ROME 40T ty. From this time reform became impossible, and revolution, through the aid of the legions, was inevitable. The few years that followed the triumph of the optimates form the most corrupt period of Roman history. The effect of this corruption of the aristocracy was seen on the breaking out of the Jugurthine war in 111. The Roman armies were baffled through the arts of Jugurtha, who found their com- manders accessible to his bribes, until first Me- tellus, and then Caius Marius, were appointed to conduct the war against him. The election of Marius to the consulship was a triumph of the people over the optimates, and he opened the legions to a lower class of men, which was an important step toward that change which made them the instruments of successful lead- ers. Numidia was conquered in 107, and Ju- gurtha was starved to death (104). The inva- sion of the Oimbrians and Teutons led to the repeated reelection of Marius ; and he justified his countrymen's confidence by exterminating those barbarians (102, 101), after they had de- stroyed many Roman armies. The second ser- vile war in Sicily, after lasting three years, was brought to an end in 99. The political con- tests of Rome now assumed a decisive charac- ter, and the failure of the Italians to obtain enfranchisement led to the social or Marsic war (90-88), in which the Romans were vic- torious, but voluntarily granted the franchise to the Italians. The appointment of Sulla to the command in the war against Mithridates, king of Pontus, caused the rivalry between that chief and Marius to assume the form of a bloody civil war, the result of which was to throw the whole power of the republic into the hands of Sulla, who was appointed perpetual dictator, which office he resigned after reconstructing the constitution accord- ing to aristocratic ideas. Sertorius, a parti- san of Marius, having fled to Spain, for years braved there the best Roman generals, until removed by assassination (72). Sulla died in 78, and the changes that he had made lost their vitality with their creator. In the mean time the conquests of the Romans had been carried on in the East by Sulla, and subsequently by Lucullus and Pompey, who overthrew Mith- ridates, and defeated the king of Armenia. Pompey converted Syria into a Roman prov- ince, and made Judea virtually dependent upon the republic. The great servile war, in which the Thracian gladiator Spartacus headed the slaves, began in 73, and lasted nearly three years, much of Italy being in the hands of the slaves ; and it was not until several power- ful armies had been beaten, and forces of the greatest magnitude had been employed, that the insurgents were overthrown. Before his expedition to the East, Pompey subdued the Mediterranean pirates. The greatest man in Rome, Pompey had soon to encounter the ri- valry of Julius Caesar, while Cicero's services in baffling the conspiracy of Catiline (63) gave him a high degree of consideration, and the wealth and civil and military talent of Cras- sus enabled him to control a powerful party. Through a coalition known as the first trium- virate, Ceesar, Crassus, and Pompey became virtual masters of their country (60) ; but the defeat and death of Crassus, in an expedition against Parthia, left supreme power to be struggled for by his associates. Caesar had been appointed to the command in Gaul, the conquest of which country he completed, while he also invaded Germany and Britain. Nomi- nally as the champion of the senate, Pompey broke with Caasar, who in 49 advanced upon Rome at the head of some of his legions, and compelled his enemies to fly. In the contest that followed Ca?sar was victorious, defeat- ing his enemies, including Pompey, Ptolemy of Egypt, Pharnaces of the Bosporus, Juba of Mauritania, the younger Cato, M. Scipio, and the sons of Pompey, in Italy, Spain, Greece, Egypt, Asia, and the province of Africa. He had concentrated all power in his person when he was assassinated in 44. His power passed into the hands of his nephew Octavius, who, with the aid of Lepidus and Antony, triumphed over the republican party, whose chief leaders were Brutus and Cassius. Octavius soon mas- tered his associates, and became lord of the Roman world, the most important addition to which made by himself was the kingdom of Egypt. Drusus and Tiberius, his stepsons, con- quered in Germany, but Varus perished there with his legions. Octavius (or Octavianus) is generally considered the first of the emperors, and his undivided rule dates from 30 B. 0. He assumed the title of Augustus, by which he has ever since been known. All the powers of the state were vested in him. His reign, which embraced a part of the golden age of Roman literature (see LATIN LANGUAGE AND LITERA- TUEE), lasted until A. D. 14, and he was suc- ceeded by Tiberius, his adopted son, who was of the Claudian gens, and in whose reign dis- appeared the last remnants of the old Roman constitution. Tiberius was succeeded in 37 by his grandnephew Caius, known as Caligula. After him reigned Claudius, and then Nero (54-68), the last of the emperors who could make any claim to connection, either by blood or by adoption, with the founder of the Julian imperial line. Tyranny and shameless corrup- tion had reached their height. In the reign of Claudius Britain was conquered. The em- perors Galba, Otho, and Vitellius followed each other in rapid succession, until the throne was occupied by the Flavian family in the person of Vespasian (69), who was succeeded by his son Titus (79-81), the conqueror of Jerusa- lem, whose successor was his brother Domi- tian. On this tyrant's assassination (96), the humane Nerva was made emperor. His suc- cessor was Trajan (98), who added Dacia to the empire, and who carried the Roman arms to the Persian gulf, conquering many countries of the East; but these conquests were aban- doned by the next emperor, Hadrian (H7-'38),
