History glossary
dictator
a Roman emergency magistrate given extraordinary authority for a limited crisis, though later rulers stretched the idea toward one-person rule.
- Category
- Political office
- Region
- Roman world
- Date range
- Roman Republic and early Empire
What it means
In the Roman Republic, a dictator was originally an emergency official appointed for a short period during a crisis. By the late Republic, figures such as Sulla and Julius Caesar used dictatorial power in more expansive and alarming ways. For Romans after Caesar's assassination, the word carried the danger of one-person rule.
Related terms
Stories using this term
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