CENSOR
CENSOR (
τιμητής), the name of two
magistrates of high rank in the Roman republic. Their office was called
Censura (
τιμητεία or
τιμητία). The
Census, which was a register of Roman
citizens and of their property, was first established by Servius Tullius,
the fifth king of Rome. After the expulsion of the kings it was taken by the
consuls; and special magistrates were not appointed for the purpose of
taking it
[p. 1.398]till the year B.C. 443. Livy (
4.8,
5) assigns as the
reason of this alteration the appointment in the preceding year of
tribuni militum with consular power in place of the
consuls; as these tribunes might be plebeians, the patricians were unwilling
that the right of taking the census and performing the formal sacrifice of
purification should pass into their hands. This explanation is very
doubtful, considering the comparative unimportance of the office at this
time. It is more probable that it had been found to be inconvenient that the
chief magistrates should be detained at home by duties necessarily
discharged at Rome, when their presence might be required in the field, and
this view is confirmed by the fact that no lustrum was held for at least
sixteen years before the appointment of censors. The office was at first
restricted to patricians, but was probably thrown open to plebeians by the
Licinian laws of B.C. 367, and in B.C. 351 C. Marcius Rutilus was the first
plebeian censor (
Liv. 7.22). Twelve years
afterwards, B.C. 339, it was provided by one of the Publilian laws, that one
of the censors must necessarily be a plebeian, and that both might be
plebeians (
Liv. 8.12), but it was not till B.C.
280 that a plebeian censor performed the solemn purification of the people
(
lustrum condidit,
Liv. Epit. 13). In B.C. 131 the two censors
were for the first time plebeians.
There were always two censors, because the two consuls had previously taken
the census together. If one of the censors died during the time of his
office, another had at first to be chosen in his stead, as in the case of
the consuls. This, however, happened only once, namely, in B.C. 393; because
the capture of Rome by the Gauls in this lustrum excited religious fears
against the practice (
Liv. 5.31). From this time,
if one of the censors died, his colleague resigned, and two new censors were
chosen. (
Liv. 6.27,
9.34,
24.43,
27.6.)
The censors were elected in the comitia centuriata held under the presidency
of a consul. (
Gel. 13.15;
Liv. 40.45.) It was necessary that both censors should be
elected on the same day; and accordingly, if the voting for the second was
not finished, the election of the first went for nothing, and new comitia
had to be held. (
Liv. 9.34.) The comitia for the
election of the censors were held under different auspices from those at the
election of the consuls and praetors; and the censors were accordingly not
regarded as their colleagues, although they likewise possessed the
maxima auspicia (
Gel.
13.15). The comitia were held by the consuls of the year very soon
after they had entered upon their office (
Liv.
24.10,
39.41); and the censors, as soon
as they were elected and the censorial power had been granted to them by a
lex centuriata, were fully installed in
their office. (
Cic. de Leg. Agr.
2.1. 1, 26;
Liv. 40.45.) As a general
rule the only persons chosen for the office were those who had previously
been consuls; but a few exceptions occur. At first there was no law to
prevent a person being censor a second time; but the only person who was
twice elected to the office was C. Marcius Rutilus in B.C. 265, who received
in consequence the surname of Censorinus (
Plut. Cor.
1;
V. Max. 4.1.3). A law was
shortly after-wards passed enacting that no one should be chosen censor a
second time (Mommsen,
Röm. Staatsr. i.2 502, note 2).
The censorship is distinguished from all other Roman magistracies by the fact
that it was not conferred for a definite period. The censors were appointed
to discharge a special duty, i.e.
ut conderent
lustrum; and although in theory this duty was performed once in
every four years (
quinto quoque anno), in
practice the interval varied considerably, partly owing to accidental
irregularities, and partly from a later interpretation of the language
employed, which made the interval one of five, not four years (cf. Mommsen,
Stcatsr. 2.331). The period during which the lustra were
held with the greatest regularity is the half-century following the outbreak
of the Second Punic War; before this time there are numerous irregularities,
and after it they occur occasionally. According to Livy (
4.24; cf. 9.33), the censors were required by a law of the
dictator Mam. Aemilius to resign office within eighteen months of their
appointment; but it is a probable conjecture of Mommsen's that this
limitation was introduced from the first, and that they were allowed
eighteen months from the time of their election for a duty which the consuls
had been required to complete within a year. The censors also held a very
peculiar position with respect to rank and dignity. No imperium was bestowed
upon them, and accordingly they had no lictors. (
Zonar. 7.19.) The
jus censurae was
granted to them by a
lex centuriata, and not by
the curiae, and in official precedence they ranked below the consuls and
praetors, and even below the magister equitum. (Mommsen,
Röm. Staatsr. 1.543, note 3.) But
notwithstanding this, the censorship was regarded as, in some respects, the
highest dignity in the state, with the exception of the dictatorship; it was
a
ἱερὰ ἀρχή, a
sanctus magistratus, to which the deepest reverence was due.
(
Plut. Cat. Ma. 16,
Flamin. 18,
Camill. 2, 14,
Aemil.
Paul. 38; Cic.
ad Fans. 3.10, 11.) The
high rank and dignity, which the censorship obtained, was owing to the
various important duties gradually entrusted to it, and especially to its
possessing the
regimens morum, or general control
over the conduct and morals of the citizens; in the exercise of which power
they were regulated solely by their own views of duty, and were not
responsible to any other power in the state. (Dionys.
Excerpt. 20.13, Kiessling;
Liv.
4.24,
29.37;
V.
Max. 7.2.6.) The censors possessed of course the sella curulis
(
Liv. 40.45), and during their term of
office wore the
toga praetexta (
Zonar. 7.19;
Athen. 14.660 c), but were honoured at burial with the
toga purpurea (cf.
Plb.
6.53, and Mommsen,
Staatsr. 1.425, note 3). The
funeral of a censor was always conducted with great pomp and splendour, and
hence a
funus censorium was voted even to the
emperors (
Tac. Ann. 4.15;
13.2).
The censorship continued in existence for 421 years, namely, from B.C. 443 to
B.C. 22; but during this period many lustra passed by without any censor
being chosen at all. According to one statement, the office was abolished by
Sulla (Schol. Gronov.
ad
Cic. Div. in Caecil. 3, p.
384, ed. Orelli), but the authority on which this statement rests is not of
much weight, and
[p. 1.399]the fact itself is not probable
(cf.
Cic. in Pis. 5, 10); for
although there was no census during the two lustra which elapsed from
Sulla's dictatorship to the first consulship of Pompeius (B.C. 82-70), there
is no reference to any law restoring it, and censors reappear in B.C. 70.
Its power was limited by one of the laws of the tribune Clodius (B.C. 58),
which prescribed certain regular forms of proceeding before the censors in
expelling a person from the senate, and the concurrence of both censors in
inflicting this degradation. (
D. C. 38.13; Cic.
pro Sest. 25, 55,
de Prov.
Cons. 19, 46.) This law, however, was repealed in the third
consulship of Pompey (B.C. 52), on the proposition of his colleague
Caecilius Metellus Scipio (
D. C. 40.57), but
the censorship never recovered its former power and influence. During the
civil wars which followed soon afterwards no censors were elected; and it
was only after a long interval that they were again appointed, namely in
B.C. 22, when Augustus caused L. Munatius Plancus and Paullus Aemilius
Lepidus to fill the office. (
Suet. Aug. 37,
Claud. 16;
D. C. 54.2.) This
was the last time that such magistrates were appointed; the emperors in
future discharged the duties of their office under the name of
Praefectura Morum. Some of the emperors sometimes
took the name of censor when they actually held a census of the Roman
people, as was the case with Claudius, who appointed the elder Vitellius as
his colleague (
Suet. Cl. 16;
Tac. Ann. 12.4,
Hist. 1.9), and with Vespasian, who likewise had a colleague in
his son Titus. (Suet.
Vesp. 8,
Tit. 6.)
Domitian assumed the title of
censor perpetuus
(
D. C. 53.18), but this example was not
imitated by succeeding emperors. In the reign of Decius we find the elder
Valerian nominated to the censorship without a colleague (Trebell. Pollio,
Valer. 1, 2); and towards the end of the fourth century
it was proposed to revive the censorship (Symmach.
Ep. 4.29,
5.9), but this design was never carried into effect.
The duties of the censors may be divided into three classes, all of which
were however closely connected with one another: I.
The
Census, or register of the citizens and of their property, in
which were included the
lectio
senatus, and the
recognitio
equitum; II.
The Regimen Morum;
and III.
The administration of the finances of the state,
including also the superintendence of the public buildings and the erection
of all new public works. The original business of the censorship was at
first of a much more limited kind, and was restricted almost entirely to
taking the census (
Liv. 4.8); but the possession
of this power gradually brought with it fresh power and new duties, as is
shown below. A general view of these duties is briefly expressed in the
following passage of Cicero (
de Leg. 3.3,
7):--“Censores populi aevitates, suboles, familias pecuniasque
censento: urbis templa, vias, aquas, aerari [so Mommsen: MSS.
aerarium] vectigalia tuento: populique partes in
tribus discribunto: exin pecunias, aevitates, ordines partiunto:
equitum, peditumque prolem describunto: caelibes esse prohibento: mores
populi regunto: probrum in senatu ne relinquunto.”
The Census, the first and principal duty of the censors, for which the
proper expression is
censum agere (
Liv. 3.3,
22,
4.8), was always held in the Campus Martius;
like all public acts concerning the Roman people, viewed as an
exercitus: and from the year B.C. 435 a special
building called
Villa Publica, which was
erected for that purpose by the second pair of censors, C. Furius
Pacilus and M. Geganius Macerinus (
Liv. 4.22;
Varr.
R. R. 3.2), was used as the censor's office, the
actual census, however, being conducted in the open air. But all other
business of the censors, including the
recognitio
equitum, was transacted in the forum. An account of the
formalities with which the census was opened is given in a fragment of
the
Tabulae Censoriae, preserved by Varro
(
L. L. 6.86, 87, ed. Müller). After the
auspicia had been taken, the citizens were summoned by a public crier
(
praeco) to appear before the censors.
Each tribe was called up separately (
Dionys. A. R. 5.75); and the names in each tribe were
probably taken according to the lists previously made out on the basis
of the latest
census by the
curatores of the tribes. Every paterfamilias had
to appear in person before the censors, who were seated in their curule
chairs; and those names were taken first which were considered to be of
good omen, such as Valerius, Salvius, Statorius, &c. (Festus, s.
v.
Lacus Lucrinus; Schol. Bob.
ad Cic.
pro Scaur. p. 374, ed.
Orelli.) The censors do not appear to have considered themselves
responsible for determining whether a man claiming to be enrolled was
really entitled to the franchise; hence the occurrence of a name on the
censor's roll was evidence merely that the franchise had been claimed,
not that there was any justification for the claim (
Cic. pro Arch. 5, 11). The
census was conducted
ad arbitrium censoris;
but the censors laid down certain rules (
Liv.
4.8,
29.15), sometimes called
leges censui censendo (
Liv. 43.14), in which mention was made of the
different kinds of property subject to the census, and the way in which
their value was to be estimated. According to these rules, each citizen
had to give an account of himself, of his family, and of his property
upon oath,
ex animi sententia. (
Dionys. A. R. 4.15;
Liv. 43.14.) First he had to give his full
name (
praenomen, nomen, and
cognomen) and that of his father, or if he were
a freedman that of his patron, and he was likewise obliged to state his
age. He was then asked,
Tu, ex animi tui sententia, uxorem
babes? and if married he had to give the name of his wife, and
likewise the number, names, and ages of his children, if any. (
Gel. 4.20;
Cic. de
Orat. 2.64, 260; Tab. Heracl. 142 (68);
Dig. 50, tit. 15, s. 3.) Single women who were
sui iuris (
viduae)
and orphans (
orbi orbaeque) were
represented by their tutores; their names were entered in separate
lists, and they were not included in the sum total of capita. (Comp.
Liv. 3.3,
Epit. 59.) After
a citizen had stated his name, age, family, &c., he then had to
give an account of all his property, so far as it was subject to the
census. In making this statement he was said
dedicare or
deferre in censum,
or sometimes
censere or
censeri, as a deponent, “to value or estimate
himself,” or as a passive, “to be valued or
estimated:” the censor, who received the statement, was also said
censere, as well as
accipere<*>cesum. (Comp. Cic.
pro Flacc.
[p. 1.400]32, 79;
Liv.
39.15.) Only such things were liable to the census (
censui censendo) as were property
ex jure Quiritium. At first each citizen appears
to have merely given the value of his whole property in general without
entering into details (
Dionys. A. R.
4.15;
Cic. de Leg.
3.3, 7 ; Festus, s. v.
Censores);
but it soon became the practice to give a minute specification of each
article, as well as the general value of the whole. (Comp. Cic.
pro Flacc. 32, 79;
Gel.
7.11; Plut.
Cat, Maj. 18.) Land formed the most
important article in the census; but public land, the
possessio of which only belonged to a citizen, was
excluded as not being Quiritarian property. If we may judge from the
practice of the imperial period, it was the custom to give a most minute
specification of all such land as a citizen held
ex
jure Quiritium. He had to state the name and situation of
the land, and to specify what portion of it was arable, what meadow,
what vineyard, and what olive-ground; and to the land thus minutely
described he had to affix his own valuation. (
Dig.
50, tit. 15, s. 4.) Slaves and cattle formed the next most
important item, as constituting along with the land the necessaries of
agriculture, and being
res mancipi
(=
res censui censendo,
Cic. pro Flacc. 32, 79).
The censors also possessed the right of calling for a return of such
objects as had not usually been given in, such as clothing, jewels, and
carriages. (
Liv. 39.44;
Plut. Cat. Ma. 18.) They undoubtedly
possessed the power of setting a higher valuation on the property than
the citizens themselves had put. It is in fact expressly stated that on
one occasion they made an extravagant surcharge on articles of luxury
(
Liv. 39.44;
Plut. Cat. Ma. 18); and even if they did not enter in their
books the property of a person at a higher value than he returned it,
they accomplished the same end by compelling him to pay down the tax
upon the property at a higher rate than others. The tax (
tributum) was usually one per thousand upon the
property entered in the books of the censors; but on one occasion the
censors, as a punishment, compelled a person to pay eight per thousand
(
octuplicato censu,
Liv. 4.24). The censors were aided by certain
assessors (
in consilio vocati) and
iuratores (
Liv.
39.44; Plaut,
Trin. 878,
Poen. prol. 56), who administered the oath, i. e.
asked the formal questions.
A person who voluntarily absented himself from the census, and thus
became
incensus, was subject to the
severest punishment. Servius Tullius is said to have threatened the
incensus with imprisonment and death (
Liv.
1.44); and in the republican period he might be sold by the state
as a slave (Cic.
pro Caecin. 34, 99). In
the later times of the republic a person who was absent from the census
might be represented by another, and thus be registered by the censors
(Varr.
L. L, 6.86). Whether the soldiers who were absent
on service had to appoint a representative, may be questioned. In
ancient times the sudden breaking out of a war prevented the census from
being taken (
Liv. 6.31), because a large
number of the citizens would necessarily be absent. It is supposed from
a passage in Livy (
29.37), that in later
times the censors sent commissioners into the provinces with full powers
to take the census of the Roman soldiers there; but this seems to have
been only a special case. It is, on the contrary, probable from the way
in which Cicero pleads the absence of Archias from Rome with the army
under Lucullus, as a sufficient reason for his not having been enrolled
in the census (
pro Arch, 5, 11), that service in the army
was a valid excuse for absence. Before the Social War the
census of the allies was taken in their own
towns: and this practice seems to have continued after they had been
admitted to the franchise (Cic.
pro Cluent.
14, 41).
After the censors had received the names of all the citizens with the
amount of their property, they then had to make out the lists of the
tribes, and also of the classes and centuries; for by the legislation of
Servius Tullius the position of each citizen in the state was determined
by the amount of his property. [COMITIA.
CENTURIATA.] These lists formed a most important part of the
Tabulae Censoriae, under which name
were included all the documents connected in any way with the discharge
of the censors' duties. (
Cic. de
Leg. 3.3, 7;
Liv. 24.18;
Plut. Cat. Ma. 16;
Cic. de Leg. Agr. 1.2) These
lists, as far at least as they were connected with the finances of the
state, were deposited in the aerarium, which was the temple of Saturn
(Liv. xxix, 37); but the regular depository for all the archives of the
censors was in earlier times the Atrium Libertatis, near the Villa
publica (
Liv. 43.16,
45.15), and in later times the temple of the Nymphs (
Cic. pro Mil. 27, 73), which
has recently been discovered
in camps
(
Ephem. Epigr. 1.35).
Besides the arrangement of the citizens into tribes, centuries, and
classes, the censors had also to make out the lists of the senators for
the ensuing lustrum, or till new censors were appointed; striking out
the names of such as they considered unworthy, and making additions to
the body from those who were qualified. This important part of their
duties is explained under SENATUS. In the same manner they held a review
of the
equites equo publico and added and
removed names as they judged proper. [
EQUITES]
After the lists had been completed, the number of citizens was counted
up, and the sum total announced; and accordingly we find that, in the
account of a census, the number of citizens is likewise usually given.
They are in such cases spoken of as
capita,
sometimes with the addition of the word
civium, and sometimes not; and hence to be registered in the
census was the same thing as
caput habere.
[
CAPUT]
This was the most important branch of the censors' duties, and the one
which caused their office to be the most revered and the most dreaded in
the Roman state. It is not mentioned in connexion with the institution
of the censorship (
Liv. 4.8), but it appears
in the account of the second
lustrum (ib.
4.24). Its main purpose was to determine how far each citizen fulfilled
his duty towards the state; but the limits of the inquiry were defined
only by the discretion of the censors. In this manner the censors
gradually became possessed of a complete superintendence over the whole
public and private life of every citizen. They were constituted the
conservators of
[p. 1.401]public and private virtue and
morality; they were not simply to prevent crime or particular acts of
immorality, but their great object was to maintain the old Roman
character and habits, the
mos majorum. The
proper expression for this branch of their power was
regimen morum (
Cic. de
Leg. 3.3, 7;
Liv. 4.8,
24.18,
40.46,
41.27,
42.3;
Suet. Aug. 27), which
was called in the times of the empire
cura
or
praefcctura morum. The punishment inflicted
by the censors in the exercise of this branch of their duties was called
Nota or
Notatio, or
Animadversio
Censoria. In inflicting it they were guided only by their
conscientious convictions of duty; they had to take an oath that they
would act neither through partiality nor favour; and, in addition to
this, they were bound in every case to state in their lists, opposite
the name of the guilty citizen, the cause of the punishment inflicted on
him,--
Subscriptio censoria. (
Liv. 39.42;
Cic. Clu.
6,
42-
48;
Gel. 4.20.) A citizen was usually
required to appear before the censors in his own defence, when
threatened with the
nota; and in .some
cases a censor required the appearance of a prosecutor, before he would
take any action (
Cic. Clu. 48,
133; cf.
V. Max.
4.1,
10). In fact, a kind of trial
was held, but one not fettered by the ordinary legal forms of procedure.
This part of the censors' office invested them with a peculiar kind of
jurisdiction, which in many respects resembled the exercise of public
opinion in modern times; for there are innumerable actions which, though
acknowledged by every one to be prejudicial and immoral, still do not
come within the reach of the positive laws of a country. Even in cases
of real crimes, the positive laws frequently punish only the particular
offence, while in public opinion the offender, even after he has
undergone punishment, is still incapacitated for certain honours and
distinctions which are granted only to persons of unblemished character.
Hence the Roman censors might brand a man with their nota censoria in
case he had been convicted of a crime in an ordinary court of justice,
and had already suffered punishment for it. The consequence of such a
nota was only
ignominia and not
infamia (
Cic. de
Rep. 4.6, 6) [
INFAMIA], and the censorial verdict was not a
judicium or
res
judicata (
Cic. Clu. 42,
117), for its effects were not
lasting, but might be removed by the following censors, or by a lex. A
nota censoria was moreover not valid, unless both censors agreed. The
ignominia was thus only a transitory capitis deminutio, which does not
even appear to have deprived a magistrate of his office (
Liv. 24.18), and certainly did not disqualify
persons labouring under it for obtaining a magistracy, for being
appointed as judices by the praetor, or for serving in the Roman armies.
Mam. Aemilius was thus, notwithstanding the animadversio censoria, made
dictator. (
Liv. 4.31.)
A person might be branded with a censorial nota in a variety of cases,
which it would be impossible to specify, as in a great many instances it
depended upon the discretion of the censors and the view they took of a
case; and sometimes even one set of censors would overlook an offence
which was severely chastised by their successors. (
Cic. de Senect. 12, 42.) But
the offences which are recorded to have been punished by the censors are
of a threefold nature.
- 1. Such as occurred in the private life of individuals, e. g.
(a) The dissolution of
matrimony or betrothment in an improper way, or for insufficient
reasons. (V. Max. 2.9.2.)
(b) The obligation of marrying
was frequently impressed upon the citizens by the censors, and
the refusal to fulfil it was punished with a fine [AES UXORIUM].
But celibacy in itself can hardly have been visited with a
nota; for, however undesirable,
it cannot have been regarded as a probrum. (c) Improper conduct
towards one's wife or children, as well as harshness or too
great indulgence towards children, and disobedience of the
latter towards their parents. (Plut.
Cat. Ma. 17 ; compare Cic.
de Rep. 4.6, 16; Dionys. A. R. 20.3.) (d) Inordinate and luxurious mode of
living, or an extravagant expenditure of money. A great many
instances of this kind are recorded. (Liv. Epit. 14, 39.44; Plut. Cat. Ma.
18; Gellius, 4.8, 17.21, 39;
Vell. 2.10; V. Max. 2.9.4.) At a
later times the leges sumptuariae were made to check the growing
love of luxuries. (e) Neglect and
carelessness in cultivating one's fields. (Gel. 4.12; Plin. Nat.
18.11.) (f) Cruelty towards
slaves or clients. (Dionys. A. R.
20.3.) (g) The carrying on of
a disreputable trade or occupation (Dionys. l.c.), such as acting in theatres. (Liv. 7.2.) (h)
Legacy-hunting, defrauding orphans, &c.
- 2. Offences committed in public life, either in the capacity
of a public officer or against magistrates. (a) If a magistrate acted in a manner not
befitting his dignity as an officer, if he was accessible to
bribes, or forged auspices. (Cic.
de Senect. 12, 42; Liv. 39.42; V.
Max. 2.9.3; Plut. Cat.
Maj. 17; Cic. de
Div. 1.1. 6, 29.) (b) Improper conduct towards a magistrate, or the
attempt to limit his power or to abrogate a law which the
censors thought necessary. (Liv.
4.24; Cic. de Orat.
2.64, 260; V. Max. 2.9.5;
Gellius, 4.20.) (c) Perjury. (Cic. de
Off. 1.1. 3; Liv.
24.18; Gel. 7.18.) (d) Neglect, disobedience, and cowardice
of soldiers in the army. (V. Max.
2.9.7; Liv. 24.18, 27.11.) (e) The keeping of the equus publicus in bad
condition. [EQUITES]
- 3. A variety of actions or pursuits which were thought to be
injurious to public morality might be forbidden by the censors
by an edict (Gellius, 15.11), and
those who acted contrary to such edicts were branded with the
nota and degraded. For an enumeration of the offences that might
be punished by the censors with ignominia, see Mommsen,
Staatsr. 2.364-368.
The consequence of the censor's
nota was the
removal of the citizen thus censured from the tribe to which he
belonged, and his degradation to the
aerarii. The former act was the main one, and therefore in
exact language is always mentioned first ( “tribu movere et
aerarium facere:”
Liv. 4.24,
7;
24.43,
3;
44.16,
8;
45.15. 8), though sometimes the order is
reversed. In the earlier times, when the tribes represented the
freeholders [
TRIBUS], this
degradation brought with it the serious disadvantage that the degraded
citizen paid taxes on
[p. 1.402]the whole of his
property, and not merely on his landed estate. But after the changes
introduced by Appius Claudius, by which the
aerarii were included in the
tribus
urbanae, and the distinction between
aerarii and
tribules thus
ceased to exist, the phrase
tribu movere,
or what was now the same thing
in aerarios
referre, came to mean the removal from the country to the less
respectable city tribes. In the case of a senator this degradation
involved the loss of his place in the senate, which could however be
recovered by subsequent election to a curule office. (
Cic. Clu. 42,
117.) In the case of an
eques, it
accompanied the
ademptio equi. Women, as
not included among the
tributes, did not come at
all under the control of the censors.
III. The Administration of the Finances of the State
was another part of the censors' office. In the first place the
tributum, or property-tax, had to be paid by
each citizen according to the amount of his property registered in the
census, and, accordingly, the regulation of this tax naturally fell
under the jurisdiction of the censors. (Comp.
Liv.
39.44.) [TRIBUTUM.] They also had
the superintendence of all the other revenues of the state, the
vectigalia, such as the tithes paid for the
public lands, the salt works, the mines, the customs, &c. [
VECTIGALIA] All these
branches of the revenue the censors were accustomed to let out to the
highest bidder for the space of a lustrum or five years. The act of
letting was called
venditio or
locatio (cf. Fest. p. 376,
venditiones dicebantur olim censorum locationes), and
seems to have taken place in the month of March (
Macr. 1.12), in a public place in Rome (
Cic. de Leg. Agr. 1.3. 7;
2.21, 55). The terms on which they were let, together with the rights
and duties of the purchasers, were all specified in the
leges censoriae, which the censors published in
every case before the bidding commenced. (
Cic. ad Qu. Fr. 1.1, § 12,
Verr. 3.7, 18,
de Vat. Deor. 3.19, 49;
Varr.
de Re Rust. 2.1.) For further
particulars see
PUBLICANI
The censors also possessed the right, though probably not without the
concurrence of the senate, of imposing new vectigalia (
Liv. 29.37,
40.51), and even of selling the land belonging to the state
(
Liv. 32.7). It would thus appear that it
was the duty of the censors to bring forward a budget for a lustrum, and
to take care that the income of the state was sufficient for its
expenditure during that time. So far their duties resembled those of a
modern minister of finance. The censors, however, did not receive the
revenues of the state. All the public money was paid into the aerarium,
which was entirely under the jurisdiction of the senate; and all
disbursements were made by order of this body, which employed the
quaestors as its officers. [AERARIUM;
SENATUS.]
In one important department the censors were entrusted with the
expenditure of the public money; though the actual payments were no
doubt made by the quaestors. The censors had the general superintendence
of all the public buildings and works (
opera
publica) ; and to meet the expenses connected with this part
of their duties, the senate voted them a certain sum of money or certain
revenues, to which they were restricted, but which they might at the
same time employ according to their discretion. (
Plb. 6.13;
Liv. 40.46,
44.16.) They had to see that the temples and
all other public buildings were in a good. state of repair (
aedes sacras tueri and
sarta
tecta exigere,
Liv. 24.18,
29.37,
42.3 [where Madvig rightly
emends
locare tuenda for
loca tuenda], 45.15), that no public places were
encroached upon by the occupation of private persons (
Liv. 43.16), and that the aqueducts,. roads,
drains, &c. were properly attended to. [AQUAEDUCTUS; VIAE; CLOACA.] The repairs of the public works
and the keeping of them in proper condition were let out by the censors
by public auction to the lowest bidder, just as the
vectigalia were let out to the highest bidder. These
expenses were called
ultro tributa,--a
remarkable phrase, probably intended to imply the complete discretion
which the senate desired to reserve to itself in conceding or refusing
the application of a magistrate for the usual grants; and hence we
frequently find
vectigalia and
ultro tributa contrasted with one another.
(
Liv. 39.44,
43.16; cf.
Lex Municip. 1. 73: “publiceis
vectigalibus, ultrove tributeis.” ) The persons who undertook
the contract were called
conductores, mancipes,
redemptores, susceptores, &c. ; and the duties
they had to discharge were specified in the
Leges
Censoriae. The censors had also to superintend the
expenses connected with the worship of the gods, even for instance the
feeding of the sacred geese in the Capitol, the contract for which was
always the first given out. (Plut.
Quaest.
Rom. 98 ;
Plin. Nat. 10.51;
Cic. pro Rosc. Am.
20, 57.) Besides keeping existing public works--in a proper state
of repair, the censors also constructed new ones, either for ornament or
utility, both in Rome and in other parts of Italy, such as temples,
basilicae, theatres, porticoes, fora, walls of towns, aqueducts,
harbours, bridges, cloacae, roads, &c. These works were either
performed by them jointly, or they divided between them the money which
had been granted to them by the senate. (
Liv.
40.51,
44.16.) They were let out to
contractors, like the other works mentioned above ; and when they were
completed, the censors had to see that the work was performed in
accordance with the contract: this was called
opus
probare or
in acceptum
referre. (
Cic. Ver. 1.57,
149;
Liv.
4.22,
45.15; Lex Puteol. in
C.
I. L. i. 163.) When there were no censors in office, their
financial duties lapsed to the consuls, who often appear as giving out
contracts for buildings, &c.
The aediles had likewise a superintendence over the public buildings; and
it is not easy to define with accuracy the respective duties of the
censors and aediles: but it may be remarked in general that the
superintendence of the aediles had more of a police character, while
that of the censors had reference to all financial matters.
After the censors had performed their various duties and taken the
census, the
lustrum or solemn purification
of the people followed. When the censors entered upon their office, they
drew lots to see which of them should perform this purification
(
lustrum facere or
condere, Varr.
L. L. 6.86;
Liv. 29.37,
35.9,
38.36,
42.10); but both censors were obliged of course to be present at
the ceremony. [
LUSTRUM]
[p. 1.403]
In the Roman and Latin colonies and in the municipia there were censors,
who likewise bore the name of
quinquennales. They are spoken of under
COLONIA
A census was usually taken in the provinces, even under the republic
(
Cic. Ver. 2.53, 131;
56,
139); but there seems to be no
single instance of a general census under the empire, with the exception
of that mentioned by St. Luke (2.2) in the time of Augustus: on which
see Mommsen,
Staatsr. 2.412, and Meyer,
ad loc. (Cf.
J. AJ
17.13.5;
18.1.1;
2.1.) As a rule the census of the various
provinces was taken quite independently, often called
censitores, sometimes by persons of equestrian rank, charged
with the census of particular communities or groups of communities,
sometimes by imperial
legati pro praetore
appointed for whole provinces (
Tac. Ann.
2.6;
6.41;
14.46), sometimes by officials of still
higher rank for several provinces together. It was quite in accordance
with the principles of imperial government that while the lists, upon
which taxation and levies were based, should be kept with great
accuracy, and regularly transmitted to Rome, no public or general
statement should be made as to the results so obtained (cf. Mommsen,
Staatsr. 2.410-413). At Rome the census still
continued to be taken under the empire, but the old ceremonies connected
with it were no longer continued, and the ceremony of the lustration was
not performed after the time of Vespasian. The two great jurists, Paulus
and Ulpian, each wrote works on the census in the imperial period; and
several extracts from these works are given in a chapter in the Digest
(
50, tit. 15), to which we must refer our
readers for further details respecting the imperial census.
The word
census, besides the meaning of
“valuation” of a person's estate, has other
significations, which must be briefly mentioned: 1. It signified the
amount of a person's property, and hence we read of
census senatorius, the estate of a senator;
census equestris, the estate of an eques. 2. The
lists of the censors. 3. The tax which depended upon the valuation in
the census. The Lexicons will supply examples of these meanings.
(Becker,
Handbuch der römischen
Alterthümer, vol. ii. part ii. pp. 191-247, with
additions and corrections by Mommsen,
Staatsrecht, vol.
ii. pp. 319-461. Compare Niebuhr, History of Rome, vol. ii. p. 397;
Arnold,
History of Rome, vol. i. p. 346, &c.;
Göttling,
Römische Staatsverfassung, p.
328, &c.; Gerlach,
Die römische Censur in ihrem
Verhaitnisse zur Verfassung, Basel, 1842; Lange,
Röm. Alterthümer, 1.667-690; Dureau
de la Malle,
Économie Politique des Romains,
vol. i. p. 159, &c.)
[
W.S] [
A.S.W]