As the Roman empire became gradually impoverished and depopulated, and as the difficulty of defending its frontiers increased, these associations must have been slowly extinguished, and the living and the dead citizen alike ceased to be the object of care and contribution. The sudden invasion of Dacia by barbarians in A.D. 166 was followed by the extinction of one collegium which has left a record of the fact, and probably by many others. The master of the college of Jupiter Cernenius, with the two quaestors and seven witnesses, attest the fact that the college has ceased to exist. “The accounts have been wound up, and no balance is left in the chest. For a long time no member has attended on the days fixed for meetings, and no subscriptions have been paid” (Dill, op. cit. p. 285). The record of similar extinctions in the centuries that followed, were they extant, would show us how this interesting form of crystallization, in which the well-drilled people of the empire displayed an unusual spontaneity, gradually melted away and disappeared (see further [Gilds] and [Charity and Charities]).
Besides the works already cited may be mentioned Mommsen, de Collegiis et Sodaliciis (1843), which laid the foundation of all subsequent study of the subject; Marquardt, Staatsverwaltung, iii. 134 foll.; de Marchi, Il Culto privato di Roma antica, ii. 75 foll.; Kornemann, s.v. “Collegium” in Pauly-Wissowa, Realencyclopädie.
(W. W. F.*)
Modern Clubs.—The word “club,” in its modern sense of an association to promote good-fellowship and social intercourse, is not very old, only becoming common in England at the time of The Tatler and The Spectator (1709-1712). It is doubtful whether its use originated in its meaning of a knot of people, or from the fact that the members “clubbed” together to pay the expenses of their meetings. The oldest English clubs were merely informal periodic gatherings of friends for the purpose of dining or drinking together. Thomas Occleve (temp. Henry IV.) mentions such a club called La Court de Bone Compaignie, of which he was a member. John Aubrey (writing in 1659) says: “We now use the word clubbe for a sodality in a tavern.” Of these early clubs the most famous was the Bread Street or Friday Street Club, originated by Sir Walter Raleigh, and meeting at the Mermaid Tavern. Shakespeare, Beaumont, Fletcher, Selden and Donne were among the members. Another such club was that which met at the Devil Tavern near Temple Bar; and of this Ben Jonson is supposed to have been the founder.
With the introduction of coffee-drinking in the middle of the 17th century, clubs entered on a more permanent phase. The coffee-houses of the later Stuart period are the real originals of the modern club-house. The clubs of the late 17th and early 18th century type resembled their Tudor forerunners in being oftenest associations solely for conviviality or literary coteries. But many were confessedly political, e.g. The Rota, or Coffee Club (1659), a debating society for the spread of republican ideas, broken up at the Restoration, the Calves Head Club (c. 1693) and the Green Ribbon Club (1675) (q.v.). The characteristics of all these clubs were: (1) no permanent financial bond between the members, each man’s liability ending for the time being when he had paid his “score” after the meal; (2) no permanent club-house, though each clique tended to make some special coffee-house or tavern their headquarters. These coffee-house clubs soon became hotbeds of political scandal-mongering and intriguing, and in 1675 Charles II. issued a proclamation which ran, “His Majesty hath thought fit and necessary that coffee houses be (for the future) put down and suppressed,” owing to the fact “that in such houses divers false, malitious and scandalous reports are devised and spread abroad to the Defamation of his Majesty’s Government and to the Disturbance of Peace and Quiet of the Realm.” So unpopular was this proclamation that it was almost instantly found necessary to withdraw it, and by Anne’s reign the coffee-house club was a feature of England’s social life.
From the 18th-century clubs two types have been evolved. (1) The social and dining clubs, permanent institutions with fixed club-house. The London coffee-house clubs in increasing their members absorbed the whole accommodation of the coffee-house or tavern where they held their meetings, and this became the club-house, often retaining the name of the original keeper, e.g. White’s, Brooks’s, Arthur’s, Boodle’s. The modern club, sometimes proprietary, i.e. owned by an individual or private syndicate, but more frequently owned by the members who delegate to a committee the management of its affairs, first reached its highest development in London, where the district of St James’s has long been known as “Clubland”; but the institution has spread all over the English-speaking world. (2) Those clubs which have but occasional or periodic meetings and often possess no club-house, but exist primarily for some specific object. Such are the many purely athletic, sports and pastimes clubs, the Jockey Club, the Alpine, chess, yacht and motor clubs. Then there are literary clubs, musical and art clubs, publishing clubs; and the name of “club” has been annexed by a large group of associations which fall between the club proper and mere friendly societies, of a purely periodic and temporary nature, such as slate, goose and Christmas clubs, which are not required to be registered under the Friendly Societies Act.
Thus it is seen that the modern club has little in common with its prototypes in the 18th century. Of those which survive in London the following may be mentioned: White’s, originally established in 1698 as White’s Chocolate House, became the headquarters of the Tory party, but is to-day no longer political. Brooks’s (1764), originally the resort of the Whigs, is no longer strictly associated with Liberalism. Boodle’s (1762) had a tradition of being the resort of country gentlemen, and especially of masters of foxhounds. Arthur’s (1765), originally an offshoot of White’s, has always been purely social. The Cocoa Tree (1746) also survives as a social resort. Social clubs, without club-houses, are represented by the Literary Club (“The Club”), founded in 1764 by Sir Joshua Reynolds and Dr Johnson, and such recent institutions as the Johnson Club, Ye Sette of Odd Volumes (founded by Bernard Quaritch) and many others.
The number of regularly established clubs in London is now upwards of a hundred. Of these the more important, with the dates of their establishment, are: Army and Navy (1837); Athenaeum (1824), founded by Sir Walter Scott and Thomas Moore “for the association of individuals known for their scientific or literary attainments, artists of eminence in any class of the fine arts, and noblemen and gentlemen distinguished as liberal patrons of science, literature or the arts”; Bachelors’ (1881); Carlton (1832), the chief Conservative club; City Carlton (1868); Conservative (1840); Constitutional (1883); Devonshire (1875); East India United Service (1849); Garrick (1831), “for the general patronage of the drama, for bringing together the supporters of the drama, and for the formation of a theatrical library with works on costume”; Guards (1813); Junior Athenaeum (1864); Junior Carlton (1864); Marlborough (1869); National Liberal (1882); Oriental (1824); Oxford and Cambridge (1830); Reform (1837), formerly the Liberal headquarters; Savage (1857); St James’s (1857), diplomatic; Travellers’ (1819), for which a candidate must have “travelled out of the British Islands to a distance of at least 500 m. from London in a direct line”; Turf (1868); Union (1822); United Service (1815); Wellington (1885); Windham (1828). Almost every interest, rank and profession has its club. Thus there is a Press Club, a Fly-Fishers’ Club, a Gun Club, an Authors’, a Farmers’, a Lawyers’ (the Eldon) and a Bath Club. Of the purely women’s clubs the most important are the Alexandra (1884), the Empress (1897), Lyceum (1904) and Ladies’ Army & Navy (1904); while the Albemarle and the Sesame have a leading place among clubs for men and women. Of political clubs having no club-house, the best known are the Cobden (Free Trade, 1866); the Eighty (Liberal, 1880) and the United (Unionist, 1886). There are clubs in all important provincial towns, and at Edinburgh the New Club (1787), and in Dublin the Kildare Street (1790), rival those of London.
The mode of election of members varies. In some clubs the committee alone have the power of choosing new members. In others the election is by ballot of the whole club, one black ball in ten ordinarily excluding. In the Athenaeum, whilst the principle of election by ballot of the whole club obtains, the duty is also cast upon the committee of annually selecting nine members who are to be “of distinguished eminence in science, literature or the arts, or for public services,” and the rule makes stringent provision for the conduct of these elections. On the committee of the same club is likewise conferred power to elect without ballot princes of the blood royal, cabinet ministers, bishops, the speaker of the House of Commons, judges, &c.
The affairs of clubs are managed by committees constituted of the trustees, who are usually permanent members, and of ordinarily twenty-four other members, chosen by the club at large, one-third of whom go out of office annually. These committees have plenary powers to deal with the affairs of the club committed to their charge, assembling weekly to transact current business and audit the accounts. Once a year a meeting of the whole club is held, before which a report is laid, and any action taken thereupon which may be necessary. (See J. Wertheimer, The Law relating to Clubs, 1903; and Sir E. Carson on Club law, in vol. iii. of The Laws of England, 1909.)