V. The Commands of Pompey against the Pirates and in the East: 67–62 b. c.
The pirate scourge. Both Pompey and Crassus had declined proconsular appointments at the close of 70 B. C., because there were no provinces open which promised an opportunity to augment their influence or military reputation. Accordingly they remained in Rome watching for some more favorable chance to employ their talents. Pompey found such an opportunity in the ravages of the Cilician pirates. After the failure of Marcus Antonius (74–72 B. C.), Caecilius Metellus had been sent to Crete in 69 B. C. and in the course of the next two years reduced the island to subjection and made it a province. But his operations there did little to check the pirate plague. So bold had these robbers become that they did not hesitate to raid the coasts of Italy and to plunder Ostia. When finally their depredations interrupted the importation of grain for the supply of the city, a famine threatened, and decisive measures had to be taken against them.
The Gabinian Law, 67 B. C. The only way to deal with the question was to appoint a commander with power to operate against the pirates everywhere, and the obvious man for the position was Pompey. However, the Senate mistrusted him and in addition feared the consequences of creating such an extensive extraordinary command. But since 71 B. C. Pompey had stood on the side of the populares and now, like Marius, he found in the tribunate an ally able to aid him in attaining his goal. In 67 B. C. the tribune Aulus Gabinius proposed a law for the appointment of a single commander of consular rank who should have command over the whole sea within the pillars of Hercules and all Roman territory to a distance of fifty miles inland. His appointment was to be for three years, he was [pg 160]to have the power to nominate senatorial legati, to raise money in addition to what he received from the quaestors, and recruit soldiers and sailors at discretion for his fleet. This command was modelled upon that of Antonius the praetor in 74 B. C., but conveyed higher authority and greater resources. The Senate bitterly resisted the passage of the bill but it passed and the Senate had to relinquish its prerogative of creating the extraordinary commands. Although no person had been nominated for this command in the law of Gabinius, the opinion of the voters had been so clearly expressed in a contio that the Senate had to appoint Pompey. He received twenty-four legati and a fleet of five hundred vessels.
The pirates crushed. Pompey set to work energetically and systematically. In forty days he swept the pirates from the western Mediterranean. In forty-nine more he cornered them in Cilicia, where he forced the surrender of their strongholds. His victory was hastened by the mildness shown to those who surrendered. They received their lives and freedom, and in many cases were used as colonists to revive cities with a declining population. Within three months he had brought the pirate war to a triumphant conclusion, but his imperium would not terminate for three years and he was anxious to gather fresh laurels.
The Manilian Law, 66 B. C. It so happened that Pompey’s success coincided with the temporary check to the Roman arms in Pontus, owing to the disaffection of the troops of Lucullus and the machinations of the latter’s enemies in Rome. Pompey now sought to have the command of Lucullus added to his own, and in this he had the support of the equestrian order. Early in 66 B. C. one of the tribunes, Caius Manilius, proposed a law transferring to Pompey the provinces of Bithynia and Cilicia and the conduct of the war against Mithradates and Tigranes. Cicero, then a praetor, supported the measure in his speech, For the Manilian Law. His support was probably dictated by the fact that he was a man without family backing and consequently had to have the friendship of an influential personage if he was to secure the political advancement which he desired. The Senate strongly opposed any extension of Pompey’s military authority, but the bill was passed and he took over the command of Lucullus. He was clothed with power to make peace or war with whom he chose, and enjoyed an unexampled concentration of authority in his hands.
The campaigns of Pompey in the East. Pompey at once advanced into Pontus and attacked Mithradates. The latter was forced to withdraw into Lesser Armenia where he was overtaken and his army scattered by Pompey. The king fled to the neighborhood of the Sea of Asov. Upon the defeat of Mithradates, Tigranes deserted his cause and submitted to Pompey. He was permitted to retain his kingdom as a Roman ally. In the following year, 65 B. C., Pompey reduced to submission the peoples situated south of the Caucasus, between the Black and the Caspian Seas, who had been in alliance with Mithradates, and so completed the subjugation of Pontus, which he made into a province (64 B. C.).
In 64 B. C. he turned his attention to Syria, where a state of chaos had reigned since Lucullus had wrested it from Tigranes and where a scion of the Seleucids had failed to find recognition. Pompey decided to treat Syria as a Roman conquest and incorporate it within the empire. He then interfered in a dynastic struggle in the kingdom of Judaea. After a brief struggle, in which the temple of Jerusalem was stormed by the Romans, he installed his nominee as High Priest at the head of the local government. Judaea was then annexed to the province of Syria (63 B. C.).
While Pompey was in Judaea the death of Mithradates occurred. Deserted by the Greek cities of the northern Euxine, he formed the plan of joining the Celtic peoples of the Danube valley and invading Italy. But his army deserted him for his son Pharnaces, who revolted against his father, and Mithradates committed suicide. Thereupon Pharnaces made peace with Pompey.
The Mithradatic war was finally over and Pompey, after organizing affairs in Asia Minor and the adjoining countries, started on a triumphal return to Italy with his victorious army and rich spoils of war (62 B. C.).