Assignment: The Gracchi (1 Viewer)

[nicko88]

Can somebody post their assignment they had to do on the Gracchi, please? In desperate need of help.

 

[wrong_turn]

Can somebody post their assignment they had to do on the Gracchi, please? In desperate need of help.

Gracchi: These were two brothers from a noble Roman family who were both tribunes (magistrates or officials who defended the lives and property of the plebeians or Roman populace and who had the right of veto over other magistrates). Tiberius was tribune in 133 BC and Gaius was tribune in 123 and 122 BC.

Challenges to the Senate

(i) The first challenge to the Senate’s power came in 133 BC. Tiberius Gracchus, tribune for that year and the elder brother of the Gracchi brothers, began a long and bitter war with the Senate for political power. He and his brother, Gaius, created an opposition group; a democratic party known as the Populares. They opposed the Senatorial party, the Optimates. The Populares were men of reform who proposed measures to the people without consulting the Senate first while the Optimates were made up primarily of Senators plus nobles who wanted to maintain the status quo prior to the tribuneship of Tiberius Gracchus.



Two resounding effects of the tribuneships of the Gracchi brothers was that they brought the equestrian order into politics (they depended on their support), and they weakened the power of the Senate. However, they were not able to break it.



(ii) The second challenge to the Senate’s power in this period came in 104 BC. In that year, a young general from the Italian village of Arpinum became consul and held the consulship until 100 BC. His name was Marius. Rome was being threatened with annihilation by the Gauls at this time. He realised that if he completely reorganised the Roman army he could build up the Roman army and defeat the Gauls. This meant that he had to bypass the Roman nobility and depend on the Roman populace to achieve his reforms.



However, his army reforms meant that a soldier’s first loyalty now was to his general. not to the Senate as in the past. This meant that power was now in the hands of any ambitious, energetic general such as Pompey [8], Caesar [9] and Octavian [10] (later Augustus) because political power would follow military power. Also, his successive consulships provided a precedent for future dictators who could gain power over the Senate.

http://ancienthistory.about.com/cs/people/p/gracchi.htm

http://ancienthistory.about.com/library/bl/bl_pennellhistoryofrome21.htm#XXI

http://clk.about.com/?zi=1/XJ&sdn=a...dham.edu/halsall/ancient/appian-civwars1.html

http://clk.about.com/?zi=1/XJ&sdn=a...academics/classics/courses/hi202/gracchi.html

i hope this info may help you nick. i just bothered to find it just tehn when i was looking stuff up for chemistry