had from the first, or finally developed, a close corporate life. Each had its peculiar sacra[1] and a place of worship, containing an altar and chapel, which itself bore the name curia;[2] and the religious affairs of each were conducted by a priest called curio, assisted by a flamen curialis.[3] The thirty curiones formed a college, of which the curio maximus was the president.[4] It is difficult to say how far the religious organisation of the curiae was a natural or artificial development. But artifice was certainly at work in determining their important political character. The primitive popular assembly at Rome is the comitia curiata, composed wholly of Patricians. Here each member of a patrician clan above the legal age—probably the age of eighteen, at which military service commenced—had the right of giving a single vote; a majority of the curiales decided the vote of the particular curia, and the decision of the assembly was determined by the majority of the groups. They also had, in a secondary degree, an importance of a military kind; for the supply of knights to the corps of celeres is said to have been effected through the curiae.[5] § 5. The Monarchical Constitution
It is generally agreed that the monarchical constitution of early Rome rested on a limited sovereignty of the people, a power restricted by the extraordinary authority of their sole magistrate. This popular sovereignty was asserted in jurisdiction, in legislation, and in the ratification of magisterial power. The attribution of the right of appeal in criminal cases (provocatio)[6] to the people shows that with them rests either the sovereign attribute of pardon or some right of trying criminal cases in the last resort. Tradition makes the Roman people the sole source of law,[7] that is, of standing ordinances of a general kind which are to bind the community,[8] although the initiative in legislation can come only
- ↑ Festus p. 62 "curionia sacra, quae in curiis fiebant"; p. 64 "curiales flamines curiarum sacerdotes."
- ↑ ib. p. 49 (s.v. curia) "locus est, ubi publicas curas gerebant."
- ↑ See note 1.
- ↑ Festus p. 126; Liv. xxvii. 8.
- ↑ Festus p. 55 "Celeres antiqui dixerunt, quos nunc equites dicimus . . . qui primitus electi fuerunt ex singulis curiis deni, ideoque omnino trecenti fuere."
- ↑ Liv. i. 26; Cic. de Rep. ii. 31, 54.
- ↑ Dionys. ii. 14.
- ↑ "Generale jussum" (Capito ap. Gell. x. 20).
