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[German version] The populus in historical times describes the totality of adult, male Roman citizens, i.e. excluding women and children as well as foreigners and slaves. From the late Republic, populus ( Romanus) became a synonym for the res publica ( Romana), the Roman state (Cic. Rep. 1,25,39: est igitur ... res publica res populi), the populus being defined as the amalgamation of a group united in recognition of the law and of common purpose (v. [2. 315-318]). It was thus entirely possible that other populi might exis…

[German version] Archive of 53 (45 surviving) wooden tablets written in ink  from southern Numidia (between Capsa and Theveste), named after their publisher, E. Albertini: largely legal documents from the Vandal period (484-496 AD), predominantly sales of plots of land, providing important information on legal culture, language and above all the writing of the period. Galsterer, Hartmut (Bonn) Bibliography E. Albertini, Documents d'époque vandale découverts en Algérie, in: CRAI 1928, 301-303  Id., Actes de vente du Ve siècle trouvés dans la région de Tébessa (Algérie)…

[German version] Collegia made up of five ( quinque) men ( viri) below the magistrate level ( magistratus ); in Rome and Italy, they were frequently called ad hoc to settle public affairs. The only long-term office was the collegium of the quinqueviri cis Tiberim, who served as night watch on …

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[German version] Funerary inscriptions (FI) (now probably approaching a number of 200,000, cf. [3. 124,1]) emerged in the context of the cult of the dead with the purpose of marking the grave of a specific person so that sacrifices for the dead could be performed at the correct place. Furthermore, they soon took on the function of keeping alive the memory of this person and his achievements. They are located above ground at the burial site, or, in communal graves, on the urn holding the ashes, on the sarcophagus, or on the lid of the loculus (the burial niche). In addition to the inscrip…

[German version] I. Mesopotamia Income needed to finance tasks of state and general social functions (admin…

( ius Latii). [German version] I. Before the dissolution of the Latin league Because of their common language and culture, Romans and Latins possessed la…

[German version] Stone inscription, slightly damaged, of the 2nd half of the 6th cent. BC, discovered in 1977 at Satricum (Latium) beneath the Temple of Mater Matuta, which was constructed around 500 BC. The inscription, one of the earliest in the Latin language, is readily legible: - - -iei steterai Popliosio Valesiosio/suodales Mamartei (‘dedicated by the companions of Publius Valerius to Mars’). The incomplete beginning is probably to be read as [med h]ei (‘me here…

[German version] Municipal law from the time of Domitian (end of the 1st cent. AD) for the Latin municipium Flavium Salpensanum, modern Facialcazar near Utrera (province of Seville) in southern Spain, of which a bronze tablet with chs. 21-29 was found together with the lex Malacita…

[German version] VI, which denote an object as a votive offering to a deity (or deities) by one or more per…

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[German version] Conciliabulum (from concilium) in the legal meaning is an assembly place or, more often, just the venue ( locus ubi in concilium convenitur, Fest. p. 33) at which citizens gathered for the proclamation of laws, levying etc. The word describes a settlement with elementary self-government in the territory of one of the tribus rusticae. In the context of the ager Romanus we hear of per fora et conciliabula (Liv. 25,22,4; 39,14,7 etc.), which -- as in the lex Poetelia of 358 -- provides an excellent parallel to the nundinae in the city of Rome. In late Republican laws it…

[German version] A. Meaning of the word The etymological connection of Latin provincia (‘province’) with pro- vincere (‘defeat beforehand’) in Festus (253: “provinciae appellantur quod populus Romanus eas provicit, i.e. ante vicit”) is not plausible and probably based on a popular etymology. Likewise, Isidore’s explanation of provinciae as overseas territory ‘far from’ ( procul) Italy is no more convincing (Isid. Orig. 14,5,19: “procul positas regiones provincias appellaverunt”). The most probable link is with proto-Germanic * fro, ‘lord’ [1. 377 f.]. However, the meaning o…

[German version] Among the documents left behind by Augustus and read out in the Senate after his death in AD 14 was an index rerum a se gestarum (‘Report of Actions’), which was then published on two bronze tablets set up in front of the Mausoleum Augusti (Suet. Aug. 101,4; Cass. Dio 56,33 and R.Gest.div.Aug. prooem.; on the setting up of the tablets and their reconstruction see [8. 6 fig.]). A copy of this text with a Greek translation was attached to the temple of the imperial cult in Ancyra (modern Ankara), the capita…

[German version] Bronze tablet from Lugdunum (modern Lyon) with part of a speech by the emperor Claudius [III 1] in the Senate in which as censor in AD 47/8 he supports the wish of Gaulish nobles to be accepted into the Senate. Comparison of the original text (CIL XIII 1668 = ILS 212) with the version in Tacitus (Ann. 11,23-25) is revealing of the latter's way of working. Galsterer, Hartmut (Bonn) Bibliography H. Freis, Historische Inschriften zur römischen Kaiserzeit, 21994, no. 34 (German translation)  F. Vittinghoff, Zur Rede des Kaisers Claudius über die Aufnahme von 'Galliern' in den römischen Senat, in: W…

[German version] Rome's allies in Italy and, in exceptional cases, also communities and individuals outside Italy were already known as socii in antiquity. The socii in Italy were listed in the formula togatorum, a schedule which laid down the extent of the obligation to provide military contributions, as communities from which Rome was accustomed to require the provision of soldiers for the Roman army (' socii nominis(ve) Latini quibus <sc. Romani> ex formula milites in terra Italia imperare solent': lex agraria of 111 BC, FIRA 1, no. 8, ll. 21 and 50). The criterion for m…

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[German version] A. Etymologie and Definition It is possible that the Latin term municipes predates that of municipium. In the view of historians such as Varro (Ling. 5,179), the former is derived from munia (or respectively munera) capere, ‘the undertaking of duties’; the explanation ‘the receiving of gifts’ in [7. 26] has to be rejected in the same way as the ancient interpretation by Gellius (16,13,7) that municipium was to be seen as munus honorarium (‘honorary privilege’). Varro referred to obligations by Roman citizens such as military service and payment of taxes which the munici…

[German version] (Pl. pagi, etymologically related to pangere and pax; 'region with fixed borders'). The Latin pagus refers to the non-urbanized 'district', whose population lived in individual farms and villages ( vici; see vicus ), possibly with one or more oppida ( oppidum ) serving as a refuge; the pagus was the customary form of settlement for many Italian tribes, esp. the Oscan population of the mountainous regions of Central I…

[German version] Bronze inscription from Banasa (in Mauretania Tingitana) with copies ( exempla) of three documents and a list of 12 witnesses, probably members of the imperial consilium. It deals with a conferment of citizenship under Marcus Aurelius on 6 July AD 177: at his own request, Iulianus, a princeps of the Zegrensi tribe, and his family are granted Roman citizenship for extraordinary service ( maxima merita), without prejudice to his tribal rights ( salvo iure gentis). The TB is important evidence of the conditions for conferring citizenship at the end of the …

[German version] A. Definition A colonia was a settlement of citizens (with the addition of a greater or lesser proportion of non-citizens) for the military and political securing of Roman rule, later for providing for veterans and occasionally the Roman proletariat, almost al…

(Singular vici magister). Elected leaders of vici (Vicus) in the city of Rome and in Italian cities. [German version] I. Rome VM are recorded as early as the Republic; their identification with the magistri collegiorum mentioned in Asconius (p. 6 Clark) cannot be doubted ( pace [2]). Their duties were the cult of the Lares Compitales (Lares [1] C) and organizing the Compitalia on 1 January. In the late Republic they were involved in the political activities of the collegia [1] and for a number of years were banned, until Clodius [I 4] permitted th…

[German version] Block of black marble found at Rome in 1899 during excavations in the Forum Romanum in front of the Curia Iulia. It is probably the niger lapis in comitio from Fest. 184 L. The upper section of the stone is damaged; on five sides it bears a fragmentary inscription, difficult to read and dating from the (early?) 6th cent. BC (probably the lex sacra of the Volcanal, the surrounding sacred precinct), which mentions a ‘king’ ( recei), his ‘herald’ ( calator) and iouxmenta (draught animals? carts?). This may be the inscription which Dionysius of Halicarnassus (Ant. …

[German version] The pomerium was the line, important in religious law, which at Rome and its colonies ( coloniae ) divided the urbs from the ager, i.e. the city in the strictest sense from its surrounding territories. Even in antiquity, the meaning of the word was obscure. According to point of view, it was etymologically explained as the line 'behind' ( post or pone murum) or 'in front of' ( promoerium) the city wall (Varro Ling. 5,143 and Gell. NA 13,14,1 versus Fest. 295), but neither etymology is likely to be tenable The establishment of the pomerium constituted the climax of a city f…

[German version] Alleged treaty from the time of king Tarquinius Superbus (end 6th cent. BC), which was still extant in the Augustan period on a shield covered in cowhide in the temple of Semo Sancus; documented in Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 4,58,4 and on coins of two Antistii (family from Gabii, C.  Antistius [II 7] Vetus and C. Antistius Reginus) from the Augustan period: FOEDUS P.R. CUM GABINIS (RIC…

[German version] Ceremonial treaty of peace and friendship between Rome and another state which is placed under the protection of the gods. By contrast to a truce ( indutiae) the foedus was drawn up for the long term ( pia et aeterna pax). The result of the foedus was a   societas or an   amicitia , Rome's partners were   foederati ,   socii or amici (the terms are not strictly differentiated). Originally the foedera were probably signed by the   fetiales in the form of a sponsio (Liv. 1,24); later their role was confined to supervising the religious formalities. The foedus was usually signed by…

[German version] (derived from Lat. viginti, 'twenty'; literally, 'the twentieth part'). In Rome, V. was the term referring to five-per-cent taxes [IV]; esp. important were the V . manumissionum or libertatis (manumission tax) and the V. hereditatium (inheritance tax). According to the annalistic tradition (Liv. 7,16,7; on this [3]), the V. manumissionum or libertatis was already decided upon in 357 BC by the Roman army through a vote according to tribus near Sutrium and was afterwards approved by the Senate. Probably from the beginning, it was paid in gold by the freedmen themselves or by their patron. The tax amount depended on the slave's value; it was collected by tax contractors ( publicani ) and originally went to an aerarium sanctius allocated for emergencies. In 209 BC, the proceeds from this tax, which had been gathering up to that time, were used for the war against Hannibal [4]; there must have been 4000 pounds of gold ( c…

[German version] A federation of towns ( populi) in Latium Vetus that was organized around the sanctuary of Jupiter Latiaris on mons Albanus , but in part also around that of Diana of Aricia. The rights of members were regulated in the foedus Cassianum . …

[German version] (literally: 'public matter', in contrast to res privata, 'private matter') is the sum of the possessions, rights and interests of the Roman state, where the term 'state' is understood not as an abstract concept separable from its citizenry, but as the concrete manifestation of the generality of its citizens: res publica est res populi (Cic. Rep. 1,25,39; ' res publica is the affair of the people'; Populus). Accordingly, res publica is not identifiable with the modern concepts of 'state' or 'constitution'; in its original meaning it denotes differen…

[German version] Stands for s(enatus) p(opulus)q(ue) R(omanus) and was the usual title of the Roman state as embodied in its two governing bodies, the 'Senate and People of Rome' (i.e. not, as in Greece, the people alone, e.g. hoi Athēnaîoi), from the 1st cent. BC. Before this, the populus was in first place (first evidence in the decree of Aemilius [I 32] Paullus for Lascuta, early 2nd cent. BC: ILS 15; cf. Pol. 21,10,8). From the time of Augustus, SPQR appears on inscriptions as the author of consecrations (e.g. of buildings and monuments), later also as the recipient of dedications. …

[German version] The five bronze fragments, belonging together, of the TH (from Heba in Etruria) can - just like the Tabula Siarensis found in Siarum (in the province of Seville) in 1980 and other fragments from Todi and Rome - be related to a dossier containing a senatus consultum and a law, based on it, of the consuls of AD 20 ( lex Valeria Aurelia) with decrees for the honouring of Germanicus [2], who had died in AD 19. The dossier provides insight into the functioning of the comitia centuriata during the Imperial period and into the mobilisation of public loyalty for the imperi…

[German version] Grove of oaks ( aesculus) in Rome, to whose branches the coronae civicae were bound. It lay in the western Campus Martius, opposite the island in the Tiber, by the Lungotevere Cenci. Galsterer, Hartmut (Bonn) Bibliography S. Panciera, Ancora tra epigrafia e topografia, in: L'Urbs. Espace Urbain et Histoire, 1987, 62-73.

[German version] Derived from the Latin praes, 'bondsman', who acted as guarantor with his property for another in the leasing of public duties (and from time out of mind probably also in civil law: cf. Lex XII tab. 1,4). Praedium is used almost synonymously with fundus (Large estates); where more closely defined, a praedium is usually denoted by the place in whose territory it lay, a fundus by the name of the original owner (e.g. praedium Nomentanum, fundus Sextilianus). Praedium includes the estate in the literal sense as well as the buildings on it. Depending on the location or owner,…

[German version] Populus Romanus Quirites (or, later, Quiritium) was the official term for the Roman citizenry. It contains the name of the city ( Romanus) and that of the populus ( Quirites), as with Ardea ( Ardeates Rutuli) and Lavinium ( Laurentes Lavinates), where the name of the city stood alongside that of the people living there. The singular form, Quiris, survives only in ar…

[German version] A bronze plaque in the Capitoline Museum in Rome contains the end of the lex de imperio Vespasiani, the so-called enabling law for Vespasianus, with which the Senate decreed at the end of AD 69 - after the death of Vitellius - to Vespasian cuncta principibus solita (‘all that is usual for emperors’, Tac. Hist. 4,3,3), and which was put before the comitia at the beginning of 70 [1. 104f.]. The inscription (from the Lateran?), which no-one could read at the time because of its classical capital letters, served Cola di Rienzo in 1347 for the foundation…

[German version] I. Ancient Orient In the field of  legal texts in cuneiform, the political structure of the Mesopotamian conf…

[German version] Alliance entered into with the Latins after the victory over them at the Lacus Regillus in 493 BC by the consul Sp.  Cassius [I 19] Vecellinus, which was extended to the Hernici in 486. The document was still preserved at the time of Cicero on a bronze column (the original?) in the Forum (Cic. Balb. 53). The historicity of the text is acknowledged today, as is the early dating, contrary to earlier research [1. 68f.; 2. 299-301]. The main conditions are found in Dion. Hal. Ant. Rom. 6,95: peace between Romans …

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[German version] (Herakleiensis). Bronze tablet (1·84 m × 0·38 m), broken into two parts, found in the area of ancient Heraclea [10] in Lucania. On the front sides of both parts, there are late 4th cent. BC regulations for the administration by public authorities of the estates of two temples, one of Dionysus and one of Athena. The end of a 1st cent. BC Latin text is preserved on the back of one of these tablets. Since the expected …

[German version] Text of a decision of the Senate dated 10 December AD 20, recording the trial of Cn. Calpurnius [II 16] Piso and the verdict of the senatus against him. Piso had been accused of the murder by poison of Germanicus [2] and of maiestas [C], and had taken his own life on 8 December. The SC, 176 lines in length, starts, after the prescript and verdict motion ( relatio) of Tiberius, with describing the facts of the case, and goes on to recount the penalties imposed on Piso and his 'followers' ( comites), Visellius Karus and Sempronius Bassus and the acquittal of Piso's childr…

Colleges of civil servants in Rome, Italy and the west of the Roman empire, consisting of four ( quattuor) persons ( viri) who could be charged with a variety of duties. [German version] I. Rome 1) The college of the quattuorviri viarum curandarum (initially probably called quattuorviri viis in urbe purgandis) had the task of providing for the street cleaning within the city walls. They belonged to the 'twentymen' ( vigintiviri), a group of offices held by young senators prior to the first magistrateship of the c ursus honorum . The nature of their task makes t…

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[German version] Related to Greek * oikos (cf. oikos ) and Old High German wick, the Latin word vicus means 'a number of houses' and described both a village within an agricultural area ( Pagus ) and a group of houses on a street in a city (and hence often also used as a street name, e.g. in Rome; cf. [6]). Vici were able to create wealth, had their own cults and their own officials. According to Festus (p. 502 and 508 Lindsay) some had their own political organization and held courts ( partim habent rem publicam et ius dicitur), others had only the right to hold markets. They were the visible centres of pagi, with some pagi also having several or even no v ici, as is clear from the Velia Tablet ( Alimenta ). In the Greek world vici correspond to κῶμαι/ kṓmai (Kome). The v ici in Rome may have originated in settlement centres of pre-urban Rome (cf. Vicus Tuscus; Vicus Pallacinae). Their officials were vici magistri . Augustus divided Rome in 7 BC into 14 regions and 265 vici (Plin. HN 3,66), which until the time of Constantinus [1] grew to 307 (Roma III F with map 3). …

[German version] Agreement of 1931 regarding the use of text-critical symbols in the apparatus of editions of Greek and Latin texts, papyri, inscriptions, etc. The most important of these are square brackets [ ] for marking the supplementation of no longer extant letters, round brackets ( ) for resolving ancient abbreviations, and curving brackets   so that letters incorrectly placed by the scribe can be eliminated and double brackets [[ ]] to mark…

I. Ancient Orient [German version] A. General In the more restricted sense, inscriptions are texts - usually of monumental character - that, because of their function, are intended to last, as well as texts that are written on other-than-usual writing materials, e.g. clay tablets,  papyrus,  ostraka, etc. Inscriptions are closely tied to other texts by commonalities of writing, form and content. Therefore, despite specific research efforts, ancient oriental epigraphy has not developed as an independent…

[German version] Seven bronze tablets, found in 1444 in Iguvium (modern Gubbio), between 87 cm × 57 cm and 40 cm × 28 cm in size, some written on one side, some on both. The earlier ones are in a local right-to-left alphabet, borrowed from Etruscan, and the later ones in Roman letters, but all are in the Umbrian language. Their origin is from the beginning of the 2nd cent. BC to the beginning of the 1st, and they represent the sacred archive of a priesthood, the Fratres Atiedii (cf. the Arvales Fratres in Rome), in which details of sacrifices by the priesthood fo…

[German version] (sc. pars). The quadragesima (τεσσαρακοστή/ tessarakostḗ, 'one fortieth') was a toll at the rate of 21/2% of the declared value of traded goods levied at the Roman imperial frontier or at customs frontiers within the empire. The term denotes, in particular, the import and export duties in the customs regions of Asia, Gaul and Hispania, but from a relatively early date, quadragesima could be used to refer simply to any toll(Quint. Decl. 359). While the customs region in Asia probably comprised only that province (ILS 1330; quadragesima portuum Asiae: ILS 1862), the Ga…

[German version] Edict of the consuls Q. Marcius [I 17] Philippus and Sp. Postumius [I 8] Albinus, on the basis of a Senate ruling ( senatus consultum ) of 7 October 186 BC, ordering the suppression of the Bacchanalia in Rome and Italy (ll. 2 f.). The sole surviving copy of the edict, found at Tiriolo (province of Catanzaro) in 1640, is directed towards the authories in the Bruttian …