'Victoria nobelium' (Cic. Rosc. Am. 142): the politics of the 90s and 80s BC reconsidered.

我的项目着眼于公元前90年代和80年代的罗马政治，重点关注诺比利塔家族的角色。自20世纪80年代以来，罗马政治史领域的一个关键问题一直是共和宪法的性质：权力在共和国的政治制度中位于哪里？最近，焦点转向贵族共识在稳定罗马政治阶层方面的作用，以及上个世纪共和国对这一共识的侵蚀。80年代的内战是一个公认的转折点，最终以苏拉的独裁统治告终。这个问题似乎很简单。为什么在经历了几个世纪基于共识的稳定之后，罗马贵族会如此戏剧性地四分五裂，以至于唯一的办法就是暴力、谋杀和独裁？有些人可能会用意识形态来回答：冲突发生在寻求改革的“进步派”和反对改革的“保守派”之间。然而，在KCL的Robb(2010)和Mouritsen(2017)的论点之后，我对这种解释持怀疑态度。相反，从社会的角度来看待这场冲突可能更有利可图。3.48.3M)和Cicero(Rosc.上午好。135-142)。他们将苏拉的独裁描述为“诺比莱斯家族”的胜利，诺比莱斯家族是社会阶层顶层的显赫家族，拥有领事血统。众所周知，苏拉的主要目标之一是有钱有势的“马仔”，一种可信的解释开始出现：这些年的决定性特征是精英内部的冲突，其标志是对诺比尔斯的挑战，以及随后在苏拉领导下的反弹。我的项目探索了由这种解释引起的问题。是什么导致了这场冲突？为什么它会变得如此致命？这种对贵族的生存威胁是真实存在的，还是仅仅是被察觉到的？如果这些发展已经酝酿了很长时间，那么这对以共识为基础的制度意味着什么：以前贵族阶层的稳定是不是表面上的，而不是真实的？文学来源将是重要的。例如，萨卢斯特的《伊格尔塔》很有教育意义，他描绘了一个腐败的贵族嫉妒地守卫着领事职位，以马吕斯为代表的勤劳的“新人”。当然，对这些来源进行批判性处理是必要的。我将寻求将对以前被低估的段落(例如西塞罗在80年代末的演讲)的强调与对一些关键证据的问题性质的认识结合起来，特别是后来的帝国叙事(例如阿皮恩、普卢塔克)。此外，我们的文学来源有时非常空洞--尤其是90年代，这是一个被忽视的十年，肯定掌握着许多这样的问题的答案。因此，我将采用传记学的方法来扩大证据的范围：谁是这个时代的政治家；有多少诺比尔人或新人；诺比尔人是否不如前几个时代那么成功，等等。KCL新网站的完成使这种方法变得可行，我将广泛使用该网站。尽管记录中不可避免地存在空白，但有意义的见解是可能的。例如，在苏拉之前的几十年里，领事新人的数量确实表明了对根深蒂固的贵族的挑战。还有一个事实是，众所周知，有几个诺贝尔奖得主在选举中失败了。相反，令人惊讶的是，在公元前81-70年的苏兰政权期间，24名领事中有18人(75%)有领事父亲、祖父或两者兼有--即他们是最负盛名的领事之一--另有3人(12.5%)有较远的领事血统。换句话说，这幅肖像画证实了公元前82年罗马精英最高阶层的胜利。如果这是真的，这一结论将对我们理解更广泛的罗马政治产生重大影响。它还将涉及与许多历史时期相关的更广泛的主题，例如寡头政体中的权力复制，或前现代社会中的合法性中心。

My project looks at Roman politics in the 90s and 80s BC, focussing on the role of the 'nobilitas'.Since the 1980s, a key issue in the field of Roman political history has been the nature of the Republican 'constitution': where did power lie in the Republic's political system? Recently, focus has turned to the role of aristocratic consensus in stabilising the Roman political classes, and the erosion of that consensus in the last century of the Republic.The civil war of the 80s is an acknowledged turning point, culminating in the dictatorship of Sulla. The question seems simple. Why, after centuries of consensus-based stability, did the Roman aristocracy splinter so dramatically that the only recourse was violence, murder, and dictatorship? Some might answer in ideological terms: the clash was between 'progressives' seeking reform and 'conservatives' opposing them. However, following the arguments of KCL's Robb (2010) and Mouritsen (2017), I am sceptical of this interpretation. Instead, it is perhaps more profitable to view the conflict in social terms.Consider the contemporary observers Sallust (Hist. 3.48.3M) and Cicero (Rosc. Am. 135-142). They portray Sulla's dictatorship as the triumph of the 'nobiles': prestigious families at the top of the social stratum, boasting consular ancestry. Since it is well-known that one of Sulla's principal targets were the rich and powerful 'equites', a plausible interpretation begins to emerge: that the defining feature of these years was intra-elite conflict, marked by challenges to the nobiles and a subsequent backlash under Sulla. My project explores the questions arising from this interpretation. What was driving this conflict? Why did it turn so deadly? Was this existential threat to the nobility real, or merely perceived? And, if these developments were long in the making, what does this mean for the 'consensus-based' system: was the previous stability of the aristocracy more apparent than real?Literary sources will feature heavily. For example, Sallust's 'Iugurtha' is instructive, in which he depicts a corrupt nobility jealously guarding the consulship from industrious 'new men', typified by Marius. Of course, critical treatment of these sources is necessary. I will seek to combine an emphasis on previously under-appreciated passages (e.g. Cicero's speeches in the late 80s) with an awareness of the problematic nature of some key evidence, in particular the later imperial narratives (e.g. Appian, Plutarch). Moreover, our literary sources are sometimes very lacunose - above all for the 90s, a neglected decade which surely holds the answers to many of these questions. I will therefore employ a prosopographical approach to widen the scope of evidence: who are the politicians of this era; how many are nobiles or new men; are the nobiles less successful than previous eras, etc. This approach is made feasible by the completion of KCL's new website, 'The Digital Prosopography of the Roman Republic', which I will use extensively.Despite inevitable gaps in the record, meaningful insights are possible. For example, the number of consular new men in the decades before Sulla does suggest challenges to the entrenched nobility. So too the fact that several nobiles are known to have suffered electoral failure. Conversely, it is striking that, during the 'Sullan regime' of 81-70 BC, 18 of the 24 consuls (75%) have consular fathers, grandfathers, or both - i.e. they are among the most prestigious nobiles possible - while another 3 (12.5%) have more remote consular ancestry. In other words, the prosopography corroborates a depiction of 82 BC as the victory of the highest echelons of the Roman elite. If true, this conclusion will have significant implications for our understanding of wider Roman politics. It will also touch upon broader themes relevant to many periods of history, such as the replication of power in oligarchies, or the locus of legitimacy in pre-modern societies.