Reporting from Berkeley, CA.
By 70 BC, a politician and wealthy land baron, Marcus Licinius Crassus, had developed a burning desire to rule Rome.
‘Just to give you an idea of what sort of man Crassus really was,’ Michael Rivero writes on the What Really Happened blog, ‘he is credited with invention of the fire brigade. But in Crassus’ version, his fire-fighting slaves would race to the scene of a burning building whereupon Crassus would offer to buy it on the spot for a tiny fraction of its worth.
‘If the owner sold, Crassus’ slaves would put out the fire. If the owner refused to sell, Crassus allowed the building to burn to the ground. By means of this device, Crassus eventually came to be the largest single private landholder in Rome, and used some of his wealth to help back Julius Caesar against Cicero.’
At the time, Rome was still a Republic. And there were still strict limits in place on what those who ruled could do and not do. But Crassus would not be held back by arbitrary constraints.
Instead, he concocted a plan. He bribed a fleet of feared mercenaries, led by Spartacus, to sail without their leader. He then positioned Roman soldiers in a way that the fleet had no choice but to ‘invade’ Rome.
Or at least that’s what any Roman onlooker would think as he or she watched the fleet roll in. And when it comes to power-building, perception is everything.
This post was published at Laissez Faire on Sep 16, 2016.
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