He traversed the length of Italy, defeating several Roman armies on the way and causing panic in the capital. In 72 Spartacus decided to take his army northward with the aim to escape from Roman encirclement and send his men home into their provinces.
New arrivals had to be trained and supplied with swords, and military discipline was tight. On the way his army grew to at least 90,000 men or more. Spartacus then moved into southern Italy. A second army attack suffered the same fate. When the Roman army arrived it was decisively defeated. He used the time during which the Roman state prepared a new assault to set up a weapons manufacture and train his people in combat. Spartacus now showed extraordinary leadership and military genius. They managed to defend their position against a military detachment and were soon joined by hundreds of runaway slaves and other country people trying to escape their debts. In 73 BC Spartacus and 70 fellow gladiator trainees escaped from the training school and avoided capture by retreating to the upper slopes of Mount Vesuvius. The fight usually ended in the death of one of the combatants, unless the spectators indicated that clemency should be applied to the severely wounded defeated party. Using a special short gladiator's sword they were trained to fight each other or confront wild animals. The Roman civilization operated many gladiatorial training schools throughout the empire, where prisoners of war and slaves were trained to perform for public entertainment. Spartacus' documented life begins in Capua, a provincial city north of Naples (Italy), where Spartacus was trained as a gladiator. Details about his early life are not well documented, but it is believed that he left the army to build a bandit group and go on raids of his own. Spartacus was born in Thracia (Greece) and served in the Roman army. Science, civilization and society Spartacus