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Dictator (Roman)
A Roman dictator was an extraordinary magistrate in the Roman Republic endowed with full authority to resolve some specific problem to which he had been assigned. He received the full powers of the state, subordinating the other magistrates, consuls included, for the specific purpose of resolving that issue, and that issue only, and then dispensing with those powers forthwith. Dictators were still controlled and accountable during their terms in office: the Senate still exercised some oversight authority and the right of plebeian tribunes to veto his actions or of the people to appeal from them was retained. The extent of a dictator's mandate strictly controlled the ends to which his powers could be directed. Dictators were also liable to prosecution after their terms completed. Dictators were frequently appointed from the earliest period of the Republic down to the Second Punic War (218–201 BC), but the magistracy then went into abeyance for over a century. It was later r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gaius Julius Caesar, Denarius, 44 BC, RRC 480-10
Gaius, sometimes spelled ''Gajus'', Kaius, Cajus (other), Cajus, Caius (other), Caius, was a common Latin praenomen; see Gaius (praenomen). People *Gaius (jurist) (), Roman jurist *Gaius Acilius *Gaius Antonius *Gaius Antonius Hybrida *Gaius Asinius Gallus *Gaius Asinius Pollio *Gaius Ateius Capito (other), Gaius Ateius Capito *Gaius Aurelius Cotta *Gaius Calpurnius Piso (other), Gaius Calpurnius Piso *Gaius Canuleius, a tribune *Gaius Cassius Longinus *Gaius Charles, American actor *Gaius Claudius Glaber, Roman military commander during the Third Servile War *Gaius Claudius Marcellus Maior, consul in 49 BC *Gaius Claudius Marcellus Minor (88–40 BC), consul in 50 BC *Gaius Cornelius Tacitus, Roman orator famous for the annals and histories *Gaius Duilius *Gaius Fabricius Luscinus *Gaius Flaminius (consul 223 BC), Gaius Flaminius *Gaius Flavius Fimbria *Gaius Gracchus *Gaius Julius Alpinus Classicianus *Philopappos, Gaius Julius Antiochus Epiphan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus
Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus, surnamed Cunctator ( 280 – 203 BC), was a Roman statesman and general of the third century BC. He was consul five times (233, 228, 215, 214, and 209 BC) and was appointed dictator in 221 and 217 BC. He was censor in 230 BC. His agnomen, ''Cunctator'', usually translated as "the delayer", refers to the strategy that he employed against Hannibal's forces during the Second Punic War. Facing an outstanding commander with superior numbers, he pursued a then-novel strategy of targeting the enemy's supply lines, and accepting only smaller engagements on favourable ground, rather than risking his entire army on direct confrontation with Hannibal himself. As a result, he is regarded as the originator of many tactics used in guerrilla warfare. Beginnings Born at Rome c. 280 BC, Fabius was a descendant of the ancient patrician Fabia gens. He was the son or grandson of Quintus Fabius Maximus Gurges, three times consul and ''princeps senatus'', and g ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roman Law
Roman law is the law, legal system of ancient Rome, including the legal developments spanning over a thousand years of jurisprudence, from the Twelve Tables (c. 449 BC), to the ''Corpus Juris Civilis'' (AD 529) ordered by Eastern Roman emperor Justinian I. Roman law forms the basic framework for Civil law (legal system), civil law, the most widely used legal system today, and the terms are sometimes used synonymously. The historical importance of Roman law is reflected by the continued use of List of legal Latin terms, Latin legal terminology in many legal systems influenced by it, including common law. After the dissolution of the Western Roman Empire, the Roman law remained in effect in the Eastern Roman Empire. From the 7th century onward, the legal language in the East was Greek. ''Roman law'' also denoted the legal system applied in most of Western Europe until the end of the 18th century. In Germany, Roman law practice remained in place longer under the Holy Roman Empire ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pomerium
The ''pomerium'' or ''pomoerium'' was a religious boundary around the city of Rome and cities controlled by Rome. In legal terms, Rome existed only within its ''pomerium''; everything beyond it was simply territory (''ager'') belonging to Rome. Name The term ''pōmērium'' is a classical contraction of the Latin phrase ', literally "behind/beyond the wall". The Roman historian Livy writes in his ''Ab urbe condita'' that, although the etymology implies a meaning referring to a single side of the wall, the pomerium was originally an area of ground on both sides of city walls. He states that it was an Etruscan tradition to consecrate this area by augury and that it was technically unlawful to inhabit or to farm the area of the pomerium, which in part had the purpose of preventing buildings from being erected close to the wall (although he writes that, in his time, houses were in fact built against the wall on the line). Other writers suggest a derivation from , "against the wall ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Curule Chair
A curule seat is a design of a (usually) foldable and transportable chair noted for its uses in Ancient Rome and Europe through to the 20th century. Its status in early Rome as a symbol of political or military power carried over to other civilizations, as it was also used in this regard by kings in Europe, Napoleon, and others. History Ancient Rome In the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, the curule chair (''sella curulis'', supposedly from ''currus'', "chariot") was the seat upon which magistrates holding '' imperium'' were entitled to sit. This includes dictators, '' magistri equitum'', consuls, praetors, '' curule aediles'', and the promagistrates, temporary or ''de facto'' holders of such offices. Additionally, the censors and the flamen of Jupiter ( Flamen Dialis) were also allowed to sit on a curule seat, though these positions did not hold ''imperium''. Livy writes that the three '' flamines maiores'' or high priests of the Archaic Triad of major gods were each g ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Toga Praetexta
The toga (, ), a distinctive garment of ancient Rome, was a roughly semicircular cloth, between in length, draped over the shoulders and around the body. It was usually woven from white wool, and was worn over a tunic. In Roman historical tradition, it is said to have been the favored dress of Romulus, Rome's founder; it was also thought to have originally been worn by both sexes, and by the citizen-military. As Roman women gradually adopted the stola, the toga was recognized as formal wear for male Roman citizens. Women engaged in prostitution might have provided the main exception to this rule.. The type of toga worn reflected a citizen's rank in the civil hierarchy. Various laws and customs restricted its use to citizens, who were required to wear it for public festivals and civic duties. From its probable beginnings as a simple, practical work-garment, the toga became more voluminous, complex, and costly, increasingly unsuited to anything but formal and ceremonial use. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Comitia Curiata
The Curiate Assembly (''comitia curiata'') was the principal assembly that evolved in shape and form over the course of the Roman Kingdom until the Comitia Centuriata organized by Servius Tullius. During these first decades, the people of Rome were organized into thirty units called "Curiae".Taylor, 3, 4 The Curiae were ethnic in nature, and thus were organized on the basis of the early Roman family, or, more specifically, on the basis of the thirty original patrician (aristocratic) clans.Abbott, 250 The Curiae formed an assembly for legislative, electoral, and judicial purposes. The Curiate Assembly passed laws, elected Consuls (the only elected magistrates at the time),Abbott, 253 and tried judicial cases. Consuls always presided over the assembly. While plebeians (commoners) could participate in this assembly, only the patricians (the Roman aristocrats) could vote. Since the Romans used a form of direct democracy, citizens, and not elected representatives, voted before each ass ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Augury
Augury is the practice from ancient Roman religion of interpreting omens from the observed behavior of birds. When the individual, known as the augur, interpreted these signs, it is referred to as "taking the auspices". "Auspices" (Latin ''auspicium'') literally means "looking at birds", and Latin ''auspex'', another word for "augur", literally means "one who looks at birds". Depending upon the birds, the auspices from the gods could be favorable or unfavorable ('' auspicious'' or ''inauspicious''). Sometimes politically motivated augurs would fabricate unfavorable auspices in order to delay certain state functions, such as elections. Pliny the Elder attributes the invention of auspicy to Tiresias the seer of Thebes, the generic model of a seer in the Greco-Roman literary culture. This type of omen reading was already a millennium old in the time of Classical Greece: in the fourteenth-century BC diplomatic correspondence preserved in Egypt called the "Amarna correspondence", ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hannibal
Hannibal (; xpu, 𐤇𐤍𐤁𐤏𐤋, ''Ḥannibaʿl''; 247 – between 183 and 181 BC) was a Carthaginian general and statesman who commanded the forces of Carthage in their battle against the Roman Republic during the Second Punic War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest military commanders in history. Hannibal's father, Hamilcar Barca, was a leading Carthaginian general during the First Punic War. His younger brothers were Mago and Hasdrubal; his brother-in-law was Hasdrubal the Fair, who commanded other Carthaginian armies. Hannibal lived during a period of great tension in the Mediterranean Basin, triggered by the emergence of the Roman Republic as a great power with its defeat of Carthage in the First Punic War. Revanchism prevailed in Carthage, symbolized by the pledge that Hannibal made to his father to "never be a friend of Rome". In 218 BC, Hannibal attacked Saguntum (modern Sagunto, Spain), an ally of Rome, in Hispania, sparking the Second Pun ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marcus Junius Pera
Marcus Junius Pera ( fl. 230216 BC) was a Roman politician before and during the Second Punic War. Career Pera served as one of the consuls for the year 230 BC; during his consulship, he – along with his colleague Marcus Aemilius Barbula – campaigned against local tribes in Liguria. He also was elected censor for 225 BC with Gaius Claudius Centho as his colleague. They conducted a census of the Roman population: Livy reports the number of citizens as 270,213. Dictatorship During Hannibal's invasion of Italy during the Second Punic War, the Carthaginian general all but wiped out an 85,000-strong Roman army at the Battle of Cannae in 216 BC. In doing so, one consul, Lucius Aemilius Paullus, was killed. The other consul, Gaius Terentius Varro, escaped to Venusia and collected his shattered army to Canusium. After news of the disaster, Pera was appointed as dictator with Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus as his ''magister equitum''. He immediately instituted a levy to repla ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marcus Fabius Buteo
Marcus Fabius Buteo (died around 210-209 BC) was a Roman politician during the 3rd century BC. He served as consul and as censor, and in 216 BC, being the oldest living ex-censor, he was appointed dictator, ''legendo senatui'', for the purpose of filling vacancies in the senate after the Battle of Cannae. He was appointed by the consul Varro, and, with M. Junius Pera, he was the only dictator to serve a simultaneous term with another. He resigned from the post immediately after he revised the censors' lists and enrolled the new Senate members. By 210 BC to 209 BC, the censor Tuditanus among possible candidates for Princeps Senatus chose instead his kinsman Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus. It is thought that Buteo would have earned this honor if he had been alive to accept it. References * Livy Titus Livius (; 59 BC – AD 17), known in English as Livy ( ), was a Ancient Rome, Roman historian. He wrote a monumental history of Rome and the Roman people, titled , covering the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Battle Of Cannae
The Battle of Cannae () was a key engagement of the Second Punic War between the Roman Republic and Carthage, fought on 2 August 216 BC near the ancient village of Cannae in Apulia, southeast Italy. The Carthaginians and their allies, led by Hannibal, surrounded and practically annihilated a larger Roman and Italian army under the consuls Lucius Aemilius Paullus and Gaius Terentius Varro. It is regarded as one of the greatest tactical feats in military history and one of the worst defeats in Roman history. Having recovered from their losses at Trebia (218 BC) and Lake Trasimene (217 BC), the Romans decided to engage Hannibal at Cannae, with approximately 86,000 Roman and allied troops. They massed their heavy infantry in a deeper formation than usual, while Hannibal used the double envelopment tactic and surrounded his enemy, trapping the majority of the Roman army, who were then slaughtered. The loss of life on the Roman side meant it was one of the most lethal sin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
