ABSTRACT
Spartacus led one of the greatest slave rebellions in ancient Rome. By the time it was quelled, thousands had been killed and the Roman Republic was badly shaken. When the Roman legions finally did arrive, Spartacus distinguished himself by repulsing them more than once. So successful was his leadership that the ruling Roman consuls themselves were finally dispatched to the region in 72, though the rebel position still held. Although ultimately unsuccessfiil, Spartacus's desperate rebellion lived on in the memory of Roman politicians and modern revolutionaries. In modern times, Spartacus has come to represent the struggle of the oppressed against political authority. This was especially true among Marxist revolutionaries in the twentieth century. In the most explicit revival of Spartacus's image, a radical faction within the German Social Democratic Party, which called itself the Spartacus League, revolted against the Weimar regime in 1919 A.D.
