Politics, right? Only a politician can take the most obvious of common sense solutions, turn it on its head, and make it into something completely ludicrous. You see it all the time from the bizarre ads piped into our living rooms on TV to the endless flip-flopping of candidates during an election. Politics brings out the very worst, it seems, in humanity.
And corruption? Forget about it. Politics would seem to be a catalyst for corruption and the two are often found in close proximity to one another. This can take the form of an outright bribe to secure a favorable judgment, the slightly more subtle campaign contribution, or the cultivation of a less-than-presentable collection of business associates. Regardless, there just seems to be something about the allure of political power that drives men and women mad.
While all of this remains true today, the antics we observe as part of the modern world pales in comparison with politics as practiced in the Roman Republic. Not to be confused with the below-the-emperor squabbling of the Imperial era, the Republic that preceded it was a time of wild alliances, shifting allegiances, and anything goes politics. Set against a backdrop of social discord, burgeoning wealth, and endemic warfare, Republican Rome probably shouldn’t have survived to become the Empire that ruled so much of the western world for so long.
The Roman World from the 2nd Century BC to the 1st Century AD was just barely that, with Rome emerging from the Punic Wars with Carthage to become the dominant military power in the region. These three conflicts brought wealth and power to what was until that time little more than an annoyingly aggressive city-state situated in central Italy. The apparent fragility of the Roman state of this period contrasts sharply with its ability to bounce back from what seemed to be crippling losses on the field of battle, losses that would have forced virtually any other state of the time to capitulate.
The Roman social structure of the time had remained essentially unchanged since the last Etruscan king had been run out of the city in 509 BC. Yet this system began to crack and crumble under the strain of too few farmers—forever the bedrock of Rome’s fiscal and military strength—and too many slaves, an unintended byproduct of victory on successive battlefields. The Republic had become incredibly rich, and in so doing appears to have sown the seeds of its own demise. Along with this wealth a third, middle class called the equestrians grew in economic and political power, adding yet another layer of complexity to the never-ending tension between the patricians at the top and plebeians at the bottom of Rome’s social and economic scale.
As well, the selfless service in the name of Roman greatness—an ideal passed down through generations that probably never really reflected reality—unraveled in the name of achieving ever greater prestige for one’s family and oneself. The constant and consistent pursuit of glory and honor slowly faded in favor of the accumulation of political power as an end in and of itself, with fatal consequences for the city-state and its people.
That Republican Rome’s senatorial class made up its military leaders has been much commented on. Dan Carlin, in his series on the end of the Republic, asks us to imagine our senator or congressman leading forces in battle … and brutal, close-up, hand-to-hand combat at that! It’s unthinkable to consider our soft, manicured, well-groomed politicians as the leaders of our nation’s army. And yet, that was exactly the situation for early Rome, and it caused the kinds of problems you might expect.
Marius, at the battle of Vercellae in 101 BC, arrayed his forces in such a way that his Co-Consul, Catulus, would not come into contact with the enemy, intent upon seizing all the glory for himself. Sulla, in 82 BC, negotiated a hasty—and undesired—peace with Mithridates of Pontus in order to rush home and re-take the capital from political opponents who’d seized it. Crassus single-handedly plunged Rome into a war with the far-off, but powerful, Parthian Empire simply to catch-up with perennial frenemies Caesar and Pompey in terms of military greatness. (Spoiler alert: it didn’t work out so well for him!) And of course, Marius, Sulla, and Caesar all marched armies against Rome, an egregious sin and terrible violation of the law to boot. This had simply never been done before Sulla, and yet by the end of the Republic, the unthinkable had occurred twice more, breaking a taboo that had existed since the founding of the Republic in 509 BC.
As well, numerous Roman military commanders throughout this period rushed into battles they were advised against simply because it was their day to command and didn’t want to waste it. Famous examples of this phenomenon include the Battle of Trebbia in 218 BC, and that most famous example of Roman military failure itself, the 216 BC battle of Cannae. And what can one even say of the long streak of embarrassing Roman losses from 112 to 105 BC as some 300,000 Teutones and Cimbri advanced southward into Italy. No fewer than five Roman armies were demolished one after another by the barbarian juggernaut—resulting in approximately 170,000 Roman casualties—before Marius finally dealt with the problem in the year 101.
And these are just the politician-generals behaving badly. Republican Roman politics doomed even heroes to ignominy! Marius—having been voted six times consul, victor of battles from Numidia to Gaul, credited with creating the professional Roman Army that would survive the Republic’s demise and exist long into the Imperial era—was exiled essentially for supporting a politician deemed too close to the people. Scipio Africanus—the general who famously brought down Hannibal—died while in exile, bitter and angry with how the Republic he’d saved had treated him. Pompey the Great—scourge of pirates throughout the Mediterranean—was deserted by the senators whose cause he championed, leaving him to be murdered while seeking refuge in Egypt.
And let’s not even go into the violence carried out within the supposedly sacred precincts of Rome itself. Tiberius Gracchus—Tribune of the Plebs, no less—beaten to death by an angry senate along with 300 of his supporters. His younger brother Caius—former Tribune of the Plebs—was chased down by the senate and either killed outright, or forced to commit suicide. 3,000 of his supporters were later killed by the senate in the violence that followed. Then, of course, there was Caesar, stabbed to death by senators, men he’d known for years, on the very floor of the temporary senate house.
Make no mistake, politics in Republican Rome, was truly a contact support, and not a pursuit to be entered into lightly. Still, for the aristocratic patrician class, politics was the family business for every clan of note. A young, male offspring didn’t really get the option to follow another career. No matter that the family’s youngest son has a gift for poetry or the voice of an angel, they were all expected to mix it up and fight to the death to increase their noble family’s reputation and power relative to all others in the class.
That these high-born families jealously guarded their position at the social apex of Roman society is reflected in their fear of any one of them becoming a king and lording over the rest. The fastest and most effective way to gather other patricians to one’s cause, it seemed, was to convince them that your political opponent was trying to make himself king. That the end result of this constant fear-mongering related to royal avoidance, as it were, became the establishment of an empire under a very king-like emperor is, perhaps, the ultimate irony of the Roman Republic.
In reading of the numerous wars, battles, social upheavals, and economic ups and downs from this period it is critical to keep in mind that this intense, all-consuming, winner-take-everything political game was never placed on ‘pause’. Rome’s leaders were every bit as petty and politically-oriented during times of great distress as they were during those brief periods the Republic found itself at peace. After all, whether they were leading troops or not, they were still, after all, politicians, concerned with the next election, fearful of losing the legal protections that officialdom offered.
That Rome survived as long as it did with such a thoroughly rotten, self-defeating foundation, should be the take-away from this brief look into Republican Roman politics. It’s hard to believe the ultra-ambitious aristocrats this system produced could somehow cooperate just enough to make Rome great. Especially given that each one seemed to spend such an inordinate amount of time planning the destruction of his rivals.
Perhaps this, then, is the greatest achievement of Republican Rome. That its inevitable implosion created one of the greatest, most powerful, and long-lasting empires the world has ever known. That Rome achieved greatness in spite of—not because of—the institutions that governed the city and state.
Were a patrician from the period available today, I wonder whether they’d take pride or feel shame in that eulogy. Somehow, I suspect they’d probably be too busy noticing that over two millennia later we’re still talking about the exploits of their family. As close to immortality, perhaps, as they could ever have hoped to achieve.
M.G. Haynes