cataclysm rome

The second origin of the praetorian guard’s serious threat to the Empire would be their immense power that came from the occupation itself. Captains of the praetorian guards (Praefectus Praetorio) were the few officials who served directly under the emperors themselves alongside a few other ones such as the Egyptian provincial governor*. The reason for this was evident which was that this particular position, dedicated for managing the emperor’s safety, should be manipulated by the big man himself. Nevertheless, there were times when the Roman emperors failed to excess restraints over them. Also, the Roman praetorian guards, unreasonably I feel, were the only armies that stationed themselves within Italy, allowing them to became the sole dominating military force in the region of the Roman capital. And, “best” of all, the other legions in the whole territory of the Roman Empire. Other legions were either too far away or too weak to defeat the praetorian guards (or most likely both), so that they were unable to triumph over the praetorian guards as quickly as possible once they took control. This part of the guards’ privileges also accounted for why the Senate was unable to rival their power, because when grievances were created between the Senate and the praetorian guards, senators were not able to use military interventions, limiting their methods for countering the legions to only doing paper works which greatly reduced the Senate’s influence over the praetorian guards. These two factors contributed to many great problems in Rome, especially corruption, for who wouldn’t use the extreme power they had to acquire tons of gold and more authority. The praetorian guards in Tiberius’s time is a fine example of corruption. Tiberius had an ambitious commander for the praetorian guards who was called Sejanus. This person bribed many of the soldiers within the praetorian guard, granting him even more power than before. Sejanus also took advantage of Tiberius’s trust and used his trustful legions to deter the Senate to make sure that they were unable to sabotage his dominion. As a result, immense power was attained by him and he became the second if not the first most revered person in Rome at that time. Though Tiberius noticed this after a while and killed him and his more loyal supporters, he set the opening for several hundred years of corruption of the praetorian guards that originated from their positions.

Overall, the praetorian guards had generated great troubles in Rome and is one significant factor contributing to its downfall because of their hard-to-maintain loyalty and their high authority.

*: Interestingly, the reason for this is because of the Egyptian’s belief that Egypt should only by ruled by someone related to God, which made Egypt become the private of the emperor. Hence, the emperor would assign a governor that is only, in theory, assisting the emperor’s direct domination over the area