The privileges of a citizen according to ancient ideas were separated into two classes: they were private and public; to the first class belonged the rights of buying and selling, intermarrying, making valid contracts, and acquiring by various tenures real property; to the second the right of voting in all or some elections, and, as the climax, of standing for some or all magistracies. The various degrees of citizenship might be conceded to individuals or to communities; Rome might admit all full citizens of Arpinum to all or some of the rights of Roman citizenship, and vice versâ, or similarly favour an individual citizen of Arpinum. Long before an alien community or individual received the benefits of citizenship business relations might be necessary, and in order to get over the difficulty of conducting business with persons who had no legal status, it was customary for aliens to form private relations with full citizens through whom their business was conducted; and here again the alien might be a whole community or a single individual. At Rome the citizen who thus took charge of an alien’s business was called his patron, and the alien was called a client. The principal service rendered by the patron was to appear on his client’s behalf in those law courts to which the client had otherwise no access; the case was dealt with as the patron’s case by a convenient legal fiction. The service rendered by the client was not definitely prescribed in this case; it could not be, for he was unknown to the Roman law; but we have no reason to suspect the Roman patrons of not exacting a satisfactory equivalent for their services. The same men who were clients at Rome would be patrons in their own towns, and transact business for their Roman friend at Ephesus or Alexandria in return for his services at Rome. In the same way aliens resident at Rome, who for various reasons were unable or unwilling to acquire rights of citizenship, enrolled themselves among the clients of a patron. The system added enormously to the wealth and influence of the powerful men at Rome; for much in the same way that the status of citizen in its various degrees was personal and transmitted by descent, only to be revoked by a solemn process, so the relation of patron and client was personal and heritable on both sides. This combination of personal with business relationships is one of the peculiarities that make ancient society so difficult for us to understand. Even after an alien had acquired the rights of citizenship the tie between his family and the patron’s family would continue. It would not be easy to prove that it was strictly obligatory in the eye of the law, but it was recognized by sentiment, and ingratitude on the part of the client, or neglect on the part of the patron, were severely punished by the unwritten law, and in certain cases by the written law.