Marcus Licinius Crassus (/ˈkræsəs/; 115–53 BC) was aRoman general and statesman who played a key role in the transformation of theRoman Republic into theRoman Empire. He was often called "the richest man in Rome".[6][7]
Crassus began his public career as a military commander underLucius Cornelius Sulla during hiscivil war. Following Sulla's assumption of thedictatorship, Crassus amassed an enormous fortune through property speculation. Crassus rose to political prominence following his victory over theslave revolt led bySpartacus, sharing theconsulship with his rivalPompey the Great.
A political and financial patron ofJulius Caesar, Crassus joined Caesar and Pompey in the unofficial political alliance known as theFirst Triumvirate. Together, the three men dominated the Roman political system, but the alliance did not last long, due to the ambitions, egos, and jealousies of the three men. While Caesar and Crassus were lifelong allies, Crassus and Pompey disliked each other and Pompey grew increasingly envious of Caesar's spectacular successes in theGallic Wars. The alliance was restabilized at theLuca Conference in 56 BC, after which Crassus and Pompey again served jointly as consuls. Following his second consulship, Crassus was appointed as thegovernor ofRoman Syria, which he used as the launchpad for a military campaign against theParthian Empire. Crassus' campaign was a disastrous failure, ending in his defeat at theBattle of Carrhae and death in its aftermath.
Crassus' death permanently unraveled the alliance between Caesar and Pompey, since his political influence and wealth had been a counterbalance to the two great leaders. Within four years of Crassus' death, Caesarcrossed the Rubicon and began acivil war against Pompey and theoptimates.[8]
Marcus Licinius Crassus was a member of thegens Licinia, an old and highly respectedplebeian family in Rome. He was the second of three sons born to the eminent senator andvir triumphalisPublius Licinius Crassus (consul 95 BC, censor 89 BC). This line was not descended from the wealthy Crassi Divites, although often assumed to be. The eldest brother, Publius (bornc. 116 BC), died shortly before theItalic War, and Crassus' father and younger brother were either slain or took their own lives in Rome, in winter 87–86 BC, when being hunted down by the supporters ofGaius Marius, following their victory in theBellum Octavianum.[9][10] Crassus had the unusual distinction of marrying his wifeTertulla after she had been widowed by his brother.
There were three main branches of the house of the Licinii Crassi in the 2nd and 1st centuries BC,[11] and many mistakes in identifications and lines have arisen owing to the uniformity of Roman nomenclature, erroneous modern suppositions, and the unevenness of information across the generations. In addition, theDivescognomen of the Crassi Divites means rich or wealthy, and since Marcus Crassus, the subject here, was renowned for his enormous wealth, this has contributed to hasty assumptions that his family belonged to the Divites. But no ancient source accords him or his father the Dives cognomen;Plutarch says his great wealth was acquired rather than inherited, and that he was raised in modest circumstances.[12]
Crassus' grandfather of the same name, Marcus Licinius Crassus[13] (praetor c. 126 BC), was facetiously given the Greek nickname Agelastus (the unlaughing or grim) by his contemporaryGaius Lucilius, the inventor of Roman satire, who asserted that he smiled once in his whole life. This grandfather was son ofPublius Licinius Crassus. The latter's brother, Gaius Licinius Crassus (consul 168 BC), produced the third line of Licinii Crassi of the period, the most famous of whom wasLucius Licinius Crassus, the greatest Roman orator beforeCicero and the latter's childhood hero and model. Marcus Crassus was also a talented orator and one of the most energetic and active advocates of his time.
After the Marian purges and the subsequent sudden death ofGaius Marius, the surviving consulLucius Cornelius Cinna (father-in-law ofJulius Caesar) imposedproscriptions on those surviving Roman senators and equestrians who had supportedLucius Cornelius Sulla in his 88 BC march on Rome and overthrow of the traditional Roman political arrangements.
Cinna's proscription forced Crassus to flee toHispania.[14] He stayed in Spain from 87 to 84 BC. Here, he recruited 2,500 men (an understrength legion) from his father's clients settled in the area. Crassus used his army to extort money from the local cities to pay for his campaigns, even being accused of sacking Malaca.[15] After Cinna's death in 84 BC, Crassus went to theRoman province of Africa and joinedMetellus Pius, one of Sulla's closest allies, but did not stay there for long because of disagreements with Metellus. He sailed his army to Greece and joinedSulla, "with whom he stood in a position of special honor."[16] DuringSulla's civil war, Crassus andPompey fought a battle in the plain of Spoletium (Spoleto), killed about 3,000 of the men ofPapirius Carbo, the leader of the Marian forces, and besiegedCarrinas, a Marian commander.[17]
During the decisiveBattle of the Colline Gate, Crassus commanded the right flank of Sulla's army. After almost a day of fighting, the battle was going poorly for Sulla; his own center was being pushed back and was on the verge of collapse when he got word from Crassus that he had comprehensively crushed the enemy before him. Crassus wanted to know whether Sulla needed assistance, or whether his men could retire. Sulla told him to advance on the enemy's center, and used the news of Crassus' success to stiffen the resolve of his own troops. By the following morning, the battle was over, and the Sullan army emerged victorious, making Sulla the master of Rome. Sulla's victory, and Crassus' contribution to it, put Crassus in a key position. Sulla was as loyal to his allies as he was cruel towards his enemies, and Crassus had been a very loyal ally.
Marcus Licinius Crassus' next concern was to rebuild the fortunes of his family, which had been confiscated during the Marian-Cinnanproscriptions. Sulla's proscriptions, in which the property of his victims was cheaply auctioned off, found one of the greatest acquirers of this type of property in Crassus: indeed, Sulla was especially supportive of this, because he wished to spread the blame as much as possible among those unscrupulous enough to do so.[19] Sulla's proscriptions ensured that his survivors would recoup their lost fortunes from the fortunes of wealthy adherents toGaius Marius orLucius Cornelius Cinna. Proscriptions meant that their political enemies lost their fortunes and their lives; that their female relatives (notably, widows and widowed daughters) were forbidden to marry, remarry or remain married; and that, in some cases, their families' hopes of rebuilding their fortunes and political significance were destroyed. Crassus is said to have made part of his money from proscriptions, notably the proscription of one man whose name was not initially on the list of those proscribed but was added by Crassus, who coveted the man's fortune.[20] Crassus' wealth is estimated by Pliny at approximately 200 millionsesterces. Plutarch, in hisLife of Crassus, says the wealth of Crassus increased from less than 300talents at first, to 7,100 talents.[21] This represented 229 tonnes of silver, worth about US$167.4 million at August 2023 silver prices, accounted right before his Parthian expedition, most of which Plutarch declares Crassus got "by fire and war, making the public calamities his greatest source of revenue."[22]
Some of Crassus' wealth was acquired conventionally, through slave trafficking, production from silver mines, and speculative real estate purchases. Crassus bought property that was confiscated inproscriptions and by notoriously purchasing burnt and collapsed buildings. Plutarch wrote that, observing how frequent such occurrences were, he bought slaves "who were architects and builders." When he had over 500 slaves, he bought houses that had burnt and the adjacent ones "because their owners would let go at a trifling price." He bought "the largest part of Rome" in this way,[8] buying them on the cheap and rebuilding them with slave labor.
The first ever Roman fire brigade was created by Crassus. Fires were almost a daily occurrence in Rome, and Crassus took advantage of the fact that Rome had no fire department, by creating his own brigade—500 men strong—which rushed to burning buildings at the first cry of alarm. Upon arriving at the scene, however, the firefighters did nothing while Crassus offered to buy the burning building from the distressed property owner, at a miserable price. If the owner agreed to sell the property, his men would put out the fire; if the owner refused, then they would simply let the structure burn to the ground. After buying many properties this way, he rebuilt them, and often leased the properties to their original owners or new tenants.[23][8][24][6]
Crassus befriendedLicinia, aVestal Virgin, whose valuable property he coveted. Plutarch says "And yet, when he was further on in years, he was accused of criminal intimacy with Licinia, one of the vestal virgins, and Licinia was formally prosecuted by a certain Plotius. Now, Licinia was the owner of a pleasant villa in the suburbs, which Crassus wished to get at a low price, and it was for this reason that he was forever hovering about the woman and paying his court to her, until he fell under the abominable suspicion. And, in a way, it was his avarice that absolved him from the charge of corrupting the vestal, and he was acquitted by the judges. But he did not let Licinia go until he had acquired her property."[25]
Despite his great wealth, Crassus is said to have avoided excess and luxury at home. Family meals were simple, and entertaining was generous but not ostentatious; Crassus chose his companions during leisure hours on the basis of personal friendship as well as political utility.[26] Although the Crassi, asnoble plebeians, would have displayed ancestral images in their atrium,[27] they did not lay claim to a fictionalizedgenealogy that presumed divine or legendary ancestors, a practice not uncommon among the Roman nobility.[28]
After rebuilding his fortune, Crassus' next concern was his political career. As a wealthy man in Rome, an adherent of Sulla, and a man who hailed from a line of consuls and praetors, Crassus' political future was apparently assured. His problem was that, despite his military successes, he was eclipsed by his contemporaryPompey the Great. Crassus' rivalry with Pompey and his envy of Pompey's triumph would influence his subsequent career.[22]
Crassus was elected praetor in 73 BC and pursued thecursus honorum.
During theThird Servile War, or Spartacus' revolt (73–71 BC), Crassus offered to equip, train, and lead new troops at his own expense, after several legions had been defeated and their commanders killed in battle. Crassus was sent into battle against Spartacus by the Senate. At first, he had trouble both in anticipating Spartacus' moves and in inspiring his army to strengthen their morale. When a segment of his army fled from battle, abandoning their weapons, Crassus revived the ancient practice ofdecimation – i.e. executing one out of every ten men, with the victims selected by drawing lots.Plutarch reports that "many things horrible and dreadful to see" occurred during the infliction of punishment, which was witnessed by the rest of Crassus' army.[29] Nevertheless, according toAppian, the troops' fighting spirit improved dramatically thereafter, since Crassus had demonstrated that "he was more dangerous to them than the enemy."[30]
Afterwards, when Spartacus retreated to theBruttium peninsula in the southwest of Italy,[31] Crassus tried to pen up the slave armies by building a ditch and a rampart across the peninsula of Rhegium in Bruttium, "from sea to sea." Despite this remarkable feat, Spartacus and part of his army still managed to break out. On the night of a heavy snowstorm, they sneaked through Crassus' lines and made a bridge of dirt and tree branches over the ditch, thus escaping.[32]
Some time later, when the Roman armies led by Pompey and Varro Lucullus were recalled to Italy in support of Crassus, Spartacus decided to fight rather than find himself and his followers trapped between three armies, two of them returning from overseas action. In this last battle, thebattle of the Silarius river, Crassus gained a decisive victory, and captured six thousand slaves alive. During the fighting, Spartacus attempted to personally kill Crassus, slaughtering his way toward the general's position, but he succeeded only in killing two of the centurions guarding Crassus.[33] Spartacus himself is believed to have been killed in the battle, although his body was never recovered. The six thousand captured slaves werecrucified along theVia Appia by Crassus' orders. At his command, their bodies were not taken down afterwards, but remained rotting along Rome's principal route to the south. This was intended as an object lesson to anyone especially slaves who might think of rebelling against Roman citizens and slave-owners.
Crassus effectively ended the Third Servile War in 71 BC. In Plutarch's account, Crassus "had written to the Senate that they must summon Lucullus from Thrace and Pompey from Spain, but he was sorry now that he had done so, and was eager to bring the war to an end before those generals came. He knew that the success would be ascribed to the one who came up with assistance, and not to himself."[34] He decided to attack a splinter group of rebels, and after this, Spartacus withdrew to the mountains. Pompey had arrived from Hispania with his veterans and was sent to provide reinforcements. Crassus hurried to seek the final battle, which he won. Pompey arrived in time to deal with the disorganized and defeated fugitives, writing to the Senate that "indeed, Crassus had conquered the slaves, but that he himself had extirpated the war."[35] "Crassus, for all his self-approval, did not venture to ask for the major triumph, and it was thought ignoble and mean in him to celebrate even the minor triumph on foot, called the ovation,"[36] nor did he wish to be honored for subduing slaves.
In Plutarch's account, Pompey was asked to stand for the consulship. Crassus wanted to become his colleague and asked Pompey for his assistance. As said in theLife of Crassus, "Pompey received his request gladly (for he was desirous of having Crassus, in some way or other, always in debt to him for some favor), eagerly promoted his candidature, and finally said in a speech to the assembly that he should be no less grateful to them for the colleague than for the office which he desired."[37] In office, however, they did not remain friendly. They "differed on almost every measure, and by their contentiousness, rendered their consulship barren politically and without achievement."[38] Crassus displayed his wealth by realizing public sacrifices to Hercules, entertaining the populace at 10,000 tables and distributing sufficient grain to last each family three months, an act that had the additional ends of performing a previously made religious vow of a tithe to the demigodHercules and also to gain support among the members of the popular party.
In Appian's account, when Crassus ended the rebellion, there was a contention over honors between him and Pompey. Neither men dismissed their armies, with both being candidates for the consulship. Crassus had been praetor as the law of Sulla required. Pompey had been neither praetor nor quaestor, and was only 34 years old, but he had promised the plebeian tribunes to restore much of their power, that had been taken away by Sulla's constitutional reforms. Even when they were both chosen consuls, they did not dismiss their armies stationed near the city. Pompey said that he was awaiting the return of Metellus for his Spanish triumph; Crassus said that Pompey ought to dismiss his army first. In the end, Crassus yielded first, offering Pompey his hand.[39]
In 65 BC, Crassus was electedcensor with another conservative,Quintus Lutatius Catulus Capitolinus, himself son of a consul. During that decade, Crassus was Julius Caesar's patron in all but name, financing Caesar's successful election to becomepontifex maximus. Caesar had formerly been the priest of Jupiter, orflamen dialis, but had been deprived of office by Sulla. Crassus also supported Caesar's efforts to win command of military campaigns. Caesar's mediation between Crassus and Pompey led to the creation of theFirst Triumvirate in 60 BC, consisting of Crassus, Pompey, and Caesar (who became consul in 59 BC). This coalition would last until Crassus' death.In 54 BC, Crassus looted theJewish Temple treasury.[40][41]
In 55 BC, after the Triumvirate met at theLuca Conference in 56 BC, Crassus was again consul with Pompey, and a law was passed assigning the provinces of the two Hispanias andSyria to Pompey and Crassus, respectively, for five years.
Crassus received Syria as his province, which promised to be an inexhaustible source of wealth. It might have been, had he not also sought military glory and crossed theEuphrates in an attempt to conquerParthia.
Crassus attacked Parthia not only because of its great source of riches, but because of a desire to match the military victories of Pompey and Caesar. The king ofArmenia,Artavasdes II, offered Crassus the aid of nearly 40,000 troops (10,000cataphracts and 30,000 infantrymen) on the condition that Crassus invade through Armenia so that the king could not only maintain the upkeep of his own troops but also provide a safer route for his men and Crassus.[42] Crassus refused, and chose the more direct route by crossing the Euphrates, as he had done in his successful campaign in the previous year.
Crassus received directions from the Osroene chieftain Ariamnes, who had previously assistedPompey in his eastern campaigns.[43] Ariamnes was in the pay of the Parthians and urged Crassus to attack at once, falsely stating that the Parthians were weak and unorganized. He then led Crassus' army into the desert, far from any water. In 53BC, at theBattle of Carrhae (modernHarran, in Turkey), Crassus' legions were defeated by a numerically inferior Parthian force. Crassus' legions were primarily heavy infantry, and not prepared for an attack by swift mounted archers, a tactic that Parthian troops had mastered. The Parthian horse archers devastated the unprepared Romans with hit-and-run tactics, feigning retreats as they shot to their rear.[44] Crassus refused hisquaestorGaius Cassius Longinus' plans to reconstitute the Roman battle line, and remained in thetestudo formation to protect his flanks until the Parthians eventually ran out of arrows. The Parthians brought camels carrying arrows to continuously resupply their archers, however, letting them relentlessly barrage the Romans until dusk. Despite taking severe casualties, the Romans successfully retreated to Carrhae, forced to leave many wounded behind to be slaughtered by the Parthians.[citation needed]
"The torture of Crassus", 1530s, Louvre
Subsequently, Crassus' men, being nearmutiny, demanded heparley with the Parthians, who had offered to meet with him. Crassus, despondent at the death of his sonPublius in the battle, finally agreed to meet the Parthian generalSurena. When Crassus mounted a horse to ride to the Parthian camp for a peace negotiation, his junior officer Octavius suspected a Parthian trap and grabbed Crassus' horse by the bridle, instigating a sudden fight with the Parthians that left all the Romans dead, including Crassus.[45] A story later emerged that, after Crassus' death, the Parthians poured molten gold into his mouth to mock his thirst for wealth.[46]
Plutarch's biography of Crassus also mentions that, during the feasting and revelry in the wedding ceremony of Artavasdes' sister to the Parthian kingOrodes II's son and heirPacorus in the Armenian capital ofArtashat, Crassus' head was brought to Orodes II.[47] Both kings were enjoying a performance ofEuripides' tragedyThe Bacchae when an actor of the royal court, named Jason of Tralles, took the head and sang these verses:
We bring from the mountain A tendril fresh-cut to the palace A wonderful prey.[48]
Crassus' head was thus used instead of a prop to representPentheus and carried byAgave.[49]
Also according to Plutarch, Crassus was mocked by dressing up a Roman prisoner, Caius Paccianus, who resembled him, in women's clothing, calling him "Crassus" and "imperator", and leading him in a spectacular show of a final, satirical "triumphal procession", ridiculing the traditional symbols of Roman triumph and authority.[50]
Crassus is a major character in the 1956Alfred Duggan novelWinter Quarters. The novel follows two fictional Gallic nobles who join Julius Caesar's cavalry and then find their way into the service of Marcus' son,Publius Licinius Crassus, in Gaul. The characters eventually become clients of Publius Crassus, and, by extension, his father Marcus. The second half of the novel is related by its Gallic narrator from within the ranks of Crassus' doomed army en route to do battle with Parthia. The book depicts an overconfident and militarily incompetent Crassus up to the moment of his death.
Crassus is a major character in the 1992 novelArms of Nemesis bySteven Saylor. He is portrayed as the cousin and patron of Lucius Licinius, the investigation of whose murder forms the basis of the novel. He also has minor appearances inRoman Blood andCatalina's Riddle.
InDavid Drake'sRanks of Bronze (1986), the Lost Legion is the major participant, although Crassus himself has been killed before the book begins.
Crassus is a major character inConn Iggulden'sEmperor series.
The story of theBattle of Carrhae is the centerpiece ofBen Kane's novelThe Forgotten Legion (2008). Crassus is depicted as a vain man with poor military judgment.
A highly fictionalized version of Crassus called Marcus Crassius is an enemy figure in the filmAmazons and Gladiators (2001), played byPatrick Bergin. They mention his defeating Spartacus and that Caesar exiles him due to his popularity to a poor province, where he's very cruel to the populace; he conquers the Amazons, under Queen Zenobia (who apparently rules a tribe of Amazons in the same province, Pannae). In this film, he is killed by a young girl whose family he killed.
A character named Hamilton Crassus III portrayed byJon Voight inFrancis Ford Coppola's 2024 sci-fi epic filmMegalopolis, is based on Marcus Licinius Crassus. The film is a modern take of theCatiline Conspiracy set in an imagined futuristic Modern America.
He is portrayed bySimon Merrells inSpartacus: War of the Damned as the main antagonist. Unlike in Alfred Duggan's novel, he is portrayed as a brilliant military tactician.
^F. Johansen (1994).Catalogue Roman Portraits. Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek. p. 162, cat. no. 69. "The portrait survives in three other replicas. The one in the Louvre,МА 1220 portrays the same man about twenty years later... The identification of M. Licinius Crassus cannot be proven."
^deducible from their commongentilicium andcognomen, while Cic.Scaur. fragment at Ascon.27G=23C explicitly states that the homonymous consulars who both took their own lives, P. Crassus Dives Mucianus (consul in 131 BC) and P. Crassus (consul in 97 BC), belonged to the samestirpes
^Plutarch,Parallel Lives,Life of Crassus, 1.1; 2.2
^Plutarch,Life of Crassus, 2 (trans. Long, George, 1892). "when Sulla took the city, and sold the property of those whom he put to death, considering it and calling it spoil, and wishing to attach the infamy of the deed to as many of the most powerful men as he could, Crassus was never tired of receiving or buying." accessed fromhttps://www.gutenberg.org/files/14140/14140-h/14140-h.htm#LIFE_OF_CRASSUS on 2023-10-31
^Plutarch,Life of Crassus, 6.6–7 (trans. Perrin, 1916). "It is said that, in Bruttium, he actually proscribed a man without Sulla's orders, merely to get his property; and that, for this reason, Sulla, who disapproved of his conduct, never employed him again on public business."
^Plutarch,Crassus 3.1–2; for a perspective on the triumvir's positive characteristics, see T.J. Cadoux, "Marcus Crassus: A Revaluation,"Greece & Rome 3 (1956) 153–161.
^On theius imaginum, or right ofnobiles to display ancestral images, see the article "Nobiles" inSmith'sDictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, Bill Thayer's edition atLacusCurtiusonline; alsoP.A. Brunt, "Nobilitas andnovitas,"Journal of Roman Studies 72 (1982), pp. 12–13, and R.T. Ridley, "The Genesis of a Turning-Point: Gelzer'sNobilität,"Historia 35 (1986), pp. 499–502. The termius imaginum is a modern coinage, and the notion that this display was constituted by a legal right was reexamined and refined by Harriet I. Flowers,Ancestor Masks and Aristocratic Power in Roman Culture (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), especially pp. 53–59online.
^T.P. Wiseman, "Legendary Genealogies in Late-Republican Rome,"Greece & Rome 21 (1974), p. 162, in reference to Publius'sconsular grandfather.
^Plutarch,Life of Crassus, p. 418: "That one of his captives who bore the greatest likeness to Crassus, Caius Paccianus, put on a woman's royal robe, and under instructions to answer to the name of Crassus and the title ofimperator when so addressed, was conducted along on horseback."
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