Menodorus had defected from Sextus's camp in what was by far the largest blow to him personally and politically. Menodorus brought Octavian Sardinia and Corsica and three legions. Octavian thought with his typical calculation that now would be a good time to get rid of Sextus-treaty or no treaty. Mark Antony was against war with Sextus to Octavian's disappointment. Antony showed up at Brundisium on a mutually agreed appointment with Octavian in 38 BC. To Antony's annoyance Octavian was nowhere to be seen. It is not known what Octavian meant to signal by his abscence. Perhaps he was busy with his own military preparations against Sextus. Octavian appears to have thought that with Menodorus on his side he wouldn't need Antony anyway. Octavian had sent for an army from his lifelong friend Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa who was now a proconsul in Gaul. He also commissioned warships at Ravenna and planned for the other machinery of war to be assembled on the eastern and western coasts of Italy at Brundisium and Puteoli. Octavian's plan was to defeat Sextus at sea and then take troops from Italy to take over Sicily. Gaius Calvisius Sabinus, who had once served under Julius Caesar and also had been the very first non-Latin consul in the previous year would sail south from Puteoli. Calvisius who was also one of the two senators who had tried to protect Caesar on the Ides of March would share his command with Menodorus. Octavian would be the admiral of the other fleet which would set sail from Tarentum and come at Sicily from the east. The sea was a very frightening and unpredictable place in ancient times. Sailing was avoided as much as possible during the winter. Roman war fleets were mostly made up of rowing galleys called triremes and quinqueremes. Even today it is not known exactly how they functioned. A trireme could have been layed out in two different ways: with three banks of oars, or one bank with the oars grouped together in threes with one man per oar. These were about 150 feet long and displaced about 230 tons. Quinqueremes probably had one bank of oars with five men pulling each oar. They would have had up to 150 rowers: these were often non-Romans-but not chained slaves as portrayed in Hollywood films! These warships would have been very hard to maneuver in storms. For weaponry they had brass battering rams on their prows. The Romans-maybe because they were not originally a maritime power-fought battles at sea as if they were on land.
The corvus (or crow) was a grappling device whereby men would board enemy ships. When boarding a ship was not an option, Romans used flaming projectiles to set them on fire. The first engagement took place when one of Sextus's men, an old pirate (as Menodorus had been) named Menecrates fought Menodorus and Calvisius off Cumae on the Campanian coast. Menecrates got the upper hand in this battle, although he himself was wounded and died. At nightfall the two fleets disengaged and Sextus's ships returned to port at Messana without finalizing their victory. After hearing about Cumae, Octavian made the mistake of trying to brave the straight and reach Calvisius. Sextus saw what was happening and made haste from Messana in great numbers and attacked Octavian's fleet. Octavian's ships tried to come back to port but many were dashed against the rocky coastline and set afire. When Sextus caught sight of Calvisius' fleet coming to help Octavian he went back to Messana. In this battle Octavian showed some courage again. He was unaware that Calvisius was close by and in danger of losing his own life helped resuce men from the water. Octavian and his men then took refuge in the mountains and lit bonfires to signal those still afloat as to their whereabouts. Octavian did not sleep and went amongst his men to do his best to keep their sprits up during a rough night without food and other necessities.
In a stroke of good luck the Thirteenth Legion was marching across those mountains at night probably heading towards Rhegium in preparation for the invasion of Sicily. The legion provided Octavian and his men with food and a makeshift tent was pitched for the extremely tired and worn down triumvir. Appian describes the scene that greeted Octavian at dawn: "At daybreak, as he looked out over the sea, his gaze was met by ships that had been set on fire, ships that were still half-ablaze or half-burned, and ships that had been smashed." Octavian was dealt a double defeat when an extremely fierce storm blew Octavian's remaining ships against the rocky coast, with the result that more than half his fleet was sunk and the rest of the ships badly damaged. For Octavian this certainly must have been the worst crisis of his young life. Not only were his hopes of defeating Sextus at sea dashed, but this was the kind of catastrophe that could start conspiracies against him in Rome. What would Sextus do now? It was Octavian who had broken the Treaty of Misenum. Surely Sextus must be outraged and wanting to extract his pound of flesh. Sextus, to Octavian's thinking anyway, must also be feeling humiliated on top of the anger he must also be feeling, as he had been advised not to sign the treaty with the triumvirs in the first place-could this make him doubly dangerous?
And what would be Mark Antony's thinking on this disastrous chain of events? As Sextus celebrated his great victory he began proclaiming that he was the son of Neptune-the god of the seas. He started wearing a dark blue cloak instead of a commanders regulation purple, sacrificed some horses (and it was also rumored some men) to Neptune by driving them into the sea. Sextus had made a kind of circle-having issued coins in Sicily identifying his father with Neptune-now he claimed to be the son of both a man and a god, just as Octavian had done. Octavian realized he would have to swallow a great deal of pride now and ask for help from his fellow triumvirs. Mark Antony, whom he had brushed off just months before and Lepidus, almost forgotten in Africa. He sent them a crucial appeal for help, as he realized that the other two might even ally with Sextus against him now! Octavian could only hope that his colleagues were not as imaginative and plotting as he was. The return of Agrippa made Octavian almost immediately want to take back his pleas for help that he had sent. Agrippa, twenty-four years of age, had some fantastic achievements in his career. He had secured the frontier on the Rhine and founded a new city, Colonia Agippinenis (modern Cologne, Germany). He was offered a triumph but always mindful of his friend and that his friend needed him, declined. Agrippa new a lot about warfare-but almost nothing of fighting at sea.
The image is of a silver denarius that Sextus Pompeius had issued around 44-43 BC. It shows his father, Pompey the Great on the obverse and a Roman warship on the reverse. I hope to have the next article here soon. Thanks to anyone following or commenting on this blog!
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