Talk:Pompey/Archive 2

Non-sequitur
"Hailing from an Italian provincial background, he earned the cognomen of Magnus — the Great ..." This sentence is a non-sequitur and should be changed to make sense.Guernseykid 21:10, 26 March 2006 (UTC)

In the section Pompey in the East, Pompey is referred to as a 'New Man'. Although there are definitional problems with the term 'New Man' doesn't it go a bit far to refer to someone whose father was a consul as a new man? Normally a new man who has no consular ancestors (definition 1) or someone who has no senatorial ancestors (definition 2). Neither of these apply to Pompey. What is true is that he wasn't part of a family as noble as the gens Licinia. Nevertheless, Licinius' main objection to the arrival of Pompey may well have been that he was losing his command! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.67.43.45 (talk) 10:03, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

On Pompey
The following relates to this diff Haploidavey (talk) 13:36, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

I understand your argument regarding puffery, but I think you're wrong. The original simply fails to acknowledge Pompey's stature and importance in the Old Republic. The Republic contained literally thousands of political and military leaders. Many of these men are notable: Lucullus, Cicero, Metellus etc. But the difference between these men and Pompey is stark. Pompey was the most powerful man in the Roman world for almost two decades. At the height of his power, he exhibited enormous influence over Roman political and military affairs in a way that fundamentally separates him from nearly all his predecessors and contemporaries.

The idea of an opening paragraph is to explain to readers with a limited knowledge of the subject, who the subject was and his importance. The opening paragraph utterly fails to do this. The fact is that doing this requires judgements being made. You can see evidence of this on many other Wikipedia pages. Many pages on this site describe great military commanders as such, and have not been altered by concerns over puffery, because these adjectives are necessary in relaying the importance of the subject discussed in the short space available in the introduction.

Look at the page for Lucullus, and the reference to his "extraordinary generalship abilities." A person reading both pages might come to the conclusion that Lucullus was a more important Roman than Pompey, something any historian of the ancient world would deem ridiculous, and certainly something these men's contemporaries would deem ludicrous.

The opening should be altered to give a good idea of Pompey's status in Rome and his importance to Roman history. If you have another way to do it, that's great, but as is, the opening is insufficient and unintentionally misleading. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.159.141.106 (talk) 07:39, 2 November 2011 (UTC)


 * I've copied the above from my talk-page. I'll respond when I've the time - soon, I hope - but other user-comments are of course welcome. Haploidavey (talk) 13:25, 2 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Heh, was Pompey a brilliant general? Some thought/think he just had an uncanny knack for showing up late in the game and claiming the victory for which others paved the way. The intro could indeed be improved to do just what you ask: make his significance clearer. Adjectives, however, are unlikely to accomplish this. Does stating that someone's "great" or "brilliant" make him so, or show how he is? (And why, when I write this, do I feel as if I'm back in my days of grading sophomore essays in Roman Civ?) Cynwolfe (talk) 19:52, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I would argue that stating someone's "great" does make their significance clearer, as in the difference between a "military and political leader of the Old Republic" and a "great military and political leader of the Old Republic." 'Great' is often used to denote significance. As for your evaluation of Pompey's generalship, you sound like Lucullus or Crassus. Certainly the Roman people thought Pompey was a brilliant general, and ancient historians seemed to come to a similar conclusion. See Plutarch's biography of Pompey. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.159.141.106 (talk) 02:17, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Interpreting the ancient evidence yourself is OR. Please note that I agree with you that the intro could be improved, despite my pro-Crassus, pro-Lucullus jocularity, where I stand on the walls with Sertorius and ask why they've sent a schoolboy against us. So I completely support your bringing in some additional modern scholarship that would give us a clearer picture, and I forget which highly admirable scholar it is who argued quite well that Caesar's glamour tends to eclipse Pompey's dominance over a period of decades. If I find the source I'm thinking of, I'll post it here in case you'd like to use it to improve the article. Not sure what you mean by "Old Republic"; Pompey belongs to the Late Republic. Cynwolfe (talk) 13:41, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Calling Pompey 'great' is hardly interpreting the ancient evidence myself considering he was called Pompeius Magnus for the last two decades of his life. I believe it was the historian Theodor Mommsen who labeled one of the chapters in his book about Rome, "The Old Republic and the New Monarchy" in order to separate the history of the Republic from the later Empire. That's all I meant by "Old Republic." As for the source, I would appreciate the post. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.159.141.106 (talk) 23:47, 3 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Well, but it already says "Pompey the Great". My point is that in WP terms it's considered "original research" if you rely on primary sources to create your own narrative or interpretation of events. An evaluation of Pompey's achievements as a general needs modern scholarship, not summarizing the ancient sources yourself. (I'm only saying this because you seem like someone with contributions to make, but perhaps new to Wikipedia, since you're editing under an IP and not a named user account, which I would encourage you to create. WP's definition of "original research" is rather narrow.) I may be thinking of Gruen's Last Generation of the Roman Republic, but it's been quite a while since I was doing my reading on Pompey. Cynwolfe (talk) 03:24, 4 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Yes, the uncritical use of ancient sources (Plutarch in particular) remains an issue; at least some sections are supported by the critical interpretations of modern, secondary sources but much remains to be done. The same applies to the Lucullus article, which relies almost entirely on ancient sources and therefore doesn't offer an appropriate model. Haploidavey (talk) 14:08, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

New Section on References in Popular Culture?
I like to read these wikipedia articles, then "go watch a movie" in order to give this words some visual substance. Any movies (or any other popular references) that might be interesting? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jonny Quick (talk • contribs) 04:51, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't know of a film, but you might take a look at Robert Harris's novel Imperium. The focus is on Cicero, but Pompey is a major supporting character and Harris does an interesting job of developing his personality. -- Michael K Smith Talk 22:59, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

three-time consul
Any chance the recent IP edit was objecting to the word 'elected'? Broughton characterizes the year of Pompey's last consulship as marked by "election disorders"—the violence in the Milo affair, the looming civil war. A coterie had managed originally to make Pompey sole consul, but after marrying Publius Crassus's young widow Cornelia "had" her father Metellus Scipio "elected his colleague for the final months of the year." If that's the problem, we can dodge this with a different wording.

Also, "Roman nobility" is linked to the article on the patricians. You couldn't make yourself a patrician, except (possibly; I've never found a straight answer on this) through adoption. (Presumably if you were a plebeian "adopted" as an adult in order to preserve the family name and sacra gentilicia, you would be performing sacra that had been patrician, so you were counted as one? I digress.) The link should be to nobiles, and Pompey wasn't himself a "new man," so his military exploits didn't so much allow him to social-climb as to leapfrog the cursus—one of the most notable things he did was to hold the consulship the first time before he went through the traditional prerequisites. Since the article takes note of this at the end of the section Pompey (an odd place for it), we can revise the intro to reflect that. Cynwolfe (talk) 20:35, 2 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Just a quickie here. The IP added the information on Pompey's three elected consulships, the next edit reverted it (as uncited and sans edit summary) and I restored it. As you say, there's plenty of irregularity in Pompey's career. But an irregular election is still an election, unless overturned. Just as an extralegal Triumph counts as a Triumph. If you can summarise these matters in the intro with your usual exactness and subtlety, please do go ahead; the intro as it stands reflects nothing of these general, erm, irregularities. Agreed, too, on the nobiles link. Sorry to be so brief, my head's mucked and swimming. Haploidavey (talk) 21:42, 2 July 2012 (UTC)
 * You can see what you think of the rewording when you have time. Not sure how to get at the "greatness" stuff without "editorializing." Cynwolfe (talk) 23:38, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

39 during his first consulship?
Hello. In the section titled "Quintus Sertorius and Spartacus," the article claims, "So Pompey was allowed to bypass another ancient Roman tradition; at only 39 years of age and while not even a senator, he was elected Consul by an overwhelming majority vote, and served in 70 BC with Crassus as partner."

However, Pompey's date of birth is listed in the opener as being "29 September, 106BC." If so, wouldn't that make him aged 35/36 while serving as consul and 34/35 at the time of his election, not the 39 years that the aforementioned quote claims? Just wondering. Thanks.114.148.238.239 (talk) 11:34, 8 August 2012 (UTC)


 * Indeed, that's definately a mistake. I've corrected it to 35 years of age as the consular elections generally took place in the month August in the year before taking office so Pompey was 34-35 when first elected and 35 when taking office. -- fdewaele, 8 August 2012 (16:20)

Circumstances surrounding Achillas death.
In this article it is claimed that

>Caesar, who, according to Plutarch, mourned this insult to the greatness of his former ally and son-in-law, and punished his assassins and their Egyptian co-conspirators, putting both Achillas and Pothinus to death.

In the linked article about Achillas himself it is stated though, that

> Arsinoe had Achillas put to death by Ganymedes, a eunuch to whom she then entrusted the command of the forces.

Sadly I have no knowledge whether this is a conflict of information found in primary sources, or an error of editing, but as stands, the conflict of information is apparent, and in the case of the former not properly addressed in either article.

I lack the resources to verify either way, and as such wanted to draw attention to the matter. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AnthariaJack (talk • contribs) 01:59, 18 July 2014 (UTC)


 * Since this edit last September, the article no longer mentions the death of Achillas and Pothinus. It says only that Theodotus escaped Caesar's revenge, without mentioning those who actually stabbed Pompey. Art LaPella (talk) 14:38, 15 May 2017 (UTC)

Merger proposal
I propose that Antistia be merged into Pompey, and the same might be suggested for some (or all) of his other wives. Being the spouse of a notable person does not make Antistia pass the notability guidelines for biographies (see Notability_(people)), and I haven't found anything else substantial about her. In addition, Antistia's article is only stub-size, and seems to focus primarily on the power struggles of her male relatives. Thoughts on this? Alanna the Brave (talk) 00:51, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Contradictory information - date of death + age
The article currently contradicts the citation used by claiming Pompey's date of death as September 29th rather than 28th. I see from the edit history that this has been a source of dispute on several occasions. Also, the infobox states Pompey as having died at age 57 whereas the article text references Plutarch as giving the age as 60. 79.72.143.70 (talk) 20:57, 26 February 2018 (UTC)