Sicilian Slave Revolt
Slavery in Rome gained momentum from the 3rd to 2nd centuries B.C., and the class conflict between slaves and slave-owners gradually became the main contradiction in society. The brutal oppression and exploitation of the slaves by the slave owners provoked the slaves to revolt. From the beginning of the 2nd century B.C. onwards, the slaves constantly launched armed struggles. In 198 B.C., the Carthaginian slaves in some Latin cities plotted to riot, but failed because of the betrayal of traitors, and more than 500 people were executed. In 196 B.C., a rural slave and peasant revolt took place in Idalaria, which spread to the whole region, and it took a legion sent by Rome to put down the revolt. In 186 B.C., the Apulian pastoral slaves of southern Italy revolted, with more than 7,000 insurrectionists, turning the roads and pastures of the region into dangerous zones. These struggles foreshadowed the coming storm of mass uprisings. Half a century later, the Great Sicilian Slave Revolt broke out.
Sicily, with its fertile soil, was known as a granary. In Sicily, the fertile soil was known as the granary, where the slaveholding estates were created earlier, and where hundreds of slaves, mostly from the same ethnic group or region, were gathered, which was conducive to the organization and launching of the revolt. Damopoulos, the lord of Enna City, was famous for his mistreatment of slaves. He not only did not provide them with food and clothing, but also sent his slaves to rob travelers on the way and asked them to share half of the spoils. The slaves could not stand it any longer and rose up. In the summer of 137 B.C., under the leadership of the Syrian slave Younus, 400 slaves armed with hoes, scythes, axes, long poles, and short rods stormed the city of Enna, and, responded by the slaves of the city, occupied the city. The revolt grew rapidly and established a regime in Enna, which was named the "Kingdom of New Syria", and Younus was elected as the king and named "Antioch". Under the king, there was also a council of counselors composed of resourceful slaves. The slave regime established in the city of Enna certainly had the color of an oriental kingdom, but in essence it emerged as a unique form of slave regime in opposition to the Roman slave-owning regime.
The slave revolt in the city of Enna received a positive response from slaves in other parts of Sicily. In Agrigente, in the southwestern part of the island, Creon, a slave of Silesian origin, led an insurrectionary band of 5,000 men who joined up with Yunus. Creon respected Younus and volunteered to serve as his second-in-command. The scope of the revolt expanded rapidly, and many cities in eastern and central Sicily, such as Messana, Tolominia, Catania, and Leontini, fell into the hands of the insurgents successively. The number of the insurgents was increasing, and according to Theodora's records, it reached 200,000 people. The insurgent slaves went around destroying large estates and killing their owners, but they protected the small estates, especially the peasants and craftsmen, and thus gained the sympathy and support of the local peasants and craftsmen.
The rebels repeatedly defeated the Roman army. In 134 and 133 B.C., they defeated the Roman legions led by the two Roman consuls. In 132 BC, Rome sent a large army to suppress it, capturing the main strongholds of the revolt, Margantina and Tolominia, and finally besieging the city of Enna. In the breakout, 20,000 slaves were killed, Creon died heroically, Younus was captured and died in prison, and the revolt was brutally suppressed.
Soon after, a second slave revolt broke out in Sicily. The immediate cause of this revolt was the stoppage of the freeing of slaves by the governor Nerva. At the time, Rome was fighting the Jugurtha War in North Africa and battling the invading Germans in the north, and needed large numbers of troops. However, many of the freedmen of the provinces and allies were reduced to slavery by debt and could not provide a source of troops. Therefore, the Senate ordered the governors of the provinces to examine the slaves of freedmen origin and to free them. Nerva, the governor of Sicily, freed 800 slaves, and then stopped the examination because he accepted bribes from slave owners. As a result, the slaves who longed for freedom were outraged and revolted. In 104 B.C., the slaves near the city of Heraclius in western Sicily, under the leadership of Saviours, firstly organized a revolt, and later established a base on Mount Caprien and defeated the army sent by Nerva. Soon after, another insurrectionary force under the leadership of Athenio gathered in the vicinity of Lillibe. In order to unite their struggles, these two groups met in Triocarra and established a regime in that city, with Savious as king under the name of Triphon, and Arsenio as the military commander-in-chief. A council was set up as a body to ****consult on major projects. A large number of slaves and peasants joined the revolt, which grew rapidly, and the strongest slaves were chosen to form an army of 20,000 infantry and 2,000 cavalry. In 103 and 102 B.C., the revolt defeated the Roman army led by two magistrates. At this time, the revolt spread throughout most of Sicily. The insurgents divided their forces and moved in all directions, destroying large estates, attacking provincial institutions, destroying postal stations, and cutting off urban and rural transportation links.
Soon the insurgents encountered an unfavorable situation. The tragic death of Savious in 102 BC deprived the rebels of a prominent leader. Scarcity of food also put the revolt in a difficult position. After the victory over the Germans, Rome concentrated its efforts on suppressing the slave revolt. In 101 B.C., the consul Acervius led a large army to attack the insurgents. In a fierce battle near Messana, Athinio died bravely and the insurgents retreated to Triocarra. Soon after the fall of Triocarra, many slaves were captured and crucified, leaving 1,000 slaves who persisted in the struggle and were later deceived into submitting to Acervarius and were actually sold as gladiators. When they realized they had been deceived, they stabbed each other to death.
The two Sicilian slave revolts, due to historical conditions and the limitations of the slave class itself, ultimately came to failure. But the revolts had important historical significance. The uprising slaves had established their own regime and army, marking the development of the Roman slave revolt to a higher level. The Sicilian slave revolt dealt a heavy blow to the rule of the Roman slave-owning class, opening the prelude to the *** and later large-scale social struggles, with wide and far-reaching impact.
Reforms of the Gracchus Brothers
While the flames of the first Sicilian slave revolt had not yet been fully extinguished, the common people of urban and rural Rome, under the leadership of the Gracchus Brothers, set off a social reform movement centered on land reform. At that time, the concentration of land in Rome and the bankruptcy of peasants had caused serious social consequences, and the landless peasants urgently demanded to regain their land, while some insightful people in the aristocracy in view of the bankruptcy of peasants to the detriment of the military and stability, but also in the planning for the revival of the small-scale farmers of the agrarian reform program. The Gracchus brothers were from a prestigious family, received good education since childhood, and followed the traditional career path of the Roman aristocracy, serving as clergymen and military officers successively, and were quite prestigious among the people. They were very active in the social reform movement in the light of the development of the situation and the long-term interests of the slave-owning class, with the ambition of enriching the country and strengthening the army, and with the heart of worrying about the country and the people.
In 133 B.C., with the support and advocacy of the reformers of the Roman plebeians and aristocrats, Tiberius Gracchus assumed the post of bailiff, and immediately put forward the bill of land reform. The bill stipulated that each head of household was limited to 500 jugs of public land, and if there were sons, each son was allowed to occupy 250 jugs, but the total amount of land occupied by each household could not exceed 1,000 jugs. The occupied communal land was to be used in perpetuity and free of rent. The over-occupied portion was nationalized and divided into 30-quaadrant plots, which were distributed to landless peasants. Such plots were subject to a small rent, were hereditary and could not be sold or transferred. The fertile Campenian lands were not included in the bill. Tiberius' land bill was strongly opposed by the senatorial nobility. They instigated Octavius, Tiberius' fellow bailiff, to use his veto power to prevent the passage of the bill. The sabotage of the senatorial nobles and the support of the people pushed Tiberius to take drastic measures and call a citizens' assembly to put the bill to a vote. As a result, Octavius was deposed and the land bill was passed. At the same time, Tiberius himself, his father-in-law Claudius, and his brother Gaius were elected to form a commission to deal with the recovery and distribution of the land. However, the implementation of the bill encountered many practical difficulties, and the Senate refused to provide the necessary funds. So Tiberius, taking advantage of the fact that the king of Pagama had bequeathed his kingdom to Rome, proposed that the treasury of the kingdom should be used as a subsidy for the poor peasants and that the disposal of the kingdom should be entrusted to the citizens' assembly. This was in serious conflict with the Senate, which had always held the diplomatic and financial power. In order to implement the land bill, Tiberius ran for re-election as a bailiff for the following year. The senatorial nobles used this as an excuse to attack Tiberius for his malicious intentions and his desire for tyranny, on the pretext that reelection as tribune was out of the ordinary. During the elections for the Civic Assembly, when the peasants were too busy with the summer harvest to go to the city, the opposition of the nobility plotted and provoked trouble. Nasika, the high priestess, gathered a group of senators, protégés and slaves, stormed the meeting place, and in the melee killed more than 300 of Tiberius and his supporters, and threw the bodies of the dead into the Tiber that night.
After the martyrdom of Tiberius, the reform movement did not cease. The Senate did not dare to abolish the agrarian law. The three-member Land Commission was reorganized and continued its activities. According to Livy, the number of Roman citizens was about 395,000 in 125 B.C., an increase of 75,000 over 131 B.C. This was generally considered to be the result of citizenship by landless peasants who had been given their share of land. However, the distribution of land was becoming increasingly difficult, the large landowners were concealing their estates, disputes over property rights were difficult to adjudicate, and the border areas of the Italian allies were also involved, causing discontent among the allies, who also demanded Roman citizenship. As a result, the agrarian reform movement rose in a more complex situation.
In 133 and 132 B.C., Tiberius's brother, Gaius, served two consecutive terms as tribune with the support of the Roman plebeians. At the beginning of his tenure, Guyon attacked the opponents of the reforms by proposing a bill that prohibited the reappointment of senior officials and bailiffs who had been dismissed by the people, and stipulated that no citizen could be sentenced to death without a trial by the people, and then moved on to social and economic reforms. He not only revived Tiberius's agrarian bill, but also introduced a number of other important bills. Since the communal land distribution was nearly exhausted, he proposed colonial laws to supplement the land laws, established colonies such as Minervia and Neptunia in South Italy, and even envisioned the establishment of overseas colonies. To prevent food shortages, he introduced the Grain Law, in which the state purchased grain from overseas, stored it in public **** granaries, and sold it to citizens in monthly rations at below-market prices. Gayo also implemented the Road Building Act, personally planning the construction of a number of thoroughfares to improve transportation and solve the problem of employment for jobless civilians. He also implemented a military law that prohibited the conscription of people under the age of 17, and supplied uniforms to the citizens at the expense of the state. In order to win the support of the knights for the reforms, Guyot introduced the law of the provincial tax charter of Asia, which stipulated that the province collected tithes, customs duties and pasture taxes in the form of tax charters, and the ombudsmen auctioned off the chartering rights to the knights. A trial law was also enacted to break the senatorial monopoly of the courts, giving knights the right to serve as members of the courts and penalizing corruption in the administration of justice. In addition, a law was enacted stating that the Senate should determine before the election of the consuls which province they would serve as governors after leaving office, so as to avoid bastardizing the best provinces.
The senatorial nobles practiced subterfuge to oppose the reforms. They used Guyot's fellow bailiff, Drusus, to introduce a bill proposing the establishment of 12 colonies in Italy, each with 3,000 immigrants. At that time there was no place for colonization in Italy, Drusus's colonial law was a deceptive one, aimed at enlisting people's support and undermining the reforms. He also demagogued a bill to prohibit the flogging of Latins. In response to the conspiracy of the opposition, Guyot, with the help of his colleague, the bailiff Lubrius, proposed a new colonial law, which was to establish a colony of Junonia on the former Carthaginian territory and to settle 6,000 people, some Italians probably included. In the spring of 122 B.C., when Guyot traveled to North Africa to prepare for the establishment of the colony, the opposition took advantage of the opportunity to spread rumors and sabotage Guyot's colonization plans. Upon Gayo's return to Rome, the struggle entered a decisive phase. He took a resolute step and put forward a citizenship bill, which granted Roman citizenship to the Latin allies and Latin citizenship to the Italian allies. But this bill was fiercely opposed not only by the senatorial nobility, but also by those citizens who did not want to give citizenship to the Italians. A large number of Italian allies were at that time excluded from the city of Rome. As a result, the bill failed to pass, and Guyot's prestige declined. In the summer of the same year, Gayo lost his bid for a third term as tribune. After he left office, the opposition retaliated. The bill for the abolition of the North African colonies was brought before the Citizens' Assembly, where clashes broke out. The Senate took the opportunity to suppress the reformers, and Guéjo and his supporters occupied Mount Affendin to resist. In the end, Guéyo was pursued to his death and more than 3,000 of his supporters were brutally murdered and their bodies thrown into the Tiber.
The Gracchus brothers carried out reforms in an attempt to curb land annexation and protect the small peasant economy through legislation restricting the occupation of public land and the distribution of land to peasants, so as to maintain the social foundation and military power of the Roman state. However, at that time, Rome was in a period of crisis of the city-state, and the division and bankruptcy of small farmers had become an inevitable trend of historical development, which made it impossible to maintain the small land ownership system. Soon after the death of Gaius, Rome passed a bill allowing the sale of land shares, and the Land Commission was also abolished. However, the reforms of the Gracchus brothers were still historically important. The reforms eased the process of land concentration to a certain extent and improved the living conditions of some of the plebeians. In particular, Gaius, driven by the situation, developed from purely land reform to the implementation of multi-faceted social reforms, dealt a heavy blow to the power of the senatorial aristocracy, and improved the function of state administration and judicial management. All these were in line with the requirements of the development of the Roman society at that time, and were affirmed and enriched in the course of the later development of Roman history, and thus had obvious progress.
Marius' Military Reforms After the failure of the reforms of the Gracchus Brothers, the internal struggle in the Roman society continued to develop, and the so-called democratic and aristocratic factions were formed, and the two sides waged a fierce struggle during and after the Jugurtha's War (111-105 B.C.E.). At that time, there was internal strife in the royal family of Numidia, and after capturing the city of Zelda, Jugurtha took advantage of the anti-Roman sentiments of the local inhabitants and killed the Roman and Italian merchants and usurers living in the city. Rome declared war on Jugurtha in 111 BC. At the beginning of the war, the corruption of the Roman aristocracy's political and military system was exposed, with senior officials and military commanders accepting bribes, soldiers doing whatever they wanted, and military discipline and morale slackened, leading to successive defeats in the war. In 109 B.C., the consul Metellus arrived in North Africa, reorganized the army and began to turn the situation around, but failed to end the war quickly. The knights were unhappy that their interests had been jeopardized, which intensified the conflict between them and the senatorial nobility.
At this time, Marius, a military man, came to prominence. He had a close relationship with the knights and a certain amount of prestige among the commoners. With the support of the democrats, Marius was elected consul in 107 B.C. and gained command of the Jugurtha War, and was re-elected consul in the following years, leading the army in battle. During this period, in order to strengthen the Roman military power and win the war, Marius implemented military reforms. Rome originally practiced the citizen-soldier system, in which citizens were required to have a certain property qualification in order to join the military service. Due to the large number of soldiers needed for the war, the property qualification was gradually lowered, and in the Punic War, the minimum property qualification was once lowered to 4,000 aristocrats. At the same time, there were also volunteers in the army, although most of them were veterans who had completed their service. By the 2nd century BC, especially after the failure of the reforms of the Gracchus brothers, the crisis of the Roman military supply became more and more serious. Marius, in order to quickly recruit an army, abolished the property qualification restriction and absorbed the proletarians into the army, i.e., replacing the citizen-soldier system with the conscription system. The introduction of this system enabled him to quickly collect the recruits needed to replenish the legions in North Africa, which amounted to about 5,000-6,000 men. However, the citizen-soldier system was not completely abolished after Marius adopted conscription, and in the 1st century BC, when the recruitment of volunteers failed to meet the needs, citizens were often forcibly recruited into the army again. After the introduction of conscription in Marius, in addition to their pay, soldiers were also provided with weapons by the state, which were no longer deducted from their pay. The duration of service was also clearly defined, and it is generally believed that Marius extended the service period of soldiers to 16 years, and veterans who had completed their service were entitled to a share of land from the state as compensation. With the abolition of the property qualification, Roman citizens served only as heavy infantry in the legions, while cavalry and light infantry were recruited from allies and provinces.
Another important measure of Marius' military reforms was the reform of legionary organization. In order to strengthen the mobility of the legions, Marius introduced the system of the Union in the legions. The unit was an intermediate organization between a corps and a company, with 600 heavily armed infantrymen, capable of carrying out tactical tasks and conducting military operations independently. Each corps had 10 wings, each with three companies (six hundreds). The combat formations of the corps of the joint-unit system still maintain the three-column formation, the front configuration of four units, the latter two columns of three units each, leaving gaps between the units, the front and rear columns of the units crossed in line, in order to insert and retreat. Marius also standardized the weapons and equipment of the army, the heavy infantry were equipped with pitcher guns and short swords, and improved the construction of the pitcher guns and the means of carrying them. In addition, Marius provided strict training for the army, introducing the training methods of the gladiatorial schools of the time into the army in order to improve the tactical skills of the soldiers. During the training, emphasis was placed on adapting the army to the difficult combat environment and living conditions. In order to improve the mobility of the troops and the ability to fight independently, Marius asked the soldiers to carry weapons in addition to the march, but also carry a marching back frame, inside the digging tools and other equipment, so that the soldiers in the army at that time, Marius won the "Marius mule" play on the name.
After the military reform and reorganization, the fighting strength of the Roman army was greatly improved. Relying on the reorganized army, Marius ended the Jugurtha War victoriously in 105 BC. At this time, the Germanic tribes originally living along the Baltic Sea coast, in search of a new place to live, migrated to the southwest and invaded Nalpine Gaul, threatening Italy. Rome sent troops to fight against the invasion and suffered repeated defeats and heavy losses. In 102 B.C., Marius became consul for the fourth time and led an army to fight against the Teutons in a fierce battle at Acqui Sextières, in which the Teutons were almost completely destroyed. The following year, he defeated the Sambrians near Vercelles. The Germanic invasion was finally crushed, eliminating the threat from the north. In 101 BC, Marius' lieutenant, Manius Aquilius, led an army to suppress the Second Sicilian Slave Revolt.
Mario's military reforms were historically important. This reform broke through the tradition of the old city-state system and changed the Roman military system based on citizen soldiers. By replacing the citizen-soldier system with the conscript system, a large number of unemployed people joined the army, partially solving the social problems caused by the bankruptcy of small farmers, and to a certain extent contributing to the stability of the country. At the same time, by opening up the source of soldiers and improving the fighting power of the army, it solved the problems of the Roman army at that time, which was in line with the needs of the slave-owning class to strengthen its rule and conduct foreign wars, and further promoted the development of the Roman slave state. On the other hand, the reform had a far-reaching impact on the historical development of Roman society. The reform led to a change in the social composition of the Roman army, turning the Roman army from citizen soldiers with peasants as the backbone into a professional army with proletarians as the main source. The system of allocating shares of land to veterans, which was gradually established after the reform, also changed the nature of the land problem in Rome, that is, from the struggle of bankrupt peasants for the restoration of their land to the struggle of veterans for their shares of land, which added a new factor in the struggle of the Roman society in the later period of the **** and the reform. The professional army followed and obeyed its commander-in-chief for a long time, while the commander-in-chief enlisted and bribed the army and utilized the army as a tool to fight for power and profit and even to seize power, thus providing the conditions for the establishment of a military dictatorship by the Roman slave-owning dignitaries in the later period.
The War of the Allies After the Roman conquest of Italy, Italy was gradually Romanized after a long period of political rule and economic and cultural exchanges. Some communes with partial Roman citizenship rose in status and gained full Roman citizenship. Among the newly built Latin colonies, there were more and more Roman immigrants, and both old and new Latin colonies enjoyed Latin citizenship. However, the position of the numerous Italian allies, instead of improving, worsened. They were nominally allies of Rome, but in reality they were subjects under Roman rule. The allies had no Roman citizenship, could not participate in Roman political activities or hold official positions, and could not share in the communal lands and spoils of war, but had to provide Rome with auxiliary troops, and this "blood tax" became more and more severe as the wars became more frequent and expanded. The Roman Senate tightened its control and often interfered in the internal affairs of the allies, who were also discriminated against and mistreated by the Romans. Therefore, the allies were y dissatisfied with the Roman rule and oppression, and they strongly demanded to obtain Roman citizenship and other rights, or to completely disassociate themselves from Rome and strive for an independent status. Thus, the struggle of the Italian allies for democratic rights converged with the Roman social reform movement.
A lot of people in the Roman ruling class advocated the granting of Roman citizenship to the Italian allies. In 125 B.C., the consul Flaccus first proposed the granting of citizenship to the allies, but was forced to abandon his proposal because of the obstruction of the Senate, and Flaccus was sent to Gaul as governor. This sparked a revolt by the inhabitants of the city of Phrygellae, which was later suppressed by Rome. In 122 B.C. Gaius Gracchus again proposed a bill for citizenship, and a large number of allies flocked to Rome to show their support, but were driven out of the city by the consuls, and the bill was not passed. In 103 and 100 B.C., Sardurninus was twice elected consul. Relying on the support of the plebeians and knights, he enacted bills such as the Grain Law and forced through a land bill in alliance with Marius, which distributed the public lands in the provinces of Africa and Gaul beside the city of Narbonne to the veterans of Marius at 100 jugs per person, including the Italian allies who had completed their military service. However, the Sarninus campaign ended in failure, making the illusions of the confederates once again illusory. In 91 B.C., the tribune Drusus attempted to reconcile the conflict by imposing a grain law and a colonial law, selling grain cheaply to poor citizens and distributing the remaining communal lands in Campenaria and Sicily, and by proposing that the tribunal should be composed of senators and knights***, and that the Italian allies should be granted Roman citizenship. However, this compromise was universally rejected and Drusus was soon assassinated. The hopes of the Italian allies of obtaining Roman citizenship by peaceful and lawful means were completely dashed, and they indignantly took up arms and waged the War of the Allies.
The Italian allies secretly formed an anti-Roman alliance with the Marchesi at its core. They exchanged hostages with each other and negotiated a joint revolt. In 91 BC, the city of Oscullum in Picenum was the first to revolt. Cities and communes participating in the anti-Roman coalition responded one after another, and almost all the Italian allies except the Idalarians and Umbrians were involved in the revolt. The revolting allies established the League*** and the State, with its capital at Corfinium, a city in Pirigiani, and renamed it Italy, and set up a citizens' assembly, a senate, and a consul according to the model of the Roman State. Minted coins were also issued, engraved with a bull overturning a she-wolf, symbolizing Italy's victory over Rome. The army of the insurgents numbered 100,000 men, with Silo the Marsian and Mutilus the Samnite as consuls of Italy and as commanders of the insurgent army. Rome collected 18 legions and sent the consuls to lead the expedition, with some famous generals such as Marius and Sulla as lieutenants. The war was divided into two main battlegrounds, the north and the south. At the beginning of the war, the insurgents held a clear advantage in both the northern and southern battlefields. Forced by the seriousness of the situation, the Roman Senate adopted a policy of concession and disintegrated the allies. At the end of 90 BC, Rome passed the Julius Act, which granted Roman citizenship to all Italian allies and Latin colonies that had hitherto remained loyal to Rome, as well as to allies serving in the Roman army, and probably to allies who laid down their arms. The publication of this act effectively stopped the expansion of the revolt and strengthened the basis of Roman rule. The Idalarians and Umbrians were the first to gain citizenship. At the beginning of 89 BC, Rome promulgated the Law of Plautius Papirius, which further supplemented the implementing regulations of the Law of Julius. The situation of the war then changed, with Rome gradually seizing the initiative and launching attacks on both battlefields. In the northern battlefield, the Roman army routed the insurrectionary hordes moving northward and captured Ausculum. Soon after, Silo led his army to retreat to the south and the capital of the allies fell. On the southern front, Sulla routed the main Samnite force and captured its capital, Povianum. However, Silo retreated to Samnium to join Mutilus, and centered on Aeserni, persisted in resisting the enemy and even recaptured Povianum for a time. Later, it was finally suppressed in 88 BC due to the disparity of power. At the same time, the revolt in Apulia was also defeated, and the War of the Allies came to an end.
The War of the Allies was a demand for Roman citizenship by the Italian allies, i.e., the demand for equal political and social rights with the Romans, and was therefore in the nature of a democratic movement. The allies were defeated by the Romans on the battlefield, but finally achieved their goal after the war. Rome had to grant citizenship to all Italian allies south of the Po River. However, Rome restricted these new citizens by grouping them into 8 (or 10) separate Tribunes, putting them at a disadvantage in voting against the older citizens who had 35 Tribunes. From then on, however, the upper echelon of the allies was able to join the ranks of the prominent Roman aristocracy, while the vast middle and lower classes of the population also enjoyed the rights of property, marriage, tax exemptions, and security of the person brought by Roman citizenship, among other things, thus enlarging the social base of the Roman state. At the same time, the war broke through the framework of the old city-state system, changed the social and political structure of Italy, and transformed the alliance of Italian cities and tribes under the control of Rome into a unified Italian state with Rome at its core, thus accelerating the process of integration of Italian regions and Rome. In short, the War of the Allies was of great historical significance for the historical development of Roman society.
Sulla's Dictatorship While Rome and the Allies were fighting, the Mithridatic Wars took place in Asia Minor. King Mithridates VI of Bendu, taking advantage of the fact that Rome had no time to look east, marched into the province of Asia Minor in 89 B.C. The local inhabitants, suffering from the oppression of Rome, regarded him as a liberator. After occupying Asia Minor, Mithridates sent troops from Thrace into Macedonia, while the Bendu fleet controlled the Aegean Sea. At this time, there was also an anti-Roman uprising in Athens and the Greek states fell to the side of Mithridates. As a result, Rome's hegemony in the East was seriously threatened.
After the end of the War of the Allies, Rome drew out its strength to deal with the East, but there was a dispute between the aristocrats and the democrats over the choice of the commander-in-chief to be sent to the war. In 88 B.C., under the auspices of the Senate, Sulla, who was consul for that year, won the command by lot. However, before Sulla's army could leave Italy, Marius, in alliance with the bailiff Rufus, passed a proposal in a civic assembly to remove Sulla from command and replace him with Marius. Sulla immediately marched to Rome with his troops, setting a precedent for the Romans to attack their own homeland. After capturing Rome, Sulla killed Rufus and a large number of democrats, and declared Marius and others "public enemies". He also abolished the laws of the democrats, stipulating that no bill could be submitted to the citizens' assembly for a vote without the approval of the Senate, and that all bills were to be referred to the Sentulian Assembly. Having restored the rule of the senatorial nobility, Sulla led an expedition to the East in 87 BC. He laid siege to Athens in Greece and bloodied the ancient city of civilization. Then came the victory over the allied forces of Bendu and Greece, and the thwarting of Mithridates' plans to enter Europe.
At this time, the situation in Rome was reversed, and Marius returned to Italy from North Africa, gathered troops in Idalaria, and occupied Rome in conjunction with the consul Zinna. They took bloody revenge by hunting down Sulla's supporters and canceling Sulla's laws. In 86 B.C. Marius and Zinna were elected consuls, but Marius died soon after he assumed the office of the seventh consul, and the power fell into the hands of Zinna. Qinna took a series of measures in favor of the knights and commoners, such as canceling part of the debt, reforming the coinage system, and assigning the new citizens of Italy to 35 terebinths. Soon afterward, Qinna died in a mutiny, but the political situation in Rome remained under the control of the democrats.
Meanwhile, Asia Minor was in turmoil. The inhabitants of the region, unable to bear the burden of Mithridates' tyranny and war, revolted one after another. When Qinna was in power, he had sent Flaccus to lead an army to replace Sulla, but he was killed due to internal strife, and Fimbria, who succeeded him, moved to Asia Minor and occupied Pagama. The fleet commanded by Sulla's vice-admiral Lucullus also recaptured the islands in the Aegean Sea. Thus the Greek cities of Asia Minor reverted to Rome. The military defeat forced Mithridates to beg for peace, while Sulla was eager to end the war and rush back to Rome to seize power. A peace treaty was concluded in 85 BC. Mithridates gave up the territories he had occupied since the war, surrendered his fleet, and paid an indemnity of 2,000 talents, while Sulla recognized him as king of Bendu and an ally of Rome. At the end of the First Mithridatic War, Sulla turned back the army led by Fimbria and severely punished the cities of Mithridates in Asia Minor, spreading large sums of money for military expenses and taxes in the provinces, and plundering and raiding the inhabitants of the provinces at will.
In 83 B.C., Sulla landed with an army of 40,000 men at Sium, Burundi, in southern Italy. A group of noble youths, including Crassus and Pompey, immediately defected to Sulla upon hearing the news. The democrats organized resistance under the leadership of Marius the Younger and others. Finally, Sulla defeated the allied forces of the Democrats and the Samonites outside the gates of Colina and entered Rome as a conqueror. He declared a list of "public enemies" and massacred democrats and innocent civilians, looting their property and land, killing at least 40 senators and 1,600 knights. At the same time, he freed 10,000 slaves belonging to his political opponents, formed a guard, and gave them the surname "Cornelius" (Sulla's surname). Sulla also took brutal revenge on the Italian cities that had betrayed him. He established 10 military colonies on confiscated land and settled 120,000 veterans, who became the backbone of Sulla's military dictatorship.
After stabilizing the situation, Sulla began to implement the so-called constitutional reforms. He authorized Regent Flaccus to reinstate the office of dictator, and brought this bill to the Citizens' Assembly for passage, approving Sulla as dictator for an unlimited period of time. The indefinite dictatorship made Sulla a veritable dictator by combining the power of the state in one person. This practically undermined the basic principles of the **** and system, but he maintained the **** and institutions and offices, and introduced a series of measures under the **** and system. He supplemented the Senate with 300 men from among the loyal knights and nobles of the Italian municipalities, increasing the number of senatorial places to 600. The senate restored its old powers and privileges; in legislation no proposal could be submitted to the general assembly of the citizens without the consideration of the senate; in justice the permanent criminal tribunals, which had been under the control of the knights, were placed in the hands of the senate. The magistrates were deprived of all their powers, their right to create legislation was restricted by the Senate, their right to bring judicial charges was abolished, their right of veto was restricted, and they were forbidden to succeed to other high official positions. In order to adapt to the situation, Sulla increased the number of bailiffs from six to eight and the number of treasurers from twelve to twenty, and two consuls and eight bailiffs were appointed as governors of ten provinces at the expiration of their term of office, and it was left to the senate to decide in which province they should take up their duties. It was also stipulated that the governors of the provinces had no right to wage war, and that they were forbidden to take troops out of the provinces or to move them beyond their borders. The Sura also reaffirmed and regulated the age qualifications and intervals of office for senior officials, and the entry of senior officials above the rank of treasurer into the Senate after leaving office. In order to strengthen and consolidate his rule, the Sura issued a series of decrees establishing seven permanent criminal tribunals and laying down trial procedures. The judges of the tribunals