Rindis.com

Adrian Goldworthy’s In the Name of Rome is something of a mixed bag. It purports itself as being an examination of the Roman style of command by looking at several of its most prominent generals. The selection is constrained to those where there’s enough known to be able to say something intelligent, which warps the coverage somewhat. Goldsworthy covers fifteen generals, with Caesar coming in for extra attention (of course!) and two (Fabius and Marcellus) combined into one chapter, and thus feeling a bit more summarized.

Despite the fact that this is centered around individual people, Goldsworthy actually spends a fair amount of time providing extra background and bridging, and the volume can serve as a decent history of Rome from the Second Punic War through the early Empire. After his chapter on Titus and the siege of Jerusalem, the gaps become too big (mostly because of a lack of sources on individual commanders) and the overall narrative of events breaks down for the final two chapters on Julian and Belisarius, making them feel more like the separate essays you would expect from the general format of the book.

The part that surprised me, is that while the book is supposed to be about Roman command, it seemed like it had more to say about the Roman military itself. He points out early on that the Roman Republic army was set up to be a very non-professional force, with it’s constant cycle of recruiting a legion, training it, and then disbanding it once the immediate goal/campaign is done. This leads to Roman armies having trouble at the start of the Second Punic War when there’s been little training, and doing better as experience is gained. In the years afterward, there’s a good number of veterans that cycle into the new legions, and help power Rome’s growth in the 2nd Century BC. Then the Marian reforms put the legions on a more permanent basis, with long-term training, making it a professional service, and creating the armies that both conquer large portions of the future Empire, and tear the Republic apart as they fight each other.

On the other hand, the last two chapters show just how completely this had all come apart. While the Empire was still a major state, even after the fall of the Western half by the time of Belisarius, and the total number of men under arms could still be fairly large, the actual armies in use were very small in comparison to previous centuries. Goldworthy’s main analysis of Julian is that his successful campaigns against various Germanic tribes would have been handled locally by a provincial governor instead of needing attention from near the very top. His failure against Persia is given as being at least partly due to having to manage a larger army and distances than he had yet had to deal with. Finally, Belisarius’ armies are generally puny, and he has to put up with a lack of discipline and mutiny that would never have been allowed in an early legion.

The stated idea of how Roman generals functioned is discussed throughout the book as well, but it felt less prominent than the arc I just summarized. But the book is large enough to support both threads, while talking about the actual people involved, and threading much of the history together. At the large scale, all the history in here can be found in any number of other places, but this particular presentation is a good one, and does develop its own themes well.

In 91 BC, the Roman Republic found itself fighting a not-quite civil war, when a large part of Rome’s allies and conquered peoples in Italy rebelled and tried to bring down the Roman Republic. Cataclysm 90 BC is about this conflict, and several directly related subjects.

The “Cataclysm” name is justified in the first chapter with the idea of ‘cataclysmic adjustment’. This is an idea that if an unstable situation is left alone long enough, it will solve itself by turning into a different (generally more severe) problem. This is presented as a pre-existing concept, though I have not run into the phrase before, and while Matyszak is on solid ground in his assertion that the Social War was the opening act in the civil wars that brought about the Roman Empire, use of the word ‘cataclysm’ in the title still feels overly dramatic.

The subtitle ‘The Forgotten War that Almost Destroyed Rome’ is far more justified. As it happened, the two sides were fairly even for the first year or so, and it was quite possible that more of Italy would join the revolt against Rome, and Rome would fall. It might be worth wondering just what the Roman Republic would have been replaced with in such a situation? Likely, the various peoples involved would have tried going their own way, and return to the general situation before Rome dominated the peninsula. But they had just banded together to fight Rome, had adopted some of the forms of the Republic, and the actual cause of the conflict was a desire to be counted as Roman citizens. It is possible that some form of Italian Republic would have emerged, that would have explicitly included full rights for everyone involved, and gone on its business in much the same way as the Roman Republic—just without the Romans. Finally, it is very true that the Social War is not very well known. In popular knowledge, the period between the Punic Wars and Julius Caesar is silent. At the same time, it is somewhat ironic that the events covered here are also covered by two volumes of the fairly recent popular Masters of Rome series by Colleen McCullough, so it is not quite as forgotten as it has been.

Matyszak does a very good job of introducing the general situation, and showing the roots of the conflict. He takes a look at both sides, and shows how the recent history of the Republic had been rife with incompetence. This includes a rundown of reform attempts in the Republic, including the Gracchi brothers and Livius Drusus. The war is also handled well, and gives those details that are available, with appropriate asides about where sources are thin, or disagree. He also continues the narrative into the war between Marius and Sulla, and then Sulla’s campaign in Italy after the Mithradatic War and his attempt to reform the Republic. This is largely there as it follows on so naturally to the main subject, but the fact is that it also saw the last bits of the Social War play out (in further fighting against the Samnites, one of the prominent rebel tribes of the war).

This is a good short overview (only ~160 pages) of about a decade, and would only really benefit from perhaps some further reading suggestions and better maps. The one map provided is quite serviceable, but by no means exceptional. The editing seems fairly good with the only flub I noticed being Marius being introduced as ‘Caius Marius’ the first time, and then called ‘Gaius Marius’ for the rest of the book (both are correct; interestingly, he’s listed as Caius in the index). Speaking of Marius, Matyszak takes a dim view of him, seeing him as overly ambitious and jealous, and seems unconvinced of his military ability, in contrast to McCullough’s glowing depiction. As such, I wish he’d spent a bit more time on the man, because while he’s on solid ground with other historians on the first part, he is bucking the trend in his judgement of military ability.