WI: Clodius Not Assassinated

Here's the scenario: In the scuffle with Milo, Clodius is seriously wounded. Milo tries to finish him off as per OTL, but Clodius manages to escape and recoup from his wounds. His gangs and supporters retaliate, stirring massive unrest and disorder in the city, enough to call for Pompey to step in, restore order, and reform the judicial system (and try Milo in a special court for some charge related to attempting to murder Clodius) as per OTL.

What move does Clodius make next? Assuming he runs for the praetorship again as he was in 53BC and wins, what does he do with it? After his praetorship he's eligible for the consulship, and if he ends up getting elected consul...what does a Clodius consulship look like?
 
This would have been a very complicated situation.

The general idea is that Claudius was a friend of Caesar and that he would have been praetorian in 52 and consul in 49.

On this ground, people believe that a Claudius consul in 49 would have powerfully backed Caesar and prevented the civil war.

I don't think so for several reasons.

First of all, the competition between patrician candidates for the only seat of consul which they could claim was very intense. It is not sure at all that A Clodius standing with Caesar's support would have won the election against a Cornelius Lentulis backed by all the optimates.

Secondly, Clodius in fact played his own game and was a very unstable and untrustable partner. His elder brother Appius was on Pompey's side and had one of his daughters married to Pompey's oldest son.

Thirdly, Clodius was a nuisance to many people. Consider that in the trials following his murder, only Milo was condemned. Milo's supporters were acquitted while the courts condemned Clodius' supporters. It was Pompey's soldiers that enforced order in Rome and made sure the trials could be organized and concluded in the "right" way.

Milo was the head of the optimates' henchmen. Clodius' death was very welcome for Pompey because it cleared the way for him to reconcile with the optimates, which he certainly was eager to do, given his role in the trials of 52.

A surviving Clodius may have been condemned by the courts and forced to exile. Several prominent nobles, even patricians like the Marcus Valerius Messalla Rufus consul in 53, who was Sulla's stepbrother (his sister was Sulla's last wife), was condemned in these years.
 
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Yeah, I too don't buy that Clodius was merely a henchman of Caesar at any point. Clodius played his own dangerous game and had his own goals, and I don't see much benefit Caesar or Pompey would get from allying with him on anything other than a temporary basis (although Pompey did ally with him for the 53 elections that never occurred due to their common interests in promoting a candidate other than Milo for the consulship).

But let's assume Clodius is charged and acquitted. What would his praetorship look like, and assuming he manages to pull off an upset and get the consulship, what would that look like?
 
Several questions.

Is there going to be a sole consulship of Pompey if Clodius is not murdered ?

Frankly I don't know. It was the strong sense of emergency created by this murder that pushed for a sole consulship of dictatorship.

And as you said, Pompey was manipulating both camps in order to disturb elections and have his interests prevail. Pompey's schemes were unreadable, although his goal was quite clear. From the early 70's on, Pompey's goal was to secure for himself an extraordinary position and prevent anyone competing with him. But he took several tortuous and unreadable ways at the same time to reach his goal.

My guess is that if the elections had taken place, Milo would have been elected by the comitiae centuriatae because he was powerfully backed by the optimates.

Not sure he would have had Metellus Scipio as colleague.

Very possible that consul Milo and praetor Clodius would have a violent conflict in which one of them is killed.

Very possible, too, that if Clodius is not killed, he is tried and forced to exile.
 
Well there was already extreme disturbances and assuming Clodius is still wounded here, Clodius' gangs and Milo's gangs are just going to go off on each other. I can easily see Pompey still getting the sole consulship.

Let's assume Milo is tried and convicted but his supporters get off, and Clodius is tried and acquitted, but his supporters get convicted. No consul Milo, but for 51, there's a praetor Clodius. He runs for the consulship in 49, and against all odds, wins. Then what?
 

Dirk

Banned
First of all, the competition between patrician candidates for the only seat of consul which they could claim was very intense. It is not sure at all that A Clodius standing with Caesar's support would have won the election against a Cornelius Lentulis backed by all the optimates.

No need to worry about that, remember that Clodius had himself adopted into the Plebs by a friend. That's how he became Tribune of the Plebs in the first place.

In any case, Clodius was only sort of an ally to Caesar, just as Milo was sort of an ally to Pompey. But you'll notice that, as soon as the rival faction was removed, Pompey deserted Milo and in fact staged his soldiers around the court to ensure a conviction, and even (it is rumored) threatened Cicero to not make a good speech. Even Clodius's own supporters and hangers-on were astounded by his idea for a law giving the citizenship to all free men in the city of Rome, and this coupled with his scandalous behavior during the Bona Dea festival and alleged or attempted adultery with Caesar's wife were enough to ensure that even Caesar wanted him out of the picture.
 
You're right.I had forgotten his becoming plebeian in 59 !

Anyway, the competition was fierce and even too candidates could be defeated in a consular election. There was a surfe of a strong faction in the 50's. The close alliance of the Claudii Marcelli and of the Cornelii Lentuli who were themselves close to the alliance of Cato, the Domitii Ahenobarbi, the stepsons of Servilia Caepionis.

PS : Clodius and Milo were fighting over the elections for 52, not for 51.

The elections for 52 had just been delayed because of violence, obstruction and manoeuvering.
 
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I know. But in this scenario, the violence still gets out of hand enough for Pompey to be appointed sole consul in 52. So Clodius in effect runs for 51 again, the elections not occurring in 52. Disregarding how he gets elected for a second: How unpredictable would he be as a consul right at the boiing point that was 49 (to say nothing of the elections of 50)
 
2 points.


Firstly, I don't see why ongoing violence would prevent elections for the whole year. After all, the consuls for 53 were elected in the middle of the year 53, which is no less than one year late.

Rome could very well appoint a dictator for holding elections. It often did it until 201 BC. And in OTL, it seriously considered appointing a dictator, although there were no consul to do it in the legal procedure.

And Clodius being at that time candidate only to the praetorship, there is no reason why Pompey would not hold elections to have praetors elected. He actually did it, as far as I remember.


Secondly if Clodius only runs for 51 and not for 52, then the biennum rule implies that he can run only for the consulship of 48 and not for the consulhip of 49.

This would imply that Clodius would be of little weight in the key moments of late 50 and of the first days of 49.
 
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