Download Rome`s Government

The Roman Republic
Main Idea: Rome’s republic was shaped by a struggle
between wealthy landowners and regular citizens as it
gradually expanded the right to vote.
A. Rome’s Government
1. Early Romans were divided into two classes: patricians
and plebeians.
a. Patricians were wealthy landowners and made up the
ruling class in Rome.
b. Most people were plebeians, this group were artisans,
shopkeepers and owners of small farms.
2. Both patrician and plebian men were Roman citizens.
a. They had the right to vote and the duty to pay taxes and
serve in the army.
b. Plebeians had less social status, they could not marry
patricians or hold public office.
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Rome’s Government
B. How Did Rome’s Government Work?
1. Rome had a tripartite, or three-part government.
a. One group of people ran the government, one made the
laws and the other acted as judges.
1) They had a checks and balances system so that one
group couldn’t become too strong.
2. The top government officials were called consuls.
a. Two consuls were chosen each year both from the
patrician class.
1) They headed the army and ran the government.
2) Each consul had the power to veto, or reject, the
other’s decision.
3) Veto is Latin for “I forbid”.
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Rome’s Government
b. Other officials were called praetors who interpreted the
law and acted as judges in court cases.
3. The most important legislative body was the Senate.
a. This was a select group of 300 patrician men who served
for life.
b. At first the Senate only gave advice to the consuls but
eventually they could propose laws, hold debates, and
approve building programs.
4. Another legislative body was the Assembly of Centuries.
a. A group of patricians who elected the consuls and
praetors, and passed laws.
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The Senate
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Rome’s Government
C. Plebeians Against Patricians
1. In 494 B.C. many plebeians were unhappy about their
lack of power in the Roman republic and they went on
strike.
a. They refused to serve in the army and left the city to set
up a republic of their own.
b. This scared the patricians into sharing power.
2. The patricians gave them their own body of
representatives called the Council of the Plebs, in 471
B.C.
a. Tribunes were elected to bring plebeian concerns to the
government’s attention.
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Rome’s Government
b. In 455 B.C. plebeians and patricians were allowed to
marry and in the 300’s B.C. plebeians were allowed to
become consuls.
3. In 287 B.C. the Council of Plebs was given the power to
pass laws for all Romans making all male citizens of
Rome equal.
a. In reality, a few wealthy patrician families still held most
of the power and women still had no vote in government.
D. Who Was Cincinnatus?
1. In times of emergency the Romans appointed someone
dictator to rule with complete control on a temporary
basis.
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Rome’s Government
a. When the danger was over the dictator gave up their
power.
2. The best-known early Roman dictator is Cincinnatus
who in 460 B.C. left his farm, gathered an army and
defeated a powerful enemy.
a. Having done his duty he returned home to his farm and
gave up his power.
3. Romans strongly believed in civic duty.
a. They thought all citizens have a responsibility to help their
country.
4. Many leaders have admired Cincinnatus including
George Washington when he left his farm to head the
Continental Army in the American War for
Independence.
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Cincinnatus
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Roman Law
Main Idea: The Roman Republic’s legal system was based on
the rule of law.
A. Roman Law
1. Rome’s first code of laws was the Twelve Tables,
adopted in 451 B.C.
a. Before this their laws were not written down and
plebeians claimed that patrician judges were not fair to
everyone.
2. The laws were carved on bronze tablets and placed in
Rome’s marketplace called the Forum.
a. The Twelve Tables became the basis for all future Roman
laws.
b. They established that all free citizens had the right to be
treated equally by the legal system.
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The Twelve Tables, 450 BCE
 Providing political and social
rights for the plebeians.
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The Roman Forum
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Roman Law
3. As the Romans took over more lands they created a
new collection of laws called the Law of Nations to solve
legal disputes between citizens and non-citizens.
4. Some of these standards are still used today.
a. A person is innocent until proven guilty.
b. People accused of crimes have the right to defend
themselves before a judge.
c. A judge must look at the evidence carefully before making
a decision.
5. The idea that the law applies to everyone equally within
the legal system is called the “rule of law”.
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Roman Law
a. At the time the “rule of law” was still a new concept and
in many places people at the top of society had special
privileges or didn’t have to obey the same laws as the
people in lower classes.
b. The “rule of law” is one of the key ideas that the Romans
gave to the world and it remains the basis of our legal
system today.
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Rome Expands
Main Idea: Rome slowly destroyed the Carthaginian Empire
and took control of the entire Mediterranean region.
A. Rome Expands
1. The Roman’s most powerful rival in the
Mediterranean area was the state of Carthage
on the coast of North Africa.
a. Carthage was founded around 800 B.C. by the
Phoenicians.
b. Carthage ruled a great trading empire that included parts
of northern Africa and southern Europe.
c. By controlling the movement of goods they made
themselves the largest and richest city in the western
Mediterranean.
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Carthaginian Empire
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Rome Expands
B. The First Punic War
1. Both Carthage and Rome wanted to control the island
of Sicily.
a. In 264 B.C. the First Punic War started when the Romans
sent an army to Sicily to prevent Carthaginian takeover.
b. Punicus is the Latin word for “Phoenician”.
2. Up until the Punic War the Romans had only fought
their wars on land.
a. They soon realized they needed a navy to defeat
Carthage.
b. They built a large fleet of ships and confronted their
enemy at sea.
c. The war lasted more than 20 years until 241 B.C. when
Rome crushed the Carthaginian navy off the coast of
Sicily.
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Rome Expands
1) Carthage had to leave Sicily and pay Rome a huge
fine.
C. The Second Punic War
1. Carthage expanded its empire into southern Spain
which angered the Romans.
a. The Romans helped the people living in Spain rebel
against Carthage.
b. This angered Carthage so they sent Hannibal to attack
Rome in 218 B.C. starting the 2nd Punic War.
2. Hannibal’s strategy was to take the fighting into Italy
itself so he gathered an army of 46,000 men, many
horses and 37 elephants.
a. He landed his forces in Spain and marched east to attack
Italy.
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• Rome would not
surrender.
– Finally turned the tables
on Carthage by
changing rules of naval
warfare.
• Equipped ships with
huge hooks and
stationed soldiers on
ships.
• Would hook enemy
ship, pull it nearby,
and board it with
soldiers.
– Converted naval
warfare into mini-land
battles.
• Something Rome
was very good at.
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Rome Expands
2. They suffered severe losses crossing the snowy Alps
into Italy.
a. The cold, hunger and attacks by the mountain tribes killed
almost half of the soldiers and most of the elephants.
b. But the remaining army was still a powerful fighting force
when they reached Italy.
3. The Romans suffered a severe loss in 216 B.C. at the
Battle of Cannae in southern Italy.
a. Hannibal’s army although outnumbered overpowered the
Roman force.
4. The Romans raised another army and in 202 B.C. led by
a general named Scipio they invaded Carthage.
a. Since almost all of Carthage’s troops were with Hannibal it
forced Hannibal to head home to defend his city.
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Hannibal’s Route
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Hannibal
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Hannibal's troops crossing
the Rhone
on their
way to attack northern Italy.
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Rome Expands
4. At the Battle of Zama, Scipio’s troops won and Carthage
had to give up Spain and pay a fine.
D. More Conquests
1. After the Second Punic War Carthage remained a
trading center until 146 B.C. when Rome finally
destroyed them in the Third Punic War.
a. Roman soldiers burned Carthage and enslaved 50,000
men, women and children.
b. Legend says they spread salt on the earth so no crops
would grow.
c. Carthage became a Roman province, or regional district.
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Rome Expands
2. During the Punic Wars Rome was also successfully
battling other states in the eastern Mediterranean.
a. In 148 B.C. Macedonia was taken over by Rome and 2
years later the rest of Greece became Roman.
b. In 129 B.C. Rome gained it’s first province in Asia.
c. The Romans began to call the Mediterranean mare
nostrum – “our sea”.
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