Quote Originally Posted by WH
And BTW teh1337tim, the guy that went against Parthia was Marcus Cornelius Crassus, who got owned at Carrhae by a General named Surena in 53BC (I think that's the date).
I thought it was Marcus Licinius Crassus.

In the book I read, it was stated that the failing was that the Republic was meant to govern a small village(early Rome), but failed badly when it came to govern such vast lands. Besides, to effectively govern their provinces, there should have been a provincial representative(a senator?) to help in the governing of the Republic, which would have been quite an improvement, but it was quite difficult to do this because of the large distance to Rome.

This is largely the explanation offered by my book. Please note that my memory may be leaky.