The First Man in Rome (140 page)

primus pilus
The centurion in command of the leading century of the leading cohort of a Roman legion, and therefore the chief centurion of that legion. He rose to this position by a serial promotion, and was considered the most able man in the whole legion.

Princeps Senatus
What today we would call the Leader of the House. The censors chose a patrician senator of unimpeachable integrity and morals—and high
dignitas
as well as high
auctoritas
—to fill the role of Princeps Senatus. Apparently it was not necessarily a title given for life, but was reviewed every five years when a new pair of censors entered office. Marcus Aemilius Scaurus was created Princeps Senatus at a relatively young age, having acquired the title, it would seem, while still actually serving as consul in 115 B.C. As it was not usual for a man to be appointed Princeps Senatus before being elected censor (Scaurus was not elected censor until 109 B.C.), Scaurus's winning the post was either a signal mark of honor for an extraordinary

man, or else (as some modern scholars have suggested) he was in 115 B.C. the most senior patrician senator available for the job. Whichever was the case, Scaurus held the title until he died—and never stood in danger of losing it, as far as we can gather.

privatus
A private citizen, but used in this book to indicate a man who was a member of the Senate yet not serving as a magistrate.

proconsul
One serving with the status of a consul. This imperium was normally given to a man who had just finished his year as consul, and went still holding the status of a consul (that is, as a proconsul) to govern a province or command an army in the name of the Senate and People of Rome. A man's term as proconsul normally lasted for a year, but was commonly prorogued beyond the year if the man was engaged in a campaign against an enemy still unsubdued. If a consular was not available to govern a province stormy enough to warrant the appointment of a proconsul rather than a propraetor, one of the year's crop of praetors was sent to govern it, endowed with the imperium of a proconsul. The proconsul's imperium was limited to the area of his province or task, and was lost the moment he stepped across the
pomerium
into the city of Rome.

proletarii
Another name for the lowliest of all Roman citizens, the
capite censi
or Head Count. The word
proletarius
derived from
proles,
which means progeny, offspring, children in an impersonal sense, and was given to these lowly citizens because children were the only thing they were capable of giving Rome.

propraetor
One serving with the status of a praetor. This imperium was given to a praetor still serving his year in office, or to a praetor after his year in office was over, and was awarded to empower its owner to govern a province and, if necessary, conduct a war. Like the imperium of a proconsul, that of a propraetor was lost the moment he stepped inside the sacred boundary of Rome. In degree, the position was less powerful than proconsul, and was normally given when the province in question was peaceful. Hence, any war the propraetor engaged in had to be forced upon him; he could not seek it out.

prorogue
The act of extending a man's tenure of magisterial office beyond its normal time span. It applied to governorships or military commands, not to the actual magistracies themselves.

province,
Provincia.
The sphere of duty of a magistrate or a promagistrate holding an imperium. By extension, the word came to mean also the place where the imperium was exercised by its holder—in other words, a territory or possession of Rome requiring the attention of a governor in local residence. By the time of Gaius Marius, all of Rome's provinces were outside Italy and Italian Gaul.

pteryges
The leather straps which depended from the waist to the knees as a kilt, and from the shoulders to the upper arms as sleeves; they were sometimes fringed at their ends. The traditional mark of senior officers and generals of the Roman army, they were not worn by the ranks.

Punic
The adjective applied to Carthage and its people, but particularly to the three wars fought between Carthage and Rome. The word is derived from the word "Phoenician."

Puteoli
Modern Pozzuoli. By the time of Gaius Marius, Puteoli was Italy's busiest and most important port, and as an emporium had surpassed Delos. It was a very well organized and run city, and in spite of its port status still managed to remain an appealing seaside vacation spot for wealthy Romans. Its most prominent family was the family Granius, who apparently had ties to Gaius Marius and the Latin town of Arpinum.

quadriga
A chariot drawn by four horses.

quaestor
The lowest rung on the senatorial
cursus honorum.
At the time of Gaius Marius, to be elected quaestor did not mean a man was automatically made a member of the Senate; however, it was the normal practice of the censors to admit quaestors into the Senate. The exact number of quaestors elected in any one year is not known for this date, but was perhaps twelve to sixteen. The age at which a man sought election as quaestor was thirty, which was also the correct age for entering the Senate. A quaestor's chief duties were fiscal: he might be seconded to the Treasury in Rome, or to secondary treasuries, or to collecting customs and port duties (there must have been at least three such quaestors at this time, one for Ostia, one for Puteoli,

and one for the other ports), or to managing the finances of a province. A consul going to govern a province the next year could ask for a man by name to serve as his quaestor; this was considered a great distinction for the quaestor and a sure way to be elected. In normal circumstances the quaestorship lasted for one year, but if a man was requested by name, he was obliged to remain in the province with his governor until the governor's term was brought to an end. Quaestors entered office on the fifth day of December.

Quirinus
One of the most Latin of all gods, Quirinus was the divine embodiment of a concept, an idea. Perhaps of Sabine rather than Latin origins, he had his home on the Quirinal Hill, where in the very beginning there had been a Sabine settlement. Later it became a part of Romulus's Latin city, and Quirinus the god was fused with Romulus the god. Just who Quirinus was, and what he was, no one knows; but it is thought he was the embodiment of the Roman citizenship, the god of the assembly of Roman men. His special priest, the
flamen Quirinalis,
was one of the three major
flamines,
and he had a festival of his own, the Quirinalia. In front of his temple there grew two myrtle trees, one representing the patricians, the other the plebeians.

Quirites
Roman citizens of civilian status. What we do not know is whether the word "Quirites" also implied that the citizens in question had never served as soldiers in Rome's armies; certain remarks of Caesar the Dictator might lead one to believe that this was so, for he addressed his mutinous soldiers as Quirites, and by doing so heaped such scorn upon them that they immediately pleaded for his pardon. However, much had changed between the time of Gaius Marius and the time of Caesar the Dictator. I have chosen to believe that at the time of Gaius Marius, the word "Quirites" was an honorable one.

Regia
The ancient little building in the Forum Romanum, oddly shaped and oriented toward the north, that served as the offices of the Pontifex Maximus and the headquarters of the College of Pontifices. It was an inaugurated temple, and contained shrines or altars or artifacts of some of Rome's oldest and most numinous gods—Opsiconsiva, Vesta, Mars of the sacred shields and spears (see
numen).
Within the Regia the Pontifex Maximus kept his archives. It was
never
his residence, though tradition had it that the Regia had been the home of Numa Pompilius, the second King of Rome.

Remus
Romulus's twin. Having, assisted Romulus in founding his Palatine settlement and helped in the building of its walls, Remus was then killed by Romulus for jumping over the walls—apparently some kind of sacrilege.

repetundae
Extortion. Until the time of Gaius Gracchus, it was not standard practice to prosecute provincial governors who used their power to enrich themselves; one or two special courts or commissions had been set up to prosecute particular governors, but that was all. These early special courts or
quaestiones
were staffed entirely by senators, and quickly became a joke, because senatorial judges and juries would not convict their fellow senators the governors. Then in 122 B.C. Manius Acilius Glabrio, boon companion of Gaius Gracchus, passed a
lex Acilia
providing a permanent extortion court staffed by knights, and empanelled 450 named knights as a pool from which the juries were to be drawn. In 106 B.C. Quintus Servilius Caepio returned
all
courts, including the extortion court, to the Senate. Then in 101 B.C. Gaius Servilius Glaucia gave the extortion court back to the knights, with many innovative refinements which were to become standard practice in every kind of court. The cases we hear of were all concerning governors of provinces enriching themselves, but it would seem that after the
lex Acilia
of 122 B.C., the extortion court was also empowered to try any case of illegal enrichment. There were rewards offered to citizen informants, and noncitizens who successfully brought a prosecution before the court were rewarded with the citizenship.

Republic
The word was originally two words,
res publica
—that is, the thing which constitutes the people as a whole—that is, its government. We use the word "republic" today to mean an elected government which does not acknowledge any monarch its superior, but it is doubtful that the Romans in establishing their Republic thought of it in quite that way, despite the fact that they founded their Republic as an alternative to monarchy.

Rex Sacrorum
During the Republic, he was the second-ranking
pontifex
in the pontifical hierarchy. He had to be a patrician, and he was hedged around with as many taboos as the
flamen Dialis.

Rhea Silvia
The daughter of Numitor, King of Alba Longa in the days before Rome existed. Numitor was deposed by his younger brother Amulius, and Rhea Silvia was made a Vestal Virgin so that she could never have children. But the god Mars saw her, and ravished her. When Amulius found out she was pregnant he locked her up until her confinement, then put the twin boys she bore into a basket made of rushes and threw the basket into the Tiber, at the time in flood. The basket washed ashore at the foot of the Ficus Ruminalis, the sacred fig tree near the later Steps of Cacus leading to the Palatine. The twins were found by a she-wolf, which suckled them in her cave nearby. They were rescued by Faustulus and his wife Acca Larentia, who raised them to manhood. The twins—Romulus and Remus, of course—then killed Amulius and re-established Numitor on the throne of Alba Longa. The other name of Rhea Silvia was—Julia.

Rhenus River
The modern Rhine. In ancient times, it was the natural boundary between Germania and its German tribes, and Gallia and its Gallic tribes. So wide and deep and strong was it that it was considered impossible to bridge.

rhetoric
The art of oratory, which both the Greeks and the Romans turned into something very close to a science. A proper orator spoke according to carefully laid-out rules and conventions which extended far beyond mere words; body movements and gestures were an intrinsic part of it. In the early and middle Republic, Greek teachers of rhetoric were despised, and sometimes even outlawed from Rome; Cato the Censor was an avowed enemy of the Greek rhetor. However, the Graecophilia of the Scipionic Circle and other highly educated Roman noblemen of the time broke down much of this Latin opposition, so that by the time of the Brothers Gracchi, most young Roman noblemen were taught by Greek rhetors; it was the Latin rhetors who then fell into disfavor. There were different styles of rhetoric—Lucius Licinius Crassus Orator favored the Asianic style, more florid and dramatic than the Attic. It must be remembered that the audience which gathered to listen to public oration, be it concerned with politics or the law courts, was composed of connoisseurs of rhetoric; they watched and listened in a spirit of marked criticism, for they knew all the rules and the techniques at first hand, and were not easy to please.
Rhodanus River
The modern Rhone. Its large and fertile valley, inhabited by Celtic tribes of Gauls, came early under Roman influence; after the campaigns of Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus in 122 and 121 B.C., the Rhone Valley up as far as the lands of the Aedui and Ambarri became a part of the Roman province of Transalpine Gaul—that is, of Gaul-across-the-Alps.