When word of the revolt reached Metellus, he raced his army to Vaga, overwhelmed its meager defenses, and sacked it mercilessly. The fate of the garrison commander Silanus, meanwhile, was still up in the air. Hauled before Metellus to explain how he lost the city but not his life, Silanus had no clear answers. In the closed-door deliberations that followed, Marius allegedly urged Metellus to sentence Silanus to death for treason. Metellus was fond of Silanus but ultimately agreed. Silanus was scourged and executed.36
But in the aftermath of the execution, Marius went around whispering that Metellus had done wrong by Silanus, and that his cruel punishment far outweighed the crime—doubly so because it was not even in Metellus’s power as consul to hand down such a sentence without right of appeal to the Assembly. The incident was depressing to Metellus, especially because now his men doubted him and looked openly to Marius for leadership.37
Metellus likely hoped that all this carping and behind-the-back undermining of his authority would soon be irrelevant as his secret connection to the traitorous Bomilcar seemed about ready to bear fruit. But instead, Jugurtha discovered Bomilcar’s treachery and executed his once faithful lieutenant. Metellus’s latest plan to capture Jugurtha had failed, but it did help drive Jugurtha into paranoid isolation. From that point on Jugurtha “never passed a quiet day or night; he put little trust in any place, person, or time; feared his countrymen and the enemy alike.”38
Since the failure to capture Jugurtha meant the war would continue, Metellus admitted that a disgruntled Marius would be more a hindrance than a help in the next campaign. So just twelve days before the consular election Metellus finally gave Marius leave to return to Rome. His hope was that even if Marius won election that the Senate would not appoint him to take over Metellus’s command in Numidia.39
AFTER MARIUS DEPARTED, Metellus marched out to finish the war. At that point, Jugurtha’s campaign was in dire straits. The king’s increasing paranoia drove many former supporters away, and conscripts deserted almost as soon as they were pressed into service. In the closing months of 108, Metellus managed to chase Jugurtha all the way to the city of Thala, deep in the interior of Numidia. The city was supposedly impervious to siege as it sat atop the only source of freshwater for fifty miles. But thanks to a fortuitous rain that filled Roman water sacks, the legions were able to batter down the gates. The sack of Thala turned out to be a hollow victory, however: by the time the Romans entered the city, Jugurtha had already fled. Meanwhile, the leaders of Thala gathered up anything the Romans might seize as profitable plunder and loaded it into the main palace in the center of town. There they threw themselves one last grand banquet and afterward, set fire to the building, destroying everything in it, including themselves.40
Though the capture of Thala was not decisive, it did change the dynamic of the war. Thala had been Jugurtha’s last great stronghold in Numidia and its fall forced him out of his own kingdom entirely. Jugurtha kept constantly on the move, riding southwest into the wild territory beyond the reach of the “civilized” powers. It was there that he finally found refuge with a tribe of nomads inhabiting the Atlas Mountains. Thanks to the treasure he carried with him, Jugurtha convinced these nomadic horsemen to form the core of a new army.41
But the mercenary nomads alone would not be enough to continue the war with Rome, so Jugurtha also wrote to King Bocchus of Mauretania to propose an alliance. The Kingdom of Mauretania bordered Numidia to the west, covering the region of northwest Africa that roughly corresponds to modern-day Morocco. The two monarchs already shared a familial tie, though the exact nature isn’t clear: some sources say Jugurtha married Bocchus’s daughter; others say Bocchus married Jugurtha’s daughter. Regardless, the king of Mauretania turned out to be amenable to a closer alliance as he had no love for the Romans or their habit of imperial expansion.42
The first joint operation of the new anti-Roman coalition was to attack the great city of Cirta. The city had been in Roman hands for many years now, and Metellus had used Cirta as the primary storehouse for his own treasury, baggage, and captured prisoners. Informed of the alliance between Jugurtha and Bocchus, Metellus decided not to rush out into battle, instead staying close to his defensive base, waiting for the kings to come to him. He sent out repeated letters of warning to Bocchus about getting mixed up with Jugurtha’s inevitably doomed resistance. Bocchus wrote back hinting at a peaceful solution but always seeking leniency for Jugurtha. It is not clear whether Bocchus was stalling for time or genuinely trying to negotiate a settlement.43
