221 Sentences With "optimates" | Random Sentence Generator

Though the Optimates had opposed him for the entirety of his political career, Pompey also found himself as the leader of the Optimates' faction once their civil war with Julius Caesar began in 49 BC. Optimates who (along with disillusioned Populares) had carried out Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 BC called themselves Liberatores (liberatores meaning "liberators").

Etcheto adds that the name of Optimates—the conservative faction in the Senate of the later Republic—possibly originates from this title of optimus vir, claimed by Nasica Serapio, who was also the first leader of the Optimates during Tiberius Gracchus' tribunate.

The establishment of individual power bases both within Rome and in the provinces undermined Cicero's guiding principle of a free state, and thus the Roman Republic itself. This factionalised the Senate into cliques, which constantly engaged each other for political advantage. These cliques were the optimates, led by such figures as Cato, and in later years Pompey, and the populares, led by such men as Julius Caesar and Crassus. Although the optimates were generally republicans, some leaders of the optimates had distinctly dictatorial ways.

Still outnumbered, Caesar recovered and went on to decisively defeat the Optimates under Pompey at Pharsalus. Pompey then fled to Egypt, where to Caesar's consternation, Pompey was assassinated. The remaining Optimates, not ready to give up fighting, regrouped in the African provinces. Their leaders were Marcus Cato (the younger) and Caecilius Metellus Scipio.

In the past the Phrygian Goths were often linked to the later Gothograeci, but this theory is not widely held today. The elite unit of the Optimates, first attested in the late 6th century under the Emperor Maurice, is sometimes thought to have its origins in the Goths of Radagaisus defeated by Stilicho in 406. According to Olympiodorus, Stilicho recruited a large number, called optimates, to serve in the Roman army. These Gothic optimates are thought to have been settled in Asia Minor, giving their name to Gothograecia and the later thema of Optimaton.

Then two of the optimates' legions switched to Caesar's side. Emboldened, Caesar marched on Thapsus and besieged the city at the beginning of February 46. The optimates could not risk the loss of this position and were forced to accept battle. Scipio commanded "without skill or success", and Caesar won a crushing victory which ended the war.

Caesar's formative years were a time of turmoil, and "savage bloodshed". The Social War was fought from 91 to 88 BC between Rome and her Italian allies over the issue of Roman citizenship, while Mithridates of Pontus threatened Rome's eastern provinces. Domestically, Roman politics was divided between politicians known as optimates and populares. The optimates tended to be more conservative,Greenblatt, Miriam. 2005.

In general, the Optimates favored the nobiles and opposed the ascension of novi homines into Roman politics, though exceptions exist. For instance, Cicero (a strong supporter of the Optimates' cause) was himself a novus homo, being the first in his family to enter the Senate—he was thus never fully accepted by the Optimates. On the other hand, during the civil war of 49 BC, Julius Caesar of a respectable old family contended against a Senate championed by Pompey, who was from a wealthy yet recently ennobled family. In addition to their political aims, the Optimates opposed the extension of Roman citizenship and sought the preservation of the mos maiorum, the ways of their forefathers, as well as the preservation of the sanctity of status quo property rights (opposing the debt reform and land distribution sought by the Populares).

Carbo was suspected of having been involved in the sudden death of Scipio Aemilianus in 129 BC. He subsequently went over to the optimates, and (when consul in 120 BC) successfully defended Lucius Opimius, the murderer of Gaius Gracchus. He was impeached for the murder of a citizen without a trial (Gaius Gracchus). At trial, he said that Gracchus had been justly slain. But the optimates did not trust Carbo.

Populares politicians had been proposing this kind land of reform since the introduction of the agrarian law of Tiberius Gracchus in 133 BC, which had led to his murder. Attempts to introduce such agrarian laws since then were defeated by the optimates. Thus, the opposition to the bill sponsored by Pompey came within this wider historical context of optimate resistance to reform as well as the optimates being suspicious of Pompey. A crucial element in the defeat of the bill sponsored by Pompey was the fact what the optimates had a strong consul in Quintus Caecilius Metellus Celer who vehemently and successfully resisted its enactment, while the consul sponsored by Pompey, Lucius Afranius, was ineffective.

John Edwin Sandys detects an Optimates grouping at time of the death of Tiberius Gracchus in 133 BC.. The Optimates' cause reached its peak under the dictatorship (81 BC) of Lucius Cornelius Sulla. Sulla's administration stripped the assemblies of nearly all power, raised the number of members of the Senate from 300 to 600, executed an equally large number of Populares via proscription lists and settled thousands of soldiers in northern Italy. However, after Sulla's withdrawal from public life (80 BC) and subsequent death (78 BC) many of their policies were gradually reversed. Besides Sulla, notable Optimates included Lucullus, Cato the Younger, Titus Annius Milo, Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus and Marcus Junius Brutus the Younger.

This is unlikely, however, since it requires soldiers recruited in the west to have settled far to the east, and there is a gap in the records of the Gothic optimates of well over a hundred years. John Haldon argues that, while the original Maurician Optimates were predominantly recruited mainly from among the Goths and to a lesser extent Lombards in Italy and the Balkans, they and their families were only settled in Mysia in the early 7th century under Tiberius Constantine and are unrelated to the Goths of Radagaisus of two centuries earlier. Thus, Optimates and Gothograeci are originally synonyms. They were Arians and had an Arian church in Constantinople under Tiberius.

Available from eBook Collection (EBSCOhost) in Ipswich, Massachusetts. Retrieved 16 November 2017. As a result, he joined forces with Caesar and Crassus. After the death of Crassus, Pompey drifted towards the Optimates.

Caesar was opposed by an oligarchy of aristocratic families, the optimates, who dominated the Senate and nearly monopolized state offices, who profited by the city's corruption and exploited the foreign conquests. They blocked the change necessitated by the times, stifling or coopting, at times by violence, any who advanced progressive programs. Although the state was dangerously unsteady, and the city often rent by armed mobs, the optimates rested on their heritage of the Roman tradition.Mommsen, A History of Rome (1854–1856; 1862–1864; reprint by The Free Press 1957), e.g.

33, 34, 36 He was an associate of Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, who led a reaction of the populares faction against the optimates after the death of Sulla. He was the father of Brutus, the assassin of Julius Caesar.

Plutarch termed the opposition "the secret disease from which the state had long been suffering." The tribunes were primarily populares. They relied for their authority on the laws of the assemblies. The consuls and praetors were primarily optimates.

442; Craig gives a bibliography of commentaries on the text. The advocate for Verres, against whom the chosen orator must bend his rhetorical skills, was Quintus Hortensius Hortalus, the ally of the optimates and principal orator of the day.

Catulus, by then the principal leader of the Optimates, testified in his favor. Catiline was acquitted.Cicero, "In Catilinam" III.9; Asconius 91C He was praetor in 68 BC, and for the following two years was the propraetorian governor for Africa.

He was impeached by Lucius Crassus on a similar charge, and, feeling that he had nothing to hope for from the optimates and that his condemnation was certain, he committed suicide.See Livy, Epit. 59; Appian, Bell. Civ. 1.18: Vell. Pat. ii.

Underneath the royal class were the nobles (called optimates by the Romans) and warriors (called armati by the Romans). The warriors consisted of professional warbands and levies of free men.Speidel (2004) Each nobleman could raise an average of c. 50 warriors.

Thereafter Hiempsal II became king. Cf. Ilevbare, Carthage, Rome and the Berbers (Ibadan University 1980), 175. During an armed phase of political-economic struggle for Rome between populares led by Marius and optimates under Sulla, Hiempsal II apparently favored the aristocratic Sulla.

In the beginning of February, Caesar arrived in Thapsus and besieged the city, blocking the southern entrance with three lines of fortifications. The Optimates, led by Metellus Scipio, could not risk the loss of this position and were forced to accept battle.

Sulpicius had changed allegiance from the optimates to the populares to qualify for the magistracy. As blandishment, Marius promised the relief of Sulpicius’ ruinous debt. Declaring a preventative cessation of business, the two consuls were attacked by Sulpicius’ men in assembly. Rufus escaped somehow.

They all ran away, except for the consul Gaius Piso, who was arrested. Gabinius had him freed. The optimates tried to persuade the other nine plebeian tribunes to oppose the bill. Only two, Trebellius and Roscius, agreed, but they were unable to do so.

After this battle, the presence of the Populare threat to the Optimates in the north of Italy was completely destroyed. In the south, Sulla would soon win another victory for his cause at the Battle of the Colline Gate which largely ended the war.

The Siege of Massilia, including a naval battle, was an episode of Caesar's civil war, fought in 49 BC between forces loyal to the Optimates and a detachment of Caesar's army. The siege was conducted by Gaius Trebonius, one of Caesar's senior legates, while the naval operations were in the capable hands of Decimus Brutus, Caesar's naval expert. Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus had become proconsul of Gaul and was sent to gain control of Massilia (modern Marseille) in order to oppose Caesar. As Caesar marched to Hispania (en route to the Battle of Ilerda), the Massiliots closed their gates to him, having allied with Ahenobarbus and the Optimates.

Sulla won prosecution of the Mithridatic War. These electoral victories represent a break-away from the political machine of which Gaius Marius was boss. He headed the Populares party; Sulla and Rufus were of the Optimates. Marius had nevertheless until now sponsored the career of Sulla.

The First Battle of Clusium was a battle that took place in June of 82 BC during the Roman Republic's Second Civil War. The battle pitted the Optimates under the command of Lucius Cornelius Sulla against the Populares commanded by Gnaeus Papirius Carbo. The battle ended indecisive.

He marched rapidly on Rome and captured it. Pompey, the optimates, and most of the Senate fled to Greece. Piso was sent to Hispania Ulterior (in modern Spain). There he served as a proquaestor, a type of military auditor, under Pompey's legates (legionary commanders) Lucius Afranius and Marcus Petreius.

The ballot laws were highly controversial and strongly opposed by the optimates. Pliny remarks: The first ballot law (the lex Gabinia tabellaria) was introduced in 139 BC for the election of magistrates by the tribune Aulus Gabinius, whom Cicero called "an unknown and sordid agitator".Cicero, p. 477.

457, note 64. In 48 BC, Scipio brought his forces from Asia to Greece, where he manoeuvred against Gnaeus Domitius Calvinus and Lucius Cassius until the arrival of Pompeius. At the Battle of Pharsalus, he commanded the centre. After the optimates' defeat by Caesar, Metellus fled to Africa.

Milo was an ally of Pompey and of the Optimates. He organized bands of armed slaves, hired thugs and gladiators in opposition to Clodius, who supported Pompey's rival, Julius Caesar, and the Populares. The two opposing factions clashed in the streets of Rome between 57 BC and 52 BC.

Celer, who was serving as governor of Gaul, wrote in support of Cicero. The charge was dismissed.Jones & Sidwell, p. 104 When he was consul in 60 BC Metellus Celer sided with the Optimates and vigorously opposed Pompey in everything because he had divorced his sister.Cassius Dio, Roman History, 37.49.

Lucius Julius Caesar had at least one son, also named Lucius. This son chose to join the optimates faction and opposed his father (Lucius) and uncle (Gaius) in the civil war. After the Battle of Thapsus in 46 BC, Lucius the younger was killed by the victorious soldiers.

The Optimates (; Latin for "best ones", singular: ), also known as boni ("good men"), were a conservative political faction in the late Roman Republic. They formed in reaction against the reforms of the Gracchi brothers—two tribunes of the plebs between 133 and 121 BC who tried to pass an agrarian law to help the urban poor, and a political reform that would have diminished the influence of the senatorial class. As the Optimates were senators and large landowners, they violently opposed the Gracchi, and finally murdered them, but their program was upheld by several politicians, called the Populares ("favouring the people"). For about 80 years, Roman politics was marked by the confrontation of these two factions.

The Metelli were distinguished as a family for their unwavering support of the party of the Optimates. The etymology of their name is quite uncertain. Festus connects it, probably from mere similarity of sound, with mercenarii. The history of the family is very difficult to trace, and in many parts conjectural.

Cicero, Att. V 21 He returned to Rome a rich man, where he married Claudia Pulchra.Cicero. ad Fam. iii. 4. From his first appearance in the Senate, Brutus aligned with the Optimates (the conservative faction) against the First Triumvirate of Marcus Licinius Crassus, Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, and Gaius Julius Caesar.

While several leaders of the Optimates were patricians—belonging to the oldest noble families—such as Sulla or Scipio Nasica Serapio, many were plebeians: the Caecilii Metelli, Pompey, Cato the Younger, Titus Annius Milo, etc. Cicero—the most famous Optimas—was even a novus homo (the first of his gens to be senator).

The Battle of Sacriporto also called the Battle of Scariportus took place in April of 82 BC during Sulla's Second Civil War. The battle pitted the Optimates under the command of Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix against the Populares forces commanded by Gaius Marius the Younger. The battle resulted in a decisive Optimate victory.

Piso's father was one of the participants in the Catiline Conspiracy, a plot by a group of aristocrats and disaffected veterans led by the distinguished ex-general and military governor Lucius Sergius Catilina and aimed at overthrowing the Roman Republic with the help of foreign armed forces. Despite this his son was a strong supporter of the self described optimates, or boni ("good men"). The boni were the traditionalist senatorial majority of the Republic, politicians who believed that the role of the Senate was being usurped by the legislative people's assemblies for the benefit of a few demagogic social reformers (known as the populares). The optimates were against anyone who attempted to use these legislative assemblies to reform the state.

It could be argued that the formation of the first triumvirate was the result of the marginalisation of an enemy (Caesar) and an outsider (Pompey) and the rebuttal of interests associated with Crassus by the optimates who held sway in the senate. A Roman bust of Lucius Cornelius Sulla in the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek With respect to the aristocratic circles of the optimates who wanted the supremacy of the senate over Roman politics, Pompey was an outsider. He built his political career as a military commander. He raised three legions in his native Picenum (in central Italy) to support Lucius Cornelius Sulla in retaking Rome, which had been seized by the supporters of Gaius Marius prior to Sulla's second civil war (83–82 BC).

Moreover, at the time of the creation of the first triumvirate, Pompey was at odds with the optimates. The suspension of his praetorship in 62 BC by the senate when he advocated the recall of Pompey had probably shown Caesar that his enemies had the means to marginalise him politically. To attain the consulship Caesar needed the support of Pompey and Crassus who, besides being the two most influential men in Rome, did not belong to the optimates and were thus likely to be politically marginalised as well. Plutarch maintained that Caesar sought an alliance with both men because allying with only one of them could have turned the other against him and he thought that he could play them off against each other.

The Battle of Ruspina was fought on 4 January 46 BC in the Roman province of Africa, between the Republican forces of the Optimates and forces loyal to Julius Caesar. The Republican army was commanded by Titus Labienus, Caesar's former supporter who had defected to the Republican side at the beginning of the civil war.

The Battle of Fidentia was a battle that took place in September of 82 BC at Fidentia during the context of Sulla's Second Civil War. The battle pitted the Optimates under the command of Marcus Terentius Varro Lucullus against the Populares forces commanded by Lucius Quincius. The battle resulted in a decisive Optimate victory.

The Battle of Faventia was a battle that took place in September of 82 BC at Faventia during the context of Sulla's Second Civil War. The battle pitted the Optimates under the command of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius against the Populares forces commanded by Gaius Norbanus Balbus. The battle resulted in an Optimate victory.

The Triumvirate disintegrated at Crassus' death. Crassus had acted as mediator between Caesar and Pompey, and, without him, the two generals manoeuvred against each other for power. Caesar conquered Gaul, obtaining immense wealth, respect in Rome and the loyalty of battle-hardened legions. He also became a clear menace to Pompey and was loathed by many optimates.

After Publius's death at Carrhae, Scipio decided to succeed Caesar as the father-in- law of Pompey, who was at least thirty years older than Cornelia. The marriage is one of the acts by which Pompey severed his alliance to Caesar and declared himself the champion of the optimates. He and Scipio were consuls together in 52.

Tuditanus was also an author but only a few fragments of his works have been preserved. Cicero emphasized his elegant style.Cicero, Brutus 95. In the internal Roman power struggles Tuditanus belonged to the Optimates and wrote a tendentious treatise on Roman constitutional law (libri magistratuum) in at least thirteen books for the political support of his party.

Sallust, Bellum Catilinae XXIII.5-XIV.1 The Optimates were particularly repulsed because he promoted the plight of the urban plebs along with his economic policy of tabulae novae, the universal cancellation of debts.Sallust, Bellum Catilinae XXI.2 He was brought to trial later that same year, but this time it was for his role in the Sullan proscriptions.

Quintus Caecilius Metellus Numidicus (c. 160 BC – 91 BC) was an ancient Roman statesman and general, he was a leader of the Optimates, the conservative faction of the Roman Senate. He was a bitter political opponent of Gaius Marius. He was consul in 109 BC, in that capacity he commanded the Roman forces in Africa during the Jugurthine War.

Hardy, Ernest G. (1924). Some Problems in Roman History: 143-4. Upon the start of the civil war, Marcellus fled Rome with the optimates and joined the Republican Grand Army in Epirus. After the Battle of Pharsalus, Marcellus abandoned opposition to Caesar, and withdrew in an honorable exile to Mytilene, where he was left unmolested by Caesar.

The tension between the Patricians and the Plebeians had produced a system of two parties: the Populares and the Optimates. The government itself was bicameral. The Senate was a body of officials appointed from the senatorial class. Its purpose was to issue decrees, which were to be carried out by the two consuls, who were elected magistrates.

From left to right: Julius Caesar, Marcus Licinius Crassus, and Pompey the Great When Pompey returned to Rome from the Third Mithridatic War, he asked the Roman senate to ratify the acts of his settlements with the cities, kings and princes in the east. This was opposed by the senators, particularly the optimates, who were suspicious of the power Pompey had acquired with the lex Gabinia and the lex Manilia and the popularity he gained with his military successes. They saw him as a threat to their supremacy and as a potential tyrant. In 60 BC, the optimates also defeated a bill that would have distributed farm land to Pompey's veterans, and to some of the landless urban poor of Rome, who relied on a grain dole distributed by the state to survive.

Cato the Younger, a member of the Optimates faction, was one of the chief architects of the decree which provoked Caesar into civil war. The feud between Caesar and Pompey erupted into open confrontation by early 49 BC. The consuls for the year, Gaius Claudius Marcellus Maior and Lucius Cornelius Lentulus Crus, were firm Optimates opposed to Caesar.Caesar, B.G. 8.50 Pompey, though remaining in Rome, was then serving as the governor of Spain and commanded several legions. Upon assuming office in January, Antony immediately summoned a meeting of the senate to resolve the conflict: he proposed both Caesar and Pompey lay down their commands and return to the status of mere private citizens.Plutarch, Antony, 6 His proposal was well received by most of the senators but the consuls and Cato vehemently opposed it.

However Marcus Petreius and Gnaeus Calpurnius Piso appeared with 1,600 Numidian cavalry and a large number of light infantry who harassed Caesar's legionaries as they retreated. Caesar redeployed his army for combat and launched a counterattack that drove the Optimates forces back over high ground. Petreius was wounded at this point. Completely exhausted, both armies withdrew back to their camps.

However, in the Life of Cato, Plutarch did not mention any calls for a dictator and instead he wrote that there were calls for Pompey to preside over the elections. Cato the Younger opposed this. In both versions the violence among the three factions continued and the elections could not be held. The optimates favoured entrusting Pompey with restoring order.

Hinard, 2000, p. 786Jallet-Huant, 2009, pp. 39–40 Though Antony was well liked by his soldiers, most other citizens despised him for his lack of interest in the hardships they faced from the civil war.Plutarch, Antony, 8 By the end of the year 49 BC, Caesar, already the ruler of Gaul, had captured Italy, Spain, Sicily, and Sardinia out of Optimates control.

Antony again protested and, in his capacity as an Augur, declared the omens were unfavorable and Caesar again backed down.Plutarch, Antony, 11.3, less clear from Dio. Seeing the expediency of removing Dolabella from Rome, Caesar ultimately pardoned him for his role in the riots and took him as one of his generals in his campaigns against the remaining Optimates resistance.

After a fair amount of turmoil, Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus and Marcus Licinius Crassus were elected to the consulship for 55 BC. Marcus Porcius Cato was put forward by the optimates for the praetorship. Pompeius and Crassus successfully defeated Cato, securing the election for Vatinius.Plutarch, Cato minor, 42; Pompey, 52. After his year in office, Vatinius was accused of bribery by Licinius Calvus.

In 54 BC, Vatia was praetor. As praetor he opposed Gaius Pomptinus in his endeavour to obtain a triumph. At the start of the civil war, Vatia defected from the optimates to Caesar. Caesar made him his colleague as consul for 48 BC. Caesar soon left Rome to fight Pompey in Greece and left Vatia in command of the city.

Caesar was later proclaimed dictator first for ten years and then in perpetuity. The latter arrangement triggered the conspiracy leading to his assassination on the Ides of March in 44 BC. Following this, Antony and Caesar's adopted son Octavius would fight yet another civil war against remnants of the Optimates and Liberatores faction, ultimately resulting in the establishment of the Roman Empire.

Indeed, he and Brutus enjoyed a close relationship at this time. Even when Brutus joined Pompey the Great to fight with Caesar and his soldiers, Caesar's main focus was Pompey, but he demanded Brutus be captured alive. After the defeat of the Optimates at the Battle of Pharsalus, Brutus surrendered and wrote to Caesar with apologies. Caesar immediately forgave him.

When Sulla became dictator he sent Metellus to Spain to quell a revolt of the Lusitanians there. When the optimates assumed control the populares all officially lost their commands. The provincial officers either kept their commands illegally or became mercenaries. The Lusitanians had hired Quintus Sertorius away from command of Roman troops in Africa to lead them as a mercenary with proconsular powers.

The populares were winning the issue of the tribes. The Lex Plautia Papiria and its predecessor, the Lex Julia, provided for the acceptance of some Italic individuals and communities into the tribal structure (as full citizens). They were already making a difference. A proposed measure to "distribute the new citizens among all thirty-five tribes" was vetoed by the optimates.

The Tusculum portrait, a bust of Julius Caesar in the Archaeological Museum of Turin, Italy With the support of Pompey and Crassus, Caesar was elected consul for 59 BC. The most controversial measure Caesar introduced was an agrarian bill to allot plots of land to the landless poor for farming, which encountered the traditional conservative opposition. In Cassius Dio's opinion, Caesar tried to appear to promote the interests of the optimates as well as those of the people, and said that he would not introduce his land reform if they did not agree with it. He read the draft of the bill to the senate, asked for the opinion of each senator and promised to amend or scrap any clause that had raised objections. The optimates were annoyed because the bill, to their embarrassment, could not be criticised.

This brought him into conflict with the optimates whom Sulla had put back in power.Tom Holland, Rubicon, p.102. In 77 BC, when he was recalled from his proconsulship of Gaul, he returned to Rome at the head of an army and an armed conflict erupted. Lepidus' forces were defeated in a battle near the Milvian Bridge and as a result his rebellion failed.

The resulting battle was a decisive victory for Caesar. Though the civil war had not ended at Pharsulus, the battle marked the pinnacle of Caesar's power and effectively ended the Republic.Davis, 1999, p. 59 The battle gave Caesar a much needed boost in legitimacy, as prior to the battle much of the Roman world outside Italy supported Pompey and the Optimates as the legitimate government of Rome.

Milo was a strong candidate for he had won popular support through largesse and the promotion of extravagant games, and he enjoyed the support of the Optimates. Pompey, however, gave his support to Milo's opponents. Plautius was an old quaestor of his and Scipio was his father-in-law. Meanwhile, Clodius feared he would achieve little as praetor if Milo were to become consul.

A ban on guild associations referred to by Cicero (In Pisonem 8) was extended to suppress the Compitalia. The political aspect suggests why the display of Gratidianus' image would be viewed as dangerous in the rivalry between the populares and the optimates, the faction of Sulla. Cicero uses his cousin's subsequent fall as a cautionary tale about relying on popular support.Cicero, De officiis 3.80.

Pompey fled to Egypt and was killed upon arrival. Scipio was defeated in 46 BC at the Battle of Thapsus in North Africa. He and Cato committed suicide shortly after the battle. The following year, Caesar defeated the last of the Optimates under his former lieutenant Labienus in the Battle of Munda and became Dictator perpetuo (Dictator in perpetuity or Dictator for life) of Rome.

The Battle of the Asio River took place in March of 82 BC during the context of Sulla's Second Civil War. The battle pitted the Optimates under the command of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius and Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus against the Populares forces commanded by Gaius Carrinas. This battle marked the start of this phase in the civil war and resulted in an Optimate victory.

Anthon & Smith, pg. 724; Holmes, pg. 282 He continued to give support to the party which soon became known as the Optimates, in 59 BC speaking in opposition of Julius Caesar’s agrarian law, while in 57 BC he spoke in support of Cicero’s return from exile.Anthon & Smith, pg. 724 Gellius was still alive in 55 BC when Cicero delivered his speech against Lucius Calpurnius Piso, but died soon afterwards.Anthon & Smith, pg.

It included land that had been forfeited but not allotted by Lucius Cornelius Sulla when he distributed land to settle his veterans in 80 BC and holdings in Arretium (Arezzo) and Volaterrae (Volterra), both in Etruria. Land was to be purchased with the new revenues from the provinces for the next five years. The optimates opposed the bill because it suspected that 'some novel power for Pompey was aimed at.

Caesar claimed that he was killed by the optimates who did not want to be exposed. The crowd gave Caesar a bodyguard. According to Appian, it is at this point that Bibulus withdrew from public business and did not go out of his house for the rest of his term of office. Caesar, who ran public affairs on his own, did not make any further investigations into this affair.

Plutarch wrote that Pompey also asked Caesar for the troops he had lent him back, using the Parthian war as a pretext. Although Caesar knew why Pompey asked this, he sent the troops back home with generous gifts. Appian wrote that Caesar gave these soldiers a donation and also sent one of his legions to Rome.Appian, The Civil Wars, 2.29 Pompey was drifting toward the optimates and away from Caesar.

Antony was strong because of his familiarity with the soldiers, and powerful due to his consulship. If Antony was not to join them, then they must assassinate Antony as well, lest he interfere with the conspiracy. Eventually, this idea was expanded upon and split the conspirators into two factions. The optimates, the "Best Men" of Rome, among the conspirators wanted to go back to the way things were before Caesar.

Roma As quaestor (104 BC) he superintended the imports of grain at Ostia, but was removed by the Roman Senate (an unusual proceeding), and replaced by Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, one of the chief members of the Optimates. He does not appear to have been charged with incapacity or mismanagement, and the standard view is that the injustice of his dismissal drove him into the arms of the Populares.

After being informed of this victory, Marcus Terentius Varro Lucullus at once attacked the camp of Lucius Quincius, the second in command of Norbanus Balbus who had previously marched to (and was defeated at) Fidentia with 5 Legions. His numerical disadvantage not withstanding, his troops fought bravely and obtained victory, taking the Populare camp. The Populares lost around 18,000 soldiers whilst the Optimates lost relatively few.Paulus Orosius, Histories, 5, 20, 5.

II 15, 3 During the civil wars (88-80 BC), Pius sided with Lucius Cornelius Sulla and the Optimates. He successfully commanded Sulla's forces in the northern theatre (northern Italy and Cisalpine Gaul). In 81 BC he became Pontifex Maximus, then consul the following year alongside Sulla. As proconsul Pius fought against Sertorius (a former supporter of Marius) on the Iberian Peninsula; in the so-called Sertorian War.

Cassius returned to Rome in 50 BC, when civil war was about to break out between Julius Caesar and Pompey. Cassius was elected tribune of the Plebs for 49 BC, and threw in his lot with the Optimates, although his brother Lucius Cassius supported Caesar. Cassius left Italy shortly after Caesar crossed the Rubicon. He met Pompey in Greece, and was appointed to command part of his fleet.

The Optimates were first set up in the late 6th century (c. 575), by Emperor Tiberius II Constantine (r. 574–582).. According to the Strategikon of Emperor Maurice, the Optimates were an elite regiment of Foederati, most likely of Gothic origin.. They were a cavalry corps, somewhere between one and five thousand strong, and formed part of the central reserve army, their commander bearing the then unique title of taxiarchēs.. The presence of descendants of these men, called Gothograeci () by the chronicler Theophanes the Confessor, is attested in northern Bithynia as late as the early 8th century.. At that time, Warren Treadgold estimates that the corps numbered 2,000 men, a figure that possibly corresponds to its original size as well.. In the mid-8th century, under the rule of Emperor Constantine V (r. 741–775), and as part of his measures to reduce the power of the thematic generals following the revolt of Artabasdos, the Count of the Opsician Theme, the corps was downgraded.

The Gracchi brothers, Tiberius and Gaius, were Romans who both served as tribunes of the plebs between 133 and 121 BC. They attempted to redistribute the occupation of the ager publicus—the public land hitherto controlled principally by aristocrats—to the urban poor and veterans, in addition to other social and constitutional reforms. After achieving some early success, both were assassinated by the Optimates, the conservative faction in the senate that opposed these reforms.

During this period, it chose its own shufets () and minted its own bronze coins with the head of "Neptune" or the Sun. During the civil war between Pompey and Julius Caesar, G. Considius Longus secured Hadrumetum for the Optimates with forces equivalent to two legions. Despite being reinforced by Gn. Calpurnius Piso's Berber cavalry and footmen from Clupea, however, he was obliged to allow Caesar to land nearby on 28 December 47.Caesar & al.

Gaius Sosius Gaius Sosius (fl. 66 – 17 BC) was a Roman general and politician. Gaius Sosius was elected quaestor in 66 BC and praetor in 49 BC. Upon the start of the civil war, he joined the party of the Senate sometimes called optimates by modern scholars (even though the term belongs to the era of Sulla and Marius). Upon the flight of Pompey to Greece, Sosius returned to Rome and submitted to Julius Caesar.

In 88 BC Lucius Cornelius Sulla marched his legions on Rome starting a civil war. Quintus Sertorius, a client of Gaius Marius, joined his patron's faction and took up the sword against the Sullan faction (mainly optimates). After the death of Lucius Cornelius Cinna and Gaius Marius, Sertorius lost faith with his factions leadership. In 82 BC, during the second war against Sulla, he left Italy for his assigned propraetorian province in Hispania.

In 88 BC Lucius Cornelius Sulla marched his legions on Rome starting a civil war. Quintus Sertorius, a client of Gaius Marius, joined his patron's faction and took up the sword against the Sullan faction (mainly optimates). After the death of Lucius Cornelius Cinna and Gaius Marius, Sertorius lost faith with his faction's leadership. In 82 BC, during the second war against Sulla, he left Italy for his assigned propraetorian province in Hispania.

Mark Antony had lost the support of many Romans and supporters of Caesar when he initially opposed the motion to elevate Caesar to divine status.Eck (2003), 11. Octavian failed to persuade Antony to relinquish Caesar's money to him. During the summer, he managed to win support from Caesarian sympathizers and also made common with the Optimates, the former enemies of Caesar, who saw him as the lesser evil and hoped to manipulate him.

Caesar was a skilled and energetic politician and exactly the man Pompey was looking for. Caesar also enjoyed the support of Marcus Licinius Crassus, allegedly Rome's wealthiest man and a political force on his own. Crassus had also seen his agenda blocked by the Optimates. Caesar won the election for one of the two consulships for 59 BC, and could provide the kind of support needed for Pompey's and Crassus's bills to be passed.

In 94 BC Sulla repulsed the forces of Tigranes the Great of Armenia from Cappadocia.Olbrycht 2009: 173. In 93 BC Sulla left the East and returned to Rome, where he aligned himself with the optimates in opposition to Gaius Marius. Sulla had done quite well in the East; restoring Ariobarzanes to the throne, being hailed Imperator on the field by his men, and being the first Roman to make a treaty with the Parthians.

In 88 BC Lucius Cornelius Sulla marched his legions on Rome starting a civil war. Quintus Sertorius, a client of Gaius Marius, joined his patron's faction and took up the sword against the Sullan faction (mainly optimates). After the death of Lucius Cornelius Cinna and Gaius Marius, Sertorius lost faith with his faction's leadership. In 82 BC, during the second war against Sulla, he left Italy for his assigned propraetorian province in Hispania.

The Optimates gathered their forces to oppose Caesar with astonishing speed. Their army included 40,000 men (about 8 legions), a powerful cavalry force led by Caesar's former right-hand man, the talented Titus Labienus, forces of allied local kings, and 60 war elephants. The two armies engaged in small skirmishes to gauge the strength of the opposing force, during which two legions switched to Caesar's side. Meanwhile, Caesar expected reinforcements from Sicily.

Gothograecia () was a region in northwestern Asia Minor on the south side of the Sea of Marmara from at least the late 7th century until the mid-10th. It was part of the region of Opsikion in the Roman (Byzantine) Empire. Its inhabitants, the Greek-speaking descendants of a group of Goths, were known as Gothograeci (Γοτθογραικοί, Gotthograikoi). The Gothograeci probably originated as an elite mercenary unit in the late 6th century, the Optimates.

The 130s and 120s BC were a turning point for Roman politics. The ballot laws were introduced at a time of rising popular sentiment that saw the rise of populares politicians, who gained power by appealing to the lower classes. Most notably, these included Tiberius Gracchus in 133 BC and Gaius Gracchus a decade later. The resulting conflict between populares and optimates would lead to the dissolution of political norms and the rise of political violence.

Before he did so, he introduced the final ballot law. The law was passed and the prosecution was successful, resulting in Popilius being sentenced to exile. Cicero, who wrote in relation to the Cassian law that the optimates dreaded the "impetuosity of the masses and the licence accorded by the ballot" on matters affecting their safety, wrote: "as long as he [Coelius] lived he repented of having injured the republic, for the purpose of oppressing Caius Popilius".

Upon crossing the Rubicon, Plutarch reports that Caesar quoted the Athenian playwright Menander in Greek, saying anerrhiphthō kubos (ἀνερρίφθω κύβος; let the dice be tossed).Plutarch, Caesar 60.2 Suetonius gives the Latin approximation alea iacta est (the die has been tossed).Suetonius, Julius 32 The Optimates, including Metellus Scipio and Cato the Younger, fled to the south, having little confidence in the newly raised troops especially since so many cities in northern Italy had voluntarily surrendered.

Metella seduced several of Julius Caesar's intimate friends, in order to get the family name cleared after the defeat of the Optimates in the battles of Pharsalus and Munda. Amongst her non-political lovers is the poet Ticida, who wrote about Metella, giving her the name of Perilla. Her last known lover was one Aesopo, a wealthy member of the equites, who supported the Caecilii Metelli for a few years. Her date of death is unknown.

Bibulus retired to his home and did not appear in public for the rest of his consulship, instead sending notices declaring that it was a sacred period and that this made votes invalid each time Caesar passed a law. The plebeian tribunes who sided with the optimates also stopped performing any public duty. The people took the customary oath of obedience to the law. Cassius Dio wrote that Cato and Quintus Metellus Celer refused to swear compliance.

However, in the Life of Cato, Plutarch did not mention any calls for a dictator and instead he wrote that there were calls for Pompey to preside over the elections, which Cato opposed. In both versions, the violence among the three factions continued and the elections could not be held. The optimates favoured entrusting Pompey with restoring order. Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus, the former enemy of the triumvirate, proposed in the senate that Pompey should be elected as sole consul.

Rome: Part Two: From the Late Republic to the Fall of the Roman Empire: 121 BC to 476 AD (2010, audio video file). Phil Sheppard Productions. Retrieved from World History in video database. Caesar managed to pass an agrarian law for a land reform, which had not been achieved since the agrarian law of Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus of 133 BC as all subsequent attempts at agrarian legislation had been thwarted by the opposition and obstructionism of the Optimates.

Nigidius sided with the Optimates in the civil war between Julius Caesar and Pompeius Magnus. Among his contemporaries, Nigidius's reputation for learning was second only to that of Varro. Even in his own time, his works were regarded as often abstruse, perhaps because of their esoteric Pythagoreanism, into which Nigidius incorporated Stoic elements. Jerome calls him Pythagoricus et magus, a "Pythagorean and mage," and in the medieval and Renaissance tradition he is portrayed as a magician, diviner, or occultist.

In 88 BC, Lucius Cornelius Sulla marched his legions on Rome starting a civil war. Quintus Sertorius, a client of Gaius Marius, joined his patron's faction and took up the sword against the Sullan faction (mainly optimates). After the death of Lucius Cornelius Cinna and Gaius Marius, Sertorius lost faith with his factions leadership. In 82 BC, during the second war against Sulla, he left Italy for his assigned propraetorian province in Hispania.Plutarch, Life of Sertorius , 6.

Therefore, Phrygia, Lycaonia, Galatia, Cappadocia, Cilicia, Upper Colchis, Pontus and Armenia as well as the forces of Lucullus were added to his command. Plutarch noted that this meant the placing of Roman supremacy entirely in the hands of one man. The optimates were unhappy about so much power being given to Pompey and saw this as the establishment of a tyranny. They agreed to oppose the law, but they were fearful of the mood of the people.

Sulla rose to prominence during the war against the Numidian king Jugurtha, whom he captured through betrayal, although his superior Gaius Marius took credit for ending the war. He then fought successfully against Germanic tribes during the Cimbrian War, and Italic tribes during the Social War. He was even awarded the Grass Crown for his command in the latter war. Sulla played an important role in the long political struggle between the Optimates and Populares factions at Rome.

Publius's brother had been married to a daughter of Q. Caecilius Metellus Creticus (consul 69 BC), probably around 63–62 BC;Syme, "The Sons of Crassus," reprint p. 1223ff. both matches signal their father's desire for rapprochement with the optimates, despite his working arrangements with Caesar and Pompeius, an indication that perhaps the elder Crassus was more conservative than some have thought.Lily Ross Taylor, Party Politics in the Age of Caesar (University of California Press, 1949), p.

On the outbreak of the civil war, Varus, an adherent of the optimates, was stationed in Picenum at the head of a considerable force. Upon the approach of Caesar, he was forced to evacuate the area. He and his levies joined Pompey in Apulia. When Pompey left Italy for Greece, Varus crossed over into Africa, and took possession of his former province, which had been allotted to Q. Aelius Tubero for the purpose of obtaining grain.

Publius Cornelius Lentulus, nicknamed Spinther because of his likeness to a popular actor of that name, came from an ancient Roman patrician family of the Cornelia gens. Although treated with great favour by Julius Caesar, Spinther eventually came to support the aristocratic senatorial cause of Caesar's great rival Pompeius Magnus and to align himself with the Optimates party. This proved an unwise move that would eventually lead to his political destruction and perhaps to his death.

Cicero was only distantly related to one notable person born in Arpinum, Gaius Marius.Rawson, E. "Cicero, a portrait" (1975) pp. 2–3 Marius led the populares faction during a civil war against the optimates of Lucius Cornelius Sulla in the 80s BC. Cicero received little political benefit from this connection. In fact, it may have hindered his political aims, as the Marian faction was ultimately defeated and anyone connected to the Marian regime was viewed as a potential troublemaker.

Brutus eventually came to oppose Caesar and fought on the side of the Optimates faction, led by Pompey, against Caesar's forces in the Civil War (49–45 BC). Pompey was defeated at the Battle of Pharsalus in 48 BC, after which Brutus surrendered to Caesar, who granted him amnesty. However, the underlying political tensions that led to the war had not been resolved. Due to Caesar's increasingly monarchical behavior, several senators, calling themselves "Liberators", plotted to assassinate him.

Violent gangs of the urban unemployed, controlled by rival Senators, intimidated the electorate through violence. The situation came to a head in the late 2nd century BC under the Gracchi brothers, a pair of tribunes who attempted to pass land reform legislation that would redistribute the major patrician landholdings among the plebeians. Both brothers were killed and the Senate passed reforms reversing the Gracchi brother's actions. This led to the growing divide of the plebeian groups (populares) and equestrian classes (optimates).

After having driven the Optimates from Italy, in March 49 BC Caesar turned his attention to the Republican army in the Spanish provinces. On his way to Spain, Caesar was delayed when the port city of Massilia rebelled under the leadership of Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus in April. Leaving the siege of Massilia to Gaius Trebonius and Decimus Junius Brutus Albinus, Caesar moved to Hispania Citerior to reinforce the three legions he had sent there as an advance guard under his legate Fabius.

Moreover, it would give Caesar popularity and power. Even though no optimate spoke against it, no one expressed approval. The law would distribute public and private land to all citizens instead of just Pompey's veterans and would do so without any expense for the city or any loss for the optimates. It would be financed with the proceeds from Pompey's war booty and the new tributes and taxes in the east Pompey established with his victories in the Third Mithridatic War.

Transactions and proceedings of the American Philological Association. Vol. 97. p. 573. Pompey was also a member of the First Triumvirate. The Optimates in the Senate side-lined him and frustrated his attempts to have his settlements in the east after his victory in the Third Mithridatic War ratified and to promote an agrarian reform to redistribute land to his veterans. Pompey's attacks pushed back Mithridates and Pompey even managed to get Mithridates's son to become an ally of Rome.

He had extensive patronage networks. Caesar was elected, and proposed an agrarian bill to the plebeian council, which Pompey and Crassus publicly supported. The bill passed over the opposition of his colleague as consul, Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus, whose election had been funded by the optimates due to his opposition to Caesar and his bill. Calpurnius Bibulus subsequently retired from politics and Caesar had the acts of Pompey's settlements in the east passed.Appian, The Civil Wars, 2.10-12Cassius Dio, Roman History, 38.2.

The Optimates favoured the ancestral Roman laws and customs, as well as the supremacy of the Senate over the popular assemblies and the tribunes of the plebs. They also rejected the massive extension of Roman citizenship to Rome's Italian allies advocated by the Populares. Although suspicious of powerful generals, they sided with Pompey when they came to believe that Julius Caesar—himself a Popularis—planned a coup against the Republic. They disappeared with their defeat in the subsequent Civil War.

Although Clodius was a patrician, and it later suited Cicero to portray him as a participant in the conspiracy, he was not involved. Instead, he adhered closely to Murena and the cause of the optimates, who rendered Cicero every assistance. As the drama of the detection and arrest of the conspirators unfolded, Clodius appears to have joined the many other equestrian and noble youths, who formed an informal, but potent and intimidating bodyguard around Cicero.Plutarch, "The Life of Cicero", 29.

One of Marius' old quaestors, Lucius Cornelius Sulla, had been elected consul for the year, and was ordered by the senate to assume command of the war against Mithridates. Marius, a member of the "populares" party, had a tribune revoke Sulla's command of the war against Mithridates. Sulla, a member of the aristocratic ("optimates") party, brought his army back to Italy and marched on Rome. Sulla was so angry at Marius' tribune that he passed a law intended to permanently weaken the tribunate.

Pompey fled Rome and organized an army in the south of Italy to meet Caesar. The war was a four-year-long politico-military struggle, fought in Italy, Illyria, Greece, Egypt, Africa, and Hispania. Pompey defeated Caesar in 48 BC at the Battle of Dyrrhachium, but was himself defeated much more decisively at the Battle of Pharsalus. The Optimates under Marcus Junius Brutus and Cicero surrendered after the battle, while others, including those under Cato the Younger and Metellus Scipio fought on.

The result unforeseen by the assassins was that Caesar's death precipitated the end of the Roman Republic.Florus, Epitome 2.7.1 The Roman middle and lower classes, with whom Caesar was immensely popular and had been since before Gaul, became enraged that a small group of aristocrats had killed their champion. Antony, who had been drifting apart from Caesar, capitalised on the grief of the Roman mob and threatened to unleash them on the Optimates, perhaps with the intent of taking control of Rome himself.

Piso bitingly replied: Feeling threatened by populist politician and general Julius Caesar, the optimates enlisted Pompey into their ranks in 53. In 50 the Senate, led by Pompey, ordered Caesar to disband his army and return to Rome because his term as a governor had ended.Suetonius, Julius 28 Caesar thought he would be prosecuted if he entered Rome without the immunity enjoyed by a magistrate. On 10 January 49 he crossed the Rubicon river, the boundary of Italy, and ignited the Great Roman Civil War.

After defeating Pompey the Great and the optimates at Pharsalus, Julius Caesar went to Asia Minor and then to Egypt. In Asia province he left Calvinus in command with an army including the XXXVI Legion, made up mainly of veterans from Pompey's disbanded legions. With Caesar preoccupied in Egypt and the Roman republic in the midst of civil strife, Pharnaces saw an opportunity to expand his Kingdom of the Bosphorus into his father's old Pontic empire. In 48 BC he invaded Cappadocia, Bithynia, and Armenia Parva.

He wanted the senate to ratify the acts of the settlements he had made with the kings and cities in the region en bloc. He was opposed by the optimates led by Lucius Licinius Lucullus, who carried the day in the senate with the support of Cato the Younger.Plutarch, Parallel Lives, The Life of Pompey, 49.3 Pompey had taken over the command of the last phase of that war from Lucullus, who felt that he should have been allowed to continue the war and win it.

There were suspicions that he was lying about Cicero and Lucullus as well and that this was a ploy by Caesar and Pompey to discredit the optimates. There were various theories, but nothing was proven. After naming the mentioned men in public, Vettius was sent to prison and was murdered a little later. Caesar and Pompey suspected Cicero and their suspicions were confirmed by his defence of Gaius Antonius Hybrida in a trial.Cassius Dio, Roman History, 38.9 Other writers blamed either Pompey or Caesar.

Julius Caesar exemplified this once he became Roman dictator, involving himself in attracting teachers and doctors and the replacement of slaves on farms (important issues to the poor), but also disbanding clubs fellow Popularist Publius Clodius Pulcher used to maintain his own infuence, seeing him as a threat to his rule. Those in the Populares tradition also tended to oppose the use of the death penalty. A true distinction between the populares and optimates usually only showed intermittently, however, mainly in relation to some contentious measure.

Caesar also pursued a policy of conciliating Crassus and Pompey, who had become rivals over the last decade.John Leach, Pompey the Great, pp 120-121 Thus, Caesar brought into being this alliance between these three men, which historians call the First Triumvirate. Together these three men could break the resistance of the Optimates. Pompey's political clout was based on his popularity as a military commander and on the political patronage and purchase of votes for his supporters and himself that his wealth could afford.

Sertorius, however, did manage to become a senator on the strength of his earlier quaestorship. In 88 BC, after being sidelined by his political opponents, Sulla marched his legions on Rome and took the capital. He took revenge on his enemies and forced Marius into exile, Sulla then left Italy to fight the First Mithridatic War against Mithridates VI of Pontus. After Sulla left, violence erupted between the optimates, led by the consul Gnaeus Octavius, and the populares, led by the consul Lucius Cornelius Cinna.

Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius (129–63 BC) was a Roman politician and general. Like the other members of the influential Caecilii Metelli family, he was a leader of the Optimates, the conservative faction opposed to the Populares during the last century of the Roman Republic. His father Metellus Numidicus was banished from Rome through the machinations of Gaius Marius and the Populares. The son, because of his constant and unbending attempts to have his father officially recalled from exile, was given the agnomen (nickname) Pius.Cic.

The Battle of Thapsus was an engagement in Caesar's Civil War that took place on February 6, 46 BCThe date is that of the Roman calendar prior to the reforms of Julius Caesar. By the Julian calendar, it is February 7, 46 BC. near Thapsus (in modern Tunisia). The Republican forces of the Optimates, led by Quintus Caecilius Metellus Scipio, were decisively defeated by the veteran forces loyal to Julius Caesar. It was followed shortly by the suicides of Scipio and his ally, Cato the Younger.

In 49 BC, the last Republican civil war was initiated after Julius Caesar defied senatorial orders to disband his army following the conclusion of hostilities in Gaul. He crossed over the Rubicon river with the 13th Legion, a clear violation of Roman Law, and marched to Rome. The Optimates fled to Greece under the command of Pompey since they were incapable of defending the city of Rome itself against Caesar. Led by Caesar, the Populares followed, but were greatly outnumbered and defeated in the Battle of Dyrrhachium.

The populares would incorporate them into the existing tribes. However, these new assembleymen, who would be populares, would influence voting in favor of that party. The optimates would avoid this event by grouping the new citizens into a definite number of tribes, which could be defeated as a block in the assemblyA summary of the complex issue of the tribes may be found in (Gerrymandering). In 90 and 89, the last days of the Social War, the Romans were deciding the fates of the defeated Italic states.

Julius Caesar arrived at Lilybaeum in Sicily on 17 December 47 BC and built up an invasion force there to crush the Optimates in Africa. Caesar failed to gather enough transport shipping to carry his army of six legions in a single fleet and a large quantity of transport animals, food, and fodder were left behind in Sicily. Caesar hoped the supply situation would improve in Africa. He set sail on 25 December, but his poor planning based on limited information about a good landing site and strong winds scattered his convoy.

One aquilifer attempted to flee but Caesar grabbed the man, spun him around and shouted "the enemy are over there!" Caesar gave the order to make the battle line as long as possible and every second cohort to turn around, so the standards would be facing the Numidian cavalry in the Romans' rear and the other cohorts the Numidian light infantry to the front. The legionaries charged and threw their pila, scattering the Optimates infantry and cavalry. They pursued their enemy for a short distance, and began to march back to camp.

As such, Piso was an opponent of the First Triumvirate, an informal political alliance of Julius Caesar, Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (Pompey the Great), and Marcus Licinius Crassus.Appian, The Civil Wars, 2.8–9 Piso first came to notice in late 66 BC when he prosecuted Gaius Manilius (also known as Gaius Manilius Crispus), a plebeian tribune who was a supporter of Pompey. The prosecution was political; Manilius had passed laws which the optimates disapproved of. Specifically the lex Manilia which gave Pompey command of the Roman armies in the east during the war against Mithridates.

Everitt, Anthony: Cicero p. 215. Cicero traveled with the Pompeian forces to Pharsalus in 48 BC,Plutarch, Cicero 38.1 though he was quickly losing faith in the competence and righteousness of the Pompeian side. Eventually, he provoked the hostility of his fellow senator Cato, who told him that he would have been of more use to the cause of the optimates if he had stayed in Rome. After Caesar's victory at the Battle of Pharsalus on 9 August, Cicero refused to take command of the Pompeian forces and continue the war.

In politics Lepidus seems to have belonged to the optimates, a conservative political faction which supported the interests of the aristocracy. During his consulship he supported the opposition by Marcus Antius Briso (a plebeian tribune) against a bill on the introduction of voting by secret ballot in the Plebeian Council (Lex Cassia Tabellaria) proposed by another plebeian tribune, Lucius Cassius Longinus Ravilla. This bill would free the plebeian voters from electoral pressure. However, on the advice of Scipio Aemilianus Africanus, Brisio dropped his opposition and the bill was carried.

In the background of the formation of this alliance were the frictions between two political factions of the Late Republic, the populares and optimates. The former drew support from the plebeians (the commoners, the majority of the population). Consequently, they espoused policies addressing the problems of the urban poor and promoted reforms that would help them, particularly redistribution of land for the landless poor and farm and debt relief. It also challenged the power the nobiles (the aristocracy) exerted over Roman politics through the senate, which was the body that represented its interests.

Moreover, when he took over the command of the war Pompey ignored the settlements Lucullus had already made. Lucullus demanded that Pompey should render account for each act individually and separately instead of asking for the approval of all his acts at once in a single vote as if they were the acts of a master. The character of the acts was not known. Each act should be scrutinised, and the senators should ratify those that suited the senate.Cassius Dio, Roman History, 37.49, 50.1 Appian thought that the optimates, particularly Lucullus, were motivated by jealousy.

Tensions between Populares and Optimates had increased with the Catiline conspiracy (63 BC) against the consulship of Marcus Tullius Cicero (an Optimate) during which Cicero, supported by a final decree (senatus consultum ultimum) of the Senate, had some of the conspirators executed without trial. There were demonstrations against these summary executions and this display of arbitrary senatorial power. There were two attempts to counter senatorial dominance which failed, but they were popular. The proponents were Quintus Caecilius Metellus Nepos Iunior, a plebeian tribune; and Julius Caesar, who at the time was a praetor.

Jm Pompey's success as a general while still young enabled him to advance directly to his first consulship without meeting the normal cursus honorum (required steps in a political career). He was consul three times and celebrated three Roman triumphs. In 60 BC, Pompey joined Marcus Licinius Crassus and Gaius Julius Caesar in the unofficial military-political alliance known as the First Triumvirate, which Pompey's marriage to Caesar's daughter Julia helped secure. After Crassus and Julia's deaths, Pompey sided with the Optimates, the conservative faction of the Roman Senate.

Holland, Rubicon, p. 287 Caesar's glory in conquering Gaul had served to further strain his alliance with Pompey, who, having grown jealous of his former ally, had drifted away from Caesar's democratic Populares party towards the oligarchic Optimates faction led by Cato. The supporters of Caesar, led by Clodius, and the supporters of Pompey, led by Titus Annius Milo, routinely clashed. In 52 BC, Milo succeeded in assassinating Clodius, resulting in widespread riots and the burning of the senate meeting house, the Curia Hostilia, by Clodius' street gang.

233–34 Antony remained on Caesar's military staff until 50 BC, helping mopping-up actions across Gaul to secure Caesar's conquest. With the war over, Antony was sent back to Rome to act as Caesar's protector against Pompey and the other Optimates. With the support of Caesar, who as Pontifex Maximus was head of the Roman religion, Antony was appointed the College of Augurs, an important priestly office responsible for interpreting the will of the gods by studying the flight of birds. All public actions required favorable auspices, granting the college considerable influence.

Plutarch, Pompey, 56.4 During the southern march, Caesar placed Antony as his second in command. Caesar's rapid advance surprised Pompey, who, along with the other chief members of the Optimates, fled Italy for Greece. After entering Rome, instead of pursuing Pompey, Caesar marched to Spain to defeat the Pompeian loyalists there. Meanwhile, Antony, with the rank of propraetor—despite never having served as praetor—was installed as governor of Italy and commander of the army, stationed there while Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, one of Caesar's staff officers, ran the provisional administration of Rome itself.

At the age of nineteen he made his first speech at the bar and shortly afterwards successfully defended Nicomedes IV of Bithynia, one of Rome's dependents in the East, who had been deprived of his throne by his brother. From that time his reputation as an advocate was established. Through his marriage to Lutatia, daughter of Quintus Lutatius Catulus and Servilia, he was attached to the aristocratic party, the optimates. During Lucius Cornelius Sulla's dictatorship the courts of law were under the control of the Senate, the judges themselves being senators.

The Battle of Pharsalus was the decisive battle of Caesar's Civil War. On 9 August 48 BC at Pharsalus in central Greece, Gaius Julius Caesar and his allies formed up opposite the army of the republic under the command of Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus ("Pompey the Great"). Pompey had the backing of a majority of the senators, of whom many were optimates, and his army significantly outnumbered the veteran Caesarian legions. The two armies confronted each other over several months of uncertainty, Caesar being in a much weaker position than Pompey.

Hellenistic bronze of Sleeping Eros, the type of work that Verres extorted from Sicilian collectors During the First Civil War (88–87 BC), Verres supported Gaius Marius and the Populares, but soon went over to Sulla and the Optimates. After Sulla’s return from the East and his subsequent victory in the Second Civil War (84-81) Verres found himself on the winning side. Sulla made him a present of land at Beneventum and secured him against punishment for embezzlement. In 80 BC Verres served on the staff of Gnaeus Cornelius Dolabella, governor of Cilicia.

The Battle of Sena Gálica was a battle that took place in April or May of 82 BC during the context of Sulla's Second Civil War in the area around present day Senigallia. The battle pitted the Optimates under the command of Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, legatus of Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix against the Populares forces commanded by Gaius Marcius Censorinus who was in turn the legatus of Gnaeus Papirius Carbo. The battle resulted in a decisive Optimate victory. Immediately following the battle, the town was subjected to a brutal sacking by Sulla's victorious forces.

The Senate, not knowing that Caesar possessed only a single legion, feared the worst and supported Pompey, who declared that Rome could not be defended. He escaped to Capua with those politicians who supported him, the aristocratic Optimates and the regnant consuls. Cicero later characterised Pompey's "outward sign of weakness" as allowing Caesar's consolidation of power. Despite having retreated into central Italy, Pompey and the Senatorial forces were composed of at least two legions: some 11,500 soldiers and some hastily- levied Italian troops commanded by Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus.

427 Links with the equestrian class, combined with his status as a novus homo meant that Cicero was isolated from the optimates. Thus, it is not surprising that Cicero envisioned a "selfless nobility of successful individuals" rather than the patrician-dominated system. Senators had made huge profits by exploiting the provinces. Repeatedly, the oligarchy had proved to be short-sighted, reactionary and "operating with restricted and outmoded institutions that could no longer cope with the vast territories containing multifarious populations that was Rome at this point of its history".

The Battle of Munda (17 March 45 B.C.), in southern Hispania Ulterior, was the final battle of Caesar's civil war against the leaders of the Optimates. With the military victory at Munda, and the deaths of Titus Labienus and Gnaeus Pompeius (eldest son of Pompey), Caesar was politically able to return in triumph to Rome, and then govern as the elected Roman dictator. Subsequently, the assassination of Julius Caesar began the Republican decline that led to the Roman Empire, initiated with the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus.

207 After the suppression of the rebellion, he remained a legate through until 49 BC. Lucius Caesar was then caught up in the events of the civil war, as the Senate, under the influence of Marcus Porcius Cato, demanded that his cousin Gaius give up his armies and his Imperium when his proconsular command came to an end. Gaius refused and, taking his cousin Lucius with him, crossed the Rubicon. In the civil war which followed, Lucius supported Gaius in his fight against the senatorial faction known as the optimates.

Other key figures in the resistance were Titus Labienus, Publius Attius Varus, Lucius Afranius, Marcus Petreius and the brothers Sextus and Gnaeus Pompeius (Pompey's sons). King Juba I of Numidia was a valuable local ally. After the pacification of the Eastern provinces, and a short visit to Rome, Caesar followed his opponents to Africa and landed in Hadrumetum (modern Sousse, Tunisia) on December 28, 47 BC. After landing, Caesar's forces were engaged by the Optimates led by Petreius and Labienus, Scipio being absent. The result was ultimately indecisive and both sides retreated.

Marius had a Plebeian Tribune revoke Sulla's command of the war against Mithridates, so Sulla, a member of the aristocratic ("optimates") party, brought his army back to Italy and marched on Rome. Marius fled, and his supporters either fled or were murdered by Sulla. Sulla had become so angry at Marius' tribune that he passed a law that was intended to permanently weaken the Tribunate.Abbott, 103 He then returned to his war against Mithridates, and with Sulla gone, the populares under Marius and Lucius Cornelius Cinna soon took control of the city.

It became more and more difficult to govern an empire with institutions originally designed to administer a city-state. Certain powerful leaders (especially Marius, Sulla, and Caesar) tried to create a state in which they had autocratic power but also preserved the externals of the old ways. They were opposed by the conservatives (called the optimates by classical historians, though they themselves preferred the title boni or "good men"). The obtuse or simply ignorant resistance of these reactionaries, who are all (except for Cato) presented as degenerate or self-serving, made the creation of an autocracy necessary.

Landing of the Romans in Kent, 55 BC: Caesar with 100 ships and two legions made an opposed landing, probably near Deal. After pressing a little way inland against fierce opposition and losing ships in a storm, he retired back across the English Channel to Gaul from what was a reconnaissance in force, only to return the following year for a more serious invasion. In the mid-1st century BC, Roman politics were restless. Political divisions in Rome became identified with two groupings, populares (who hoped for the support of the people) and optimates (the "best", who wanted to maintain exclusive aristocratic control).

Cicero, who had been elected consul with the support of the Optimates, promoted their position as advocates of the status quo resisting social changes, especially more privileges for the average inhabitants of Rome. Shortly after completing his consulship, in late 62 BC, Cicero arranged the purchase of a large townhouse on the Palatine Hill previously owned by Rome's richest citizen, Marcus Licinius Crassus. It cost an exorbitant sum, 3.5 million sesterces, which required Cicero to arrange for a loan from his co- consul Gaius Antonius Hybrida based on the expected profits from Antonius's proconsulship in Macedonia.Dunstan, William (2010).

Lepidus was the son of Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (consul in 78), his mother may have been a daughter of Lucius Appuleius Saturninus. His brother was Lucius Aemilius Lepidus Paullus (consul in 50). His father was the first leader of the revived populares faction after the death of Sulla, and led an unsuccessful rebellion against the optimates in 78-77 (he was defeated just outside of Rome and fled to Sardinia where he died in 77). Lepidus married Junia Secunda, half-sister of Marcus Junius Brutus and sister of Marcus Junius Silanus, Junia Prima and Junia Tertia, Cassius Longinus's wife.

However, this measure, an unprecedented assertion of senatorial power over the life and death of Roman citizens, backfired for the optimates. It was seen by some as a violation of the right to a trial and led to charge of repressive governance, and gave the populares ammunition with which to challenge the notion of aristocratic dominance in politics and the prestige of the senate. Cicero's speeches in favour of the supremacy of the senate made matters worse. In 63 BC the plebeian tribunes Quintus Caecilius Metellus Nepos Iunior and Calpurnius Bestia, supported by Caesar, sharply criticized Cicero, who came close to being tried.

Plutarch, Parallel Lives, The Life of Caesar, However, the picture might have been more nuanced than this. Crassus may also have had another reason—having to do with the equites—for joining an alliance against the optimates. Cicero noted that in 60 BC Crassus advocated for the equites and induced them to demand that the senate annul some contracts they had taken up in the Roman province of Asia (in today's western Turkey) at an excessive price. The equites (equestrians) were a wealthy class of entrepreneurs who constituted the second social order in Rome, just below the patricians.

Private land was to be bought at the price assessed in the tax-lists to ensure fairness. The land commission in charge of the allocations would have twenty members so that it would not be dominated by a clique and so that many men could share the honour. Caesar added that it would be run by the most suitable men, an invitation to the optimates to apply for these posts. He ruled himself out of the commission to avoid suggestions that he proposed the measure out of self-interest and said that he was happy with being just the proposer of the law.

Roma is portrayed on the obverse, while the reverse depicts the Columna Minucia, with at the top a statue of his ancestor Lucius Minucius Augurinus, who as praefectus annonae in 439 BC organised a corn distribution. This coin participates to the Popularis propaganda in favour of the grain dole.Crawford, Roman Republican Coinage, pp. 273–276. A historian of the Late Republic cautions against understanding the terms populares and optimates as formally organized factions with an ideological basis: This summarizes the dominant interpretation of the Populares in 20th-century scholarship, deriving in large part from Ronald Syme in the Anglophone literature.

After Pompey's defeat former allies began to align themselves with Caesar as some came to believe the gods favored him, while for others it was simple self- preservation. The ancients took great stock in success as a sign of favoritism by the gods. This is especially true of success in the face of almost certain defeat – as Caesar experienced at Pharsalus. This allowed Caesar to parlay this single victory into a huge network of willing clients to better secure his hold over power and force the Optimates into near exile in search for allies to continue the fight against Caesar.

Robert Morstein-Marx, a historian of the Late Republic, cautions against understanding the terms populares and optimates as solid factions or as ideological groupings: This summarizes the dominant interpretation of the Populares in 20th-century scholarship, deriving in large part from Ronald Syme in the Anglophone literature. In the early 21st century and as early as the publication of the ninth volume of The Cambridge Ancient History in 1994,Andrew Lintott. "Political History, 146–96 B.C." in The Cambridge Ancient History (Cambridge University Press, 1994). p. 52. the validity of examining Popularist ideology in the context of Roman political philosophy has been reasserted.

April 12, 45 BC was the date of Caesar's famous "Gallic Triumph". The Battle of Munda, which occurred March 17, 45 BC in Hispania, would have occurred between episodes #10 and #11, although it is not mentioned in the series. It was the last military action in "Caesar's Civil War", and the end of the Optimates military opposition to Caesar. The only other man to be granted such sweeping powers over Rome – at least while it was still a Republic – was Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix, who used the power to turn the Republic into a bloodbath.

Through the course of the campaign of 82 BC, the Populares forces had divided into two groups, those in the north under the command of Gnaeus Papirius Carbo, and those in the south who were commanded by Gaius Marius the Younger. Sulla had successfully defeated Marius Battle of Sacriporto and had managed to pin Marius and his fellow survivors under a siege at Preneste. Rome itself soon after had fallen to the Optimates. Soon after, the war had shifted to Etruria where Sulla engaged in a pitched cavalry skirmish against Popular forces near the Glanis River, emerging victorious.

Cornelius Nepos, Life of Atticus (17) In 65 BC, Atticus returned from Athens to Rome. In keeping with his Epicurean sympathies, he kept out of politics to the greatest extent possible, except to lend Cicero a helping hand in times of peril — for instance, when Cicero was forced to flee the country in 49 BC, Atticus made him a present of 250,000 sesterces. All in all, his political activity was minimal, though we know that, like Cicero, he belonged to the optimates (the aristocratic party), and held generally conservative views. He was also a partner of the Triumvir Marcus Licinius Crassus.

674 In his history, anyone named Cornelius is considered a hero and anyone named Claudius is an enemy, and the opposition to the populares never went by a consistent name but were instead called "boni", "optime" or "optimates", implying that they were the good guys. Roman historiography is also very well known for subversive writing styles. The information in the ancient Roman histories is often communicated by suggestion, innuendo, implication and insinuation because their attitudes would not always be well received, as with Tacitus’ attitude to Tiberius.J Boardman, The Oxford History of the Classical World (OUP 1991) p.

Moving the Gothograeci, still renowned for the martial skill, from the Optimaton to the Opsikion may be responsible for the downgrading of the former to a logistical rather than fighting unit. It was probably punitive also for the Gothograeci, who lost prestige when incorporated into a thema that already included other elite units. This was probably because they were regarded as a threat to the capital owing to their proximity and their participation in a rebellion in 715. It is also probably only with Constantine V's reform that the Optimates' (and hence Gothograeci's) presence in Constantinople is brought to an end.

Palazzo Massimo alle Terme in the National Museum of Rome When Caesar's Civil War broke out in 49 BC between Pompey and Caesar, Brutus followed his old enemy and the present leader of the Optimates, Pompey. When the Battle of Pharsalus began on August 9, Caesar ordered his officers to take Brutus prisoner if he gave himself up voluntarily, but to leave him alone and do him no harm if he persisted in fighting against capture.Plutarch, Life of Brutus, 5.1. Caesar's concern, given that he and Brutus' mother Servilia had been lovers in their youth, was that Brutus might be his biological son.

Roman die ("The die has been cast") is a variation of a Latin phrase ( ) attributed by Suetonius to Julius Caesar on January 10, 49 BCE, as he led his army across the Rubicon river in Northern Italy. With this step, he entered Italy at the head of his army in defiance of the Senate and began his long civil war against Pompey and the Optimates. The phrase, either in the original Latin or in translation, is used in many languages to indicate that events have passed a point of no return. It is now most commonly cited with the word order changed ("Alea iacta est") rather than in the original phrasing.

The law threatened punishment for anyone who offered fire and water to those who had executed Roman citizens without a trial "qui civem Romanum indemnatum interemisset, ei aqua et igni interdiceretur." This was an ingenious means of forcing Cicero into exile without trying him directly. Cicero, an enemy of Clodius having executed members of the Catilinarian conspiracy several years before without formal trial, was clearly the intended target of the law. Caesar supported Clodius as he wanted Cicero exiled (Cicero was one of the leaders of the Senate's optimates, which was a group that opposed Caesar, Clodius, and other populares.) Pro Domo, 18, &c.

Confident that Caesar could be stopped by legal means, Pompey's party tried to strip Caesar of his legions, a prelude to Caesar's trial, impoverishment, and exile. To avoid this fate, Caesar crossed the Rubicon River and invaded Rome in 49 BC. Pompey and his party fled from Italy, pursued by Caesar. The Battle of Pharsalus was a brilliant victory for Caesar and in this and other campaigns he destroyed all of the optimates' leaders: Metellus Scipio, Cato the Younger, and Pompey's son, Gnaeus Pompeius. Pompey was murdered in Egypt in 48 BC. Caesar was now pre-eminent over Rome, attracting the bitter enmity of many aristocrats.

In distinguishing the two groups, he employed the Latin terms optimates for proponents of the Senate nobility and populares for elite proponents of the popular demos or commoners. She points to the Roman historians Sallust (86–34) and Livy (59 BC-AD 17) for partial confirmation, as well as to later writers Plutarch (c.46–120), Appian (c.95-c.165), and Dio (c.155-c.235), and later still Machiavelli (1469–1527).Lily Ross Taylor, Party politics in the age of Caesar (University of California 1949) at 8–14, with notes 18–54 at 187–193; especially at 10–12 and the historians in footnote 51.

There are references to their deaths in the Annales Fuldenses, Annales Bertiniani and in Thegan, cf. Coupland, 88. Probably both Eccihard and Hemming were responsible for the defence of Frisia from the Vikings, as a capitulary of 821 refers to "the counts who are responsible for coastal defence". If so, Hemming appears to have been the superior, since Thegan of Trier in his Gesta Hludowici imperatoris, an account of the reign of Louis the Pious, names him first when recording the dead, followed by "another leader, Eccihard, and many of the emperor's nobles".“Eccihardus alius dux et multi optimates imperatoris”, quoted in Coupland, 88 and note 17.

The same year, Caesar ran for election to the post of Pontifex Maximus, chief priest of the Roman state religion, after the death of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius, who had been appointed to the post by Sulla. He ran against two powerful optimates, the former consuls Quintus Lutatius Catulus and Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus. There were accusations of bribery by all sides. Caesar is said to have told his mother on the morning of the election that he would return as Pontifex Maximus or not at all, expecting to be forced into exile by the enormous debts he had run up to fund his campaign.

Pompey thus ordered a special inquest to investigate that as well as the murder of Clodius. Cicero refers to this incident throughout the Pro Milone by implying that there was greater general indignation and uproar at the burning of the curia than there was at the murder of Clodius.Asconius, Pro Milone, 33C The violent nature of the crime as well as its revolutionary repercussions (the case had special resonance with the Roman people as a symbol of the clash between the populares and the optimates) made Pompey set up a handpicked panel of judges. Thus, he avoided the corruption, rife in the political scene of the late Roman Republic.

The legion remained faithful to Caesar during the resulting civil war between Caesar and the conservative Optimates faction of the senate, whose legions were commanded by Pompey. Legio XIII was active throughout the entire war, fighting at Dyrrhachium (48 BC) and Pharsalus (48 BC). After the decisive victory over Pompey at Pharsalus, the legion was to be disbanded, and the legionaries "pensioned off" with the traditional land grants; however, the legion was recalled for the Battle of Thapsus (46 BC) and the final Battle of Munda (45 BC). After Munda, Caesar disbanded the legion, retired his veterans, and gave them farmland in their native Italy.

Caesar's Civil War (49–45 BC), also known as the Great Roman Civil War, was one of the last politico-military conflicts in the Roman Republic before the establishment of the Roman Empire. It began as a series of political and military confrontations, between Julius Caesar (100–44 BC), his political supporters (broadly known as Populares), and his legions, against the Optimates (or Boni), the politically conservative and socially traditionalist faction of the Roman Senate, who were supported by Pompey (106–48 BC) and his legions.Kohn, G.C. Dictionary of Wars (1986) p. 374 Prior to the war, Caesar had served for eight years in the Gallic Wars.

According to historical accounts, one night in April, Sulla had a dream that Gaius Marius told his son, Gaius Marius the Younger, that he should not give battle to Sulla's forces the following day. Encouraged by this premonition, Sulla decided to immediately give combat and called on Gnaeus Cornelius Dolabella who was encamped nearby. Dolabella's army was exhausted from marching in an intense rainstorm and the military tribunes had ordered that the army make camp rather than give battle. Emboldened by the enemy's lack of offensive action, Gaius Marius decided to attack thinking he would be able to surprise the Optimates and win the day.

Upon his return to Rome the elder Lucullus had succeeded in making himself and his family wealthy, and therefore influential, and was never prosecuted for his illegal conduct. His son, also Lucius Licinius Lucullus, was born around 144 BCArthur Keaveny, Lucullus: A Life, 1992 and, sometime around 119 BC, married Caecilia Metella, the daughter of Lucius Caecilius Metellus Calvus. She was also the sister of Metellus Numidicus (Consul 109 BC) and Metellus Dalmaticus (Consul 119 BC), two of the leading optimates of their day.Plutarch, Life of Lucullus This political marriage brought the Luculli the support and influence of the powerful Caecilii Metelli family which would help their own rise to prominence.

Due to the influence of a guest-friend of Nicomedes, Julius Caesar, then a young man, and an impassioned speech by the deceased king's sister, Nysa before the Senate, the gift was accepted. Rome was divided into two parties, the populares, party of the "people," and the optimates, party of the "best." The guest-friendship had been offered to Caesar, a popular, to save his life by keeping him from Rome during a proscription (a kind of witch-hunt) by Sulla, an optimate in power. Forever after Caesar had to endure scurrilous optimate slander about his relationship to Nicomedes, but Bithynia became a favored project of the populares.

Taking advantage of Pompey's absence from the Italian mainland, Caesar made an astonishingly fast 27-day, west-bound forced march to Hispania and destroyed the Pompeian army in the Battle of Ilerda. The Roman Republic, shown in green, at the time of the civil wars After the defeat of the Pompeian forces in Hispania, Piso escaped to North Africa. There the optimates raised an army which included 40,000 men (about eight legions), a powerful cavalry force led by Caesar's former right- hand man, the talented Titus Labienus, forces from local allied kings, and sixty war elephants. This force was commanded by Metellus Scipio, who placed Piso in command of the Numidian cavalry.

Cicero was both an Italian eques and a novus homo, but more importantly he was a Roman constitutionalist. His social class and loyalty to the Republic ensured that he would "command the support and confidence of the people as well as the Italian middle classes". The optimates faction never truly accepted Cicero, and this undermined his efforts to reform the Republic while preserving the constitution. Nevertheless, he successfully ascended the cursus honorum, holding each magistracy at or near the youngest possible age: quaestor in 75 BC (age 30), aedile in 69 BC (age 36), and praetor in 66 BC (age 39), when he served as president of the "Reclamation" (or extortion) Court.

The year is 49 BC, and Caesar has crossed the Rubicon, throwing the Roman Republic into civil war. At the same time, a favourite cousin of Pompey has been murdered, Pompey and the other leaders of the Optimates faction of the senate are leaving Rome to rally their forces against Caesar, but Pompey forces Gordianus to take on the job of solving the murder. To ensure himself of the Finder's diligence, he seizes his son-in-law and makes him join the Pompeian army, while Gordianus' adoptive son Meto, secretary to Caesar, is part of the other army marching on Rome. Category:Roma Sub Rosa Category:1999 American novels Category:49 BC Category:St.

Both brothers were murdered by their opponents, the Optimates, the conservative faction representing the interests of the landed aristocracy, which dominated the Senate. Several tribunes of the plebs later tried to pass the Gracchi's program by using plebiscites to bypass senatorial opposition, but Saturninus and Clodius Pulcher suffered the same fate as the Gracchi. Furthermore, many politicians of the late Republic postured as Populares to enhance their popularity among the plebs, notably Julius Caesar and Octavian (later Augustus), who finally enacted most of the Populares' agenda during their rule. The Populares counted a number of patricians, the most ancient Roman aristocrats, such as Appius Claudius Pulcher, Lucius Cornelius Cinna, and Julius Caesar among their number.

In the early 21st century and as early as the publication of the ninth volume of The Cambridge Ancient History in 1994,Andrew Lintott. "Political History, 146–96 B.C." in The Cambridge Ancient History (Cambridge University Press, 1994). p. 52. the validity of examining Popularist ideology in the context of Roman political philosophy has been reasserted. In particular, T. P. Wiseman has rehabilitated the use of the word "party" to describe the political opposition between Optimates and Populares, based on Latin usage (partes) and pointing to the consistency of a sort of party platform based on the food supply and general welfare of the populus ("people"), making land available to those outside the senatorial elite and debt relief.

Caecilia thus fled with her and Sulla's children with difficulty, informed Sulla that his villas had been burned and offered to help the Optimates (who supported Sulla) at home.Plutarch, Parallel Lives, The Life of Sulla, 21.1 After Sulla celebrated his triumph for his victory in Greece, Caecilia bore him twin children, "[Sulla] named the male child Faustus, and the female Fausta; for the Romans call what is auspicious and joyful, 'faustum.'"Plutarch, Parallel Lives, The Life of Sulla, 34.3 While Sulla was devoting a lavish feast in honour of the god Hercules, Caecilia was sick and dying. The priests forbade Sulla 'to go near her or to have his house polluted by her funeral.

He did not return until 82 BC, during the dictatorship of Lucius Cornelius Sulla. In 75 he was consul, and excited the hostility of the optimates by carrying a law that abolished the Sullan disqualification of the tribunes of the plebs from holding higher magistracies; another law de judiciis privatis, of which nothing is known, was abrogated by his brother Lucius Cotta. Cotta obtained the province of Gaul, and was granted a triumph for some victory of which we possess no details; but on the very day before its celebration an old wound broke out, and he was injured suddenly. According to Cicero, Publius Sulpicius Rufus and Cotta were the best speakers of the young men of their time.

He was allowed to have 200 ships, levy as many soldiers and oarsmen as he needed and collect as much money from the tax collectors and the public treasuries as he wished. The use of treasury in the plural might suggest power to raise funds from treasures of the allied Mediterranean states as well.Plutarch, Parallel Lives, The Life of Pompey, 25.2 Such sweeping powers were not a problem because comparable extraordinary powers given to Marcus Antonius Creticus to fight piracy in Crete in 74 BC provided a precedent.Williams, C.E., "Pompey and Cicero: An Alliance of Convenience", MA theses, Texas State University, 2013, p. 12 The optimates in the Senate remained suspicious of Pompey—this seemed yet another extraordinary appointment.

Marcus Claudius Marcellus was a Roman politician. Marcellus was elected curule aedile in 56 BC. In 52 BC he was elected consul, together with Servius Sulpicius Rufus, for the following year. During his consulship Marcellus proved himself to be a zealous partisan of Pompey and the optimates, and urged the Senate to extreme measures against Julius Caesar, managing to establish that the subject of recalling Caesar should be discussed on 1 March of the following year. He also considered the Lex Vitinia invalid, removing Roman citizenship from citizens of Comum, and caused a senator of Comum, who happened to be in Rome, to be scourged, a punishment Roman citizens were exempted from under the Lex Porcia.

This alliance had overthrown many of the formal legal institutions of the state, through their combined command of the Senate, the Centuriate Assembly and the Tribal Assembly of the Plebs. This friendship of convenience came to an end with the death of Crassus in 53 BCE, and Pompey's marriage to Cornelia Metella, the daughter of a fierce opponent of Caesar. Amid a fresh outbreak of political violence in Rome, Pompey was appointed sole consul in 52 and solidified his support among the Optimates in the Senate. Caesar, meanwhile, had concluded his conquest of Gaul and, aided by the publication of his Commentarii de Bello Gallico, had become a champion of the people.

Roman society from the outset was divided into tribes, which grew from a few at Rome during foundation to 35 in the 1st century BC in all Italy, excluding the Italian allies, which were independent states. Their loss of the Social War (91-88 BC) left them in uncertain status. If they were to be included as full citizens in the Roman state they needed to be organized into tribes, as all voting for office was done by the Tribal Assembly at Rome, composed of representatives from each tribe. The optimates and the populares collaborated to win the Social War, but after it their platforms on the disposition of the conquered Italian states differed sharply.

The Caecilii Metelli were one of the most important families of the late Roman Republic. They rose to prominence in the beginning of the third century, with the consulship of Lucius Caecilius Metellus Denter in 284 BC. It was however Quintus Caecilius Metellus—consul in 143—who greatly improved the prestige of the family, notably thanks to his victory during the Fourth Macedonian War, for which he received the agnomen Macedonicus. His descendants and those of his younger brother Lucius received an astonishing number of magistracies during the last century of the Republic. As the most powerful family in Roman politics, the Metelli distinguished themselves by their unwavering support of the Optimates, the conservative faction that opposed the social reforms advocated by the Populares.

Hercules and Omphale cross-dressed (mosaic from Roman Spain, 3rd century AD) Effeminacy was a favorite accusation in Roman political invective, and was aimed particularly at populares, the politicians of the faction who represented themselves as champions of the people, sometimes called Rome's "democratic" party in contrast to the optimates, a conservative elite of nobles.Edwards, pp. 63–64. In the last years of the Republic, the popularists Julius Caesar, Marcus Antonius (Mark Antony), and Clodius Pulcher, as well as the Catilinarian conspirators, were all derided as effeminate, overly-groomed, too-good-looking men who might be on the receiving end of sex from other males; at the same time, they were supposed to be womanizers or possessed of devastating sex appeal.Edwards, p. 47.

They saw him as a potential challenge to the supremacy of the senate, which they largely controlled and which had been criticized for the summary executions during the Catilinarian conspiracy. They saw a politically strong man as a potential tyrant who might overthrow the republic. Pompey remained aloof with regard to the controversies between optimates and populares that raged in Rome at the time when he returned from the Third Mithridatic War in 62 BC. Whilst he did not endorse the populares, he refused to side with the senate, making vague speeches that recognised the authority of the senate, but not acknowledging the principle of senatorial supremacy advocated by Cicero and the optimates.Mitchell, T., Cicero, Pompey and the rise of the First Triumvirate, Traditio, Vol.

However, it is very likely that the optimates would have opposed this in the senate, making it unlikely that this measure could have been passed if the two consuls had opposed each other on this issue. Livy’s Periochae (a short summary of Livy's work) recorded that "Marcus Crassus and Gnaeus Pompey were made consuls ... and reconstituted the tribunician powers."Livy Periochae, 97.6 Similarly, Suetonius wrote that when Caesar was a military tribune, "he ardently supported the leaders in the attempt to re-establish the authority of the tribunes of the commons [the plebeians], the extent of which Sulla had curtailed."Suetonius, The Twelve Caesars, Julius Caesar, 5 The two leaders must obviously have been the two consuls, Crassus and Pompey.

Moreover, the 65 BC proposal to annex Egypt occurred during the period of ascendancy of Pompey and followed the Gabinian Law (67 BC), which gave Pompey extraordinary proconsular powers in any province within 50 miles of the Mediterranean Sea to deal with the problem of piracy, and the 66 BC Manilian Law (which Cicero had supported), which gave Pompey the mandate to replace the previous Romans commander in the Third Mithridatic War and gave him supreme command in the last phase of this war. Sumner also notes that the opponents to these two laws were optimates and that Julius Caesar had supported them.G. V. Sumner, Cicero, Pompeius, and Rullus, Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, Vol. 97 (1966), p.

This led to the end of the Roman Republic and the beginning of rule by emperors. Caesar's commanders followed different paths. Labienus sided with the Optimates, the conservative aristocratic faction Caesar fought against in his civil war, and was killed at the Battle of Munda in 45 BC. Caius Trebonius, one of Caesar's most trusted lieutenants, was appointed consul by Caesar in 45 BC, and was one of the senators involved in Caesar's assassination on the Ides of March (March 15), 44 BC. He was himself murdered a year later. Caius Fabius held up the Pompeian forces at Ilerda until Caesar got there and won the Battle of Ilerda in 49 BC. Decimus Junius Brutus Albinus was entrusted with fleet operations by Caesar during his civil war.

A dispute between Caesar and the optimates faction in the Senate of Rome culminated in Caesar marching his army on Rome and forcing Pompey, accompanied by much of the Roman Senate, to flee in 49 BC from Italy to Greece, where he could better conscript an army to face his former ally. Caesar, lacking a fleet to immediately give chase, solidified his control over the western Mediterranean – Spain specifically – before assembling ships to follow Pompey. Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus, whom Pompey had appointed to command his 600-ship fleet, set up a massive blockade to prevent Caesar from crossing to Greece and to prevent any aid to Italy. Caesar, defying convention, chose to cross the Adriatic during the winter, with only half his fleet at a time.

In 88 BC Lucius Cornelius Sulla marched his legions on Rome starting a civil war. Quintus Sertorius, a client of Gaius Marius, joined his patron's faction and took up the sword against the Sullan faction (mainly optimates). After the death of Lucius Cornelius Cinna and Gaius Marius, Sertorius lost faith with his factions leadership. In 82 BC, during the second war against Sulla, he left Italy for his assigned propraetorian province in Hispania.Plutarch, Life of Sertorius , 6. Unfortunately his faction lost the war in Italy right after his departure and in 81 BC Sulla sent Gaius Annius Luscus with several legions to take the Spanish provinces from Sertorius.Plutarch, Life of Sertorius, 7. After a brief resistance Sertorius and his men are expelled form Hispania.

His sons by his wife Venuleia were Publius Licinius Crassus (who died in the Social War), Lucius Licinius Crassus (killed in 87 BC) and Marcus Licinius Crassus Dives, the triumvir. He remained with his family for the rest of his life, living long enough to see the two sons Publius and Lucius marry, as well as the birth of his first grandchild. Conflict between the Populares under Gaius Marius and the Optimates under Lucius Cornelius Sulla was escalating in the 80s BC. Although originally a supporter of Marius, Publius adopted a more neutral position opposed to the methods of both Marius and Sulla. He was killed, or committed suicide to avoid a more humiliating death, after the Marians took Rome in 87 BC.

Gaius Julius Caesar ( , ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC) was a Roman general and statesman who played a critical role in the events that led to the demise of the Roman Republic and the rise of the Roman Empire. In 60 BC, Caesar, Crassus and Pompey formed the First Triumvirate, a political alliance that dominated Roman politics for several years. Their attempts to amass power as Populares were opposed by the Optimates within the Roman Senate, among them Cato the Younger with the frequent support of Cicero. Caesar rose to become one of the most powerful politicians in the Roman Republic through a string of military victories in the Gallic Wars, completed by 51 BC, which greatly extended Roman territory.

Favonius was a member of the optimates faction within the Roman aristocracy; in a letter to Caesar on ruling a state (Ad Caesarem senem de re publica oratio), traditionally attributed to Sallust but probably by the rhetorician Marcus Porcius Latro, Caesar is told of the qualities of some of these nobles. Bibulus and Lucius Domitius are dismissed as wicked and dishonourable while Cato is someone "whose versatile, eloquent and clever talents I do not despise." The writer continues, Like Cato, Favonius opposed the corruption of many of Rome's leading politicians in general and the rise of the First Triumvirate in particular. When Caesar returned from his praetorship in Spain in 59 BC and successfully stood for consul, he allied himself with Pompey (to whom he gave his daughter Julia in marriage) and Clodius.

In particular, T. P. Wiseman has rehabilitated the use of the word "party" to describe the political opposition between Optimates and Populares, based on Latin usage (partes) and pointing to the consistency of a sort of party platform based on the food supply and general welfare of the populus ("people"), making land available to those outside the senatorial elite and debt relief.Though this has been a strand in Wiseman's scholarship over the decades, see particularly the introduction and "Roman History and the Ideological Vacuum" in Remembering the Roman People: Essays on Late-Republican Politics and Literature (Oxford University Press, 2009) at p. 14 for partes and "party". A less truncated version of "Roman History and the Ideological Vacuum" may be found in Classics in Progress (Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 285.

Rome, a dramatic television series created by John Milius, William J. MacDonald and Bruno Heller, premiered on 28 August 2005 on the HBO Network in the United States and ended on 25 March 2007, after 2 seasons and a total of 22 episodes. Rome is a historical drama depicting the period of history surrounding the violent transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire; a change driven by civil warfare between radical populares and conservative optimates, the decay of political institutions, and the actions of ambitious men and women. The first and second seasons of Rome were released on DVD in the U.S. in 2006 and 2007, respectively; and Blu-ray versions were released in 2011. A complete series box set with additional features was released in 2009, on both DVD and Blu-ray.

Drusus was elected tribune of the Plebs for 91 BC. Hostile propaganda later portrayed him as a demagogue from the outset of his tribunate, but Cicero and others assert that he began with the aim of strengthening senatorial rule and had the backing of the most powerful optimates in the Senate.Cicero, De Officiis 1.108Florus 2.5.1–3 These included the 'father of the senate' (princeps senatus), Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, who had been the colleague of Drusus' father in the censorship of 109 BC; and Lucius Licinius Crassus, the most influential orator of the day.Cicero, De Oratore 3.2-6 In pursuing a 'conservative' tribunate, Drusus was following in the footsteps of his father who, as tribune in 122 BC, had successfully championed the Senate's interests against the famous popularis reformer Gaius Gracchus.

Panoramic view of the Val d'Aran today On 24 November 1017, in his last known act, William and his optimates (magnates) witnessed the consecration of Borrell, whose election he had confirmed three days earlier (21 November), as the Bishop of Roda.Martínez Díez, 82: the consecration took place "cum consensu domno Wilielmo comite cum eius optimatibus" (with the consent of the lord William, count, and his great ones). Shortly afterwards, either in that same year or early in 1018, William led an expedition into the Val d'Aran, probably to claim his hereditary rights there. When the domains of his great- great-grandfather, Raymond I, the first independent count of Pallars and Ribagorza, had been divided between his sons, William's great-grandfather Bernard Unifred received Ribagorza, while Bernard's brother Bishop Atto of Roda received the Val d'Aran.

He was at the centre of a paradigmatic shift from the militia levies of the middle Republic to the professional soldiery of the late Republic; he also improved the pilum, a javelin, and made large-scale changes to the logistical structure of the Roman army. For his victory over invading Germanic tribes in the Cimbrian War, he was dubbed "the third founder of Rome". His life and career, by breaking with many of the precedents that bound the ambitious upper class of the Roman Republic together and instituting a soldiery loyal not to the Republic but to their commanders, was highly significant in Rome's transformation from Republic to Empire. In the realm of politics he helped lead the Populares faction against the Optimates of Lucius Cornelius Sulla, their rivalry coming to a head in 88–87 BC during Sulla's first civil war.

This law was proposed by the consul Quintus Servilius Caepio, and aimed to end the equestrian monopoly on juries.Cicero, Pro Cluentio 140 Since the legislative reforms of Gaius Gracchus, jurors for a number of important courts had been drawn only from the ranks of the equites. Crassus and the other conservative senators (the optimates) wanted mixed juries drawn from both senators and equestrians. He therefore attacked the equestrian courts in a famous speech, considered by Cicero (who also preserves the following quotation from the speech) to be Crassus' finest moment: An orator (Gaius Gracchus) addressing the Roman People > Save us from wretchedness, save us from the fangs of men whose cruelty can > only be satisfied by our blood; do not let us be slaves to others, unless to > you alone, the whole People, to whom we may and should be servants.

Movements of armies in the Battle of Philippi The Battle of Philippi was the final battle in the Wars of the Second Triumvirate between the forces of Mark Antony and Octavian (of the Second Triumvirate) and the leaders of Julius Caesar's assassination, Brutus and Cassius in 42 BC, at Philippi in Macedonia. The Second Triumvirate declared the civil war ostensibly to avenge Julius Caesar's assassination in 44 BC, but the underlying cause was a long-brewing conflict between the so-called Optimates and the so-called Populares. The battle, involving up to 200,000 men in one of the largest of the Roman civil wars, consisted of two engagements in the plain west of the ancient city of Philippi. The first occurred in the first week of October; Brutus faced Octavian, and Antony's forces fought those of Cassius.

406, 407. The plebeian tribunes (the representatives of the plebeians) and the Plebeian Council (the assembly of the plebeians) at times clashed with the Senate over the mentioned reforms and over the power relationship between the plebeian institutions and the Senate. The Optimates among the senators spearheaded the senatorial opposition. These tribunes were supported by Populares politicians such as Gaius Marius and Julius Caesar, who were often patricians, or equites. Their conflicts also played a part in some of the civil wars of the Late Roman Republic: Sulla's first civil war (88–87 BC), Sulla's second civil war (82–81 BC), the Sertorian War (83–72 BC), Lepidus' rebellion (77 BC), Caesar's Civil War (49–45 BC), the post-Caesarian civil war (44–43 BC), the Liberators' civil war (44–42 BC) and the Sicilian revolt (44–36 BC).

The Mithridatic Wars were three conflicts fought by Rome against the Kingdom of Pontus and its allies between 88 BC and 63 BC. They are named after Mithridates VI, the King of Pontus who initiated the hostilities after annexing the Roman province of Asia into its Pontic Empire (that came to include most of Asia Minor) and committing massacres against the local Roman population known as the Asian Vespers. As Roman troops were sent to recover the territory, they faced an uprising in Greece organized and supported by Mithridates. Mithridates was able to mastermind such general revolts against Rome and played the magistrates of the optimates party off against the magistrates of the populares party in the Roman civil wars. Nevertheless, the first war ended with a Roman victory, confirmed by the Treaty of Dardanos signed by Lucius Sulla and Mithridates.

Pompeius was a supporter of the Dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla. In 100 BC Pompeius was tribune of the plebs; was praetor in 91 BC and served his consulship with Sulla in 88 BC. When the civil war broke out between Sulla and Gaius Marius, Pompeius was deprived of his consulship and fled to Nola, where Pompeius met up with Sulla and his army. Sulla took the place in the war against Mithridates and left Pompeius in charge of Italy. While Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo was commanding the war against the Marsi tribe, the Optimates gave his army to Pompeius Rufus, the new consul. This caused Pompeius Rufus to be murdered by Strabo’s soldiers. Pompeius had married an unnamed Roman woman and they had a son a younger Quintus Pompeius Rufus, who married Sulla’s first daughter Cornelia Sulla.

The Optimates were an anti-reform conservative faction that favoured the nobles, and also wanted to limit the power of the plebeian tribunes (the representatives of the plebeians) and the Plebeian Council (the assembly of the plebeians) and strengthen the power of the senate. Julius Caesar was a leading figure of the populares. The origin of the process that led to Caesar seeking the alliance with Pompey and Crassus traces back to the Second Catilinarian conspiracy, which occurred three years earlier in 63 BC when Marcus Tullius Cicero was one of the two consuls. A Roman bust of Marcus Tullius Cicero, depicted here at about age sixty, in the National Archaeological Museum of Spain In 66 BC Catiline, the leader of the plot, presented his candidacy for the consulship, but he was charged with extortion and his candidacy was disallowed because he announced it too late.

From the beginning of the 2nd century BC, power was contested between two groups of aristocrats: the optimates, representing the conservative part of the Senate, and the populares, which relied on the help of the plebs (urban lower class) to gain power. In the same period, the bankruptcy of the small farmers and the establishment of large slave estates caused large-scale migration to the city. The continuous warfare led to the establishment of a professional army, which turned out to be more loyal to its generals than to the republic. Because of this, in the second half of the second century and during the first century BC there were conflicts both abroad and internally: after the failed attempt of social reform of the populares Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus, and the war against Jugurtha, there was a first civil war between Gaius Marius and Sulla.

Eligius' reputation spread rapidly, to the extent that ambassadors first sought out Eligius for counsel and to pay their respects to him before going to the king. He made some enemies. His success in inducing the Breton prince, Saint Judicael, to make a pact with Dagobert, at a meeting at the king's villa of Creil (636–37) increased his influence: "Indeed King Dagobert, swift, handsome and famous with no rival among any of the earlier kings of the Franks, loved him so much that he would often take himself out of the crowds of princes, optimates, dukes or bishops around him and seek private counsel from Eligius". Saint Eligius at the feet of the Virgin and Child by Gerard Seghers Eligius took advantage of this royal favor to obtain alms for the poor, and to ransom captive Romans, Gauls, Bretons, Moors, and especially Saxons, who were arriving daily at the slave market in Marseilles.

Both Pompey and Crassus also had extensive patronage networks. The alliance was cemented with the marriage of Pompey with Caesar's daughter Julia in 59 BC. Thanks to this alliance, Caesar thus received an extraordinary command over Gaul and Illyria for five years, so he could start his conquest of Gaul. In 56 BC the Triumvirate was renewed at the Lucca Conference, in which the triumvirs agreed to share the Roman provinces between them; Caesar could keep Gaul for another five years, while Pompey received Hispania, and Crassus Syria. The latter embarked into an expedition against the Parthians to match Caesar's victories in Gaul, but died in the disastrous defeat of Carrhae in 53 BC. The death of Crassus ended the Triumvirate, and left Caesar and Pompey facing each other; their relationship had already degraded after the death of Julia in 54 BC. Pompey then sided with the Optimates, the conservative faction opposed to the Populares—supported by Caesar—and actively fought Caesar in the senate.

Crassus was then to assume the office of dictator and have Caesar named Magister Equitum, reform the state and then restore the consulship to Sulla and Autronius. According to one of the sources from which Suetonius drew this information, Crassus pulled out at the last minute and Caesar did not go ahead with the plan.Suetonius The Twelve Caesars, Julius Caesar, 9 Plutarch did not mention these episodes in his Life of Caesar. Suetonius wrote that in 65 BC Caesar tried to get command in Egypt assigned to him by the plebeian council when Ptolemy XII, a Roman ally, was deposed by a rebellion in Alexandria, but the optimates blocked the assignment.Suetonius, The Twelve Caesars, Julius Caesar,11 Plutarch did not mention this either, but in the Life of Crassus he wrote that Crassus, who in that year was a praetor, wanted to make Egypt a tributary of Rome without mentioning the rebellion.

The supporters of Caesar argued that Caesar deserved an extension of his command so that the fruit of his success would not be lost, which triggered a debate. Pompey showed goodwill towards Caesar, claiming that he had letters from Caesar in which he said he wanted to be relieved of his command, but Pompey opined that he should be allowed to stand for the consulship in absentia. Cato opposed this and said that if Caesar wanted this he had to lay down his arms and become a private citizen. Pompey did not contest Cato's view, which gave rise to suspicions about his real feelings towards Caesar.Plutarch, Parallel Lives, the Life of Pompey, 55-56 A Roman bust of Pompey the Great made during the reign of Augustus (27 BC – 14 AD), a copy of an original bust from 70–60 BC, Venice National Archaeological Museum, Italy Pompey was moving towards a power struggle with Caesar and reliance on the support of the senate and the optimates.

His military service abroad had postponed marriage to a later age than a Roman noble typically took a wife. The date of their betrothal goes unrecorded, but if Cornelia had long been the desired bride, she would have been too young to marry before Publius left for Gaul, and his worth as a husband may not have been as evident.Ronald Syme, “Marriage Ages for Roman Senators,” Historia 26 (1987) 318–332. The political value of the marriage for Publius lay in family ties to the so-called optimates, a continually realigning faction of conservative senators who sought to preserve the traditional prerogatives of the aristocratic oligarchy and to prevent exceptional individuals from dominating through direct appeal to the people or the amassing of military power.Eve J. Parrish, "Crassus' New Friends and Pompey's Return," Phoenix 27 (1973) 357–380; Erich S. Gruen, "Pompey, the Roman Aristocracy, and the Conference of Luca," Historia 18 (1969) 71–108, especially p. 73.

Publius Sulpicius Rufus probably came from the Roman equestrian class, and was born in 124 BC or perhaps the following year. He had close ties to prominent elements of the Roman senatorial aristocracy, and in his youth was tutored in rhetoric and groomed for public life by Lucius Licinius Crassus, a renowned orator and prominent senator. Under his tutelage Sulpicius became one of the most distinguished orators of the time, and, together with two friends and fellow disciples of Crassus – Marcus Livius Drusus and Gaius Aurelius Cotta – he formed a circle of "talented and energetic" young nobles in whom the senatorial oligarchy (the self-styled "optimates" or boni, "best men") placed significant hope to defend their interests in the near future. The first major event of Sulpicius's public life occurred around 95 BC, when, with support of the boni, he prosecuted a turbulent tribune of the plebs, Gaius Norbanus – unsuccessfully, despite Sulpicius's impressive performance on the occasion.

At home, the Republic similarly experienced a long streak of social and political crises, which ended in several violent civil wars. At first, the Conflict of the Orders opposed the patricians, the closed oligarchic elite, to the far more numerous plebs, who finally achieved political equality in several steps during the 4th century BC. Later, the vast conquests of the Republic disrupted its society, as the immense influx of slaves they brought enriched the aristocracy, but ruined the peasantry and urban workers. In order to solve this issue, several social reformers, known as the Populares, tried to pass agrarian laws, but the Gracchi brothers, Saturninus, or Clodius Pulcher were all murdered by their opponents, the Optimates, keepers of the traditional aristocratic order. Mass slavery also caused three Servile Wars; the last of them was led by Spartacus, a skilful gladiator who ravaged Italy and left Rome powerless until his defeat in 71 BC. In this context, the last decades of the Republic were marked by the rise of great generals, who exploited their military conquests and the factional situation in Rome to gain control of the political system.