The Battle of Cabira was fought in 72 or 71 BC between forces of the Roman Republic under proconsul Lucius Licinius Lucullus and those of the Kingdom of Pontus under Mithridates the Great. It was a decisive Roman victory. Background Rome had already fought two major conflicts with King Mithridates of Pontus; the so called First and Second Mithridatic Wars. During the first war, after taking the Roman province of Asia, Mithridates had slaughtered 80,000 Roman and other Italian civilians (the so called Asian Vespers). This was something Rome would never forgive him, therefore the stage was set for another conflict. When in 74 BC the Kingdom of Bithynia was bequeathed to the Roman Republic (on the death of King Nicomedes IV of Bithynia) things came ahead. Mithridates, who anticipated a war with Rome, invaded the country in 73 BC, he defeated the first Roman governor of Bithynia the proconsul Marcus Aurelius Cotta in battle and besieged him in the city of Chalcedon. Lucullus, Cotta's consular partner, had also anticipated war and had used his influence to get the command against Mithridates, he had also gotten the proconsular governorship of the Roman province of Cilicia from which he wanted to invade Pontus. Lucullus had just arrived in Roman Asia when he got word of Cotta's plight, he took command of all Roman forces in Asia Minor and marched his army north to relieve Cotta who was still besieged at Chalchedon. Mithridates left Cotta under siege at Chalcedon and pushed on westward to the city of Cyzicus, then allied to Rome, which he hoped to take before Lucullus arrived. After assembling an army and a war fleet Lucullus marched north and established a counter-siege trapping Mithridates's army on the Cyzicus peninsula. He also successfully mounted a naval expedition against Mithridates's navy in the Black Sea; defeating Marcus Varius, Mithridates's naval commander, off Lemnos. The Siege of Cyzicus turned out to be a spectacular success; the Romans blockaded and starved the numerically superior Pontic army. Mithridates having failed to take the city before the onset of winter was forced to withdraw. Of the 300,000 who had set out for Bithynia only 20,000 effective troops made their way back to Pontus. Mithridates occupied Heraclea Pontica, blocking the northern land route into Pontus. Lucullus, not wanting to conduct another lengthy siege, left Heraclea to Cotta and prepared to invade Pontus by means of Galatia.