As the invaders departed, the patricians attempted to seize power again. What happened instead was an expansion of power among the plebeians, who in 367 b. c. gained the right to run for consul. Ironically, this would prove to be a victory for the patricians' long-term interests. The extension of greater rights among the plebeians helped give rise to a group of wealthy plebeians who increasingly saw themselves as aristocrats rather than as men of the people.
In 338 B. C., the same year Philip II of Macedon won control of Greece, Rome scored a decisive victory over its Latin neighbors. These were the same neighbors with whom Rome had earlier signed a treaty of mutual obligation. Now
The Romans turned their eyes to southern Italy, a region called Campania (kahm-PAHN-yah), which until quite recently had been firmly in the hands of the Greeks. A number of factors had changed that, not the least of which was the turmoil following the Macedonian conquest of Greece itself. Furthermore, the dominant Greek leader in southern Italy, the tyrant Dionysius the Elder (c. 430-367 b. c.) of Syracuse, was dead. But another group had also taken note of the Greeks' declining power in the south.
Philip II of Macedon won control of Greece in 338 B. C.
Library of Congress.
The Samnites were ethnically related to the Romans and Latins.
They had helped themselves to the cities of Cumae and Capua (KAP-yoo-uh) in Campania before the Romans went to war with them in 343 b. c. It was no easy victory for Rome, however, because the Samnites fought with what in modern times would be called guerilla warfare. (Guerilla is pronounced like “gorilla.”) Using hit-and-run maneuvers, they fought the Romans off during three wars between 343 and 290 B. C.
It was a somewhat desperate time for Rome, which saw a number of humiliations at the hands of the Samnites. In order to strengthen the republic, it extended further political power to the poorer plebeians. By 287 b. c., plebeians held the true power in the legislature. Likewise, for its final victory in the war against the Samnites, Rome had to win the allegiance of the peoples in surrounding areas.
Most of these neighboring peoples were Greek. Now that the Romans dominated much of southern and central Italy, they recognized that the Greeks farther south were among their two most formidable opponents for control of the entire country. In 280 b. c., the Greek colonists in the city of Tarentum (tah-REHN-tuhm) in southeastern Italy called upon King Pyrrhus of Epirus (319-272 b. c.) to aid them in battle
World History
