II. PRÆCONES, heralds or public criers, who were employed for various purposes:

1. In all public assemblies they ordered silence, (silentium indicebant vel imperabant: ExSURGE, PRÆCO, FAC POPULO AUDIENTIAM, Plaut. Poen. prol. 11.) by saying, SILETE vel TACETE; and in sacred rites by a solemn form, FAVETE LINGUIS, Horat. Od. iii. 1. ORE FAVETE OMNES, Virg. Æn. v. 71. Hence SACRUM silentium for altissimum or maximum, Horat. Od. ii. 13, 29. Ore favent, they are silent; Ovid. Amor. iii. 13, 29..

2. In the comitia they called the tribes and centuries to give their votes; they pronounced the vote of each century; they called out the names of those who were elected, Cic. Verr, ve 15. (See p. 94.) When laws were to be passed, they recited them to the people, (p. 90.) In trials they summoned the judices, the persons accused, their accusers, and the witnesses.

Sometimes heralds were employed to summon the people. to an assembly, Liv. i. 59. iv. 32. and the senate to the senatehouse, i. 38. (see p. 8.) also the soldiers, when encamped to hear their general make a speech, Liv. i. 28.

3. In sales by auction, they advertised them (auctionem conclamabant vel prædicabant), Plaut. Men. fin. Cic. Verr. iii. 16. Off. iii. 13. Horat. de Art. Poet. 419. they stood by the spear, and called out what was offered. See p. 54.

4. In the public games; they invited the people to attend them; they ordered slaves and other improper persons to be removed from them, Cic. de resp. Har. 12. Liv. ii. 37. they proclaimed (prædicabant) the victors and crowned them, Cic. Fam. v. 12. they invited the people to see the secular games which were celebrated only once every 110 years, by a solemn form, CONVENITE AD LUDOS SPECTANDOS, QUOS NEC SPECTAVIT QUISQUAM, NEC SPECTATURUS EST, Suet. Claud. 21. Herodian. iii. 8.

5. In solemn funerals, at which games sometimes used to be exhibited, Cic. de legg. 11. 24. they invited people to attend by a certain form: EXSEQUIAS CHREMETI, QUIBUS EST COMMODUM, IRE JAM TEMPUS EST, OLLUS EFFERTUR, Ter. Phorm. v. 8. 38. Hence these funerals were called FUNERA INDICTIVA. Festus in QUIRITES, Suet. Jul. 84. The præcones also used to give public notice when such a person died; thus, OLLUS QUIRIS LETO DATUS EST, Festus ibid.

6. In the infliction of capital punishment, they sometimes signified the orders of the magistrate to the lictor, Liv. xxvi.

15.

LICTOR, VIRO forti adde virgaS, ET IN EUM LEGE primum AGE, ibid. 16.

7. When things were lost or stolen they, searched for them, Plaut. Merc. iii. 4. v. 78. Petron. Arbit. c. 57. where an allusion is supposed to be made to the custom abolished by the Æbutian law.

The office of a public crier, although not honourable, was profitable, Juvenal. vii. 6. &c. They were generally freeborn, and divided into decuriæ.

Similar to the pracones were those who collected the money bidden for goods at an auction from the purchaser, called COACTORES, Hor. Sat. i. 6. 86. Gic. pro Cluent. 64. They were servants (ministri) of the money-brokers who attended at the auctions: Hence coactiones argentarias factitare, to exercise the trade of such a collector, Suet. Vesp. 1. They seem also to have been employed by bankers to procure payment from debtors of every kind. But the collectors of the public revenues were likewise called COACTORES, Cic. pro Rab. Post. 11.

III. LICTORES. The lictors were instituted by Romulus, who borrowed them from the Etruscans. They are commonly supposed to have their name, Liv. i. 8. (a ligando), from their binding the hands and legs of criminals before they were scourged, Gell. xii. 3. They carried on their shoulder rods (virgas ulmeas, Plaut. Asin. ii. 2. v. 74. iii. 2. v. 29. Vïminei fasces virgarum, Id. Epid. i. 1. 26. vel ex betula, Plin. xvi. 18. s. 30.) bound with a thong in the form of a bundle, (bacillos loro colligatos in modum fascis), and an ax jutting out in the middle of them. They went before all the greater magistrates, except the censors, one by one in a line, Liv. xxiv. 44. He who went foremost was called PRIMUS LICTOR, Cic. ad Fratr. i. 1. 7. he who went last, or next to the magistrate, was called PROXIMUS LICTOR, Liv, ibid. Sallust. Jug. 12. or Postremus, Cic. Divin. i. 28. i. e. the chief lictor, summus lictor, who used to receive and execute the commands of the magistrate.

The office of the lictors was,

1. To remove the crowd, (ut turbam summoverent), Liv. iii. 11. 48. viii. 33. Hor. Od. ii. 16. 10. by saying, Cedite CONSUL VENIT; DATE VIAM, vel LOCUM CONSULI; SI VOBIS VIDETUR, DISCEDITE, QUIRITES, Liv. ii. 56. or some such words, (solennis ille lictorum et prænuncius clamor, Plin. Pan. 61.) whence the lictor is called summotor aditus, Liv. xlv, 29.

This sometimes occasioned a good deal of noise and bustle, Liv. passim. When the magistrate returned home, a lictor knocked at the door with his rod, (forem, uti mos est, virgâ percussit), Liv. vi. 34. which he also did, when the magistrate went to any other house, Plin. vii. 30. s. 31.

2. To see that proper respect was paid to the magistrates, (ANIMADVERTERE, ut debitus honos is redderetur), Suet. Jul. 80. What this respect was, Seneca informs us, Epist. 64. namely, dismounting from horseback, uncovering the head, going out of the way, and also rising up to them, &c. Suet. Jul. 78.

3. To inflict punishment on those who were condemned, which they were ordered to do in various forms: I, LICTOR, COLLIGA MANUS; I, CAPUT OBNUBE.HUJUS; ARBORI INFELICI SUSPENDE, VERBERATO VEL INTRA POMERIUM vel extra POMÆRIUM, Liv. i. 26. I, LIC FOR, DELIGA AD PALUM, Id. viii. 7. ACCEDE, LICTOR, VIRGAS ET SECURES EXPEDI, Id. viii. 32. IN EUM LEGE AGE, i. e. securi percute, vel feri,

xxvi. 16.

The lictors were usually taken from the lowest of the common people, Liv. ii. 55. and often were the freedmen of him on whom they attended. They were different from the public slaves, who waited on the magistrates, Cic. in Verr. i. 26.

IV. ACCENSI. These seem to have had their name from summoning (ab acciendo) the people to an assembly, and those who had law-suits to court, (in jus). One of them attended on the consul who had not the fasces, Suet. Jul. 20. Liv. iii. 33. Before the invention of clocks, one of them called out to the prætor in court when it was the third hour, or nine o'clock, before noon; when it was mid-day, and the ninth hour, or three o'clock afternoon, Varro de Lat. ling. v. g. Plin. vii. 60. They were commonly the freedmen of the magistrate on whom they attended; at least in ancient times, Cic. ad Fratr. i. 1. 4. The Accensi were also an order of soldiers, called Supernumerari, because not included in the legion, Veget. ii. 19. Ascon. in Cic. Verr. i. 28. Liv. viii. 8, & 10.

V. VIATORES. These were properly the officers who attended on the tribunes, Liv. ii. 56. and ædiles, xxx. 39. Anciently they used to summon the senators from the country where they usually resided; whence they had their name, (quod sæpe in viâ essent), Cic. de Sen. 16. Columell. Præf. 1.

N 2

VI. CAR

VI. CARNIFEX. The public executioner or hangman, who executed (supplicio afficiebat) slaves, and persons of the lowest rank; for slaves and freedmen were punished in a manner different from frec-born citizens, Tacit. Annal. iii. 50. The carnifex was of servile condition, and held in such contempt, that he was not permitted to reside within the city, Cic. pro Rabir. 5. but lived without the Porta Metia, or Esquilina, Plaut. Pseud. i. 3. v. 98. near the place destined for the punishment of slaves, (juxta locum servilibus panis sepositum, Tac. Annal. xv. 60. ii. 32.) called Sestertium, Plutarch. in Galb. where were erected crosses and gibbets, (cruces et patibula, Tac. Annal. xiv. 33.) and where also the bodies of slaves were burnt, Plaut. Cas. ii. 6. v. 2. or thrown out unburied, Hor. Epod. v. 99.

Some think that the carnifex was anciently keeper of the prison under the Triumviri capitales, who had only the superintendance or care of it: hence tradere vel trahere ad carnificem, to imprison, Plaut. Rud. iii. 6. v. 19.

THE

LAWS of the ROMAN S.

HE laws of any country are rules established by public authority, and enforced by sanctions, to direct the conduct, and secure the rights of its inhabitants. (LEX justi injustique regula, Senec. de benef. iv. 12. LEGES quid aliud sunt, quam minis mixta præcepta? Id. Epist. 94.)

The laws of Rome were ordained by the people, upon the application of a magistrate, (rogante magistratu). See p. 86, 90. The great foundation of Roman law or jurisprudence, (Romani juris), was that collection of laws called the law, Liv. xxxiv. 6. or laws of the Twelve Tables, compiled by the decemviri, and ratified by the people, (see p. 156.) a work, in the opinion of Cicero, superior to all the libraries of philosophers, (omnibus omnium philosophorum bibliothecis anteponendum), de Orat. i. 44. Nothing now remains of these laws but scattered fragments.

The unsettled state of the Roman government, the extension of the empire, the increase of riches, and consequently

of

of the number of crimes, with various other circumstances, gave occasion to a great many new laws, (corruptissimâ republica plurima leges, Tacit. Annal. iii. 27.)

At first those ordinances only obtained the name of laws, which were made by the Comitia Centuriata, (POPULISCITA), Tacit. Annal. iii. 58. but afterwards those also which were made by the Comitia Tributa, (PLEBISCITA), when they were made binding on the whole Roman people; first by the Horatian law, (ut quod tributim plebes jussisset, populum teneret), Liv. iii. 55. and afterwards more precisely by the Publilian and Hortensian laws, (ut plebiscita OMNES QUI, RITES tenerent) Liv. viii. 12. Epit. xi. Plin. xvi. 10. s. 15. Gell. xv. 27.

The different laws are distinguished by the name, (nomen gentis) of the persons who proposed them, and by the subject to which they refer

Any order of the people was called LEX, whether it respected the public, (jus publicum vel sacrum), the right of private persons, (jus privatum vel civile), or the particular interest of an individual. But this last was properly called PRIVILEGIUM, Gell. x. 20. Ascon. in Cic. pro Mil.

The laws proposed by a consul were called CONSULARES, Cic. Sext.64. by a tribune, TRIBUNITIE, Cic.in Rull. ii. 8. by the decemviri, DECEMVIRALES, Liv. iii. 55, 56, & 57.

Different Significations of JUS and LEX, and the Different SPECIES of the ROMAN LAW.

THE words, Jus and Lex are used in various senses. They are both expressed by the English word, LAW.

Jus properly implies what is just and right in itself, or what from any cause is binding upon us, Cic. de Offic. iii. 21. Lex is a written statute or ordinance: (LEX, quae scripto sancil, quod vult, aut jubendo, aut vetando Cic. de legg. i. 6. a LE GENDO, quòd legi solet, ut innotescat, Varro de Lat. ling. v. 7 legere leges propositas jussere, Liv. iii. 34, vel a delectu, Cic. de legg. i. 6. a justo et jure legendo, i. e. eligendo, from the choice of what is just and right, Id. ii. 5. LEX, justorum injusto

rumquæ