Historical origins

Around 1500 BC, the Italic tribes started to settle on the Apennine Peninsula. They worked bronze, used horses, and had wheeled carts. They were a war-like people.

Greek colonists.

Etruscans: a people of unknown origin who established cities in Italy around modern day Tuscany.

The founding of Rome

Around 753 BC, Rome was founded by an Italic tribe.

The founding myth of Rome: The Aeneid, by Virgil; the story of Romulus and Ramos.

Early Roman government

A monarchy with a king whose power was called imperium. His authority was patriarchal and paralleled the role of the father in the Roman family. It was absolute but limited by the welfare, tradition, and consent of the people.

Senate: elderly advisers to the king who had evolved from clan leaders. Power similar to that of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Assembly: Roman male citizens.

Etruscan rule

Mid-6^th century to 509 BC, the Etruscan kings ruled over Rome.

After the expulsion of the Etruscans, the Romans established a republic and ruled by the senate and the assembly.

The Roman Republic

The Roman republic was a compromise between the patricians (only 135 families around 510 BC) and plebeians. The form allowed the latter representation, especially in the form of tribunes to represent the people.

Republican political structure

• Consuls that were annually elected.
• Proconsuls who were consuls with extended service because of war.
• Quaestors: financial officers.
• Praetors: evolved into military offices: central generals of Rome.
• Censors: those who conducted census. Immense power.
• Senate: 300 senators for life.
• Tribunes: representatives of the people.

Struggle between the patricians and the plebians

450 BC, the Law of the Twelve Tables.

Plebian victories: 445BC, right to intermarriage; 367 BC, right to consulship and senate; 287 BC, plebian assembly’s decisions binding on all Rome.

Roman Expansion

In 510, Rome had a size of 500 square miles. By 338 BC, it controlled 2,000 square miles in Latium and was expanding into Etruria and Samnite territory. By 265, Rome controlled the whole Italian peninsula. By 146 BC, controlled the Mediterranean. By 1^st century BC, the whole Greece and the near east.

    Q: What were the important similarities and differences between Athenian and Roman politics?

Rome after the 2nd C. B.C.(200 BC-101BC)

The Roman Republic developed a checks and balances system, in a somewhat different way from the Athenian one during the time of Cleisthenes.  The establishment of the plebeian assembly in 494 led to greater plebeian participation in the government, especially in 287 BC, when decisions and legislation of the plebeian assembly were binding on the entire Roman citizenry.  There were, however, few Solons, Cleistheneses, or Pericleses in Roman politics: aristocrats who reached out to the people to bridge gaps and lessen social tensions.  The aristocrats as a collective were much more powerful in Rome than in Athens, and the confrontation between the plebeian assembly and the aristocracy more dramatic at times. 

 The conflict between the aristocracy and the plebeians became intensified after 200 BC because of the growing gap between the rich and the poor.  The plebeian assembly's reforms often met with violent backlashes from the aristocracy who were still an entrenched force in the senate.  The most dramatic confrontations were those with the Gracchi brothers tribunes.  Growing wealth through military conquest and lack of political and social unity in Rome led to often unconstitutional military rule.  Rome gradually transformed from a republic to an empire.

I. Social polarization 

In the 2^nd century BC, greater polarization of society occurred because of the destruction of much of the Roman countryside by the Carthaginians, whom the Romans fought. Greater inequality of land ownership because of the wealthy’s purchase of land.

II. The Gracchi brothers and political reforms

Tiberius Gracchus: tribune in 133 BC, tried to limit land ownership. Assassinated in 132.

123 BC, Gaius Gracchus, tribune: stabilize grain price; expand citizenship to all Italians.

121 BC, senate announced Gaius enemy of the state. Killed.

III. A new type of rule via military strength

1. Switch of soldiers' loyalty from the state to a particular general.

Marius, consul (107 BC), famous military general who bought soldiers’ allegiance via land pensions.

Sulla: war hero, consul, 88BC. Continued Marius's practice with the soldiers.  The first in Roman history to succeed in politics through military strength.  Civil war with Marius. Declared Dictator by the senate. Used army to kill opponents.

2. Clouding politics with military clout, alliances, and struggles.

 Although Sulla abdicated from dictatorship in 79 BC, he and Marius established the precedent that one could use military clout and intimidation to establish political supremacy over the Roman republican government.  Later imitators used military clout, alliances and struggles to achieve similar effects.  The most successful  was The First Triumvirate (ca 60-49 BC):

The First Triumvirate (ca 60-49 BC): The need for financial and political support in running for the position of the consul led to the alliance of Caesar, Crassus, and Pompey after 78 BC.  Crassus: the wealthiest man in Rome; Pompey, military general who campaigned in Asia Minor.  58 BC, Caesar became consul. Then, proconsul for Gaul.  55BC. Pompey and Crassus became consuls. Caesar returned to Rome in 46 BC. Became dictator. Then got imperium for life. Murdered in 44 BC.

Although The First Triumvirate was declared unconstitutional by the Senate, hence the murder of Caesar, it did not stop the military warfare of generals, and soon, those for and against Caesar formed into two confrontational camps, with the triumph of the pro-Caesar camp led by his stepson Octavian, called the The Second Triumvirate 43-33 BC, which, eventually, also resulted in in-fighting and finally, the dissolution of the republican government.

The Second Triumvirate 43-33 BC Senate trusted the republic to Mark Anthony, Octavian, and Lepidus.  31 BC: civil war between Octavian and Anthony.  27 BC: the beginning of the principate. Augustus and the senate.