Late Roman Republic, Gaius Marius (fl.133-86 BC): Second Servile War (104-100 BC), Sicily

Before the new uprising in Sicily there were a number of short-lived and minor revolts in Campania. The first was at Nuceria, but only thirty slaves were involved and they were quickly stopped. The next was at Capua where two hundred rose up but again they were crushed. The third involved hundreds, in the region of Capua and led by a Roman landowner ⁰⁹Minucius Vettius. The Senate sent a praetor ⁰⁸Licinius Lucullus (fl.104-102 BC) with four thousand infantry and four hundred cavalry. By persuading one of the rebel commanders to betray his own side, Lucullus gained the upper hand and Vettius committed suicide before he could be captured.

In 104 BC when Marius was launching his campaign against the Cimbri and the Teutones, he sent a request for aid to the Bithynian king Nicomedes III (r.c.127-c.94 BC) who replied that he had no young men to send because so many of his people had been seized by Roman tax collectors and were being held as slaves in territories of Rome.

The Senate responded by issuing a decree that the provincial governors were to identify and free all the slaves of allied states. In accordance with this decree the governor of Sicily, ⁰⁹Licinius Nerva freed more than eight hundred slaves within a couple of days. When the Sicilian landowners heard the news, they persuaded Nerva to end the emancipation. The slaves, angry when told by the governor to return to their masters, fled for safety.

  Violence broke out in western Sicily, where slaves murdered their masters. Nerva crushed this initial rising, but then blundered by moving his troops into eastern Sicily. Two more uprisings broke out, one in southwestern Sicily, led by Salvius, and one in the west by Athenion (1). The two rebel leaders combined forces, and Salvius, with the larger contingent, made Athenion his subordinate and took the name Tryphon.

In 103 BC ⁰⁸Licinius Lucullus commanding a Roman force of fourteen thousand gained a victory near Scirthaea (west) over an enemy forty thousand strong, but he failed to follow it up. He was succeeded in 102 BC by Gaius ¹⁰Servilius, who did nothing. Finally, Manius Aquillius (3) (cos.101 BC), after two years of hard fighting, defeated Athenion (Tryphon appears to have died) and pacified the island.