Was the Roman Empire inherently aggressive towards its neighbours?

Authors Avatar

7027544

Was the Roman Empire inherently aggressive towards its neighbours?

When conquest is hard, states are blessed with neighbours that are relaxed by their own security and by the high cost of attacking others. Hence states have less reason to expect attack. This leaves all states even more secure and therefore more willing to follow peaceful policies. Alternatively when the offense dominates, states are cursed with neighbours made aggressive by both temptation and fear. These neighbours see easy gain from aggression and danger in pursuing passive action. Faced with such aggressive neighbours, all states face greater risk of attack. This drives them to compete harder to control resources and create conditions that provide security.

Tacitus opens his Histories by describing an aggressive, unstable and violent Rome.

I am entering on the history of a period rich in disasters, frightful in its wars, torn by civil strife, and even in peace full of horrors.[…] There was success in the East, and disaster in the West. There were disturbances in Illyricum; Gaul wavered in its allegiance; Britain was thoroughly subdued and immediately abandoned; the tribes of the Suevi and the Sarmatae rose in concert against us; the Dacians had the glory of inflicting as well as suffering defeat; the armies of Parthia were all but set in motion by the cheat of a counterfeit Nero. Now too Italy was prostrated by disasters either entirely novel, or that recurred only after a long succession of ages; cities in Campania's richest plains were swallowed up and overwhelmed; Rome was wasted by conflagrations, its oldest temples consumed, and the Capitol itself fired by the hands of citizens. Sacred rites were profaned; there was profligacy in the highest ranks; the sea was crowded with exiles, and its rocks polluted with bloody deeds. In the capital there were yet worse horrors. Nobility, wealth, the refusal or the acceptance of office, were grounds for accusation, and virtue ensured destruction. The rewards of the informers were no less odious than their crimes; for while some seized on consulships and priestly offices, as their share of the spoil, others on procuratorships, and posts of more confidential authority, they robbed and ruined in every direction amid universal hatred and terror. Slaves were bribed to turn against their masters, and freedmen to betray their patrons; and those who had not an enemy were destroyed by friends.”

How were the Romans so successful in maintaining their empire? Why did those who had been conquered so willing submit to foreign domination and foreign taxes? Rome actually had relatively little bureaucracy to control its empire. Control was maintained more through conditioning the minds of the conquered masses to accept Roman rule than a complex system of government. Through careful planning, Rome used various methods of control to pacify and please the millions under its control. Rome, of course, did not gain control of its immense empire overnight. Thus, its policies of control slowly evolved as necessity was placed upon it. Firstly, consider the beginning of Rome’s power-- its domination of Italy.        Italy, much like Greece, was a land of the city state. However, quite unlike Greece, Italy was extremely diverse. There was no common bond that the Romans could point to in order to say that they were a single people.                                                        

Join now!

Rome encountered aggressive neighbours such as the Samnites, but the Romans of the Roman Empire were themselves aggressive. In this regard it should be remember that Rome conducted many of their military operations in foreign territory. To a Roman the greatest honour was that of  victory in war. The Roman state was therefore configured to pursue an aggressive foreign policy.
        The Roman Empire was a strong hold over the Mediterranean for many years. As is the goal of most all world leaders, the Romans wanted land along with their power. They set their eyes on the valuable lands around them and ...

This is a preview of the whole essay