4 - The Crisis of the Republic

Summary

TIBERIUS GRACCHUS AND THE CONFLICT OVER LAND REFORM

When Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus took office as tribune of the plebs on 10 December 134 B.C., everything in the Roman Republic seemed to be in fine working order. Rome's dangerous rival Carthage had been destroyed; the kingdom of Macedonia had become a province; the whole world of the Hellenistic states was now under Roman control. Rome faced the annoyance of a slave revolt in Sicily and a guerilla war around the town of Numantia in Spain, but neither conflict posed a serious threat, and both were already in the process of being brought to a successful conclusion. In the city of Rome itself, the leading men of the most prominent political families, the nobility of office (nobilitas), dominated political life from their seats in the senate. They knew how to bring one or the other recalcitrant magistrate to heel, and the same applied to the occasional tribune of the plebs who might prove too independent. They were flexible enough to integrate talented and ambitious social climbers into their ranks and clever enough to include all the citizens in the making of political decisions in the various types of assemblies - and particularly to entrust to them the choice between the rival candidates in the competition for political office.

Less than a year later, everything had fundamentally changed, according to Appian of Alexandria, writing in the preface to his history of the Roman civil wars. A political clash had ended in assassination and death; further fighting would follow, first in the city and then for the city, eventually culminating in the short-lived domination of Caesar and finally in the establishment of the principate by Augustus.