Challenge: Restore the Roman Republic

Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to bring back a republican form of government for Rome by AD 200 with a POD after the death of Augustus.
 
Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is to bring back a republican form of government for Rome by AD 200 with a POD after the death of Augustus.

Preliminary question: why would anyone want to restore the Republic?

By the time of Cicero the Republic was functionally no different than the Empire. Augustus, in some respects, provided the antidote to years of civil war even though he suppressed the Senate.

The Republic was no more than an oligarch-kleptocracy. The gulf between the plebs and the patricians even in the 3rd century BCE was just as wide as during the height of the pax romana. Any idealization of the Roman Republic as a precursor to liberal democracy is quite misguided.

An aside: Oliver Cromwell portrayed himself as Julius Caesar (complete with laurel) on the limited Commonwealth mintage. He had it right. The brutality of the English Commonwealth military dictatorship mirrored many aspects of the Roman Republic.
 
Preliminary question: why would anyone want to restore the Republic?

By the time of Cicero the Republic was functionally no different than the Empire. Augustus, in some respects, provided the antidote to years of civil war even though he suppressed the Senate.

The Republic was no more than an oligarch-kleptocracy. The gulf between the plebs and the patricians even in the 3rd century BCE was just as wide as during the height of the pax romana. Any idealization of the Roman Republic as a precursor to liberal democracy is quite misguided.

You make it sound like people hold realistic assessments of the past.
 

Typo

Banned
Preliminary question: why would anyone want to restore the Republic?

By the time of Cicero the Republic was functionally no different than the Empire. Augustus, in some respects, provided the antidote to years of civil war even though he suppressed the Senate.

The Republic was no more than an oligarch-kleptocracy. The gulf between the plebs and the patricians even in the 3rd century BCE was just as wide as during the height of the pax romana. Any idealization of the Roman Republic as a precursor to liberal democracy is quite misguided.

An aside: Oliver Cromwell portrayed himself as Julius Caesar (complete with laurel) on the limited Commonwealth mintage. He had it right. The brutality of the English Commonwealth military dictatorship mirrored many aspects of the Roman Republic.
I was under the impression the Pleb councils had significant power they didn't have under the empire
 
I was under the impression the Pleb councils had significant power they didn't have under the empire

Not after the Sullan 'Reforms'. But if you want power to the plebs, the Empire had that in spades. Any frontier legion held more sway over the political process than the plebeian assembly ever wielded.

Of course, the original question doesn't work. Augustus restored the res publica. The idea that the Roman state should be governed by something akin to democrtatic processes to qualify as a 'Republic' is our idea, not theirs.
 

Typo

Banned
I was referring more to the 3rd century BC period that the previous post mentioned.

I distinguish between political institutions including pretty much all Roman Plebians and military establishments involving only a minor portion. One seem to give more political power to the the average person than the other.
 
I was referring more to the 3rd century BC period that the previous post mentioned.

I distinguish between political institutions including pretty much all Roman Plebians and military establishments involving only a minor portion. One seem to give more political power to the the average person than the other.

I don't think we know very much about how political processes worked in 3rd-century BC Rome (you can't trust Livy). But the plebeian asse,bly before Sulla held adegree of power that it would lose later, it is true. It still was not representative of the Roman citizen body, though. Probably more representative thanthe legions, truie, but by the time of Sully more Roman citizens lived outside the city (and thus were not entitled to vote on plebiscita) than inside.

Personally, I've always considered the fates of the Gracchi (self-appointed aristocratic representatives of the citizen smallholder) and Diocletian (actually a citizen smallholder's son).
 
The gulf between the plebs and the patricians even in the 3rd century BCE was just as wide as during the height of the pax romana.

It is gravely mistaken to identify the distinction between the patricians and plebeians as the defining social divide between the élite clique of the aristocracy on the one hand and the masses of the poor on the other. In reality, the distinction was only particularly relevant during the first centuries of the ancient res publica; formal equality with the patriciate was achieved in the early third century B.C., and by the mid-second century B.C., with the rise of the Cæcilii Metelli and other influential plebeian houses to office in the fasti and eventual dominance of the nobilitas, the plebeians had effectively supplanted the ancient patriciate within the aristocracy. By the first century B.C. there were few notable distinctions between the patricians and the plebeians, with the exception of certain special privileges granted under the dictatorship of Lucius Cornelius Sulla and the holding of minor priesthoods of little genuine political importance. During the late Republic, dynastic plebeian houses such as the Cæcilii Metelli, the Calpurnii Pisones, and the Licinii Luculli and Licinii Crassi dominated the nobilitas, and were generally far more influential and powerful then the decayed relics of the houses of the ancient patriciate, of which Gaius Julius Cæsar was a rare exception. The reactionary Sullan oligarchy that held power after Lucius Cornelius Sulla’s coup d’état and purge of the Marians was dominated by the Cæcilii Metelli, an eminent plebeian house, and Sulla’s top partisans and lieutenants -- Gnæus Pompeius Magnus and Marcus Licinius Crassus -- were great noble plebeians. Gaius Julius Cæsar’s neo-Marian faction was composed largely of great ancient plebeian houses -- the Antonii and the Scribonii Curiones -- and plebeian equestrian financiers, bankers, and novi homines. Indeed, by the late Republic the so-called “gulf” between the plebeian order and the patriciate was largely non-existent.

By the conclusion of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, the Augustan aristocracy and the ancient patriciate was almost extinct, with only a few rare and portentous relics surviving into the Flavian dynasty, among them the Valerii Messallæ, Aelii Lamiæ, and the Junii Silani, while even then their august age made them a frequent target for imperial suspicions and purges. Cæsar Augustus undertook to reform and re-invigorate the ancient patriciate through the granting of special privileges and status to ancient patrician houses like the Valerii Messallæ, the Fabii, and the Æmilii Lepidi, through adoption into patrician families, and, most notably, through the adlection of noble plebeian houses to patrician rank, among them the Domitii Ahenobarbi and the Junii Silanii. Thus, while the roll of patricians was greatly expanded, only a few ancient patrician houses -- among them the Valerii Messallæ and the Junii Silanii -- survived to the apogee of the pax Romana in the second and early third centuries A.D. The practice of adlecting illustrious plebeians into the patriciate continued under the Principate, largely becoming a prerogative of the imperial office, to the extent that by the beginning of the second century the eminent and prestigious rank was far more a mark of imperial favor and membership in the nucleus of the senatorial élite, and had lost most, if not all, of the social distinctiveness of the ancient patriciate of the res publica. Of the great houses of the senatorial élite under the Severan dynasty in the early third century, eighteen were of patrician rank, but only two -- the Valerii Messallæ and the Acili Glabriones -- held consular ranks before the inauguration of the imperial régime, while all rest dated their patrician status to the second century or later, while several of them were recently elevated novi homines granted imperial favor. Again, the “gulf” between plebeians and patricians was largely a question of titles and rare privilege, not a discernible social divide.

As to the question of a restoration of the res publica, as Cornelius Tacitus wrote of the late Augustan Principate: “quotus quisque reliquus qui rem publicam vidisset?” Restoring the res publica would imply that it had formally ended, while generally, the inauguration of the Augustan ‘New State’ was perceived as a re-confirmation and restoration of the res publica, and an end to factionalism and the politicking of the dynasts. Even last late as the reign of Nero Claudius Cæsar Germanicus, the Princeps was still generally primus inter pares in a system that was largely Republican. What was there to restore?
 
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IMP CAES AVG -- I'm going to cut this down quite a bit. Let me know if my ellipses are fair.

It is gravely mistaken to identify the distinction between the patricians and plebeians as the defining social divide between the élite clique of the aristocracy on the one hand and the masses of the poor on the other. In reality, the distinction was only particularly relevant during the first centuries of the ancient res publica; formal equality with the patriciate was achieved in the early third century B.C., and by the mid-second century B.C., [...] the plebeians had effectively supplanted the ancient patriciate within the aristocracy. By the first century B.C. there were few notable distinctions between the patricians and the plebeians, [...] Indeed, by the late Republic the so-called “gulf” between the plebeian order and the patriciate was largely non-existent.

Wow. Excellent. So I guess your Classics degree is in Roman history. Mine was in Roman and Hellenistic cults. My use of plebs and patricians was quite unfortunate. For my part, the quasi-Marxist-Hegelian school of antique studies shows itself. Perhaps it would have been better to use terms like "non-landholders" versus "landholders" or an economic distinction rather than a hereditary distinction. You are entirely right on the merger of the hereditary system. Hereditary distinctions mutated well before the Empire. The practical distinctions within the oligarchy did not change. If anything, the Imperial system created a new class of petty bourgeois through army service (why not indulge the M-H school?)

By the conclusion of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, the Augustan aristocracy and the ancient patriciate was almost extinct [...] to the extent that by the beginning of the second century the eminent and prestigious rank was far more a mark of imperial favor and membership in the nucleus of the senatorial élite, and had lost most, if not all, of the social distinctiveness of the ancient patriciate of the res publica. [...] the “gulf” between plebeians and patricians was largely a question of titles and rare privilege, not a discernable social divide. [...] As to the question of a restoration of the res publica, as Cornelius Tacitus wrote of the late Augustan Principate: “quotus quisque reliquus qui rem publicam vidisset?” [How many men remain who have yet seen the res publica? (proximefactum trans.)] [...] Restoring the res publica would imply that it had formally ended, while generally, the inauguration of the Augustan ‘New State’ was perceived as a re-confirmation and restoration of the res publica, and an end to factionalism and the politicking of the dynasts. Even last late as the reign of Nero Claudius Cæsar Germanicus, the Princeps was still generally primus inter pares in a system that was largely Republican. What was there to restore?

What's the Tacitus citation? I'll be sure to look for the Loeb tomorrow ...

Again, really cool. Yes, the beginning of the prinicipate leveled certain aspects of the corruption of the late republican Senate and realigned the patronage system as well as social expectations. No doubt, cf. ius triorum puerorum. Your accurate analysis is from the perspective of hereditary distinction. Yet there is more to socio-economic Rome than hereditary distinctions. The oligarchic and economically repressive features of Roman society did not disappear even with the blurring of the traditional Roman social stratification. If anything, the Augustan period created new socioeconomic distinctions within non-Roman societies. These distinctions even appear in the New Testament and demonstrate a retrospective view on the Roman exacerbated tensions in 1st century CE Judaea. Think tax farming a la Levi Matthew in Mark 2:14 i.e. Καὶ παράγων εἶδεν Λευὶν τὸν τοῦ Ἁλφαίου καθήμενον ἐπὶ τὸ τελώνιον (Walking along Jesus saw Levi son of Alphaius sitting on his tax-bench).

A socio-economic-cultic Classics perspective focuses on variables other than political organization. Still, thanks for the great summary.
 
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