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The Conflict of the Orders, also referred to as "the Struggle of the Orders," was a political struggle between the plebeians (plebs) and patricians (patricii) of the ancient Roman Republic, in which the plebeians sought political equality and achieved it in 287 BC, after two centuries of strife. In Ancient Rome, the plebs was the general body of Roman citizens, distinct from the privileged class of the patricians. ...
This is an article about the privileged class in ancient Rome. ...
See also Roman Republic (18th century) and Roman Republic (19th century). ...
Centuries: 4th century BC - 3rd century BC - 2nd century BC Decades: 330s BC 320s BC 310s BC 300s BC 290s BC 280s BC 270s BC 260s BC 250s BC 240s BC 230s BC Years: 292 BC 291 BC 290 BC 289 BC 288 BC - 287 BC - 286 BC 285 BC...
The traditional account
The traditional story, whose primary source is the first few books of Livy, is that the patricians were the aristocrats of Rome, taking over when the kings were expelled and the Republic formed in 509 BC, while the plebeians were the "lower class". Initially, only patricians could hold magistracies (such as the consulate), positions in the religious colleges, and sit in the Roman Senate. A portrait of Titus Livius made long after his death. ...
Centuries: 7th century BC - 6th century BC - 5th century BC Decades: 550s BC - 540s BC - 530s BC - 520s BC - 510s BC - 500s BC - 490s BC - 480s BC - 470s BC - 460s BC - 450s BC Events and Trends 509 BC - Foundation of the Roman Republic 508 BC - Office of pontifex maximus created...
Consul (abbrev. ...
The Roman Senate (Latin: Senatus) was the main governing council of both the Roman Republic, which started in 509 BC, and the Roman Empire. ...
However, the patrician clans abused their position, using the creditor's right of nexum to take plebeian debtors into bondage and selling them as slaves, favoring patricians over plebeians in court cases, and overriding the will of the Centuriate Assembly. Nexum is a term used in ancient Rome; it means debt bondage, and was ordained illegal by the lex poetelia in 326 or 313 BC. Categories: Substubs ...
The Buxton Memorial Fountain, celebrating the emancipation of slaves in the British Empire in 1834, London. ...
The Roman Republic (Latin: Res Publica Romanorum) vested formal governmental powers in four separate peoples assemblies — the Comitia Curiata, the Comitia Centuriata, the Comitia Tributa, and the Concilium Plebis. ...
Plebeian responses included the establishment of the tribunes, whose authority to protect plebeians was eventually accepted by the patricians, and the concilium plebis whose decisions were originally binding on plebeians only, but in 287 applied to all citizens. The plebs convinced the patricians by engaging in secessio, the act of leaving the city and refusing to participate until the patricians gave in. Tribune (from the Latin: tribunus; Greek form tribounos) was a title shared by several elected magistracies and other governmental and/or (para)military offices of the Roman Republic and Empire. ...
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Events Diocletian and Maximian become Roman Consuls Births Deaths Categories: 287 ...
Secessio in historical terms refers to the exercise of power by Romes plebian citizens; who simply abandoned the city en masse and left the patrician order to themselves. ...
In 449 BC the decemvirs codified the law via the Twelve Tables, but then their 11th Table forbade intermarriage between patricians and plebeians, sharpening the distinction between the classes, and it was soon repealed by the Lex Canuleia of 445 BC. Centuries: 6th century BC - 5th century BC - 4th century BC Decades: 490s BC 480s BC 470s BC 460s BC 450s BC - 440s BC - 430s BC 420s BC 410s BC 400s BC 390s BC 454 BC 453 BC 452 BC 451 BC 450 BC 449 BC 448 BC 447 BC 446...
Decemviri (sing. ...
The Law of the Twelve Tables (Lex Duodecim Tabularum, more informally simply Duodecim Tabulae) was the ancient legislation that stood at the foundation of Roman law. ...
The Lex Canuleia was a law in ancient Rome, passed during the Republic in 445 BC, which allowed intermarrige between plebians and patricians. ...
Centuries: 6th century BC - 5th century BC - 4th century BC Decades: 490s BC 480s BC 470s BC 460s BC 450s BC - 440s BC - 430s BC 420s BC 410s BC 400s BC 390s BC Years: 450 BC 449 BC 448 BC 447 BC 446 BC - 445 BC - 444 BC 443 BC...
In 367 the Lex Licinia Sextia resumed the previously suspended consulship and provided that one of the two consuls should always be a plebeian. Soon after the dictatorship, censorship, and praetorship became open to plebeians as well. Centuries: 5th century BC - 4th century BC - 3rd century BC Decades: 410s BC 400s BC 390s BC 380s BC 370s BC - 360s BC - 350s BC 340s BC 330s BC 320s BC 310s BC 372 BC 371 BC 370 BC 369 BC 368 BC - 367 BC - 366 BC 365 BC 364...
Lex Licinia Sextia was a Roman law passed in 367 BCE and took effect in 366 BCE. It resumed the consulship, reserved one of the two consul positions for a plebeian, and introduced new agrarian limits. ...
Dictator was a political office of the Roman Republic. ...
Censor was the title of two magistrates of high rank in the Roman Republic. ...
// Definition According to Cicero, Praetor was a title which designated the consuls as the leaders of the armies of the state. ...
The final crisis in the struggle came in 287, when economically-stressed farmers demanded debt relief from the Senate and were rebuffed. A secessio resulted in the Senate appointing the plebeian Quintus Hortensius the elder as dictator, who solved the problem in a manner unknown to us, then passed the lex Hortensia giving equal weight to the decrees of the Senate and the Council of Plebs. Although individuals identified themselves as plebeian or patrician for the remainder of the Republic and well into the Empire, and the patricians retained certain priesthoods, there was no political difference between the orders. Events Diocletian and Maximian become Roman Consuls Births Deaths Categories: 287 ...
In Roman law, Lex Hortensia (287 BCE) was the final result of the long class struggle between patricians and plebeians. ...
What really happened? The traditional account was long accepted as factual, but it has a number of problems and inconsistencies, and almost every element of the story is controversial today; some scholars, such as Richard E. Mitchell, have even argued that there was no conflict at all, the Romans of the late Republic having interpreted events of their distant past as if they were comparable to the class struggles of their own time.
The crux of the problem is that there is no contemporaneous account of the conflict; writers such as Polybius, who might have met persons whose grandparents participated in the conflict, do not mention it, while the writers who do speak of the conflict, such as Livy or Cicero, report fact and fable equally readily, and invariably assume that there were no fundamental changes in Roman institutions in nearly 500 years. Polybius (c. ...
Cicero at about age 60, from an ancient marble bust Marcus Tullius Cicero (IPA: ; Latin pronunciation: ; January 3, 106 BC – December 7, 43 BC) was an orator, statesman, political theorist, lawyer and philosopher of Ancient Rome. ...
For instance, the fasti report a number of consuls with plebeian names during the 400s, when the consulate was supposedly only open to patricians, and explanations to the effect that previously-patrician gentes somehow became plebeians later are difficult to prove. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
GENS is an open source emulator for the Sega Genesis (Sega Megadrive). ...
Another point of difficulty is the apparent absence of armed revolt; as the history of the late Republic shows, similar types of grievances tended to lead to bloodshed rather quickly, yet Livy's account seems to entail debate mostly, with the occasional threat of secessio.
None of this is helped by our basic uncertainty as to who the plebs actually were; many of them are known to have been wealthy landowners, and the "lower class" label dates from the late Republic.
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