The Roman Army: A Social and Institutional History - Karatunov.net

282
The Roman A rmy
but some of t h emfled to an island of f the west coast of S p a i n , so Caesar ga t h ered
ships from Gades (modern Cadiz) and flu s h edthem out . He all owed his soldiers
to take a share of the boo ty that the bandits had ga t h ered , and he sent some of
the proceeds to Rom e , pre su m a bly pocketing the re s t . Th en he tu rn ed to the legal
aspects of his po s t , trying to all evi a te the probl ems sti ll left over from the Roman
war against Sertoriu s . Tow a rdthe end of his tenu re of Fu rt h er Spain, Cae s a r
s t a rted to lay the fo u n d a ti ons of his futu re career, i n tent on the con sulship for 59
bc. He had been vo ted a triu m ph by the Sen a te for his ex p l oits against the band
i t s , wh i ch meant that he would have to remain out s i de Rome until he en tered
the city in proce s s i onat the head of his troop s . At the same ti m e , it was sti p u l a ted
that he had to lay down his command and come to Rome in pers on for the el ecti
on s . Some of his oppon ents may have hoped that Caesar would be vain en o u gh
to insist on holding the triu m ph , t hus deb a rring himsel f f rom standing for the
con su l s h i p. Un fortu n a tely for them , Caesar knew how to pri ori ti ze . He abandon
ed the triu m ph and was du ly el ected con sul for 59 bc.
His colleague was Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus, but before the year had progressed
very far contemporary wits had labeled it the consulship of Julius and
Caesar. Bibulus, backed by Cato, tried to oppose Caesar but was either simply
i gn ored or disco u ra ged by force and even tu a lly gave up. The most import a n t
legislation that Caesar passed concerned the land bill to solve several problems
at once, not only alleviating the population pressure at Rome by settling men on
farms, but also providing for Pompey’s veterans who had already been waiting
for a few years while their leader was blocked at every turn by his enemies in the
Senate. Caesar’s first attempts to have this bill passed were reasonable. He had
examined all other land bills of the past years and had been careful to circumvent
all the objections raised to them, but when he still met with opposition he
resorted to force. In acting reasonably himself, he exposed the opposition as unreasonable.
His other legislation concerned taxation, extortion in the provinces,
and the ruler of Egypt. The tax gatherers of the province of Asia had put in a bid
for the contract but found that the profits were not as high as they had anticipated,
so Caesar finally adjusted the situation and warned the tax gatherers to
be more cautious in future. His laws on extortion formed the basis of fair dealings
with the provinces for the next centuries, ensuring that provincials could
bring about a prosecution at Rome against governors who had overstepped the
ru l e s . He proc u red Roman recogn i ti on for Pto l emy Au l etes as ru l er of Egypt
and earned considerable profit for himself and Pompey out of the deal, setting
the scene for Pompey’s flight to Egypt after the battle of Pharsalus.
The matter of the provi n ces to be all oc a ted to the con suls of 59 bc w a s
s om ething that Caesar did not intend to leave to ch a n ce . He sec u red a lon g -
term command in Gaul, where he knew that he could make a military and political
reputation for himself to equal that of Pompey the Great. At this time, he
and Pompey were not rivals, and perhaps he did not even foresee a time when