“Sylla is a mulberry sprinkled o’er with meal”
Lucius Cornelius Sulla was born in 138 BC in Rome, a descendant of a once prominent patrician family that had, however, by his time lost a great deal of its prestige and importance. The young Sulla was educated in Rome in the Latin and Greek classics, spending his time in luxury, typical at that time even for not so rich senatorial families. He is said to have been handsome, with blond hair, blue eyes that, on certain occasions threw wild sparks, and pale face being, in moments of anger, covered with spots of fiery red. Of temperament he was sanguine, easy to be approached, himself ready to be acquainted with everybody whom he considered worthy of this, regardless of their being simple soldiers, esteemed generals, or learnt senators. Having a strong affinity for irony and even sarcasm, Sulla tended to surround himself with jesters and actors, the most famous of whom was the great Roscius. From life he wanted nothing more than pleasure, which was apparently evident from the fact that, following his greatest triumphs, he tended to go back to the dolce vita of his youth. With his friends he was as kind and tolerant as he was harsh and grave with his enemies, whereby he often boasted and even put on his epitaph that no friend had outdone him in doing good deeds and no adversary in bad. He was munificent with everything and especially with money, which he was willing to lend to any ally standing in need, himself reluctant to seek favours and always trying to return them as quickly as possible with utmost generosity. These qualities of Sulla’s won him many friends, but also many enemies.
In 107 BC, Sulla, having been chosen quaestor, was sent to Africa to serve under Gaius Marius in the Jugurthine War in the position of Master of the Horse. There he greatly distinguished himself, eager to take on any assignment which he received from the consul and acting friendly towards the common legionaries. He also gave signs of his great military talent, for the Roman army being suddenly attacked during its march by the kings of Numidia and Mauretania, Jugurtha and Bocchus, and close to defeat, Sulla, crushing the forces opposing him on the right wing, led a counterattack and, skilfully surrounding the enemy with the cavalry, secured victory.
After this battle the sly Bocchus, who was not officially at war with Rome, decided to betray Jugurtha, who was his kinsman, to the Romans, thereby winning their gratitude. For this enterprise he asked Marius to send Sulla, to whom he was acquainted from before, to receive the captive. This was a dangerous mission, for the barbarian king, who often changed his opinion, was not to be trusted. Sulla, however, conferring upon the matter with Marius and realising that Jugurtha’s imprisonment would effectively bring the war to an end, took a small detachment and boldly began his march through the desert. Half way through he was met by Volux, the son of Bocchus, and the two factions moved on together until, one morning Volux delivered news that Jugurtha was standing before them with a large force. This brought about serious discontent in the camp, many of the Roman soldiers accusing the king’s son of being a traitor and aspiring to kill him. Sulla, albeit himself sharing that opinion, refused to do Volux any harm and ordered him to leave immediately. Upon this Volux, with tears in his eyes, managed to persuade Sulla that this was a deed of the sly Jugurtha, and urged the Roman to flee with him. Sulla, however, declared he would rather die there and then rather than betray his solders and resumed his march, fooling the enemy’s forces and succeeding in going around them to reach Bocchus.
Bocchus, now having both Sulla and Jugurtha in his power, hesitated whom to give up; in the end, however, his sympathies towards the brave Roman prevailed, and Sulla received the rebellious king, whom he brought safely to Marius. At Rome, Marius was initially proclaimed victor and held a triumph on January 1st, 104 BC. Later, however, people realised that it was Sulla who was responsible for bringing the long war to an end. King Bocchus himself contributed to this by issuing a golden trophy, which depicted his giving and Sulla’s receiving Jugurtha, in the Roman Capitol.
After the Jugurthine War, Marius employed Sulla as a lieutenant on another occasion, in the war against the Cimbri and Teutones (104 BC – 101 BC), where Sulla once again showed his valour and organisational skills serving as a main intendant of the army. Following the repulsion of these Germanic tribes are a few obscure years in Sulla’s life; he probably spent them in Rome as a private citizen amidst revelry. In 93 BC, after unsuccessfully trying to be elected for the same office the previous year, he was chosen praetor and received the province of Cilicia. His praetorship coincided with the first troubles stirred by Mithridates VI Eupator, king of Pontus, who had at that time deposed the rightful ruler of Cappadocia, putting a puppet king on his place with Armenian help. Sulla was ordered by the Senate to return the fleeing monarch to his throne and drive the Armenians out of Cappadocia. He had a small number of troops at his disposal, but with the help of confederate forces performed this task with considerable slaughter of the Cappadocians and even more so of the Armenians, as noted by Plutarch. Upon this he was the first Roman general to reach the Euphrates, where he was met by an ambassador of the Parthian king Arsaces. What followed was a profound ceremony that raised Sulla’s prestige much more than his esteemed victories. At the first encounter between the Romans and the Parthians, Sulla had three chairs installed and, himself assuming the central one and in this way forcing the Parthian Orobazus and the king of Cappadocia to sit on his sides, held an audience. The Parthians offered alliance, recognising the Euphrates as a border between the two Empires, which Sulla accepted, but with such contempt, that king Arsaces later beheaded Orobazus for having disgraced the Parthian name. As a servant of Orobazus there attended the meeting a certain Chaldean, who, upon observing Sulla’s overall appearance and manners, said that he was destined to become master of all.
After his praetorship was over, Sulla returned to Rome and was chosen general in the Social War (91 BC – 89 BC), owing to his new fame. He commanded the Roman armies in southern Italy, while Marius was in command in the north. In the war where Marius lost his eminence, Sulla acted with honour and was more than anybody responsible for an outcome more or less favourable to Rome. Consequently he was elected consul for 88 BC and given the command of the Mithridatic War in the east. Marius, however, wanted the command for himself and hence allied himself to the tribune Sulpicius, who intended to stage a revolution. To prevent it, the consuls intended set up officials celebrations, to which Sulpicius reacted with armed force, pursuing the consuls. Pompeius’s son was murdered and Sulla was forced to take refuge in Marius’s house; Marius was further given the command against Mithridates. Thereafter Sulla immediately went to his army from the Social War, which, still not disbanded, was besieging the town of Nola, where the Samnites were still holding out. He appealed to his troops in the sense that the new general would probably draft new soldiers for the eastern campaign and succeeded so much, that all common legionaries agreed to follow him in the march against the capital. Only a few centurions, who still possessed at least some civil responsibility, refrained from this. In the meantime, the Senate had dispatched envoys to the army to denounce Sulla; upon their entrance into the camp these were stripped of their insignia and barely escaped death.
Sulla now led his army forth and the petty Senate, seriously alarmed, sent more magistrates to check his advance; they suffered the fate of the previous delegates. Realising that the conflict would have to be resolved by force, Marius armed his veterans residing in the city, so that Sulla’s men, upon their entrance into Rome, met furious resistance and were starting to retreat when Sulla, threatening to set the houses on fire, gave them strength to continue their offensive and defeat the enemy. As a last resort, Marius decided to free all slaves; few, however, came to him, so that he was eventually forced to flee Rome. Sulla, now master of the situation, passed death sentences on twelve of the leaders of the democratic party, including Marius, as well as a number of laws, whereby the power of the Senate was increased. According to the most important ones, each future acts had to receive senatorial approval before being presented to the populace. The majority of the common people rejected these innovations, though, which resulted in elections for the next year, 87 BC, largely unfavourable to Sulla. Along with Octavius, an optimate, Cinna, a radical supporter of the populars, became consul. Sulla did not oppose this, stating that he was happy to see the people exercising their right to vote as they pleased. The only measure he took was to request an oath from the consuls, whereby they would be loyal to his laws, which was granted. This was only pretence, though. While Cinna urged Sulla to set sail for the east, he had a tribune challenge him in court. It was evident that an assault was in the making, to which Sulla could react by marching against Rome for the second time. As the situation in Asia by that time required his immediate advent, however, he decided to leave Italy to itself and face the foreign threat. The patriot Sulla prevailed over the politician Sulla to the effect that in the beginning of 87 BC he set sail for the Hellenistic east.
Sulla landed in Epirus in a position very different from that of previous Roman generals. His army consisted only of 30,000 men; he had to re-conquer not only the continent but also all the islands without a war navy; he had no sufficient funds either. Upon his immediate arrival, he was attacked by Archelaus, Mithridates’s best general, and Aristion, the tyrant of Athens. Sulla ousted them, following which all of Greece, with the exception of Athens, where Archelaus and Aristion had fortified themselves, went over to his side. Resolving to conquer the city before moving north into Macedonia, he laid siege to it. This siege proved extremely hard from the very beginning, for not having sufficient quantities of wood to construct siege weapons, the general had to order the groves of the Academy and Lyceum chopped down. Thereafter, in need of money, he emptied the sanctuaries of the most famous Greek oracles, promising to return them when he could. Yet, notwithstanding these extreme measures, progress was very limited, as the Pontic navy ruled the sea and could easily supply Athens with goods through the port of Piraeus. Sulla, however, persisted in his blockade and soon after the winter season, during which supplies scarcely reached the city, Athens was almost starved to death. Therefore Aristion sent envoys to the Romans with the intention of negotiating a favourable capitulation. But when these delegates proceeded to boast of Athens’s great history, Sulla bade them go back, as he had been sent by the Roman Senate not to take lessons as a student, but as a general to subdue rebels. Soon after, the city, no longer being able to defend itself, was stormed and finally overtaken on March 1st, 86 BC, the wrathful Romans making their entrance a bloody one. Aristion held out for some time in the Acropolis, but eventually had to surrender, being in strong need of water. Thereafter Archelaus received orders to empty Piraeus and join the huge Pontic army, which was making its way towards Sulla with the intention of defeating him in open battle. Subsequently Sulla took Athens’s port, levelling its excellent fortifications so that they could no longer delay him in the future.
Thereafter he left rugged Attica, moving north to face the Pontines. In March 86 BC, the two factions met on a plane at Caephisus, near Chaeronea. The Pontic army, numbering more than 100,000 men, was set in confusion by its poor organisation to the effect that Sulla, upon observing this, charged. Archelaus sent forth his excellent cavalry and chariots with the intention of gaining time to reorder his poor infantry. The Romans withstood the assault, themselves moving to the offensive. Seeing the cavalry defeated, the Asian infantry made no intention of opposing the victorious legions; instead the troops flung themselves into full flight, so that at the end of the day only a few thousand men from the great army escaped demise, Archelaus being among them. The effect of this victory was limited, however, due to the appalling lack of ships. The results of this glamorous victory were limited, however, owing to the appalling lack of ships Sulla had sent Lucius Lucullus to employ the Egyptian navy, but the admiral faced stiff refusal in Alexandria. He then took to the Syrian ports, receiving a considerable amount of ships. Sulla later made good use of the Thessalian shipyards as well, so that by the end of the war in 84 BC he had gathered together a strong fleet.
While the optimatic general was fighting the foreign enemy in the east, the circumstances in Rome changed dramatically. A successful coup d’etat was staged by Cinna and Marius, who then inflicted bloody terror on everyone in the capital whom they considered was against them, to the effect that several thousand people were killed. Many of Sulla’s friends were murdered, the rest, among whom was his wife Metella, fled to him in Macedonia, establishing an anti-Senate as it were. His estates were taken away, his house destroyed, and finally he was outlawed. Marius would have undoubtedly gone personally to fight Sulla in the east, had he not died shortly after he was elected consul for the sixth time early in 86 BC. Notwithstanding the death of one of the consuls, the other, Flaccus, was dispatched to deal away with the foreign invader as well as with the political adversary. He opposed Sulla in Greece but, judging himself no match for the experienced general, chose to move to Asia with the intention of defeating Mithridates there. Shortly after that, early in 85 BC he was deposed and killed by Fimbria, who took over the command and won a battle against the Pontic king. The latter had, meanwhile, sent over to Europe another army as huge as the previous one. Sulla confronted it at Orchomenes, near Caephisus in 85 BC. Archelaus again made good use of his excellent heavy cavalry to the point where the Romans were almost routed and started retreating. Upon this Sulla, grabbing an ensign, boldly attacked the enemy with his bodyguards, crying out to his troops that, should they be asked in Rome where they had betrayed their general, the answer ought to be “at Orchomenes”. These words strongly encouraged the soldiers, who crushed the enemy cavalry and after that, with great ease the infantry. With the few detachments that he had left, Archelaus took to the ships and left Greece. By the end of the year, Sulla had purged Europe clean of the king’s men. He wintered in Thessally, settling the affairs on the northern border of Macedonia and preparing an invasion of Asia, which was staged to take place early in the spring.
Mithridates, having thus lost Europe and now facing serious discontent in Asia, proceeded to negotiate a peace treaty with Sulla. Archelaus spoke to the Roman on his behalf, asking of him to leave Asia to the king in return for support during the campaign in Italy. As a true patriot, however, Sulla was reluctant to yield to these terms and proposed his own, whereby Mithridates should give back all conquered territories, pay a sum of 3000 talents as well as the soldiers’ salaries and lastly assume his old status of a Roman confederate. The king deemed these demands harsh, but Archelaus finally persuaded him to conclude peace in agreement with them (84 BC). Sulla then moved to Asia, meeting personally with Mithridates, and then lured Fimbria’s men over to his side, following which Fimbria committed suicide. Thereafter Asia was thoroughly reorganised and forced to pay a reparation of 20, 000 talents. Leaving Lucullus in the province along with the two legions taken from Fimbria, Sulla, at the head of 1600 ships, set sail from Ephesus to Piraeus early in 83 BC. From there he marched to Patras and then crossed over to Brundisium. In the meantime he had sent the Senate an account of his winning the Mithridatic War, which was understood as a declaration of war.
At Sulla’s advent in Italy, the Senate proclaimed that the state in danger and bestowed unlimited powers to the consuls, Norbanus and Scipio. These petty leaders, however, had not prepared themselves for what had been expected for years, so that when Sulla landed at Brundisium there was not a single soldier in all of southeast Italy. Fearing lest his troops should pillage the cities they take, Sulla made them take a vow whereby they would not to be violent towards their fellow countrymen. Further still, he promised to respect the rights of the new citizens to the effect that many of them went over to his side. As the general proceeded north, the towns wilfully joined his cause and were consequently spared. The scattered remnants of the optimatic party began to gather about him, Quintus Metellus returning from exile and Marcus Crassus arriving with a small detachment from Africa. The young Gnay Pompey also supported his cause, delivering the neighbourhood of Picenna; the first deserters from the democratic party started coming as well. Sulla encountered the army of Norbanus in Campania, and his trained veterans easily overcame their inexperienced adversaries. Further north Sulla was met by the forces of Scipio, the other consul, to whom he offered peace. As the negotiations went on, the two armies intermingled, so that when Scipio finally rejected the treaty, most of his troops went over to Sulla’s side. Thus ended the first year of fighting and as winter came, Sulla was confident of capturing the capital during his next campaign.
Realising that they should put their best efforts into the war in order to prevent demise, the democrats elected their best leaders, Carbo and Marius-son, as consuls for 82 BC. Marius encountered the enemy near Sacriport on a rainy afternoon and attacked. Suffering great casualties, though, he fled to the nearby town of Praeneste. Sulla left Quintus Ofella to besiege Praeneste, himself resuming his march and, not spotting anybody guarding Rome, took it. From there he march to Etruria with the intention of fighting Carbo, who was still holding out, Norbanus in the meantime opposing Metellus in northern Italy. In a hard-fought battle, Carbo succeeded in halting Sulla’s advance. While matters went thus in the north, in the south the Samnite Pontius raised an army of 70,000 men, aspiring to relieve Praeneste from the siege. Upon receiving intelligence of this, Sulla retired to Latium, from where he could observe carefully the actions of the Samnites. Looking to take advantage of this, Norbanus foolishly attacked the able Metellus and was utterly crushed; thereafter Carbo fled to Africa, most of his troops following suit.
Pontius, perceiving that all had been lost, set off from Praeneste to Rome. Doing this, he was going into a dead end, as he would be surrounded by the enemy armies. As the Samnites neared the capital, however, their intentions became clear – they aimed at eradicating Rome from the face of the earth. Sulla hurried to its defence, sending forth Balbus with a few cavalry squadrons, himself reaching the enemy in the late afternoon of November 1st, 82 BC. His friends bade him delay the attack till the next morning and not expose his weary troops to the chance of being overtaken. Perceiving what Rome might face in the evening, however, Sulla charged the foes at the Colline Gate. The pitched battle lasted till the next day, until the very end being uncertain who would gain the upper hand. On the left, Sulla himself was hard pressed and forced to retreat to the very city walls; messengers were already hurrying to warn Ofella of the fatal defeat. On the right wing, however, the young Crassus bravely repulsed the enemy. Early in the next morning a Samnite regiment of about 3000 men deserted to the Romans so that Sulla, hearing of Crassus’s victory, ordered a final charge and finally crushed the Samnites, most of whom, reluctant to run away, were slain during the battle. Rome was saved. Praeneste surrendered, even though a few towns desperately held out, the last being Volattere, which capitulated only in 79 BC.
Sulla entered Rome as an undisputed master. In a speech to the Senate he expressed the opinion that power ought to be transferred into the hands of a single man in order for the restoration of the Republic to be carried out successfully, considering himself worthy of such position. This was immediately granted, being officially termed “dictator for the prescription of laws and restoration of the state” (November of 82 BC). The new dictatorship was very different from the limited old one, which had passed out of use shortly after the Second Punic War. Only Sulla could decide when to strip himself of his powers; he could rule alongside the magistrates and the Senate or simply choose to ignore them. Further still, ownership of the land was transferred from the people to him, along with the permission to change the borders of the state as he pleased and organise the provinces and vassal kingdoms according to his will.
Sulla’s first concern, once in power, was to punish his political enemies. He proscribed everyone who had continued to oppose him after the failed treaty with Scipio, ordering those who were still alive to be put to death. Furthermore he confiscated their property, subsequently sold out to his friends for very little sums, and outlawed their descendants, forbidding them to hold any public office. If a person killed any one of the proscribed, he was not only excused, but received 12,000 denarii as well. There being, however, great uncertainty as to who exactly was guilty and who innocent, Sulla proceeded to set up lists for the people sentenced to death. Upon their eventual completion on June 1st, 81 BC, these lists included more than 4700 victims. Many others were killed for the sake of their property throughout all of Italy by Sulla’s protйgйs. The dictator did not invoke these murders, yet he was utterly forgiving to his friends, never punishing them even if they deserved it. He based his absolute rule on terror, which was mercilessly carried out, but we might not judge Sulla as harshly on that if we recall how his friends had been butchered and his property destroyed during his absence in the east during the Mithridatic War. Besides, these prosecutions would have been carried out by the victorious aristocracy even had it not been for Sulla – this was the oligarchy’s revenge for the bloodshed inflicted by Cinna and Marius earlier. Besides, Sulla, being of a sanguine nature, did not despise personally the majority of the deceased, with the exception of Marius and his associates; he considered the terror as something that was required for the rule of the Senate to be secured.
Sulla’s other big concern was the restoration of the Senate to its formal glory. He reasserted its position as the highest authoritative institution, with the power to veto any decision passed by the various assemblies, including that of the people, which had been made pre-eminent by the Gracchi brothers. Perceiving, however, the decadent position of the Senate, Sulla introduced to it 300 new members, most of which came from the democratic and centrist parties. The power of the tribunes was severely limited, their being made subservient to the Senate. The free wheat distributed to the population of Rome that was introduced by the Gracchi was taken away. Reforms were carried out in the judicial courts as well, whereby only esteemed senators and equestrians could become judges. The length of the consulship was prolonged from one to two years and lastly, the old laws of a two-year period before one could be elected to the next highest position and a ten-year period, during which one could not hold the same office again, were brought again into use. Sulla let the government run normally in 80 BC, ruling as a consul alongside his friend Metellus, but not exercising his dictatorship. As the new laws seemed to be working, Sulla allowed free elections for the next year, rejecting a second consulship, which was against the laws he himself had written. Soon after the new magistrates for the year 79 BC had been chosen and began governing, Sulla resigned from his absolute powers and sent away his lictors, thereby becoming a private citizen. As a dictator he had held undisputed mastery over the entire Roman domain and punished thousands, yet he was not afraid expose himself to their possible revenge. Everyone was utterly astounded when he left the forum with his closest friends.
Sulla’s reforms proved ephemeral – they were abolished less than a decade after his death and the Gracchi constitution again adopted. Ironically, he was remembered not as the restorer of the Republic, but as the last nail in its coffin. His rise to power showed clearly that it could be laid aside by an ambitious general at the head of a strong army. Sulla’s true importance, not to be found in his proscriptions or laws, is that he apparently saved the state from its complete disintegration. In a time when the eastern provinces had been conquered and Italy was in tumult, Sulla secured the frontiers, defeating Mithridates, and effectively brought the civil war to an end, finally making all Italians equal, all receiving Roman citizenship. His adversaries claimed that his success was due merely to great luck, to which Sulla, in accordance with his affinity for irony, readily admitted, officially adopting the name Felix, “the Fortunate”. As Caius Sallusti remarks, however, his good fortune never exceeded his merit. A truly remarkable man, Sulla retired to privacy, having reached the goals he had set for himself.
The ex-dictator spent the last year of his life in his Cuman estate, feasting, hunting and writing his Memoirs. He did not abstain entirely from public affairs, for the citizens of the nearby colony of Putaeoli, asking him to devise laws for the better government of their town, Sulla wilfully agreed. He died in 78 BC at the age of sixty, having been active just two days before his end. Upon his death, Marcus Lepidus, one of the consuls, along with many supporters, urged the people not to allow the tyrant to have an official burial. The fear of Sulla’s veterans, however, combined with Pompey’s popularity, defied the consul. Rome had never seen such a glorious funeral. The capital ceasing all public activities, the body was brought to the forum, adorned with two thousand gold crowns. The flames having consumed the corpse, the cavalry rode around the pyre as a final token of honour. The ashes were buried by the remnants of the old kings. The greatest tribute to Sulla, however, was delivered not by Pompey or by the army, but by the Roman ladies, who wept for him for an whole year. |
