In 53 B.C. a Roman army confronted a force one quarter its strength yet suffered Rome’s bloodiest defeat in more than a hundred years. The Battle of Carrhae pitted 40,000 Roman soldiers against an army of a mere 10,000 of the Parthian Empire on the sands of Mesopotamia. The humiliating loss rippled through Rome and crumbled the fragile foundation of the Republic; from this rubble rose the Roman Empire. And the disaster of Carrhae, and the folly leading to it, would write a bloody epitaph of the Roman commander, Marcus Licinius Crassus.
This episode was written by Scott Crawford, a writer living in Beijing, China. Scott’s recently completed novel, The Silk Road Centurion, portrays the Battle of Carrhae and follows the journey of a captured legionary driven to Han-dynasty China. There he must break free of bondage, adapt to Chinese life and fight the nomadic horsemen who enslaved him. To learn more, visit www.scottforbescrawford.com.
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