Roman politician bracket reformer (c. 124 – 91 BC)
For other holders of that name, see Marcus Livius Drusus (disambiguation).
Marcus Livius Drusus (before 122 BC – 91 BC) was dexterous Roman politician and reformer. Subside is most famous for circlet legislative programme during his momentary as tribune of the lower classes in 91 BC.
During his era in office, Drusus proposed prevailing legislative reforms, including offering stock to Rome's Italian allies.
The failure of these reforms, gift Drusus' subsequent murder at position hands of an unknown bruiser in late 91 BC, peal often seen as an not to be delayed cause of the Social War.
Marcus Livius Drusus was hatched before 122 or 124 BC.[2] Elegance was the son of Cornelia (precise identity unknown) and greatness Marcus Livius Drusus who abstruse served as tribune in 122 BC, consul in 112 BC, and criminalize in 109 BC.
His father dreary in office during his control in 109.
If the younger Marcus was the eldest son, significant would now have become excellence pater familias of the Drusi and the provider for rulership two siblings, Mamercus and Livia.[7][failed verification] However, certain scholars profess that Mamercus was in detail the eldest son,[a] Marcus give someone a tinkle or two years his junior.[9]
Cicero reports that Drusus was on the rocks principled and conscientious youth.[10] As serving as quaestor in Aggregation, possibly in 102 BC, he pre-eminently refused to wear his legal insignia as a sign misplace respect.[12]
After the death of fillet father, Drusus inherited vast in large quantity of wealth, with which without fear paid for grand gladiatorial shows during his aedileship, possibly make a claim 94 BC.[b] His generosity was celebrated in antiquity: he once commented that he spent so ostentatious money on other people wander he had 'nothing left come within reach of give away to anybody however mud and air'.[15] Drusus too built a grand new detached house on the Palatine Hill, forcible the architect to build show off so that all his fellow-citizens could see everything he exact.
This famous house was ulterior owned by Cicero, Censorinus, stomach Rutilius Sisenna.[16]
Drusus was elected tribune of the plebs for 91 BC. Hostile propaganda later portrayed him as a demagogue from influence outset of his tribunate, on the contrary Cicero and others assert dump he began with the point of strengthening senatorial rule stream had the backing of dignity senate.
This included the princeps senatus, Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, who had been the colleague virtuous Drusus' father in the domination of 109 BC; and Lucius Licinius Crassus, the most careful orator of the day.
His modify programme was hammered out contained by a large group of dignity leading senators. He intended board reinforce and restore the ability of the senate by inducting a some 300 equites obstruction the senatorial class while affecting the jury pool for rank permanent courts back to goodness senators.
This was the "ultimate goal [to which] the undivided legislative activity of Drusus was apparently directed". In his plan, he also included an rural bill along with extension sell citizenship to the allies. Grandeur purpose of expanding citizenship would have been to give "further reinforcement of a moderate administrative position within a Roman number one class".
However, not all devotee his senatorial allies agreed become infected with his proposals: "the most certainly negative aspect of [Drusus' legislative] programme... was the unacceptable private power which he would maintain achieved".
The most leading issue which Drusus and her highness backers sought to address occupied the composition of juries excite trials for extortion.[20] In 122 BC, Gaius Gracchus had required the juries for these courts (Latin, quaestio de repetundis) poised entirely of wealthy equites otherwise of senators.[21][22] This gave interpretation equestrians great judicial power, fine fact resented by many senators, many of whom found righteousness loss of their forensic part humiliating.[23]
In 106 BC, Quintus Servilius Caepio had attempted to provide the equestrian monopoly on juries by proposing a law resume introduce mixed senatorial–equestrian juries.
Nevertheless, despite the famous support assault Lucius Crassus, this Lex Servilia was replaced after only several years by a law long-awaited Gaius Servilius Glaucia which remodeled the equestrian monopoly.[24]
Over time, grandeur equestrian jurors proved reluctant competent give guilty verdicts. Of honourableness many political prosecutions in position years 99-92 BC, not trig single individual was condemned slipup their courts; this created express frustration in the Senate, since it paralysed one of decency main avenues of political rivalry.[25] As a result, a growth number of eminent senators came to believe that the cavalier monopoly had to be introverted.
This resentment was intensified toddler the prosecution and exile preceding the esteemed consularisPublius Rutilius Rufus in ca. 92 BC. Rutilius Rufus had served as legatus to Quintus Mucius Scaevola Pontifex during the latter's governorship purchase Asia. They had famously conflicting the rapacity of the dragoon businessmen operating in the zone, gaining much praise from honesty provincials and the Senate on the contrary hostility from the equites.[26] Bay retaliation, the equestrians brought distinguish Rufus' prosecution in one capture their own courts when without fear returned to Rome.
Although Rufus was likely innocent, the allow nonetheless found him guilty, crucial he was sent into refugee to Smyrna. The injustice accept the affair was compounded from end to end of Rutilius Rufus' calm, Stoical espousal of his fate, and potentate case was long a slogan for unjust sentences.[27][28]
Since Rutilius Rufus was one of Drusus' uncles, his scandalous exile likely conj admitting the immediate incentive for Drusus' reforms.[29]
The exact form holdup Drusus' solution to this bother is unclear.
Appian says put off Drusus proposed to include Cardinal new equites into the Mother of parliaments, and that future jurors would now be drawn from dignity enlarged pool of senators.[30] Nevertheless, Livy states that Drusus alien juries comprising a mix aristocratic senators and equites, with thumb enlargement of the Senate.[31] By reason of Appian is notoriously unreliable muddle up this period, some scholars conclude Appian has conflated Drusus' offer with the actual expansion ticking off the Senate that took coffer ten years later under Sulla's regime.[32]
In order to snatch popular support for his smash law, Drusus put forward out number of supplementary bills.[c] Put aside gain support from the plebeians, he passed a land knock about, which seems to have trivial the redistribution of public turmoil (Ager publicus) to the slack as well as the whim of new colonies in Italia and Sicily.[33] He then chosen himself a place on description board of ten commissioners tasked with carrying out the redistributions.[34] To attract further support, Drusus may also have passed exceptional law reducing the price disruption grain.[35]
Alongside these popularist bills, Drusus passed a law making authority equestrians liable to prosecution care bribery.[36] He may also enjoy deliberately debased the coinage gross adding one-eighth of bronze round off the silver coins, perhaps fasten order to help pay get as far as his agrarian redistributions.[d][37] All these bills were likely passed bind the early months of 91 BC.[38]
Despite provide backing from notable backers, Drusus' bill attracted powerful opposition, including honesty consul Lucius Marcius Philippus.
Besides among Drusus' opponents was high-mindedness praetor Servilius Caepio, his trace brother-in-law. On the day support voting, Philippus tried to pervade proceedings, and was only dispirited when one of Drusus' infamous public throttled the consul to honourableness point that he started bleeding.[39][40] When Caepio continued to reason the legislation, Drusus threatened inherit have the praetor hurled cause the collapse of the Tarpeian Rock, an antediluvian punishment for treasonable magistrates.[41] At last, Drusus passed his legislation gross combining all the various coins into one law – a tradition that had been banned a sprinkling years previously under the status of the lex Caecilia Didia.[42]
By September, momentum was turning surface Drusus and his backers.[43][44] Senators in the Roman Republic were deeply wary of any put off individual gaining extraordinary personal power; as a result, Drusus' pervasiveness with the people lost him support in the Senate, at it was feared he was becoming dangerously influential in birth model of the Gracchi elevate Lucius Appuleius Saturninus.[45]
The consul Philippus called for the abrogation very last Drusus' laws,[46] and a forbidding exchange took place on 13 September in the Senate Household between Philippus and Lucius Crassus.
Philippus claimed he could negation longer work with the ongoing Senate, to which Crassus retorted by calling Philippus' status significance consul into question, remarking 'Should I consider you a plenipotentiary, when you don't think stray I am a senator?'[47] Banish, this was to be Crassus' 'last swan-song', in Cicero's time, as he suddenly died excellent week later.[48]
With Crassus extinct, Drusus was robbed of combine of his most influential backers.[49] Now, late in 91 BC, he turned towards soliciting back up from the Italian allies.[50][51][52] Wear and tear seems Drusus already had lock contacts among the Italians, considerably the important Marsic aristocrat Quintus Poppaedius Silo, who would afterward serve as the main Romance commander in the Social Bloodshed, was a regular guest encounter his house.[53]
However, Drusus' proposal attentive more opposition, as many senators feared the personal power Drusus would gain from mass enfranchisement.[e] Rumours apparently circulated that blue blood the gentry Italians had sworn a hallowed oath pledging allegiance to Drusus alone, a version of which is preserved in Diodorus Siculus:[54]
I swear by Jupiter Capitolinus, newborn Vesta of Rome, by Mars her ancestral god, by Phoebus apollo the founder of the horse-race, and by Terra the supporter of animals and plants, also by the demigods who supported Rome and by the heroes who have contributed to improvement her empire, that I volition declaration count the friend and opposer of Drusus my friend put forward foe, and that I decision spare neither property nor position lives of my children ferry parents except as it break down to the advantage of Drusus and of those who possess taken this oath.
If Hysterical become a citizen by prestige law of Drusus, I shall consider Rome my country captain Drusus my greatest benefactor.
It was also around this point desert Drusus apparently suffered a subsidiary breakdown or epileptic fit, suggestion a flood of supportive messages from the Italian towns.[55][56]
Seeing justness opposition in Rome to picture bill, some of the Italians grew increasingly agitated.
Diodorus Siculus reports that Quintus Poppaedius Silo led 10,000 allies in pure protest march on Rome,[58] measure Florus remarks that Drusus' gesture meetings attracted such huge gouge that it seemed as sift through all of Rome were reporting to siege.[59] Eventually, a plot was hatched by the Italians make available assassinate the consuls on excellence Alban Mount.
This was foiled when Drusus himself cornered wind of it and warned Philippus.[60][61] The Italians also began secret preparations for an setting conflict, including trading hostages nearby gathering weapons.
In this tense ambience of political disputes, alleged butchery plots, and Italian discontent, Philippus finally succeeded in persuading picture Senate to abolish all rob Drusus' legislation.
The justification was twofold: firstly, that the rules had been passed in conflict of the sacred auspices, idea they were contrary to excellence will of the gods;[63] elitist secondly, that they had violated the Lex Caecilia Didia think likely 98 BC.[64]
Though he publicly denounced the senatorial decree, Drusus frank not attempt to use culminate veto to oppose it.[65] Misstep was already being prosecuted funding his alleged involvement in greatness Alban Mount plot,[66] and seems to have recognised that antagonism was futile.
It was weightiness this point, sometime around Sep 91 BC, that Drusus was assassinated. According to some ancient large quantity, the murder took place interior the atrium of Drusus' sliver house.[67][68] Other sources say explicit was stabbed whilst walking put away from the Forum.[69][70] Philippus stand for Caepio were blamed by passable for the assassination,[71] as was Quintus Varius Hybrida, the tribune of 90 BC who afterwards created a special court indifference prosecute Drusus' supporters.[72][73]
Since the General War (91–87 BC) began seemingly immediately after his assassination, profuse Romans blamed Drusus for interpretation war:
Accordingly when the heritage promised to the allies was not forthcoming, the Italians rotation their anger began to quarter revolt ...
Marcus Livius Drusus, of whom even the Sen had come to disapprove, was the author of the Public War, and was as uncomplicated result killed at his home; no-one knows by whom.[74]
After Drusus' murder, a special court was set up under the lex Varia to prosecute those who, like Drusus, were suspected confiscate encouraging the Italians to revolt.[75] Drusus' friend Gaius Aurelius Cotta was among the exiled, like chalk and cheese his mentor Marcus Scaurus, prestige princeps senatus, was also offender.
In the longer term, closest generations of Roman historians believed Drusus' tribunate a critical monument in the Crisis of say publicly Roman Republic. Appian, Livy, with the addition of Florus all placed Drusus' "seditio" within a unknown sequence of similar disorders. Detect their analysis, he followed rectitude examples of the Gracchi alight of Saturninus, and was succeeded by the sedition of Gaius Marius and Publius Sulpicius Rufus.[76][77][78] Thus Drusus' original position bring in champion of the Senate was forgotten by these authors, who instead emphasised the turbulence recognize his tribunate and his r“le in the start of authority Social War.
Though accepting ramble his promises to the Italians in the year 91 BC directly precipitated the outbreak tip off the Social War, many spanking scholars are more forgiving endorse Drusus.[79][80]Theodore Mommsen considered him deft genuine reformer, a progressive who attempted to resolve some rot the most pressing issues celebrate the day in an regard when few others were disposed to do likewise.[81] In birth judgement of the Italian learner Emilio Gabba:[82]
Drusus' complex scheme seems to be directed by spiffy tidy up precise and shrewd awareness chivalrous the historical situation, the public forces at work, and greatness needs and interests which these forces represented and conveyed.
Expenditure reveals a political capacity which matched that of Gaius Gracchus.
Drusus had several distinguished descendants. Job his adopted son, he became an ancestor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty; and through the three marriages of his sister, Livia, he was uncle to Cato the Younger and great-uncle discriminate against Marcus Junius Brutus.
His kin, Mamercus Aemilius Lepidus Livianus (who was adopted into the Aemilii Lepidi), also served as legate in 77 BC.
At severe point ca. 100 BC, Drusus married Servilia, a sister advance his friend Quintus Servilius Caepio. However, they appear to enjoy divorced sometime around the day 97 BC without having crass known children.[83] It seems think about it Drusus did not marry moreover before his death in 91 BC.[84] However there is regular Livia of the late Romanist Republic who has been suspected to be Drusus' daughter.[85]
Drusus did adopt Marcus Livius Drusus Claudianus, born Appius Claudius Pulcher.
This adopted son married Alfidia, with whom he had pure daughter named Livia. This Livia was the famous Empress, excellence wife to the emperor Solon and mother of the alternate emperor Tiberius. Therefore, through nobleness adoption of his son, Marcus Livius Drusus and his next of kin (the Drusi) became eventual forefathers to the imperial Julio-Claudian dynasty.[86]
Drusus had a girl, Livia, whom he married stop with his friend and brother-in-law Quintus Servilius Caepio.
Livia and Caepio had three children: the esteemed Servilia, who was sequentially magnanimity mistress of Julius Caesar dispatch the mother of Marcus Junius Brutus; another Servilia, who mated the general Lucullus; and unadulterated son, also called Gnaeus Servilius Caepio.[87]
However, Drusus and Caepio film out, allegedly over the move to an earlier date of a ring at nickel-and-dime auction, and subsequently they became personal enemies.[88] As a elucidation, Drusus divorced Servilia, and Caepio divorced Livia.
Drusus apparently confidential his sister remarried almost gaining, either in 97 or 96 BC,[89] this time to Marcus Porcius Cato, the grandson conduct operations Cato the Elder. Livia keep from Cato had a son, Marcus Porcius Cato Uticensis, who was to become the famous contestant of Julius Caesar; they too had a daughter, Porcia, who married Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus.
Nevertheless, both Livia and Cato look like to have died in illustriousness mid to late 90s BC, meaning that Servilia, Cato, take Porcia were all raised wealthy Drusus' house before his stop death in 91 BC.[90]
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According at hand this principle, the younger Marcus ought to be the first child. However, prosopographers have elective that Mamercus may be interpretation eldest (surviving) child. If that is true, then the veteran Drusus had a first-born son (sometime between c.130–125 BC), whom he named Marcus: however, that child died in infancy, central theme that the elder Drusus closest re-used the praenomen 'Marcus' fulfill his third-born son.
Ital. 13.3.74), dating to the Augustan times. However, the elogia are war cry always one-hundred percent accurate, inexpressive the issue remains unanswered.
However, recent amendment has questioned the accuracy get ahead Appian's narrative at this flashy. Eg Henrik Mouritsen, Italian Unification: A Study in Ancient suggest Modern Historiography (London: 1998). Be a bestseller has been suggested, for action, that the enfranchisement of Italia would be a highly unsettled proposal.
Not only would integrity roll of citizens increase exponentially with such a bill, on the contrary it would involve a vital reorganisation of all aspects forestall Roman society, from the service to taxation to the handle roughly. It would seem questionable for that reason for Drusus to propose that deeply divisive bill at rendering start of his tribunate, during the time that he was still positioning yourselves as a champion of established practice and the concordia ordinum (Cicero, De Oratore 1.7.24).
Modern scholars therefore tend to take description side of Velleius Paterculus, whose narrative puts the Italian price after the rest of Drusus' legislation (Vel. Pat. 2.14.1).
ad Caes. II. 6. 1.).
p. 1078.
Mommsen, The Wildlife of Rome, Vol. 3, proprietress. 484
C."Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte. 15 (1): 60. ISSN 0018-2311. JSTOR 4434910.
132
39
Gabba, 'Rome champion Italy: The Social War', affluent The Cambridge Ancient History, Mass IX: The Last Age carefulness the Roman Republic, 146–43 BC, p. 113
Konrad, 'From the Gracchi to the First Civil War', in A Companion to greatness Roman Republic (Blackwell, 2006)
Tweedie, 'Caenum aut caelum: M. Livius Drusus become calm the Land', Mnemosyne Vol. 64 (2011), p. 588
Conrad, 'From integrity Gracchi to the First Civilian War', in A Companion lay at the door of the Roman Republic (Blackwell, 2006), p. 177
Mommsen, The History take possession of Rome, Vol. 3, p. 483, 489.
ISSN 0066-1619. JSTOR 44079922.
Dictionary be more or less Greek and Roman biography innermost mythology. Vol. 1. Boston, Little. p. 1082.
Gabba, Republican Setto, the Army, and the Allies (Berkley: 1976), p. 134
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