This chapter explores the period when Pompeii became Roman, following its colonization by Rome, c, 80—40 bc. The Pompeians were among the Italian allies opposed to Rome in the Social, or Italic, War (91—87 Bc) and the town was successfully besieged by the Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix in 89 bc. The first group of sources traces Pompeii’s opposition to Rome (B1—5). Some time later (c, 81 bc), in punishment for Pompeii’s resistance, Sulla imposed upon the town a colony of his veteran soldiers (perhaps between two and four thousand of them), led by his nephew Publius Cornelius Sulla. At this point, the town was renamed as colonia Veneria Cornelia Pompeianorum (see E1), a name recording its links to the goddess Venus and to the family name (Cornelius) of its new founder, Sulla, who also claimed Venus as his protectress. It adopted the constitution of a Roman colony, and Latin supplanted Oscan in all public inscriptions. Latin inscriptions from this period illustrate the impact of the colonists upon the buildings of the town (B7—12). The names of Sullan veterans dominate the inscriptions of the first couple of generations following colonization, down to the Augustan period, and it is possible that the original Pompeians were formally excluded from fully participating in local politics for a couple of decades (B15—16). Although Rome’s grip upon the Italian peninsula in the mid-first century bc, following the Social War, perhaps seems secure to us, some Pompeians may have been prepared to exploit times of insecurity at Rome, notably in the wake of Spartacus’ slave revolt and of the so-called Catilinarian conspiracy (B13—16).
Not only Sullan veterans, however, but other Romans — notably Cicero — also came to acquire property around Pompeii by the mid-first century bc (B17—22). Excavators in the eighteenth century identified a villa on the outskirts, just beyond the Herculaneum Gate, as belonging to Cicero. This was covered over again after excavation in 1749 and 1764, as was usual practice at that time (compare J24). In any case, he is more likely to have possessed a country estate further away from the town, but in its territory.
World History
