Livy it Up
Every once in a while, I am seized with a perverse desire to pick up a really musty old book and plow through it. Funny about those classics – some of ‘em are pretty good. Right now, I’m reading Rome and the Mediterranean, covering the history of pre-Imperial Rome from 201-167 BC, as related by first-century Roman historian Titus Livius (known as Livy). This is the era when the Roman republic fought a series of wars with neighboring empires in Carthage, Macedonia and Persia – wars characterized by Livy as efforts to extend the benefits of freedom to peoples living under oppressive and unjust regimes.
What’s amazing about Livy’s accounts is how cogently the policies and arguments are presented. Unlike the Bible, whose characters seem remote and whose motivations often seem opaque to contemporary readers, the cast in Livy seem drawn from the ranks of present-day politicians. Indeed, some of the situations and debates seem eerily familiar, and way people lined up on the issues more than 2200 years ago bears little distinction from the principles and politics of the current day.
The volume opens with a debate in the Senate over the wisdom of launching a pre-emptive war to rid Greece of the odious rule of King Philip of Macedonia. The Roman army had only just survived a bloody conflict with Hannibal, the fanatically anti-Roman leader of Carthage, and there seemed little appetite for another battle in another place. The argument that carried the day is that Rome could not sit back and wait to be attacked on its own soil, but must carry the battle to the enemies' country and thus deal with the root of the problem. Only when democracy be restored to the Greek cities could Rome rest easy within its sovereign borders. Never mind that the enemy in Greece was somehow confused and muddied up with the real enemy Hannibal (still at large, despite the rout of his forces) – the principle was the same.
So the Roman legions sail to Greece – a land divided by all kinds of factional in-fighting. For the most part, they are well-received, although their motives are questioned and some accuse them of harboring imperial ambitions. By the end of the war, they defeat Philip and restore the freedom of most of the Greek cities, but, exhausted by battle, they don’t take the final step of deposing Nabis, the tyrant of Sparta, who has extended his brutal regime over the important city of Argos, claiming that it was part of the ancestral domain of Sparta and that his forces had been welcomed into the city by the public authorities.
Now Nabis was a bad guy. He seized power from the lawful kings of Sparta by claiming to be a populist. He freed some slaves, and elevated lower classes such as his own tribesman to ruling positions in the city and countryside. But he also imprisoned and executed his critics, terrorized the population through all kinds of evil tricks and cunning, and constantly threatened his neighbors. His son-in-law Pythagoras was as bloodthirsty as his patron, and reportedly, for his own amusement, tortured athletes who did not compete well at the Olympic games and conducted other fiendish policies against the hapless population of Argos. The rest of Greece, as well as a sizeable community of Spartan expatriots, were dying to get rid of these folks and urged the Romans to finish the job they had started.
The problem is, Nabis had been a useful ally of the Romans in the recent war against Philip, and the Romans had turned a blind eye to his abuses when the alliance served their purpose. Called before the Roman general at a peace negotiation, Nabus reportedly said the following:
“If I had been able to think of any reason why you should have declared war, I should have awaited my fate in silence, but if I am to perish, I cannot restrain my desire to know why I am to perish… Like all citizens of Sparta, I am linked to Rome by a most ancient and sacred treaty, and, as a personal matter, have renewed this friendship and alliance during the war against Philip.
“...But what tells against me is the title of tyrant, and also my action of summoning slaves to liberty and bringing indigent lower classes into the countryside. As for the title, I can reply that, whatever kind of man I am, I am no different when you yourself made alliance with me. At that time, as I remember, you addressed me as ‘king.’ Now, I observe that I am called ‘tyrant’…”
To this, the Roman replies:
“…Could anything be less consistent than for the people waging war against Philip for the liberation of Greece to establish a treaty of friendship with a tyrant? And with a tyrant unmatched in savagery and violence towards his own people? Even if you had not taken Argos by fraud, even if you were not now in fraudulent possession of that city, it would be incumbent on us, engaged as we are in the liberation of the whole of Greece, to restore Sparta to her ancient liberty and laws…
“You speak of your invitation to slaves to enjoy freedom and your distribution of land to the needy… But what are they in comparison with the misdeeds daily committed, one after the other, by you and your supporters? Put on a free assembly in either Argos or Sparta if you would like to hear genuine accusations against an unbridled despotism. To pass over all other crimes of remoter times, what a hideous massacre was committed at Argos, almost under my very eyes, by that son-in-law of yours, Pythagoras!”
And so, the Romans, clearly on the side of right and justice in this case, liberate Argos, besiege Sparta, depose Nabis and his rotten clan, and restore freedom to Greece using their vast military superiority. Unfortunately, while they are at it, Hannibal has been plotting with the Persian king in Asia to embroil the over-extended Romans in more difficulties at home and abroad.
The Romans, now pre-occupied on other fronts, evacuate Greece with a warning to preserve the peace among themselves. But old rivalries soon come to the fore and it’s not long before the whole place dissolves into chaos again. Eventually, to preserve order, Rome must station permanent garrisons overseas and interfere more and more in the internal affairs of its allies and neighbors. As this condition becomes permanent, the democratic institutions of the Roman republic give was to the increasing militarization of society. Julius Caesar’s military coup is averted by his assassination, but civil war results in the end of the Republic and the installation of the first emperor, Augustus.
The rest, as they say, is history.
