Formal political activity in Rome took place according to strict rules (Maps 7 and 8; see also Chapter 12). The Senate had its own designated meeting place, the curia, located on a low hill overlooking the Forum, for example, though it might also gather in one of Rome’s temples, as it was required to meet in a location religiously designated by the augurs.48 Meetings of the popular assemblies took place in different locations according to the assembly in question: the comitia centuriata had to meet in the Campus Martius, beyond the pomerium, for example. Since it constituted the Roman People assembled as for war, it was forbidden to meet within the city limits. The comitia tributa (and concilium plebis) also gathered in the Campus for elections (at least from the first century), but for legislative purposes they met predominantly either in the Comitium, Forum, or Capitol.49 Given this tendency to conservatism in the institutions of Roman politics, where practices relating to the formal meetings of assemblies can in fact be seen to change, this can often reflect significant broader trends: notably the advent of ‘‘popular politics’’ under the leadership of radical tribunes from the mid-second century onward and the exceptional predominance in public life of the dynasts of the late Republic (see also Chapter 18).
For example, the building history of the curia during the first century can be seen to reflect the institutional history of the Senate itself: we know that the ancient curia Hostilia was rebuilt by Sulla, to provide accommodation for the Senate he had expanded from 300 to 600 members. Sulla’s Senate House was destroyed in the disturbances which followed the death of Clodius in 52 (see below), and although it was subsequently rebuilt by the dictator’s son Faustus Sulla, the new building was soon demolished ‘‘so that the name of Sulla should not be preserved on it’’ (Dio Cass. 44.5.2). Work on a new curia, aligned with Caesar’s new Forum, was eventually completed in 29 by Octavian.50 The impact of successive dictators, Sulla and Caesar, on this centrally important monument is very striking.
Just below the curia was the comitium, an open area traditionally used for meetings of the comitia tributa and concilium plebis and for contiones, at which magistrates would address the Roman People. Together the two monuments reflected the close interrelation of the Senate and People of Rome in the political ideology of the Roman state and were imitated in the layout of the civic monuments of Latin colonies (cf. Figure 4.1). Adjacent was the speaker’s platform (rostra), the tribunal (where legal judgments were made by the praetors), and the prison (carcer), where capital sentences were carried out. In the years after the Latin War, this area came to be characterized by a series of statues and monuments which commemorated Rome’s past history and was thus also a place of collective memory: the beaks of the Latin ships captured at Antium in 338 were displayed on the rostra, the columna Maenia commemorated the same victory, and statues of Pythagoras and Alcibiades were set up ‘‘at the corners of the comitium" at the time of the Samnite Wars (see also Chapters 23 and 24). The trend was reinforced after the First Punic War with the setting up of the sundial removed from Catana in Sicily in 263 by M’ Valerius Messalla and the victory monument of Cn. Duilius three years later (see also Chapter 23).51
Different reconstructions of the comitium in the late Republic have been proposed, either circular (Coarelli) or roughly triangular in shape (Carafa), illustrating, incidentally, the provisionality of our knowledge of even the most central monuments of the Roman Republic. This has made the impact of Sulla's rebuilding of the curia on the popular space of the comitium difficult to assess, especially since in Carafa's reconstruction that building is at a level some 10 m higher than the comitium.52 Pliny reports that the statues of Pythagoras and Alcibiades were removed at that time ( HN 34.26), and an equestrian statue of Sulla himself was set up close to the rostra (App. B Civ. 1.97). What is clear, however, is that Caesar’s reorganization of the area, completed by Octavian, was on a major scale: just as the senate-house was rebuilt, the comitium was also swept away, and the rostra replaced on a completely new
Alignment.53
The comitium similarly plays an important part in the history of‘‘popular participation’’ at Rome. In 145 we hear that the tribune C. Licinius Crassus transferred voting assemblies from the comitium to the Forum (Varr. Rust. 1.2.9); subsequently C. Gracchus also transferred contiones (Plut. C. Gracch. 5.3).54 Views differ as to whether ideological or practical considerations provided the main impetus behind this reform: both may have played a part.55 The population of Rome was increasing significantly at this time, but the number of voters that the comitium would have held has been estimated between 3,000 and 5,000, whereas the Forum could hold considerably more. Estimates of those able to attend and vote there range between 10,000 and 30,000. Equally, as Plutarch notes, the move had a strong symbolic impact, as speakers addressing the People were now in effect turning their backs on the senate-house. The issue of numbers attending assemblies is an important one in the context of the debate about ‘‘democracy at Rome’’: even if the Forum, on a maximum estimate, were completely filled by voters (or the Saepta in the Campus Martius, variously estimated to have held some 30,000-70,000 people), only a small proportion of the overall Roman citizenry would in practice have actually been able to vote.56 This observation tends to reinforce those analyses which take the view that although public meetings, voting, and elections played an important part in public life at Rome, those involved were likely to be a select and unrepresentative body of people and that the role of the People may thus have been largely a symbolic selection between, and validation of, individuals from the elite (see also Chapters 1, 12, and 18).57
The spread of political violence in the first century may be seen in part as yet another possible consequence of the increasing growth of the city, together with the changing nature of politics and the declining importance of patronage (see also Chapter 19). Whereas second-century episodes of violence - e. g., the episode in 185 when ‘‘Claudian force’’ was successfully used to ensure the election of a member of that family or the murders of the Gracchi by mobs led by Scipio Nasica and Opimius, respectively - were to a significant extent, it appears, the result of deployment of supporters and associates by member of the elite,58 the increasingly frequent outbreaks of political violence in the first century appear to involve more fragmented groups, including the collegia, though with members of the elite - Clodius and Milo, for example - often taking the lead. This led on occasion to what we might see as an appropriation by the mob of the traditional uses of public space by the Roman aristocracy. The funeral of Clodius is a case in point: it drew on the traditions of the aristocratic funeral but subverted them, also, as Cicero notes (Cic. Mil. 33). Clodius’ battered body was taken by a crowd of his supporters from his atrium to the Forum without the usual accompaniment of busts of his ancestors (of whom Clodius had many distinguished examples). The body was displayed on the rostra as usual, but the commemorative oration delivered by the tribunes rather than by a family member. The culmination of the ceremony was the cremation of Clodius in the curia, which was followed by a funerary banquet in the Forum. Dio observes that this sequence of events was a deliberate choice, ‘‘not under the sort of impulse that suddenly seizes crowds.’’ Afterwards, an attack was made on Milo’s house nearby, but the rioters were driven off by a volley of arrows. An assault on the house of M. Aemilius Lepidus was more successful, however, as the mob smashed up his atrium, masks of ancestors included (Asc. 32-3C, 43C; Dio Cass. 40.48-9; App. B Civ. 2.21).59 Where traditionally the aristocratic house had been the venue for the peaceful greeting ofclients, houses now acted as garrisons, the targets for violence, or places of refuge, as in 75 when the two consuls of the year had to take refuge from a hungry mob in the house of one of them on the Via Sacra (Sall. Hist. 2.45M = 2.42 McGushin).60 Even the Forum itself, for all its ancient traditions, was now regularly the scene of violence.61
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