The Spartacus War

Acknowledgements

Chapters of this manuscript were read by and greatly improved through the comments of Kimberly Bowes, Judith Dupré, Mark Levine, Adrienne Mayor, Marcia Mogelonsky, Jan Parker, Matthew Sears and Chaya Rivka Zwolinski. Many Cornell colleagues and students, past and present, offered advice and answered specific questions. I would like to thank in particular Annetta Alexandridis, Edward Baptist, Flaminia Cervesi, Nora Dimitrova, Michael Fontaine, Kathryn Gleason, Harry Greene, Martin Loicano, Elizabeth Macaulay-Lewis, Kathryn McDonnell, Mich elle Moyd, Jon Parmenter, Eric Rebillard, Sidney Tarrow, Robert Travers, Rachel Weil and Michael Weiss. I would also like to thank Josh Bernstein, Anna Kirkwood, Kim McKnight, Josiah Ober, Priya Ramasabban, Philip Sabin and Rob Tempio.

I am deeply grateful to my two academic homes at Cornell University, the Department of History and the Department of Classics. The superb collection and the supportive staff of Cornell’s John M. Olin Library helped make this book possible. I benefited from the comments received when I read portions of my manuscript at Cornell’s Ancient Mediterranean Colloquium, Cornell’s Peace Studies Seminar, and at the Duke-UNC Graduate Colloquium.

I was lucky enough to make several research trips to Italy. Among those who helped me there are Carmine Cozzolino, Marcella DeFeo, Umberto Del Vecchio, Maria Laura Frullini, Donato Punello and Marcello Tagliente. Jim Zurer provided expert travel advice.

As in the past, Suzanne Lang provided invaluable secretarial and logistical assistance. Barbara Donnell, Michael Strauss and Sylvie Strauss helped with typing.

I am greatly indebted to my editor at Simon & Schuster, Bob Bender, whose sage advice improved the manuscript thoroughly. I would also like to thank his assistant, Johanna Li. I am greatly indebted as well to my editors at Weidenfeld & Nicolson, Alan Samson and Keith Lowe, for their perceptive and productive reading of the manuscript. My literary agent and friend, Howard Morhaim, first suggested that I write about Spartacus.

My family is the true sine qua non of this book. I thank Sylvie and Michael for their support and patience and Marcia for more than I can say.

George Wood, my former student and friend, fell in Iraq in 2003. George was planning a career as a Roman historian. It is impossible for me to write about Rome without remembering him.

Josiah Ober and Adrienne Mayor have always been there, as friends and colleagues, for thirty years. Dedicating this book to them is but small recompense.