Chapter XVIII: Part 18

A great and essentially plebeian legislation by which that of Licinius was completed, manifests itself as the result of this event. Whatever may have been the true history of that commotion, it was certainly of much greater importance than Livy describes it to have been. Whereas until then the Licinian law, according to which there was always to be one plebeian consul, had been violated seven times in thirteen years; from henceforth there are no more infringements of it, notwithstanding some absurd attempts in later times. In the present fermentation, a rule must have been made which precluded the possibility of any such design being successful. Clauses must have been added, perhaps as stringent as those in the _lex Valeria Horatia_, by which the severest punishments were denounced against any one who hindered the election of the tribunes of the people. Moreover, it is said to have been enacted, that both consuls might also be chosen from the plebeians; but this seems to be a mistake: that this was not carried out, may easily be proved. In the war of Hannibal, there was once a special resolution passed, that both consuls might be taken from the _Plebes_ while the war lasted; yet it was not acted upon. It was not before 580, that the natural proportion first won the day, the patrician nobility having dwindled down to such insignificance, that it became impossible to keep up the law as had been done hitherto. Another ordinance which Livy mentions, is of great importance: it shows that there was no longer a mere question of the opposition of the orders against each other; but that among the plebeian nobility the same oligarchical intrigues had manifested themselves, which until then had been confined to the patricians alone,--a proof, that neither of the two was better than the other. This law comprised two points: in the first place, that no one should hold two curule dignities at the same time; secondly, that whoever had filled a curule office, could only be re-elected to it after ten years. The first point, as far as the prætorship was concerned, could effect the patricians only, it having probably often happened that a patrician consul had caused himself to be elected prætor as well, so that he might get the upperhand over his colleague; but with regard to the ædileship, it would also affect the plebeians in alternate years. Livy says that the law was especially directed against the _ambitio novorum hominum_. The second point had probably been mooted by the plebeians themselves, as a check upon the overwhelming influence of men who belonged to their own order; as until then we always find the same plebeian names as Popillius Lænas, C. Marcius, C. Poetelius, in the list of consuls. What was wanted, was to keep the honours of the state from becoming the property of a few exclusive families.

With regard to military matters, Livy knows of two laws which date from the time of these disturbances. The first, that whosoever had once been a military tribune, should no more become a centurion, is represented as having been brought forward owing to a certain Salonius, who is said to have been thus reduced to a lower rank out of spite. The consuls had full right to appoint whom they chose as centurions; yet there was a feeling among the soldiers, that when a man had been a tribune, he could no more be a centurion which was no higher than a non-commissioned officer. Among the military tribunes, six places every year were filled by the tribes, the rest by the consuls: one could not, however, be elected two years running by the same party. During the year in which a person could not be tribune, he must have been unemployed. Now Salonius, who had been a tribune, and as such had no doubt opposed the consuls, was therefore made by these a centurion: thus the voice of the public promoted, and the consuls degraded him. It was against this that the law was directed. The organisation of the class of officers is one of the best things in the Roman system. Slow advancement, the right to gradual promotion, and the making provision for officers in old age, were unknown to the Romans: by law, no one held a permanent commission; every officer was required to be efficient. They had no notion either of gradually rising by length of service, or of a standing corps of officers: every military tribune was appointed for one year only; if he did not show himself equal to his duty, he was not chosen again; but whoever was efficient was elected year by year by the people and by the consuls in turn, and this was his calling, and his desire. Moreover, it was not necessary to pass through a whole succession of subordinate steps: the young Roman of rank served as a horseman; the consul had the distinguished ones in his cohort as staff-officers; there they learned a great deal, and in a couple of years the young man, in the full prime of life, might become a military tribune. Regard was had besides to that respectable class of people who, without any calling for a higher command, were well qualified to train the soldiers. These were made centurions, what with us would be sergeants. They were all of them people of humble station; they had good pay and enjoyed consideration, and they also might in some cases become tribunes, if they showed remarkable ability. What is done by the great mass of our subalterns, might be performed as well by an able non-commissioned officer. In all this, the Roman military system is as admirable as in its perfect training of the individual soldier.

The second law may show us how Livy jumbles everything together. The pay of the _equites_ is said by him to have been lowered, because they had not taken a share in the insurrection. If the rebels could carry this through, the state was lost. I believe that this was the period when the _equites_ ceased to be assigned as a burthen of two thousand _asses_ upon the widows and orphans, and it was decreed, that they should have a fixed pay. This was a reasonable change, but a loss for the _eques publicus_; reasonable, because the state could afford the expense.

_In luco Petelino_, the curies now voted a complete amnesty for all that had happened: no one was either in jest or in earnest to be reproached with it. Livy takes it for a resolution of the centuries _auctoribus patribus_; but it is evident from the trial of Manlius, that in the _lucus Petelinus_ the curies alone assembled.

THE WAR AGAINST THE LATINS. THE LAWS OF THE DICTATOR Q. PUBLIUS PHILO. FURTHER EVENTS.

The Romans now decided upon peace with the Samnites. They had already, on account of the past year, received from them an indemnity for pay and keep; or they then received it. The peace was made by the Romans in a selfish and base manner; as the war had been undertaken in conjunction with the Latins. They yielded Capua to the Samnites, and left them at liberty to conquer Teanum. The Sidicines, on the other hand, threw themselves into the arms of the Latins, and concluded with the Volscians, Auruncians, and Campanians, a separate league against the Samnites. The same thing has happened also in modern times; as for instance, the alliance between Prussia and Russia under Frederic the Great and Peter III., in the seven years’ war. The Latins now went on with the war _suo Marte_, which Livy in his way of viewing things deems an offence in them, as if they had violated the _majestas populi Romani_. They made war with the Pelignians; from which it may be seen that the Æquians belonged to them, as otherwise they could not have touched the Pelignians. The latter allied themselves with the Samnites, who in their turn applied to the Romans for help or mediation, as the peace had evidently been immediately followed by an alliance. The federal compact of Rome with the Latins and Hernicans had now come to a crisis: the Hernicans were either neutral, or, what is more likely, in a league with the Romans; as Livy and the Capitoline Fasti do not mention them among those over whom Mænius triumphed. Such confederacies may subsist between peoples, none of which is as ambitious and powerful as the Romans then were; but there were now only three ways open. Either they might part from each other and remain friends; or they might enter into a union, like that between Great Britain and Ireland; or lastly, the fortune of arms had to decide, which was to be master of the other: to stand side by side, as hitherto, was impossible. During the last year already, the war had no longer been carried on in common; the Latins had taken the field under their own standards. It was therefore now resolved to negociate. Latium had a more solid constitution than the Samnites; it was governed like Rome. It had two prætors, as Rome had two consuls; and it must have had a senate, as _decem primi_ are mentioned, evidently the deputies of as many towns. These ten leaders betook themselves to Rome, and there they made the most just proposal that the two states should unite; that the senate from three hundred members should be doubled to six hundred; that the popular assembly should be increased,--in which case the seven and twenty Roman tribes would no doubt have been raised to thirty, and the Latin towns have voted as so many tribes; that Rome should be the seat of government, and a Roman and a Latin consul be elected every year. Had the Romans accepted these terms, Rome and Latium would in reality have been equal; but every Roman would have had his privileges lessened. The idea of a Latin consul was odious to the Romans; for, in all the republics, however democratically they may be disposed, there is a spirit of exclusiveness. Of this we find a striking instance in the history of the institutions of Geneva. In that republic there are _bourgeois_; _natifs_, that is to say, children of the μέτοικοι or _habitans_; and lastly, _habitans_; all of which have one after the other acquired the right of citizenship. Nothing is more oligarchical than the canton of Uri. Patricians as well as plebeians were discontented. If there was to be only one consul, who should it be, a patrician or a plebeian? They would rather have agreed to have four consuls. The embassy of the Latins, as Livy tells us, was received with general indignation; not that they had disguised from themselves that the impending struggle would be a war for life and death; but because vanity and selfishness outweighed this consideration. We are told, that the consul T. Manlius had declared that he would stab with his own hand the first Latin in the Roman senate. The story has besides the poetical addition, that while they were debating in the Capitol, a thunderstorm and a pelting shower came on; and that the Latin prætor, as he was retiring, fell down the _centum gradus_ of the Tarpeian rock, and was taken up lifeless. In later narratives, “lifeless” was prosaically made out to mean “in a swoon.”

The Sabines, renowned as they were of old for uprightness, had been quite asleep, and they had no longer any importance whatever: the northern confederation, the Marsians, Pelignians, Marrucinians, and Vestinians, in spite of their bravery, only wished to be left quiet in their mountains. The Romans passed through their territory, and were in alliance with the Samnites: the latter expected for themselves the conquest of Capua and Teanum as the result of the war. Had the Romans now been afraid of letting their open country be wasted by the Latins, they would have been obliged to keep themselves merely on the defensive, or else to carry on a tedious war of sieges against the Latin towns. But here the Roman generals showed themselves great, and the way in which they dealt with the whole matter, was masterly. Fixing upon the very boldest plan, they armed the reserve at Rome, and abandoned the fields, even to the very gates of the city, to the Latins; then they marched all the way round through the Sabine and the Marsian country, to join the Samnites; and when this was done, they advanced with a combined force against Capua. If the Latins had now left the Campanians to their fate, and had gone beforehand to meet the Romans, while they were still on their march through the country of the Æquians, they might have perhaps defeated them in these impassable regions. This daring enterprise of the Romans is a proof of high strategical talent; and great men were Manlius and Decius, who, like all great men, knew very well how to estimate their foes: it was on the strength of this knowledge that they ventured thus to lead their armies round in a semicircle. The Latins, by a quick movement, might have devastated the whole of the Roman territory; and then, eight days before the Romans could have returned, they might have made their appearance at the gates of Rome, with an easy retreat to their fortresses: but the Roman generals must have well known the want of spirit and the mediocrity of their enemy, and therefore have left the road to Rome open. The Latins listened to the complaints of the Campanians, and may perhaps have thought thus to destroy the whole of the Roman army with one blow, as it could not return. Their force also might have encouraged them in such a hope: a trifle would have turned the scale; they might have conquered, as well as have been conquered. The Romans, no doubt, had sent all that they could muster into the field, and were not even then equal to the Latins. That the Samnites joined them, is certain; but the Roman annalists try to deny it, as if the Samnites had arrived only after the battle. The Latins and their allies, the Volscians, Æquians, Sidicines, Campanians, and Auruncians, had pitched their camp on the eastern side of Vesuvius; whether Veseris, where the battle was fought, is the name of a town or a river, is not certain. Here the two armies stood for a long time over-against each other, anxiously awaiting the decisive day. If the Latins had had an able general, they would, after a defeat, have been far better off than the Romans: they could retreat to Capua, throw themselves behind the Liris, and there collect reinforcements from their own country. Nor were the Romans superior to the Latins in a military point of view. There had always been a Roman and a Latin century combined as a maniple in the legion, so that the organisation of the two armies was the same. Under these circumstances, the consul forbade all single combats on pain of death; and this he did on account of the moral effect,--as slight accidents may easily give birth to a prejudice concerning the issue of the battle,--not on account of the acquaintance with the enemy, as is stated by Livy. Thus it was forbidden in the Russian army to accept the challenge of the Turkish Spahis. The stricter the prohibition was, the louder was the defiance of the Latin knights; and it moreover happened that the Roman cavalry had always been the worst part of the army, worse, for instance, than that of the Ætolians. This gave rise to the duel between the Tusculan Geminius Metius and the son of consul Manlius. Livy has told this incident in a masterly style, with the heart of a Roman, and the soul of a poet: the father, in order to enforce obedience, had his son executed. There is another circumstance connected with it, which Livy mentions only cursorily.[135] In the old legend, it was certainly not the son of Manlius alone, but a centurion besides, who conquers for the _pedites_ as the former did for the _equites_.

The long time which elapsed before the battle began, is a decisive proof that the Samnites did not stay away altogether. The Romans went into battle with gloomy forebodings; besides which, both of the consuls had had a dream, which announced a dismal issue, that one army and the general of the other were doomed to the infernal gods. On this, the two consuls agreed that the general of whichever wing[136] was hard pressed, should devote himself to the infernal gods. Both of them offered sacrifice; and that of Decius was of evil omen, that of Manlius propitious. It occurs here, as it often does in such cases, that the liver had no _caput_, which is, what in Italian is still called _capo_, the place where the liver is grown to the midriff; the seam was wanting. The liver exhibits the most varied features: quite healthy animals may have great differences of formation in their livers. In the heart and the lungs, no handle for divinations is to be found; the liver has nearly always some abnormities. Decius now went into battle with the resolution of sacrificing himself, a resolution which must have been formed already in Rome, as the pontifex accompanied the army in order to devote him.

The Roman legion then consisted of five bodies, _hastati_, _principes_, _triarii_, _rorarii_, _accensi_. Of these, there were three battalions of the line mixed up with light troops, and a battalion of light troops, the _rorarii_ with a third of the _hastati_. Of the latter, nearly two-thirds were from early times armed with spears: the _principes_ had at that time already _pila_; but the _triarii_ had still lances. These were the troops of the line; but the _ferentarii_ were light troops with slings, and one-third of the _hastati_, light soldiers with javelins. In the beginning of the battle, these skirmishers were thrown out like the ψιλοί of the Greeks, and afterwards retired through the lines to the rear; yet they always came forth again, as soon as the enemy retreated. These three battalions stood in detached maniples with intervals, as at Zama; but certainly not _en échelons_, such a large interval, as that stated by Livy, being practically impossible in a line, as the cavalry would have broken through it at once: probably they were drawn up in a _quincunx_, in which such intervals might exist. As the whole of the Roman array of battle was calculated to keep up the exertion of the individual, not, like the Greek, to form compact masses; the rule was this, that the two first battalions, covered by the skirmishers, approached the enemy as close as possible. Every Roman soldier was perfectly trained for fighting. In the later order of battle, the soldier began the onset with the _pilum_. The Roman soldiers stood in ten ranks with plenty of room for moving; if these were closed, the first battalion ran forward, halted, and then hurled those terrible _pila_ which pierced through armour, and of which each man had several with him. When they thus halted, all was not yet over after the first throw; but the front ranks, after having discharged their _pila_, fell back two steps, and the rank close behind them came forward too, and took its place at the side of each, on the same line; the first rank then retired, and formed the tenth rank. Thus the whole ten advanced in their turn to use their _pila_. This mode of attack, the only possible and true one, was terrible to the enemy. From this quiet rotation it may also be conceived, how it was that the fights lasted a long while, and that the soldiers did not at once come to close quarters: an hour surely was taken up in merely throwing the _pila_. Then did the fight with swords begin, in which the ranks again relieved each other. The rear ranks were not idle in the meantime. If some of the front ranks fell, or were worn out, they took their places; and thus the Roman battle might last a good while. For this, armies must indeed have been trained and practised, as the Romans were. The dust and the shout of battle were not as confusing as the smoke and thunder of artillery. If the _hastati_ had done fighting, they withdrew to the rear of the _principes_ who now commenced; if the troops were overpowered, they fell back on the _triarii_, who, at that time, formed a reserve which, however, was always obliged to enter into the fight. Besides those four battalions, the three of the line and one of light troops, there was a fifth, the _accensi_, without armour, and merely intended to fill up the places of the slain, whose arms they were to take. The _accensi_ and _velati_ were the two centuries which were attached to the fifth class, though below its census.

It is evident that Manlius, in this instance, did a thing which had never been done before: he armed the _accensi_, used them to strengthen his line, instead of the _triarii_ whom he reserved for the last decision. By this means he saved himself. Not that, as Livy says, the Latins mistook the _accensi_ for _triarii_; this is not possible, though it may be that the _accensi_ also were armed with spears, and advanced as phalangites. The Latins went on in the old routine; and even then, they had nothing but its common-place elements. In the meantime, at the wing of Decius the fight was disastrous; the Latins were conquering. On this, Decius caused himself to be devoted to death by the pontifex M. Valerius. This devotion had an inspiring effect upon the army, and one which to their ideas was magical; as the consul had atoned for the whole nation, which was now deemed invincible. And thus, according to the legend, the fortune of the battle turned at once; the legions rallied, and won the completest of victories.

If Rome had been overpowered in this struggle, the whole of her army would have been annihilated. The Latins, however, would not have been able to derive the same advantages from it which Rome did; for as Latium itself was wanting in that unity which is based upon a grand central point, the supremacy would have been left in abeyance between it and Samnium. There is every likelihood that Italy would then have fallen under a foreign yoke; it might perhaps have become the hopeless prey of Pyrrhus, or at least of the Carthaginians, and the Gauls would have incessantly wasted it. Had the Italian nations been wise, the same result would have been brought about without the destruction which now indeed accompanied it.

The battle must have been a complete defeat to the Latins; so decisive was it, that all were seized with panic. Capua evidently yielded at once; and those who had been beaten, did not even try to defend themselves behind the Vulturnus, but hurried away beyond the Liris. All fled. At Vescia, however, a new army was formed. Vescia is an Ausonian town near the Vescinian mountains, probably the present S. Agata di Goti: there are indeed no ruins there, but many tombs. It is situated on the natural road from the Liris to the Vulturnus; going to Naples, one has the mountains on the right hand. The flight of the Latins cannot then have been so disorderly as Livy describes it. Here those who had escaped assembled, and were reinforced by fresh contingents from the old Latin and Volscian towns; the Volscians on the sea coast, and on the Liris, the Auruncians and Sidicines, consequently the whole of the country between the Liris and the Vulturnus, were united. This army offered to the Romans a final battle near Trifanum on the Liris, between Sinuessa and Minturnæ. The Romans at once attacked, without resting from their march, and gained a decisive victory, though with a great loss of men; and this second overthrow of the Latins completed the destruction of all their resources, especially as they had the broad river Liris behind them. The contingents dispersed, each to defend its own town. The Romans quickly followed up the advantage which they had won, and went on towards Rome, passing through the very territory of the Latins. Whether Latium was then entirely subdued already, as Livy tells us, or yet later,--the Latins indeed are still open enemies the year after,--can only be decided according to probability. The Roman senate now pronounced judgment at once: perhaps these had laid down arms in their first fright, and had afterwards taken them up again; perhaps also the senate, with a grand confidence in the certainty of eventual success, passed the resolution that the _ager publicus_ of the Latin state, the Falernian district of the Campanians, and part of the _ager Privernas_,--Privernum does not seem to have entered into the league of the Latins,--should be confiscated, and assigned to the _Plebes viritim_, that is to say, to every one who had put on the _toga pura_: assignments beyond the Vulturnus would not have been worth anything to the Romans. The assignation was, however, of very trifling extent, as the chief men among the plebeians intrigued with the patricians against the people. It was probably as a compensation for the _ager Falernus_, that to each of the Campanian knights a yearly revenue of four hundred and fifty _denarii_, to be paid by the commonalty of Capua, was adjudged: these, as was already remarked, were the Samnites of the old colony, who for the sake of their own interest had taken no share in the struggle. In the following year, after the Romans had received the submission of the Latins, that terrible punishment must have driven the latter to despair, and we see them again under arms. We know from more examples than one, with what cruelty the Romans dealt with a people that had revolted, for instance, Pleminius at Locri, during the war of Hannibal; so that we may believe that the garrisons in each of the towns were allowed to commit every crime, and such places had long to suffer all the horrors of a city taken by storm. The Romans now made war against the Latins from the nearest points of their territory. The insurrection was only in old Latium proper; in Tibur, Præneste, Pedum, on one side, and in Aricia, Lavinium, Antium, and Velitræ, on the other: this last town was originally Latin, then Volscian, at length it received a Roman colony; Tusculum and Ardea were Roman. These places formed two masses which defended themselves. The two consuls, Ti. Æmilius Mamercinus and Q. Publilius Philo, fought against them: Publilius had foiled an attempt of the Latins in the field;[137] Æmilius besieged Pedum. Here the united peoples of Tibur and Pedum had intrenched themselves, and the year passed away without any result. It was resolved to appoint a dictator; it is uncertain for what reason. Æmilius thence took occasion to name Publilius for that dignity.

There was now a suspension of arms, and attention was turned to domestic laws _minuendo juri Patrum_, the necessary results of the existing state of things, and not to be blamed, as Livy imagines. The first was, that one of the censors was now, of necessity, to be a plebeian. This in truth had already before been the case; C. Marcius, as we know, was the first plebeian censor; but it was only now that it became lawful, and was always done. The second, that to the laws which should be brought before the _comitia centuriata_, the patricians were to give a previous consent, whatever might be the resolution which the centuries should come to. Formerly the consuls had the initiative in the laws; afterwards also the prætor, as he too might preside in the senate, and make motions, his power having sprung from that of the consuls: the ædiles therefore had not this right, although they had the _sella curulis_. Yet the decree which the senate had passed on the motion of the magistrate, was not law; but it went to the centuries, and then to the curies. This circuitous method began when the _comitia centuriata_ were added to the constitution. The senate was at first a patrician committee, and in fact even now the majority was still patrician; there was, however, already a very powerful plebeian element in it. Since the decemvirate, a hundred and ten years had elapsed; many patrician clans therefore must in that time have become extinct, and others have gone over to the _Plebes_. From Von Stetten’s history of the houses of Augsburg, we see that out of fifty-one houses in that city, thirty-eight became extinct in one hundred years; and that those which were left, then put forth the self-same claims which the fifty-one, a hundred years before, had not been able to make good. There was therefore no longer any reason whatever for allowing the patricians at Rome to have the veto as formerly; if it were taken away, it would only save a very great deal of unnecessary quarrelling. The more the patricians dwindled away, the more the ground was felt to be shaking beneath their feet, the more jealous they became, and the more they displayed their ill-humour in the weightiest business of the state. The change therefore made by Publilius, was a well-grounded one. Nothing, however, was ever formally abolished in Rome; but if old institutions were no more of use, they were allowed to continue as forms, so that they could do no harm: and thus it was enacted, that if the senate wanted anything to be decreed, the curies were to give their sanction to it beforehand. It is probable that, as in after days, only the lictors lent themselves to this farce. The third law is, _ut plebiscita omnes Quirites tenerent_; and it concerns, as was explained above, government decrees (ψηφίσματα), which were to be confirmed by the tribes, instead of by the centuries. This too was a mere formality; for if the tribunes, with whom the consul had previously conferred, agreed to them, the _Plebs_ also always gave its consent.

The following year 417 is a decisive one: it is that in which the two hostile masses, the people of Pedum with their neighbours, and the inhabitants of the sea-coast, were utterly routed by L. Furius Camillus and C. Mænius, and Pedum taken by storm. C. Mænius is looked upon by the ancients as the one who decided the war. He conquered on the river Astura, the position of which is not known; a place of that name was situated between Circeii and Antium: certain it is, that he gained a victory on the coast, and Camillus another inland. To Mænius as the conqueror of the Latin people, an equestrian statue was erected. From henceforth no Latin army makes a stand any more in the field: the towns one by one capitulated. Livy’s account of it seems extremely satisfactory; but, if we compare it with other important notices, it is not so. He postdates events; some matters he omits, others he conceives but vaguely; and he makes no distinction between the free and the dependent _municipium_. Thus it happens, that we have only a general knowledge of these relations. The whole of the Latin state was broken up; the single towns, the senate resolved upon keeping, and making them of use to Rome, which, with extraordinary wisdom was done in different ways. Tusculum had had from of old the right of Roman citizenship, but not completely; its inhabitants now became full citizens. To the people of Lanuvium and of Nomentum, the freedom of Rome was granted, to become full citizens like the Tusculans; and at the same time, their population was enrolled in the census as plebeians, and admitted into the tribes. The Tusculans were put into the _tribus Pupinia_;[138] the Lanuvinians, and perhaps the Veliturnians, were formed into a new tribe, probably the _Scaptia_: whether the Nomentans formed the _Mæcia_, is uncertain. The Aricians also are mentioned by Livy among those who had received the citizenship; but according to an authentic account, they stood some years later in the position of a dependent _municipium_. Thus therefore these peoples attained to great honours. No place has given birth to so many renowned families as the little town of Tusculum, the cradle of the Fulvii, Porcii, Coruncanii, Curii, and others. This is a remark of Cicero’s, and as a general rule, a particularly large number of great men thus often come from certain places. Of Lanuvium hardly a family can be named.

Others also became citizens; but not _optimo jure_. From thence begins the class of citizens _sine suffragio_, which afterwards increases, and rises to a position of its own. The isopolites of old were _municipes_; and, if they settled in Rome, they could exercise the full rights of Roman citizens, a case like that of the freemen from the district of Florence before the year 1530. Into this relation of isopolity did those towns now enter, which had received the _civitas sine suffragio_. There was this difference, that formerly those only were _municipes_, who came to Rome, but whose native land enjoyed perfect independence in its political relations with other countries. This was now done away with. Single places became _municipia_; but were quite dependent with regard to foreign affairs; in the definition therefore in Festus, this is the second class of the _municipia_. Such _municipia_ had _connubium_ with Rome, and their own magistrates, and their inhabitants might acquire landed property there; but they were entirely dependent upon Rome, like an _arrogated_ son on his father, or a wife _quæ in manum convenerat_: with regard to others they had no _persona_. Their right as regarded Rome, was to have equity at her hands. To that of Roman citizenship, they might be admitted as individuals by the censors; yet they did not serve in the legion, because they were not in the tribes; still they had to furnish troops, not as _socii_, but in fact as _Romani_, although in separate cohorts. The question may be mooted, whether they were liable to the _tributum_; that is to say, whether, if a _tributum_ was levied at Rome, they had to pay according to the Roman census, and possessed the right of sharing burthens and advantages with the Roman people; or whether they were assessed at home. The latter was probably the case, as they raised and paid their troops themselves, and the _tributum_ was also inherently connected with the _tribus_. To pay they had at all events; that was a thing of course. Without doubt, they had a share in the common land: if the Romans got a general assignation, these places also had a district assigned to them which they might dispose of in whatever way they chose. It is thus only, that Capua could have made such considerable acquisitions after the war of Pyrrhus.

Thus was this decision an important epoch for the Roman state. There sprang up quite a new class of _municipia_, the consequence of which was, that the Romans frequently bought estates in those districts. Soon, however, an inconvenience showed itself; as Romans had to appear before the tribunal of those who were by no means of so high a standing as themselves. This was afterwards remedied by the establishment of a _præfectura_; which the ancients, Livy in particular, misinterpreted, as if those towns had become quite subject when such an office was instituted. The province of the præfects (townwardens, reeves), was that of administering the law to the full citizens. Such places were then called _fora_ or _conciliabula_, which was much the same thing as the townhouse in an American township: here was the court of law, and the markets also. The Roman who, for instance, bought at Capua a slave according to the law of that district, could not claim him as his property at Rome; if, however, the purchase had been made before the præfect according to Roman law, it could not be impugned on any account.

The fate of the other Latin towns was very hard. From Velitræ, the old senators, who were probably Volscians, together with a large part of the inhabitants, were led away across the Tiber into exile; and a new colony was sent into the place. To Antium, which was a sea-port, a marine colony was sent; the inhabitants received the inferior right of Roman citizenship, which the Roman settlers also entered into on going thither. The Antiates were deprived of their armed vessels (_interdictum mare_): the Romans detested piracy, and in this way got most easily out of it: whether the commerce of the Antiates suffered from it, was all the same to them. The other places were forbidden _connubium_ and _commercium_ among each other, and also common deliberations (_concilia_), as in Achaia, Phocis, Bœotia; from none of them could any thing be bought or sold to the other; besides which, each had its own burdens; so that, if once by any calamity the landed property in one of them fell in value, the distress was very great. They were limited to selling among themselves, or to Roman citizens, as they had _commercium_ with Romans only. This was the cause of the decline of these towns; for in proportion as Romans settled there, their burthens became greater and greater, so that part of them vanished from the face of the earth. Præneste and Tibur only kept their footing. They were _agro multati_; but in Polybius’ times they again make their appearance in possession of the old _jus municipii_. According to Livy, it might seem as if none but the Laurentines had retained the old _fœdus_; but it is very possible that this was also the case with these two, and that, although they at that time lost their demesne, they still preserved the franchise of the _municipium_. Both of them had large and fruitful country districts, and they must have had peculiar vitality in them: Præneste indeed tried more than once to shake off the Roman yoke. In this isolation all those places were comprehended, which at the end of the fourth century were leagued with Latium. The prohibition of the _concilia_ remained in force; for the _feriæ Latinæ_, the old diet, became a mere shadow, a _conventus_ (πανήγυρις) solely for the celebration of the games. This isolation was also particularly extended to the Æquians, who doubtless had been in the Latin league.

This was an expedient which the Romans now invariably employed, wherever they wanted to break a conquered people, as they did afterwards in Achaia. By this means, the chief places were entirely severed; the feeling of unity died away; they looked on each other as strangers,--and such a separation generally brings on hostility after it, as in Northern and Southern Dittmarschen. As the Romans placed no garrisons in the towns, they were obliged to adopt this Machiavellian policy. In the same manner, the Grand Duke Peter Leopold of Tuscany, who likewise kept no troops, divided his subjects, and thereby made them bad.

The Latin colonies, as it seems, were severed from the rest of Latium; whereas formerly they had been attached in the first instance to Latium, and did not immediately depend upon Rome. They now became a peculiar class of subjects, the like of which had not existed before; as Rome from this time founds Latin colonies by her own absolute authority. These deserve the admiration with which Machiavel speaks of them; they are the device of a grand, statesmanlike spirit. They were increased to thirty, even as there had formerly been thirty Latin towns. These colonies have their origin in the treaty between the two peoples. A district conquered in common, was formerly shared between them both; but those which could not, or which were not to have been thus divided, were assigned as colonies. Rome also founded for herself several colonies, which received the Cærite franchise; but those were called Latin colonies. Here Roman citizens might settle, and thereby left the tribes; yet they could again become citizens, if they chose. Afterwards these colonies joined the Latin towns: in the list of the thirty Latin places, previous to the battle at the Regillus, in Dionysius, which are certainly those in the treaty of peace between Rome and Latium, there are some which were stated to have been founded as Latin colonies by Tarquin the Proud, and are mentioned as such in the war of Hannibal. With regard to these, there is no doubt but that those Romans who joined the Latins in them, acquired equal civil rights. In the Latin colonies, the number of citizens was much larger than in the Roman ones. Afterwards the Italians were admitted to take part in the colonies; they also sometimes got a share of the demesne; and thus the colonies became the great means for the spread of the Roman dominion, and by the Latin language, which became that of Roman policy, those of the old inhabitants were overpowered. They always were from the first dependent upon Rome, and quite unconnected with each other. Until then, the number of the Latin colonies was inconsiderable; from henceforth it increases. All these places were bound to military service, and Rome prescribed to them their contingent: they mainly contributed to the success of the Romans in the Samnite wars. The Romans surrounded themselves with colonies, as their border strongholds. A district was given over to several thousand men with the obligation to keep it; there were added to them from Rome as many as liked to join them, and others from Latium and other nations. The laws were established; the old inhabitants remained as a commonalty,--the mass of the tradesmen certainly consisted of them; they amalgamated before long with the _coloni_, and this germ grew up to be a stately tree. Rome first planted these colonies on the Liris, and in Campania; then drew this chain as high up as Umbria, and pushed it on further and further. This double plan of founding colonies, and of imparting the right of citizenship, without, and in some cases with the _suffragium_, became the means by which Rome, from a city-corporation, grew into a state which comprised the whole of Italy. The _coloni_ were not charged with any personal taxes, which fell upon foreigners only; they had but to pay tithes from the _Ager_, _ex formula_.

The revolution which resulted from the conquest of the Latins, is immense in its consequences. Only two years before, Rome’s destruction by the Latins was quite a possible event; now all the resources of Latium had accrued to her, which had not been destroyed during the struggle. There follows, however, from the reasons mentioned above, an epoch of decline for the Latin towns.

Among the Campanians the Romans likewise created divisions: they made a distinction between the _Populus_ and the _Plebes_, the former being the indemnified knights. The relation with the Hernicans was not changed; or if it were, they had now in the victories of the Romans got an equivalent in money. Capua, Cumæ, Suessula, Atella, Fundi, and Formiæ, receive the free _municipium_ and isopolity; the Romans therefore nominally acknowledge their full equality.

We are hardly able to form a distinct idea of the then state of the Roman commonwealth at home, owing to the insufficiency of the accounts which we have. The war had cost Rome such heavy sacrifices, that although her sway reached from Sutrium and Nepete as far as Campania, she suffered from faintness and loss of blood for a long time after; and thus the calm which ensued is perfectly intelligible. The year after the decision of the war (418), the prætorship was imparted to the plebeian order, under certain conditions; so that from that time, the prætorship, in accordance with the rule laid down, alternated between patricians and plebeians. This may be historically proved: the exceptions are worth remarking, and they help to explain the law. The first plebeian prætor was Q. Publilius Philo; and therefore, perhaps, some connection between this law and three others which go by his name, may be surmised. When the second prætorship, the so-called _prætura peregrina_ was added, one was always a patrician and the other a plebeian; just as afterwards, when there are four in number, two are patricians, and two plebeians. But when afterwards there were six of them, such an equal division could no longer take place, as the patricians had fast dwindled. The completion of the Licinian law was a great step in advance; the equality of the two orders had now become a reality; for the circumstance that the patricians still chose _interreges_ exclusively from among themselves, is of no importance. The recurrence of the _interregna_ at that period, indeed shows that the patricians were still dreaming of evading the law; the gain became the more tempting, as the number lessened of those who laid claim to it. Yet these attempts, as far as we can see, did not call forth any violent reaction: the force of circumstances and the reality of facts turned the scales.

Abroad there was no war of any consequence. The Romans had to carry on a petty warfare which was rather welcome to them, and which had for its object, to make their state a connected whole as far as the Liris and Campania. On both banks of the Liris dwelt the Auruncians (called Ausonians by the Greeks, and also in Livy, when he borrows from Greek sources, namely Fabius, or Dionysius), an Oscan people. These had taken part against the Romans in the Latin war; but had afterwards submitted to them as subjects, and were now under their protection. The Sidicines had been left by the Romans to be conquered by the Samnites, and must have come to terms with them: so that the Samnites allowed them to keep their ground, not wishing the barrier between themselves and the Romans to be pulled down. For this reason, there was now jealousy between the Romans and Samnites. Nor could it have been otherwise. It was especially owing to the Samnite conquests in those parts, that the Volscians had attached themselves to the Latins, and afterwards to the Romans; as the Samnites, at that time, were more dangerous to them than the Romans. The great states would let the small ones make war with each other; for by this means events might be brought about, in which they would find an opportunity for coming forth with all their might: these states, were as it were _pour les coups d’épingles qui précèdent les coups de canon_. The Sidicines, leagued with the Auruncians of Cales, attacked the other Auruncians; and therefore the Romans marched against them. The Romans carried on the war with much policy: they behaved lukewarmly, as it was far from their interest that the Sidicines should be hard pressed, lest they should throw themselves into the arms of the Samnites. They took Cales, between Teanum and Cassilinum, and occupied it by a strong colony. The system was now, by means of such settlements, to gain a firm footing in the country between the Liris and the Vulturnus, as far as the Samnites did not possess it: this course they pursued with great perseverance and great success. By the colony of Cales, Rome connected Campania, which was ever suspected, with her own empire. A second colony, founded soon afterwards, was Fregellæ, which in the seventh century became so remarkable for its pride and its misfortune: it was situated on the spot where the Liris is crossed by the Latin road, which leads through Tusculum to the Hernican towns, and thence by Teanum to Capua. The planting of this colony was a real usurpation: the Samnites were masters of the country as far as Monte Casino; they had subjected the Volscians there, and destroyed Fregellæ; by the treaty moreover, they were allowed to spread in those parts, and even if they had abandoned them, the Romans were not to take possession of them. The Samnites had also taken Sora, and established themselves there, with views certainly as ambitious as those of Rome. The Romans concluded isopolity with the Caudinians; nevertheless the two nations were convinced that war between them was inevitable. Under these circumstances, the Romans indeed were engaged in as troublous a policy as the interesting one of the sixteenth century was.

It is certainly not the mere result of chance, when we remark in history, that at certain periods, in countries far apart, the very same kind of changes take place, which, owing to the distance of space and time, cannot have been brought about one by the other, and from which a new order of things springs up. In this we trace the hand of Providence, which guides the fortunes of men, and the progress of all nations, as one whole. Such an epoch is the breaking up of the Latin league, and the spread of the power of Rome, quite similar to the state of things towards the end of the fifteenth century. An interesting parallel may be drawn between the two periods. It is as if the events which single nations and countries may work out by their own resources, had been achieved; and as if all the relations of life should now be changed according to new landmarks. Nations which had ever been strangers to each other, are now brought into contact; the states, which had hitherto been the most flourishing, begin to decay, and there only remains the yellow leaf of autumn; the intellectual brilliance of the most gifted races is waning fast, never to blaze forth again; inclinations and tastes take a new turn, as well as the whole of every day life with its animal wants and enjoyments: even the physical nature of man is changed, as new diseases make their appearance. Thus it was at the end of the fifteenth century. The bloom of the Italian towns had withered, even as, at the period of which we are treating, Greece was falling into decay. The cause of the prosperity of Greece, the balance of its many small states, was also that of its decline; for no single one of these was powerful enough to keep up the whole.--The very same were the relations of Italy at that time. Florence and Venice stood side by side with equal power; if Venice had been strong enough to have had the mastery, a new and better order of things would have arisen. The battle of Chæronea and the downfall of the Latins took place in the same year, and this coincidence shows us the hand of Providence working in secret. The Romans and Samnites, to all appearance, faced each other as equals; and it seemed as if the struggle must have ended in the destruction of both, of which foreigners and barbarians would then have reaped the advantage. For in the North, the Gauls already held a great part of Italy; and on the other side, the Carthaginians were threatening. It is true that a short time before, Timoleon had checked the spread of the latter in Sicily; yet sooner or later, they could not fail to take that island as well as Corsica, even as they had already got Sardinia, all but one mountain range. Thus it seemed, that after the Romans and Samnites had mutually ruined each other, these two peoples were to divide Italy between themselves.