Quintus Sertorius
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Roman conquest of Hispania |
|---|
| Second Punic War - First Celtiberian War – Third Punic War – Lusitanian War - Numantine War – Sertorian War – Cantabrian Wars |
Quintus Sertorius (died 72 BC), Roman statesman and general. He was a native of Nursia in Sabine territory.
After acquiring some reputation in Rome as a jurist and orator, he entered upon a military career. His first recorded campaign was under Quintus Servilius Caepio at the Battle of Arausio, where he showed unusual courage. Serving under Marius in 102 BC, Sertorius succeeded in spying upon the wandering German tribes that had defeated Caepio. After this success, he fought at the great Battle of Aquae Sextiae (now Aix-en-Provence, France) in which the Teutones were decisively defeated. In 97, he served in Hispania as a tribune under Titus Didius.
In 91 he was quaestor in Cisalpine Gaul, where he was in charge of recruiting and training legions for the Social War. Upon his return to Rome he would have been elected to the tribuneship but for the decided opposition of Sulla. This defeat led Sertorius to hate Sulla.
He now declared for Marius and the populares party, though of Marius himself as a man he had the worst opinion. He must have been a consenting party to the hideous massacres of Marius and Cinna in 87, though he seems to have done what he could to mitigate their horrors, including annihilating the slaves that Marius had used as allies in his atrocities. On Sulla's return from the East in 83, Sertorius went to Hispania, where he represented the Marian or populares party, but without receiving any definite commission or appointment.
Having been obliged to withdraw to North Africa in consequence of the advance of the forces of Sulla over the Pyrenees, he carried on a campaign in Mauretania, in which he defeated one of Sulla's generals and captured Tingis (Tangier). This success recommended him to the people of Hispania, more particularly to the Lusitanian tribes in the west, whom Roman generals and governors of Sulla's party had plundered and oppressed.
Brave and kindly, and gifted with a rough telling eloquence, Sertorius was just the man to impress them favourably, and the native militia, which he organized, spoke of him as the "new Hannibal." His skill as a general was extraordinary, as he defeated forces many times his own size repeatedly. Many Roman refugees and deserters joined him, and with these and his Hispanian volunteers he completely defeated several of Sulla's generals and drove Q. Caecilius Metellus Pius, who had been specially sent against him from Rome, out of Lusitania, or Hispania Ulterior as the Romans called it.
Sertorius owed much of his success to his prodigious ability as a statesman. His object was to build up a stable government in the country with the consent and co-operation of the people, whom he wished to civilize after the Roman model. He established a senate of three hundred members, drawn from Roman emigrants, with probably a sprinkling of the best Hispanians, and surrounded himself with a Hispanian bodyguard. For the children of the chief native families he provided a school at Osca (Huesca), where they received a Roman education and even adopted the dress of Roman youths.
Strict and severe as he was with his soldiers, he was particularly considerate to the people generally, and made their burdens as light as possible. It seems clear that he had a peculiar gift for evoking the enthusiasm of rude tribes, and we can well understand how the famous white fawn, a present from one of the natives, which was his constant companion and was supposed to communicate to him the advice of the goddess Diana, promoted his popularity.
For six years he may be said to have really ruled Hispania. In 77 he was joined by Marcus Perperna Vento from Rome, with a following of Roman nobles, and in the same year the great Pompey was sent to conquer him. Contemptuously calling Pompey Sulla's pupil, Sertorius proved himself more than a match for his adversaries, utterly defeating their united forces on one occasion near Saguntum. Pompey wrote to Rome for reinforcements, without which, he said, he and Metellus would be driven out of Hispania.
Sertorius was in league with the pirates in the Mediterranean, was negotiating with the formidable Mithridates, and was in communication with the insurgent slaves in Italy. But owing to jealousies among the Roman officers who served under him and the Hispanians of higher rank he could not maintain his position, and his influence over the native tribes slipped away from him, though he won victories to the last. In 72 BC he was assassinated at a banquet at Perpenna Vento's instigation.
See Plutarch's lives of Sertorius and Pompey; Appian, Bell. civ. and Hispanica; the fragments of Sallust; Dio Cassius xxxvi.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
- Sertorius by Plutarch
| Plutarch's Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans |
|---|
| Alcibiades and Coriolanus - Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar - Aratus & Artaxerxes and Galba & Otho - Aristides and Cato the Elder |
| Crassus and Nicias - Demetrius and Antony - Demosthenes and Cicero - Dion and Brutus - Fabius and Pericles - Lucullus and Cimon |
| Lysander and Sulla - Numa and Lycurgus - Pelopidas and Marcellus - Philopoemen and Flamininus - Phocion and Cato the Younger - Pompey and Agesilaus |
| Poplicola and Solon - Pyrrhus and Gaius Marius - Romulus and Theseus - Sertorius and Eumenes |
| Tiberius Gracchus & Gaius Gracchus and Agis & Cleomenes - Timoleon and Aemilius Paullus - Themistocles and Camillus |
