School of War - Ep 60: Marc Hyden on Gaius Marius

Episode Date: February 7, 2023

Marc Hyden, Director of State Government Affairs at R Street and author of Gaius Marius: The Rise and Fall of Rome's Saviour, joins the show to discuss the life of one of the Roman Republic’s most innovative and controversial generals: Gaius Marius. ▪️ Times  • 01:33 Introduction • 01:46 An interest in Rome • 04:06 Growing pains • 06:36 The man born in Arpinum • 09:46 Serving in the legions • 11:37 Jugurtha  • 13:25 Roman politics   • 20:31 Marius in Numidia  • 28:51 Sulla and political reform • 37:06 The Cimbri and Teutones and “Marius’s Mules”  • 43:05 Career on the rocks  • 49:02 Social War to Civil War • 56:27 “Do you dare kill Gaius Marius?”

When we talk about Rome these days, we tend to talk about the Roman Empire, or perhaps the revolution that led to the empire. But it was the Roman Republic that captured the imagination of America's founders. Its triumphs and its struggles were thought to be representative of both the promise and peril of self-government, and its history, both a model and a warning. Today, we are going to talk about Marius and about the military and political history of the late Republic, The time when it seemed like the wheels might really be on the verge of coming off. I think it's a good idea for us to pay attention. It is a prescription for war, this Iraqi invasion of Hawaii.

December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamous. The bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a state of it. We continue to face a grave situation in Iran. We should fight on the beaches. We should fight on the landing grounds. We shall fight in the fields and in the streets. We shall never surrender. Hi, I'm Aaron McLean.

Thanks for joining the School of War. I'm joined today by Mark Hayden, who directs the R Street Institute's Outreach Engagement at the state level and educates lawmakers and executive branch officials about R Street's initiatives, the southeastern United States. He's the author of a couple books. He wrote a book about Romulus, Rome's legendary founding father,

and he is also the author of what we're going to talk about today, Gaius Marius, the rise and fall of Rome's savior. Mark, thanks so much for joining the show. Thanks for having me. Hey, and, you know, so obviously your day job and your literary career are about two different subjects. What is the source of the interest in Rome and these Roman historical figures? I've always been interested in ancient Rome.

You know, if you look at what the, especially in the empire, what they were able to accomplish. I mean, they had running water. They had plumbing of some form. They built these magnificent structures that we can still go see today. But when you go a little bit further back and look at the Republic, it laid the groundwork for the American Constitution. We were modeled after that. And I like the idea of some of the liberty, Libertas, that the ancient Romans held near and dear to their heart and the checks and balances.

Of course, it kind of fell apart toward the end, which we'll talk about. But I just find it to be a cautionary tale and a very interesting one. And so speaking of the founding and sort of American perceptions of Rome, or to the extent the we think about Rome today and maybe I'm just colored by my own experiences here I I tend to hear more about read more about see more references to the Roman empire indeed you just said that sort of the sort of deepest source of your interest comes from the imperial period and I think that's probably pretty pretty common but your your book and what we're going to talk about today is from the Republican period and you know at the time of the American founding I think there was much more

of an interest in the the Roman Republic as opposed to the Roman Empire what what's What's going on with that? Why are we so interested in the empire today and what was it about the Republic that interested earlier generations? Well, the Republic tends to be a greater source of interest for me at this point in my life, but I think the empire, people are drawn to what they perceived to be greatness, that this was just this massive empire, sprawling empire, that had legions that marched anywhere from, you know, Scotland all the way to the Middle East and everything in between. But unlike much of the Republic, there are many other structures that we can still see now from the imperial period, whether we're talking about Caracalla's baths, the amphitheater,

and even provincial towns, we can still see. I was just in Trier, Germany, and you can see what the remains of their amphitheater. They have baths that were probably never used as bath houses, but some beautiful structures, the Porta Negra, all this is stuff that we can view and enjoy now. And it just reminds us of the height, the pinnacle of where Rome once was. And so Marius, our subject, today was born in or around 157 BC. Before we get to his life and military and political career, talk a bit about the Republic in 157. You know, where did things stand in terms of Rome's growth? What would it be like to live in Rome, you know, in the year 157 BC? Well, I think that was kind of a time of growing pains when it comes to Rome. There was always a

little bit of that, the pushing back and forth between the plebeian class, the patricians, and the equestrians as they struggled for some form of equity or to solidify their, their land holdings, their wealth, and their power. And, you know, some 20 or so years later, a lot of that came to a head with the Grakis brothers, especially beginning in around 133 BC, where they achieved a lot more policies for, you know, the broader proletariat. But around 157 BC, Rome is starting to really get its footing. I mean, they've taken down mighty Carthage against Hannibal years prior, and now they have all this excess land, but they still have to figure out how to solidify control of it, especially in places like what we know is Spain.

But within Rome, you know, we think about this beautiful city of marble. That didn't exist for the most part at this point. It was probably a pretty gross town. I mean, I don't think the plumbing at this point was what we would like to expect, at least in today's society, so it probably stunk. I'm sure the stench was ubiquitous and could be observed from miles away. The water was certainly polluted and was probably the source of many of the outbreaks that they have. Malaria was a major issue being on the Tiber, and this was kind of a swampy area, at least

originally. So it would have been a tough time for a lot of folks living there. But given that, it was probably one of the better places within the Mediterranean to live at the time, and there were a lot of opportunities. So, you know, it was very hard to climb the curses on, or them, to reach the pinnacle of political life. It was hard to, you know, use a more modern phrasing, pick yourself up by your bootstraps. But the opportunity was there, whether it was through the beginning in the military or running for office.

But of course, like many societies, it greatly supported and helped those that already had money to be able to reach those new heights. So let's talk about Marius. Let's talk about his family. One of the interesting things about him considering the level of prominency comes to, right, is the fact that he does not come from a family of great repute, right? Talk to us about that. Yeah, he was born around 157 BC in an area known as Arpanum. And, you know, another very famous Roman came from that area, Cicero, the great jurist and philosopher and statesman. And in fact, they were kind of distantly related.

But Marius was born in this provincial backwater that had only recently been given Roman citizenship. So before that, you know, they kind of fell under Rome's purview, but they really didn't participate in much of the political process. and probably had issues in the court system as well, which benefited the Romans over a lot of those provincial towns. But Arpinum had come into its own, and now they had some form of equity quality with a lot of the Romans, and it likely considered themselves Romans by this point. But Marius' background is a bit obscure. So if you read the ancient accounts, it talks about how he's proud that he came from this poor family and just worked his way up the ladder to become, you know, the former.

most person in the Roman Republic. But the truth of the matter is he probably came from a pretty influential family. They were patricians, which were kind of the upper echelon. That's what everyone would like to have been. In ancient Rome, was just like this ancient nobility. His family, more than likely, were known as equestrians, which was a different census designation. They were, were essentially, it'd be more like a middle class, but a very, very rich middle class. So they didn't meet the threshold. They didn't have that same history as the patricians, but they were still becoming increasingly powerful during this time within the Republic. And they were now, you know, being able to hold consulships, and they had many years before as well. But he was born into this

family. And, you know, if he followed a lot of the other forms of in ancient Rome, he was probably educated, but education was far different in ancient Rome than now. I mean, it wasn't funded by the government. Families were essentially expected to take care of it, whether they taught their children, you know, reading, writing, an arithmetic, or they hired someone else to do it. Often later in Rome's history, they would have Greek slaves that would teach children this. But Marius was, I don't want to call them racist, but he did not like the Greeks. I think he viewed them as inferior to the Romans, and probably he would have called them some form of infeminine as well compared to them, which is obviously this is very unfair of him to say.

But he still probably would have learned Greek or at least some degree of it since that was one of the dominant languages in the Mediterranean. And a lot of the great literature was written in Greek. And then he would have come into age and maybe gone through the coming of age ceremony where he would have been ceremonially shaven and given an adult haircut and marched through the city where they might have offered a sacrifice to Juventus, the goddess of the youth. And he embarks upon a military career. I think at this point early in the record, we don't have a lot of information, right? But say what you can about what would have gone into that.

Was it a decision? You know, is there a draft of sorts? How does one go into the military? And what is he doing when he first gets there? Yeah, there's a gap of information with Marius. Much of his early life, we know almost nothing about. We know he has a brother, at least one brother. But not a lot is known, and there's some conflicting, curious things that show up in the ancient record. But by no later than probably 134 BC, he's serving as a legionary, possibly in the cavalry, especially given that he was likely an equestrian. And he was doing so in Spain where, you know, the Romans have all this land that has resulted in their very successful endeavors.

But there's some people that just aren't pleased with being ruled over by, you know, a foreign power, which I very much am sympathetic to that. And these were the Newmanteens. And they were a tough tribe that just were fighting very hard tooth and nail against the Romans. And Marius at one point finds him there with the great general, Scipio. And they were able to him all the Newman teens into their main city. And then they conducted an extended blockade, and it resulted in a mass suicide. as I recall of the Newman teens, the Romans were successful, but it was a very strange victory.

But one of the interesting moments is, you know, there's a bunch of soldiers sitting around just chit-chatting with Scipio. And they ask him, well, where are we going to find the next great general? And he looks over to the youthful Marius and pats him on the back and says, here perhaps. And, you know, for many ancients, I believe they think that they may have set the seeds, planted the seeds for Rome's for Marius's assent and his interest in, becoming even more influential. And also out there in Spain, fighting on the Roman side in this war is Jugurtha, right? Tell us a bit about him and give us a preview of how he's going to figure into this story. Well, Jagurtha was a Numidian, and he came from an influential family, although his history is

probably that he was an illegitimate child of some form, but still connected to the royal family. But he was an up-and-comer, and I think he had more energy. and more desire than his royal relatives. And, you know, the Numidians were allied with the Romans. So when Rome would go to war, they would call in a lot of their allies, and they would bring, you know, some generals like Jagertha or some sort of commander as well as troops to support Rome's endeavors. So Jagurtha is this wily individual that appears prime to be a long-term ally of Rome.

This is a guy that fought with Marius in Spain, helping them to pacify the region. And he fought with distinction. He was a very brilliant tactician, and he knew a lot about the Roman way of fighting. And I think he learned it in part through this service. So this great Numidian, eventually the war ends, Rome's successful, and he goes back, and he ultimately is able to become Numidia's next king, though not without turning again. against his relatives when the kingdom is actually partitioned. But he finds himself atop the new media, and that's when things kind of fall apart.

And it was irretrievable, at least by that point, when it comes to Rome's relationship with Jagertha. We'll come back to that. So in the meantime, Marius has gone back to Rome and has embarked on a political career. Talk to us a little bit about the Roman constitution at this time. You know, what does it mean to go into politics, you know, for someone like Marius, both in terms of the offices available, but also the parties, if you will, the main groupings in Roman politics. So political parties were much different than kind of what we view today. But the two main classes of what we might consider parties were the popularas and the

optimates, the optimates being, you know, the best meant. At least they called themselves that. And then the popularas, they would have been, I think if you're going to paint them as something, they'd be more populist. They're championing, or at least positioning themselves to say that they're championing the cause of the little guy. We're talking about the plebeians that are often overlooked in Roman society, mistreated. They're expected to go fight wars and do all of these things for the good of Rome. And then the optimates, the patricians, they're the ones that get to benefit from their toils.

So there's obviously this clashing between those two. And the optimates, they're obviously going to be more patrician. They're going to be the richer in many cases, trying to ensure that they can maintain their position of power in many cases. Now, of course, I'm really just trying to give a 30-second spiel of what these are. They're far more complex. They don't really have an agenda or a platform like you might expect from Republicans and Democrats.

So Marius, he sometimes, many times, if not the majority of the time, would have been seen more as a popularis. So that means he would probably have a line more with the plebeian cause, but not always. He was a maverick politician that kind of jumped sides, although I think in his heart of hearts, he always wanted to be accepted by that upper echelon of Roman society, the patricians, and make peace with the optimates, but that was a fight that he was going to have the rest of his life. But he entered the political realm. This, again, it's kind of murky. So between 1.30 and 1.20, 20 BC. Somewhere around there, he probably began his actual elected career by becoming a military tribune. So this was a purely military role. It had no civil duties. He was just elected to be a

kind of commander, but it was more of a lower level commander. And that was his entrance into it. But when you talk about civil positions, which almost always double as military as well, there's what you would call the curses oner, them, the path of honors, where it was kind of expected that you'd hold one office before another. So it'd be like to compare to today, you may be a state representative before you're a state senator, before you're a governor,

before you run for president, or something along those lines. So often it may, maybe he would be a quaster, which was essentially an accountant for the army. Or he may go and become a political plebeian tribune. And these were folks that had immense power around 10, I believe at this point in time, were elected per year.

and they had veto power, which is where we get the word. Vito means, I forbid. So any official action, they could stand up and say, I veto, and they had to stop it. And it was intended to protect plebeians. This is a creation from hundreds of years earlier intended to help those folks. But after that, there was the praetorship, which is essentially a senior judge who may have some minor military duties, commanderships, and then you may run for consul. And consul is probably the closest thing to a president that we hear.

can compare to, but there were two that served concurrently, and they could, they could essentially veto each other in, in certain ways. And that was essentially the largest, that represents most of what we know about their major political parties, as we may talk about, and their offices. Of course, there were a lot of municipal ones as well, but that would get into the minutiae a little too much, I think. Sure, sure. And so how does, how does Marius begin? Well, Marius begins with his military tribunship, and he had a lot to talk about with his experience, in Numontia, and he likely also served in other theaters of war, and he was able to talk about

his successes there. And then he finds himself in 119 BC being, that's the first year he began as his plebeian tribunship, and he clashes in a very weird way, which shows how much of a maverick he was. He opposed an expansion of the grain doll. So there was essentially their food stamps where they would have subsidized grain, that they would give to people that were needy. And he opposed an expansion and likely thinking that it was not physically responsible from his perspective. So this is something that would have gone against the popularis.

They would have been supportive of this. But he also essentially picked a fight with the Optimates when he proposed and successfully got across the finish line a measure to limit the power of Optimates to influence elections and votes where they wouldn't be able to, I think, think he narrowed the pins where you'd stand in line to go vote so people couldn't stare at you or possibly try to bribe you as you're trying to vote. And in doing this, he also clashed with his patron and the system of the clientele, the system of patronage. He clashed with the Mattelis family, and that was something that reverberates throughout much of his career. But after that, he decides to stand for what's known as the Adel ship. Essentially, they fund and oversee games and public works. But he lost.

He lost his election so poorly, so badly. He actually tried to run for it twice in the same year, and he lost both of them. And likely this was influenced in part because of the fight that he picked with the optimates. They wanted to punish him and probably keep him maybe mute his career. So it could be stunted at this point. But after that, he runs, he decides he's not done. So in 116 BC, he runs for the praetorship, and he is elected, although just barely. There was a college of six of them, and he came in sixth.

So he just barely got there and he has a very quiet praetorship, likely also because the Optimates were trying to keep him for being too successful. And following up on that, he becomes the governor of further Spain, where after you're a praetor and after you're a consul, you can get a pro praetorship or a pro-consulship, or essentially you're a governor of a province. And apparently he served very admirably. And this also signals that he probably had made peace with the Optimates and the Mattelis family, at least to some degree, so that he was able to feel. finally obtain some sort of posting that was he probably felt was worth his time. The picture you're painting, not to be, not to be crass or engaged in too much anachronism, but sort of a conservative Democrat, a bit of a Joe Manchin figure, generally associated with the party of the left, but given to heterodox moves in the direction of the right?

I think that's fair. Okay. Interesting. So his political career is proceeding. And then let's talk about the the Gergothene War. We foreshadowed it a bit. But, I mean, it may be helpful. I should just say, where is Numidia? How does this thing begin? How does Marius find himself at war with his erstwhile comrade at arms? Sure. So his career kind of goes cold. There's no mention of it, but it's kind of assumed that he ran for the consulship and lost. So his career kind of languishes, but he's still working his way toward being accepted into the upper echelon of Roman society. And he marries into the Julian family. And it results, he marries a lady named Julia.

And in doing so, eventually his nephew is the great Julius Caesar. So they have that connection. And in many ways, Julius Caesar probably looked up to Marius as a role model and example going forward, which for better or for worse, we can talk about that. So just to be clear, in the family relationship, this will be Julius's father's sister that he marries? Or how does it actually? Yes. Okay. Got it.

Yeah. So he marries into this family that had kind of been, yes, it was a patrician family, a very storied history. but it kind of gone, hadn't really been very successful lately. So what the Julian family gets is a successful politician who probably has some means and he's able to marry into a family that at least many years ago was very influential. So it's a win-win for both of them. But fast forward some time. I mean, he has a child, but there's trouble brewing, as you alluded to, in Numidia.

The Jugurtha is able to take over New Media. Midia. So there was this plan to partition the country into, I believe, three with Jagurtha and then two of the king's sons after the king passed. And Jagurtha outmaneuvers them and is able to take control over all of it, even against the Senate's will, the Roman Senate's will, which is telling him how he should operate. And he goes his own path, takes over all of it. And in the meantime, during one of his conflicts, he ends up killing a lot of Italian merchants that are in one of the cities. And for Rome, you know, these Italians are, I guess, fall under their protection. So the Senate, the people, they can't permit this to keep going. And then they began a war with

Jagertha. But he keeps out, outmaneuvering and outsmarting the folks that are sent down there to take care of the Numidian problem. So eventually, Mattelis, who comes from the family, that was the patron of Marius's family, is assigned to go down there with an army. And and quell matters, and he assigns Marius to be as legate. So he was essentially one of his number twos as they prosecute the war. And how is Marius' conduct on the battlefield? Let's talk maybe about some of the big operations, you know, like the battle of the, I'm going to mispronounce this potentially, but the Muthal.

This is all in what is today, Algeria, correct? Yeah, I'd be in the neighborhood of Algeria. So there's a lot of battles, Muthel, Zama, Vaga, during the time where Mattelis leads this command. But Marys proves himself to be, he's a hard worker, I think, for one. And he's very ambitious. He wants to be in battle. He wants to lead troops, and he wants to prove his worth. And he does so very much in the service to Mattelis.

But he also shows that he's kind of the common guy. I mean, he sleeps on the regular beds that all the legionaries sleep in. He helps build bulwarks along with, you know, these common lowly legionaries. And he eats the same food. So he becomes beloved by a lot of the troops and understandably. But ambition starts to creep in after having all these successes. There's a letter writing campaign from troops sending letters to Rome talking about how the war would be over if they would just assign it to Marius and attributing a lot of success to what he's been able to do. And eventually he asked Mattelis.

He's like, I'd like to go run for consul. And he keeps badgering Mattelis who won't let him do it. He's very much against it, probably because he knows, in part, how good of an assistant general Marius has been during this. And also, he doesn't want him to be too successful. And in fact, he tells him he should be happy to wait to run for the consulship with Mattelis's son, which would mean that he would have to wait, you know, 20, 30 years. In the executive structure of Rome, and correct me if this is wrong, but the generals would, they answer to the Senate, right? which means that they're answering in practice to consuls? Is that basically accurate?

Or is that my misunderstanding the way that authority actually flows? Because if that's the case, I could understand Mattelis's objection. Yes, it depends. So there's a lot of different levers that you can pull. So at this point, there must be a formal declaration of war from the people. So they would have voted for this in a system that's kind of like the American Electoral College. That's not purely democratic. but he would be getting a lot of the direction from the Senate, which doesn't wield a lot of actual

constitutional power, but in practice it serves as a very powerful role, whether it's in foreign policy or otherwise. It becomes incredibly powerful throughout much of the republic. So yes, Mattelis is probably getting a lot of his direction from the Senate, but eventually there's a spat, and Mattelus is like, fine. Go to Rome, run for the the consulship, I don't care because you're becoming such a nuisance and a headache here. And he does with days to go before the election. And he wins. He wins the election for the consulship, which I don't think at this point, Mattelis really cared that much because his appointment to command and prosecute the war in Numidia had no bearing on the consulship from

his perspective because he had been appointed. But Comerius, being the very smart guy that he is, figures out a way to get the people to vote to give him the command after he had been appointed consul, which causes even more grief between the Marius and the Mattelis family. And this is when a lot of the changes and the brilliance of Marius start to really show. So how does that play out for the rest of the war then? Mattelis is out. Marius is in. Do things improve on the battlefield? Absolutely. But before Marius comes down, because he believed that, Mattelis had two, he was too conservative in his approach. And I'm not sure that's entirely

true because when Marius goes to Numidia, he continues to use the same approach, conquer cities, ensure that Jagurtha doesn't have any strongholds, take away whatever resources he has. The only thing that Marys did differently, other than just being a very smart general on the battlefield, was he used a troop search. But there was a shortage of troops. So he went against precedent within Rome, which is that he allowed the poor to join. You know, there was this requirement that you'd have to have a certain amount of wealth to join the military, I think in part because historically, at least, they provided their own military equipment, although by this time, I think that had been changed. And also the Romans, I think, incorrectly believe that,

you know, people that own a bunch of land are going to want to fight for it more passionately than those that don't own any land within Rome. But he builds up this larger force, ships it across the Mediterranean, lands in Numidia, and he captures Kapsa, this city. He has a big battle near Malacca. I mean, he does a lot. There's limited detail about some of these battles, but he survives many onslaughts with Jigurtha coming back with more troops, aligning himself with Bacchus from Mauritania, and he just shows a lot of brilliance. You know, when he was, when he march through the desert. He would try to, after learning from mistakes, he reorders the way they march so that they'd either be in a square formation or a circle so that they'd be protected

from all sides. So ambushes would become as major of an issue. And eventually he's able to turn the tide. After many victories, through some work with one of his subordinates named Sulla, they're able to capture Jagurtha. So King Bacchus of Moritania turns against Jagurtha, even though that was his father-in-law, I believe, turns against him and then hands Jagirtha to Sala in chains, who then goes to Marius and they bring him back, and then the war is finally concluded. Talk to us a bit about Sola. He's come onto the scene now. He's going to be significant in the rest of Marius's life. Who was he and what were his political associations in Rome? Sulla would have been more aligned with the Optomati cause, and he came from a family that

there was a time when they were up and coming, but for some time prior to him, they had fallen into disrepute, to a point that he was quite certainly ashamed of his standing, felt that he lived in means with the means that are far below what his family should be. So he's a very ambitious individual. He has a chip on his shoulder, and he wants to prove its worth. And it turns out that he's also very brilliant on the battlefield, becomes a great military commander. But the Jagirtha issue is really what begins to create this wedge between Marius and Sulla, because Sulla was the one that was able to, in large part, get Bacchus to hand over Gigertha. Now, the war had been on the Roman side, especially since Marius had taken over.

So much of the success needs to be attributed to Marius for his battlefield successes, but Jagirtha tries to promote himself as being the person that ended the war because he's the one that got Jagirtha in chains. And, you know, he has, I think, a signet ring made with that scene. Bacchus eventually creates a statue that is sent to Rome depicting this. So I think this really bothers Marius who he wants credit. And to his credit, like he deserved it. He had done so much good there.

But yet Sulla is trying to take a lot of this credit away from him. And this begins, sets in motion a real grudge between the two guys. And this is a period obviously of just kind of relentless ongoing warfare for Rome. And there's a war brewing and underway with the Germanic tribes in the north, which we should talk about too. But I'm interested in this issue that you raise of reforms to the military. And in particular, you know, as it were, broadening the franchise of those who can be soldiers. You know, this strikes me as the kind of thing that is militarily expedient, but also potentially has reverberating social impacts, the sorts of which might be concerning to the conservatives, right, to the optimates. You know, was that the case?

You know, were there reverberating impacts? You know, what's the nature of the debate over a reform like that in Rome? In short, yes and no. So Marius was not the first person to enlist the poor. It just didn't become a regular operating procedure until Marius hit the scene. So he's not the one that should be to blame for that. This was a natural evolution that the Romans were going to have to do no matter what. But one of the problems is when they broadened their pool, they also wanted to take care of them.

And generals would try to give them land to settle on after their service to the state was over. So, of course, they would get their legionary pay, which wasn't a whole heck of a lot. It might have been one denarius a day, which is their silver coinage. So they may have gotten that and enjoyed some spoils. And if they had a general that was really kind to them, they may try to give them free land to settle for them and their families. But this policy, again, not unique to Marius, and he's not the first one to do that, but he did try to get land in Africa and in Italy for some of his veterans. But I think this is it can pose a problem because it can create. an allegiance to a general instead of to the state, which is that can be a powder keg.

And I think you see in Rome that increasingly legionaries were less interested in the Constitution and they're more interested in their bottom line and who would promote their interests the most. But again, I don't think Marius is to blame for how this fell apart. And I don't believe that it was necessarily a natural evolution to create this kind of perversion because people that didn't have land. I mean, there was reason to expect that they would be loyal to the state. And I don't think just because they're of a lower income that they're, you know,

not as patriotic as some of the others. But there is a problem and it rears its head many times within Roeb. Yeah. No, I ask because I'm just trying to sort of get it a broader picture here. And this is your subject, not mine. So correct me if my understanding is off base here. But between what you're describing with Marius and the military reforms and also, we didn't talk much about it, but the reforms of the Grachai that kind of precede.

that kind of precede Marius' career, and it's the context in which he's operating. You know, Rome at the end of the second century, B.C. seems to be a place where there is an accelerating movement of power out of the hands of aristocrats and into the hands of the party of the poor, if you will. You have a party of the rich and a party of the poor. I'm trying to use language that's appropriate to the time, not just impose modern American categories on it because it really doesn't map perfectly or well. And Marius is sort of surfing those currents and forces over the course of his career.

And it also strikes me as the kind of, as you just point out with the way in which the troops have to be bought off, essentially, it strikes me as the kind of thing that works so long as there's still stuff to hand out. And as you start to run out of stuff to hand out, you're going to run into trouble, right? Which, of course, happens. Absolutely. No, you're correct. And, you know, this is in kind of the period in which the common people are in the ascendant to some degree. you know, after years of being mistreated, you know, the Gracchus brothers worked hard on this,

and they paid for it with their lives by fighting against the optimates. And they would get things, you know, like the grain doll assigned for people who obviously, it was intended for those of low means, but it was actually open to just about everyone. And in fact, there's even a story of a rich former consul in the line to get his free grain doll. And when one of the Gracchus brothers walks up and it starts, you know, castigating, yelling at him. He's like, what are you doing here? He's like, well, if I'm going to pay for it, I'm going to at least get my fair share. But the common people are in the ascendant thanks to a lot of these popularas politicians. And then in kind of a strange parallel to, I think, what you see today, Mary's tapped into this dislike, this demonization of the upper echelons of society, the optimates, the patricians, you know, in particular. So in his speeches, he would he would lambast the rich folks. And, and, talk about the plight of the common people and then promote himself as as one of those common people even though he probably came from a pretty rich family but this demonization again not unique

to marius other folks have have done this too but i believe that drives another wedge creates ill will and then if you follow that path you know you can have civil strife and this of course becomes i mean this is sort of the the style of the julian family right for the next for the coming generation. I mean, Caesar is very much with the party of the people as opposed to the party of the wealthy. Does Mary sort of establish that for that family, or is that already a trend that that family is on its way towards? I think it's going to be based on the individual within the Julian family, but I think that you can see the power of, you know, the proletariat with their vast numbers and their voting abilities, even though some of that is muted by their, the way they

vote by tribe. But I believe with, you know, Mary is serving as Caesar's role model that he follows in line with him. And I think also you can see times in Caesar's career, which, in which he was also a maverick politician that didn't perfectly align with one side or the other. He was probably very adept and knew when he should do that. However, when the triumvirate fell apart, of course, I think he aligns more closely with the popularas. Meanwhile, Pompey sides with the Senate, which is going to be heavily skewed towards the optimates. Got it. So let's talk a bit about the ongoing warfare that he is participating in and often commanding in against these German tribes in the North. And also, you know, we've talked a bit about the expansion of who can join the military,

but there are other aspects to what Marius does to the military that are very significant, right? These are the so-called Marian reforms. So, and I think the things are all sort of jumbled up in this period to help us pick it apart. What is going on with the Germans in the North? And then also what is Marius doing to the military as his career progresses? Well, for years the Romans have been in conflict with these Germanic, perhaps Ghalish tribes. There's some scholarly debate over what the Kimbre were. They were one of the two.

But they were kind of in search for new land for whatever reason, supposedly. The land from which they came for was full. flooded. I'm not sure what the cause of that could be. And, you know, I've speculated on it. But they came from, it may have been a Germanic Denmark, somewhere around in that area. They're not very clear in the ancient text where exactly that would be, Jutland. But they start marching around looking for land and they cross paths with one of Rome's allies in the area of Noricum. And this leads to conflict with the Romans. And the Romans acted dishonorably. You know, they tried to ambush them after seeing them away. And it doesn't turn out well for the Romans. The Kimbrey are successful and they see through the Romans duplicity and that leads to numerous conflicts, one of which the Romans were defeated so badly that it may have been the largest loss that they had ever had. Even more casualties than were in Canny when Hannibal just destroyed an entire army.

We're talking tens of thousands of people in one fell swoop in a single day. So the Romans are terrified of the Kimbrey, who eventually align themselves with some others, including the Ambrones and Teutones. And the Romans look to one man. They said, we've got to have someone. There's only one person that we trust with this kind of power to destroy what they view as an existential threat. And that's Marius. So he's elected to his second consulship, which begins in 104 BC. Thankfully for the Romans, I believe, they don't come into contact with the Kimbray for a few years.

they kind of wander, meander across Europe, running into other locals, but not the Romans, at least as much. So that gives Marius time to train his army. And one of the reforms that he institutes is requiring Roman legionaries to carry their own stuff. They weren't supposed to rely on pack animals to a large degree, carry your own kit, all of your necessities. And for that, according to some ancient accounts, is why they call them Marius' mules, because they were replaced. the pack animals. They were the mules and they carried their own, their own stuff. But there's a good reason for this, and this is also another natural evolution because it made them quick, it made them nimble. And I'm sure carrying all of that, that all of their equipment, their food, made them

much more physically fit. So Marius's mules, he trains them. And one of the things that Marius is just fantastic at is that he prepares his troops and he just maintains a strict adherence to natural precepts that you would see in any sort of military academy. He prepares his troops, always chooses where he wants to fight in most cases, builds protective bulwarks in most cases, will march in certain formations to protect against any sort of ambushes. And then he also employs some battlefield tactics, whether it's a pincor or others. So he's this brilliant commander and very revolutionary. So he does, one reform is creating the Marius' mules. Another one is to reform the pylon, which was kind of a kind of spear that they had,

whereas a wooden pole with a spike in it. And that spike was held in place by two pins. Marius, for much of Rome's history at this point, it was held in place by two iron pins. Well, he replaced one of those pins, and this sounds like a minor thing. He replaces one of those pins with a wooden dowel. So when it would be thrown, the wooden dowel would break. So if it lodged into an enemy shield, it would bend in wood. warp because that one Dow would break, rendering that shield useless. And also if they threw it and

it missed its mark, likely it would still break and become unusable so that the enemy couldn't use that back on the Romans. And then another one of his reforms, which is not tactical at all, is he created a legionary standard that was only topped by a silver eagle when beforehand, you know, it had different animals and for whatever reason, I guess Mary is like the eagle. So, you know, to To sum up, I mean, this sounds like this is the creation of the modern, is obviously a funny word for it, but of the modern Roman army. That is to say that the army that Marius would have joined when he was a young man was the kind of army, you know, raised from the class of citizens for this or that contingency on an as needed basis that would have been familiar to, you know, the Greek city states hundreds of years earlier, sort of normal Mediterranean practice. And what you're describing is standing, sophisticated professional force. Absolutely.

He did that. And then he's also imputed with changing the formation of the Roman legions and how they're grouped. There's no, to my knowledge, there's no direct evidence that he was responsible for, but it happened during his lifetime. And they assume that, you know, Marius being this visionary may have been part of that. But you're spot on. You know, Rome goes from, you know, relying on citizen militias to have. having these large standing armies that are professionals.

These, that's what they do. You know, you and I, we, we work our day jobs. Their day job was waging war, and they were very good at it. And this is a change that we see that lasts their routes. Rome's history until it's fall. So we come to a point here in Marius' life where there's a bit of a false finish, right? His political, despite the significance of his leadership and the impact of his work on, you know, what we would call defense policy today. He doesn't seem to be an extraordinarily popular figure,

right? So talk to us about how his career comes to a pause. Well, he violates a constitution in that he's reelected to the consulship as they wait for the Kimbrey to invade Rome. So he's just reelected, reelected when term limits dictate that you're not allowed to be consul any more than one time in any 10-year period. So he violates it quite a bit. You know, he's elected, of course, for the term of 107 to fight Jagurtha. Then he's elected to the term of 104, then 103, 103, 102, 101, and for 100. So he just stays in power. And eventually the Kimbrey do finally turn on Rome, toward Rome, them and their allies.

And Marius is very successful. He fights two battles near Acquai, Sextii, one of which was so devastating. We're talking tens of thousands of deaths, so devastating that near Marseille, they had wonderful wine and they attributed that to all of the rotting corpses, which is absolutely disgusting when you think about it. And apparently they also used the bones that were ubiquitous of all of the victims, you know, his fences and things like that, which just sounds like such a macabre and disgusting, you know, thing to envision.

But after that, he finally clashes with the main power player, which is the Kimbrey. And he fights them in northern Italy, at Verseli, and is wildly successful. And at the end of this war with these, like possibly Germanic, possibly all Germanic tribes, upwards of 360,000 of them are killed. I mean, we're talking levels that are nearing genocide, if not for, you know, the hundred and thousand or 150,000 or whatever it was that they enslaved. And after this, Marius is the richest man in Rome. I mean, he is without any question, the richest man after all of his successes. but he wants to be elected one more time, in part to secure land for his veterans. So he's elected to the term of 100, although there may have been some irregularities.

There's talk that maybe he was using electoral bribes or some form of impropriety. But he is successful, but he partners with a plebeian tribune of ill repute, who eventually, you know, him and one of his allies engages in murder of political rivals and has kind of a, you know, a January 6th moment where they storm the Capitol and they try to hold on to it. And this is Marius's ally. So eventually Marius is forced to remove him and he cuts off the water to the capital district and ensures that, you know, this rebellion is put down. But the people know this was this was Marius's close ally. Why would he have done that? This is the savior of Rome. I mean, after, after Marius defeats the Kimbre, they consider him the third founder of

Rome, putting him in the likes of Romulus and Camillus. But then his popularity starts to wane when they see that he's partnering with murderous traders and clear his terms. So after that, he kind of falls into the background. And his influence wanes. I mean, he's still a power player. I'm sure he's promoting other politicians' careers. And he's still a member of the Senate. So he retains some influence, but his popularity is certainly weighing by this point. And then so now we're into the 90s. He comes back to the fore of Roman politics, right, with this reopening of the question. So often this keeps coming up and I've gotten this question of citizenship, this question

of who's a Roman who gets access to what kind of privilege of Roman society. Talk to us about what's happening here as the 90s proceed and how it draws him back into public life or more prominence in public life. Sure. We talked a little bit about alluding to it with Arpanum being this part of this growing Roman enterprise in which they have voting or some sort of citizenship. But many of these other Italian cities, city states, they're aligned with Rome. They're the associates. So they're forced to fight for Rome whenever Rome calls because they've had conflicts in the past and they lost.

They get to serve Rome at this point that or they've created alliances in order to avoid. any sort of trouble with, you know, this mighty Roman Republic. But Rome, in truth, abuses this relationship. So they invite them in, and Rome was great at this. They would defeat someone on a battlefield, and it might be the next day that they invite them to join in on their enterprise. Like, hey, you can fight with us, enjoy the spoils of war. We're going to rule the world. It's going to be a great time. And I think this, this mollifies a lot of the Italian city states for a while, but Rome abuses it. And of course, wants more of the Italians to be fighting and dying, I think, than the Romans.

They also don't give them citizenship in many cases. So that means that there are summary default judgments in the courts. You know, they have zero standing in many ways. They also can't vote about whether or not they're going to go to war because they have no Roman citizenship and can't vote in the tribes. So this causes an issue and they push for more and more power of some, or at least equity. And a man named Drussus comes along and thinks that he's going to be able to push through legislation to finally get them the citizenship that they want so that they can have a say and how they're ruled. Well, Drusses is ultimately murdered. And the proposal dies,

of course. So the Italians go back and they see no other path forward other than to rebel against the Romans. Now, not all the Italians sided against Rome. Some stayed loyal in Latium and elsewhere. but it creates this civil war. And suddenly the Romans are essentially surrounded by people that have fought alongside them that are just as good on the battlefield, have fantastic generals. And they're looking around trying to desperately find out how they can survive this. And they look to find the greatest generals that the Romans have and throw them back on the battlefield.

So we're looking around 91 BC, 90 BC around there. the Romans call on Marius and many others to take on commands in the battlefield. And how, I mean, Marius has got to be getting a little bit older, certainly by Roman standards at this point. How does this return to military office go for him? And talk a bit about the relationship with Sulla, which is obviously significant again at this point. Marius would have been in the 60s at this point. So which in Roman society, yes, he's definitely in the ripe old age. And from what we learn, you know, he's probably had some health issues.

he's probably overweight, but he really wants to be in the battlefield. There's one thing that he loves beyond just about anything else other than himself, and that's waging war. That's how he was able to be successful. That's how he could regain his popularity. That's how he could regain a lot of power. So he must have leapt at the opportunity to serve in the battlefield. But I think he's sympathetic to the Italian cause.

I think he probably supports them to have some form of citizenship. I mean, he's from Orpanum. He knows the plague. that they're trying to fight against. But he's also a Roman and he's dedicated to the Roman cause. And he takes over. The Senate is very careful not to give him too much power in this war, which is known as the social war. So he has to split commands with other commanders that just aren't worth their salt.

And time and time again, his co-commanders makes blunders die and he saves the day. So within his short time in the social war, he served admirably and had some notable successes. And Sulla was one of the other generals who was asked to come save the Romans against these Italians. And he does very well, too, which really increases Sulla's popularity within Rome. So while Marius is able to probably regain some of his standing in popularity, this is Sala that really has, it was better for him than it was for Marius. But toward the end of the campaign season of 90 BC, the social war has started to kind of turn against the Sochi. The Romans are starting to turn it around, thanks in part to folks, commanders like Sulla, like Marius. But Marius makes a curious

decision to resign from his office. I personally think that he saw the writing on the wall. The Senate, many of those in the Senate, did not like him. They did not want to see him return to power, so they were probably likely going to strip him of his command. And he just wanted to save face, And he resigned. That or perhaps he was tired of seeing Romans and Italians fight each other since he was sympathetic to the Italian cause. So he withdraws from the battlefield, but his career is, he's not done, at least trying to wage war at this point. And how do we get from this resignation and this war against the Italians in which the wings of Roman politics are, you know, theoretically more or less aligned, though we can talk about the nuances there, to civil war,

which we arrive at very quickly and Marius and Sola at war with one another. Talk us through that. Well, so the social war by, you know, 89 BC is in large part resolved. There's still some holdouts that are very serious, but most of the social war has been resolved to a large degree. And interestingly, the Romans went on the battlefield, but they lose politically because the soci are eventually given Roman citizenship. They become Roman. So it was a needless war in which countless people died. The Romans were successful in the battlefield, but they eventually submit to all their demands. It's a very bizarre turn of events. But there's another problem stirring in the realm of Rome, and that's Pontus in the east, far east, has a king named Mithridates. And he is stirring up

trouble. He has plans for expanding his realm, and it's going to come at the cost of Rome's allies and perhaps Rome itself. And Marius sees this long before there's any sort of talk of war with Mithridates. In fact, supposedly Marius goes in visits with him and tells him to either be stronger than the Romans or go ahead and submit to them now, to paraphrase. Mithridates took his advice and decided to be stronger. And with this growing threat, Marius really wants to be assigned this command because Mithridates rules over this very powerful and very rich country. And whoever wins this war is going to become so popular, so rich, and so powerful. And Marius, he sees no other way than to get involved in this war, although he says

it rather ridiculously that he only wants the command so that he can teach his son how to be a general. Well, there's other ways of doing that. So he pushes for himself to be given the command since he desires it, but he's not successful. Sulla is this very popular figure at this point, and he's very adept on the battlefield. And he is assigned the role of commanding legions and marching on Pontus. Well, this doesn't sit well with Marius. So he being a very smart politician, he goes to the assemblies after Sulla has already departed from Rome, but is still in Italy.

and Marius gets them to strip Sulla of the command and reassign it to Marius. This was purely legal, although it was kind of, and it's not necessarily the first time that he's done it, because this harkens back to the time of stripping Mattelis of his Numidian command. But there's a difference in that Marius was a private individual at this point. He didn't hold any official position other than, you know, he was a senator, but that didn't make him qualified necessarily to be a commander at this point. So he's successful. This is not illegal.

This is not unconstitutional, but it's certainly unprecedented. And Sala is not willing to give this up. He learns of the problem when Marius sends emissaries to tell him to go ahead and surrender his army to Marius and then he'll head over to Pontus and take care of business. Well, Sulla doesn't like this. He wants the riches. He wants the fame. He wants the popularity and the power that comes.

So he marches on Rome. So Sala becomes the first Roman to lead a Roman army to invade Rome as an invading force. And this has never been done before. This is unprecedented. It's very scary time, I'm sure, in Rome. This leaves Marius, you know, without an army in Rome, seeing thousands of troops coming to get up. He tries to rally defense in Rome, you know, and he offers, you know, freedom to slaves, but it's, it doesn't work. Marius marches into Rome, takes control.

and then sentences Marius to death in absentia because Marius was able to flee because he knew the situation was far too hot to remain at Rome, especially with a lawless individual like Sulla. So the next chapter is Mary's fleeing for his life. And then he raises an army. Walk us through the rest of the war. Sure. He orchestrates quite a – there's a question over whether there's entire truth of the, of the Indian. accounts of his trip, his journey away from Rome as he's trying to survive. But there's some interesting episodes about being captured and taken to the city council of Minterni. And, you know,

they decide that, you know, there's a sentence of death against this man. Even if he's the savior of Rome, we have to follow the law and we have to execute him. So they decide, all right, we're going to do this, but we're going to have a slave do it because we don't want this blood on our hands. And the slave sneaks into Marius's bedroom where he's laying down. He's, he's laying down and he looks at him and he sees what he thinks his flames coming out of Marius's eyes. And the slave is holding a sword. And Marius looks at him, sits up and says, you know, fellow, do you dare kill Gaius Marius? And the slave drops his sword, screaming, runs out saying, I can't kill Gaius Marius.

And then the city council just decides they don't want this on their hands. They release him. Marius escapes and he goes toward Africa, where he tries to raise some troops and bides his time to come back to Rome. And he soon gets an opportunity because after Sulla leaves, the following consuls, they have a dispute and they end up clashing with each other through arms. And Mary sees this as an opportunity. And he sails back to Rome or back toward Rome and he brings some troops, raises some forces, and then offers to serve consul Sinha, which is one of the consuls that's in that conflict. And of course, Sina is just probably falling all over himself to have someone like Mary's

volunteer to serve him. Like it bolsters his cause. We have this great figure. And then, you know, things start to turn against Mary's and the Romans. And Sina, this is another, is he a Julian? It's another Julius Caesar connection, correct? What is Cinnett's relation? Yeah, the upper echelon of Rome, it's kind of incestuous.

There's a lot of webs connecting all these individuals. You know, throughout much of Sina's career, he seems like he's probably a pretty conscientious individual, but he engaged. in this conflict with his co-consul who was probably in the wrong, although there was plenty of blame to go around. But I think Sina probably would have, from what we can tell, probably more aligned with the Marians, with more of a popular as cause, and the two ally together go into Rome and they assert their own control. So talk about the end for Marius. Sinna's story will obviously continue. But what's the end

for Marius? And also talk about his legacy and impact more broadly. Sure. Well, he finally comes back to Rome, and he yearns to have justice reenter as a person not under a sentence of death, but he becomes incredibly bitter. I mean, this is a person who's really been through the ringer. And as he comes to Rome, he stops at the gate and says, I can come in here. You know, there's a sentence of death. The tribes need to repeal it before I'm willing to come in. So the tribes are hastily assembled, and they start to vote. And after only a few tribes vote to repeal it, he gives up. all pretenses and comes in. But he's not a gracious victor. There's stories, and I think we need to be very careful in how much we believe the story. So some of the ancients talk about a pogrom. You know, there's mass killings of Marius's enemies. And there may be a kernel of truth here, but we got to remember that a lot of the people that wrote the history of Marius probably got their sources from the Sullins and people who just were not friendly to him. But there are talks of some enemies, political enemies being executed, at least seven. We only know of seven people

that were killed during this that was the result of Marius. Could be more. It could be. But I think we need to be careful not to look at this as a mass murder, which it's possible, but we need to be careful. Anyhow. So he goes in, orchestrate some of these executions, whether there were judicial pretenses or not. It's hard to say. It's very possible because at least one person they waited to execute him until after his political term was up. So Marius is excited to see some of these people that turned on him and forced him to flee as a hostess to see their downfall in a very despicable manner. And I also don't want to sound crass here. Even if he was only responsible of killing seven people, that's horribly despicable, deplorable in every form. He decides that he's going to

run for office at this point. And through probably some electoral irregular, he's elected to the consulship and it's his seventh, seventh in his life, which is more than any other prior Roman has ever had. And had he remained alive, you know, it's no telling how this consulship would have ended, but ultimately he died days into it. You know, today is January 13th, and it's actually January 13th that he died in 86 BC. So he only lived a few days, a handful of days into his last consulship. And his legacy for Rome and the Republican. His legacy is complicated. In many ways, he was a defender of Rome, a defender of the Constitution.

In a lot of ways, he didn't go around it. But, of course, then you look and you see that he violated the Constitution in at least one form in that he violated the term limits. You can also see that out of a bitter feud with Sala, he allowed things to unravel, which ultimately led to civil wars. And it started, if it didn't start, it was at least a key cause. hog in the chain of events that led to the rise of Julius Caesar, who became dictator in perpetuity, and then Augustus, who threw some sleight of hand essentially abolished the republic and created this empire in which people had less rights, less liberties, and Mary's what played a role in this. He was looked at in many ways as a great conqueror, a great

general, but he was, despite being also, I think, fairly brilliant politically, he could be clumsy. And I think the clumsiness came at the expense of the Romans. I looked it up while you were speaking. Forgive my suggestion that Sina was a Julian, he was not, but he was Caesar's father-in-law, Julia's father. That was the connection that I couldn't quite remember what it was. This has been fascinating. I really appreciate you taking the time.

This is Mark Hayden, author of Gaius Marius, The Rise and Fall of Rome's Savior. Thanks for joining the show. Thanks so much. This is a nebulous media production. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.