THE FIRST ROMAN EMPEROR

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23471, 7 October 1939, Page 4 (Supplement)

THE FIRST ROMAN EMPEROR

Major Work by R. Syrne

By E. M. BLAIKLOCK

MANY graduates of the Auckland University College will remember Mr. Ronald Symc, Lecturer in Classics, with peculiar interest. Student legends grew up about his feats of memory. To deal with Greek, said some, finally and for -all, he simply read the lexicon, from Alpha unto Omega. He was something of a personality. 1 retain a mental picture of his walking stick elegantly swinging down Queen Street. The stocky figure of his brilliant chief, the late Professor A. C. Paterson, is in the picture. Anthony Eden and General grants striding down the Strand might create just such an impression! Historical Research But that is by the way.. Mr. Syme iis now of international repute in the realm of ancient history, and those who have f6llowed his occasional writings with interest and profit will welcome his sturdy volume on the Roman Revolution. It is one of those heavy, widepaged books, with clear, sharp print, pleasant to hold and open. The Clarendon Press has done the tutor of Trinity justice. > Mr. Syme has been in no hurry to produce his first major work. He was no moro than twenty-five years of ago when the Cambridge Ancient History entrusted him with one of its most difficult sections. In his own right lie could have appeared much earlier and more prominently in print. Ho has withheld the present volume until his peculiar industry had digested the astonishing mass of historical material the choice of subject, has involved. The result is not only an important page of history reset in sane perspective, but a monument of historical research. There are few better documented periods of ancient history than that which covers the ruir\, and fall of the old Roman oligarchy (so-called Republic) and the emergence of the great Fascist state we call the Empire, under that subtle diplomat and shrewd dictator, great Julius' nephew, called Augustus. The books on the subject are legion. But no one to date has walked with such sure foot through the network of intrigue,. or set so intimately in lino the obscurer personalities of the great drama. Julius, Cicero, Augustus, Antony, Cleopatra, havo all had their prejudiced apologists—with expense to history, and sacrifico of truth to romance. Mr. Syme has not written a novel, he has produced the facts. First Fascist Empire And what a story! The first Fascist empire was built on the ruins of a warwearv world. Built to govern a city, the old Roman constitution had managed to hold, with some success, the long peninsula. The wars had come, and conquest. Dire necessity set the struggle going, and striving to survive, Rome found herself .the mistress of the Mediterranean. Her legions know the Atlas i and the Alps, the waters of the Thames 1 and the Euphrates. Came wealth and j the might of privilege. Came generals i flushed with victory, too great for mortal men, the clash of military ambition, civil war and social strife. Out of the weariness of men arose the saviour. Julius might have been the man, but Julius was cynical, and too much fact is bitter on the tongue. Julius fell under the many daggers, when privilege took umbrage under specious names" Pompey's statue saw it all unmoved. Julius' adoptive nephew did not intend to fall at the foot of any statue. Ho knew his Rome. They were astounding years during which he played the clever game of power, with men and families, provinces and peoples for his pawns. There emerged a despotism utter and complete, a totalitarian state which could only he made more crusliingly complete by the radio and the press, and the speed of communication, which have made pos.siblo the deadly efficiency of the modern counterpart. A king in Rome? Precisely. But friends, Romans, countryman no such hated name! It died' with cursed Tarquin, called the proud. Augustus is no king. Augustus knew too well to take such title. Had Hitler not been Hitler he might have built just such a despotism. He climbed to power by the ballot box and the constitution. So did the first emperor of Pome. His power was absolute, but it was held in the shape of constitutional offices, their ancient force and privilege of old tradition and good sound democratic tang, concentrated subtly in one hand. The Senate, like an ancient Reichstag, retained a show of power. No king could be more powerful, but . our clever diplomat called himself princeps or first citizen —even as those other monarchs of our day, are but the Fuehrer and the Ducc, loaders both! Tale For the Times It is a tale for the times this ancient revolution, and a lesson for democracy. The modern game played on this ancient classic stage is so complete. No radio, we say, or press to drill the simple souls of men. True, hut the poets' pens worked; well, and: no inconsiderable portion of Roman literature (the Golden Ago, forsooth, the great Augustan!) is the propaganda of the new regime. It is interesting to look on down the centuries. The Fascist state thus founded gave the worjd long generations of prosperity and peace.The aura of deity collected round the varied heads of its dictators. It evolved its state worship, which in a totalitarian state produces those-problems of divided loyalty which rousod the persecution of the church in ancient Rome and modern Germany. It produced grim problems of succession, which the world may sec again when Duce and Fuehrer go the way of flesh, ft ended ns a naked despotism,' and a crushing bureaucracy. ]f the study of history lias use, what more useful theme'? Readers, and they need not all he scholars, may bo left to appreciate the present telling of the story. Scholars will appraise the facts, all will appreciate the subject, and the splendid English style.

'Tho Roman Revolution," R. Syme. (Ox ford).