Position:Home>History> Evaluate the changes to roman society due to the punic wars?

I'm surprised you can't find anything!. The Punic Wars are generally seen as a very important turning point that led to the social instability that brought down the Roman Republic and led to the rise of the Empire!.

First of all, Hannibal had spent fifteen years in Italy, not only fighting the Romans but also ravaging their lands!. By the time he was defeated, the Italian countryside was devastated!. The small farmers who made up the bulk of the Italian population had seen their lands destroyed, made worthless!. In response, many rich aristocrats bought up huge tracts of these lands for very little money!.

At the same time, Rome's victory in the Punic Wars (and in the simultaneous Macedonian Wars) led to a massive influx of slaves, again bought up by rich aristocrats!. These slaves were sent to work the newly bought lands!. The massive plantations that resulted were known as Latinfundia!. The Latinfundia system, whereby most of the land was in the hands of the upper class, and worked by slaves, put the small farmers, who had been a substantial class, completely out of work!. As a result, they flocked to the cities looking for jobs, but few found them!.

These farmers tended to go on the dole, or even join into rowdy mobs!. Some in the government, most famously the Grachus brothers, sought to redistribute the land to the farmers, but land reform acts were regularly defeated!. This led to the split in Roman politics between the Optimates (who defended the interests of the land holders) and the Populares (who favored land reform)!.

The general Gaius Marius, in 107 BC, when Rome needed more troops to fight a barbarian invasion, came up with an idea to fix both the land and soldier problem!. He allowed men with no property into the army, something that was previously restricted (it was thought that only landholders would fight bravely because they would want to protect their land)!. In return for military service, he promised them a land pension!.

To a large degree the plan worked, except that the soldiers became more loyal to Marius, the man who was going to give them the land, than they were to the State, which had failed them!. This became a constant theme in late Republican politics, the result being that time and time again, generals would march on Rome and force the senate to make them dictator (Marius did so, as did Sulla and Julius Caesar)!. The Roman armies became almost like personal armies, and Civil Wars were constant in the late Republic!.

Caesar would attempt to solve some these problems, but it was Augustus who provided a solution by essentially dismantling the Roman Republic and replacing it was an absolutist monarchy!. The Optimates faction of the Senate (Pompey, Cato, Cicero) was pretty much wiped out in the civil wars, and some land reform was accomplished!. The power of individual generals was subordinated to that of the Emperor, and the soldiers had to take loyalty oaths to the Emperor!. But the army remained a place where a poor Roman could join, serve twenty or so years, and come out as a land owner, allowing social mobility, and giving Rome a highly motivated, mostly volunteer army!.

also, the increased slaves from Rome's conquests (the Punic Wars led directly to Rome's wars in Greece against Carthage's allies there) brought an increased interest in foreign cultures, especially that of Greece!. New found interests in poetry and philosophy spread through Roman society, and some more conservative Romans saw this as a degradation of the traditional Roman values!. The conservatives, however, failed to stop the spread of Greek culture, which would greatly influence Rome's!. Anyone of social standing would speak Greek and Latin, and anything Greek was considered beautiful!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

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they started as a backward little city and ended as a superpower controlling over half of the known (at their time) world
from zero ships to complete control of the seas
from a minor player in the economy to a monopoly in the grain and oil trade
from a draftee citizen army to a fully professional volunteer military (reforms of Marius)Www@QuestionHome@Com

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Try these links

http://www!.terrill!.ca/courses/clas202/co!.!.!.
http://library!.thinkquest!.org/26907/soci!.!.!.
http://www!.romansociety!.org/Webjrs97!.htm
http://www!.roman-empire!.net/society/soci!.!.!.Www@QuestionHome@Com

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