The Roman senate promises aid to Cappadocia against Mithridates.
89. The consul Pompeius (father of Pompey the Great) gains decided victories over the Picentines; his colleague, Cato, defeats the Marsi, but is killed in the battle; Sulla takes the command, and is so successful that he is elected consul for the ensuing year. Cicero is a cadet in the army of Pompeius.
Cleopatra is put to death by her son Alexander, who is expelled from Egypt, and Ptolemy Soter restored.
88. End of the Social War. Most of the refractory states admitted to Roman citizenship.
Mithridates, King of Pontus, occupies Phrygia; he asks all Asia Minor to join him; a general massacre of the Romans occurs.
Quarrel between Sulla and Marius which causes war between them for the control of the Roman army. The first Roman civil war.
87. Sulla proceeds to Greece to conduct the war against Mithridates; Sulla besieges Athens.
The consul Cinna, deposed by the senate, calls Marius from Africa, raises an Italian army, and reinstates himself in office; bloody proscriptions by Marius and Cinna follow.
86. Death of Marius, in the beginning of his seventh consulate; Flaccus, appointed in his place, is assassinated on his march to the east, by C. Fimbria, who assumes command of the Roman army.
Sulla captures the revolted city of Athens and defeats the army of Mithridates under Archelaus.