Roman Republics (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Roman Republics Alexander Yakobson Harriet I. Flower . Roman Republics. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2010. xv + 204 pp. Cloth, $29.95. Flower's book offers a new interpretation of Republican history based on rejecting the traditional notion of a single Roman Republic. Flower's alternative periodization speaks of several republics (six to be exact), with several transitional periods. This thesis puts emphasis on cleavage rather than on (excessive) continuity implied, according to Flower, in the customary notion of "a single, monolithic republic" (17). Part 1, "Framework," presents the case for regarding the Roman history during the time in question as a history of several republics that differed from each other in crucial aspects, rather than being different versions, and stages of development, of a single political system. Periodization is, notoriously, at once indispensable and highly problematic. Among other things, it is "intrinsically and inevitably anachronistic . . . The Romans in antiquity did not think of their lives in terms of the phases and divisions that modern historians use. Too often, however, a chronological scheme seems to take on a life of its own. . . . By contrast, my study sets out to construct a periodisation that is based entirely on hindsight and that is explicitly characterized as such" (6). Thus the suggested list of republics and transitional periods does not purport to reflect Roman contemporary (or later) self-perception. Rather, it is meant to serve as a useful analytical tool for a modern historian—more useful than the "orthodox" notion of a single Republic, which, in Flower's view, tends to obscure the fundamental and radical changes that took place within this timeframe (including within each of the traditional sub-categories of Early, Middle, and Late Republic). The analytical advantages that such an approach promises are considerable. However, they come at a price. The Romans' own historical consciousness is important in analysing Roman society. There certainly seems to have been a strong and widespread feeling that the Republic—the "Roman people henceforward free, annual magistrates, the power of laws stronger than of men" (Liv. 2.1), "liberty and consulate" (Tac. Ann. 1.1), the "old res publica" of the Principate—was a distinct system of government that emerged with the expulsion of Tarquinius, underwent various changes and modifications while retaining its essential continuity, reached its apogee during what modern historians call the Middle Republic, deteriorated during what they call the Late Republic, collapsed during the civil wars of the 40s and was finally replaced by what, at any rate with hindsight, was clearly perceived as a new and fundamentally different political dispensation under Augustus. These feelings and perceptions were historical facts in their own right, [End Page 153] and people might sometimes be prepared to act upon them. Those who called upon Brutus in the last months of Caesar's dictatorship to follow the example of his putative ancestor, the legendary founder of the Republic, evidently saw the contemporary Roman Republic as a continuation, in some essential sense, of the one established by the first consul (although there is no reason to assume that they were ignorant of the fact that its political character had changed hugely since 509), rather than regarding their times as already post-Republican (according to Flower's reconstruction). They expected Brutus the praetor of 44 to share their historical outlook and political sentiments (closely interconnected) and to act accordingly. Of course, a political system can be regarded as both "new," in some important respect, and a continuation, in a larger sense, of an older one. The semi-official designation of five republics in France is certainly compatible with the notion of the continuous existence of the French Republic since the Third one. At the outset of the Fourth Republic, immediately after the liberation of Paris, De Gaulle rejected a suggestion that he should "proclaim the Republic," in the style of French revolutions, on the grounds that the Republic had continued to exist, legitimately, during the Vichy "transitional period." In Britain, on the other hand, it would have been inconceivable to label the political system emerging from any of the numerous changes since the Glorious Revolution (whose accumulative effect has indisputably been to transform the system of...