Ben Kane

And we know that it started with Crassus putting his camp quite close to Spartacus' one, being provocative.

And his men were digging ditches when some of Spartacus' horsemen attacked them.

Maybe they were trying to panic the Romans.

We don't know.

But

What then happened is both armies deployed.

This was something that was very slow in ancient times.

It probably would have taken a couple of hours, and the two armies then attacked each other.

Crassus watching from the back of a horse behind the front line, but able to see Spartacus.

And again, this is a later source, but I love the scene, so I had to put it in the book.

And we have evidence of a...

of a Thracian leader doing this in a battle later that was recorded.

He led out his stallion in front of his army and sacrificed it to the gods.

Now, it's horrible.

He killed a horse, but what he was doing was giving a very powerful blood sacrifice to the gods to request their help.

But he was also showing his men he wasn't going to run away.

I am with you.

no matter what.

And as I say, there is an example of a Thracian chieftain about 70 or 80 years later fighting a Roman army who killed his own horse in front of the Romans and told his men that he would eat the Roman commander's intestines.

If he won the battle now, I don't think he did.