The Roman assemblies from their origin to the end of the Republic

by George Willis Botsford

The ancient authorities represent Servius Tullius as the founder of an organization at once military and political—on the one hand the army composed of classes and centuries, and on the other the comitia centuriata. According to Livy[383]—

“From those whose rating was 100,000 asses or more he made 80 centuries, 40 of seniors and 40 of juniors, and termed them all the first class. The seniors were to be ready for guarding the city and the juniors were to serve in the field. The arms required of them were a helmet, round shield, greaves, and cuirass,—all bronze,—for the protection of the body. Their offensive weapons were a spear and a sword. To this class were added two centuries of sappers who were to serve without arms. Their duty was to convey the engines of war. The second class was made up of those whose rating was between 75,000 and 100,000 asses, 20 centuries of seniors and juniors together. They were equipped with an oblong shield (scutum) instead of a round one, and they lacked the cuirass, but in all other respects their arms were the same. The minimal rating of the third class was 50,000 asses, and the number of centuries was the same with the same distinction of age, and there was no change in arms excepting that greaves were not required. In the fourth were those appraised at 25,000 asses. They had the same number of centuries but their arms were changed, nothing being assigned them but a spear and a long javelin. The fifth class was larger, composed of 30 centuries. They carried slings and stones for throwing. Among them were counted the accensi, the hornblowers, and the trumpeters, 3 centuries. This class was appraised at 11,000 asses. Those whose rating was less formed one century exempt from military service. Having thus armed and organized the infantry, he levied 12 centuries of equites from among the chief men of the state. Also the 3 centuries instituted by Romulus he made into 6 others of the same names as those under which the three had originally been inaugurated.” Afterward Livy speaks of the votes of the centuries in the comitia.

The ultimate source of this description, as well as of the similar account given by Dionysius, is the censorial document already mentioned,[384] sometimes termed the “discriptio centuriarum,”[385] sometimes “Commentarii Servi Tullii”[386] on the supposition that Servius was the author. In reality it belonged to the Censoriae Tabulae[387] of the period immediately following 269.[388] The document gave a list of the classes, centuries, and ratings, and furnished directions for holding the centuriate assembly. As the military divisions and equipments mentioned by Livy in the passage above had been discarded long before this date,[389] they could not have been described in the document. The account of them found in our sources must, therefore, have been supplied by antiquarian study.[390] The annalist who first used these Tabulae in the censorial archives was Fabius Pictor.[391] Whether Livy and Dionysius derived their account directly from him or through a later annalist cannot be determined.[392] Though Cicero’s source may ultimately have been the same, he seems to have depended largely on his memory and is chronologically, though not in substance, less exact. In assigning seventy rather than eighty centuries to the first class he most probably has in mind a stage of transition from the earlier to the reformed organization.[393]

A brief analysis of this description, as presented by Livy or Dionysius, will prove that it could not apply at the same time to an army and a political assembly: (1) The century of proletarians, which formed a part of the comitia, and which according to Dionysius was larger than all the rest together, was exempt from military service.[394] (2) The unarmed supernumeraries termed accensi velati must in their military function have lacked the centuriate organization, as will hereafter be made clear.[395] (3) The musicians and the skilled workmen who accompanied the army must also be eliminated from the centuriate organization of the army.[396] (4) The seniors, too, lacked the centuriate military organization.[397] (5) Thus the only pedites in the original centuriate system were the juniors. Even the military century of juniors was not in the beginning strictly identical with a voting century; and as time progressed, the one group diverged more and more widely from the other.[398]

Chiefly from these facts, which will become clear in the course of this study, we are warranted in concluding that the army was at no time identical with the comitia centuriata. As one was necessarily an outgrowth of the other, the military organization must have been the earlier. If therefore the original form of the centuriate system is to be referred to Servius Tullius, he will be considered the organizer of the phalanx, which the military centuries constituted,[399] not of the comitia.[400] This result harmonizes with the view of the ancient writers that the comitia centuriata exercised no functions—hence we have a right to infer that it had no existence—before the beginning of the republic.[401]

The following sketch of the development of the Roman military system from the earliest times to the institution of the manipular legion includes those features only which are essential to an understanding of the origin and early character of the centuriate assembly. The view maintained in this volume is, as suggested in the preceding paragraph, that the comitia centuriata in the form described by Livy and Dionysius developed from the early republican military organization, which was itself the result of a gradual growth. Reference is made to equipments chiefly for the purpose of throwing light on the relation of the Roman to the Greek organization and of the various Roman military divisions to one another.

I. The Primitive Graeco-Italic Army and the Origin of the Phalanx

Recent research has brought to light a period of Italian history during which the military system of the Latins and Etruscans closely resembled that of the Mycenaeans, the former doubtless being derived in large part from the latter.[402] The nobleman,[403] equipped in heavy armor, rode forth in his chariot[404] to challenge his peer among the enemy to personal combat. The mass of common footmen were probably grouped in tribes and curiae (Greek phratries, brotherhoods),[405] as in Homeric Greece[406] and among the early Europeans[407] before the development of an organization based on a numerical system. The arms of the footmen must have been lighter, and probably varied with the individual’s financial resources. These common troops could have had no special training or discipline, as they counted for little in war.[408] Yet in the Homeric age of Greece some attempt was made to keep the fighters in line, and to prevent the champions from advancing beyond it to single combat.[409] A similar tendency to even, rhythmic movement may be inferred for the Latin army.[410] The great innovators in this direction were the Lacedaemonians, to whom the honor of inventing the phalanx is chiefly due.[411] This improvement, which made an epoch in European warfare, could not have been later than the eighth century B.C. The phalanx was a line, several ranks deep, of heavy-armed warriors, who moved as a unit to the sound of music.[412] The depth varied as the occasion demanded; it was not necessarily uniform throughout the line, but for Lacedaemon eight may be considered normal.[413] The heavy-armed trooper carried a large shield, which covered the entire body, a helmet, and greaves; his offensive weapons were sword and spear.[414] Tyrtaeus mentions also a coat of mail though not as an essential part of the equipment.[415] The metal of their defensive armor was mostly bronze; their swords and spear-points were probably iron, which the mines of Laconia abundantly supplied.[416] Although it is well known that the phalanx was composed of smaller units, the original organization can only be conjectured. It is not unlikely that in the beginning there were tribal regiments,[417] divided into companies of fifty or perhaps a hundred,[418] which were made up of still smaller groups. The military age extended from the twentieth to the sixtieth year.[419]

The phalanx was readily adopted by other Greek states, which modified it to suit their several conditions. In Athens and probably elsewhere the army had a tribal organization,[420] but a census was introduced in order to determine who possessed sufficient wealth for service on horseback, in the heavy infantry, and in the light infantry; and when once the census classes were adopted, it was easy to extend them to political uses. In this way the four property classes at Athens, probably instituted about the middle of the seventh century B.C.,[421] became under Solon if not earlier a basis for the distribution of offices and other political privileges. Naturally the Greeks of Sicily and Italy adopted the phalanx, and it is reasonable to suppose that the Romans derived it, through the Etruscans,[422] from one of these neighbors.