The Urban Side of the Gracchan Economic Crisis*

Abstract

THE critical period for the Roman Republic, it is often recognized, began in I33 B.C., the year of the tribuneship of Tiberius Gracchus. The measures which he and after him his brother Gaius (tribune in I23 and I22 B.C.) forced, over the opposition of most of the reluctant senatorial aristocracy, exposed the weaknesses of the Roman constitution with its dual development and divided responsibility and created new, irreconcilable factions whose strife eventually overthrew the Republic. The modern, who is likely to think of the English example of progress toward democracy through a series of concessions by the ruling classes, will perhaps conclude that the Gracchi only checked what might have been a similar evolution in Roman government. On the other hand, it is quite possible that Gaius Gracchus intended to foster development toward democracy, but along Greek lines, that is, by setting himself up as a tyrant, a popular champion, who would ally himself with the merchant class to destroy the power of the aristocratic families. Uncompromising nobles like Scipio Nasica and Lucius Opimius, who did not hesitate to use violence against the Gracchi and their followers, must certainly be held chiefly accountable for the vicious nature of the subsequent factional strife which racked the state until Augustus. In any case, the Gracchan period was the beginning of the end for the Republic and is consequently worth careful study. It is the thesis of this paper that the most pressing problems, those which precipitated the disastrous political tug of war, were economic and that they were of a peculiarly urban nature not before fully recognized by historians of Rome. These conclusions are based partly on new evidence but depend primarily upon heretofore overlooked negative evidence and a fresh look at the traditional sources. In their discussions of the economic crisis of this period, the historians, following Appian, Plutarch, and Tiberius Gracchus himself, have emphasized the rise of the slave-operated latifundia, the decline of the small farmer, and