I'll have to check them out at some point - they sound a bit more balanced than McCullough's series that we discussed a while ago.
I agree up to a point with your remarks on Caesar - he could have retired from political life, walked away and written his memoirs or something. Like Cincinnatus. But that would've left his allies and his reforms hanging. I do think after all those years in the field and in the political arena, he was genuinely concerned about that, and realized that he could only protect his allies and ensure his legionaries received their land, by retaining sufficient power. And in the highly polarized climate of the day, nothing less than a permanent consulship, or dictatorship, would do the job.
To put it another way, at the time of the Rubicon, perhaps it really was too late to give up power. From a saving the Republic point of view, things went south long before that, probably even before Caesar's entry into politics, in the Marius and Sulla era.
All of that's stipulating a lot on the part of Caesar. Like the idea that his taking power was a means to his reforms, rather than the proposals for reform being a means to seize power. As for legionaries receiving land, what were they going to do with it? Farming is a lot of work, and takes a lot of skill and knowledge, especially in a pre-mechanical society. Most of them would not have been able to make a go of it, and would probably have ended up selling their lands to a latifundia, and taking their money to the city to something they understood better. And given the Roman system of patronage, it would be Caesar and his allies buying up the failed farms anyway. Giving every soldier a farm would no more have ensured their well-being than giving every veteran today a computer repair shop.
“Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.” GK Chesteron
Inde muagdhe Aes Sedai misain ye!
Deus Vult!
*MySmiley*
