The Via Sacra ( Latin : Sacra Via , " Sacred Street ") was the main street of ancient Rome , leading from the top of the Capitoline Hill , through some of the most important religious sites of the Forum (where it is the widest street), to the Colosseum .
159-542: The road was part of the traditional route of the Roman Triumph that began on the outskirts of the city and proceeded through the Roman Forum . Later it was paved. During the reign of Nero , it was lined with colonnades . The road provided the setting for many deeds and misdeeds of Rome's history, the solemn religious festivals, the magnificent triumphs of victorious generals, and the daily throng assembling in
318-616: A great victory for Metellus. Rome then besieged the last Carthaginian strongholds in Sicily, Lilybaeum and Drepana , but these cities were impregnable by land. Publius Claudius Pulcher , the consul of 249, recklessly tried to take the latter from the sea, but suffered a terrible defeat ; his colleague Lucius Junius Pullus likewise lost his fleet off Lilybaeum . Without the corvus , Roman warships had lost their advantage. By now, both sides were drained and could not undertake large-scale operations. The only military activity during this period
477-595: A coalition of Latins at the battles of Vesuvius and the Trifanum . The Latins submitted to Roman rule. A Second Samnite War began in 327 BC. The war ended with Samnite defeat at the Battle of Bovianum in 305 BC. By 304 BC, Rome had annexed most Samnite territory and begun to establish colonies there, but in 298 BC the Samnites rebelled, and defeated a Roman army, in a Third Samnite War . After this success, it built
636-408: A coalition of several previous enemies of Rome. The war ended with Roman victory in 290 BC. At the Battle of Populonia , in 282 BC, Rome finished off the last vestiges of Etruscan power in the region. In the 4th century, plebeians gradually obtained political equality with patricians. The first plebeian consular tribunes were elected in 400. The reason behind this sudden gain is unknown, but it
795-539: A consequence of an Etruscan occupation of Rome rather than a popular revolution. According to Rome's traditional histories, Tarquin made several attempts to retake the throne, including the Tarquinian conspiracy , which involved Brutus's own sons, the war with Veii and Tarquinii , and finally the war between Rome and Clusium . The attempts to restore the monarchy did not succeed. The first Roman republican wars were wars of expansion . One by one, Rome defeated both
954-402: A fairly standard processional order. First came the captive leaders, allies, and soldiers (and sometimes their families) usually walking in chains; some were destined for execution or further display. Their captured weapons, armour, gold, silver, statuary, and curious or exotic treasures were carted behind them, along with paintings, tableaux, and models depicting significant places and episodes of
1113-491: A generation, the Republic fell into civil war again in 49 BC between Julius Caesar and Pompey . Despite his victory and appointment as dictator for life , Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC. Caesar's heir Octavian and lieutenant Mark Antony defeated Caesar's assassins in 42 BC, but they eventually split. Antony's defeat alongside his ally and lover Cleopatra at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC, and
1272-460: A gift to the people of Rome, funded by his spoils. Its gallery and colonnades doubled as an exhibition space and likely contained statues, paintings, and other trophies carried at his various triumphs. It contained a new temple to Pompey's patron goddess Venus Victrix ("Victorious Venus"); the year before, he had issued a coin which showed her crowned with triumphal laurels. Julius Caesar claimed Venus as both patron and divine ancestress; he funded
1431-470: A gigantic portrait-bust of the triumphant general, a thing of "eastern splendor" entirely covered with pearls, anticipating his later humiliation and decapitation. Following Caesar's murder, his adopted son Gaius Octavian assumed the permanent title of imperator and became the permanent head of the Senate from 27 BCE (see principate ) under the title and name Augustus . Only the year before, he had blocked
1590-405: A globe surrounded by triumphal wreaths, symbolising his "world conquest", and an ear of grain to show that his victory protected Rome's grain supply. A notable coin, minted by Lucius Manlius Torquatus, a supporter of Sulla , references Sulla's victory over Mithridates VI of Pontus . This coin depicts a quadriga with Sulla's legend and the general partially visible in his chariot. This established
1749-537: A large painting, showing his siege of Syracuse , the siege engines themselves, captured plate, gold, silver, and royal ornaments, and the statuary and opulent furniture for which Syracuse was famous. Eight elephants were led in the procession, symbols of his victory over the Carthaginians. His Spanish and Syracusan allies led the way wearing golden wreaths; they were granted Roman citizenship and lands in Sicily. In 71 BCE, Crassus earned an ovation for quashing
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#17327799618191908-517: A long-lasting alliance with Rome. In 262 BC, the Romans moved to the southern coast and besieged Akragas . In order to raise the siege, Carthage sent reinforcements, including 60 elephants—the first time they used them—but still lost the battle . Nevertheless, Rome could not take all of Sicily because Carthage's naval superiority prevented it from effectively besieging coastal cities. Using a captured Carthaginian ship as blueprint, Rome therefore launched
2067-433: A massive construction program and built 100 quinqueremes in only two months. It also invented a new device, the corvus , a grappling engine that enabled a crew to board an enemy ship. The consul for 260 BC, Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Asina , lost the first naval skirmish of the war against Hannibal Gisco at Lipara , but his colleague Gaius Duilius won a great victory at Mylae . He destroyed or captured 44 ships and
2226-430: A moral lesson, rather than to provide an accurate description of the triumphal process, procession, rites, and their meaning. This scarcity allows only the most tentative and generalised (and possibly misleading) reconstruction of triumphal ceremony, based on the combination of various incomplete accounts from different periods of Roman history. The origins and development of this honour are obscure. Roman historians placed
2385-672: A new elite, called the nobiles , or Nobilitas . By the early 3rd century BC, Rome had established itself as the major power in Italy, but had not yet come into conflict with the dominant military powers of the Mediterranean : Carthage and the Greek kingdoms. In 282, several Roman warships entered the harbour of Tarentum , triggering a violent reaction from the Tarentine democrats, who sank some. The Roman embassy sent to investigate
2544-498: A new temple to her and dedicated it during his quadruple triumph of 46 BCE. He thus wove his patron goddess and putative ancestress into his triumphal anniversary. Augustus , Caesar's heir and Rome's first emperor, built a vast triumphal monument on the Greek coast at Actium , overlooking the scene of his decisive sea-battle against Antony and Egypt; the bronze beaks of captured Egyptian warships projected from its seaward wall. Imperial iconography increasingly identified Emperors with
2703-517: A noblewoman, Lucretia . The tradition asserted that the monarchy was abolished in a revolution led by the semi-mythical Lucius Junius Brutus and the king's powers were then transferred to two separate consuls elected to office for a term of one year; each was capable of checking his colleague by veto . Most modern scholarship describes these accounts as the quasi-mythological detailing of an aristocratic coup within Tarquin's own family or
2862-550: A precedent for the Imperial period, where coins often depicted triumphal arches erected by emperors to commemorate their victories. Germanicus ' achievements in Germany in 15-16 CE are depicted on coins showing Tiberius in a quadriga. In Republican tradition, a general was expected to wear his triumphal regalia only for the day of his triumph; thereafter, they were presumably displayed in the atrium of his family home. As one of
3021-738: A range of popular games and entertainments for the Roman masses. Most Roman festivals were calendar fixtures, tied to the worship of particular deities. While the triumphal procession culminated at Jupiter's temple on the far end of the Via Sacra (sacred road) in the Roman Forum, the procession itself, attendant feasting, and public games promoted the general's status and achievement. By the Late Republican era, triumphs were drawn out and extravagant, motivated by increasing competition among
3180-652: A similar revolt in Sardinia to seize the island from Carthage, in violation of the peace treaty. This led to permanent bitterness in Carthage. After its victory, the Republic shifted its attention to its northern border as the Insubres and Boii were threatening Italy. Meanwhile, Carthage compensated the loss of Sicily and Sardinia with the conquest of Southern Hispania (up to Salamanca ), and its rich silver mines. This rapid expansion worried Rome, which concluded
3339-461: A slow walking pace at best, punctuated by various planned stops en route to its final destination of the Capitoline temple, a distance of just under 4 km (2.48 mi). Triumphal processions were notoriously long and slow; the longest could last for two or three days, and possibly more, and some may have been of greater length than the route itself. Some ancient and modern sources suggest
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#17327799618193498-651: A stalemate, with the Treaty of Phoenice signed in 205. In Hispania, Scipio continued his successful campaign at the battles of Carmona in 207, and Ilipa (now Seville ) in 206, which ended the Punic threat on the peninsula. Elected consul in 205, he convinced the Senate to invade Africa with the support of the Numidian king Masinissa , who had defected to Rome. Scipio landed in Africa in 204. He took Utica and then won
3657-534: A statue". Theodosius I celebrated his victory over the usurper Magnus Maximus in Rome on June 13, 389. Claudian 's panegyric to Emperor Honorius records the last known official triumph in the city of Rome and the western Empire. Emperor Honorius celebrated it conjointly with his sixth consulship on January 1, 404; his general Stilicho had defeated Visigothic King Alaric at the battles of Pollentia and Verona . In Christian martyrology , Saint Telemachus
3816-680: A treaty with Hasdrubal in 226, stating that Carthage could not cross the Ebro river . But the city of Saguntum , south of the Ebro, appealed to Rome in 220 to act as arbitrator during a period of internal strife . Hannibal took the city in 219, triggering the Second Punic War. Initially, the Republic's plan was to carry war outside Italy, sending the consuls P. Cornelius Scipio to Hispania and Ti. Sempronius Longus to Africa, while their naval superiority prevented Carthage from attacking from
3975-560: A triumph that included some "radically new" Christian and Byzantine elements. Belisarius successfully campaigned against his adversary Vandal leader Gelimer to restore the former Roman province of Africa to the control of Byzantium in the 533–534 Vandalic War . The triumph was held in the Eastern Roman capital of Constantinople . Historian Procopius , an eyewitness who had previously been in Belisarius's service, describes
4134-486: A triumph. The origins and development of this honour are obscure: Roman historians themselves placed the first triumph in the mythic past. Republican morality required that the general conduct himself with dignified humility, as a mortal citizen who triumphed on behalf of Rome's Senate, people, and gods. Inevitably, the triumph offered the general extraordinary opportunities for self-publicity, besides its religious and military dimensions. Most triumphal celebrations included
4293-483: A triumphal Republican general, and the symbols he employed in his triumph, would have been closely scrutinised by his aristocratic peers, alert for any sign that he might aspire to be more than "king for a day". In the Middle to Late Republic, Rome's expansion through conquest offered her political-military adventurers extraordinary opportunities for self-publicity; the long-drawn series of wars between Rome and Carthage –
4452-474: A victory procession of Alexander the Great . Like much in Roman culture, elements of the triumph were based on Etruscan and Greek precursors; in particular, the purple, embroidered toga picta worn by the triumphal general was thought to be derived from the royal toga of Rome's Etruscan kings. For triumphs of the Roman regal era, the surviving Imperial Fasti Triumphales are incomplete. After three entries for
4611-488: A year at a time. In times of crisis or emergency, the Senate might appoint a dictator to serve a longer term; but this could seem perilously close to the lifetime power of kings. The dictator Camillus was awarded four triumphs but was eventually exiled. Later Roman sources point to his triumph of 396 BCE as a cause for offense; the chariot was drawn by four white horses, a combination properly reserved for Jupiter and Apollo – at least in later lore and poetry. The demeanour of
4770-420: Is an aureus (a gold coin) that has a laurel-wreathed border enclosing a head which personifies Africa; beside it, Pompey's title "Magnus" ("The Great"), with wand and jug as symbols of his augury . The reverse identifies him as proconsul in a triumphal chariot attended by Victory . A triumphal denarius (a silver coin) shows his three trophies of captured arms, with his augur's wand and jug. Another shows
4929-594: Is listed on the Fasti for 27 BCE. Crassus was also denied the rare (and technically permissible, in his case) honour of dedicating the spolia opima of this campaign to Jupiter Feretrius . The last triumph listed on the Fasti Triumphales is for 19 BCE. By then, the triumph had been absorbed into the Augustan imperial cult system, in which only the emperor would be accorded such a supreme honour, as he
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5088-765: The Circus Maximus , perhaps dropping off any prisoners destined for execution at the Tullianum . It entered the Via Sacra then the Forum . Finally, it ascended the Capitoline Hill to the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus . Once the sacrifice and dedications were completed, the procession and spectators dispersed to banquets, games, and other entertainments sponsored by the triumphing general. In most triumphs,
5247-458: The Triumphs of Caesar (1484–92, now Hampton Court Palace ) became immediately famous and was endlessly copied in print form. The Triumphal Procession commissioned by Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (1512–19) from a group of artists including Albrecht Dürer was a series of woodcuts of an imaginary triumph of his own that could be hung as a frieze 54 metres (177 ft) long. In
5406-410: The lex Ovinia transferred this power to the censors, who could only remove senators for misconduct, thus appointing them for life. This law strongly increased the power of the Senate, which was by now protected from the influence of the consuls and became the central organ of government. In 312 BC, following this law, the patrician censor Appius Claudius Caecus appointed many more senators to fill
5565-469: The Battle of the Great Plains , which prompted Carthage to open peace negotiations. The talks failed because Scipio wanted to impose harsher terms on Carthage to prevent it from rising again as a threat. Hannibal was therefore sent to face Scipio at Zama . Scipio could now use the heavy Numidian cavalry of Massinissa—which had hitherto been so successful against Rome—to rout the Punic wings, then flank
5724-495: The Fasti but none in Dionysius. No ancient source gives a triumph to Romulus' successor, the peaceful king Numa . Rome's aristocrats expelled their last king as a tyrant and legislated the monarchy out of existence. They shared among themselves the kingship's former powers and authority in the form of magistracies . In the Republic, the highest possible magistracy was an elected consulship, which could be held for no more than
5883-652: The Punic Wars – produced twelve triumphs in ten years. Towards the end of the Republic, triumphs became still more frequent, lavish, and competitive, with each display an attempt (usually successful) to outdo the last. To have a triumphal ancestor – even one long-dead – counted for a lot in Roman society and politics. Cicero remarked that, in the race for power and influence, some individuals were not above vesting an inconveniently ordinary ancestor with triumphal grandeur and dignity, distorting an already fragmentary and unreliable historical tradition. To Roman historians,
6042-655: The Seleucid Empire made increasingly aggressive and successful attempts to conquer the entire Greek world. Now not only Rome's allies against Philip, but even Philip himself, sought a Roman alliance against the Seleucids. The situation was exacerbated by the fact that Hannibal was now a chief military advisor to the Seleucid emperor, and the two were believed to be planning outright conquest not just of Greece, but also of Rome. The Seleucids were much stronger than
6201-834: The Seleucid Empire , the Lusitanian Viriathus , the Numidian Jugurtha , the Pontic king Mithridates VI , Vercingetorix of the Arverni tribe of Gaul , and the Egyptian queen Cleopatra . At home, during the Conflict of the Orders , the patricians , the closed oligarchic elite, came into conflict with the more numerous plebs ; this was resolved peacefully, with the plebs achieving political equality by
6360-545: The Seleucid Empire . In 202, internal problems led to a weakening of Egypt's position, disrupting the power balance among the successor states. Macedonia and the Seleucid Empire agreed to an alliance to conquer and divide Egypt. Fearing this increasingly unstable situation, several small Greek kingdoms sent delegations to Rome to seek an alliance. Rome gave Philip an ultimatum to cease his campaigns against Rome's new Greek allies. Doubting Rome's strength, Philip ignored
6519-539: The Spartacus revolt, and increased his honours by wearing a crown of Jupiter's "triumphal" laurel. Ovations are listed along with triumphs on the Fasti Triumphales . The Fasti Triumphales (also called Acta Triumphalia ) are stone tablets that were erected in the Forum Romanum around 12 BCE, during the reign of Emperor Augustus. They give the general's formal name, the names of his father and grandfather,
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6678-602: The plebs elected tribunes , who were personally sacrosanct, immune to arbitrary arrest by any magistrate, and had veto power over legislation. By 390 BC, several Gallic tribes were invading Italy from the north. The Romans met the Gauls in pitched battle at the Battle of Allia River around 390–387 BC. The battle was fought at the confluence of the Tiber and Allia rivers, 11 Roman miles (10 mi or 16 km) north of Rome. The Romans were routed and subsequently Rome
6837-525: The "kingly" garb of the triumphator to Rome's first king Romulus , whose defeat of King Acron of the Caeninenses was thought coeval with Rome's foundation in 753 BCE. Ovid projected a fabulous and poetic triumphal precedent in the return of the god Bacchus /Dionysus from his conquest of India, drawn in a golden chariot by tigers and surrounded by maenads , satyrs, and assorted drunkards. Arrian attributed similar Dionysian and "Roman" elements to
6996-469: The 1550s, the fragmentary Fasti Triumphales were unearthed and partially restored. Onofrio Panvinio 's Fasti continued where the ancient Fasti left off. The last triumph recorded by Panvinio was the Royal Entry of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V into Rome on April 5, 1536, after his conquest of Tunis in 1535. Panvinio described it as a Roman triumph "over the infidel." The Emperor followed
7155-574: The 4th century BC. The late Republic, from 133 BC onward, saw substantial domestic strife , often anachronistically seen as a conflict between optimates and populares , referring to conservative and reformist politicians, respectively. The Social War between Rome and its Italian allies over citizenship and Roman hegemony in Italy greatly expanded the scope of civil violence. Mass slavery also contributed to three Servile Wars . Tensions at home coupled with ambitions abroad led to further civil wars . The first involved Marius and Sulla . After
7314-629: The Basilicas to chat, throw dice, engage in business, or secure justice. Many prostitutes lined the street as well, looking for potential customers. From the reign of Augustus, the Via Sacra played a role in the Apotheosis ceremony by which deceased Roman Emperors were formally deified . The body of the Emperor, concealed under a wax death mask , was carried on a pall from the Palatine hill down
7473-460: The Boii ambushed the army of the consul-elect for 215, L. Postumius Albinus , who died with all his army of 25,000 men in the Battle of Silva Litana . These disasters triggered a wave of defection among Roman allies, with the rebellions of the Samnites, Oscans, Lucanians, and Greek cities of Southern Italy. In Macedonia, Philip V also made an alliance with Hannibal in order to take Illyria and
7632-469: The Capitoline temple. The following schematic is for the route taken by "some, or many" triumphs, and is based on standard modern reconstructions. Any original or traditional route would have been diverted to some extent by the city's many redevelopments and re-building, or sometimes by choice. The starting place (the Campus Martius) lay outside the city's sacred boundary ( pomerium ), bordering
7791-673: The Circus, but he met with a hostile reception. Julius Caesar's penchant for wearing his triumphal regalia "wherever and whenever" was taken as one among many signs of monarchical intentions which, for some, justified his murder. In the Imperial era, emperors wore such regalia to signify their elevated rank and office and to identify themselves with the Roman gods and Imperial order – a central feature of Imperial cult . The building and dedication of monumental public works offered local, permanent opportunities for triumphal commemoration. In 55 BCE, Pompey inaugurated Rome's first stone-built Theatre as
7950-531: The Florentines' portable, wheeled altar, the carroccio . Flavio Biondo 's Roma Triumphans (1459) claimed the ancient Roman triumph, divested of its pagan rites, as a rightful inheritance of Holy Roman Emperors. Italian poet Petrarch 's Triumphs ( I triomfi ) represented the triumphal themes and biographies of ancient Roman texts as ideals for cultured, virtuous rule; it was influential and widely read. Andrea Mantegna 's series of large paintings on
8109-539: The Great were lavish and controversial. The first in 80 or 81 BCE was for his victory over King Hiarbas of Numidia in 79 BCE, granted by a cowed and divided Senate under the dictatorship of Pompey's patron Sulla. Pompey was only 24 and a mere equestrian. Roman conservatives disapproved of such precocity but others saw his youthful success as the mark of a prodigious military talent, divine favour, and personal brio; and he also had an enthusiastic, popular following. His triumph, however, did not go quite to plan. His chariot
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#17327799618198268-476: The Macedonians had ever been, because they controlled much of the former Persian Empire and had almost entirely reassembled Alexander the Great's former empire. Fearing the worst, the Romans began a major mobilization, all but pulling out of recently conquered Spain and Gaul. This fear was shared by Rome's Greek allies, who now followed Rome again for the first time since that war. A major Roman-Greek force
8427-455: The Punic army—and confronted Hannibal, who was encamped at Cannae , in Apulia . Despite his numerical disadvantage, Hannibal used his heavier cavalry to rout the Roman wings and envelop their infantry, which he annihilated. In terms of casualties, the Battle of Cannae was the worst defeat in Roman history: only 14,500 soldiers escaped, and Paullus was killed as well as 80 senators. Soon after,
8586-578: The Republic, they were paid for by the triumphing general. Marcus Fulvius Nobilior vowed ludi in return for victory over the Aetolian League and paid for ten days of games at his triumph. Most Romans would never have seen a triumph, but its symbolism permeated Roman imagination and material culture. Triumphal generals minted and circulated characteristically detailed, high value coins to propagate their triumphal fame and generosity empire-wide. Pompey's issues for his three triumphs are typical. One
8745-712: The Rhone, sent his elder brother Gnaeus with the main part of his army in Hispania according to the initial plan, and went back to Italy with the rest to resist Hannibal in Italy, but he was defeated and wounded near the Ticino river . Hannibal then marched south and won three outstanding victories. The first one was on the banks of the Trebia in December 218, where he defeated the other consul Ti. Sempronius Longus. More than half
8904-425: The Roman army was lost. Hannibal then ravaged the country around Arretium to lure the new consul C. Flaminius into a trap at Lake Trasimene . This clever ambush resulted in the death of the consul and the complete destruction of his army of 30,000 men. In 216, the new consuls L. Aemilius Paullus and C. Terentius Varro mustered the biggest army possible, with eight legions—some 80,000 soldiers, twice as many as
9063-404: The Roman economy; the amount brought in by Octavian 's triumph over Egypt triggered a fall in interest rates and a sharp rise in land prices. No ancient source addresses the logistics of the procession: where the soldiers and captives, in a procession of several days, could have slept and eaten, or where these several thousands plus the spectators could have been stationed for the final ceremony at
9222-407: The Romans concluded a peace in the north and moved south with reinforcements, placing Pyrrhus in danger of being flanked by two consular armies; Pyrrhus withdrew to Tarentum. In 279 BC, Pyrrhus met the consuls Publius Decius Mus and Publius Sulpicius Saverrio at the Battle of Asculum , which remained undecided for two days. Finally, Pyrrhus personally charged into the melee and won the battle but at
9381-415: The Romans' inability to conceive of plausible alternatives to the traditional republican system in a "crisis without alternative". The second instead stresses the continuity of the republic: until its disruption by Caesar's civil war and the following two decades of civil war created conditions for autocratic rule and made return to republican politics impossible: and, per Erich S. Gruen , "civil war caused
9540-467: The Senate turned down Marcus Marcellus ' request for a triumph after his victory over the Carthaginians and their Sicilian-Greek allies, apparently because his army was still in Sicily and unable to join him. They offered him instead a thanksgiving (supplicatio) and ovation. The day before it, he celebrated an unofficial triumph on the Alban Mount . His ovation was of triumphal proportions. It included
9699-583: The Senate's grant of extraordinary powers to Octavian as Augustus in 27 BC—which effectively made him the first Roman emperor —marked the end of the Republic. Rome had been ruled by monarchs since its foundation . These monarchs were elected, for life, by the men of the Roman Senate . The last Roman monarch was called Tarquin the Proud , who in traditional histories was expelled from Rome in 509 BC because his son, Sextus Tarquinius , raped
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#17327799618199858-598: The Spartan general marched on Regulus, crushing the Roman infantry on the Bagradas plain ; only 2,000 soldiers escaped, and Regulus was captured. The consuls for 255 nonetheless won a naval victory at Cape Hermaeum, where they captured 114 warships. This success was spoilt by a storm that annihilated the victorious navy: 184 ships of 264 sank, 25,000 soldiers and 75,000 rowers drowned. The corvus considerably hindered ships' navigation and made them vulnerable during tempest. It
10017-485: The Velian and Palatine Hills , creating grand colonnades on either side for shop stalls and commerce. At the east side was built under Hadrian and Antoninus Pius the temple of Venus and Roma . [REDACTED] Media related to Via Sacra at Wikimedia Commons Roman Triumph The Roman triumph ( triumphus ) was a civil ceremony and religious rite of ancient Rome , held to publicly celebrate and sanctify
10176-634: The Via Sacra into the Forum, where funeral orations were held before the procession of Knights and Senators resumed its course to the Campus Martius . While the western stretch of the Via Sacra which runs through the Forum follows the original ancient route of the road, the eastern stretch between the end of the forum and the Colosseum , which passes underneath the Arch of Titus , is a redirection of
10335-691: The affair was insulted and war was promptly declared. Facing a hopeless situation, the Tarentines (together with the Lucanians and Samnites) appealed to Pyrrhus , king of Epirus , for military aid. A cousin of Alexander the Great , he was eager to build an empire for himself in the western Mediterranean and saw Tarentum's plea as a perfect opportunity. Pyrrhus and his army of 25,500 men (with 20 war elephants) landed in Italy in 280 BC. The Romans were defeated at Heraclea , as their cavalry were afraid of Pyrrhus's elephants. Pyrrhus then marched on Rome, but
10494-533: The aftermath of the Social War. In the winter of 138–137 BC, a first slave uprising, known as the First Servile War , broke out in Sicily. After initial successes, the slaves led by Eunus and Cleon were defeated by Marcus Perperna and Publius Rupilius in 132 BC. In this context, Tiberius Gracchus was elected plebeian tribune in 133 BC. He attempted to enact a law to limit
10653-423: The agreement when Philip's emissaries were captured by a Roman fleet. The First Macedonian War saw the Romans involved directly in only limited land operations, but they achieved their objective of occupying Philip and preventing him from aiding Hannibal. The past century had seen the Greek world dominated by the three primary successor kingdoms of Alexander the Great 's empire: Ptolemaic Egypt , Macedonia and
10812-493: The amount of land anyone could own and establish a commission to distribute public lands to poor rural plebs. The aristocrats, who stood to lose an enormous amount of money, bitterly opposed this proposal. Tiberius submitted this law to the Plebeian Council , but it was vetoed by fellow tribune Marcus Octavius . Tiberius induced the plebs to depose Octavius from his office on the grounds that Octavius acted contrary to
10971-485: The ancient triumphs of Vespasian and his son Titus ; but Belisarius and Gelimer walked, as in an ovation . The procession did not end at Rome's Capitoline Temple with a sacrifice to Jupiter, but terminated at Hippodrome of Constantinople with a recitation of Christian prayer and the triumphant generals prostrate before the emperor. During the Renaissance , kings and magnates sought ennobling connections with
11130-500: The area around Epidamnus , occupied by Rome. His attack on Apollonia started the First Macedonian War . In 215, Hiero II of Syracuse died of old age, and his young grandson Hieronymus broke the long alliance with Rome to side with Carthage. At this desperate point, the aggressive strategy against Hannibal the Scipiones advocated was abandoned in favour of a slow reconquest of the lost territories, since Hannibal could not be everywhere to defend them. Although he remained invincible on
11289-455: The backbone of Rome's economy, as smallholding farmers, managers, artisans, traders, and tenants. In wartime, they could be summoned for military service. Most had little direct political influence. During the early Republic, the plebs (or plebeians) emerged as a self-organised, culturally distinct group of commoners, with its own internal hierarchy, laws, customs, and interests. Plebeians had no access to high religious and civil office. For
11448-408: The battlefield, defeating all the Roman armies on his way, he could not prevent Claudius Marcellus from taking Syracuse in 212 after a long siege , nor the fall of his bases of Capua and Tarentum in 211 and 209 . In Hispania, Publius and Gnaeus Scipio won the battles of Cissa in 218, soon after Hannibal's departure, and Dertosa against his brother Hasdrubal in 215, which enabled them to conquer
11607-424: The city's legendary founder Romulus , eleven lines of the list are missing. Next in sequence are Ancus Marcius , Tarquinius Priscus , Servius Tullius , and finally Tarquin "the proud" , the last king. The Fasti were compiled some five centuries after the regal era, and probably represent an approved, official version of several different historical traditions. Likewise, the earliest surviving written histories of
11766-486: The classical past. Ghibelline Castruccio Castracani defeated the forces of the Guelph Florence in the 1325 Battle of Altopascio . Holy Roman Emperor Louis IV made him Duke of Lucca , and the city gave him a Roman-style triumph. The procession was led by his Florentine captives, made to carry candles in honour of Lucca's patron saint. Castracani followed, standing in a decorative chariot. His booty included
11925-693: The consul Appius Claudius Caudex , turned to one of the popular assemblies to get a favourable vote by promising plunder to the voters. After the assembly ratified an alliance with the Mamertines, Caudex was dispatched to cross the strait and lend aid. Messina fell under Roman control quickly. Syracuse and Carthage, at war for centuries, responded with an alliance to counter the invasion and blockaded Messina, but Caudex defeated Hiero and Carthage separately. His successor, Manius Valerius Maximus , landed with an army of 40,000 men and conquered eastern Sicily, which prompted Hiero to shift his allegiance and forge
12084-502: The consular investiture of Emperors, and the adventus , the formal "triumphal" arrival of an emperor in the various capitals of the Empire in his progress through the provinces. Some emperors were perpetually on the move and seldom or never went to Rome. Christian emperor Constantius II entered Rome for the first time in his life in 357, several years after defeating his rival Magnentius , standing in his triumphal chariot "as if he were
12243-457: The cost of an important part of his troops ; he allegedly said, "if we are victorious in one more battle with the Romans, we shall be utterly ruined." He escaped the Italian deadlock by answering a call for help from Syracuse, where tyrant Thoenon was desperately fighting an invasion from Carthage . Pyrrhus could not let them take the whole island, as it would have compromised his ambitions in
12402-619: The creation of promagistracies to rule its conquered provinces , and differences in the composition of the senate. Unlike the Pax Romana of the Roman Empire, throughout the republican era Rome was in a state of near-perpetual war. Its first enemies were its Latin and Etruscan neighbours, as well as the Gauls , who sacked Rome in 387 BC. After the Gallic sack, Rome conquered
12561-579: The departure of the Epirote king. Between 288 and 283 BC, Messina in Sicily was taken by the Mamertines , a band of mercenaries formerly employed by Agathocles . They plundered the surroundings until Hiero II , the new tyrant of Syracuse , defeated them (in either 269 or 265 BC). In effect under a Carthaginian protectorate, the remaining Mamertines appealed to Rome to regain their independence. Senators were divided on whether to help. A supporter of war,
12720-432: The dictator Camillus , who made a compromise with the tribunes: he agreed to their bills, and they in return consented to the creation of the offices of praetor and curule aediles, both reserved to patricians. Lateranus became the first plebeian consul in 366 BC; Stolo followed in 361 BC. Soon after, plebeians were able to hold both the dictatorship and the censorship. The four-time consul Gaius Marcius Rutilus became
12879-638: The dominant force in politics and society. They initially formed a closed group of about 50 large families, called gentes , who monopolised Rome's magistracies, state priesthoods, and senior military posts. The most prominent of these families were the Cornelii , Aemilii , Claudii , Fabii , and Valerii . The leading families' power, privilege and influence derived from their wealth, in particular from their landholdings, their position as patrons , and their numerous clients. The vast majority of Roman citizens were commoners of various social degrees. They formed
13038-587: The eastern bank of the Tiber . The procession entered the city through a Porta Triumphalis (Triumphal Gate), and crossed the pomerium , where the general surrendered his command to the senate and magistrates . It continued through the site of the Circus Flaminius , skirting the southern base of the Capitoline Hill and the Velabrum , along a Via Triumphalis (Triumphal Way) towards
13197-683: The eastern coast of Hispania. But in 211, Hasdrubal and Mago Barca successfully turned the Celtiberian tribes that supported the Scipiones, and attacked them simultaneously at the Battle of the Upper Baetis , in which the Scipiones died. Publius's son, the future Scipio Africanus , was then elected with a special proconsulship to lead the Hispanic campaign, winning a series of battles with ingenious tactics. In 209, he took Carthago Nova ,
13356-451: The economic difficulties of the plebs for their own gain: Stolo, Lateranus, and Genucius bound their bills attacking patricians' political supremacy with debt-relief measures. As a result of the end of the patrician monopoly on senior magistracies, many small patrician gentes faded into history during the 4th and 3rd centuries BC due to the lack of available positions. About a dozen remaining patrician gentes and 20 plebeian ones thus formed
13515-457: The end of the war, the consuls for 256 BC decided to carry the operations to Africa, on Carthage's homeland. The consul Marcus Atilius Regulus landed on the Cap Bon peninsula with about 18,000 soldiers. He captured the city of Aspis , repulsed Carthage's counterattack at Adys , and took Tunis . The Carthaginians hired Spartan mercenaries, led by Xanthippus , to command their troops. In 255,
13674-655: The establishment of the Roman Empire following the War of Actium . During this period, Rome's control expanded from the city's immediate surroundings to hegemony over the entire Mediterranean world . Roman society at the time was primarily a cultural mix of Latin and Etruscan societies, as well as of Sabine, Oscan, and Greek cultural elements, which is especially visible in the Ancient Roman religion and its pantheon . Its political organization developed at around
13833-402: The extent of the general's political and military powers and popularity, and the possible consequences of supporting or hindering his further career. There is no firm evidence that the Senate applied a prescribed set of "triumphal laws" when making their decisions, Valerius Maximus extrapolated various "triumphal laws" from disputed historic accounts of actual practice. They included one law that
13992-525: The fall of the republic, not vice versa". A core cause of the Republic's eventual demise was the loss of elite's cohesion from c. 133 BC : the ancient sources called this moral decay from wealth and the hubris of Rome's domination of the Mediterranean. Modern sources have proposed multiple reasons why the elite lost cohesion, including wealth inequality and a growing willingness by aristocrats to transgress political norms, especially in
14151-421: The first plebeian dictator in 356 BC and censor in 351 BC. In 342 BC, the tribune of the plebs Lucius Genucius passed his leges Genuciae , which abolished interest on loans, in a renewed effort to tackle indebtedness; required the election of at least one plebeian consul each year; and prohibited magistrates from holding the same magistracy for the next ten years or two magistracies in the same year. In 339 BC,
14310-471: The first time a Roman army had ever entered Asia . The decisive engagement was fought at the Battle of Magnesia , resulting in complete Roman victory. The Seleucids sued for peace, and Rome forced them to give up their recent Greek conquests. Rome again withdrew from Greece, assuming (or hoping) that the lack of a major Greek power would ensure a stable peace. In fact, it did the opposite. In 179, Philip died. His talented and ambitious son, Perseus , took
14469-531: The first triumph in the mythical past; some thought that it dated from Rome's foundation ; others thought it more ancient than that. Roman etymologists thought that the soldiers' chant of triumpe was a borrowing via Etruscan of the Greek thriambus ( θρίαμβος ), cried out by satyrs and other attendants in Dionysian and Bacchic processions. Plutarch and some Roman sources traced the first Roman triumph and
14628-486: The focus of the triumph was the general himself. The ceremony promoted him – however temporarily – above every mortal Roman. This was an opportunity granted to very few. From the time of Scipio Africanus , the triumphal general was linked (at least for historians during the Principate) to Alexander and the demi-god Hercules , who had laboured selflessly for the benefit of all mankind. His sumptuous triumphal chariot
14787-406: The four patricians in the college. The Conflict of the Orders ended with the last secession of the plebs around 287. The dictator Quintus Hortensius passed the lex Hortensia , which reenacted the law of 339 BC, making plebiscites binding on all citizens, while also removing the requirement for prior Senate approval. These events were a political victory of the wealthy plebeian elite, who exploited
14946-522: The funeral and apotheosis of the deified Titus. Prior to this, the senate voted Titus a triple-arch at the Circus Maximus to celebrate or commemorate the same victory or triumph. In Republican tradition, only the Senate could grant a triumph. A general who wanted a triumph would dispatch his request and report to the Senate. Officially, triumphs were granted for outstanding military merit;
15105-399: The general funded any post-procession banquets from his share of the loot. There were feasts for the people and separate, much richer feasts for the elite; some went on for most of the night. Dionysius offers a contrast to the lavish triumphal banquets of his time by giving Romulus's triumph the most primitive possible "banquet" – ordinary Romans setting up food-tables as a "welcome home", and
15264-434: The general must have killed at least 5,000 of the enemy in a single battle, and another that he must swear an oath that his account was the truth. No evidence has survived for either of these laws, or any other laws relating to triumphs. A general might be granted a "lesser triumph", known as an Ovation. He entered the city on foot, minus his troops, in his magistrate's toga and wearing a wreath of Venus ' myrtle. In 211 BCE,
15423-489: The general's direct appeal to the people over the senate and a promise of public games at his own expense. Others were blocked or granted only after interminable wrangling. Senators and generals alike were politicians, and Roman politics was notorious for its rivalries, shifting alliances, back-room dealings, and overt public bribery. The senate's discussions would likely have hinged on triumphal tradition, precedent, and propriety; less overtly but more anxiously, it would hinge on
15582-473: The gods, starting with the Augustan reinvention of Rome as a virtual monarchy (the principate ). Sculpted panels on the arch of Titus (built by Domitian ) celebrate Titus ' and Vespasian 's joint triumph over the Jews after the siege of Jerusalem , with a triumphal procession of captives and treasures seized from the temple of Jerusalem – some of which funded the building of the Colosseum . Another panel shows
15741-533: The gods. This is probably so for the earliest legendary and later semi-legendary triumphs of Rome's regal era, when the king functioned as Rome's highest magistrate and war-leader. As Rome's population, power, influence, and territory increased, so did the scale, length, variety, and extravagance of its triumphal processions. The procession ( pompa ) mustered in the open space of the Campus Martius (Field of Mars) probably well before first light. From there, all unforeseen delays and accidents aside, it would have managed
15900-589: The growing unrest he had caused led to his trial for seeking kingly power; he was sentenced to death and thrown from the Tarpeian Rock . Between 376 BC and 367 BC, the tribunes of the plebs Gaius Licinius Stolo and Lucius Sextius Lateranus continued the plebeian agitation and pushed for an ambitious legislation, known as the Leges Liciniae Sextiae . The most important bill opened the consulship to plebeians. Other tribunes controlled by
16059-474: The growth of triumphal ostentation undermined Rome's ancient "peasant virtues". Dionysius of Halicarnassus ( c. 60 BCE to after 7 BCE) claimed that the triumphs of his day had "departed in every respect from the ancient tradition of frugality". Moralists complained that successful foreign wars might have increased Rome's power, security, and wealth, but they also created and fed a degenerate appetite for bombastic display and shallow novelty. Livy traces
16218-462: The highest possible honours, which connected the vir triumphalis ("man of triumph", later known as a triumphator ) to Rome's mythical and semi-mythical past. In effect, the general was close to being "king for a day", and possibly close to divinity. He wore the regalia traditionally associated both with the ancient Roman monarchy and with the statue of Jupiter Capitolinus : the purple and gold "toga picta", laurel crown, red boots and, again possibly,
16377-535: The infantry, as Hannibal had done at Cannae. Defeated for the first time, Hannibal convinced the Carthaginian Senate to pay the war indemnity, which was even harsher than that of 241: 10,000 talents in 50 instalments. Carthage also had to give up all its elephants, all its fleet but ten triremes , and all its possessions outside its core territory in Africa (what is now Tunisia ), and it could not declare war without Roman authorisation. In effect, Carthage
16536-507: The league's surrender. Rome decided to divide Macedonia into two new, directly administered Roman provinces, Achaea and Macedonia . For Carthage, the Third Punic War was a simple punitive mission after the neighbouring Numidians allied to Rome robbed and attacked Carthaginian merchants. Treaties had forbidden any war with Roman allies; viewing defence against banditry as "war action", Rome decided to annihilate Carthage. Carthage
16695-530: The main Punic base in Hispania. The next year, he defeated Hasdrubal at the Battle of Baecula . After his defeat, Carthage ordered Hasdrubal to reinforce his brother in Italy. Since he could not use ships, he followed the same route as his brother through the Alps, but the consuls M. Livius Salinator and C. Claudius Nero were awaiting him and defeated him in the Battle of the Metaurus , where Hasdrubal died. It
16854-477: The manifest will of the people, a position that was unprecedented and constitutionally dubious. His law was enacted and took effect, but, when Tiberius ostentatiously stood for reelection to the tribunate, he was murdered by his enemies. Tiberius's brother Gaius was elected tribune ten years later in 123 and reelected for 122. He induced the plebs to reinforce rights of appeal to the people against capital extrajudicial punishments and institute reforms to improve
17013-505: The matter of cash raised his standing among the conservatives, and Pompey seems to have learned a lesson in populist politics. For his second triumph (71 BCE, the last in a series of four held that year) his cash gifts to his army were said to break all records, though the amounts in Plutarch's account are implausibly high: 6,000 sesterces to each soldier (about six times their annual pay) and about 5 million to each officer. Pompey
17172-506: The military-political adventurers who ran Rome's nascent empire. Some triumphs were prolonged by several days of public games and entertainments. From the Principate onwards, the triumph reflected the Imperial order and the pre-eminence of the Imperial family. The triumph was consciously imitated by medieval and later states in the royal entry and other ceremonial events. In Republican Rome, truly exceptional military achievement merited
17331-472: The most important cities in the Roman Empire. Views on the structural causes of the Republic's collapse differ. One enduring thesis is that Rome's expansion destabilized its social organization between conflicting interests; the Senate's policymaking, blinded by its own short-term self-interest, alienated large portions of society, who then joined powerful generals who sought to overthrow the system. Two other theses have challenged this view. The first blames
17490-564: The new limit of 300, including descendants of freedmen, which was deemed scandalous. Caecus also launched a vast construction program, building the first aqueduct , the Aqua Appia , and the first Roman road, the Via Appia . In 300 BC, the two tribunes of the plebs Gnaeus and Quintus Ogulnius passed the lex Ogulnia , which created four plebeian pontiffs, equalling the number of patrician pontiffs, and five plebeian augurs, outnumbering
17649-401: The nobility, he was entitled to a particular kind of funeral in which a string of actors walked behind his bier wearing the masks of his ancestors; another actor represented the general himself and his highest achievement in life by wearing his funeral mask, triumphal laurels, and toga picta . Anything more was deeply suspect; Pompey was granted the privilege of wearing his triumphal wreath at
17808-415: The old kingdom. The Romans swiftly defeated the Macedonians at the second battle of Pydna . The Achaean League , seeing the direction of Roman policy trending towards direct administration, met at Corinth and declared war "nominally against Sparta but in reality, against Rome". It was swiftly defeated: in 146, the same year as the destruction of Carthage , Corinth was besieged and destroyed , forcing
17967-467: The patricians vetoed the bills, but Stolo and Lateranus retaliated by vetoing the elections for five years while being continuously reelected by the plebs, resulting in a stalemate. In 367 BC, they carried a bill creating the Decemviri sacris faciundis , a college of ten priests, of whom five had to be plebeians, thereby breaking patricians' monopoly on priesthoods. The resolution of the crisis came from
18126-485: The people's welfare. While ancient sources tend to "conceive Gracchus' legislation as an elaborate plot against the authority of the Senate... he showed no sign of wanting to replace the Senate in its normal functions". Amid wide-ranging and popular reforms to create grain subsidies, change jury pools, establish and require the Senate to assign provinces before elections, Gaius proposed a law that would grant citizenship rights to Rome's Italian allies. He stood for election to
18285-615: The people(s) or command province whence the triumph was awarded, and the date of the triumphal procession. They record over 200 triumphs, starting with three mythical triumphs of Romulus in 753 BCE and ending with that of Lucius Cornelius Balbus (19 BCE). Fragments of similar date and style from Rome and provincial Italy appear to be modeled on the Augustan Fasti , and have been used to fill some of its gaps. Many ancient historical accounts also mention triumphs. Most Roman accounts of triumphs were written to provide their readers with
18444-533: The persistent Sabines and the local cities. Rome defeated its rival Latin cities in the Battle of Lake Regillus in 496 BC, the Battle of Ariccia in 495 BC, the Battle of Mount Algidus in 458 BC, and the Battle of Corbio in 446 BC. But it suffered a significant defeat at the Battle of the Cremera in 477 BC, wherein it fought against the most important Etruscan city, Veii ; this defeat
18603-493: The plebeian consul and dictator Quintus Publilius Philo passed three laws extending the plebeians' powers. His first law followed the lex Genucia by reserving one censorship to plebeians, the second made plebiscites binding on all citizens (including patricians), and the third required the Senate to give its prior approval to plebiscites before they became binding on all citizens. During the early Republic, consuls chose senators from among their supporters. Shortly before 312 BC,
18762-445: The poorest, one of the few effective political tools was their withdrawal of labour and services, in a " secessio plebis "; the first such secession occurred in 494 BC, in protest at the abusive treatment of plebeian debtors by the wealthy during a famine. The patrician Senate was compelled to give them direct access to the written civil and religious laws and to the electoral and political process. To represent their interests,
18921-632: The procession's display of the loot seized from the Temple of Jerusalem in 70 CE by Roman Emperor Titus , including the Temple Menorah . The treasure had been stored in Rome's Temple of Peace after its display in Titus' own triumphal parade and its depiction on his triumphal arch ; then it was seized by the Vandals during their sack of Rome in 455; then it was taken from them in Belisarius' campaign. The objects themselves might well have recalled
19080-526: The procession, two flawless white oxen were led for the sacrifice to Jupiter, garland-decked and with gilded horns. All this was done to the accompaniment of music, clouds of incense, and the strewing of flowers. Almost nothing is known of the procession's infrastructure and management. Its doubtless enormous cost was defrayed in part by the state but mostly by the general's loot, which most ancient sources dwell on in great detail and unlikely superlatives. Once disposed, this portable wealth injected huge sums into
19239-421: The red-painted face of Rome's supreme deity. He was drawn in procession through the city in a four-horse chariot, under the gaze of his peers and an applauding crowd, to the temple of Capitoline Jupiter . His spoils and captives led the way; his armies followed behind. Once at the Capitoline temple, he sacrificed two white oxen to Jupiter , and laid tokens of victory at the feet of Jupiter's statue, thus dedicating
19398-454: The regal era, written some centuries after it, attempt to reconcile various traditions, or else debate their merits. Dionysius , for example, gives Romulus three triumphs, the same number given in the Fasti . Livy gives him none, and credits him instead with the first spolia opima , in which the arms and armour were stripped off a defeated foe, then dedicated to Jupiter. Plutarch gives him one, complete with chariot. Tarquin has two triumphs in
19557-559: The request, and Rome sent an army of Romans and Greek allies, beginning the Second Macedonian War . In 197, the Romans decisively defeated Philip at the Battle of Cynoscephalae , and Philip was forced to give up his recent Greek conquests. The Romans declared the "Peace of the Greeks", believing that Philip's defeat now meant that Greece would be stable, and pulled out of Greece entirely. With Egypt and Macedonia weakened,
19716-448: The returning troops taking swigs and bites as they marched by. He recreates the first Republican triumphal banquet along the same lines. Varro claims that his aunt earned 20,000 sesterces by supplying 5,000 thrushes for Caecilius Metellus 's triumph of 71 BCE. Some triumphs included ludi as fulfillment of the general's vow to a god or goddess, made before battle or during its heat, in return for their help in securing victory. In
19875-739: The road built after the Great Fire of Rome in AD 64. In the Republic and Early Empire, the route forked to the north near the House of the Vestals and passed through a saddle in the Velian Hill , now occupied largely by the Basilica of Maxentius and the modern Via dei Fori Imperiali . As part of his rebuilding program following the fire, Nero essentially straightened the road by redirecting it between
20034-483: The same time as direct democracy in Ancient Greece , with collective and annual magistracies, overseen by a senate . There were annual elections, but the republican system was an elective oligarchy , not a democracy ; a small number of powerful families largely monopolised the magistracies. Roman institutions underwent considerable changes throughout the Republic to adapt to the difficulties it faced, such as
20193-583: The sea. This plan was thwarted by Hannibal's bold move to Italy. In May 218, he crossed the Ebro with a large army of about 100,000 soldiers and 37 elephants. He passed in Gaul , crossed the Rhone , then the Alps , possibly through the Col de Clapier . This exploit cost him almost half of his troops, but he could now rely on the Boii and Insubres, still at war with Rome. Publius Scipio, who had failed to block Hannibal on
20352-455: The senatorial award of a triumph to Marcus Licinius Crassus the Younger , despite the latter's acclamation in the field as Imperator and his fulfillment of all traditional, Republican qualifying criteria except full consulship. Technically, generals in the Imperial era were legates of the ruling Emperor (Imperator). Augustus claimed the victory as his own but permitted Crassus a second, which
20511-593: The spoils of foreign nations". A triumphal arch made for the Royal entry into Paris of Louis XIII of France in 1628 carried a depiction of Pompey. Roman Republic#Late Republic.28147.E2.80.9330 BC.29 The Roman Republic ( Latin : Res publica Romana [ˈreːs ˈpuːblɪka roːˈmaːna] ) was the era of classical Roman civilization beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kingdom (traditionally dated to 509 BC) and ending in 27 BC with
20670-519: The start of the rot to the triumph of Gnaeus Manlius Vulso in 186, which introduced ordinary Romans to such Galatian fripperies as specialist chefs, flute girls, and other "seductive dinner-party amusements". Pliny adds "sideboards and one-legged tables" to the list, but lays responsibility for Rome's slide into luxury on the "1400 pounds of chased silver ware and 1500 pounds of golden vessels" brought somewhat earlier by Scipio Asiaticus for his triumph of 189 BCE. The three triumphs awarded to Pompey
20829-569: The state paid for the ceremony if this and certain other conditions were met – and these seem to have varied from time to time, and from case to case – or the Senate would pay for the official procession, at least. Most Roman historians rest the outcome on an open Senatorial debate and vote, its legality confirmed by one of the people's assemblies ; the senate and people thus controlled the state's coffers and rewarded or curbed its generals. Some triumphs seem to have been granted outright, with minimal debate. Some were turned down but went ahead anyway, with
20988-413: The success of a military commander who had led Roman forces to victory in the service of the state or, in some historical traditions, one who had successfully completed a foreign war. On the day of his triumph, the general wore a crown of laurel and an all-purple, gold-embroidered triumphal toga picta ("painted" toga), regalia that identified him as near-divine or near-kingly. In some accounts, his face
21147-471: The throne and showed a renewed interest in conquering Greece. With its Greek allies facing a major new threat, Rome declared war on Macedonia again, starting the Third Macedonian War . Perseus initially had some success against the Romans, but Rome responded by sending a stronger army which decisively defeated the Macedonians at the Battle of Pydna in 168. The Macedonians capitulated, ending
21306-425: The traditional ancient route, "past the ruins of the triumphal arches of the soldier-emperors of Rome", where "actors dressed as ancient senators hailed the return of the new Caesar as miles christi ," (a soldier of Christ). The extravagant triumphal entry into Rouen of Henri II of France in 1550 was not "less pleasing and delectable than the third triumph of Pompey ... magnificent in riches and abounding in
21465-463: The triumph as an Imperial privilege. Those outside the Imperial family might be granted "triumphal ornaments" ( Ornamenta triumphalia ) or an ovation, such as Aulus Plautius under Claudius . The senate still debated and voted on such matters, though the outcome was probably already decided. In the Imperial era, the number of triumphs fell sharply. Imperial panegyrics of the later Imperial era combine triumphal elements with Imperial ceremonies such as
21624-526: The triumph to the Roman Senate, people, and gods. Triumphs were tied to no particular day, season, or religious festival of the Roman calendar . Most seem to have been celebrated at the earliest practicable opportunity, probably on days that were deemed auspicious for the occasion. Tradition required that, for the duration of a triumph, every temple was open. The ceremony was thus, in some sense, shared by
21783-644: The verge of losing the war. Pyrrhus again met the Romans at the Battle of Beneventum . This time, the consul Manius Dentatus was victorious and even captured eight elephants. Pyrrhus then withdrew from Italy, but left a garrison in Tarentum, to wage a new campaign in Greece against Antigonus II Gonatas of Macedonia . His death in battle at Argos in 272 BC forced Tarentum to surrender to Rome. Rome and Carthage were initially on friendly terms, lastly in an alliance against Pyrrhus, but tensions rapidly rose after
21942-443: The war. Convinced now that the Greeks (and therefore the rest of the region) would not have peace if left alone, Rome decided to establish its first permanent foothold in the Greek world, and divided Macedonia into four client republics. Yet Macedonian agitation continued. The Fourth Macedonian War , 150 to 148 BC, was fought against a Macedonian pretender to the throne who was again destabilizing Greece by trying to reestablish
22101-518: The war. Next in line, all on foot, came Rome's senators and magistrates, followed by the general's lictors in their red war-robes, their fasces wreathed in laurel, then the general in his four-horse chariot. A companion, or a public slave, might share the chariot with him or, in some cases, his youngest children. His officers and elder sons rode horseback nearby. His unarmed soldiers followed in togas and laurel crowns, chanting "io triumphe!" and singing ribald songs at their general's expense. Somewhere in
22260-523: The western Mediterranean, and so declared war. The Carthaginians lifted the siege of Syracuse before his arrival, but he could not entirely oust them from the island as he failed to take their fortress of Lilybaeum . His harsh rule soon led to widespread antipathy among the Sicilians; some cities even defected to Carthage. In 275 BC, Pyrrhus left the island before he had to face a full-scale rebellion. He returned to Italy, where his Samnite allies were on
22419-425: The whole Italian Peninsula in a century and thus became a major power in the Mediterranean. Its greatest strategic rival was Carthage , against which it waged three wars . Rome defeated Carthage at the Battle of Zama in 202 BC, becoming the dominant power of the ancient Mediterranean world. It then embarked on a long series of difficult conquests, defeating Philip V and Perseus of Macedon , Antiochus III of
22578-574: The whole community of Roman gods, but overlaps were inevitable with specific festivals and anniversaries. Some may have been coincidental; others were designed. For example, March 1, the festival and dies natalis of the war god Mars , was the traditional anniversary of the first triumph by Publicola (504 BCE), of six other Republican triumphs, and of the very first Roman triumph by Romulus . Pompey postponed his third and most magnificent triumph for several months to make it coincide with his own dies natalis (birthday). Religious dimensions aside,
22737-503: Was soundly defeated by Catulus. Exhausted and unable to bring supplies to Sicily, Carthage sued for peace. Carthage had to pay 1,000 talents immediately and 2,200 over ten years and evacuate Sicily. The fine was so high that Carthage could not pay Hamilcar's mercenaries, who had been shipped back to Africa. They revolted during the Mercenary War , which Carthage suppressed with enormous difficulty. Meanwhile, Rome took advantage of
22896-431: Was abandoned after another similar catastrophe in 253 BC. These disasters prevented any significant campaign between 254 and 252 BC. Hostilities in Sicily resumed in 252 BC, with Rome's taking of Thermae. The next year, Carthage besieged Lucius Caecilius Metellus , who held Panormos (now Palermo). The consul had dug trenches to counter the elephants, which once hurt by missiles turned back on their own army, resulting in
23055-458: Was almost defenceless, and submitted when besieged. But the Romans demanded complete surrender and removal of the city into the desert hinterland, far from any coastal or harbour region; the Carthaginians refused. The city was besieged and completely destroyed . Rome acquired all of Carthage's North African and Iberian territories. The Romans rebuilt Carthage 100 years later as a Roman colony, by order of Julius Caesar. It flourished, becoming one of
23214-441: Was bedecked with charms against the possible envy ( invidia ) and malice of onlookers. In some accounts, a companion or public slave would remind him from time to time of his own mortality (a memento mori ). Rome's earliest "triumphs" were probably simple victory parades, celebrating the return of a victorious general and his army to the city, along with the fruits of his victory, and ending with some form of dedication to
23373-428: Was condemned to be a minor power, while Rome recovered from a desperate situation to dominate the western Mediterranean. Rome's preoccupation with its war with Carthage provided an opportunity for Philip V of Macedonia , in the north of the Greek peninsula , to attempt to extend his power westward. He sent ambassadors to Hannibal's camp in Italy, to negotiate an alliance as common enemies of Rome. But Rome discovered
23532-431: Was drawn by a team of elephants in order to represent his African conquest – and perhaps to outdo even the legendary triumph of Bacchus. They proved too bulky to pass through the triumphal gate, so Pompey had to dismount while a horse team was yoked in their place. This embarrassment would have delighted his critics, and probably some of his soldiers – whose demands for cash had been near-mutinous. Even so, his firm stand on
23691-510: Was granted a third triumph in 61 BCE to celebrate his victory over Mithridates VI of Pontus. It was an opportunity to outdo all rivals – and even himself. Triumphs traditionally lasted for one day, but Pompey's went on for two in an unprecedented display of wealth and luxury. Plutarch claimed that this triumph represented Pompey's domination over the entire world – on Rome's behalf – and an achievement to outshine even Alexander 's. Pliny's narrative of this triumph dwells with ominous hindsight upon
23850-446: Was later avenged at the Battle of Veii in 396 BC, wherein Rome destroyed the city. By the end of this period, Rome had effectively completed the conquest of its immediate Etruscan and Latin neighbours and secured its position against the immediate threat posed by the nearby Apennine hill tribes. Beginning with their revolt against Tarquin, and continuing through the early years of the Republic, Rome's patrician aristocrats were
24009-439: Was limited as patrician tribunes retained preeminence over their plebeian colleagues. In 385 BC, the former consul and saviour of the besieged capital, Marcus Manlius Capitolinus , is said to have sided with the plebeians, ruined by the sack and largely indebted to patricians. According to Livy, Capitolinus sold his estate to repay the debt of many of them, and even went over to the plebs, the first patrician to do so. Nevertheless,
24168-455: Was martyred by a mob while attempting to stop the customary gladiatorial games at this triumph, and gladiatorial games ( munera gladiatoria ) were banned in consequence. In 438 CE, however, the western emperor Valentinian III found cause to repeat the ban, which indicates that it was not always enforced. In 534, well into the Byzantine era , Justinian I awarded general Belisarius
24327-530: Was mobilized under the command of the great hero of the Second Punic War, Scipio Africanus , and set out for Greece, beginning the Roman–Seleucid War . After initial fighting that revealed serious Seleucid weaknesses, the Seleucids tried to turn the Roman strength against them at the Battle of Thermopylae , but were forced to evacuate Greece. The Romans pursued the Seleucids by crossing the Hellespont ,
24486-403: Was painted red, perhaps in imitation of Rome's highest and most powerful god, Jupiter . The general rode in a four-horse chariot through the streets of Rome in unarmed procession with his army, captives, and the spoils of his war. At Jupiter's temple on the Capitoline Hill , he offered sacrifice and the tokens of his victory to Jupiter. In Republican tradition, only the Senate could grant
24645-528: Was sacked by the Senones . There is no destruction layer at Rome around this time, indicating that if a sack occurred, it was largely superficial. Second Samnite War Third Samnite War From 343 to 341 BC, Rome won two battles against its Samnite neighbours, but was unable to consolidate its gains, due to the outbreak of war with former Latin allies. In the Latin War (340–338 BC), Rome defeated
24804-438: Was the first Roman to receive a naval triumph, which also included captive Carthaginians for the first time. Although Carthage was victorious on land at Thermae in Sicily, the corvus gave a strong advantage to Rome on the waters. The consul Lucius Cornelius Scipio (Asina's brother) captured Corsica in 259 BC; his successors won the naval battles of Sulci in 258, Tyndaris in 257 BC, and Cape Ecnomus in 256. To hasten
24963-409: Was the landing in Sicily of Hamilcar Barca in 247 BC, who harassed the Romans with a mercenary army from a citadel he built on Mt. Eryx . Unable to take the Punic fortresses in Sicily, Rome tried to decide the war at sea and built a new navy, thanks to a forced borrowing from the rich. In 242 BC, 200 quinqueremes under consul Gaius Lutatius Catulus blockaded Drepana. The rescue fleet from Carthage
25122-508: Was the supreme Imperator . The Senate, in true Republican style, would have held session to debate and decide the merits of the candidate; but this was little more than good form. Augustan ideology insisted that Augustus had saved and restored the Republic, and it celebrated his triumph as a permanent condition, and his military, political, and religious leadership as responsible for an unprecedented era of stability, peace, and prosperity. From then on, emperors claimed – without seeming to claim –
25281-416: Was the turning point of the war. The campaign of attrition had worked well: Hannibal's troops were now depleted; he only had one elephant left ( Surus ) and retreated to Bruttium , on the defensive. In Greece, Rome contained Philip V without devoting too many forces by allying with the Aetolian League , Sparta , and Pergamon , which also prevented Philip from aiding Hannibal. The war with Macedon resulted in
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