Lucullus had been replaced by the senate in his military command and in his provinces by Q. Marcius Rex (cos. 68) and by M’ Acilius Glabrio (cos. 67), both of whom arrived in their respective provinces in 67. Even though Marcius Rex brought three fresh legions to his province Cilicia, and Acilius Glabrio, proconsul in Bithynia and Pontus, had been appointed army commander against Mithridates, neither was anxious to be involved in a perilous campaign’, McGushin, 1994, p.210.

  107. Cf. Dio XXXVI.14.4; 17.1.

  108. ‘Pompey’s patience rivalled that of the spider. He … knew well how to create a situation and then stand back from it until it had matured to the point where others would call upon him to apply a remedy’, Keaveney, 2009, p.163). Glabrio would never be able to do what Lucullus had failed to achieve, and so Pompey would be able to swoop in and save the Roman predicament. Pompey, for his part, had good reason to be confident in his abilities; he had achieved success in Spain, Italy and the Mediterranean, and he no doubt assumed that Asia would be yet another victory.