Battle of Actium (31 BC): Octavian Defeats Antony and Cleopatra

The Battle of Actium was a naval battle fought on 2 September 31 BC off the coast of western Greece between the fleet of Octavian and the combined forces of Mark Antony and Cleopatra VII, queen of Egypt. Octavian’s admiral Marcus Agrippa won a decisive victory, and Antony and Cleopatra fled to Egypt. The battle ended a century of Roman civil wars and opened the way for Octavian to become Augustus, the first Roman emperor.

Background: the breakdown of the Triumvirate

After the assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BC, his adopted heir Octavian, his lieutenant Mark Antony and the general Marcus Lepidus formed the Second Triumvirate in 43 BC. Together they crushed Caesar’s assassins Brutus and Cassius at the Battle of Philippi in 42 BC and then divided the Roman world between them.

Antony took the wealthy eastern provinces, while Octavian held Italy and most of the West. In the East, Antony formed a political and personal partnership with Cleopatra VII, who needed Roman backing for her kingdom while Antony needed Egypt’s money and grain. His invasion of Parthia in 36 BC ended in a costly retreat, which weakened his standing.

Relations with Octavian worsened through the 30s BC. In 34 BC, in a ceremony known as the Donations of Alexandria, Antony assigned eastern territories to Cleopatra and her children, including Caesarion, her son by Julius Caesar. In Rome, Octavian presented this as proof that Antony had fallen under the spell of a foreign queen.

The Triumvirate’s legal term ran out at the end of 33 BC. In 32 BC the two consuls, both supporters of Antony, and several hundred senators left Rome to join him in the East. In the same year Antony formally divorced Octavia, Octavian’s sister.

Octavian then took a dramatic step. He seized Antony’s will from the Vestal Virgins, who kept it, and read parts of it aloud. According to the ancient accounts, it confirmed gifts to Cleopatra’s children and asked that Antony be buried in Alexandria. Octavian used the document to rally opinion in Italy, and he later claimed that the whole of Italy swore an oath of loyalty to him.

The Senate declared war on Cleopatra, not on Antony. This choice allowed Octavian to present the conflict as a foreign war against Egypt rather than another civil war among Romans, although everyone understood that Antony was the real opponent.

Manoeuvres in western Greece

Antony and Cleopatra gathered a large army and fleet and spent the winter of 32-31 BC in western Greece, with their main naval base inside the Ambracian Gulf. The gulf was a sheltered anchorage, entered by a narrow channel between the promontory of Actium to the south and the opposite shore to the north.

Early in 31 BC Agrippa took the initiative. He captured the base at Methone in the southern Peloponnese and attacked other points along Antony’s supply route from Egypt. Octavian then landed his army in Epirus and built a fortified camp on high ground north of the gulf entrance. Antony’s forces were now hemmed in, with supplies running short.

Over the summer Antony’s position deteriorated. Disease, probably malaria and dysentery, spread through his camp and crews. Prominent allies deserted to Octavian, including the senator Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus and King Amyntas of Galatia. With his army unable to force a land battle and his fleet short of rowers, Antony decided to fight his way out by sea.

What happened on 2 September 31 BC

Before the battle, Antony burned the ships he could not man. On the morning of 2 September his fleet rowed out of the gulf and formed a line facing Octavian’s ships, which were waiting outside. Antony commanded the right wing, while Gaius Sosius and other commanders held the centre and left. Cleopatra’s squadron of about 60 ships, carrying the treasury, waited behind the line.

Antony’s warships were mostly large, heavy galleys, some fitted with towers and protected against ramming. Agrippa’s fleet was more numerous and generally lighter and faster. For several hours the two lines faced each other. Fighting began around midday, when Agrippa extended his line northward to outflank Antony’s right, and the lines opened up as Antony’s wing moved to match him.

In the early afternoon, when the usual sea breeze rose, Cleopatra’s squadron hoisted its sails, passed through a gap in the centre and headed south towards the Peloponnese. Antony transferred from his flagship to a smaller vessel and followed her with a small group of ships. Most of his fleet was left behind and continued fighting until the late afternoon, when the remaining ships surrendered or retreated into the gulf. Some were set on fire.

Ancient writers such as Plutarch, drawing on sources favourable to Octavian, described Cleopatra’s departure as panic and Antony’s as a man abandoning his men out of love. That version shaped the story for centuries.

Many modern historians read the evidence differently. Antony’s ships carried their sails into battle, although sails were normally left on shore before a fight because they added weight and were useless for manoeuvring under oars. This suggests that escape was part of the plan from the start. On this view, Antony’s aim was to break the blockade, save as much of the fleet and treasure as possible and continue the war from Egypt. If so, the plan largely failed, because most of the fleet could not get away.

Aftermath: the surrender of the army and the end in Egypt

Antony’s land army, reportedly 19 legions and about 12,000 cavalry, was still intact in Greece. Its commander, Publius Canidius Crassus, tried to lead it towards Macedonia, but the soldiers negotiated with Octavian and surrendered about a week after the battle when Canidius fled. Octavian took over the troops on generous terms.

Plutarch, citing Augustus’s own memoirs, says that no more than about 5,000 men were killed in the sea battle and some 300 ships were captured. These figures come from the winning side and cannot be checked, but they suggest that the battle was decided more by collapse and surrender than by slaughter.

Octavian moved against Egypt the following year. As he approached Alexandria in the summer of 30 BC, Antony’s remaining forces deserted. Antony died by suicide on 1 August 30 BC, and Cleopatra died by suicide shortly afterwards, traditionally by the bite of an asp, although the exact method is uncertain. Caesarion was put to death. Egypt was annexed as a Roman province governed by a prefect appointed by Octavian himself.

By the numbers

Key people

Octavian (63 BC-AD 14), Caesar’s great-nephew and adopted son, was the political leader of the war. He was not a gifted admiral and left naval command largely to others.

Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa (c. 63-12 BC) was Octavian’s closest friend and most able general. He had already won the naval war against Sextus Pompey in 36 BC and was the real architect of the Actium campaign.

Mark Antony (83-30 BC) had been Caesar’s chief lieutenant and a hero of Philippi. Ancient sources portray him as brave but reckless and increasingly dependent on Cleopatra.

Cleopatra VII (69-30 BC) was the last ruling Ptolemaic monarch of Egypt. She provided ships, money and supplies, and her presence in Antony’s camp was used by Octavian as the central theme of his propaganda.

Legacy

Octavian celebrated a triple triumph in Rome in August 29 BC, for victories in Illyricum, at Actium and in Egypt. On the site of his camp he founded a new city, Nicopolis, meaning “City of Victory”, and built a monument decorated with bronze rams taken from captured ships. He also revived the Actian Games in honour of Apollo, whom he credited with the victory.

The battle became a founding story of the new regime. In Virgil’s Aeneid, the shield of Aeneas shows Actium as a clash between Rome’s gods and the animal-headed gods of Egypt. In January 27 BC Octavian received the name Augustus, a moment usually treated as the beginning of the Roman Empire. Since the battle had ended the civil wars, it also became the starting point of the long Pax Romana.

The story of Antony and Cleopatra, seen through the hostile lens of the victors, inspired later works, above all Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra (c. 1606-07), and countless paintings and films.

Timeline

• 43 BC, November: Octavian, Antony and Lepidus form the Second Triumvirate.
• 36 BC: Antony’s campaign against Parthia ends in a costly retreat.
• 34 BC: The Donations of Alexandria grant eastern lands to Cleopatra’s children.
• 32 BC: Antony divorces Octavia; Octavian publishes Antony’s will; Rome declares war on Cleopatra.
• 31 BC, spring: Agrippa seizes Methone; Octavian lands his army in Epirus.
• 31 BC, 2 September: Battle of Actium; Cleopatra and Antony break away to Egypt.
• 31 BC, September: Antony’s land army in Greece surrenders to Octavian.
• 30 BC, 1 August: Octavian enters Alexandria; Antony dies by suicide, followed by Cleopatra.
• 29 BC, August: Octavian celebrates a triple triumph in Rome.

Why it matters

Actium settled who would rule the Roman world. It ended the civil wars that had destroyed the Republic, brought Egypt and its wealth under Roman control, and left Octavian without a rival. Within four years he had become Augustus, and the Roman state he built lasted, in the East, for well over a thousand years.