erium_ which in some way exceeded that
of the regular constitutional officers and required to be created or
defined by a special enactment of the Senate or Comitia.

The man who first realized the value of the extraordinary command as a
path to power was Pompey the Great.

I. POMPEY'S COMMAND AGAINST SERTORIUS IN SPAIN: 77-71 B. C.

*The revolt of Lepidus.* It was not to be expected that Sulla's measures
would long remain unassailed. Those dispossessed of their property, those
disqualified for office, and the equestrians who sought to regain control
of the courts, were all anxious to undo part of his work. They found a
leader in Lepidus, who as consul in 78 B. C., the very year of Sulla's
death, sought to renew the distribution of cheap grain to the masses in
Rome, which Sulla had suppressed, to restore the Marian exiles, and
reinstate those who had lost their lands. For the time he failed to carry
his proposals, but in the next year, as proconsul of Cisalpine Gaul, he
raised an army and marched on Rome to seize the consulate for a second
term, since disorders had prevented the election of consuls for that year.
However he was defeated by his former colleague, the proconsul Catulus,
and Pompey, whom the Senate had appointed to a subordinate command in view
of his military expedience. Lepidus crossed over to Sardinia where he died
shortly after, and the bulk of his forces under Marcus Perperna withdrew
to Spain, to join the Marians who were in revolt there.

*Sertorius in Spain, 83-78 B. C.* The rebellion in Spain was headed by
Quintus Sertorius, who had been appointed governor of Hither Spain by
Cinna in 83 B. C. Two years later he was driven out by Sulla's
representative, but, after various adventures, returned in 80 B. C. to
head a revolt of the Lusitanians. His ability as a guerrilla leader, and
the confidence which he aroused among the native Spaniards soon created
alarm in Rome. Sertorius professed to take the field not against Rome but
against the Senate. He regarded himself as the legitimate governor of
Spain, employed members of the Marian party as his military and civil
subordinates and organized a Senate among the Romans of his following. To
crush the revolt Sulla sent out to Farther Spain Metellus, the consul of
80 B. C., but he failed to make any headway, and Sertorius was able to
overrun Hither Spain also. In 79 B. C. the praetor of that province was
killed in battle, and the same fate befell