How were political factions in the late Roman republic different from political parties today?
score:7
In addition to the "patrician" Optimates and "plebeian" Populares, there was also a third group - the Equites - which today we might think of as a kind of 'upper middle class'. To complicate matters still further, by no means all members of the Patrician class were associated with the Optimates faction. Perhaps the best-known example is Julius Caesar, who belonged to the Patrician class, but was politically aligned with the Populares (although quite how far he shared the Populares agenda remains a matter for debate).
You are absolutely right that the three groupings were not remotely like political parties in the modern sense. In modern political parties, people tend to give their loyalty to the party and follow a party line. The groupings in ancient Rome were rather shifting groups of alliances between smaller sub-groups of wealthy and powerful people.
Political support in Rome was primarily mobilised by patronage or clientela - the relationship between wealthy, influential patrons and their poorer but free dependants. The concept is complex to modern eyes (and I suspect it was not much less complex to ancient Roman eyes). It had some elements that we might think of as the more modern notion of noblesse-oblige. Other aspects we might associate with the techniques employed by modern drug lords or Mafia kingpins. These could involve acts of charity and patronage or through the use of enforcers with clubs and brass knuckles. If a patron changed sides, he would expect his clientele to come with him.
The shifting allegiances could give rise to some very strange outcomes (at least to modern eyes). Consider the election of Crassus and Pompey as co-consuls in 70BC (they hated each other) or, even more bizarre to modern eyes, the election of Caesar and Bibulus in 62BC!
It may be easier to understand the way that the system worked if you remember that most votes were controlled by this network of patronage. Individual patrons were often themselves caught up in the network of patronage of more important figures. It would not be at all unusual for someone to repay a favour to one patron by calling their clients to support a particular candidate (say from the Optimates) for election as a Praetor, while simultaneously also agreeing with another patron to support a candidate from the rival camp (in this example, the Populares) for election as an Aedile at the same time.
More post
- 📝 What sovereign Jewish polities have existed outside of Palestine?
- 📝 What were conditions like for Chinese men subject to recruitment by the army during the Second Sino-Japanese War and Chinese Civil War?
- 📝 What territories were lost or abandoned after Trajan?
- 📝 White on Polish coat of arms
- 📝 Why did Ivan the Terrible put a Khan to rule Astrakhan in 1554?
- 📝 What is the earliest recorded female name in history?
- 📝 Were any Californios able to hold on to their ranchos?
- 📝 Alexander, Olympias, and Zeus in Giulio Romano's painting
- 📝 Did the Allies try to "bribe" Franco to join them in World War II?
- 📝 Do historians agree that wars break out because of miscalculations?
- 📝 In 1916, did an amputee, invalided out of the French army, get a pension?
- 📝 What evidence is there for the severity of Roman scourging before crucifixion?
- 📝 What kind of device is pictured on this Roman mosaic from Villa Tellaro, Sicily?
- 📝 Throughout history, how many wars have there been between Russia and Japan?
- 📝 During the Berlin Blockade, why didn't the people in West Berlin just go over to buy food in East Berlin?
- 📝 What is the origin of Americans sometimes refering to the Second World War "the Good War"?
- 📝 How did the lighthouse at Pharos work?
- 📝 Is there evidence to suggest that vampire fiction was invented to satirize Lord Byron?
- 📝 What did the Germans believe were the causes of WWI during the war and after?
- 📝 Which Confederate State provided the most troops in the American Civil War?
- 📝 What is the race of Iranians?
- 📝 Why did Hitler declare war on the USA?
- 📝 How educated were the Orthodox priests of Imperial Russia around 1800?
- 📝 Why does the amount of days in an year on average of the Gregorian calendar only have 4 decimal places (365.2425)?
- 📝 How was the administration of the liberated part of The Netherlands organised between 12 September 1944 and 5 May 1945?
- 📝 US Army stations in France during World war 2
- 📝 What are canonical sources about fifth century BCE Athens?
- 📝 Historical documents of Mount Athos
- 📝 What is the citation-system for the Linear B tablets?
- 📝 What lands have been called by names chosen to disassociate those lands from its inhabitants
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 How were political factions in the late Roman republic different from political parties today?
- 📝 Were bookshops 'common' in the late 19th century, and how did they differ from modern ones?
- 📝 How was life in the Iron Age different from life in the Middle Ages?
- 📝 How rich were carpenters in Roman Galilee in the 1st century AD?
- 📝 How long would it take to travel from England to western Africa in the late 1890's?
- 📝 How many British navy officers were from lower classes at the end of 18th century?
- 📝 How were the Morisco refugees from Europe received in North Africa, given that they were foreigners and Christian?
- 📝 How did the Roman army go from constantly losing battles in the middle of the 3rd century to winning almost everything?
- 📝 How were the borders of the Holy Roman Empire established?
- 📝 How many citizens were in each century of the Roman electoral system?
- 📝 Were taxes from senatorial provinces and imperial provinces sent to their respective treasuries in the Roman Empire? (Under the rule of Augustus)
- 📝 How were political borders marked during the Middle Ages?
- 📝 Did the food economy of the late Roman republic rely on foreign imports, or was it more localized?
- 📝 Were the Roman Empire provinces Alpes Poeninae and Alpes Graiae different provinces or the same?
- 📝 How were maps drawn and printed in the late 19th-early 20th centuries?
- 📝 Were quaestors in the Roman Republic entitled to lictors/fasces?
- 📝 What were the rights and statuses of different types of Roman colonies?
- 📝 Who were some of the specific people in the Renaissance who wrote about their period being different from the Middle Ages?
- 📝 How is the "Blitzkrieg" different from the "glubokaya operatsiya"
- 📝 How independent were the Eastern European countries from the Soviet Union?
- 📝 How were blacks excluded from juries in the US southern states in the 1930s?
- 📝 Why were the military and civil powers split in the Late Roman Empire?
- 📝 How were the territories added to (and thus the limits set in) the Holy Roman Empire
- 📝 Why were the people from the Southeast in the US so different from the rest of the US?
- 📝 How exactly were the titles of the Roman emperors passed on to their heirs
- 📝 How is the Byzantine(Eastern Roman) different from Western Roman?
- 📝 How was Napoleon able to take power from the Republic
- 📝 How were the Roman Triarii trained?
- 📝 How did redenomination prevent the Weimar Republic from further decline?
- 📝 How important were social justice issues in dissident circles in the late USSR?
