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Lucius Cornelius Sulla - In the East. The First Civil War
As the consul of Rome, Sulla prepared to depart once more for the East, in order to fight the first Mithridatic War, by the appointment of the Senate. But he would leave trouble behind him. Marius was now an old man, but he still had the ambition to lead the Roman armies against King Mithridates VI of Pontus. Marius convinced the tribune P. Sulpicius Rufus to call an assembly and revert the Senate's decision on Sulla's command. Sulpicius also used the assemblies to eject Senators from the Senate until there were not enough senators needed to form a quorum. As violence in the forum ensued and the efforts of the nobles to effect a public lynching similar to what had happenned to the brothers Gracchi and Saturninus were smashed by the gladitatorial bodyguard of Sulpicius, Sulla went to the house of Marius and made a personal plea to stop the violence which was ignored.
Sulla fled Rome and went to the camp of his victorious "Italian war" veterans, in the South of Italy, ready to cross over to Greece. He incited them to stone the envoys of the assemblies who came to announce that Marius would be leading the Mithridatic war. Sulla than took six of his most loyal legions and prepared to march on Rome. This was an unprecedented event. No general before him had ever crossed the city limits, the 'pomerium', with his army. It was so unethical that most of his commanders refused to accompany him and Sulla hardly took measures against them. However Sulla justified his actions on the grounds that the senate had been neutered and the mos maiorum ("The way things were done" which as a reference amounted to a Roman constitution though none of it was codified as such) had been offended by the negation of the rights of the consuls of the year to fight the wars of that year. Armed gladiators were unable to resist Roman veterans so Marius and his followers fled the city.
Sulla consolidated his position, ordered death for Marius and a few of his allies and addressed the Senate in harsh tones, portraying himself as a victim, presumably to justify his violent entrance into the city. In this time of civil war some Italian cities were destroyed: for instance, Forlì was destroyed in 88 BC and later rebuilt by the praetor Livius Clodius. After some major restructuring of the city's political trends and with the Senate's power strengthened, Sulla returned to his camp and proceeded with the original plan of fighting Mithridates in Pontus.
But Marius was not dead, he had fled to safety in Tunesia. With Sulla out of Rome, Marius began to recover control of the situation. By the end of 87 BC Marius returned to Rome with the support of Lucius Cornelius Cinna (Julius Caesar's father in law). Now back in power, Marius declared Sulla's reforms and laws invalid and Sulla officially exiled. Marius ordered the deaths of many supporters of Sulla, in revenge for the small group of men Sulla had killed. Some of Marius's soldiers went through the streets of Rome looking for supporters of Sulla to kill. The heads of the murdered were displayed in the Forum. After five days, Cinna ordered his own soldiers to kill the maurauding bands and so the terror came to an end. All told, some 100 supporters of Sulla were killed during this time. Marius and Cinna were elected consuls for the year of 86 BC. However, Marius died a few days after the election. Cinna was the effective ruler of Rome, being elected consul without opposition, in the following years.
Meanwhile, Sulla defeated Mithridates in the East and in 86 BC captured Athens and then defeated Archelaus at the Chaeronea and again in 85 BC at the Orchomenus. While in the East, Sulla was the first Roman magistrate to meet a Parthian ambassador. However, he unknowingly offended him by taking the seat between Mithridates and the ambassador. He left the East in 84 BC upon hearing the news of Cinna's death.
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