Gaius Marius

Roman general

• Born: 157 b.c.e.
• Birthplace: Cereatae, Arpinum, Latium (now Arpino, Italy)
• Died: January 13, 86 b.c.e.
• Place of death: Rome (now in Italy)

Marius was a successful Roman general whose military innovations created the professional army of the late Roman Republic and early Empire. Representing the Popular Party, he was elected consul seven times.

Early Life

Gaius Marius (MEHR-ee-uhs) was born on a farm near the village of Cereatae in the district of Arpinum, about sixty miles southeast of Rome. He was the son of a middle-class farmer. Marius received little formal education and grew to manhood with a certain roughness in speech and manner that characterized him throughout his life. He first saw military service in 134 b.c.e. in Spain under Scipio Aemilianus in the campaign against the Numantines. Marius readily adapted to military life and was decorated for valor. For the following ten years, he served as a junior officer in Spain and the Balearic Islands.

After returning to Rome, Marius began his political career. With the help of the powerful Metelli clan, he won the election for tribune of the people in 119 b.c.e. During his tribuneship, he showed his independence by carrying a bill for election reform despite opposition from the Metelli and the Senatorial Party. In the next year Marius stood for the office of aedile but was defeated. In 115 b.c.e. he was elected praetor but only with difficulty. In the following year he was appointed propraetor for Further Spain. About the year 111 b.c.e. Marius contracted a highly favorable marriage alliance with the ancient Julian clan. His marriage to Julia, a future aunt of Julius Caesar, gave him an important link to the aristocracy.

Life’s Work

The Jugurthine War soon brought Marius to a position of prominence in Roman affairs. In 109 b.c.e. he was appointed staff officer to Quintus Caecilius Metellus, who, as consul, was given command of the army in the war against Jugurtha, the king of Numidia. Bringing his army to Africa, Metellus waged war against the wily Jugurtha for two years without success. Amid growing criticism of the slowness of the campaign, Marius determined that he would seek the consulship for the year 107 b.c.e. If successful, he hoped to replace Metellus as commander and reap the glory of ending the war. Returning to Rome, he boldly attacked Metellus and the senate and promised to capture or kill Jugurtha if elected. He was supported by members of the business class, who desired stability in North Africa, and the plebeians, who used the war as an opportunity to criticize senatorial leadership. Marius won the consulship by a wide margin. Although the senate voted to extend the command of Metellus for an additional year, the tribal assembly passed a measure directing that the command be transferred to Marius.

In raising an army, Marius chose not to rely on conscription, which involved a small property qualification. Instead, he called for voluntary recruits from the proletariat, promising land at the end of military service. The innovation was made by Marius out of necessity, because conscription was viewed as a burden by the small farmers, whose numbers were diminishing and who were reluctant to leave their farms. Those who joined the army were often the poorest citizens. For them, the army offered hope for the future.

After arriving in North Africa, Marius began seizing and occupying the fortified strongholds of Jugurtha. By the end of 107, most of eastern Numidia was under Roman control. Jugurtha retreated westward, joining forces with his father-in-law, Bocchus, king of Mauretania. During the year 106, Marius marched across the western half of Numidia. He reached the river Muluccha, five hundred miles west of his base of operations, and seized the war treasure of Jugurtha in a remote mountain fortress. As the Roman army returned eastward, Bocchus and Jugurtha attacked but were repelled. Convinced now that he was on the losing side, Bocchus secretly offered to make peace. Marius sent his quaestor, Lucius Cornelius Sulla, to the Mauretanian camp. Sulla persuaded Bocchus to betray Jugurtha, who was kidnapped and turned over to the Romans. With the capture of Jugurtha, the war ended. Marius took credit for the victory, overlooking the critical role played by Sulla, who was to become his bitter rival. Marius returned to Rome in triumph with Jugurtha in chains; a few days later, Jugurtha was executed.

Marius had returned from Africa at a critical time, for two Germanic tribes, the Cimbri and the Teutons, had invaded the Roman province in southern France. In 105, the Cimbri had annihilated a Roman army at Arausio (Orange) in the lower Rhone Valley. Marius was elected consul for 104 even before he returned from Africa. With Italy threatened by invasion, the Romans disregarded the law requiring a ten-year interval between consulships. The need for Marius’s military ability was so great that he was elected consul repeatedly between 104 and 101. Fortunately for Rome, the Cimbri migrated to Spain and the Teutons to northern France, giving Marius time to prepare for their return.

In raising an army, Marius again used voluntary recruits from the propertyless class. He increased the strength of the legion to six thousand men; each legion was divided into ten cohorts of six hundred men. Marius completed the process of making the cohort the standard tactical unit of the legion, replacing the smaller maniple. The cohort was subdivided into six centuries, led by veteran centurions who had risen through the ranks. Weapons were standardized to include the short sword and the hurling pilum. Each soldier was required to carry his own pack. Marius introduced the silver eagle as the standard for each legion; each developed its own traditions and esprit de corps.

In 102 the Cimbri and Teutons reappeared. The Teutons advanced toward Italy along the southern coast of France. Marius met them at Aquae Sextiae (now Aix). The battle took place in a narrow valley, with the Teutons advancing uphill against the Romans. At the height of the battle, the Teutons were attacked from the rear by a Roman force that had been concealed behind a hill. The Teutons panicked, and the battle became a rout. As many as 100,000 Teutons may have perished. The Cimbri invaded Italy through the Brenner Pass. The other consul, Quintus Lutatius Catulus, brought an army northward to intercept them but was driven back south of the Po River. In the spring of 101, Marius joined Catulus with additional troops. The decisive battle was fought on the Raudine Plain near Vercellae, located between Milan and Turin. The Cimbri, facing a burning sun, advanced against the Roman center. As soon as they were overextended, Marius attacked on the flanks. The Cimbri were dealt a severe defeat from which they could not recover. With the threat of the German invasion ended, Marius and Catulus returned to Rome to celebrate a joint triumph.

After these victories, Marius began a new phase of his career as a politician, but he failed miserably. He formed a coalition with two political opportunists, Lucius Appuleius Saturninus and Gaius Glaucia. In the elections for the year 100, Marius won the consulship for the sixth time; Glaucia was elected praetor and Saturninus tribune. Soon afterward, Saturninus introduced bills to establish land grants for Marius’s veterans in Transalpine Gaul and colonies in the east. Marius was to be given the right to bestow citizenship on a select number of the settlers. When the senate objected, Saturninus took the unprecedented step of requiring all senators to take an oath supporting the bills after passage or suffer exile. The urban proletariat also protested, for they judged the measures overly generous to the Italian allies, who made up a large part of the veterans. The bills were finally passed after Saturninus used Marius’s veterans to drive off the opposition in the assembly.

In the elections for 99 b.c.e., Saturninus again won the tribuneship. Glaucia stood for consul but was defeated by Gaius Memmius. Seeking to intimidate their opponents, Saturninus and Glaucia ordered their henchmen to murder Memmius. The reaction to the slaying restored momentum to the senate, which passed a decree directing Marius to arrest Saturninus and Glaucia. After some hesitation, Marius ordered his veterans to seize his former friends, who were encamped on the Capitoline. He placed them in the senate building for protection, but the angry mob tore off the roof and pelted the prisoners to death with tiles. Marius completed his term as consul, but his influence and prestige disappeared. Under the pretext of fulfilling a vow to the goddess Cybele, he departed for the east.

After returning to Rome, Marius remained in relative obscurity until the outbreak of the Social War. When the allies gained early victories in the war, Marius was recalled to military service in the year 90 b.c.e. Although serving in a subordinate status, he was responsible for inflicting two defeats on the Marsi. Despite his success, he was given no assignment for the following year. The glory of concluding the war went to Sulla. In the year 88, when Mithradates VI Eupator, king of Pontus, led a revolt in the east, Marius sought to gain the command for the approaching war. The senate, however, ignored him and bestowed the command on Sulla, who was consul for 88. Marius gained the support of the tribune Publius Sulpicius Rufus, who initiated a tribal assembly measure transferring the command to him. Sulla, who was with his army in Campania, marched on Rome and ordered the executions of Marius and the leaders of the assembly. Sulpicius was captured and put to the sword; Marius fled to the coast, hiding in the marshes near Minturnae. At length he found refuge on the island of Cercina off the coast of Africa.

When Sulla departed for the east in 87, Marius returned to Italy and raised a new army. He joined forces with the democratic leader Lucius Cornelius Cinna, whom the senate had recently driven from Rome. With their combined armies, they advanced against Rome and forced its surrender. Marius now vented his anger after years of frustrations and disappointments by ordering wholesale executions of his enemies in the senate and among members of the nobility. Dispensing with the elections process, Marius and Cinna appointed themselves consuls for the year 86. Marius, now seventy-one years of age, entered his seventh consulship, but by this time he was gravely ill. He died of fever a few days after taking office in January, 86.

Significance

One of the foremost generals of his age, Marius showed his resourcefulness and capability as a military commander in his successful campaigns in North Africa, Gaul, and Italy. His innovative recruitment of troops was of major significance for the future of Rome. By relying on volunteers from the proletariat class, Marius created an army of professional soldiers who were ready to serve for extended periods of time.

The new system was vastly superior to the short-term conscript militia of the past, but it also posed dangers. The soldiers of the professional army identified their interests with their general and expected to be rewarded with land following their service. They gave allegiance to their general rather than to the state. This system gave extraordinary power to any general who might desire to use the army for his own political ends. It led directly to the civil wars of the late Republic, when military strength became the key to political power.

Marius also introduced important reforms to improve the fighting ability of the army. His innovations in organization, weapons, and tactics produced a highly efficient fighting machine at a time when Rome was sorely pressed by its enemies. The new Marian army became the Roman army of the late Republic and early Empire.

Although Marius was a successful general, he failed as politician. His successive consulships are attributable not to political adroitness but to his skill as a general at a time when Rome was severely threatened. The year 100 marked a turning point in Marius’s career. Elected consul for the sixth time and immensely popular after his recent victories, Marius devised no program for social reform beyond that of acquiring land for his veterans. Inept as a public speaker and vacillating in his political decisions, Marius allowed himself to be led by the demagogues Saturninus and Glaucia, whose radicalism and violence precipitated his fall. Driven by ambition, Marius spent the remaining years of his life trying to recover his former power and prestige. At his death, Rome had entered a new era of civil war and bloodshed that would last more than half a century.

Bibliography

Carney, Thomas F. A Biography of C. Marius. Chicago: Argonaut, 1970. A concise, highly technical treatment of Marius’s career. The notes present several directions in research. Includes numerous references and an appendix with tables listing all existing and nonextant contemporary sources.

Kildahl, P. A. Caius Marius. New York: Twayne, 1968. Highly readable, sympathetic account of the life of Marius. This book is intended for students and the general reader but will also be useful for scholars. Preface contains an analysis of contemporary sources. Chronology, map, useful notes, and select bibliography.

Last, Hugh. “The Wars of the Age of Marius.” In The Roman Republic. Vol. 9 in The Cambridge Ancient History. 3d ed. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Causes and historical background for both the Jugurthine War and the Cimbrian War are discussed. Detailed accounts of military campaigns, strategy, and battle tactics. Maps with physical features, mileage scales, and Roman place-names for areas of military operations. Description of military reforms under Marius. Includes notes and lengthy discussion of sources.

Parker, H. M. D. The Roman Legions. Chicago: Ares, 1980. A study of the composition of the Roman army through the periods of the Republic and the Empire. The chapter on the Marian army reforms offers technical explanations and details regarding Marius’s innovations and contains valuable references to contemporary sources. The introduction provides a description of the pre-Marian army.

Scullard, H. H. From the Gracchi to Nero. New York: Routledge, 1988. An excellent account for the general background of the last century of the Roman Republic. Contains a detailed chapter on the career of Marius. Extensive notes include a discussion of sources for Marius, problems and conflicting interpretations arising from the sources, and numerous references for additional study.