Marcus Minucius Thermus was a praetor

Praetor

Praetor was a title granted by the government of Ancient Rome to men acting in one of two official capacities: the commander of an army, usually in the field, or the named commander before mustering the army; and an elected magistratus assigned varied duties...

 in 81 BC and propraetor of the Roman province of Asia the following year, succeeding Murena

Murena

Murena is a name used by a Roman plebeian family from Lanuvium belonging to the gens Licinia. It is supposed to be derived from the fondness of a family member for lampreys ....

. The capture of Mytilene

Mytilene

Mytilene is a town and a former municipality on the island of Lesbos, North Aegean, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality Lesbos, of which it is a municipal unit. It is the capital of the island of Lesbos. Mytilene, whose name is pre-Greek, is built on the...

 occurred during his governorship; Mytilene had been in revolt against Rome and was suspected of actively or tacitly aiding so-called pirates in the region

Cilician pirates

The Cilician pirates dominated the Mediterranean Sea from the 2nd century BC up until their speedy suppression by Pompey . Although there were notorious pirate strongholds in Cilicia, Cilician had long been a term for pirates.-Rise of piracy:...

. Suetonius

Suetonius

Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, commonly known as Suetonius , was a Roman historian belonging to the equestrian order in the early Imperial era....

 credits Thermus with the victory, but the siege may have been conducted by or in coordination with L. Licinius Lucullus

Lucullus

Lucius Licinius Lucullus , was an optimate politician of the late Roman Republic, closely connected with Sulla Felix...

. Little else is known of his life or career.

Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar

Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....

 began his military service under Thermus after his pardon by Sulla during the proscriptions of 82 BC. It was Thermus who sent the young Caesar as an envoy to the court of Nicomedes IV of Bithynia

Nicomedes IV of Bithynia

Nicomedes IV Philopator, was the king of Bithynia, from c. 94 BC to 74 BC. He was the first son and successor of the Monarchs Nicomedes III of Bithynia and Nysa and had a sister called Nysa....

 to request aid in the form of a fleet

Naval fleet

A fleet, or naval fleet, is a large formation of warships, and the largest formation in any navy. A fleet at sea is the direct equivalent of an army on land....

.

Although Thermus was a Sullan partisan, in 86 BC his younger brother Quintus had been a legate

Legatus

A legatus was a general in the Roman army, equivalent to a modern general officer. Being of senatorial rank, his immediate superior was the dux, and he outranked all military tribunes...

 in Asia under appointment by the rival Marians

Gaius Marius

Gaius Marius was a Roman general and statesman. He was elected consul an unprecedented seven times during his career. He was also noted for his dramatic reforms of Roman armies, authorizing recruitment of landless citizens, eliminating the manipular military formations, and reorganizing the...

. Quintus had replaced Fimbria

Gaius Flavius Fimbria

Gaius Flavius Fimbria was a Roman politician and a violent partisan of Gaius Marius. He fought in the First Mithridatic War.-Partisan of Marius:...

 after his mutiny.

External links

• Further discussion by T. Corey Brennan
  T. Corey Brennan
  Terry Corey Brennan is an associate professor of Classics at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, , and was a guitarist and songwriter involved with several bands, most notably the alternative rock band The Lemonheads....
  
  , The Praetorship in the Roman Republic (Oxford University Press, 2000), vol. 2, p. 557 online.