Could the Roman Republic separated civilian and military authority?

Right but that was a minor affair in the grand scheme of things that didn't impede Julian very much for very long. As far as the rest goes, that doesn't really have much to do with the division of civilian and military authorities. As you alluded to, the major positions-the magisters-had dual civilian and military roles. This was De jure for the Magister officiorum, who had dual military and civilian roles from the beginning, and de facto for the Magister militi through their effective control of the emperors in the west. But the good of this overwhelmingly outweighed the bad. The creation of an official sophisticated bureaucracy was a necessity by the third century, as was the creation of a more dedicated and semi-meritocratic military hierarchy, do the Senate's small size and their requirements to have most of their property in Italy and spend a lot of time there. This required opening up the government and military leadership to equites, something that would also be required to divide civilian and military administration during the republic, which is why I do not think it was a realistic possibility until the late 2nd-3rd centuries.

The bureaucratic machine of the Imperium was horrible, overly complicated and corrupt and the Inperators had almost no idea of the state of the Imperium thanks to it.

Iulianus had to purge it when he became Augustus and his clashes with the Praefectus were "resolved" by Constantius bypassing him and indeed it didn't impeded him for very long because it ended with him rebelling just after 4 years.

I'm rather curious about what good are you referring to, under Diocletian you had the division to avoid a General having too much power and resources and yet it never stopped civil war and the military officers usually ended in control of both civil and military power in their areas so the "division" was nominal at best.
 
The bureaucratic machine of the Imperium was horrible, overly complicated and corrupt and the Inperators had almost no idea of the state of the Imperium thanks to it.
Huh? The Roman Empire of the first and the second centuries had serious structural problems, most glaringly the lack of bureaucracy that were papered over by weak external enemies, a fairly prosperous economy, and a few strong personalities that became emperor. The moment these things changed-weak or crazy emperors, strong enemies on the Rhine, Danube, and Persian frontiers, and economic decline, the structural weaknesses and internal contradictions of the systems were laid bare and the empire imploded and very nearly collapsed in the third century. The reason any rudimentary form of bureaucracy even began to come into existence was because it was completely necessary. The renewed pressure on the Persian frontiers and the the expansion of the army under the Severans required new revenue streams, especially at a time of economic and population trouble. The old system, with provinces managed entirely by a senatorial legate and his senatorial quaestor were insufficient for this task. Even at the height of the empire in the second century, the senatorial aristocracy only barely had the numbers to fulfill the duties of government required of them. To operate effectively, the Senate always had to have a significant number of their body in Rome at all times to fulfill their legislative and judicial duties, while these senators were simultaneously required to churn out enough former consuls and praetors to run the affairs of government in the provinces. Every province needed a senatorial governor (and in the case of senatorial provinces, an imperial appointed legate, also coming from the senatorial class, as well), as well as senatorial legates to command each legion (lest any individual governor have too much power).In addition to this, there were senatorial urban praefects, curators, a juridici in some provinces to manage judicial duties (such as in Tarroconensis and Cappadocia), and of course there were junior senators working as assistants (adiutores) to senior magistrates.. By the time of Marcus Aurelius, 160 senatorial officials were required to manage the empire, and a significant number of them had to be of consular or praetorian rank. This was barely sustainable in the best of times, and was completely unsustainable once the empire faced significant internal and external pressures. For example, by the second century there was often only one senatorial official per 350,000-400,000 inhabitants.


This is where the equites came in. As the bureaucracy needed to be expanded to manage the empire and the challenges it faced, it was more efficient to appoint equestrians to these roles. This was particularly true once citizenship was expanded to everyone. These posts required long tenures, developed a hierararchy and cursus honororum, and provided a form of efficiency and professionalism that was not present in the early empire and could not be with senators. It became a quasi-patronage based quasi meritocratic system rather than the pieced together ad-hoc bureaucracy of the early empire. Equites rose through the administration based on local patronage, to some extent on ability, compared to senators, who's careers relied on personal patronage of the emperor. This was already the de facto situation before Diocletian and Constanitne systematized this, and also led to the de facto division of civilian and military offices, as each developed their own cursus honorum. It created a semi-professional civilian bureaucracy alongside a semi-professional military hierarchy that was lacking in the early empire and was necessary in the later empire, especially since the empire could not realistically be micromanaged by the emperor himself as it had been in the early empire.

As for the Dominate in particular, I don't see where the clash between civilian and military officials really comes into play. At the most basic imperial administrative level, the civilian dioceses became the strong foundation of imperial government. The diocese effectively were the ones managing the government on a day to day level. The vicarius and his staff oversaw tax collection and managed judicial functions in the imperial stead. They were better able to dole out justice and manage the complex legal jurisdictions, which often overlapped. In effect, the vicarius was able to provide surveillance over local officials. This local bureaucracy functioned efficiently no matter who the emperor was or what the imperial politics at the top were, and provided revenue and legal and administrative continuity regardless of the political situation and the frequent changing of hands of dioceses between emperors. This was immensely important to the stability of the late empire.

As for the praetorian prefects I can't think of any situation where they played any significant political role after Constantine-their job was to manage the military's finances, and maintain the infrastructure and postal system. They all required any number of lesser officials to carry out these activities. Again, this systematized and proffesionalized what had been an ad-hoc system and allowed for the empire to function relatively smoothly even when there was significant turmoil at the top.

What you are referring to with regards to tension between civilian and military officials really isn't that. It's simply tension and squabbling within the emperor's comitatus, and in particular the most prominent posts of said staff. The financial bureaus created by Diocletian and Constantine (such as the res privata and the sacrae largitoiones) weren't controlled by anyone in this separated civilian and military hierarchy, but were always controlled by members of the imperial comitatus, who owed their position and loyalty to the emperor himself. The magister officiorum, and the magistri militi were both a part of the emperor's comitatus. I fail to see how this would change without the bureaucracy that formed in the 2nd-4th centuries. The senior military and civilian posts were always going to be loyal men of the emperor, chosen by him, and they were always going to squabble among themselves and potentially engage in civil war if the opportunity presented itself, just as was the case at any point in the Roman emperor. The only difference now was it was not the governors or commanders of the individual legions that were revolting or seizing power, but the people with whom were now invested with real military and political power.





ulianus had to purge it when he became Augustus and his clashes with the Praefectus were "resolved" by Constantius bypassing him and indeed it didn't impeded him for very long because it ended with him rebelling just after 4 years.
Julian had to replace it with his loyalists, mostly because the leadership in the eastern half of the empire never really liked him very much and represented a political threat. Which would be the case at any point in Roman history. As far as his clashes with Florentius are concerned, they are horribly overblown. Florentius devised a scheme to make up for a revenue shortfall, which was opposed by Julian and appealed to Constantius, who proceeded to take Julian's side. Regardless, any conflict between Florentius and Julian is not indicative of conflict between the civilian and military leadership, but is the result of the fact that Constantius appointed his own men to high level positions in Gaul surrounding Julian, specifically to constrain him and make sure real authority lied with his own trusted officials.

I'm rather curious about what good are you referring to, under Diocletian you had the division to avoid a General having too much power and resources and yet it never stopped civil war and the military officers usually ended in control of both civil and military power in their areas so the "division" was nominal at best.
That's not why a dedicated civilian bureaucracy separate from the military was created, though. As I elaborated above, it was created because it was necessary to manage the empire, and was above all much more efficient than the ad-hoc system that preceded it.


Also, where's @Basileus Giorgios when you need him, he's far more knowledgeable about the dominate than I am.
 
I would argue that in Republican times, the Romans hardly had any concept of civilian authority as a thing at all. They tended to conceive power in basically military terms, so that the notion of a separate civilian authority would have bordered on absurdity to them. There were magistrates with (almost) exclusively civilian offices, of course, but they were subordinates to the ones with imperium, that is, authority to impart real orders, that was seen primarily as a military thing. The only authority of any kind that was not in principle intrinsically tied to military command in Republican Rome was the religious one, but even there, there was a very considerable overlap. Rome was a militarized oligarchic society for most of the Republic, and military activity was the quintessential legitimizing factor for the oligarchy even after the army became professional in the Late Republic (and well into the Empire).
More generally, in pre-modern societies the army tended to be the most basic and most significant feature of the state.
 
It wasn`t just the elites. Over several centuries, I think military glory was not as decisive in getting you elected into important offices, at least when compared to factors like the size of your client networks (which derived in good measure from wealth).
It was also, and maybe more so, the way popular participation was organised in the Roman state. On the superficial, institutional level, you see this mirrored in the Comitia Centuriata. On a deeper level, as long as the Republican constitution was upheld, this was the case in no small measure because Rome relied on its yeoman infantry. Farmers serving as soldiers forming the backbone of Roman power was why farmers weren`t, for a long time, excluded from having a say in the state. Separating the military and political spheres - which, in theory, could have been done easily by having only the Consuls or some other strategos-type office elected by the Comitia Centuriata, while civilian offices like Praetors, Censors, Aedils, and Quaestors would be elected by the Comitia Populi Tributa or later maybe by the Concilium Plebis - would have run against this logic of the republic. If there was a sphere of power entirely separated from the military, it would also be a sphere of power entirely separated from ordinary people`s power.
A typical example of such offices were the religious offices (pontifices etc.), they were entirely civilian, rather removed from direct political power, and extremely elitist.
 
I just had a thought.

In the Republic, the nominal top leaders were the Consuls. If you got a series of pairs of guys where one guy focused on the army and the other on domestic issues (e.g. staying at home and politicking to support the other guys campaign), it might, MIGHT be made to work.

Obviously, if it starts out largely by chance, then there'll be some periods where both guys are military or both not, and in those cases you might need to have some crisis that discredits them. Like 2 civilians, so Roman is caught on the back foot by a surprise attack, or both guys are military, and no one's back in Rome and they both get turfed out by their political enemies. Or 2 military guys, and they fight each other.

So....
---
Edit: compare the Athenian Arkhons (Polemakhos, Basileus and Eponymous), who nominally split rule over military, economic and religious authority.
 
In the Republic, the nominal top leaders were the Consuls. If you got a series of pairs of guys where one guy focused on the army and the other on domestic issues (e.g. staying at home and politicking to support the other guys campaign), it might, MIGHT be made to work.
Well it developed IOTL where the consuls became almost solely civil authorities, and did not take up a military command until after their term, as a pro consul. The same went for praetors.
 
Well it developed IOTL where the consuls became almost solely civil authorities, and did not take up a military command until after their term, as a pro consul. The same went for praetors.
From some things I've read and inferred it seems as though consuls were mainly military leaders in the early Republic, with praetors actually being more involved in city government. This office evolved as consular families amassed huge wealth in campaigns, to the point where campaigns were too far and large to be done in a year, and consuls became involved more in managing Rome's conquests and allies. Then Punic War 2 and the late Republic, which we know of best.
 
From some things I've read and inferred it seems as though consuls were mainly military leaders in the early Republic, with praetors actually being more involved in city government. This office evolved as consular families amassed huge wealth in campaigns, to the point where campaigns were too far and large to be done in a year, and consuls became involved more in managing Rome's conquests and allies. Then Punic War 2 and the late Republic, which we know of best.
Yes, the consuls had civil duties, until the Punic Wars there were always campaigns to be fought virtually every single year, and they would be led by consular armies. So while the consuls had civil duties when they were around, they were almost always on campaign anyway. This fact, along with pro-magistracies being better suited to the pro-longed campaigns abroad where campaigns lasted much longer than a single year, is what saw the consuls lose their military role in favor of pro-consuls and pro-praetors.
 
Yes, the consuls had civil duties, until the Punic Wars there were always campaigns to be fought virtually every single year, and they would be led by consular armies. So while the consuls had civil duties when they were around, they were almost always on campaign anyway. This fact, along with pro-magistracies being better suited to the pro-longed campaigns abroad where campaigns lasted much longer than a single year, is what saw the consuls lose their military role in favor of pro-consuls and pro-praetors.
Definitely good specifics to know. Also, since there were praetors but not consuls during the kingdom, insofar as we know anything about the kingdom, I'm tempted to think the consuls pretty much directly took up the king's role, at least at first, religious and military leader, with civil duties playing second fiddle.
 
Top