The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Roman Empire (18 page)

Chapter 7
 
Let's Conquer . . . Ourselves! The Roman Revolution and the End of the Republic

• The breakdown of the Republic
  
• The Gracchae,
  optimates,
  and
  populares
  
• Marius and Sulla
  
• Caesar and Pompey
  
• Octavian (Augustus) and Antony and Cleopatra
  

In this chapter, we'll follow the implosion of the Roman Republic as individual political and military power came to dominate the internal and external affairs of Rome. The story of the last century of the Republic is one of competition between factions of nobles. It begins with the Gracchae and the senate, proceeds to individual commanders with their own armies (Marius and Sulla, Pompey and Caesar), and ends in the destruction of the state (Antony and Octavian).

As of 146
B
.
C
.
E
., with Rome's defeat of Corinth and Carthage, no other power remained to challenge Rome's dominance. The bounty of conquest funneled into the hands of the few who controlled the Roman state. War tribute flowed to Rome, and
hundreds of thousands of slaves were imported to work in
latifundia
, huge private or corporate farms (see Chapter 10, “The Romans at Large,” for more on the latifundia). Many Romans became fabulously rich, and the spoils of conquests created a thriving upper class, especially in importing, banking, and financing.

Two economic classes in particular became economically influential and powerful. One class was the
equites
, or “cavalrymen”—wealthy Romans who were not senators. The name comes from the top property classifications the
comitia centuriata
(the general assembly during the Republic). Senators, who were also in this property classification, could not legally engage in business outside of real estate and farming. The
Equites
therefore came to refer to wealthy men who chose commerce over politics, or businessmen who became wealthy enough to enter the top brackets. This growing “business class” became quite powerful after the Punic Wars. Another influential economic group was the
publicani
—members of the Equestrian Order who formed companies (
societates
) to bid on and administer public contracts, the collection of taxes in the provinces, and other public works.

The continual wars, however, had taken a toll on Italy, and after 146
B
.
C
.
E
., there were no more rich conquests. Costly wars in Spain and Gaul and slave rebellions at home offered no return. The Italian allies, who had served Rome so faithfully, wanted a bigger share of Roman rights. Small farmers, from whom the soldiers came, were dislocated by economic change and by continual military service. Many lost or abandoned their farms and migrated to the cities in search of work. Military recruitment began to plummet, partly because the number of small landowners was declining, and partly because dangerous military service against slaves or Spanish tribes offered no reward.

The nobility, however, were not inclined to give up their enormous share nor change the political structures that allowed them to keep it. They did, however, learn to utilize the manpower of the lower classes in their armies and the plebs' political power to advance their own interests in the popular assemblies.

Gaius and Tiberius Gracchus were brothers from a distinguished noble family. Their father, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, was the fair-minded governor of Spain (179
B
.
C
.
E
.). (For more about Spain in this era, see Chapter 6, “On Golden Pond: Rome Conquers Italy and the Mediterranean.”) The brothers were raised by their famous mother, Cornelia, who was the daughter of Scipio Africanus (conqueror of Hannibal). Tiberius was married to the daughter of Appius Claudius, the leading senator of the day. In other words, these two guys were connected.

Gaius and Tiberius addressed the urgent problems of their day in ways that exploited a fatal flaw in the Roman political system: the presence of two separate legislative bodies (plebeian and senatorial) that didn't have to come to agreement before a piece of legislation became law. Gaius and Tiberius took their causes to the plebeian assembly and passed legislation there in direct opposition to the senate. They showed that there was, through the popular assembly, another avenue to power besides through the senate. The senate's violent backlash would set forces in motion that eventually tore the Republic apart.

 
Veto!
The Gracchi are sometimes portrayed as radical champions of the common people. This is far too simplistic. Tiberius's proposals, for example, had already been made in the senate by Appius Claudius.

Tiberius was elected tribune in 133
B
.
C
.
E
. He proposed to enforce an old law limiting the amount of public land controlled by one citizen. He wanted to distribute the remaining land to landless Romans and set up a commission to oversee the redistribution. When the senate refused funds, Tiberius gave the donation of Attalus III's kingdom (Pergamum) to the Roman people (133
B
.
C
.
E
.). (For more about Pergamum, see Chapter 6.) The senate bribed another tribune to veto the legislation. When Tiberius got the tribune deposed, things got ugly. A mob led by senators killed Tiberius during the next election.

Gaius was tribune in 123
B
.
C
.
E
. He won over the equites by protecting their economic and judicial interests; he won over the urban poor by proposing public works projects, a ceiling on grain prices, and military reforms; he won over the landless farmers when he proposed a new colony at Carthage. When he went off to Africa to set up the new colony, his enemies in the senate used another tribune to undercut Gaius by offering even more sweeping and radical proposals (which they never intended to fulfill). When Gaius returned, he attempted to broaden his base by proposing to give the vote to the Italian allies. This enraged the urban poor, who felt threatened, and there were riots.

 
When in Rome
The
senatus consultum ultimum
allowed the consul to take any steps he saw fit for protecting the Republic.

Optimates
favored the ultimate power of the senate and pursued their ambitions by traditional means.
Populares
promoted their interests through the popular assembly, and protected (when it suited their interests) the rights of the tribunes such as
intercessio
and
veto.

Gaius unsuccessfully tried for election two more times. Riots continued, mostly provoked by the senators. The senate eventually imposed martial law under a
senatus consultum ultimum.
The consul, Opimius, had offered a reward for Gaius's head: its weight in gold. Senators and their supporters attacked and killed about 250 of Gaius's followers. Gaius was cornered and ordered his slave to kill him. About 3,000 of the Gracchae's supporters were later executed.

The Gracchae became hallowed martyrs. Statues were set up to them, the places they died became shrines, and no politician would dare speak ill of them. Their causes and strategies were taken up (not always genuinely) by other ambitious Roman aristocrats in pursuit of power, which resulted in the rough division of Roman politics into
optimates
and
populares.

 
Veto!
Optimates
and
populares
in no way represented what we might think of as political parties or ideologies. These terms apply more to how individuals pursued their aims at a particular time. If rejected or beaten in the senate, a politician might seek to accomplish what he wanted through the popular assembly and friendly tribunes. If so, he could be labeled a
popularis
by his political enemies in the senate and by supporters in the popular assembly.

The careers of Gaius Marius (157–86
B
.
C
.
E
.) and Lucius Sulla (138–78
B
.
C
.
E
.) would add the explosive power of personal armies to the volatile mixture of politics at Rome. The interdependent relationship between a general, who relied on his army for spoils abroad and for votes at home, and his army, who relied on the general to take care of them at home, would prove devastating to any political opposition.

Marius was ambitious—a brilliant general and an opportunistic politician. As a member of a nonnoble family, he became a
novus homo
and consul seven times by winning immense popularity in successive victories against the Numidian rebel Jugurtha in Africa, against the Gauls in northern Italy (between 105 and 101
B
.
C
.
E
.), and against an enormous slave revolt in Sicily (104–99
B
.
C
.
E
.), which erupted when a
promise to free slaves who were held illegally was cancelled. It was for the Jugurthine campaign that Marius opened enrollment in the army to everyone. This filled the army with dispossessed men who became professional soldiers and who became more loyal to their general than to the state.

The Romans elected Marius consul five times successively in his absence. This was illegal (one had to declare for election in Rome and wait 10 years before consular reelection), but apparently the Gallic threat and Marius's popularity took prominence. Upon returning to Rome, however, Marius fared badly because politically he was still an outsider. He became embroiled in a political fiasco and, as consul in 98, was compelled by senate decree to use force against his political associates. This left him hated and distrusted by both sides.

In 90
B
.
C
.
E
., the allies erupted into revolt when a tribune who proposed giving the vote to them was assassinated. The Marsi, Samnites, and others set up their own confederation. For two years Italians who had fought together for two centuries waged a bitter civil war. Rome won, in part, through the passage of laws giving the allies what they wanted if they laid down their arms. In the end, Italy was devastated and exhausted, but men from the river Po in the north to the toe of Italy in the south became full citizens of Rome. Rome did, however, distribute allies's votes so that they had less clout than they should have.

 
When in Rome
A
novus homo
was a man who became consul for the first time in his family's history and thus “ennobled” his family. Only Cato the Elder, Marius, and Cicero achieved this distinction in the last two centuries. All came from the equestrian class.

 
Great Caesar's Ghost!
The Romans' war with Jugurtha, in which Marius and Sulla started their careers, is the subject of a famous history by the Roman historian Sallust (86–35
B
.
C
.
E
.),
Bellum Jugurthinum.
Sallust identifies this period as the beginning of the end for the Roman Republic.

Lucius Cornelius Sulla “Felix” (Lucky) was an ambitious optimate who came up under Marius. He distinguished himself in the Jugurthine and Social Wars. Since Marius's political prestige had been weakened, the optimates ventured to appoint Sulla commander against the eastern potentate, Mithridates. Both Marius and Sulla wanted this command, which promised riches, popularity, and power. When a Marian tribune proposed to take
the command from Sulla and give it to Marius, riots broke out from which Sulla had to hide in Marius's own house and escape out the back. But instead of getting out of Italy, Sulla merely got out of town, got his army, and came back. A Roman had attacked Rome.

Sulla's forces burned the city and murdered their political enemies. Marius escaped to Africa by the skin of his teeth. Sulla settled affairs in the senate and left for the war with Mithridates. As soon as he was gone, one of the consuls, Lucius Cinna, recalled Marius. Marius brought his army, starved Rome into surrender, and went on his own bloody vendetta. He was elected consul for the seventh time but fell ill and died within a few days of taking office. Rome functioned under Cinna until his death in 83
B
.
C
.
E
.

Sulla concluded a treaty with Mithridates and returned from the east in 83
B
.
C
.
E
. with a well-trained army. His opponents in Rome tried to martial forces to stop him, but only the Samnites, at the famous battle of the Colline Gate, came close to turning the tide against him. Six thousand Samnite prisoners were tortured to death as Sulla, appointed dictator, calmly spoke over their screams to the frightened senate. In the following period, Sulla organized a reign of terror, known as the
proscriptions.
When that didn't bring enough money, he extorted tribute from some towns, destroyed others and sold their inhabitants as slaves, and turned Samnium into a wasteland. These atrocities left deep and bitter antipathies between Romans of the next generations.

 
When in Rome
Proscriptions
were published lists of names. A man on the list was declared a public outlaw and could be hunted down and killed for a reward. His sons lost their citizenship, and his property was confiscated and given to Sulla's friends or sold to pay his veterans. Many of the proscribed were guilty of nothing more than being rich.

As dictator, Sulla also reformed the constitution to strengthen the power of the senate and curb the tribunes and popular assembly. He also reformed the Roman judicial system (one of his few reforms to survive). To avoid another Marius, Sulla put the senate in control of armies. He restricted governors to fighting only in their provinces. If a commander's jurisdiction needed to exceed provincial boundaries, Sulla made provisions for the senate to appoint a general of their own choosing to an “extraordinary command.”

Sulla resigned the dictatorship in 80
B
.
C
.
E
. and retired to write his memoirs. He died two years later, never to see that instead of creating stability he had only built up coals that would feed the flames of destruction. Marian exiles and Spaniards under the leadership of Marius's general Sertorius set up a government in exile in Spain. Sulla's veterans, who settled on confiscated land, had no knack for farming. They soon became a debt-ridden, disenchanted, and dangerous element in Roman politics. In addition, the resentment and discontent of the groups he subjugated and disenfranchised was manipulated by the next generation until
the whole deadly brew erupted into another civil war. Sulla's reforms were quickly overturned after his death, while the means he used for achieving them proved catastrophic.