Rome-135-140 Flashcards
What happened after the defeat of Carthage?
Rome became involved in the world of Hellenistic politics as an advocate of the freedom of the Greek states
Who were the Romans in conflict with?
Both Macedonians and the kingdom of the Seleucids
What brought Greek states their freedom?
Roman military victories and diplomatic negotiations rearranged the territorial boundaries
Rome tried to be a power broker in the affairs of the Greeks without doing what?
assuming direct control of their lands
What happened when these efforts failed?
Romans changed their policy
in 148 B.C.C what was made a Roman province?
Macedonia
Who rose in revolt?
Greek states
What city was the leader of the revolt, and was destroyed in 146 to teach the Greeks a lesson?
Corinth
Greece was placed under the control of who?
The roman governor of Macedonia
What happened in 133?
The king of Pergamum deeded his kingdom to Rome, giving Rome its first province in Asia
What were the stages in building Rome’s empire?
the conquest of Italy
the conflict with Carthage and expansion into the western Mediterranean
involvement with and domination of the Hellenistic kingdoms
What happened as they expanded?
the more threats to their security appeared on the horizon, involving them in yet more conflicts
How did the Romans like to portray themselves?
as only declaring war only for defensive reasons or to protect allies
Who favored expansion both for the glory it offered and for the economic benefits?
Roman aristocratic leaders
What were some new opportunities?
lucrative foreign commands
enormous spoils of war
abundant supply of slave labor
What indicated Roman imperialism?
the destruction of Corinth and Carthage
What did Rome’s foreign success have enormous repercussions on?
the internal development of the Roman Republic
Who had become the effect governing body of the Roman state?
the senate
Where were the 300 men drawn primarily from?
the landed aristocracy
How long did they remain senators for?
life
What did the senate hold?
the chief magistracies
What did the senate exercise?
enormous power
What did the senate do?
directed the wars
control foreign and domestic policy
financial affairs
Who were the magistracies and senate controlled by?
a relatively select circle of wealthy and powerful families-both patrician and plebeian-called the nobiles
Where did 80 percent of the consuls come from?
twenty-six families
Where did 50 percent come from?
only ten families
What did the nobiles constitute?
a governing oligarchy that managed a system of patronage and intimidation to maintain its hold over the magistracies and senate and guide the destiny of Rome while running the state in its own interests
Who were the backbone of the Roman state and army?
small farmers
What happened to the small farmwers?
many small farmers had found themselves unable to compete with large, wealthy landowners and had lost their lands
What had the aristocrats developed by taking over state owned land and buying out small peasant owners?
latifundia
What did latifundia use?
slave labor
What did the rise of latifundia contribute to?
a decline in the number of small farmers
What declined?
the number of men available for military service
Where did the small farmers go?
cities, forming a large class of landless poor
What did some aristocrats try to remedy?
growing economic and social crisis
What did Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus believe?
the underlying cause of Rome’’s problems was the decline of the small farmer
What did the Gracchus brothers do?
bypassed the senate by having the council of the plebs pass land reform bills that called for government to reclaim public land and distribute it to landless Romans.
Senators were furious
When was Tiberius killed?
133 B.C.E
Did Gaius get killled as well?
yes
what opened the door to more instability and further violence?
attempts to bring reforms
WHo began to recruit his armies in a new way?
Roman general named Marius
WHo did Marius recruit?
volunteers from both the urban and rural poor who possessed no property. Volunteers swore an oath of loyalty to the general not the senate
How were these men recruited?
they were promised land
What did Marius do?
left a powerful legacy.
He created a new system of military recruitment that placed much power in the hands of the individual generals
WHo was the next general to take advantage of the new military system?
Lucius Cornelius Sulla
Who gave Sulla command of a war in Asia Minor?
The senate
What happened when the plebs tried to transfer command of this war to Marius?
a civil war broke out
Who won?
Sulla won and seized Rome itself, conducting a reign of terror to wipe out all opposition.
Sulla restored power to the hands of the senate and eliminated powers of the popular assemblies.
His example of using an army to seize power would prove most attractive to ambitious men.
For the next fifty years, what were two important features of Roman history?
the jostling for power by a number of powerful individuals and the civil wars generated by their conflicts.
Who were the three powerful individuals who came to hold enormous military and political power?
Crassus, Pompey, and Julius Caesar
Who was Crassus?
richest man in Rome
put down a major slave rebellion
Who was Pompey?
successful military command in Spain
hailed as a military hero
Who was Julius Caesar?
military command in Spain
joined with Crassus and Pompey to form a coalition that historians called the First Triumvirate
What enabled the first triumvirate to dominate the political scene?
combined wealth and power of these men was enormous
What did Pompey receive?
lands for his veterans and command in Spain
What was Crassus given?
command in Syria
What was Caesar granted?
special military command in Gaul.
hat did Caesar do during his time in Gaul?
caesar had conquered all of Gaul and gained fame, wealth, and military experience and an army of seasoned veterans who were loyal to him
Who voted for Caesar to lay down his command and return as a private citizen to Rome (he refused)
leading senators
What did Caesar choose to do?
keep his army and move into Italy by illegally crossing the Rubicon
What does the phrase “crossing the Rubicon” entail?
doing something after which there is no turning back
What guaranteed a civil war between Caesar’s forces and those of Pompey and his allies?
caesar marching on Rome
What left caesar in complete control of the Roman government?
defeat of Pompey
When was Caesar officially made dictator?
47 B.C.E
When was Caesar made dictator for life?
44 B.C.E
What did Caesar do?
gave land to the poor and increased the size of the senate to 900 by filling it with many of his supporters
weakened the power of the senate
granted citizenship to people who had helped him
reformed the calendar by introducing the Egyptian solar year of 365 days
building projects
military adventures
a group of leading senators assassinated him
What two men divided the Roman world between them?
Octavian, Caesar’s heir and grandnephew, taking the west, and Antony Caesar’s ally and assistant, the east
Why did Octavian and Antony eventually come into conflict?
Antony allied himself with the Egyptian queen Cleopatra.
Octavian began a propaganda campaign accusing Antony of catering to Cleopatra
What battle in Greece did Octavian’s forces smash the army and navy of Antony and Cleopatra?
Battle of Actium
Where did Antony and Cleopatra flee to, and a year later commit suicide?
Egypt
Who stood supreme over the Roman world when the civil wars and the Republic were ended?
Octavian
WHat were the three classes that Rome was divided into?
senatorial
equestrian
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