General Historical Background

When Octavian gained control of the state in 31 bc, the Roman world was still in a state of confusion. The main demand of the age was the return to the stability that only a properly functioning system of government could provide.

But the whole administration of the state was so inextricably bound up with the republican constitution that political stability was virtually impossible without upholding the republican traditions. Based on this realistic appraisal of the situation, Octavian- Augustus, through a series of masterful manipulations, established a constitution that artificially preserved the republican institutions but in fact created a new monarchical power and a new system of government for the provinces. This constitution, referred to as the Principate, made possible for more than 200 years the peaceful development of the Roman empire and its civilization. The work of Augustus was continued and developed further by his successors: the Julio- Claudians (Tiberius ad 14-37, Caligula ad 37-41, Claudius ad 41-54 and Nero ad 54-68); the Flavians (Vespasian ad 69-79, Titus ad 79-81 and Domitian ad 8196); and the Antonines (Nerva ad 96-98, Trajan ad 98-117, Hadrian ad 117-138, Antoninus Pius ad 138-161, and Marcus Aurelius ad 161-180).

For nearly a century and a half after the establishment of the Principate the Roman empire continued to expand territorially until it included all the countries within the natural boundaries outlined by Augustus: Thrace, the Rhine regions, Britain, Armenia and Mauretania. During the same period the Roman world enjoyed an unprecedented degree of peace and the Greco-Roman civilization continued to spread throughout the provinces. The conditions of peace and security that prevailed promoted economic development and produced high levels of prosperity throughout the empire.

This prosperity was to a large extent based on an enormous increase in industry and commerce that was precipitated by the expansion of the Roman road network, the security of transport and the establishment of a currency system for the whole empire.^{^[30]} The cultural and economic basis of the empire was a vast network of city-states spread throughout the provinces. These enjoyed a large measure of autonomy, and all had a share in the same civilization and favourable economic conditions.^{^[31]} Moreover, from the early years of the Principate age Roman citizenship began to spread in the provinces. From the time of Emperor Claudius on, provincial aristocrats were admitted as members of the senate, and by the reign of Hadrian they filled nearly half of this body. By the second century ad, the provincials shared in all the privileges of Rome and even the office of emperor itself was opened to persons of Roman descent whose families lived in the provinces. The process of Romanization of the empire was completed in ad 212, when Emperor Caracalla issued an edict, the constitutio Antoniniana, by which he bestowed Roman citizenship on all the free inhabitants of the empire who were members of organized communities. Caracalla’s edict was a milestone in the history of the Roman Empire: it signified the triumph of the idea of a supra-national world empire over the old idea of the city-state and led to the gradual leveling of the inhabitants of the empire with respect to their legal and political rights. The republican traditions, which Augustus had artificially preserved and which in the course of time had become an empty shell, were ripe for collapse.

In the later half of the second century ad, several forces began to gather to complete the transformation of the empire from its previous structure under Augustus. The most important among these forces originated from the conditions present in the socio-political milieu of the times: the increasing reliance of the emperors on the army as a means of maintaining control of the state; the creation of a vast administrative apparatus that, in the long run, could not be supported by the resources of the empire; the perpetuation of a class structure that failed to give the producing classes rewards equal to the burdens imposed on them; and the sharp decline of public spirit in a state where servility to imperial authority had replaced active participation in public affairs.

With the final abandonment of the principle of diarchy (the double rule of the emperor and the senate) during the reign of Emperor Septimius Severus (ad 193-211) and the further militarization of the administration, the army discarded its position as the empire’s servant and became its master. From ad 235, the collapse of the central government authority entailed disorder and civil war as different field armies proclaimed their generals as emperors and used their own strength to plunder the lands of the empire. The continuous military mutinies and struggles between different pretenders to the throne weakened the state’s defences at a time when new external enemies increasingly threatened its frontiers. In the wake of the devastation caused by war and plunder, the civilian populations and the economies were severely damaged; law and order disintegrated; commerce and industry came to a standstill; and once flourishing urban centres fell into decay. In the closing years of the third century, the crisis was finally checked under a succession of capable emperors but only at the cost of establishing a despotic government and a rigidly regulated society.

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Source: Mousourakis G.. Roman Law and the Origins of the Civil Law Tradition. Springer,2015. — 339 p.. 2015

General Historical Background

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