Was the Roman Republic a democracy, an oligarchy, or what?
How was the government of the Roman Republic different than the ancient Greek democracy?
First, when people say "ancient Greek Democracy,"
they should say "Athenian democracy." Athens began as a city-state, and
it conquered some of the surrounding land, but there were a bunch of
Greek city-states, and they were always at war with each other, except
for a few years when then were all at war together against the Persian
Empire. Some Greek city-states were more democratic than others. Athens
called itself a democracy, and was an oligarchy which occasionally had
efforts within toward greater democracy. The IDEA of democracy as we
know it, and terminology we use in democracies, was formulated in Athens
in the 6th and 5th centuries BC.
I
tell you all this because Rome copied Athens to a very great extent.
The ancient Romans themselves, from about 300 BC onwards, believed that
the city of Rome was founded in 753 BC, and that a monarchy was
overthtrown by a democracy in 509 BC. In truth, most dates having to do
with Rome before 300 BC or so, and some after, a bit hazy. Anyway, at
some point before 300 BC or so, Rome established a republic which
imitated Athens in many ways.
The
Roman Republic existed down to 30 BC. It was an oligarchy, mainly ruled
by the Senate, which was chosen from a small group of aristocratic men.
Then there were the tribunes, elected by the plebians, which was,
basically, all of the men who were Roman citizens, but not aristocrats.
All the men in Rome between the aristocrats and the slaves.
Legally,
women, and the children of fathers who were still alive -- even if they
were very old and their fathers were very, very old -- had no rights
whatsoever. Legally, they were actually worse off than slaves. In
practical reality, women and the children of living fathers very often
had considerable power, but they had to exercise it behind the scenes.
In
30 BC, Augustus (born Octavian) established what we today call the
Roman Empire. The ancient Romans themselves continued to call their
state a republic, and they continued to have tribunes and so forth, and
to give a huge amount of lip service to democracy. In reality, the Empire was a very strict monarchy. Everybody from the Senators on down
had the right to do exactly what the Emperor wanted, or to be in a lot
of trouble. Of course, individual Emperors might choose to share more
power than others, but it always their choice. It was delegation, not
division of power.
One
more thing, very important: in the early 4th century, in AD 313, the
Emperor Constantine divided the Empire into two parts. The western part
continued to be rules from the city of Rome, and the eastern part was
now ruled from a city originally called Byzantium, then called
Constantinople after Constantine, and now called Istanbul in present-day
Turkey.
From
AD 313 to 453, sometimes there was one emperor, and sometimes there
were two, one based in the city of Rome and the other based in
Constantinople.
The
western part of the Empire crumbled and disappeared in the 5th century
AD, with the western Emperor Romulus Augustulus surrendering to the
Germanic leader Odoacer in AD 476, while other Germanic leaders took
over other parts of the west.
In
the east, the Empire, ruled from Constantinople, lasted until AD 1453,
and continued to call itself the Roman Empire, as well it should have.
Western historians have often called it Byzantium or the Byzantine
Empire. The Romans, based in Constantinople, were rightly quite annoyed
when German leaders, beginning with Charlemagne in AD 800, called
themselves Roman Emperors. This western Roman empire, also known as the
Holy Roman Empire, lasted until it was overthrown by Napoleon in 1806.
By now you're probably much more confused than when you started reading this, but I'd be glad to answer further questions.
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