The reign of Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus or Emperor Caligula was a chaotic one. For the first two years, beloved by the Senate and people, after a mysterious illness, his moods became erratic. Ruling like a king, he humiliated Senators, abused his power, and made claims of divinity. Narcissistic and cruel, he finally met his end at the hands of one of his own bodyguards whom he mocked cruelly humiliated because of his high-pitched voice.

With his death, the Senate immediately convened to choose the next course of action. Pro-Republic Senators, fearing that it was only a matter of time before the Roman Legions or the Praetorian Guard clamored for a return to the Republic to prevent the excesses of the previous emperor. The Senate quickly voted its assent and the garrison in Rome bribed and charged with eliminating the powerful Praetorian Guard and other Caligula or Imperial supporters among the common people whom Caligula remained popular with. Caligula's assassin was tried before a magistrate and executed to please the common people.

Four years later in 45 A.D., Rome is prosperous. The wealth of the known world pours into the Eternal City. Yet, despite the return to Republican principles, the legacy of the Empire remains. The legislative powers transferred from the old legislative Assemblies to the Roman Senate by Emperor Tiberius is retained by the simple fact that the Assemblies functioned via direct democracy and Rome had grown too large for direct democracy to be practical. However, the Plebeians (common class of the Republic) regained the ability to elect tribunes to veto laws and, in theory, may even be elected Consul. The most troubling aspect for the Republic's survival is the precedent of single-rule. Powerful Patrician families have noted that it is possible to take ultimate power. This remains an unspoken fear or ambition amongst Senators.

Social Classes



There are many social classes in Rome, but there are a few main ones:

Patricians: The basis for this class is political. It include all men who serve in the Senate, and by extension their families. This class is dominated by the nobles (nobiles), families whose ancestors include at least one consul (earlier the qualification had been a curule magistracy, i.e. curule aedile and up). The first man in his family to be elected consul, thus qualifying his family for noble status, is called a “new man” (novus homo), although this term is used in varying senses—it could refer to an equesterian who was the first in his family to be elected to political office and thus join the senatorial class, or to a man from the senatorial class who was the first in his family to be elected consul and thus join the nobles, or most dramatically to an equestrian like Cicero who was elected consul. Senators have to prove that they had property worth at least 1,000,000 sesterces; there was no salary attached to service in the Senate, and senators were prohibited from engaging personally in nonagricultural business, trade or public contracts. This does not apply to family members or activities done earlier in life, but in practice, Senators are usually rather wealthy from birth and enter politics at a young age. Men of the senatorial class wear the tunic with broad stripes (laticlavi).

Equestrian class (equites): The basis for this class is economic. A man can be formally enrolled in the equestrian order if he can prove that he possessed a stable minimum amount of wealth (property worth at least 400,000 sesterces); by extension his family members are also considered equestrians. However, if an equestrian is elected to a magistracy and entered the Senate, he moves up to the senatorial class; this was not particularly easy or frequent. Equestrians are primarily involved in the types of business prohibited to senators. Equestrians wore the tunic with narrow stripes (angusti clavi).

Patricians and Equestrians may serve as patrons for certain people or groups to gain glory or public support for themselves and their families. (See Patronage, Bread, and Circuses in the OOC forums)

Plebeians: All other freeborn Roman citizens. The special mark of dress for citizen males is the toga. All Roman citizens have conubium, the right to contract a legal marriage with another Roman citizen and beget legitimate children who are themselves Roman citizens.

Foreigners (peregrini): All freeborn men and women who lived in Roman territories outside of Italy. They are usually conquered people, but have more rights than freedmen or slaves.

Freedmen: (liberti or libertini): Men and women who have been slaves but have bought their freedom or been manumitted. They are not fully free because they have various restrictions on their rights and owed certain duties to their former masters, who now became their patrons, but they could become citizens if their former masters were citizens and they had been formally manumitted; they were not, however, eligible for public office. This is the one class it is not possible to leave, though the class encompassed only one generation. The next generation, their freeborn children, became full citizens (i.e., members of the Plebians, though there is a social stigma attached to being a freedman's son) and could even become equestrians if rich enough. Freedpeople had low social status, and most were probably fairly poor, but it is possible for them to achieve some success in a trade, and a few might even become wealthy. They had no special distinction of dress, though their names indicated their status as freedpeople.

Women: At this point in time, women are considered to be part of the same class as their parents. In addition, a child is of the same class of his or her mother. Thus, a child of a wealthy Patrician and a slave woman is still a slave, though his or her father may choose to do something about it. Women are barred from political power and, by custom but not law, from economic independence. Prostitution is legal and frequented by many, though said prostitutes are not held in high regard.

Slaves (servi): Rome employs a system of chattel slavery where human beings are born into slavery or sold into slavery through war or piracy. Slaves are the property of their owners by law, but by custom some slaves (especially urban, domestic slaves) might be allowed their own savings (peculium) with which they might later buy their freedom, or their masters could manumit them, so some mobility into the previous class was possible. Roman slavery is not racially based, and slaves had no special distinction of dress, though slaves who habr run away were sometimes made to wear metal collars with inscriptions such as the following: “I have run away. Capture me. When you have returned me to my master, Zoninus, you will receive a reward.

Character Profiles

Code: Select all

Full name: (Please check out "Roman Names" in OOC)
Age:
Birth month and day:
Race: (Roman, Greek, Gaulish, Syrian, Egyptian, Carthaginian, Pontic, Celtic, Macedonian, Numidian, Illyrian, Latin, Etruscan, Seleucid, Germanic, Thracian, etc. Basically what would be around in 45 A.D.)
General appearance: (descriptions and/or pics are good.)
Social Class: (Patrician, Plebian, etc.)
Occupation: (Please refer to OOC posts for more information. If you are interested in taking up the challenge of a political career, please check out "Roman Government" in OOC.)
Personality and character traits:
Skills and special knowledge:
Hopes and ambitions:
History:
Associated Side Characters: (Write N/A if there are none. These are characters you will play as well as your main characters to have someone they can interact with when we aren't interacting with each other.)