Surena sent a party to Carrhae to offer the Romans a truce and safe conduct out of Mesopotamia, provided Crassus and Cassius were handed over to him. Crassus and the Romans tried to escape from the city by night, but their guide betrayed them to the Parthians. Cassius distrusted the guide because of the circuitous route he was following and went back to the city, and managed to get away with 500 horsemen.
When Surena found Crassus and his men the next day, he again offered a truce, saying the king had ordered it. Surena supplied Crassus with a horse, but as Surena's men tried to make the horse go faster, a scuffle developed between the Romans, who were unwilling for Crassus to go unaccompanied, and the Parthians. Crassus was killed in the fighting. Surena ordered the rest of the Romans to surrender, and some did. Others who tried to get away by night were hunted down and killed the next day. Altogether, 20,000 Romans were killed on the campaign and 10,000 captured.
The historian Dio Cassius, writing in the late 2nd or early 3rd century AD, reports a story that after Crassus' death the Parthians poured molten gold into his mouth as punishment for his greed (Cassius Dio 40.27).
Primary Sources:
Plutarch's Life of Crassus (the Perrin translation) Plutarch paired Crassus with Nicias, and the Comparison between the two is online in the Dryden translation.
For the campaign in Parthia , see also Dio Cassius' History of Rome, Book 40: 12-27
Secondary Sources:
For another life of Crassus, illustrated with maps and coins, see: Caesar's Contemporaries.
Parthian records of the battle of Carrhae have not survived, but Iranchamber has articles on the Parthian Army and Surena.
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