Since the remaining small farmers could not compete

with the latifundia, they were lucky just to survive.

That is, the farmers who had survived the

Second Punic War. The widows of soldiers who died

in the war,uncompensated for the loss of their husbands

usually sold their land to latifundia operators at

ridiculously low prices. Some small farmers left

because they couldn't even afford to pay their taxes.

With nowhere else to go, these former small farmers

and their families were forced to move to the big city,

which almost always Rome. By this time,

the old patrician-plebeian breakdown had faded away,

surviving only in the office of the Tribunate and

in the existence of the Popular Assembly. Thanks

to the Sextio-Licinian laws of three sixty seven BC,

the classes had been permitted to intermarry.

This brought fresh blood into the upper class and it

gave ambitious and gifted plebeians something to

shoot for. The old patrician class had been replaced

by the nobility. Membership in the noble class was

determined by being elected consul, or by being the

descendant of somebody who had been elected consul.

Rome was still, surely, an oligarchy in keeping with

the dear old mos maiorum.

It's just that plebeian blood had revitalized the

old ruling class. As elsewhere, Rome profited from

its adaptability in allowing social mobility.

The only drawback to being a member of the noble

or senatorial class was that senators were expected

to be above having business interests.

According to the mos maiorum, it was assumed that

senators were already wealthy farmers in need of

no additional income. Since they still wanted

additional income, because who doesn't?

The latifundia were the perfect business venture.

Romans who chose not to be in the senatorial class

and compete for slots on the cursus honorum could

belong to the equestrian class, also known as the

class of knights. Once a term for Roman soldiers who

served as cavalrymen, the equestrian class of Rome's

late Republic was made up of those who chose to

focus upon business interests instead of politics.

These men were often but not always from less

established families, and less wealthy, temporarily.

Some equestrians later aspired to become members of

the senatorial class,but for the most part equestrians

were happy making money and adopting individual

senators as their patrons. Also about this time

politicians began to sort themselves out into

two factions called optimates and populares.

Neither faction, the optimates and populares,

could be called a political party in the American sense,

neither had a particular agenda or world view

other than getting the people who belonged to it

elected to the cursus honorum. The factions differed

primarily in the noises they made in order to get

political office. The populares talked furiously about

their deep concern for the Roman masses.

They applauded the powers of the tribunes and

appealed to the Council of the Plebeians,

but basically they just wanted to get elected.