The Storm Before the Storm
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Copyright
Copyright © 2017 by Mike Duncan.
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CONTENTS
COVER
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION
TIMELINE
MAP OF ROMAN ITALY
MAP OF THE REPUBLICAN EMPIRE
AUTHOR’S NOTE
PROLOGUE THE TRIUMPH OF THE ROMAN REPUBLIC
ONE THE BEASTS OF ITALY
TWO THE STEPCHILDREN OF ROME
THREE DAGGERS IN THE FORUM
FOUR A CITY FOR SALE
FIVE THE SPOILS OF VICTORY
SIX THE GOLDEN EARRING
SEVEN MARIUS’S MULES
EIGHT THE THIRD FOUNDER OF ROME
NINE ITALIA
TEN THE RUINS OF CARTHAGE
ELEVEN THE SPIKED BOOTS
TWELVE CIVIL WAR
THIRTEEN DICTATOR FOR LIFE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
THE ANCIENT SOURCES
SELECT MODERN SOURCES
NOTES
INDEX
For Brandi
for everything
TIMELINE
146–78 BC
146 Aemilianus sacks Carthage
Mummius sacks Corinth
Senate annexes Greece and Africa
139 Secret ballot for electoral assemblies
137 Numantine Affair
Secret ballot for judicial assemblies
135 Beginning of First Servile War in Sicily
134 Aemilianus departs for Numantia
Death of King Attalus of Pergamum
133 Tribunate of Tiberius Gracchus
Passage of Lex Agraria
Fall of Numantia
Beginning of Aristonicus’s revolt
Death of Tiberius Gracchus
132 Anti-Gracchan tribunal
End of First Servile War
131 Secret ballot for legislative assemblies
130 End of Aristonicus’s revolt
129 Death of Scipio Aemilianus
125 Fulvius Flaccus proposes Italian citizenship
Revolt of Fregellae
124 Lucius Opimius sacks Fregellae
123 First tribunate of Gaius Gracchus
122 Second tribunate of Gaius Gracchus
Founding of Aquae Sextiae
121 Senate issues first senatus consultum ultimum
Suicide of Gaius Gracchus
Battle of Isère River in Gaul
119 Prosecution and suicide of Gaius Carbo
Tribunate of Gaius Marius
118 Founding of city of Narbo
117 Marius fails to win aedileship
Death of King Micipsa of Numidia
Jugurtha assassinates Hiempsal
116 Adherbal appeals to Senate for aid
Opimius leads Roman delegation to Numidia
Marius elected praetor in possibly fraudulent election
115 Praetorship of Marius
114 Scordisci defeat Cato
Marius curbs banditry in Spain
113 Jugurtha attacks Adherbal
Cimbri arrive from north
Cimbri defeat Gnaeus Carbo at Noreia
112 Jugurtha besieges Cirta
Jugurtha kills Adherbal
Jugurtha’s soldiers massacre Italians
Rome declares war on Jugurtha
111 Lucius Bestia leads legions to Numidia
Bestia and Scaurus conclude peace with Jugurtha
Memmius calls Jugurtha to Rome
Prosecution and suicide of Gnaeus Carbo
110 Jugurtha assassinates Massiva
109 Jugurtha defeats Romans and forces legions to pass under the yoke
Mamilian Commission established
Metellus’s first campaign in Numidia
Cimbri return and demand land in Italy
Cimbri defeat legions led by Silanus
108 Marius elected consul
Sulla elected quaestor
Marius recruits soldiers from all classes
Jugurtha and King Bocchus of Mauretania forge alliance
107 First consulship of Marius
Marius campaigns in Numidia
Tigurini defeat legions in Gaul
106 Caepio restores control of courts to the Senate
Caepio “loses” the Tolosa gold
Marius defeats Jugurtha and Bocchus near Cirta
Birth of Cicero
Birth of Pompey the Great
105 Sulla induces Bocchus to hand Jugurtha over to the Romans
Cimbri wipe out legions at Battle of Arausio
Marius elected to second consulship
104 Second consulship of Marius
Triumph of Marius over Jugurtha
Marius reforms legions in Gaul
Beginning of Second Servile War in Sicily
Senate relieves Saturninus of his duties
103 Third consulship of Marius
Saturninus secures land for Marius’s veterans
Mallius and Caepio exiled
Lucullus defeats slave army in Sicily
102 Fourth consulship of Marius
Lucullus demobilizes legions in Sicily
Cimbri, Teutones, and Ambrones migrate south
Marius defeats Teutones and Ambrones at Battle of Aquae Sextiae
Cimbri successfully invade Italy
101 Fifth consulship of Marius
Marius defeats Cimbri at Battle of Raudian Plain
Aquillius defeats slave army in Sicily
Supporters of Saturninus murder Nonius
100 Sixth consulship of Marius
Second tribunate of Saturninus
Metellus exiled
Supporters of Saturninus murder Memmius
Senate issues second senatus consultum ultimum
Death of Saturninus and Glaucia
Birth of Julius Caesar
98 Marius meets King Mithridates VI of Pontus
Metellus recalled from exile
Sulla elected praetor
95 Sulla installs King Ariobarzanes on throne of Cappadocia
Mithridates and King Tigranes of Armenia forge alliance
Birth of Cato the Younger
94 Scaevola and Rutilius reform administration of Asia
Sulla meets Parthian ambassador
92 Trial and banishment of Rutilius
91 Tribunate of Marcus Drusus the Youngerv
Mithridat
es invades Bithynia, Tigranes invades Cappadocia
Drusus proposes Italian citizenship
Drusus murdered
Beginning of Social War
90 Rebel Italians establish capital at Corfinium
Varian Commission prosecutes those accused of inciting Italians
Gaius Marius takes command of legions in northern Italy
Aquillius escorts Nicomedes and Ariobarzanes back to their kingdoms
Lex Julia extends citizenship to Italians not under arms
89 Lex Plautia Papiria extends citizenship to all Italians
Nicomedes of Bithynia invades Pontus
Mithridates invades Cappadocia
Pompey Strabo captures Asculum
Sulla wages successful campaign in southern Italy
Sulla and Pompeius elected consuls
88 Death of Poppaedius Silo
End of Social War
Sulpicius proposes equal suffrage for the Italians
Sulpicius gives eastern command to Marius
Sulla’s march on Rome
Marius flees to Africa
Mithridates invades Asia
Mithridates orders massacre of Italians
87 First consulship of Cinna
Sulla departs for east and besieges Athens
Cinna pushed out of Rome after proposing equal suffrage for the Italians
Cinnan army surrounds Rome
Death of Pompey Strabo
Cinnan army enters Rome
Marian reign of terror
86 Seventh consulship of Marius
Second consulship of Cinna
Death of Gaius Marius
Sulla sacks Athens
Sulla defeats Pontic army at Chaeronea
Flaccus and Asiaticus lead legions east
Sulla defeats Pontic army at Orchomenus
85 Third consulship of Cinna
Fimbria kills Flaccus
Lucullus lets Mithridates escape
Sulla and Mithridates conclude peace
Sulla forces Fimbria to commit suicide
84 Fourth consulship of Cinna
Cinna killed by mutinous soldiers
Sulla imposes settlement on Asia
Senate and Sulla negotiate his return
83 Sulla returns to Italy
Metellus Pius, Pompey, and Crassus join Sulla
Beginning of Civil War
82 Beginning of siege of Praeneste
Sulla addresses the Romans
Sulla wins Battle of Colline Gate
End of Civil War
Sulla appointed dictator
81 Sullan proscriptions
Sulla reforms the Republican constitution
80 Sulla resigns dictatorship and becomes consul
79 Sulla retires
78 Death of Sulla
AUTHOR’S NOTE
NO PERIOD IN history has been more thoroughly studied than the fall of the Roman Republic. The names Caesar, Pompey, Cicero, Octavian, Mark Antony, and Cleopatra are among the most well known names not just in Roman history, but in human history. Each year we are treated to a new book, movie, or TV show depicting the lives of this vaunted last generation of the Roman Republic. There are good reasons for their continued predominance: it is a period alive with fascinating personalities and earth-shattering events. It is especially riveting for those of us in the modern world who, suspecting the fragility of our own republican institutions, look to the rise of the Caesars as a cautionary tale. Ben Franklin’s famous remark that the Constitutional Convention had produced “a Republic… if you can keep it” rings all these generations later as a warning bell.
Surprisingly, there has been much less written about how the Roman Republic came to the brink of disaster in the first place—a question that is perhaps more relevant today than ever. A raging fire naturally commands attention, but to prevent future fires, one must ask how the fire started. No revolution springs out of thin air, and the political system Julius Caesar destroyed through sheer force of ambition certainly wasn’t healthy to begin with. Much of the fuel that ignited in the 40s and 30s BC had been poured a century earlier. The critical generation that preceded that of Caesar, Cicero, and Antony—that of the revolutionary Gracchi brothers, the stubbornly ambitious Marius, and the infamously brash Sulla—is neglected. We have long been denied a story that is as equally thrilling, chaotic, frightening, hilarious, and riveting as that of the final generation of the Republic. This book tells that story.
But this book does not serve simply as a way to fill in a hole in our knowledge of Roman history. While producing The History of Rome I was asked the same set of questions over and over again: “Is America Rome? Is the United States following a similar historical trajectory? If so, where does the US stand on the Roman timeline?” Attempting to make a direct comparison between Rome and the United States is always fraught with danger, but that does not mean there is no value to entertaining the question. It at least behooves us to identify where in the thousand-year history of the Roman Empire we might find an analogous historical setting.
In that vein, let’s explore this. We are not in the origin phase, where a collection of exiles, dissidents, and vagabonds migrate to a new territory and establish a permanent settlement. That would correspond to the early colonial days. Nor are we in the revolutionary phase, where a group of disgruntled aristocrats overthrow the monarchy and create a republic. That corresponds to the days of the Founding Fathers. And we aren’t in the global conquest phase, where a series of wars against other great powers establishes international military, political, and economic hegemony. That would be the twentieth-century global conflicts of World War I, World War II, and the Cold War. Finally—despite what some hysterical commentators may claim—the Republic has not collapsed and been taken over by a dictator. That hasn’t happened yet. This means that if the United States is anywhere on the Roman timeline, it must be somewhere between the great wars of conquest and the rise of the Caesars.
Further investigation into this period reveals an era full of historical echoes that will sound eerily familiar to the modern reader. The final victory over Carthage in the Punic Wars led to rising economic inequality, dislocation of traditional ways of life, increasing political polarization, the breakdown of unspoken rules of political conduct, the privatization of the military, rampant corruption, endemic social and ethnic prejudice, battles over access to citizenship and voting rights, ongoing military quagmires, the introduction of violence as a political tool, and a set of elites so obsessed with their own privileges that they refused to reform the system in time to save it.
These echoes could be mere coincidence, of course, but the great Greek biographer Plutarch certainly believed it possible that “if, on the other hand, there is a limited number of elements from which events are interwoven, the same things must happen many times, being brought to pass by the same agencies.” If history is to have any active meaning there must be a place for identifying those interwoven elements, studying the recurring agencies, and learning from those who came before us. The Roman Empire has always been, and will always be, fascinating in its own right—and this book is most especially a narrative history of a particular epoch of Roman history. But if our own age carries with it many of those limited number of elements being brought to pass by the same agencies, then this particular period of Roman history is well worth deep investigation, contemplation, and reflection.
Mike Duncan
Madison, Wisconsin
October 2017
PROLOGUE
THE TRIUMPH OF THE ROMAN REPUBLIC
Who is there so feeble-minded or idle that he would not wish to know how and with what constitution almost all the inhabited world was conquered and fell under the single dominion of Rome within fifty-three years?
POLYBIUS1
PROCONSUL PUBLIUS SCIPIO AEMILIANUS STOOD BEFORE the walls of Carthage watching the city burn. After a long, bloody siege, the Romans had breached the walls and pierced the heart of their greate
st enemy. The Carthaginians had put up a fight, forcing the Romans to conquer the city street by street, but at the end of a week’s fighting the Romans prevailed. After systematically looting the city, Aemilianus ordered Carthage destroyed and its remaining inhabitants either sold into slavery or resettled further inland—far away from their lucrative harbor on the coast of North Africa. Long one of the great cities of the Mediterranean, Carthage was no more.2
Meanwhile, seven hundred miles to the east, consul Lucius Mummius stood before the walls of the Greek city of Corinth. For fifty years, Rome had attempted to control Greek political life without ruling Greece directly. But persistent unrest, disorder, and rebellion had forced the Romans to intervene repeatedly. Finally, in 146 BC, the Senate dispatched Mummius to end these rebellions once and for all. When he breached the walls of Corinth he made an example of the rebellious city. As with Carthage, the legions stripped the city of its wealth, tore down buildings, and sold its inhabitants into slavery.3
By simultaneously destroying Carthage and Corinth in 146, the Roman Republic took a final decisive step toward its imperial destiny. No longer one power among many, Rome now asserted itself as the power in the Mediterranean world. But as Rome’s imperial power reached maturity, the Republic itself started to rot from within. The triumph of the Roman Republic was also the beginning of the end of the Roman Republic.4
THE ROAD TO Rome’s triumph began in central Italy six centuries earlier. According to the official legend, twin babies Romulus and Remus were found abandoned beside the Tiber River by a she-wolf who suckled them back to life. When they came of age the twins resolved to found a city on the spot where they had been discovered. But an argument over where to place the city’s boundary markers led to a quarrel; Romulus killed Remus and became the sole founder of the new city of Rome. The legendary founding date is April 21, 753 BC.5
The oft-told story of Romulus and Remus is obviously a myth, but that does not mean the story is pure invention. There is archeological evidence that shows human habitation dates back to the 1200s BC with permanent settlements by early 900—roughly corresponding to the legendary timeline. Contrary to the myth, however, the location of Rome has nothing to do with fortuitous encounters with friendly wolves, but rather strategic economics. Rome sits nestled in a cluster of seven hills commanding one of the few stable crossings of the Tiber. Most of the early Romans were farmers, but the location allowed them to control the river, establish a marketplace, and defend themselves in case of attack. Their small community was soon stable and prosperous.6