5 A Wider World
Roman literature and roman territorial expansion went hand in hand. Rome had used writing for basic communication since its inception. But with its increasing interaction, particularly with Greece, it began to attempt its own literature. At first it was aping Greek literature.
Polybius was one of the first to ask philosophical questions about what made Rome so successful.
In 280 BC, Pyrrhus came from northern Greece to aid Tarentum against Rome. He won, but at such a cost that he remarked “He could not afford any more such victories.” From that time to 146 BC when the Romans finally destroyed Carthage, there was nearly continuous warfare.
The first Punic (Carthaginian) war lasted from 264 – 241 BC. It was fought largely in Sicily and ended in Roman control of the island.
The second Punic war was fought between 218 – 201 BC. It started in Spain, but ended with Carthage recalling Hannibal back home as they were increasingly uneasy about the odds. Hannibal had enlisted the Macedonian king Perseus in the fight, but his defeat meant Roman control over Greece in 168 BC.
The Romans also had to engage the Gauls in the 220’s, and Antiochus of Syria in 190 BC.
Military campaigning was a way of life for Romans. And one of the consequences of military success overseas was that the profits of warfare made Rome the richest people known in the world. Thousands of captives poured in and became the slave labor that worked Roman fields, mines, and mills. Roman reconstruction and new construction took off, and for a while, Rome’s coffers overflowed so that Rome became a tax free zone.
But these changes destabilized the culture too. So much wealth and luxury had an effect on Rome. The expansion of power raised debates and paradoxes about Rome’s place in the world, and what counted as “Roman” when so much of the Mediterranean was under Roman control. Winning brought its own problems.
Cannae and the Elusive Face of Battle
Hannibal had crossed the Alps and won a decisive battle at Cannae. Romans were in a panic about his eventual invasion of the city. But for some unknown reason, Hannibal stopped and gave the Romans time to recover. Quintus Fabius took command after Cannae and avoided direct confrontation with Hannibal. He waited, and he combined guerilla tactics with a scorched earth policy to wear down the enemy. Scipio Africanus was the more dashing leader and wanted a more direct confrontation.
Perhaps more than anything else, it was Rome’s commitment to continue the fight, at any cost, that eventually won the war. Hannibal himself maybe understood that Rome’s manpower was due to their relations with those allied to them, and he tried to win them over to his own side. But he never managed it successfully enough to undermine the Romans. Polybius himself goes into this at length, describing the strength and stability of Rome’s political structures.
Polybius on the Politics of Rome
Polybius was a Greek from the Peloponnese that was captured when Perseus lost to Rome. Perseus was an educated writer and as such was placed higher than many slaves. He noted that Romans were afraid of the gods, but that they also were systematically efficient in organization.
The stories of Roman valor, heroism, and self-sacrifice were told to the young to inspire them to endure all for the common good. But Polybius noted within the Roman state structure itself, that there was a mixed constitution that pulled the best aspects of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy. The consuls were the monarchical element. The senate was the aristocratic element, and the people were the democratic element. There was a set of checks and balances on each so that none could entirely prevail. In fact, speaking of democracy is a bit misleading, because we tend to see it in our modern terms. Democracy at root means mob rule. Romans fought for liberty, not democracy.
Even though the plebs had won the right to participate, office was still only available to both wealthy plebs and wealthy patricians. But that didn’t mean the poor were ignored. In fact, there support was sought after by those in office. Since the rich were rarely united on issues, those that did campaign sought to convince the poor public that their policies were the best. The rich had to learn the lesson that they depended on the people as a whole.
An Empire of Obedience
The Romans didn’t start out bent on vast conquest or in the belief of some manifest destiny. They had a thirst for glory and economic profits, but so did their neighbors. They were not the only agents in the process and they didn’t march across peace-loving people who were just minding their own business until the thuggish Romans came along. The Mediterranean was a vast area of shifting alliances and continuous brutal violence. The more powerful Rome was perceived to be, the more these warring parties sought to enlist the Romans as allies in their own power struggles. Of course as Rome gained control over these areas they did impose their will to greater or lesser degrees.
The Impact of Empire
As conquered peoples were brought to Rome, Romans traveled to far flung corners of the empire too. By the mid second century BC, probably over half the adult male citizens of Rome would have seen something of the world abroad, leaving children where they went. The Roman population had become the most traveled of any state ever in the Mediterranean.
How to be Roman
This wider view of the world also allowed the Romans to be more realistic about themselves. Their sculpture, realistic in the capture of flaws, expressed a willingness to see themselves accurately, and often call out their society for its lack of living up to its own standards.