Battle of Pharsalus

The war for supremacy between Cæsar and Pompey which had for some time been gradually growing more certain, broke out in 49 bc, when Cæsar led his army across the Rubicon, and Cicero after much irresolution threw in his lot with Pompey, who was overthrown the next year in the battle of Pharsalus and later murdered in Egypt.

For when he was about to fight the last and all-decisive battle at Pharsalus, he himself took the right wing, but he gave the command of the left to Antony, as the most capable officer under him.

After the defeat at Pharsalus, when Pompey had made his escape to the sea and his camp was besieged, Brutus went out unnoticed by a gate leading to a place that was marshy and full of water and reeds, and made his way safely by night to Larissa.

As he was holding a lustration and review of his forces and had sacrificed the first victim, the seer at once told him that within three days there would be a decisive battle with the enemy.

Moreover on the night before the battle, as Caesar was making the round of his sentries about midnight, a fiery torch was seen in the heavens which seemed to be carried over his camp, blazing out brightly, and then to fall into Pompey’s.

And most of all were his cavalry impatient for the battle, since they had a splendid array of shining armour, well-fed horses, and handsome persons, and were in high spirits too on account of their numbers, which were seven thousand to Caesar’s one thousand.

When the defeat at Pharsalus came, Cato resolved that, if Pompey were dead, he would take over to Italy those who were with him, but would himself live in exile as far as possible from the tyranny of Caesar;

Moreover, he used to sup in a sitting posture from the day when he learned of the defeat at Pharsalus;

However, after the battle at Pharsalus, in which Cicero took no part because of illness, had been fought, and Pompey was in flight, Cato, who had a considerable army and a large fleet at Dyrrhachium, asked Cicero to take the command in accordance with custom and because of his superior consular rank.

For surely Heaven had not appointed that Pharsalian plain to be the stadium and theatre of their struggle for the supremacy, nor was he summoned by voice of herald to go down thither and do battle or leave to another the victor’s wreath;

And yet some say that he was deceived by his father-in-law Scipio, who wished to appropriate to his own uses the greater part of the treasure which he had brought from Asia, and therefore hid it away, and then hastened on the battle, on the plea that there was no longer any money.

But notwithstanding, by their importunities and agitations, after they had gone down into the plain of Pharsalia, they forced Pompey to hold a council of war, where Labienus, the commander of the cavalry, rose first and took an oath that he would not come back from the battle unless he routed the enemy;

For he had been the first man whom Caesar saw as he issued from the camp, and addressing him, he had asked him what be thought about the battle.

At break of day, Caesar was about to decamp and move to Scotussa, and his soldiers were taking down their tents and sending on ahead the beasts of burden and servants, when the scouts came in with a report that they saw many shields moving to and fro in the enemy’s camp, and that there was a noisy movement there of men coming out to battle.