Lavish Spending Could Not Buy This Ancient Tycoon What He Craved the Most
Crassus’ guide, secretly in Parthian pay, took the Romans on an arid route that left his army parched and exhausted by the time they reached the town of Carrhae in today’s Turkey. There, they encountered a Parthian army of 1000 armored heavy cavalry and 9000 horse archers. It did not go well for Crassus. Although they greatly outnumbered the Parthians, the Romans were demoralized by the hard march and by Crassus’ poor leadership. Parthian archers whittled the Romans with arrows from a safe standoff distance, and used their super mobility to ride away to safety whenever the Romans advanced on foot. Morale plummeted as casualties mounted. Crassus finally ordered his son to drive off the horse archers with the Roman cavalry and an infantry detachment.
The Parthians feigned retreat, Crassus’ son rashly pursued, and was slaughtered with all his men. The Parthians returned, and taunted the Roman army and Crassus with his son’s head mounted on a spear. Crassus abandoned thousands of his wounded, and retreated. The Parthians invited him to parley, and offered safe retreat in exchange for Roman territorial concessions. Crassus was reluctant, but his army threatened to mutiny if he did not negotiate. The parley went badly, violence broke out, and Crassus was killed. To mock his greed, the Parthians poured molten gold down the rich Roman’s throat. Out of his 50,000 man army, only 10,000 made it back to Roman territory.
