Читать книгу Why Rome Fell - Michael Arnheim - Страница 29

Lucius Cornelius Sulla, nicknamed Felix (Lucky), from an impoverished patrician background, who as quaestor (deputy commander) to Marius in the Jugurthine War managed by a stratagem to capture King Jugurtha himself in 105 BCE. But Marius and Sulla soon crossed swords, leading eventually to Sulla’s unprecedented march on Rome with his army in 88 BCE and again in 83 BCE. Sulla used his victory in 81 BCE to have himself appointed dictator legibus faciundis et reipublicae constituendae causa (dictator for the making of laws and for the settling of the constitution). This was the first time that Rome had a dictator since 202 BCE, but, unlike previous dictators, Sulla’s appointment was for an indefinite period. He held it for just over a year, using his power to enact some far-reaching constitutional reforms intended to strengthen the Senate against popular institutions, notably the tribunate of the plebs. He then resigned and retired into private life to write his memoirs and, if Plutarch is to be believed, to devote himself to debauchery (Plutarch, Sulla, 37). But no tinkering with the constitution could save the Republic. Sulla’s own career illustrated the fundamental truth that the future shape of the Roman government would be decided not by laws but by arms.