CAMPAIGN HISTORY OF THE ROMAN MILITARY

The history of ancient Rome—originally a city-state of Italy, and later an empire covering much of Eurasia and North Africa from the ninth century BC to the fifth century AD—was often closely entwined with its military history. The core of the 'campaign history of the Roman military' is the account of the Roman military's land battles, from its initial defence against and subsequent conquest of the city's hilltop neighbours in the Italian peninsula, to the ultimate struggle of the Western Roman Empire for its existence against invading Huns, Vandals and Germanic tribes after the empire's split into East and West. Despite the later Empire's encompassing of lands around the periphery of the Mediterranean sea, naval battles were typically less significant than land battles to the military history of Rome, due to its largely unchallenged dominance of the sea following fierce naval fighting during the First Punic War.
The Roman army battled first against its tribal neighbours and Etruscan towns within Italy, and later came to dominate much of the Mediterranean and further afield, including the provinces of Britannia and Asia Minor at the Empire's height. As with most ancient civilisations, Rome's military served the triple purposes of securing its borders, exploiting peripheral areas through measures such as imposing tribute on conquered peoples, and maintaining internal order.^[1] From the outset, Rome's military typified this pattern and the majority of Rome's campaigns were characterised by one of two types: the first is the territorial expansionist campaign, normally begun as a counter-offensive,^[2] in which each victory brought subjugation of large areas of territory and allowed Rome to grow from a small town to the third largest empire in the ancient world, encompassing around one quarter of the world's total population;^[3] the second is the civil war of which examples plagued Rome right from its foundation to its eventual demise.
Roman armies were not invincible, despite their formidable reputation and host of victories:^[4] over the centuries the Romans "''produced their share of incompetents''"^[5] who led Roman armies into catastrophic defeats. Nevertheless, it was generally the fate of even the greatest of Rome's enemies, such as Pyrrhus and Hannibal,^[6] to win the battle but lose the war. The history of Rome's campaigning is, if nothing else, a history of obstinate persistence overcoming appalling losses.^[7]^[8]

Pre-Republic (756 BC - 459 BC)

''Rape of the Sabine Women'', by Nicolas Poussin, Rome, 1637-38 (Louvre Museum)

Rome is almost unique in the ancient world in that its history, military and otherwise, is documented often in great detail almost from the city's very foundation right through to its eventual demise. Although some histories have sadly been lost, such as Trajan's account of the Dacian Wars, and others, such as Rome's earliest histories, are at least semi-apocryphal, nevertheless the extant histories of Rome's military history are extensive.
The very earliest history, from the time of Rome's founding as a small tribal village,^[9] through to the downfall of Rome's kings, is the least well preserved. This is because, whilst the early Romans were literate to some degree,^[10] they either lacked the will to record their history at this time, or else such histories as they did record were lost.^[11]
Although the Roman historian Livy lists a series of seven kings of early Rome in his work ''Ab Urbe Condita'', from its establishment and through its earliest years, the first four 'kings' (Romulus,^[12] Numa,^[13]^[14] Tullus Hostilius^[15] and Ancus Marcius^[16]) are almost certainly entirely apocryphal. Grant and others argue that prior to the time when the Etruscan kingdom of Rome was established under the traditionally fifth king Tarquinius Priscus,^[17] Rome would have been led by a religious leader of some sort.Grant,''The History of Rome'', p. 21 Very little is known of Rome's military history during this era and what history has come down to us is of a legendary rather than factual nature. Traditionally, Romulus fortified one of the first-settled of Rome's seven hills, the Palatine Hill, after founding the city and Livy states that shortly after its founding Rome was "''equal to any of the surrounding cities in her prowess in war''".^[18]

"Events before the city was founded or planned, which have been handed down more as pleasing poetic fictions than as reliable records of historical events, I intend neither to affirm nor to refute. To antiquity we grant the indulgence of making the origins of cities more impressive by comingling the human with the divine, and if any people should be permitted to sanctify its inception and reckon the gods as its founders, surely the glory of the Roman people in war is such that, when it boasts Mars in particular as its parent... the nations of the world would as easily acquiesce in this claim as they do in our rule."
''Livy, on Rome's early history^[19]''

The first campaign, if such it can be called, that was fought by the Romans in this legendary account is their seizing of the women from several nearby villages habited by the Sabine people for purposes of "begetting their children",^[20] an event known as The Rape of the Sabine Women. According to Livy, the Sabine village of Caenina responded first by invading Roman territory, but were routed and their city captured. The Sabines of Antemnae were defeated next in a similar fashion, and again the Sabines of Crustumerium. The remaining main body of the Sabines attacked Rome and briefly captured the citadel, but were then routed.^[21]
There were further wars against the Fidenae,^[22] Veientes, the Albans,^[23] the Medullia, the Apiolae,^[24] and the Collatia.^[25]
Under the Etruscan kings Tarquinius Priscus,^[26] Servius Tullius^[27] and Tarquinius Superbus^[28] Rome expanded to the north-west, coming into conflict again with the Veientes after the expiry of the treaty that concluded their earlier war.^[29] There was a further campaign against the Gabii,^[30]^[31] and later against the Rutuli.^[32] The Etruscan kings were overthrown^[33] as part of a wider reduction in Etruscan power in the region during this period, and Rome reformed itself as a republic,^[34]^[35] a form of government based on popular representation and in contrast to its previous autocratic kingship.

Early Roman Republic (458 BC - 282 BC)

Early Italian campaigns (458-396 BC)

Map showing Rome's Etruscan neighbours

The first non-apocryphal Roman wars were wars of both expansion and defence, aimed at protecting Rome itself from neighbouring cities and nations and establishing its territory in the region.^[36] Florus writes that at this time
Although sources disagree, it is possible that Rome itself was twice invested by Etruscan armies in this period, first in around 509 BC under the recently-overthrown king Tarquinius Superbus,^[37]^[38] and again in 508 BC under the Etruscan Lars Porsenna.^[39]^[40]
Initially, Rome's immediate neighbours were either Latin towns and villages^[41] on a similar tribal system to Rome itself, or else tribal Sabines from the Apennine hills beyond.^[42] One by one Rome defeated both the persistent Sabines and the local cities that were either under Etruscan control or else Latin towns that had cast off their Etruscan rulers, as had Rome. Rome defeated the Lavinii and Tusculi in the Battle of Lake Regillus in 496 BC,^[43]^[44] the Sabines in an Unknown Battle in 449 BC, the Aequi in the Battle of Mons Algidus in 458 BC and the Battle of Corbione in 446 BC^[45]), the Volsci^[46] in the Battle of Corbione^[47] in 446 BC and the Capture of Antium in 377 BC^[48]), the Aurunci in the Battle of Aricia,^[49] and the Veientes in the Battle of the Cremera in 477 BC,^[50]^[51] the Capture of Fidenae in 435 BC^[52] and the Siege of Veii in 396 BC.^[53] After defeating the Veientes, the Romans had effectively completed the conquest of their immediate Etruscan neighbours,^[54] as well as secured their position against the immediate threat posed by the tribespeople of the Apennine hills.
However, Rome still controlled only a very limited area and the affairs of Rome were minor even to those in Italy: the remains of Veii, for instance, lie entirely within modern Rome's suburbs and Rome's affairs were only just coming to the attention of the Greeks, the dominant cultural force at the time.^[55] At this point the bulk of Italy remained in the hands of Latin, Sabine, Samnite and other peoples in the central part of Italy, Greek colonies to the south, and, notably, the Celtic people, including the Gauls, to the north. The Celtic civilisation at this time was vibrant and growing in strength and territory, and stretched, if incohesively, across much of mainland Europe. It is at the hands of the Gallic Celts that Rome suffered a humiliating defeat that temporarily set back its advance and was to imprint itself upon the Roman consciousness.

Celtic invasion of Italia (390-387 BC)

By 390 BC, several Gallic tribes had begun invading Italy from the north as their culture expanded throughout Europe. Most of this was unknown to the Romans at this time, who still had purely local security concerns, but the Romans were alerted when a particularly warlike tribe,^[56] the Senones, invaded the Etruscan province of Siena from the north and attacked the town of Clusium,^[57] not far from Rome's sphere of influence. The Clusians, overwhelmed by the size of the enemy in numbers and ferocity, called on Rome for help. Perhaps unintentionally the Romans found themselves not just in conflict with the Senones, but their primary target. The Romans met them in pitched battle at the Battle of Allia River around 390-387 BC. The Gauls, under their chieftain Brennus, defeated the Roman army of around 15,000 troops and proceeded to pursue the fleeing Romans back to Rome itself and partially sacked the town^[58]^[59] before being either driven off^[60]^[61] or bought off.
Now that the Romans and Gauls had blooded one another, intermittent warfare was to continue between the two in Italy for more than two centuries, including the Battle of the Anio, the Battle of Lake Vadimo, the Battle of Faesulae in 225 BC, the Battle of Telamon in 224 BC, the Battle of Clastidium in 222 BC, the Battle of Cremona in 200 BC, the Battle of Mutina in 194 BC, the Battle of Arausio in 105 BC, and the Battle of Vercellae in 101 BC. The Celtic problem would not be resolved for Rome until the final subjugation of all Gaul following the Battle of Alesia in 52 BC.

Roman expansion into Italia (343-282 BC)

Apennine hills around Samnium

After recovering surprisingly swiftly from the sack of Rome,^[62] the Romans immediately resumed their expansion within Italy. Despite their successes so far, their mastery of the whole of Italy was by no means assured at this point: the Samnites were a people just as martial^[63] and as rich^[64] as the Romans and with an objective of their own of securing more lands in the fertile Italian plains on which Rome itself lay.^[65] The First Samnite War of between 343 BC and 341 BC that followed widespread Samnite incursions into Rome's territory^[66] was a relatively short affair: the Romans beat the Samnites in both the Battle of Mount Gaurus in 342 BC and the Battle of Suessola in 341 BC but were forced to withdraw from the war before they could pursue the conflict further due to the revolt of several of their Latin allies in the Latin War.^[67]^[68]
Rome was therefore forced to contend by around 340 BC against both Samnite incursions into their territory and, simultaneously, in a bitter war against their former allies. Rome bested the Latins in the Battle of Vesuvius and again in the Battle of Trifanum, after which the Latin cities were obliged to submit to Roman rule.^[69]^[70] Perhaps due to Rome's lenient treatment of their defeated foe, the Latins submitted largely amicably to Roman rule for the next 200 years.
The Second Samnite War , from 327 BC to 304 BC, was a much longer and more serious affair for both the Romans and Samnites,^[71] running for over twenty years and incorporating twenty-four battles that led to massive casualties on both sides. The fortunes of the two sides fluctuated throughout its course: the Samnites seized Neapolis in the Capture of Neapolis in 327 BC, which the Romans then re-captured before losing at the Battle of the Caudine Forks^[72] and the Battle of Lautulae. The Romans then proved victorious at the Battle of Bovianum and the tide turned strongly against the Samnites from 314 BC onwards, leading them to sue for peace with progressively less generous terms. By 304 BC the Romans had effectively annexed the greater degree of the Samnite territory, founding several colonies. This pattern of meeting aggression in force and almost inadvertently gaining territory in strategic counter-attacks was to become a common feature of Roman military history.
Seven years after their defeat, with Roman dominance of the area looking assured, the Samnites rose again and defeated the Romans at the Battle of Camerinum in 298 BC, to open the Third Samnite War. With this success in hand they managed to bring together a coalition of several previous enemies of Rome, all of whom were probably keen to prevent any one faction dominating the entire region. The army that faced the Romans at the Battle of Sentinum in 295 BC therefore included Samnites, Gauls, Etruscans and Umbrians.^[73] When the Roman army won a convincing victory over these combined forces it must have become clear that little could prevent Roman dominance of Italy. In the Battle of Populonia in 282 BC Rome finished off the last vestiges of Etruscan power in the region.

Mid-Roman Republic (281 BC - 148 BC)

Pyrrhic War (280-275 BC)

Route of Pyrrhus of Epirus

By the beginning of the third century BC, Rome had established itself as a major power on the Italian Peninsula, but had not yet come into conflict with the dominant military powers in the Mediterranean at the time: Carthage and the Greek kingdoms. Rome had all but completely defeated the Samnites, mastered its fellow Latin towns, and greatly reduced Etruscan power in the region. However, the south of Italy was controlled by the Greek colonies of Magna Grecia^[74] who had been allied to the Samnites, and continued Roman expansion brought the two into inevitable conflict.^[75]^[76]
When a diplomatic dispute between Rome and the Greek colony of Tarentum^[77] erupted into open warfare in the naval Battle of Thurii, Tarentum appealed for military aid to Pyrrhus, ruler of Epirus.^[78] Motivated by his diplomatic obligations to Tarentum, and a personal desire for military accomplishment,^[79] Pyrrhus landed a Greek army of some 25,000 men and a contingent of war elephants^[80] on Italian soil in 280 B.C,^[81] where his forces were joined by some Greek colonists and a portion of the Samnites who revolted against Roman control.
The Roman army had not yet seen elephants in battle, and their inexperience turned the tide in Pyrrhus' favour at the Battle of Heraclea in 280 BC,^[82] and again at the Battle of Ausculum in 279 BC.^[83]^[84]Despite these victories, Pyrrhus found his position in Italy untenable. Rome steadfastly refused to negotiate with Pyrrhus as long as his army remained in Italy.^[85] Furthermore, Rome entered into a treaty of support with Carthage, and Pyrrhus found that despite his expectations, none of the other Italic peoples would defect to the Greek and Samnite cause.^[86] Facing unacceptably heavy losses with each encounter with the Roman army, and failing to find further allies in Italy, Pyrrhus withdrew from the peninsula and campaigned in Sicily against Carthage,^[87] abandoning his allies to deal with the Romans.
When his Sicilian campaign was also ultimately a failure, and at the request of his Italian allies, Pyrrhus returned to Italy to face Rome once more. In 275 BC, Pyrrhus again met the Roman army at the Battle of Beneventum. This time the Romans had devised methods to deal with the war elephants, including the use of javelins, fire and, one source claims, simply hitting the elephants heavily on the head. While Beneventum was indecisive, Pyrrhus realised that his army had been exhausted and reduced by years of foreign campaigns, and seeing little hope for further gains, he withdrew completely from Italy.
The conflicts with Pyrrhus would have a great effect on Rome, however. Rome had shown that it was capable of pitting its armies successfully against the dominant military powers of the Mediterranean, and further showed that the Greek kingdoms were incapable of defending their colonies in Italy and abroad. Rome quickly moved into southern Italia, subjugating and dividing Magna Grecia.^[88] Effectively dominating the Italian peninsula,^[89] and with a proven international military reputation,^[90] Rome now began to look outwards at expansion from the Italian mainland. Since the Alps formed a natural barrier to the north, and Rome was none too keen to meet the fierce Gauls in battle once more, the city's gaze turned to Sicily and the islands of the Mediterranean, a policy that would bring it into direct conflict with its former ally Carthage.^[91]

Punic Wars (264-146 BC)

Theatre of Punic Wars

Rome first began to make war outside the Italian peninsula in the Punic wars against Carthage, a former Phoenician colony^[92] on the north coast of Africa that had developed into a powerful state. These wars, starting in 264 BC^[93] were probably the largest conflict of the ancient world^[94] and saw Rome become a Mediterranean power, with territory in Sicily, North Africa, Iberia, and, after the Macedonian wars, Greece.
The First Punic War began in 264 BC when settlements on Sicily began to appeal to the two powers between which they lay - Rome and Carthage - in order to solve internal conflicts. The willingness of both Rome and Carthage to become embroiled on the soil of a third party may indicate a willingness to test each other's power without wishing to enter a full war of annihilation; certainly there was considerable disagreement within Rome about whether to prosecute the war at all.^[95] The war saw land battles in Sicily early on such as the Battle of Agrigentum but the theatre shifted to naval battles around Sicily and Africa. For the Romans naval warfare was a relatively unexplored concept.^[96] Before the First Punic War in 264 BC there was no Roman navy to speak of as all previous Roman wars had been fought in Italy. The new war in Sicily against Carthage, a great naval power,^[97] forced Rome to quickly build a fleet and train sailors.^[98]
Rome took to naval warfare ''"like a brick to water"'' and the first few naval battles of the First Punic War such as the Battle of the Lipari Islands were catastrophic disasters for Rome, as might fairly be expected from a city that had no real prior experience of naval warfare. However, after training more sailors and inventing a grappling engine known as a Corvus,^[99] a Roman naval force under C. Duillius was able to roundly defeat a Carthaginian fleet at the Battle of Mylae. In just 4 years, a state without any real naval experience had managed to better a major regional maritime power in battle. Further naval victories followed at the Battle of Tyndaris and Battle of Cape Ecnomus.^[100]
After having won control of the seas, a Roman force landed on the African coast under Regulus, who was at first victorious, winning the Battle of Adys^[101] and forcing Carthage to sue for peace.^[102] However the terms of peace that Rome proposed were so heavy that negotiations failed and, in response, the Carthaginians hired Xanthippus, a mercenary from the martial Greek city-state of Sparta, to reorganise and lead their army.^[103] Xanthippus managed to cut off the Roman army from its base by re-establishing Carthaginian naval supremacy, then defeated and captured Regulus^[104] at the Battle of Tunis.^[105]
Despite being defeated on African soil, with their newfound naval abilities, the Romans roundly beat the Carthaginians in naval battle again - largely through the tactical innovations of the Roman fleet - at the Battle of the Aegates Islands and leaving Carthage without a fleet or sufficient coin to raise one. For a maritime power the loss of their access to the Mediterranean stung financially and psychologically, and the Carthaginians again sued for peace,^[106] during which Rome battled the ''Ligures'' tribe in the Ligurian War^[107] and the ''Insubres'' in the Gallic War^[108]
Continuing distrust led to the renewal of hostilities in the Second Punic War when Hannibal Barca, a member of the Barcid family of Carthaginian nobility, attacked Saguntum,^[109]^[110] a city with diplomatic ties to Rome.^[111] Hannibal then raised an army in Iberia and famously crossed the Italian Alps to invade Italy.^[112]^[113] In the first battle on Italian soil at Ticinus in 218 BC Hannibal defeated the Romans under Scipio the Elder in a small cavalry fight.^[114]^[115] Hannibal's success continued with victories in the Battle of the Trebia,^[116] the Battle of Lake Trasimene,^[117]^[118] and the Battle of Cannae,^[119]^[120] in what is considered one of the great masterpieces of the tactical art, and for a while ''"Hannibal seemed invincible"'', able to beat Roman armies at will.^[121]
In the three battles of Nola, Roman general Marcus Claudius Marcellus managed to hold off Hannibal but then Hannibal smashed a succession of Roman consular armies at the First Battle of Capua, the Battle of the Silarus, the Second Battle of Herdonia, the Battle of Numistro and the Battle of Asculum. By this time Hannibal's brother Hasdrubal Barca sought to cross the Alps into Italy and join his brother with a second army. Although initially defeated in Iberia in the Battle of Baecula the army of Gaius Claudius Nero defeated Hasdrubal at the Battle of the Metaurus.

"Apart from the romance of Scipio's personality and his political importance as the founder of Rome's world-dominion, his military work has a greater value to modern students of war than that of any other great captain of the past.. His genius revealed to him that peace and war are the two wheels on which the world runs."
''BH Liddell Hart on Scipio Africanus Major^[122]''

Unable to defeat Hannibal himself on Italian soil, and with Hannibal savaging the Italian countryside but unwilling or unable to destroy Rome itself, the Romans boldly sent an army to Africa with the intention of threatening the Carthaginian capital.^[123] In 203 BC at the Battle of Bagbrades the invading Roman army under Scipio Africanus Major defeated the Carthaginian army of Hasdrubal Gisco and Syphax and Hannibal was recalled to Africa. At the famous Battle of Zama Scipio decisively defeated^[124] - perhaps even ''"annihilated"'' - Hannibal's army in North Africa, ending the Second Punic War.
Carthage never managed to recover after the Second Punic War^[125] and the ''Third Punic War'' that followed is in reality a simple punitive mission to raze the city of Carthage to the ground.^[126] Carthage was almost defenceless and when besieged offered immediate surrender, conceding to a string of outrageous Roman demands.^[127] The Romans refused the surrender, demanding as their further terms of surrender the complete destruction of the city^[128] and, seeing little to lose, the Carthaginians prepared to fight. In the Battle of Carthage the city was stormed after a short siege and completely destroyed,^[129] its culture "almost totally extinguished".^[130]

Conquest of the Iberian peninsula (218-19 BC)

Peoples of the Iberian peninsula just before the Roman process of conquest

Rome's conflict with the Carthaginians in the Punic Wars led them into expansion in the Iberian peninsula of modern-day Spain and Portugal.^[131] The Punic empire of the Carthaginian Barcid family consisted of territories in Iberia, many of which Rome gained control of during the Punic Wars. Italy remained the main theatre of war for much of the Second Punic War, but the Romans also aimed to destroy the Barcid Empire in Iberia and prevent major Punic allies from linking up with forces in Italy.
Over the years Rome had gradually expanded along the southern Iberian coast until in 211 BC it captured the city of Saguntum. Following two major military expeditions to Iberia, the Romans finally crushed Carthaginian control of the peninsula in 206 BC, at the Battle of Ilipa, and the peninsula became a Roman province known as Hispania. From 206 BC onwards the only opposition to Roman control of the peninsula came from within the native Celtiberian tribes themselves, the disunity of which prevented security from Roman expansion.
Following two small-scale rebellions in 197 BC,^[132] in 195-194 BC, war broke out in between the Romans and the Lusitani people in the Lusitanian War, in modern-day Portugal.^[133] By 179 BC, the Romans had mostly succeeded in pacifying the region and bringing it under their control.
In around 154 BC, a major revolt was re-ignited in Numantia, which is known as the First Numantine War, and a long war of resistance was fought between the advancing forces of the Roman Republic and the Lusitani tribes of Hispania. The praetor Servius Sulpicius Galba and the proconsul Lucius Licinius Lucullus arrived in 151 BC and began the process of subduing the local population.^[134] Galba betrayed the Lusitani leaders he had invited to peace talks and had them killed in 150 BC, ingloriously ending the first phase of the war.
The Lusitani revolted again in 146 BC under a new leader called Viriathus, invading Turdetania (southern Iberia) in a guerilla war.^[135] The Lusitanians were initially successful, defeating a Roman army at the Battle of Tribola and going on to sack nearby Carpetania,^[136] and then besting a second Roman army at the First Battle of Mount Venus in 146 BC, again going on to sack another nearby city. In 144 BC, the general Quintus Fabius Maximus Aemilianus campaigned successfully against the Lusitani, but failed in his attempts to arrest Viriathus.
In 144 BC, Viriathus formed a league against Rome with several Celtiberian tribes^[137] and persuaded them to rise against Rome too, in the Second Numantine War.^[138] Viriathus' new coalition bested Roman armies at the Second Battle of Mount Venus in 144 BC and again at the failed Siege of Erisone. In 139 BC, Viriathus was finally killed in his sleep by three of his companions who had been promised gifts by Rome.^[139] In 136 and 135 BC, more attempts were made to gain complete control of the region of Numantia, but they failed. In 134 BC, the Consul Scipio Aemilianus finally succeeded in suppressing the rebellion following the successful Siege of Numantia.^[140]
Since the Roman invasion of the Iberian peninsula had begun in the south in the territories around the Mediterranean controlled by the Barcids, the last region of the peninsula to be subdued lay in the far north. The Cantabrian Wars or Astur-Cantabrian Wars, from 29 BC to 19 BC, occurred during the Roman conquest of these northern provinces of Cantabria and Asturias. Iberia was fully occupied by 25 BC and the last revolt put down by 19 BC^[141]

Greece and Macedonia (215-148 BC)

Map showing Illyria, Macedon and Greece

Rome's preoccupation with its war with Carthage provided an opportunity for Philip V of Macedon in northern Greece, to attempt to extend his power westward. Philip sent ambassadors to Hannibal's camp in Italy, to negotiate an alliance as common enemies of Rome.^[142]^[143] However, Rome discovered the agreement when Philip's emissaries, along with emissaries from Hannibal, were captured by a Roman fleet. Desiring to prevent Philip from aiding Carthage in Italy and elsewhere, Rome sought out land allies in Greece to fight a proxy war against Macedon on its behalf and found partners in the Aetolian League of Greek city-states, the Illyrians to the north of Macedon and the city-states of Pergamon^[144] and Rhodes, which lay across the Aegean from Macedon in modern-day Turkey.^[145]
The First Macedonian War saw the Romans involved directly in only limited land operations and when the Aetolians sued for peace with Philip once more Rome's small expeditionary force, with no more allies in Greece, but having achieved their objective of pre-occupying Philip and preventing him from aiding Hannibal, was ready to make peace. A treaty was drawn up between Rome and Macedon at Phoenice in 205 BC which promised Rome a small indemnity, formally ending the First Macedonian War.^[146]
Macedon began to encroach on territory claimed by several of the Greek city states in 200 BC and these states pleaded for help from their newfound ally Rome.^[147] Rome gave Philip an ultimatum that he must submit Macedonia to being essentially a Roman province. Philip, unsurprisingly, refused and, after initial internal reluctance for further hostilities,^[148] Rome declared war against Philip in the Second Macedonian War. In the Battle of the Aous Roman forces under Titus Quinctius Flamininus defeated the Macedonians,^[149] and in a second larger battle under the same opposing commanders in 197 BC, in the Battle of Cynoscephalae,^[150] Flamininus again beat the Macedonians decisively.^[151] Macedonia was forced to sign the Treaty of Tempea, in which it lost all claim to territory in Greece and Asia, and had to pay a war indemnity to Rome.^[152]
Between the second and third Macedonian wars Rome faced further conflict in the region due to a tapestry of shifting rivalries, alliances and leagues all seeking to gain greater influence. After the Macedonians had been defeated in the Second Macedonian War in 197 BC, the Greek city-state of Sparta stepped into the partial power vacuum in Greece. Fearing the Spartans would take increasing control of the region, the Romans drew on help from allies to prosecute the Roman-Spartan War, defeating a Spartan army at the Battle of Gythium in 195 BC. They also fought their former allies the Aetolian League in the Aetolian War,^[153] against the Istrians in the Istrian War,^[154] against the Illyrians in the Illyrian War,^[155] and against Achaia in the Achaean War.^[156]
Rome now turned its attentions to Antiochus III of the Seleucid Empire to the east. After campaigns as far abroad as Bactria, India, Persia and Judea, Antiochus moved to Asia Minor and Thrace^[157] to secure several coastal towns, a move that brought him into conflict with Roman interests. A Roman force under Manius Acilius Glabrio defeated Antiochus at the Battle of Thermopylae^[151] and forced him to evacuate Greece:^[159] the Romans then pursued the Seleucids beyond Greece, beating them again in naval battles at the Battle of the Eurymedon and Battle of Myonessus, and finally in a decisive engagement of the Battle of Magnesia.^[160]
In 179 BC Philip died^[161] and his talented and ambitious son, Perseus, took his throne and showed a renewed interest in Greece.^[162] He also allied himself with the warlike Bastarnae, and both this and his actions in Greece possibly violated the treaty signed with the Romans by his father or, if not, certainly was not "''behaving as [Rome considered] a subordinate ally should''". Rome declared war on Macedonia again, starting the Third Macedonian War. Perseus initially had greater military success against the Romans than his father, winning the Battle of Callicinus against a Roman consular army. However, as with all such ventures in this period, Rome responded by simply sending another army. The second consular army duly defeated the Macedonians at the Battle of Pydna in 168 BC^[163] and the Macedonians, lacking the reserve of the Romans and with King Perseus captured,^[164] duly capitulated, ending the Third Macedonian War.^[165]
The Fourth Macedonian War, fought from 150 BC to 148 BC, was the final war between Rome and Macedon and began when Andriscus usurped the Macedonian throne. The Romans raise a consular army under Quintus Caecilius Metellus, who swiftly defeated Andriscus at the Second battle of Pydna.

Late Roman Republic (147 BC - 30 BC)

Jugurthine War (111-104 BC)

Rome had, in the earlier Punic Wars, gained large tracts of territory in Africa, which they had consolidated in the following centuries,^[166] and much of which had been granted to the kingdom of Numidia, a kingdom on the north African coast approximating to modern Algeria, in return for its past military assistance.^[167] The Jugurthine War of 111-104 BC was fought between Rome and Jugurtha of Numidia and constituted the final Roman pacification of Northern Africa,^[168] after which Rome largely ceased expansion on the continent after reaching natural barriers of desert and mountain. Following Jugurtha's usurpation of the Numidian throne,^[169] a loyal ally of Rome since the Punic Wars,^[170] Rome felt compelled to intervene. Jugurtha impudently bribed the Romans into accepting his usurpation^[171]^[172]^[173] and was granted half the kingdom. Following further aggression and further bribery attempts, the Romans sent an army to tackle him. The Romans were defeated at the Battle of Suthul^[174] but faired better at the Battle of the Muthul^[175] and finally defeated Jugurtha at the Battle of Thala,^[176]^[177] the Battle of Mulucha,^[178] and the Battle of Cirta(104 BC).^[179] Jugurtha was finally captured not in battle but by treachery,^[180]^[181] ending the war.^[182]

Resurgence of the Celtic threat (121-101 BC)

By 121 BC, memories of Rome itself being sacked by Celtic tribes from Gaul were still prominent despite their historical distance, having been made into a legendary account that was taught to each generation of Roman youth. However, Rome was, unknown at the time, to face a resurgent Celtic threat twice more within the next twenty years. First, in 121 BC, Rome came into contact with the Celtic tribes of the Allobroges and the Arverni, both of which they defeated with apparent in ease in the First Battle of Avignon near the Rhone river and the Second Battle of Avignon, the same year.^[183]
The Cimbrian War (113-101 BC) was a far more serious affair than the earlier clashes of 121 BC. The Celtic-Germanic tribes of the ''Cimbri''^[184] and the ''Teutons'' or ''Teutones'' migrated from northern Europe into Rome's northern territories,^[185] and clashed with Rome and her allies.^[186] The Cimbrian War was the first time since the Second Punic War that Italia and Rome itself had been seriously threatened, and caused great fear in Rome for some time. After the Cimbri inadvertently granted the Romans a reprieve by diverting to plunder Iberia,^[187] Rome was given the opportunity to carefully prepare for and successfully meet the Cimbri in battle in the Battle of Aquae Sextiae and the Battle of the Raudian Field.

Internal unrest (135-71 BC)

The extensive campaigning abroad by Roman generals, and the rewarding of soldiers with plunder on these campaigns, led to a general trend of soldiers becoming increasingly loyal to their generals rather than to the state, and to a willingness to follow their generals in battle against the state.^[188] Rome was also plagued by several slave uprisings during this period, in part because in the past century vast tracts of land had been given over to slave farming in which the slaves greatly outnumbered their Roman masters. In the last century before the common era at least twelve civil wars and rebellions occurred. This pattern did not break until Octavian (later ''Caesar Augustus'') ended it by becoming a successful challenger to the Senate's authority, and was made ''princeps'' (emperor).
Between 135 BC and 71 BC there were three "Servile Wars" involving slave uprisings against the Roman state, the third and final uprising the most serious,^[189] involving ultimately between 120,000^[190] and 150,000^[191] revolting slaves. Additionally, in 91 BC the Social War broke out between Rome and its former allies in Italy,^[192]^[193] collectively known as the ''Socii'', over dissent among the allies that they shared the risk of Rome's military campaigns, but not its rewards.^[194]^[195] Despite defeats such as the Battle of Fucine Lake, Roman troops defeated the Italian militias in decisive engagements, notably the Battle of Asculum. Although they lost militarily, the ''Socii'' achieved their objectives with the legal proclamations of the ''Lex Julia'' and ''Lex Plautia Papiria'', which granted citizenship to more than 500,000 Italians.
The internal unrest reached its most serious, however, in the two civil wars or marches upon Rome of the consul Lucius Cornelius Sulla at the beginning of 82 BC. In the Battle of the Colline Gate at the very door of the city of Rome, a Roman army under Sulla bested an army of the Roman senate, along with some Samnite allies.^[196] Whatever the rights and wrongs of his grievances against those in power of the state, his actions marked a watershed of the willingness of Roman troops to wage war against one another that was to pave the way for the wars of the triumvirate, the overthrowing of the Senate as the ''de facto'' head of the Roman state, and the eventual endemic usurpation of the later Empire.

Conflicts with Mithridates (89-63 BC)

Mithridates the Great was the ruler of Pontus,^[197] a large kingdom in Asia Minor, from 120 to 63 BC. He is remembered as one of Rome's most formidable and successful enemies who engaged three of the most prominent generals of the late Roman Republic: Sulla, Lucullus, and Pompey the Great. In a pattern familiar from the Punic Wars, the Romans came into conflict with him after the two states' spheres of influence began to overlap. Mithridates antagonised Rome by seeking to expand his kingdom,^[198] and Rome for her part seemed equally keen for war and the spoils and prestige that it might bring.^[199] After conquering western Anatolia (modern Turkey) in 88 BC, Roman sources state that Mithridates ordered the killing of the majority of the 80,000 Romans living there.^[200] The massacre may have been greatly exaggerated by the Romans but it was the official reason given for the commencement of hostilities in the First Mithridatic War. The Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla forced Mithridates out of Greece proper after the Battle of Chaeronea and later Battle of Orchomenus but then had to return to Italy to answer the internal threat posed by his rival Marius; consequently, Mithridates VI was defeated but not beaten. A peace was made between Rome and Pontus, but this proved only a temporary lull.
The Second Mithridatic War began when Rome tried to annex Bithnyia as a province. In the Third Mithridatic War, first Lucius Licinius Lucullus and then Pompey the Great were sent against Mithridates.^[201] Mithridates was finally defeated by Pompey in the night-time Battle of the Lycus.^[202]

Campaign against the Cilician pirates (67 BC)

The Mediterranean had at this time fallen into the hands of pirates,^[202] largely from Cilicia.^[204] Rome had destroyed many of the states that had previously policed the Mediterranean with fleets, but had failed to step into the gap created.^[205] The pirates had seized the opportunity of a relative power vacuum and had not only strangled shipping lanes but had plundered many cities on the coasts of Greece and Asia,^[204] and had even made descents upon Italy itself.^[207] After the Roman admiral Marcus Antonius failed to clear the pirates to the satisfaction of the Roman authorities, Pompey was nominated his successor as commander of a special naval task force to campaign against the pirates.^[202] It took Pompey supposedly just forty days to clear the western portion of the sea of pirates,^[209] and restore communication between Iberia, Africa, and Italy. Plutarch describes how Pompey first swept their craft from the Mediterranean in a series of small actions and through promise of honouring the surrender of cities and craft. He then followed the main body of the pirates to their strongholds on the coast of Cilicia, and destroyed them there in the naval Battle of Korakesion.^[202]

Caesar's early campaigns (59-50 BC)

Map of the Gallic Wars

During a term as praetor in Iberia Pompey's contemporary Julius Caesar of the Roman Julii clan defeated the Calaici and Lusitani in battle.^[211] Following a consular term, he was then appointed to a five year term as Proconsular Governor of Transalpine Gaul (current southern France) and Illyria (the coast of Dalmatia).^[212] Not content with an idle governorship, Caesar strove to find reason to invade Gaul, which would give him the dramatic military success he sought.^[213] To this end he stirred up popular nightmares of the first sack of Rome by the Gauls and the more recent spectre of the Cimbri and Teutones. When the Helvetii and Tigurini tribes began to migrate on a route that would take them near (not into)^[214] the Roman province of Transalpine Gaul, Caesar had the barely sufficient excuse he needed for his Gallic Wars, fought between 58 BC and 49 BC.^[215] After slaughtering the Helvetii tribe,^[216] Caesar prosecuted a ''"long, bitter and costly"''^[217] campaign against other tribes across the breadth of Gaul, many of whom had fought alongside Rome against their common enemy the Helvetii, and annexed their territory to that of Rome. Plutarch claims that the campaign cost a million Gallic lives.^[218] Although ''"fierce and able"'' the Gauls were handicapped by internal disunity and fell in a series of battles over the course of a decade.^[219]
Caesar defeated the ''Helvetii'' in 58 BC at the Battle of the Arar and Battle of Bibracte,^[220] the Belgic confederacy known as the ''Belgae'' at the Battle of the Axona, the ''Nervii'' in 57 BC at the Battle of the Sabis,^[221] the ''Aquitani'', ''Treviri'', ''Tencteri'', ''Aedui'' and ''Eburones'' in unknown battles, and the ''Veneti'' in 56 BC. In 55 and 54 BC he made two expeditions to Britain.^[222] In 52 BC, following the Siege of Avaricum and a string of inconclusive battles,^[223] Caesar defeated a union of Gauls led by Vercingetorix^[224] at the Battle of Alesia,^[225]^[226] completing the Roman conquest of Transalpine Gaul. By 50 BC, the entirety of Gaul lay in Roman hands. Caesar recorded his own accounts of these campaigns in ''Commentarii de Bello Gallico'' ("Commentaries on the Gallic War").
Gaul never regained its Celtic identity, never attempted another nationalist rebellion, and remained loyal to Rome until the fall of the Western Empire in 476. However, although Gaul itself was to thereafter remain loyal, cracks were appearing in the political unity of Rome's governing figures - partly over concerns over the loyalty of Caesar's Gallic troops to his person rather than the state - that were soon to dive Rome into a length series of civil wars.

Triumvirates, Caesarian ascension, and revolt (53-30 BC)

By 59 BC an unofficial political alliance known as the First Triumvirate was formed between Gaius Julius Caesar, Marcus Licinius Crassus, and Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus to share power and influence.^[227] It was always an uncomfortable alliance given that Crassus and Pompey intensely disliked one another. In 53 BC, Crassus launched a Roman invasion of the Parthian Empire. After initial successes,^[228] he marched his army deep into the desert;^[229] but here his army was cut off deep in enemy territory, surrounded and slaughtered at the Battle of Carrhae^[230]^[231] in ''"the greatest Roman defeat since Hannibal"''^[232] in which Crassus himself perished.^[233] The death of Crassus removed some of the balance in the Triumvirate and, consequently, Caesar and Pompey began to move apart. While Caesar was fighting against Vercingetorix in Gaul, Pompey proceeded with a legislative agenda for Rome that revealed that he was at best ambivalent towards Caesar^[234] and perhaps now covertly allied with Caesar's political enemies. In 51 BC, some Roman senators demanded that Caesar would not be permitted to stand for Consul unless he turned over control of his armies to the state, and the same demands were made of Pompey by other factions.^[235]^[236] Relinquishing his army would leave Caesar defenceless before his enemies. Caesar chose Civil War over laying down his command and facing trial. The triumvirate was shattered and conflict was inevitable.
Pompey initially assured Rome and the senate that he could defeat Caesar in battle should he march on Rome.^[237]^[238] However, by the spring of 49 BC, when Caesar crossed the Rubicon river with his invading forces and swept down the Italian peninsula towards Rome, Pompey ordered the abandonment of Rome. Caesar's army was still under-strength, with certain units remaining in Gaul, but on the other hand Pompey himself only had a small force at his command, and that with uncertain loyalty having served under Caesar. Tom Holland attributes Pompey's willingness to abandon Rome to waves of panicking refugees stirring ancestral fears of invasions from the north.^[239] Pompey's forces retreated south towards Brundisium,^[240] and then fled to Greece.^[241] Caesar first directed his attention to the Pompeian stronghold of Iberia^[242] but following campaigning by Caesar in the Siege of Massilia and Battle of Ilerda decided to tackle Pompey himself in Greece.^[243]^[244] Pompey initially defeated Caesar at the Battle of Dyrrachium in 48 BC^[245] but failing to follow up on the victory, Pompey was decisively defeated in the Battle of Pharsalus in 48 BC^[246]^[247] despite outnumbering Caesar's forces two to one.^[248] Pompey fled again, this time to Egypt, where he was murdered^[249]^[202] in an attempt to ingratiate the country with Caesar and avoid a war with Rome.
Pompey's death did not see the end of the civil wars since initially Caesar's enemies were manifold and Pompey's supporters continued to fight on after his death. In 46 BC Caesar lost perhaps as much as a third of his army when his former commander Titus Labienus, who had defected to the Pompeians several years earlier, defeated him at the Battle of Ruspina. However, after this low point Caesar came back to defeat the Pompeian army of Metellus Scipio in the Battle of Thapsus, after which the Pompeians retreated yet again to Iberia. Caesar defeated the combined forces of Titus Labienus and Gnaeus Pompey the Younger at the Battle of Munda in Iberia. Labienus was killed in the battle and the Younger Pompey captured and executed.

"The Parthians began to shoot from all sides. They did not pick any particular target since the Romans were so close together that they could hardly miss...If they kept their ranks they were wounded. If they tried to charge the enemy, the enemy did not suffer more and they did not suffer less, because the Parthians could shoot even as they fled...When Publius urged them to charge the enemy's mail-clad horsemen, they showed him that their hands were riveted to their shields and their feet nailed through and through to the ground, so that they were helpless either for flight or for self-defence''."
''Plutarch on the Battle of Carrhae^[251]''

Despite his military success, or probably because of it, fear spread of Caesar, now the primary figure of the Roman state, becoming an autocratic ruler and ending the Roman Republic. This fear drove a group of senators naming themselves The Liberators to assassinate him in 44 BC.^[252] Further civil war followed between those loyal to Caesar and those who supported the actions of the Liberators. Caesar's supporter Mark Antony condemned Caesar's assassins and war broke out between the two factions. Antony was denounced as a public enemy, and Octavian was entrusted with the command of the war against him. In the Battle of Forum Gallorum Antony, besieging Caesar's assassin Decimus Brutus in Mutina, defeated the forces of the consul Pansa, who was killed, but Antony was then immediately defeated by the army of the other consul, Hirtius. At the Battle of Mutina Antony was again defeated in battle by Hirtius, who was killed. Although Antony failed to capture Mutina, Decimus Brutus was murdered shortly thereafter.
Octavian betrayed his party, and came to terms with Caesarians Antony and Lepidus and on 26 November 43 BC the Second Triumvirate was formed,^[253] this time in an official capacity. In 42 BC Triumvirs Mark Antony and Octavian fought the indecisive Battle of Philippi with Caesar's assassins Marcus Brutus and Cassius. Although Brutus defeated Octavian, Antony defeated Cassius, who committed suicide. Brutus also committed suicide shortly afterwards.
However, civil war flared again when the Second Triumvirate of Octavian, Lepidus and Mark Antony failed just as the first had almost as soon as its opponents had been removed. The ambitious Octavian built a power base and then launched a campaign against Mark Antony. Together with Lucius Antonius, Mark Antony's brother, Fulvia raised an army in Italy to fight for Antony's rights against Octavian but she was defeated by Octavian at the Battle of Perugia. Her death led to partial reconciliation between Octavian and Anthony who went on to crush the army of Sextus Pompeius, the last focus of opposition to the second triumvirate, in the naval Battle of Naulochus.
As before, once opposition to the triumvirate was crushed, it started to tear at itself. The triumvirate expired on the last day of 33 BC and was not renewed in law and in 31 BC, war began again. At the Battle of Actium,^[254] Octavian decisively defeated Antony and Cleopatra in a naval battle near Greece, using fire to destroy the enemy fleet.^[255]
Octavian went on to become Emperor under the name Augustus and, in the absence of political assassins or usurpers, was able to greatly expand the borders of the Empire.

Early Roman Empire to mid-Roman Empire (30 BC - 180 AD)

Imperial expansion (40 BC-117)

The extent of the Roman Empire in 116 AD following sharp expansion

Under emperors secure from interior enemies, such as Augustus and Trajan, the military achieved great territorial gains in both the East and the West. In the West, following humiliating defeats at the hands of the Sugambri, Tencteri and Usipetes tribes in 16 BC,^[256] Roman armies pushed north and west out of Gaul to subdue much of Germania. The Pannonian revolt in AD 6 forced the Romans to cancel their plan to cement their conquest of Germany by invading Bohemia^[257] for the moment.^[258] Despite the loss of a large army almost to the man in Varus' famous defeat at the hands of the Germanic leader Arminius in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in 9 AD,^[259]^[260]^[261] Rome recovered and continued its expansion up to and beyond the borders of the known world. Roman armies under Germanicus pursued several more campaigns against the Germanic tribes of the Marcomanni, Hermunduri, Chatti,^[262] Cherusci,^[263] Bructeri, and Marsi.^[264] Overcoming several mutinies in the armies along the Rhine,^[265] Germanicus defeated the German tribes of Arminius in a series of battles culminating in the Battle of the Weser River^[266] and went on to invade Britain.
After preliminary low-scale invasions of Britain,^[267]^[268] the Romans invaded Britain in force in 43 AD,^[269] forcing their way inland through several battles against British tribes, including the Battle of the Medway, the Battle of the Thames, the Battle of Caer Caradoc and the Battle of Mona.^[270] Following a general uprising^[271]^[272] in which the Britons sacked Colchester,^[273] St Albans^[274] and London,^[275] the Romans suppressed the rebellion in the Battle of Watling Street^[276]^[277] and went on to push as far north as central Scotland in the Battle of Mons Graupius.^[278]^[279] Tribes in modern-day Scotland and Northern England repeatedly rebelled against Roman rule and two military bases were established in Britannia to protect against rebellion and incursions from the north, from which Roman troops built and manned Hadrian's Wall.^[280]
On the continent, the extension of the Empire's borders beyond the Rhine hung in the balance for some time, with the emperor Caligula apparently poised to invade Germania in AD 39, and Cnaeus Domitius Corbulo crossing the Rhine in 47 AD and marching into the territory of the Frisii and Chauci^[281] before his successor Claudius ordered the suspension of further attacks across the Rhine, setting what was to become the permanent limit of the Empire's expansion in this direction.

"Never was there slaughter more cruel than took place there in the marshes and woods, never were more intolerable insults inflicted by barbarians, especially those directed against the legal pleaders. They put out the eyes of some of them and cut off the hands of others; they sewed up the mouth of one of them after first cutting out his tongue, which one of the barbarians held in his hand, exclaiming ''At last, you viper, you have ceased to hiss!''."
''Florus on the loss of Varus' force^[282]''

Further east, Trajan turned his attention to Dacia, an area north of Macedon and Greece and east of the Danube that had been on the Roman agenda since before the days of Caesar^[283]^[284] when they had beaten a Roman army at the Battle of Histria.^[285] In 85, the Dacians had swarmed over the Danube and pillaged Moesia^[286]^[287] and initially defeated an army the Emperor Domitian sent against them,^[288] but the Romans were victorious in the Battle of Tapae in 88 AD and a truce was drawn up.
Emperor Trajan recommenced hostilities against Dacia and, following an uncertain number of battles,^[289] defeated the Dacian general Decebalus in the Second Battle of Tapae in 101 AD.^[290] With Trajan's troops pressing towards the Dacian capital Sarmizegethusa, Decebalus once more sought terms.^[291] Decebalus rebuilt his power over the following years and attacked Roman garrisons again in 105 AD. In response Trajan again marched into Dacia,^[292] besieging the Dacian capital in the Siege of Sarmizethusa, and razing it to the ground.^[293] With Dacia quelled, Trajan subsequently invaded the Parthian empire to the east, his conquests taking the Roman Empire to its greatest extent. Rome's borders in the east were indirectly governed through a system of client states for some time, leading to less direct campaigning than in the west in this period.^[294]
The land of Armenia between the Black Sea and Caspian Sea became a focus of contention between Rome and the Parthian Empire, and control of the region was repeatedly gained and lost. The Parthians forced Armenia into submission from 37 AD^[295] but in 47 AD the Romans retook control of the kingdom and offered it client kingdom status. Under Nero, the Romans fought a campaign between 55 AD and 63 AD against the Parthian Empire, which had again invaded Armenia. After gaining Armenia once more in 60 AD and subsequently losing it again in 62 AD, the Romans sent Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo in 63 AD into the territories of Vologases I of Parthia. Corbulo succeeded in returning Armenia to Roman client status, where it remained for the next century.

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