792 



KOMI-: 



potettru, he possessed powers which made all oihet s 

 of minor bMpOrtMMt Head of the state, lie was 

 also head of religion a fn^i/i/rj- nin.ruiin\, and fnmi 

 tinif to time he had privileges and exemptions 

 decreed him by the senate. Anxious as he was to 

 retain the outward show of republican institutions. 

 they declined under the weight of his |>ersonal in- 

 fluence. The coinitia were ' transferred from the 

 Campus to the senate,' which in the succeeding 

 reign nominated and voted for candidates to all 

 magistracies except the consulship, the-e magis- 

 i nicies being in request for the social distinction 

 they carriea, not for any power they conferred. 

 The emperor as princeja virtually ap]H>intcd them, 

 ami his subordinates transacted their work. The 

 consulship iteelf, the highest ambition of the private 

 citizen, ami a prerequisite for ptovineU commaml, 

 was shorn of ite duties, excepting those of presiding 

 in the senate and regulating its proceedings. 

 Pnetor, a-dile, tribune ceased to be what they were 

 under the republic the last named swallowed up in 

 the trili a nil- In note.it (is. Only the quiestor retained 

 something of the old significance. But the senate, 

 in theory at least, continued to represent the re- 

 publican system. To it, in the al>sence of a prin- 

 ceps, the real power reverted, and from it the new 

 princeps received the authority and the privi. 

 still derived by a fiction only from the people. But 

 the princeps was really nominated by the army, 

 and though the senate was formally deferred to 

 as beyond his jurisdiction, he could in his capacity 

 as censor man it as he chose, till it survived but 

 in name, like the comitia and the magistracies. 

 These innovations had their compensating side. 

 The provinces, previously at the mercy of nominees 

 of the Unman pi-ople, now under the control of the 

 princeps or emperor, gradually gained equality 

 with the Italians as Roman citizens, and made cor- 

 responding advances in civilisation and prosperity. 

 With the establishment of the imperial system 

 the fortunes of Itome are reflected in those of her 

 em|>eror8, to narrate which would l>e to rc]>eat the 

 biographies given elsewhere. Henceforth we have 

 but to deal with epoch-making events. Tiberius 

 (14-27 A.D. )had little of his predecessor's esteem, 

 genuine or assumed, for republican institutions. 

 The senate liecamu more of an imperial tool, all 

 power more and more emlmdied in the princeps. 

 The simple mode of life affected by Augustus was 

 replaced by a .splendour conspicuous in multiplying 

 palatial residences, in the l>o<iyguards, the courtiers, 

 the aiilic etiquette sulci|iiently carried to unheaid- 

 of lengths. The population of Uome, from the 

 highest to the humblest, deteriorated a \\ealthy, 

 indolent, lii\iirious upper class maintaining moii- 

 of dependents, IM>!OW whom was the proletariat, 

 which the emperor from time to time provi- 

 sioned and amused. Si-cure against public opinion, 

 Tilieriiis relied on the military arm, and in Koine 

 herself had his pnctorian guard, some 6000 strong, 

 within ready call. These troops acquired a power 

 which overshadowed all others as the emperors 

 became more and more dependent on them. Cali- 

 gula (37 41 ) did much to MOW with what depravity 

 the imperial system was compatible, and in the 

 succeeding reigns of Claudius (41-54) and of Nero 

 [."I <>x> the evils it could generate hail further 

 illustration. The former, made, emperor by the 

 pi etoriaim in defiance of the senate, was <\\<- 

 creature of profligate and scheming wives, the 

 ad of whom poisoned him; the laller per- 

 petiated every crime or e\ees< within his power, 

 till, at the age of thirty, he committed suicide, to 

 tin- joy of Homans, provincials, and of the army 

 it*elf. Like his two predecessors he had first IM-C'II 

 hailed l.y the soldiers as imperator, and thereafter 

 invested with (Miwer by the senate : but with him 

 the niicrowion from Augustus expired ; and whom 



to replace him by was the question, uai' 

 the nominee of senate and soldiers alike, inclined 

 the enmity of the pnctoriaiiH, who killed him in 

 the interests of Otlio (O'.l), now proclaimed em- 

 peror. But the legions on the German frontier 

 preferred their own general, Vitellius (69). Otho, 

 defeated at the head of his pnctorians, com- 

 mitted suicide, and Vitellius succee<led him, in 

 turn to IK' murdered after licing disavowed l.y the 

 army in Syria, who proclaimed their commander, 

 Vespasian. With him began the Flavians (69-96), 

 strong and l>enelicent emperors, save one. Ves- 

 pasian (69-79) disclaimed the divine attributes 

 associated with the ( \-csar-\vorship of his .lulian 

 predecessors, and not only returned to the simpler 

 life and mole modest court of early imperial days, 

 but tried to resuscitate the authority of the senate, 

 and even ostentatiously to keep himself within the 

 law and to promote the welfare of the people. 

 Titus (79-81 ) improved on this sound policy, while 

 providing public baths and the amusements of the 

 Colosseum; but his brother Domitian (81-96) be- 

 came infamous for profligacy and cruelty, popular 

 only with the worst of bis pr;etorians. Nerva 

 (96-98) was restoring the best traditions of the 

 Flavii, when, after sixteen months' reign, he was 

 murdered by the pnetorians. impatient of his 

 austerities not, however, before he had adopted as- 

 soii and successor Trajan (98 117), commanding on 

 the Rhine. The assumption of empire by a born 

 provincial illustrates the gradual weakening of 

 Koine's connection with her rulers, whose seat of 

 government became really the military head- 

 quarters for the time being. He and the following 

 three emperors gave Rome a century of beneli 

 rule the happiest hundred years yet known to 

 her. Living like a plain soldier, he concilia led the 

 senate by the deference he paid it, and the people, 

 whose good he consulted, while keeping the Koiuan 

 name res]>ected abroad. His adopted sncc. 

 Hadrian (117-138), gave up to travel the time 

 s|H'iit by Trajan in war, visiting the provinces- 

 from the cast to Britain, providing them with 

 public buildings, improving the discipline of the 

 army, and indeed the whole administrative organisa- 

 tion. A provincial himself, he adopted a provincial 

 to succeed him Aurelius Antoninus, a native of 

 Caul (138-101). He too earned the love of the 

 lioman world, and on his death an adopted son 

 of his, Marcus Aurelius, became emperor (161-180). 

 He was a thinker and moralist, whom necessity 

 made also a man of action, called away to defend 

 the Danube and Upper Rhine. I nhappy in his 

 wife, he was still more so in his son Com modus, 

 and died at headquarters, closing the line of the 

 good emperors. The profligate reign of Commodus 

 192) accentuated still more the ascendency 

 of the soldiers, who killed his upright and austere 

 successor. IVitinax (193), and became for nearly a 

 century the makers and unmakers of emperors. 

 The Augustan system was gone ; except on a few 

 insignificant occasions, the senate did not assert it* 

 right to nominate ; the soldiers, often serving on 

 the frontiers, were the arbiters of empire. The 

 pnctorians next sold it to the highest bidder, the 

 rich senator Didius.Iulianus ; but this was resented 

 by the provincial armies, who started their own 

 nominees. 



The ensuing conflicts Vtween these 'pretenders' 

 resulted in the triumph of Septimins Severus 

 (193-211), an able, unscrupulous African soldier, 

 who, ignoring the senate, till then the formal 

 raliliers of im|K-rial authority, set the further pre- 

 cedent of posing as proconsul in the city itself, 

 made the palace, not the forum, the justice-seat, 

 and raisin! the prefect of the praetorians to power 

 only inferior to his own. Caracalla (211-217), 

 that he might impose on the provinces the taxes 



