Crassus’ request for summoning of Рompey and М. Lucullus against Spartacus: the date and the circumstances

The article explores the date and the circumstances of Crassus’ request to the senate for summoning Pompey and M. Lucullus to Italy against Spartacus. The information about these events in our sources is fragmentary but not discrepant, and the analysis of warfare allows to suppose that most probably Crassus wrote the letter immediately after the defeat of his legate Mummius and simultaneously with the decimation of the cohort which had fled from the battlefield. At this point Spartacus posed a threat for Campania and Latium. The subsequent successes of Crassus averted the threat but the delaying of warfare caused the discontent in Rome, and Pompey was summoned to Italy though Crassus considered this no longer necessary.