Only a few decades later, the Romans fought a major war against Numidia. Numidians had aided Rome against Carthage during the Third Punic War. In 112 B. C.E., Jugurtha (d. 104 B. C.E.), the adopted son of the Nu-midian king, seized power from two rivals with the help of some Roman senators. When the resulting civil war in Numidia disrupted grain supplies to Rome, some Romans called for war. Rome wanted to restore order to make sure it had access to the Numidian grain.
At first the war went badly for Rome, with Jugurtha winning several battles. In 107 b. c.e., a Roman officer named Gaius Marius (157-86 B. C.E.) emerged as a political and military leader. To raise troops to fight Jugurtha, Marius recruited volunteers among the landless peasants. Rome had done this before only during emergencies; Marius made it an accepted practice. These soldiers felt personal loyalty to Marius, and he counted on them to support his political career.
On the battlefield, Marius defeated Jugurtha in 105 b. c.e. The Nu-midian king was executed using a traditional method for defeated foes-he was strangled. Marius now had a powerful force of fiercely loyal soldiers. He set a pattern that endured for centuries, as popular military commanders relied on loyal troops to help them gain political power. Marius also made the Roman army more professional, improving their weapons and training. A legion now numbered between 5,000 and 6,000 troops, with each soldier carrying a javelin, a sword, and a shield.
Rome was fairly peaceful for about a decade, until its allies on the Italian peninsula rebelled, demanding full Roman citizenship. At the end of the so-called Social War between Rome and the Italians, the Romans agreed to give their allies full citizenship rights. Rome then turned its attention to the east. King Mithridates VI (132-63 B. C.E.) of Pontus, in Asia Minor, had massacred Romans living in the region and conquered several of the Republic’s Greek allies.
Marius wanted to command the army sent to battle Mithridates, but the Senate gave the honor to Lucius Cornelius Sulla (c. 138-78 b. c.e.), who had fought under Marius in North Africa. The two men were rivals, and their rivalry reflected the tensions between Rome’s two main political groups: Marius was a popularis, one of the politicians who tended to support the interests of the common people; while Sulla sided with the opti-mates, who favored the wealthy and powerful. In 88 b. c.e., after Sulla and his troops left the city, Marius worked with a tribune to pass a law that made Marius commander, replacing Sulla. Fighting broke out in Rome and Sulla returned to the city with some of his troops. For the first time since the founding of the Republic, Romans were waging civil war.
With military support, Sulla won control of the government. He weakened the tribunes’ political power while boosting the authority of the Senate and the Centuriate Assembly. He then returned to battle against King Mithridates. While he was gone, Lucius Cornelius Cinna (d. 84 b. c.e.), a consul, tried to overturn the laws Sulla had pushed through. He was driven out of the city but soon recruited Marius to attack Rome. With Marius’s help, Cinna emerged as dictator. He died in 84 b. c.e. during a mutiny-a revolt of soldiers against either their officers or civilian authority.
After defeating Mithridates in 85 B. C.E., Sulla returned to the Italian peninsula two years later. He fought two armies sent by the government to stop him from reaching Rome. The general acquired new allies, while his various opponents united against him. Sulla won control of Rome in 82 B. C.E., then had thousands of his enemies tortured and killed. The Centuriate Assembly confirmed his power by making him dictator for life. Sulla set up a government system that favored his wealthy friends and weakened the power of the tribunes. Rome remained at risk for future civil wars, since the plebs and others not connected to Sulla detested his harsh rule. Sulla, wrote Plutarch in his Lives of Noble Grecians and Romans, brought “Rome more mischief than all her enemies together had done,” by creating so much potential for conflict within the Republic.
World History
