The means by which Sulla attained the fortune which later would enable him to ascend the ladder of Roman politics are not clear Plutarch refers to two inheritances, one from his stepmother (who loved him dearly) and the other from his mistress Nicopolis. During these marriages, he engaged in an affair with Nicopolis, who also was older than him. He married again, with a woman called Aelia, of whom nothing is known other than her name. He had one child from this union, before his first wife's death. If the latter, he may have married into the Julii Caesares. His first wife was called either Ilia or Julia. Regardless, by the standards of the Roman political class, Sulla was a very poor man. Sallust declares him well-read, intelligent, and he was fluent in Greek. Sulla almost certainly received a normal education for his class, grounded in ancient Greek and Latin classics. Plutarch mentions that during his last marriage to Valeria, he still kept company with 'actresses, musicians, and dancers, drinking with them on couches night and day. During these times on the stage, after initially only singing, he started writing plays, Atellan farces, a kind of crude comedy. Lacking ready money, Sulla spent his youth among Rome’s comedians, actors, lute players, and dancers. He might have been disinherited, though it was 'more likely' that his father simply had nothing to bequeath.

After his father's death, around the time Sulla reached adulthood, Sulla found himself impoverished. One story, 'as false as it is charming', relates that when Sulla was a baby, his nurse was carrying him around the streets, until a strange woman walked up to her and said, ' Puer tibi et reipublicae tuae felix', which can be translated as, 'The boy will be a source of luck to you and your state'. His father may have served as praetor, but details are unclear his father married twice and Sulla' stepmother was of considerable wealth, which certainly helped the young Sulla's ambitions.

Sulla's family thereafter did not reach the highest offices of the state until Sulla himself. Publius Cornelius Rufinus, one of Sulla's ancestors and also the last member of his family to be consul, was banished from the Senate after having been caught possessing more than 10 pounds of silver plate. Sulla, the son of Lucius Cornelius Sulla and the grandson of Publius Cornelius Sulla, was born into a branch of the patrician gens Cornelia, but his family had fallen to an impoverished condition at the time of his birth. Later political leaders such as Julius Caesar would follow precedent set by Sulla and his military coup in attaining political power through force. Resigning his dictatorship in 79 BC, Sulla retired to private life and died the following year. He used his powers to purge his opponents, and reform Roman constitutional laws, to restore the primacy of the Senate and limit the power of the tribunes of the plebs. He then revived the office of dictator, which had been inactive since the Second Punic War, over a century before. He returned victorious from the east in 82 BC, marched a second time on Rome, and crushed the populares and their Italian allies at the Battle of the Colline Gate. The populares nonetheless seized power once he left with his army to Asia. In a dispute over the command of the war against Mithridates, initially awarded to Sulla by the Senate, but withdrawn as a result of Marius' intrigues, Sulla marched on Rome in an unprecedented act and defeated Marian forces in battle. He was a leader of the optimates, which sought to maintain senatorial supremacy against the populist reforms advocated by the populares, headed by Marius. Sulla played an important role in the long political struggle between the optimates and populares factions at Rome. Sulla was closely associated with Venus, adopting the title Epaphroditos meaning favored of Aphrodite/Venus.

He was awarded the Grass Crown for his bravery at the Battle of Nola.

He then fought successfully against Germanic tribes during the Cimbrian War, and Italian allies during the Social War. Sulla rose to prominence during the war against the Numidian king Jugurtha, whom he captured as a result of Jugurtha's betrayal by the king's allies, although his superior Gaius Marius took credit for ending the war. A gifted and innovative general, he achieved numerous successes in wars against foreign and domestic opponents. Sulla had the distinction of holding the office of consul twice, as well as reviving the dictatorship. He won the first large-scale civil war in Roman history and became the first man of the Republic to seize power through force. Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix ( / ˈ s ʌ l ə/ 138–78 BC), commonly known as Sulla, was a Roman general and statesman.

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