Empires: Rome -Sulla: Dictator Part Two

Many Greek rulers had chosen to depict themselves as younger than they really looked. This was not the case with the Republic. The marble busts and portraiture of Rome seemed to place great value on imaging aging statesmen as they really appeared-wrinkles, thinning hair and all of the ravages of time. The Senate, which had been the traditional ruling body, derived its name from "senex" or old man and liked to dignify themselves with the title of "Fathers." The notion that an assembly of men who had not only physical wealth, but also a wealth of experience and wisdom that would act as a barrier against the wild and irresponsible members of society such as the young and the poor, was a notion held dear in every conservative's heart. Being a conservative, Sulla now aimed to uplift the Senate to its former glamorous state after being the same man who had so reduced its numbers. Sulla not only increased the numbers of men in the Senate to the largest in Roman history, but also increased the number of praetorships on offer any one year to eight, and of quaestorships from eight to twenty. Sulla clearly intended that the higher offices of power had new faces in them regularly.

One office that Sulla brought lower instead of higher was the office of the tribunate. Knowing that his old enemy Sulpicius had been a tribune, Sulla's debilitation of that office was a delicious act of personal revenge, as were all of Sulla's disputes and blood feuds. Never again would a tribune be allowed to propose a bill against a consul-in fact Sulla barred them from proposing bills altogether. Also, in Sulla's new plan a tribune was barred from seeking further magistracies. Sulla was a one man demolition team as far as the ancient pillars of the constitution were concerned. It wasn't only in legislative matters that Sulla sought to change things. Troubled by Rome's congestion and overpopulation he pushed back the boundary of the pomerium, Rome's ancient sacred boundary and was the first Roman in history to do so. He had the Senate House rebuilt to accomodate its larger numbers. However, because the original building had been sanctified by the Republic's heroes, Romans mourned its loss, saying "its enlargement appeared to have shrunk it." (Cicero, On the Ends of Good and Evil, 5.2). Sulla only appeared to be bounded by custom on the sacred grounds of the Capitol.

The temple of Jupiter had been burned to the ground but its outline remained. The columns that Sulla had stolen from Athens were put in the new temple, but the temple itself remained within its ancient boundaries. Well before the new temple was rebuilt, however, Sulla had resigned his office. Knowing about just a few of the dictators of the blood-soaked twentieth century makes this amazing to me. He simply let go of the reigns of power sometime in late 81 BC. Sulla was the man responsible for the deaths of more Roman citizens than any other Roman in history, one would think he would have been scared of leaving office until death took him. Apparently his courage, nerve, luck or insanity-very probably a combination of all of those was validated. Perhaps just the terror of his name was enough, "fearing neither the people at home nor the exiles abroad...Such was the extent of his daring and good luck." (Appian, 1. 103-104). Sulla did serve as consul the year after he resigned his dictatorship, and the year after that he did not hold any office at all. The image is a model of how the sacred Capitoline Hill in Rome may have appeared. I hope to finish up with Sulla's dictatorship very soon-there is only a bit left to go-maybe tonight-need to rest a bit now. Peace and be well to anyone stopping by!