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| February 2011 |
| Billie Silvey |
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| The Republic |
| During the republican period, Rome's influence spread south down the length of Italy, west to Spain and east into Pontus (northern Turkey) on a vast network of paved roads. The earliest of these, the Via Appia, was broad enough for vehicles to pass and had facilities every ten miles for travelers to stop, change horses and eat. Named for its engineer, the magistrate Appius Claudius Caecus, who also built the first aqueduct to bring water into the city, it stretched south from Rome to the Adriatic port of Brindisi. The Appian Way was paved and crowned for drainage and was lined with tombs just outside the city walls. These roads were built by and for the legions so they could travel swiftly to respond to threats. |
| The Roman economy was built on the backs of slaves. Spartacus was apparently a freeborn Thracian who served in the army in Macedonia. He deserted and was captured and sold into slavery. Trained in a gladiator school, he escaped with 70 or 80 gladiators who were joined by a ragtag band of runaway slaves. They pillaged and plundered the countryside despite Spartacus' efforts to restrain them. Finally, the Roman general Clodius thought he had trapped them on Mount Vesuvius, but Spartacus led his troops down the other side of the mountain, sometimes letting themselves down on vines. Twice, Spartacus tried to escape into the Alps, but the Gauls and Germans in his army refused. They were defeated in a major battle in Northern Italy after two years of terrorizing the Romans. |
| A triumph was the highest honor granted a victorious general in the Roman Republic. It was held to celebrate a great military victory and to offer public thanksgiving. A procession was led by the senators, followed by captured leaders, slaves and booty, followed by the general's personal bodyguard and lictors or magistrates carring fasces or bundles of sticks with axes in the middle. The general, wearing a crown of laurel, followed in an opulent chariot drawn by four horses. He was followed by his family and troops from the Field of Mars, through the Circus Maximus, along the Via Sacra to the Temple of Jupiter, where he sacrificed white bulls. It was a festive event for the citizens of Rome and one of the few times the army was allowed inside the city because of fear of a military coup. |
| The Roman Republic lasted from the fall of Tarquin the Proud, the last of the Roman kings (509 B.C.) to the death of Julius Caesar (44 B.C.). During that time, Rome expanded to dominate the Mediterranean area as the Roman Legions (right) responded to real and perceived threats from both outside and within Rome. At first, legionnaires were landowning citizens who attained their rank through wealth and experience. They even bought their own armor. |
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| Then, in 107 B.C., Gaius Marius, a general fighting in Africa, reformed the military, abolishing land ownership requirements and making military service a pathway to citizenship. He also abolished the strict phalanx formation as too inflexible. The Roman legions became a professional war machine that was nearly ten times more efficient. After the reforms, however, fighters were paid directly by their generals and were loyal to them. This led to instability as the generals used their soldiers to gain political power. |
| During the period of the republic, Rome expanded first down the Italian peninsula, then into Spain, Macedonia, the Tyrrhenian islands and North Africa. Later, they took Gaul (France), much of Asia Minor, Cilicia and Syria, North Africa and Egypt. |