The Latin colonies. Of the non-Romans in Italy the people most closely bound to Rome by ties of blood and common interests were the Latin allies. Outside the few old Latin cities, that had not been absorbed by Rome in 338, these were the inhabitants of the Latin colonies, of which thirty-five were founded on Italian soil. Prior to the destruction of the Latin League seven of these colonies had been established, whose settlers had been drawn half from the Latin cities and half from Rome. After 338, these colonies remained in alliance with Rome, and those subsequently founded received the same status. But for these the colonists were all supplied by Rome. These colonists had to surrender their Roman citizenship and become [pg 45]Latins, but if any one of them left a son of military age in his place he had the right to return to Rome. Each colony had its own administration, usually modelled upon that of Rome, and enjoyed the rights of commercium and connubium both with Rome and with the other Latin colonies. These settlements were towns of considerable size, having 2,500, 4,000 or 6,000 colonists, each of whom received a grant of 30 or 50 iugera (20 or 34 acres) of land. Founded at strategic points on conquered territory, they formed one of the strongest supports of the Roman authority: at the same time colonization of this character served to relieve over-population and satisfy land-hunger in Rome and Latium. In all their internal affairs the Latin cities were sovereign communities, possessing, in addition to their own laws and magistrates, the rights of coinage and census. Their inhabitants constituted the nomen Latinum, and, unlike the Roman cives sine suffragio, did not serve in the Roman legions but formed separate detachments of horse and foot.
The Italian allies. The rest of the peoples of Italy, Italian, Greek, Illyrian and Etruscan, formed the federate allies of Rome—the socii Italici. These constituted some 150 separate communities, city or tribal, each bound to Rome by a special treaty (foedus), whereby its specific relations to Rome were determined. In all these treaties, however, there was one common feature, namely, the obligation to lend military aid to Rome and to surrender to Rome the control over their diplomatic relations with other states. Their troops were not incorporated in the legions, but were organized as separate infantry and cavalry units (cohortes and alae), raised, equipped and officered by the communities themselves. However, they were under the orders of the Roman generals, and if several allied detachments were combined in one corps the whole was under a Roman officer. The allied troops, moreover, received their subsistence from Rome and shared equally with the Romans in the spoils of war. In the case of the seaboard towns, especially the Greek cities, this military obligation took the form of supplying ships and their crews, whence these towns were called naval allies (socii navales). All the federate allies had commercium, and the majority connubium also, with Rome. Apart from the foregoing obligations towards Rome, each of the allied communities was autonomous, having its own language, laws and political institutions.
However, a strong bond of sympathy existed between the local [pg 46]aristocracies of many of the Italian towns and the senatorial order at Rome. As we have seen, the foreign relations of Rome were directed by the Senate, which represented the views of the wealthier landed proprietors, and it was only natural that the senators should have sought to ally themselves with the corresponding social class in other states. This class represented the more conservative, and, from the Roman point of view, more dependable element, while the support of Rome assured to the local aristocracies the control within their own communities. Consequently there developed a community of interest between the Senate and the propertied classes among the Roman allies.
Thus Rome was at the head of a military and diplomatic alliance of many separate states, whose sole point of contact was that each was in alliance with Rome. As yet there was no such thing as an Italian nation. Still it was from the time that this unity was effected that the name Italia began to be applied to the whole of the peninsula and the term Italici was employed, at first by foreigners, but later by themselves, to designate its inhabitants.[1]