Gaius Claudius Glaber

When the news reached Rome, the Senate was too busy with wars in Spain and the Pontic Empire to worry about some unruly slaves.

Unconcerned, praetor Claudius Glaber took an army of 3,000 men to the rebels' refuge at Mount Vesuvius and blocked off the only passage up the mountain.

All that remained was to wait and starve them out, or so he thought.

In the dead of night, the rebels lowered themselves down the cliffside on ropes made from vines and flanked Glaber's unguarded camp.

Rome laughed.

The Senate sent Gaius Claudius Glaber.

He was the praetor, so he had real rank.

But he came with about 300 men scraped together on short notice, rather than a proper legion.

He marched to Vesuvius, blocked the one easy path down off the mountain, and settled in to starve them out.

which is when Spartacus did something Rome hadn't accounted for.

His men wove ropes out of the wild vines growing on the slope, climbed down the sheer cliff off the other side, and came around behind Glaber's camp.

And in the dark, they destroyed it.