For when he had carried the consulship for a friend of his, against the pursuit of Sylla, and that Sylla did a little resent thereat, and began to speak great, Pompey turned upon him again, and in effect bade him be quiet.
Opposition research is as old as politics itself—Cicero's orations against Catiline, a dodgy candidate for the Roman consulship in 63BC, were notably well-informed.
Marius would hold the consulship a record-breaking seven times before becoming embroiled in a bitter civil war against another popular general named Sulla.
Scipio was a member of a very old and very famous patrician family, but as a mere lad of thirty-one, he was twelve years too young to hold the consulship.
Because opposition to monarchy had become a Roman core value, the Romans believed that politicians should rise up a ladder of offices to the highest office or consulship.
Since Rome needed both Marius and his army, he was elected four times in a row to the consulship, one zero four, one zero three, one zero two, one zero one.
As was traditional Vespasian was able to administer a foreign province following his consulship, and in 63 AD he became proconsul of Africa, where he demonstrated his rigorous administrative and financial skills.
Vespasian had largely retired from public life following his consulship in 51 AD owing to his falling out of favour with Claudius and Agrippina and he remained out of public life for the remainder of the 50s AD.
Between 71 and 79 AD he held the consulship seven times alongside his father - this was by now a mostly ceremonial office but it nevertheless is a testament to his influence at the highest levels of the Roman state.