The Fall of Carthage (64 page)
Political violence began in 133 when the tribune of the plebs, Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, and many of his followers were lynched by a mob of senators. Grandson of the man who had led the slave legions so successfully in the years after Cannae, son of the man who had brought a generation of peace to Spain earlier in the century, Tiberius fought with some distinction at the storming of Carthage in 147-146 and subsequently in Spain. In Africa he had served under the command of Scipio Aemilianus, his cousin as Tiberius' mother was Cornelia, the daughter of Scipio Africanus. In 121 his younger brother Caius, who had also tried to use the office of tribune for an ambitious series of reforms, was in turn killed in a spate of even more open fighting. Both of the Gracchi had been concerned with the decline of the rural poor and the implication this had for the recruitment of Rome's militia armies. Caius had also introduced a highly controversial bill establishing a new colony on the site of Carthage, although this was abandoned following his death.
Rome's vast reserves of military manpower had made possible her success in the First and Second Punic Wars, yet in the decades after 146 the Romans certainly believed that the class of small farmers on which the legions most relied was in decline. The poor performance of Roman armies evident from the 150s continued until the end of the century, nearly every conflict opening with embarrassing defeats and scandals. Some of the defeats were on a very large scale, notably the disaster inflicted by migrating German tribes at Arausio in 105, where the casualties are claimed by a late source to have rivalled those of Cannae. Concern over legionary recruitment was made especially relevant in the context of such military failures. This eventually led to the creation of a professional army in the last years of the century. Recruits were no longer required to possess a minimum level of property and as a result tended to come from the poorest classes for whom the army's steady, if low, pay offered an attractive living. The greater permanence of the new legions allowed them to retain the experience which had invariably been lost when the old militia armies were demobilized, and eventually led to the marked rise in the average effectiveness of Roman armies during the first century
BC
. However, these poorer recruits had little to return to in civilian life after their discharge, and the Senate, which continued to maintain that military service was the patriotic duty of all propertied Romans, refused to take responsibility for these men and provide them with some sort of livelihood. This encouraged a trend whereby legionaries became more loyal to popular commanders than they were to the State itself. The Roman army had ceased to be the entire State under arms, each class serving in accordance with its wealth so that men fought to preserve a community from which they benefited, and became something outside normal society. This was the change which allowed successive Roman generals to lead their armies against each other and Rome itself. Scipio Africanus could not even have dreamed of turning to the men who had served under him to bring armed force to bear against his opponents in the 180s.
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The rise of the professional army was a major factor in the Fall of the Republic. It is therefore important to understand to what extent the class of peasant farmers, which had traditionally provided the bulk of the legions, was really in decline during the second century
BC
and ask why this process occurred. The scale of the problem is now impossible to assess with any certainty, for our only evidence consists of occasional comments in our written sources and often suspect census figures. Archaeological evidence for this period is available for only a tiny fraction of rural Italy and although this sometimes suggests the survival of small farms throughout the period, we can never know whether this reflected general trends or the peculiar conditions of a small area. One view sees the falling numbers of peasant farmers as a direct consequence of the Second Punic War. For fifteen years Hannibal's army had marauded through Italy, burning or consuming crops, laying waste to fields and villages and killing the population. As a deliberate tactic, Roman commanders such as Fabius Maximus had laid waste to their own territory to deny the Punic army food and fodder. The devastation was particularly bad in the southern corner of Italy, where Hannibal's army had been confined for over thirteen years and which had been raided and thoroughly plundered by both sides.
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and ask why this process occurred. The scale of the problem is now impossible to assess with any certainty, for our only evidence consists of occasional comments in our written sources and often suspect census figures. Archaeological evidence for this period is available for only a tiny fraction of rural Italy and although this sometimes suggests the survival of small farms throughout the period, we can never know whether this reflected general trends or the peculiar conditions of a small area. One view sees the falling numbers of peasant farmers as a direct consequence of the Second Punic War. For fifteen years Hannibal's army had marauded through Italy, burning or consuming crops, laying waste to fields and villages and killing the population. As a deliberate tactic, Roman commanders such as Fabius Maximus had laid waste to their own territory to deny the Punic army food and fodder. The devastation was particularly bad in the southern corner of Italy, where Hannibal's army had been confined for over thirteen years and which had been raided and thoroughly plundered by both sides.
When the Senate began to discharge soldiers and encourage a return to agriculture in the final years of the war, many of the owners of small properties lacked the wealth to restore their farms and begin to produce a viable crop once more. Most abandoned the countryside and migrated to the big cities, especially to Rome, where the profits of conquests were increasingly spent on lavish entertainments and public buildings. Their farms, along with large areas confiscated from the rebellious Italian communities and added to Rome's publicly owned land, were absorbed into large estates owned by the wealthy. Purchased with the profits of overseas expansion, these were worked by slaves captured during the same wars of conquest. Gradually these latifundia came to cover much of the most fertile land in Italy. Although there were fewer legions and
alae
in service in the second century these were recruited from the already reduced citizen and allied peasantry, and were now likely to spend even longer in distant service. Five to ten years on garrison duty in one of the Spanish provinces could well spell ruination for a small farmer whose land fell into neglect during his absence. In the long run this process swelled the urban poor, who were reliant on handouts and casual labour, frequently in debt and inclined to support any radical politician who offered them something better, whilst large parts of the countryside came to be worked by an almost exclusively servile population. Rioting in the city, disorder in the country and a widespread slave revolt were all to feature in the disturbances of the first century
BC
. The falling numbers of citizens eligible for military service set against the growing demand for long-term overseas garrisons eventually prompted fundamental change in the Roman army. In an extreme view, this process has been seen as a major factor not just in the end of the Republic, but in the later decline of the Roman Empire, and even in the poverty of southern Italy compared to the north still visible in the twentieth century
AD.
alae
in service in the second century these were recruited from the already reduced citizen and allied peasantry, and were now likely to spend even longer in distant service. Five to ten years on garrison duty in one of the Spanish provinces could well spell ruination for a small farmer whose land fell into neglect during his absence. In the long run this process swelled the urban poor, who were reliant on handouts and casual labour, frequently in debt and inclined to support any radical politician who offered them something better, whilst large parts of the countryside came to be worked by an almost exclusively servile population. Rioting in the city, disorder in the country and a widespread slave revolt were all to feature in the disturbances of the first century
BC
. The falling numbers of citizens eligible for military service set against the growing demand for long-term overseas garrisons eventually prompted fundamental change in the Roman army. In an extreme view, this process has been seen as a major factor not just in the end of the Republic, but in the later decline of the Roman Empire, and even in the poverty of southern Italy compared to the north still visible in the twentieth century
AD.
Most of the longer-term claims for the impact of Hannibal's invasion have rightly been rejected. It is for instance highly questionable that it created factors prompting an inevitable collapse of the Roman Empire, more than six centuries later. Some have attempted to minimize the damage inflicted between 218 and 203, arguing that the literary accounts of widespread devastation are grossly exaggerated and even contradictory. In addition, the area of Italy which suffered most heavily from the depredations of both sides was the south, a region where the proportion of land owned by Roman citizens was relatively small. The consequences of the war should not as a result have had a major impact on the number of citizen farmers qualified for military service. In this view, the decline in the Roman peasantry was primarily a result of the increasing duration of legionary service resulting from overseas expansion in the second century
BC
. However, whilst it is probable that the extent of agrarian damage caused by the war in Italy is exaggerated by our sources, such exaggeration is entirely understandable and cannot be taken to mean that no significant hardship resulted. At least some areas farmed by Roman citizens had been directly affected by the campaigns against Hannibal and it must always be remembered that the decline in the free peasantry was also a problem for Rome's Latin and Italian allies. At least to some extent the Gracchi and later reformers attempted to relieve the plight of allied as well as citizen poor. It is more likely that a combination of the devastation caused by the Hannibalic invasion and the heavy demands of military service in the second century
BC
ruined many small farmers, and produced a shift in population away from the country to swell the urban poor. This was not universal. In some areas small farmers were able to survive and prosper for several centuries. Slave-worked latifundia were already in existence before the Romans intervened in Sicily, but the disturbances caused by the Hannibalic War and the wealth and slaves produced by subsequent conquests greatly encouraged their spread.
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BC
. However, whilst it is probable that the extent of agrarian damage caused by the war in Italy is exaggerated by our sources, such exaggeration is entirely understandable and cannot be taken to mean that no significant hardship resulted. At least some areas farmed by Roman citizens had been directly affected by the campaigns against Hannibal and it must always be remembered that the decline in the free peasantry was also a problem for Rome's Latin and Italian allies. At least to some extent the Gracchi and later reformers attempted to relieve the plight of allied as well as citizen poor. It is more likely that a combination of the devastation caused by the Hannibalic invasion and the heavy demands of military service in the second century
BC
ruined many small farmers, and produced a shift in population away from the country to swell the urban poor. This was not universal. In some areas small farmers were able to survive and prosper for several centuries. Slave-worked latifundia were already in existence before the Romans intervened in Sicily, but the disturbances caused by the Hannibalic War and the wealth and slaves produced by subsequent conquests greatly encouraged their spread.
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The Punic Wars were not the sole cause of the major changes in Roman society in the mid to late Republic, but they were a highly important episode in Rome's history. During these conflicts the Romans mobilized massive human and economic resources to wage war with relentiess determination. In doing so they were drawn into close involvement all around the shores of the Mediterranean, so that much of the fighting in the second century was a direct result of this contact. Rome was already an active imperialist, warfare an inseparable part of her political system, before the struggle with Carthage, but this produced a permanent increase in the scale and intensity of Roman war-making. The Romans became accustomed to maintaining a large army and governing and exploiting overseas provinces. The Romans, and most especially their elite, had profited from expansion for many years, but as the rate of expansion quickened, so the scale of the spoils massively increased. Rome was flooded with wealth, luxuries and slaves, as well as new ideas and cultural influences. Most of the problems which beset the Republic in the century before its end - increasingly fierce aristocratic competition; the rapidly escalating costs of a political career; the decline of the rural population and the dramatic increase of slavery, urban poverty and debt; the difficulties of recruitment which led to the creation of a professional army - were all directly or indirectly the consequences of imperial expansion. Ultimately the Republic failed to cope with these problems and a monarchy was created. Some would argue that the Republican system relied too heavily on outmoded institutions, perfectly adequate for a city state but utterly incapable of ruling a massive empire. The weakness of this view is that the institutions of the Principate remained for many years essentially those of a city state. Perhaps the Republican system in the second and early first centuries
BC
had simply become too inflexible to adapt as it had in the past to changing circumstances. Maybe the changes produced by Rome's rapid overseas expansion simply occurred too quickly for the state to deal with effectively. If this was so, then the Punic Wars had played a part, for they had undoubtedly accelerated Roman expansion.
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had simply become too inflexible to adapt as it had in the past to changing circumstances. Maybe the changes produced by Rome's rapid overseas expansion simply occurred too quickly for the state to deal with effectively. If this was so, then the Punic Wars had played a part, for they had undoubtedly accelerated Roman expansion.
The Punic Wars in Perspective
The world today would be a very different place if Carthage had won the struggle with Rome. The Romans would only have conceded defeat if their enemy had inflicted considerable real damage upon them; more, certainly, than they proved capable of doing. Defeat in such a large-scale conflict might have been enough to cause the collapse of Rome as a state. Roman expansion would have slowed for a very long time and perhaps never happened. The Graeco-Roman culture of the empire which covered much of Europe, North Africa and the Near East for more than 500 years had a profound influence on the subsequent development of the Western world in particular, and through this spread throughout most of the globe. A significant proportion of the world's countries now speak Latin-based languages, or languages heavily influenced by Latin, and use a version of the Latin alphabet. Many legal systems are based on Roman law. The existence of the Roman Empire, and the relative ease of travel it permitted, gready facilitated the spread of Christianity and of course the creation of a Roman Catholic Church. Would any of this happened in the same way if the Romans had lost?
The Romans came close - we will never know how close - to defeat on very few occasions in either the First or Second Punic Wars, and never in the Third War. They did not lose because they refused to admit defeat in spite of enormous losses, and won through sheer determination and the willingness to expend massive resources in their war effort. The solidarity of all classes at Rome was remarkable, especially in comparison to other ancient city states, and, more often than not, their allies, Latin, Italian and overseas, were also inclined to remain loyal. The entire Roman state went to war, mobilizing an exceptionally high proportion of its manpower, marshalling all of its wealth and resources to pay, feed, clothe and equip its armies, and to construct great fleets of warships. Once (and for whatever reasons) the Romans came into direct conflict with Carthage they did everything necessary to achieve victory, grimly building new fleets or raising fresh legions to replace the ones they had lost, private individuals assisting when the State's finances ran low. The Romans took great pride in their ability to learn from their enemies, copying weaponry and tactics from successive opponents and often improving upon them. This characteristic was amply demonstrated in the Punic Wars by the speed with which Rome turned herself into a great naval power in the First War, or the steady improvement of her armies and generals during the Second.
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The Carthaginian war effort was never so wholehearted, and most of the State did not directly participate in the conflict until 149 when they were faced with the extinction of their city. This less determined approach to warfare was not because the Carthaginians remained at heart a nation of merchants, who viewed every enterprise in terms of profit and loss. It was the normal attitude towards warfare of every civilized state in the Mediterranean world. Only the Romans viewed every war as a life and death struggle, refusing to consider defeat whilst they had any means of carrying on the fight, and always pursuing total victory. The Carthaginians, and especially Hannibal, put the Romans under greater pressure than any other single foreign opponent. That they survived this ordeal confirmed their distinctive attitude towards warfare, until the changing conditions of late antiquity made it impossible to maintain. The Romans' relentless attitude to warfare was one of the most important factors in the creation of their Empire, combined with their remarkable talent for absorbing other peoples which gave it such stability. The same attitude to war tended to breed more conflict after an initial clash, and the differences between the Romans' and Carthaginians' expectation of how a beaten enemy should behave contributed in no small way to the renewal of war in 218 and 149.
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