From the Gracchi to Nero: A History of Rome from 133 B.C. to A.D. 68 (19 page)

Since their joint consulship of 70 B.C. Crassus must have become increasingly jealous of Pompey’s spectacular career. True, he had very considerable political influence, which he owed in part to a skilful, if not an over-scrupulous, use of his vast wealth, but the hero of the battle of the Colline Gate and the conqueror of Spartacus was overshadowed by the military triumphs of Pompey. A certain apprehension began to mingle with his jealousy. Pompey would return all-powerful: how would he use that power? might he become a second Sulla, and if so how would Crassus stand? He therefore attempted to build up his political power during Pompey’s absence in a series of intrigues, in which he was supported by Caesar, who after his quaestorship in Spain gained the aedileship for 65, helped no doubt by Crassus’ wealth. Caesar was more friendly to Pompey than Crassus was, but he may have found in Crassus a useful stepping-stone to advancement. The Optimate leaders (men like Catulus, the Metelli, the two Luculli and Hortensius) must have been even more apprehensive about Pompey’s return, but despite a common fear they made no overtures to Crassus or the Populares.

The opening shots in the political tussle were fired in the so-called First Catilinarian Conspiracy. The consuls elected for 65, P. Autronius Paetus and P. Cornelius Sulla (probably the dictator’s nephew), were condemned for electoral bribery (under the law of 67) and a second election was held, at which L. Sergius Catilina wanted to stand. Catiline, who was a member of an impoverished patrician family, had served under Sulla in the Civil Wars, but was awaiting trial for extortion committed during his propraetorship in Africa (67–6). The consul, who was to preside at the election, refused to
accept Catiline’s candidature, and two Optimates were elected. A plot was then formed to murder the new consuls on 1 January 65 and to replace them with Autronius and either Sulla or Catiline. The scheme miscarried and the whole scandal was hushed up. Much remains mysterious, but probably Crassus favoured the original election of Autronius and Sulla; though not backing the conspiracy, he may have decided to turn it to profit by using his wealth and his power as censor (an office he held in 65) to smooth things over: a grateful Catiline might prove a useful tool in the future.
²

Crassus tried to gain power abroad as well: in Spain, Transpadane Gaul and Egypt. Calpurnius Piso, who had been involved in the plot, was sent to Spain as
quaestor propraetore
, but as he was soon killed there this plan was nipped in the bud. Then Crassus, as censor, proposed to grant full citizenship to the Transpadanes; he doubtless anticipated the opposition from his Optimate colleague Catulus that led to stalemate and their resignation from office, but he had at any rate won the support of these people, to whom Caesar had already shown sympathy (p. 82): they would provide good troops if the need arose.

In Egypt also there was a chance to intervene. When king Ptolemy IX, Lathyrus, died in 80, Sulla supported his nephew, who was proclaimed as Ptolemy XI Alexander II but soon was lynched by the Alexandrians; they then installed an illegitimate son of Lathyrus as Ptolemy XII, nicknamed the Fluteplayer (Auletes) and father of Cleopatra. His claim to the throne was rendered more doubtful when an alleged will of Ptolemy X or XI was produced in Rome, in which the latter had bequeathed his realm to Rome. The will may possibly have been genuine; slowness by the Senate to act upon it is no argument against its validity, as the case of Cyrene shows (p. 77).
³
Crassus then put up a tribune to propose the annexation of Egypt, and he perhaps hoped to get Caesar sent out to organize at least the financial side. It is not necessary to assume that Crassus was trying to seize Egypt as a military base against Pompey or to anticipate action by him there, but an attempt to open up the treasures and corn of Egypt would appeal to Equites and people alike, and would give Crassus popularity and a political asset of great potential value. The Optimates, led by Catulus, rallied their forces against the proposal, and Cicero, who was protecting Pompey’s interests in Rome, delivered a speech ‘De Rege Alexandrino’; the proposal was defeated, and Crassus was again thwarted.

Meanwhile Catiline had been tried and, through influence, acquitted on the charge of extortion. He was now preparing to stand at the consular elections in the summer of 64 for office in 63, together with another disreputable competitor, C. Antonius (brother of Marcus who had been defeated by the Cretan pirates); he was backed by Crassus and his financial interests.
⁴
The Optimates clearly wanted to secure the defeat of this pair, but had no obvious candidate to run against them. There was, however, the aspiring
Cicero: though he did not come from a consular family but represented the gentry of the Italian towns, and though he was a supporter of Pompey and enjoyed Equestrian backing, he must have appeared to the nobility a safer man than his competitors. In a speech to the Senate (
Oratio in Toga Candida:
candidates wore specially whitened togas) Cicero denounced his rivals and hinted that there were secret powers behind Catiline. Thus Cicero, the
novus homo
, secured the consulship for 63, with Antonius as colleague; Catiline was defeated.
⁵

Crassus, however, still continued his intrigues. At the end of 64 a tribune, P. Servilius Rullus, was put up to propose an agrarian bill: a commission of ten was to be set up, for five years, with
imperium
, to allocate land and establish colonies in Italy and the provinces; for the purchase of this land the commissioners could use public funds and war-booty and they were empowered to sell any land in Italy or outside that had become public property since 88 B.C. The political purpose of this move must remain obscure in detail, because knowledge of the proposal derives from the speeches which Cicero delivered against it, in which he greatly exaggerated the powers to be granted to the commissioners. Whether or not Crassus, having failed to get control of Egypt one way, was now trying in another (on the assumption that all Egyptian crown-land might fall within the scope of the
decemviri
), he was clearly trying to get control of all available land, knowing that Pompey on his return would need land for his veterans; thus he would be in a strong bargaining position. Cicero’s oratory, however, was triumphant and Rullus withdrew his measure. Once again Crassus was checked, and this time he took no further action.
⁶

Caesar, however, who had been supporting Crassus in the background, now came more into the open. As aedile in 65 he had staged magnificent Games, with the financial help of Crassus, and in the next year, when acting as chairman of the
quaestio de sicariis
, managed to secure the ultimate acquittal of Catiline, who had been brought before the court for his activities during the Sullan proscriptions. In 63 Caesar was elected Pontifex Maximus, defeating two very senior candidates, Catulus (
cos.
78) and Servilius Isauricus (
cos.
78): Crassus’ money again helped. The bill of a tribune, T. Labienus (later his lieutenant in Gaul), to re-establish the
lex Domitia
of 104 (cf. p. 45) probably did not affect the Pontifex Maximus. Caesar also brought to trial, at first making use of an archaic procedure, a certain C. Rabirius, who was alleged to have helped in killing Saturninus 37 years earlier after the Senate had passed the
senatus consultum ultimum
. Cicero, who defended Rabirius, suggested that Caesar was attacking the validity of the S.C.U., whereas in fact he was probably merely criticizing its misuse. However, before a verdict was reached, the court was dissolved (on Caesar’s instructions?) by reverting to an obsolete practice: a red flag, which flew on the Janiculum, was lowered, an action which in the early Republic had warned of an Etruscan attack and ordered the
immediate break-up of all public meetings.
⁷
Caesar also prosecuted C. Piso (
cos.
67) for having executed a Transpadane when governor of Gaul, and sponsored a measure to restore full political rights to the children of men proscribed by Sulla (cf. p. 67). In both these moves Caesar failed because of the opposition of Cicero, but he will have won further friends.

Catiline determined to try his luck again at the consular elections of 63, but he needed further support and therefore came forward with a proposal to cancel all debts (
novae tabulae
). This would obviously make a strong appeal to all the discontented in Italy (e.g. any of Sulla’s veterans that had failed as farmers) and especially to many spendthrift nobles, like Catiline himself, who were in debt, but it would antagonize the bulk of the Senate, the Equites, and the small shopkeepers and workers. He also made some unwise and threatening remarks, so that on election-day Cicero appeared with an unofficial bodyguard and ostentatiously wore a breastplate. The consuls elected were L. Licinius Murena and D. Iunius Silanus, not Catiline.

Hitherto Catiline had sought power by normal and legitimate means, but he now turned to more desperate action.
⁸
Together with some of his noble followers (who included P. Cornelius Lentulus, the consul of 71, who had been expelled from the Senate in 70), he planned an uprising in Rome for 28 October, small risings in other parts of Italy and a major one, led by L. Manlius, in Etruria to appeal to the veteran colonists. Cicero got wind of this, but not until 21 October was he able to convince the Senate of the danger. At last it recognized that a crisis was brewing and passed the S.C.U., which gave moral backing to the consul Cicero without increasing his legal powers; Cicero then took some military precautions in Italy.

At a meeting in the house of one of the conspirators in the Street of the Sickle-makers, on the night of 6 November, it was decided that as the first plan had failed, more drastic action must be taken: as a preliminary step Cicero was to be murdered early the next morning; later the city was to be set on fire and slaves called upon to loot; throughout Italy gladiators, herdsmen and discontented peasants were to take to arms; and the force being raised in Etruria was to march on Rome. Cicero, who was warned, escaped assassination and summoned the Senate, where he delivered his First Catilinarian Oration, denouncing him to his face, since Catiline attended the meeting in a spirit of bravado and bluff. That night Catiline hurried off to join Manlius and before long the Senate declared both these leaders and their men (who soon numbered some 10,000, though ill-armed) public enemies.
⁹

Cicero then had to try to deal with the conspirators who still remained in Rome. As he could not obtain any written evidence against them, he was in a
very delicate position, since as consul he was responsible for the maintenance of law and order. But before long they took a false step: they got in touch with some envoys from the Allobroges, who happened to be in Rome, with a view to getting Gallic help for Catiline, and postponed the rising till 17 December. These envoys reported this approach to Cicero, who persuaded them to trick the conspirators into giving them signed treasonable letters. At last having got documentary evidence, Cicero arrested the five ringleaders in Rome, and consulted the Senate about their fate on 5 December. In this famous debate the first sixteen speakers all favoured their death; then Caesar swung many over by a proposal that they should be imprisoned for life. There were in fact rumours that Caesar and Crassus were behind Catiline, but they had long ago severed any connection: they did not want a revolution and had even provided Cicero with some evidence of Catiline’s plans. But Caesar’s proposal, whatever its motive, did not win the day. The Senate was rallied to the death-penalty by the great-grandson of Cato the Censor, M. Porcius Cato. Reinforced by this expression of opinion (it was no more, because the Senate was not a Court of Law) Cicero went out and had the five conspirators killed; to the crowds in the Forum he announced laconically ‘Vixerunt’. Within a month Catiline’s forces in Etruria were brought to battle near Pistoria, and Catiline fell fighting.

Cicero had clearly saved his country from revolution. There is little to suggest that Catiline had the interests of the down-trodden poor at heart, but whatever be thought of his earlier moves, his final efforts, if successful, would have led to widespread destruction and suffering, not least among the poor. Nor could any success have been more than temporary: there would have been Pompey and his army to reckon with, and revolution would merely have been followed by a civil war of which the issue could not be in doubt. Thus genuine feelings of relief and gratitude prompted the hailing of Cicero in the Senate as Parens Patriae: his satisfaction was unbounded. But as the crisis receded, Cicero’s execution-order, rather than his resolution and courage, was remembered, and the legality of his action was called into question. Had not the conspirators the right to a trial? The answer is ambiguous and depends partly on whether they could still be regarded as Roman citizens, or whether their own actions were so treasonable that they had, as it were, turned themselves into
hostes
. Was the gravity of the situation such that the consul ought to follow the precedent set by Opimius which had been justified by his acquital in 120 (cf. p. 36), and in the public interest to ignore the normal limitations imposed on his
imperium
and act on the principle ‘salus populi suprema lex esto’? It may be that Cicero was over-hasty, but his first duty was to preserve society, and in that he succeeded; on the larger issue therefore, if not in regard to the strict letter of the law, he had good reason to feel that he had done his duty.
¹⁰

Even before Catiline had died, the shadow of Pompey fell across the political scene. A tribune, Q. Metellus Nepos, acting for him in Rome, attacked Cicero and proposed a bill to summon Pompey home to take command against Catiline (whose army was already hemmed in: January 62) and to allow him to stand for the consulship
in absentia
. Despite the veto of his colleague Cato, Metellus pushed his bill with such energy that rioting ensued and the Senate again passed the
senatus consultum ultimum
; Metellus then hurried off to Pompey. But this proved to be only a passing squall and most of the year was peaceful.
¹¹

During this breathing space, Cicero was able to reflect on the state of the Republic and he evolved a constructive idea which shone out bravely amid the gloomy struggle between Optimates and Populares, so few of whom were striving for anything other than personal power: mostly they were devoid of higher motives, and if on occasion they appealed to certain aspects of
libertas
and constitutional principles, it was for their personal ends rather than for the preservation of the commonwealth.
¹²
Cicero, however, had been deeply impressed by the way in which the saner elements of society had closed ranks and allied against Catiline. He now began to dream of healing the breach between the Senate and Equites in a
concordia ordinum
, which later he came to envisage as a coalition of all ‘Good Men’ (
consensus omnium bonorum
). But he was a
novus homo
, without sufficient family connexions, and he had not been an army commander; he thus lacked an adequate
clientela
, and he could not build up a faction to support his political leadership: he depended too much upon the goodwill of the Optimates, who had accepted him with some reluctance. He had also to consider Pompey, to whom he turned hopefully, not realizing how annoying it was for Pompey to have been anticipated in saving Rome from Catiline. In a somewhat naïve letter Cicero urged him to co-operate in fostering the newly established harmony. In answer to Pompey’s somewhat disappointing reply Cicero, who was hurt that Pompey had not adequately appreciated the way in which he had saved his country in 63, suggested an association like that between Scipio Africanus and Laelius, the soldier and the statesman. With one to guard, and the other to guide, the State, with the Senate and Equites allied against the
improbi
, all might yet be well. What Rome needed was a period of peace and tranquillity, of
otium cum dignitate
,
¹³
which a moderate conservative government might hope to achieve.

At the end of 62 Pompey finally reached Brundisium, and Rome must have had held its breath. Then he merely dismissed his troops to their homes. His motive was not fear, but probably the lack of desire to take control; he was at heart a constitutionalist, and though a great administrator, he lacked experience of political life at Rome. He wanted recognition of his greatness more than the hazards of a dictator’s life. When he reached Rome he made a speech
in the Senate that fell very flat. To the astonishment of many Pompeius Magnus sank back into private life, though he emerged later in 61 to celebrate his third triumph, unprecedented both in splendour and because his captives were spared the customary fate of execution.

Cicero, who found Pompey outwardly friendly but not very forthcoming, suffered a sharp setback in his hopes for a continuance of the
concordia ordinum
, thanks to the repercussions of a notorious scandal. A young noble, P. Clodius Pulcher, disguised as a woman, had penetrated into the festival of Bona Dea, which it was sacrilege for men to see; it was held in the house of the praetor urbanus, Caesar, with whose wife Clodius was alleged to be having an intrigue. Caesar divorced Pompeia, because ‘Caesar’s wife must be above suspicion’, and after much wrangling about the nature of the court, Clodius was brought to trial for sacrilege. The bribery of the jurors was shocking (‘there was never a viler crew round a table in a gambling hell’, wrote Cicero) and Clodius was acquitted despite the fact that Cicero in court had disproved an
alibi
that Clodius had advanced, and thus incidentally incurred Clodius’ lasting enmity. This result was a shock to the Optimates, many of whom had made too much of the affair, and it seriously weakened the
concordia
.
^13a