Hist1121Rome

Ancient Rome as a Basis for Europe

Outline of Lecture

1. Introduction: the Importance of Rome in Preserving Greek Culture and Serving as a Seedbed for Christianity
2. Frame of Reference
3. Qualities of the Roman Mind and Character: the Roman Outlook
4. Roman Law and Government as the Foundation of Eternal Rome
5. Eternal Rome: The Stabilization and Expansion of Classical Culture
6. Conclusion

The Romans unified and stabilized the ancient Mediterranean world. Thus the Roman empire nurtured and disseminated two major cultural traditions which contributed the most to Europe as a culture. As the next chapter will show, the empire was a seedbed for Christianity as it sprang from Judaism to challenge and then displace and borrow from the Greco-Roman or classical outlook. This chapter describes how the Romans created their empire, took up the task of preserving and expanding Hellenistic Greek culture and finally, through Christianity, passed on this culture to Europe. In adopting Greek beliefs, values, and ideas Romans modified and shaped them in keeping with their own distinctive moral and intellectual outlook, creating a Romanized Greek or Greco-Roman culture.
Why did the Romans succeed in creating a stable political order which could draw the Mediterranean peoples together in a common culture when Greeks themselves had earlier failed? There were many reasons, but surely one of the most important of them was that the Romans initially valued certain qualities of mind and character. These qualities stand out during the rise of Rome as the major Mediterranean power and particularly in the development of government and law for ruling the empire.

Frame of Reference: 600 B.C. - 200 A.D.

The beginnings of Rome date from about 600 B.C. when diverse peoples in west central Italy combined to create a city-state on the lower Tiber river. At first Rome was ruled by kings from the neighboring Etruscans. In 509 B.C., however, Roman aristocrats led a revolt which created an independent republic. For generations afterwards Romans had to fight for their lives, beginning with the Etruscans and then with numerous hill tribes. Even after 350, when Rome had defeated these closest enemies, the wars continued. One seemed to lead to another, as successive victories brought Romans into contact and friction with new peoples. Although they had not originally planned to do so, Romans by 265 controlled all the peninsula.

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Scholars have debated whether the Roman conquest of empire was deliberate policy or accidental? What do you think? Can one arrive at empire by accident?

A brief summary leaves out many of the difficulties and reverses the Romans had to overcome in these early years. Although they always won wars, they sometimes lost battles and entire armies. Several times they came close to civil war because of social and political tensions produced by the wars of expansion. And they had to find methods of ruling conquered peoples. They mastered all these challenges. Destroyed legions were replaced and men were found for additional ones. The legion itself was reorganized to be more manageable on the battlefield. The more numerous plebeians (common people) demanded, and got, as the price of their service in the legions, more political and social rights from the patricians (aristocrats). Among these concessions was the publishing of a code of laws, the Twelve Tables (about 450 B.C.), the beginning of one of Rome's major contributions to later peoples. By 265 all Romans had a voice in public affairs, although the aristocracy still managed to control things most of the time. Perhaps Rome's greatest achievement down to 265 was in dealing so successfully with its defeated enemies that generally they became and remained loyal allies. This genius for organization became more clear later in the unifying of the ancient Mediterranean.

How were the Romans able to do it all? No single factor explains their success in this early period, and later, so well as the basic Roman character itself. Perhaps because the Romans admired certain moral and intellectual qualities they expected to have to struggle and believed that in any struggle they would finally win. The sense that the gods, the city-state, and the family came before one's own wishes and that if one so yielded himself he became part of a divine plan--pietas or piety--this was a central quality in the moral character. One who was pious in the Roman sense would also be serious, sober, and dignified which meant that one possessed gravitas. These qualities shaded off into others which Romans admired: disregard for one's own comfort, respect for traditions and for authority, discipline, and duty. Intellectually, Romans tended to value and emphasize the practical, simple, solid, and useful, rather than the abstract, theoretical, and complicated. Thinking and feeling as they did, Romans not only doggedly endured the harsh and bloody wars of the early Republic but also carried through the compromises which opened up the business of the city-state to all citizens rather than allow civil war.

From 265 to 133 Rome was drawn into wider struggles for power, first in the western half and then in the eastern half of the Mediterranean basin. These wars brought Romans formidable challenges again; so too did the empire which the wars created. The city of Carthage on the north African coast was the first of Rome's enemies outside Italy. Carthage was a major power long before Rome and had for centuries virtually monopolized the commerce of the western Mediterranean. Rome's rise as master of Italy made war between the two powers almost certain, although Carthage was a sea power and Rome had no fleet. During the first Punic War (264-241), however, Romans built a navy and learned naval warfare at a staggering cost in men and ships until finally their dogged endurance wore down the Carthaginians. In the second Punic War (218-201) much of the fighting took place on land where Romans had the advantage of experience. But they had to cope with the unexpected again in the superior tactics of Hannibal. For fifteen years he devastated the countryside and defeated Rome's armies again and again. At Cannae (216) the Romans lost perhaps 50,000 men. Still they refused to surrender, to pay ransom for the survivors, or to allow the word "peace" in the city, and armed even the slaves to resist Hannibal. Slowly they raised new legions to contain Hannibal and reconquer the lost parts of Italy, and finally they found in Scipio Africanus a general to match Hannibal.

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The Romans had a gift for perseverance? What explains it? As a percentage of population, the Roman loss of 50,000 men far exceeds the loss of all American dead in all our wars. Would we have been as dogged as the Romans in refusing to surrender?

At the end of the second Punic War Rome was the master of the western Mediterranean. In just a year Roman armies marched eastward to punish the Hellenistic kingdom of Macedon which had helped Hannibal. Once into the Hellenistic world the Romans found that they could not leave. Their victories over Macedon and then over a second monarchy, Syria, destroyed an uneasy balance of power and left a power vacuum which the Romans were at first unwilling to fill. However, about the middle of the second century they realized that there was no other power to do it. By 133 Roman provinces and dependent or client kingdoms such as Judea under the Maccabee dynasty and the third Hellenistic kingdom, Egypt, under the Ptolemy dynasty almost ringed the Mediterranean.
Romans had demonstrated that they could conquer an empire, even though they had not at first planned to do so. But could they rule one and solve the problems which the long wars of conquest had produced? By 133 Roman institutions were inadequate to govern the city, much less meet the responsibilities of a vast empire. At the same time, the wars had caused such social and economic changes as to undermine the stability of the Republic. Another of the consequences of the wars and of empire was that Rome, while undergoing basic changes, received the full impact of Hellenistic Greek culture. The Greek influence upon Rome had begun before 265, but it had been limited. As Rome became a major power, however, many Romans had occasion to see for themselves Greek culture and its products. The Greek influence might not have been so great a problem for Romans if they had not begun to doubt their own culture and if their institutions had been working well. Hellenistic culture, however, ran counter to the old ways which had sustained Rome's rise. Could the two cultures be reconciled? And could the Romans successfully reorganize their institutions?
In the period from 133 B.C. to 14 A.D. these two questions were answered in the affirmative. Rome was reorganized and a resolution of the conflict between Greek and Roman cultures was worked out. Reorganization was not a deliberately developed policy; it came out of bloody civil war. Among the welter of conflicting solutions which were attempted during the period only one was workable: some form of continuing autocratic rule. Since the Republic was not working and could not be made to work, the only means of binding the empire together and stabilizing it was one-man rule. The question, however, was whether it would be open or covert.

Caius Julius Caesar (100-44 B.C.), who was one of the two men of the period who understood the need for a permanent autocratic rule, apparently intended to be an open autocrat. As governor of the provinces of northern Italy and southern France he conquered and added to the empire what is now France, Belgium, part of the Netherlands and part of Germany (this ensured that Europe would receive the classical and Judaeo-Christian traditions). Then using his legions he made himself the sole master of the empire. Had he lived long enough, he probably would have made himself king on the model of the Hellenistic monarchs. But he mistakenly assumed others would see the logic to his open mastery as he did, and conspirators killed him in 44, thinking they were restoring the Republic.

Caesar's grandnephew and heir, Caius Julius Caesar Octavianus, better known as Augustus (63 B.C.-14 A.D.), did not make the same mistake as his granduncle. When he emerged as the sole victor following Caesar's assassination, Augustus, following his own instincts of making haste slowly, devised a form of one-man rule which was neither military despotism, nor monarchy. The result was classically Roman in its inventiveness, combining republican political traditions and Hellenistic techniques of ruling. None of the institutions of the Republic was abolished -- some, such as the Senate, even received greater responsibility and all were treated with deference and respect by Augustus. He styled himself princeps, or first citizen, and lived simply and unostentatiously. Yet he used the traditional institutions and forms to concentrate power in himself. Not the least of the impressive features of this Principate (after princeps) was that it gained immediate and lasting support from most important groups in every part of the empire.

While Romans in the period 133 B.C. - 14 A.D. were working their way towards a solution of the problems of empire, they were also resolving the conflict between their own culture and that of the Greeks. Like the Principate, the result of this reconciliation was a synthesis of Roman and Hellenistic Greek elements. The qualities of this new synthesis appeared in art, architecture, and even in the technical application of science as Romans used older Greek models in many areas. Perhaps the synthesis, however, was most forcefully expressed in works of the Golden Age of Roman literature (c. 80 B.C.-14 A.D.). The political violence of the earlier part of that period did not stifle writers as they turned to Greek models in poetry, philosophy, and oratory. Always they led in selecting from the Greeks, although being affected in turn by what they selected. Lucretius (c. 99 - c. 55 B.C.) in philosophy and Cicero (106-43 B.C.) in oratory and widely ranging essays dominated the first half of the Golden Age.

The full possibilities which the classical synthesis provided writers, however, were not attained until the latter part of the Golden Age or the Augustan period. This coincided with and is in part explained by the beginnings of the Principate. Writers, reflecting the widespread optimism and confidence about the new system, found in it a creative inspiration and turned to Greek and Roman sources to justify and celebrate it. Augustus and his friend Maecenas encouraged this outpouring by a liberal patronage of writers. Although three who enjoyed these subsidies--the historian Livy (59 B.C.-17 A.D.) and the poets Horace (65-8 B.C.) and Virgil (70-19 B.C.)--towered over all the others, Virgil alone dominated the later period. In his greatest work, the epic Aeneid he hailed the Augustan reforms as the culmination of all the Greek and Roman past and the beginnings of eternal Roman rule. Virgil's theme was that under "Caesar Augustus, a god's son" Rome had succeeded in creating a stable and lasting political and social order which made the Mediterranean world safe for civilization and brought the peoples of the world together in one cosmopolis.

This spirit of hope and confidence lasted for almost two centuries after Augustus' death (A.D.14--180). During this period the empire enjoyed such tranquility and prosperity that the era came to be known as the Roman peace, the Pax Romana. For centuries afterwards men looked back upon it with longing. The princeps or emperors and their central administration provided stable and efficient government. From stations mainly on the frontiers the Roman armed forces protected the empire so successfully that people knew of war only from stories. Trade and industry expanded to support a rich urban civilization both in the rebuilt cities of the eastern and the new cities of the western Mediterranean. Most important of all, classical culture became a common possession throughout the empire, varying in local expression from region to region. Up to about 200 A.D. the empire became increasingly one unit politically, economically and culturally.

Qualities of the Roman Mind and Character

To understand how the Romans won and ruled an empire and why they should have taken up the burden of a civilizing mission within that empire, one must begin with the simple qualities of the Roman mind and character. These qualities were set in the early Republic and they lingered on as ideals into the time of the Principate by which time many Romans perhaps paid only lip service to them. These values they formed the basis for the Roman sense of mission in protecting civilization in the ancient world.

Several centuries of struggle with nature and neighboring enemies shaped the mind and character of the Roman. He learned to be serious, patient, practical, self-reliant, to practice endurance and obedience, to value physical energy and courage, and to believe that there were divine forces at work in the world with which he must cooperate if his own efforts were to amount to anything. Intellectually, he sought to grasp the solid, the durable, the simple and the practical. He never took the kind of delight Greeks did in pushing the mind to its limits, preferring the concrete and useful to the theoretical, and directness to involved and complex speculation. Intellectual analysis for its own sake rarely interested him. But he could be inventive and imaginative when it came to meeting problems requiring engineering and organization. Thus the Roman distinguished himself mainly by his political and legal effectiveness and by the new vitality and sense of purpose with which he adopted Greek culture.

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Roman differences from the Greeks are already apparent. What explains why peoples are different? Environment, geography? What?

Romans themselves summarized their moral and intellectual ideals in several words. First, and basic to all other virtues, was pietas--a spirit of submission to the claims of the gods, the city-state, and the family upon the individual. Joined to pietas were other related ideals: gravitas or a sober, serious, responsible attitude towards whatever one did; virtus, physical toughness and daring; disciplina, the training which molded men physically and morally; industria, unremitting and arduous toil; frugalitas, living plainly and simply; and severitas, the habit of making one's self do the hard and difficult thing. Together these virtues made up the body of traditional customs which had come down from the founding fathers of Rome--the mos maiorum. Until the first century B.C. Romans learned these values, not abstractly and formally, but in the everyday life of the family and the city-state.

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1. Can you recognize the words, and virtues, deriving from the Roman ideals? How is piety today different from Roman pietas? How about disciplina or discipline? Moral and physical then; only physical now? What does virtue mean today? Then?
2. Christian adoption of these virtues changed them. How?
3. Some of us make a lot today about teaching values in the public schools. Ancient Romans taught them in the home. Which is better?

The Roman family was a miniature absolute monarchy with such a powerful hold on the individual member that he had hardly any individuality. Under the father's authority, the family reminded the Roman that he belonged to the dead generations and those yet to be born even more than to himself. Even his names reminded him of his obligations: his first name was so generic that it gave him hardly any individuality; the other two linked him to this clan and family subdivision. The family prepared the Roman for the heavy responsibilities which the city-state and its gods placed upon him. In some respects the family exercised more authority over him than the city-state which accorded him certain legal rights. But the city-state demanded much in ways which completed the shaping of the individual's character and outlook. Only through the city-state did the Roman have access to the major gods. He made himself a cooperator with them and became part of their divine plan for Rome not only by formal devotion but also by submitting himself to the authority of the law and of the magistrates and elder statesmen. He put aside his personal affairs when Rome needed him. If need be, he gave his life.

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1. How would you like to be under the pater familias authority of a Roman father?
2. Are you your own, or do you belong to the family, society, and religious authority? Is individualism good? Would we be better off with less individualism and more corporate responsibility?

Every young able-bodied Roman male spent his formative years learning the military discipline and skill which always won wars, if not all battles. The major unit, the legion, consisted of maneuverable blocs of infantry which could mass for concentrated force and also fight separately. The strength of the legion depended not only on the individual soldier's skill in hand-to-hand combat, for which he trained daily, but also on his fighting in formation. Discipline and drill were aimed toward producing physical endurance, steadiness in the ranks, and instant obedience. When on the march, legionnaires built a fortified camp at every stopping place, right after marching all day. When not on campaign or drilling, they were put to building roads and other projects so that battle was a welcome relief. All this they did on the same simple, mainly meatless, diet most Roman civilians had.

The moral and intellectual qualities formed by the family and city-state stood Romans in good stead during most of the Republican era. Even the Carthaginian wars did not destroy the Romans' faith in their traditional attitudes and values. But they themselves began to wonder about the old ways after they had won control of the Mediterranean and had come to know Hellenistic Greek civilization. During the wars Romans poured out of Italy into the wider Mediterranean and returned with skilled slaves and spoils. At the same time Greeks were drawn to Rome to practice their skills and arts. These new ways and thought dazzled many Romans. As they listened to philosophers and orators, read the literature, commissioned copies of the art, and imitated the ways of Greeks, they began to question their own traditional culture. Discipline, duty, subordination to the gods of Rome, the city-state and the family--all the old ways had meant more in a simpler society. In the more cosmopolitan Rome of the second and first centuries B. C. many Romans began to think that better ideals might be found in the rationalist and individualist spirit of Hellenistic Greek culture. Thus the authority of the father over the family declined, the public-spirited outlook and the sense of subordination to the older civic gods decreased, and many Roman citizens resisted military service.

The Roman outlook, however, did survive. By the first century B.C. Romans were clearly adapting and shaping what they took from the Greeks, filtering it through their own preconceptions about what was worthwhile and creating an amalgam of Greek and Roman values which was neither the one nor the other but a synthesis of values from both. As they did so they gave new life to major Greek concepts and beliefs: the principle that a basic order underlay the world; the conviction that rational thinking could explain this order and offer man guidance in his own life; and the assumption that man's life was meaningful in its own right and worth living well. In adopting Greek culture Romans displayed an enthusiasm, almost a missionary zeal, a no-nonsense kind of practicality and energy, and a greater and simpler faith than most Greeks had for a long time that Greek civilization could be preserved and built upon. Thus the earlier qualities of the Roman mind and character became a mold into which Hellenistic Greek culture could be reformed and recast. Only Romans among all the peoples who adopted Hellenistic culture were able to shape it so much. A few examples best illustrate this trend.

A characteristic Roman vigor stamped all their cultural borrowing, but nowhere more clearly than in literature of the Golden Age (80 B.C.-14 A.D.). The major writers of this period did not simply imitate Greek models in philosophy, oratory, history, and poetry but infused them with their own vigorous Roman outlook. No one of his generation was more at home in the literature of Greece than Cicero (106-43 B.C.). And yet in oratory and essays he brought this knowledge to bear on the problems of the Republic in a characteristically Roman fashion. A public-minded spirit and practicality pervaded most of his writings, directing knowledge to public ends and particularly attempting to promote the public good. Hellenistic Greek literature, by way of contrast, treated few if any public concerns. Cicero's own active political life recalled both the ideals of the Republic and the old Greek polis. The Hellenistic ideal was to withdraw from society into contemplation or a divine mystical experience. But Cicero, by contrast, so vigorously pursued his ideal that the Republic could be made into the perfect commonwealth--free men united under law for the common good--that it cost him his life.

In the next generation, Virgil demonstrated the full effect of the creative energy with which Romans borrowed from the Greeks. His Aeneid gave the classic expression to the classical synthesis in literature. The work drew much from Greek literary and cultural traditions. In technique and style Virgil followed all the conventions laid down in the Homeric epics (except that he wrote in Latin): the invocation to the Muse; the beginning in the middle of the narrative (in medias res); the catalogue of heroes; the rites and athletic games in honor of the dead; and the use of the epic simile. He adopted Greek mythology, using Roman names for the gods. And he was indebted to Greek culture for certain basic principles: the classical Greek conviction about order and emphasis upon rationalism and naturalism; and the Hellenistic ideal of the cosmopolis, or universal political and cultural union.

Virgil used these ideas and literary forms and techniques, however, to define the purpose of Roman rule. His larger theme was that Rome stood ready to safeguard Greek culture and civilization and that the Principate and the Pax Romana represented the fulfillment of Greek aims and ideals. Order and not chance did indeed prevail in the world in the form of Roman rule. Those who believed in Roman rule as truly divinely ordained could be certain that the world made rational sense and that life was meaningful in its own right. Moreover, Rome had achieved the Greek ideal of the cosmopolis by unifying and pacifying the Mediterranean world. This was not temporary but for all time: Eternal Rome was a cosmopolis of all peoples living under Roman rule and sharing a common culture and civilization.

Virgil narrated the adventures of Aeneas, a Trojan hero who escaped from Troy as the Greeks sacked it and then led his followers towards the Italian homeland promised by Jupiter to him and his Roman descendants. The journey was no leisurely excursion. Aeneas and his followers faced one difficulty after another. One of the major crises was the attempt by the Carthaginian queen, Dido, to keep Aeneas from going on to Italy. She became so infatuated with him and provided him with such diversions that Aeneas forgot for awhile Jupiter's plans for him. At the critical moment, however, he did sail for Italy because of his piety and self-discipline. There he encountered the other major challenge -- the hostility of the native peoples led by Turnus. Aeneas had been prepared for this final challenge by a trip to the underworld and a look into the Roman future. He had learned the destiny of Rome to bring law and order to the world and to make possible the blessings of civilization. Before this could be, and future generations of Romans could be born, Aeneas had to defeat Turnus. In the end Aeneas did win, with divine aid and Roman-like resourcefulness and determination. Pain, sacrifice, bloodshed -- all these had to be endured to found Rome.

Throughout, Aeneas was the ideal Roman as he obeyed the gods and struggled boldly and inventively to overcome challenges. Divine destiny may finally have explained why he was successful, but his character as an ideal Roman was an important reason too. He displayed pietas towards the gods and his family in doing his duty to his ancestors and the yet-unborn. He showed seriousness and firmness of purpose in disregarding his own emotions and comfort while moving towards his final goal. He was energetic and bold in battle when it came to that, although he did not seek war. Virgil offered Aeneas thus as an epitome of Romanness and as a model for his own age. It was fitting that the Aeneid became a basic school text in the empire, along with Homer's poems.

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Aeneas comes across to the modern reader as cold and heartless? Why did the Romans find him an admirable, heroic figure, if he lacked what we call sympathy?

In the Aeneid Virgil spoke, as it were, to both Romans and non-Romans. To the latter he said that the Pax Romana was not for Roman exploitation but for the defense of civilization and culture. He implied that the Roman achievement justified renewed commitment to the ideals and beliefs of Greek culture. He reminded Romans, on the other hand, of the sanctity of their own distinctive culture. They bore the terrific burden of ruling justly as keepers of the Roman peace, but they could be confident that this rule had the sanction of the gods as a fulfillment and culmination of the natural order of things and would last forever. Implicit in this message was the assumption that Greek culture and civilization were finally safe for Romans. It was no longer anti-Roman or un-Roman to adopt Greek values as these had been rendered safe for Romans. This adoption of "Romanized" Greek or classical culture justified Rome's divine mission, as Rome's mission fulfilled Greek ideals.

Roman Law and Government as the Foundation
of Eternal Rome

The realization of the ideal of Eternal Rome in Virgil's thought depended on the Roman genius in creating legal and governmental forms which would guarantee perpetual peace and justice. In reality, Eternal Rome was not eternal. And yet the Romans adeptness at law and government made possible a remarkable achievement in the preservation and expansion of classical culture. Roman inventiveness and practicality in institutional and legal matters provided a long period of peace and prosperity in which the classical synthesis could be spread widely and organized for transmission to Europe. Romans showed the same qualities in creating law and government that they did in conquering their empire and in adopting Greek culture. The intellectual search for the solid, durable, simple, and practical; the imagination and inventiveness in solving problems; the reverence for the sanctity of institutions; the sense of subordination to higher authority: all these characterized the Romans' efforts at law and government. Even a sketch of the development of Rome's government illustrates this.

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Romans with their practicality and adeptness at problem-solving sound almost American. What do you think? Are there similarities?

The machinery of Rome's government was very simple in 509 B.C. and was controlled by a small group of patrician or aristocratic families. They monopolized the executive offices and had the exclusive right to membership in the Senate. This body actually made most of the important decisions of state. The plebeians or commoners had a voice only through a powerless assembly. But they were indispensable as soldiers, and when they pressed their demands in the fifth and fourth centuries B.C., the patricians gave up prerogatives for the greater welfare of Rome. Plebeians formed their own assembly and elected tribunes to watch out for their interests. They insisted upon and got the Twelve Tables of written law so that the patricians could not use the law against them. They got the right to stand for all public offices, and in 287 won the theoretical right to final legislative power through their assembly. These changes happened with very little violence. There could have been civil war, or the powers claimed by the plebeians could have made the state machinery inoperable. But the practical sense of the Romans and their sense of subordination to higher authority and the well-being of Rome won out.

Romans also found a workable, sensible way to govern the states they conquered in Italy down to 265. They installed colonies on land taken from these states, built roads to key points, but more important they gave good peace terms. They left the subject states to govern their own local affairs, in return for Rome's control of their foreign policy and for quotas of soldiers for the armies. Rome even granted citizenship to many of these peoples once they had proved their loyalty. By 265 the Romans were quite good at organizing a relatively small empire in Italy. How would they fare, however, in governing a larger one and in governing themselves with only simple city-state institutions?

Between 265 and 133 B.C. Rome did become responsible for a vast empire. Major problems followed. The government was decentralized and did not respond to problems quickly. Officials in Rome and the provinces were amateurs serving only for a year without a civil service to support them. And the forces protecting the empire were not on a permanent footing. As a result, Rome did not give its provinces very efficient or just rule. There was no higher purpose to empire. Provinces outside Italy were regarded as tributaries, not allies, and valued only for their contributions of grain or bullion. Even the city of Rome itself was not being governed very well. At the same time the wars had caused serious social and economic divisions in Rome and Italy. The senatorial aristocrats and a new equestrian or middle class made fortunes off the wars. But the peasant farmers who had served in Rome's armies were driven into poverty and forced into the cities to eke out an existence. These changes in society and the economy undermined the political foundations of the Republic. Could these problems which stemmed from the inadequacy of republican institutions be solved?

From 133 B.C. to 14 A.D. Rome did produce an answer to the problem of effective authority. The answer was one-man rule. And yet it was one-man rule in a form which was basically Roman and bears the stamp of Roman qualities more than the Hellenistic model which had already been attempted in the Middle East. Only two men during the period seemed to understand the direction in which Rome was going and to have the ability to think of alternatives to the old Republic. Julius Caesar was one, but he failed to appreciate the depth of attachment many Romans still had for their political traditions. When he openly aimed at monarchy, he paid with his life. The other figure was Augustus, who learned from his great uncle's mistakes. He did not repeat Caesar's grasp for a crown nor choose military despotism as he might have. Instead, he achieved the necessary power by choosing for himself the title princeps or "first citizen," and receiving from the Senate (and the people) the traditional authority delegated to the tribunes and the commanders of the armies. (For Augustus' own version of his career see his Res Gestae.) This authority was periodically renewed, as was his title, in an appeal to the tradition of popular authority in the Republic. Because of Augustus' decision, this authority was carried forward in Roman law and helped lay the foundation for constitutional rule--government according to fixed fundamental law to which everyone is subject, the ruler no less than the ruled. Had he decided otherwise, and preserved the empire by naked despotism, later history might well have been different because there would have been no legal or political tradition from which constitutional government could draw. The Senate maintained all its traditional authority and even enjoyed increased powers. Every year, as in the past, the people elected the state officials. Yet underneath this outwardly republican system Augustus held the real power. He directly controlled the armed forces and the most important and wealthiest provinces. He kept an eye on finances and on the duties which were left to the Senate. If he wanted to, he could check that body, although most of the time it was only too willing to do what he wanted. He created a bureaucracy to manage the empire and solve the problems which had plagued the decentralized system of the Republic.

The Augustan system, called the Principate after Augustus' title of princeps, was actually a blend of older republican institutions and forms and the new expedients which provided an even more effective autocracy than the centralized Hellenistic Greek monarchies. It was a major sign that the Romans still had creative qualities of mind and character. Augustus did not merely impose the new system. He succeeded because most Romans and the upper classes in the provinces wanted him to stabilize the empire. They believed that the Augustan reforms which seemed to reaffirm much of the past would bring peace, stability, and prosperity. To be sure, the aristocracy generally gave him only grudging support, but they furnished at the beginning most of the chief administrative officials of the empire. The equestrians, however, were more enthusiastic because Augustus gave them opportunities for major offices which they had not been able to hold under the Republic. The provincial wealthy classes liked the new system because they were left to handle local government. This widespread support not only assured the success of political reform but also helped heal the social divisions which had torn the late Republic. All classes looked to the princeps as the source of well-being. Even the urban poor became quiet so long as they got their grain ration and free entertainment. Many in the empire saw Augustus not only as the savior of the empire, but as a god, or one whose fortune or destiny was blessed by the gods. The figure of the princeps thus became one of the bonds holding the empire together. Until the end of the second century A.D. the Roman government hardly changed from the form Augustus gave it.

Romans bound the ancient Mediterranean together for centuries not only by efficient and fair government, but also by a unique system of justice. Roman law came nearer to the ideal (defined earlier by the Greeks) of universal or natural justice, applicable to all men everywhere at all times, than any other ancient law code, including the Greek ones. The Greek influence accounted for part of this. Long before this influence began to shape Roman law, however, Romans themselves had provided for modification of the law through interpretation and had built up a branch of the law which treated men as men. So the Greek influence only shaped a development which Roman attitudes and values had already begun. With characteristic patience and concern for the concrete, Romans early began producing a law which could endure. It combined solidity and stability with flexibility and the capacity for change and joined a spirit of reverence for the old with a practical attitude toward meeting new problems by stretching the meaning of the old.

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Law must be stable, yet not stand still. Agree?

The development of Roman law began with the Twelve Tables (about 440 B.C.), which published the earliest laws governing citizens. In 367 Romans, recognizing that these simple laws required interpretation began electing a praetor, an official who drew up instructions or interpretations for judges to follow in deciding cases between citizens. Every year as a new praetor was elected, he issued an edict stating the general principles he would follow in making interpretations. Usually he built upon and modified the edict of his predecessor which had followed an earlier one, and so on. These edicts had the force of law and became part of the law. They meant that Roman law had stability and yet did not stand still, qualities which an enduring law must have.

Romans discovered an even greater need for special interpretations of the law as they conquered their empire. When cases developed between Roman citizens and foreigners, legal remedies simply could not be found in existing law. Roman law up to this point recognized only the rights and responsibilities of citizens, but took no cognizance of non-Romans. Characteristically, Romans followed a proven procedure and elected another praetor to prepare rules for cases between Romans and non-Romans. Every year he too issued an edict, drawing not only on Roman law, but on foreign laws and customs as well, as he tried to find interpretations which would be acceptable to litigants regardless of their citizenship. Thus appeared a new branch of Roman law-- Romans called it jus gentium, the law of nations. In effect, it affirmed the idea that men other than Roman citizens have rights too and that these belong to them as men, not as members of some particular political or social group.

Although both kinds of law continued to develop as the empire grew, the distinction between the two tended to disappear once the empire settled down under Roman authority. During the classical period of Roman law (from the 2nd century B.C. to the third century A.D.) more and more people in the empire were admitted to Roman citizenship until by 212 A.D. everyone had received it. There was then no further need for two kinds of law. Rome in a legal sense had become the entire Mediterranean world. During these same centuries Roman law was being shaped by the work of skilled lawyers or legal experts. These men assisted the praetors in drawing up the annual edicts because they had detailed knowledge of the law. They gave advice on difficult cases to both judges and litigants. More important, they wrote opinions on the law which were cited and accepted as authoritative in cases and which became part of the law. Their influence as advisors became even greater under the emperors because legislation increasingly came to be by imperial wish, then by imperial decree. Legal experts served emperors as an judicial council from the mid-second century A.D. onward, shaping as they advised in the codification of law in the later empire.

Insofar as these expert advisors were guided by an intellectual outlook it was the viewpoint of Stoicism with the general conception of a basic order or law governing the world and existing in man as well. This natural law the Stoics called divine reason which they propounded as a universal and ideal standard for men to follow always regardless of circumstance. To the legal experts "natural" law suggested a search for that which was always the same for all men everywhere. If they could discover and apply that to their work, then they would be making the law of the empire correspond to natural law or divine reason. This would be ideal justice. It was toward this end that over two centuries of written opinions by these experts in jurisprudence moved Roman law.

One step remained before the law could become enduringly useful: codification. The law was bulky from almost a thousand years of development. Obsolete parts needed to be eliminated and the whole thing put in order. This occurred definitively when the emperor Justinian issued the Corpus of Civil Law (529-534 A.D.) the great codification which summed up the statutes and condensed the writings of the greatest legal experts. In this form the law built up by the Romans so practically, solidly, and wisely lasted to preserve the ideals that all men have private rights and that natural justice is the ultimate standard for man-made law.

Eternal Rome: the Stabilization and
Expansion of Classical Culture

From Virgil's point of view, history had come to an end with the Roman empire and the Roman peace. Early in the Aeneid Jupiter declared of the Romans,

To these I ordain neither period nor boundary
of empire. I have given them dominion without
end . . . the lords of the world, the gowned race
of Rome.⁽¹⁾

To what end or higher purpose did Rome hold an unending imperial rule? To bring all the Mediterranean peoples who enjoyed the protection of Roman rule into a vast union, a cosmopolis; to expand the rich and highly developed material civilization of the older Hellenistic Middle East and to disseminate the stock of ideas, concepts, and values which had been polished and refined by Greeks and invigorated by Romans. In other words, to make Eternal Rome. Much of this ideal was achieved during the period of the Pax Romana (14-180 A.D.). The emperors did provide stable and efficient government, material civilization became widespread, and classical culture came to be widely adopted in the provinces.

Some of Augustus' successors have been depicted as cruel and capricious tyrants like Nero (54-68). Even so, most of them down through the second century A.D. ruled ably. Most adopted the spirit Augustus had set. This was especially true of the "five good Emperors": Nerva (96-98); Trajan (98-117); Hadrian (117-138); Antoninus Pius (138-161); and Marcus Aurelius (161-180). Under them the empire reached its farthest limits, including not only all the lands around the Mediterranean but most of what is today continental Europe and two thirds of Britain. The emperors kept and expanded the central administration started by Augustus. Increasingly they relied on specialists to staff this bureaucracy and to see that taxes were fairly and systematically collected and that provincial governors were honest and efficient. Local government was left to the provincial leading classes, who could be expected as a result to back the emperors.

Behind the emperors and their central administration stood the armed forces. The bulk of these forces still consisted of legions of professional, heavily armed infantry. They were stationed permanently in the provinces, mainly the threatened frontier ones, where they not only protected the empire but also introduced provincials to imperial culture and civilization. Troops could be moved rapidly, if need be, along a system of excellent roads or by water. Roman fleets guarded the Mediterranean and the rivers on the frontiers. All these forces swore allegiance to and were commanded by the emperor (from imperator or commander).

The security and efficiency provided by the imperial government stimulated commerce and industry which in turn supported a vigorous urban civilization. The most vigorous economic growth came in the eastern Mediterranean, but trade moved freely across secure seas and along the protected system of roads and all parts of the empire shared in the rising prosperity. Economic growth made possible the founding of new cities in frontier provinces (such as the one near modern Norwich, Great Britain) and the expansion of existing ones. It was imperial policy to encourage city building and a strong urban life. Cities were given responsibility for local administration of their own affairs and for supervising large areas of the countryside as well. Often in the West they were built on a common pattern with a Forum for business and public affairs in the center, streets laid out at right angles from two main intersecting thoroughfares, temples to the major deities of the empire and local gods, a market, public buildings, a theater, an aqueduct (for a view of a water channel and a section of lead plumbing click here) to supply fresh water, public baths, schools, perhaps an amphitheater and homes for the wealthier and poorer inhabitants. (For a look at Pompeii, click here). Together with the older and similarly designed or redesigned cities of the East, these new cities represented the expanding material civilization of the empire.

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1. If you looked at the Pompeii links above, what differences did you see between Roman and modern towns? Similarities?
2. Romans entertained themselves very differently than we do. Would gladiatorial combats go over today, if made legally possible? (Have you seen the film "Gladiator"?) Are we more civilized today in our attitude toward taking human life? Or not?

Cities also acted with the armed forces on the frontiers to disseminate classical culture to people in the provinces. The classical synthesis had relatively little impact on provincials in the eastern Mediterranean. There Hellenistic Greek culture had long before been widely adopted by the upper and middle classes. But signs appeared, nonetheless, that Roman rule and sponsorship of Greek culture had given rise to a new energy and activity. In letters and science several major figures carried on the Hellenistic traditions. Plutarch (c. 46-c. 120) composed a comparative series of biographies of great Greeks and Romans in the Parallel Lives. Galen (c. 129-199) diligently filled volume after volume with medical essays. And Ptolemy (about 150) pulled together much previous work in astronomy.

In the West, however, classical culture was a new sophisticated and cosmopolitan outlook compared to the local cultures. What the poorer, inarticulate classes did is not very clear, but the favored classes eagerly abandoned their old cultures for the new one. They learned Latin and in general learned to think in terms of classical principles and assumptions. They imbibed these from the basic pattern of urban life and from the large published body of classical literature, particularly the Latin works. The first century C.E. produced some major Latin writers, even if they did not have the stature of Virgil: the historian Tacitus (c. 55 - c. 116), and the philosopher-dramatist Seneca (c. 5 B.C.- 65 A.D.). Another method of imparting the classical outlook--through the school--had already become standard in the East. Education at the elementary level consisted of learning reading and writing by memorizing passages from Homer and Virgil and a little arithmetic. After this some students went on to study grammar, logic, and literature. Finally, for the very few, came an intensive study of some specialty such as public speaking or law. This was not a broad education, nor one stressing inquiry or originality. But it did convey for centuries a common outlook to the educated and articulate classes, whether they were British or Egyptian.

As the empire became ever more united politically, economically, and culturally up through the second century A.D., some aspects of Virgil's ideal of Eternal Rome were realized. From all parts of the empire came thanksgiving and praise for the Roman achievement. In 143 the Greek orator Aelius Aristides (combining in his person as in his names the Latin and the Greek) summed up those feelings, lauding the Romans for bringing all peoples peace and civilization:

In your empire all paths are open to all. No one worthy of rule or trust remains an alien, but a civil community of the World has been established. . . . Homer said, 'Earth common of all," and you have made it come true. . . . You have accustomed all areas to a settled and orderly way of life. . . . Though the citizens of Athens began the civilized life of today, this life in its turn has been firmly established by you, who came later but who, men say, are better.⁽²⁾

But as Aristides spoke many imperial inhabitants were unsatisfied by the material prosperity, security and civilized life offered by Rome.

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1. Aeneid, I, ll. 279-284 (trans. J. W. Mackail [London: Macmillan and Company, 1908]).

2. J. H. Oliver, "The Ruling Power: A Study of the Roman Empire in the Second Century after Christ through the Roman Oration of Aelius Aristides," Transactions, American Philosophical Society, Vol. 43 (Philadelphia, 1953), Part 4, pp. 906-907.