Abstract
Rome had been confronted with piracy for centuries prior to the Late Republic, yet it was
the ‘Cilician’ pirates from the coasts of south-west Anatolia who were perceived as being
responsible for problems including the ransoming of magistrates, plundering Roman allies,
and forming an alliance with Mithridates. This dissertation provides an investigation of
Greco-Roman literary accounts and epigraphy to ascertain the multifaceted portrayal of
these pirate communities.