Chapter X The Organization of the Comitia Centuriata
I. In the Early Republic
From the point of view of the Roman historians the centuriate assembly,1181 planned by Servius Tullius, came into existence at the beginning of the republic; its earliest act in their opinion was the election of the first consuls1182 and its earliest statute the Valerian law of appeal.1183 Though they could not know precisely when it voted for the first time, they were right in understanding it to have been the basal comitia of the republic during the patrician supremacy. It may not have been instituted till some time after the downfall of the kingship,1184 and it certainly did not reach its full complement of a hundred and ninety-three centuries till more than a hundred years after that event.
Through the early republic Rome was engaged in an almost unceasing struggle for existence. The army was constantly in the field; and the consuls from the praetorium issued their commands for the protection and the government of the city. Their measures, after discussion in the council of war, they must often have submitted to the approval of the army. The military contio was sometimes summoned for exhorting the men,1185 for promising the reward of spoil in case of victory,1186 for reprimanding as well as for encouraging.1187 On one occasion the master of horse, calling a contio of soldiers, appealed to them for protection from the dictator,1188 and they replied with a shout that they would allow no harm to befall him.1189 Thereupon the dictator summoned another contio to witness the court-martial of the rebellious officer.1190 On another occasion the consuls asked the soldiers to decide a question by acclamation, and they obeyed.1191 We hear of the adjournment of a meeting on the motion of a military tribune.1192 After a victory, honors and rewards were granted by vote of the soldiers.1193 For acclamation, the regular form of voting,1194 was sometimes substituted a division of the army to right and left for the sake of silence.1195 A military assembly, meeting at Veii, decided upon the appointment of Camillus, then in exile, to the dictatorship, and despatched the resolution to Rome.1196 In the year 357 the consul Cn. Manlius held a tribal assembly of his troops at Sutrium, and passed in it a law which imposed a tax of five per cent on the manumission of slaves.1197 Long afterward the army in Spain elected a propraetor.1198 It may be that much other political business was decided by the army in the troublous times which followed the overthrow of the kings. Although such acts were valid, they were always of an exceptional nature, and they ran counter to the spirit of the constitution, which granted to all the citizens, not to those merely who chanced to be on military duty, a voice in the decision of such public affairs as came before the people.
It is true that the centuriate assembly, having developed from the army, showed pronounced military features. It could not be convoked within the pomerium, for the reason that the army had to be kept outside the city;1199 before the reform it met ordinarily in military array under its officers and with banners displayed;1200 the usual place of gathering was the Campus Martius; and no one but a magistrate cum imperio could under his own auspices convoke it for the purpose of taking a vote.1201 For these reasons it was frequently, even in official language, termed exercitus.1202 The use of this word, however, should not mislead us into supposing that the assembly was an actual army. Though Dionysius1203 represents the first meeting as armed—a mere supposition, apparently to account for its known military features—the fact is that the citizens carried weapons to none of the assemblies.1204 Strictly, too, the centuriate gathering was termed exercitus urbanus in contrast with the real army designated as exercitus armatus or classis procincta.1205 The facts thus far adduced amply warrant us in refusing to consider the voting assembly an army.
But some imagine the censorial assembly for the assessment and lustration of the citizens to have been an army.1206 For this view they rely upon Dionysius,1207 who states that the people came armed to the first lustrum, and upon an uncertain passage from the Censoriae Tabulae, quoted by Varro,1208 which possibly speaks of the citizens in the lustral assembly as armati. If this word should be supplied in the passage, it might refer to an inspection of arms of the men of military age;1209 but that circumstance would by no means imply that all who attended the lustrum were armed or were liable to military duty. It is certain that as the census-taking had primary reference to property for the purpose of apportioning taxes and other burdens of citizenship, those only were summoned who were legally capable of holding property in their own name. The list excluded all the men “in patris aut avi potestate,” however liable they were to military duty,1210 as well as the women and children.1211 All such persons were reported by the father or guardian. It included, on the other hand, many who were exempt from military service on account of age, physical condition, or want of the necessary property qualification. Hence the censorial assembly could not have been identical with the army. Furthermore the centuriate assembly was not a basis for the levy.1212 On the contrary, the soldiers were enrolled directly from the tribes.1213 These facts warrant the conclusion that the relation between the army and the assembly must have been one of origin only; the organization of the assembly developed from that of the army, but at no time was the political assembly an army or the army otherwise than exceptionally or irregularly a political assembly. The truth is that an army regularly officiating as a political body would require for its explanation two revolutions—one to bring it into existence and another to abolish it; but of both cataclysms history is silent.
The growth of the political from the military organization was somewhat as follows. After the Romans had determined to use the centuries regularly as voting units for the decision of questions not purely military, they proceeded forthwith to extend the organization so as to include all the citizens. For this purpose the men of military age who were free from duty for the time being, or who had served the required number of campaigns—sixteen in the infantry or ten in the cavalry1214—or who were exempt on account of bodily infirmity or for any other reason, had to be admitted to the junior centuries, thus materially increasing their number and making them unequal with one another. In a state, too, in which great reverence was paid to age the seniors could not be ignored. They were accordingly organized in a number of centuries (84) equal to that of the juniors—an arrangement which made one senior count as much as three juniors.1215 The mechanics who were liable to skilled service in the army1216 were then grouped for voting purposes in two centuries, that of the smiths and that of the carpenters,1217 based on the two guilds in which these artisans were already organized.1218 Authorities differ as to the classes with which they were associated. Livy1219 adds them to the first class. Cicero,1220 too, places a century of carpenters with that group, making no mention of the smiths, whereas Dionysius1221 assigns both centuries of mechanics to the second class. The explanation of the difference of opinion seems to be that information as to this point was not contained in the censorial document from which the annalist (Fabius Pictor) drew his knowledge of the earlier comitia centuriata; the Romans knew only by tradition that the industrial centuries were associated in the assembly with one of the higher classes. The weight of authority inclines in favor of the first class, and the reason for the respectable place occupied by the mechanics is the high value placed on their service in early time.1222 In like manner the trumpeters (tubicines, liticines) and the hornblowers (cornicines) were grouped each in a century for voting in the comitia,1223 also on the basis of their guild organizations.1224 The accensi velati, who as we are informed followed the army in civilian dress and without weapons,1225 also received a centuriate organization. As to the number of centuries belonging to them opinion has differed. Some, formerly including Mommsen,1226 have assumed two. Livy,1227 however, gives but one century; Cicero1228 seems to have only one in mind; and in imperial time there was a single collegium, or century, of accensi,1229 probably a survival of the old political group. These considerations led Mommsen to abandon his former view, to assume instead a single century of the kind; and recent writers are inclined to follow him.1230 Lowest in rank of the supernumerary centuries was that of the proletarians.1231 The government so designated those citizens who owned no land,1232 and hence were poor. They were exempt from military duty, excepting in so far as they served with arms furnished by the state.1233 Though few in the beginning, their number gradually increased till in the time of Dionysius1234 it exceeded all the five classes together. At some time in the early history of the comitia centuriata they were formed into a century and given one vote,1235 which was not counted with any class but was reported after all the others. Dionysius1236 wrongly speaks of it as a sixth class. The existence of this century is due to the principle that no one should be excluded from the right to vote on account of poverty.1237
Six supernumerary centuries have now been mentioned and the place of three—the two industrial and the one proletarian—in the voting system has been considered. With reference to the others Dionysius assigns the musicians to the fourth class, Livy to the fifth. The settlement of this question is aided by an examination into the total number of comitial centuries of the fifth class. It is given as thirty by the sources.1238 Assuming this to be the correct number and adding to the sum of centuries in the five classes (170) the six supernumerary centuries and the eighteen centuries of knights to be considered below, we should have in all a hundred and ninety-four, which would be one too many. In an earlier chapter, however, the conclusion was reached that there were but fourteen military centuries in the fifth class.1239 Two of the thirty centuries assigned to that class In the comitia centuriata must therefore have been in fact supernumerary. If one was the accensi, what was the other? Most probably it was the century of the tardy described by Festus,1240 made up at each meeting of those who came too late to vote in their own classes. Obviously all writers who apply the discriptio centuriarum to the army view this century, as well as that of the proletarians, with suspicion.1241 The two centuries of the accensi and the tardy should be included among, not added to, the thirty of the fifth class.1242 Having reached this result, it might seem advisable for us to assume no further supernumerary centuries for the fifth class, but to follow the authority of Dionysius in assigning the musicians to the fourth. Or as the trumpeters preceded the hornblowers in rank, it might be plausibly argued that the former belonged to the fourth and the latter to the fifth. In this way a compromise could be effected between Livy and Dionysius, and Livy’s three supernumerary centuries of the fifth class could be explained. Absolute certainty is unattainable. The notion of Dionysius that one century of musicians voted with the seniors, the other with the juniors, and so of the mechanics,1243 is erroneous; for the seniors did not vote separately from the juniors.
In the centuriate assembly each of the six tribal troops of knights1244 had one vote, and was called, therefore, a suffragium. As the term centuria had not previously applied to these groups, it was for a time withheld from them in the comitia, the six divisions being known simply as the sex suffragia.1245 Afterward as new voting groups were added to the equites they came to be called centuries, and thence the term extended to the old.1246 The centuriate organization of the comitia did not demand the creation of suffragia seniorum, to correspond with the centuriae seniorum of the infantry, perhaps because the six votes in the comitia centuriata adequately represented the whole number of patricians. As the equites originally provided their own horses,1247 they held their rank for life, not merely through the period of service. After the state had undertaken to furnish money for the purchase and keeping of the horses,1248 the eques retained his public horse, and consequently his membership in an equestrian century, long after his retirement from active duty.1249 The increase in the number of equestrian votes was owing to the participation of plebeians in the mounted service.1250 From them twelve equestrian centuries were formed for the centuriate assembly, and added to the six groups already existing. This increase probably came about in the course of the fourth century, accompanying or following the enlargement of the infantry from two to four legions.1251 Thus the total number of one hundred and ninety-three centuries could not have been reached till shortly before 269.
The foregoing discussion has made it evident that from the time when the comitia centuriata came into being, there were two centuriate organizations; (1) the military, which continued as before till it changed to the manipular formation,1252 (2) the political, which developed from the military but which was at no time identical with it.
Discriptio Centuriarum of the Comitia Centuriata
| Old centuries of knights | 6 |
| New centuries of knights | 12 |
| Classes | Junior Centuries | Senior Centuries | Ratings in Asses according to Livy | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| I | 40 | + 2 of artisans | 40 | 100,000 |
| II | 10 | 10 | 75,000 | |
| III | 10 | 10 | 50,000 | |
| IV | 10 | + 2 of musicians | 10 | 25,000 |
| V | 14 | + 1 of accensi | ||
| + 1 of the tardy | 14 | 11,000 | ||
| Below the classes: | |
| 1 century of proletarians | |
| SUMMARY | |
| Knights | 18 |
| Seniors and juniors | 168 |
| Supernumerary | 7 |
| Total | 193 |
Before the reform this assembly met in military array with banners displayed, each company under its centurion.1253 The voting was oral. Probably it was at first by acclamation; if so the suggestion of individual voting, as we find it in historical time, must have come from the orderly military array, which offered itself conveniently for the purpose.1254 The centurions may originally have served as rogatores, to collect and report the votes.1255 Each century cast a single vote, which in historical time the majority of its members decided.1256 The voting proceeded according to classes; the equites were asked first, hence their centuries were termed prerogative (praerogativae), then the eighty centuries of the first class. If the votes of these two groups were unanimous, they decided the question at issue; as ninety-seven was a majority, they had one to spare from their total number. If they disagreed, the second class was called and then the third and so on to the proletarian century. But the voting ceased as soon as a majority was reached, which was often with the first class; and it rarely happened that the proletarians were called on to decide the issue.1257 The announcement of the prerogative votes greatly influenced the action of those which followed.1258
II. The Reform
The study of the centuriate assembly begun earlier in the volume1259 and continued in the preceding part of this chapter shows it gradually developing its organization during the fifth and fourth centuries B.C. The main line of progress has been traced though details are unknown. The growth of popular rights in the latter half of the fourth century gave a great impetus to the activity of the assemblies in general, as is manifested in the Genucian, Publilian, and Hortensian legislation. In 312 when the change was made in the appraisements from land to money, many aerarii who had voted with the proletarians must have been advanced to the higher classes.1260 This step toward the democratization of the comitia centuriata, following upon the reduction of the patrum auctoritas to a mere formality, could not help adding new energy to the institution, leading to further changes in a popular direction. The class ratings which are known to history were established no earlier than 269.1261 Two other more important changes, which can be but approximately dated, must now be considered in detail. They are (1) the abolition of the equestrian prerogative and the introduction of the custom of drawing by lot a prerogative century from the first class on each occasion before the voting began; (2) the division of the citizens into classes and centuries within the several tribes. These two innovations are commonly grouped together under the name of the “reform.” As they have no necessary connection with one another, they need not have been simultaneous. Livy’s narrative of the happenings of 3961262 and of 3831263 seems to imply that they had been introduced before these dates.1264 But the passages here referred to are uncertain; and at all events they belong to a period in which the centuries may still have been closely connected with the tribes.1265 But should they be so interpreted as to apply to the reformed centuriate assembly, they might still be looked upon as historical anticipations for the reason that Livy’s1266 account of the year 296 has reference to a feature of the old organization. This disposition of the three passages is supported by the following consideration. Had the reform been introduced much earlier than 269, the annalists would have assigned it to Servius Tullius, just as they assigned to him thirty tribes (reached in 318), all thirty-five tribes (reached in 241), and the census ratings in the sextantarian asses (established in or after 269);1267 and in that case all memory of the original Servian system would have been lost. The circumstance that we are acquainted with it in some detail is proof of its survival into the third century B.C. In fact Livy’s1268 chief reference to the reform indicates that it was completed, if not undertaken, after the number of tribes had been brought up to thirty-five (241). On the other hand it came before the opening of his third decade (218), which takes the new arrangement for granted.1269 The contention is often made that Livy must have given an account of the reform in his second decade (292-219) now lost; and there is a universal agreement that the reform was brought about not by statute, but by arbitrary censorial disposition.1270 The censor commonly assumed to be the author of the change is either Fabius Buteo, 241, or Flaminius, 220.1271 Against the latter may be urged the silence of Polybius1272 and Livy,1273 who in speaking at length of his opposition to the nobles makes no reference to this reform. In favor of Fabius it may be said that in 241 the full number of tribes was completed; and the name of the thirty-fifth, Quirina, corresponding to Romilia, the first rural tribe, suggests that the Romans intended to create no more. In naming the last tribe the censors seem to have had in mind the completion of the new system, to each component part of which they apparently guaranteed a definite share of political power, which would have been impaired by the further creation of tribes.1274
A little reflection, however, will convince us of the impossibility of assigning the reform to any one censor or to a definite date. Livy could not have made much of it in the lost part of his history without leaving some trace in the epitome, which mentions far more trivial matters.1275 The only explanation of the epitomator’s silence is that the reform was so gradual as to escape marked attention. This view is supported by a strict interpretation of Livy,1276 who supposes the change to have come about naturally with the increase in the number of tribes, and of Dionysius,1277 who ascribes the innovation, or a part of it, to no individual but to “certain powerful forces.” A conclusion as to the date of the reform, to be acceptable, must satisfy the conditions above mentioned. In earlier time, when there was a single classis, the centuries were made up within the tribes; but this simple system was rendered impossible by the increase in the number of classes.1278 For convenience of administration the censors must soon after this enlargement have begun an effort to reduce the discord to harmony. One class may have been brought into agreement with the tribes more readily than another, and thus the readaptation may have extended through many lustra. The number of centuries probably did not long remain at one hundred and ninety-three. It may have received its first increase above that sum in 304, for instance, the date to which Niebuhr1279 assigns the reform. The process may have been far advanced in 241, the date preferred by a majority of scholars, and completed by Flaminius in 220.1280 The abolition of the equestrian prerogative may likewise have been gradual; it may have been retained in one class of comitial acts—elections or legislation, for instance—longer than in another. The conclusion that the changes were gradually introduced in the period from 304 to 220 would best explain all the known facts.1281
As no description of the reformed organization has come down to us, we are obliged to reconstruct it from the scant references of various writers. It is to be noted first that the five classes continued in the new system.1282 They were still based on the census,1283 and were called to vote in their order as before.1284 The distinction between juniors and seniors was retained;1285 and as these comitia were still called centuriata, the centuries necessarily continued as the voting units.1286 But the reform brought them into direct relation with the tribes, which now served as a basis for the division into centuries and for their distribution according to age and class. On this point Livy1287 remarks, “We ought not to wonder that the arrangement which now exists after the tribes have been increased to thirty-five, their number being doubled in the centuries of juniors and seniors, does not agree with the total number instituted by Servius Tullius; for he divided the city into four parts,... which he called tribes.... Nor did those tribes have any relation to the distribution and number of the centuries.” From this passage we may infer (1) that in the reformed assembly the number and distribution of the centuries depended closely upon the tribes—a conclusion supported by other citations to be given hereafter, (2) that the number of centuries was changed, although we are not distinctly informed whether by diminution or increase. According to one interpretation the number of tribes was doubled by the number of centuries of juniors and seniors, and there were therefore seventy of these centuries, thirty-five juniors and as many seniors, each century forming a half tribe. This view is supported by passages in which the century bears the name of the tribe, as Aniensis iuniorum,1288 Voturia iuniorum,1289 Galeria iuniorum,1290 as well as by those which in a more general way refer to voting or the announcement of the votes by or according to tribes in the centuriate assembly.1291 It accords perfectly with other evidence that the century was an integral part of the tribe.1292 This is the view adopted by Niebuhr.1293 It is open, however, to the fatal objection of abolishing the classes, which in fact continued through the republic, as has already been shown.1294 He does indeed allow for a first class comprising the country tribes and a second class made up of the others;1295 but this hypothesis is overthrown by those citations which imply the continuance of all five classes,1296 as well as by those which make the census an element of the later organization.1297 Huschke,1298 who places the reform in the earliest times of the republic, adopts Niebuhr’s view as to the number of centuries; but maintaining the continuance of the five classes,1299 he considers them to be groups of tribes, the seventeen old rural tribes being distributed as follows: in the first class eight, in the second, third, and fourth respectively two, in the fifth three.1300 But bearing in mind that these tribes were primarily local, we cannot at the same time regard them as census groups without ascribing to them an impossibly artificial character. For this reason the theory of Huschke should be rejected. To avoid this difficulty, while retaining the classes, the assumption has been made that the classes were subdivisions of the century, in other words that each century contained men of every class. This view is invalidated by the fact that the centuries continued to be divisions of the classes, which were still called to vote in their order.1301
The assumption of a diminution in number having proved untenable, the conclusion is that there was an increase.1302 In view of the facts (1) that the reformed organization rested on a tribal basis,1303 (2) that the centuries were divisions not only of the tribes1304 but also of the classes,1305 (3) that the tribes could not have been divisions of the classes,1306 it is necessary to conclude that the classes were themselves divisions of the tribes with the centuries as subdivisions. In other words, the work of organization took place within the tribe: the members of a tribe were first divided into five classes according to their wealth; within each class the men were grouped on the basis of age into juniors and seniors,1307 one century for each within the several classes, making ten centuries of juniors to the tribe, or in all three hundred and fifty tribal centuries, to which are to be added eighteen centuries of knights and probably five supernumerary centuries, amounting to a total of three hundred and seventy-three. This is substantially the view of Pantagathus.1308 Convincing evidence is afforded by a group of inscriptions of the imperial period.1309 From them we learn that under the emperors the urban tribes comprised severally (1) a corpus seniorum, (2) a corpus iuniorum, (3) the tribus Sucusana a corpus Iulianum, and the Palatine and Esquiline each a corpus Augustale. Every corpus consisted of several centuries. In the corpus Sucusana iuniorum were eight centuries divided into two groups of five and three respectively, the first group being evidently superior to the second. At the head of the century was a centurio or curator.1310 Eliminating the corpora which were named after emperors and which must have been instituted in their time, eliminating also the inferior centuries of the corpora seniorum and iuniorum, which were undoubtedly added either by the emperors or by the late republican censors, we have remaining five centuries to the corpus as it must have stood in the period immediately following the reform. This result confirms the view suggested by Pantagathus.
It was accepted by Mommsen in his Römische Tribus (1844) and in the first seven editions of his History of Rome; but in his Römisches Staatsrecht1311 he has offered a radical modification: while holding to the 373 centuries, he maintains that they were so combined as to cast in all 193 votes. According to this theory the first class comprised 35 × 2 = 70 centuries, each with one vote, whereas the remaining classes together, made up of 4 × 35 × 2 = 280 centuries, cast but 100 votes. How the centuries were combined Mommsen does not presume to say. He considers it possible, however, that for instance sixty of the seventy centuries of the second class were grouped by threes and ten by twos, making twenty-five voting groups in all. Had he attempted to follow out in detail the practical working of the theory, he would hardly have offered it to the public. The votes could not have been determined by a majority of component centuries, for according to the theory some groups comprised but two. Or if the group voted by individuals without regard to the component centuries, the four lower classes were practically composed not of centuries but of larger, nameless voting divisions.
His main support is the account of the centuriate organization given in Cicero’s Republic,1312 which speaks of a hundred and ninety-three centuries, and which Mommsen1313 believes to be a description of the reformed organization. Cicero’s1314 assumption that the essential facts were known to the friends of the younger Scipio—the leader in the dialogue—and the discrepancy in the number of centuries of the first class between the Servian system as given by the annalists (Livy and Dionysius) and the organization which Cicero describes1315 are the chief points in Mommsen’s favor. Against his interpretation it may be urged (1) that the passage is exceedingly uncertain;1316 (2) that Cicero makes Servius Tullius the author of the organization which he describes; (3) that though the reform affected the details of the comitial organization, the principle—a distribution of the people according to ordines, census, aetates—remained the same from the time of Servius to the time of Cicero, so that he could assume that it was known to the hearers of Scipio; (4) that as to the discrepancy in the number of centuries in the first class, on the assumption that the text is correct, (a) Cicero, who was by no means infallible, may have made a mistake,1317 being in this case especially liable to error because in the reformed organization the first class comprised seventy centuries, or (b) in case Cicero is right, either (m) the annalists may be in error in assigning eighty centuries to the first class, or (n) in an early stage of transition from the old to the new organization the number of centuries in the first class may have been cut down to seventy with a corresponding increase of ten in some other part of the system; (5) that Mommsen’s theory is refuted by the language of Cicero,1318 who speaks of the voting divisions of the four lower classes not as groups of centuries but simply as centuries, the absence of a name for such a group being one of the strongest arguments against its existence. Mommsen’s interpretation of the passage is in brief too strained and unnatural to commend itself to the understanding. Apart from its lack of support in the sources, an objection to the theory is its extreme impracticability. Holding that juniors and seniors could not have been brought together in the same voting divisions, and assuming that the combinations were made by twos and threes and that the four lower classes had an equal number of votes, Klebs has worked out the simplest arrangement as follows:
| Class | Centuries | Votes | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| I | 70 | One vote each | 70 | |||
| II | 70 | 35 of seniors | ||||
| 8 | in groups of two | 4 | votes | |||
| 27 | in groups of three | 9 | votes | |||
| 13 | votes | |||||
| 35 of juniors | ||||||
| 2 | in a group | 1 | vote | |||
| 33 | in groups of three | 11 | votes | |||
| 12 | votes | |||||
| Total | 25 | |||||
| If the remaining classes are like the second, we shall have: | ||||||
| III | 70 | 25 | ||||
| IV | 70 | 25 | ||||
| V | 70 | 25 | ||||
| Equites | 18 | One vote each | 18 | |||
| Supernumeraries | 5 | One vote each | 5 | |||
| Total | 193 1319 | |||||
This complex system would make the action of the centuriate assembly exceedingly slow and difficult, and would be as useless as impracticable; for if the object was to reduce the votes of the first class by ten and to make the other classes equal, that end could have been easily attained by the readjustment of numbers on the old basis, without the invention of this awkward grouping, the like of which is not known to have existed in any ancient or modern state. Such a reform, too, would bring out more clearly than ever the inequality of rights in the comitia,1320 and therefore could not have been called democratic by Dionysius.1321 It is contradicted also by Livy,1322 who distinctly states that the number of centuries was changed. Lastly the objection must be made that the joining of centuries of different tribes into voting units cannot be reconciled with the imperial grouping of centuries of the same tribe into corpora,1323 and is refuted by the many citations which assume the voting or the announcement of the votes to have proceeded according to tribes1324 as well as according to classes.1325
Lange,1326 not thinking it necessary to preserve a total of a hundred and ninety-three votes but accepting in the main the view of Pantagathus, tries to bring the centuries into relation with the tribes by assuming that the seventy half-tribes, severally comprising five centuries of juniors or seniors, were given each one vote in the “concluding announcement” (Schlussrenuntiation), this vote being determined by a majority of the five component centuries. In like manner the eighteen centuries of knights were grouped in divisions of three centuries each, so as to count six votes in the final announcement, hence the name sex suffragia. The supernumerary centuries were grouped in one or two voting divisions, so that in all seventy-seven or seventy-eight votes were cast.1327 As to the process, he believed that after the prerogative the seventy centuries of the first class and the eighteen centuries of cavalry voted simultaneously, and while their votes were being counted the second class was voting, the votes, in his opinion, not being announced as soon as known.1328 This view as to the announcement is contradicted by the sources,1329 which clearly imply that the reports were made public as they came in. Against his theory may be urged also (1) the fact that no name existed for the half-tribe, which in his opinion cast one vote in the closing announcement,1330 as well as (2) the fact that the sources give more than six votes to the equites in the late republic.1331 Lange is right, however, in understanding that the voting did not now, as formerly, cease when a majority was reached, but continued till all the centuries had voted.1332
A solution of the problem as to the order of voting suggested by Klebs1333 seems to satisfy all conditions. The centuries gave their votes by classes, each being announced as soon as it was ascertained. Then when all the centuries had voted, a count was taken by tribes in the order determined by lot;1334 and a second announcement, made in that order, decided the election or other act of the people. Each candidate was declared elected when a majority of votes was reached in his favor.
Regarding the supernumerary centuries our information is extremely meagre. As it does not seem likely that influential corporations would be robbed of a privilege they once enjoyed, we may reasonably believe that the artisans, musicians, and accensi velati retained centuries of their own in the reformed organization. Cicero,1335 however, speaks of a single century of artisans for his time. The two industrial colleges, which had existed from an early age,1336 seem to have been joined in one and to have continued into the imperial period after nearly all the other guilds had been abolished.1337 When the two were united, they were probably reduced to a single vote in the assembly. In like manner the liticines, or tubicines, and the cornicines were united in one college of musicians1338 and were probably given one vote. The accensi velati, too, formed a college composed of wealthy freedmen, freeborn, and even knights.1339 We may well suppose that it still possessed a vote in the centuriate assembly. Lastly may be mentioned the century of proletarians and that of the tardy,1340 which were as necessary after the reform as before it.1341 Although new centuries were added, possibly by the later republican censors and certainly by the emperors,1342 the principle of the reformed organization remained unchanged.1343
In the reformed assembly the equestrian centuries ceased to be prerogative.1344 A century was drawn from the first class1345 by lot1346 to take the lead in voting. Then came the remainder of the class, including the equestrian centuries and the single century of artisans, eighty-eight in all. In the announcement the votes of the equites were distinguished from those of the class;1347 and the sex suffragia, no longer exclusively patrician,1348 were reported after the other eighty-two. The inferior place assigned to the suffragia was evidently to remove them far from their earlier prerogative position so as to free the assembly from patrician influence. Next the lower classes, among which other supernumerary centuries were distributed as in the earlier republic, voted in order; and finally came the summing up by tribes in the way described above. The old military array gave place to a civilian grouping like that already established for the curiate and tribal assemblies.1349
I. The Earlier Organization: the literature on this subject is essentially the same as for ch. iv.
II. The Reform: Schulze, C. F., Volksversamml. der Römer, 69 ff.; Huschke, Ph. E., Verfass. des Königs Servius Tullius, ch. xii; Peter, C., Epochen der Verfassungsgesch. der röm. Republik, 42 ff.; Savigny, F. C., Verbindung der Centurien mit den Tribus, in Vermischte Schriften, i. 1-13; for other early literature, see Lange, Röm. Alt. ii. 495 ff., notes; Neumann, C., Zeitalter der punischen Kriege, 187 ff.; Nitzsch, K. W., Gesch. der röm. Republik, i. 146 f.; Mommsen, Röm. Tribus, 66-113, 143-149; Röm. Staatsr. iii. 269 ff.; Lange, L., De magistratuum romanorum renuntiatione et de centuriatorum comitiorum forma recentiore, in Kleine Schriften, ii. 463-493; Röm. Alt. ii. 494-516; Madvig, J. N., Verfass. und Verw. des röm. Staates, i. 117-23; Herzog, E., Röm. Staatsverf. i. 320-7; Die Charakter der Tributcomitien... und die Reform der Centuriatcomitien, in Philol. xxiv (1876). 312-29; Willems, P., Droit public Romain, 92-8; Mispoulet, J. B., Institutions politiques des Romains, i. 46-8; Greenidge, A. H. J., Roman Public Life, 252 f.; Abbott, F. F., Roman Political Institutions, 74-6; Karlowa, O., Röm. Rechtsgesch. i. 384-8; Soltau, W., Altröm. Volksversamml. 358-71; Cicero de Re Publica und die servianische Centurienordnung, in Jahrb. f. Philol. xli (1895). 410-4; Kappeyne Van de Coppello, J., Comitien, 20 ff.; Morlot, E., Comices électoraux sous la république Rom. ch. v; Goguet, R., Centuries, ch. iv; Le Tellier, M., L’organisation centuriate, ch. ii; Hallays, A., Comices à Rome, 25-31; Plüss, H. T., Entwick. der Centurienverfass.; Ullrich, J., Centuriatcomitien; Clason, O., Zur Frage über die reformierte Centurienverfass. in Heidelb. Jahrb. lxv (1872). 221-37; Ritschl, F. W., Opuscula Philologica, iii. 637-73; Genz, H., Centuriat-Comitien nach der Reform; Guiraud, P., De la Reforme des Comices centuriates au III Siècle av. J.-C. in Rev. hist. xvii (1881). 1-24; Klebs, E., Stimmenzahl und Abstimmungsordnung der ref. servianischen Verf., in Zeitschr. d. Savignystift. f. Rechtsgesch. Röm. Abt. xii (1892). 181-244; Meyer, E., Die angebliche Centurienreform Sullas, in Hermes, xxxiiii (1898). 652-4; Humbert, G., in Daremberg et Saglio, Dict. ii. 1389 f.; Kübler, in Pauly-Wissowa, Real-Encycl. iii. 1956-60.