Part 13 (1/2)

*Chaeronea and Orchomenus.* From Athens Sulla hastened to meet the army of Mithradates which had penetrated as far as Boeotia. At Chaeronea the numerically inferior but better disciplined Romans won a complete victory.

At this juncture there arrived in Greece the consul Flaccus at the head of another army, with orders to supersede Sulla. The latter, however, was not disposed to give up his command and as Flaccus feared to force the issue they came to an agreement whereby each pursued a separate campaign. This left Sulla free to meet a new Mithradatic army which had crossed the Aegean. At Orchomenus he attacked and annihilated it. But Mithradates still controlled the Aegean, and Sulla, being unable to cross into Asia, was forced to winter in Greece.

*Peace with Mithradates, 85 B. C.* In 85 B. C. Lucius Lucullus, Sulla's quaestor, appeared in the Aegean with a fleet that he had gathered among Rome's allies in the East. He defeated the fleet of Mithradates and secured Sulla's pa.s.sage to Asia. The king's position was now precarious.

His exactions had alienated the sympathies of the Greek cities which now began to desert his cause. Furthermore Flaccus, after recovering Macedonia and Thrace, had crossed the Bosphorus into Bithynia. There he was killed in a mutiny of his soldiers and was succeeded by his legate Fimbria, who was popular with the troops because he gratified their desire for plunder.

But Fimbria was energetic; he defeated Mithradates and recovered the coast district as far south as Pergamon (86 B. C.). Mithradates was ready for peace and Sulla was anxious to have his hands free to return to Italy, where the Marians were again in power. Negotiations were opened by Mithradates with Sulla and after some delay peace was concluded in 85 B. C. on the following terms: The king was to surrender Cappadocia, Bithynia, the Roman province of Asia and his other conquests in Asia Minor, to pay an indemnity of 3000 talents, and give up a part of his fleet. His kingdom of Pontus remained intact.

*Sulla's treatment of Asia and Greece, 8583 B. C.* Sulla spent the following winter in Asia, readjusting affairs in the province. The rebellious communities were punished by the quartering of troops upon them, and by being forced to contribute to Sulla the huge sum of 20,000 talents, or $24,000,000. To raise this amount they were forced to borrow from Roman bankers and incur a crus.h.i.+ng burden of debt. In 84 B. C. Sulla crossed to Greece, there to complete his preparations for a return to Italy. The Greek states had suffered heavily in the recent campaigns on her soil. Sulla had carried off the temple treasures of Olympia, Delphi and Epidaurus, Attica and Boeotia had been ravaged and depopulated, and the coasts had been raided by the Mithradatic fleet. From the devastations of the Mithradatic war h.e.l.las never recovered.

IX. SULLA'S DICTATORs.h.i.+P

*The Marian party in Rome 8784 B. C.* While Sulla had been conducting his successful campaign in Greece, in Italy the Marian party had again won the upper hand. Scarcely had Sulla left Italy with his army when the consul Cinna re-enacted the Sulpician Laws. His colleague Gnaeus Octavius and the senatorial faction drove him from the city and had him deposed from office. But Cinna received the support of the army in Campania, recalled Marius, and made peace with the Samnites still under arms by granting them Roman citizens.h.i.+p. Marius landed in Etruria, raised an army there, and he and Cinna advanced on Rome. They forced the capitulation of their opponents, had Cinna reinstated as consul, and had the banishment of Marius revoked; Sulla's laws were repealed, and his property confiscated.

Then ensued a ma.s.sacre of the leading senators, including Octavius the consul. On 1 January, 86, Marius entered upon his seventh consuls.h.i.+p and died a few days later. His successor, Lucius Valerius Flaccus, was sent to supersede Sulla, a mission which cost him his life, as related before. In 85 B. C., the war with Mithradates was at an end and the Marians had to face the prospect of the return of Sulla at the head of a victorious army.

The consuls Cinna and Carbo proceeded to raise troops to oppose him. They illegally prolonged their office for the next year (84) and made preparations to cross the Adriatic and meet Sulla in Macedonia. But the army gathered for this purpose at Brundisium mutinied and murdered Cinna.

Carbo prevented the election of a successor and held office as sole consul. The Senate had previously begun negotiations with Sulla in an effort to prevent further civil war. He now demanded the rest.i.tution of property and honors both for himself and all those who had taken refuge with him. The Senate was inclined to yield, but was prevented by Carbo.

In the spring of 83 B. C. Sulla landed at Brundisium, with an army of 40,000 veterans from whom he exacted an oath of allegiance to himself. He made known his intentions of respecting all privileges granted to the Italians, to prevent their joining his enemies. Still the bulk of the new citizens, particularly in Samnium and Etruria, supported the Marian party.

Sulla was joined at once by the young Cnaeus Pompey, who had raised an army on his own authority in Picenum, and by other men of influence. In the operations which followed the leaders of the Marians showed themselves lacking in cooperation and military skill. Sulla penetrated into Campania, where he defeated one consul Norba.n.u.s, at Mount Tifata. The other consul Scipio Asiaticus, entered into negotiations with him, and was deserted by his army which went over to Sulla.

In the following year Sulla advanced into Latium and won a hard fought victory over the younger Marius, now consul, at Sacriportus. Rome fell into his hands and Marius took refuge in Praeneste. Sulla then turned against the second consul, Carbo, in Etruria, and, after several victories forced him to flee to Africa. In a final effort the Marians, united with the Samnites, tried to relieve Praeneste; failing to accomplish this they made a dash upon Rome. But Sulla appeared in time to save the city and utterly defeat his enemies in a b.l.o.o.d.y contest at the Colline Gate.

Praeneste fell soon after; Marius committed suicide, and except at a few isolated points all resistance in Italy was over.

*Sulla's aims.* Sulla was absolute master of the situation and at once proceeded to punish his enemies and reward his friends. In cold-blooded cruelty, without any legal condemnation, his leading opponents were marked out for vengeance; their names were posted in lists in the forum to indicate that they might be slain with impunity and that their goods were confiscated. Rewards were offered to informers who brought about the death of such victims, and many were included in the lists to gratify the personal enmities of Sulla's friends. The goods of the proscribed were auctioned off publicly under Sulla's direction, and their children and grandchildren declared ineligible for public office. From these proscriptions the equestrians suffered particularly; 2600 of them are said to have perished, together with ninety senators. The Italian munic.i.p.alities also felt Sulla's avenging hand. Widespread confiscations of land, especially in Samnium and Etruria, enabled him to provide for 150,000 of his veterans, whose settlement did much to hasten the latinization of these districts. Ten thousand slaves of the proscribed were set free by Sulla and took the name of Cornelii from their patron.

These arrangements were given the sanction of legality by a decree of the Senate and a law which confirmed all his acts as consul and proconsul and gave him full power for the future.

*Sulla dictator: 8279 B. C.* But Sulla's aims went further than the destruction of the Marian party. He sought to recreate a stable government in the state. For this he required more const.i.tutional powers than the right of might. Therefore, since both consuls were dead, he caused the appointment of an _interrex_ who by virtue of a special law appointed him a dictator for an unlimited term to enact legislation and reorganize the commonwealth (_dictator legibus scri__bundis et rei publicae const.i.tuendae_). Sulla's appointment occurred late in 82 B. C. The scope of his powers and their unlimited duration gave him monarchical or rather tyrannical authority.

*Sulla's reforms.* The general aim of Sulla's legislation was to restore the Senate to the position which it had held prior to 133 B. C. and to guarantee the perpetuation of this condition. His reforms fall into two cla.s.ses; firstly, those directed to securing the rule of the _optimates_, which were not long-lived; secondly, those seeking to increase the efficiency of the administration, which being of a non-partizan character enjoyed greater permanency than the preceding. Those of the former sort const.i.tuted a renewal and extension of his reforms of 88 B. C. The senatorial veto over legislation in the a.s.sembly of Tribes was renewed, and the tribunes' intercession restricted to interference with the exercise of the magistrate's _imperium_. To deter able and ambitious men from seeking the tribunate, it was made a bar to further political office.

The senators were once more made eligible for the juries, while the equestrians were disqualified. The Domitian Law of 104 B. C. was abrogated and the practise of co-opting the members of the priestly college was revived. Most important of Sulla's administrative reforms was that which concerned the magistracy. The established order of offices in the _cursus honorum_ was maintained, an age limit set for eligibility to each office, and an interval of ten years required between successive tenures of the same post. The number of quaestors was increased to twenty, that of the praetors raised from six to eight. In connection therewith the method of appointing provincial governors was regulated. By the organization of the province of Cisalpine Gaul, the number of provinces was raised to ten, and the two consuls and eight praetors, upon the completion of their year of office in Rome, were to be appointed to the provinces as pro-consuls and propraetors for one year. The pro-magistrates thus lost their original extraordinary character and this change marks the first step in the creation of an imperial civil service.

As before, the Senate designated the consular provinces before the election of the consuls who would be their proconsular governors. The consuls were not deprived of the right of military command, but, as before, regularly a.s.sumed control of military operations in Italy. The consular _imperium_ remained senior to that of the provincial governors, and might be exercised beyond the frontiers of Italy. However, in practise the consuls were not regularly employed for overseas campaigns, since the Senate now arrogated to itself what had previously been a prerogative of the a.s.sembly, namely, the right of selecting any person whatever to exercise military _imperium_ in any sphere determined by itself. A new field for the activity of the praetors arose from the establishment of special jury courts for the trial of cases of bribery, treason, fraud, peculation, a.s.sa.s.sination and a.s.sault with violence. These were modelled on the court for damage suits brought against provincial officers, and superseded the old procedure with its appeal from the verdict of the magistrate to the Comitia. To provide a sufficient number of jurors for these tribunals the members.h.i.+p of the Senate was increased from three hundred to six hundred by enrolling equestrians who had supported Sulla.

This increased number was maintained by the annual admission of the twenty ex-quaestors, whereby censors were rendered unnecessary for enrolling the Senators. The administration, especially in its imperial aspects, was more than ever concentrated in the Senate's hands.

*Pompey **”**the Great,**”** 79 B. C.* While Sulla was effecting his settlement of affairs in Rome and Italy, the Marians in Sicily and Africa were crushed by his lieutenant Cnaeus Pompey. Their leader Carbo was taken and executed. In 82 B. C. Sulla had caused the Senate to confer upon Pompey the command in this campaign with the _imperium_ of a propraetor, although he had not yet held any public office. Having finished his task Pompey demanded a triumph, an honor which previously had only been granted to regular magistrates. Sulla at first opposed his wishes, but as Pompey was insistent and defiant, he yielded to avoid a quarrel, and even accorded him the name of Magnus or the Great. Pompey celebrated his triumph 12 March, 79 B. C.

*Sulla's retirement and death, 78 B. C.* Sulla did not seek political power for its own sake, and, after carrying his reforms into effect, he resigned his dictators.h.i.+p in 79 B. C. He retired to enjoy a life of ease and pleasure on his Campanian estate, relying for his personal security and that of his measures upon his veterans and the Cornelian freedmen. In the following year he died at the age of sixty. Sulla's genius was rather military than political. Fond though he was of sensual pleasures, he was possessed of great ambition which led him to such a position of prominence that he was forced to adopt the cause of one of the two political factions in the state. From that point he must crush his enemies or be crushed by them; and in this lies the explanation of his attempt to extirpate the Marian party. As a statesman he displayed little imagination or constructive ability. He could think of nothing better than to restore the Senate to a position which it had shown itself unable to maintain; and his persecutions of his political opponents had not crushed out opposition to the Senate, but left a legacy of hatred endangering the permanence of his reforms.

The epoch between the tribunate of Tiberius Gracchus and the death of Sulla revealed the incapacity of either the Senate or the tribunes and the a.s.sembly to give a peaceful and stable government to the Roman state.