Gaius Claudius Glaber was a military commander of the late Roman Republic, holding the office of praetor in 73 BC. During his term he was defeated in the Battle of Mount Vesuvius against the forces of Spartacus during the Third Servile War. [1]
Glaber was a member of a Roman plebeian family. He might have a distant connection with the famous patrician Claudii. [2]
Glaber, who was one of eight elected praetors in 73 BC, is only mentioned by classical historians in connection with his disastrous military leadership against Spartacus. They note his force of Roman militia (not professional legionaries) [3] was destroyed because he was unable to adapt to the gladiators' unorthodox tactics. [4]
After Glaber besieged the slaves on slopes of Mount Vesuvius, he failed to anticipate what they would do next. Spartacus' forces used rappelling lines made from local vegetation to scale down the cliffs on the other side of the mountain. [4] They then outflanked Glaber's militia, annihilating his forces. [5]
Roman records make no further mention of Glaber after this defeat. It is not known whether he was killed during the battle, or was simply considered too obscure for further mention by classical historians. [6] Classics scholar Barry S. Strauss noted that his obscurity might also have been another sign of how little attention the Roman Senate gave Spartacus in 73 BC. [7]
In screen adaptations of the life of Spartacus, Glaber has been portrayed:
Year 73 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Lucullus and Longinus. The denomination 73 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.
This article concerns the period 79 BC – 70 BC.
Marcus Licinius Crassus was a Roman general and statesman who played a key role in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. He is often called "the richest man in Rome".
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The Third Servile War, also called the Gladiator War and the War of Spartacus by Plutarch, was the last in a series of slave rebellions against the Roman Republic known as the Servile Wars. This third rebellion was the only one that directly threatened the Roman heartland of Italy. It was particularly alarming to Rome because its military seemed powerless to suppress it.
The gens Licinia was a celebrated plebeian family at ancient Rome, which appears from the earliest days of the Republic until imperial times, and which eventually obtained the imperial dignity. The first of the gens to obtain the consulship was Gaius Licinius Calvus Stolo, who, as tribune of the plebs from 376 to 367 BC, prevented the election of any of the annual magistrates, until the patricians acquiesced to the passage of the lex Licinia Sextia, or Licinian Rogations. This law, named for Licinius and his colleague, Lucius Sextius, opened the consulship for the first time to the plebeians. Licinius himself was subsequently elected consul in 364 and 361 BC, and from this time, the Licinii became one of the most illustrious gentes in the Republic.
Crixus was a Gallic gladiator and military leader in the Third Servile War between the Roman Republic and rebel slaves. Born in Gaul, he was enslaved by the Romans under unknown circumstances and trained as a gladiator in Capua. His name means "one with curly hair" in Gaulish.
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Publius Varinius was a Roman praetor in 73 BC, proconsul in 72 BC, and a military commander who was unsuccessful during the Third Servile War.
Oenomaus was a Gallic gladiator, who escaped from the gladiatorial school of Lentulus Batiatus in Capua. Together with Spartacus, Crixus, Castus, and Gannicus, he became one of the leaders of rebellious slaves during the Third Servile War
Spartacus is a 2004 North American miniseries directed by Robert Dornhelm and produced by Ted Kurdyla from a teleplay by Robert Schenkkan. It aired over two nights on the USA Network, and stars Goran Visnjic, Alan Bates, Angus Macfadyen, Rhona Mitra, Ian McNeice, Ross Kemp and Ben Cross. It is based on the 1951 novel of the same name by Howard Fast.
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Spartacus was a Thracian gladiator (Thraex) who, along with Crixus, Gannicus, Castus, and Oenomaus, was one of the escaped slave leaders in the Third Servile War, a major slave uprising against the Roman Republic. Little is known about him beyond the events of the war, and surviving historical accounts are sometimes contradictory. All sources agree that he was a former gladiator and an accomplished military leader.
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Gannicus was a Celtic slave, who together with the Thracian Spartacus, Crixus, Castus and Oenomaus, became one of the leaders of rebel slaves during the Third Servile War. In the winter of 71 BC, Gannicus, along with Castus, broke off from Spartacus, taking a large number of Celts and Germans with them, marking the second detachment of the rebellion. Gannicus and Castus met their end at the Battle of Cantenna in Lucania near Mount Soprano, where Marcus Licinius Crassus, Lucius Pomptinus and Quintus Marcius Rufus entrenched their forces in battle and defeated them.
Castus was an enslaved Gallic man who, together with the Thracian Spartacus, the fellow Gaul Crixus, and Celt Gannicus, alongside Oenomaus, was one of the leaders of rebellious slaves during the Third Servile War. He was killed along with his co-commander Gannicus and their Gallic and Germanic followers by Roman forces under Marcus Licinius Crassus at the Battle of Cantenna in Lucania in 71 BC.
The Battle of Vesuvius was the first conflict of the Third Servile War which pitted the escaped slaves against a military force of militia specifically dispatched by Rome to deal with the rebellion.
The gens Fonteia was a plebeian family at ancient Rome. Members of this gens are first mentioned toward the end of the third century BC; Titus Fonteius was a legate of Publius Cornelius Scipio during the Second Punic War. The first of the Fonteii to obtain the consulship was Gaius Fonteius Capito, consul suffectus in 33 BC.
The gens Munatia was a plebeian family at Rome. Members of this gens are first mentioned during the second century BC, but they did not obtain any of the higher offices of the Roman state until imperial times.
Ancient sources mentioning Glaber include:
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: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)