diers who were appointed to watch the city. Of these there were seven cohorts, one for every two wards, composed chiefly of manumitted slaves. Those who guarded adjoining houses in the night-time, carried each of them a bell,3 to give the alarm to one another when any thing happened. The præfectus vigilum took cognizance of incendiaries, thieves, vagrants, and the like; and if any atrocious case happened, it was remitted to the præfect of the city. There were various other magistrates in the latter times of the empire, called comites, correctores, duces, magistri officiorum, scriniorum, &c. who were honoured with various epithets, according to their different degrees of dignity; as, clarissimi, illustres, spectabiles, egregii, perfectissimi, &c. The highest title was nobilissimus and gloriosissimus. EXTRAORDINARY MAGISTRATES. I. DICTATOR AND MASTER OF HORSE. THE Dictator was so called, either because he was named by the consul, or rather from his publishing edicts or orders." He was also called magister populi, and prætor maximus. This magistracy seems to have been borrowed from the Albans, or Latins.6 It is uncertain who was first created dictator, or in what year. Livy says, that T. Lartius was first created dictator, A. U. 253, nine years after the expulsion of the kings. The first cause of creating a dictator was the fear of a domestic sedition, and of a dangerous war from the Latins. As the authority of the consuls was not sufficiently respected on account of the liberty of appeal from them, it was judged proper, in dangerous conjunctures, to create a single magistrate, with absolute power, from whom there should be no appeal, and who should not be restrained by the interposition of a colleague.7 A dictator was afterwards created also for other causes: as,1. For fixing a nail in the right side of the temple of Jupiter, which is supposed to have been done in those rude ages, to mark the number of years. This was commonly done by the ordinary magistrate; but in the time of a pestilence, or of any great public calamity, a dictator was created for that purpose,' to avert the divine wrath.-2. For holding the Comitia.-3. For the sake of instituting holidays, or of celebrating games when 1 una cohors binis regionibus. 2 libertino milite, Suet. 3 wow, tintinnabulum, 5 a dictando, quod mul- clavi figendi vel pan. gendi causa. 9 cum raræ. 10 literæ erant 10 quia majus impe rium erat. Liv. viii. 18. the prætor was indisposed.-4. For holding trials.'-And, 5. Once for choosing senators, on which occasion there were two dictators; one at Rome, and another commanding an army, which never was the case at any other time.3 The dictator was not created by the suffrages of the people, as the other magistrates; but one of the consuls, by order of the senate, named as dictator whatever person of consular dignity he thought proper; and this he did, after having taken the auspices, usually in the dead of the night. 4 One of the military tribunes also could name a dictator; about which Livy informs us there was some scruple. He might be nominated out of Rome, provided it was in the Roman territory, which was limited to Italy. Sometimes the people gave directions whom the consuls should name dictator.5 Sylla and Cæsar were made dictators at the Comitia, an interrex presiding at the creation of the former, and Lepidus the prætor at the creation of the latter." In the second Punic war, A. U. 536, after the destruction of the consul Flaminius and his army at the Thrasimene lake, when the other consul was absent from Rome, and word could not easily be sent to him, the people created Q. Fabius Maximus PRODICTATOR, and M. Minucius Rufus master of horse." At The power of the dictator was supreme both in peace and war. He could raise and disband armies; he could determine about the life and fortunes of Roman citizens, without consulting the people or senate. His edict was observed as an oracle. first there was no appeal from him, till a law was passed that no magistrate should be created without the liberty of appeal, first by the consuls Horatius and Valerius, A. U. 304; and afterwards by the consul M. Valerius, A. U. 453.10 But the force of this law with respect to the dictator is doubtful. It was once strongly contested," but never finally decided. The dictator was attended by twenty-four lictors, 12 with the fasces and secures even in the city.1 13 When a dictator was created, all the other magistrates abdicated their authority, except the tribunes of the commons. The consuls, however, still continued to act, but in obedience 1 quæstionibus exercen. 2 qui senatum legeret. Bell. Civ. ii. 19. Dio. 7 Liv. xxii. 8. 31. 11 Liv. viii. 33. tors, with the fasces to himself 24 lictors, had done a thing entirely unprecedented: Sylla, dictator factus, quod nemo quidem un. quam fecerat, cum fas cibus viginti quatuor processit.-ANTHON. 13 so that Livy justly calls imperium dictato ris, suo ingenio vehe. mens, a command in itself uncontrollable ii. 18. 30. to the dictator, and without any ensigns of authority in his presence.1 The power of the dictator was circumscribed by certain limits. 1. It only continued for the space of six months, even although the business for which he had been created was not finished, and was never prolonged beyond that time, except in extreme necessity, as in the case of Camillus. For Sylla and Cæsar usurped their perpetual dictatorship, in contempt of the laws of their country. But the dictator usually resigned his command whenever he had effected the business for which he had been created. Thus Q. Cincinnatus and Mamercus Emilius abdicated the dictatorship on the sixteenth day, Q. Servilius on the eighth day.* 2. The dictator could lay out none of the public money, without the authority of the senate or the order of the people. 3. A dictator was not permitted to go out of Italy; which was only once violated, and that on account of the most urgent necessity, in Atilius Calatinus.5 6 4. The dictator was not allowed to ride on horseback, without asking the permission of the people, to show, as it is thought, that the chief strength of the Roman army consisted in the infantry. But the principal check against a dictator's abuse of power was, that he might be called to an account for his conduct, when he resigned his office.? For 120 years before Sylla, the creation of a dictator was disused, but in dangerous emergencies the consuls were armed with dictatorial power. After the death of Cæsar, the dictatorship was for ever abolished from the state, by a law of Antony the consul. And when Augustus was urged by the people to accept the dictatorship, he refused it with the strongest marks of aversion.9 Possessed of the power, he wisely declined an odious appellation.10 For ever since the usurpation of Sylla, the dictatorship was detested on account of the cruelties which that tyrant had exercised under the title of dictator. To allay the tumults which followed the murder of Clodius by Milo, in place of a dictator, Pompey was by an unprecedented measure made sole consul, A. U. 702. He, however, on the first of August, assumed Scipio, his father-in-law, as colleague." 12 When a dictator was created, he immediately nominated a master of horse,13 usually from among those of consular or prætorian dignity, whose proper office was to command the cavalry, and also to execute the orders of the dictator. M. Fabius Bu teo, the dictator nominated to choose the senate, had no master of horse. Sometimes a master of horse was pitched upon1 for the dictator, by the senate, or by order of the people. The magister equitum might be deprived of his command by the dictator, and another nominated in his room. The people at one time made the master of the horse, Minucius, equal in command with the dictator Fabius Maximus.3 The master of the horse is supposed to have had much the same insignia with the prætor, six lictors, the prætexta, &c.1 He had the use of a horse, which the dictator had not without the order of the people. DICTATORSHIP. THE appointment of the first dictator is placed in the tenth year after the first consuls; and the oldest annalists say it was T. Larcius. But there were divers contradictory statements, and the vanity of the Valerian house assigned this honour to a nephew of Publicola. Accord ing to the date just mentioned, Larcius was consul at the time, and so only received an enlarge ment of his power: another account related as the occasion of the appointment, what sounds probable enough, that by an unfortunate choice the republic had been placed in the hands of two consuls of the Tarquinian faction, whose names were subsequently rendered dubious by indulgence or by calumny. That the name of dictator was of Latin origin, is acknowledged; and assuredly the character of his office, invested with regal power for a limited period, was no less so. The existence of a dictator at Tusculum in early, at Lanuvium in very late times, is matter of history; and Latin ritual books, which referred to Alban traditions, enabled Macer to assert that this magis. tracy had subsisted at Alba; though it is true that the preser vation of any historical record concerning Alba is still more out of the question than concerning Rome before Tullus Hostilius. The Latins, however, did not merely elect dictators in their several cities, but also over the whole nation: from a fragment of Cato we learn that the Tusculan Egerins was dictator over the collective body of the Latins. Here we catch a glimmering of light; but we must follow it with caution. If Rome and La tium were confederate states on a footing of equality, in the room of that supremacy which lasted but for a short time after the revolution, they must have pos sessed the chief command alter- The object aimed at in insti- That even the members of the houses at the first had no right of appealing against the dictator to their comitia, though they had possessed such a right even under the kings is expressly as serted by Festus: at the same time he adds that they obtained it. This is confirmed by the example of M. Fabius; who, when his son was persecuted by the ferocity of a dictator, appealed in his behalf to the populace; to his peers, the patricians in the curies. The later Romans had only an indistinct knowledge of the dictatorship, drawn from their earlier history. Excepting Q. Fabius Maximus in the second campaign of the second Punic war, whose election and situation, moreover, were completely at variance with ancient custom, no dictator to command an army had been appointed since 503; and even the comitia for elections had never been held by one since the beginning of the Macedonian war. As applied to the tyranny of Sylla and the monarchy of Cæsar, the title was a mere name, without any ground for such a use in the ancient constitution. Hence we can account for the error of Dion Cassius, when, overlooking the privilege of the patricians, he expresslyasserts that in no instance was there a right of appealing against the dictator, and that he might condemn knights and senators to death without a trial: as well as for that of Dionysius, who fancies he decided on every measure at will, even about peace and war. Such notions, out of which the moderns have drawn their phrase dictatorial power, are suitable indeed to Sylla and Cæsar: with reference to the genuine dictatorship they are utterly mistaken. Like ignorance as to the ancient state of things is involved in the notion of Dionysius, that after the senate had merely resolved that a dictator was to be appointed, and which consul was to name him, the consul exercised an uncontroled discretion in the choice: which opinion, being delivered with such positiveness, has became the prevalent one in treatises on Roman antiquities. Such might possibly be the case, if the dictator was restricted to the charge of pre 1 datus vel additus est. 2 Liv. vii. 12. 24. 28. 3 Liv. viii. 35. xxii. 26. 4 Dio. xlii. 27. II. THE DECEMVIRS. 5 THE laws of Rome at first, as of other ancient nations, were very few and simple.1 It is thought there was for some time no written law.2 Differences were determined by the pleasure of the kings, according to the principles of natural equity, and their decisions were held as laws. The kings used to publish their commands either by pasting them up in public on a white wall or tablet, or by a herald. Hence they were said, omnia MANU gubernare. The kings, however, in every thing of importance, consulted the senate and likewise the people. Hence we read of the LEGES CURIATE of Romulus and of the other kings, which were also called LEGES REGIÆ.9 7 siding over the elections, for which purpose it mattered not who he was: in the second Punic war, in 542, the consul M. Valerius Levinus asserted this as his right; and in the first the practice must already have been the same; for else P. Claudius Pulcher could not have insulted the republic by nominating M. Glycia. But never can the disposal of kingly power have been entrusted to the discretion of a single elector. The pontifical law books, clothing the principles of the constitution after their manner in an historical form, preserved the true account. For what other source can have supplied Dionysius with the resolution of the senate, as it professes to be, that a citizen, whom the senate should nominate, and the people approve of, should govern for six months? The people here is the populus: it was a revival of the ancient custom for the king to be elected by the patrici. ans: and that such was the form is established by positive testimony. Still oftener, indeed, through out the whole first decad of Livy, do we read of a decree of the senate whereby a dictator was appointed, without any notice of the great council of the patricians. The old mode of electing the kings was restored in all its parts: the dictator after his appointment had to obtain the imperium from the curies. And thus, from possessing this right of conferring the imperium, the patricians might dispense with voting on the preliminary nomination of the senate. Appointing a dictator was an affair of urgency: some augury or other might interrupt the curies: it was un 1 Tac. Ann. iii. 26. fortunate enough that there were However, when P. Claudius 5 ex æquo et bono, Sen. 6 Diony. x. 1. 7 in album relata pro Livy, that none but consulars were eligible. A law of those early times can only have spoken of prætors and prætorians: for which reason, the prætor continuing to be deemed a colleague of the consuls, it was not violated when L. Papirius Crassus was made dictator in 415: and the other cases which would be against the rule, if interpreted strictly of such men as had actually been consuls, might probibly be explained in the same way, if we had prætorian Fasti. In a number of passages it is distinctly stated that the master of the knights was chosen by the dictator at pleasure. But this again must have been the more recent practice: at all events his appointment in on instance is attributed to the senate no less clearly than that of the dictator: as at the origin of the office it is at least in general terms to electors: and the decree of the plebs, which in 542 raised Q. Fulvius Flaccus to the dictator ship, enjoined him to appoint P. Licinius Crassus magister equitum. The civil character of this officer is enveloped in total obscurity: but that he was not merely the master of the horse and the dictator's lieutenant in the field, is certain. I conjecture, that he was elected by the centuries of plebeian knights.as the magister populi was by the populus, the six suffragia,-and that he was their protector. The dictator may have presided at the election, letting the twelve centuries vote on the person whom he proposed: this might afterward fall into disuse, and he would then name his brother magistrate himself.-Niebuhr, Vol. i. p 552-559. |