The two armies met here in a life and death struggle, Cnæus Pompeius appealing to his men to avenge his father, while Cæsar’s veterans, responding to the battle cry of Venus the Victorious, the patron goddess of the Cæsarian house and its mythical foundress, made it plain that the cause for which they fought was also a personal one. Neither side could look for quarter; Pompeius had already shown his temper by cruel dealings with the provincials who had opposed him, and Cæsar’s men were not likely to deal mercifully with those who had rekindled the flame of civil war and so deprived them of a well-earned peace. Both in attack and defense each side showed equal bravery and obstinacy. For some time the issue seemed dubious; Cæsar to rally his own men had to take sword in hand and engage in the thick of the struggle. Finally, when the Pompeians made a change of their order to help the wing of their army which was being hard pressed by the tenth legion, the movement gave the Cæsarians a chance to put their opponents in confusion and finally to flight. On the Pompeian side 30,000 are reported to have been slain; among the dead were Labienus, Cæsar’s right-hand man in the Gallic campaign, and Cnæus Pompeius himself, who escaped from the field but was taken and put to death afterward. Before the return to Italy the affairs of the Spanish provinces had to be set in order; special favors were distributed to the loyal communities in the way of franchise or immunities, and this reconstructive work seems to have been accompanied by financial exactions. The return to Italy was not made until September, and for a whole month Cæsar remained outside the walls of Rome. To mark the victory at Munda there was nothing tangible to do in the way of increasing the autocratic power of the supreme and all-embracing magistrate and executive; there were, however, no visible limitations to the servility of the Senate and Assembly. Fifty days’ thanksgiving, yearly games commemorative of the victory, special distinctions of dress, extraordinary honorific titles, a state residence on the Palatine, built after the model of a temple of the gods; special statues in holy places connected with communal worship, all these were voted, and most of them accepted by the conqueror.