Patrician Revolt Vs Plebeian Revolt

INTRODUCTION

Although the Patricians and the Plebeian classes are both citizens of the Roman government, there exists a great deal of economic and political differences on the extreme ends of these two Roman classes that had high level of influence on their relationships with each other; the Plebeian revolt was inspired by these economic and political differences that ultimately led to a dichotomy between the two classes and consequently a Plebeian revolt. In this paper, I will be examining the nature of these two classes, as well the economic and political differences that exists between them. I will also be analyzing their extreme ends – showing the results of the first revolt, and from the results an inference will be drawn signifying what

6). The Plebeians were very poor as an aftermath of the wars and they were compelled to keep borrowing from the rich Patricians. As a result of their continuous debts to the Patricians, and having no other source of income, they were insolvent. Morey (1901) found also that “In ancient Rome, debtors are more like slaves to their creditors, especially when they are insolvent; they were treated very harshly and even arrested and jailed” (p. 7). The unjust law of debts is actually a stratagem, and a pretext to keep debtors insolvent so as to remain subjects to their creditors in such a way that they cannot be equal to their creditors; making their creditors (the Patricians) to have complete hegemony over the resources that were supposed to be for their debtors (the Plebeians). Most of the Plebeians understood the wiles of the Patricians to dominate them and keep their resources for themselves. The Plebeians resorted to a revolt, since there is no other way for them to fight this injustice – they have no power in the governance, nor do they have sits at the senate where they would have fought for their plight. In the revolt, they deserted the army, thereby weakening it and making it more susceptible to the attacks of the enemy of the Patricians. They gathered themselves together in one accord at the Sacred Mount and they proposed to form an independent city. The Patricians seeing the revolt and that the impact would be grievous to them if left untreated, quickly made amends to pacify the Plebeians to halt the revolt and deter further secession (Morey,