Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T06:26:29.312Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Mobility and Secession in the Early Roman Republic*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2017

Guy Bradley
Guy Bradley*
Affiliation:
Cardiff University [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

One consequence of the globalisation of the modern world in recent years has been to focus historical interest on human migration and movement. Sociologists and historians have argued that mobility is much more characteristic of past historical eras than we might expect given our modern nationalistic perspectives. This paper aims to contribute to this subject by surveying some of the evidence for mobility in central Italy and by examining its implications for early Rome. I will focus primarily on the plebeian movement, which is normally seen in terms of an internal political dispute. Our understanding of the ‘Struggle of the Orders’ is conditioned by the idealising view of our literary sources, which look back on the early Republic from a period when the plebeians provided many of the key members of the nobility. However, if we see the plebeian movement in its contemporary central Italian context, it emerges as much more threatening and potentially subversive. The key plebeian tactic – secession from the state – is often regarded as little more than a military strike. Instead, I argue that it was a genuine threat to abandon the community, and secessions can be seen as ‘paused migrations’. This paper also considers two other episodes that support this picture, the migration to Rome of Attus Clausus and the Claudian gens and the proposed move to Veii by the plebs.

Type
Research Article
Information
Antichthon , Volume 51: Thematic Issue: Politics and Power in Early Rome 509-264 BC , 2017 , pp. 149 - 171
Copyright
© The Australasian Society for Classical Studies 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

I would like to thank the editors, the anonymous referee, and audiences in Auckland, Dublin, and Cardiff for their comments, which have much improved the finished article.

References

Abulafia, D. and N., Berend (eds) (2002), Medieval Frontiers: Concepts and Practices. Aldershot.Google Scholar
Ampolo, C. (1970-71), ‘Su alcuni mutamenti sociali nel Lazio tra l’VIII e il V secolo’, DdA 4-5, 37-68.Google Scholar
Ampolo, C. (1976-7), ‘Demarato: osservazioni sulla mobilità sociale arcaica’, DdA 9-10, 333-345.Google Scholar
Ampolo, C. (1988a), ‘Rome archaïque: une société pastorale?’, in C. R. Whittaker (ed.), Pastoral Economies in Classical Antiquity. 120-133. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Ampolo, C. (1988b), ‘La città riformata e l’organizzazione centuriata. Lo spazio, il tempo, il sacro nella nuova realtà urbana’, in A. Momigliano and A. Schiavone (eds), Storia di Roma I. Roma in Italia. 203-239. Turin.Google Scholar
Bayet, J. (1938), ‘Tite-Live et la précolonisation romaine’, RPh 12, 97-119.Google Scholar
Bourdin, S. (2012), Les peuples de l’Italie préromaine: identités, territoires et relations inter-ethniques en Italie centrale et septentrionale. Rome.Google Scholar
Bradley, G. (2006), ‘Colonization and Identity in Republican Italy’, in G. J. Bradley and J.-P. Wilson (eds), Greek and Roman Colonization: Origins, Ideologies and Interactions. 161-187. Swansea.Google Scholar
Bradley, G. (2015), ‘Investigating Aristocracy in Archaic Rome and Central Italy: Social Mobility, Ideology and Cultural Influences’, in N. Fisher and H. van Wees (eds), ‘Aristocracy’ in Antiquity. Redefining Greek and Roman Elites. 85-124. Swansea.Google Scholar
Bradley, G. (2016), ‘The Rome of Tarquinius Superbus: Demography and Economy’, in P. Lulof and C. Smith (eds), The Age of Tarquinius Superbus. Ancient History, Archaeology, and Methodology. 123-133. Amsterdam.Google Scholar
Bruun, C. (2000), ‘“What Every Man in the Street Used to Know”: M. Furius Camillus, Italic Legends and Roman Historiography’, in C. Bruun (ed.), The Roman Middle Republic: Politics, Religion, and Historiography c. 400-133 B.C. 41-68. Rome.Google Scholar
Cornell, T. J. (1995), The Beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000-264 BC). London.Google Scholar
Cornell, T. J. (2003), ‘Coriolanus: Myth, History and Performance’, in D. Braund and C. Gill (eds), Myth, History and Culture in Republican Rome. Studies in Honour of T. P. Wiseman. 73-97. Exeter.Google Scholar
Crawford, M. H. (2014), ‘The Roman History of Roman Colonization’, in J. H. Richardson and F. Santangelo (eds), The Roman Historical Tradition: Regal and Republican Rome. Oxford Readings in Classical Studies. 201-206. Oxford.Google Scholar
Daube, D. (1972), Civil Disobedience in Antiquity. Edinburgh.Google Scholar
Dench, E. (1995), From Barbarians to New Men. Greek, Roman, and Modern Perceptions of Peoples of the Central Apennines. Oxford.Google Scholar
Drummond, A. (1978), ‘Some Observations on the Order of Consuls’ Names’, Athenaeum 56, 80-108.Google Scholar
Elliott, J. (2013), Ennius and the Architecture of the Annales. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Farney, G. (2007), Ethnic Identity and Aristocratic Competition in Republican Rome. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Forsythe, G. (1997), Review of T. J. Cornell, The Beginnings of Rome: Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000-264 B.C.). London: Routledge, 1995. Bryn Mawr Classical Review 97.3.26.Google Scholar
Forsythe, G. (2005), A Critical History of Early Rome. From Prehistory to the First Punic War. Berkeley.Google Scholar
Gabrielli, C. (2008), ‘Debiti e secessione della plebe al monte sacro’, Diritto@storia 7, 1-8. <http://www.dirittoestoria.it/7/Memorie/Gabrielli-Debito-secessione-plebe-Monte-Sacro.htm>.Google Scholar
Greenblatt, S. (ed.) (2009), Cultural Mobility: A Manifesto. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Guaitoli, M. (1995), ‘Lavinium: nuovi dati dalle necropoli’, AL 12, 551-562.Google Scholar
Horden, P. and N., Purcell (2000), The Corrupting Sea: A Study of Mediterranean History. Oxford.Google Scholar
Isayev, E. (2017), Migration, Mobility and Place in Ancient Italy. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Keaney, A. (1991), ‘Three Sabine Nomina: Clausus, Cōnsus, *Fisus’, Glotta 69, 202-214.Google Scholar
Kraus, C. (1994), ‘“No Second Troy”: Topoi and Refoundation in Livy, Book V’, TAPA 124, 267-289.Google Scholar
Lanfranchi, T. (2015), Les tribuns de la plèbe et la formation de la République romaine, 494-287 avant J.-C. Rome.Google Scholar
Le Glay, M., J.-L., Voisin, and Y., LeBohec (2004), A History of Rome. Oxford.Google Scholar
Lightfoot, K. G. and A., Martinez (1995), ‘Frontiers and Boundaries in Archaeological Perspective’, Annu. Rev. Anthropol. 24, 471-492.Google Scholar
Lintott, A. (1999), The Constitution of the Roman Republic. Oxford.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maggiani, A. (2006), ‘Dinamiche del commercio arcaico: le tesserae hospitales ’, in G. Della Fina (ed.), Gli Etruschi e il Mediterraneo. Commerci e politica. 317-349. Orvieto.Google Scholar
Marchesini, S. (2007), Prosopographia Etrusca II, 1: Studia: Gentium Mobilitas. Rome.Google Scholar
Mignone, L. (2016), The Republican Aventine and Rome’s Social Order. Ann Arbor.Google Scholar
Moatti, C. (ed.) (2004), La mobilité des personnes en Méditerranée de l’antiquité à l’époque moderne. Procédures de contrôle et documents d’identification. Rome.Google Scholar
Moatti, C. (2013), ‘Immigration and Cosmopolitanization’, in P. Erdkamp (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Rome. 77-92. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Momigliano, A. (2005), ‘The Rise of the plebs in the Archaic Age of Rome’, in K. A. Raaflaub (ed.), Social Struggles in Archaic Rome: New Perspectives on the Conflict of the Orders, 2nd edn. 168-184. Malden, MA.Google Scholar
Mommsen, Th. (1862), The History of Rome, translated by W. P. Dickson. London.Google Scholar
Naso, A. (2004), ‘The Etruscans in Lazio’, in G. Camporeale (ed.), The Etruscans Outside Etruria , translated by T. M. Hartmann. 220-235. Los Angeles.Google Scholar
Oakley, S. P. (1997), A Commentary on Livy: Books VI–X: Volume I: Introduction and Book VI . Oxford.Google Scholar
Ogilvie, R. M. (1965), A Commentary on Livy, Books 1-5. Oxford.Google Scholar
Poma, G. (2008), ‘Le secessioni della plebe (in particolare quella del 494-493 a.c.) nella storiografia’, Diritto@storia 7, 1-16. <http://www.dirittoestoria.it/7/Memorie/Poma-Secessioni-plebe-storiografia.htm>.Google Scholar
Raaflaub, K. A. (2005), ‘From Protection and Defense to Offense and Participation: Stages in the Conflict of the Orders’, in K. A. Raaflaub (ed.), Social Struggles in Archaic Rome: New Perspectives on the Conflict of the Orders, 2nd edn. 185-222. Malden, MA.Google Scholar
Ranouil, P. C. (1975), Recherches sur le patriciat: 509-366 avant J.-C. Paris.Google Scholar
Richard, J.-C. (2015), Les origines de la plèbe romaine. Essai sur la formation du dualisme patricio-plébéien, 2nd edn. Rome.Google Scholar
Spaeth, B. S. (1996), The Roman Goddess Ceres. Austin.Google Scholar
Stibbe, C. M. et al. (eds) (1980), Lapis Satricanus. Archaeological, Epigraphical, Linguistic and Historical Aspects of the New Inscription from Satricum. The Hague.Google Scholar
Torelli, M. (1981), Storia degli Etruschi. Rome.Google Scholar
Torelli, M. (1988), ‘Dalle aristocrazie gentilizie alla nascita della plebe’, in A. Momigliano and A. Schiavone (eds), Storia di Roma I. Roma in Italia. 241-261. Turin.Google Scholar
Torelli, M. (1999), Tota Italia. Essays in the Cultural Formation of Roman Italy. Oxford.Google Scholar
Vasaly, A. (2015), Livy’s Political Philosophy: Power and Personality in Early Rome. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Walsh, P. G. (1961), Livy: His Historical Aims and Methods. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Wiseman, T. P. (1979), Clio’s Cosmetics: Three Studies in Greco-Roman Literature. Leicester.Google Scholar
Woolf, G. (2016), ‘Movers and Stayers’, in L. de Ligt and L. E. Tacoma (eds), Migration and Mobility in the Early Roman Empire. 438-462. Leiden.Google Scholar