page_title: Pompey
section_title: Civil war and assassination
hierarchical_section_title: Pompey / Civil war and assassination
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: La Fuite de Pompée après la défaite de Pharsale Histoire ancienne, vers 1470-1475. Paris, musée du Louvre, département des Arts graphiques, RF 5271 RMN
context_page_description: Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, known by the anglicisation Pompey the Great, was a leading Roman general and statesman, whose career was significant in Rome's transformation from a republic to empire. He was for a time a political ally and later enemy of Julius Caesar. A member of the senatorial nobility, Pompey entered a military career while still young and rose to prominence serving the later dictator Sulla as a commander in Sulla's civil war, his success at which earned him the cognomen Magnus – "the Great" – after Pompey's boyhood hero Alexander the Great. His adversaries also gave him the nickname adulescentulus carnifex for his ruthlessness. Pompey's success as a general while still young enabled him to advance directly to his first consulship without meeting the normal cursus honorum. He was consul three times and celebrated three Roman triumphs.
  In 60 BC, Pompey joined Marcus Licinius Crassus and Gaius Julius Caesar in the unofficial military-political alliance known as the First Triumvirate, which Pompey's marriage to Caesar's daughter Julia helped secure. After Crassus and Julia's deaths, Pompey sided with the Optimates, the conservative faction of the Roman Senate.
context_section_description: Caesar sent a detachment to Ariminum (Rimini), the first town in Italy, and took it by surprise. He then advanced towards Rome, having crossed the River Rubicon at the boundary of Italy. On hearing of this, the consuls directed Pompey to quickly recruit more troops. The Senate, still unprepared, was panicked at Caesar's unexpected speed. Cicero proposed sending messengers to Caesar to negotiate their safety, but the frantic consuls rejected this path. Therefore, Caesar marched on to Rome, winning over all the cities on the way without a fight, either because their garrisons were too weak or they preferred his cause. Pompey, after learning of this from a defector and having had no time to prepare a large enough force, sent Roman envoys to Caesar to request negotiations.
  Caesar agreed to negotiate. He promised the envoys that no one would suffer harm at his hands and that he would call for the immediate disbandment of the troops. However, the people of Rome feared war and were already calling for both men to disarm at the same time.
  Pompey knew that any negotiations would soon leave him inferior to Caesar rather than an equal partner. Therefore, before his envoys could return, Pompey planned his flight to Campania to pursue the war from there. He ordered the senators and officials to go with him, and to seize the public treasury to pay for the troops they needed to recruit. However, after hearing exaggerated reports about Caesar's not being conciliatory, the senators disobeyed and hurriedly left Rome to their own estates without touching the money. The flight from Rome was disorderly. As Pompey rushed away, he hastily levied troops from the Italian cities on the road, setting up garrisons as he went.
  Caesar stopped his march on Rome and claimed that he was fighting against his opponents and in defence of Rome. He sent letters throughout Italy that challenged Pompey, who responded with a letter campaign himself and tried to make Caesar look as if he had turned down reasonable terms.
  In response, Caesar ordered his lieutenants to advance; Picenum, Etruria, and Umbria were taken. Caesar was joined by his Twelfth legion, which increased his numbers in Italy to two legions. Pompey did not want to send his newly-recruited green forces against Caesar's battle-hardened veterans, so he decided to abandon Italy and called on all loyalist commanders to retreat south.
  Meanwhile, Caesar had set out against Corfinium, in central Italy, which was occupied by Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus. Domitius had thirty-one cohorts at Corfunium and decided to make a stand. Caesar quickly took the neighbouring town of Sulmo garrisoned by seven cohorts; Caesar's Eighth legion had arrived, increasing the number of his veteran legions to three, and Curio had brought up twenty-two cohorts of recruits. Caesar now outnumbered Domitius 5:3 and started building siege-works all around the city. Realising that escape for the whole army was impossible and that no relief was on its way, Domitius apparently decided to attempt to save himself and tried to escape the siege. His troops, however, found out his plans, seized Domitius as he was trying to escape, and took him to Caesar who let Domitius go and even let him take his money with him. Domitius's soldiers, however, were made to swear a new oath of loyalty (to Caesar) and were added to Caesar's army. They were eventually sent to Sicily under the command of Asinius Pollio and helped him take the island from Marcus Porcius Cato.
  Pompey hastened to Nuceria and then to Brundisium, the main port for crossing to Greece. He had finally decided to abandon Italy and to complete his war preparations in Greece. He wrote to the governors of the provinces, and also to the kings and cities he had won over in the Third Mithridatic War asking them to send aid. Pompey knew he could not reach his troops in Hispania because Caesar controlled Gaul and therefore blocked the land route into the Iberian peninsula. He believed Caesar would be unable to pursue him to Greece because there were too few ships, and the winter, which made th
caption: The Flight of Pompey after Pharsalus, by Jean Fouquet
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