Transcript The End of the Roman Republic - Nipissing University Word

January 17 th , 2012
 Social Structures of the Roman Republic.
 Political Structures of the Roman Republic.
 Political Struggle and Political Reform.
 Collapse of the Republic.
 Patrician and Plebeian (Birth).
 Census Rating (Property).
 Patron and Client System (Connections).
 Auctoritas (“Authority” or “Influence”) and Dignitas
(“Honour” or “Respect” or “Esteem”.); Finite qualities.
 Early Republican society divided into two main social classes: 1.
Patricians (nobility of birth). 2. Plebeians (commoners).
 Only patricians could: 1.Take auspices. 2. Hold priesthoods. 3. Be
senators. 4. Hold public office. 5. Command armies.
 Patricians & plebeians forbidden to marry (from ca. 450 BCE)
 Plebeians = the majority of the citizen population; the
manpower of the Roman army
 Family and clan (gens) central feature of Republican political
life.
 Struggle of the Orders 509 BCE – 287 BCE (494 BCE – Plebeian
Assembly & Tribune of the Plebs; 445 BCE – Marriage between
Patricians and Plebeians; 367 BCE – Plebeians hold the
consulship; 287 BCE – Plebiscita binding on all Romans).
 Patron = Wealthy elite who provided a client with loans, legal help, other
opportunities and services.
 Client = Supported his patron by voting for him, supporting his legislative
initiatives, providing other services.
 Patron-Client relationship inheritable across generations.
 Not all patrons are patricians.
 Tendency toward the formation of cliques along gens (Clan) lines.
 Ties/obligations cut by ballot laws (139-137 BCE)
 “If a patron shall have defrauded his client, he must
be solemnly forfeited” (N. Lewis & M. Reinhold, 1966)
“Forfeited” (Latin = Sacer) meant that he was outside the law and eligible for death
 Senate.
 Assemblies (Centuriate Assembly & Plebeian
Assembly)
 Magistrates (Censor, Consuls, Praetors, Aediles,
Quaestors, Tribune of the Plebs)
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The Consuls: 2 elected annually by the Centuriate Assembly; Patricians only (until 367 BCE);
Had Imperium; Commanded the army; Prepared legislation for the Centuriate Assembly;
Judicial functions
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The Praetor: Created in 367 BCE to assist the consuls; Elected by the Centuriate Assembly;
Numbers grew from 1 in 367 BCE to 16 by 49 BCE; Held judicial and military functions
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The Aediles (2 in 494 BCE/4 after 367 BCE): Elected by the Comitia Tributa; Responsible for
maintenance of temples, public buildings, public games, markets, basic police functions
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The Quaestors: Financial/Treasury officers, esp. for the army; Elected by the Comitia Tributa;
Between 420 and 80 BCE numbers increased from 4 to 20; quaestorship qualified one for a
senate seat.
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Tribune of the Plebs (10 elected annually by the Plebeian Assembly; summoned the Pleb.
Assembly; Introduced “plebiscita”; Interposition.).
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The Censors: Created in the Regal Period; 2 Censors elected periodically by the Centuriate
Assembly; Held office for 5 years; Conducted the census; Responsible for public contracts

Dictatorship (Elected by the senate in a crisis; 6 month term; held supreme authority together
with Magister Equuum “Master of the Horse.”)..
 Initially made up of ca. 100-300 patrician gentes
 Holding the office of Quaestor entitled one to a senate seat
 Possessed auctoritas and not potestas
 Advised the Consuls and other magistrates
 Met with foreign embassies
 Controlled the allocation of funds for public works
 Voted such honors as triumphs and ovations for victorious
commanders
 Free male citizen population divided into 193 centuries on the
basis of wealth
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Equites (knights) = 18 Centuries = 18 votes
100,000 asses + = 82 Centuries = 82 votes
75,000-100,000 asses = 20 Centuries = 20 votes
50,000-75,000 asses = 20 Centuries = 20 votes
25,000-50,000 asses = 20 Centuries = 20 votes
11,000-25,000 asses = 32 Centuries = 32 votes
Under 11,000 asses = 1 Century = 1 vote
 Centuriate Assembly = Divisions of the Roman army; voting
assembly, tax brackets.
 Elected senior magistrates (i.e. Consuls, Praetors, Censors),
passed legislation, declared war or peace.
 Acted as a court on capital charges and treason.
 Weighted voting system based on wealth.
 Est. 494 BCE - Open to all adult male plebeian citizens.
 Divided into 35 tribes (31 rural and 4 urban).
 Summoned, presided over, and elected Tribune of the
Plebs.
 Passed plebiscita (legislation binding only on plebeians.
until 287 BCE); binding on all citizens after 287 BCE.
 Centuriate Assembly created tensions between rich and everyone else.
 Parallel systems of legislation after 287 BCE.
 Imperial Expansion (Italy – 396-275 BCE; Sicily 264-241 BCE; Africa,
Spain, and Greece – 218-146 BCE; Near East and Egypt – 80-30 BCE;
Gaul – 59-52 BCE).
 Ager Publicus.
 Gaius Flaminius (232 BCE) and Tiberius & Gaius Gracchus (133-121
BCE).
 Populares (Populists) v. Optimates (Conservatives).
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Marius (107-100 BCE).
Marius v. Sulla (88-86 BCE).
Sulla (dictator - 85-78 BCE).
Pompeius Magnus (78-60 BCE).
Pompeius Magnus, C. Julius Caesar, M. Licinius Crassus (Triumvirate:
60-54 BCE).
Pompeius Magnus and Caesar (54-52 BCE)
Pompeius Magnus v. C. Julius Caesar (52-48 BCE).
C. Julius Caesar (dictator: 48-44 BCE).
Marcus Antonius and C. Julius Caesar Octavianus (44-31 BCE).
Marcus Antonius v. C. Julius Caesar Octavianus (31-30 BCE).
C. Julius Caesar Octavianus (Augustus after 27 BCE).
 Note: Do not underestimate the role played by self-interest and
ambition.
 Please the Senate (i.e. High offices and commissions;
deferential treatment; consultation etc.; victories).
 Extraordinary Powers under a Constitutional Façade.
 Please the People (Bread and Circuses; victories).
 Please the Army (Land for veterans; good pay; good
terms of service; victories)..
 “He filled the vacancies in the Senate by enrolling
additional patricians, and increased the number of
praetors, aediles, and quaestors as well as minor
officials. He reinstated those who had been
degraded by official action of the censors or found
guilty of electoral bribery by verdict of the jurors. He
shared the elections with the people on this basis:
that except in the case of the consulship, half of the
magistrates should be appointed by the people’s
choice while the rest should be those whom he
personally had nominated.” (Lim & Bailkey, 2005)
 “Yet after all, his other actions and words so turn the
scale that it is thought that he abused his power and
was justly slain. For not only did he accept excessive
honours, such as an uninterrupted consulship, the
dictatorship for life, the surname Father of his
Country, a statue among those of the kings, and a
raised couch in the orchestra; a chariot and litter in the
procession at the circus; temples, altars, and statues
beside those of the gods; a special priest, and
additional college of the Luperci, and the calling of
one month by his name. In fact, there were no
honours which he did not receive or confer at
pleasure.” (Lim & Bailkey, 2005).
 25 This power extended its operations over the whole of our
Mediterranean Sea, making it unnavigable and closed to all commerce.
This was what most of all inclined the Romans, who were hard put to it
to get provisions and expected a great scarcity, to send out Pompey with
a commission to take the sea away from the pirates. 2 Gabinius, one of
Pompey's intimates, drew up a law which gave him, not an admiralty,
but an out-and-out monarchy and irresponsible power over all men.
For the law gave him dominion over the sea this side of the pillars of
Hercules, over all the mainland to the distance of •four hundred
furlongs from the sea. These limits included almost all places in the
Roman world, and the greatest nations and most powerful kings were
comprised within them. 3 Besides this, he was empowered to choose
fifteen legates from the senate for the several principalities, and to take
from the public treasuries and the tax-collectors as much money as he
wished, and to have two hundred ships, with full power over the
number and levying of soldiers and oarsmen.” (Trans. B. Perrin, 1923)
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38 To each and every foot-soldier of his veteran legions he gave twenty-four thousand sesterces by way of
booty, over and above the two thousand apiece which he had paid them at the beginning of the civil strife. He
also assigned them lands, but p53not side by side, to avoid dispossessing any of the former owners. To every
man of the people, besides ten pecks of grain and the same number of pounds of oil, he distributed the three
hundred sesterces which he had promised at first, and one hundred apiece to boot because of the delay. 2 He
also remitted a year's rent in Rome to tenants who paid two thousand sesterces or less, and in Italy up to five
hundred sesterces. He added a banquet and a dole of meat, and after his Spanish victory two dinners; for
deeming that the former of these had not been served with a liberality creditable to his generosity, he gave
another five days later on a most lavish scale.
39 He gave entertainments of divers kinds: a combat of gladiators and also stage-plays in every ward all over
the city, performed too by actors of all languages, as well as races in the circus, athletic contests, and a sham
sea-fight. In the gladiatorial contest in the Forum Furius Leptinus, a man of praetorian stock, and Quintus
Calpenus, a former senator and pleader at the bar, fought to a finish. A Pyrrhic dance was performed by the
sons of the princes of Asia and Bithynia. 2 During the plays Decimus Laberius, a Roman knight, acted a farce
of his own composition, and having been presented with five hundred thousand sesterces and a gold ring,
passed from the stage through the orchestra and took his place in the fourteen rows. For the races the circus
was lengthened at either end and a broad canal was dug all about it; then young men of the highest rank
drove four-horse and two-horse chariots and rode pairs of horses, vaulting from one to the other. The game
called Troy was performed by two troops, of p55younger and of older boys. 3 Combats with wild beasts were
presented on five successive days, and last of all there was a battle between two opposing armies, in which five
hundred foot-soldiers, twenty elephants, and thirty horsemen engaged on each side. To make room for this,
the goals were taken down and in their place two camps were pitched over against each other. The athletic
competitions lasted for three days in a temporary stadium built for the purpose in the region of the Campus
Martius. 4 For the naval battle a pool was dug in the lesser Codeta and there was a contest of ships of two,
three, and four banks of oars, belonging to the Tyrian and Egyptian fleets, manned by a large force of fighting
men. Such a throng flocked to all these shows from every quarter, that many strangers had to lodge in tents
pitched in streets or along the roads, and the press was often such that many were crushed to death, including
two senators.
 Was the Roman Republic a democracy, an oligarchy, or
a monarchy?
 Was there anything inherent in the Republican form
of government that doomed it to failure?
 Was the emergence of a single autocratic ruler in Rome
in the later first century BCE an inevitability?