A source-book of ancient history - The Search For Mecca

CHAPTER XXXVI
THE REVOLUTION: (I) FROM PLUTOCRACY TO
MILITARY RULE
I. Tiberius Gracchus
While Scipio (iEmilianus, his brother-in-law), was The legislawarring
against Numantia, Tiberius began his legislation,
to which he was led by the following motives.
rius.
Plutarch,
Of the land acquired by war the Romans (i) assigned Gracchus
the cultivated part forthwith to settlers or (2) leased or How the
(3) sold it. Since they had no leisure immediately to allot ^°3°s
the part which then lay desolated by war, — generally the
greater part,— (4) they made proclamation that in the
acquired
meantime those who were willing to work it might do so Civil Wars,
on condition of rendering to
the government a share of
the yearly crops—a tenth of the grain and a fifth of the
fruit. From those who kept flocks was required a share
of the animals, both oxen and small cattle. They did
these things in order to multiply the Italian race,
which
they considered the most laborious of peoples, that they
might have plenty of allies at home.
The result, however, was the very opposite of their desire.
For the rich, getting possession of the greater part
of the undistributed lands,
and emboldened by the lapse
of time to believe that they should never be dispossessed,
added to their holdings the small farms of their poor
neighbors partly by purchase and partly by force. In this
way they came to cultivate vast tracts instead of single
estates, using for the purpose slaves as laborers and
417
1. 7-
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