Civil Wars

Thus Gaius Gracchus became tribune a second time. Having bought the plebeians, as it were, he began, by another like political manœuvre, to court the equestrian order, who hold the middle place between the Senate and the plebeians. He transferred the courts of justice, which had become discredited by reason of bribery, from the senators to the knights, reproaching the former especially with the recent examples of Aurelius Cotta, Salinator, and, third in the list, Manius Aquilius (the one who subdued Asia), all notorious bribe-takers, who had been acquitted by the judges, although ambassadors sent to complain against them were still present, going around uttering hateful accusations against them. The Senate was extremely ashamed of these things and yielded to the law, and the people ratified it. In this way were the courts of justice transferred from the Senate to the knights. It is said that soon after the passage of this law Gracchus remarked that he had broken the power of the Senate once for all. This saying of Gracchus has been even more confirmed by experience in the course of events. This power of sitting in judgment on all Romans and Italians, including the senators themselves, in all matters as to property, civil rights, and banishment, exalted the knights like rulers over them and put senators on the same level with subjects. Moreover, as the knights voted in the election to sustain the power of the tribunes, and obtained from them whatever they wanted in return, they became more and more formidable to the senators. So it shortly came about that the political mastery was turned upside down, the power being in the hands of the knights, and the honor only remaining [*](B.C. 122) with the Senate. The knights went so far that they not only held power over the senators, but they openly flouted them beyond their right. They also became addicted to bribe-taking, and having once tasted these enormous gains, they indulged in them even more basely and immoderately than the senators had done.[*](Cicero in his first oration against Verres (xiii.) says that there was no bribery of judges while the knights held that office, but inasmuch as he was trying to shame the senators against taking Verres' money, it would not be safe to accept the statement as literally true.) They suborned accusers against the rich and did away with prosecutions for bribe-taking altogether, partly by concert of action and partly by force and violence, so that the practice of this kind of investigation became entirely obsolete. Thus the judiciary law gave rise to another struggle of factions, which lasted a long time and was not less baneful than the former ones.

Gracchus made long roads throughout Italy and thus put a multitude of contractors and artisans under obligations to him and made them ready to do whatever he wished. He proposed the founding of numerous colonies.[*](The founding of colonies, which was originally a method of guarding the frontier, now became a method of providing for the poorer citizens.) He also called on the Latin allies to demand the full rights of Roman citizenship, since the Senate could not with decency refuse this privilege to their blood relations. To the other allies, who were not allowed to vote in Roman elections, he sought to give the right of suffrage, in order to have their help in the enactment of laws which he had in contemplation. The Senate was very much alarmed at this, and it ordered the consuls to give the following public notice, "Nobody who does not possess the right of suffrage shall stay in the city or approach within forty stades of it while voting is going on concerning these laws." The Senate also persuaded Livius Drusus, another tribune, to interpose his veto against the laws proposed by Gracchus, but not to tell the people his reasons for doing so; for a tribune was not required to give reasons for his veto. In order to conciliate the people they gave Drusus the privilege of founding twelve colonies, and the plebeians were so much pleased with this that they began to scoff at the laws proposed by Gracchus.

Having lost the favor of the rabble, Gracchus sailed for Africa in company with Fulvius Flaccus, who, after his consulship, had been chosen tribune for the same reasons as Gracchus himself. A colony had been voted to Africa on account of its reputed fertility, and these men had been expressly chosen the founders of it in order to get them out of the way for a while, so that the Senate might have a respite from demagogism. They marked out a town for the colony on the place where Carthage had formerly stood, disregarding the fact that Scipio, when he destroyed it, had devoted it with curses to sheep-pasturage forever. They assigned 6000 colonists to this place, instead of the smaller number fixed by law, in order further to curry favor with the people thereby. When they returned to Rome they invited the 6000 from the whole of Italy. The functionaries who were still in Africa laying out the city wrote home that wolves had pulled up and scattered the boundary marks made by Gracchus and Fulvius, and the soothsayers considered this an ill omen for the colony. So the Senate [*](Y.R. 633) summoned the comitia, in which it was proposed to repeal [*](B.C. 121) the law concerning this colony. When Gracchus and Fulvius saw their failure in this matter they were furious, and declared that the Senate had lied about the wolves. The boldest of the plebeians joined them, carrying daggers, and proceeded to the Capitol, where the assembly was to be held in reference to the colony.

Now the people were assembled, and Fulvius had begun speaking about the business in hand, when Gracchus arrived at the Capitol attended by a body-guard of his partisans. Disturbed by what he knew about the extraordinary plans on foot he turned aside from the meeting-place of the assembly, passed into the portico, and walked about waiting to see what would happen. Just then a plebeian named Antyllus, who was sacrificing in the portico, saw him in this disturbed state, seized him by the hand, either because he had heard something or suspected something, or was moved to speak to him for some other reason, and asked him to spare his country. Gracchus, still more disturbed, and startled like one detected in a crime, gave the man a piercing look. Then one of his party, although no signal had been displayed or order given, inferred merely from the very sharp glance that Gracchus cast upon Antyllus that the time for action had come, and thought that he should do a favor to Gracchus by striking the first blow. So he drew his dagger and slew Antyllus. A cry was raised, the dead body was seen in the midst of the crowd, and all who were outside fled from the temple in fear of a like fate. Gracchus went into the assembly desiring to exculpate himself of the deed. Nobody would so much as listen to him. All turned away from him as from one stained with blood. Gracchus and Flaccus were nonplussed and, having lost the chance of accomplishing what they wished, they hastened home, and their partisans with them. The rest of the crowd occupied the forum throughout the night as though some calamity were impending. Opimius, one of the consuls, who was staying in the city, ordered an armed force to be stationed at the Capitol at daybreak, and sent heralds to convoke the Senate. He took his own station in the temple of Castor and Pollux in the centre of the city and there awaited events.

When these arrangements had been made the Senate summoned Gracchus and Flaccus from their homes to the senate-house to defend themselves. But they ran out armed toward the Aventine hill, hoping that if they could seize it first the Senate would agree to some terms with them. They ran through the city offering freedom to the slaves, but none listened to them. With such forces as they had, however, they occupied and fortified the temple of Diana, and sent Quintus, the son of Flaccus, to the Senate seeking to come to an arrangement and to live in peace. The Senate replied that they should lay down their arms, come to the senate-house, tell what they wanted, or else send no more messengers. When they sent Quintus a second time the consul Opimius arrested him, as being no longer an ambassador after he had been warned, and at the same time sent an armed force against the Gracchans. Gracchus fled across the river by the Sublician bridge,[*](This well-known construction is called the "wooden bridge" in Appian's history. The Romans called it "Sublicius pons" because it rested on wooden piles.) with one slave, to a grove where he presented his throat to the slave, as he was on the point of being arrested. Flaccus took refuge in the workshop of an acquaintance. As his pursuers did not know which house he was in they threatened to burn the whole row. The man who had given shelter to the suppliant hesitated to point him out, but directed another man to do so. Flaccus was seized and put to death. The heads of Gracchus and Flaccus were carried to Opimius, and he gave their weight in gold to those who brought them. The people plundered their houses. Opimius arrested their fellow-conspirators, cast them into prison, and ordered that they should be strangled. He allowed Quintus, the son of Flaccus, to choose his own mode of death. After this a lustration was performed in behalf of the city for the bloodshed, and the Senate ordered the building of a temple to Concord in the forum.

So the sedition of the younger Gracchus came to an end. Not long afterward a law was enacted to permit the holders to sell the land about which they had quarrelled; for even this had been forbidden by the law of the elder Gracchus. Presently the rich bought the allotments of the poor, or found pretexts for seizing them by force. So the condition of the poor became even worse than it was before, until Spurius Borius, a tribune of the people, brought in a law providing that the work of distributing the public domain should no longer be continued, but that the land should belong to those in possession of it, who should pay rent for it to the people, and that the money so received should be distributed. This distribution was a kind of solace to the poor, but it did not serve to increase the population. By these devices the law of Gracchus (most excellent and useful if it could have been carried out) was once for all frustrated, and a little later the rent itself was abolished at the instance of another tribune. So the piebeians lost everything. Whence resulted a still further decline in the numbers of both citizens and soldiers, and in the revenue from the land and the distribution thereof; and about fifteen years after the enactment of the law of Gracchus, the laws themselves fell into abeyance by reason of the slackness of the judicial proceedings.[*](The meaning of the last sentence of Sec. 27 is doubtful. Schweighäuser suspected a lacuna. "Desperandum de totius enuntiati inde ab o)/qen verbo vel emendatione vel enarratione," says Mendelssohn. I have followed the rendering of M. Combes-Dounous.)

About this time the consul Scipio [Nasica] demolished the theatre begun by Lucius Cassius, and now nearly finished, because he considered this also the source of new seditions or because he thought it not altogether desirable that the Romans should become accustomed to Grecian pleasures. The censor, Quintus Cæcelius Metellus, attempted to degrade Glaucia, a senator, and Apuleius Saturninus, who had already been a tribune, on account of their disgraceful mode of life, but was not able to do so because his colleague [*](Y.R. 653) would not agree to it. Accordingly Saturninus, a [*](B.C. 101) little later, in order to have revenge on Metellus, became a candidate for the tribuneship again, seizing the occasion when Glaucia held the office of prætor and presided over the election of the tribunes; but Nonius, a man of noble birth, who used much plainness of speech in reference to Saturninus and reproached Glaucia bitterly, was chosen for the office. As they feared lest he should punish them as tribune, they made a rush upon him with a crowd of ruffians just as he was going away from the comitia, pursued him into a certain inn, and stabbed him. As this murder had a pitiful and shocking aspect, the adherents of Glaucia came together early the next morning, before the people had assembled, and declared Saturninus elected tribune. In this way the killing of Nonius was hushed up, since everybody was afraid to call Saturninus to account because he was a tribune. [*](Y.R. 654)

Metellus was banished by them at the instigation of Gaius Marius, who was then in his sixth consulship, and was the secret enemy of Metellus. Thus they all helped each other. Saturninus brought forward a law to divide the land which the Cimbri (a Celtic tribe lately driven out [*](B.C. 100) by Marius) had seized in the country now called Gaul by the Romans, and which was considered as no longer Gallic but Roman territory. It was provided also in this law that if the people should enact it the senators should take an oath within five days to obey it, and that any one who should refuse to do so should be expelled from the Senate and should pay a fine of twenty talents for the benefit of the people. Thus they intended to punish those who should take it with a bad grace, and especially Metellus, who was too high-spirited to submit to the oath. Such was the proposed law. Saturninus appointed the day for holding the comitia and sent messengers to summon from the country districts those in whom he had most confidence, because they had served in the army under Marius. As the law gave the larger share to the Italian allies the city people were not pleased with it.

Sedition broke out in the comitia. Those who attempted to prevent the passage of the laws proposed by the tribunes were assaulted by Saturninus and driven away from the rostra. The city folks exclaimed that thunder was heard in the assembly, in which case it is not permitted by Roman custom to finish the business that day. As the adherents of Saturninus persisted nevertheless, the city people girded themselves, seized whatever clubs they could lay their hands on, and dispersed the rustics. The latter were rallied by Saturninus; they attacked the city folks with clubs, overcame them, and passed the law. When this was done Marius, in his capacity as consul, forthwith proposed to the Senate that they consider concerning taking the oath. Knowing that Metellus was a man of fixed opinion and firm in whatever he might believe or commit himself to, he gave his own opinion publicly, but deceitfully, saying that he would never willingly take this oath himself. When Metellus had agreed with him in this, and the others had praised them both, Marius adjourned the Senate. On the fifth day thereafter (the last day prescribed in the law for taking the oath) he called them together in haste about the tenth hour, saying that he was afraid of the people because they were so zealous for the law. He saw a way, however, to avoid it, and he proposed the following trick--to swear that they would obey the law as far as it was a law, and thus at once disperse the country people by stratagem. Afterward it could be easily shown that this thing, which had been enacted by violence and in spite of thunder, contrary to the custom of their ancestors, was not a law.

After speaking thus he did not wait for the result, but while all were in silent amazement at the plot, and confused because there was no time to be lost and no opportunity for thinking, he rose and went to the temple of Saturn, where the quæstors were accustomed to administer oaths, and took the oath first with his friends. The rest followed his example, as each one feared for his own safety. Metellus alone refused to swear, but stood fearlessly by his first determination. Saturninus proceeded against him at once on the next day. He sent an officer for him and dragged him out of the senate-house. As the other tribunes defended him Glaucia and Saturninus hastened to the country people and told them that they would never get the land, and that the law would not be executed, unless Metellus were banished. They proposed a decree of banishment against him and directed the consuls to interdict fire and water and shelter to him, and appointed a day for the ratification of this decree. Great was the indignation of the city people, who constantly escorted Metellus, carrying daggers. He thanked them and praised them for their good intentions, but said that he could not allow any danger to befall the country on his account. After saying this he withdrew from the city. Saturninus got the decree ratified, and Marius made proclamation that it was a part of the law.

In this way was Metellus, a most admirable man, sent into banishment. Thereupon Saturninus was made tribune a third time and he had for a colleague one who was thought to be a fugitive slave, but who claimed to be a son of the elder Gracchus. The multitude supported him in the election because they regretted Gracchus. When the election for consuls came on Marcus Antonius was chosen as one of them by common consent. The aforesaid Glaucia and Memmius contended for the other place. Memmius was the more illustrious man by far, and Glaucia and Saturninus were fearful of the result. So they sent a gang of ruffians to attack him with clubs while the election was going on. They fell upon him in the midst of the comitia and beat him to death in the sight of all. The assembly was broken up in terror. Neither laws nor courts nor sense of shame remained. The people ran together in anger the following day intending to kill Saturninus, but he had collected another mob from the country and, with Glaucia and Gaius Saufeius, the quæstor, seized the Capitol. The Senate voted them public enemies. Marius was vexed; nevertheless he armed some of his forces reluctantly, and, while he was delaying, some other persons cut off the water-supply from the Capitoline temple. Saufeius was near perishing with thirst and proposed to set the temple on fire, but Glaucia and Saturninus, who hoped that Marius would assist them, surrendered first, and after them Saufeius. As everybody demanded that they should be put to death, Marius shut them up in the senate-house as though he intended to deal with them in a more legal manner. The crowd considered this a mere pretext. They tore the tiles off the roof and stoned them to death, including a quæstor, a tribune, and a prætor, who were still wearing their insignia of office.