E-text prepared by MFR
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
()
from page images generously made available by
Internet Archive
(https://archive.org)
| Note: | Images of the original pages are available through Internet Archive. See https://archive.org/details/romanpubliclife00greeiala |
ROMAN PUBLIC LIFE
BY
A. H. J. GREENIDGE, M.A.
LECTURER AND LATE FELLOW OF HERTFORD COLLEGE, AND
LECTURER IN ANCIENT HISTORY AT BRASENOSE COLLEGE, OXFORD
London
MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1901
All rights reserved
To
M. L. P.
J. T. W. G.
and
J. E. G. H.
The object of this work is to trace the growth of the Romanconstitution, and to explain its working during the two phasesof its maturity, the developed Republic and the Principate.The title selected perhaps expresses more succinctly than anyother could do the nature of the plan which I wished to undertake.My desire was to touch, however briefly, on all theimportant aspects of public life, central, municipal, and provincial;and, thus, to exhibit the political genius of the Romanin connexion with all the chief problems of administrationwhich it attempted to solve. This design, like many othercomprehensive plans which have to be adapted to the limits ofa single volume, was necessarily subjected to modifications indetail; and, since one of these modifications has affected thewhole scope of the book, it requires some mention in a preface.
I had intended to carry the treatment of my subject beyondthe confines of the Principate, and to describe the politicalorganisation of the later Empire as elaborated by Diocletianand his successors. I found, however, that a discussion of thisperiod would cause my work to exceed the reasonable limitswhich can be conceded to a handbook, and I was forced toabandon the enterprise much against my will. I was somewhatcomforted in this surrender by the suggestion that the constitutionof the later Empire was perhaps not strictly “Roman.”This is a verdict with which I agree in part. The organisationwhich had Constantinople as its centre was certainly theorganisation of an Empire which