The Revolt Of The People
The overthrow of the kings of Rome did not relieve the people from all
their oppression. The inhabitants of that city had long been divided
into two great classes, the Patricians, or nobles, and the Plebeians, or
common people, and the former held in their hand nearly all the wealth
and power of the state. The senate, the law-making body, were all
Patricians; the consuls, the executors of the law, were chosen from
thei
ranks; and the Plebeians were left with few rights and little
protection.
It was through the avarice of money-lending nobles that the people were
chiefly oppressed. There were no laws limiting the rate of interest, and
the rich lent to the poor at extravagant rates of usury. The interest,
when not paid, was added to the debt, so that in time it became
impossible for many debtors to pay.
And the laws against debtors had become terribly severe. They might,
with all their families, be held as slaves. Or if the debtor refused to
sell himself to his creditor, and still could not pay his debt, he might
be imprisoned in fetters for sixty days. At the end of that time, if no
friend had paid his debt, he could be put to death, or sold as a slave
into a foreign state. If there were several creditors, they could
actually cut his body to pieces, each taking a piece proportional in
size to his claim.
This cruel severity was more than any people could long endure. It led
to a revolution in Rome. In the year 495 B.C., fifteen years after the
Tarquins had been expelled, a poor debtor, who had fought valiantly in
the wars, broke from his prison, and--with his clothes in tatters and
chains clanking upon his limbs--appealed eloquently to the people in the
Forum, and showed them on his emaciated body the scars of the many
battles in which he had fought.
His tale was a sad one. While he served in the Sabine war, the enemy had
pillaged and burned his house; and when he returned home, it was to find
his cattle stolen and his farm heavily taxed. Forced to borrow money,
the interest had brought him deeply into debt. Finally he had been
attacked by pestilence, and being unable to work for his creditor, he
had been thrown into prison and cruelly scourged, the marks of the lash
being still evident upon his bleeding back.
This piteous story roused its hearers to fury. The whole city broke into
tumult, as the woful tale passed from lip to lip. Many debtors escaped
from their prisons and begged protection from the incensed multitude.
The consuls found themselves powerless to restore order; and in the
midst of the uproar horsemen came riding hotly through the gates, crying
out that a hostile army was near at hand, marching to besiege the city.
Here was a splendid opportunity for the Plebeians. When called upon to
enroll their names and take arms for the city's defence, they refused.
The Patricians, they said, might fight their own battles. As for them,
they had rather die together at home than perish separate upon the
battle-field.
This refusal left the Patricians in a quandary. With riot in the streets
and war beyond the walls they were at the mercy of the commons. They
were forced to promise a mitigation of the laws, declaring that no one
should henceforth seize the goods of a soldier while he was in camp, or
hinder a citizen from enlisting by keeping him in prison. This promise
satisfied the people. The debtors' prisons were emptied, and their late
tenants crowded with enthusiasm into the ranks. Through the gates the
army marched, met the foe, and drove him in defeat from the soil of the
Roman state.
Victory gained, the Plebeians looked for laws to sustain the promises
under which they had fought. They looked in vain; the senate took no
action for their redress. But they had learned their power, and were not
again to be enslaved. Their action was deliberate but decided. Taking
measures to protect their homes on the Aventine Hill, they left the city
the next year in a body, and sought a hill beyond the Anio, about three
miles beyond the walls of Rome. Here they encamped, built
fortifications, and sent word to their lordly rulers that they were done
with empty promises, and would fight no more for the state until the
state kept its faith. All the good of their fighting came to the
Patricians, they said, and these might now defend themselves and their
wealth.
The senate was thrown into a panic by this decided action. When the
hostile cities without should learn of it, they might send armies in
haste to undefended Rome. The people left in the city feared the
Patricians, and the Patricians feared them. All was doubt and anxiety.
At length the senate, driven to desperation, sent an embassy to the
rebels to treat for peace, being in deadly fear that some enemy might
assail and capture the city in the absence of the bulk of its
inhabitants.
The messenger sent, Menenius Agrippa Lanatus, was a man famed for
eloquence, and a popular favorite. In his address to the people in their
camp he repeated to them the following significant fable:
"At a time when all the parts of the body did not agree together, as
they do now, but each had its own method and language, the other parts
rebelled against the belly. They said that it lay quietly enjoying
itself in the centre, while they, by care, labor, and service, kept it
in luxury. They therefore conspired that the hands should not convey
food to the mouth, the mouth receive it, nor the teeth chew it. They
thus hoped to subdue the belly by famine; but they found that they and
all the other parts of the body suffered as much. Then they saw that the
belly by no means rested in sloth; that it supplied instead of receiving
nourishment, sending to all parts of the body the blood that gave life
and strength to the whole system."
It was the same, he said, with the body of the state. All must work in
unity, if all would prosper. This homely argument hit the popular fancy.
The people consented to treat for their return if their liberties could
be properly secured. But they must now have deeds instead of words. It
was not political power they sought, but protection, and protection they
would have.
Their demands were as follows: All debts should be cancelled, and all
debtors held by their creditors should be released. And hereafter the
Plebeians should have as their protectors two officials, who should have
power to veto all oppressive laws, while their persons should be held as
sacred and inviolable as those of the messengers of the gods. These
officials were to be called Tribunes, and to be the chief officers of
the commons as the consuls were of the nobles.
This proposition was accepted by the senate, and a treaty signed between
the contesting parties, as solemnly as if they had been two separate
nations. It was an occasion as important to the liberties of Romans as
the treaty signed many centuries afterwards on the field of Runnymede,
between King John and his barons, was to the liberties of Englishmen,
and was held by the Romans in like high regard. The hill on which the
treaty had been made was ever after known as the Sacred Mount. Its top
was consecrated and an altar built upon it, on which sacrifices were
made to Jupiter, the god who strikes men with terror and then delivers
them from fear; for the people had fled thither in dread, and were now
to return home in safety.
Thus ended the great revolt of the people, who had gained in the
Tribunes defenders of more power and importance than they or the senate
knew. They were never again to suffer from the bitter oppression to
which they had been subjected in preceding years. As for Lanatus, to
whose pleadings they had yielded, he died before the year ended, and was
found to have not left enough to pay for his funeral. Therefore the
Plebeians collected funds to give him a splendid burial; but the senate
having decreed that the state should bear this expense, the money raised
by the grateful people was formed into a fund for the benefit of his
children.