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Eunus was a good enough medium to figure at a fashionable seance. His latest profession was the promise of a kingdom to himself; it was the Syrian goddess who had held out the golden prospect. The promise he declared boldly to his master, knowing perhaps the spirit in which the message would be received. Antigenes was delighted with his prophet king.
Some of them approached Eunus and asked him if their enterprise was permitted by the gods. The prophet first produced the usual manifestations which attested his inspiration and then replied that the gods assented, if the plan were taken in hand forthwith.
Eunus vomited fire, Athenion read the stars; the plummets thrown by the slaves in these wars bear in great part the names of gods, those of Zeus and Artemis, and especially that of the mysterious Mother who had migrated from Crete to Sicily and was zealously worshipped there.
Soon after the death of Gracchus a rebellion broke out in Sicily among the slaves, who, exasperated by the cruelties exercised upon them by their masters, revolted, and having seized Enna, chose one Eunus for their king. This new monarch gained considerable advantages over the Romans, took the strong city of Tauromin'ium, and protracted the war upwards of six years.
They had gathered everything which could serve as a weapon, and when midnight was approaching they were ready for the first attempt. They marched swiftly to the sleeping town and broke its stillness with their cries of exhortation. Eunus was at their head, fire streaming from his mouth against the darkness of the night. The streets and houses were immediately the scene of a pitiless massacre.
At length he was completely defeated by the consul Rupil'ius, and his followers slaughtered or executed: as for Eunus, he died in prison.
The civil wars of Marius and Sulla were not waged for liberty but for power. In Sicily, where the slaves under Eunus had for a time wrested the governing power from their masters, they did not hesitate to enslave in turn. The doctrine that the individual man has some rights by nature which the state ought not to disregard had no place in ancient nor medieval governments.
Each of these wreaked his own peculiar vengeance and then turned to take his share in the general massacre. Meanwhile Eunus and his immediate following had learnt news of the arch-enemy Damophilus, He was known to be staying in his pleasance near to the city.
It was not the first time that a slave had assumed the diadem; for was it not being worn for the moment by Diodotus surnamed Tryphon, the guardian and reputed murderer of Alexander of Syria? The elevation of Eunus to the throne was due to no belief in his courage or his generalship.
The next step in the progress of the revolt was to form a political and military organisation that might command the respect of the countless slaves who were soon to break their bonds in the other districts of Sicily. Eunus was elected king. His name became Antiochus, his subjects were "Syrians."
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