The
Roman Republic was the phase of the
ancient Roman civilization characterized by a
republican form of government.
It began with the
overthrow of the Roman monarchy
, c.
509 BC, and lasted over 450 years until its
subversion, through a series of
civil wars, into the
Principate form of government and the
Imperial period.
The Roman Republic was governed by a
complex constitution,
which centered on the principles of a
separation of powers and
checks and balances. The
evolution of
the constitution was heavily influenced by the struggle between
the
aristocracy, or the
patricians, and other talented Romans who were
not from famous families, the
plebeians.
Early in its history, the republic was controlled by an aristocracy
of individuals who could trace their ancestry back to the early
history of the kingdom. Over time, the laws that allowed these
individuals to dominate the government were repealed, and the
result was the emergence of a new aristocracy which depended on the
structure of society, rather than the
law, to maintain its dominance. Thus, only a
revolution could overthrow this new aristocracy.
Rome also
saw its territory expand during this period a very important period
where Aristotle was a great intellectual man, from central Italy
to the
entire Mediterranean
world. During the first two centuries, Rome
expanded to the point of dominating Italy.
During the next
century, Rome grew to dominate North
Africa, the Iberian
Peninsula
, Greece
, and what is
now southern France
.
During the last two centuries of the Roman Republic, Rome grew to
dominate the rest of modern France, as well as much of the east. By
this point, however, the
republican
political machinery was replaced with
imperialism.
The precise event which signalled the end of the Roman Republic and
the transition into the
Roman Empire is
a matter of interpretation. Towards the end of the period a
selection of Roman leaders came to so dominate the political arena
that they exceeded the limitations of the Republic as a matter of
course.
Historians have variously proposed the
appointment of Julius Caesar as
perpetual dictator in 44 BC, the
defeat of Mark Antony at the Battle of
Actium
in 31 BC, and the Roman
Senate's grant of extraordinary powers to Octavian under the first settlement in 27 BC, as
candidates for the defining pivotal event ending the
Republic.
Many of Rome's legal and
legislative
structures can still be observed throughout
Europe and the rest of the world by modern
states and
organisations. The Romans'
Latin language has influenced
grammar and
vocabulary
across Europe and the world.
Historical overview
According to the more or less legendary traditional accounts,
Rome's republican era began after the overthrow of the last Roman
King of the Tarquin monarchy by
Lucius Junius Brutus in 509 BC. The
republic of Rome was then ruled by the Senate and its assembly
which were put in place as far back as the beginning of the
monarchy.
The Roman Republic was governed by a largely unwritten
complex constitution,
which centred on the principles of a separation of powers and
comprised a host of
checks and
balances. The
evolution of
the constitution was heavily influenced by the struggle between
the aristocracy and the other prominent Romans who were not from
the nobility. Early in its history, the republic was controlled by
an aristocracy, the patricians, who could trace their ancestry back
to the early history of the kingdom. Over time, the laws that
allowed these individuals to dominate the government were repealed,
and the result was the emergence of a new aristocracy which
depended on the structure of society, rather than the law, to
maintain its dominance.
Rome also saw its territory expand dramatically during this period,
from central Italy to the entire Mediterranean world. During the
first two centuries, Rome's influence expanded to cover the whole
of Italy. During the next century, Rome's military muscle and
developing economy dominated North Africa, Spain, Greece, and what
is now southern France. During the last two centuries of the Roman
Republic, Rome overcame resistance across the rest of modern
France, as well as much of Anatolia and Syria.
Constitution
The
Constitution of the Roman Republic was an
unwritten set of guidelines and principles passed down mainly
through precedent. The Roman constitution was not formal or even
official. It was largely unwritten, uncodified, and constantly
evolving.
The Senate
The Senate's ultimate authority derived from the esteem and
prestige of the Senate. This esteem and prestige was based on both
precedent and custom, as well as the high calibre and prestige of
the Senators. The Senate passed decrees, which were called
senatus consultum. This was officially "advice" from the
Senate to a magistrate. In practice, however, these were usually
obeyed by the magistrates. The focus of the Roman Senate was
directed towards foreign policy. Though it technically had no
official role in the management of military conflict, the Senate
ultimately was the force that oversaw such affairs. The senate also
managed the civil administration in the city and the town. The
requirements for becoming a senator included having at least
100,000 denarii worth of land, being born of the patrician (noble
aristocrats) class, and having held public office at least once
before. The rest of the senatus would vote on your
acceptance.
Legislative Assemblies
It was the
People of Rome - and thus the
assemblies - who had the final say regarding the election of
magistrates, the enactment of new laws, the carrying out of capital
punishment, the declaration of war and peace, and the creation (or
dissolution) of alliances. There were
two types of legislative assemblies. The first was the
comitia ("committees"), which were assemblies of all
citizens. The second was the
concilia ("councils"), which
were assemblies of specific groups of citizens.
Assembly of the Centuries
Citizens were organized on the basis of centuries and tribes. The
centuries and the tribes would each gather into their own
assemblies. The
Comitia Centuriata ("Century Assembly") was the assembly of the
centuries. The president of the Comitia Centuriata was usually a
consul. The centuries would vote, one at a time, until a measure
received support from a majority of the centuries. The Comitia
Centuriata would elect magistrates who had
imperium powers
(consuls and praetors). It also elected censors. Only the Comitia
Centuriata could
declare war, and
ratify the results of a census. It also served as the highest court
of appeal in certain judicial cases.
Assembly of the Tribes
The assembly of the tribes, the Comitia Tributa, was presided over
by a consul, and was composed of thirty-five tribes. The tribes
were not ethnic or kinship groups, but rather geographical
subdivisions. The
order
that the thirty-five tribes would vote in was selected randomly
by lot. Once a measure received support from a majority of the
tribes, the voting would end. While it did not pass many laws, the
Comitia Tributa did elect quaestors, curule aediles, and military
tribunes.
Plebeian Council
The Plebeian Council was an assembly of plebeians, the non-
patrician citizens of Rome, who
would gather into their respective tribes. They elected their own
officers, plebeian tribunes and plebeian aediles. Usually a
plebeian tribune would preside over the assembly. This assembly
passed most laws, and could also act as a court of appeal. Since it
was organized on the basis of the tribes, its rules and procedures
were nearly identical to those of the Comitia Tributa.
Executive Magistrates
Each magistrate was vested with a degree of
maior potestas
("major power"). Each magistrate could veto any action that was
taken by a magistrate of an equal or lower rank.
Plebeian tribunes and
plebeian
aediles, on the other hand, were independent of the other
magistrates.
Magisterial powers, and checks on those powers
Each republican magistrate held certain
constitutional powers. Only the People of Rome (both plebeians
and patricians) had the right to confer these powers on
any individual magistrate. The most powerful constitutional power
was
imperium.
Imperium
was held by both consuls and praetors.
Imperium gave a
magistrate the authority to command a military force. All
magistrates also had the power of
coercion.
This was used by magistrates to maintain public order. While in
Rome, all citizens had an absolute protection against coercion.
This protection was called
provocatio (see below).
Magistrates also had both the power and the duty to look for omens.
This power would often be used to obstruct political
opponents.
One check over a magistrate's power was his
collegiality.
Each magisterial office would be held concurrently by at least two
people. Another check over the power of a magistrate was
provocatio.
Provocatio was a primordial form of
due process. It was a precursor to
habeas corpus. If any magistrate was
attempting to use the powers of the state against a citizen, that
citizen could appeal the decision of the magistrate to a tribune.
In addition, once a magistrate's annual term in office expired, he
would have to
wait
ten years before serving in that office again. Since this did
create problems for some consuls and praetors, these magistrates
would occasionally have their
imperium extended. In
effect, they would retain the powers of the office (as a
promagistrate), without officially holding
that office.
Consuls, praetors, censors, aediles, quaestors, tribunes, and
dictators
The
consul
of the Roman Republic was the highest ranking ordinary magistrate.
Consuls had supreme power in both civil and military matters. While
in the city of Rome, the consuls were the head of the Roman
government. They would preside over the senate and the assemblies.
While abroad, each consul would command an army. His authority
abroad would be nearly absolute.
Praetors
would administer civil law and command provincial armies. Every
five years, two
censors
would be elected for an eighteen month term. During their term in
office, the two censors would conduct a
census. During the census, they could enroll citizens
in the senate, or purge them from the senate.
Aediles
were officers elected to conduct domestic affairs in Rome, such as
managing public games and shows. The
quaestors
would usually assist the consuls in Rome, and the governors in the
provinces. Their duties were often financial.
Since the tribunes were considered to be the embodiment of the
plebeians, they were sacrosanct. Their sacrosanctity was enforced
by a pledge, taken by the plebeians, to kill any person who harmed
or interfered with a tribune during his term of office. All of the
powers of the tribune derived from their sacrosanctity. One obvious
consequence of this sacrosanctity was the fact that it was
considered a capital offense to harm a tribune, to disregard his
veto, or to interfere with a tribune.
In times of military emergency, a
dictator would be appointed for a term of six months.
Constitutional government would dissolve, and the dictator would
become the absolute master of the state. When the dictator's term
ended, constitutional government would be restored.
Political history
The constitutional history of the Roman Republic can be divided
into five phases.
The first phase began with the revolution
which overthrew the monarchy
in 509
BC. The final phase ended with the revolution which
overthrew the Roman Republic, and thus created the
Roman Empire, in 27 BC. Throughout the history
of the republic, the constitutional evolution was driven by the
struggle between the
aristocracy and the ordinary citizens.
The patrician era (509-367 BC)
According to legend, the last king was overthrown in 509 BC. The
historical monarchy, as the legends suggest, was probably
overthrown quickly, but the constitutional changes which occurred
immediately after the revolution were probably not as extensive as
the legends suggest. The most important constitutional change
probably concerned the chief executive. Before the revolution, a
king would be elected by the senators for a life term. Now, two
consuls were elected by the citizens for an
annual term. Each consul would check his colleague, and their
limited term in office would open them up to prosecution if they
abused the powers of their office. Consular political powers, when
exercised conjointly with a consular colleague, were no different
from those of the old king. In the immediate aftermath of the
revolution, the senate and the assemblies were as powerless as they
had been under the monarchy.
In the year 494 BC, the city was at war with two neighboring
tribes.
The plebeian soldiers refused to march
against the enemy, and instead seceded to
the Aventine
hill
. The plebeians demanded the right to elect
their own officials. The patricians agreed, and the plebeians
returned to the battlefield. The plebeians called these new
officials "
plebeian
tribunes". The tribunes would have two assistants, called
"
plebeian aediles". In 367 BC a law was
passed, which required the election of at least one plebeian aedile
each year. In 443 BC, the
censorship was
created, and in 366 BC, the praetorship was created. Also in 366
BC, the curule aedileship was created. Shortly after the founding
of the republic, the Comitia Centuriata ("Assembly of the
Centuries") became the principal legislative assembly. In this
assembly, magistrates were elected, and laws were passed.
During the fourth century BC, a series of reforms were passed. The
result of these reforms was that any law passed by the Plebeian
Council would have the full force of law. This gave the tribunes
(who presided over the Plebeian Council) a positive character for
the first time. Before these laws were passed, the only power that
the tribunes held was that of the veto.
The Conflict of the Orders (367-287 BC)
After the plebeian aedileship had been created, the patricians
created the curule aedileship. After the consulship had been opened
to the plebeians, the plebeians were able to hold both the
dictatorship and the censorship. In 337 BC, the first plebeian
praetor was elected.
In 342 BC, two significant laws were passed. One of these two laws
made it illegal to hold more than one office at any given point in
time. The other law required an interval of ten years to pass
before any magistrate could seek reelection to any office.
During these years, the tribunes and the senators grew increasingly
close. The senate realized the need to use plebeian officials to
accomplish desired goals. To win over the tribunes, the senators
gave the tribunes a great deal of power and the tribunes began to
feel obligated to the senate. As the tribunes and the senators grew
closer, plebeian senators were often able to secure the tribunate
for members of their own families. In time, the tribunate became a
stepping stone to higher office.
Around the middle of the fourth century BC, the Concilium Plebis
enacted the "Ovinian Law". During the early republic, only consuls
could appoint new senators. The Ovinian law, however, gave this
power to the censors. It also required the censor to appoint any
newly-elected magistrate to the senate. By this point, plebeians
were already holding a significant number of magisterial offices.
Thus, the number of plebeian senators probably increased quickly.
However, it remained difficult for a plebeian to enter the senate
if he was not from a well-known political family, as a new
patrician-like plebeian aristocracy emerged. The old nobility
existed through the force of law, because only patricians were
allowed to stand for high office. The new nobility existed due to
the organization of society. As such, only a revolution could
overthrow this new structure.
By 287 BC, the economic condition of the average plebeian had
become poor. The problem appears to have centered around widespread
indebtedness. The plebeians demanded relief, but the senators
refused to address their situation. The result was the final
plebeian secession.
The plebeians seceded to the Janiculum hill
. To end the secession, a dictator was
appointed. The dictator passed a law (the "Hortensian Law"), which
ended the requirement that the patrician senators must agree before
any bill could be considered by the Plebeian Council. This was not
the first law to require that an act of the Plebeian Council have
the full force of law. The Plebeian Council acquired this power
during a modification to the original Valerian law in 449 BC. The
significance of this law was in the fact that it robbed the
patricians of their final weapon over the plebeians. The result was
that control over the state fell, not onto the shoulders of voters
in a democracy, but to the new plebeian nobility.
The plebeians had finally achieved political equality with the
patricians. However, the plight of the average plebeian had not
changed. A small number of plebeian families achieved the same
standing that the old aristocratic patrician families had always
had, but the new plebeian aristocrats became as uninterested in the
plight of the average plebeian as the old patrician aristocrats had
always been.
The supremacy of the new nobility (287-133 BC)
The great accomplishment of the Hortensian Law was in that it
deprived the patricians of their last weapon over the plebeians.
Thus, the last great political question of the earlier era had been
resolved. As such, no important political changes would occur
between 287 BC and 133 BC. The critical laws of this era were still
enacted by the senate. In effect, democracy was satisfied with the
possession of power, but did not care to use it. The senate was
supreme during this era because the era was dominated by questions
of foreign and military policy. This era was the most militarily
active era of the Roman Republic.
The final decades of this era saw a worsening economic situation
for many plebeians. The long military campaigns had forced citizens
to leave their farms to fight, only to return to farms that had
fallen into disrepair. The landed aristocracy began buying
bankrupted farms at discounted prices. As commodity prices fell,
many farmers could no longer operate their farms at a profit. The
result was the ultimate bankruptcy of countless farmers. Masses of
unemployed plebeians soon began to flood into Rome, and thus into
the ranks of the legislative assemblies. Their economic state
usually led them to vote for the candidate who offered the most for
them. A new culture of dependency was emerging, which would look to
any populist leader for relief.
From the Gracchi to Caesar (133-49 BC)
The prior era saw great military successes, and great economic
failures. The patriotism of the plebeians had kept them from
seeking any new reforms. Now, the military situation had
stabilized, and fewer soldiers were needed. This, in conjunction
with the new slaves that were being imported from abroad, inflamed
the unemployment situation further. The flood of unemployed
citizens to Rome had made the assemblies quite populist. The
ultimate result was an increasingly aggressive democracy.
The Gracchi tribunates
Gaius Gracchus, tribune of the people,
presiding over the Plebeian Council
Tiberius Gracchus was elected
tribune in 133 BC. He attempted to enact a law which would have
limited the amount of land that any individual could own. The
aristocrats, who stood to lose an enormous amount of money, were
bitterly opposed to this proposal. Tiberius submitted this law to
the Plebeian Council, but the law was vetoed by a tribune named
Marcus Octavius. Tiberius then used
the Plebeian Council to
impeach Octavius.
The theory, that a representative of the people ceases to be one
when he acts against the wishes of the people, was counter to Roman
constitutional theory. If carried to its logical end, this theory
would remove all constitutional restraints on the popular will, and
put the state under the absolute control of a temporary popular
majority. His law was enacted, but Tiberius was murdered when he
stood for reelection to the tribunate.
Tiberius' brother Gaius was elected tribune in 123 BC.
Gaius Gracchus' ultimate goal was to weaken
the senate and to strengthen the democratic forces. In the past,
for example, the senate would eliminate political rivals either by
establishing special judicial commissions or by passing a
senatus consultum ultimum ("ultimate decree of the
senate"). Both devices would allow the senate to bypass the
ordinary due process rights that all citizens had. Gaius outlawed
the judicial commissions, and declared the
senatus consultum
ultimum to be unconstitutional. Gaius then proposed a law
which would grant citizenship rights to Rome's Italian allies. By
this point, however, the selfish democracy of Rome deserted him. He
stood for election to a third term in 121 BC, but was defeated and
then murdered. The democracy, however, had finally realized how
weak the senate had become.
The populares party and the optimates
party
In 118 BC, King
Micipsa of
Numidia in North Africa died. He was survived by his
two legitimate sons,
Adherbal and
Hiempsal, and by his bastard son,
Jugurtha. Micipsa divided his kingdom between these
three sons. Jugurtha, however, turned on his brothers, killing
Hiempsal and driving Adherbal out of Numidia. Adherbal fled to Rome
for assistance, and initially Rome mediated a division of the
country between the two brothers. Eventually, Jugurtha renewed his
offensive, leading to a long and inconclusive war with Rome. He
also bribed several Roman commanders, and at least two tribunes,
before and during the war. His nemesis,
Gaius Marius, a young legate from a virtually
unknown provincial family, returned from the war in Numidia and was
elected consul in 107 BC over the objections of the aristocratic
senators. Marius invaded Numidia and brought the war to a quick
end, capturing Jugurtha in the process. The apparent incompetence
of the senate, and the brilliance of Marius, had been put on full
display. The
populares party took
full advantage of this opportunity by allying itself with
Marius.
Several years later, in 88 BC, a Roman army was sent to put down an
emerging Asian power, king
Mithridates of
Pontus. The army, however, was defeated. One of
Marius' old quaestors,
Lucius
Cornelius Sulla, had been elected consul for the year, and was
ordered by the senate to assume command of the war against
Mithridates. Marius, a member of the democratic ("
populares") party, had a tribune revoke
Sulla's command of the war against Mithridates. Sulla, a member of
the aristocratic ("
optimates")
party, brought his army back to Italy and marched on Rome. Sulla
was so angry at Marius' tribune that he passed a law intended to
permanently weaken the tribunate. He then returned to his war
against Mithridates. With Sulla gone, the
populares under
Marius and
Lucius Cornelius
Cinna soon took control of the city.
During the period in which the
populares party controlled
the city, they flouted convention by re-electing Marius consul
several times without observing the customary ten year interval
between offices. They also transgressed the established oligarchy
by advancing unelected individuals to magisterial office, and by
substituting magisterial edicts for popular legislation.
Sulla soon made peace with Mithridates. In 83 BC, he returned to
Rome, overcame all resistance, and recaptured the city. Sulla and
his supporters then slaughtered most of Marius' supporters. Sulla,
having observed the violent results of radical
popular
reforms, was naturally conservative. As such, he sought to
strengthen the aristocracy, and by extension the senate. Sulla made
himself dictator, passed a series of constitutional reforms,
resigned the dictatorship, and served one last term as consul. He
died in 78 BC.
Pompey, Crassus, and the Catilinarian Conspiracy
In 77 BC, the senate sent one of Sulla's former lieutenants,
Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus ("Pompey the Great"),
to put down an uprising in Spain. By 71 BC, Pompey returned to Rome
after having completed his mission. Around the same time, another
of Sulla's former lieutenants,
Marcus Licinius Crassus, had just
put down a slave revolt in Italy. Upon their return, Pompey and
Crassus found the
populares party fiercely attacking
Sulla's constitution. They attempted to forge an agreement with the
populares party. If both Pompey and Crassus were elected
consul in 70 BC, they would dismantle the more obnoxious components
of Sulla's constitution. The two were soon elected, and quickly
dismantled most of Sulla's constitution.
Around 66 BC, a movement to use constitutional, or at least
peaceful, means to address the plight of various classes began.
After several failures, the movement's leaders decided to use any
means that were necessary to accomplish their goals. The movement
coalesced under an aristocrat named
Lucius Sergius Catiline. The
movement was based in the town of Faesulae, which was a natural
hotbed of agrarian agitation. The rural malcontents were to advance
on Rome, and be aided by an uprising within the city. After
assassinating the consuls and most of the senators, Catiline would
be free to enact his reforms. The conspiracy was set in motion in
63 BC. The consul for the year,
Marcus Tullius Cicero, intercepted
messages that Catiline had sent in an attempt to recruit more
members. As a result, the top conspirators in Rome (including at
least one former consul) were executed by authorization (of dubious
constitutionality) of the senate, and the planned uprising was
disrupted. Cicero then sent an army, which cut Catiline's forces to
pieces.
The most important result of the Catilinarian conspiracy was that
the
populares party became discredited. The prior 70 years
had witnessed a gradual erosion in senatorial powers. The violent
nature of the conspiracy, in conjunction with the senate's skill in
disrupting it, did a great deal to repair the senate's image.
The First Triumvirate
In 62 BC, Pompey returned victorious from Asia. The senate, elated
by its successes against Catiline, refused to ratify the
arrangements that Pompey had made. Pompey, in effect, became
powerless. Thus, when
Julius Caesar
returned from a governorship in Spain in 61 BC, he found it easy to
make an arrangement with Pompey. Caesar and Pompey, along with
Crassus, established a private agreement, now known as the
First Triumvirate. Under the agreement,
Pompey's arrangements would be ratified. Caesar would be elected
consul in 59 BC, and would then serve as governor of Gaul for five
years. Crassus was promised a future consulship.
Caesar became consul in 59 BC. His colleague,
Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus, was an
extreme aristocrat. Caesar submitted the laws that he had promised
Pompey to the assemblies. Bibulus attempted to obstruct the
enactment of these laws, and so Caesar used violent means to ensure
their passage. Caesar was then made governor of three provinces. He
facilitated the election of the former patrician
Clodius to the tribunate for 58 BC. Clodius set
about depriving Caesar's senatorial enemies of two of their more
obstinate leaders in
Cato and
Cicero. Clodius was a bitter opponent of Cicero because Cicero had
testified against him in a sacrilege case. Clodius attempted to try
Cicero for executing citizens without a trial during the Catiline
conspiracy, resulting in Cicero going into self-imposed exile and
his house in Rome being burnt down. Clodius also passed a bill that
forced Cato to lead the invasion of Cyprus which would keep him
away from Rome for some years. Clodius also passed a bill that gave
the populace a free grain dole, which had previously just been
subsidised.
The end of the First Triumvirate
Clodius formed armed gangs that terrorised the city and eventually
began to attack Pompey's followers, who in response funded
counter-gangs formed by
Titus Annius Milo. The
political alliance of the triumvirate was crumbling. Domitius
Ahenobarbus ran for the consulship in 55
BC promising to take Caesar's command from him. Eventually, the
triumvirate was renewed at Luca. Pompey and Crassus were promised
the consulship in 55 BC, and Caesar's term as governor was extended
for five years. Crassus led an ill-fated expedition with legions
led by his son, Caesar's lieutenant, against the Kingdom of
Parthia. This resulted in his defeat and death at the
Battle of Carrhae. Finally, Pompey's wife,
Julia, who was Caesar's daughter, died in childbirth. This event
severed the last remaining bond between Pompey and Caesar.
Beginning in the summer of 54 BC, a wave of political corruption
and violence swept Rome. This chaos reached a climax in January of
52 BC, when Clodius was murdered in a gang war by Milo. On January
1 of 49 BC, an agent of Caesar presented an ultimatum to the
senate. The ultimatum was rejected, and the senate then passed a
resolution which declared that if Caesar did not lay down his arms
by July of that year, he would be considered an enemy of the
republic. On January 7 of 49 BC, the senate passed a
senatus
consultum ultimum, which vested Pompey with dictatorial
powers. Pompey's army, however, was composed largely of untested
conscripts. On January 10, Caesar crossed the
Rubicon with his veteran army (in violation of Roman
laws) and marched towards Rome. Caesar's rapid advance forced
Pompey, the consuls and the senate to abandon Rome for Greece.
Caesar entered the city unopposed.
The period of transition (49-29 BC)
The era that began when Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon in 49 BC
and ended when Octavian returned to Rome after Actium in 29 BC, saw
the constitutional evolution of the prior century accelerate at a
rapid pace. By 29 BC, Rome had completed its transition from being
a city-state with a network of dependencies, to being the capital
of a world empire.
With Pompey defeated and order restored, Caesar wanted to ensure
that his control over the government was undisputed. The powers
which he would give himself would ultimately be used by his
imperial successors. He would assume these powers by increasing his
own authority, and by decreasing the authority of Rome's other
political institutions.
Caesar would hold both the dictatorship and the tribunate, but
alternated between the consulship and the proconsulship. In 48 BC,
Caesar was given permanent tribunician powers. This made his person
sacrosanct, gave him the power to veto the senate, and allowed him
to dominate the Plebeian Council. In 46 BC, Caesar was given
censorial powers, which he used to fill the senate with his own
partisans. Caesar then raised the membership of the senate to 900.
This robbed the senatorial aristocracy of its prestige, and made it
increasingly subservient to him. While the assemblies continued to
meet, he submitted all candidates to the assemblies for election,
and all bills to the assemblies for enactment. Thus, the assemblies
became powerless and were unable to oppose him.
Near the end of his life, Caesar began to prepare for a war against
the
Parthian Empire. Since his absence from
Rome would limit his ability to install his own consuls, he passed
a law which allowed him to appoint all magistrates in 43 BC, and
all consuls and tribunes in 42 BC. This, in effect, transformed the
magistrates from being representatives of the people to being
representatives of the dictator.
Caesar's assassination and the Second Triumvirate
Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC. The motives of the conspirators
were both personal and political. The assassination was lead by
Gaius Cassius and
Marcus Brutus. Most of the conspirators were
senators, many of whom were angry that Caesar had deprived the
senate of much of its power and prestige. Others believed he was a
tyrant, abusing his power and clearing a path to absolute rule as a
king. The senators took it upon themselves to destroy Caesar before
he made himself invulnerable, and they stabbed Caesar to death in
the senate chamber on March 15 (44 BC). A civil war followed that
destroyed what was left of the republic.
After the assassination,
Mark Antony
formed an alliance with Caesar's adopted son and great-nephew,
Gaius Octavian. Along with
Marcus Lepidus, they
formed an alliance known as the
Second Triumvirate. They held powers that
were nearly identical to the powers that Caesar had held under his
constitution. As such, the senate and assemblies remained
powerless, even after Caesar had been assassinated. The
conspirators were then defeated at the
Battle of Philippi in 42 BC. Eventually,
however, Antony and Octavian fought against each other in one last
battle.
Antony was defeated in the naval Battle of
Actium in 31 BC, and he committed suicide with his love,
Cleopatra. In 29 BC, Octavian
returned to Rome as the unchallenged master of the empire and later
accepted the title of
Augustus-"Exalted
One" .
Culture
Life in
the Roman Republic revolved around the city of
Rome
, and its famed seven
hills. The city also had several
theaters.
gymnasiums, and many
taverns,
baths and
brothels.
Throughout the territory under Rome's
control, residential architecture ranged from very modest houses to country villas,
and in the capital city of Rome, to the
residences on the elegant Palatine Hill
, from which the word "palace" is
derived. The vast majority of the population lived in the
city center, packed into apartment blocks.
Most
Roman towns and cities had a forum
and temples,
as did the city of Rome itself. Aqueducts were built to bring
water to urban centers and
wine and
oil were imported from abroad. Landlords
generally resided in cities and their estates were left in the care
of farm managers. To stimulate a higher labor productivity, many
landlords freed a large numbers of slaves.
Beginning in the middle of the second century BC, Greek culture was
increasingly ascendant, in spite of tirades against the "softening"
effects of Hellenized culture. By the time of Augustus, cultured
Greek household slaves taught the Roman young (sometimes even the
girls). Greek sculptures adorned Hellenistic landscape gardening on
the Palatine or in the
villas, and much
Roman cuisine was essentially Greek. Roman writers disdained Latin
for a cultured Greek style.
Social history and structure
Many aspects of Roman culture were borrowed from the
Greeks. In
architecture and
sculpture, the difference between Greek models and
Roman paintings are apparent. The chief Roman contributions to
architecture were the
arch and the
dome. Rome has also had a tremendous impact on Western
cultures following it. Its significance is perhaps best reflected
in its endurance and influence, as is seen in the longevity and
lasting importance of works of
Virgil and
Ovid.
Latin, the
Republic's primary language, remains used in
religion,
science, and
law.
The center of the early social structure was the family, which was
not only marked by
blood relations but
also by the legally constructed relation of
patria potestas. The
Pater familias was the absolute head of the
family; he was the master over his wife, his children, the wives of
his sons, the nephews, the slaves and the freedmen, disposing of
them and of their goods at will, even putting them to death. Roman
law recognized only patrician families as legal entities.
Slavery and slaves were part of the social
order; there were
slave markets where
they could be bought and sold. Many slaves were freed by the
masters for services rendered; some slaves could save money to buy
their freedom. Generally
mutilation and
murder of slaves was prohibited by
legislation. It is estimated that over 25% of the Roman population
was enslaved.
Clothing and dining
The cloth and the dress distinguished one class of people from the
other class. The tunic worn by
plebeians,
or common people, like shepherds and slaves, was made from coarse
and dark material, whereas the
tunic worn by
patricians was of linen or
white wool. A knight or magistrate would wear an
augusticlavus, a tunic bearing small purple studs.
Senators wore tunics with broad red stripes, called
tunica
laticlavia. Military tunics were shorter than the ones worn by
civilians. Boys, up until the festival of
Liberalia, wore the
toga praetexta, which
was a toga with a crimson or purple border. The
toga
virilis, (or
toga pura) was worn by men over the age
of 16 to signify their citizenship in Rome. The
toga picta
was worn by triumphant generals and had embroidery of their skill
on the battlefield. The
toga pulla was worn when in
mourning.
Even
footwear indicated a person’s social
status. Patricians wore red and orange
sandals, senators had brown footwear,
consuls had white shoes, and soldiers wore heavy boots. Men
typically wore a
toga, and women a
stola. The woman's
stola looked different
than a toga, and was usually brightly colored. The Romans also
invented socks for those soldiers required to fight on the northern
frontiers, sometimes worn in sandals.
Romans had simple food habits. Staple food was simple, generally
consumed at around 11 o’clock, and consisted of
bread,
salad,
cheese,
fruits,
nuts, and cold meat left over from the dinner
the night before. The Roman poet,
Horace
mentions another Roman favorite, the
olive, in
reference to his own diet, which he describes as very simple: "As
for me, olives,
endives, and smooth
mallows provide sustenance." The family ate
together, sitting on
stools around a
table. Fingers were used to eat solid
foods and
spoons were used for soups.
Wine was considered a staple drink, consumed at all meals and
occasions by all classes and was quite cheap.
Cato the Elder once advised cutting his
rations in half to conserve wine for the workforce. Many types of
drinks involving grapes and honey were consumed as well. Drinking
on an empty stomach was regarded as boorish and a sure sign for
alcoholism, whose debilitating physical
and psychological effects were known to the Romans. An accurate
accusation of being an alcoholic was an effective way to discredit
political rivals. Prominent Roman alcoholics included
Mark Antony, and Cicero's own son Marcus
(
Cicero Minor). Even
Cato the Younger was known to be a heavy
drinker.
Education and language
Following various military conquests in the
Greek East, Romans adapted a number of Greek
educational precepts to their own fledgling system. physical
training to prepare the boys to grow as Roman citizens and for
eventual
recruitment into the
army. Conforming to discipline was a point of great
emphasis. Girls generally received instruction from their mothers
in the art of
spinning,
weaving, and
sewing.
Schooling in a more formal sense was begun around 200 BC. Education
began at the age of around six, and in the next six to seven years,
boys and girls were expected to learn the basics of
reading,
writing
and
counting. By the age of twelve, they
would be learning
Latin,
Greek,
grammar and
literature, followed by training for
public speaking.
Oratory was an art to be practiced and learnt, and
good orators commanded respect. To become an effective orator was
one of the objectives of
education and
learning. In some cases, services of gifted
slaves were utilized for imparting education.
The native language of the Romans was
Latin.
Although surviving
Latin literature
consists almost entirely of
Classical
Latin, an artificial and highly stylized and polished
literary language from the 1st century BC,
the actual spoken language was
Vulgar
Latin, which significantly differed from Classical Latin in
grammar, vocabulary, and eventually pronunciation. Rome's expansion
spread Latin throughout Europe, and over time Vulgar Latin evolved
and
dialectized in different locations,
gradually shifting into a number of distinct
Romance languages. Many of these languages,
including
French,
Italian,
Portuguese,
Romanian and
Spanish, flourished, the differences
between them growing greater over time. Although
English is
Germanic rather than Romanic in origin,
English borrows heavily from Latin and Latin-derived words.
The arts
Roman literature was from its very inception influenced heavily by
Greek authors. Some of the earliest works we possess are of
historical epics telling the early military history of Rome. As the
republic expanded, authors began to produce poetry, comedy,
history, and tragedy.
Virgil represents the
pinnacle of Roman epic poetry.
His Aeneid
tells the story of flight of Aeneas from Troy
and his
settlement of the city that would become Rome. Lucretius, in his
On the Nature of Things,
attempted to explicate
science in an epic
poem. The genre of satire was common in Rome, and satires were
written by, among others,
Juvenal
and
Persius. The
rhetorical works of
Cicero
are considered to be some of the best bodies of correspondence
recorded in antiquity.
In the 3rd century BC, Greek art taken as booty from wars became
popular, and many Roman homes were decorated with landscapes by
Greek artists. Portrait sculpture during the period utilized
youthful and classical proportions, evolving later into a mixture
of realism and idealism. Advancements were also made in relief
sculptures, often depicting Roman victories.
Music was a major part of everyday life. The word itself derives
from
Greek μουσική
(
mousike), "(art) of the
Muses". Many
private and public events were accompanied by music, ranging from
nightly dining to military parades and maneuvers. In a discussion
of any ancient music, however, non-specialists and even many
musicians have to be reminded that much of what makes our modern
music familiar to us is the result of developments only within the
last 1,000 years; thus, our ideas of melody, scales, harmony, and
even the instruments we use would not be familiar to Romans who
made and listened to music many centuries earlier.
Over time, Roman architecture was modified as their urban
requirements changed, and the
civil
engineering and
building construction technology became developed and refined. The
Roman concrete has remained a riddle,
and even after more than 2,000 years some Roman structures still
stand magnificently. The architectural style of the capital city
was emulated by other urban centers under Roman control and
influence. Roman cities were well planned, efficiently managed and
neatly maintained.
Sports and entertainment
The city of Rome had a place called the
Campus Martius ("Field of Mars"), which was a
sort of drill ground for Roman soldiers. Later, the Campus became
Rome’s track and field playground. In the campus, the youth
assembled to play and exercise, which included
jumping,
wrestling,
boxing and
racing.
Riding,
throwing, and
swimming were also preferred physical
activities. In the countryside,
pastime also
included
fishing and
hunting.
Board games
played in Rome included
Dice (Tesserae or
Tali), Roman Chess (
Latrunculi), Roman
Checkers (Calculi),
Tic-tac-toe (Terni Lapilli), and
Ludus duodecim scriptorum and
Tabula, predecessors of backgammon. There were several other
activities to keep people engaged like chariot races, musical and
theatrical performances,
Religion
Roman
religious beliefs date back to the founding of Rome, around 800
BC. However, the Roman religion commonly associated with the
republic and early empire did not begin until around 500 BC, when
Romans came in contact with
Greek
culture, and adopted many of the Greek’s religious beliefs. Private
and personal worship was an important aspect of religious
practices. In a sense, each
household was
a
temple to the
gods. Each household had an altar (
lararium), at which the family members would
offer prayers, perform
rites, and interact with
the household gods. Many of the gods that Romans worshiped came
from the
Proto-Indo-European pantheon,
others were based on
Greek gods. The two
most famous deities were
Jupiter
(the king God) and
Mars (the god of
war).
With its cultural influence spreading over
most of the Mediterranean, Romans began accepting foreign gods into their own
culture, as well as other philosophical traditions such as Cynicism and Stoicism.
Military
Structural history
The
structural history of the Roman military
describes the major chronological transformations in the
organization and constitution of the Roman armed forces. The Roman
military was split into the
Roman army
and the
Roman navy, although these two
branches were less distinct than they tend to be in modern defence
forces. Within the top-level branches of army and navy, structural
changes occurred both as a result of positive military reform and
through organic structural evolution.
Hoplite armies (509–c. 315 BC)
During
this period, Roman soliders seem to have been modelled after those
of the Etruscans
to the north, who themselves seem to have copied
their style of warfare from the
Greeks. Traditionally, the
introduction of the
phalanx
formation into the
Roman army is
ascribed to the city's penultimate king,
Servius Tullius (ruled 578 to 534 BC).
According to
Livy and
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, the
front rank was composed of the wealthiest citizens, who were able
to purchase the best equipment. Each subsequent rank consisted of
those with less wealth and poorer equipment than the one before
it.
One disadvantage of the phalanx was that it was only effective when
fighting in large, open spaces, which left the Romans at a
disadvantage when fighting in the hilly terrain of central
Italy. Sometime during the
fourth century BC, the Romans abandoned the
phalanx in favour of the more flexible manipluar formation. This
change is sometimes attributed to
Marcus Furius Camillus and placed
shortly after the
Gallic
invasion of 390 BC; it is more likely, however, that they were
copied from Rome's
Samnite enemies to the
south, possibly as a result of Samnite victories during the
Second Samnite War (326 to 304
BC).
Manipular legion (c. 315–107 BC)
During this period, an army formation of around 5,000 men (of both
heavy and light infantry) was known as a legion. The manipular army
was based upon social class, age and military experience.
Maniples were units of 120 men each drawn from a single
infantry class. The maniples were typically deployed into three
discreet lines based on the three heavy infantry types.
Each first line maniple were leather-armoured infantry soldiers who
wore a brass breastplate and a brass helmet adorned with 3 feathers
approximately 30 cm (12
in) in height
and carried an iron-clad wooden shield. They were armed with a
sword and two
throwing spears. The
second infantry line was armed and armoured in the same manner as
was the first infantry line. The second infantry line, however,
wore a lighter coat of mail rather than a solid brass breastplate.
The third infantry line was the last remnant of the hoplite-style
(the Greek-style formation used occasionally during the early
republic) troops in the Roman army. They were armed and armoured in
the same manner as were the soldiers in the second line, with the
exception that they carried a lighter spear.
The three infantry classes may have retained some slight parallel
to social divisions within Roman society, but at least officially
the three lines were based upon age and experience rather than
social class. Young, unproven men would serve in the first line,
older men with some military experience would serve in the second
line, and veteran troops of advanced age and experience would serve
in the third line.
The heavy infantry of the maniples were supported by a number of
light infantry and cavalry troops, typically 300 horsemen per
manipular legion. The cavalry was drawn primarily from the richest
class of equestrians. There was an additional class of troops who
followed the army without specific martial roles and were deployed
to the rear of the third line. Their role in accompanying the army
was primarily to supply any vacancies that might occur in the
maniples. The light infantry consisted of 1,200 unarmoured
skirmishing troops drawn from the youngest and lower social
classes. They were armed with a sword and a small shield, as well
as several light javelins.
A small navy had operated at a fairly low level after about 300 BC,
but it was massively upgraded about forty years later, during the
First Punic War.
After a period of
frenetic construction, the navy mushroomed to a size of more than
400 ships on the Carthaginian
("Punic") pattern. Once completed, it could
accommodate up to 100,000 sailors and embarked troops for battle.
The navy thereafter declined in size.
The extraordinary demands of the
Punic
Wars, in addition to a shortage of manpower, exposed the
tactical weaknesses of the manipular legion, at least in the short
term. In 217 BC, near the beginning of the
Second Punic War, Rome was forced to
effectively ignore its long-standing principle that its soldiers
must be both citizens and property owners. During the second
century BC, Roman territory saw an overall decline in population,
partially due to the huge losses incurred during various wars. This
was accompanied by severe social stresses and the greater collapse
of the middle classes. As a result, the Roman state was forced to
arm its soldiers at the expense of the state, which it had not had
to do in the past.
The distinction between the heavy infantry types began to blur,
perhaps because the state was now assuming the responsibility of
providing standard-issue equipment. In addition, the shortage of
available manpower led to a greater burden being placed upon Rome's
allies for the provision of allied troops. Eventually, the Romans
were forced to begin hiring mercenaries to fight alongside the
legions.
The legion after the reforms of Gaius Marius (107 BC – 27
BC)
In a process known as the
Marian
reforms, Roman
consul Gaius Marius carried out a programme of reform
of the Roman military. In 107 BC, all citizens, regardless of their
wealth or social class, were made eligible for entry into the Roman
army. This move formalised and concluded a gradual process that had
been growing for centuries, of removing property requirements for
military service. The distinction between the three heavy infantry
classes, which had already become blurred, had collapsed into a
single class of heavy legionary infantry. The heavy infantry
legionaries were drawn from citizen stock, while non-citizens came
to dominante the ranks of the light infantry. The army's
higher-level officers and commanders were still drawn exclusively
from the Roman aristocracy.
Unlike earlier in the Republic, legionaries were no longer fighting
on a seasonal basis to protect their land. Instead, they received
standard pay, and were employed by the state on a fixed-term basis.
As a consequence, military duty began to appeal most to the poorest
sections of society, to whom a salaried pay was attractive. A
destabilising consequence of this development was that the
proletariat "acquired a stronger and more elevated position" within
the state.
Bust of Marius, instigator of the
Marian reforms
The legions of the late Republic were, structurally, almost
entirely heavy infantry. The legion's main sub-unit was called a
cohort and consisted
of approximately 480 infantrymen. The cohort was therefore a much
larger unit than the earlier
maniple sub-unit, and was
divided into six
centuries of 80
men each. Each century was separated further into 10 "tent groups"
of 8 men each. Legions additionally consisted of a small body,
typically 120 men, of Roman legionary cavalry. The cavalry troops
were used as scouts and dispatch riders rather than battlefield
cavalry. Legions also contained a dedicated group of artillery crew
of perhaps 60 men. Each legion was normally partnered with an
approximately equal number of allied (non-Roman) troops.
However, the most obvious deficiency of the Roman army remained its
shortage of cavalry, especially heavy cavalry. As Rome's borders
expanded and its adversaries changed from largely infantry-based to
largely cavalry-based troops, the infantry-based Roman army began
to find itself at a tactical disadvantage, particularly in the
East.
After having declined in size following the subjugation of the
Mediterranean, the Roman navy underwent short-term upgrading and
revitalisation in the late Republic to meet several new demands.
Under
Caesar, an invasion fleet was
assembled in the English
Channel
to allow the invasion of Britannia; under Pompey, a large fleet was raised in the Mediterranean
Sea to clear the sea of Cilician
pirates. During the civil war that followed, as many as a
thousand ships were either constructed or pressed into service from
Greek cities.
Campaign history
The core of the
campaign history of the Roman Republican
military is the account of the
Roman military's land battles.
Despite the
encompassing of lands around the periphery of the Mediterranean sea, naval battles were typically less significant than
land battles to the military history of Rome.
As with most ancient civilisations, Rome's military served the
triple purposes of securing its borders, exploiting peripheral
areas through measures such as imposing tribute on conquered
peoples, and maintaining internal order. From the outset, Rome's
military typified this pattern and the majority of Rome's campaigns
were characterised by one of two types. The first is the
territorial
expansionist campaign,
normally begun as a counter-offensive, in which each victory
brought subjugation of large areas of territory. The second is the
civil war, of which examples plagued the
Roman Republic in its final century.
Roman armies were not invincible, despite their formidable
reputation and host of victories. Over the centuries the Romans
"
produced their share of incompetents" who led Roman
armies into catastrophic defeats. Nevertheless, it was generally
the fate of even the greatest of Rome's enemies, such as
Pyrrhus and
Hannibal, to win the battle but lose the war. The
history of Rome's campaigning is, if nothing else, a history of
obstinate persistence overcoming appalling losses.
Early Republic (458 BC - 274 BC)
Early Italian campaigns (458-396 BC)
The first Roman republican wars were wars of both expansion and
defence, aimed at protecting Rome itself from neighbouring cities
and nations and establishing its territory in the region.
Initially, Rome's immediate neighbours were either
Latin towns and villages, or else tribal Sabines from
the Apennine hills beyond. One by one Rome defeated both the
persistent Sabines and the local cities that were either under
Etruscan control or else Latin towns that had cast off their
Etruscan rulers. Rome defeated Latin cities in the
Battle of Lake Regillus in 496 BC,
the
Battle of Mons Algidus in
458 BC, the
Battle of Corbione in
446 BC, the
Battle of Aricia, and
an Etruscan city in the
Battle of
the Cremera in 477 BC, By the end of this period, Rome had
effectively completed the conquest of their immediate Etruscan and
Latin neighbours, as well as secured their position against the
immediate threat posed by the tribespeople of the nearby Apennine
hills.
Celtic invasion of Italia (390-387 BC)
By 390 BC, several Gallic tribes had begun invading Italy from the
north as their culture expanded throughout Europe. The Romans were
alerted of this when a particularly warlike tribe invaded two
Etruscan towns from the north. These two towns were not far from
Rome's sphere of influence. These towns, overwhelmed by the size of
the enemy in numbers and ferocity, called on Rome for help. The
Romans met them in pitched battle at the
Battle of Allia River around 390-387 BC.
The Gauls, under their chieftain
Brennus, defeated the Roman army of
around 15,000 troops and proceeded to pursue the fleeing Romans
back to Rome itself and sacked the city before being either driven
off or bought off. Now that the Romans and Gauls had bloodied one
another, intermittent warfare was to continue between the two in
Italy for more than two centuries.
The Celtic problem would not be resolved
for Rome until the final subjugation of all Gaul by Julius Caesar at the Battle of
Alesia
in 52 BC.
Roman expansion into Italia (343-282 BC)
Apennine hills around Samnium
Map showing Roman expansion in
Italy.
After recovering surprisingly swiftly from the sack of Rome, the
Romans immediately resumed their expansion within Italy. The
First Samnite War of between 343
BC and 341 BC was a relatively short affair: the Romans beat the
Samnites in two battles, but were forced to withdraw from the war
before they could pursue the conflict further due to the revolt of
several of their Latin allies in the
Latin
War. Rome bested the Latins in the
Battle of Vesuvius and again in the
Battle of Trifanum, after which
the Latin cities were obliged to submit to Roman rule.
The
Second Samnite War, from 327
BC to 304 BC, was a much longer and more serious affair for both
the Romans and Samnites. The fortunes of the two sides fluctuated
throughout its course. The Romans then proved victorious at the
Battle of Bovianum and the tide
turned strongly against the Samnites from 314 BC onwards, leading
them to sue for peace with progressively less generous terms. By
304 BC the Romans had effectively annexed the greater degree of the
Samnite territory, founding several colonies.
Seven years after their defeat, with Roman dominance of the area
looking assured, the Samnites rose again and defeated a Roman army
in 298 BC, to open the
Third Samnite
War. With this success in hand they managed to bring together a
coalition of several previous enemies of Rome. In the
Battle of Populonia in 282 BC Rome
finished off the last vestiges of Etruscan power in the
region.
Pyrrhic War (280-275 BC)
Route of Pyrrhus of Epirus
By the
beginning of the third century, Rome had established itself as a
major power on the Italian
Peninsula, but had not yet come into conflict with the dominant
military powers in the Mediterranean at the time: Carthage and the Greek
kingdoms.
When a diplomatic dispute between Rome and a Greek colony erupted
into open warfare in a naval confrontation, the Greek colony
appealed for military aid to
Pyrrhus, ruler of the northwestern Greek
kingdom of
Epirus. Motivated by a
personal desire for military accomplishment, Pyrrhus landed a Greek
army of some 25,000 men on Italian soil in 280 BC.
Despite early victories, Pyrrhus found his position in Italy
untenable. Rome steadfastly refused to negotiate with Pyrrhus as
long as his army remained in Italy. Facing unacceptably heavy
losses with each encounter with the Roman army, Pyrrhus withdrew
from the peninsula. In 275 BC, Pyrrhus again met the Roman army at
the
Battle of
Beneventum. While Beneventum was indecisive, Pyrrhus realised
his army had been exhausted and reduced, by years of foreign
campaigns, and seeing little hope for further gains, he withdrew
completely from Italy.
The conflicts with Pyrrhus would have a great effect on Rome. Rome
had shown it was capable of pitting its armies successfully against
the dominant military powers of the Mediterranean, and that the
Greek kingdoms were incapable of defending their colonies in Italy
and abroad. Rome quickly moved into southern Italia, subjugating
and dividing the Greek colonies. Now, Rome effectively dominated
the Italian peninsula, and won an international military
reputation.
Mid-Republic (274 BC - 148 BC)
Punic Wars (264-146 BC)
Theatre of Punic Wars
The
First Punic War began in 264 BC
when settlements on Sicily began to appeal to the two powers
between which they lay - Rome and Carthage - in order to solve
internal conflicts. The war saw land battles in Sicily early on,
but the theatre shifted to naval battles around Sicily and Africa.
Before the
First Punic War there was
no Roman navy to speak of.
The new war in Sicily
against Carthage, a great naval power, forced Rome to quickly build
a fleet and train sailors.
The first
few naval battles were catastrophic disasters for Rome.
However, after training more sailors and inventing a grappling
engine, a Roman naval force was able to defeat a Carthaginian
fleet, and further naval victories followed. The Carthaginians then
hired
Xanthippus of Carthage,
a Spartan mercenary general, to reorganise and lead their army. He
managed to cut off the Roman army from its base by re-establishing
Carthaginian naval supremacy. With their newfound naval abilities,
the Romans then beat the Carthaginians in naval battle again at the
Battle of the Aegates
Islands and leaving Carthage without a fleet or sufficient coin
to raise one. For a maritime power the loss of their access to the
Mediterranean stung financially and psychologically, and the
Carthaginians sued for peace.
Continuing distrust led to the renewal of hostilities in the
Second Punic War when
Hannibal Barca attacked a Spanish town, which
had diplomatic ties to Rome. Hannibal then crossed the Italian Alps
to invade Italy.
Hannibal's successes in Italy began
immediately, and reached an early climax at the Battle of
Cannae
, where 70,000 Romans were killed.
In three battles, the Romans managed to hold off Hannibal but then
Hannibal smashed a succession of Roman consular armies. By this
time Hannibal's brother
Hasdrubal
Barca sought to cross the Alps into Italy and join his brother
with a second army. Hasdrubal managed to break through into Italy
only to be defeated decisively on the
Metaurus River. Unable to defeat
Hannibal himself on Italian soil, the Romans boldly sent an army to
Africa under
Scipio Africanus with
the intention of threatening the Carthaginian capital. Hannibal was
recalled to Africa, and defeated at the
Battle of Zama.
Carthage never managed to recover after the Second Punic War and
the
Third Punic War that followed
was in reality a simple punitive mission to raze the city of
Carthage to the ground. Carthage was almost defenseless and when
besieged offered immediate surrender, conceding to a string of
outrageous Roman demands. The Romans refused the surrender, and the
city was stormed after a short siege and completely destroyed.
Ultimately, all of Carthage's North African and Spanish territories
were acquired by Rome.
Macedon, the Greek poleis, and Illyria (215-148 BC)
- Poleis and wars
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 Map showing the southern Balkans and
western Asia Minor
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Rome's preoccupation with its war with Carthage provided an
opportunity for
Philip V of the
kingdom of
Macedon, located in the north of
the
Greek peninsula, to attempt to
extend his power westward. Philip sent ambassadors to Hannibal's
camp in Italy, to negotiate an alliance as common enemies of Rome.
However, Rome discovered the agreement when Philip's emissaries
were captured by a Roman fleet. The
First Macedonian War saw the Romans
involved directly in only limited land operations, but they
ultimately achieved their objective of pre-occupying Philip and
preventing him from aiding Hannibal.
Macedon began to encroach on territory claimed by Greek city states
in 200 BC and these states pleaded for help from their newfound
ally Rome. Rome gave Philip an ultimatum that he must submit
Macedonia to being essentially a Roman province. Philip refused,
and Rome declared war against Philip in the
Second Macedonian War. Ultimately, in
197 BC, the Romans defeated Philip at the
Battle of Cynoscephalae, and
Macedonia was forced to surrender.
Rome now turned its attentions to one of the Greek kingdoms, the
Seleucid Empire, in the east. A
Roman force defeated the Seleucids at the
Battle of Thermopylae and
forced them to evacuate Greece. The Romans then pursued the
Seleucids beyond Greece, beating them in the decisive engagement of
the
Battle of Magnesia.
In 179 BC Philip died and his talented and ambitious son, Perseus,
took his throne and showed a renewed interest in Greece. Rome
declared war on Macedonia again, starting the
Third Macedonian War. Perseus initially
had greater military success against the Romans than his father.
However, as with all such ventures in this period, Rome responded
by simply sending another army.
The second consular army duly defeated the
Macedonians at the Battle of Pydna
in 168 BC and the Macedonians duly capitulated,
ending the Third Macedonian
War.
The Fourth Macedonian War, fought from 150 BC to 148 BC, was the
final war between Rome and Macedon. The Romans swiftly defeated the
Macedonians at the
Second
battle of Pydna. Another Roman army besieged and destroyed
Corinth in 146 BC, which led to
the surrender and thus conquest of Greece.
Late Republic (147 BC - 30 BC)
Jugurthine War (111-104 BC)
The
Jugurthine War of 111-104 BC was
fought between Rome and
Jugurtha of the
North African kingdom of
Numidia. It
constituted the final Roman pacification of Northern Africa, after
which Rome largely ceased expansion on the continent after reaching
natural barriers of desert and mountain. Following Jugurtha's
usurpation of the throne of Numidia, a loyal ally of Rome since the
Punic Wars, Rome felt compelled to intervene. Jugurtha impudently
bribed the Romans into accepting his usurpation. Jugurtha was
finally captured not in battle but by treachery.
The Celtic threat (121 BC) and the new Germanic threat (113-101
BC)
In 121 BC, Rome came into contact with two Celtic tribes (from a
region in modern France), both of which they defeated with apparent
ease. The
Cimbrian War (113-101 BC) was
a far more serious affair than the earlier clashes of 121 BC. The
Germanic tribes of the
Cimbri and the
Teutons migrated from northern Europe into
Rome's northern territories, and clashed with Rome and her allies.
At the
Battle of Aquae
Sextiae and the
Battle of
Vercellae both tribes were virtually annihalated, which ended
the threat.
Internal unrest (135-71 BC)
The extensive campaigning abroad by Roman generals, and the
rewarding of soldiers with plunder on these campaigns, led to a
general trend of soldiers becoming increasingly loyal to their
generals rather than to the state. Rome was also plagued by several
slave uprisings during this period, in part because vast tracts of
land had been given over to slave farming in which the slaves
greatly outnumbered their Roman masters. In the last century BC at
least twelve
civil wars
and rebellions occurred. This pattern did not break until Octavian
(later
Caesar Augustus)
ended it by becoming a successful challenger to the Senate's
authority, and was made
princeps
(emperor).
Between 135 BC and 71 BC there were three
"Servile Wars" involving slave uprisings
against the Roman state, the
third
and final uprising was the most serious. involving ultimately
between 120,000 and 150,000 slaves under the command of the
gladiator
Spartacus. Additionally, in 91
BC the
Social War
broke out between Rome and its former allies in Italy over dissent
among the allies that they shared the risk of Rome's military
campaigns, but not its rewards. Although they lost militarily, the
allies achieved their objectives with legal proclamations which
granted citizenship to more than 500,000 Italians.
The internal unrest reached its most serious state, however, in the
two civil wars that were caused by the consul
Lucius Cornelius Sulla at the
beginning of 82 BC. In the
Battle of the Colline Gate at the
very door of the city of Rome, a Roman army under Sulla bested an
army of the Roman senate, entered the city, and marched on Rome.
Sulla's actions marked a watershed in the willingness of Roman
troops to wage war against one another that was to pave the way for
the wars which ultimately overthrew the republic, and caused the
founding of the
Roman Empire.
Conflicts with Mithridates (89-63 BC) and the Cilician pirates
(67 BC)
Mithridates the Great was the ruler of
Pontus, a large kingdom in
Asia
Minor
(modern Turkey), from 120 to 63 BC.
Mithridates antagonised Rome by seeking to expand his kingdom, and
Rome for her part seemed equally keen for war and the spoils and
prestige that it might bring. In 88 BC, Mithridates ordered the
killing of a majority of the 80,000 Romans living in his kingdom.
The massacre was the official reason given for the commencement of
hostilities in the
First
Mithridatic War. The Roman general
Lucius Cornelius Sulla forced
Mithridates out of Greece proper, but then had to return to Italy
to answer the internal threat posed by his rival,
Gaius Marius. A peace was made between Rome and
Pontus, but this proved only a temporary lull.
The
Second Mithridatic War
began when Rome tried to annex a province that Mithridates claimed
as his own. In the
Third
Mithridatic War, first
Lucius Licinius Lucullus and then
Pompey the Great were sent against
Mithridates. Mithridates was finally defeated by Pompey in the
night-time
Battle of the
Lycus.
The Mediterranean had at this time fallen into the hands of
pirates, largely from
Cilicia. The pirates not only strangled shipping
lanes but also plundered many cities on the coasts of Greece and
Asia.
Pompey was nominated as commander of a
special naval task force to campaign against the pirates. It took
Pompey just forty days to clear the western portion of the sea of
pirates and restore communication between Iberia (Spain), Africa,
and Italy.
Caesar's early campaigns (59-50 BC)
Map of the Gallic Wars
During a term as praetor in Iberia (modern Spain), Pompey's
contemporary
Julius Caesar defeated
two local tribes in battle. Following his term as consul in 59 BC,
he was then appointed to a five year term as the proconsular
Governor of Cisalpine Gaul (current northern Italy), Transalpine
Gaul (current southern France) and Illyria (the modern Balkans).
Not content with an idle governorship, Caesar strove to find reason
to invade Gaul, which would give him the dramatic military success
he sought. When two local tribes began to migrate on a route that
would take them near (not into) the Roman province of Transalpine
Gaul, Caesar had the barely sufficient excuse he needed for his
Gallic Wars, fought between 58 BC and 49
BC.
Caesar defeated large armies at major battles 58 BC and 57 BC. In
55 and 54 BC he made
two
expeditions into Britain, becoming the first Roman to do so.
Caesar
then defeated a union of Gauls at the Battle of Alesia, completing the Roman conquest of Transalpine
Gaul. By 50 BC, the entirety of Gaul lay in Roman hands.
Gaul never regained its Celtic identity, never attempted another
nationalist rebellion, and remained loyal to Rome until the fall of
the western empire in 476.
Triumvirates and Caesarian ascension (53-30 BC)
By 59 BC an unofficial political alliance known as the
First Triumvirate was formed between
Gaius Julius Caesar,
Marcus Licinius Crassus, and
Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus
("Pompey the Great") to share power and influence. In 53 BC,
Crassus launched a Roman invasion of the Parthian Empire (modern
Iraq and Iran). After initial successes, he marched his army deep
into the desert; but here his army was cut off deep in enemy
territory, surrounded and slaughtered at the
Battle of Carrhae in which Crassus himself
perished. The death of Crassus removed some of the balance in the
Triumvirate and, consequently, Caesar and Pompey began to move
apart. While Caesar was fighting in Gaul, Pompey proceeded with a
legislative agenda for Rome that revealed that he was at best
ambivalent towards Caesar and perhaps now covertly allied with
Caesar's political enemies. In 51 BC, some Roman senators demanded
that Caesar not be permitted to stand for consul unless he turned
over control of his armies to the state, which would have left
Caesar defenceless before his enemies. Caesar chose Civil War over
laying down his command and facing trial.
By the spring of 49 BC, the hardened legions of Caesar crossed the
river
Rubicon and swept down the Italian
peninsula towards Rome, while Pompey ordered the abandonment of
Rome. Afterwards Caesar turned his attention to the Pompeian
stronghold of Iberia (modern Spain) but decided to tackle Pompey
himself in Greece. Pompey initially defeated Caesar, but failed to
follow up on the victory, and was decisively defeated at the
Battle of Pharsalus in 48 BC,
despite outnumbering Caesar's forces two to one, albeit with
inferior quality troops. Pompey fled again, this time to Egypt,
where he was murdered.
Pompey's death did not result in an end to the civil war as
Caesar's enemies were manifold and continued to fight on. In 46 BC
Caesar lost perhaps as much as a third of his army, but ultimately
came back to defeat the Pompeian army of
Metellus Scipio in the
Battle of Thapsus, after which the
Pompeians retreated yet again to Iberia. Caesar then defeated the
combined Pompeian forces at the
Battle
of Munda.
Caesar was now the primary figure of the Roman state, enforcing and
entrenching his powers and his enemies feared that he had ambitions
to become an autocratic ruler. Arguing that the Roman Republic was
in danger a group of senators hatched a conspiracy and
murdered Caesar in the Senate
in March of 44 BC. Mark Antony, Caesar's lieutenant, condemned
Caesar's assassination, and war broke out between the two factions.
Antony was denounced as a public enemy, and Caesar's adopted son
and chosen heir, Gaius Octavian, was entrusted with the command of
the war against him. At the
Battle of
Mutina Antony was defeated by the consuls
Hirtius and
Pansa, who were both
killed.
Octavian came to terms with Caesarians Antony and Lepidus in 43 BC
when the
Second Triumvirate was
formed. In 42 BC
Triumvirs Mark Antony and
Octavian
fought the
Battle of Philippi
with Caesar's assassins
Brutus and
Cassius. Although Brutus defeated
Octavian, Antony defeated Cassius, who committed suicide. Brutus
joined him shortly afterwards.
However, civil war flared again when the Second Triumvirate of
Octavian, Lepidus and
Mark Antony
failed. The ambitious Octavian built a power base of patronage and
then launched a campaign against Mark Antony.
At the naval Battle of
Actium off the coast of Greece, Octavian decisively defeated Antony and Cleopatra. Octavian was
granted a series of special powers including sole "imperium" within
the city of Rome, permanent consular powers and credit for every
Roman military victory, since all future generals were assumed to
be acting under his command. In 27 BC Octavian was granted the use
of the names "Augustus" and "Princeps" indicating his primary
status above all other Romans, and he adopted the title "Imperator
Caesar" making him the first Roman Emperor.
Figures of the Republic
Early Republic
Late Republic
See also
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