In 36 BCE, Octavian’s admiral Marcus Agrippa crushed Sextus Pompeius off Sicily, ending the blockade that strangled Italy’s grain [3][4][16]. Oarlocks creaked and bronze rams struck at Naulochus, while smoke smeared the Strait of Messina. With the sea secured, Octavian could face political rivals on land.
What Happened
After Philippi, the Triumvirate confronted a different threat: Sextus Pompeius, son of Pompey the Great, who commanded fleets from Sicily and cut Rome’s grain lifeline. Starvation is a political argument; the Roman crowd on the Forum steps could hear it in their stomachs. Sicily’s harbors—Messana, Tauromenium, and Naulochus—became the hinges of Italy’s fate [3][4][16].
Octavian lacked a navy to match Sextus. Marcus Agrippa, his friend since boyhood and now his indispensable admiral, built one. At Puteoli and Baiae he carved out a hidden harbor, Portus Julius, connecting lakes Avernus and Lucrinus to the sea. Shipwrights hammered oak; bronze rams were bolted on; oarsmen drilled until the creak of oarlocks rose like a chant [4][16].
In 36 BCE, the fleets met repeatedly. A fight off Mylae bloodied both sides; but the decision came near Naulochus on Sicily’s north coast. Agrippa’s ships, lighter and better handled, exploited the wind across the Tyrrhenian’s slate-blue swell. Grappling hooks flew; boarding bridges crashed down; decks ran slick. Sextus’ captains tried to disengage toward Messana; scarlet command pennants fluttered and fell [3][4].
When the spray cleared, Sextus Pompeius’ naval power lay in wreckage. He fled east, a spent force without a base. Sicily—Rome’s grain barn—reopened. In the harbors of Ostia and Puteoli, the groan of grain sacks and the shouts of stevedores replaced the silence of empty quays. Prices eased; the Forum’s temper cooled [3][16].
This was a military victory engineered by logistics and engineering as much as tactics. Agrippa’s creation of Portus Julius turned a coastline into an arsenal. Octavian’s decision to hand the sea war to his lieutenant displayed an instinct for talent that would matter from Actium to urban renewal in Rome [4][16].
Yet the end of Sextus did not mean the end of rivalry. In the immediate aftermath, Lepidus attempted to leverage his legions in Sicily to displace Octavian. Command of the sea had solved one problem; it had created an opportunity for another. Octavian would take it [4].
Why This Matters
Eliminating Sextus Pompeius restored food security to Italy—a direct political dividend for Octavian. Popular anger in Rome subsided as wheat moved again from Sicily to Ostia, strengthening Octavian’s standing in the city’s fractious assemblies and among the plebs frumentaria [3][16].
The episode underscores the alliance theme: while still formally partners, Octavian and Agrippa acted as a highly coordinated pair to remove a rival, using law, engineering, and force. It also previewed the regime’s administrative flair—building harbors and systematizing supply would later define Augustan governance [4][16].
Strategically, with the Tyrrhenian secure, Octavian could turn to the political calculus on land, where Lepidus awaited humiliation and Antony awaited confrontation. The sea’s slate-blue surface near Naulochus reflected not only wreckage but a reorganized balance of power [4].
Historians point to the Sicilian war as proof of Agrippa’s centrality. Augustus’ era is as much a story of trusted lieutenants as of a single leader, a pattern visible from Portus Julius to the Campus Martius’ marble [4][16].
Event in Context
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People Involved
Key figures who played a role in Elimination of Sextus Pompeius
Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa
Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa (63–12 BCE) was Octavian’s closest friend, field commander, and problem-solver—the engineer of victory as Rome turned from republic to empire. He built and commanded the fleets that crushed Sextus Pompey at Naulochus (36 BCE) and Mark Antony at Actium (31 BCE), then remade Rome with aqueducts, baths, and the first Pantheon. Loyal, practical, and unglamorous, Agrippa made Augustus’s political magic possible by delivering military certainty and civic prosperity. In this timeline, he is the quiet architect behind the decisive battles and the marble peace that followed.
Marcus Aemilius Lepidus
Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (c. 89–13 BCE) was the least formidable—but necessary—third of the Second Triumvirate. A loyalist of Julius Caesar and later pontifex maximus, he helped broker the pact with Antony and Octavian in 43 BCE, contributed forces against Sextus Pompey, and then overreached. In 36 BCE, Octavian stripped him of power and confined him to a priesthood. Lepidus’s rise and fall reveal how Octavian eliminated rivals without shattering the veneer of legality.
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