ABSTRACT
Dictatorship research is generally dominated by the experiences of the twentieth century. However, not few references suggest that the (long) nineteenth century’s ‘Age of Revolution’ was also an ‘Age of Dictatorship’. For dictatorship was in its original, ancient Roman meaning a quasi-constitutional office with which a citizen was bestowed in exceptional times, for the purpose of solving a particular crisis and for a limited period. The longevity of the ancient Roman paradigm is palpable in contemporary lexicography, too. The phases or cycles of dictatorial systems and of public calls for dictatorship emphasising its benefits are intrinsically connected with periods of uncertainty and crisis. The awareness that the concept of dictatorship was experiencing an irreversible mutation and, therefore, causing the abovementioned confusion, in the first decades of the nineteenth century is the starting point for Moises Prieto’s final chapter.
