A History of Rome to 565 A. D Part 23

However, he did establish the _aerarium militare_ at Rome for the control of the revenues destined for the pensioning of veteran troops.

Furthermore, Augustus drew a sharp distinction between the public revenues which were administered by the princeps in his magisterial capacity, and the income from his own private property or patrimony. For the expenditure of the former he acknowledged a strict accountability to the Senate. The policy of Augustus was followed by Tiberius and Caligula, but under Claudius a central _fiscus_ was organized at Rome for the administration of all the public revenues of the princeps. The provincial _fisci_ disappeared, and the military treasury became a department of the _fiscus_. This new imperial _fiscus_ was under the direction of the _a rationibus_. From this time the princeps ceased to hold himself accountable for the expenditure of the public imperial revenues, and the _fiscus_ a.s.sumes an independent position alongside of the old _aerarium_ of the Roman people, which, as we have shown, it ultimately deprived of all share in the control of the public finances. However, the distinction between the public and private revenues of the princeps was still observed, and the _patrimonium_ was independently administered by a special procurator.

*(II). The Patrimonium.* But with the extinction of the Julio-Claudian house and the accession of Vespasian the patrimony of the Caesars pa.s.sed as an appendage of the princ.i.p.ate to the new ruler. It then became state property, and as it had grown to enormous size owing to the inheritances of Augustus and the confiscations of Caligula and Nero, the _patrimonium_ was organized as an independent branch of the imperial financial administration. The personal estate of the princeps was henceforth distinguished as the _patrimonium privatum_. This situation continued until the accession of Septimius Severus, whose enormous confiscations of the property of the adherents of Niger and Albinus were incorporated in his personal estate. This, the _patrimonium privatum_, was now placed under a new department of the public administration called the _ratio_ or _res privata_. The old _patrimonium_ became a subordinate branch of the _fiscus_. The t.i.tle of the secretary of the treasury in charge of the _fiscus_ was now changed to that of _rationalis_, while the new secretary in charge of the privy purse was called at first _procurator_, and later _magister_, _rei privatae_. The reform of Severus, which gave to the private income of the princeps a status in the administration comparable to that of the public revenues, is a further expression of the monarchical tendencies of his rule.

*The officiales.* The subaltern personnel of the various bureaus, the clerks, accountants, etc., during the first two centuries of the princ.i.p.ate was composed almost entirely of imperial freedmen and slaves.

Among these there was apparently no fixed order of promotion or uniform system of pay, nor could they ever advance to the higher ranks of the service. However, from the time of Severus soldiers began to be employed in these capacities and a military organization was introduced into the bureaus. The way was thus gradually paved for completely dispensing with the services of freedmen and slaves in any part of the civil administration.

III. THE ARMY AND THE DEFENCE OF THE FRONTIERS

*The barbarization of the army.* It will be recalled that the military policy of Augustus aimed at securing the supremacy of the Roman element in the empire by restricting admission to the legions to Roman citizens or to freeborn inhabitants of provincial munic.i.p.alities who received a grant of citizenship upon entering the service. The gradual abandonment of this policy is one of the most significant facts in the military history of the princ.i.p.ate.

*The territorial recruitment of the legions.* Under the Augustan system the legions in the West were recruited from Italy and the romanized provinces of the West, the eastern legions from the Greek East and Galatia. But the increasing reluctance of the Italians to render military service led to the practical, although not to the theoretical, exemption of Italy from this burden which now rested more heavily upon the latinized provinces. An innovation of utmost importance was the introduction of the principle of territorial recruitment for the legions by Hadrian.

Henceforth these corps were recruited princ.i.p.ally from the provinces in which they were stationed, and consequently freedom from the levy was extended to the ungarrisoned provinces, Baetica, Narbonese Gaul, Achaia and Asia. The effect of Hadrian's reform is well ill.u.s.trated by a comparison of the various racial elements in the legions stationed in Egypt under the early princ.i.p.ate with those in the same legions in the time of Marcus Aurelius. The lists of the veterans discharged from these legions under Augustus or Tiberius show that fifty per cent were recruited from Galatia, twenty-five per cent from the Greek munic.i.p.alities in Egypt, fifteen per cent from Syria and the Greek East, and the remainder from the western provinces. A similar list from 168 A. D. shows sixty-five per cent from Egypt, the remainder from the Greek East, and none from Galatia or the West. In general, the consequence of Hadrian's policy was to displace gradually in the legions the more cultured element by the more warlike, but less civilized, population from the frontiers of the provinces. It was Hadrian also who opened the pretorian guard to provincials from Spain, Noric.u.m and Macedonia. As we have seen, Severus recruited the pretorians from the legions and so deprived the more thoroughly latinized parts of the empire of any real representation in the ranks of the army.

*The auxiliaries.* The auxiliary corps, unlike the legions, were not raised by Augustus from Roman citizens but from the non-Roman provincials and allies. At first they were recruited and stationed in their native provinces, but after the revolt of the Batavi in 68 A. D. they were regularly quartered along distant frontiers. From the time of Hadrian, they were generally recruited, in the same manner as the legions, from the districts in which they were in garrison. The extension of Roman citizenship to practically the whole Roman world by Caracalla in 212 A. D.

removed the basic distinction between the legions and the auxiliaries.

*The numeri.* A new and completely barbarous element was introduced by Hadrian into the Roman army by the organization of the so-called _numeri_, corps of varying size, recruited from the non-Romanized peoples on the frontiers, who retained their local language, weapons and methods of warfare but were commanded by Roman prefects. The conquered German peoples settled on Roman soil by Marcus Aurelius and his successors supplied contingents of this sort.

*The strength of the army.* At the death of Augustus the number of the legions was twenty-five; under Vespasian it was thirty; and Severus increased it to thirty-three, totalling over 180,000 men. A corresponding increase had been made in the numbers of the auxiliaries. From about 150,000 in the time of Augustus they had increased to about 220,000 in the second century. The total number of troops in the Roman service at the opening of the third century was therefore about 400,000; one of the largest professional armies the world has ever seen.

*The system of frontier defence.* A second momentous fact in the military history of the princ.i.p.ate was the transformation of the army from a field force into garrison troops. This was the result of the system developed for the defence of the frontiers. Augustus, for the first time in the history of the Roman state endeavored to preclude the possibility of indefinite expansion by attaining a frontier protected by natural barriers beyond which the Roman power should not be extended. Roughly speaking these natural defences of the empire were the ocean on the west, the Rhine and the Danube on the north, and the desert on the east and south. At strategic points behind this frontier Augustus stationed his troops in large fortified camps, in which both legionaries and auxiliaries were quartered. These camps served as bases of operations and from them military roads were constructed to advantageous points on the frontier itself to permit the rapid movement of troops for offensive or defensive purposes. Such roads were called _limites_ or "boundary paths," a name which subsequently was used in the sense of frontiers. These _limites_ were protected by small forts manned by auxiliary troops.

*The fortification of the limites.* Although Claudius and Vespasian discarded the maxims of Augustus in favor of an aggressive border policy they adhered to his system for protecting their new acquisitions in Britain and the Agri Dec.u.mates. However, these conquests and that of the Wetterau region by Domitian pushed the frontier beyond the line of natural defences and led to the attempt to construct an artificial barrier as a subst.i.tute. It was Domitian who took the initial step in this direction by fortifying the _limites_ between the Rhine and Main, and the Main and the Neckar, with a chain of small earthen forts connected by a line of wooden watchtowers. To the rear of this advanced line there were placed larger stone forts, each garrisoned by a corps of auxiliaries, and connected by roads to the posts on the border. While the auxiliary troops were thus distributed along the frontiers in small detachments, the larger legionary cantonments were broken up, and after 89 A. D. no camp regularly contained more than a single legion. Trajan, who also waged his frontier wars offensively, merely improved the system of communication between the border provinces by building military highways along the line of the frontier from the Rhine to the Black Sea, in Arabia, and in Africa.

In the matter of frontier defence, as in so many other spheres, a new epoch begins with Hadrian. He reverted abruptly to the defensive policy of Augustus and began to fortify the _limites_ on a more elaborate scale. The frontier between the Rhine and the Danube was protected by an unbroken line of ditch and palisade, in which stone forts, each large enough for an auxiliary cohort, took the place of the earthen forts of Domitian. At the same time the _limes_ was shortened and straightened, and the secondary line of forts abandoned. In Britain a wall of turf was constructed from the Tyne to the Solway, and in the Dobrudja a similar wall linked the Danube to the Black Sea. The eastern frontier of Dacia was likewise defended by a line of fortifications. Here, as on the other borders, the Roman sphere of influence, and even of military occupation, extended beyond the fortified _limes_.

Antonius Pius followed Hadrian's example and ran an earthen rampart with forts at intervals from the Forth to the Clyde in northern Britain. This line of defence was abandoned by Septimius Severus, who rebuilt Hadrian's rampart in the form of a stone wall with small forts at intervals of a mile and intervening watch towers. In addition seventeen larger forts were constructed along the line of the wall. The _limes_ in Germany was strengthened by the addition of a ditch and earthen wall behind Hadrian's palisade, but along the so-called Raetian _limes_, between the Danube and the Main, another stone wall, 110 miles long, took the place of the earlier defences. A similar change was made in the fortifications of the Dobrudja. However, this system was not followed out in the East or in Africa, where the _limes_ was guarded merely by a chain of blockhouses.

*The consequences of permanent fortifications.* The result of the construction of permanent fortifications along the frontier was the complete immobilization of the auxiliary corps. Stationed continuously as they were for the most part in the same sectors from early in the second century, and recruited, in increasing proportion, from among the children of the camps, it only required the granting to them of frontier lands by Severus Alexander, upon condition of their defending them, to complete their transformation into a border militia (_limitanei_). At the same time the scattering of the legions along the line of the frontiers made the a.s.sembling of any adequate mobile force a matter of considerable time. And the fortifications themselves, while useful in checking predatory raids by isolated bands and in regulating intercourse across the frontiers, proved incapable of preventing the invasion of larger forces. Consequently, when in the third century the barbarians broke through the _limites_ they found no forces capable of checking them until they had penetrated deeply into the heart of the provinces.

The chaos which followed the death of Severus Alexander was the result of a military policy which left the richest and most highly civilized parts of the empire without any means of self-defence; created a huge professional army the rank and file of which had come to lose all contact with the ungarrisoned provinces, all interest in the maintenance of an orderly government and all respect for civil authority; and at the same time rendered the army itself incapable of performing the task for which it was organized.

On the other hand the army had been one of the most influential agents in the spread of the material and cultural aspects of Roman civilization. The great highways of the empire, bridges, fortifications and numerous public works of other sorts were constructed by the soldiers. Every camp was a center for the spread of the Latin language and Roman inst.i.tutions and the number of Roman citizens was being augmented continuously by the stream of discharged auxiliaries whose term of service had expired. In the _canabae_, or villages of the civilian hangers-on of the army corps, sprang up organized communities of Roman veterans with all the inst.i.tutions and material advantages of munic.i.p.al life. The constant movement of troops from one quarter of the empire to another furnished a ready medium for the exchange of cultural, in particular of religious, ideas. To the ideal of the empire the army remained loyal throughout the princ.i.p.ate, although this loyalty came at length to be interpreted in the light of its own particular interests. Not only was the army the support of the power of the princeps; it was also the mainstay of the _pax Romana_ which endured with two brief interruptions from the battle of Actium to the death of Severus Alexander and was the necessary condition for the civilizing mission of Rome.

IV. THE PROVINCES UNDER THE PRINc.i.p.aTE

It is to the provinces that one must turn to win a true appreciation of the beneficial aspects of Roman government during the princ.i.p.ate. As Mommsen(16) has said: "It is in the agricultural towns of Africa, in the homes of the vine-dressers on the Moselle, in the flourishing townships of the Lycian mountains, and on the margin of the Syrian desert that the work of the imperial period is to be sought and found." In this sphere the chief tasks of the princ.i.p.ate were the correction of the abuses of the republican administration and the extension of Graeco-Roman civilization over the barbarian provinces of the west and north. How well this latter work was done is attested not merely by the material remains of once flourishing communities but also by the extent to which the civilization of Western Europe rests upon the basis of Roman culture.

*Number of the provinces.* At the establishment of the princ.i.p.ate there were about thirteen provinces, at the death of Augustus twenty-eight, and under Hadrian forty-five. In the course of the third century the latter number was considerably increased. The new provinces were formed partly by the organization of newly conquered countries as separate administrative districts and partly by the subdivision of larger units. At times this subdivision was made in order to relieve a governor of an excessively heavy task and to improve the administration, and at times it proceeded from a desire to lessen the dangers of a revolt of the army by breaking up the larger military commands.

*Senatorial and imperial provinces.* As we have seen the provinces were divided into two cla.s.ses, senatorial or public and imperial or Caesarian, corresponding to the division of administrative authority between the Senate and the princeps. The general principle laid down by Augustus that the garrisoned provinces should come under the authority of the princeps was adhered to, and consequently certain provinces were at times taken over by the latter in view of military necessities while others were given up by him to the Senate. As a rule newly organized provinces were placed under imperial governors, so that these soon came to outnumber the appointees of the Senate. Eventually, as has been observed in connection with the history of the civil service, the public provinces pa.s.sed completely into the hands of the princeps.

*Administrative officials.* The governors of the senatorial provinces were ent.i.tled proconsuls, even if they were of pretorian rank. However, Asia and Africa were reserved for ex-consuls. Following the law of Pompey, a period of five years intervened between the holding of a magistracy and a promagisterial appointment. Each proconsul was a.s.sisted by a _quaestor_, and by three propraetorian _legati_ whose appointment was approved by the princeps. The imperial governors were of two cla.s.ses, _legati Augusti_ and procurators. In the time of Hadrian there were eleven proconsuls, twenty-four _legati Augusti_ and nine procurators, besides the prefect of Egypt. The subordinates of the _legati Augusti_ were the legates in command of the legions, and the fiscal procurators. The procuratorial governors, at first called prefects, were equestrians, and were placed in command of military districts of lesser importance which were garrisoned by auxiliaries only. An exception to this practice was made in the case of Egypt, which senators were forbidden to enter, and which was governed by a prefect who ranked next to the praetorian prefect and had under his orders a garrison of three legions. These governmental procurators had, in addition to their military duties, the task of supervising financial administration. The t.i.tle _praeses_ (plural _praesides_) which was used in the second century for the imperial governors of senatorial rank, came to designate the equestrian governors when these supplanted the _legati_ in the latter half of the third century.

As under the republic, the governors exercised administrative, judicial, and, in the imperial provinces, military authority. However, with the advent of the princ.i.p.ate the government of the empire aimed to secure the welfare and not the spoliation of its subjects, and hence a new era dawned for the provinces. All the governors now received fixed salaries and thus one of their chief temptations to abuse their power was removed.

Oppressive governors were still to be found, but they were readily brought to justice-the senatorial governors before the Senate and the imperial before the princeps-and condemnations, not acquittals, were the rule. It was from the exactions of the imperial fiscal procurators rather than those of the governors that the provinces suffered under the princ.i.p.ate.

Although the term of the senatorial governors, as before, was limited to one year, tried imperial appointees were frequently kept at their posts for a number of years in the interests of good government.

It has been mentioned before that under Augustus the taxation of the provinces was revised to correspond more closely to their taxpaying capacity. Under the princ.i.p.ate these taxes were of two kinds, direct or _tributa_ and indirect or _vectigalia_. The _tributa_, consisted of a poll-tax (_tributum capitis_), payable by all who had not Roman or Latin citizenship, and a land and property tax (_tributum soli_), from which only communities whose land was granted the status of Italian soil (_ius Italic.u.m_) were exempt. The chief indirect taxes were the customs dues (_portoria_), the five per cent tax on the value of emanc.i.p.ated slaves, possibly the one per cent tax on sales, and the five per cent inheritance tax which was levied on Roman citizens only. In the imperial provinces the land tax was a fixed proportion of the annual yield of the soil, whereas in the senatorial provinces it was a definite sum (_stipendium_) annually fixed for each community.

The princ.i.p.ate did not break abruptly with the republican practice of employing a.s.sociations of _publicani_ in collecting the public revenues.

It is true that they had been excluded from Asia by Julius Caesar, and it is possible that Augustus dispensed with them for the raising of the direct taxes in the imperial provinces, but even in the time of Tiberius they seem to have been active in connection with the _tributa_ in some of the senatorial provinces. Their place in the imperial provinces was taken by the procurator and his agents, in the senatorial at first by the proconsul a.s.sisted by the taxpaying communities themselves and later by imperial officials.

On the other hand the indirect taxes long continued to be raised exclusively by the corporations of tax collectors in all the provinces.

However, the operations of these _publicani_ were strictly supervised by the imperial procurators. In place of the previous custom of paying a fixed sum to the state in return for which they acquired a right to the total returns from the taxes in question, the _publicani_ now received a fixed percentage of the amount actually collected. Under Hadrian the companies of _publicani_ engaged in collecting the customs dues began to be superseded by individual contractors (_conductores_), who like the companies received a definite proportion of the amount raised. About the time of Commodus the system of direct collection by public officials was introduced and the contractors gave way to imperial procurators. In the same way, the five percent taxes on inheritances and manumissions were at first farmed out, but later (under Hadrian in the case of the former) collected directly by agents of the state.

*The munic.i.p.alities.* Each province was an aggregate of communes (_civitates_), some of which were organized towns, while others were tribal or village communities. From the opening of the princ.i.p.ate it became a fixed principle of imperial policy to convert the rural communities into organized munic.i.p.alities, which would a.s.sume the burden of local administration. Under the Republic the provincial communities had been grouped into the three cla.s.ses, free and federate (_liberae et foederatae_), free and immune (_liberae et immunes_), and tributary (_stipendiariae_). In addition to these native communities there had begun to appear in the provinces Roman and Latin colonies. Towards the close of the Republic and in the early princ.i.p.ate the majority of the free communities lost their immunity from taxation and became tributary. Some of them exchanged the status of federate allies of Rome for that of Roman colonies. During the same period the number of colonies of both types was greatly increased by the founding of new settlements or the planting of colonists in provincial towns. Some of the latter also acquired the status of Roman munic.i.p.alities. Thus arose a great variety of provincial communities, which is well ill.u.s.trated by conditions in the Spanish province of Baetica (Farther Spain) under Vespasian. At that time this province contained nine colonies and eight munic.i.p.alities of Roman citizens; twenty-nine Latin towns; six free, three federate, and one hundred and twenty tributary communities.

We have already mentioned the policy of transforming rural communities into organized munic.i.p.alities. How rapidly this transformation took place may be gathered from the fact that in Tarraconesis (Hither Spain) the number of rural districts sunk from one hundred and fourteen to twenty-seven between the time of Vespasian and that of Hadrian. A parallel movement was the conversion of the native towns into Roman colonies and munic.i.p.alities, often through the transitional stage of Latin communities, a status that now existed in the provinces only. The acquirement of Roman or Latin status brought exemption from the poll-tax, while the former opened the way to all the civil and military offices of the empire. An added advantage was won with the charter of a Roman colony, for this usually involved immunity from the land tax also. The last step in the Romanization of the provincial towns was Caracalla's edict of 212 A. D.

which conferred Roman citizenship upon all non-Roman munic.i.p.alities throughout the empire.

*The three Gauls and Egypt.* From this munic.i.p.alization of the provinces two districts were at first excluded on grounds of public policy. These districts were the three Gauls (Aquitania, Lugdunensis and Belgica) and Egypt. At the time of its conquest Gaul was a rich agricultural country, with sharply defined tribal communities, but little or no city development. This condition Augustus judged well adapted, under strict imperial control, to furnishing recruits and supplies of money and kind for the great army of the Rhine. Therefore he continued the division of Gaul in tribal units (_civitates_), sixty-four in number, each controlled by its native n.o.bility. His policy was in general adhered to for about two hundred years, but in the course of the third century the munic.i.p.al system was introduced by converting the chief town of each _civitas_ into a munic.i.p.ality with the rest of the _civitas_ as its _territorium_ or district under its administrative control.

In Egypt Augustus by right of conquest was the heir of the Ptolemies and was recognized by the Egyptians proper as "king of upper Egypt and king of lower Egypt, lord of the two lands, _autocrator_, son of the Sun." For the Greek residents he was an absolute deified ruler of the h.e.l.lenistic type.

Thus Egypt, although a part of the Roman empire, was looked upon as subject to the rule of the princeps alone. And, as in the theory of government, so in the political inst.i.tutions of the country the Romans adapted to their purposes existing conditions in place of introducing radical changes.

In the time of Augustus there were three Greek towns in Egypt, Alexandria the capital, Ptolemais and Naucratis. To these Hadrian added a third, Antinoopolis. Ptolemais, Naucratis and Antinoopolis enjoyed munic.i.p.al inst.i.tutions, but Alexandria because of the turbulence of its population was ruled by imperial officials following the Ptolemaic practice. The rest of the population of the country lived in villages throughout the Nile Valley, which was divided for administrative purposes into thirty-six districts called nomes (_nomoi_). The bulk of the land of Egypt was imperial or public domain land, and the great majority of the Egyptian population were tenants on the imperial domain. For the collection of the land tax, poll tax, professional and other taxes, for the supervision of irrigation, and for the maintenance of the public records of the cultivated acreage and the population (for which a census was taken every fourteen years) there had been developed a highly organized bureaucracy with central offices at Alexandria and agents in each of the nomes. This system of government was maintained by the Romans, and profoundly influenced the organization of the imperial civil service. At the head of the administration of Egypt stood the prefect, an equestrian because of his position as a personal employee of the princeps, and because the power concentrated in his hands would have proved a dangerous temptation to a senator. The chief burden laid upon Egypt was to supply one third of the grain consumed at Rome, or about 5,000,000 bushels annually. This amount was drawn partly from the land tax which was paid in kind and partly from grain purchased by the government.

The first step towards spreading munic.i.p.al government throughout all Egypt was taken in 202 A. D., when Septimius Severus organized a _boule_, or senate of the Greek type, in Alexandria and in the metropolis or seat of administration of each nome. His object was to create in each metropolis a body which could be made to a.s.sume definite responsibilities in connection with the administration. However, it was not until after Diocletian that these villages received a full munic.i.p.al organization.

The princ.i.p.ate's greatest service to the provinces was the gift of two and a half centuries of orderly government, which led in many quarters to a material development unequalled in these regions before or since. It is in these centuries that the history of Rome becomes the history of the provinces. At the opening of the period the Italians occupied a privileged position within the empire, at its close they and their one-time subjects were on the same level. The army and the senatorial and equestrian orders had been thoroughly provincialized, and the emperors had come to be as a rule of provincial birth. Rome was still the seat of the administration, but this and the corn dole to the city proletariat were the only things that distinguished it from a provincial city.

The imperial government of Rome had crushed out all vestiges of national loyalty among the peoples it had absorbed, and had failed to create any political inst.i.tutions which would have permitted the provincials, as such, to have partic.i.p.ated in the government of the empire. With the gradual decline of munic.i.p.al autonomy the great ma.s.s of the provincials were deprived of the last traces of an independent political life. The provincial councils established for the maintenance of the imperial cult did indeed occasionally voice the complaints of the provincials but never acquired active political powers. And that the Roman administration proved a heavy burden is attested by the numerous complaints against the weight of taxation and the necessity which many emperors felt of remitting the arrears of tribute.

V. MUNIc.i.p.aL LIFE

The Roman empire was at bottom an aggregate of locally self-governing communities, which served as units for conscription, taxation and jurisdiction. They were held together by the army and the civil service, and were united by the bonds of a common Graeco-Roman civilization. These munic.i.p.alities were of two general types, the h.e.l.lenic in the East and the Latin in the West.

The h.e.l.lenic munic.i.p.alities were developments from the _poleis_, or city-states, which existed prior to the Roman conquest in Greece and the h.e.l.lenized areas of Asia and Africa. Munic.i.p.al towns organized in these areas subsequent to the Roman occupation were of the same type. Their language of government, as well as of general intercourse, was Greek. The characteristic political inst.i.tutions of the h.e.l.lenic munic.i.p.alities were a popular a.s.sembly, a council or _boule_ and annual magistrates. The a.s.sembly had the power to initiate legislation; the council and magistrates were elected by it or were chosen by lot. But even under the Roman republic these democratic inst.i.tutions were considerably modified in the interests of the wealthier cla.s.ses. Timocratic const.i.tutions were established with required property qualifications for citizenship and for the council and offices. The princ.i.p.ate saw a further development along the same lines. The a.s.semblies lost their right to initiate legislation, a power which pa.s.sed to the magistrates, while the council tended to become a body of ex-magistrates who held their seats for life. However, in spite of this approximation to the Latin type, the Greek official terminology remained unchanged throughout the first three centuries A. D.

The Latin type of munic.i.p.ality was that which developed on Italian soil with the extension of Roman domination over the peninsula, and which was given uniformity by the legislation of Julius Caesar. With the Romanization of the western part of the empire it spread to Africa, Spain, Gaul, Britain, Germany and the Danubian provinces. In spite of the distinctions in status between Roman and Latin colonies and _municipia_, all these cla.s.ses of munic.i.p.alities were of the same general type which is revealed to us in the Julian Munic.i.p.al Law (45 B. C.), the charter of the Roman _Colonia Genetiva Julia_ (44 B. C.), and those of the Latin munic.i.p.alities of Malaca and Salpensa (8184 A. D.).

The const.i.tutions of these munic.i.p.alities were patterned closely after that of Rome, although certain t.i.tles, like those of consul and Senate were reserved for the capital city. Like Rome, the munic.i.p.al towns had their officials, their council (_curia_, _ordo_), and their plebs. The chief magistrates were a pair of duovirs (or at times a college of quattuovirs), who were a.s.sisted by two aediles, and two quaestors The duovirs were in charge of the local administration of justice, and in general conducted the public affairs of the community. Every fifth year the duovirs were called _quinquennales_ and took the census. The aediles had charge of public works, and market and police regulations, while the quaestors were the local treasury officials. All the officials were elected by popular vote, but a definite property qualification was required of each candidate. If no candidates presented themselves for any particular office, provision was made for the nomination of candidates who must serve if elected. At his election each magistrate paid into the treasury, or expended in accordance with the direction of the council, a definite sum of money (_summa honoraria_), which varied for each office in different communities. Oftentimes these officers did not restrict themselves to the required sum but took this opportunity for displaying their munic.i.p.al loyalty. As other prominent citizens followed their example the munic.i.p.alities were richly provided with useful and ornamental public works donated by the richer cla.s.ses. Thus the munic.i.p.al offices, being unsalaried, were a heavy drain upon the resources of their holders, but at the same time they offered almost the sole opportunity for gratifying the political ambitions of the population of the provinces. In addition to these civil officials, each community had its colleges of pontiffs and augurs.

The members of the _curia_ were called _decuriones_, and were usually one hundred in number. They comprised those who had held some local magistracy, and others having the requisite property qualification who were enrolled directly (_adlecti_) in the council. The council supervised the work of the magistrates and really directed the munic.i.p.al administration. As in early Rome, so in the munic.i.p.alities the people were grouped in _curiae_, which were the voting units in the local a.s.sembly or _comitia_. This a.s.sembly elected the magistrates and had legislative powers corresponding to those of the Roman a.s.semblies. However, in the course of the second century A. D. these legislative powers pa.s.sed into the hands of the council, whose decrees became the sole form of munic.i.p.al legislation.

*The collegia.* While the plebs of Rome and the munic.i.p.alities alike had little opportunity for political activity they found a compensation in the social life of their guilds or colleges. These were a.s.sociations of persons who had some common tie, such as a common trade or profession, a common worship, or the humble desire to secure for themselves a decent burial by mutual cooperation. Thus arose professional, religious, and funerary colleges. The organization of the colleges was modelled on that of the munic.i.p.alities. They had their patrons, their presidents (_magistri_, or _quinquennales_), their quaestors, and their treasury sustained by initiation fees, monthly dues, fines, contributions, gifts and legacies. The membership was called plebs or _populus_. The chief factor in the life of the colleges was the social element and their most important gatherings were for the purpose of holding a common banquet. The professional colleges in no way corresponded to the modern trades unions; they attempted no collective bargaining with regard to wages, prices or working hours, although they did not altogether neglect the common interests of their profession.

Apparently until late republican times no restrictions had been placed upon the forming of such collegiate a.s.sociations, but in 64 B. C. all such unions in Rome had been abolished because of the disorders occasioned by political clubs. In 58 B. C. complete freedom of a.s.sociation was restored, only to be revoked again by Julius Caesar who permitted only the old and reputable professional and religious colleges to remain in existence.