# The War That Made the Roman Empire  ## Metadata - Author: [[Barry Strauss]] - Full Title: The War That Made the Roman Empire - Category: #books ## Highlights - On a September day more than two thousand years ago, the crews of six hundred warships—nearly two hundred thousand people—fought and died for the mastery of an empire that stretched from the English Channel to the Euphrates River, and would eventually reach even farther, from what is today Edinburgh, Scotland, to the Persian Gulf. One woman and two male rivals held the fate of the Mediterranean world in their hands. That woman, accompanied by her maidservants, was one of the most famous queens in history: Cleopatra. ([Location 77](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=77)) - Actium was the decisive event, and its consequences were enormous. If Antony and Cleopatra had won, the center of gravity of the Roman Empire would have shifted eastward. Alexandria, Egypt, would have vied with Rome as a capital. An eastward-looking empire would have been more like the later Byzantines, with even more emphasis on Greek, Egyptian, Jewish, and other eastern Mediterranean cultures than in the Latin-speaking elite of Imperial Rome. That empire might never have added Britain to its realm, might never have clashed with Germany, and might never have left the deep imprint that it did on western Europe. But it was Octavian who won. ([Location 91](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=91)) - Octavian, or Augustus, as he would soon be known, would no doubt have approved of British prime minister Winston Churchill’s later dictum: the great Englishman said that he was confident of the judgment of history because “I propose to write that history myself.” At Nicopolis, Augustus wrote it in stone. ([Location 108](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=108)) - Not only is the lore of Cleopatra among the richest in history, but she herself invested the contest with mythic meaning from the start, as did both Octavian and Antony. Octavian professed to be the champion of the god of reason—Apollo—against the forces of brute and intoxicated irrationality. He claimed that the war was a battle of East versus West, of decency versus immorality, and of manliness versus a virago. Moderns tend to turn these categories around and see his propaganda as racism, orientalism, and misogyny. What Antony or Cleopatra thought is harder to reconstruct, but the sources offer clues. Cleopatra asserted that she was the leader of the resistance against Rome, the champion of the entire eastern Mediterranean rising in armed and righteous anger against the arrogant invader from the West. More than that, she claimed to be a savior, the earthly embodiment of a goddess, Isis, whose victory would usher in a golden age. Antony, proud to be her consort, claimed to be inspired by the god who had conquered Asia, Dionysus, and he saw Octavian as not merely jealous but impious. ([Location 123](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=123)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Caesar began a civil war that went on for four years. Caesar defeated all his enemies, and, in the end, he was proclaimed Rome’s first-ever dictator in perpetuity. That created so much hostility among the old elite that a group of senators stabbed him to death in a meeting of the Senate in Rome on March 15, 44 BC. The infamous Ides of March. ([Location 155](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=155)) - Tags: [[blue]] - One of Caesar’s best generals, Antony was the scion of a leading but louche noble family. At thirty-nine, he was the old man of this company. A warrior at heart, he was also a gifted orator. He was no revolutionary and had more respect for the republic’s traditional institutions than some, but he was hardly a principled conservative. ([Location 174](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=174)) - Aged eighteen, Octavian was a prodigy. On his father’s side, he came from the Italian upper middle classes, but his mother’s mother belonged to one of Rome’s great noble houses, the Caesars. Julius Caesar was his great-uncle, and he took the boy under his wing after Octavian lost his father at the age of four. In autumn 45 BC, six months before his death, Caesar changed his will to Octavian’s benefit. ([Location 176](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=176)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Now Octavian, undaunted by his youth, aimed for great power. Antony resented the young man’s claim to have leapfrogged to the top because of Caesar’s will, and he had every intention of thwarting Octavian. ([Location 182](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=182)) - Handsome young Antony was vigorous, athletic, charming, and charismatic. At various periods of life, he wore a beard in imitation of Hercules, the demigod claimed by his family as an ancestor. Yet Antony was no model youth. He grew notorious in Rome for drinking, womanizing, racking up debts, and keeping bad company before settling down some by his midtwenties. He studied rhetoric in Greece and excelled as a cavalry commander in the East between 58 and 55 BC. In his earliest armed encounter, he was the first man on the wall during a siege, thereby demonstrating great physical courage. Other military engagements followed. As an officer, he endeared himself to his soldiers by eating with them. ([Location 213](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=213)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Yet for all his success in the field, Antony was never the man in charge. In politics, he displayed less than a deft touch. He went back to Rome on Caesar’s orders after Pharsalus, while Caesar spent the next year in the East. In Rome, Antony served as master of the horse (magister equitum), as a dictator’s second in command was called. Antony now resumed with abandon his debauched lifestyle. The sources speak of wild nights, public hangovers, vomiting in the Forum, and chariots pulled by lions. It was hard to miss his affair with an actress and ex-slave who went by the stage name of Cytheris, “Venus’s Girl,” since she and Antony traveled together in public in a litter. ([Location 226](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=226)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Antony was in the prime of life and ready to don Caesar’s mantle as heir. But in his will, Caesar left his name and most of his fortune to Octavian. Antony no doubt burned about this. Octavian was kin to Caesar, but so was Antony—although only a distant cousin. Time and again Antony had risked his life for Caesar on the battlefield and sealed the great man’s victories; Octavian had yet to draw first blood. ([Location 252](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=252)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Burning with ambition, Octavian was a natural politician: intelligent, charming, and careful in his choice of words. He was bright eyed and handsome, with slightly curly blond hair. Short and somewhat frail, he was not imposing in his looks, but he made up for it by the force of his character. Although not a born soldier, he was tenacious, cunning, and brave, with an iron will. And he had his mother, Atia, who surely sang his praises to Caesar at every opportunity. ([Location 272](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=272)) - Tags: [[blue]] - The next year, Octavian made his way to his great-uncle’s military campaign in Hispania. Caesar was sufficiently impressed by the maturing youth to change his will in Octavian’s favor. The document was deposited with the vestal virgins in Rome and, as far as we know, kept secret. ([Location 286](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=286)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Note: Impressing the right people at pivotal moments in your life can send you on a completely different trajectory. Think - impressing Mike and being thrust into higher position at Deloitte. Spending a year impressing the right people can change everything - Though only eighteen, Octavian aimed high. After an apprenticeship under Julius Caesar, he was ready to take the Forum by storm. It was as if by some sudden shock all the springs of an immobile Roman catapult had been set in motion. ([Location 296](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=296)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Octavian was a crafty young politician on the make, possessed of plenty of glowing prospects. He faced potential ruin or supreme possibilities, could he but master the situation. Master it he did. Octavian wasn’t just a Roman, but a Caesar. Antony once dismissed him as a boy who owed everything to his name, but Antony missed the point. As far as Octavian was concerned, what mattered wasn’t the name but the heritage it represented. ([Location 308](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=308)) - Tags: [[blue]] - young Octavian succeeded in convincing two hardened Roman legions to defect to him from Antony. Octavian’s agents mingled with the troops and exploited their anger at Antony’s stinginess and harsh discipline. It was a lesson in how to leverage military from political power, and it was a skill that Octavian would hone to perfection over the years ahead. It was also a demonstration of Octavian’s lack of interest in republican traditions. He had no legal authority to raise troops. His was, in effect, a private army. ([Location 315](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=315)) - Tags: [[blue]] - As the great clash approached, Brutus wrote with courage and acceptance to Titus Pomponius Atticus, a close friend of Cicero’s and a shrewd observer of politics. Either they would free the Roman people, Brutus wrote, or they would die and be freed from slavery. Everything was safe and secure, he added, except the outcome. ([Location 361](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=361)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Brutus’s cause—and that of Cassius and the other men who had killed Caesar—was not free of tarnish. They called themselves Liberators, but they were oligarchs. Although they assassinated Caesar in the name of liberty, they meant the liberty of a few elite families to hold the reins of power over fifty million people. Caesar might have been a dictator, but he was also a champion of popular causes who chose Italian commoners and elites of the conquered provinces as his close advisors. Caesar cared little for elections or constitutional precedents. He rode roughshod over the institutions of the Roman Republic, but those institutions enshrined a narrow-minded ruling class. The future demanded change, and Caesar knew it. He was unable to usher it in, however, without haughtiness, violence, and dictatorship. The result was civil war. The decision to kill Caesar was selfish and shortsighted, but not without idealism. In a sense, Brutus really was the noblest Roman of them all, as Shakespeare’s Antony proclaims. ([Location 368](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=368)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Antony was the architect of victory at Philippi—a thorough, decisive success. When he and Octavian divided the empire, it is no surprise that Antony got the richer part. He took the East and made his base in Athens, while Octavian ruled the West from Rome. Gaul, however, remained in Antony’s hands. Lepidus, the least powerful of the three triumvirs, held only Roman Africa (roughly, modern-day Tunisia). ([Location 403](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=403)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Antony paid attention to his public image, peccadillos aside. He was probably already cultivating a reputation as the new Dionysus when the people of Ephesus hailed him with that title upon his entrance into town. Dionysus was a favorite god of kings and conquerors in the last centuries BC, and with good reason. Although nowadays Dionysus is associated with alcohol and revelry, to the Greeks, he was the god not only of wine but also of liberation and conquest. Myth said that Dionysus had conquered Asia, and Alexander the Great was thought to be following in the god’s footsteps by invading the Persian Empire. More recently, King Mithradates VI of the kingdom of Pontus (who reigned from 120 to 63 BC), an enemy of Rome, identified himself with Dionysus. So did King Ptolemy XII of Egypt (reigned from approximately 80 to 51 BC), also known as Auletes—that is, “Flute Player”—nicknamed apparently for his performances in festivals. He was a friend of Rome, and Cleopatra’s father. ([Location 426](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=426)) - Tags: [[blue]] - By her grand entrance into Tarsus, Cleopatra was saying to Antony, in effect: “Propaganda is a force multiplier, my dear general. Join me in the role of my consort, Osiris-Dionysus, and the two of us can achieve great things.” She then turned down Antony’s dinner invitation, to insist that he come to her. Or so legend has it; it suited both players to keep the magnificent symbol of the barge on center stage. ([Location 461](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=461)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Marbled, multicultural, teeming, and resplendent, Alexandria was the greatest metropolis of the Mediterranean, far outstripping in its grandeur, if not its population, a still rather provincial Rome. ([Location 488](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=488)) - Tags: [[blue]] - What we do have, though, are images, carefully cultivated by Cleopatra, to put her in a good light, or by her enemies, to do the opposite. She presented herself now as Greek, now as Egyptian, now as a feminine beauty, now as an almost masculine woman, depending on the audience and the purpose. Had Cleopatra succeeded, we would compare her to a grand strategist like England’s Queen Elizabeth I or to an empire builder like Russia’s Catherine II the Great. Instead, our Cleopatra is sexy when we should be looking for majesty. ([Location 503](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=503)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Anyone wishing to survive on the throne of Egypt had to learn Roman politics. Cleopatra had begun her education as a teenager with her father, King Ptolemy XII. He had ensured his throne through obsequious support for Rome. Egypt became a virtual client state, which made the king so unpopular in Alexandria that he had to spend three years in exile in Rome. After sitting at her father’s feet, Cleopatra then moved on to advanced studies with the most powerful man in the world: Julius Caesar, her ally and lover. ([Location 555](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=555)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Antony and Cleopatra formed a “society of the Inimitable Livers”—that is, “a society of those with Incomparable Lives.” Plutarch says they spent their time feasting each other at extravagant expense. The term society, however, often referred to a religious association, and it is possible that the Inimitable Livers was dedicated to worshipping Dionysus. No doubt alcohol was part of the ceremony. ([Location 615](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=615)) - Tags: [[blue]] - In November Antony and Octavian traveled to Rome for the wedding. In addition to the usual festivities, they received from the Senate the right to celebrate an ovation. This was the highest honor that could be awarded for a bloodless victory. From the Roman point of view, Brundisium was a victory. To the Romans, peace never just happened; it was the result of hard work and usually of violent action, earned by victory. Hence, its achievement was worth celebrating. ([Location 763](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=763)) - Tags: [[blue]] - But an even more memorable remark came when one of Sextus’s admirals took him aside and suggested that he murder his two enemies aboard ship, and so win the empire. Supposedly, Sextus pondered the thought and then replied at last that the man should have killed them without asking permission, but now that he had, it was too late: Sextus could not approve so dishonorable a deed. If the story is true, it was more likely cunning than honor that moved Sextus, on the grounds that it was better to work with the devils he knew than the ones who might emerge in the turbulent aftermath of their murders. ([Location 794](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=794)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Octavian deserves credit, too, for knowing his limitations. He was a bad general but solved that problem by getting a good general—actually, a great general—to work for him. Octavian did not lack self-esteem, but he never let it blind him to his weaknesses. He thereby demonstrated self-control and maturity. ([Location 819](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=819)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Although Sextus failed, his bold strategy might have succeeded against a lesser man than Octavian. Sextus had thought that by cutting off Rome’s food supply and demonstrating Octavian’s impotence, he could bring his rival to his knees. Another leader might have been willing to compromise or might have balked at the huge expense of building a fleet or at the risk of serving in it. Or he might have hesitated to entrust such power to a subordinate as Octavian did with Agrippa. But in Octavian, Sextus faced a man of iron will and determination, with great political talent, few principles, and infinite cunning—and such a man was dead set against compromise. Although not the best of military commanders, Octavian was nevertheless courageous and indefatigable. It would be hard to say which was greater: his cunning, his unscrupulousness, or his ambition, all of them at the extreme end of human capability. In addition, he had a superb team of advisors and commanders. And so Sextus’s spectacular effort to break Octavian’s will failed. ([Location 920](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=920)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Although battered by the rule of a few strong men, Rome was still enough of a republic that public opinion continued to matter. Antony and Octavian each mounted a vigorous campaign to win the information war. ([Location 964](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=964)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Both sides weaponized information, but in Rome, Octavian did so to greater effect, controlling the narrative of the conflict. Perhaps he had to. In retrospect, Octavian might have looked like a giant, but, at the time, he was the underdog. To contemporaries, Antony and Cleopatra appeared to be powerful and frightening foes. We falsify history when we make Octavian seem the surefire and obvious winner. Octavian did not have a unifying master plan. Knowing Antony as well as he did, through his own observations and his sister’s intelligence, he might have had a reasonable hope of predicting his enemies’ behavior and thereby achieving success. But he couldn’t be sure. He also knew that Cleopatra was shrewd, and he might have feared that she would steer Antony in the right direction. ([Location 988](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=988)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Octavian had good reason to distort the facts. Antony’s successful reentry into Alexandria represented a mortal threat. Antony wasn’t just setting up bastions on the frontier. Rather, he was building something magnificent with Cleopatra. The two of them could have turned Alexandria into a second capital of the empire—a Constantinople long before Constantinople. Even if Octavian had not declared war in 32 BC, he and Antony would most likely have come to blows eventually. If Antony had won and become master of Rome, he would not have forgotten Alexandria. He and Cleopatra could have sponsored a renaissance of Hellenism in that great city that could have advanced science and culture by centuries. It all depended, however, on their ability to defend their realm. Whoever said war never settles anything was not thinking of Actium. ([Location 1130](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1130)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Antony and Octavian represented two different visions for the future of the Roman Empire. Antony offered the combination of a Roman noble and a Hellenistic prince, an imperator and a god, family that was half Roman and half Greco-Egyptian. His would be an empire that looked eastward and was anchored in Alexandria as well as Rome. Above all, Antony came with Cleopatra, which thrilled some and horrified others. Octavian looked westward. He offered better Italian credentials than Antony but a worse noble pedigree. Without access to the wealth of Egypt and the East, he had much less money than his rival and was forced to squeeze taxes out of an unhappy Italy. Yet his political skills gave him a commander, Agrippa, who offered the possibility of winning what Antony had by force of arms. Octavian had learned from Caesar to open the most powerful positions to men whose talent outstripped their lineage. ([Location 1174](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1174)) - Tags: [[blue]] - He and his colleagues in Ephesus told Antony that she had to go. Having Cleopatra go back to Egypt would help Antony’s case in Rome, because her absence would make clear that Octavian was fighting a civil war against Antony, not a foreign war against Cleopatra. And Octavian had vowed in public never to fight a civil war again. ([Location 1255](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1255)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Focusing the war on Cleopatra rather than on Antony offered several advantages in Rome. Not declaring war on Antony allowed Octavian to keep his promise of not starting any new civil wars. In terms of publicity, the queen of Egypt represented an almost perfect enemy. As a female, a foreigner, a Greek, an Egyptian, and a monarch, she offered a rich target for Roman prejudices. ([Location 1417](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1417)) - Tags: [[blue]] - By attacking Antony’s rear, Agrippa was, although unbeknownst to him, following the advice of the great, ancient Chinese military strategist, Sun Tzu: he was attacking the enemy’s strategy rather than immediately attacking the enemy. Agrippa had an excellent intuitive sense of the strategic landscape. And by attacking Antony’s supply chain, Agrippa was anticipating the advice that Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus, author of an influential military treatise, would give Roman generals many centuries later: “A great strategy is to press the enemy more with famine than with the sword.” ([Location 1686](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1686)) - Tags: [[blue]] - To be sure, Antony and Bogud should have attended meticulously to all of these factors. Antony knew as well as any commander just how vulnerable waterborne supply lines were. He was cocommander with Octavian at Philippi in 42 BC when a relief force, en route to resupply their army, was attacked and destroyed by the enemy navy. Another example that should have been on Antony’s mind was the enemy’s harassment of his supply lines during the Parthian campaign. But even careful commanders make mistakes or take risks when they have to man far-flung bases with limited resources. ([Location 1815](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1815)) - Tags: [[blue]] - In his treatise on fortifications and defense, Philo of Byzantium, the author of a book on siege warfare ca. 200 BC, advised attacking a city when most men were outside the gates—for example, during a festival or during the harvest or vintage—and preferably when the enemy was drunk. He also recommended approaching the wall secretly, with ladders ready, either by night or during a storm. Philo advised the commander to offer rewards to the first men over the wall. He wrote that it was best to make the first assault by placing ladders against the weakest spots on the walls, in order to storm the city while those inside were still afraid. Philo also recommended the use of special climbing equipment, such as leather and rope ladders with hooks on the ends in order to catch on the battlements when thrown up and over; tempered and sharpened iron pegs to place into cracks and joints in the wall; and iron hooks thrown onto the battlements on ropes with loops in them. ([Location 1833](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1833)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Note: Multi-pronged approach: attacking the enemy where & when they’re weak, as well as incentivizing being first over the wall for your soldiers which ensures that the storm of the city is quick and decisive - Agrippa seems to have worked in a methodical manner to prevent Antony from offsetting the loss of his southern sea lines of communication to Egypt by establishing an alternate route. That is, we might suppose that Antony off-loaded supplies at the Corinthian isthmus and reloaded them on the other side, allowing him to resupply his forces via the Gulf of Corinth. This would explain Agrippa’s raids north and the capture of Patrae and his raid(s) on Corinth itself. Agrippa surely did this either in response to Antony’s efforts to reconfigure his supply route or in anticipation that he would do so, thus preemptively denying Antony this option. ([Location 1893](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1893)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Agrippa’s attacks can be considered a form of swarming: a seemingly amorphous but actually highly structured and coordinated series of attacks that appear to come from all directions. Agrippa moved with great speed and unpredictability, whereas Antony’s commanders reacted more slowly and with less success. The result was to disrupt the enemy’s ability to respond effectively. ([Location 1900](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=1900)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Antony’s allied forces represented a diverse group particularly strong in cavalry. Yet each allied leader came with a private agenda. None could be counted on for loyalty. Nor would forging them into a unified force be easy. For all they added to Antony’s power, they also represented a challenge. ([Location 2004](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=2004)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Men defect because they like to follow a winner. In spring and summer 32 BC, that looked to be Octavian. He could offer political support, money, and the promise of victory. Each new success by him or Agrippa tipped the balance in his favor for kings and princes who wanted to survive on their thrones. ([Location 2155](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=2155)) - Tags: [[blue]] - The real blame for the state of the expedition lies with Antony. He wasn’t prepared to fight a maritime war. It seems that, for him, the navy was a transport service and, perhaps, a siege weapon, should he actually invade Italy. Why was Antony unprepared? In the 48 BC campaign that culminated in victory at Pharsalus, his side had won without a maritime strategy, and the other side had not used its naval resources effectively. The same had been true in the Philippi campaign of 42 BC. So, maybe Antony just assumed that he could get Octavian to engage in a land battle, whether in Italy or Greece. ([Location 2266](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=2266)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Among the qualities of a successful general are good judgment, audacity, agility, and a leadership that is both courageous and decisive. In the spring and summer of 32 BC, Antony proved deficient in these qualities. Why? Perhaps it was the challenge of fighting his first real naval campaign. Even with experienced sailors such as Ahenobarbus and Sosius, learning how to coordinate land and sea operations could not have been easy. Perhaps he was past his prime. Perhaps he was simply overmatched by Agrippa’s daring, experience, and sheer skill. At the start of the war, there was a question as to whether the naval experience of Agrippa and his veteran forces would outweigh the material and financial resources of the other side. That was a question no longer. ([Location 2283](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=2283)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Agrippa, however, put it otherwise. The enemy’s ships would be prepared for flight, with sails to hoist, while their own would be stripped for battle. Presumably, Antony would wait for a favorable wind to speed his path. Hence, their own ships would be unable to catch Antony and Cleopatra’s fleet. The only choice was to block the enemy’s exit. Octavian agreed. Once again, he showed his quality as a leader by his willingness to admit that he was wrong and his subordinate was right. ([Location 2401](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=2401)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Antony’s best bet at Actium was to take advantage of his ships’ greatest asset. Because his larger units had reinforced timbers in the prow, they could pack a punch in prow-to-prow ramming. They could start the battle with a charge into the enemy’s line that might rip open a hole in it. Then they could follow up with marine boarding parties. They might even start a panic that could turn the enemy fleet to flight. They could do so, however, only if the enemy was unprepared. But Dellius had brought Agrippa crucial intelligence. Once Agrippa understood Antony’s battle plan, he knew exactly how to counter it. ([Location 2405](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=2405)) - Tags: [[blue]] - What Went Wrong? That is the question that Antony and Cleopatra might have asked themselves at Taenarum. An honest answer would have been something along the following lines: The allied fleet was splendid, and its resources were misspent. Its comparative advantage was the ability to smash into the ports of southern Italy and open up the road to Rome, thereby allowing Antony to fight and win his kind of war: a land war. In such an effort, the allied fleet would be unmatched. When it came to war at sea, the allied fleet stood at a disadvantage. To be sure, it had certain strengths: in particular the reinforced prows that could be devastating in head-to-head ramming and the catapult towers that could barrage the enemy with missiles. Its admirals included the experienced Ahenobarbus, who had achieved victory at sea. But these were not war winners when deployed against the greatest admiral of the era, Agrippa, and against the fleet that had defeated the most dynamic seafarer of the age, Sextus Pompey, especially not when they also had the cunning and ruthless leadership of Octavian. Risky as an invasion of Italy was, Antony and Cleopatra’s armada had a real chance of pulling it off. But if victory depended on command of the sea off the waters of western Greece, then the advantage passed to Agrippa and Octavian. Antony and Cleopatra might still win, but only if they were prepared to make a supreme effort of alertness and audacity. They were not. ([Location 2938](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=2938)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Note: A lack of decisiveness and conviction doomed them. They needed to act quickly and aggressively, but instead allowed Agrippa and Octavian to determine the contours of the conflict - Leadership was key. Had Antony deployed his resources with skill, aggressiveness, and efficiency, he could have won, even had he stayed on the defensive in western Greece. Instead, he showed himself to be unprepared, reactive, and inept. Antony and Cleopatra offered an example of a rift in the leadership. Their enemy was united. Octavian and Agrippa were a twin foe; Antony and Cleopatra, a house divided. No wonder the defections went from their camp to Octavian’s. ([Location 2958](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=2958)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Another commander might have forged ahead after Actium and followed Antony and Cleopatra to Egypt, the way Caesar hastened after Pompey when the latter escaped from his defeat at Pharsalus in 48 BC. Both battles took place in Greece, and both sets of vanquished leaders fled to Egypt. Not Octavian. Instead, he followed, perhaps instinctively, one of his favorite maxims: Speuda bradeēos, Greek for “make haste slowly.” He knew that the situation called for careful and deliberate preparation, not precipitate action. ([Location 3036](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=3036)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Antony was a great man, but, living in an age of giants, it wasn’t enough to keep him from meeting his match, and repeatedly. Had he found a more tractable mate than Cleopatra or faced a lesser foe than Octavian, he might have succeeded. But, to paraphrase another Shakespeare play, The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, the fault was not in Antony’s stars but in himself. Compared to most people, he was a colossus, but at the level on which he played, he was a subordinate or, as the Bard says, an underling. That was Antony’s tragedy. ([Location 3466](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=3466)) - Tags: [[blue]] - There was, however, more. Octavian’s hosts wanted to show him the remains of the Ptolemaic kings, who lay at rest near Alexander. Only Alexander had been mummified; his successors had been cremated and placed in urns. Octavian declined the invitation. It was beneath his dignity as a Roman consul—an office he held for the fourth time in 30 BC—and imperator to pay his respects to a group that he had considered his inferiors. Indeed, some of the Ptolemies had been clients of Rome. Octavian replied archly, “I wanted to see a king, not corpses.” ([Location 3777](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=3777)) - Tags: [[blue]] - The triumphs offered another message as well. At the end of the civil wars stood Octavian. He led the magistrates of Rome and not vice versa. His was the face on every coin. His was the mausoleum rising in oversized majesty outside the city walls on the Campus Martius. He was the only living son of Caesar, the deified man whose name he bore. ([Location 3877](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=3877)) - Tags: [[blue]] - Roman civil wars had a well-established pattern: first came the bloodshed, then came the settlement. But it was easier to win the war than to forge the peace, since few generals were as good at making peace as they were at waging war. Augustus was the exception. The cold-blooded killer grew with the job. ([Location 3943](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=3943)) - Tags: [[blue]] - The Augustan makeover produced a new Rome. Now, for the first time, it began to be known as the Eternal City. It was enough to justify one of Augustus’s most memorable remarks, made on his deathbed: “I found a Rome of bricks; I leave to you one of marble.” Thanks to Augustus, Rome no longer suffered by comparison to the splendid cityscape of Alexandria. ([Location 4059](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B08LDXYWYF&location=4059)) - Tags: [[blue]]