What caused the relationship between the military and the emperor to be so unstable in Roman empire?

The end of the first Roman dynasty, the Julio Claudian dynasty, was one of bloodshed and devastating civil war. In this essay, I will be looking for the pattern of the first ever principate civil war. The importance of the Julio Claudian dynasty is that as the first principate Roman dynasty, the Julio Claudian dynasty has all it needs to analyse the frequent civil war in the Roman Empire because it is the first principate Roman dynasty which had acted as an experiment of principate rule and had demonstrated almost all phonons representing the unstable relationship between the military and the emperor. The evidence that has been demonstrated in the Julio Claudian dynasty’s downfall and the assignation of Caligula is that the frequent military intervention in politics has deep roots in the system of the Roman military.

The Praetorian guard were founded by Octavian as a protectional force of the emperor to prevent another assisination from occurring. The praetorian guard received better pay than the rest of the army and had better living conditions than the rest of the Roman army. They were undoubtedly the most privileged group in the Roman military. They were intended to be the emperor’s personal elite army. However, as time progressed, the Praetorian Guard were no longer the elite battle-hardened troops they once were. Rather, they became a political institution, making full use of their deadly force for wealth and power.

The Praetorian guard loves wealth as much as all ordinary people. They would not shy away from obtaining wealth by taking advantage of being close to the center of power to threaten the emperor for their lavish lives. Emperor Caligula was the first emperor to be murdered by his own bodyguard. Anticipation of reward may lead to the assassination of Caligula and the ascension of Claudius. After Claudius ascended the throne, he gave the Pretorians a large sum of donations, which further proves the anticipation of reward. The Pretorians were given a donation after Claudius adopted and chose Nero as his son and successor to the throne. Nero, after ascending the throne, also promised the Pretorians that they would be given the same in his reign as the money given by his father. The Praetorian guards were dissatisfied with emperor Galba for refusing to give the donation promised by Sabinus, which was a major factor in the assassination of Galba.All these examples show the flaw of the system where we have a military unit close to the emperor that lacked supervision and could assassinate the emperor at any given time if enough was offered to them. The military unit, after spending time with the emperor, became corrupt due to the expectation of money. Emperors risked assassination or at least making enemies off their guard if they refused to pay them. This shows that the Praetorian Guard can be swayed by wealth and kill the emperor. It also shows that the Praetorians could be used as a political tool by other fractions to accomplish their own political desires.

Money was not the only thing that mattered to the Praetorians in their selective process of murdering the emperor. The popularity of the emperor among the guards and how strict the emperor was with the guards was also a key factor. An example of the emperor trying to defy and be strict on the Praetorian Guard also didn’t end well. After the death of Agrippina, there was widespread dissatisfaction with Nero over his dissatisfying behaviour. The Praetorian Guard abandoned Nero after major dissatisfaction with Nero while he was absent from Greece, and the man he left in charge of Rome, Sabinus, had already undermined the last remaining relationship between the emperor and the guard since emperor Nero gained a bad reputation in the guard due to his personal behaviour and the guards even plotted to overthrow him. The cruel treatment of Galba to his troops and the Praetorians on his way to Rome, and the dissatisfaction of Galba with the Praetorian guard over his treatment of the soldiers in the guard, was a major factor that drove the assassination of Galba. These were all examples of the influence of the emperor’s behaviour on the Praetorian guards. When they were treated harshly by their emperor, the long corrupted guards were dissatisfied and that, combined with the unwillingness to give grants to the pretorians, and that, killed the person they were meant to serve. This was a clear representation of the guards taking full advantage of their closeness to the emperor to satisfy their political desires. The Praetorian guard’s closeness to the emperor also meant that they were subject to the emperor’s behaviour and may have lost patience with the unpopular behavior of the emperor. The dislike of these behaviours lead to assassination.

The guards may also have helped an emperor to reign when the emperor gains their affection. The Praetorian guard can also be loyal soldiers on some occasions when their emperors were close to them, were generous and willing to give money. The Praetorian Guards were satisfied with Otho, one of the confidants of Galba in Rome, who made quite a lot of friends with the Praetorian Guards and made them satisfied. Thus, they killed Galba and put Otho on the throne. They also proved to be very loyal to Otho. Some of them committed suicide with Otho after he committed suicide upon his defeat. Otho’s funeral was held by some loyal Praetorian Guard. They even killed one of their officers over suspicion of a plot against Otho. This further shows the instability and problems of the Praetorian Guard system.The guards could be a helpful and functional personal armed forces as long as that emperor pleased them with his behavior and wealth while the guards were a deadly threat to the emperor they disliked and did not please them with wealth. In this way, the system is unstable since an emperor was not guaranteed loyalty and protection from his Praetorian guards and the guards would function only under an emperor who pleases them with wealth and prestige.

The Praetorian Guard being the emperor’s personal guard was being used as a political tool. The Guards were also political players in their own right when they killed a disliked emperor and replaced him with one they approved of. The Praetorian Guard, after tasting the benefits of wealth and power, was a major cause of the instability of the Roman empire, especially under the reign of an incompetent or/and unpopular emperor based on the aforementioned events involving the Praetorian guard.

Legions, the bodyguards of the Roman empire, were one of the most important forces that determined the outcome of the civil war. However, the legions stationed at the border were meant to protect the empire and the internal affairs of the empire, and not to interfere in them. A major cause of the Roman legions’ intervention in politics may be the Roman local governance system. The Roman governance of provinces can be described as “conquest with incorporation but without representation.” The provinces were only obliged to recognize the supremacy of Rome while still maintaining the right to function under their own governance. Rome was not a great fan of uniformity, and the east and west looked dramatically different. Local institutions and systems of governance were maintained and were vastly different from their overlords. The only Roman force in the provinces was the legions stationed in the provinces which gave them substantial autonomy. This can be proved by the legions getting out of control when instability struck Rome. In the year of the four emperors, Vespasian who was leading his legions battling with the rebelling Jewish population launched a well planned and well executed rebellion and marched to the capital. Vitellius, the governor of Germania Inferior, also rose to revolt and defeated emperor Otho. These all prove that the legions in the provinces were a ticking time bomb with high autonomy and would not waste any time taking advantage of the instability in Rome and seize power.

The imperial power struggle also forced the legions in each province to pick sides. The Roman legions stationed in the provinces had connections and loyalty to one of the contenders in the capital. One of the key aspects of the early propaganda launched by Vespasian and his troops was to champion Otho since the Danubian legions, the first Adjuerix in Spain, the Praetorian Guard, and the fourteenth Germina in Britain were all loyal to Otho which could be a great help to Vespasian in his war with Otho. However, the absolute loyalty of the legions is also important since there is a high chance of mutiny since the generals were commanding the soldiers to kill their fellow Romans and attack their comrades and their cities which leads us to the relationship between the soldiers in Roman legions.

Another factor that may have led to the legions marching to Rome and killing their comrades was that the Roman legions stationed on the border had great relations with each other and were very loyal and friendly to their generals as long as they were popular among the soldiers. Act of friendliness bonds each other closely. An example was shown in the name of Rome’s third emperor. The name “Caligula” wasn't the real name of the future emperor. Rather, it was a name given by the troops in the legion led by his father Germanicus. The soldiers thought that the young Caligula wearing a little military boot was cute and named the little boy Caligula. The troops under the command of Otho had a very good relationship with him because he was willing to communicate with the soldiers. Thus, the next emperor, Vitellius, was afraid of Otho’s men attacking him so he laid off all the Praetorians who served under Otho. These were just some examples of the Roman legions being united as one and being very close to each other which posed a threat to the stability of the country since it was very easy for a popular general to defy order or launch a rebellion since they had the support of their soldiers.

The Roman military after the Marian reform became a specialized military where soldiers fight as a formalised standing army with full-time, professional soldiers. This system can improve fighting capability but can also create alienation since the troops were stationed on the border and fighting for years, alienated from their home which improves relations between troops. The Roman soldiers, once sent to the frontline, had to endure 25 years in a harsh, waterless desert or a watery, foggy forest filled with barbarians launching occasional raids and guerilla warfare. The soldiers were packed into legions of about eight hundred people, all enduring the same harsh environment and facing death every day, which greatly improved their mental uniformity. This disconnects the legions from the central government and the influence of the emperor. The only leader of the legionaries was not the emperor of the Roman empire but the general of the legions. An example of that would be the ease of Vitellius and Vespasian launching rebellion and gaining the support of their soldiers. In these soldiers' eyes, there was only one commander which was their general and the emperor was worth less than the emperor.

One of the main criteria for a successful armed rebellion is good financial and logistical support for the rebels. This criteria was accomplished by the Roman taxation system in the Principate era that solved the problem for successive rebellions. The taxation policy in the Principate era also changed from the “tax farming” system to a system where people in the provinces would give taxes to the provincial government and the provincial government would give that money to Rome. The governor also acted as the commander of the legions stationed in the provinces, which made the logistical and financial support of the rebellious legions an easy matter since the governor was the chief administrator of a province which included that province’s taxation. Thus, with the tax money going to the governor and the commander of legions' lands, those tax money would automatically turn into potential financial and logistical support for a rebellion.

Since the Roman system was such a fragile system, why did it break down on some occasions but didn’t break down on others? To answer this question, we have to look into the people involved. The empire was in a delicate balance. The delicate system worked very well under competent emperors in the Principate era, but broke under emperors who either were too weak or made themselves too unpopular. When emperor Nero became very unpopular among the Praetorian Guard, they killed him, which triggered the year of the four emperors. Emperor Galba also played a part in it by not paying donations to the Praetorian Guard, and being harsh on them which caused the guards to rebel and start the civil war. We can find a similar instance in the murder of Caligula. He was also an unpopular emperor and was killed by the Praetorian Guard. However, the difference between them was the next emperor. Emperor Claudius knew that without the Praetorians he would never be Augutus and had thus given a massive amount of tribute to the Praetorian Guard which stabilized the situation. Galba on the other hand, gained power by rebelling against Nero in Nero’s most dire time and was reluctant to give donations to the Praetorian Guard, which led the guards to kill him and start the civil war. The fragile system will not automatically break, however, incompetent men who either chose or didn’t choose to break it would crumble the system if they were not careful about operating the system.

In conclusion, the habit and system of the Roman military force made the emperor the caretaker of a cup of water that could spill at any moment. A clear demonstration of that would be the year of the four emperors. The Praetorian Guard’s corruption, the legions’ autonomy, and the incompetence of the emperor in Rome all proved the vulnerability of the Roman empire to civil war. The frequent civil wars were thus a result of all the major players. The emperor was the one who led to it, the Praetorian Guard were the ones triggering it, and the legions were the ones escalating it. However, only those ordinary people paid for the civil war.

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