The Evolution of Emperor Worship

As you may have read a few weeks ago, Augustus Caesar was the first Emperor, whose authority was more of a subtle, de facto kind of rule, rather than the flamboyance of his descendants. He was also the first person to introduce the concept of a living divine leader into Roman politics, which had for almost five hundred years avoided deifying their leaders, unlike the Greeks and Egyptians. When Julius Caesar was deified post mortem by a guilty Senate, Augustus wasted no time in adding “son of god” to his list of many titles. As such, people were much more hesitant to go against him, for fear that their anger at his naked power grabbing might be perceived as impiety by the masses who adored him.

This is not to say that the Romans were all Agnostic pragmatists before Augustus Caesar, far from it. Many a popular assembly was disrupted or canceled because some appointed Pontifex claimed ill omens, signs which only seemed to appear when the assembly favored policies which the Senate opposed. Sometimes, this was seen for the crass undemocratic interruption that it was, but other times it succeeded.

Gaius Marius claimed to have found an eagle's nest with seven baby chicks in it – a large number of baby eagles for a single nest. He and his followers claimed that this was a sign from the gods that he was meant to serve seven terms as Consul, something that helped to sway Plebeian support for the unorthodox multiple terms that he served. The people of Rome recognized, for better or worse, that there was a law higher than the Roman codes.

Augustus took things a step further by claiming to be God's son, since God was Julius Caesar. By endowing himself with divine status, confirmed by the Senate's own apotheosis, he set the stage for the later Emperors and the Popes after them to claim infallibility. He also removed a key element to becoming a deity within his culture: dying. He was to his people a living, breathing divine entity, capable of bringing great good to his allies and terrible wrath upon his enemies.

It is really no wonder that this sort of thing got carried way too far by those who came after. It wasn't long before people were required to burn incense to the images of the sitting Emperor in order to enter local marketplaces as far away as Palestine and Asia Minor. But even deification couldn't save some Emperors from disfavor and assassination, as it seems even Roman piety had its limits.

Pax vobiscum

The Centurion's Riddle

Quick: how many soldiers did a centurion command?  If you guessed one hundred, you are dead wrong.  Don't feel bad, though, a lot of people have gotten this wrong for hundreds of years.  A centurion, in the days of the early Republic, commanded about 60 men, or half of a maniple.  Later centurions of the early Imperial Era commanded around 80.  So why the confusion?

Basically, it comes down to a problem of language.  Centum is Latin for one hundred, and it's where we get the terms centimeter, centigrade, century, and cent.  There is a similar word which the Romans used to describe their army divisions: Centuriae.  This word means tribe or group, and literally has almost zero relation to the word centum.  Avid readers will remember this post [link], where we learned about the Comitia Centuriata, which is translated "Tribal Assembly."

Lazy scholarship led to people assuming that centum and centuriae were related when it's clear that their similarity is purely coincidental.  Imagine a future in which the people believe that the ancient English word Career meant being able to drive a Car.

Pax vobiscum

-- On a side note, I will now be posting a little differently - All the days will continue their present themes, but they will be on an every other day/week basis.  So, Technology Tuesday and Theology Thursday will have to wait until next week, while Culture Wednesday and Famous Friday are still on track for this one.  Having babies changes everything

Culture Wednesday: The Early Republicans

For those of you rooting around teh Interweb for American political posts, welcome! This blog is about the ancient world, but hey, stick around and you might learn something new.

During the early Republic, Rome had certain ideals which its citizens, for the most part, tried to uphold. This young, upstart city-state was based, like most ancient economies, on agriculture first and foremost. The ideal Roman, therefore, was a farmer, regardless of social status, personal wealth, or fame. Land ownership was key to obtaining respect, political office, and financial independence, and the ironically egalitarian rhetoric of the Patricians often praised the Roman farmer-soldiers for their simplicity of lifestyle, expertise with weaponry, and willingness to fight for the city and put her needs above their own.

Not unlike Sparta before it, or even America much later, the early Roman military system was militia-style conscripting with annual training during the slow winter season. If you owned enough property to qualify for the fifth census class, you were not only eligible for service, you were required to report for duty. Those in the lower classes were expected to obtain work as farm-hands, house servants, or really any menial work.

Scipio Africanus, who I so recently covered, served as a great bad example by the conservative Senators of his day for his tendency to wear his hair long, spend huge amounts of money on lavish parties, and generally live a life of excess matched today only by rock stars, royalty and professional athletes. Despite his unique lifestyle, he still restored Rome's honor by defeating Carthage, though the Senate was largely displeased at his decision to parlay with the residents rather than simply burning their city to ash and putting its citizens to the sword.

The Senate's desire to see Carthage destroyed seems an unspeakable war crime to us today, and became a famous warning when it did happen after the Third Punic War. Their other imperial-style cruelties would certainly horrify us today, as well as their military discipline, which included killing soldiers who drew a short straw. However, what set the Romans apart from the Greeks and other peoples was their practicality. This may have come about because of their farming ethic, but regardless of its source, it was their most powerful weapon.

While other 'great' civilizations were concerned with the true meaning of love or which day is proper for worshiping Athena, the Romans concerned themselves with supply lines, siege engineering, battle tactics, and in general, how to ensure victory. They learned well the lesson of the Second Samnite War: either destroy your enemy or forgive them, but never humiliate if you intend to let them live. Their world and culture, heinous though some of its elements may seem to our modern sensibilities, was born out of necessity and practical reality.

The Republic had its triumphs along with its faults, and lauded the heroes of old who were granted temporary Dictatorship and did what was necessary to resolve whatever crisis led to their election only to relinquish power when their term was up. Cincinnatus was a one such hero, who went right back to farming after he had served Rome and defeated its enemies.

What happened to the noble Roman, the farmer-soldier who was as skillful with a sword as he was with a plowshare? He was out-sourced. In short, the Patricians and wealthy Plebs utilized slavery so extensively that it became impossible for the working class to find work. The excesses promoted by Scipio Africanus became commonplace, and politics became overly corrupt. The Senate, having grown powerful since the Punic Wars, desperately tried to restore the old ethics of a hard day's work and a simple lifestyle, but even they had grown used to living in great estates with their every need attended to by slaves from every corner of their colonies. Their conservatism was short-sighted at best; treating symptoms instead of stepping back to understand the problem. They sacrificed their hard-nosed practicality for selfish, soft living, and many of them paid the price in their own blood.

The biggest danger to representative government, historically, is itself. The poor Plebs became frustrated at their lack of power and representation and turned to liberators like Lucius Cornelius Sulla, Gaius Marius, and Julius Caesar. The cult of personality toppled the old rhetoric of freedom and shared power, replacing it with hero worship, mob rule, and might-makes-right style politics. The old Romans eventually faded into the annals of history along with Romulus and the kings of old, their lifestyles gradually viewed as quaint instead of inspiring.

Pax vobiscum

Scipio Africanus: A New Kind of Roman

Known to readers of this blog as 'that guy who finally beat Hannibal,' Scipio Africanus was much more than just another Roman military genius. He grew his hair long, wore his toga in an unorthodox style, preferred Greek culture and language to Latin, and became a model of later charismatic commanders like Gaius Marius, Lucius Cornelius Sulla, and Julius Caesar. Scipio introduced the cult of personality into Roman politics, and it was a cult that would outlive and ultimately destroy the Republic itself.

Scipio got his start at age 17, joining his father on campaign against the Carthaginian invaders. He was present at the battles of Ticinus, Trebia, and Cannae, all of which ended with decisive victories for Hannibal. In 211 BCE a mere five years after that crushing defeat at Cannae, Scipio went to the Senate and requested command over the new Roman army which was being sent to Spain (the previous army had been utterly destroyed by Hannibal's brother Hasdrubal). The other candidates kept their mouths shut, believing Spain to be a death sentence, now that it was once again so firmly under Carthaginian control. Scipio promptly captured New Carthage and proceeded to win goodwill for Roman occupation. He set captives free, and returned a young Celtiberian princess to her fiancé and family, thus earning that tribe's allegiance against the Carthaginians.

Wisely plotting his strategic course, he sought to defeat the three Carthaginian armies in the area one by one, knowing that they would too far outnumber his own legions if he faced them all at once. He faced off against Hasdrubal Barca in the battle of Baecula and gained a victory by using a similar technique that gave Hannibal the victory at Cannae. Hasdrubal withdrew and marched on Italy, and in a controversial move both now and then, Scipio Africanus refused to pursue. There have been many theories of why he did this, but I tend to believe that it was his strategic good sense that prevented him from risking being caught between the remnants of Hasdrubal's forces and those of Mago or Gisgo, the other two Carthaginian commanders in Spain.

After gaining more Celtiberian allies, he defeated the two other Carthaginian commanders at Ilipa (modern Seville) in 206 BCE, and consequently drove their commanders out of Spain entirely. In addition to recruiting the local tribes, Scipio also made overtures to Syphax and Massinissa, two Numidian princes who agreed to cease their support of Carthage and supply the Roman army with cavalry. This was a huge win for the Romans because Numidian cavalry of the time outmatched nearly all other types, and was one of the chief causes of Hannibal's many successes. Syphax later switched back to the Carthaginian side, marrying one of their noble-ladies to seal the deal, but Massinissa proved extremely helpful in the later invasion of Carthage itself.

Scipio was the ultimate success story for the new culture of Rome: a culture which was fast-growing among the military and plebs. The old Roman model of farmer/soldier was quickly eroding under the increasing power of the Senate and their abusive practices toward the soldiers and the poor. The conservatives in the Senate distrusted his charismatic Greek mannerisms and disliked his fame. When Scipio won at Zama and ended the Second Punic War, he was greeted as a national hero in Rome and given his famous moniker Africanus. Several dissident groups offered to nominate him as Dictator or Consul for Life, but to his credit, he refused. It seems that this radical, innovative commander and politician had some old-fashioned Roman virtue in him after all.

Pax vobiscum

The Genius of Hannibal

I thought I'd take some time out today to simply marvel at one of history's most famous tacticians. Hannibal's genius cannot be understated, in my opinion: he was a man far ahead of his time and culture, and had his family been positioned a little more favorably within Carthaginian politics, it seems likely that history would remember the Second Punic War as the event that ended Roman expansion and brought the rogue Italian superpower to heel, paving the way for Phoenician hegemony throughout the Mediterranean.

The Barca family had a reputation as fierce fighters and noble warriors. However, Carthaginian culture was largely based on trading and the mighty city trained only a small percentage of its residents as professional soldiers, hiring most of the work of battle out to mercenary groups. Hence, though Hannibal's father Hamilcar fought the last eight years of the First Punic War with virtually no support from Carthage itself, his sacrifice and continual victories counted for little in the eyes of Carthaginian politicians, who allowed him an expedition in Spain after the war mostly to get rid of him. Young Hannibal joined his father in this conquest, and spent most of his adolescent years encamped with the soldiers, who took a liking to the young warrior and trained him in every weapon they could. Thus, when Hannibal one day took up his father's reigns and led the army, he commanded strong personal loyalty from them and there is no report of mutiny among his troops to be found in recorded history.

I like to believe that Hannibal's military education was two-fold: he likely learned about the more efficient “guerilla” tactics from his father, and the more practical, battlefield realities from the encamped soldiers. Thus, we have events like the Battle of Trebia, in which Hannibal hid some allied forces to execute an ambush against the already engaged Roman infantry, whom he had also deprived of their morning breakfast and forced to walk through the freezing Trebia river. That battle alone combines many elements from Hannibal's likely upbringing: the ambush tactics his father perfected, plus knowing that an unfed army poses little threat to a well-supplied force.

The biggest innovation in Roman tactics of that time was the maniple system, which allowed different lines of infantry to assault the enemy's front lines while having an avenue to fall back should the battle prove difficult. While they did deploy cavalry on their wings, their only purpose was to engage the enemy cavalry. This helped to win many battles, but was still essentially focused on the enemy's front. Hannibal knew that his forces would eventually be facing larger numbers, and so he focused on mobility, harassment, and flanking.

His wisdom in fighting battles also extended to knowing when he could not win. While Fabius was struggling to contain him in southern Italy, Hannibal tricked one of the containment armies by attaching torches to a herd of oxen and driving them through the forest at night. Thinking it was the enemy army preparing an ambush, the legions followed the torches, determined to out-ambush this troublesome Carthaginian. While they were busy chasing oxen, Hannibal led his forces through the now undefended pass and made for resupply in the north.

The saying goes that amateurs study tactics, while professionals study logistics. Unfortunately for Hannibal, he never fully secured supply lines from Carthage, and had to repeatedly fight for resupply from the Gauls or whichever Italian city decided to join him that week. Though he spent an impressive ten years in Italy campaigning successfully against the Romans, it was only a matter of time until the Romans took the war to Carthage, giving command to the unorthodox general Scipio Africanus, who would use Hannibal's own tactics to gain a victory over Carthage and Hannibal at the Battle of Zama.

Pax vobiscum

Julius Caesar Part II: The Later Years

When we last left old Gaius Julius Caesar, he had just won Consulship for the year in 59 BCE by a nasty, corrupt election that left no Senator clean, including Caesar's most tireless opponent, the notoriously incorruptible Cato. Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus was elected to serve as the second Consul, but would prove to be an ineffective check against his fellow executive. Supporting Caesar were Crassus, to whom Julius owed his freedom, and Pompey, whom Caesar recruited by promising to support land redistribution, a wedge issue amongst the Senators, and one that Caesar would use to cast the elite into the role of petty oligarchs and himself as the egalitarian savior of Rome.

When Caesar proposed a series of reforms designed to redistribute tracts of land to the poor, Crassus supported it on the Senate floor, while Pompey garrisoned his soldiers inside the city, frightening the moderate Senators into passing the decree. Seeking divine intervention, Bibulus tried to declare foul omens and therefore end the assembly prematurely, but he was chased off by armed supporters of Caesar and a bucket of sewage was thrown onto him as he rushed to his home to remain until the end of his term. The law passed without further delay, and thus was the First Triumvirate born: an alliance of three ambitious and savvy populists who would ultimately turn on each other. Caesar and Bibulus' Consulship was so one-sided that the Romans jokingly referred to the year 59 BCE as the Consulship of Julius and Caesar.

Caesar's father-in-law was elected as Consul during the next term, and it was lucky for Caesar because the Optimate Senators were thirsty for his blood. Instead of being confined to stewardship of a nearby uninhabited forest, Caesar's friends saw to it that he was appointed the governor of Cisalpine Gaul and Illyricum, in northern Italy and just east of the Adriatic Sea. He was given command over four legions and was now prepared to fight his way out of his ever-increasing debt. He made war on some local tribes which had been arming themselves, and made some money from their spoils. His term as governor was made to be five years instead of the usual one, which was lucky because otherwise his debts would have made him a slave, and he would have faced prosecutions for his quasi-legal activities while serving as Consul.

His campaigns in Gaul led him all the way to Britain, which he invaded under the pretense that they had aided a local Gallic tribe against him, a shaky accusation against anyone other than the Britons, who were mostly Gauls themselves and very similar in culture. His first invasion didn't go well and he had to return to the mainland, but he succeeded following season, securing Roman-allied control over the southern portion of the island.

Meanwhile, back in Rome, Caesar's daughter Julia, whom he had married to Pompey to secure his alliance, died during childbirth in 54 BCE. He offered him his niece Octavia, but Pompey eventually refused. Crassus died the next year while trying to invade Parthia in the east. Pompey weighed his options carefully and chose to marry Cornelia, the daughter of Caesar's enemy Quintus Metellus Scipio. In 52 BCE, political violence in the city got so bad that Pompey was declared the sole Consul, an office very different from Dictator because a Consul is answerable for their actions in office while a Dictator is not. While in office, Pompey blocked an attempt by Caesar to serve as Consul in absentia, though this had been allowed in previous years. The Triumvirate was broken and the two men left would now fight over the real prize: Rome itself.

That same year, there was a massive rebellion in Gaul led by Vercingetorix, a charismatic and capable military leader who defeated the Roman legions on more than one occasion during the war. Eventually, the Gallic forces were defeated by superior technology through the extensive siegeworks in place at the Battle of Alesia and Vercingetorix was forced to surrender. I'd like to go into more detail here, but rest assured, there will be coverage of these battles in upcoming Military Mondays.

In 50 BCE, Pompey and the Senate ordered Caesar to lay down arms, disband his troops and return to Rome. Caesar believed that it was a trap; that Pompey, who had now joined his enemies, would lead the way in prosecuting Caesar for crimes real and fabricated. He was probably not far off, for at one point that year Pompey accused Caesar publicly of insubordination and treason. January 10, 49 BCE, Gaius Julius Caesar crossed the Rubicon River with one legion and set off the Civil War. When many of the cities in northern Italy surrendered willingly to the invading legion, Pompey and his Senator allies abandoned Rome and sailed for Greece, taking with them every ship in the harbors of southern Italy. And so Caesar, being unable to chase his quarry, set off to challenge Pompey's lieutenants in Iberia, declaring, “I go to fight an army without a leader, so as later I may fight a leader without an army.”

He swept up the remains of forces loyal to Pompey and the Optimates in Iberia and made passage to Greece, where he would square off against his old ally and former son-in-law. At the Battle of Dyrrachium the next year, Pompey's army, which outnumbered Caesar's own legions at least 3 to 1, easily broke through Caesar's battle lines and his army routed. Caesar himself withdrew, and Pompey probably could have ended the entire war then and there, but his years of alliance with Caesar had taught him to be wary of this crafty populist. He feared a trap, and so did not pursue the enemy legions. Even Caesar remarked later that victory had belonged to his enemies, if only one of them would have claimed it.

His forces resupplied and fought the Battle of Pharsalus, in which they won an impressive and decisive victory for Caesar. The Optimates' power now broken, they fled in all directions, while Pompey sailed to Egypt where he believed he might find refuge. Instead he was assassinated, and his head presented to Caesar by Pharaoh Ptolemy XIII, who believed the gift would win him Caesar's favor. It worked in the opposite, however, and Caesar soon cast his support for Ptolemy's sister, Cleopatra VII, helping her to secure the throne of Egypt before he left. Caesar maintained a close relationship with Cleopatra, and there are historical rumors that they had a secret love child. He could have never married the Egyptian queen, however, as she was not a Roman citizen.

There was still work to be done, so Caesar granted immunity to many of his former enemy Senators, while mopping up the remnants of Pompey's forces, defeating all military opposition by 45 BCE. He had been elected Dictator in 48 and again in 47 BCE. In 46 he was appointed as Dictator for an unprecedented 10-year term, which undoubtedly led to his downfall two years later.

On the 15^th of March, 44 BCE, Caesar was attending a session of the Senate. A group of Senators had organized a conspiracy against this perpetual Dictator, calling themselves the Liberatores, or liberators. They lured Caesar into a false state of security by gathering around him to support a bill, and then proceeded to stab him repeatedly until he was dead. As many as 60 Senators participated in the assassination, and declared that Rome was now a free Republic once again.

Ultimately, Caesar's death did nothing to stem the tide of anti-Republican sentiment. In the old days of Rome, citizens were expected to be loyal to the State first, and many of the cautionary fables from the early years involve fathers ordering the executions of their own children if they betrayed the Republic. The shift from Republic to Empire was a gradual one, and as I said last week, Caesar is by no means the first ambitious Senator to have delusions of kingship. However, because the people had come to believe, generation after generation, that the Oligarchical Senators did not have their best interests at heart, they turned to Dictators and Emperors to right the wrongs that their own corrupt and bogged down bureaucracies had either created or failed to counteract. The fall of the Republic, and indeed Caesar's life as a whole, should send shivers down the spine of any government official, elected or otherwise, who fails to care for their citizens.

Pax vobiscum

Ancient Metallurgy

The manipulation of metal is one of the most important technological achievements of any civilization, whether ancient or modern. It's impact on both military and civilian life was so immense that entire periods of ancient history are named after the sorts of metals they were able to forge. The Bronze Age in Europe, for example, started in 2300 BCE and ended in 600 BCE. And the same way that modern advances often drive prices down for older technology, the Iron Age caused Bronze to become a more common, affordable commodity for soldier and farmer alike.

The ancient Europeans had many different methods for working metals long before the Romans added their own spice to the process. The earliest was probably hammering, where you just take two different malleable alloys and smash them together with a hammer until they've blended. Not the most efficient means, to be sure, but it was an effective, if time-consuming alternative to costlier methods involving furnaces and seals.

Provided you had a furnace, you could employ it to purify metals and weed out the slag, normally in preparation for working it. Smelting was commonly employed, a process where you seal the melting metal in a small container and separate the metal from the metal oxide. Before you smelted, however, you'd probably want to roast, which means almost literally barbecuing the metal over an open pit to eliminate the sulfur oxide before purifying the metal itself. After the metal has been melted and liberated of impurities, it would be cast into a mold where it would harden and become a plow, fork, helmet, or spearhead.

While the Romans certainly didn't create these and other primitive techniques, they built an empire upon the use of metals. Many of their early conquered lands were rich in metals of all sorts, and it wasn't long before captive slaves were sold to wealthy speculators who forced them to work the mines in Spain, Sicily, Britannia, and many other provinces. The mines were often dangerous, but it is interesting to note that the Romans appeared to have used a sort of hydraulic mining by utilizing their aqueducts and pushing water under some of the more metal-rich mountains especially in Spain. Just like with modern strip-mining, the result is almost offensive to behold.

Security of these mines was of top priority to the Roman government, whether Republican or Imperial. Many wars were fought over the resources they contained because the Romans knew that without a steady supply of metals, both precious and practical, the entire Empire would grind to a halt and even the city itself would be in danger. In fact, almost half of the time, they were fighting wars to ensure that they would be able to fight wars.

Pax vobiscum

Julius Caesar Part 1: The Early Years

 The Roman Republic had several huge problems by the time young Gaius Julius Caesar was born in 100 BCE. The Patrician Senate was in the midst of a conservative freak-out, fearing the now armed mob that Caesar's own uncle, Gaius Marius, had created by recruiting soldiers from the poor. Though they had fought hard against any reform that would give the Plebeians equal power, they couldn't stop the shift that was occurring right before their very eyes. And when Caesar was about 12, a wholly unprecedented and fearful thing took place: Lucius Cornelius Sulla, incensed at the Senate for trying to grant his command against Mithridates VI to Gaius Marius, used his army to lay siege to Rome and enter the city by force. Caesar later referred to this event when he was looking across the Rubicon years later, pondering the same course of action.

Caesar's early life was probably fairly easy, coming from a wealthy Patrician family and inheriting a massive estate at the age of 16 when his father died suddenly while tying his shoes. However, the social and political unrest in Rome which so frequently erupted in violence soon engulfed even this promising young man, who married another wealthy Patrician and had been named the High Priest of Jupiter. Sulla returned from Asia Minor only to fight another war at home; a purge of the Marian supporters who still opposed him. Because young Gaius was Marius' nephew, he was stripped of his inheritance and his wife's dowry, as well as his office of priest. If not for the pleading of Caesar's relatives who were loyal to Sulla, he may have even been executed. Though he was born a wealthy Patrician, he was now a man with no titles or inheritance to rely upon. So, he did what many young men without title or prospects continue to do today: he joined the army.

He won the Civic Crown, the second highest honor available to fighting men, during a campaign in Asia Minor, and after Sulla finally stepped down as Dictator and restored Consular rule, Caesar felt it safe to return to Rome, though he was little better off financially than when he had left. He entered the legal profession, having a natural gift for public speaking, and made quite a name for himself as a skillful prosecutor. He took on several high-profile cases involving corruption by retired Governors and other officials, gaining convictions most of the time and gaining the adoration of the masses, who were growing ever-weary of the corruption of their leaders.

While sailing to Rhodes to study under a skilled rhetorician, he was kidnapped by Cilician pirates and held for ransom. He continued to act the part of the superior Roman in captivity and even swore to his jailers that he would have them all crucified for this act. They believed he was joking, but after the ransom was paid, he raised a fleet of warships and hunted them down. While they were being held prisoner in Pergamum, the local Governor thought that it made more financial sense to sell them as slaves, but Caesar caught up with the traders who purchased them and saw to it that every last one of them hung on a cross. He had their throats slit beforehand, which is a kindness compared to the slow death of crucifixion. Nonetheless, the message was sent that Gaius Julius Caesar intended to crush his enemies completely, no matter who they were or what efforts were required.

When he returned to Rome he decided to take up politics and was elected Military Tribune, and over the next ten years he continued to climb the political ladder, gaining higher and higher appointments in the Senate. He made many of them nervous with his constant outward support for the memory of his uncle, the late Gaius Marius. In 63 BCE, he convinced a Tribune to prosecute an optimate Senator for a political murder which took place 37 years before. The case ended in a verdict of guilty, the crime itself being treason, and the Senator desperately appealed. During the opening of the appeal, one of the Praetors adjourned the trial temporarily, and Caesar told the Tribune to let the matter drop. His point had been made: do not mess with me.

Unfortunately, the Optimates continued to harry his every step, bringing in accusations of bribery and involvement in coup attempts. The Optimates and the Populares were kind of like political parties, but much less unified than those of today. Basically, the Optimates favored laws and policies that benefited and empowered the Patrician class and the Populares gained power and popularity by supporting policies of reform that could benefit the Plebeians. Remember that Patrician doesn't necessarily mean rich any more than Plebeian means poor. This was a kind of Republican monarchy, with the Patricians claiming descent to the original Senate as their right to rule. It might seem strange that Julius Caesar, a Patrician of the very aristocratic family Julii, would court Plebeians for power, but he was not wealthy like most Patricians. In fact, when he was appointed the Governor of Hispania Ulterior, the southern part of modern Spain, he was up to his eyeballs in debt and wasn't allowed to leave until he had satisfied it. Along came Marcus Lucinius Crassus, a copiously wealthy Senator who wanted Caesar's support against Pompey, the young upstart army commander who refused to play by traditional rules. Caesar agreed, and Crassus paid some of his debts and guaranteed the others, allowing Caesar to enter his new commission.

He secured his province well, defeating many local Celtic tribes in battle, and even earning the right to a Triumph parade back in Rome. However, he had his eye set on Consulship as well, and could only muster enough political clout to enact one of the two. Keeping his eye on the prize, he chose Consulship, and earned it through an election that was dirty on all sides.

We'll talk more about old Gaius Julius next week, but for now let's critically analyze this guy. I have to look upon Caesar with some admiration purely for his ability to rise to the top, regardless of negative personal situations. After all, he was stripped of land and titles by Sulla, and had to re-make himself if he hoped to even survive, much less gain any power. If not for his public speaking skills, we probably wouldn't even know his name. But he took what skills he had and put them to good use, using his status as a Patrician to borrow money and pull strings when he needed to.

That being said, I don't think he is quite the 'pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps' example that some historians have made him out to be. In truth, if he were a Plebeian Tribune and all of this happened to him, he would surely have been killed, not having the family connections to keep him alive. He may have been able to borrow money, but he certainly would have fallen into indentured servitude without a wealthy guarantor. He would probably have been killed or sold as a slave by the pirates who kidnapped him, since he wouldn't be worth a ransom.

Though he was an impressive individual who made the best of his situation, we should not ignore the impact of his title as a Patrician, nor the involvement and help of his family. The fact was, though you didn't need to be a Patrician to be wealthy, you did need to be one in order to be powerful, and all the reforms that the Plebeians had been fighting for politically were still coming to naught because the aristocrats in Rome did not want to really share power. Their stubbornness was their ultimate undoing, as was their use of violence to make political gains. Caesar can hardly be blamed for some of the more thuggish tactics he took later on, since he was not the first Senator to resort to violence when Democracy failed him.

Ultimately, I see Caesar as both an impressive individual and a product of his time. Next Friday, we will look closer at some of his later career and you can decide if he is truly the hero who saved Rome from corruption or the villain who killed the Republic when it no longer suited his political ends.

Pax vobiscum

A Kinder, Gentler Paganism

One of my favorite video games, as many of you have probably guessed, is the Rome: Total War series. In the expansion Barbarian Invasion, the game begins with the announcement that Paganism is the most popular religion in the known world. This always gives me a good chuckle because it is similar to saying that Soccer is the most popular sport in the world. While it is technically true, it doesn't mean that fans of rival teams are united in their love for soccer and agree on everything. The term Paganism is a bit misleading because there were so many different deities and forms of worship that to group the Roman practice of sacrificing bulls to Jupiter or Mars with the Germanic practice of sacrificing people by drowning them in a bog seems a little bit uneven. Thus, even the label Pagan itself becomes somewhat fluid, under the proper microscope.

The Gauls were a constant thorn in Rome's side, always pillaging and competing with the northern Italians for food, water, trade, and money. The Romans never really forgave them for sacking their fair city around 390 BCE after the crushing defeat of their Phalanx at the Battle of the Allia, and many young politicians would cut their teeth by campaigning against the savage barbarians to the north. When they finally conquered most of the Gaul territory, as seen in the image below, they syncretized their religion to match up with the Greco-Roman Pantheon.

Yellow=starting point

Light Green=furthest expansion

Dark Green=areas where languages

descended from Gallic are still spoken

Because we have few written records of the Gallic religion before the Roman conquest in the 50's BCE, it is difficult to assess their exact rituals and procedures. We know they engaged in human sacrifice, and Julius Caesar himself would have us believe that a funeral for a Gallic noble involved his family and slaves being burned with their deceased patriarch inside a large wooden man. However, the Romans are fond of exaggeration, and since they were hostile to the Gauls, we can't completely trust their historians to shoot straight.

We do know that there were some gods who were 'national' in the sense that Gauls from Spain to the Balkans would worship them. These included Toutatis, Esus, and Taranis, who were transformed into Mercury, Mars, and Jupiter after the Roman conquest. However, they also had regional deities and familial patron gods to choose from as well. At its core, this religion was animism, but it evolved over time to include anthropomorphic gods as well, largely thanks to Roman influence.

Taranis Jupiter, holding a Gallic chariot wheel in one hand

and a lighting bolt in the other - syncretastic!

After Rome conquered, the Gauls submitted and ceased their human sacrifices. Druids, the mysterious oracles of the Gallic religion, fled to Germania and Northern Britannia to continue their strange and unrecorded practices. The conquest of the Gauls and the destruction of their religion marked the end of the old days of Western European nomads and the beginning of a more urban, administrative era. At least, until the Eastern tribes migrated toward the Atlantic, bringing with them a similar form of Pagan animism and mysterious ceremonies.

Pax vobiscum

Why do All Roads Lead to Rome?

The simple answer is that the Romans built them. There. Satisfied? I didn't think so. We see in the Romans a penchant to absorb and syncretize the things that they admired from other cultures, and in one respect, roads were no different. Government building of roads has been with humanity since at least the Ancient Persian Empire, and it is likely that the Etruscans brought a road-building ethic with them from Asia Minor, and that the Romans appropriated this idea. And if there was one thing that the politicians could all agree on, it was roads.

The Romans didn't just level dirt paths; they had a method of paving these roads which made them durable and easy to drive on. Merchants from all over mainland Europe used carts to transport goods, and sturdy, flat roads ensured that their more expensive breakable items would remain intact on the way to market. Travelers and pilgrims eager to visit the famous Temple of Saturn in the heart of Rome could now make the trip without fear of getting lost, since Augustus made the Temple the starting point for the marker stones. If the numbers on the stones got smaller, you were heading for Rome, hence the famous saying.

The politics of roads was always contentious, with many Patrician Senators using their vast treasuries to pave large, wide roads and name them after themselves. Like the Gladiatorial games, this was a good way to endear themselves to an underrepresented populace of mostly Plebeians. However, anyone who built a road in the early Republic was required to pay for its upkeep, which could be a problem if a wealthy Senator got involved in shady financial dealings that went south.

Eventually, the Roman Empire was connected by a large system of roads, which were eventually all made public property. Armies could march over the roads very easily compared to marching through dangerous forests and hunting paths. While this also helped the enemy armies of 'barbarians' to invade, the Romans made a habit of building a system of outposts and forts near choke points, and had a swift communication system to help ward off the smelly hordes. The roads lasted for centuries, some of them being preserved up to this present day.

The Siege of Syracuse

Located in south-eastern Sicily, Syracuse was an old Corinthian-Greek Colony with old-time values. Ruled over by kings and tyrants since its founding in 733 BCE, Syracuse enjoyed the many benefits of its central Mediterranean locale and became very wealthy through trade with Egypt, Rome, Carthage, Asia Minor, Palestine, and Spain. After the Pyrrhic war in 275 BCE, however, it was the sole remaining Greek settlement west of the Peninsula itself, and in a very tenuous position sandwiched between Rome and Carthage.

Syracuse survived for quite a while after Pyrrhus' final defeat because its leaders made smart alliances and used skilled diplomacy to ensure the protection of either Rome or Carthage. When the first Punic War broke out, Syracuse was at the center of the action and made an alliance with Carthage from fear of Rome. Luckily, Rome and Carthage fought each other so bitterly that by the time Rome got around to dealing with the unlucky Sicilian Greeks, they had already lost so many in battle that they were willing to settle for an apology and a cut of their trade. However, when the second Punic War broke out, Syracuse made the mistake of allying with Carthage again, and the Romans were determined to make them pay. However, Roman vengeance would come at a high cost to the Republic because of one resident of Syracuse whose mind possessed knowledge that could bring both great prosperity and very great destruction. This man's name was Archimedes.

I like to think of Archimedes as a sort of ancient world Da Vinci, except without the moral qualms about creating weapons. Where Da Vinci was purposefully putting gears in the wrong place so that his designs would ultimately fail, Archimedes was not only sketching these out, but utilizing them to a terrible degree of success. For this week's Famous Friday, we'll delve into Archimedes' discoveries in greater detail, but since it's Military Monday, let's focus on his original and horrific siege weapons.

The most famous of his weapons was The Claw, which utilized pulleys and complicated weight balancing to capsize Roman Triremes. Seriously, this crane-like weapon would hook onto the bow or stern of the boat, lift it out of the water, and send it crashing against the nearby rocks. Each boat carried about two hundred soldiers, so you can imagine the carnage that ensued when this happened over and over:

Another of his creations was an improved catapult. Again, using pulleys and counterweights, he was able to create an engine capable of throwing a 500 pound rock with much better accuracy than the inferior Roman scorpions and ballistae. He also contributed to the building of other weapons which could fire missiles and keep the Romans at bay.

The most controversial of his creations was his 'death ray.' Several authorities have tested it using various techniques, and some have been successful, while most have ended in a wash. Supposedly, Archimedes built a large array of bronze mirrors which could be turned, focusing their reflected light into a concentrated beam onto an approaching ship. The Roman ships, which were sealed with tar, caught on fire and sunk. While this does seem a bit far-fetched, I wouldn't put it past old Archie to give it a try. After all, it was Hiero II, the king of Syracuse and relative of Archimedes, who frequently challenged the genius and gave him the funding he needed to build better weapons since the first Punic War, so why wouldn't this mathematician try literally everything he could think of? Were there easier ways to light ships on fire? Yeah, lots. But if I were an invading Roman, I might think twice about mixing it up with an enemy who can light my ships on fire without shooting anything.

Syracuse eventually fell to sheer Roman determination, and Archimedes was killed, possibly while drawing circles in the sand. If not for him, the last Greek colony on Italian soil would surely have fallen in the first year, and Carthage wouldn't have stood a chance of surviving the Second Punic War. By the time the Roman army came to the gates of Carthage, they had suffered so many casualties from Syracuse and from fighting Hannibal for ten years that they allowed Carthage to live, albeit under severe economic sanctions. And when Carthage was finally leveled in the Third Punic War, there were no more brilliant mathematicians around to set Romans on fire from a distance.

Pax vobiscum

Culture Wednesday: Democracy, Roman Style

When Romulus founded Rome, so the story goes, he appointed one hundred upstanding and powerful men to be Senators of the new city. These hundred men elected kings, raised armies, and administered the day to day needs of Roman citizens. Later this number swelled to 300 with the incorporation of the Sabine and Etruscan people, but those original hundred Latins would be important for hundreds of years to come, for they would be known as the Patricians.

The Patricians were the old money of Rome, and everyone who was not a Patrician was a Plebeian. Over time, these distinctions only made a difference for the sake of elected office and plain old discrimination, since several of the Plebes did pretty well for themselves. I find it helpful to think of them in terms of Jew-Gentile, that is, if you are not a Jew, you are a Gentile. Of course, being a Gentile means you could be black, white, asian, hispanic, or really any race on earth that isn't Jewish, making the Gentiles a diverse group by that sort of division. In the same way, while the Patricians were a specific group of old-money aristocrats, a Plebeian might be poor, rich, or even middle class. At the founding of the Republic, they just couldn't be a Senator.

After Rome exiled their king, allegedly in 509 BCE (the Roman historians probably chose this date just to predate Athens' democracy by a year), the Senate took command over the anarchy that ensues when a leader is deposed. They decided that executive authority should never rest with just one man, and thus the position of Consul was created. Every year, the Senate would elect two Consuls for a one-year term, the hope being that if one of them talked to his horse, the other could veto his decision to order the execution of all Rabbits in Italy (a hypothetical scenario, since our records from the early Republic are less than trustworthy). The Romans feared what absolute power could do in the hands of any given man, so they set up a complicated system of checks and balances as seen below:

Sorry if I just gave you flashbacks of U.S. History, but the founding fathers of the United States had a similar fear, which led to a similar system. However, the system displayed in the diagram is the final product; the original was basically Senatorial rule with no recourse for the Plebeians if those ruling Patricians did something they didn't like. Also, the Tribal Assembly wasn't for family tribes, but for regions, similar to our own congressional districts today, except you were part of the tribe that your father belonged to regardless of your current home. So I, for example, would still be included in the Tulare County Tribe even though I now reside in Fresno County because that's where my family comes from.

The tricky thing about Democracy is reassuring the citizens that each of them gets a fair shake. It's a little difficult to ensure the lower class that they're being represented fairly when one requirement for being a Senator was being a Patrician. And not just a Patrician, but a rich one, owning at least 100,000 denarii worth of land which would be several thousand acres (we think). Now, on the one hand, I can see the benefit of Senators who supposedly couldn't be bribed because they're already rich. But I can also see how the Plebeians may have begun looking fondly toward their pitchforks whenever the Senate did something they didn't like.

The creation of the Plebeian Council is, to my mind, one of the most brilliant compromises in the political history of the world. While it still did not give a voice to women or slaves, it did give an unprecedented amount of power to those at the lowest station of Roman life. The Plebeians were allowed to elect a Tribune who had veto power over the wealthy Patrician Senate, thus giving the common freemen of Rome a check against their wealthy and aristocratic overlords.

As the Roman Constitution continued to evolve, Plebeians were eventually given the right to become Senators, if they were elected as a magistrate. But who elected the magistrate? You guessed it: the Senate. In 342 BCE, however, a law passed that required at least one of the Consuls to be a Plebeian.

While this all sounds very progressive and looks wonderful on paper, there was still a huge divide between rich and poor. Most of the Plebeians who were elected to the Senate were very well-off, and the old economic separation between Patrician and Plebeian were already blurring, favoring instead a simple matter of have and have-nots. The one thing the rich could still claim was the protection of Rome, as the army was still staffed by those of the 5^th Census class and above, but even that would prove insufficient in later years and the army would eventually be opened to all citizens under the Marian Reforms.

Those reforms would forever change the face of Rome, both militarily and politically. The Senate and other Legislative Councils faced an identity crisis which they failed to deal with, leaving a power vacuum that the Emperors easily filled. The Plebian Tribune who still held veto power over the Senate became little more than just another wealthy and complicit politician whom the Senate could bribe if they needed to. What began as an ancestral caste system changed into an economic class system over time, and failure to recognize the role of economics in politics ultimately brought an end to the Roman Republic.