After spending many, many episodes on the events of 449 BCE, we are now flying through multiple years in ONE episode! Ah, the ups and downs of the early Republic. Tune in to find out what happened to Rome in 448, 447 and 446 BCE.

Episode 120 – Rebels Without a Cause

The Year 448 BCE

This has to be one of the briefest and most mysterious years on record. Now that we are out of the decemvirate, there are two new consuls on the block – neither of whom have held the position before. One may even have Etruscan ancestry. This may indicate that experienced and suitable candidates are hard to come by now that the members of the decemvirate are either dead or exiled. This pair of consuls are quite happy to sit on the fence between the patricians and plebeians and have an uneventful year.

Something very unusual did take place in this year. Livy records that two patrician ex-consuls were elected to serve as tribunes of the plebs!

There is some doubt about the accuracy of this claim, but Livy’s account tells us that some of the new tribunes consulted with the patricians when co-opting colleagues after the election fell short at the end of 449 BCE. What a world we live in! One of the tribunes is most displeased, and Lucius Trebonius pushes for a law that stipulates that elections need to continue until no fewer than ten tribune of the plebs are elected. Trebonius is given the cognomen ‘Asper’ (prickly or truculent) in recognition of his fight to keep patrician power in check.

A prickly pear, which seems like an apt image for Lucius Trebonius Asper. Image Courtesy of Ken Bosma on Flickr.

The 447 BCE

The new consuls, Geganius and Iulius, just want there to be less tension between the social orders in 447, but it is hard to keep everyone happy in this situation.

In Livy, they manage to calm the plebeians down by suspending a levy for a war against the Volscians and Aequians (although Dr G has an inscription that indicates otherwise). After all, is this war really necessary? The enemies of Rome only want to fight when they