A. Politics and Society
The Roman gens comprised the members of a family who descended from a common ancestor and under whose potestas they would have been, if he had still been alive (Varro, Ling. 8,4). The main distinction between gentiles and agnati lay in the fact that the latter could prove their blood relationship with their progenitor, whereas for the former, this relationship was only a fictitious assumption.
The origins of the gens are a matter of scholarly dispute, and will likely remain so…