Crassus

Roman general and the wealthiest man in Rome — member of the First Triumvirate with Caesar and Pompey — who died catastrophically invading Parthia at the Battle of Carrhae.

Crassus as the political-financial archetype: his wealth (estimated at 200 million sestertii, the equivalent of Rome's entire annual state budget) was built partly through the fire brigade model — buying burning buildings at fire-sale prices and putting them out with his private fire brigade. His political ambition drove him to join Caesar and Pompey in the First Triumvirate. The Carrhae disaster (53 BCE) — Rome's worst defeat since Cannae, where his 40,000 legionaries were destroyed by Parthian horse archers — cost him his life and removed the political counterweight that might have prevented Caesar and Pompey's civil war.