The article examines the inaugural encounter of the Greek theory of tyranny and the Roman institution of dictatorship. Although the twentieth century is credited for fusing the tyrant and the dictator into one figure/concept, I trace the origins of this conceptual synthesis in a much earlier historical period, that of the later Roman Republic and the early Principate, and in the writings of two Greek historians of Rome, Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Appian of Alexandria. In their histories, the traditional interest in the relationship between the king and the tyrant is displaced by a new curiosity about the tyrant and the dictator. The two historians placed the two figures alongside one another and found them to be almost identical, blurring any previous empirical, analytical, or normative distinctions. In their Greco-Roman synthesis dictatorship is re-described as `temporary tyranny by consent' and the tyrant as a `permanent dictator.' Dictatorship, a venerated republican magistracy, the ultimate guardian of the Roman constitution, is for the first time radically reinterpreted and explicitly questioned. It meets its first critics.
Fossey John Cobb Hearnshaw, “Democracy or Dictatorships? ” The Contemporary Review, 286 (1934), p. 432. Also see, Gaetano Mosca , The Ruling Class, Hannah D. Kahn (trans.), New York: McGrawn-Hill Book Company, 1939, pp. 355, 486; Giovanni Sartori, The Theory of Democracy Revised, Vol. I, Chatham, New Jersey: Chatham House Publishers, 1987, p. 204.
2.
Norberto Bobbio, Democracy and Dictatorship, Peter Kennedy(trans.), Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press, 1989, p. 166.
3.
For example, see E.E. Kettlet, The Story of Dictatorship. From the Earliest Times till Today, London: Ivor Nicholson and Watson, 1937; Alfred Cobban, Dictatorship: Its History and Theory, New York: Haskell House Publishers, 1939; Oscar Jászi and John D. Lewis, Against the Tyrant: The Tradition and Theory of Tyrannicide, Illinois : The Free Press, 1957; Maurice Latey, Patterns of Tyranny, New York: Atheneum, 1969; Maurice Latey, Tyranny: A Study in the Abuse of Power, London: Macmillan, 1969; Raymond Aron, De la dictature , Paris: René Julliard, 1961; Raymond Aron, Machiavel et les tyrannies modernes, Paris: Éditions de Fallois, 1993 ; Brian Loveman , The Constitution of Tyranny: Regimes of Exception in Latin America, University of Pittsburgh, 1993; Alan Axelrod and Charles Phillips, Dictators and Tyrants: Absolute Rulers and Would-Be Rulers in World History; Facts on File, 1995; Daniel Chirot, Modern Tyrants: The Power and Prevalence of Evil in Our Age, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1996; Simon Tormey, Making Sense to Tyranny: Interpretations of Totalitarianism, Manchester : Manchester University Press, 1995 ; Roger Boesche , Theories of Tyranny From Plato to Arendt, University Park, Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1996; For three noticeable exceptions, see Élie Halévy, The Era of Tyrannies: Essays on Socialism and War, New York: New York University Press, 1966, p. 308; Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, New York: A Harvest Book, 1975, p. 6; Andrew Arato, “Good-bye to Dictatorship?” Social Research, 67:4 (2000), pp. 926, 937. Franz Neumann adopts a different view in his “Notes on the Theory of Dictatorship.” See Franz Neumann, The Democratic and the Authoritarian State: Essays in Political and Legal Theory, Herbert Marcuse (ed.), New York: The Free Press, 1957, pp. 233-256. For an illuminating discussion of dictatorship and tyranny in the twentieth century, see Melvin Richter, “A Family of Political Concepts: Tyranny, Despotism, Bonapartism, Caesarism, Dictatorship, 1750-1917,” European Journal of Political Theory, 4:3 (2005), pp. 242-243.
4.
Chantal Millon-Delson , “Dictature et despotisme, chez les Anciens et chez les Modernes,” Revue Française D'Histoire des Idées Politiques, 6 (1997), pp. 245-251.
5.
Claude Nicolet, “ Dictatorship in Rome,” Peter Baehr and Melvin Richter (eds.), Dictatorship in History and Theory. Bonapartism, Caesarism, and Totalitarianism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 263.
6.
It may well be that Cromwell was the first modern to be considered by many of his contemporaries to be both a tyrant and a dictator. Pierre Jeannin, “ Cromwell: une dictature introuvable?” Maurice Duverger, Dictatures et Légitimité, Paris: PUF, 1982, pp. 143-158; R. Zaller, “The Figure of the Tyrant in English Revolutionary Thought,” Journal of the History of Political Ideas, 54 (1993), pp. 585—610.
7.
Claude Nicolet, L'idée républicaine en france (1789-1924), Paris: Gallimard, 1994, p. 101-105.
8.
François Hinard, “ De la dictature à la tyrannie. Réflexions sur la dictature de Sylla,” François Hinard (ed.), Dictatures, Actes de la Table ronde de Paris, 27-28 février 1984, Paris: De Boccard, 1988, pp. 87-96.
9.
For the Greek historians of the Roman empire, see G.W. Bowersock, Augustus and the Greek World, Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1965; G.W. Bowersock, “Historical Problems in Late Republican and Augustan Classicism,” T. Gelzer, F. W. Bowersock (eds.), Le classicisme à Rome aux I siècle avant et apres J.-C, Geneva: Fondation Hardt, 1978, pp. 65-72; Bettie Forte, Rome and the Romans as the Greeks Saw Them, Rome: American Academy in Rome, 1972; E.L. Bowie, “The Greeks and their Past in the Second Sophistic,” Studies in Ancient Society, M. I. Finley (ed.), London: Routledge and K. Paul, 1974 , pp. 166-209; Hugh J. Mason, Greek Terms for Roman Institutions, Toronto: American Studies in Papyrology, 1974; André Hurst, “Un critique grec dans la Rome d'Auguste: Denys d'Halicarnasse” ANRW II. 30.1, 1982, pp. 839-865; Claude Nicolet (ed.), Demokratia et Arisokratia. A propos de Caius Gracchus: mots grecs et réalites romaines, Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 1983; Emilio Gabba, “The Historians and Augustus,” Fergus Millar and Erich Segal (eds.), Caesar Augustus: Seven Aspects, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984, pp. 61-88; Erich S. Gruen, The Hellenistic World and the Coming of Rome, Berkeley : University of California Press, 1984, pp. 316-356; Robert Syme, “Greeks Invading the Roman Government ,” Roman Papers, 4, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988, pp. 1-20; Claude Nicolet, “ Dictateurs Romains, stratégoi autokratores et généraux carthaginois,” Dictatures, pp. 27-47; I. S. Moxon, J. D. Smart, and A. J. Woodman (eds.), Past Perspectives. Studies in Greek and Roman Historical Writings, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986; George A. Kennedy (ed.), The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism. Vol. I: Classical Criticism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989; Kurt A. Raaflaub and Mark Toher (eds.), Between Republic and Empire: Interpretations of Augustus and His Principate, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990; Michael Grant, Greek and Roman Historians: Information and Misinformation, London: Routledge, 1995; Paul Cartledge , Peter Garnsey, Erich Gruen (eds.), Hellenistic Constructs: Essays in Culture, History, and Historiography, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996; Simon Swain, Hellenism and Empire: Language, Classicism, and Power in the Greek World, AD 50-250, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996; David S. Potter, Literary Texts and the Roman Historian, London: Routledge1999; Fergus Millar, The Roman Republic in Political Thought, Hanover and London: The University Press of New England, 2002, pp. 37-49; Timothy E. Duff, The Greek and Roman Historians, London: Bristol Classical Press, 2003.
10.
T.J. Cornell , “The formation of the historical tradition of early Rome,” Past Perspectives. Studies in Greek and Roman Historical Writings, pp. 74, 80-81; Emilio Gabba, Dionysius and the History of Archaic Rome, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991, pp. 10-11, 21-22, 87-96, 152; Harvey C. Mansfield, Taming the Prince. The Ambivalence of Modern Executive Power, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989, pp. 84-85; Gregory S. Bucher, “ The Origins, Program, and Composition of Appian's Roman History,” Transactions of the American Philological Association, 130 (2000), pp. 411-458; Duff, The Greek and Roman Historians, p. 118.
11.
Nicolet, “ Dictateurs Romains, stratégoi autokratores et généraux carthaginois,” pp. 35-36, 38; Schultze , “Dionysius of Halicarnassus and his audience ,” p. 128; Gabba, Dionysius and the History of Archaic Rome, pp. 23-59; Matthew Fox, “History and Rhetoric in Dionysius of Halicarnassus,” The Journal of Roman Studies, 83 (1993), p. 42; Alain M. Gowing, The Triumviral Narratives of Appian and Cassius Dio, Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1992, pp. 283-287; Swain, Hellenism and Empire, pp. 253, 414-421; Millar , The Roman Republic in Political Thought, pp. 38-39; Mario Turchetti, Tyrannie et Tyrannicide de l'Antiquité à nos jours, Paris : Presses Universitaires de France, 2001, pp. 162-164.
12.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1971, Book V: 70-77, pp. 211-237; Appian, Roman History: The Civil Wars, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002, Book I: 98-115, pp. 181-215.
13.
Cicero, “ Philippic I,” Philippics, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001, 1, p. 23; Cicero, “Philippic II,” Philippics , 36, p. 155; Appian, The Civil Wars, Book III:25, p. 565; Dio Cassius, Roman History, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001. Book 54:51, p. 401, Book 54:2, pp. 283-285.
14.
Res Gestae Divi Augusti, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002, 5, p. 353; Theodor Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Paris: Thorin et fils, Éditeurs, Vol. IV, 1894, pp. 428-429, 436-438; Ronald Syme, The Roman Revolution, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002, pp. 53-54; Cobban, Dictatorship. Its History and Theory, p. 331; Arthur Kaplan, Dictatorships and “Ultimate” Degrees in the Early Roman Republic 501-201 BC, New York: Revisionist Press, 1977, pp. 6, 165.
15.
Clemence Schultze, “Dionysius of Halicarnassus and his audience,” Past Perspectives. Studies in Greek and Roman Historical Writings, pp. 131-134; Bucher, “The Origins, Program, and Composition of Appian's Roman History,” pp. 431, 433-437, 441.
16.
For example, see Sallust, The Conspiracy of Catiline, New York and London: Penguin Books, 1963, Book I: 10-12, p. 181-183; Livy, History of Rome, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998, Book I: Preface, pp. 3-9; Gabba, Dionysius and the History of Archaic Rome, pp. 211-213.
17.
Polybius, The Histories, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, Book VI: 7-8, pp. 283-285; Cicero, De Re Publica, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, Book I: 33, 42, pp. 77, 97-99; Book II: 26-29, 32, pp. 150, 167-169. Also, see Roger Dunkle, “ The Rhetorical Tyrant in Roman Historiography: Sallust, Livy, Tacitus,” Classical World, 65 (1971), pp. 12-20; Alain Michel, La philosophie politique a Rome d'Auguste a Marc Aurèle, Paris: Armand Colin, 1969, pp. 22-27.
18.
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1999, Book VIII: 10, p. 491; Cicero , De Re Publica, II: 27, p. 159; Melvin Richter, “A Family of Political Concepts: Tyranny, Despotism, Bonapartism, Caesarism, Dictatorship, 1750-1917,” p. 224.
19.
For the merging of the Roman king and the Greek tyrant, see Roger Dunkle, “ The Greek Tyrant and Roman Political Invective of the Late republic,” Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, 98 (1967), pp. 151-171.
20.
Livy, History of Rome, Book II: 18, pp. 275-277; Cicero, De Re Publica, Book II: 56, p. 69-71. More generally, see D. Cohen, “The Origin of Roman Dictatorship,” Mnemosyne, 4:10 (1957), pp. 300-318.
21.
Livy, History of Rome, Book II: 18, pp. 275-277. Also see, Clifton Walker Keyes, “ The Constitutional Position of the Roman Dictatorship,” Studies in Philology, 14 (1917), pp. 298-305; Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Paris: Thorin et fils, Éditeurs , Vol. III, 1893, p. 163; Andrew Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, pp. 109-113.
22.
Livy, History of Rome, Book II: 18, pp. 277. A reaction mentioned by Cicero as well. Cicero, De Re Publica, Book I: 60, p. 95; Nicolet , “Dictateurs Romains, stratégoi autokratores et généraux carthaginois,” p. 30.
23.
Dunkle, “ The Greek Tyrant and Roman Political Invective of the Late Republic,” pp. 153-156; J. Béranger, “ Tyrannus: Notes sur la notion de la tyrannie chez les Romains particulièrement a l'époque de César et de Cicéron,” Revue de études Latines, 13 (1935), pp. 89-90; Jászi and Lewis, Against the Tyrant, pp. 10-11; Mario Turchetti, Tyrannie et Tyrannicide de l'Antiquité à nos jours, pp.160-164; Cicero, “ Pro rege Deiotaro,” Orations, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2000, p. 501-541; Jean-Louis Ferrary, “ Cicéron et la. dictature,” Dictatures, pp. 97-105; Neal Wood, Cicero's Social and Political Thought, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988, pp. 155-158.
24.
Livy, History of Rome, Book II: 18, pp. 275-276; Mommsen , Le droit public romain, Vol. III, pp. 162-163.
25.
Aristotle, Politics, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990, Book V: 10, pp. 457; Plato, The Republic, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1994, Book VIII: 19, p. 333; Book II: 3, pp. 117-119; Diogenes Laertius, “Plato,” Lives of Eminent Philosophers, Vol. I, Cambridge: Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2000, III: 83, p. 349; Heredotus' story of Gyges, the first tyrant, exemplifies the violent, murderous beginnings of tyranny. Herodotus, Histories, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995, Book I: 8-15, pp. 11-19; Cicero, De re publica, Book I: 64, pp. 101-103. For the relationship between tyranny and violent usurpation, see Dolores Hegyi, “Notes on the Origins of Greek Tyrannis ,” Academia scientiarum Hungarica, Acta Antiqua, 13 (1965), pp. 303-318; H.W. Plecket, “The Archaic tyrannis,” Talanta, 1 (1969), pp. 19-61; Jules Labarbe, “L'apparition de la notion de tyrannie dans la Grèce archaique,” L'Antiquité Classique , 40 (1971), pp. 471-504.
26.
Aristotle, Politics, Book IV:8, p. 327; Book VI:2, p. 507; Polybius, The Histories, Book VI:7, pp. 283-284.
27.
Cicero, Laws, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1994, Book III:3, p. 467.
28.
This contrasts with the arbitrariness and indeterminacy of tyranny that made law its enemy. For an insightful discussion of this aspect of tyranny, tyranny as freedom, see Arlene W. Saxonhouse, “The Tyranny of Reason in the World of the Polis,” The American Political Science Review, 82:4 (1988), pp. 1261-1275.
29.
Aristotle, Politics, Book V:9, 10-11, p. 467.
30.
Aristotle, Politics, Book III:11, pp. 269-271; Book V:9, p. 459-475; Plato, The Laws, Book VIII, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 832c, pp. 137-139; Nicolet, “Dictatorship in Rome,” p. 265; Lucien Jerphagnon, “ Que le tyran est contre-nature. Sur quelques clichés de l'historiography romaine ,” Actes du Colloque: La Tyrannie, Centre de Publication de l'Université de Caen: Cahiers de philosophie politique et juridique, 1984, pp. 39-50.
31.
Herodotus, Histories, Book III:80, p. 105; Aristotle, Politics, Book III:5, p. 207; Cicero, De Re Publica; Book II:32, pp. 169; Dio Cassius, Roman History, Book IV:13 (Zonaras), p. 107; Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. III, pp. 7, 164-165, 191-197; D. Cohen, “The Origins of Dictatorship,” pp. 300-318; F.E. Adcock, Roman Political Ideas and Practice, Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1967, p. 46; Mansfield, Taming the Prince. The Ambivalence of Modern Executive Power, pp. 82-85. Polybius and Cicero recognized in the tyrant a deviant ruler, an unjust king. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book VIII: 10, pp. 489-491; Cicero , De Re Publica, II:27, p. 159; Book I: 28-31, 60, 62, pp. 69-71, 93-95, 97; Book II: 25-27, 32, pp. 155-161, 169; Polybius, The Histories, Book VI:7, pp. 284-285. Tyranny was regarded as an almost inevitable, natural perversion of kingship in that the limits separating them did not mark any real difference. See, Aristotle , Politics, Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 1994 , Book III:5, p. 209; Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book VIII:10, pp. 489-491; Aristotle , Rhetoric, Book I:8, p. 89; Polybius , The Histories Book VI:7, p. 285; Cicero , De Re Publica, Book II:25, 157; Claude Nicolet, “Polybe et les institutions romaines,” Entretiens sur l'Antiquité Classique de la Fondation Hardt, XX, Genève: Vandoeuvres, 1974, p. 209-265; Neal Wood, Cicero's Social and Political Thought, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988, pp. 156-157.
32.
Cicero, De Re Publica, Book I: 30, p. 95; Dio Cassius, Roman History, Book IV:13 (Zonaras), pp. 107-109; Carl Schmitt, Die Dictatur, Berlin: Duncker und Humblot , 1994, p. 2l; Clinton Rossiter, Constitutional Dictatorship: Crisis Government in the Modern Democracies, New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2004, pp. 17-18.
33.
Cicero, De Re Publica, Book I:40-43, pp. 93-101; Book II:26-30, 32, pp. 157-163, 169; Dio Cassius, Roman History, Book IV:13 (Zonaras), p. 107. Also, see Jean-Louis Ferrary, “Cicéron et la dictature,” pp. 97-105; Béranger , “Tyrannus: Notes sur la notion de la tyrannie chez les Romains particulièrement a l'époque de César et de Cicéron,” pp. 89-90.
34.
Clinton l. Rossiter, Constitutional Dictatorship, p. 17.
35.
Polybius, The Histories, Book VI: 7, pp. 284-285; Kurt von Fritz, The Theory of the Mixed Constitution in Antiquity. A Critical Analysis of Polybius's Political Ideas, New York: Columbia University Press, 1954; T. Cole, “The Sources and Composition of Polybius VI,” Historia, 13 (1964), pp. 440-486; Claude Nicolet, “Polybe et les institutions romaines,” Emilio Gabba (ed.), Polybe. Entretiens sur l'Antiquité classique , Geneva: Vandoeuvres, 1973, pp. 209-259; S. Podes, “Polybius and his Theory of Anacyclosis—Problems of not just Ancient Political Theory,” History of Political Thought, 12:4 (1991), pp. 577-587.
36.
Dio Cassius, Roman History, Book IV:13 (Zonaras), p. 109.
37.
Aristotle, Politics, Book III:4, p. 201, Book III:9, p. 249; Polybius, The Histories; Book III:86, 87, pp. 213, 215; Cicero, De Re Publica, Book I:32, p. 77, Book I:60, p. 95, Book II:32, p. 169. Also see, James F. McGlew, Tyranny and Political Culture in AncientGreece, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993, pp. 9. Here, the term anomia refers to its original ancient Greek meaning and not to its modern appropriation by Emile Durkheim.
38.
For tyranny as anomy, see Plato, Republic, Book IX: 572b, 575a-b, pp. 339, 349; Plato, Statesman, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995, 302e-303a, p. 163; Aristotle, Politics, Book IV:8, pp. 325-327; Dionysius, Roman Antiquities, Book V:70, p. 211. Raymond Weil, “De la tyrannie dans la pensée politique grecque de l'époque classique,” Dictatures et Légitimité , p. 38. For an insightful discussion of nomos, anomie, and tyranny, see Angel Sanchez de la Torre, La tyrannie dans la Grèce antique, Paris: Éditions Bière, 1999, pp. 23-124.
39.
P.-M., Martin , L'idée de royauté à Rome. Vol. II. Haine de la royauté et séductions monarchiques (du IVe siècle av. J.-C. au principat augustéen), Clermont-Ferrand: Adosa , 1994, pp. 104-105.
40.
Hinard, “ De la dictature à la tyrannie. Réflexions sur la dictature de Sylla,” pp. 89-92; Ferrary, “Cicéron et la dictature,” pp. 101-105.
41.
Martin, L'idée de royauté à Rome. Vol. II. Haine de la royauté et séductions monarchiques (du IVe siècle av. J.-C. au principat augustéen), pp. 104-105.
42.
For a brief but clear comparative presentation of the two accounts, see Kaplan, Dictatorships and “Ultimate” Degrees in the Early Roman Republic 501-201 BC, pp. 18-20; Fox, “ History and Rhetoric in Dionysius of Halicarnassus,” pp. 134-135; H. Hill, “Dionysius of Halicarnassus and the Origins of Rome,” The Journal of Roman Studies, 51:1-2 (1961), p. 92; Emilio Gabba, “Diogini e la dittatura a Roma,” Tria Corda. Scritti in onore di Arnaldo momigliano, Como: Biblioteca di Athenaeum, 1983, pp. 215-228.
43.
Emilio Gabba , Dionysius and the History of Archaic Rome, pp. 140-141; Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic, p. 110; Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. III, p. 163; Paul M. Martin, L'idée de royaté à Rome. Vol. I. De la Rome royale au consensus républicain, Paris: Adosa, 1982, p. 302.
44.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 70, p. 211. Cicero proposes a different account of Publius Valerius and his legislation. Cicero , De Re Publica, Book II:31, p. 165.
45.
A.W. Lintott , “Provocatio: From the Struggle of the Orders to the Principate,” Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt, 1:2 (1972), pp. 226-267; A.W. Lintott, Violence in RepublicanRome, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, pp. 12-13; A.W. Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic , p. 33. Also see, A.H.J. Greenidge, “ The Procedure of the `Provocatio,'” The Classical Review , 9:1 ( 1895), pp. 4-8; A.H.J. Greenidge, “ The `Provocatio Militiae' and Provincial Jurisdiction,” The Classical Review, 10:5 (1896), pp. 225-233; E.S. Staveley, “Provocatio during the Fifth and Fourth Centuries BC,” Historia, III (1954-1955), p. 412-428. Cloud J. Duncan, “The Origin of Provocatio,” RPh, 72:1 (1998), p. 25-48.
46.
M. Humbert, “ Le tribunat de la plèbe et le tribunal du people: remarques sur l'histoire de la provocation ad populum,” Mélanges de l'École Française de Rome, 100 (1988), pp. 431-503; Michèle Ducos, Les Romains et la Loi. Reserches sur les rapports de la philosophie grecque et de la tradition romaine á la fin de la République, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1984, pp. 71-79.
47.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 70, pp. 211-215; Livy, History of Rome, Book II: 7-8, pp. 239-245; Plutarch, “Publicola,”Lives, Vol. I, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998, sections xi-xii, pp. 531-535.
48.
Livy, History of Rome, Book III:55, p. 183; Cicero, De Re Publica, Book II:31, 53, p. 165; Cicero, De Oratore, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, Book II:199, p. 343. Also, see Ch. Wirszubski, Libertas as a Political Idea at Rome during the Late Republic and Early Principate , Cambridge, Mass.: Cambridge University Press, 1950, pp. 25-27.
49.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities , Books V: 70, p. 211.
50.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 70, p. 213.
51.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 70, p. 213.
52.
Livy, History of Rome, Book II:18, 29-30, p. 277, 313-315; Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. IV, p. 461.
53.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 70, p. 215.
54.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 75, p. 229.
55.
Gabba, Dionysius and the History of Archaic Rome, p. 140.
56.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 70, 71, pp. 215, 213, 217.
57.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 73, p. 223. Also, see Forte, Rome and the Romans as the Greeks Saw Them, p. 200; Nicolet, “Dictateurs Romains, stratégoi autokratores et généraux carthaginois,” pp. 30, 34-37, 42; Hinard, “De la dictature à la tyrannie. Réflexions sur la dictature de Sylla,” pp. 94-96; Ferrary , “Cicéron et la dictature,” p. 103.
58.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, “Thucydides,” Critical Essays. Vol. 1: Ancient Orators, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1973, 51, p. 617; Hurst, “Un critique grec dans la Rome d'Auguste: Denys d'Halicarnasse,” pp. 841-843; Gabba, Dionysius and the History of Archaic Rome, p. 147.
59.
Gabba, Dionysius and the History of ArchaicRome, p. 140.
60.
Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. IV, p. 187.
61.
Gabba, Dionysius and the History of Archaic Rome, p. 140; Mansfield, Taming the Prince. The Ambivalence of Modern Executive Power, pp. 84-85; Hugh J. Mason, “The Roman Government in Greek Sources: The Effect of Literary Theory on the Translation of Official Titles,” Phoenix, 24:2 (1970), pp. 153-154.
62.
Cicero, De Re Publica, Book I:63, p. 95; Cicero, De Legibus, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, Book III:3, p. 467; Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic, p. 110; Giuseppe Valditara, Studi sul magister populi. Dagli ausiliari militari del rex ai primi magistrati repubblicani, Milano: Giuffré, 1989.
63.
Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. III, pp. 187.
64.
Clinton Rossiter , Constitutional Dictatorship. Crisis Government in the Modern Democracies, p. 25.
65.
Xenophon, “ Hieron,” Scripta Minora, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2000, 4, p. 35; 6, p. 29.
66.
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book VIII: 12, pp. 497-499; Lucian, “The Downward Journey, or the Tyrant ” Lucian, Vol. II, 11, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1999, p. 23; Melvin Richter, “A Family of Political Concepts: Tyranny, Despotism, Bonapartism, Caesarism, Dictatorship, 1750-1917,” p. 224.
67.
Aristotle, Politics, Book V:9, p. 463.
68.
Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. III, pp. 187; Rossiter , Constitutional Dictatorship. Crisis Government in the Modern Democracies, p. 25.
69.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 70, p. 211; Nicolet, “Dictateurs Romains, stratégoi autokratores et généraux carthaginois,” pp. 34-35. For the concept of “voluntary tyranny,” see Jim MacAdam, “Voluntary Tyranny,” University of Ottawa Quarterly, 56:2 (1986), pp. 153-161.
70.
Aristotle, Politics, Book III: 9, p. 251, Book IV: 8, pp. 325-326; Book V: 8, p. 441; Book V: 8, p. 457; Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book VIII: 10, p. 491; Xenophon, Memorabilia, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, Book: IV: 6, p. 345.
71.
Herodotus, Histories, Book I: 8-15, pp. 11-19.
72.
Jászi and Lewis, Against the Tyrant: The Tradition and Theory of Tyrannicide, pp. 7, 26-27.
73.
Aristotle, Politics, Book III: 9, p. 247.
74.
Aristotle, Politics, Book III: 9-10, pp. 251-253, 261-263, Book IV: 8, p. 325. Also, see Raymond Weil, “De la tyrannie dans la penseé politique grecque de l'époque classique,” Dictatures et Légitimité, pp. 42-47; Roger Boesche, “Aristotle's `Science' of Tyranny ,” History of Political Thought, 14 (1993), pp. 1-25.
75.
Aristotle, Politics, Book III: 9, p. 251.
76.
Aristotle, Politics, Book IV: 8, pp. 325-327.
77.
Aristotle, Politics, Books III: 9, p. 251. For the tyranny of Pittacus, see A. Andrewes, The Greek Tyrants, New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1956 , pp. 92-99; Claude Mossé, La tyrannie dans la Gréce antique, Paris: PUF, 1969, 14-15; H.W. Pleket, “The Archaic Tyrannis,” Atalanta, 1 (1969), pp. 19-61. Dionysius supplements Aristotle's observation about this extraordinary office by reporting an additional broader function, that of restoring the Republic to its foundational principles against the destructive force of corruption. Here, the dictator assumes the form of the founder and legislator.
78.
For a different, less sympathetic, interpretation of Dionysius' appropriation of this Aristotelian term, see Mason, “ The Roman Government in Greek Sources: The Effect of Literary Theory on the Translation of Official Titles,” pp. 153-154, 159.
79.
Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Roman Antiquities, Books V: 77, p. 235; Gabba, Dionysius and the History of Archaic Rome , p. 143; Nicolet, “Dictateurs Romains, stratégoi autokratores et généraux carthaginois,” p. 30.
80.
Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. IV, pp. 425-470.
81.
Istvan, Hahn , “Appians Darstellung der sullanischen Diktatur,” Acta classica Universitatis Scientiarum Debreceniensis , 10-11 ( 1974-1975), pp. 111-120.
82.
For Appian's interest in emergencies and conflicts, see Gowing, The Triumviral Narratives of Appian and Cassius Dio, p. 280; Bucher, “The Origins, Program, and Composition of Appian's Roman History,” p. 420.
83.
Appian, The Civil Wars, Book I: 99, pp. 183-185; Mommsen , Le droit public romain, Vol. IV, p. 440.
84.
Appian, The Civil Wars, Book I: 3, 99, pp. 7, 183-185; Kaplan, Dictatorships and “Ultimate” Degrees in the Early Roman Republic, p. 144.
85.
Appian, The Civil Wars, Book I: 99, 3, p. 183, 7. On Appian's conceptual equation, see James Luce Jr., “ Appian's Magisterial Terminology,” Classical Philology , 56:1 (1961), pp. 25-27. 86. Appian, The Civil Wars , Book II:137, p. 481.
86.
Nicolet, “ Dictateurs Romains, stratégoi autokratores et généraux carthaginois,” pp. 37-39, 42.
87.
Appian, The Civil Wars , Book I: 99, p. 185. Also, see Kaplan, Dictatorships and “Ultimate” Decrees in the Early Roman Republic 501-202 BC, p. 144; Frédéric Hurlet, La dictature de Sylla: Monarchie ou magistrature Republicaine?Brussels: Institut Historique Belge de Rome, 1993, pp. 93-108; Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. IV, pp. 425-470.
88.
Appian, The Civil Wars , Book I: 99, p. 183.
89.
Appian, The Civil Wars , Book I: 99, p. 183. In addition, the exceptional trait of Sulla's tyranny also was due, according to Appian, to the unparalleled fact that “he was the first man, so far as I know,” who “desired to turn himself . . . from a tyrant into a private citizen” and “had the courage to lay down his tyrannical power voluntarily.”Appian , The Civil Wars, Book I: 3, 104, p. 7, 195.
90.
Plutarch, “Caesar ,” Lives VII, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1994, 53:1-2, pp. 575; Plutarch , “Lysander and Sulla,” Lives IV, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2000, 1:1, p. 447.
91.
Turchetti, Tyrannie et Tyrannicide de l'Antiquité à nos jours, p. 163.
92.
Appian, The Civil Wars , Book I: 3, p. 7.
93.
I say “almost all” because there are three recorded cases, that of Furius Camillus II (390 BC), L. Aemilius Mamercinus Privenas (316 BC), and M. Servilius Pulex Geminus (202 BC), which violated the six-month limit. Another irregular dictatorship was that of Minucius in 217 BC. T.A. Dorey, “ The Dictatorship of Minucius,” The Journal of Roman Studies, 45: 1-2. (1955), pp. 92-96. For these and some additional violations, see Saint-Bonnet, L'État d'exception, pp. 59-60.
94.
Appian, The Civil Wars , Book I: 99, pp. 183-184.
95.
Appian's tyrannical dictatorship reappears timidly and ambivalently in Jean-Jacques Rousseau's republican vision. Although Rousseau approves of the institution and the practice, he warns, echoing Appian, that “in the crises that call for its establishment the state is soon destroyed or saved, and once the pressing need has passed, the dictatorship becomes tyrannical or useless.” Departing clearly from his more canonical and “precise” definition of tyranny as usurpation of royal authority, Rousseau places it in the void opened up by the absence of temporal limits, suggesting that the tyrant is a permanent dictator. This formulation evokes Appian in that the affinity between the dictator and the tyrant unfolds in a temporal horizon. For this reason Rousseau insists that the best protection against this ominous prospect is to never extend or prolong a dictator's commission. However, there is an important difference between the two thinkers. While Appian understands the temporal factor as only one of degree, Rousseau sees it as a bridge allowing the crossing from one form of rule over to another. In that sense, although the Roman institution of dictatorship appears to be liable to abuse once it is abused it is not the same anymore. It has undergone a qualitative transformation into something else: tyranny. Here one can sense the presence of Rousseau's canonical definition. The dictator who has violated the law regulating the length of his magistracy has in fact usurped a title “without having any right to it.” In that sense, the tyrant remains a usurper, he who by violating the temporal restrictions seizes illegally dictatorial power. Tyranny is again a stolen, degenerated form of a supreme executive rule and not the secret truth of dictatorship, not even its dark side. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Du Contract Social; ou, Principes du Droit Politique,” Œuvres Complètes, Volume III, Gallimard: Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, 1964, Book IV: 7, pp. 458, 423; Pierangelo Catalano, “Le concept de dictature de Rousseau à Bolivar: essai pour une mise au point politique sur la base du droit romain,” Dictatures, pp. 7-25; Jean Ferrari, “Rousseau, Kant et la tyrannie,” Actes du Colloque: La Tyrannie, pp. 177-189.
96.
Appian, The Civil Wars , Book I:16, p. 33.
97.
Cicero, “The Third Speech on the Agrarian Law,” Orations, Vol. IV, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1930, III: 5, p. 489.
98.
Livy, History of Rome, Book 9:26, pp. 263-267; Kaplan, Dictatorships and “Ultimate” Decrees in the Early Roman Republic 501-202 BC, pp.93-94; Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic , p. 112.
99.
It is worth noting, however, that Diodorus of Sicily (80-20 BC), another Greek historian contemporary of Livy, does not confirm this interpretation. Although Diodorus recounts the dictatorship of Gaius Manius, he does not mention the story of his impeachment. Diodorus of Sicily, Library of History, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2002, Book 19:76, p. 43.
100.
It seems that Dionysius and Appian's re-interpretation of tyranny is empirically contradicted by the lex repetundarum or recovery law, contained in a fragmented bronze tablet, and which suggests that the dictator could be brought to trial after the end of his tenure in office. Without knowing, however, the exact dating of the law, its duration, and most importantly its author, it is difficult to ascertain with certainty the extent and character of its legal impact on dictatorship. For example, most scholars have suggested that the law was authored by Gaius Gracchus in his struggle to weaken the senatorial class and thus has been interpreted as an instrument in the political warfare between the orders. Two questions are relevant here: (1) How did the demise of Gracchus affect this law? (2) Is it not the case that the law itself is a telling instance of how the institution of dictatorship was turned into a site of political struggle and that the problem of the accountability of the dictator was a contested, open-ended issue, depending on relations of power and political interests? On this see, Emilio Badian, “Lex Acilia Repetundarum,” The American Journal of Philology , 74:4 ( 1954), pp. 374-384; A.N. Sherwin-White, “The Date of the Lex Repetundarun and its Consequences” The Journal of Roman Studies, 62 (1972), pp. 83-99; A.N. Sherwin-White, “ The Lex Repetundarum and the Political Ideas of Gaius Gracchus,” The Journal of Roman Studies, 72 ( 1982), pp. 18-31.
101.
Lintott, The Constitution of the Roman Republic, p. 112.
102.
Richter, “ A Family of Political Concepts: Tyranny, Despotism, Bonapartism, Caesarism, Dictatorship, 1750-1917,” pp. 221-248.
103.
Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. III, pp. 193-194; Vol. IV, pp. 425-470; Carl Schmitt, Die Diktatur, Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 1994, p. 3; Saint-Bonnet, L'État d'exception, pp. 47-70; Nicolet, “Dictatorship in Rome,” pp. 265-276; Andrew Arato, “ Good-bye to Dictatorship?” pp. 925-933.
104.
Hinard, “ De la dictature à la tyrannie. Réflexions sur la dictature de Sylla,” pp. 87-105.
105.
Appian, The Civil Wars, Book I:11, p. 185; Plutarch, “Comparison of Solon and Publicola,” Lives, II-III, pp. 569-575; Dio Cassius, Roman History , Book IV:13 (Zonaras), p. 109; Ch. Wirszubski, Libertas as a Political Idea at Rome during the Late Republic and Early Principate , Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968, p. 64. As Aristotle perceptively observed regarding Greek tyrants, “ a mode of securing tyranny is to make it more like kingship.” Aristotle, Politics, Book V: 9, p. 467.
106.
Martin, L'idée de royauté à Rome. Vol. II. Haine de la royauté et séductions monarchiques (du IVe siècle av. J.-C. au principat augustéen), pp. 3-11.
107.
Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. III, p. 193; Dio Cassius, Roman History, Book IV: 13 (Zonaras), p. 107.
108.
Dio Cassius, Roman History, Book IV: 13 (Zonaras), p. 107.
109.
Thomas Jefferson , “Notes on Virginia: Query XIII,” Joyce Appleby and Terence Ball (eds.), Jefferson. Political Writings, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999, p. 332. Michael Zuckert offers an illuminating interpretation of Jefferson's objections to Roman dictatorship within the context of the neo-republican revival. See, Michael P. Zuckert, The Natural Rights Republic. Studies in the Foundation of the American Political Tradition, Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1996, pp. 212-219.
110.
Jefferson, “Notes on Virginia: Query XIII,” p. 335 (emphases added).
111.
Aristotle, The Art of Rhetoric , Book I: 8, p. 89.
112.
Herodotus, Histories, Book III:81, p. 107,
113.
Plato, Gorgias, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996, 493, p. 417; Plato, The Republic, Book IX: 578, p. 361.
114.
Jefferson, “Notes on Virginia: Query XIII,” p. 334.
115.
Jefferson, “Notes on Virginia: Query XIII,” pp. 334-335. Also, see Spinoza, A Political Treatise, New York: Dover Publications, 1951 , chapter X:1, pp. 378-379.
116.
Jefferson, “Notes on Virginia: Query XIII,” p. 335. For dictatorship as a “remedy,” see Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. III, p. 169.
117.
Polybius, The Histories , Book VI: 10, p. 291; Cicero, De Re Publica, Book II: 57, p. 167.
118.
Jefferson, “Notes on Virginia: Query XIII,” pp. 334-335.
119.
For the concept of constitutional dictatorship, see Schmitt, Die Dictatur; Frederick M. Watkins, “ The Problem of Constitutional Dictatorship,” Friedrich and Mason (eds.), Public Policy, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1940, pp. 324-378; Carl J. Friedrich, Constitutional Government and Democracy, New York: Ginn and Company, 1950, pp. 572-588; Clinton Rossiter, Constitutional Dictatorship: Crisis Government in the Modern Democracies, pp. 3-32, 288-314; Bruce Ackerman, “The Emergency Constitution,” The Yale Law Journal, Vol. 113:5 (2004 ), pp. 1029-1091. For a recent opposite approach that opposes the historical and conceptual continuity of constitutional dictatorship, see Giorgio Agamben, State of Exception, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2005, p. 6-11. Clinton Rossiter, Constitutional Dictatorship: Crisis Government in the Modern Democracies, pp. 5, 8, 288.
120.
Antocides, “ On the Mysteries,” Minor Attic Orators: Antiphon, Andocides , Vol. I, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1982, Book I: 96-98, p. 413; Benjamin D. Meritt, “ Greek Inscriptions: Anti-tyrannical Inscription,” Hesperia , 21 (1952), pp. 355-359; Lysias, Against Eratosthenes; Lucian, “Tyrannicide,” Lucian. Vol I, Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 1996 ; MartinOstwald, “ Athenian Legislation against Tyranny and Subversion,” Transactions of the American Philological Association, 86 (1955), 110-128; Jaszy and Lewis, Against the Tyrant: the Tradition and Theory of Tyrannicide; Antony J. Podlecki, “The Political Significance of Athenian `Tyrannicide' Cult,”Historia, 15:2 (1966), pp. 129-141; F.L. Ford, Political Murder: From Tyrannicide to Political Terrorism, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1985; Michael W. Taylor, The Tyrant Slayers. The Heroic Image in the Fifth Century BC: Athenian Art and Politics , Salem: Ayer, 1992.
121.
Robert J. Bonner, “Emergency Government in Rome and Athens,” The Classical Journal, 18:3 (1922), p. 144; Saint-Bonnet , L'État d'exception, pp. 45-46.
122.
Cicero, De Re Publica, Book II: 26, p. 157; Plato, Republic, Book VIII, 566b, p. 321.
123.
Aristotle, Politics, Book IV:8, p. 327.
124.
For the continuity between Roman dictatorship and modern theories and practices of the state of emergency, see Mommsen, Le droit public romain, Vol. IV, p. 187.
