Free people joined in all the slave revolts, which is quite an interesting idea. Plutarch says that they were camped separately due to their insolent arrogance. There's a disagreement about whether some people wanted to cross the alps and just go home - what our sources say spartacus wanted. And these, the slaves, who had been encouraged by all the success and slaughter of romans, didn't want to do that. So there's that idea that theres distinction nomen.
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the life of Spartacus, the gladiator who led a major slave rebellion against the Roman Republic in the 1st century BC. He was an accomplished military leader, and the campaign he led contributed significantly to the instability of the Roman state in this period. Spartacus was celebrated by some ancient historians and reviled by others, and became a hero to revolutionaries in 19th-century Europe. Modern perceptions of his character have been influenced by Stanley Kubrick's 1960 film - but ancient sources give a rather more complex picture of Spartacus and the aims of his rebellion.
With:
Mary Beard
Professor of Classics at the University of Cambridge
Maria Wyke
Professor of Latin at University College, London
Theresa Urbainczyk
Associate Professor of Classics at University College, Dublin.
Producer: Victoria Brignell.