Spartacus and the Slave Wars
Journal Data
| Type | SOURCE_BOOK |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Springer Nature (SG) |
| ISBN-13 | 9781137121615 |
| Open Library | OL2905880W |
| Total publications | 12 |
| Coverage period | 2001 - 2001 |
| Language | EN |
| Cited by | 38 |
| h-index | 1 |
| i10-index | 1 |
Spartacus
On April Fool’s Day of 1865, Karl Marx’s elder daughter, Jenny, presented her father with a playful questionnaire. Not unlike the marketing surveys of our own day, it asked questions about his likes and dislikes: the qualities that he most preferred in a person, his favorite food (fish), his favorite color (not surprisingly, red), and various other preferences. The survey also asked about his hero, to which Marx replied, “Spartacus and Kepler.” 1…
Gladiators, Slaves, and Resistance
Gladiators were men trained to fight with a sword (gladius) and other weapons in order to kill or wound each other for the entertainment of spectators. Other armed professional entertainers known as beast fighters (bestiarii) or hunters (venatores) were trained to hunt wild animals such as leopards and bears for the enjoyment of large crowds. Gladiatorial games were a defining element of Roman culture as it developed in the third and second centu…
Reading Greek and Roman Historical Sources
Today we are so far removed from a world where servitude in manual labor was the norm that empathy alone is often our faulty guide to historical understanding. For instance, in Spartacus’s day, Enna was a center of the slave economy on the island of Sicily and of the slave wars against the Roman state; now it is the home of Marina Taglialavore, the inventor of a new computer chip that has revolutionized the reading of images. Any hope of crossing…
The First Sicilian Slave War, 135–132 b.c.
The first major slave war faced by the Roman Republic erupted in the center of the island of Sicily, the state’s first overseas province. According to most accounts, the war began with a sudden outburst of violence in 135 b.c. in the city of Enna, the agricultural center of one of the richest agricultural plains on the island and also an important cult center of the goddess Demeter. A slave named Eunus led the initial outbreak, but the war also i…
Slave Life on the Large Farms
On the new agricultural plantations, or latifundia, that developed in Italy and Sicily between the third and second centuries b.c., the core permanent labor force was made up of large numbers of slaves who had been purchased from abroad. This new type of market-oriented agriculture generated handbooks to instruct farm owners how to run a large agricultural operation. According to the ideal farm model, slaves were deployed in small work units of t…
The Second Sicilian Slave War, 104–100 b.c.
The second major slave war that afflicted the Roman state was almost a carbon copy of the first Taking place a generation after the first war, it also occurred on the island of Sicily. The sequence of events and the actions of the main protagonists are so reminiscent of the first slave war that some modern historians have hypothesized that the Greek and Roman historians who told the story of the second war simply copied the narrative patterns of …
Slave Revolts in Italy and Sicily before the Great Slave Wars
In the second major war that Rome fought with Carthage (218–201 b.c.), the Carthaginian commander Hannibal ravaged Italy south of Rome, while Roman forces devastated the parts of Sicily controlled by the Carthaginians and their allies. After the war, general conditions of peace and prosperity returned to southern Italy and Sicily. The half-century after 200 b.c., however, witnessed several slave rebellions. For information on most of these outbre…
Fugitive Slaves and Maroon Communities
One of the more usual modes of resistance by slaves, and one that has parallels with the aims of larger types of collective resistance such as the slave wars, was running away. To control this behavior, slave owners used threats, the services of professional slave hunters, the force of law, and the posting of information and rewards that encouraged others to arrest and return the fugitives.
A Note about the Text
When you read these documents, it is important to be aware of the nature of the sources in which the information appears. To that end, I have provided a general description of the most important authors of the literary works from which this information has been derived (see “List of the Principal Authors and Literary Sources”). The dates provided for many of these authors are approximate, not much better than educated guesswork.
The Slave Wars in Italy and Sicily
Finding out about Spartacus is more difficult than understanding his role as a modern-day symbol of resistance. To see through the masks of our own modern images of him requires us to discover who Spartacus was in the world in which he and his fellow slaves lived. Most important is for us to understand the new slave economy and society that emerged in the third and second centuries b.c. Once we delve into this historical context, we can begin to …
The Spartacus Slave War, 73–71 b.c
Between 73 and 71 b.c., large areas of the Italian peninsula south of Rome were thrown into a state of upheaval by the sudden outbreak of the third great slave war. This war was sparked by an incident involving the escape of a group of slave gladiators from their training school at Capua, the city that was the de facto capital of the wealthy region of Campania. A gladiator named Spartacus led the rebel slaves. Although their initial forays were l…
Spartacus and the Slave Wars
Spartacus
On April Fool’s Day of 1865, Karl Marx’s elder daughter, Jenny, presented her father with a playful questionnaire. Not unlike the marketing surveys of our own day, it asked questions about his likes and dislikes: the qualities that he most preferred in a person, his favorite food (fish), his favorite color (not surprisingly, red), and various other preferences. The survey also asked about his hero, to which Marx replied, “Spartacus and Kepler.” 1…
Gladiators, Slaves, and Resistance
Gladiators were men trained to fight with a sword (gladius) and other weapons in order to kill or wound each other for the entertainment of spectators. Other armed professional entertainers known as beast fighters (bestiarii) or hunters (venatores) were trained to hunt wild animals such as leopards and bears for the enjoyment of large crowds. Gladiatorial games were a defining element of Roman culture as it developed in the third and second centu…
Reading Greek and Roman Historical Sources
Today we are so far removed from a world where servitude in manual labor was the norm that empathy alone is often our faulty guide to historical understanding. For instance, in Spartacus’s day, Enna was a center of the slave economy on the island of Sicily and of the slave wars against the Roman state; now it is the home of Marina Taglialavore, the inventor of a new computer chip that has revolutionized the reading of images. Any hope of crossing…
The First Sicilian Slave War, 135–132 b.c.
The first major slave war faced by the Roman Republic erupted in the center of the island of Sicily, the state’s first overseas province. According to most accounts, the war began with a sudden outburst of violence in 135 b.c. in the city of Enna, the agricultural center of one of the richest agricultural plains on the island and also an important cult center of the goddess Demeter. A slave named Eunus led the initial outbreak, but the war also i…
Slave Life on the Large Farms
On the new agricultural plantations, or latifundia, that developed in Italy and Sicily between the third and second centuries b.c., the core permanent labor force was made up of large numbers of slaves who had been purchased from abroad. This new type of market-oriented agriculture generated handbooks to instruct farm owners how to run a large agricultural operation. According to the ideal farm model, slaves were deployed in small work units of t…
The Second Sicilian Slave War, 104–100 b.c.
The second major slave war that afflicted the Roman state was almost a carbon copy of the first Taking place a generation after the first war, it also occurred on the island of Sicily. The sequence of events and the actions of the main protagonists are so reminiscent of the first slave war that some modern historians have hypothesized that the Greek and Roman historians who told the story of the second war simply copied the narrative patterns of …
Slave Revolts in Italy and Sicily before the Great Slave Wars
In the second major war that Rome fought with Carthage (218–201 b.c.), the Carthaginian commander Hannibal ravaged Italy south of Rome, while Roman forces devastated the parts of Sicily controlled by the Carthaginians and their allies. After the war, general conditions of peace and prosperity returned to southern Italy and Sicily. The half-century after 200 b.c., however, witnessed several slave rebellions. For information on most of these outbre…
Fugitive Slaves and Maroon Communities
One of the more usual modes of resistance by slaves, and one that has parallels with the aims of larger types of collective resistance such as the slave wars, was running away. To control this behavior, slave owners used threats, the services of professional slave hunters, the force of law, and the posting of information and rewards that encouraged others to arrest and return the fugitives.
A Note about the Text
When you read these documents, it is important to be aware of the nature of the sources in which the information appears. To that end, I have provided a general description of the most important authors of the literary works from which this information has been derived (see “List of the Principal Authors and Literary Sources”). The dates provided for many of these authors are approximate, not much better than educated guesswork.
The Slave Wars in Italy and Sicily
Finding out about Spartacus is more difficult than understanding his role as a modern-day symbol of resistance. To see through the masks of our own modern images of him requires us to discover who Spartacus was in the world in which he and his fellow slaves lived. Most important is for us to understand the new slave economy and society that emerged in the third and second centuries b.c. Once we delve into this historical context, we can begin to …
The Spartacus Slave War, 73–71 b.c
Between 73 and 71 b.c., large areas of the Italian peninsula south of Rome were thrown into a state of upheaval by the sudden outbreak of the third great slave war. This war was sparked by an incident involving the escape of a group of slave gladiators from their training school at Capua, the city that was the de facto capital of the wealthy region of Campania. A gladiator named Spartacus led the rebel slaves. Although their initial forays were l…
Spartacus and the Slave Wars