The Princeps and the Senate: The Flavians and Rome

 Example of Senatorial Career

This includes many of the available senatorial posts, along with many other optional offices such as curator of the Tiber and the city sewers which became available once a senator had reached praetorian or consular rank

As with many such inscriptions, the offices are listed in reverse order of how important they were considered to be - i.e the consulship comes first, because this was considered the peak of a senatorial career, while the last office listed is a minor legal administrative position

(See older posts for the various senatorial positions)

The Senate by AD 70

• The senate had lost much of its influence by Vespasian's succession in AD 70
• The facade that Augustus had created to mask his own position and power behind a Republican framework had all but dropped. Everyone knew that the Princeps was a monarch
• The Senators themselves had never experienced anything other than emperors also, as Tacitus puts it "how many were left who had seen the Republic?"
• Yet the Senate still held a significant purpose within the Principate. They were the key administrators of the vast empire, with consuls, praetors, proconsuls and aediles still fulfilling their responsibilities

Vespasian and the Senate

• The Senate's declining influence had rendered them ineffective and immobilised, yet Vespasian appears to have desired for the Senate to retain some of its use, even if only as administrative assistants to the Princeps
• In 73-4 AD Vespasian adopted the Censorship, allowing him to promote chosen individuals into the Senate (adlection)
• Adlected individuals seem particularly to be drafted from the provinces, perhaps reflecting a wider participation of the empire in governance
• Vespasian attempted to consult and curry favour with the Senate, either by himself or through his sons
• However, he also maintained a number of imperial freedmen to help with the administrative needs of the empire

Titus and the Senate

• Few serious changes due to his short-lived reign
• Appears to have continued Vespasian's desire to establish a functional autocracy - with defined roles for both the Senate and Princeps
• The sources do emphasise Titus' desire to respect the Senate, in particular his mercy and clemency which was considered unique for an emperor

Domitian and the Senate

• Whilst Titus and Vespasian sought to placate the Senate and create a functional and practical working relationship, Domitian appears to have deviated from these plans
• Crucially, Domitian formalised far more clearly the Consilium Principis, the imperial council of selected amici (friends) who acted as advisors to the emperor
• Though this system had been created by Augustus and existed under every emperor, it was Domitian who most openly admitted their importance and more blatantly preferred monarchy and autocracy over working with the Senate
• Domitian fanned the flames of his autocracy by openly accepting the accusations of the delatores and beginning again the bloody process of maiestas that had earned Tiberius such hatred from the Patricians
• He openly boasted of his role as Censoria Perpetuita (Perpetual Censor), allowing him to both scrutinise and overhaul the Senate at his own whim

Activity:

• Vespasian
• Reforms/changes made to the senatorial order or its roles
• Suetonius
• "He reformed the senatorial and equestrian orders, now weakened by frequent murders and long-term neglect"
• "Replacing any undesirables with the most eligible Italian and provincial candidates" - continuing a policy of adlection (enlisting) provincials to the Senate begun by Claudius, this would help the Senate become more representative of the entire empire rather than just the Roman elite
• The emperor's attitude towards the senate
• Suetonius
• "in order to define clearly the difference between those orders as one of status rather than privilege" - he said this during a dispute between a senator and an equestrian: "no abuse may be offered a senator, though it may be returned when given." - shows a desire for the Senate to retain their privileged position, perhaps very important considering the Flavians were an Equestrian family
• Cassius Dio
• "He would regularly attend the senate and was open to discussion with members on any topic...any despatches he could not read himself, beacuse of his age, he usually asked his sons to read for him, thus showing in even such minor details a meticulous respect for the senate"
• The emperor's attitude towards maiestas
• Suetonius
• he hated it when a person was to receive 'the extreme penalty' often times weeping. Thus with Helvidius Priscus who was to be put to death, he tried after this penalty to stop the execution but was too late to change the order
• "No innocent party was ever punished during his reign"
• Titus
• Reforms/changes made to the senatorial order or its roles
• Suetonius
• "He chose commissioners by lot from among the ex-consuls for the relief of Campania; and the property of those who lost their lives by Vesuvius" - shows a desire to include the Senate in administrative tasks
• The emperor's attitude towards the senate
• The emperor's attitude towards maiestas
• Suetonius
• "one of the worst features of Roman life at the time was the licence ling enjoyed by informers and their managers" [on Titus' orders] after these had been soundly beaten in the Forum with scourges and cudgels, and finally left in procession of the amphitheatre, he had some of them put up and sold into slavery, and others deported to the wildest islands
• He also prevented anyone from being tried for the same crime twice, and imposed limits on the time that inquiries could be made into the status of dead people
• He could not bring himself to use execute senators, even those who had committed open plots - once when two Senators were convicted of plotting against the emperor Titus instead invited them into the imperial box to inspect the swords at a gladiator match

• Domitian
• Reforms/changes made to the senatorial order or its roles
• Suetonius
• "He personally urged the tribunes of the people to charge a corrupt aedile with extortion and to petition the senate for a special jury in the case"
• he was "conscientious" about justice and levels of justice rose to "unprecedently high levels"
• He came down heavily on authors who lampooned men and women, expelled a senator for being "overfond of acting and dancing", "struck an equestrain from the jury roll because he had divorced his wife on a charge of adultery and then taken her back again" and sentenced members of both orders under the Scantinian Law
• "It was his ruling that if a juryman were proved to have taken bribes, all his colleagues must be penalized as well as himself"
• The emperor's attitude towards the senate
• Tacitus
• "Domitian no longer allowed any interval or breathing space but destroyed the state as if by one, continuous assault!
• "It was some consolation that Agricola did not see the senate house besieged and the senators blocked in by armed men; nor the murder of so many former consuls in one massacre; nor the exile or banishment of so many noble ladies"
• "The old have reached almost the limits of the span of life in silence" under Domitian - Tacitus is glad to have composed an account of "our former slavery"
• Tacitus extolls Nerva's virtues for undoing such terror, but "does it matter if, for fifteen years, a large part of our human lifespan, most have perished, but the vicissitudes of fate, and all the most prominent, by the emperor's savagery?"
• The emperor's attitude towards maiestas
• Suetonius
• "He put many senators to death, three for conspiracy but others for trivial reasons;"
• Aelius Lamia was killed for the comments he made - after his wife was taken by Domitian, he remarked "I'm in training" when someone praised his voice, and when encouraged by Titus to marry again he responded "you're not wanting a wife too, are you?"
• Salvius Cocceianus was killed for still celebrating his uncle, Otho's, birthday, and Mettius Pompusianus for having an "imperial horoscope", carrying around a map of the world and speeches by kings and generals extracted from Livy, and naming two of his slaves Mago and Hannibal
• Sallustius Lucullus had offended Domitian by calling a new type of lance 'the Lucullan'
• Junius Rusticus by calling Thrasea Paetus and Helvidius Priscus the "most virtuous of men" (this incident led to Domitian banishing all philosophers from Italy)
• After his victory in the civil war he became even more cruel, and to discover any conspirators who were in hiding, tortured many of the opposite party by a new form of inquisition, inserting fire in their privates; and he cut off the hands of some of them
• Tacitus
• "But before long our hands led Helvidius into prison; the expressions of Maurcus and Rusticus condemned us; we were drenched in the innocent blood of Senecio. Even Nero looked away when he ordered crimes and did not watch them, whereas an especial part of the miseries under Domitian was to watch them and to be observed our sighs were noted down and his savage and purple face (which saved him from blushing for shame) was enough to mark out all those who had turned 

Resistance to the Flavians: Vespasian

• Though the Flavians enjoyed (relative) political stability, opposition from within the Senatorial body did occasionally rear its head
• The Stoics:
• Under Vespasian a group of self-identified Stoic Senators voiced open opposition to the notion of emperor
• These rallied behind Helvidius Priscus, the son-in-law of famous senator Thrasea Patus
• Priscus and the Stoics preached a nostalgic (probably not practical) Republicanism that was in direct contradiction of the Flavian's aims of a functional autocracy
• Priscus himself would eventually be exiled and executed, but his martyrdom became a figurehead for other Stoic Senators, leading to their persecution under Domitian

Resistance to the Flavians: Domitian

• Direct conspiracies and opposition to the emperor are rare in this period, but under Domitian, the charges of maiestas became prevalent again
• Our sources are keen to emphasis a number of atrocities committed by Domitian against the Senate, explained by many of their own first-hand experiences under the emperor (i.e Tacitus)
• However, Domitian's reign was ended not by the Senate, but by his own conspiring courtiers. The Senate only took part in his damnatio memoriae when it was certain he was dead

Denarius of Domitian, 85 AD, proudly boasting of his acceptance of the Censoria Perpetuita, giving him the right to overhaul the Senate indefinitely. The goddess displayed is Minerva, whom Domitian adopted as his patron goddess

Task One: The Stoics

• How are Helvidius Priscus and the Stoics described by the sources?
• Tacitus
• "As a young man he devoted his notable talents to higher scholarship, not, like many, to clothe a life of idleness under a pretentious name, but to be better able to withstand the vicissitudes of public office."
• "He followed those teachers of philosophy who hold that virtuous conduct is the only good; that wrong-doing is shameful; that power, noble birth and other things outside what one can control should be counted as neither good nor wrong."
• "While still a quaestor he was chosen by Thrasea Paetus as his son-in-law, and from his father-in-law's character he learnt freedom (libertas) above all"
• "As a citizen, senator, husband, son-in-law, friend he was just in all his duties in life, uncorrupted by wealth, resolute in righteousness, dauntless in the face of fear."
• "There were people who thought he was too keen to seek fame, since even philosophers rid themselves, last of all, of desire for glory."
• Cassius Dio
• "Instead he constantly insulted him. For this on one occasion he was arrested by the tribunes, and placed in custody with their deputies. Vespasian was greatly distressed by this and left the senate-house in tears. His only comment was that, "my son is going to be my successor; no one else."
• Suetonius
• "Although Helvidius Priscus 757 was the only man who presumed to salute him on his return from Syria by his private name of Vespasian, and, when he came to be praetor, omitted any mark of honour to him, or even any mention of him in his edicts, yet he was not angry, until Helvidius proceeded to inveigh against him with the most scurrilous language. (456) Though he did indeed banish him, and afterwards ordered him to be put to death, yet he would gladly have saved him notwithstanding, and accordingly dispatched messengers to fetch back the executioners; and he would have saved him, had he not been deceived by a false account brought, that he had already perished. He never rejoiced at the death of any man; nay he would shed tears, and sigh, at the just punishment of the guilty.
• What does Cassius Dio tell us of Vespasian's attitude towards other Stoics?
• There were many others also, among them Demetrius the Cynic, who were encouraged by so-called Stoic teachings to promote to the public at large many ideas, wholly inappropriate to current circumstances, under the guise of philosophical instruction."
• Mucianus persuaded Vespasian to expel all such persons from the city
• "Vespasian's immediate reaction was to expel all the philosophers from Rome, except Musonius; with Demetrius and Hostilianus he went further, deporting them to imprisonment on islands. Hostilianus happened to be holding a conversation with someone, when he heard of the decision for his exile. Far from refraining from any further discussion, he continued to denounce autocracy even more vigorously. All the same, he lost no time in leaving Rome."
• "Demetrius, by contrast, even then refused to give an inch. Vespasian had a message sent to him to the effect that "you are doing everything you can to make me execute you. But I don't kill yapping dogs."

• What does Cassius Dio tells us of Domitian's persecution of philosophers?

• "He killed Arulenus Rusticus for being a philosopher and for calling Thrasea Paetus "holy"; and Herennius Senecio, because in the whole of a long life he had failed to campaign for any office after his quaestorship, and had written a biography of Helvidius Priscus. Many others died for the self same offence of philosophising, and any that remained were all exiled from Rome once more."

• What does Tacitus tell us of Domitian's oppression of free speech?
• "We have certainly produced a great example of passiveness; just as a former age saw the last word in freedom, so we have seen the last word in servility, since cross-examinations have robbed us of even the exchange of speaking and listening. We would have lost memory itself, alongside speech, if it had been equally possible for us to forget as to be silent."

Task Two: Resistance to the Flavians

• Vespasian
• Cassius Dio
• “there was also a conspiracy against the emperor, led by Alienus and Marcellus”
• These two plotted to assassinate Vespasian despite him giving them “every kind of honour”
• Suetonius
• "that even after constant conspiracies were made against him he had the assurance to say to the senate that either his sons would succeed him or no one would"
• Titus 
• Suetonius
• "Two men of patrician rank being convicted of aspiring to the empire, he only advised them to desist, saying, "that the sovereign power was disposed of by fate," and promised them, that if there was anything else they desired of him, he would grant it. He also immediately sent messengers to the mother of one of them, who was at a great distance, and in deep anxiety about her son, to assure her of his safety. Nay, he not only invited them to sup with him, but next day, at a show of gladiators, purposely placed them close by him; and handed to them the arms of the combatants for his inspection."

• Domitian
• Cassius Dio
• Domitian almost put Ursus to death for not showing "manifest delight" at his achievements
• Domitian had some of the "leading citizens" murdered, and confiscated someone's goods because they buried one of his victims
• Domitian expelled Caecillius Rufinus from the senate for acting in pantomimes, and he killed Arulenus Rusticus for being a philosopher and calling Thraesea Patus 'holy'
• Then there was a sophist called Maternus, whom Domitian executed for criticising tyrants as part of a rhetorical exercise
• Domitian killed Herrenius Senecio because he didn't run for office after his quaestorship and wrote a biography of Helvidius Priscus
• Juventius Celsus was charged with conspiracy against Domitian but escaped by grovelling and promising an investigation into the conspiracy, which was unsuccessful, he managed to create excuses for the lack of success until Domitian's death.
• Julius Calvaster, a military tribune with senatorial ambitions. he could not think of any way of escaping a charge of conspiracy. So he stated that they had in fact met for sexual intercourse — and certainly his good looks made the claim plausible. And so he was acquitted
• Domitian treated all senatorial supporters and critics the same: “the former because they were clearly seeking to ingratiate themselves with him, the latter because they seemed to view him with contempt.”
• "Many men and women among the wealthy classes were punished for adultery, some of the women being the victims of rape by Domitian himself. Many others were fined or murdered on a variety of charges. One woman was tried and put to death for undressing in front of a statue of Domitian; another man for consorting with astrologers."
• “They were both charged with atheism, an offence which had shipwrecked many of those who had been condemned for sailing too close to Jewish customs.” These were Flavius Clemens and his wife Flavia Domitilla.                                        
• The consequences: “Domitilla herself was merely exiled to the island of Pandateria. But Glabrio, Traianus' fellow consul, was charged with the same offences as many others, but specifically also with fighting in the arena with wild animals, and executed.”
• "In this period a certain Antonius was the governor of Germany. He staged a revolt against Domitian, but Lucius Maximus attacked and destroyed him. In itself this victory was of little merit or significance — after all, unexpected success is not unusual in military campaigns, and of course Lucius' soldiers were part and parcel of that victory. But Lucius also burnt all the documents that were found in Antonius' storage chests, an act which showed that he was relatively indifferent to his own safety compared with his desire to protect others from being informed against. Such an action seems to me so wholly admirable that I cannot find words with which to express my admiration."
• Suetonius
• Got rid of many of the leading aristocrats on a "range of pretexts"
• Punished the Vestal Virgins on a charge of them having sex
• Helvius Agrippa was so shocked by the barbarity that he died of shock in the senate house
• Ex-consuls Civica Cerealis, Salvidienus Orfitus and Acilius Glabrio (who was in exile) were all killed for plotting revolution, while others were killed by Domitian “on whatever charge, however trivial.”:
• Aelius Lamia for joking about Domitian stealing his wife.
• Salvius Cocceianus for celebrating the birthday of Otho, his uncle
• Mettius Pompusianus for having an imperial horoscope, carrying around a map of the world and speeches from kings and generals from Livy, and naming two slaves Mago and Hannibal.
• Sallustius Lucullus, governor of Britain, for naming a new type of lance the ‘Lucullan’ after himself.
• Junius Rusticus for praising Thrasea Paetus and Helvidius Priscus
• The younger Helvidius for parodying Domitian and his wife on stage.
• And Flavius Sabinus, one of his cousins, for announcing him as emperor-elect rather than consul on the day of consular elections. 
• "Flavius Sabinus too, one of his cousins, because on the day of the consular elections the crier had inadvertently announced him to the people as emperor elect, instead of consul."