Politicians

Marcus Licinius Crassus

Roman general and statesman of the late Republic (115-53 BC), often called the richest man in Rome. He amassed an enormous fortune through Sulla's proscriptions, fire-brigade extortion, and silver mining, then crushed the Spartacus slave revolt by reviving the ancient practice of decimation and crucifying six thousand captured slaves along the Appian Way. With Pompey and Caesar he formed the First Triumvirate, the unofficial cartel that dominated Roman politics. Envy of his colleagues' military glory finally drove him to invade Parthia, where his legions were destroyed by horse archers at the Battle of Carrhae and he himself was killed during a forced parley — a death that removed the last counterweight between Caesar and Pompey and accelerated the civil war that ended the Republic.

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