Napoleon III - History of Julius Caesar Vol. 1 of 2

Below the municipia, which had their own magistrates, came, in this social hierarchy, the prefectures, 169 169 In this category were sometimes found municipia of the third degree, such as Cære. (See Festus, under the word Præfecturæ , p. 233.) – Several of these towns, such as Fundi, Formiæ, and Arpinum, obtained in the sequel the right of suffrage; they continued, however, by an ancient usage, to be called by the name of præfecturæ , which was also applied by abuse to the colonies. so called because a prefect was sent there every year to administer justice.

The dediticii were still worse treated. Delivered by victory to the discretion of the Senate, they had been obliged to surrender their arms and give hostages, to throw down their walls or receive a garrison within them, to pay a tax, and to furnish a determinate contingent. With the exclusion of these last, the towns which had not obtained for their inhabitants the complete rights of Roman citizens belonged to the class of allies ( fœderati socii ). Their condition differed according to the nature of their engagements. Simple treaties of friendship, 170 170 Socius et amicus (Titus Livius, XXXI. 11). – Compare Dionysius of Halicarnassus, VI. 95; X. 21. or of commerce, 171 171 With Carthage, for example. (Polybius, III. 22. – Titus Livius, VII. 27; IX. 19, 43.) or of offensive alliance, or offensive and defensive, 172 172 Thus with the Latins. “Ut eosdem quos populus Romanus amicos atque hostes habeant.” (Titus Livius, XXXVIII. 8.) concluded on the footing of equality, were called fœdera æqua . On the contrary, when one of the contracting parties (and it was never the Romans) submitted to onerous obligations from which the other was exempted, these treaties were called fœdera non æqua . They consisted almost always in the cession of a part of the territory of the vanquished, and in the obligation to undertake no war of their own. A certain independence, it is true, was left to them; they received the right of exchange and free establishment in the capital, but they were bound to the interests of Rome by an alliance offensive and defensive. The only clause establishing the preponderance of Rome was conceived in these terms: Majestatem populi Romani comiter conservanto ; 173 173 Cicero, Oration for Balbus , xvi. that is, “They shall loyally acknowledge the supremacy of the Roman people.” It is a remarkable circumstance that, dating from the reign of Augustus, the freedmen were divided in categories similar to those which existed for the inhabitants of Italy. 174 174 The freedmen were, in fact, either Roman citizens, or Latins, or ranged in the number of the dediticii ; slaves who had, while they were in servitude, undergone a grave chastisement, if they arrived at freedom, obtained only the assimilation to the dediticii . If, on the contrary, the slave had undergone no punishment, if he was more than thirty years of age, if, at the same time, he belonged to his master according to the law of the quirites, and if the formalities of manumission or affranchisement exacted by the Roman law had been observed, he was a Roman citizen. He was only Latin if one of these circumstances failed. ( Institutes of Gaius, I. § 12, 13, 15, 16, 17.)

As to the colonies, they were established for the purpose of preserving the possessions acquired, of securing the new frontiers, and of guarding the important passes; and even for the sake of getting rid of the turbulent class. 175 175 “Valerius sent upon the lands conquered from the Volsci a colony of a certain number of citizens chosen from among the poor, both to serve as a garrison against the enemies, and to diminish at Rome the party of the seditious.” (Year of Rome 260.) (Dionysius of Halicarnassus, VI. 43.) – This great number of colonies, by clearing the population of Rome of a multitude of indigent citizens, had maintained tranquillity (452). (Titus Livius, X. 6.) They were of two sorts: the Roman colonies and the Latin colonies. The former differed little from the municipia of the first degree, the others from the municipia of the second degree. The first were formed of Roman citizens, taken with their families from the classes subjected to military service, and even, in their origin, solely among the patricians. The coloni preserved the privileges attached to the title of citizen, 176 176 Modern authors are not agreed on this point, which would require a long discussion; but we may consider the question as solved in the sense of our text by Madvig, Opuscula , I. pp. 244-254. and were bound by the same obligations, and the interior administration of the colony was an image of that of Rome. 177 177 “There the people ( populus ) named their magistrates; the duumviri performed the functions of consuls or prætors, whose title they sometimes took ( Corpus Inscriptionum Latin. , passim ); the quinquennales corresponded to the censors. Finally, there were questors and ediles . The Senate, as at Rome, was composed of members, elected for life, to the number of a hundred; the number was filled up every five years ( lectio senatus ).” ( Tabula Heracleensis , cap. x. et seq. )

The Latin colonies differed from the others in having been founded by the confederacy of the Latins on different points of Latium. Emanating from a league of independent cities, they were not, like the Roman colonies, tied by close bonds to the metropolis. 178 178 A certain number of colonies figure in the list given by Dionysius of Halicarnassus of the members of the confederacy (V. 61). But the confederacy once dissolved, these colonies were placed in the rank of allied towns ( socii Latini ). The act ( formula ) which instituted them was a sort of treaty guaranteeing their franchise. 179 179 Pliny, Natural History , III. iv. § 7.

Peopled at first by Latins, it was not long before these colonies received Roman citizens who were induced by their poverty to exchange their title and rights for the advantages assured to the colonists. These did not figure on the lists of the censors. The formula fixed simply the tribute to pay and the number of soldiers to furnish. What the colony lost in privileges it gained in independence. 180 180 Because it named its magistrates, struck money (Mommsen, Münzwesen , p. 317), privileges refused to the Roman colonies, and preserved its own peculiar laws according to the principle: “Nulla populi Romani lege adstricti, nisi in quam populus eorum fundus factus est.” (Aulus Gellius, XVI. xiii. 6. – Compare Cicero, Oration for Balbus , viii. 21.)

The isolation of the Latin colonies, placed in the middle of the enemy’s territory, obliged them to remain faithful to Rome, and to keep watch on the neighbouring peoples. Their military importance was at least equal to that of the Roman colonies; they merited as well as these latter the name of propugnacula imperii and of specula , 181 181 Cicero, Oration on the Agrarian Law , ii. 27. that is, bulwarks and watch-towers of the conquest. In a political point of view they rendered services of a similar kind. If the Roman colonies announced to the conquered people the majesty of the Roman name, their Latin sisters gave an ever-increasing extension to the nomen Latinum , 182 182 Titus Livius, XXVII. 9. that is, to the language, manners, and whole civilisation of that race of which Rome was but the first representative. The Latin colonies were ordinarily founded to economise the colonies of Roman citizens, which were charged principally with the defence of the coasts and the maintenance of commercial relations with foreign people.