Directory

75 BCE

At the Battle of Saguntum the republican forces on the Iberian Peninsula and the Sertorian rebels fight each other to a draw. Quintus Sertorius is forced to withdraw leaving the battlefield to Pompey and Metellus (the republican commanders). In the Roman province of Hispania Citerior an army of Sertorian rebels under Quintus Sertorius himself defeats a republican army under Pompey the Great at the Battle of Sucro. Julius Caesar travels to Rhodes to study under Apollonius Molon. On his way across the Aegean Sea, he is kidnapped by Cilician pirates and held prisoner in the Dodecanese islet of Pharmacusa. The young Caesar is held for a ransom of twenty talents, but he insists they ask for fifty. After his release Caesar raises a fleet at Miletus, pursues and crucifies the pirates in Pergamon.

Conflict & Security

  • Third Mithridatic War: Marcus Aurelius Cotta is defeated by Mithridates in the Battle of Chalcedon.source
  • At the Battle of Saguntum the republican forces on the Iberian Peninsula and the Sertorian rebels fight each other to a draw. Quintus Sertorius is forced to withdraw leaving the battlefield to Pompey and Metellus (the republican commanders).source
  • In the Roman province of Hispania Ulterior a republican army under Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius defeats an army of Sertorian rebels at the Battle of Italica.source
  • Nicomedes IV of Bithynia bequeaths his kingdom to Rome on his death (75/4 BC). Angered by the arrangement, Mithridates VI of Pontus declares war on Rome and invades Bithynia, Cappadocia and Paphlagonia, thus starting the Third Mithridatic War.source
  • In the Roman province of Hispania Citerior an army of Sertorian rebels under Quintus Sertorius himself defeats a republican army under Pompey the Great at the Battle of Sucro.source
  • In the Roman province of Hispania Citerior a republican army under Pompey the Great defeats an army of Sertorian rebels at the Battle of Valentia.source

Exploration & Expansion

  • Cicero is quaestor in Western Sicily.source
  • Julius Caesar travels to Rhodes and is taken captive by piratessource

Religion & Belief

  • Start of Golden Age of Latin Literature.source

Health & Medicine

  • In Rome, the tribune Quintus Opimius speaks out against Sullan restrictions on the tribunate, in orations noted for sarcasm against conservatives.source

Crime & Justice

  • Julius Caesar travels to Rhodes to study under Apollonius Molon. On his way across the Aegean Sea, he is kidnapped by Cilician pirates and held prisoner in the Dodecanese islet of Pharmacusa. The young Caesar is held for a ransom of twenty talents, but he insists they ask for fifty. After his release Caesar raises a fleet at Miletus, pursues and crucifies the pirates in Pergamon.source

Births

  • Yuan of Han, Chinese emperor of the Han Dynasty (d. 33 BC)source
  • Gaius Asinius Pollio, Roman politician and poet (d. AD 4)source
  • Calpurnia, Roman noblewoman and wife of Julius Caesarsource

Deaths

  • Gaius Herennius, tribune of the plebs in 80 BC and legate to Quintus Sertorius during the Sertorian War, killed at the Battle of Valentia.source
  • Lucius Hirtuleius, right-hand-man of Quintus Sertorius during the Sertorian War, killed at the Battle of Saguntum.source
  • Gaius Memmius, brother-in-law of Pompey the Great, died at the Battle of Saguntum.source