Part 866

"Caius, it is said, was the first Roman statesman who appointed a regular distribution of corn among the poorer citizens, requiring the state to buy up large consignments of grain from the provinces, and to sell it again at a fixed rate below the natural price. The nobles themselves seem to have acquiesced without alarm in this measure, by which they hoped to secure the city from seditious movements in time of scarcity; but they failed to foresee the discouragement it would give to industry, the crowds of idle and dissipated citizens it would entice into the forum, the appetite it would create for shows, entertainments and largesses, and the power it would thus throw into the hands of unprincipled demagogues. Caius next established customs duties upon various articles of luxury imported into the city for the use of the rich: he decreed the gratuitous supply of clothing to the soldiers, who had hitherto been required to provide themselves out of their pay; he founded colonies for the immediate gratification of the poorer citizens, who were waiting in vain for the promised distribution of lands: he caused the construction of public granaries, bridges and roads, to furnish objects of useful labour to those who were not unwilling to work. Caius himself, it is said, directed the course and superintended the making of the roads, some of which we may still trace traversing Italy in straight lines from point to point, filling up depressions and hollowing excrescences in the face of the country, and built upon huge substructions of solid masonry. Those who most feared and hated him confessed their amazement at the magnificence of his projects and the energy of his proceedings; the people, in whose interests he toiled, were filled with admiration and delight, when they saw him attended from morning to night by crowds of contractors, artificers, ambassadors, magistrates, soldiers, and men of learning, to all of whom he was easy of access, adapting his behaviour to the condition of each in turn: thus proving, as they declared, the falsehood of those who presumed to call him violent and tyrannical. … By these innovations Caius laid a wide basis of popularity. Thereupon he commenced his meditated attack upon the privileged classes. We possess at least one obscure intimation of a change he effected or proposed in the manner of voting by centuries, which struck at the influence of the wealthier classes. He confirmed and extended the Porcian law, for the protection of citizens against the aggression of the magistrates without a formal appeal to the people. Even the powers of the dictatorship, to which the senate had been wont to resort for the coercion of its refractory opponents, were crippled by these provisions; and we shall see that no recourse was again had to this extraordinary and odious appointment till the oligarchy had gained for a time a complete victory over their adversaries. Another change, even more important, was that by which the knights were admitted to the greater share, if not, as some suppose, to the whole, of the judicial appointments. … As long as the senators were the judges, the provincial governors, who were themselves senators, were secure from the consequence of impeachment. If the knights were to fill the same office, it might be expected that the publicani, the farmers of the revenues abroad would be not less assured of impunity, whatever were the enormity of their exactions. … It was vain, indeed, to expect greater purity from the second order of citizens than from the first. If the senators openly denied justice to complainants, the knights almost as openly sold it. This was in itself a grievous degradation of the tone of public morality; but this was not all the evil of the tribune's reform. It arrayed the two privileged classes of citizens in direct hostility to one another. 'Caius made the republic double-headed,' was the profound remark of antiquity. He sowed the seeds of a war of an hundred years. Tiberius had attempted to raise up a class of small proprietors, who, by the simplicity of their manners and moderation of their tastes, might form, as he hoped, a strong conservative barrier between the tyranny of the nobles and the envy of the people; but Caius, on the failure of this attempt, was content to elevate a class to power, who should touch upon both extremes of the social scale,—the rich by their wealth, and the poor by their origin. Unfortunately this was to create not a new class, but a new party. … One direct advantage, at all events, Caius expected to derive, besides the humiliation of his brother's murderers, from this elevation of the knights: he hoped to secure their grateful co-operation towards the important object he next had in view: this was no less than the full admission of the Latins and Italians to the right of suffrage."

_C. Merivale, The Fall of the Roman Republic, chapter 1._

ALSO IN: _Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus; Caius Gracchus._

_T. Mommsen, History of Rome, book 4, chapters 2-3 (volume 3)._

_S. Eliot, Liberty of Rome: Rome, book 3, chapter 1._

See, also, AGER PUBLICUS.

ROME: B. C. 125-121. Conquest of the Salyes and Allobroges in Gaul. Treaty of friendship with the Ædui.

See SALYES; ALLOBROGES; and ÆDUI.

ROME: B. C. 118-99. Increasing corruption of government. The Jugurthine War. Invasion and defeat of the Cimbri and Teutones. The power of Marius.

"After the death of Caius Gracchus, the nobles did what they pleased in Rome. They paid no more attention to the Agrarian Law, and the state of Italy grew worse and worse. … The nobles cared nothing for Rome's honour, but only for their own pockets. They governed badly, and took bribes from foreign kings, who were allowed to do what they liked if they could pay enough. This was especially seen in a war that took place in Africa. After Carthage had been destroyed, the greatest state in Africa was Numidia. The king of Numidia was a friend of the Roman people, and had fought with them against Carthage. So Rome had a good deal to do with Numidia, and the Numidians often helped Rome in her wars. In 118 a king of Numidia died, and left the kingdom to his two sons and an adopted son named Jugurtha. Jugurtha determined to have the kingdom all to himself, so he murdered one of the sons and made war upon the other, who applied to Rome for help.

See NUMIDIA: B. C. 118-104.

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The Senate was bribed by Jugurtha, and did all it could to please him; at last, however, Jugurtha besieged his brother in Cirta, and when he took the city put him and all his army to death (112). After this the Romans thought they must interfere, but the Senate for more money were willing to let Jugurtha off very easily. He came to Rome to excuse himself before the people, and whilst he was there he had a Numidian prince, of whom he was afraid, murdered in Rome itself. But his bribes were stronger than the laws. … The Romans declared war against Jugurtha, but he bribed the generals, and for three years very little was done against him. At last, in 108, a good general, who would not take bribes, Quintus Metellus, went against him and defeated him. Metellus would have finished the war, but in 106 the command was taken from him by Caius Marius the consul. This Caius Marius was a man of low birth, but a good soldier. He had risen in war by his bravery, and had held magistracies in Rome. He was an officer in the army of Metellus, and was very much liked by the common soldiers, for he was a rough man like themselves, and talked with them, and lived as they did. … Marius left Africa and went to Rome to try and be made consul in 106. He found fault with Metellus before the people, and said that he could carry on the war better himself. So the people made him consul, and more than that, they said that he should be general in Africa instead of Metellus. … Marius finished the war in Africa, and brought Jugurtha in triumph to Italy in 104. … When it was over, Marius was the most powerful man in Rome. He was the leader of the popular party, and also the general of the army. The army had greatly changed since the time of Hannibal. The Roman soldiers were no longer citizens who fought when their country wanted them, and then went back to their work. But as wars were now constantly going on, and going on too in distant countries, this could no longer be the case, and the army was full of men who took to a soldier's life as a trade. Marius was the favourite of these soldiers: he was a soldier by trade himself, and had risen in consequence to power in the state. Notice, then, that when Marius was made consul, it was a sign that the government for the future was to be carried on by the army, as well as by the people and the nobles. Marius was soon wanted to carry on another war. Two great tribes of barbarians from the north had entered Gaul west of the Alps, and threatened to drive out the Romans, and even attack Italy. They came with their wives and children, like a wandering people looking for a home. … At first these Cimbri defeated the Roman generals in southern Gaul, where the Romans had conquered the country along the Rhone, and made it a province, which is still called the province, or Provence. The Romans, after this defeat, were afraid of another burning of their city by barbarians, so Marius was made consul again, and for the next five years he was elected again and again. … In the year 102 the Teutones and the Cimbri marched to attack Italy, but Marius defeated them in two great battles.

See CIMBRI AND TEUTONES: B. C. 113-102.

Afterwards when he went back to Rome in triumph he was so powerful that he could have done what he chose in the state. The people were very grateful to him, the soldiers were very fond of him, and the nobles were very much afraid of him. But Marius did not think much of the good of the state: he thought much more of his own greatness, and how he might become a still greater man. So, first, he joined the party of the people, and one of the tribunes. Lucius Appuleius Saturninus, brought forward some laws like those of Caius Gracchus, and Marius helped him. But there were riots in consequence, and the Senate begged Marius to help them in putting down the riots. For a time Marius doubted what to do, but at last he armed the people, and Saturninus was killed (99). But now neither side liked Marius, for he was true to neither, and did only what he thought would make himself most powerful. So for the future Marius was not likely to be of much use in the troubles of the Roman state."

_M. Creighton. History of Rome (Primer). chapter 7._

ALSO IN: _H. G. Liddell, History of Rome, chapters 54-56 (volume 2)._

_V. Duruy, History of Rome, chapters 39-41 (volume 2)._

_Plutarch, Marius._

ROME: B. C. 90-88. Demands of the Italian Socii for Roman citizenship. The Marsian or Social War. Rise of Sulla.

"It is a most erroneous though widely prevalent opinion that the whole of Italy was conquered by the force of Roman arms, and joined to the empire [of the Republic] against its will. Roman valour and the admirable organization of the legions, it is true, contributed to extend the dominion of Rome, but they were not nearly so effective as the political wisdom of the Roman senate. … The subjects of Rome were called by the honourable name of allies (Socii). But the manner in which they had become allies was not always the same. It differed widely according to circumstances. Some had joined Rome on an equal footing by a free alliance ('fœdus æquum'). which implied nothing like subjection. … Others sought the alliance of Rome as a protection from pressing enemies or troublesome neighbours. … On the whole, the condition of the allies, Latin colonies as well as confederated Italians, seems to have been satisfactory, at least in the earlier period. … But even the right of self-government which Rome had left to the Italian communities proved an illusion in all cases where the interests of the ruling town seemed to require it. A law passed in Rome, nay, a simple senatorial decree, or a magisterial order, could at pleasure be applied to the whole of Italy. Roman law gradually took the place of local laws, though the Italians had no part in the legislation of the Roman people, or any influence on the decrees of the Roman senate and magistrates. … All public works in Italy, such as roads, aqueducts, and temples, were carried out solely for the benefit of Rome. … Not in peace only, but also in the time of war, the allies were gradually made to feel how heavily the hand of Rome weighed upon them. … In proportion as with the increase of their power the Romans felt more and more secure and independent of the allies, they showed them less consideration and tenderness, and made them feel that they had gradually sunk from their former position of friends to be no more than subjects." There was increasing discontent among the Italian allies, or Socii, with this state of things, especially after the time of the Gracchi, when a proposal to extend the Roman citizenship and franchise to them was strongly pressed. {2684} In the next generation after the murder of Caius Gracchus, there arose another political reformer, Marcus Livius Drusus, who likewise sought to have justice done to the Italians, by giving them a voice in the state which owed its conquests to their arms. He, too, was killed by the political enemies he provoked; and then the allies determined to enforce their claims by war. The tribes of the Sabellian race—Marsians, Samnites, Hirpenians, Lucanians, and their fellows—organized a league, with the town of Corfinium (its name changed to Italica) for its capital, and broke into open revolt. The prominence of the Marsians in the struggle caused the war which ensued to be sometimes called the Marsian War; it was also called the Italian War, but, more commonly, the Social War. It was opened, B. C. 90, by a horrible massacre of Roman citizens residing at Asculum, Picenum,—a tragedy for the guilt of which that town paid piteously the next year, when it was taken at the end of a long siege and after a great battle fought under its walls. But the Romans had suffered many defeats before that achievement was reached. At the end of the first year of the war they had made no headway against the revolt, and it is the opinion of Ihne and other historians that "Rome never was so near her destruction," and that "her downfall was averted, not by the heroism of her citizens, as in the war of Hannibal, but by a reversal" of her "policy of selfish exclusion and haughty disdain." A law called the Julian Law, because proposed by the consul L. Julius Cæsar, was adopted B. C. 90, which gave the Roman franchise to the Latins, and to all the other Italian communities which had so far remained faithful. Soon afterward two of the new tribunes carried a further measure, the Plautio-Papirian Law, which offered the same privilege to any Italian who, within two months, should present himself before a Roman magistrate to claim it. These concessions broke the spirit of the revolt and the Roman armies began to be victorious. Sulla, who was in the field, added greatly to his reputation by successes at Nola (where his army honored him by acclaim with the title of Imperator) and at Bovianum, which he took. The last important battle of the war was fought on the old blood-drenched plain of Cannæ, and this time the victory was for Rome. After that, for another year, some desperate towns and remnants of the revolted Socii held out, but their resistance was no more than the death throes of a lost cause.

_W. Ihne, History of Rome, book 6, chapter 9, with foot-note, and book 7, chapters 13-14._

ALSO IN: _G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 2, chapters 15-16._

_B. G. Niebuhr, Lectures on the History of Rome, lectures 83-84 (volume 2)._

ROME: B. C. 88-78. Rivalry of Marius and Sulla. War with Mithridates. Civil war. Successive proscriptions and reigns of terror. Sulla's dictatorship.