PATRI´CII
PATRI´CII The authorised version of Roman History,
as given in the narrative of
[p. 2.354]Livy and Dionysius
and by Cicero in the
de Republica, represents
the state as divided from the first into ordinary citizens and a privileged
class who are generally described as
patricii.
These are further stated to have been the families of one hundred persons
selected by Romulus for his senate: “Patres certe ab honore,
patriciique progenies eorum appellati” (
Liv.
1.8,
7). On the other hand, we find in
Festus a second tradition: “Patricios Cincius ait in libro de Comitiis
eos appellari solitos, qui nunc ingenui vocentur.” It is
connected with a strange etymological guess, that the patricii were
originally those “qui patrem ciere possent;” that is to say,
all freeborn persons (
Liv. 10.8,
10). The word has, of course, really no connexion
with
ciere, but is simply the adjectival form
of
pater. Nevertheless it is certain that the
explanation of Cincius is right in referring
patricius to
pater, not in its sense
of senator, but in its original meaning of father and head of a family. On
no other supposition can we account for the fact that the word
patres is sometimes used of the whole order as
synonomous with
patricii (so in
Liv. 4.4,
5, “ne
conubium patribus cum plebe esset” ). The true explanation is
summed up by Mommsen (
Staatsrecht, iii. p. 13): “They
are called either
patres, inasmuch as they
and they alone are or can be fathers. or else in adjectival form
patricii, inasmuch as they and they
alone have a father.” If there ever were a time in Rome when the
word
patricius was strictly and etymologically
significant, so that no one but a patricius had a lawful father or could
himself become a paterfamilias, then at that time the patricii were the only
real citizens of Rome. It is impossible to count as a full burgess anyone
who is incapable of becoming as paterfamilias a person of the civil law,
able to hold property and to sue and be sued in his own right. The old
story, which represents the patricians as from the first a nobility among
their fellow-citizens, appears however in a somewhat different light, when
we read that Romulus assigned the whole of the plebs as clients to one or
other of the patres. According to this, there would be in the state as
originally constituted no one but the patricii and their clients; as a
client was at first in a position hardly distinguishable from that of a
slave, this brings us round again to the proposition that
“patrician” and “freeborn man” were originally
synonymous.
The development of the rights and capacities of citizens outside the
patriciate will be discussed elsewhere [see PLEBS]. It is sufficient here to say that in process of time certain
outsiders won their way to the position of patresfamilias. By analogy these
persons, or at any rate their children, should have been able to claim the
title of
patricii. But this logical conclusion
was never drawn. The word
patricius survived as
a token of an arrested development: it was confined to the descendants of
those who once exclusively possessed the qualifications on which the title
rested. From the moment when plebeian patresfamilias come into existence the
patricii must be counted as a nobility among their fellow-citizens. It is
possible that the power to vote in the assemblies [see
POPULUS] was for a time a
privilege reserved to these nobles. But such a situation, if it ever
existed, did not last long enough for the patricians to consolidate into a
corporation with a general assembly and officers and powers of separate
action. The patriciate as a body never gets free from the body of the Roman
people. “Magistratus patricius” and “auspicia
patriciorum” are always precisely the same as
“magistratus” and “auspicia Populi Romani” [see
MAGISTRATUS]. It may be
noticed that this fact in itself gives us strong reason to conclude that the
patricii were the original stock on which the other branches of the Roman
people were grafted.
For a long time the patricians alone were eligible to the great offices of
the state. The struggle over this question of eligibility lasted on into
historical times. When it finally closed about the year 300 B.C., the members of the two orders were not left
in a position of absolute equality. The patrician was weighted in the race
for office with certain disqualifications, which had been originally imposed
as a means of breaking the ancient monopoly of the order. Both places in the
consulship and the censorship were open to plebeians, but only one to
patricians. The patricians were likewise, as a matter of course, excluded
from the offices of tribune and plebeian aedile. On the other hand, the
great colleges of pontiffs, augurs, and
decenciri sacris
faciundis were divided as equally as possible between the two
orders (in favour, therefore, of the chances of a member of the less
numerous one), and certain other functions still remained for which
patricians alone were qualified. The best list of these is derived from
Cicero's description (
pro Domo, 14, 38) of what
will happen if the patriciate suffers extinction (a description closely
followed by
Liv. 6.41): “Ita populus
Romanus brevi tempore, neque Regem sacrorum, neque flamines, neque
salios habebit, nec ex parte dimidia reliquos sacerdotes, neque auctorcs
centuriatorum et curiatorum comitiorum: auspiciaque Populi Romani, si
magistratus patricii creati non sint, intereant necesse est, quum
interrex nullus sit, quod et ipsum patricium esse et a patriciis prodi
necesse est.”
There are other passages which casually confirm what Cicero here says about
the exclusively patrician character of the interregnum. For instance, in
Liv. 6.41, Ap. Claudius says, “sed nos
quoque ipsi sine suffragio populi auspicato interregem
prodirnus;” and again we have in
Liv.
4.43, “prohibentibus tribunis patricios coire ad prodendum
interregem,” and in later times in Asconius (
ad Cic.
pro Mil.), “Tribuni plebis
referri ad senatum de patriciis convocandis non essent passi.” On
the other hand, the elaborate descriptions of the first interregnum by Livy
(
1.17) and Dionysius (
2.57) attribute the whole proceeding to
the senate, and the same is distinctly stated by Appian (
App. BC 1.98),
τῇ δὲ
βουλῇ προσέταξεν ἑλέσθαι τὸν καλούμενον Μεταξὺ
βασιλέα: and above,
βουλεντὴς ἕτερος
παρ᾽ ἑτεροὺ ἐπὶ ἐπὶ πέντε ἡμέρας ἦρχεν, &c.
There seems no way of reconciling these very clear statements on either side
except by adopting Mommsen's hypothesis that the powers of the interregnum
were vested in the patrician members of the senate, who met on such
occasions unsummoned and without the co-operation of their plebeian
brethren.
[p. 2.355]
The same theory must serve to explain the
patrum
auctoritas. The words are sometimes used in a general sense
for the approval or recommendation of the senate (e. g.
Liv. 7.15,
12;
17,
9;
33.24,
4;
35.7,
5), and the single word
auctoritas likewise bears the meaning of a resolution of the
senate which has been vetoed by a magistrate. But
patrum
auctoritas in its technical sense is quite distinct from this
later usage. It is a confirmatory act necessary to give legal validity to
the decrees and elections made by the populus Romanus, and it survived as a
form down to the Augustan age. Livy (
1.17), in
speaking of the election of king Numa, attributes the confirmation to the
senate which had just conducted the interregnum; and we may trust him here,
for he appeals to the practice of his own time: “Hodie quoque in
legibus magistratibusque rogandis usurpatur idem jus vi adempta;
priusquam populus suffragium ineat in incertum eventum comitiorum patres
auctores fiunt.” Cicero likewise (
Rep. 2.32),
after beginning with the words “Tenuit igitur in hoc statu senatus
rempublicam,” proceeds to adduce, amongst other points,
“quodque erat ad retinendam potentiam nobilium vel maximum,
vehementer id retinebatur populi comitia ne essent rata nisi ea patrum
approbavisset auctoritas.” On the other hand, we have passages in
which the established phrase “patres auctores fiunt” is altered
into “patricii:” e. g.
Liv. 6.42,
“quia patricii se auctores futuros negabant;” and Sallust,
Fragm. 82, 15, “libera ab auctoribus patriciis
majores vostri suffragia paravere” --and Cicero, as we have seen,
distinctly says that the
auctoritas will lapse
with the patriciate. The difficulty then is precisely the same as in the
case of the interregnum, and may be solved by the same hypothesis of a
“patrician senate.”
Since the
auctoritas patrum was reduced to a
mere form by being put before instead of after the voting (as was ordered by
the Lex Publilia of B.C. 339 and the Lex Maenia), it can never have amounted
to the power of rejecting a measure on its merits: such a power could be
exercised as easily, perhaps more easily, on a bill before it came to the
assembly. If, however, the
patrum auctoritas
was limited to a confirmatory certificate that the law had been passed in
due form, it would be rendered nugatory if it had to be given before any
objections could possibly be raised to the procedure. (For Mommsen's view,
which differs slightly from this, see
Röm. Forsch.
i. p. 242, and
Staatsrecht, iii. p. 1041.)
In spite of the decay of their political privileges, the patricians retained
to the end of the Republic the dignity which attached to the oldest and
purest blood in Rome. The number of families known from the lists of
magistrates of the later Republic amounts to about 30 (Mommsen,
Staatsr. iii. p. 12). Dionysius, however, gives 50 as the
number of “Trojan families” which remained to his day. It would
seem to follow that outside the ranks of the nobility of office there
remained a certain number of patricians in equestrian station, though their
ancient birth was fully recognised. Their position would somewhat resemble
that of the more obscure Scottish peers in our time. Like the Scottish
peerage, the patriciate could not be recruited. With the doubtful exception
of the Claudii, no instance is known in Republican times of any man or
family attaining the patriciate.
When Caesar as Dictator wished to increase their numbers, there appears to
have been no machinery by which the patricians could act as a body in
admitting fresh members. This admission was accomplished by a special law
(Lex Cassia) of the sovereign people, whose mandate was of course absolute
in all matters. The same precedent was followed by Augustus, who was
authorised by the Lex Saenia to create a fresh batch of patricians. Claudius
seems to have made such creations on the strength of his power as censor
(
Tac. Ann. 11.25), and after him the
emperors conferred the rank freely. [Mommsen's view of the patrician senate
(
Röm. Forsch. vol. i. p. 218
seq.;
Staatsrecht, iii. p. 1037
seq.), which
is maintained in this article, is disputed by Willems,
Sénat de la République, vol. ii. 1.
§ § 1-5.] [
J.L.S.D]
Period from the time of Constantine to the Middle Ages.--From
the time of Constantine the dignity of patricius was a personal title, which
conferred on the person to whom it was granted a very high rank and certain
privileges. Hitherto patricians had been only genuine Roman citizens, and
the dignity had descended from the father to his children; but the new
dignity was created at Constantinople, and was not bestowed on old Roman
famsilies; it was given, without any regard to persons, to such men as had
for a long time distinguished themselves by good and faithful services to
the Empire or the emperor. This new dignity was not hereditary, but became
extinct with the death of the person on whom it was conferred; and when
during this period we read of patrician families, the meaning is only that
the head of such a family was a patricius. (Zosim. 2.40; Cassiodor.
Variar. 6.2.) The name
patricius during this period assumed the conventional meaning of
father of the emperor (Ammian. Marcellin. 29.2; Cod. 12, tit. 3.5), and
those who were thus distinguished occupied the highest rank among the
illustres; the consuls alone ranked higher
than a patricius. (Isidor. 9.4, 1, 3; Cod. 3, tit. 24, s. 3; 12, tit. 3, s.
3.) The titles by which a patricius was distinguished were
magnificentia, celsitudo, eminentia, and
magnitudo. They were either engaged in actual
service (for they generally held the highest offices in the state, at the
court, and in the provinces), and were then called
patricii praesetales, or they had only the title and were called
patricii codicillares or
honorarii. (Cassiod. 8.9; Savaron.
ad Sidon. Apoll. 1.3.) All of them, however, were distinguished
in their appearance and dress from ordinary persons, and seldom appeared
before the public otherwise than in a carriage. The emperors were generally
very cautious in bestowing this great distinction, though some of the most
arbitrary despots conferred the honour upon young men and even on eunuchs.
Zeno decreed that no one should be made patricius who had not been consul,
praefect, or magister militum. (Cod. 3, tit. 24, s. 3.) Justinian, however,
did away with some of these restrictions. The elevation to the rank of
patricius was testified to the person by a writ called diploma. (Sidon.
Apollin. 5.16; Suidas,
[p. 2.356]s. v.
Γραμματείδιον; compare Cassiodor. 6.2, 8.21, &c.)
This new dignity was not confined to Romans or subjects of the Empire, but
was sometimes granted to foreign princes, such as Odoacer, the chief of the
Heruli, and others. When the popes of Rome had established their authority,
they also assumed the right of bestowing the title of patricius on eminent
persons and princes, and many of the German emperors were thus distinguished
by the popes. In several of the Germanic kingdoms the sovereigns imitated
the Roman emperors and popes by giving to their most distinguished subjects
the title of patricius, but these patricii were at all times much lower in
rank than the Roman patricii, a title of which kings and emperors themselves
were proud. (See Gibbon, vols. 2.109, 6.158; Bryce,
Holy Roman
Empire, p. 40; Rein, in Ersch und Gruber's
Encyclopädie, s. v.
Patricier.)
[
L.S]