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The Fall of the Roman Republic (Lancaster Pamphlets in Ancient History)

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Any literate adult with a passing knowledge of Roman Republican history will find this book a relatively easy read and quite enlightening. Any specialist in Roman Republican history will find this work a concise, accurate, and extremely valuable synthesis of scholarly opinion on the fall of the Roman Republic that is fully informed by most all works on the topic from Syme to the present. In my opinion, this book stands as the current state of the art on its subject. While my reading on the topic is not encyclopedic, I believe it is extensive enough for me to render that judgement. The author, David Shotter, is a prolific writer and respected historian of Rome both imperial and republican. What is striking here is the degree to which this writer has been able to detach himself from his present and paint an objective assessment of the period from the Gracchi to the emergent principate of Augustus. Any reader in this area will know that this has been a problem for writers on topics Roman from Edward Gibbon to Tom Holland.

As the previous reviewer has pointed out, Shotter finds the seeds of the downfall of the Republic in the growth of the Roman Empire. With the terms of proconsular power stretching out for years at a time, a new class of warrior politicians arose much to the discomfort of the old vested consular and praetorian nobility. The wealth, power, and "dignitas" of men like Sulla, Pompey, Crassus and Ceasar overwhelmed a system based on weak annual magistracies. From the Gracchi through the Social Wars and Marius followed by the Sullan restoration, the author provides a fast paced rendition of the events and personalities while painting a picture of an ever more volatile situation. Next Shotter deals with Pompey incisively portraying him as "the essential man" both needed and hated and distrusted. The first "triumvirate," the Civil War, Ceasar's dictatorship coupled with his assassination, and the rise of the second "triumvirate" followed by the triumph of Octavian occupy the remainder of the book.

The text is only one hundred and three pages long, but I can think of nothing that is not well covered. This is an inclusive political history. Furthermore, the interpretive insights are well reasoned and present an almost spot on consensus of current scholarly thought. The general bibliography of secondary sources while not totally exhaustive of books published on the topic since the nineteen fifties is extensive and of great value. While granting Erich Gruen's contention that the Civil War of Caesar against the oligarchy and Pompey was unforeseen and not necessarily inevitable, the last fifty years of the Republic experienced rebellion, insurgency, and civil war on the Italian peninsula with alarming frequency. That the Senate could or would not make all the necessary changes for the evolution of the political system to accommodate the new realities of the first century BCE Republic is more than firmly established by this work. And yes Shotter makes it clear, that the "fall of the Roman Republic" was not viewed as such by those who experienced it. The "res publica" continued, and Augustus restored the Republic as its "princeps." That is as its first citizen, not its destroyer or tyrant. This book is an absolute must read for any person interested in Roman history.

Shotter provides a concise and up-to-date (at the time, bearing in mind it is nearly a decade old now) look at the Fall of the Roman Republic that is invaluable to any student of the period. Indeed it is useful as a general guide to the general reader. Commencing with an explanation of the governemnt of Rome and detailing the concept of the res publica he makes it clear that the republic was divided amongst what he terms the 'aristocratic class' and the plebian. He makes the sweeping statement that the downfall of the republic was caused by the growth of empire and talks of the Social War, the Gracchi and enfranchisement, sweeping on through Marius' reforms to construct a professional standing army to the inevitable conflict between military brilliance as shown under Sulla and oligarchic steadiness as employed by the Senate. A chapter on Pompey focuses on Cicero and Clodius' involvement in the Bona Dea in 61 and Shotter concludes with three chapters on the first triumvirate between Caesar, Pompey and Crassus, Caesar's dictatorship and the second triumvirate of Octavian, Anthony and Lepidus culminating in the battle of Actium in 31. He confirms that this battle is the decisive watershed in the move from republic to empire - though a modern-designated pivotal piece of history. In some respects this admission leads us to realise that whilst modern scholarship neatly splits the Roman domination of the Mediterranean into Republic and Empire, for Rome itself there would have been no such distinction. Indeed, one could argue that the premise of the book is indeed artificial by nature. However, it does allow Shotter to boundary his period of Roman history to 31 and discuss more fundamentally the nature of political power of the time and its shift from oligarchy to principate.
This concise yet fluid discussion on the shift in Rome's power is worth reading as both a general introduction and a more interesting discussion on the nature of political power.