Niebuhr's lectures on Roman history, Vol. 1 (of 3)Niebuhr, Barthold Georg
History
Niebuhr's lectures on Roman history, Vol. 1 (of 3)
Niebuhr, Barthold Georg
Rome -- History
In its first form, Rome consisted of a city on the Palatine,
surrounded by a wall and ditch, with a suburb, and of a Sabine town
on the Quirinal and on the Tarpeian Hill. From the union of both,
Rome arose; and from the union of both bodies of citizens, the Roman
citizenship. All modern states, with the single exception of the
canton of Schwytz, have their governments and subdivisions according
to their territory. Every city is divided into districts and wards,
and on these, in representative governments, the representation is
based: he who has his abode in a district is both an elector, and
may also be elected in it. But the view which the ancients took was
this, that the land was only the substratum of the state; that the
state itself was formed of individuals; and that the relations of
these to the whole community were modified in different ways by the
corporations. Hence the state was divided into a certain number of
associations, each of which again consisted of several families. These
associations had among themselves their assemblies, their rights of
inheritance, &c. their tribunals, and especially their sanctuaries.
Whoever belonged to them, bequeathed these to his children; and
wherever he might live, within or without the state, he was always
deemed to belong to that association. Whoever, on the contrary, did not
belong to it by right of birth, could only come in as an exception,
if that association acknowledged him. A man might be received into
the state with all the rights which the ancients confined to the
citizen as such, he might acquire landed property, he might sue and
be sued; and yet, unless he had a share in some association, he was
only an inmate, and could not be invested with an office, nor could
he vote. This view was generally entertained by all the most ancient
states. The state could merely bestow upon an individual the right
of abode and civil privileges: it could not command the association
to receive any one. In many states, the associations had not even
the right of admitting any body. This is the case with the castes
which always remain exclusive, and which, being separate, allow of
no intermarriage. Such an association, comprehending a number of
families from which one may go out, but into which one either cannot
enter at all, or only by the adoption of the whole association, is a
clan, and by no means what we call family, which implies an origin
from a common root; for when these clans have patronymics, they are
always merely symbolical, and derived from heroes.[66] I assume it as
a certain fact that among the Romans the division of the nation was
into _gentes_, which were analogous to the γένη of the Greeks, and to
the _Geschlechter_ of our German forefathers. This is a presupposition
to start from, for which, when the time comes, historical proofs will
not be wanting. Let us first speak of that people concerning which the
accounts are more distinct,--the Greeks. Their γένη are associations
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