Chapter VII: Part 7

The Etruscans have all the distinguishing features of an immigrating people, probably not much more numerous than the Germans who settled in Italy at the beginning of the middle ages. The towns bear rule, and in them the clans govern; their territories are large, but have no importance. This oligarchical form of government was the very thing which made Etruria powerless against Rome, as it was dangerous to put arms into the hands of the common people.

Dionysius, who gives the expressions of his authorities with great care, says that the magnates of the Etruscans had assembled with their clients for war. Among the Romans it is only the last resource to call upon the clients, when the plebeians refused to take the field. Other nations also allude to the fact that Etruria was peopled by vassals under a territorial aristocracy. When on the advance of the Gauls the dwellers on the left bank of the Tiber separated from Rome, Rome drew to herself those on the right bank, Cære got isopolity; four new tribes were formed from those who in the war had separated from Veii and Falerii, evidently not _transfugæ_, as Livy says, but whole populations which joined Rome to escape from oppression. This plainly appears from analogy; for from the Volscians two tribes only are formed, and as many from the Sabines. Moreover, the history of the insurrection of Vulsinii exhibits the condition of a vanquished people, as I have shown in the first volume of my Roman history. The Vulsinians formed from their serfs a _plebes_ in order to repel the Romans; the _plebes_ afterwards subjects its former rulers, and the latter choose rather to throw themselves into the arms of the Romans, and to allow their town to be destroyed by them. There is every where such an oligarchy; hence it is that we find so very few towns in Etruria. The whole country from the Apennines to Rome had only twelve. For this reason power was only in its rudest state of development: there was no lasting vitality in it, no elements of national existence, as among the Romans, or the Samnites who evidently did not oppress the old Oscan people, but combined into one whole with them, and even adopted their language; whilst on the contrary, the Lucinians, who had emigrated from among the Sabines, stood in quite a different position to the old Œnotrians, or else the numbers of their citizens must have been stated quite differently by Polybius. Here an opposite policy bears opposite fruits. The insurrection of the Bruttians is nothing else but that the Œnotrians, who were already serfs under the Greeks, broke their chains when they became subject to new masters who treated them still more harshly. The Etruscans, in spite of their wealth and their greatness, could not withstand the Romans; their towns did not form a closely connected state as did those [of] the Latins, nor even as the Achæans. Most of the towns laid down their arms in the fifth century, after one or two battles. The only town which defended itself for thirty years, was that very Vulsinii where the serfs were changed into a _plebes_. The Samnites resisted for seventy years; the Lucanians for a very short time only.

The Etruscans have met with great favour with the moderns; the ancients thought very lightly of them. Among the Greeks, very unfavourable accounts were in circulation concerning their unbounded luxury. In some measure justice is done to them in respect to the fine arts. The technical perfection and quaint effect of their works had great attraction; the _Signa Tuscana_ were about as much prized at Rome, as old German pictures are now a-days in Germany.

The Etruscans enjoyed particular consideration as a people of priests, who were devoted to soothsaying in all its forms, especially from meteorological or astronomical phenomena, and from the entrails of victims: the augural divinations, on the other hand, are an inheritance of the Sabellian races. Yet we must after all acknowledge this to have been a system of gross fraud. I will not deny that the observations on lightning led the Etruscans to interesting discoveries. They were already aware of the lightnings flashing forth from the earth, which are now generally acknowledged by natural philosophers, but were denied only thirty years ago. That they knew of lightning conductors, as one might suppose from Jupiter Elicius, is now much less probable to me than it was formerly. It would never have been so entirely lost. And, besides, it is not stated that the lightnings were attracted, but called forth.

In history, the Etruscans show themselves in any thing but a favourable light. Unwarlike, inclined to withdraw from impending danger at the price of humiliation; just as in modern times so many states have done between 1796 and 1813. The descriptions of their great luxury may have been exaggerated; yet they had some foundation. For nearly two hundred years, the Etruscans lived in the most profound peace under the Roman dominion, free from every service in war; except in extraordinary emergencies, as in the war of Hannibal. To this period, then, the immense wealth and luxury which Polybius described are to be referred.

The Etruscans had also annals, of which the emperor Claudius made use. Some few portions of them may have likewise come to Verrius Flaccus and to Varro. Cæles Vibenna is especially celebrated. He offers, in fact, the only historical point which we know from the history of the Etruscans. Cæles Vibenna is said by some to have come to Rome, and to have settled on the Cælius. According to others, and indeed to those who follow the Etruscan traditions, he died in Etruria, and his general, Mastarna, led the remainder of his army to Rome, where he is said to have given the _Mons Cælius_ the name of his old general. In the narratives we always find him as a condottiere, as the independent leader of a free corps, in no sort of subjection to any of the towns; like the Catalan hosts in the beginning of the fourteenth century, and the East Indians in the eighteenth. We do not know any thing more about him; yet the emperor Claudius asserts, from the Etruscan books, that his faithful general, Mastarna, when he had come to Rome and settled on the Cælius, had been received into the Roman state under the name of Servius Tullius. This is possible; whilst, on the other hand, the tradition of the Romans concerning Servius Tullius falls entirely within the sphere of the miraculous. It is said that in the ashes of the altar a vision of the God of fire had appeared to Tanaquil; that she had ordered her maid to lock herself up there, dressed as a bride; that the maid had gotten with child, and had borne Servius Tullius; and that therefore, in token of the latter’s descent from the god of fire, his head had during his childhood been surrounded, when he was asleep, by a halo of fire, and also at the conflagration of a temple, his wooden image in it had remained untouched. With a great deal of circumspection those who refine on history, have attempted to introduce this legend also into authentic history. Many of them find his descent from a bondmaid to be unseemly; and so they make him out to be the son of a man of rank at Corniculum, who had died, and had left her with child, whereupon she had been brought to the royal palace. According to others, his mother was indeed a bondmaid, but his father was the king. The halo of fire also is interpreted as symbolical of his early developed mind: _non latuit scintilla ingenii in puero_, says Cicero. Yet the old poets meant it seriously. We have the choice either of leaving the descent of Tullius in obscurity, or of believing that the Etruscan histories are true. I am so decidedly of opinion, that the Etruscan literature is older than that of the Romans, that I do not hesitate to give their legends the preference; and still more so, because Tarquinius Priscus has been made to be an Etruscan; since the existence of an Etruscan element was perceived, which, on account of the name, was referred to Tarquinius. Servius Tullius was represented as belonging to another race, chiefly because Rome did not wish to own herself indebted to an Etruscan for the important changes which are ascribed to that king. As he could not, however, be positively assigned to any distinct clan, recourse was had to the mythus; and he was made to be the son of a god like Romulus, just as Numa also was said to be the husband of a goddess. In the case of the son of a god, it is of no consequence who is his mother.[65] Yet we cannot draw from this any farther conclusions; nor can we make any use in history of the notice that he was an Etruscan, and that he led the remainder of the army of Cæles Vibenna up to Rome. Livy speaks of a Veientian war; but he only gives a few outlines, from which it is evident that he knew this was nothing but the fraudulent work of the Fasti.

In the legend we find Servius Tullius as a Latin, who ascends the throne, yet not even by regular election. To him all the political law is traced back, as all the spiritual was to Numa; a proof that to Livy himself they were no historical persons. The _gens Tullia_, to which Servius may have belonged, perhaps by adoption, is expressly mentioned as an Alban clan settled on the Cælius, consequently belonging to the Luceres; and thus a king of the third tribe,--or as that and the commonalty are very nearly related, for it is derived from Corniculum,--a king from the commonalty ascends the throne. He is installed in his rule without election; yet he is then acknowledged by the Curies. Now Servius appears important from three different points of view:--as the enlarger of the city, inasmuch as he gave to Rome its legal circuit, even as it remained down to the time of the Emperors, although suburbs were added;--as the author of a constitution, since he constitutes the _plebes_ as the second half of the nation;--and as the founder of the connexion with the Latins, who before that had only been either at war with the Romans, or else in a state of forced dependance upon them.

In these respects he is of such consequence, that we must dwell at some length on the subject. Tarquinius Priscus and Servius Tullius, for the sake of clearness, shall here be treated as if they were historical persons; but merely for the designation of relations and causes, their names serving instead of an _x_. In this manner, as was already remarked, we start from the most ancient form of Rome previous to this change.

In its first form, Rome consisted of a city on the Palatine, surrounded by a wall and ditch, with a suburb, and of a Sabine town on the Quirinal and on the Tarpeian Hill. From the union of both, Rome arose; and from the union of both bodies of citizens, the Roman citizenship. All modern states, with the single exception of the canton of Schwytz, have their governments and subdivisions according to their territory. Every city is divided into districts and wards, and on these, in representative governments, the representation is based: he who has his abode in a district is both an elector, and may also be elected in it. But the view which the ancients took was this, that the land was only the substratum of the state; that the state itself was formed of individuals; and that the relations of these to the whole community were modified in different ways by the corporations. Hence the state was divided into a certain number of associations, each of which again consisted of several families. These associations had among themselves their assemblies, their rights of inheritance, &c. their tribunals, and especially their sanctuaries. Whoever belonged to them, bequeathed these to his children; and wherever he might live, within or without the state, he was always deemed to belong to that association. Whoever, on the contrary, did not belong to it by right of birth, could only come in as an exception, if that association acknowledged him. A man might be received into the state with all the rights which the ancients confined to the citizen as such, he might acquire landed property, he might sue and be sued; and yet, unless he had a share in some association, he was only an inmate, and could not be invested with an office, nor could he vote. This view was generally entertained by all the most ancient states. The state could merely bestow upon an individual the right of abode and civil privileges: it could not command the association to receive any one. In many states, the associations had not even the right of admitting any body. This is the case with the castes which always remain exclusive, and which, being separate, allow of no intermarriage. Such an association, comprehending a number of families from which one may go out, but into which one either cannot enter at all, or only by the adoption of the whole association, is a clan, and by no means what we call family, which implies an origin from a common root; for when these clans have patronymics, they are always merely symbolical, and derived from heroes.[66] I assume it as a certain fact that among the Romans the division of the nation was into _gentes_, which were analogous to the γένη of the Greeks, and to the _Geschlechter_ of our German forefathers. This is a presupposition to start from, for which, when the time comes, historical proofs will not be wanting. Let us first speak of that people concerning which the accounts are more distinct,--the Greeks. Their γένη are associations which, notwithstanding their common name, are not to be looked upon as families sprung from the same ancestors; but as the descendants of those persons, who at the foundation of the state were united in a corporation of this kind. This is expressly stated in Pollux, undoubtedly from Aristotle, wherein it is asserted that the _Gennetæ_ were called from the γένη; and that they were connected not by descent (γένει μὲν οὐ προσήκοντες) but by ἱερά which they had in common. Then we have also the evidence of Harpocration concerning the Homerides in Chios; he says that they were a _genos_ in that island, but that according to the opinion of the well-informed they had no relationship whatever with Homer. These γένη are just like the Arabian tribes, the Beni Tai are ten thousand families who cannot all descend from Edid Tai; or like the clans of the Highlanders, who were named after individuals; yet it was only in a poetical sense that they spoke of themselves as the kinsmen and descendants of these. In the Highlands there were five thousand Campbells able to bear arms, who looked upon the Duke of Argyle as their cousin.

Concerning the Roman _gentes_ we have no positive evidence, like that of Pollux and Harpocration (such perhaps as Verrius Flaccus would have given), that they were corporations without relationship; but we have an important definition of Cicero’s in the _Topica_. He there gives the word _gentiles_ as a difficult subject for definition; and such it was, because in fact time in its course had wrought a thorough change in the original institution. The _gentes_ in Cicero’s days had lost much of their former consequence, and their constitution had been affected by law decisions. He says, _Gentiles sunt, qui inter se, eodem nomine sunt. Non satis est. Qui ab ingenuis oriundi sunt. Ne id quidem satis est. Quorum majorum nemo servitutem servivit. Abest etiam nunc. Qui capite non sunt deminuti. Hoc fortasse satis est._ According to this, the Scipios and Sulla were _gentiles_; for they are _eodem nomine_, &c. Suppose that one of the Cornelii had been _addictus_ as liable to a debt, or condemned to death for a crime, then he was _capite deminutus_, and ousted from his tribe, exactly what the English in feudal language call “corruption of blood.” And should he now as an addictus beget children, these also were outcasts, and did not belong to the _gens_. By the added clause _quorum majorum nemo servitutem servivit_, all the _Libertini_ and their descendants were excluded, although bearing the gentile name of their patrons; yet all the _Peregrini_ were left, whom one might admit if one chose. But this in all likelihood is an addition which was unknown to the old gentile law. For, in my opinion, there was in the earlier times no difference whatever with regard to the Libertini: they belonged to the _gens_ as well as the patrons. Yet this was a moot point, as is shown by the remarkable lawsuit between the patrician and plebeian Claudii (the Marcelli), for the inheritance of a _Libertinus_ in Cicero _de Oratore_. On that occasion a _res judicata_ was pronounced by the centuries, that the patrician Claudii could not inherit in a case of this kind; from which the conclusion was afterwards drawn that the _Libertini_ did not belong to the _gens_.

In the whole of this definition, there is not a word about a descent from a common stock, closely connected as the idea would seem with it. Hence it clearly follows that the _gentes_ in Rome were of the same nature as the Greek γένη. _Genus_ and _gens_ are moreover quite the same word, a thing which often happens with words of the old language, e. g. _cliens_ and _clientus_,[67] _Campans_[68] and _Campanus_, and likewise _Romans_ and _Romanus_: the genitives _Romanum_ and _Romanom_ come from that old contracted nominative.

The very institution of the _gens_ essentially implies a division of the state by its fundamental laws into a certain number of such associations, which then constituted small states by themselves, and enjoyed special privileges of which the extent was very great: _jus gentium_, and _jura gentium_, originally had perhaps a somewhat different, a much wider meaning than we generally believe. The numbers of the _gentes_ are always found in such a proportion to the state as never could have been the result of chance. In Attica there were 360 γένη, a number which the grammarians very correctly refer to the division of the year, or of the compass. This is also the case in Germany; in Cologne there were three orders, each of fifteen houses (Geschlechter); in Florence there were three times four and twenty houses; in Dittmarsch three times ten. Now in Rome there were probably three times one hundred _gentes_, i. e. three tribes of a hundred clans each; wherefore Livy gives them the name of _centuria_, and not _tribus_. There usually existed between the division into tribes and that into clans an intermediate one comprising the latter, as the φράτραι: in Greece, the curies at Rome, which corresponded to the orders in Cologne, and to the classes in the Lombard towns. These Curies are parts of a _Tribus_, and a combination of several _gentes_ (probably consisting always of ten) for common sacrifice. And just as every _gens_ had its own _gentilician sanctuaries_,--for _sacra familiarum_, which sometimes we find mentioned in modern writers, were unknown to the Romans,--so likewise as member of a Cury, each individual had some special duties besides of worship, and a vote in the popular assemblies. The ancients did not vote by poll, but by corporations: from the earliest times therefore it continued to be the established usage at Athens that recruiting and voting should be carried on by φυλαί (_Tribus_). Four Phylæ might be outvoted by six; although, if polled, the latter were very inferior in numbers. In Rome they went still farther: they did not vote by Tribes but by Curies. The reason for it is easy to be seen: for, since at first the Ramnes and the Tities were ruling alone, difficulties might have arisen from allowing only these two to vote. It might easily have happened that one tribe would be for, and the other against; and this would have led to collisions. But if each Tribe was again divided into Curies, and voted accordingly, it was then perhaps more likely that some one Cury gave the casting vote. Before the admission of the third estate this would necessarily happen. Afterwards we find that the turn of the Curies and the _prærogativa_ were decided by lot, a thing which cannot be presumed to have been done before; for by this means the Luceres might have got the initiative as well as the two others. But here we have an instance of the innumerable stages by which the Roman constitution developed itself; and it is precisely this gradual development which has given such a long duration to Roman freedom. For the true secret of a great statesman, who is quite as seldom found as any other great genius, is indeed the gradual perfection and reform of the several points of an existing constitution, and not the sudden setting up of a finished work.

Thus therefore the Curies came into the place of the tribes. During the reign of Tarquinius, the third estate was admitted to the full citizenship: these are the _gentes minores_. The gentes are such an essential element of the constitution, that, as _gentes civium patriciæ_ is the formal expression for _patricii_, thus also _gentes civium majores_ and _minores_ is said. It is stated that the senate had consisted of two hundred, and that Tarquinius had raised it to three hundred by the admission of the _gentes minores_. This can only mean that he gave the third tribe the full citizenship, and received a number of them, which corresponded to that of their _gentes_, into the senate; and this is the usual course of things. In Cologne also, the second and third order were admitted to offices later than the first. It is a great change in the constitution, and one which completes it for the first _populus_. The third estate at the beginning was not quite on the same footing with the rest: their senate was not consulted until the other two had already voted, and in the same way their Curies were certainly only allowed to vote when the others had already given theirs. With regard to the priestly offices, they were only admitted to the college of the Vestals. Where we find _duumviri_, these are but the representatives of the two first tribes: it is in later times only that we find _triumviri_, and when these are patrician, they represent the three tribes. But they are likewise often plebeian, and then based upon the plebeian constitution to be treated of hereafter.

One of the widest spread peculiarities of former times, is the difference made between the old homebred citizens and those who have come from without. This difference has been almost every where done away with by the notions of the eighteenth century. In North America there is hardly any homebred population: with the exception of the eligibility for the presidentship, it matters not in the least how long one has lived in the country; there is no difference between him who is come from the first colonists, and the man who has just landed. Among the ancients, the admission to the rights of citizenship was every where difficult: the alien needed not to be of a foreign tongue, he might belong to the same nation as the citizen, and even to the same tribe of the nation. The lines of demarcation are drawn in the most varied manner. In the oldest constitution of which we have any authentic knowledge, that of the Jews, we already find such a distinction. The people consists of tribes with unequal rights, just as the tribes of the Romans; besides these, are the persons who had been received into the congregation of the Lord. With regard to the latter, the Pentateuch expressly makes this distinction, that some nations might be received, and others not. These aliens form a mass closely connected with the Jewish people, but out of the tribes. In after times, when the Jewish constitution is better known to us from books of more recent date, the population is divided into Jews and Proselytes; and the latter again into two classes,--the Proselytes of Righteousness, and the Proselytes of the Gate.[69] The former had political and civil rights, yet they were excluded from civic honours; they could buy land, make wills, marry Jewish women, &c. &c. The Proselytes of the Gate had to accommodate themselves to the Jewish customs; they could not do any thing which was against the ceremonial law for fear of giving offence; but they did not participate in civil rights with the inhabitants of the country.

The same system presents itself, only less distinctly, in all the Greek constitutions,--a fact about which so much nonsense has been talked. Among the Greeks there existed from the very earliest times, besides the sovereign body of the citizens, a community of native freemen, who had civil rights, but by no means in every instance the privilege of intermarriage with the ruling tribe; they might sue and be sued, yet they had no share in the government. It was otherwise with the aliens or the freedmen, who were bereft of all the personal rights of citizens, and only protected against violence by taking a citizen for their patron. This twofold distinction, that one might be born in a country and exercise civil rights to a certain extent; and that those who were aliens had no civil rights whatever, was a very general notion.

The body of the Roman citizens was now enlarged. At its first origin it was an aristocracy, only so far as the subjected people of the neighbourhood and the freedmen stood in the position of vassals to the citizens; beyond this, no aristocratical relation whatever existed. But when Sabine and Latin communities were so incorporated with Rome that they got full civil rights, and had to serve, that class was formed which in our German towns we call _Pfahlbürger_ (burghers of the pale), an expression which no one has rightly and clearly understood. The derivation of this word is from _Pahl_, or _Pfahl_, (_pale_); in Ireland, the counties round Dublin were said to be “within the English pale.” This name was also given in Germany to the district in the immediate vicinity of a town. The freemen who lived in it had, properly speaking, no rights of citizenship, as these were limited to the _Geschlechter_ (the _Houses_), but merely civil rights. The signification of the word in the course of time was more and more widened, it being also applied to those aliens who had acquired the right of community with a country (Landrecht), or a town (Burgrecht), the _isopolity_ of the Greeks. The investigation of this subject, which is perfectly analogous to the origin of the Roman _plebes_, has to me been fraught with such considerable difficulties, because in the sixteenth century these relations had vanished, and we therefore nowhere find any thing more about them. In the fifteenth century this expression is still found, but hardly in the sixteenth. Johannes Von Müller did not understand it, and has used it without any proper meaning. Now, when a province, or a town, or a baron established such a right of community (_Landrecht_ or _Burgrecht_) with a town, the consequences of it were twofold. In the first place, both parties protected each other in their feuds; and moreover, the strangers might settle with their vassals in the town, where they had the full civil rights of freemen, and also their own courts of law: yet they were not of the sovereign people, as they had no share in the government; and in this respect the _Houses_, as having the sovereignty, stood on quite a different footing. Many of the communities beyond the Tiber, Sabine and Latin, entered into relations of this kind with the Romans, and it was chiefly on the Aventine that they settled. The account given by the Roman historians is, that Ancus had led them from their homes, and had made them take up their abode there; but there are circumstances which make this impossible. For, since all the land near Rome was occupied, they could not have got any there, and must therefore have had their dwellings some miles away from their fields. It is very possible that some of the most distinguished were obliged to settle in Rome. This citizenship “of the pale” now became more and more enlarged. The great body of the people did not as yet form a corporation, though they contained all the elements of one: they increased in the city and the environs at such a rate, especially owing to the union with Latium in the reign of Servius Tullius, that they far outnumbered the old population, and formed the chief strength of Rome, and were employed to a great extent in the wars. And the more they grew, the more did the Tribes, which only intermarried among themselves, die off.

Thus arose the Roman _Plebes_,--the Greek δῆμος, in German _Gemeinde_. The _demos_ comprehended all those who had the inferior citizenship, and who therefore owed service to the state, but had no rights but that of personal freedom. Thus the δῆμος stands in contraposition to the πολῖται, the _plebes_ to the _populus_, the _Gemeinde_ to the _Bürgerschaft_, the _commune_ to the _cittadine_.[70] I also think that πόλις was not originally the term for city (which was called ἄστυ), but just like _populus_, a Tyrrhenian word; and that both of these bear the same meaning which we have stated above, _Populus_ having been formed by reduplication from πόλις. The commonalty is in all states the main part as far as numbers are concerned; yet the way in which it developed itself was different in the ancient world from what it was in the middle ages. In the middle ages, the commonalty resided within the walls: it often settled, as for instance in Geneva, round the _cité_, the heart of the town, in the _bourg_, _borgo_, the suburbs; and its members were therefore called _bourgeois_. These suburbs were then likewise fortified, and in the course of time gained equal rights with the cities. In Germany the same thing happened, the name only being different, for _Bürger_ and _Geschlechter_ have the same meaning; and there the cities sprang up, particularly after the tenth century, when the age had become more settled. And in Gaul, where a _civitas_ and a royal villa still existed from the times of the Romans, a place often grew up near the villa, which remained under the protection of the king, and under the management of the mayors of the Palace. This is the original meaning of the word _ville_, as opposed to _cité_. There is therefore a distinction in French towns between _la cité_, _la ville_, and _le bourg_. Wherever the commonalty was growing up within the walls, it was formed of quite different elements. In the Germanic states, aliens were better treated on the whole than they were in the ancient world, or even in France. The _Beisassen_ of the small Swiss cantons, as for instance of Uri, are, properly speaking, nothing else but subjugated communities; the inhabitants of St. Gervais were subjects of Geneva. In France, by the _droit d’aubaine_, the liege lord was heir to the aliens who were not naturalized; for they were not allowed to make a will. In all those medieval towns where trade and commerce were paramount, the commonalty soon divided itself into guilds, which got their own heads and wardens, their own privileges and style, as well as property; as to capital jurisdiction, it could only be granted by the kings, and wherever it was exercised, they had a share in it. The wardens of the companies at first appear in the council to take care that their rights were not infringed upon; but they soon took their seats as members, and ended by getting the ascendency. This is clearly seen in the Italian cities, e. g. in the case of the seven old guilds at Florence. During the feuds of the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, the clans or houses had still the upperhand; but soon afterwards, about the time of Rudolf of Habsburg, the guilds are every where the ruling power,--in Italy in the thirteenth century, and in Germany about the middle of the fourteenth; at Zurich as well as at Augsburgh, at Strasburg, Ulm, Heilbronn, and the Suabian imperial cities. The transition is made by the houses (_Geschlechter_) sharing the government with the guilds: wherever this is conceded, the union is effected peacefully; but where it is refused, it is only after a sanguinary struggle, which generally ends in the destruction of the houses. But sometimes also the reverse takes place, as at Nuremberg, where the guilds were crushed.

This union of the clans and of the community, or the guilds, is called in Greece πολιτεία; in Italian _popolo_, the meaning of which is somewhat different from that of the Roman _populus_.[71] The partition was so fully carried out, that at Florence, for example at the _palazzo vecchio_, and on books also, the coat of arms of the city, a fleur de luce, and that of the commonalty (_il commune_), a cross, gules, field argent, are seen side by side. The expression _il commune_ easily gives rise to misconceptions; it does not mean the union, but the commonalty, as Savigny has pointed out to me. At Bologna there is a _palatium civium_, and a _palatium communis_. The _Capitano del popolo_ and the _Capitano di parte_ at Florence are also difficult to be understood. In the struggle of the Guelphs and Ghibellines, the _Capitano di parte_, that is, of the party of the Guelphs, having driven the Ghibellines out of the city, was placed at the head of affairs, and the others had their rights of citizenship suspended. The single _Capitano_ of the houses was nevertheless called _di parte_. But among the ancients it was not the guilds within the walls which formed the commonalty; but the population of the country round the city, which consisted of quite different elements, comprehending people of the highest as well as of the lowest ranks. The notion, therefore, is altogether a wrong one, that the _Plebes_ was made up of the poorer classes only. It was occasioned already by the language employed in Plato and Aristotle, as they had only the word δῆμος to designate city-corporation, commonalty, the union of both,--in short, all that did not belong to the ruling class, and moreover the common people. Dionysius knew the word δῆμος only as contradistinguished to βουλὴ, ὄχλος being the proper term for the mass of poor. Yet he also is not free from that mistake, but carried it into Roman history; and as he went much more fully into detail with regard to these relations than Livy did, he led the restorers of ancient history into quite erroneous notions. Livy likewise did not see the matter in a clear light; yet he has many passages from which it is manifest, that the annalists whom he followed were correct in their views. A further cause of this confusion is, however, to be found in the pecuniary embarrassments and debts which are stated to have prevailed among the Plebes; but which, as we shall see hereafter, are only to be understood of the mortgages which encumbered the landowners in many communities. The Plebes is the counterpart of the Populus, as the Romans in general divide all the primary agencies in nature and in the world of intellect into two; one part being male, and the other female: as for instance, Vulcanus and Vesta are the element of fire; Janus and Jana the heavenly lights, the sun and moon; the generating power of the earth, Saturnus and Ops; the earth as solid ground, Tellumo and Tellus; and thus also the entire state, Populus and Plebes, both of which together formed its whole.

Under the protection of the Populus, a number of dependents[72] (_cluentes_, from _cluere_ to hear) dwelt within the liberties of the old town, which extended for about one German mile (nearly five English) on the road leading to Alba. The boundary may be laid down very accurately: unfortunately, the thought struck me only after my departure from Italy. The way in which these clients came to be bound to their patrons, just as the vassals were to their liege-lords, to ransom them from captivity, to pay the portion of their daughters, to be their stay and defence in the time of trouble, had its origin from very different causes. They may partly have been old native Siculians, who on being conquered by the Cascans, swore fealty in order to be mercifully dealt with; foreigners may also have come in as residents, and placed themselves under the guardianship of a Roman citizen; there may likewise have been among them some of the inhabitants of those places which were obliged to submit to the supremacy of Rome; and the slave who had gained his freedom, stood to his late master in the relation of a client. This class must necessarily have gone on increasing so long as Rome was in a flourishing state. The asylum, in the old tradition, has reference to the clientship, the clients having really gathered together from all quarters. Quite distinct from them, however, were the free communities, from which the country population arose, of which the first beginning was traced back to the times of Ancus. Scaliger, in one of the noblest of divinations, has discovered that Catullus calls the Romans _gens Romulique Ancique_, in which Romulus represents the clans, Ancus the commonalty. This _plebes_ now increased, partly owing to the enlargement of the territory, and partly also, without doubt, in consequence of the extinction of some of the clans; in which case their former clients having no more liege lord, now joined themselves to the commonalty; and many came in besides from the free cities with which there were relations of isopolity. Such organizations are, however, imperfect in their beginnings, and are only developed in the course of time. Towns like those of the Tellenians, Ficanians, Politorians, were surely quite isolated at first, and had no regularly organized power. It is beyond a doubt, that in all the towns of Italy a _Populus_ and a _Plebes_ existed; and this was also the case in the Greek colonies of Lower Italy and Sicily, which in their constitutions exhibit the closest analogy to the states of Italy. In the former even the same names were certainly in use.

Before the age of Servius Tullius the country district was not yet united with the state, to which it was linked perhaps by the king alone: it does not even seem to have had _commercium_, that is to say, no patrician could acquire property in it, and _vice versa_. In many countries also, the rule was in force, down to the latest times, that the landed property of the peasant could not pass to the nobleman; a most judicious custom, which, however, was set aside owing to the illusion that it was a vain limitation. Still less can any intermarriage be presumed to have existed between the patricians and plebeians. The children of such a marriage were not admitted to the rank of their (patrician) father; but they rather followed the worse blood, that is to say, theirs was under any circumstances the inferior right. The _Lex Mensia_[73] has not devised this; but merely revived the rule, and more clearly defined it in difficult cases. A lawgiver now came forth, who on one hand gave to the commonalty a constitution complete in itself, and, on the other invented forms by which it was united to the whole body. The former part of this plan has been entirely overlooked, and the latter appeared to Livy and Dionysius quite a riddle; so much had circumstances changed since Fabius, who had still a perfectly correct insight into these matters. In Rome a great revolution in literature had been brought about by Cicero; and Livy must have felt himself as much a stranger among the authors of the earlier times as we do with regard to those who were before Lessing: few only were still acquainted with books. And there was likewise a great deal in the federal citizenship of the Latins abrogated by the _Lex Julia_, on account of which the remembrance of the former state of things has perished. Thus it is easy to understand, how it was that the judicious Livy and the learned Dionysius were quite mistaken as to these points, and nevertheless have preserved a great number of hints from ancient sources, from which we may with much trouble guess the truth. To take an example from our own times, I really believe that there are not now ten people at Cologne, who know what the constitution of their city was two hundred years ago. How many are there, who still know any thing about the constitution of their own town before the French revolution?

The division of such a country population was local. This was not peculiar to Rome, we find it also to have been the case in Greece: Clisthenes took the _ager Atticus_ as the basis for the division of the Athenian people. The whole was divided into certain definite parts, to effect which they did not reckon together several large places, but they chose a particular number which seemed suitable, for instance, one hundred, into which the division was to be made; and for this purpose some large places were to be parcelled into districts, and other smaller ones to be combined. These divisions according to a number fixed before hand, were so general among the Romans, that, when Augustus divided the city into fourteen regions, he did not count how many _Vici_ there were, but to each region he assigned a certain number of _Vici_. Now the lawgiver whom we call Servius Tullius took all those portions of the city of Rome which were inhabited by burghers of the pale, and the country around, and divided the former into four and the latter into twenty-six regions. This must be assumed as true: the proof that this statement of Fabius is correct would lead us too far. Every _Populus_ presupposes almost as its necessary counterpart a _Plebes_; in a certain sense therefore there was already a _Plebes_ before the reign of Ancus, although an insignificant one. Roma, Quirium, Lucerum had each of them their commonalty; these and the settlement on the Esquiliæ in the time of Servius Tullius constituted the four first tribes, the first of which, the Palatina, corresponds to the Palatine; the second, the Collina, to the Quirinal; the third, the Suburana, to the Cælius with the Carinæ and Subura; the fourth, the Esquilina to the Esquiline and Viminal. This organization is to be dated before the _Murus Servii_, as is proved to a certainty by the existence of the Esquilina. Each of these regions had a corresponding local tribe, so that all those who, at the time of their being established, were living in a place, were inscribed there on the register of the local tribes, and their descendants after them.[74] This continued so during the first generation; but in the course of time it was changed, as the descendants did not always remain in the same place. The names of the country tribes were not taken originally from the districts, but from heroes, being at the same time surnames for the tribes and for the clans; for it was evidently the object of this legislation to amalgamate the different elements of the people. The remembrance of olden times, when those places had been independent, was to be absorbed in the idea that they were Roman. They acquired common _sacra_ like the tribes composed of clans, as Dionysius expressly mentions. Sacred rites were always among the ancients a bond of union. That the plebeian tribes had _sacra_, we know from the fact that Tarquin the Proud positively forbade them. Besides this, there was a local subdivision into _vici_ for the city, and into _pagi_ for the country. Each of these vici had a warden (_magister_); each tribe, a tribune. The same system was established at Athens. If for instance a person was registered at Acharnæ, and emigrated to Sunium, he still remained an Ἀχαρνεύς. As in the earlier times these tribes were all equal, there was no occasion for any one to wish to be registered in another tribe; but afterwards it was different, when there arose between the tribes an inequality of political consideration, of which I shall afterwards speak. The _tribus urbanæ_ were inferior to the _rusticæ_, and the removal from the latter to the former was a _nota ignominiæ_: this dates from the censorship of Fabius Maximus. If a man became a Roman citizen _sine suffragio_, he was not received into a plebeian tribe; nor could he get admission therein by isopolity or emancipation; and therefore he could not hold any office, nor have a vote. A vote in the plebeian tribes belonged only to those who were settled on the land, and to the cultivators of the soil; he who got his livelihood by some other trade was debarred from it.

Now that the lawgiver had constituted the two bodies, the patricians and the plebeians, he might, as is done in modern states, have put them side by side in two separate assemblies. Yet this was impracticable in those earliest times, inasmuch as they both looked upon each other as enemies. In order to effect an accommodation, Servius established the centuries (_centuriæ_), similar to the _concilio grande_ in Venice, in which every one was equal to his neighbour on entering the Hall, whether he were rich or poor, each being in a plain garb. It was the object of the centuries, to unite the patricians and the plebeians, and those who grew up at the side of the plebeians, and now took the place which these formerly held; and at the same time to exclude those, who, as they had no property at all, could give no guarantee to the state. The centuries therefore contained the whole of the first estate; of the second, those who were qualified to vote; of the third, all those, who, owing to their means, were equals of the second; and, besides, some distinguished trades. Great confusion with regard to this was created in Roman history by the views of Livy and Dionysius, who imagined the tribes to have differed as to rank and fortune only. They thought that the old body of the citizens, which contained the patricians, had been divided into curies, and that these were all placed on the same footing; but that this had been an oppressive democracy which Servius Tullius had done away with by establishing the centuries. This mistake is the same as that into which Sismondi falls when he represents the Italian cities, at the time in which they first appear in history, as having been democratically governed,--a prodigious error! Had the Roman historians attentively studied the old law books, they could not possibly have remained in darkness with regard to these things. It is true, however, that it is not yet fifty years since Möser’s first researches, by the light of which we too have only begun to get a clear insight into our own institutions.

According to the old system, the clansmen not only served on horseback, as in aftertimes, but likewise on foot: it was also just the same originally in the German cities. They had not at first the least likeness to a nobility. We may take it for granted that each clan served in war with one horseman and ten foot soldiers; and hence the statement in Plutarch, that the first town had consisted of about one thousand households. This looks like history; yet such additions as “about,” and others of the same kind, in Plutarch, Dionysius, and other writers of the later times, are touches put in to subdue the tone of colouring which seemed to them too bright. The narrative is quite ancient, but it is not so much history as the personification of a system of rights. In the earliest Rome there were a hundred clans, and consequently a thousand foot soldiers, each of whom was deemed to have been furnished by one house.[75] Besides these the country population had to serve, being probably called out according to their place of abode. The new laws made a change in the phalanx; relieved the old citizens from the duty of serving as foot soldiers; and granted them immunities for serving as horsemen. In laying the burthen of the foot-service on the plebeians, they also at the same time gave them corresponding privileges, and thereby the means of upholding their freedom. In this manner they divided the population into horsemen and footmen, without however excluding the commonalty from the cavalry. The military array of all the European nations in ancient times was analogous to the Greek phalanx. It was a mass of men which acted by the pressure of its own weight, and these were armed with pikes and charged with them against each other in files eight, ten, or twelve deep. The barbarians never fought in dense masses, and the Asiatics were merely archers. When the soldiers, as at Rome, stood ten files deep, those who were in the rear were not, of course, quite so much exposed and in need of so much armour as those in front: they wanted, if they closed their shields properly, no breast-plates, nor did the hindmost ranks even require greaves. Part of them also were light troops, slingers who threw either leaden bullets or stones. Every one at Rome who served on foot, had to find his equipments at his own expense, and therefore according to his means; so that the wealthier citizens were completely armed, while those who were badly off were called upon to serve as slingers only. When wars became protracted, gaps occurred in the ranks, as the first rows grew thinner; in this case, the men who were behind took possession of the arms and equipments of the slain, and being now already trained, stepped into their places. At the same time there followed a reserve in case of need. These therefore were the three component parts of the Roman line of battle,--the legion proper, the light armed, and last of all the men in the reserve, who stepped into the hindmost ranks when those in front had been filled up from thence.

Servius therefore looked upon the whole nation, Populus and Plebes, as an army, _exercitus vocatus_. And as this militia had to march against the enemy abroad, there was need besides of carpenters for building bridges, pitching tents, &c., and of musicians;--the former constituted one, the latter two centuries;--and now only was the host (_Classis_)[76] quite organized. These centuries did not consist of plebeians, as no plebeian was allowed to carry on any other trade but that of agriculture; otherwise he renounced his caste and was struck off by the censors from his tribe (_capitis deminutio_,) originally without any disgrace being attached to it. Yet the Romans had from the earliest times companies of trade, which were traced back as high as Numa, and of which there were three times three,--pipers, goldsmiths, carpenters, dyers, girdlers, tanners, braziers, potters, and then all the rest. Of this the intention certainly was to give the craftsmen of the city also an existence as a corporation, just as in the middle ages. But as those who were in these centuries were generally freedmen and foreigners, it became an object of ambition to get out of them, and to be enrolled among the tribes; and so the companies could never thrive. They were of greater importance at Corinth. By the division into centuries, the lawgiver connected the plebeians with the patricians and ærarians. To the trades so necessary for warfare as the carpenters and musicians, distinct centuries were assigned, by which they acquired the same rights which would have belonged to them, if they had served in war as plebeians. The carpenters were reckoned in the first class on account of their importance, the musicians in the fifth.

Lastly, he had regard to those free people who did not belong to the commonalty. Many of these certainly entered the service, either by conscription or as volunteers; for I cannot imagine that the _capite censi_, and the _proletarii_, should not have had to do any service at all. They were not, however, arrayed against the enemy; but they were camp followers, (_lixæ et calones_). We have no reason to presume that these had always been slaves.

Thus was an army now completely formed; and by this, together with the horsemen, Servius caused the people to be represented. For the cavalry he chose the three old double tribes, or six centuries of Tarquinius Priscus; then twelve other centuries of the Plebes, which were the most distinguished among the commonalty. In the six centuries was the entire patrician body; which indeed had on the whole a very insignificant number of votes, but, as we shall see by and by, the upperhand in other respects. Within these, there was perfect equality; there was no distinction of age: every century had a vote.