The sweeping orgy of terror finally wound itself down after the June 1 deadline came and went. Guilty men could still be tracked down and killed, but the worst was now over. A final accounting will never be possible, but at a minimum about a hundred senators and over one thousand Equestrians were killed in the Sullan proscriptions—with the total death toll possibly as high as three thousand. But good to his word, Sulla and his assassins mostly left the lower classes of Italy alone; not only were they spared for noble reasons, but also because they had no property that was liable to make them “guilty.” As the killing wound down, it was time for Sulla to embark on the rejuvenation of the Republic made possible by his purge of his enemies.15
WHILE HIS AGENTS prowled the streets, Sulla himself had not yet found a way to enter Rome without losing his constitutional authority. The best option would be to secure election as consul, but technically the consuls for the year were still Carbo and Marius the Younger. With Carbo dead in Sicily and Marius the Younger’s head rotting in the Forum, they were not available to convene elections. So Sulla had to get more creative.
While Sulla fretted over his sovereignty, the remaining rump of the Senate took steps to legitimize his actions. They accepted his report on the Mithridatic War and confirmed all the settlements he had made in Asia. They repealed the decree making him an enemy of the state. They even ordered a large statue of Sulla be erected in the Forum bearing an inscription of Sulla’s own devising: LUCIUS CORNELIUS SULLA FELIX. The title “Felix” now entered his official propaganda; it meant Sulla the Fortunate. But all of those decrees still left Sulla on the other side of the walls. So Sulla offered a radical suggestion: revive the ancient Dictatorship.16
It had been 120 years since Rome gave itself over to the hands of a dictator. Once a ubiquitous office in the early days of the Republic, the Dictatorship had been abandoned in the triumphant era of the Republican Empire. Even recent existential emergencies like the Cimbrian Wars and the Social War had not triggered a revival of the office, nor had the violent unrest of the Gracchi and Saturninus. From his headquarters on the Campus Martius, Sulla composed a long letter to the Senate proposing they make him dictator. He said that Italy was devastated, the Republic gutted by the fire of a brutal civil war. There was no aspect of social, political, or economic life that had not been upended by the events of the last decade. If Sulla was to fulfill his destiny and restore the Republic to its former glory, he needed more than consular authority. He need absolute and unquestioned authority.17
Sulla’s suggestion was a shocking deviation from all accepted custom, but what was the Senate to do? Say no? It was like asking the legions surrounded in Numantia in 137 if they wanted to be slaughtered. So they complied with Sulla’s request. To bridge the constitutional gap now that both sitting consuls were dead, the Senate revived the ancient office of
With plenty of legal advisers on hand, and with a decent grasp of constitutional law himself, Sulla ensured his new title came with all requisite powers to act without constraint. As dictator, Sulla now had the power of life and death over all Romans. He had sole discretion over declarations of war and peace. He could appoint or remove senators. He could confiscate property at will. He could found new cities and colonies. He could punish and destroy existing cities. He had the final say in all matters in the provinces, the treasury, and the courts. Most importantly the dictator’s every decree automatically became law. The enormous constitutional force of the Assembly now existed at Sulla’s mere word.19
