Rome was at first governed by kings, chosen by the people; their power was not absolute, but limited; their badges were the trabea or white robe adorned with stripes of purple, a golden crown and ivory sceptre; the curule chair and twelve lictors with the fasces, that is, carrying each a bundle of rods, with an axe in the middle of them.
The regal government subsisted at Rome for two hundred and forty-three years, under seven kings—Romulus, Numa Pompilius, Tullus Hostilius, Ancus Marcius, Lucius Tarquinius Priscus, Servius Tullius, and Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, all of whom, except the last, may be said to have laid the foundation of Roman greatness by their good government.
Tarquin being universally detested for his tyranny and cruelty, was expelled the city, with his wife and family, on account of the violence offered by his son Sextus to Lucretia, a noble lady, the wife of Collatinus.
This revolution was brought about chiefly by means of Lucius Junius Brutus. The haughtiness and cruelty of Tarquin inspired the Romans with the greatest aversion to regal government, which they retained ever after.
In the two hundred and forty-fourth year from the building of the city, they elected two magistrates, of equal authority, and gave them the name of consuls. They had the same badges as the kings, except the crown, and nearly the same power; in time of war they possessed supreme command, and usually drew lots to determine which should remain in Rome—they levied soldiers, nominated the greater part of the officers, and provided what was necessary for their support.
In dangerous conjunctures, they were armed by the senate with absolute power, by the solemn decree that the consuls should take care the Republic receives no harm. In any serious tumult or sedition they called the Roman citizens to arms in these words, “Let those who wish to save the republic follow me”—by which they easily checked it.
Although their authority was very much impaired, first by the tribunes of the people, and afterwards upon the establishment of the empire, yet they were still employed in consulting the senate, administering justice, managing public games and the like, and had the honor to characterize the year by their own names.
To be a candidate for the consulship, it was requisite to be forty-three years of age: to have gone through the inferior offices of quæstor, ædile, and prætor—and to be present in a private station.
The office of prætor was instituted partly because the consuls being often wholly taken up with foreign wars, found the want of some person to administer justice in the city; and partly because the nobility, having lost their appropriation of the consulship, were ambitious of obtaining some new honor in its room. He was attended in the city by two lictors, who went before him with the fasces, and six lictors without the city; he wore also, like the consuls, the toga pretexta, or white robe fringed with purple.
The power of the prætor, in the administration of justice, was expressed in three words, do, dico, addico. By the word do, he expressed his power in giving the form of a writ for trying and redressing a wrong, and in appointing judges or jury to decide the cause: by dico, he meant that he declared right, or gave judgment; and by addico, that he adjudged the goods of the debtor to the creditor. The prætor administered justice only in private or trivial cases: but in public and important causes, the people either judged themselves, or appointed persons called quæsitores to preside.