Tiberius and Gaius Gracchi: Initiators of the Roman Revolution

Although the Gracchi were motivated by a genuine concern for the welfare of Rome, ultimately their actions (and the events surrounding these) contributed to the decline of the Replublic.

-Assess the validity of this statement.

Around the time of which Tiberius and Gaius Gracchi gained power through being voted by the popular assembly, Rome was already in crisis, one of the reasons owing to the shrinking army force. Thus although the Gracchi were motivated by a genuine concern for the welfare of Rome, ultimately their actions (and the events surrounding these) contributed to the decline of the Republic, but did not play a significant part. These ambitious brothers saw that changes must be made before the situation got worse; their land reform ideas were of the many goals/ideas and thus turned actions they undertook in an attempt to improve the general structure of their state’s society. Some of these even marked a turning point in Roman political history, ultimately making the Gracchi brothers revolutionists of Rome.

Tiberius Gracchus, the older of the Gracchi brothers, though was motivated by a genuine concern for the welfare of Rome, his reformist ideas and actions (and the events surrounding these) ultimately contributed to the decline of the Republic. The most significant of Tiberius’ reforms was the idea of redistributing land in an attempt to recruit the army. This was because according to [], “traditionally, legionary soldiers were recruited among men who possessed some land.” This fact is also verified by Koutsoukis, who wrote that “the recruitment area for the nation’s army shrank alarmingly” and also that “there was a rapid rise in unemployment”. This all would have been a result of “prolonged campaigning overseas”...

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...ong the Romans, who questioned their motives for doing what they did and “plotted to get rid of him” (Koutsoukis)

Although the Gracchi brothers were driven by a genuine concern for the welfare of their city, ultimately their actions (and the events surrounding these) contributed to the decline of Rome, but was not the cause of it. They had real reasons to contribute to Rome and attempt to rectify its problems, and though their reformist ideas were not mild in the greatest, they ultimately did not count towards to collapse of the Roman republic. These ideas were mainly centred around the redistribution of land in order to recruit the shrinking army. Thus because these were unprecedented and furthermore, set by wealthy aristocrats who would’ve otherwise had no reason to be concerned, this made the Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus the initiators of the Roman Revolution.