What POD can make the Roman Republic less aristocratic?

Yet another thing I was pondering throughout the day. What POD could make the Roman republic far less aristocratic?

I was thinking of the Secessio plebis (Plebeian secession) of 494 BC. Instead of simply leaving and threatening to found their own city, the plebeians, who greatly outnumber the patricians, overthrow their patrician rulers and claim Rome as their own. What happens next is what I'm stuck on.

Any ideas?
 
The Plebeians form their own aristocracy, as IOTL. In any pre-industrial society, a landed aristocracy of some sort is always going to be very likely, if not certain, to dominate.
 

PhilippeO

Banned
1 ) Greater Grant of Land to the veterans
2 ) Distribution of land to soldier during proscription
3 ) Grant of land to legionaires by each new consul
4 ) Custom of dividing part of inheritance to freedslaves after death of landowner
5 ) designation of some land as swordland/shieldland/theme, which Aristocrats is banned to buy, and can be redistributed to new soldier every generation

Its very difficult to do, the trend is during peacetime, wealth tend to accumulate, it happen in many places. There are many cause for this : tendency for the rich to marry one another, gift / inheritance from those without children, greater ability of richer farmer to survive crisis, greater ability to bribe/intimidate tax collector, more favorable treatment from authorities, etc

i think the only place that managed to avoid this trend is Székely Land
 
Yup, land grants to veterans would be the best bet. For any sort of pre-modern polity that isn't a mercantile city state the easiest way to get it half-way egalitarian to try to get as large of a class of freeholders as possible.
 
That makes sense.

Kind of a separate question but also kind of on topic but would there be any significant changes if the plebeians had overthrown the patricians in 494?
 
That far back everything changes and it's hard to predict how.

Well let's look short term first I guess. Initially I imagine the plebeians would set up a republic similar to the one that preceded it except much friendlier to the poorer classes. Where it goes from there...
 
Top