Sertorius is joined in 77 BCE—at the…

Sertorius is joined in 77 BCE—at the insistence of the forces that he had brought with him—by Marcus Perpenna Vento from Rome, with a following of Roman nobles and a sizable Roman army (fifty-three cohorts).

Perpenna belonged to the populares faction, led by Gaius Marius and Lucius Cornelius Cinna.

After Lucius Cornelius Sulla defeated the populares faction in Italy and became Dictator of Rome, Perpenna had fled with a substantial sum of money and an army to Hispania, where he is determined to wage war against Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius on his own, despite the fact that Sertorius is already present in the province and is more or less ruling it.

Also this year, Pompey, who had intrigued for and won the assignment to join Metellus Pius against Quintus Sertorius' rebellion in Hispania, arrives to help finish off Sertorius.

Perpenna's soldiers are dissatisfied with his leadership, and when they learn that Pompey is crossing the Pyrenees, they demand that Perpenna take them to Sertorius, or they will abandon him to Pompey's mercies while they take themselves to Sertorius.

Perpenna yields to the demands of the legions, and hands them over to Sertorius.

This is not done with good will, and Perpenna, conscious of his noble bloodline and wealth, views the entire affair as a humiliation.