A History of Rome to 565 A. D Part 10

From the pa.s.sing of the Hortensian Law in 287 B. C. to the tribunate of Tiberius Gracchus in 133 B. C. the Senate exercised a practically unchallenged control over the policy of the Roman state. For the Senate was able to guide or nullify the actions of the magistrates, the tribunate, and the a.s.semblies; a condition made possible by the composition of the Senate, which, in addition to the ex-magistrates, included all those above the rank of quaestor actually in office, and by the peculiar organization and limitations of the Roman popular a.s.semblies.

The higher magistrates were simply committees of senators elected by the a.s.semblies. Their interests were those of the Senate as a whole, and const.i.tutional practice required them to seek its advice upon all matters of importance. The Senate a.s.signed to the consuls and praetors their spheres of duty, appointed pro-magistrates and allotted them their commands, and no contracts let by the censors were valid unless approved by the Senate. Except when the consuls were in the city, the Senate controlled all expenditures from the public treasury.

The chief weapon of the tribunes, their right of veto, which had been inst.i.tuted as a check upon the power of the Senate and the magistrates, became an instrument whereby the Senate bridled the tribunate itself. For, since after 287 the plebeians speedily came to const.i.tute a majority in the senate chamber, it was not difficult for this body to secure the veto of the tribunes upon any measures of which it disapproved, whether they originated with a consul or a tribune.

And, because the popular a.s.semblies could only vote upon such measures or for such candidates as were submitted to them by the presiding magistrates, the Senate through its influence over magistrates and tribunes controlled both the legislative and elective activities of the comitia.

*The Senate and the public policy.* Since the Senate was a permanent body, easily a.s.sembled and regularly summoned by the consuls to discuss all matters of public concern, it was natural that the foreign policy of the state should be entirely in its hands-subject, of course, to the right of the a.s.sembly of the Centuries to sanction the making of war or peace-and hence the organization and government of Rome's foreign possessions became a senatorial prerogative. And, likewise, it fell to the Senate to deal with all sudden crises which const.i.tuted a menace to the welfare of the state, like the spread of the Baccha.n.a.lian a.s.sociations which was ended by the _Senatus Consultum_ of 186 B. C. And, finally, the Senate claimed the right to proclaim a state of martial law by pa.s.sing the so-called _Senatus Consultum ultimum_, a decree which authorized the magistrates to use any means whatsoever to preserve the state.

*Polybius and the Roman Const.i.tution.* Thus in spite of the fact that the Greek historian and statesman, Polybius, who was an intimate of the governing circles in Rome about the middle of the second century B. C., in looking at the form of the Roman const.i.tution could call it a nice balance between monarchy, represented by the consuls, aristocracy, represented by the Senate, and democracy, represented by the tribunate and a.s.semblies, in actual practice the state was governed by the Senate. It is true that the Senate was not always absolute master of the situation. Between 233 and 217 B. C., the popular leader Caius Flaminius, as tribune, consul and censor, was able to carry out a democratic policy at variance with the Senate's wishes, but with his death the control of the Senate became firmer than ever. From what has been said it will readily be seen that the Senate's power rested mainly upon custom and precedent and upon the prestige and influence of itself as a whole and its individual members, not upon powers guaranteed by law. The Roman republic never was a true democracy, but was strongly aristocratic in character.

*The aristocracy of office.* The Senate was representative of a narrow circle of wealthy patrician and plebeian families, which const.i.tuted the new n.o.bility that came into being with the cessation of the patricio-plebeian struggle and which was in truth an office-holding aristocracy. For, after the initial widening of the circle of families en.o.bled by admission to the Senate, the third century saw these create for themselves a real, if not legal, monopoly of the magistracies and thus of the regular gateway to the senate chamber. This they could do because the expense involved in holding public offices, which were without salary, and in conducting the election campaigns, which became increasingly costly as time went on, deterred all but persons of considerable fortune from seeking office, and because the exercise of personal influence and the right of the officer conducting an election to reject the candidature of a person of whom he disapproved, made it possible to prevent in most cases the election of any one not _persona grata_ to the majority of the senators. It was only individuals of exceptional force and ability, like Cato the Elder, and in later times Marius and Cicero, who could penetrate the barriers thus established. Such a person was signalled as a _novus h.o.m.o_, a "new-comer."

*The goal of office.* While Rome was hard-pressed by her enemies and while the issue of the struggle for world empire was still in doubt, the Senate displayed to a remarkable degree the qualities of self-sacrifice and steadfastness which so largely contributed to Rome's ultimate triumph, as well as great political adroitness in the foreign relations of the state.

But with the pa.s.sing of all external dangers, personal ambition and cla.s.s interest became more and more evident to the detriment of its patriotism and prestige. Office-holding, with the opportunities it offered for ruling over subject peoples and of commanding in profitable wars, became a ready means for securing for oneself and one's friends the wealth which was needed to maintain the new standard of luxurious living now affected by the ruling cla.s.s of the imperial city. The higher magistracies were rendered still more valuable in the eyes of the senators when the latter were prohibited from partic.i.p.ating directly in commercial ventures outside of Italy by a law pa.s.sed in 219 B. C., which forbade senators to own s.h.i.+ps of seagoing capacity, with the object probably of preventing the foreign policy of the state from being directed by commercial interests. As a consequence the rivalry for office became extremely keen, and the customary canva.s.sing for votes tended to degenerate into bribery both of individuals and of the voting ma.s.ses. In the latter case it took the form of entertaining the public by the elaborate exhibition of lavish spectacles in the theatre and the arena.

*Attempts to restrain abuses.* However, the sense of responsibility was still strong enough in the Senate as a whole to secure the pa.s.sing of legislation designed to check this evil. The Villian law (_lex Villia annalis_) of 180 B. C. established a regular sequence for the holding of the magistracies. Henceforth the quaestors.h.i.+p had to be held before the praetors.h.i.+p, and the latter before the consulate. The aediles.h.i.+p was not made imperative, but was regularly sought after the quaestors.h.i.+p, because it involved the supervision of the public games and festivals, and in this way gave a good opportunity for ingratiating oneself with the populace.

The tribunate was not considered as one of the regular magistracies, and the censors.h.i.+p, according to the custom previously established, followed the consuls.h.i.+p. The minimum age of twenty-eight years was set for the holding of the quaestors.h.i.+p, and an interval of two years was required between successive magistracies. Somewhat later, about 151 B. C., re-elections to the same office were forbidden. In the years 181 and 159 B. C. laws were pa.s.sed which established severe penalties for the bribery of electors. Another attempt to check the same abuse was the introduction of the secret ballot for voting in the a.s.semblies. The Gabinian Law of 139 provided for the use of the ballot in elections; two years later the Ca.s.sian Law extended its use to trials in the _comitia_, and in 131 it was finally employed in the legislative a.s.semblies.

But these laws accomplished no great results, as they dealt merely with the symptoms, and not with the cause of the disorder. And the Roman Senate, deteriorating in capacity and morale, was facing administrative, military, and social problems, which might well have been beyond its power to solve even in the days of its greatness. As we have indicated the Senate's power rested largely upon its successful foreign policy, but its initial failures in the last wars with Macedonia and Carthage, and the long and b.l.o.o.d.y struggles in Spain, had weakened its reputation and its claim to control the public policy was challenged, from the middle of the second century B. C., by the new commercial and capitalist cla.s.s.

*The Roman Const.i.tution from 265 to 133 B. C.* During the period in question there were few changes of importance in the political organization of the Roman state. The dictators.h.i.+p had been discarded, although not abolished, before the close of the Hannibalic War, a step which was in harmony with the policy of the Senate which sought to prevent any official from attaining too independent a position. In 242 B. C. a second praetors.h.i.+p, the office of the _praetor peregrinus_ or alien praetor was established. The duty of this officer was to preside over the trial of disputes arising between Roman citizens and foreigners. Two additional praetors.h.i.+ps were added in 227, and two more in 197 B. C., to provide provincial governors of praetorian rank. In 241 B. C. the last two rural tribal districts were created, making thirty-five tribes in all.

Hereafter when new settlements of Roman colonists were undertaken, or new peoples admitted to citizens.h.i.+p, they were a.s.signed to one or other of the old tribes, and members.h.i.+p therein became hereditary, irrespective of change of residence.

*The reform of the centuries.* At some time subsequent to the creation of these last two tribes, very probably in the censors.h.i.+p of Flaminius in 220 B. C., a change was made in the organization of the centuriate a.s.sembly.

The centuries were organized on the basis of the tribes, an equal number of centuries of juniors and seniors of each cla.s.s being a.s.signed to each tribe.(9) The reform was evidently democratic in its nature, as it diminished the relative importance of the first cla.s.s, deprived the equestrian centuries of the right of casting the first votes-a right now exercised by a century chosen by lot for each meeting-and placed in control of the a.s.sembly of the Centuries the same elements as controlled the a.s.sembly of the Tribes.

*The comitia an antiquated inst.i.tution.* But by the second century B. C.

the Roman primary a.s.semblies had become antiquated as a vehicle for the expression of the wishes of the majority of the Roman citizens, because with the spread of the Roman citizen body throughout Italy it was impossible for more than a small percentage to attend the meetings of the Comitia, and this situation became much worse with the settlement of Romans in their foreign dependencies. It was the failure of the Romans to devise some adequate subst.i.tute for this inst.i.tution of a primitive city-state, which was largely responsible for the people's loss of its sovereign powers. As it was, the a.s.semblies came to be dominated by the urban proletariat, a cla.s.s absolutely unfitted to represent the Roman citizens as a whole.

*The allies of Rome in Italy.* The Latin and Italian allies, with the exception of such as were punished for their defection in the war with Hannibal, remained in their previous federate relations.h.i.+p with Rome.

However, the Romans were no longer careful to adhere strictly to their treaty rights, and began to trespa.s.s upon the local independence of their allies. Roman magistrates did not hesitate to issue orders to the magistrates of federate communities, and to punish them for failure to obey or for lack of respect. The spoils of war, furthermore, were no longer divided in equal proportions between the Roman and allied troops.

Added to these aggravations came the fact that the allies were after all dependents and had no share in the government or the financial administration of the lands they had helped to conquer. But their most serious grievance was their obligation to military service, which was exacted without relaxation, and which, owing to reasons which we shall discuss later, had become much more burdensome than when originally imposed. It is not surprising, then, to find that by 133 B. C. the federate allies were demanding to be admitted to Roman citizens.h.i.+p.

However, it was not in Rome or in Italy, but in Rome's foreign possessions that the important administrative development of the third and second centuries occurred.

II. THE ADMINISTRATION OF THE PROVINCES

*The status of the conquered peoples.* The acquisition of Sicily in 241, and of Sardinia and Corsica in 238 B. C. raised the question whether Rome should extend to her non-Italian conquests the same treatment accorded to the Italian peoples and include them within her military federation. This question was answered in the negative and the status of federate allies was only accorded to such communities as had previously attained this relations.h.i.+p or merited it by zeal in the cause of Rome. All the rest were treated as subjects, not as allies, enjoying only such rights as the conquerors chose to leave them. The distinguis.h.i.+ng mark of their condition was their obligation to pay a tax or tribute to Rome. Except on special occasions they were not called upon to render military service.

*The provinces.* At first the Romans tried to conduct the administration of Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica through the regular city magistrates, but finding this unsatisfactory in 227 B. C. they created two separate administrative districts-Sicily forming one, and the other two islands the second-called provinces from the word _provincia_, which meant the sphere of duty a.s.signed to a particular official. And in fact special magistrates were a.s.signed to them, two additional praetors being annually elected for this purpose. In like manner the Romans in 197 organized the provinces of Hither and Farther Spain, in 148 the province of Macedonia, in 146 that of Africa, and in 129 Asia. Subsequent conquests were treated in the same way. For the Spanish provinces new praetors.h.i.+ps were created, "with consular authority" because of the military importance of their posts. But for those afterwards organized no new magistracies were added, and the practice was established of appointing as governor an ex-consul or ex-praetor with the t.i.tle of pro-consul or pro-praetor. This method of appointing provincial governors became, as we shall see, the rule for all provinces under the republican regime.

*The provincial charter.* Although each province had its own peculiar features, in general all were organized and administered in the following way. A provincial charter (_lex provinciae_) drawn up on the ground by a commission of ten senators and ratified by the Senate fixed the rights and obligations of the provincials. Each province was an aggregate of communities (_civitates_), enjoying city or tribal organization, which had no political bond of unity except in the representative of the Roman authority. There were three cla.s.ses of these communities: the free and federate, the free and non-tributary, and the tributary (_civitates liberae et foederatae_, _liberae et immunes_, _stipendiariae_). The first were few in number and although within the borders of a province did not really belong to it, as they were free allies of Rome whose status was a.s.sured by a permanent treaty with the Roman state. The second cla.s.s, likewise not very numerous, enjoyed exemption from taxation by virtue of the provincial charter, and this privilege the Senate could revoke at will. The third group was by far the most numerous and furnished the tribute laid upon the province. As a rule each of the communities enjoyed its former const.i.tution and laws, subject to the supervision of the Roman authorities.

*The Roman governor.* Over this aggregate of communities stood the Roman governor and his staff. We have already seen how the governor was appointed and what was his rank among the Roman magistrates. His term of office was regularly for one year, except in the Spanish provinces where a term of two years was usual. His duties were of a threefold nature: military, administrative, and judicial. He was in command of the Roman troops stationed in the province for the maintenance of order and the protection of the frontiers; he supervised the relations between the communities of his province and their internal administration, as well as the collection of the tribute; he presided over the trial of the more serious cases arising among provincials, over all cases between provincials and Romans, or between Roman citizens. Upon entering his province the governor published an edict, usually modelled upon that of his predecessors or the praetor's edict at Rome, stating what legal principles he would enforce during his term of office. The province was divided into judicial circuits (_conventus_), and cases arising in each of these were tried in designated places at fixed times.

*The governor's staff.* The governor was accompanied by a quaestor, who acted as his treasurer and received the provincial revenue from the tax collectors. His staff also comprised three _legati_ or lieutenants, senators appointed by the senate, but usually nominated by himself, whose function it was to a.s.sist him with their counsel and act as his deputies when necessary. He also took with him a number of companions (_comites_), usually young men from the families of his friends, who were given this opportunity of gaining a knowledge of provincial government and who could be used in any official capacity. In addition, the governor brought his own retinue, comprising clerks and household servants.

*The provincial taxes.* The taxes levied upon the provinces were at first designed to pay the expenses of occupation and defence. Hence they bore the name _stipendium_, or soldiers' pay. At a later date the provinces were looked upon as the estates of the Roman people and the taxes as a form of rental. The term _tributum_ (tribute), used of the property tax imposed on Roman citizens did not come into general use for the provincial revenues until a later epoch. As a rule the Romans accepted the tax system already in vogue in each district before their occupancy, and exacted either a fixed annual sum from the province as in Spain, Africa and Macedonia or one tenth (_dec.u.ma_) of the annual produce of the soil, as in Sicily and Asia. The tribute imposed by the Romans was not higher, but usually lower than what had been exacted by the previous rulers. The public lands, mines, and forests, of the conquered state were incorporated in the Roman public domain, and the right to occupy or exploit them was leased to individuals or companies of contractors. Customs dues (_portoria_) were also collected in the harbors and on the frontiers of the provinces.

*The tax collectors.* Following the custom established in Italy, the Roman state did not collect its taxes in the provinces through public officials but leased for a period of five years the right to collect each particular tax to the private corporation of tax collectors (_publicani_) which made the highest bid for the privilege. These corporations were joint stock companies, with a central office at Rome and agencies in the provinces in which they were interested. It was this system which was responsible for the greatest evils of Roman provincial administration. For the _publicani_ were usually corporations of Romans, bent on making a profit from their speculation, and practised under the guise of raising the revenue, all manner of extortion upon the provincials. It was the duty of the governor to check their rapacity, but from want of sympathy with the oppressed and unwillingness to offend the Roman business interests this duty was rarely performed. Hand in hand with tax collecting went the business of money lending, for the Romans found a state of chronic bankruptcy prevailing in the Greek world and made loans everywhere at exorbitant rates of interest.

To collect overdue payments the Roman bankers appealed to the governor, who usually quartered troops upon delinquent communities until they satisfied their creditors.

*The rapacity of the governors.* A further source of misgovernment lay in the greed of the governor and his staff. The temptations of unrestricted power proved too great for the morality of the average Roman. It is true that there were not wanting Roman governors who maintained the highest traditions of Roman integrity in public office, but there were also only too many who abused their power to enrich themselves. While the shortness of his term of office prevented a good governor from thoroughly understanding the conditions of his province, it served to augment the criminal zeal with which an avaricious proconsul, often heavily indebted from the expenses of his election campaigns, sought to wring a fortune from the hapless provincials. Bribes, presents, illegal exactions, and open confiscations were the chief means of ama.s.sing wealth. In this the almost sovereign position of the governor and his freedom from immediate senatorial control guaranteed him a free hand.

*The quaestio rerum repetundarum: 149 B. C.* The mischief became so serious that in 149 B. C. the public conscience awoke to the wrong and ruin inflicted upon the provinces, and by a Calpurnian Law a standing court was inst.i.tuted for the trial of officials accused of extortion in the provinces. This court was composed of fifty jurors drawn from the Senate and was presided over by a praetor. From its judgment there was no appeal. Its establishment marks an important innovation in Roman legal procedure in criminal cases. It is possible also that the Senate was encouraged to undertake the organization of new provinces shortly after 149 because it believed that this court would serve as an adequate means of controlling the provincial governors. But it was useless to expect very much from such a tribunal. The cost of a long trial at Rome, the difficulty of securing testimony, the inadequacy of the penalty provided, which was limited to rest.i.tution of the damage inflicted, as well as the fear of vengeance from future governors, would deter the majority of sufferers from seeking reparation. Nor could an impartial verdict be expected from a jury of senators trying one of their own number for an offense which many of them regarded as their prerogative. And so till the end of the republic the provincials suffered from the oppression of their governors, as well as from that of the tax-collectors.

III. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

*Outstanding characteristics of the period.* The epoch of foreign expansion which we are considering was marked by a complete revolution in the social and economic life of Rome and Italy. It witnessed the spread of the slave plantations, the decline of the free Italian peasantry, the growth of the city mob of Rome, the great increase in the power of the commercial and capitalist cla.s.s, and the introduction of a new standard of living among the well-to-do.

*The slave **plantations.* The introduction of the plantation system, that is, of the cultivation of large estates (_latifundia_) by slave labor, was the result of several causes: the Roman system of administering the public domain, the devastation of the rural districts of South Italy in the Hannibalic War, the abundant supply of cheap slaves taken as prisoners of war, and the inability of the small proprietors to maintain themselves in the face of the demands of military service abroad and the compet.i.tion of imported grain as well as that of the _latifundia_ themselves.

The public domain that was not required for purposes of colonization had always been open for pasturage or cultivation to persons paying a nominal rental to the state. Those who profited most from this system were the wealthier landholders who could occupy and cultivate very considerable areas. This fact explains the senatorial opposition to the division and settlement of the _ager Gallicus_ proposed and carried by the tribune Flaminius in 233 B. C. The dangers of the practice to the smaller proprietors caused the pa.s.sing of laws, probably late in the third century, which limited the amount of public land to be occupied by any individual and his family. But these laws were disregarded, for the Senate administered the public domain and the senators were the wealthy landholders. After several generations the public lands occupied in this way came to be regarded as private property. The havoc wrought by Hannibal in South Italy, where he destroyed four hundred communities, caused the disappearance of the country population and opened the way for the acquisition of large estates there, and the law which restricted the commercial activities of senators and forbade their engaging in tax collecting or undertaking similar state contracts encouraged them to invest their capital in Italian land and stimulated the growth of their holdings.

The change in agrarian conditions in Italy was also advantageous to large estates. The cheapness of Sicilian grain rendered it more profitable in Italy to cultivate vineyards and olive orchards, and to raise cattle and sheep on a large scale. For the latter wide acreages were needed: a summer pasturage in the mountains and a winter one in the lowlands of the coast.

Abundant capital and cheap labor were other requisites. And slaves were to be had in such numbers that their labor was exploited without regard for their lives. Cato the Elder, who exemplified the vices as well as the virtues of the old Roman character, treated his slaves like cattle and recommended that they be disposed of when no longer fit for work. Often the slaves worked in irons, and were housed in underground prisons (_ergastula_). The dangers of the presence of such ma.s.ses of slaves so brutally treated came to light in the Sicilian Slave War which broke out in 136 B. C., when over 200,000 of them rebelled and defied the Roman arms for a period of four years.

*The decline of the free peasantry.* Partly a cause and partly a result of the spread of the _latifundia_ was the decline of the free Italian peasantry. As we have seen, the compet.i.tion of the slave plantations proved ruinous to those who tilled their own land. But another very potent cause contributing to this result was the burden imposed by Rome's foreign wars. Since only those who had a property a.s.sessment of at least 4000 a.s.ses were liable to military service, and since the majority of Roman citizens were engaged in agricultural occupations, the Roman armies were chiefly recruited from the country population. And no longer for a part of each year only, but for a number of consecutive years, was the peasant soldier kept from his home to the inevitable detriment of his fields and his finances. Furthermore, a long period of military service with the chances of gaining temporary riches from the spoils of war unfitted men for the steady, laborious life of the farm. And so many discharged soldiers, returning to find that their lands had been mortgaged in their absence for the support of their families, and being unable or unwilling to gain a livelihood on their small estates, let these pa.s.s into the hands of their wealthier neighbors and flocked to Rome to swell the mob of idlers there. Then came the heavy losses of the Second Punic and the Spanish Wars. Although the census list of Roman citizens eligible for military service shows an increase in the first half of the second century B. C., between 164 and 136 it sank from 337,000 to 317,000. Yet the levies had to be raised, even if, as we have seen, they were unpopular enough to induce the tribunes to intercede against them. The Latin and Italian allies felt the same drain as the Roman citizens, but had no recourse to the tribunician intercession. The Senate was consequently brought face to face with a very serious military problem. The provinces, once occupied, had to be kept in subjection and defended. Since the Roman government would not, or dare not, raise armies in the provinces, it had to meet increasing military obligations with declining resources.

*The urban proletariat.* Another difficulty was destined to arise from the growth of a turbulent mob in Rome itself. This was in large measure due to Rome's position as the political and commercial center of the Mediterranean world. By the end of this period of expansion the city had a population of at least half a million, rivalling Alexandria and Antioch, the great h.e.l.lenistic capitals. Although not a manufacturing city, Rome had always been important as a market, and now her streets were thronged with traders from all lands, and with persons who could cater in any way to the wants and the appet.i.tes of an imperial city. There was a large proportion of slaves belonging to the mansions of the wealthy, and of freedmen engaged in business for themselves or for their patrons. Hither flocked also the peasants who for various reasons had abandoned their agricultural pursuits to pick up a precarious living in the city or to depend upon the bounty of the patron to whom they attached themselves.

Owing to the slowness of transportation by land and its uncertainties by sea, the congestion of population in Rome made the problem of supplying the city with food one of great difficulty, since a rise in the price of grain, or a delay in the arrival of the Sicilian wheat convoy would bring the proletariat to the verge of starvation. And upon the popular a.s.semblies the presence of this unstable element had an unwholesome effect. Dominated as these a.s.semblies were by those who resided in the city, their actions were bound to be determined by the particular interests and pa.s.sions of this portion of the citizen body. Furthermore, in the _contiones_ or ma.s.s meetings for political purposes, non-citizens as well as citizens could attend, and this afforded a ready means for evoking the mob spirit in the hope of overawing the Comitia. This danger would not have been present if the Roman const.i.tution had provided adequate means for policing the city. As it was, however, beyond the magistrates and their personal attendants, there were no persons authorized to maintain order in the city. And since the consuls lacked military authority within the _pomerium_, there were no armed forces at their disposal.

*The equestrian order.* The Roman custom of depending as much as possible upon individual initiative for the conduct of public business, as in the construction of roads, aqueducts and other public works, the operation of mines, and the collection of taxes of all kinds, had given rise to a cla.s.s of professional public contractors-the _publicani_. Their operations, with the allied occupations of banking and money-lending, had been greatly enlarged by the period of war and conquest which followed 265 B. C.

through the opportunities it brought for the exploitation of subject peoples. Roman commerce, too, had spread with the extension of Roman political influence. The exclusion of senators from direct partic.i.p.ation in these ventures led to the rise of a numerous, wealthy and influential cla.s.s whose interests differed from and often ran counter to those of the senatorial order. In general they supported an aggressive foreign policy, with the ruthless exploitation of conquered peoples, and they were powerful enough to influence the destruction of Carthage and Corinth. In the course of the second century this cla.s.s developed into a distinct order in the state-the equestrians. Since the Roman cavalry had practically ceased to serve in the field, the term _equites_ came to be applied to all those whose property would have permitted their serving as cavalry at their own expense. The majority of these was formed by the business cla.s.s, although under the name of equestrians were still included such members of the senatorial families as had not yet held office.

*The new scale of living.* In the course of their campaigns in Sicily, Africa, Greece, and Asia Minor, the Romans came into close contact with a civilization older and higher than their own, where the art of living was practised with a refinement and elegance unknown in Latium. In this respect the conquerors showed themselves only too ready to learn from the conquered, and all the luxurious externals of culture were transplanted to Rome. But the old Periclean motto, "refinement without extravagance," did not appeal to the Romans who, like typical _nouveaux riches_ vied with one another in the extravagant display of their wealth. The simple Roman house with its one large _atrium_, serving at once as kitchen, living room, and bed chamber, was completely transformed. The _atrium_ became a pillared reception hall, special rooms were added for the various phases of domestic life; in the rear of the _atrium_ arose a Greek peristyle courtyard, and the house was filled with costly sculptures and other works of art, plundered or purchased in the cities of h.e.l.las. Banquets were served on silver plate and exhibited the rarest and costliest dishes. The homes of the wealthy were thronged with retinues of slaves, each specially trained for some particular task; the looms of the East supplied garments of delicate texture. A wide gulf yawned between the life of the rich and the life of the poor.

*Sumptuary legislation.* But the change did not come about without vigorous opposition from the champions of the old Roman simplicity of life who saw in the new refinement and luxury a danger to Roman vigor and morality. The spokesman of the reactionaries was Cato the Elder, who in his censors.h.i.+p in 184 B. C. a.s.sessed articles of luxury and expensive slaves at ten times their market value and made them liable to taxation at an exceptionally high rate, in case the property tax should be levied. But such action was contrary to the spirit of the age; the next censors let his regulations fall into abeyance. Attempts to check the growth of luxury by legislation were equally futile. The Oppian Law, pa.s.sed under stress of the need for conservation in 215 B. C., restricting female extravagance in dress and ornaments, was repealed in 195, and subsequent attempts at sumptuary legislation in 181, 161, and 143, were equally in vain.

To resume: in 133 B. C. the Roman state was faced with a bitter contest between the Senate and the equestrians for the control of the government, the Comitia was dominated by an unstable urban proletariat, the provisioning of Rome was a source of anxiety, dissatisfaction was rife among the Latin and Italian allies, the military resources of the state were weakening, while its military burdens were greater than ever, and the ruling circles had begun to display unmistakable signs of a declining public morality. With a const.i.tution adapted to a city-state Rome was now forced to grapple with all the problems of imperial government.

IV. CULTURAL PROGRESS

*Greek influences.* In addition to creating new administrative problems and transforming the economic life of Italy, the expansion of Rome gave a tremendous impulse to its cultural development. The chief stimulus thereto was the close contact with h.e.l.lenic civilization. We have previously mentioned that Rome had been subject to Greek influences both indirectly through Etruria and directly from the Greek cities of South Italy, but with the conquest of the latter, and the occupation of Sicily, Greece, and part of Asia Minor, these influences became infinitely more immediate and powerful. They were intensified by the number of Greeks who flocked to Rome as amba.s.sadors, teachers, physicians, merchants and artists, and by the mult.i.tude of educated Greek slaves employed in Roman households. And as the h.e.l.lenic civilization was more ancient and had reached a higher stage than the Latin, it was inevitable that the latter should borrow largely from the former and consciously or unconsciously imitate it in many respects. In fact the intellectual life of Rome never attained the freedom and richness of that of Greece upon which it was always dependent.

In this domain, as Horace phrased it, "Captive Greece took captive her rude conqueror."

*New tendencies in Roman education.* A knowledge of Greek now became part of the equipment of every educated man, the training of the sons of the well-to-do was placed in the hands of Greek tutors, who were chiefly domestic slaves, and the study of the masterpieces of Greek literature created the genuine admiration for Greek achievements and the respect that men like Flamininus showed towards their Greek contemporaries-a respect which the political inept.i.tude of the latter soon changed to contempt.

These tendencies were vigorously opposed by the conservative Cato, who regarded Greek influences as demoralizing. Following the old Roman custom he personally trained his sons, and had no sympathy with a philh.e.l.lenic foreign policy. But even Cato in the end yielded so far as to learn Greek.

The chief patrons of h.e.l.lenism were men of the type of Scipio Africa.n.u.s the Elder; notably t.i.tus Flamininus, Aemilius Paulus and Scipio Aemilia.n.u.s, at whose house gathered the leading intellectuals of the day.