Political metamorphoses in Asia Minor during the time of Cicero and Augustus, or how pirates and philosophers became tyrants

The authors devoted their study to a topic that has remained relevant over the past several decades: piracy and its role in the military and political confrontation in the Roman Mediterranean in the first century BC. Firstly, at this time the last state formations of the Hellenistic world, such as the Seleucid and Ptolemaic kingdoms, finally disappeared from the political map of the region, being absorbed by the world Roman Empire. Secondly, in Rome itself, the senatorial republic was replaced by autocracy in the form of the principate regime during the bloody civil wars, and what is commonly called the Roman Empire arose. And in these significant changes of a military-political nature, the "third force" - numerous pirate squadrons - played a significant role. The authors analyze the causes and consequences of the rise of Mediterranean piracy in the 1st century BC, as well as how the Roman authorities responded to this phenomenon: at first, they tried to ignore it, then they began to fight it - until 67 BC with varying success, and later they sometimes even attracted pirates to their side, using this "third force" in the political struggle. Here the authors turn to the historical realities of Roman Asia Minor, where during the specified period there were cases of seizure of power in individual cities and even regions by successful adventurers, among whom were found not only pirates, such as Zeniketus, Tarcondimotus, Antipater and Cleon, but also representatives of quite peaceful professions, such as, for example, the Epicurean philosopher Lysias. All these episodes were evidence of the political instability that accompanied the dramatic and painful transition from the Roman Republic to the Roman Empire

Autocracy · Cicero · Politics · Principate · Roman Empire · Ruler · Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History · Classical Antiquity Studies · Maritime Security and History

• The Campaigns of Servilius Isauricus against the Pirates

  Open Access•H A Ormerod•The Journal of Roman Studies•1922

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