[258] Cf. Ihering Geist des röm. Rechts i. pp. 257 ff.
[259] Provocatio seems to mean a challenge, i.e. a challenge by an accused to a magistrate to appear before another tribunal, on the ground that he is not acting within his own right; cf. Gaius iv. 93 (of the actio per sponsionem) “Provocamus adversarium tali sponsione.”
[260] “In this conflict of competence the position of the king was far more favourable than that of the people, since the people could only be summoned by the king. Hence the share of the people in criminal jurisdiction was reduced to a minimum” (Ihering Geist des röm. Rechts i. p. 258).
[261] “Judiciis regiis” (Cic. de Rep. v. 2, 3).
[262] p. 56.
[263] Savigny System, vi. p. 287; Bernhöft Staat und Recht der Königszeit p. 230. The idea of its being an innovation has sometimes been associated with Dionysius’s description (iv. 25, see p. 62) of a change in jurisdiction introduced by Servius Tullius.
[264] Cic. pro Cluent. 43, 120 “Neminem voluerunt majores nostri non modo de existimatione cujusquam, sed ne pecuniaria quidem de re minima esse judicem, nisi qui inter adversarios convenisset.”
[265] Ihering Geist des röm. Rechts i. p. 169.
[266] Dionys. iv. 22 ὁ δὲ Τύλλιος καὶ τοῖς ἐλευθερουμένοις τῶν θεραπόντων ... μετέχειν τῆς ἰσοπολιτείας ἐπέτρεψε ... καὶ πάντων ἀπέδωκε τῶν κοινῶν αὐτοῖς μετέχειν, ὧν τοῖς ἄλλοις δημοτικοῖς.
[267] The change, however, was not supposed (except perhaps by Tacitus Ann. iii. 26, see p. 58) to rest on a rogatio. Mommsen (Staatsr. iii. p. 161) explains this tradition by noting that the alteration was a mere administrative act, which would fall within the competence of the king.