This edited volume, the product of a 2017 conference, on Sextus Pompeius as a participant in the late republican civil war(s) as well as maris rector (Flor. 2.18.3) signifies the growing interest in Sextus Pompeius since K. Welch and A. Powell's major 2002 volume (Sextus Pompeius) (J.H. Thiel's extreme ‘landlubber’ interpretation – the Romans’ alleged unfamiliarity with the sea – is appropriately called into doubt [p. 3]). This new book contains ten articles and an introduction. In the latter an overview of scholarship – missing the two current main trends within civil war studies: trauma and impact – is followed by an overview of the volume itself.
The first chapter by C. Rollinger focuses on the subject of aristocratic performance (Part 1), including the triumphus navalis, repeating the somewhat dated idea that we cannot know what defined the naval triumph (p. 30). I. Östenberg (Staging the World [2009]) emphasises that the rams were the central defining piece, C.H. Lange (Triumphs in the Age of Civil War [2016]), with Livy (41.13.8; 45.42.2–3), stresses that ship crews joined in the procession. Part 2 looks at coins and maritime symbols, and Part 3 more specifically at the civil war period. The article restates that Augustus labelled Sextus as a pirate. This is correct, but an inscription mentioned by Appian (B Civ. 5.130) clearly shows that the ideology of ending the civil war was already used in 36 bce (rightly so W. Hollstein, p. 177; C. Rosillo-López, p. 202; Wendt, p. 251), signifying the accomplishment of the triumviral assignment. At the same time, Sextus was labelled a pirate in order for Young Caesar to receive an ovation (two contemporary letters show this: App. B Civ. 5.77, 80).
E. Baltrusch, on the importance of the sea in republican strategies of legitimacy, emphasises that the sea became yet another level of competition. He is right to ask what we mean by sea power (p. 75). The subsequent discussion might have asked how sea power can influence the outcome of events on land; the same can be said about the volume as a whole (power from the sea = J.S. Corbett, Some Principles of Maritime Strategy [1911]). Securing strategic effect on land was of the utmost importance as wars are seldom decided by naval warfare alone. Cooperation of land and naval forces has always been a predominant feature of naval warfare, whereas sea power in itself was rarely sufficient to secure victory. Consequently, the ideology of the sea was important.
D. Maschek's chapter on Sextus Pompeius’ maritime symbolism follows. The aplustre and globe on the famous coin of Young Caesar (RIC 12 Aug. 256) may refer to terra marique (p. 93). This more than anything suggests that the cooperation of land and naval forces was a predominant feature of naval warfare in ancient Rome. Young Caesar/Augustus famously uses the slogan together with pax (on the inscription of the Victory monument at Actium; RG 13, 3). The above-mentioned 36 bce inscription from the rostral monument might have been referred to here, as it is the first attestation of his use of this phrase (App. B Civ. 5.130). A small but insightful catalogue of the use of maritime symbols follows, including an intriguing mid-40s to 36 bce date for the Scylla group at Sperlonga (pp. 102–3). Maschek returns to the coin of Young Caesar that resembles a coin of Sextus (p. 104; RRC 511/3). I would add that the coins make it likely that the cuirassed statue of the (Claudian) Medinaceli relief, with its foot on a rostrum and aplustre in hand – the aplustre from the enemy ship of Antonius, also visible on the relief (Lange [2016], epilogue) –, showing Actium as a civil war, might even refer to an original statue of Young Caesar.
B. Strauss, on the strategy and tactics of Sextus, rightly emphasises that Sextus can be labelled a warlord (p. 121). He was also a dynast. M. Crawford's 2008 piece (‘States Waiting in the Wings’, in L. de Ligt and S. Northwood [edd.], People, Land, and Politics) about alternative states would have been a helpful addition to this fine article. Such states, mostly in the provinces, such as Sertorius in Spain in the 70s, Pompeius in the east in the 60s and Caesar in Gaul in the 50s bce, included alternative career structures and a local manpower resource. The dynasts of the Late Republic, on this model, certainly so Sextus, behaved like (alternative) states. This dynast label is perhaps preferable as it is used by our evidence – for example Appian and Cassius Dio –, and it allows us to emphasise that Sextus behaved opportunistically (rightly so p. 123), as did Young Caesar and Antonius. Sextus was not a republican (pp. 123, 129; contra Welch, Magnus Pius [2012]), but an actor in his own right (Lange [2019], in J. Osgood and C. Baron [edd.], Cassius Dio and the Late Republic; this is not a literary study as claimed in the introduction, Kersten and Wendt, p. 10 n. 52). The article asks how good a commander Sextus was. Strauss repeats the old idea that Young Caesar was a poor commander, but Strauss himself shows that his skills as the commander-in-chief, appointing Agrippa as his operational commander and showing iron will and determination, were excellent (esp. pp. 124, 129, 131, 134–5). Sextus fought a limited war (p. 124), blockading Italy, but this could not win him the war, only be used as a bargaining tool (the pact of Misenum shows that it worked). As for Naulochus and the outcome of the war, most wars were won by land powers (p. 124), but against sea powers only if they themselves took to the sea.
W. Hollstein focuses on the coins of Sextus with special focus on maritime motives. Young Caesar later reuses some of the coin legends. Hollstein may, however, be wrong to suggest that some of these coins were the last ‘republican’ coins minted. The chief motive of his coinage was not republican but his family – father and brother – and the pietas between them, apart from elements linked to maritime matters. The article is followed by C. Rosillo-López on the public opinion in Rome of Sextus. Even pro-Augustan sources claim that Sextus enjoyed the favour of the Roman people (p. 187). Two comments: would the Roman people also include those who were angry when Caesar was killed? In addition, even if it is accepted that the evidence was pro-Augustan, both Appian and Cassius Dio clearly used anti-Augustan evidence – they were historians trying to understand the past –, and consequently there were stories from the other side of the civil war (to use Welch's fine description). Rosillo-López effectively focuses on sources of public opinion (pp. 190–200): letters from exiles, the domus rostrata and political literature. There would have been anti-Sextus sources as well.
Kersten, on the fourth tyrant in the narrative of Appian, emphasises Sextus as ‘Streiter und die Macht im Imperium Romanum’ (p. 211). The article clearly shows that the alleged republican nature of Sextus is not visible in Appian. Sextus wanted to be the fourth triumvir. Wendt's chapter focuses on the function of Sextus in the different civil war narratives. The civil war actor is a literary figure (emphasised like this, who is not?), and, as a result, there is more than one way of approaching him. Within those narratives the role of the sea is often portrayed as negative. This is followed by H. Kopp's chapter on the terminology of Sextus and sea power in Appian (thalassokrator) and Florus (rector maris). F. Mundt's article on Sextus and Antonius in Roman poetry concludes the volume; it asks why the battle of Actium was central in Augustan poetry. The article rests on a series of assumptions, some of which this reviewer disagrees with. Actium was indeed the main turning point of the age, signifying the transition from republic to monarchy and the ending of civil war(s). In addition, poetry was not mere propaganda. Even if accepted, Sextus is prominently mentioned in the historiography of the period – not contemporary, as this is almost all lost (see, however, FrHist), but in Appian and Cassius Dio. They used contemporary material in writing the narrative of the period, including stories from the other side of the civil war. Adding to this, Actium was a civil war and symbolised the ending of it (H. Cornwell, Pax and the Politics of Peace [2017]; RG 34.1; Livy, Per. 133; Vell. Pat. 2.87.1 etc.). Augustus himself will have written about this in great detail in his memoirs, as he did with Perusia (App. B Civ. 5.45).
In the end, this was not quite a book on sea power, but a fine volume on Sextus Pompeius and the use of the sea in practical and ideological terms. One thing to take away from the reading is that we should always remember the connection between Duilius/Mylae, Sextus/Naulochus and Antonius/Augustus/Actium. Whether thalassocracy was at all possible in ancient times is an altogether different matter.
