An Unscrupulous Ancient Entrepreneur
Rome in Crassus’ days was full of fire-prone buildings, and fires were a common occurrence. However, the city had no public firefighters, so Crassus formed a private firefighting company manned by his slaves. When a fire broke out, he rushed to the scene with his firefighters, and on the spot, offered to buy the burning building or those nearby that were threatened by the flames at literally fire-sale prices. To get at least something for their property was preferable to nothing if it was reduced to ashes, so the distressed owners often agreed. Through such shady methods, Crassus became Rome’s greatest property owner. By the 70s BC, he was Rome’s richest man. As seen above, he leveraged his wealth into power, and divvied up the Roman Republic with Caesar and Pompey.
However, Crassus wanted to be more than just a rich man. He craved military glory such as that enjoyed by his partners. Unlike them, Crassus’ main military accomplishment was defeating Spartacus’ slave rebellion. Defeating slaves paled in comparison to Pompey’s and Caesar’s deeds. To win glory of his own, Crassus decided to invade Parthia, a newly established wealthy kingdom that ruled Persia and Mesopotamia. Parthia did not seem a difficult nut to crack: a decade earlier, Pompey had easily defeated other eastern kingdoms. With an army of 50,000, Crassus invaded Parthia in 53 BC. As seen below, things went wrong from the start.
