GAIUS MARIUS HAD not lingered long in Rome after celebrating his triumph over Jugurtha in January 104 BC. The disaster at Arausio was still just a few months old, and though the Cimbri had gone west, there was nothing to guarantee they would not turn around and come back. But Marius could not simply race north to take command of the legions in southern Gaul because there
The core of this new army was a reserve legion that had been conscripted by the previous year’s consul, Publius Rutilius Rufus. When his ill-fated colleague Mallius had gone off to battle the Cimbri, Rutilius had stayed behind in Rome to continue raising reinforcements. Not wanting these reinforcements to sit idle, Rutilius kept them busy with a training regimen adapted from the gladiatorial schools. The men engaged in hand-to-hand combat, calisthenics, and physical conditioning. When Marius inherited this small force in early 104 he found it to be one of the best-trained groups of soldiers he had ever commanded.5
To build around this core, Marius canvassed for new recruits. As with the Numidian campaign, Marius secured an exemption from the property requirements and drafted men of every class and background. He had little difficulty raising recruits. Men who had watched their friends and neighbors win riches and fame in North Africa now wanted in on the action. Where once the hopeless underclasses had been left behind by the Roman conquest of the Mediterranean, they now stood to profit along with the nobility. We do not know exactly how many men Marius took with him to Gaul, but it was perhaps as many as thirty thousand Romans plus forty thousand Italian Allies and foreign auxiliaries. One thing we know for sure, however, is that Marius made sure Sulla stayed by his side. Though Marius was annoyed that Sulla happily took credit for capturing Jugurtha, he could not deny that Sulla was among the most talented officers in Rome. Having finished his term as quaestor, Sulla joined Marius as a legate and became his chief lieutenant in Gaul for the coming campaign.6
After Marius arrived in Gaul, he moved west beyond the frontier base at Aquae Sextiae and built up a fortified position along the Rhône river, probably near modern-day Arles. If the Cimbri came back from Spain along the southern coast or once again descended through the Rhône valley, they would have to pass through Marius’s army. After settling in, Marius began to train his legions, expanding the program pioneered by Rutilius the year before. Though the men trained with a sense of urgency, as it turned out the Cimbri would not return for two full years. But this reprieve did not mean the Republic was able to enjoy a moment’s peace; while the northern frontier was quiet, the island of Sicily was seized by another violent slave insurrection.7
THIRTY YEARS HAD passed since the great slave rebellion had erupted on Sicily in the 130s. After the slave armies of “King Antiochus” were finally defeated, the Senate had introduced a few reforms to mitigate some of the worst abuses of the slaves. But as the years passed, and memories of the First Servile War faded, most Roman owners slipped back into their old brutal habits. But the next slave rebellion was not merely a reaction to abusive treatment; it was also driven by an unkept promise that came directly from Marius.8
As Marius filled out his new army, he called for foreign auxiliaries. But King Nicomedes III of the allied Kingdom of Bithynia replied that the publicani tax farmers had been arresting and selling his subjects into slavery, so he could not meet his obligation. Closer to home, the Italians echoed the same complaint. The publicani tax farmers had apparently been seizing and enslaving anyone who fell short of meeting their tax obligations. Since this practice now affected Rome’s ability to fill the legions, the Senate issued a decree that henceforth no citizen of an allied nation, Italian or otherwise, could be held in slavery in a Roman province. They further decreed that any man, woman, or child so held was to be emancipated immediately. Ironically this decree of emancipation would end up triggering the second great slave revolt in Roman history.9
To enforce the decree in Sicily, a praetor named Publius Licinius Nerva set up a tribunal in 104 to go through the records and determine who among the hundreds of thousands of slaves on the island qualified for release. In the first week, the tribunal was able to identify and emancipate eight hundred slaves. But with their profits on the line, a coalition of Sicilian estate owners confronted Nerva and demanded he shut down the tribunal. Using a mixture of bribes and threats, the owners convinced Nerva to turn away future slaves petitioning for release.10
