HISTORY A (A2) LEVEL COURSEWORK

HISTORY DEPARTMENT

Kesteven and Sleaford High School

Jermyn St, Sleaford NG34 7RS

Teacher: Mr G. de la Bédoyère MA FSA FHA FRNS

 

POWER AND AUTHORITY IN EARLY IMPERIAL ROME

31BC–AD69   

 

 

 

 

This page is in the process of being created for first teaching in September 2009.

 

THE BOARD

History A-Level at KSHS follows the AQA syllabus:

 

The new AQA specification

1. AS outline (Units 1 and 2)

2. A2 outline (Units 3 and 4)

 

The Coursework is A2 Unit 4. Students are required to produce an approximately 3500-word ‘analysis of a historical issue’ chosen from the AQA A-Level History Coursework Exemplars or from one devised by the school and approved by AQA. Students must study a period of 100 years and their coursework must show understanding of change over the century being studied. Students choose their own key question from within the period being followed (but a number of suggested ones are listed on this page). Guidance can be offered by teachers while the analysis is being researched but the board’s instructions are that this guidance ‘should cease’ when the student is able to prepare his/her final essay plan. In other words teachers are instructed NOT to offer guidance during the preparation of the final plan OR the writing of the 3500-word essay. This means they cannot ‘comment’ or ‘correct’ work at this stage. In short – it has to be YOUR own work!

 

You must also produce:

·       A 500-word evaluation of your work

·       A bibliography

 

ASSESSMENT

The coursework is marked by KSHS and moderated by AQA. There are 60 marks allocated thus:

·       Enquiry: 50 marks

·       Evaluation: 10 marks

 

 

 

Unit 4. Historical Enquiry: POWER AND AUTHORITY IN EARLY IMPERIAL ROME 31BC–AD69

 

Themes, Issues and Debates

Key Questions

Sources

Governing the Empire

How to write a Bibliography

 

At KSHS we have chosen the first century of the Roman Empire for the A2 Coursework section of History A Level. It is designed to present a completely different area of study by exploring how the Roman emperors created the model of European monarchy which so many medieval kings and emperors tried to emulate. It provides a superb opportunity to study the struggle between political systems and personalities, the army and the emperors, the succession, the surviving record, and to research the period through ancient and modern sources.

 

This is an over-view of our area of study. AQA Coursework must cover 100 years, and therefore the nominal dates for our work are 31 BC to AD 69 but the work will involve looking at the period immediately before and after the core century under study.

 

In 509 BC the Romans expelled Tarquinius Superbus, the last of her kings, and resolved never to be ruled by a monarch again. Over the years that followed she developed her Republican government, a system based on an assembly of adult male citizens to pass laws, and magistrates elected from the wealthy upper class who became members of an assembly known as the senate that oversaw and advised the magistrates as well as passing laws. It was dominated by the Roman elite but the system was filled with checks and balances designed to prevent any one man having supreme power. By the 1st century BC the system was breaking down as rival Roman generals with their armies fought for control of the Roman world. Alliances were formed and broken. Anarchy reigned.

 

By 48 BC Gaius Julius Caesar had won the civil wars and been made dictator of Rome for ten years. His enemies were enraged and accused him of making himself into a king. Caesar denied this, but the truth is that he effectively was sole ruler of the Roman world, a king in all but name. In 44 BC he was assassinated in ‘the name of the Republic’ by anti-monarchist conspirators led by Brutus (descended from another Brutus who expelled Tarquinius) and Cassius. Another civil war broke out as Mark Antony, Lepidus and Caesar’s great-nephew Octavian, first defeated Caesar’s murderers then fell out amongst themselves.

 

In 31 BC the ruthless Octavian had won. He set out to ‘restore the Republic’, or so he claimed. In 27 BC he handed over all his powers to the Senate, who promptly gave most of them back and named him Augustus (‘the Venerable’). In 23 BC he was awarded the power of a tribune (see below). This was awarded to him annually thereafter, which meant he could veto Senate legislation. It meant he was effectively in charge of everything that went on without actually being named ‘emperor’. Augustus rebuilt much of central Rome with new and great monuments, allowed the wide distribution of statues of himself as a youthful and benign warrior around the Empire, and set out to restore Rome’s traditional standards and virtues.

 

Augustus was in every sense a king or an emperor, but he would never have allowed himself to be described as such. Was despotism the price of ending a century of anarchy? How successfully had Augustus created a new system? Had he just reinvented the Republic? Or had he pulled off one of the greatest sleights of hand in history? How did he get away with it? Tacitus said ‘the interests of peace demanded the concentration of power in the hands of one man’ (Histories I.1). Was this true?

 

Augustus was succeeded by his stepson Tiberius (AD 14–37), followed by other members of his family who ruled the Empire until AD 68 (Gaius Caligula 37–41, Claudius (41–54) and Nero (54–68). Nero committed suicide in 68 as his regime crumbled thanks to rebellions against his arbitrary and lunatic rule.

 

What was this curious system? Back in the mid-second century BC, long before the emperors when Rome was still a Republic, the historian Polybius wrote:

 

It was impossible even for a native to pronounce with certainty whether the whole system was aristocratic, democratic or monarchical. This indeed was only natural. For if one fixed one’s eyes on the power of the consuls, the constitution seemed completely monarchical and royal; if on that of the senate, it seemed again to be aristocratic; and when one looked at the power of the masses, it seemed clearly to be a democracy.

Polybius, Histories VI.11.11–12

 

In the days of the emperors it had become even more complex. In fact the position of ‘emperor’ theoretically did not exist. Augustus was princeps (‘first citizen’) with a unique portfolio of powers held within the Republican system. The emperors usually represented the people’s interests by serving as tribune of the plebs. But they also frequently held the consulship, and were of the senatorial class, as well as controlling the army as imperator (‘general’). This created unique tensions in which the personality of the emperor played the decisive role in this balancing act. His personal authority (auctoritas) was crucial. It was a precarious situation and an emperor’s personality could lead to climactic events in which the lives of millions of people were affected. Only one of the Julio-Claudians, Augustus, died a natural death and when Nero, the last of that family, committed suicide in 68 it was no great surprise that the Roman world dissolved into civil war once more.

 

Three emperors followed in rapid succession, supported by different parts of the army: Galba (68–9), Otho (69), and Vitellius (69). Tacitus said of Galba that his elevation to the purple revealed a secret: ‘it was possible, it seemed, for an emperor to be chosen outside Rome’ (Histories I.4). He was not to be the last. Galba was soon murdered for his failure to pay the soldiers their promised handout and was followed by Otho. His three-month reign ended with his suicide after being defeated by Vitellius.

 

Vitellius was in turn defeated by the general Vespasian whose triumph in suppressing the Jewish Revolt of AD 66 had left him the most powerful man in the Roman world. Vespasian (69–79) established the short-lived Flavian dynasty of 69–96, which was then followed by a stable succession based on adoption until AD 193. Even then, despite civil wars, barbarian invasions and other problems, the position of emperor continued in Rome until the 5th century AD, and in the eastern half of the Roman Empire until 1453.

 

It was clear that the principle of rule by one man had become the established system by which the Roman Empire was ruled. The offices and institutions of the Republic remained intact but they had been subsumed into an entirely different form of government that maintained the pretence of a democracy and the institutions of an autocracy while being to all other intents and purposes a monarchy. In the second century AD it was Rome’s good fortune to be ruled by a series of emperors whose personalities and talents made them generally good rulers. The Empire enjoyed an unparalleled period of stability and affluence. This alone proves the fundamental fact that in the days of the Roman Empire the lives of millions could be directly affected by the personality of one man, as the wilder and more capricious personalities of the Julio-Claudians had already demonstrated.

 

THEMES, ISSUES AND DEBATES

1) What factors led to the authority of a single man becoming pre-eminent in Rome, when the system was specifically designed to prevent that?

2) The relationship between the emperor and the people

3) How decisive a role did control of the army play?

4) The role and significance of key personalities

 

Sources

Back to the Top

 

THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT: Key Questions

 

The following are suggested key questions and topics you might wish to base your research around. There is NOTHING definitive about any of this. You can devise your own Key Question and your own Key Topics. If you choose one of the suggested Key Questions you can devise your own Key Topics.

 

3.  Themes, Issues and Debates

 

You need to choose a theme to explore in your Coursework. The following are some suggested themes. You do not need to follow any of these, but they may provide you with some ideas. Although your Coursework can focus on a particular part of the period, it MUST also substantially (at least 20%) refer to, and take into account, the WHOLE of the hundred years under investigation.

 

Note that each of these suggested themes has been devised around:

  • A Key Question
  • Key Topics

 

These are some of the underlying aspects to consider:

  • What factors led to the authority of a single man becoming pre-eminent in Rome, when the system was specifically designed to prevent that?
  • The relationship between the emperor and the people
  • How decisive a role did control of the army play?
  • The role and significance of key personalities

 

1. BACKGROUND – An introduction to the 1st century BC:

Key question: within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 how did the collapse of the Roman Republic and the rise of Julius Caesar lay the foundations for Augustus’s emergence as supreme ruler?

Key topics:

  • The Roman Republican system
  • The rise of the Imperatores: Marius, Sulla etc
  • The 1st Triumvirate: Pompey, Crassus, and Caesar (especially the latter)
  • 44–31 BC: the Second Triumvirate and the victory of Octavian

 

2. AUGUSTUS THE RULER

Key question: within the context of the period 31 BC–AD 69 how successfully did Octavian/Augustus establish the principle of a supreme ruler within a system that was specifically designed to prevent rule by one man?

Key Topics:

  • The political settlement: ‘Restoration of the Republic’
  • Restoration of traditional values and virtues
  • A brief over-view of the narrative history 31 BC–AD 69
  • Patronage in Rome and the Italian municipalities

 

3. IMPERIAL IMAGE

Key question: within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 to what extent did the emperors actively manipulate a public image and how was this expressed?

Key topics:

  • Augustus and the archetype image of imperial power: statues, inscriptions, coinage
  • The Julio-Claudians and their popular image in statuary and coinage
  • The use of imagery to promote the contenders of 68–9
  • The use of imagery by Vespasian to consolidate the Flavian regime

 

4. THE SUCCESSION

Key question: within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 Augustus and his successors were simply members of a Roman aristocratic family playing out its affairs on a grand scale, by seeking to keep their property ‘in the family’. How far is this true and how did this affect the succession?

Key topics:

  • Augustus’s attempts to ensure he would be followed by a family member
  • Keeping it in the family: the succession of Gaius in 37 and Nero in 54
  • Succession after murder or suicide: the accession of Claudius in 41 and Galba in 68
  • A new dynasty: Vespasian and his sons Titus and Domitian – his policy of establishing a dynastic succession immediately after taking power

 

5. THE REIGNS OF CALIGULA AND NERO

Key question: Caligula and Nero both began their reigns with secure successions and enjoyed popularity and success to begin with. Within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 Roman historians judged the reigns of Caligula and Nero to have begun well but to have ended catastrophically. To what extent is this justifiable?

Key topics:

  • The security of their claims on the throne
  • The part played by advisers
  • Finance and taxation
  • The emergence of tyrannical tendencies
  • The destruction of rival claimants to the throne and the consequences

 

6. CLAUDIUS THE WEAK EMPEROR

Key question: within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 how far can Claudius be judged to have been a weak emperor compared to his predecessors and successors?

Key topics:

  • The nature of his succession
  • Winning public support
  • The freedmen
  • Military glory: the invasion of Britain
  • Messallina and Agrippina

 

7. PLEASING THE PUBLIC

Key question: within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 to what extent were public buildings, entertainments and triumphs used to reinforce the regime and confidence in it? What could happen if resources were diverted to the emperors’ own indulgence?

Key topics:

  • Augustus’s policy for building projects in Rome, and the role of Marcus Agrippa
  • Public projects by Tiberius and Claudius
  • The consequences of personal extravagance and self-indulgence: the reigns of Gaius and Nero

 

8. THE ARMY

Key question: within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 to what extent were the Roman emperors simply military dictators?

Key topics:

  • The organization and geographical distribution of the Roman army (legions, Praetorians, but also the careers of the Roman elite)
  • Military loyalties: Antony, Augustus, Tiberius and Gaius
  • Earning military support: Claudius

 

9. WOMEN

Key question: Roman law excluded women from public office. Within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 to what extent could women affect the course of political events in the early Roman Empire?

Key topics:

  • Livia and Augustus
  • Messallina and her ambitions in the court of Claudius
  • Agrippina the Younger, her role in the court of Claudius and the succession of Nero
  • The lines of descent from key women: Scribonia, Octavia

 

 

10. SOURCES

Key question: our principal source for this period is Tacitus. Within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 to what extent can we rely on him to provide us with reliable characterizations of the political figures he describes, and on other sources help balance the picture?

Key topics:

  • The extent to which Tacitus’ Annals and Histories are composed as dramatic works of literature, rather than accurate representations of words, motives and actions
  • The extent to which Tacitus relied on sources which themselves were biased
  • The availability or lack of other material to verify Tacitus

 

11. REINVENTING THE EMPIRE

Key question: ‘It was not the senators but the army which constituted the basis of Vespasian’s power’ (Grant, M., The Roman Emperors 1985, 53). How far would you agree with this statement?

Key topics:

  • The position in 68 on the death of Nero
  • The secret revealed: an emperor could be declared in a place other than Rome
  • Why the Roman world divided itself between a number of candidates: who supported who
  • Why was the imperial system continued rather than restoring the Republic?
  • How did Vespasian establish himself? (the OB CIVES SERVATOS ‘for having saved the citizens’ issues of Vespasian, or consider here the Restitution series of coins issued by Titus)

 

12. PERSONALITIES AND POLITICAL CHANGE

Key question: ‘The varied and often bizarre characters of the emperors … were crucial agents of political change in the principate’ (Goodman 1997, 50). Within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 how far do you agree with this statement?

Key topics:

  •  
  • The private excesses of emperors as a provocation to their enemies
  • The cultivated public persona of each emperor, and the falsification of the record under later rulers
  • The personalities of the individual emperors as a factor in their response to issues and problems
  • Factors involved in change beyond the personality of the emperor

 

13. EMPERORS OR INSTITUTIONS

Key question: ‘Once the system had been put in place, it made little difference who was emperor’. Within the context of the period 31BC–AD69 how far do you believe that emphasis on individual emperors distorts historical analysis of the period?

Key topics:

  • The extent to which individuals can influence or determine the course of events
  • The role of faction or syndicates in determining the course of events
  • The role of contemporary sources in magnifying the individual at the expense of understanding the institutions and underlying influences

 

N.B. Key Questions 12 and 13 are similar, but provide different ways to explore the conflicting view of understanding how the Empire worked.

 

14. IMPERIAL RESPONSIBILITIES

Key question: The demands of administering the Empire were so great on the personality of the emperor that it was inevitable many of the incumbents would fail.’ How far do you agree with this statement?

Key topics:

  • The extent to which individuals can influence or determine the course of events
  • The extent to which individual emperors were obliged to take personal charge of affairs from dealing with individual petitions to imperial strategy
  • The effect of relying on finding new emperors from the Julio-Claudian family
  • The significance of the rule of Vespasian and his family compared to the Julio-Claudians
  • The failings and successes of rulers such as Tiberius, Caligula and Nero

 

15. EMPEROR AND THE SENATE

Key question: ‘Nero’s reign had come to grief because of the same trouble which had damaged or destroyed previous reigns: his relations with the senate and its leading members became disastrously bad’ (Grant, M., 1975, The Twelve Caesars, 173). How far do you agree with this statement?

Key topics:

  • Nero’s conflicts with the senate and his actions which incurred the disapproval of the senate
  • The conflicts experienced by previous emperors
  • The extent to which some emperors abrogated their responsibilities
  • Examples of how well some emperors managed the senate
  • The extent to which the senate believed itself to be the basis of Roman government

 

 

Some of the key personalities (apart from the emperors themselves)

Marcus Agrippa, Maecenas (Augustus)

Sejanus (Tiberius)

Lentulus Gaetulicus, Macro, Cassius Chaerea (Caligula)

Messalina, Agrippina, and his freedmen (Claudius)

Agrippina, Seneca, Tigellinus, Vindex (Nero)

 

 

SOURCE MATERIALS

Back to the Top

 

3. Ancient and Modern Sources

 

AQA state that your enquiry should use:

·        A minimum of about 6 sources

·        Primary or secondary sources or both

·        Written, oral or visual sources

 

Your enquiry should show an understanding of

·        Historiography (how history is written)

·        Different views and interpretations

 

ANCIENT SOURCES (PRIMARY):

 

Ancient Sources are not like the sources you may be familiar with from medieval Europe. For a start there are far fewer of them. But there are several other factors to consider:

 

  • COPYISTS: Ancient Sources survive only because medieval monks copied what remained of the ancient manuscripts. There were no printed versions produced until the Middle Ages.

 

  • INCOMPLETE: This means that very few ancient sources are complete. The Annals of Tacitus, our most important source for the period, starts with Tiberius but has gaps covering the whole reign of Caligula (37–41), part of the reign of Claudius (41–54) and part of Nero’s reign (54–68). The History of Dio Cassius survives in part only through summaries made by later copyists – in other words, we don’t have the original text for some sections, just someone else’s version of it.

 

  • MISTAKES: It also means the sources sometimes have mistakes made by the copyists.

 

  • DATE OF THE SOURCE: Few of these ancient sources were eyewitnesses or contemporaries of the time they describe. Suetonius and Tacitus both wrote around the end of the 1st century AD and the beginning of the 2nd century AD. Dio Cassius (or Cassius Dio) wrote in the early 3rd century.

 

  • Conversely, Velleius Paterculus was a contemporary of Augustus and Tiberius, and strongly supported them. We also have Augustus’s own Res Gestae or ‘achievements of his life’ which of course paints a very attractive picture of those achievements.

 

  • BIAS: Ancient Sources, like any other sources, are obviously subject to bias. Tacitus was a senator and he lived under the emperors and this affected his views.

 

  • In some cases the bias amounts to outright falsification, or deliberate manipulation of the record. In Tacitus’s case it is believed that his portrayal of Tiberius (14–37) as a paranoid, arbitrary recluse, was in reality a veiled criticism of Domitian (81–96) under whom Tactius had grown up and had seen his father-in-law, Agricola, ruined. Tacitus wrote under Trajan (98–117), considered by him to be a benign ruler.

 

  • LITERATURE/HISTORIOGRAPHY: Ancient Sources are not always ‘histories’ as we understand them. Tacitus and others were concerned with producing literature and that meant modifying the story by exaggerating events and obscuring others to make a more literary or artistic account.
  • BIOGRAPHERS: Suetonius wrote pen portraits of Julius Caesar and the first eleven emperors (‘The Twelve Caesars’) but he produced a hotch-potch of historical fact, scurrilous rumour, anecdotes and fantasy. He was in this sense a biographer and his concern was to produce a colourful and memorable account of the emperors and their personalities.

 

  • TRANSLATIONS: Ancient Sources have had to be translated from Latin or Greek. Translations are often paraphrases of the original, since Latin and Greek expressions are quite different from English. Take a look at this, which is Tacitus’s damning observation of the short-lived emperor Galba (AD 68–9) (Histories I.49):

 

Omnium consensu capax imperii nisi imperasset.

In English, a translation might be:

‘By common consent he was capable of ruling if only he had not ruled.’

 

This means that translations differ quite widely. In other words, you need to take care! Part of the success of your Coursework will depend on your ability to look critically at these sources, and also form your own judgment about how modern historians have dealt with them. You will find, for example, that in ancient history enormous importance can be attached to brief phrases and passages.

 

Many of these sources are readily available in books like the Penguin Classics series. But they are also available online:

 

 

PART 1 – Ancient Sources

These are the principal historical sources for the period to be studied. They include Augustus’s own record of his achievements, the Res Gestae.

 

A. Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus The Lives of the Twelve Caesars

 

Suetonius - the Life of Julius Caesar (died 44 BC)

 

Suetonius - the Life of Augustus (reigned 27 BC–AD 14)

 

Suetonius - the Life of Tiberius (reigned AD 14–37)

 

Suetonius - the Life of Caligula (reigned AD 37–41)

 

Suetonius - the Life of Claudius (reigned AD 41–54)

 

Suetonius - the Life of Nero (reigned AD 54–68)

 

B. Augustus Caesar The Res Gestae

Introduction

Chapters 1-7

Chapters 8-13

Chapters 14-18

Chapters 19-24

Chapters 25-31

Chapters 32-35

 

Another version of the Res Gestae

 

C. Velleius Paterculus The Roman History (a very flattering portrait of Augustus)

 

D. Tacitus The Annals of Imperial Rome and another version here

 

E. Tacitus The Histories – Book I is especially useful for the state of the Empire in 68 and general observations

 

F. Dio Cassius Roman History (especially Books 45–66)

 

G. Appian Roman History

 

H. Josephus Jewish Antiquities - on the accession of Claudius (search under Gratus on this page to find the account of how Claudius was made emperor in AD 41)

 

I. Strabo Book V – Rome provides a description of the City in Augustan times (scroll down to Chapter 8).

 

K. Pliny the Elder’s Natural History – a vast compendium of information about the Roman world compiled by Pliny who died in the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79.

 

 

 

Many of these and others are included in:

Cooley, M.G.L., (Ed) The Age of Augustus (London Association of Classical Teachers no. 17, Kingston, 2003)

 

Inscriptions and other texts may be found in:

Braund, D.C., A Sourcebook on Roman History, 31 BC–AD 68 (Croom Helm, London 1985)

 

 

PART 2 – Modern Sources

 

You might wonder how, with so little to go on, modern authors have been able to write history books about the Roman Empire. The answer is that it is possible for an author to have a grasp on almost everything there is to know about the Roman world, or the period he/she is studying. This makes for a very different type of treatment involving detailed consideration of the surviving sources, inscriptions, coins, art, buildings and sometimes archaeological evidence. Throughout all these the vivid personalities of the emperors, their acolytes and their families, have burned an indelible impression on all later ages.

 

1. General Roman History books

 

Alston, R., 1998, Aspects of Roman History AD 14–117, Routledge, Abingdon

Balsdon, J.P.V. D., 1962, Roman Women: their History and Habits, Bodley Head, London

Bauman, R.A., 1992, Women and Politics in Ancient Rome, Routledge, London

Goldsworthy, A.  2003, In the Name of Rome, Weidenfield & Nicholson, London

Goodman, M., 1997,The Roman World 44BC–AD180, Routledge, London

Holland, T., 2003, Rubicon. The Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic, Little Brown, London

Patterson, J.R., 2000, Political Life in the City of Rome, Bristol Classical Press, London

Rodgers, N., 2008, Roman Empire, Metro Books, New York

Scarre, C., 1995, Chronicle of the Roman Emperors, Thames & Hudson, London

Scullard, H.H., 2007, From the Gracchi to Nero, Routledge, London

Syme R.,  1939,The Roman Revolution, OUP, Oxford. Some of this classic work is available on Google Books here

Wallace-Hadrill, A., 1993 Augustan Rome, Bristol Classical Press, London. Examines the impact of the new regime on Roman society

Wells, C., 1984,The Roman Empire, Fontana, London

 

2. Books on the emperors under study

 

Barrett, A.A., 1989 Caligula. The Corruption of Power, Batsford, London

Barrett, A.A., 2008, Lives of the Caesars, Blackwell, Oxford

Everitt, A.,  2007,The First Emperor, John Murray, London

Goldsworthy, A., 2006, Caesar: the Life of a Colossus, Weidenfield & Nicholson, London

Grant, M., 1975,The Twelve Caesars, Michael Grant, London

Holland, R., 2004, Augustus. Godfather of Europe, Sutton, Stroud

Jones, A.H.M., 1970, Augustus, Norton, New York

Levick, B., 1990, Claudius, Routledge, London

Levick, B., 1999,Tiberius the Politician, Routledge, London

Levick, B., 1999, Vespasian, Routledge, London

Shotter, D., 2008, Nero Caesar Augustus, Emperor of Rome, Pearson Longman, London

Wiedemann, T., 1989, The Julio-Claudian Emperors, Bristol Classical Press, London

Wilkinson, S., 2005, Caligula, Rouledge, London

 

 

Governing the Empire

 

This section of the Coursework Booklet is designed to familiarize you with the political language of the Roman world.

 

REVOLUTIONARY CONSERVATISM

The Roman system under the emperors combined Revolution and Conservatism:

  • The Romans did not devise an ingenious new system of monarchical rule
  • The Romans were dominated by their principle of mos maiorum (‘the tradition of ancestors’)
  • Under Augustus the Republican system was refined and modified so that it was in reality a monarchy but had the form of the old Republic

 

THE FORM OF THE REPUBLIC

Traditional Roman society fell into two parts:

  • The patrician nobility, the patricii or the patricians
  • The people, plebs

By the fourth century BC this had become blurred (see below). Rich plebs were able to serve as magistrates alongside members of the old patricii and even intermarried with them. Rome was thus ruled by a mixture of the old noble familes, and new noble families drawn from the plebs. However, most of the plebs had as little power as they had ever had (essentially none).

 

Rome had NO written constitution. This is how it worked:

 

1. The COMITIA (Assembly)

  • In theory Rome was a democracy, ruled by the people (plebs) who met in the Comitia and who had unlimited powers.
  • In practice the Comitia only met when magistrates (originally drawn from the upper class, patricii) summoned it, and voted only on measures placed before it
  • The Comitia was only made up of male citizens, divided up according to their wealth into blocks of 100 men called centuriae (centuries).
  • Voting started with the richer centuries and ended when an overall majority had voted, so the poorest rarely (if ever) got to vote at all
  • This caused little trouble as most people had no interest in governing the Roman state. They just wanted to be protected from extremist magistrates and have a way of seeking redress for their grievances.
  • The Comitia in theory chose the magistrates, but lost this right in AD 14.

 

2. The MAGISTRATES

The system become formalized in 82 BC. Men who served as magistrates now followed a series of posts in a career structure called the cursus honorum and entered the Senate. This is the order, starting from the highest:

 

a. The Consuls, the most senior

  • Two consuls were elected annually by the Comitia (until AD 14). They had equal powers, and could veto each other
  • Age: at least 42 years old.
  • The idea of having two was to prevent any one man gaining supreme power.
  • Ex-consuls were known as proconsuls and were sent out to govern the most important provinces of the Empire or take senior military commands.
  • To maximize the number of available proconsuls it became customary for the consuls to resign their posts early and be replaced by several other pairs of consuls each year.
  • In the days of the emperors, it was common for the emperor to serve as one of the consuls. Augustus served as consul annually from 27–23 BC, and again in 5 BC, and 2 BC. Tiberius held it three times: AD 18, 21 and 31. Caligula held it in AD 37, 39–41, Claudius AD 42–43, 47, and 51, and Nero in AD 55, 57–8, 60 and 68.
  • Since this made an emperor a proconsul too there was a technical possibility of rivalry with other proconsuls. Proconsuls sent to govern provinces under the emperor’s personal control (e.g. Britain) were therefore classified as propraetors instead, regardless of their actual status.

 

b. The Praetors

  • By Julius Caesar’s time, there were 16 praetors who dealt with justice in Rome and foreigners
  • Ex-praetors, propraetors, were sent out to command legions and govern provinces.

 

c. The Aediles

  • There were 4 Aediles, in charge of corn dole, streets, public order, water, weights and measures.
  • It was not necessary for a man on the cursus honorum to hold this post.

 

d. The Quaestors

  • By Julius Caesar’s time there were 40 Quaestors
  • Quaestors looked after public finance and the treasury
  • Once a man had served as Quaestor he was automatically eligible to enter the Senate
  • Age: about 25

 

e. The military tribunes (not a magistracy)

  • Bottom of the ladder entry post, serving alongside the commander of a legion.
  • Age: about 20

 

3. The TRIBUNES of the PEOPLE (PLEBS)

  • Some magistrates held the tribuneship of the plebs, usually after being a Quaestor

·        Tribuni plebis (‘the tribunes of the people’) could convene the Senate but their main power came from the right to interfere on behalf of a Pleb who was being oppressed by a Patrician.

·        Since the tribune was the one to decide whether someone was being oppressed, it was a great power: tribunes could disrupt magistrate elections, stop troop or supply levies and even suspend Senate business.

·        Tribunes did all these things to wear down the Patrician monopoly on power, so that for example in 367 BC Plebs were admitted to the consulship.

·        In the late Republic rival factions exploited tribunes and their powers, causing the political chaos of the age, helped by the fact that tribunes were usually treated as sacred and inviolable.

·        The tribuneship essentially became a magistracy like all the others, with the holder just being a member of the Senatorial nobility and therefore not being much of an advocate for the People.

·        Because emperors held the power of a tribune (see below), the tribuneship wasn’t a popular office as a result and Augustus had to have a law passed that the tribuneship be selected by lot from men who had served as quaestors.

 

4. The POWER of the TRIBUNE (tribunicia potestas)

·        Under the emperors the tribunes generally operated on paper in the same way as they always had done but they took care to do only what the emperor wanted. Not surprising seeing as the emperors adopted the power of a tribune in order to give them rights over legislation and the Senate. Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero, held this power every year.

·        The concept of the ‘power of the tribune’ (as distinct from actually being a tribune) was invented by Augustus. According to Tacitus, he was ‘reluctant to style himself king or dictator but wanted some title that would indicate his pre-eminence over all other authorities’ (Annals iii.56).

·        Tacitus named this phrase the summi fastigii vocabulum, ‘the phrase for the supreme dignity’ (ibid) because it was this device that gave the emperors their legal power over everyone else.

 

5. The SENATE

  • Senators had served at least as Quaestors on the magistrate career structure (see above)
  • Senators had to own property valued at a minimum of 1 million sesterces, and were assessed for this by the Censors. So long as they continued to fulfil this they were in for life. Most were far wealthier.
  • The Senate was originally made up of men drawn from around 1,000 noble patrician families which in practice meant a closed circle of around 2000 men, from whom the roughly 600-odd serving senators were drawn.
  • Since 367 BC members of wealthy plebs families could enter the Senate, and one of the two annual consulships had to be held by a plebs.
  • The Senate preselected candidates for the magistracies, approved measures before they went to the Assembly, advised magistrates, and issued its views in a senatus consultum (senatorial decree)
  • The senatus consultum (senatorial decree) did not automatically have the force of law in the period we are studying. To become law a decree had to be ratified by the popular assemblies.
  • The Senate’s greatest power lay in its informal auctoritas or prestige authority. In other words, its decisions and views carried such authority and weight its decrees normally became law.
  • Senators wore a special toga with a broad purple stripe, and sat in the best rows at the theatre.
  • Senators who supported the Senate were known as Optimates (‘Best Men’). Those who courted the support of the mob were known as Populares.

 

6. The SENATE under the EMPERORS

  • During the days of the emperors, the emperor virtually always held the power of a tribune and was quite often one of the consuls. This gave him enormous power over the Senate.
  • The emperor appointed ex-consuls and ex-praetors to govern his provinces (about 2/3 of the total) and command the legions from amongst the senators.
  • Senate controlled law courts, appointed governors to senatorial provinces (about 1/3 of the total).
  • The emperor co-opted wealthy provincials onto the Senate, for example Claudius brought in Gauls, so that provincials had a stake in the system.

 

 

 

 

 

Timeline

 

By the mid-1st century BC Rome’s Republican government had been torn apart. Rival Roman generals divided up the Roman Empire between themselves, fell out amongst themselves and fought. The Senate was totally unable to control the situation. By 50 BC the only two men who mattered were Julius Caesar and Pompey. Caesar was a shameless populist, always courting the crowd. His military successes in Gaul had brought him enormous prestige. He was hated by the traditionalists who supported the Senate, the Optimates.

 

The prelude

50 BC   Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon (enters Italy) with his army, an illegal act, to challenge his rival   Pompey: Civil War ensues

48 BC   Caesar, despite being outnumbered, defeats Pompey at the Battle of Pharsalus in Greece

44 BC   Caesar was made dictator perpetuus (dictator for life). This semi-monarchical position horrifies         traditionalists who hate any sense of one man having supreme power. Caesar believes it is the only    way to settle Rome. Soon after he is murdered by traditionalists.

44 BC   Civil War again. Octavian (Caesar’s great-nephew and adopted son) and Mark Antony now pursue    the killers of Caesar, Brutus and Cassius.

43 BC   Mark Antony, Octavian and Lepidus form the Triumvirate and divide the Roman world between them.

42 BC   Antony and Octavian defeat Brutus and Cassius at Philippi.

41 BC   Antony meets Cleopatra of Egypt. This sets in train a series of events:

40 BC   Antony marries Octavia, Octavian’s sister, but has fallen for Cleopatra.

37 BC   Antony bigamously marries Cleopatra

32 BC   Antony divorces Octavia. Octavian publishes Antony’s will (stolen) in Rome which shows how he     plans to divide the Roman world amongst his children by Cleopatra

31 BC   Octavian defeats Antony and Cleopatra at the Battle of Actium – they commit suicide.

29 BC   Octavian celebrates a triumph in Rome

 

Augustus (27 BC–AD 14)

27 BC   Octavian, now Augustus (‘venerable’), agrees a constitutional settlement. Granted imperium (military            command power) for 10 years, and renewed later.

23 BC   Augustus gives up the consulship (but holds it again in 5 BC and 2 BC)

17 BC   Augustus adopts his grandsons Gaius and Lucius

12 BC   Augustus becomes Chief Priest

11 BC   Augustus’s step-son Tiberius forced to divorce his wife and marry Augustus’s daughter Julia

2 BC     Augustus becomes Father of the Country (Pater Patriae)

2          Lucius dies

4          Gaius dies, Augustus now adopts Tiberius

9          Catastrophe in Germany when three legions are lost

14         Death of Augustus

 

Tiberius (AD 14–37)

14         Accession of Tiberius

23         Death of Tiberius’s son Drusus

27         Tiberius withdraws to Capri

31         Execution of Tiberius’s Praetorian Prefect Sejanus, who had plotted a coup

37         Death (murder?) of Tiberius

 

Gaius ‘Caligula’ (AD 37–41)

37         Accession of Gaius (son of Germanicus and grandson of Tiberius’s brother Drusus the Elder; is       grandmother Antonia was daughter of Augustus’s sister Octavia and Mark Antony; his mother was          Agrippina, daughter of Agrippa and Augustus’s daughter Julia)

40         Abortive expedition to invade Britain – Gaius shows increasing signs of madness

41         Gaius murdered by disaffected Praetorians

 

Claudius (AD 41–54)

41         Accession of Claudius, brother of Gaius’ father Germanicus, noted as a family idiot

42         Commences new harbour works at Ostia

43         Invasion of Britain, Claudius attends

44         Holds a triumph for his British invasion

48         Executes his wife Messalina, mother of his son Britannicus, and marries his niece Agrippina (sister             of Gaius)

53         Agrippina’s son Nero marries Claudius’s daughter Octavia (murdered in 62)

54         Murder(?) of Claudius

 

Nero (AD 54–68)

54         Accession of Nero, who can claim descent from Mark Antony, Augustus’s sister Octavia, and         Augustus’s wife Livia (by her first husband)

55         Britannicus poisoned

59         Nero murders his mother Agrippina

61         Revolt of Boudica in Britain nearly costs Rome the province

62         Nero ejects his tutor Seneca, appoints Tigellinus Praetorian Prefect, divorces Octavia and marries    Poppaea

64         Great Fire in Rome. Nero builds his Golden House on the site

65         Conspiracy of Piso uncovered

66         Nero visits Greece. Conspiracy of Vinicius

67         Vespasian, with his son Titus, crushes the Jewish Revolt

68         Nero returns to Italy and forced to commit suicide

 

Galba (AD 68–9), Otho (69), Vitellius (69)

68         Galba accepted by the Senate as the new emperor. Fails to pay promised donative to soldiers

69         January: Galba murdered. Accession of Otho but Rhine armies support Vitellius

            April: defeat and murder of Otho. Accession of VItellius

            1 July: army in Alexandria declares for Vespasian

            July: defeat and murder of Vitellius at Cremona by supporters of Vespasian

 

Vespasian (69–79)

69         Accession of Vespasian

70         Vespasian reaches Rome and establishes the Flavian dynasty

71         Return of Vespasian’s son Titus, now associated with him in titles as designated successor

79         Death of Vespasian

 

 

Summary of the emperors

 

REMEMBER! Julius Caesar was NOT an emperor.

 

Augustus (Octavian)       27BC–AD14

Tiberius             14–37

Caligula             37–41

Claudius                        41–54

Nero                             54–68

Galba                            68–69

Otho                             69

Vitellius             69

Vespasian                     69–79

Titus                             79–81

Domitian                       81–96

Nerva                            96–98

Trajan                           98–117

 

How to write a Bibliography

 

When writing an extended essay like this it must be clear to the reader where your information came from. This distinguishes your source material from your own conclusions and allows the examiner to assess what material you utilized to write your essay and how you handled it. This quotation below is from a report on a Classics essay prize awarded by Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge in 2009 and it sums up how this can cause you real problems:

 

There were many essays which were very well written with strong arguments which were however lacking in proper referencing. We wish to emphasize that it is important to reference not only the ancient sources, but also the secondary reading. In some cases, lack of referencing resulted in other people’s arguments and ideas being passed off as the entrant’s own idea. In others, there seemed to be a lack of secondary reading and a reliance upon unreliable material from the internet. The strongest entries showed evidence of wide reading of secondary material as well as of original sources, and referencing of data and ideas. Such essays also contained a bibliography of works cited.

 

So how do you do it? Your essay should feature a Bibliography at the end which lists the works you used. They should appear in a form like this, detailing author, title, publisher and city and date of publication:

 

Barrett, A.A., (Ed.) 2008, Lives of the Caesars, Blackwell, Oxford

Bauman, R.A., 1992, Women and Politics in Ancient Rome, Routledge, London

Everitt, A., 2007, The First Emperor, John Murray, London

 

However, this is only part of the referencing procedure. You must also place references within your text to these sources by using the author, year and page. With ancient sources, for example Suetonius, you refer to the specific work and the numbered sub-section within the source – all ancient sources are sub-divided into ‘books’ and ‘chapters’ which are universally applied so that it does not matter which edition you use; for the same reason you do not need to cite the year for ancient sources. You may do this either within the text, for example:

 

Hurley’s judgment is that Claudius avoided the worst excesses of his predecessors (Hurley in Barratt, Ed., 2008, 106), though his contemporaries considered him to be variously ‘wise’, ‘hasty’, ‘foolish’ and even by some to be ‘out of his senses’ (Suetonius, Claudius 15).

 

Or you can do it as footnotes or endnotes, like this:

 

Hurley’s judgment is that Claudius does seem to have avoided the worst excesses of his predecessors,1 though his contemporaries considered him to be variously ‘wise’, ‘hasty’, ‘foolish’ and even by some to be ‘out of his senses’.2

 

____________________________

1 Hurley in Barratt, Ed., 2008, 106  [Ed = ‘Editor’]

2 Suetonius, Claudius 15

 

As you can see, footnotes and endnotes are neater than inserting the reference into the text and prevent the flow being disrupted. Note that in the Barrett book’s case, he was the editor. The actual chapter in that book is by Barbara Hurley so we show this in the reference and the page number. In Suetonius’ case we refer to the section on Claudius, and the sub-section within it, NOT the page number and we do not need the year.

 

Sometimes you may find a modern author has two works in the same year. In such cases you would distinguish them in the Bibliography and references as, for example 2006 (i) and 2006 (ii).

 

 

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KSHS Classical Civilisation