Can anyone point me in the direction of the Latin text of Tiberius Gracchus's speech on the land reform law? The one that starts with The wild beasts.
I'm new to latin studies and don't know well where to look. Thanks!
Hey there, I'm looking for some help on the name of Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus (brother of Gaius Sempronius Gracchus), who was a fascinating political figure heavily involved in the Roman Land Crisis around 133 BCE. I'm looking to get a tattoo of his name as part of a larger piece, but before I do, I figured I might ask about him here. Specifically, is there anything I should know about his name? Was Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus his full name? Do any of those names have an "uncouth" meaning to them in Classical Latin? Are there any other resources on him you could point me to?
Much obliged!
The 130s BC were a turbulent decade in Roman history, because they encompassed both the First Servile War and the Gracchi movement. Yet when reading histories of this time, one is not left with the impression that these concurrent crises were connected in any way, other than that the influx of slaves vaguely caused both. It reads like they were happening in two different countries with no knowledge of each other.
I mean, if there were a hugely violent revolt in the United States today, it would be all any politician could talk about. Partisans would accuse the other of being too harsh or too soft towards the rebels. People would be proposing measures to either stamp it out or mollify their grievances. But it seems like the servile revolt was entirely absent from the political discourse of the period.
Mike Duncan's Storm Before the Storm mentions that Tiberius Gracchus' Lex Agraria would create a political power base for the Claudian family by turning over ownership of public lands to landless men who were otherwise effectively share-croppers.
My question is why this would create political power for the Claudians? Once those landless men had their land it seems like there were under no further obligation to support the Claudians. If they were their own landlords they could vote however they wished. Was it seen as a gift from the Claudians that those men wanted to repay with political support? Did they continue to support the Claudians in the hopes there would be further land hand-overs in the future?
Thanks for the expertise
I guess this is a wider question about the class structure in ancient Rome during the Republic period, but how is it that the Gracchi seemingly came from a noble patrician family, the Sempronia, and yet are considered Plebeians? At what point did the "patrician" blood dilute to the point that you were no longer nobility or is there some other mechanism of society at work here? And finally, what was the actual tangible difference between a patrician and a powerful plebeian like either of the Gracchi?
Strikes me as odd that we know so little about what would have been a major historical figure who arose so shortly after the withdrawal of Romans from Brittania. Is there a consensus on whether or not he was a real dude? And if the consensus is that he DID NOT exist, how do we explain the rise of his legend and the influence it has had on world history?
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