M Worthington

7/27/2019 M Worthington

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OIN GE ND SULLA S RETIREMEN

Sulla s retirement into private life in 79 BC has provoked nut ions, including illness, apathy towards Rome s future and theresult o f the complet ion of his work . Carcopino s theoryl), t htended to become a monarch a combination of Pompey, the Metelde r of the nobility forced hirn to abdicate, since he was unwillingagain (in o rd er t o maintain his position), was criticised by Scullahistory of the period 2 ) . Scullard hirnself suggested that Sullathought he simply had done enough, particularly with the increapowers in an a ttempt to bring about areturn to a republican form the latest wo rk on Sulla Keaveney extends Scullard s point sothat Sulla withdrew from Rome because he considered his conwould inhibit th e workings of the reformed republic, in which thCatulus was defending his legislation against M. Lepidus 3 ).

All of these explanations are, of course, speculative; hardlythe existing evidence. Appian (BC 1.1 03) rather eulogisticallyvoluntarily retired to live at his country estate in Cumae, whilst Pof Sulla has noth ing to say ab ou t th e actual retirement bu t is morgory descriptions of the final stages of Sullas fatal disease Althou


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of the Marians at homes). Sulla was now all-powerful and, correspondingly,result of the proscript ions his band of supporters , the Sullani, also exerciseinfluential rle in Roman politics 6 .

Sulla s equestrian statue seems to have been thefirst for any living Rleast in Rome), and although the honour was probably tolerated his coinweil have caused discontent amongst his supporters, perhars fuelled by the moate or middle group which had joined him after the fall 0 Cinna 7 . wpractice for coins to bear the images of gods and dead heroes and individuafor example, Caesar (cos. 90) coined wi th head of Venus in c. 104,

Crawford s dating, as Sulla was to do laters . However, Sulla went one stagwhen his equestrian statue and thus, in effeet, his own port rait appeared o

coins whilst he was still alive: see the gold aureus which appears on the pparticular coin was struck after Sulla s triumphal coins of 8210 and folloit is extremely likely that i t was struck not in the east but in Rome itself

coin was struck there rather than in the east i lluminates the polit ical implicaand significance of this coinage as far as Sulla s motives go.

effect, Sulla had set himself up as the first emperor of Rome I

coinage is a direct indication of this However his megalomania proved his d


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time to depose hirn did precisely that. was the Sullani wh oRome, probably aided by the advanced stages of his disease, alloloyalty to live out an anticipated short life in the country, well awSulla did no t retire: he was retired

Wh y then bring hirn back to Rome in 79 for the consularAccording to Keaveney Sulla re ti red, having created a group owould uphold his acta, and expected to play the rle of the elderinto Rome only when needed. These part icular elections, involvingbetween Catulus, M. Lepidus and Mam. Lepidus, were an indication

even though Sulla had married Scaurus widow Caecilia by 87 his rCaesars and Catulus seem to have remained dose. Althoughsuggestion for Sulla s retirement above brings me into conflict with Kis no t necessarily the case. Sulla still had influence; there was still mcapital to be made ou t of one s name just as there is today), andat the first set of elections following his withdrawal from Rome hisdeemed necessary in view of the Pompey-backed candidate M. Lepthat I think needs to be emphasized is that Sulla does no t appear toreturning to Rome; others decided for hirn that his presence was requir


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The purpose of this paper has been to extend the theory of Carcopino asuggest that Sulla was deliberatelr. ousted from power - and from Rome - bonly group able to do s his ow n 9 Such an occurrence was the result of aof factors, including Sulla s rapidly deteriorating health, but principally the protion of coins which not only flouted Roman tradition but also was a visible sithe autocratic power he dared to hold. In the 70s the Roman state was notto endure an emperor, as is demonstrated by Sulla s retirement ; nor was itover a qu ner of century later when Julius Caesar followed much the same cbut was to suffer a more bloody demise.

Armidale (Australia) l n o r th i ng t on

19 See Keaveney, Sulla 207 f for the spli t in Sulla s group whichchallenge his authority.

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M Worthington