[697] See the section dealing with the powers of the people. The vitium effected the elections even of tribunes of the Plebs—but purely as a result of auspicia oblativa. See Liv. x. 47 (293 B.C.) “exacto jam anno novi tribuni plebis magistratum inierant: hisque ipsis, quia vitio creati erant, quinque post dies alii subfecti.”
[698] ib. v. 31, etc.
[699] Mommsen thinks that the auspices of the consuls might have alternated, like their fasces, from month to month (Staatsr. i. p. 95).
[700] Thus before Cannae Varro takes the field in spite of the ill-omens which the observation of his colleague Paulus had revealed (Liv. xxii. 42).
[701] Val. Max. ii. 8, 2.
[702] Cic. de Leg. iii. 3, 6 “magistratus nec oboedientem et noxium civem multa, vinculis, verberibus coerceto, ni par majorve potestas populusve prohibessit, ad quos provocatio esto.” A lex Porcia prohibited the scourging of a Roman citizen by a gravis poena (Liv. x. 9); but that technically it merely submitted the threat of such coercitio to appeal is shown by the fact that the law is classed amongst those regulating the provocatio (Cic. de Rep. ii. 31, 54).
[703] pp. 79, 109.
[704] Liv. x. 9 “cum eum qui provocasset virgis caedi securique necari vetuisset, si quis adversus ea fecisset, nihil ultra quam improbe factum adjecit.” The meaning of this sanction has been much disputed: it may mean “incapable of making a will,” on the analogy of “improbus (i.e. qui probare non potest) intestabilisque esto.” Mommsen (Strafrecht p. 632) takes the expression to mean that the act of the magistrate would be regarded as “unjustified,” i.e. as an ordinary criminal offence.
[705] Cic. de Rep. ii. 31, 54.
[706] p. 95.