Welcome back to Rome’s rebuilding era! It’s a year of reasserting dominance, crafting fancy hewn stones for building works, and getting the citizen body back in order.
Camillus in Triumph
After seemingly managing to defeat three of Rome’s enemies at once, Camillus was back in Rome, basking in his glory. Unfortunately, his success seems to have meant a life in slavery for many of the conquered people. Camillus auctioned these prisoners off, using the proceeds to pay back the Roman matrons and buy the city some gold bowls, engraved with his name.
Citizens of Rome
The Romans were trying to get back to business as usual after the Gallic sack. This involved granting citizenship to any people who had switched sides during the conflicts of the past decade or so. Welcome to the cleerrrb.
There were also some reluctant Roman citizens still hanging out in Veii, and that just would not do. The senate issued a decree ordering them back to Rome – OR ELSE.
A section of Hadrian’s wall near Carlisle, featuring some modest hewn stones. Original image from zoonabar on Flickr, also located on World History Encyclopedia where it was uploaded by Jan van der Crabben on 26th April 2012.
Renovating Rome
The Romans had to do some rebuilding after the Gallic sack, as we know, but why not make some improvements whilst they were at it? Livy records that the Capitol was given a substructure of hewn stone, which he thought was still impressive in his own time.
Image
Spiteful Skirmishes
Never a city that revels in peace, the Romans decided to attack some of the people who had tried to take advantage of their moment of weakness in 390 BCE. The Aequians and some Etruscan towns found themselves the victims of sudden assaults. Payback is a bitch!
Our Players 388 BCE
Military Tribunes with Consular Power
T. Quinctius (T. f. L. n.) Cincinnatus Capitolinus (Pat) Mil. Tr. c.p. 385?, 384
Q. Servilius Q. f. P. n. Fidenas (Pat) Mil. Tr. c.p. 402, 398, 395, 390, 386
L. Iulius -f. -n. Iullus (Pat) Mil. Tr. c.p. 379
L. Aquilius -f. -n. Corvus
L. Lucretius -f. -n. Flavus Tricipitinus (Pat) Cos. Suff. 393, Mil. Tr. c.p. 391, 383, 381
Ser. Sulpicius – f. -n. Rufus (Pat) Mil. Tr. c.p. 384, 383, 377?
Sound Credits
Our music is by Bettina Joy de Guzman.
Automated Transcript
Dr Rad 0:15
Welcome to the partial historians. We explore all the details of ancient Rome, everything from political scandals, the love affairs, the battles waged, and when citizens turn against each other. I’m Dr. Rad,
Dr G 0:33
and I’m Dr. G. We consider Rome as the Romans saw it by reading different authors from the ancient past and comparing their stories.
Dr Rad 0:44
Join us as we trace the journey of Rome from the founding of the city.
Dr G 0:58
Hello, and welcome back to the partial historians. I am Dr. G,
Dr Rad 1:04
and I am Dr. Rad.
Dr G 1:06
And today we are going to be looking at 388 or thereabouts, BCE in Roman history.
Dr Rad 1:15
Yeah, so, but before we get into that, Dr. G, we need to recap the very important things that Marcus Furius Camillus, the star of ancient Rome, who perhaps nobody outside Roman historians has ever heard of. What was he up to in 389 BC? Because that’s really what my ancient accounts are all about at the moment. Everything else is just a backdrop.
Dr G 1:39
He was up to everything, if we believe Livy, he was here, there, and everywhere. He was a man who could just turn up at the scene of a potential battle, and the enemy would fall at their feet, being like, ‘You’ve turned up, we couldn’t possibly fight now.
Dr Rad 1:54
Yes, he did carry victory entirely before him against the many enemies of ancient Rome, who were seeming taking great delight in the fact that the Romans had just had their asses handed to them by the Gauls.
Dr G 2:09
Yeah, I mean, when better to have a guy with such fearful charisma that the enemy literally falls down at their feet at the very sight of him than on the back of Rome having its lowest of lows in the Gallic sack.
Dr Rad 2:23
Yeah, so we saw him deal with the Volscians, then the Aequians, and then finally the evil Etruscans, who decided to attack a very pitiful ally of ancient Rome, and I say pitiful just in the sense that the way Livy described their conquest was very sad.
Dr G 2:45
Look, Sutrium was saved in the end,
Dr Rad 2:49
exactly. I mean, it might hold the distinction of being, you know, one of the only places in the ancient world to change hands several times in the course of one day,
Dr G 2:58
a noble distinction, I am sure,
Dr Rad 3:01
exactly, and you know, I do really love the idea that you know in the morning you thought you’d lost everything, and nighttime you were back in bed with your hot coco and blessing the name of Camillus.
Dr G 3:14
What a time to be alive! It’s a chaotic period. We really don’t know what’s going on very much, because the Fasti Capitolini, our list of magistrates is missing for these years. We also have highly fragmentary sources. Currently, Livy is pretty much the only source in town that has a continuous narrative to share with us, and
Dr Rad 3:35
he’s mine. He’s mine. I suppose the one thing that’s kind of interesting, which we did highlight last time, and then we can move on from all of this, but even though we might have some serious doubts about how involved Camillus was in some of these events, and even though the chronology is a little different between my account and your account, at the same time Diodorus did also include a lot of these same conquests that Camillus was apparently involved in, so clearly there is some sort of association between him and dealing with Rome’s enemies in the area of central Italy at this point in time.
Dr G 4:15
Yeah, definitely, this is the story that seems to get passed down and recorded by all of our available sources, and even to the extent to which some scholars would like to classify Camillus as a literary figure rather than a historical figure, somebody’s got to be doing something at this point in time, because Rome does survive the Gallic sack, and this is almost – we’re sitting at what feels like is going to be a turning point for Roman history, because once we get out of this sort of hazy period of what’s going on with the chronology, Rome is going to start being on the up and up in a way that we have not yet seen since the beginning of the city,
Dr Rad 4:57
that’s right, and so Dr. G, please do. With me in my time machine as I take us back to 388 BC
Dr G 5:20
Wow, 388 BCE. What a time to be alive as a Roman
Dr Rad 5:35
Dr. G. Please tell me, what kind of magistrates do we have, and who are they?
Dr G 5:39
Well, it is one of the few things I can tell you about this year. Let me commence. It is apparently a year where we have military tribunes with consular power.
Dr Rad 5:51
I shall try and conceal my surprise.
Dr G 5:55
We’ll be out of this phase of Roman history soon, but not yet. We still have some time to go. There are six, apparently, which is almost the maximum number we see for this group, and there are some familiar families in here. So we start off with Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus Capitolinus, a patrician, and this might be the first time we’ve seen him, but he will go on to hold positions in the future as well. We then have Quintus Servilius Fidenas. Now he was previously a military tribune in 402 also 398 also 395 also 390 So where anybody who’s listening who doesn’t remember this guy, get with the program, he has been around a lot.
Dr Rad 6:44
Well, he’s from the civili, or the civili if you prefer, and that’s a pretty famous family, and that name Fidenas, that would associate his family with the conquest of Fidenae, I suppose. Yes, yes,
Dr G 7:01
and so, yes, he comes from a family lineage of some distinction,
Dr Rad 7:05
exactly.
Dr G 7:06
Clearly, a patrician. We then have Lucius Iulius Iullus, also a patrician, but first time in this role. And then perhaps my favorite figure from this list, because I want to get into this guy a little bit later. Lucius Aquilius Corvus,
Dr Rad 7:25
Little red corvette!
Dr G 7:29
a man with two interesting bird names.
Dr Rad 7:33
Oh, okay, bird names:
Dr G 7:36
Aquila the eagle and Corvus the raven.
Dr Rad 7:40
Ah, I didn’t know Corvus meant the raven. Okay, cool, cool.
Dr G 7:45
And perhaps more interesting from our perspective, plebeian question mark.
Dr Rad 7:52
Oh, actually, you know what? I didn’t notice when I was writing all these names down that I didn’t have my usual little pat abbreviation after his name, intrigue, intrigue.
Dr G 8:04
Yes, put a pin in that. We’ll come back to this guy.
Dr Rad 8:06
Yep, yep, he’s
Dr G 8:07
number four on our list. Sitting squarely in number five is Lucius Lucretius Flavus Tricipitinus Patrician, previously a suffect consul in 393 and the military tribune in 391 and we’ll see him again in the future.
Dr Rad 8:26
Yep,
Dr G 8:27
he was the guy who famously waged a war against the aequians, and also proposed dividing up the territory of Veii.
Dr Rad 8:36
Controversial,
Dr G 8:38
and it remains controversial. We have not figured out what’s going on with Veii yet.
Dr Rad 8:42
No,
Dr G 8:42
and finally, last but not least, Servilius Sulpicius Rufus, also a patrician, and he’ll go on to hold some magisterial positions in the future as well.
Dr Rad 8:56
Excellent.
Dr G 8:56
Some debate about which Sulpicius Rufus this guy might be where we’re sort of in that period of time, where, and also, thank you, Rome, for always naming people with the same names, so when there’s any doubt about who somebody is, and it’s like, is it the brother, is it the other cousin, does it come from this line over here? So there are some question marks about which Sulpicius Rufus, but he seemed one of them was in there.
Dr Rad 9:20
It is kind of interesting, actually, because the Romans are so obsessed with being remembered, obviously, which I understand. I mean, I think all humans have that instinct in them for some reason, and I guess it kind of testifies to the way that for the Romans, even though, yes, your personal reputation means a lot, it also is about really, at the end of the day, the glory of your family, so it’s like, does it matter, the brother, the father, whatever, as long as it’s from the silpikii, that’s the main point, guys. It’s my family, we’re the ones that are awesome,
Dr G 9:55
somebody’s carrying the honor, and that’s what’s important
Dr Rad 9:58
around,
Dr Rad 9:58
exactly, exactly. Now, speaking of honor, Dr. G, Camillus is on his victory lap after his glorious triple triumph. He’s back in Rome. He, of course, gets awarded a triumph because apparently the Romans look at his conquests as being victorious in three simultaneous wars, which has got to be an accomplishment, simultaneous wars difficult to wage.
Dr G 10:26
Yeah, three at once as well. Goodness me, the myth, the man, the legend, that is Camillus,
Dr Rad 10:32
exactly. Now he has a huge amount of prisoners that he’s captured, particularly from the Etruscan peoples. Just thought that was something worth mentioning, that the Romans are imagining that they are already factoring into a triumph. We don’t often talk about the flip side of what the Romans are up to here, but, and it’s not just the Romans, to be fair, it is, I think, kind of standard understanding in a lot of ancient society is that if you lose a war, there’s a very good chance you’re going to end up being someone’s slave if you are not killed, which is a sad side effect of all of this. Now he decides he’s going to sell them under the spear, so that’s sub hasta. It’s basically the idea is that this a spear would be standing in the ground, and it’s like a representation of the authority of Rome as a state, and it comes to basically mean that he’s selling these people at a public sale, or at auction, is the way that we perhaps would understand it, and he makes so much money selling all of these Etruscan prisoners that the matrons in Rome have the value of the gold that they had contributed way back when the Gauls were around a couple of years ago given back to them. Oh, wow. Okay, they get a return on their investment. Camillus is like, you know, what? I pay my debts, and I’m going to do it in a horrible way by selling people into slavery. You’re welcome, Roman Matrons. He’s looking at you, kid.
Dr G 12:13
Yeah, okay, yeah. It’s hard to feel super positive about this.
Dr Rad 12:17
It is
Dr G 12:18
both good that the women are getting their money back, but it is unfortunate. Okay, so this is the undercurrent that runs through most of Rome’s history, and we’re starting to see its presence more and more, because Rome, through the nature of conquest, is taking prisoners. What do you do with prisoners? They become a resource that you sell.
Dr Rad 12:41
Yeah,
Dr G 12:41
so enslaved people are on the rise as soon as Rome goes through this process.
Dr Rad 12:49
Yes, and whenever we talk about the fact that people are fighting over the booty, or they’re keen to have booty, or the commanders aren’t dividing the booty up fairly, all of these sorts of references that we make, the sources obviously aren’t explicit at this moment in time about what that booty actually entails, and I know we joke that it’s just the one pair of sandals that’s being traded backwards and forwards in the area, but realistically it probably also does include humans who have been conquered or taken obviously, Rome’s warfare at this moment in time is not as gigantic as they would like us to believe. I mean, how else does a man wage three simultaneous wars at once if they’re not all in a fairly close geographic location in ancient times, but you have to assume that there is some conquest going on, and that slavery is sometimes a part of the deal. Hopefully, it’s not super large scale. I basically is what I’m trying to say at this moment in time, because it is fairly low-level warfare, and often it does seem to be raiding, you know, raiding each other’s fields, and you know, just actually genuinely being annoying most of the time, but it does show that there’s this shadowy undercurrent to these accounts, which, whilst we obviously have to question the, you know, how big these wars are and how important they are, and that sort of thing, I don’t doubt that there is some slavery going on at this early stage. That part I do believe it’s just a question, obviously, of how much, you know, how many people are we talking about, what kind of work are they being put to, and unfortunately that kind of detail often doesn’t make it into our source material.
Dr G 14:37
Yes, we will see this increase over time, for sure.
Dr Rad 14:40
To connect to what we were talking about before, actually, the reason why Camillus probably has so many Etruscan prisoners is that you might recall that one of the ways that he managed to deal with the situation in Sutrium, which the Etruscans had attacked, because it was a Roman ally, is he said he wasn’t going to kill anyone unless they were holding a weapon, and a lot of. People chose to, therefore, put their weapons down, and things resolved quite peacefully. But this is where we can see that, oh yeah, you didn’t get killed, but you still got taken prisoner. You basically had to choose life as a slave or death in that moment.
Dr G 15:21
Yeah, there is no just walk away, and we’ll leave you alone. There is still a price to be paid.
Dr Rad 15:26
No. And to be fair, I think, I think if the shoe was on the other foot, the Etruscans probably would have done a similar thing. You know, it’s.. I think it is kind of what a lot of people would have done at this moment in time. However, he makes so much money from the sale of these people that there is actually money left over. Dr. G, there’s extra in the till. Oh, I know it’s hard to celebrate this when we know where the money is coming from, but not only is he able to give the money back to the women. So, I mean, what an investment for them. They get to look like heroes, and they’re only out of pocket for two years. Well done, matrons, but there’s enough left over to make three golden bowls.
Dr G 16:09
Well, Camillus does like a golden bowl, we know this.
Dr Rad 16:13
He really does, it’s his thing. Yes, and they are inscribed with Camillus’s name, and apparently were stored in the Temple of Jupiter at Juno’s feet until there was a fire on the Capitoline in 83 BCE. Oh, those balls stick around for quite some time. They, well, I mean, they’re gold, Dr. G doesn’t tarnish.
Dr G 16:37
Okay, I this is a moment where I’d like to mention coinage,
Dr Rad 16:41
okay,
Dr G 16:42
because Rome doesn’t operate with coinage as far as we’re aware at this period of time, and actually doesn’t technically develop coinage until about 280 BC. We’ve got another century to go of, like, how is Rome doing economics, because when we say, you know, the matrons got paid, it’s not like they were handed a bag of coins, because that’s not how Ron did business at this point. They do seem to have things like bars of metal that they can sort of pass around, and it might also be the case that we’re dealing with a lot of economy in kind, so it’s like, what is something of an equivalent value that you could be given as payment for something else? I tell you what, Dr. G, if those matrons were given back the value of their gold jewelry in grain, I would have screamed. What am I supposed to do with this? I can’t wear this out on a Saturday night. How am I supposed to turn this into a pair of nice earrings?
Dr Rad 17:42
Exactly,
Dr G 17:43
I mean, you can, but it is more laborious because you have to take the grain around to a jeweler and be like, I will pay you five bags of grain for a pair of earrings, can you make it happen? The guy will be like, I can, but so this idea that there is limited resources and commodities and coinage is not quite a thing, but trading obviously is, and you can have, I think it’s difficult for us to imagine in our modern world, particularly because we deal now with imaginary currency in the form of like it’s a picture on a screen on your phone, you’re like, I have, I have money. It’s like, do you, though? Yeah, there’s numbers on a
Dr Rad 18:25
screen,
Dr Rad 18:25
definitely. Dan,
Dr G 18:26
so it’s become so abstracted for us in the modern world that I think we can anticipate that the idea of value exchange is one of these ideas that underpins how Roman culture operates. When they say they’re paying the soldiers, that’s not necessarily also handing them a bag coins, it again, it might be something like bags of grain or an allotment of some sort of other valuable material, and we’ve definitely had guests on the podcast in the past talking about things like fabrics,
Dr Rad 18:55
which
Dr G 18:56
take a reasonable amount of time and effort to manufacture, because there’s a lot of steps in that process. The final product is valuable, it holds value from all of the processes that have been done upon it. So, if you give somebody a bolt of fabric, that is actually quite valuable. So, those sorts of things are definitely things that we can keep in mind when we’re like, who’s getting paid, and just keeping in the back of our minds that how people get paid is actually maybe a more thorny problem that we don’t have all the answers to right now, in comparison, if we’re thinking about meanwhile in Sicily, they do have coinage already, we’ve got plenty of examples of their coins,
Dr Rad 19:37
the Romans really feel very late to coinage, and it’s weird.
Dr G 19:42
It is weird. It is one of these small, odd details about ancient Rome, where everybody around them already has currency.
Dr Rad 19:50
Yeah,
Dr G 19:50
and they don’t.
Dr Rad 19:52
So bizarre. Really cool currency with like owls on them.
Dr G 19:56
Yeah, like Sicily’s got a whole bunch of ones with like cool octopus. On them and stuff, and it’s like, like they’re way ahead of the Roman game. Romans are kind of like, would you like this egg I found?
Dr Rad 20:10
How about this fabric that I got one of my slaves to dance around in urine on? It’s great,
Dr G 20:16
exactly. So we don’t even tend to get into the sort of chunks of metal kind of stuff until a little bit later from where we are now, so it’s really interesting to think about, because they clearly have a functioning economy, and there’s clearly movement of value between people, and we just don’t quite know what that looks like.
Dr Rad 20:36
Yeah, animals, they would be another thing, wouldn’t they?
Dr G 20:39
I’d love your goat. Thank you for offering.
Dr Rad 20:42
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Okay, now interesting detail here. Dr. G, Livvy now tells me that in the midst of all the conflict that’s been going on for quite some time, so we’re talking about, I think, about the past, you know, sort of 10 years, basically, of Roman warfare, there have been various people who, rather than stand by their original city, decided that they were going to switch sides to Rome. Kept that quiet up until this moment, Livy. So, we’re talking about people from Veii, people from Campana, people from Valerii. They have at some point decided that they’re just going to take up with the Romans at the right moment, and they are now made citizens and given some land.
Dr G 21:28
What
Dr Rad 21:29
I know,
Dr G 21:30
Diodorus is letting me down. There’s no detail at all about this year.
Dr Rad 21:34
Well, I find that really bizarre, in the sense that there’s so much dispute in Roman society, allegedly, about who has land, I’m like, you just gonna give this Johnny Come Lately from Veii some land because he happened to switch sides, and what it strokes your ego. What about the people that actually live here and don’t have land? What about them? Weird. All right, so I think
Dr Rad 22:00
this
Dr G 22:00
might be a retro fit by Livy, yeah, to try and explain some things that have been going on, because obviously Vae has been conquered quite recently. How many people would be switching sides is, I feel like a moot point. That place was done over, and it’s like it might just be some of the people in the northern regions of the countryside, just outside of Rome, and just south of a who were like sure, yeah, exactly,
Dr Rad 22:24
and like, what? He doesn’t give me any details, obviously. Like, when did they switch sides? How did they indicate they were switching sides? Some of these places were under siege. What do they do? Did they sneak out and join you? What happened?
Dr G 22:34
No, they made little badges that said I’m for Rome.
Dr Rad 22:39
Don’t kill me, I like you guys.
Dr G 22:41
Yeah, friend, not foe.
Dr Rad 22:46
Anyway, so very weird, but it’s interesting that we’ve got that little detail, and apparently they just get citizenship, which will become a much thornier issue later in Rome’s history about who gets citizenship and who doesn’t. Apparently, right now, though, it’s very easy. Just wave a magic wand and poof, you’re a Roman.
Dr G 23:05
Oh, Livy.
Dr Rad 23:07
Yeah,
Dr G 23:07
I mean, all of this struggle of the orders business, and now just people walking up, being like, what about it? And Rome’s like, yes,
Dr Rad 23:15
the answer is, you can stay. Yeah, now we apparently also have a lingering issue in that, as we know, during the Gallic sack, when there was that scattering that happened after Battle Allia, we had a bunch of people from Rome who decided that they were going to shack up in vain and just lay low until it all blew over. Smart move.
Dr G 23:40
Yes.
Dr Rad 23:40
Now, as it turns out, some of them decided I might just stay here. I’ve been here for a while, apparently. The siege of Rome by the Gauls lasted for many, many months, so I guess they got comfortable. Some of them might have been part of the group that thought it would be good idea to move to Veii before the Gallic sack. Who knows, but they never came back, so they’re still living there, and the people in Rome are not happy about that. As you know, Dr. G, we had a very lengthy speech from Camillus not that long ago about why you can’t live in Veii if you’re a Roman.
Dr G 24:18
Ah, yes, it’s problematic, at least from his perspective, I mean, I don’t really buy his rhetorical points about this, and it’s like, seems like a reasonable thing to do. Why not expand your territory? You’re happy to set up colonies elsewhere, Sutrium is one of them. Why wouldn’t you send some people to they?
Dr Rad 24:38
Because it’s sacrilegious, Dr. G, but there’s now an official senatorial decree saying get your asses back here now.
Dr G 24:49
I see
Dr Rad 24:52
they basically, they’re basically saying, you know, you guys are quitters, you’re giving up on Rome, you’re lazy, because, of course, Rome is going through. This rebuilding process, after all the destruction and whatnot, so perhaps those people are kind of hanging out in Vay because they don’t want to have to rebuild their house.
Dr G 25:10
Well, also I think this is one way that you can increase your property standing. I would be very inclined to become a squatter in Veii, and be like, well, I’m the king of the castle over here now, so why would I come back to you guys exactly? Surely we could be friends, and I can only imagine that from a patrician perspective, understanding that they is now conquered territory that now needs to be divided up in a way that suits the elite, not whoever is currently sitting in an old house in Veii, being like, look, I’ve done it up nice. I’ve been here for a few months, and it’s looking really good.
Dr Rad 25:44
I went to Ikea. It’s all furnished. Why would I come back now? They are 100% unhappy about receiving this order from the Senate. They drag their feet, they complain a lot, they’re bitching and moaning, and it kind of seems like they’re just going to pretend the senatorial degree got lost in the mail. I never saw that messenger word the Senate try and make sure that they have no excuses, because they set a firm date, a very teacherly move, where they’re not leaving it up to interpretation of you had to come back from they, and then just leaving up to them when they come back, they give them a firm date, and they say that anyone who refuses to return will be executed.
Dr G 26:31
Wow,
Dr Rad 26:32
yeah, they’re taking this very seriously, and so they come back under threat of death. That’s how much they love Rome.
Dr G 26:41
Okay, well, I suppose being Romans themselves, they’d be like, “Look, I really don’t want the military might of Camillus turning up on my doorstep, because I’ll immediately have to fall down.
Dr Rad 26:50
Exactly, exactly, it’s no point resisting. So, Livy sees this very much as a time period, therefore, where Rome is expanding, it’s getting more citizens, getting bigger, there are new buildings going up all the time, going up everywhere. The state is, as we know, apparently very involved in the construction. It even kind of seems like we’ve got the aediles functioning in a way that we would understand from, like, later in the Republic, like, you know, they’re helping with these building works, which we know is something that an aedile later on would be involved in.
Dr Rad 27:29
Is this
Dr Rad 27:30
true? Is this something that just makes sense in Livvy’s time, and therefore he’s kind of mentioning it. Who knows? But the Roman citizens are very driven, because they obviously just want the city to be complete and finished, so that they can actually, you know, live again as a result. Livy tells me they are so intent on finishing that the entire city, in its brand new expanded version, is finished within a year, completely rebuilt. Dr. G, not a stone left to be put in place.
Dr G 28:04
Wow, that is incredible. All right, okay.
Dr Rad 28:07
That’s how analytic history works.
Dr G 28:09
Of the things that I have questions about, and I think you’ve already flagged the aediles. I think that’s a good flag. Yeah, we’re not very sure about a dolls right now, although hopefully we’ll start seeing them soon, but because we don’t have the Fasti Capitolini for this period, we’ve got no names to go with, and if there are magistrates in that position, there’s no, there doesn’t seem to be any way to back that up, and if Livy doesn’t mention them by name, it’s like they’re not real, and he doesn’t seem to, the fact that the building program only takes a year. I think this tells us how small Rome is, more than anything else.
Dr Rad 28:45
Well, and also, as we’ve highlighted many, many times, potentially how limited the damage done by the Gauls was, that mostly they stole their transistor radios and televisions, and then got out of there
Dr G 29:01
anything that they could carry,
Dr Rad 29:03
exactly, exactly,
Dr G 29:04
yes, even the sacred hut on the Palatine survived, so guys, just a wooden hut, precisely.
Dr Rad 29:10
Now the capital also has some renovations done, which is mentioned because Livy thinks that the work done on the substructure here was so impressive that even in his own time he’s still blown away by it, and that’s because it is put together with using hewn stone. Now I am not a Mason, Dr. G, so I had to check out what that actually meant. That basically means that the stones were specifically shaped and smooth, so that they could, you know, build a particular thing, so a lot of effort is what I’m reading into that.
Dr G 29:47
I think that’s correct. Yes, effort, time, and effort, and also stone masonry.
Dr Rad 29:53
Yeah, I mean that sounds hard. I don’t underestimate the work of masons here, but it’s more that I was like hewn stone, I. Have no idea what that means, anyway. It’s still around for Livy to marvel at many, many decades, centuries later. So, well done, Rome. It’s at this point that he mentions the elections taking place, so towards the end of the year, and this is where we get all the people that you mentioned. Now, they decide once they’re in place that they are going to lead an army against the aequians, not because the Aequians had somehow managed to start yet another war with Rome, they had definitely been beaten by Camillus, I mean, of course, as if anything else were possible, but it is purely a war of spite and vengeance, Dr. G, the Romans intend to completely devastate their territory, so that they can never ever start another war again until 387 BCE,
Dr G 30:52
that is next year. Wait a minute. Okay, so whatever the Aquians have done sounds like Rome’s pretty unhappy about that. So, how does that campaign go for them?
Dr Rad 31:05
Well, Dr. G, Livy, alas, gives me very little information about what goes on with the Aequians. I’m imagining it’s just a bit of, you know, fear and terror on the Romans’ part. What he does tell me is that there is another force that is sent to deal with the Etruscans, who also were a problem for the Romans and Camillus in the previous year, so they invade Tarquinii, and they’re going to focus their attention on two towns, Cortuosa and Contenebra, I believe. Now, I don’t mean to be rude, but as some more perhaps minor locations, shall we say, we don’t really know where these are in a modern sense. So, I can’t tell you much about where they are in a modern sense. I don’t know the answer to that. It’s possible that the last one I said, Contenebra, might be modern day San Giovenale, but really, really not sure.
Dr G 32:05
Big question marks,
Dr Rad 32:06
yeah, as usual with this point in time, really, really not sure. But Cortuosa is very easily captured. I mean, as you might expect from the fact that the Romans have just decided to do this out of spite, they had no idea that they were at war with Rome, and so they were completely taken by surprise. The Romans sacked their city and set it on fire. Yay!
Dr G 32:29
Thanks, Rome. Wake up one morning, you’re like, oh, this is not gonna go well. We were not prepared for this. I’m still in my pajamas,
Dr Rad 32:38
I’ve got the cucumbers on my eyes still. My coffee is over there. What is happening? Conten Contenebra Contenebra, it’s a little different. They do actually manage to resist for a few days, but the Romans are fired by a sense of injustice that few people understand in this world, and therefore they are not going to be put down by the resistance of this paltry little town. They overwhelm them to the point where they have no choice but to surrender.
Dr G 33:12
Okay, now the bad news about that is that does this involve more prisoners of war?
Dr Rad 33:18
Yes, probably there is booty talked about as usual, but as said earlier in this episode, it’s a little unclear exactly what that booty entails. The interesting detail I think about Contenebra and the conquest of this particular place is that the Romans take a particular strategy with this, which reminds me a little bit of one of Camillus tactics when he was trying to break the siege at Veii, where they seem to divide the forces up into even groups, and they take turns waging war against the town in like six hour shifts.
Dr G 33:59
Right. Okay.
Dr Rad 34:01
Now I think Camillus did that more with the construction of the, like, the secret tunnel that he used to get into Veii, but the same principle kind of applies, and the town is too small to do something similar to what the Romans are doing, and therefore they’re using the same men to just stand against the Romans, and therefore their men tire out before the Romans, because the Romans are doing it in shifts, and therefore getting a break, getting a rest, and this is why they are forced to surrender. Just thought that was interesting, because we don’t always get a lot of details about the tactics that the Romans are using at this moment in time. It’s just, oh, they set it on fire, and you know, steal all their stuff,
Dr G 34:42
yeah, and the idea that not everybody is involved all at once means that you can have this continuous onslaught, which would be very hard for anyone to resist, particularly if you weren’t expecting an attack, and you sort of see them in the distance, and you’re like, ah, oh. And you have to be on all the time, and they’re just sort of taking their time about
Dr Rad 35:04
it. Yes. Now, the last detail I have about 388 is about the booty, Dr. G, but not the specifics of what the booty entails, although I definitely think it probably does involve people. They are valuable, particularly at this moment in time when I don’t think Rome is exactly swimming in slaves, and they, they like slaves. The military tribunes had decided that the booty should go to the state, but they were little slow about telling everybody else that decision that they had made. So, in the meantime, all the soldiers who were with them had just helped themselves and divided it up amongst them, and the military tribunes were like, “Oh, oh, I was going to, you know, what? You just keep it, that’s fine. They realize that it’s going to be way too dangerous to try and take back whatever it is the soldiers have split up amongst themselves, because they’re obviously very happy with their new acquisitions. They’re like, “Yeah, you know what? You look great in those stolen clothes. Yes, you absolutely should wear that next week to the meeting. Keep it, it looks fab.
Dr G 36:08
Yeah, we don’t want to anger those guys, not after they’ve fought in six hour shifts. They’re like, I deserve this,
Dr Rad 36:15
and that is where 388 ends up for me, Dr. G. Basically, a lot of other, you know, rebuilding news, and another Roman victory, but with a bit of a sad tinge
Dr G 36:27
to it. Okay, well, I think piecing together a couple of things, the fact that you, that Livy seems to think that the rebuilding process in Rome takes so little time, but we also have this narrative of enslaved people coming into the city, being sold, suggesting this sort of trading.
Dr Rad 36:48
I see where you go.
Dr G 36:53
I see these things maybe weaving together. I mean, like, how did they rebuild so quickly? Well, conveniently they weren’t paying the labor, potentially everybody’s been handed their public tiles,
Dr Rad 37:05
yeah,
Dr G 37:05
and they’ve immediately passed them on to their newly acquired enslaved person, be like, “You build it for me.
Dr Rad 37:12
Yeah, good point, good point.
Dr G 37:15
So, in terms of what’s going on with Diodorus Siculus, I really have so little to give you. He gives us the names of most of the military tribunes, and he does get most of them right, which is quite telling, because sometimes that doesn’t work out for him. But he places this series of events for whatever events they are, because he doesn’t talk about Rome after he lists the tributes, is that the archon in Athens is a guy called Pythias, and his archonship dates to 380 to 379 which means we’ve lost almost 10 years in terms of the chronology, potentially at this point in time, but to take us through some of these names, so I mentioned this guy, Lucius Aquilius Corvus. We finally, after a long period of time, have what appears to be a plebeian in the military tribune with consular power role, which is hugely significant,
Dr Rad 38:22
and no mention, no mention of it in Livy, just slides right by,
Dr G 38:27
slides right by, but maybe he shouldn’t. Military tribunes with consular power nominally were created by the patricians in order to facilitate keeping the plebeians on side, who wanted to hold some sort of magisterial position, but they didn’t want to give them the consulship, so they’ve created this lesser position, nominally so that plebeians could hold it, and then we’ve rarely seen plebeians in the role,
Dr Rad 38:52
and as we’ve highlighted, that’s probably because that’s not at all why this position was created,
Dr G 38:58
doesn’t, yes, the more logistical, pragmatic reason would be because you’ve got wars on a number of fronts, and you want to be able to have people who have legitimate imperium to be able to lead forces against multiple enemies at the same time,
Dr Rad 39:12
and we also question when the consulship per se really becomes part of this conversation. Are we talking about praetors before then? It seems much more warlordy in the ancient Roman world in the four hundreds when this position was apparently created. It’s just a lot of stuff where it’s probably far more chaotic and almost feudal than the Romans would like us to believe.
Dr G 39:38
Definitely, definitely. And then we get this guy who just sort of pops up as seemingly out of nowhere,
Dr Rad 39:45
yeah,
Dr G 39:45
and he comes with this plebeian name, Aquilius is plebeian as far as we know, it also is sometimes considered patrician, but also the other note about this. Yes, which the writers of the Brill New Pauly talk about, is that it might not be historical either. So, in terms of hazy territory, this is where we are. But we do have some stories about previous Aquilii. So, there are the Aquilii brothers from the end of the sixth century BCE, and I don’t know if we mentioned them, I can’t remember. It was so long ago since we talked about that, would have been
Dr Rad 40:08
10 years ago.
Dr G 40:10
Yeah, of all the details that I may or may not have held on to, I have no idea whether we’ve mentioned these guys before.
Dr Rad 40:32
Yeah,
Dr G 40:32
but they apparently conspired against the newly established Republic.
Dr Rad 40:38
Oh, so this would have been part of the whole Brutus’ sons story,
Dr G 40:44
yeah, and they were executed. Those guys were
Dr Rad 40:47
done. Okay, then
Dr G 40:48
we have a guy called Gaius Aquilius Tuscus aftermark consul in 487 BCE, and he fights against the Hernucii, who at this point in Rome’s history have long been allies of Rome, yeah, but we’re not in that period, and received am ovatio, so that sounds like more of a patrician than a plebeian,
Dr Rad 41:11
yeah,
Dr G 41:12
holding the consulship, that sort of thing, and then we’ve got this guy Corvus, and that’s that’s it,
Dr Rad 41:20
and he does not seemingly accomplish anything individually.
Dr G 41:27
Maybe nothing is noted.
Dr Rad 41:29
No, that’s what I mean. Yeah, nothing is specifically.. I mean, to be fair, nothing that specific is noted about any of these guys for 388 in terms of what they actually managed to accomplish. There is some trouble brewing on the horizon for the following year, but I won’t get too much into that.
Dr G 41:51
And so the other thing is that I was just looking at some of the patrician names, just to sort of give myself something to hold on to for this year, and I was like, Who are these people? So Titus Quintius Cincinnatus Capitolinus. So the Quintius folk, they are a family of quite some distinction, and with a whole bunch of names involved, including Cincinnatus, Capitolinus, and later on Crispini and Flaminii, which gives you a sense that they might be end up moving into more religious positions over time as well.
Dr Rad 42:31
Yeah,
Dr G 42:31
but this is a family with a long history and connection with Rome that goes back to the kings.
Dr Rad 42:37
Yeah, well, I mean we had so much to talk about with Cincinnatus in his escapades, he was like the Proto Camillus,
Dr Rad 42:44
yeah, the
Dr G 42:45
original and shirt off man,
Dr Rad 42:48
exactly,
Dr G 42:48
par excellence, yeah, and this family seems to have been one of the families that came to Rome under the leadership of Tullus Hostilius,
Dr Rad 43:00
wow, okay, so that’s the third king of Rome for people keeping score at home,
Dr G 43:06
keeping track, and so this is a family from Alba originally, and he’s these are this is not the only family that crops up in this year that also has that connection, because the civili also are thought to have migrated to Rome in that same period from that same region, so it wouldn’t surprise me that there were a lot of interconnections between those two family groups based on that history alone.
Dr Rad 43:35
Well, and this is something that we used to talk about, I think, a bit more when we had consuls, allegedly.
Dr Rad 43:42
Mm. which
Dr Rad 43:43
is that you do see people from similar families often sort of running together, you know. We definitely see these associations between particular gens, where they, they are, they do have an association with each other, and it does seem like there is intermarriage, perhaps, going on. They do have these historic connections. We know the tradition is very important for the Romans, so we know there are allies and rivalries between these rival families, even though there aren’t that many of these clans.
Dr G 44:21
Yeah, even in this early period, and so because Romans are so interested in families and family history, the other group that’s worth mentioning here is the Julii, because again they are one of these families that seems to move into Rome under Tullus Hostilius from Alba, and so we’ve got these three big gens in this moment in time, and they’re all taking up spots in the military tribunate with Consular Power for this year, so it seems like we’re leaning into old families for the most part, except for our maybe our stray plebeian,
Dr Rad 44:58
so random, yeah. Yeah,
Dr G 45:01
I mean, I hope he’s a plebeian, but it’s hard to know. We have so little to go on, but certainly the name stands out for being a little bit different, and one that we’re not used to seeing.
Dr Rad 45:12
I was gonna say, I don’t recognize it. Yeah, not like the others.
Dr G 45:16
Yeah, and so all of a sudden I was like, oh, does this bear more investigation, perhaps, but that is about all that I have for this year, because I really, I don’t have a narrative to hang my hat on, and so that’s where I’m at, 388 BCE.
Dr Rad 45:31
That is great, Dr. G. I think that means it’s time for the partial pick. All right, Dr. G, please tell me, in case I have somehow forgotten, how does the partial pick work?
Dr G 45:48
Ah, the partial pick, so Rome is capable of winning 50 golden eagles, but only if they manage to score 10 golden eagles in five categories.
Dr Rad 46:00
All right, Dr. G, what is our first category?
Dr G 46:04
Military clout.
Dr Rad 46:06
Well, not a lot of detail, but it goes well for the Romans in this year. Not perhaps the most impressive conquest to capture a couple of cities that weren’t expecting you in the slightest, but nonetheless, it all goes well. Not a lot of death, it would seem, on the Roman side.
Dr G 46:27
Yeah, look, I don’t think the Romans would be fussy about was it just or unjust at this point in time. They decided it was just, so they
Dr Rad 46:36
definitely think they’ve got a cause. This is really just them saying, “Oh yeah, you want to start a war for no apparent reason. Guess what, you could play that game.
Dr G 46:45
You started it, but we’re gonna finish it
Dr Rad 46:48
exactly. So, what do we say? Like a, like a six, a five? I don’t know. I don’t
Dr G 46:54
know, maybe a five. It’s not like a glorious.. it doesn’t.. I think from our perspective it doesn’t feel just, but from their perspective it seems reasonable enough, and they seem
Dr Rad 47:03
it does, but there’s not a great sense of triumph about it. I guess it’s not like they’re adding heaps of territory or something like that.
Dr G 47:11
That’s true.
Dr Rad 47:12
Yeah. Okay. Five. It is
Dr G 47:15
all right. Then we move on to diplomacy
Dr Rad 47:17
again. When there is warfare, there tends to be little diplomacy. I don’t think so.
Dr G 47:26
Yeah, no mention of any ambassador at any point in time in this year, it’s a zero.
Dr Rad 47:30
Yeah, yeah.
Dr G 47:32
All right, expansion.
Dr Rad 47:33
No, there’s no mention that these towns that they attack added to their territory, per se. I mean, they capture them, but I think that just means they get to take all this stuff and set the rest on fire.
Dr G 47:49
Wow. Okay. Zero.
Dr Rad 47:51
Yeah.
Dr G 47:52
We’re tous
Dr Rad 47:54
again. In spite of the fact that there is military success, no one is really singled out for doing anything exceptionally daring or heroic.
Dr G 48:04
Yes, exactly. So, even though we’ve got all of these names, it’s not like they were like, you know, Lucius really stood out on the battlefield today because he did a thing, then everyone was like, “Wow,
Dr Rad 48:16
I don’t even hear who decided on the whole six hour shift tactic.
Dr G 48:20
Wow. Okay, so another zero. So far, so good. Rome, can you climb from the depths with the final category, the citizen score?
Dr Rad 48:31
Well, I think it’s actually quite a good time to be a citizen, because we’ve got a bunch of new citizens. So well done, them. They got land magic, the Romans don’t give that away easily. They’ve apparently managed to rebuild their city entirely and add some fancy things like hewn stone substructures.
Dr G 48:54
Very impressive. Okay, but what about those Romans that were living in Veii and were demanded to return?
Dr Rad 49:01
Well, look, they might be a bit grumpy, but let’s face it, they’re coming back to their home, and perhaps they managed to drag their feet long enough that everyone else did the rebuilding for them, and their tactic worked. They were threatened with death. Yeah, but you know what? I feel like the Romans are not shocked by that. They’re like, yeah, yeah, all right. I’ll be there on the 15th, or you’ll cut my head off, yeah.
Dr G 49:27
Oh
Dr Rad 49:29
my god, god senators, so embarrassing.
Dr G 49:34
Yeah, I mean, that’s not good though. I can’t.. we’ve got to take a few points off whatever the score is for that.
Dr Rad 49:39
Oh, yeah, look, it might not be a 10 out of 10, but I guess it’s just.. I don’t know, I guess I’m just.. I’m not shocked by the whole ‘you can’t live in Veii’ narrative, like for the 100th time. How many times do we have to say this? You can’t live in vain demonstrably untrue. Was doing it for ages until you threatened me with death. I don’t know. No, no, Roman lives in Bay. That’s our next T-shirt. No Romans live in Bay.
Dr G 50:12
On the other hand, and obviously we’re in murky territory, but the matrons get their money back.
Dr Rad 50:16
That’s what I mean. The matrons are getting their money back. There are gold bowls with Camillus name sitting around the city’s rebuilt in record time, and in an improved way. There’s just so much, and on top of that, okay, bad for the people that are captured, but as usual, we have to take it from the Roman point of view here, because that’s what this podcast is about. From their perspective, there is wealth coming in from all these military victories, even though it might be informed we find highly morally repugnant these days.
Dr G 50:50
All right. Well, yes. So I’d say we’re dealing with maybe a seven,
Dr Rad 50:55
an eight. Could you go an eight? Well, come on, like I mean, really, for the citizens, they often have a terrible time.
Dr G 51:04
That is true. Yeah, only some of them were threatened with death,
Dr Rad 51:09
and you know what? It was the lazy ones, the ones that hadn’t bothered to come back to Rome and help with the rebuilding effort.
Dr G 51:16
Did you even see what I did with that apartment in Veii? I don’t see if you’d seen it, you wouldn’t say I was lazy.
Dr Rad 51:22
Okay, come on. Eight
Dr G 51:27
fine. Yes, I accept.
Dr Rad 51:29
Thank you. All right. That means, Dr. G, that the Romans end up with a total of 13 golden eagles, surprisingly low. The funny thing is, I think often these sorts of years where like stuff is happening, but it’s not these pivotal moments. It’s often in those important moments, even when they’re bad for Rome overall, like the Gaelic sack, because they are such dramatic moments and such important moments in Rome’s history. You do get so many stories of how people reacted and behaved, that often they get higher scores, oddly, because of things like virtus and stuff like that. In peaceful times, our scoring system does not fare well.
Dr Rad 52:14
Rome
Dr G 52:14
is not designed for peace,
Dr Rad 52:15
that’s what I mean, that’s the problem. Yeah, Rome is not designed for peace, so they score low, and that’s the thing, I think, by their, we’re judging them by their own standards, right? So, by their own standards, this is a bit of a
Dr G 52:27
yeah, we haven’t done the things, you know, we could have been better on the battlefield, we were there, could have been waiters, there wasn’t. Oh, well,
Dr Rad 52:35
all right, Dr. G, well, that wraps up 388 for us, and I’m very excited to get into what happens next. I have to tell you, there might be a return to the conflict of the orders. All
Dr G 52:47
right. Well, I’ll look forward to that.
Dr Rad 52:57
Thank you for listening to this episode of The Partial historians, you can find our sources, sound credits, and an automated transcript in our show notes. Our music is by Bettina Joy De Guzman. The partial historians is part of the Memory Collective, creators and educators dedicated to sharing knowledge that is accessible, contextualized, socially conscious, and inclusive. To find more from the Memory Collective, head to collectivemem.com You can support us by buying us a coffee on Kofi, but you can also support our show and help us to produce more amazing content about the ancient world by becoming a Patreon, in return you receive exclusive early access to our special episodes and ad-free content. Today, we would like to say Salve to our newest Patreon, Captain Ducky. Welcome aboard, Captain. However, if you are trying to save up for some hewn stone. Please just tell someone about the show, or give us a five star review. Until next time, we are yours in ancient Rome.
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