Running Head: SPARTACUS AND AUGUSTUS

Spartacus and Augustus

A Comparative Essay
Emily Velazquez
Holy Family University

Author Note
This paper was prepared for History 108, Section A, taught by Professor Molden.

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In the history of Rome, there have been many powerful leaders that changed life for
Romans during their time. Some were actual rulers who were praised in their lifetime for their
efforts; others gained recognition and even mythical fame far after their existence. Spartacus
and Augustus are a perfect example of each type of leader. Spartacus was a Thracian gladiator
who fought against the Romans for liberty, while Augustus was born into power, the nephew of
the famous Julius Caesar, and would change the Roman Republic forever. These were two very
different men, each a leader in his own unique way.
Modernly, when the name Spartacus is mentioned, it sparks, in most people, an image
of a brave leader who fought vigorously for the elimination of oppression. This idea that many
people have of Spartacus in recent times, however, is mainly fictitious. The concept of Spartacus
as a symbol of rebellion is quite modern, created by many Russian and European writers of the
18th and 19th centuries for use as a symbol in their own conquest of political freedom and liberty.
Who was Spartacus in his time?
Spartacus was born sometime around 109 B.C. but very little is known about his life
before he became the leader of the third slave revolt. It is primarily believed that he served as a
Roman soldier. Regardless of his past, it is true that he was captured and made a slave. The
expanding need for slaves in Rome was a direct result of the wealth acquired by Rome from their
conquest of the Mediterranean. With the lands belonging to only a small group of elite Romans
and Italians, the use of human beings for labor became necessary to keep up with the demand for
luxury goods derived from these lands. The Roman who purchased Spartacus was the owner of a
gladiatorial training school. Gladiators at the time were trained to kill one another as a form of
entertainment. Gladiatorial games, as they called it, were hosted by politicians in order to gain
enough popularity to be voted into office. Within time, Spartacus, along with many other

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gladiators and slaves escaped the school and began a revolt against the Roman Republic. Still
today, the reasons why these men led a rebellion are unclear, besides the obvious reason of no
longer wanting to be oppressed. According to the very few primary sources that are left,
specifically the writing of Plutarch, Spartacus had a great strength and spirit that made him a
natural leader. Because of the belief that he once served in the Roman auxiliaries, it is thought
that having that quality made him more successful and allowed him to be viewed as a leader by
his followers at the time. Nonetheless, the slave rebellion was led by Spartacus as well as by a
Gallic and Germanic slave, Crixus and Oenamus.
But slave rebellions were not new to Rome. There had previously been two slave
uprisings concentrated on the island of Sicily in 135 and 104 B.C., respectively. The first slave
war was led by a slave named Eunus and another named Cleon who separately gathered several
thousand slaves and then joined forces against the Roman army. After a period of four years, the
war came to an end at the defeat of the slaves. Slave masters were the blame for this war, as it
was believed their cruelty led to the revolt. The second slave war took place a generation after
the first and is said to be almost a carbon copy of the first. The main difference is the reason for
the uprising. During this time, the Roman senate had passed a measure to prevent free persons
from being enslaved so that they would be available for the Roman army. Many of the men
already enslaved grew expectations that they might be freed, and when that was not the result,
they revolted, led by a slave named Salvius. The war lasted four years as well and was also
unsuccessful.
The third Sicilian slave war led by Spartacus in 73 B.C., however, was the first to
threaten the heart of Rome. Although the exact cause of this war is unknown, it is speculated that
it may have been due to pure brutality. Despite the two previous slave wars being unsuccessful,

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Spartacus and his followers dreamed of crushing the Romans and so set out on a third rebellion.
The response of the Roman authority was once again the same as in the first two wars, slow.
Because they underestimated the power of the gladiators and slaves, an undertrained army of
3,000 was sent to put an end to the war. They were outsmarted by Spartacus and his slave army
who defeated them and ceased their camp to steal their weapons. Much to the despair of the
Romans, they had only made the rebels stronger. Following this, the Roman army began to send
legions to try and stop the rebels but Spartacus and his team remained victorious. After being
successful at defeating several consuls, something occurred and instead of following the planned
path, Spartacus and his rebels went south. Their new goal was now to conquer Sicily and they
ended up where the first two wars had taken place. Here, they were met by Commander Crassus,
who ordered his army to build a wall and trap Spartacus. He lost two-thirds of his men, but
Spartacus was able to escape with still one-third and so he did. He traveled back to Italy where
he was found by Crassus and his Roman army, engaged in a battle, and was defeated in 71 B.C.
His body was never found.
In the true history of Spartacus, he was a brave gladiator who fought against the
oppressors of his time. He succeeded momentarily but was crushed by the Romans as were the
other slaves in the previous wars. In actuality, despite his strength and courageousness to lead a
revolt, Spartacus was nothing more than a criminal chosen by other slaves as a leader. His heroic
image is mostly fabricated and a completely modern myth.
About eight years after the third slave revolt, Augustus was born into wealth in 63 B.C.
Born Gaius Octavius, he was the nephew of Julius Caesar, who adopted the young boy to make
him his heir. It was 44 B.C, when Octavian was only 19 that his great uncle (Caesar) was killed
and he received news of his inheritance of the throne. His first rivals were the murderers of his

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uncle, Julius own advisors. Within these rivals was Mark Antony, whose troops had been
defeated by the army of Octavian. Instead of also taking down Mark Antony, Octavian decided
that he would rather attempt and form an alliance with him. Octavian, along with Antony and
Marcus Lepidus created the Second Triumvirate, which divided the land of Rome between the
three men. Trouble with the friendship began in 41 B.C., when Antony began a romantic affair
with Cleopatra, the ruler of Egypt at the time. He began a political alliance with her and when
Octavian was informed of the news, Antony was forced to marry his sister, Octavia minor in 40
B.C. The romantic affair continued, however, and in 32 B.C., Antony divorced Octavians sister.
In revenge to this, Octavian declared a war, not against Antony, but against Cleopatra. The reason
was because the Romans believed that she, along with Antony, was after the Roman throne. A
year later, in 31 B.C., Antony and Cleopatra committed suicide after their Egyptian army was
defeated in the battle of Actium by Octavian. Lepidus had been previously removed from the
Triumvirate during its renewal back in 37 B.C. It was now clear that Octavian was the only ruler
of Rome.
In the time between 31 B.C. and 27 B.C., Octavian worked to win over the people of
Rome by returning peace, beauty, and stability to the city. He used Cleopatras Egyptian treasure,
now his, to build and keep and army. He founded the Roman Empire. In 27 B.C., he was granted
the name Augustus and became the empires first emperor. However, avoiding making the same
mistake as his great uncle, Augustus never claimed absolute power or titled himself as emperor.
Augustus reigned as emperor for forty years and in this time he expanded Rome tremendously,
adding on lands in Europe and Asia Minor and forming alliances that allowed him to have power
from Britain to India. Under his rule, he ended decades of civil war and achieved years of
internal peace and stability, which became known as the Roman Peace (Pax Romana). When he

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died in 14 A.D., he was referred to as a god for the founding of the Roman Empire and for
returning Rome to peace and beauty once again.
Ultimately, both Spartacus and Augustus were leaders. But in analyzing the life of
each, it is clear that Augustus was the more influential of the two. In reality, Spartacus was a
leader but not a hero like he is portrayed to be today. Although he was a slave and did not have
any assets of his own, he stole everything that he could from the Romans as he went along in his
rebellion. He used the stolen assets selfishly, as his ultimate goal was his own personal freedom.
Spartacus gained followers because he was physically one of the strongest and probably was
listened to when he spoke. However, he did not have a good enough plan to last more than two
years. After two years of fighting against the Romans, he had lost nearly all his men and was
caught and killed. Spartacus did not really seem to have learned from the mistakes of the
previous slave wars, which each lasted twice as long as the one he leaded. Augustus on the other
hand was powerful from a young age. Not necessarily because he was born into some wealth, but
because at a youthful age of about 19, he became the heir to the Roman throne and had to step
into the shoes of his famous uncle, Julius Caesar. He was strong enough to form an alliance with
one of his very own rivals, a murderer of his uncle, and was able to quickly eliminate him when
the friendship was destroyed. However, there was no obvious greed or selfishness in Augustus.
He used all the Egyptian treasure he had acquired from the defeat of Cleopatra to stabilize he
beloved city of Rome. He was able to pay his army and use the rest of the money to restore
Rome to the beauty it was before all of the civil wars. Not only did he accomplish this, he was
able to restore decades of peace. He learned from his uncles mistakes, and avoided them. He
used his previously owned and gained assets on his city and made it better for everyone that

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lived there. Because of this no one saw him as a significant threat and he was able to rule Rome
for forty years and die a peaceful death.

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References
Augustus. History.com. Retrieved April 21, 2014 from http://www.history.com/topics/ancienthistory/emperor-augustus
Augustus. Pbs.org. Retrieved April 21, 2014 from
http://www.pbs.org/empires/romans/empire/augustus.html
Lendering, Jona. (2002). Spartacus. Livius.org. Retrieved April 19, 2014 from
http://www.livius.org/so-st/spartacus/spartacus.html
Mellor, Ronald. (2006). Augustus and the Creation of the Roman Empire. Boston, MA. Bedford.
Shaw, Brent D. (2001). Spartacus and the Slave Wars. Boston, MA. Bedord.