CONTENTS
| PAGES | |
| PART I | |
| Elements of the Comitial Constitution | [1-118] |
| CHAPTER I | |
| The Populus and its Earliest Political Divisions | [1-15] |
| CHAPTER II | |
| The Social Composition of the Primitive Populus | [16-47] |
| CHAPTER III | |
| The Thirty-five Tribes | [48-65] |
| CHAPTER IV | |
| The Centuries and the Classes | [66-99] |
| CHAPTER V | |
| The Auspices | [100-118] |
| PART II | |
| The Assemblies: Organization, Procedure, and Functions, Resolutions, Statutes, and Cases | [119-477] |
| CHAPTER VI | |
| Comitia and Concilium | [119-138] |
| CHAPTER VII | |
| The Contio | [139-151] |
| CHAPTER VIII | |
| The Calata Comitia | [152-167] |
| CHAPTER IX | |
| The Comitia Curiata | [168-200] |
| CHAPTER X | |
| The Organization of the Comitia Centuriata | [201-228] |
| CHAPTER XI | |
| The Functions of the Comitia Centuriata | [229-261] |
| CHAPTER XII | |
| The Comitia Tributa and the Rise of Popular Sovereignty, to 449 | [262-282] |
| CHAPTER XIII | |
| The Comitia Tributa and the Rise of Popular Sovereignty, from 449 to 287 | [283-316] |
| CHAPTER XIV | |
| The Judicial Functions of the Comitia Tributa, from 287 to the End of the Republic | [317-329] |
| CHAPTER XV | |
| Comitial Legislation, from Hortensius to the Gracchi | [330-362] |
| CHAPTER XVI | |
| Comitial Legislation, from the Gracchi to Sulla | [363-411] |
| CHAPTER XVII | |
| Comitial Legislation, from Sulla to the End of the Republic | [412-461] |
| CHAPTER XVIII | |
| The Composition and Preservation of Statutes, Comitial Procedure, and Comitial Days | [462-472] |
| CHAPTER XIX | |
| A Summary of Comitial History | [473-477] |
| Bibliography | [479-498] |
| Index | [499-521] |
THE ROMAN ASSEMBLIES
PART I
ELEMENTS OF THE COMITIAL CONSTITUTION
CHAPTER I
THE POPULUS AND ITS EARLIEST POLITICAL DIVISIONS
I. The Populus
The derivation of populus, “people,” “folk,” is unknown. Attempts have been made to connect it with populari, “to devastate,” so as to give it primarily a military signification—perhaps simply “the army.”[1] In the opinion of others it is akin to plēnus, plēbes, πλῆθος, πολύς, πίμπλημι,[2] in which case it would signify “multitude,” “mass,” with the idea of collective strength, which might readily pass into “army” as a secondary meaning.[3] Fundamentally personal, it included all those individuals, not only the grown men but their families as well, who collectively made up the state, whether Roman or foreign, monarchical or republican.[4] Only in a transferred sense did it apply to territory.[5] The ancient definition, “an association based on the common acceptance of the same body of laws and on the general participation in public benefits,”[6] is doubtless too abstract for the beginnings of Rome. Citizenship—membership in the populus—with all that it involved is elaborately defined by the Roman jurists;[7] but for the earlier period it will serve the purpose of the present study to mention that the three characteristic public functions of the citizen were military service, participation in worship, and attendance at the assembly.[8] In a narrower sense populus signifies “the people,” “masses,” in contrast with the magistrates or with the senate, as in the well known phrase, senatus populusque Romanus.