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The Subject of the impact of Julius Caesar on the Ending of the Republic is a very deep and many-layered one. Much has been said and written about the interplay between the two.
Some thoughts:
The Republic was created as the result of the activities of a community of people with a particular view of life, and was derived from various beliefs and values.
When it was considered normal to serve the community as unselfishly as possible - while still taking good care of family and self - people naturally extended themselves to protect and enhance the group.
As Rome acquired Sicily, Corsica, Spain etc., however, life began to change in very important ways.
1. The Roman Army, composed of citizen soldiers, began to be away from home for long periods of time. Family farms fell into decay, men were not home to father more sons and the citizen-farmer class began to shrink.
2. Large amounts of money, booty, cultural prizes and slaves began to flood into Rome, mostly into the hands of the Ruling Classes. Stakes became higher for people in competition for Magisterial Posts.
3. There had been a tradition in Rome of settling differences of opinion by socially constructive means - boycotts, protests and withdrawing to the city limits etc. Occasionally there had been violent repression of individuals seen to be courting favor with the lower classes to achieve dominance over fellow ruling class members, but this violent expression was not the norm.
4. The Gracchi Family achieved prominence in the Punic Wars in Spain, and when Tiberius and Gaius, acting as Tribunes of the People, attempted to improve the lot of the citizen farmers - to both strengthen agriculture and renew the sources of army recruits, they ran in to the extremely strong, vested interests of ruling class members who had taken over vacant farms and made them into very large and profitable agricultural estates. The Gracchi were also seen to be courting favor with the lower classes and perceived as dangerous to the Ruling classes, and thus needing to be stopped. However, because so much money and power was at stake, and desire and self-centered fear was so strong, there was a very violent response to their efforts, one being slaughtered with many followers, and the other being forced to commit suicide.
5. This moment in Roman History set the stage for resolution of all future strong differences of opinion within the Roman Ruling Classes. There had been no effort to isolate the Gracchi by peaceful means - even trials and banishment. There had been public killing of large numbers of people and the murder of Talented, Ruling Class Duly Elected Magistrates. This moment is the progenitor of the Social War - (at the beginning of which another Tribune of the Plebs, Livius Drusus, was murdered - rather than allowing him to peacefully settle the claims of the Allies to Citizenship ((Which they got eventually after a brutal and bloody war!!))) and the Civil Wars. The Romans started down a path of violent outburst rather then peaceful conflict resolution, and the path became a bitter one.
6. Julius Caesar was born into a world where the deaths of the Gracchi had changed political life forever. Additionally, his own Uncle, the Great General Gaius Marius had thumbed his nose at the Roman Ruling Classes and used the Popular Assembly to procure laws he desired to pass when he was Tribune of the People, and taken the Africa Command of the Jugurthan War from another Aristocrat - Mettelus. Most powerfully, Sulla had won the Social War and brought Mithradates of Pontus to heel and returned to Rome and been made Dictator for three years. After a bloodbath of 1600 knights' deaths, he put the Roman Senate back in power and then retired and died.
7. So, while Julius Caesar was born and grew up, many precedents had been set in the two generations before him. Violence had become a frequently employed political tool, Generals had put their own careers and safety ahead of the traditional mores of the Republic, and professional armies now had greater loyalties to their own leaders than to the Senate and People. All of this was not lost on the energetic and brilliant Caesar.
8. As Caesar pursued his career, he excelled in physical, military, intellectual, political, and social endeavors. His intelligence covered a wide span of abilities and interests. He was a Julian, so he was absolutely the highest Aristocrat, with nothing to prove in terms of ancestry. He was brave in combat and a natural leader, so he grew in military prowess. He was shrewd and inventive, so he was able to outsmart his opponents - for example having Labienus legislate in the Assembly to have all priesthoods decided by election, and then running for Pontifex Maximus and sweeping the polls.
9. Caesar saw himself as inside Roman life, descended from the gods and in the highest family circles. Yet he was also an "Outsider." He was not co-opted by the Ultraconservative "Boni" of Catullus, Cato and Bibulus. He had progressive ideas - and believed change was good and necessary, while his adversaries abhorred change and fought it tooth and nail. With his superb talents, realistic view of life and the respect and popularity with the Roman people as a whole, Caesar was a powerful political entity and a force to be reckoned with.
10. Caesar was a man who knew what he wanted and exactly how to get it. Arthur Kahn, in "The Education of Julius Caesar" shows out how often Caesar went to a certain point in his efforts and then stopped before completely winning, completely overwhelming his political opponents. Making his opponents aware of what could have happened was often enough for his purpose. For example, the trial of Postumus Rabirius. Caesar and Mettelus Nepos, Titus Labienus, plus Caesar's cousin Lucius arranged to try one of the killers of Saturninus - a rebel Tribune of the Plebs from 40 years before. They held an ancient form of a trial where the two judges were all powerful - allowed it to be referred to the Centuriate Assembly and for the punishment to be reduced from death to banishment. Then, when the trial was progressing on the Campus Martius, they lowered the flag on the Janiculum Fortress - an antique sign to the population to rush back to the security of Rome's Servian walls when armed men were approaching. This stopped the trial, saved old Rabirius from actually being condemned - the last thing Caesar would have wanted actually - and made the point that even murder forty years old committed under the protection of the Senate's Ultimate Decree would not go unpunished. With this, Caesar warned Cicero and others about abusing the peoples' rights to trial and that killing citizens without a trial was unacceptable. He made his point, but didn't have to go further than he wanted. Subtle and Effective.
11. As Caesar matured he found himself opposed in all he wished to accomplish by a coterie of individuals - Catullus, Bibulus, Cato, Ahenobarbus, Piso, etc. who were determined to block all change and any "progress" as defined by Caesar. Caesar attempted to work through constitutional means, but after a while availed himself of all types of tricky maneuvers to get what he believed needed to be done, accomplished. He used the assemblies in unusual ways, formed an alliance with Marcus Crassus and Gnaeus Pompeius -two of the richest men in Rome, both Consulars and successful Generals, and with their agreement passed legislation to break the stalemate in government that the Ultra-Conservatives had created. Once this situation was established, both sides resorted to Forum violence and force to keep their agendas in motion. This had a very unfortunate side-effect of popularizing street violence as a political tool, and when Caesar went to Gaul and his eight year war, things really heated up on the streets of Rome between followers of Publius Clodius - a wild demagogue Tribune of the Plebs, and Milo, an equally devious and violent man. Behind the scenes, it was Crassus and Pompey fighting it out using Clodius and Milo as their instruments. Things went from bad to worse, with elections being vetoed by Cato and postponed for months on end. Rome was descending into chaos, with the allies of Caesar fighting each other viciously.
12. Caesar was able to keep things together a while longer by meeting with Pompeius and Crassus in Lupa in Italian Gaul, and proposing a renewal of the alliance, with the two of them holding the Consul's Office again. This stabilized Rome for a while and allowed civil life to resume for a time.
13. The genius of Caesar is shown by his ability to deal with a whole country - Gaul with six million inhabitants, an army of eleven legions, and also stay in touch with happenings at Rome on the political and economic front. At times things happened too quickly even for Caesar, with his couriers constantly riding back and forth between him and Rome, covering 100 miles a day. He was three weeks out of date for events, and when things could be planned for, he was all right. When a crisis hit, however, it took him time to respond.
14. For a while, the Alliance with Pompey and Crassus held. However, after the death of both Julia - Caesar's daughter, married to Pompey, and then Crassus himself in Parthia - Caesar began to lose connection with Pompey. Pompey became suspicious of Caesar's surpassing him as Rome's greatest living general and First Man in Rome. Also, the Boni - ultraconservative ruling class members - began to court Pompey, arranging a marriage with Metellus Scipio's daughter, and drawing him closer to their side.
15.
Select Bibliography:
Julius Caesar- Commentaries
Suetonius - The Twelve Caesars
Tacitus - Various Passages
Plutarch - Lives of the Noble Romans
Augustus Caesar - Res Gestae
Virgil - The Anaeid
Livy - History of Rome
Works of Michael Grant - British Roman Historian:
History of Rome
The Etruscans
The Collapse and Recovery of the Roman Empire
The Severans: The Changed Roman Empire
The Antonines: the Roman Empire in Transition
Constantine The Great: The Man And His Times
The Education of Julius Caesar - Arthur Kahn
Caesar - A Military Commentary - Theodore Aryault Dodge
Augustus - Pat Southern
The Punic Wars - Adrian Goldsworthy
Hannibal - Ernle Bradford
Tiberius - George Baker
Caesar - Christian Meier
The Roman Revolution - Ronald Syme
History of Rome - Theodore Mommsen
Julius Caesar - Matthias Gelzer
Fiction:
I Claudius and Claudius the God - Robert Graves
The Novels of Colleen McCullough:
First Man in Rome
The Grass Crown
Fortunes Favorites
Caesar's Women
Caesar - Let the Dice Fly High
The October Horse
I have read most of these books multiple times - as many as five or six for some. I have a passion for Roman History and for the Roman Republic and Principate. The article above is the result of eight years of reading and pondering about Ancient Rome, as well as of my deep interest in the Life and Achievements of Julius Caesar.
Film:
Spartacus
Ben Hur
Cleopatra
The Fall of the Roman Empire
Gladiator
Television:
I Claudius
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