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The Development of the Quaestorship, 267–81 b.c.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

W. V. Harris
W. V. Harris
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Columbia University
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Extract

In 267 the number of quaestors was increased from the established total of four (two consular and two urbani). But how many were added, and what were their functions? The standard works agree that the new quaestors numbered four, and that they were stationed in four Italian towns, where they are usually supposed tohave performed administrative functions necessary to the Roman navy, and, in the case of the quaestor stationed at Ostia, functions necessary to Rome's grainsupply. These were the quaestores classici, or according to others the quaestores Italici. A few historians have very reasonably gone on to interpret this event as an important stage in the tightening of Roman control in Italy, or as a deliberate step towards a large-scale navy and war against Carthage.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , May 1976 , pp. 92 - 106
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1976

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References

1 I thank Professor J. Linderski for anumber of helpful comments on this article.

2 The theory that the new quaestorships created at about this date numbered four, and that they were stationed in four Italian towns (of which Ostia, Ariminum, and Cales were three; cf. below, pp. 97–104) can already be found in Justus Lipsius (lusti Lipsi ad Annales Cor. Taciti Giber Commentarius, Antwerp 1585, 84). Sigonius had already in his first edition of Livy (C. Sigonius, T. Livi Patavini historiarum, etc., Venice 1555) concluded that they were four. loannes Lydus's De magistratibus, first published in 1812, seemed to reveal the connection with the navy and th date 267 (see below, p. 93). The view outline( in the text is put forward by, among many others, Lange, L., Römische Alterthümer, i 3 (Berlin 1876), 891–2Google Scholar, Mommsen, T., Römisch Staatsrecht, ii 3 (Leipzig 1887), 570–2Google Scholar, Sanctis, G. De, Storia dei romani, ii (Turin 1907), 453Google ScholarSiber, H., Römisches Verfassungsrecht (Lahr 1952), 200Google Scholar, Ernst Meyer, , Rdmiscber Staat un Staatsgedanke 2 (Zürich-Stuttgart 1961), 86Google Scholar, 177, 233, G.Wesener in RE, s.v. quaestor (196: cols. 809, 818–19, Toynbee, A.J., Hannibal's Legacy (Oxford 1965), i. 247, 387–8. The agreement among scholars makes a full bibli ography unnecessary.Google Scholar

3 The term quaestores classici comes from loannes Lydus; quaestores Italici is not attested.

4 Meyer, op. cit. 86.

5 Cassola, F., I gruppi politici romani nel III secolo a. C. (Trieste 1962), 179Google Scholar; cf. Meiggs, R., Roman Ostia 2 (Oxford 1973), 25.Google Scholar

6 Notably Herzog, E. von, Geschichte und System der römischen Staatsverfassung i (Leipzig 1884), 823–4Google Scholar, argued that the alleged Italian stations of the new quaestors did not fit their alleged naval responsibilities, and that their business in the Italian towns was to collect Rome's revenues (similarly Karlowa, O., Römische Rechtsgeschichte (Leipzig 1885, i. 262–3). Meiggs (loc. cit.) accepts the usual view of the quaestores classici with some reserve, and suggests that ‘later in the Republic… their duties seem to have become more general’. E. Badian notes (OCD 2 s.v. quaestor) that the four new quaestors were ‘perhaps called classici, and stationed in various Italian towns, notably Ostia’.Google Scholar

7 Martino, F. De, Storia della costituzione romana, ii (revised edn., Naples 1964), 206–11.Google Scholar

8 Cf. below, p. 104.

9 Op. cit., 211.

10 Hommages á Marcel Renard (Brussels 1969), ii. 505–11.Google Scholar

11 In his 1555 edition (above, note 2).

12 The 243rd year of the consuls (Mommsen's emended figure) = 267 B.C. No Atilius and lunius were ever consuls together, but the consuls of 267 were Atilius and Iulius (howeve a lunius was consul in 266 and that could be the date intended here). De Martino is wrong to say (op. cit., 207) that Lydus gives the 230th year of the Republic.

13 Livy may well have dated the event to 267. The Periochist mentions the colonies sent to Ariminum and Beneventum (268), then tha ‘the Roman people began to use silver’ (269 or 268), then the surrender of the Umbrians and Sallentini (campaigns of 267 and 266), finally the increase in the quaestorships. It seems likely that though the Periochist grouped the Italian wars of 267 and 266 together (cf. C.M. Begbie, CQ 61, 1967, 334, 338, for this trait of his), Livy described those of 266 after he described the increase in the quaestorships.

14 It is true that in 300 the pontifices were increased from four to eight and the augurs from four to nine, but this was for the benefit of the plebeian aristocracy, which already of course had access to the quaestorship in 267.

15 On this see below, p. 103.

16 Mommsen, (op. cit. ii3. 572, n. 3) realized that this was what Tacitus meant; he dic not explain why he rejected this evidence. To Mattingly belongs the credit for first taking Tacitus' statement seriously (art. cit., 509).

17 Cf. the comments of Mommsen, op. cit iii. 729, n. 1, and Staveley, E.S., Historia 5 (1956), 86 (both unduly sweeping).Google Scholar

18 He certainly seems to have investigated the history of the quaestorship (cf. Syme, R., Tacitus, Oxford 1958, 397, 704–5),Google Scholar

19 Syme, op. cit., 802–4, scarcely vindicates Tacitus on this point.

20 So Mommsen believed (op. cit. ii3. 572 n. 7), and because of this supposed inaccurac, De Martino (op. cit., 207) doubted Tacitus' other statements about the development of the quaestorship. According to E. Koestermann (n. on 11. 22. 5) stipendiaria is ‘wenig glücklich’. Of course Italy did not pay stipendium of the kind paid by some provinces, but it was an important source of revenue for Rome, through taxation on new citizens, money derived in various ways from ager publicus, and perhaps portoria. Tacitus often avoided the technical terminology of administration (Syme, op. cit., 343–4), and he could not have expressed his idea as briefly in any other way. Stipendium can have quite a general meaning; cf. Ennius, Ann. 265V., Liv. 2. 9. 6, Plin. N.H. 34. 23, etc.

21 So Mattingly, art. cit., 509, though his view of the functions of the quaestors differs from mine.

22 No even total of officials was ever increased by an odd number, as far as we knot except for the augurs, who were a special case (Liv. 10. 6. 7–8).

23 Mattingly (art. cit., 510) appropriately cites De mag. 1. 38 ().

24 Art. cit., 511. Incidentally, Lydus probably wrote , not , in spite of the manuscript, editors and L.-S.-J.

25 The difficulty is not significantly diminished by . Lydus may have been translating quaestores classici duodecim and after taking the adjective classici first, a Greek writer might, he may have been led on to take duodecim next (Professor Walthe Ludwig suggested this to me). But full of translations though De magistratibus is, it does not normally violate Greek in such ways. There is a parallel of a kind in Appian, Samm. 7. 1, , Latin again?

26 De mag. 1. 38. Cf. 1.45: …

27 Examples in De mag. 1. 26 (p. 29, line 14 Wuensch), 2. 23 (p. 78, lines 20–1), 2. 27 (p. 82, lines 16 and 18), 2. 30 (p. 85, lines 20–1).

28 See below, p. 96.

29 As the accent and the unabbreviated show (Kai standing on its own is usually abbreviated). The copyist's word-divisions are erratic, as Wuensch noted (p. xiii).

30 Wuensch, pp. xv-xvi.

31 On 311, Liv. 9. 30. 4; on 176, Liv. 41. 17. 7. For the other years, T.R.S. Broughton, M.R.R.

32 Liv. 9. 30. 4 (cf. ‘[c[ lasesque navales primos ornavet pa travetque)’, in the Duillius inscription, ILLRP 319, line 7). Elsewhere they are called duumviri navales (40. 26. 8, 40. 42. 8, 41. 1. 2–3, 41. 17. 7), quem senatus maritimae orae praefecerat (9. 38. 2), Ilvir qui praeerat classi (Per. 12), (Dio fr. 39. 4), praefecti navium (Oros. 4. 1. 1).

33 The most important exploit of the campaign was the capture of Brundisium, Zon. 8. 7, Flor. 1. 15.

34 Cf. Mattingly, art. cit. 511.

35 SIG 3 591, line 37, refers to an unnamed Roman official encountered by the Lampsacene embassy of 197 as ; this person Mommsen at one time believed to be a quaestor classicus (M.D.A.I.-A. vi, 1881, 213), but he later retracted his opinion (R. Staatsr. ii3. 570 n. 5- cf. 563 n. 1). The quaestor was probably a pro-quaestor subordinate to the proconsul T. Flamininus, or to L. Flamininus if the latter was propraetor. The inscription carefully describes the ambassador Hegesias' journey stage by stage, and it is reasonably clear that in line 37 he is still in Greek waters, where he met L. Flamininus, (lines 17–18), and that the crossing to Italy is only described in line 41 ().

36 Thiel, J.H., A History of Roman Sea-Power before the Second Punic War (Amsterdam 1954), 78–83.Google Scholar

37 e.g. in Polyb. 1. 52–3. In the Hannibalic War praefecti classium were sometimes used (Mommsen, R. Staatsr. ii3. 579).

38 Duumviri navales were apparently deemed to have imperium (Mommsen, op. cit. i3. 118, n. 1). I doubt whether the quaestors become more plausible as naval commanders if they only commanded small coastguard detachments, as suggested by Koester, A. and Nischer, E. von in Kromayi, J.Veith, G., Heerwesen und Kriegführung der Griechen und Römer (Munich 1928), 621.Google Scholar

39 If this was their function it is hard to understand why Rome was totally without warships three years later (Polyb. 1. 20. 13-though he may, as Walbank says, be over-dramatizing the situation).

40 Mommsen, op. cit. ii3. 572, Thiel, op. cit. 33, Wesener, art. cit., 819 etc.

41 Quaestors might sometimes be sent to these cities; e.g. P. Vatinius, who received the aquaria provincia in 63, was sent to Puteoli by Cicero to prevent the export of gold and silver (Cic. Vat. 12).

42 Badian, E., Publicans and Sinners (Ithaca, N.Y. 1972), 16Google Scholar(cf. Cassola, op. cit., 74). The referred to in Polyb. 1. 20. 10 and 21. 1 were presumably private businessmen. Some of the construction was probably carried out in allied cities (Thiel, op. cit., 46–7).

43 Art. cit., 505–9.

44 Cic. Sest. 39, Har. Resp. 43 Diod. Sic. 36. 12. Other references to the post: Cic. Mur. 18, Vell. 2. 94, CIL xiv. 375, 3603 (cf. Meiggs, op. cit., 499), AE 1955, no. 178 (= H. Bloch, N.S.A., 1953, pp. 269–70, no. 32), Suet. Claud. 24. 2.

45 Sest., Har. Resp. Vell., II. cc.

46 Diod. Sic., Sest., Vell., 11. cc. Thereis no necessary conflict between these quaestorian responsibilities and the responsibility of the aediles for the grain-supply (on which cf. Mommsen, op. cit. ii3. 502–4), though the exact limits of their respective tasks are unknown.

47 CIL xiv. 3603, AE 1955 no. 178.

48 Dio 55. 4. 4 (9 B.C.). Mommsen (op. cit. ii3. 570, n. 5) rejected this statement on the grounds that it misdated the creating of the quaestorships actually begun in 267; so too Mattingly (art. cit., 505). But there is no need to think that Dio was referring to quaestorships created before 9 B.C. () does not have to mean Ostia, in fact suggests places other than. Ostia), and for Mattingly the error would have to be more complicated since Dio refers to more than one other place in Italy as receiving a quaestor. In fact Dio's notice is entirely credible and intelligible (see text and next n.).

47 Dio offers no explanation. It is not difficult to fit such quaestors into Augustus' annona arrangements (curatores frumenti populo dividundi of praetorian rank from 22 B.C., Dio 54. 1. 4, 54. 17. 1, Suet. D.A. 37. 1; since they did not deal with procurement, there was an obvious job for the quaestors). According to Dio 55. 4. 4 these quaestorian posts , presumably continuing after the institution of the praefectus annonae at some date between A.D. 7 and 14, until their abolition by Claudius. These quaestors will have been concerned partly with importation, partly with transporting Italian grain to Rome (on the role of Italy in supplying grain to Augustan Rome cf. Brunt, P. A., Italian Manpower, 225 B.C.-A.D. 14 Oxford 1971, 705–6).Google Scholar

50 Suet. Claud. 24. 2: ‘collegio quaestorum pro stratura viarum gladiatorum munus iniunxit detractaque Ostiensi et Gallica provincia curam aerari Saturni reddidit…’

51 Dio 60. 24. 3 (A.D. 44): ).

52 The earliest appearance of this office seems to be in the inscription of Claudius Optatus, 'Aug. I. proc. portus Ostiesis, (CIL xiv. 163 = I.G.S. 1533). On the development of this office and that of the procurator annonae see Meiggs, op. cit., 299–301.

53 It should be mentioned that Mattingly (art. cit., 506) is probably incorrect to suppose that Cic. Att. 2. 9. 1 tells us anything about the Ostian quaestorship, and certainly incorrect to suppose that Vat. 12 does; both passages are discussed below.

54 Cf. Meiggs, op. cit., 25.

55 Ibid., 304–5.

56 Ibid., 25.

57 However it is very likely that grain had sometimes been imported through Ostia in the fourth century, Meiggs, op. cit., 24.

58 Harris, W.V., Rome in Etruria and Umbria (Oxford 1971), 66, n. 5; Strabo 5. 232 and SIG3 1225 may refer to slightly later events.Google Scholar

59 Harris, op. cit., 45–7.

60 The earliest known horreum at Ostia is tentatively dated by Meiggs to late in the pre-Sullan period (op. cit., 124).

61 Ostia is mentioned in Liv. 22. 37. 1–6 25. 20. 3. Other references to importation b: sea, apart from the tithes and requisitions of Sicily and Sardinia: Liv. 25. 22. 5, 26. 32.3, 26. 40. 16 (but see Brunt, op. cit., 274), 30. 38. 5 (and cf. Polyb. 9. 11a). Toynbee's assertion that ‘down to, and during, the Hannibalic War, Rome met her growing need for a port by using Caere's ports on the Tyrrhene coast’ (op. cit. i. 389) is not supported by evidence known to me.

62 For the period 200–150 see Frank, T., An Economic Survey of Ancient Rome i (Baltimore 1933), 158–60.Google Scholar

63 Siber, loc. cit., Thiel, op. cit., 33, Wesener, art. cit., 819, Toynbee, op. cit. i. 247, Salmon, E.T. in OCD2, s.v. Cales (but in Samnium and the Samnites, Cambridge 1967 68, n. 7, he preferred calles).Google Scholar

64 Describing a slave rebellion of A.D. 24 in the region of Brundisium, in towns nearby and in the ‘longinqui saltus-‘velut munere deum tres biremes adpulere ad usus commeantium illo mari. et erat isdem regionibus Cutius Lupus quaestor, cui provincia vetere ex more calles evenerant: is disposita classiariorum copia coeptantem cum maxime coniurationem disiecit.’ Lipsius changed calles to Cales. It hardly needs to be pointed out that Cales was not ‘isdem regionibus’ and that the classiarii came under the quaestor's command only by accident.

65 by Salmon, loc. cit., Mattingly, art. cit., 507–8, and Wiseman, T.P. (New Men in the Roman Senate, 139 B.C.-A.D. 14, Oxford 1971, 156) among recent scholars.Google Scholar

66 Suet. D.J. 19. 2. For some possibly significant background: Wiseman, T.P., PBSR 32 (1964), 35Google Scholar. Were silvae and calles separate provinciae (silvae are not mentioned by Tacitus)? The unnecessary attempts that have been made to emend and explain away silvae callesque in Suetonius (e.g. by Balsdon, J., JRS 29, 1939, 181–3) need not be discussed here.Google Scholar

67 The additional meaning usually given (e.g. in TLL, OLD), ‘mountain pasturage’, is not established by any text.

68 Lex Agraria (FIRA, ed. Riccobono, no. 8), line 26; Varro, R.R. 2. 1. 16, 2. 2. 10.

69 Varro, R.R. 2. 1. 16.

70 Toynbee, op. cit. ii. 286–95. Brunt, op. cit., 370–2.

71 Cic. Sest. 12; cf. Mattingly, art. cit., 508–9. For controversia as a common event in the calles cf. Cic. Cluent. 161.

72 Similarly the provincia aquaria (discussed later) was an occasional assignment.

73 None of the evidence cited by Skydsgaard, J.E., Analecta Romana Instituti Danici 7 (1974), 7–36Google Scholar, establishes this (Liv. 10. 23. 13 and 10. 47. 4 may be quite irrelevant); nor does the more guarded account of Salmon, E.T., Samnium and the Samnites, 68–9.Google Scholar

74 Toynbee, op. cit. ii. 286–7, Brunt, loc. cit., following the older study of Grenier, A., MEFR. 25 (1905), 293–328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

75 Accepted as a quaestorian provincia, under various titles, by Siber, Thiel, Wesener; Toynbee and Wiseman give the ager Gallicus as the province.

76 Sert. 4. 1; cf. Sall. Hist. 1. 88M. = A. Gell. 2. 27.

77 Cf. Mattingly, art. cit., 507.

78 That he possessed imperium was suggested by Bülz, M., Fasti Quaestorum qui ab a.u.c. CCCXXXX ad a.u.c. DCLXXI extra Romam fuerunt (Progr. Zittau 1908), 23.Google Scholar

79 See above, n. 50.

80 Mattingly, art. cit., 508–9. Sex. Atilius is mentioned by Cicero because he turned against the orator in 57 (Wiseman, New Men, 156, n. 6). In any case there is no reason atall to think that Atilius was a quaestor callium rather than, say, a quaestor urbanus. Mattingly's contention (art. cit., 505) that Suetonius, Claud. 24. 2 implies that when Claudius came to abolish the Ostian quaestorship there were only two ‘Italian' quaestorships is incorrect, as Wiseman points out.

81 Pomponius Mela 2. 4. 59 (‘Carni et Veneti colunt togatam Galliam’) is unintentionally antiquated (cf. his statement that Ancona ‘inter Gallicas Italicasque gentes quasi terminus interest’ 2. 4. 64), Martial 3. 1. 12 (‘Gallia Romanae nomine dicta togae’) intentionally so. In Plin. N.H. 17. 20 the manuscript reading ‘Italia’ should not be changed. There is no sign that the old ager Gallicus retained its name, and even Narbonensis began to lose the name ‘Gallia’ in the late first century (Syme, op. cit., 456, n. 3).

82 Dio 55. 4. 4.

83 Att. 2. 9. 1. This has not been treated as a separate provincia. Mommsen, op. cit. ii3. 571, n. 2, thought that he was probably the quaestor of Cales. Mattingly (art. cit., 506) suggested that he was the quaestor Ostiensis (cf. App. B.C. 1. 69. 313–14), which is possible; but see the text. The Caecilius of Att. 2. 19. 5 and 2. 20. 1 was different.

84 Tyrrell-Purser2, W. Sternkopf, Jahrb. f cl. Phil. 38 = 145 (1892), 716. Formiae still appears in De Martino, op. cit. ii. 208, n. 82.

85 Strabo 5. 232; cf. Liv. 43. 4. 6 and 7. 10.

86 Cicero does not say that he was working at Antium (so Mattingly, art. cit. 506).

87 See Mommsen, op. cit. ii3. 572, and among relatively recent writers Thiel, op. cit. 33, n. 90, Meyer, op. cit., 233.

88 Known only from Cic. Vat. 12, schol. Bob. p. 316 St. Frontinus, De aq. 2. 96 (‘eorumque operum probandorum curam fuisse penes censores aliquando et aediles, interdum etiam quaestoribus eam provinciam obvenisse, ut apparet ex s.c. quod factum est C. Licinio et Q. Fabio consulibus [or censoribus]’, their consulship was in 116, their censorship in 108). It has never been specifically argued that this was one of the quaestorships of 267 (but cf. Wiseman, op. cit., 156).

89 The notion that the provincia aquaria was the same as the Ostiensis goes back to the sixteenth century (cf. C. Halm on In Vat. 12, and also Rubino, J., Untersuchungen fiber romische Verfassung and Geschichte (Cassel 1839), i. 330, n. 4). Mattingly's argument (art. cit., 506) is that according to Cic. Mur. 18 the assignment of Ostia was usually marker by acclamatio, and when Vatinius received his provincia there was a magnus clamor (Vat. 12). That Cicero was referring to a provincia by a ‘nickname’ (Mattingly, 506, n. 6) is also improbable.Google Scholar

90 Mommsen, op. cit. ii3. 573, Wesener, art. cit., 819–20. They should have cited the Frontinus passage. Wiseman, op. cit., 156, following Willems, P., Le Sénat de la république romaine ii (Louvain 1883), 603, n. 1, takes the provincia aquaria to have meant ‘Ostia and the west coast harbours’; but in Vat. 12 there is no difficulty in thinking that Cicero was sending Vatinius on a special mission rather than on his normal duties; and see the text.Google Scholar

91 See above, n. 88.

92 JRS. 35 (1945), 66–9.Google Scholar

93 Mints B and C in his scheme. On this point see Breglia, L., La prima fase della coniazione romana dell'argento (Rome 1952), 154, n. 23.Google Scholar

94 Thomsen, R., Early Roman Coinage iii (Copenhagen 1961), 63–9Google Scholar, 162, n. 93; cf. Crawford, M.H., Roman Republican Coinage (Cambridge 1974), 45.Google Scholar

95 Only one of them at a time was in charge of the aerarium, at least in the late second century and under Sulla (Crawford, op. cit., 313, gathers the evidence).

96 Op. cit., 42–3.

97 Op. cit., 616–17; cf. Pink, K., The Triumviri Monetales and the Structure of the Coinage of the Roman Republic (New York 1952), 50, 58.Google Scholar

98 Op. cit., 172–8. According to Hamilton, C.D., TAPA. 100 (1969), 184, the year 289 is ‘conclusively established’ for the institution of the triumviri.Google Scholar

99 (28) ‘Post aliquot deinde annos’ the peregrine praetorship was created [242]… (29) ‘deinde’ the decemviri stlitibus iudicandis were created [date unknown]… (30) ‘eodem tempore’ there were created ‘quattuorviri qui curam viarum agerent’ [date unknown], the triumviri monetales, the triumviri capitales [c. 289], and (31) the quinqueviri cis Tiberim [date unknown]. (32) ‘Capta deinde Sardinia, mox Sicilia…’ Cf. Mommsen, , Geschichte des römischen Münzwesens (Berlin 1860), 367Google Scholar, n. 5, H. Schaefer in RE, s.v. vigintiviri (1958), cols. 1574–1575, Lippold, A., Consules (Bonn 1963), 96Google Scholar, n. 79, Crawford, op. cit., 602. Zehnacker, H., Moneta (Rome 1973), i. 66–8, assigns the triumviri monetales to 289, but fails to dispose of this counter-argument.Google Scholar

100 Crawford, loc. cit. This would put them shortly after the experiment with the triumviri mensarii (Liv. 23. 21. 6), which in spite of difficulties (cf. Schaefer, art. cit. 2575), rather confirms the hypothesis (cf. Pink, op. cit., 52, Lippold, op. cit., 96).

101 The date derived from Plin. N.H. 33. 44.

102 This is his explanation for the discrepancy in the sources between 269 (Plin.) and 268 (Liv. Per. 15), op. cit., 42–3.

103 Vell. 1. 14: ‘suffragii ferendi ius Sabinis datum’. Brunt, P.A., Hommages Marcel Renard (Brussels 1969), ii. 121–9Google Scholar, defends the view that all the Sabines were included, against Taylor, L.R., The Voting Districts of the Roman Republic (Rome 1960), 59–66. Was it in the census of 269/8 that the Romans first ‘perceived wealth’, as Strabo (5. 228) cryptically says they first did when they mastered the Sabines?Google Scholar

104 Some of which became ager quaestorius, i.e. land sold off by the quaestors (cf. Burdese, A., Studi sull'ager publicus, Turin 1952, 42–6; E. Gabba on App. B.C. 1. 7. 27). There was probably some income from Italian portoria; they are first known in 199 (Liv. 32. 7. 3), but were hardly new then (cf. F. Vittinghoff in RE, 1953, s.v. ‘portorium’, col. 349).Google Scholar

105 Cic. Verr. 2. 2. 11 (‘quaestores utriusque provinciae’), Ps.-Ascon. p. 187St. (‘cum a duobus quaestoribus Sicilia regi soleat, uno Lilybitano, altero Syracusano’), p. 259St.

106 Mommsen, R. Staatsr. ii3. 563, n. 4, De Sanctis, op. cit. iii. 1. 199.

107 Plu. C.G. 2. 5 seems to show that returning after one year was permitted to quaestors in Gaius Gracchus' time, but 2. 3 suggests that this was not the normal practice. Cf. Willems, op. cit., 601.

108 But the functions of the quaestors were not as variable as De Martino claims (above, p. 92), for the consular quaestors, as well as the urbani, were unvarying appointments; so the provincia Ostiensis probably became; and certain provinces were assigned regularly over very long periods.

109 This is the view of Mommsen, op. cit. ii3. 527, De Sanctis, op. cit. iv. 1, 501, Meyer, op. cit., 177, Wesener, art. cit., 809; on the other side O. Karlowa, op. cit. above, (n. 6), i. 181, Fraccaro, P., Opuscula ii (Pavia 1957), 217, and apparently De Martino, op. cit., 209, argue for the continuation of the total of eight until Sulla.Google Scholar

110 32. 27. 6.

111 Magdelain, A., Recherches surl' ‘imperium’, la loi curiate et les auspices d'investiture (Paris 1968), 7–8.Google Scholar

112 On these points cf. Wiseman, op. cit., 95–100.

113 Dig. 1. 13. 1. 2.

114 Mommsen, op. cit. ii3. 532, n. 3. The erroneous imperial date put forward by Willems, op. cit., ii. 600, n. 1, was repeated by Thompson, L.A., PACA 5 (1962), 18.Google Scholar

115 Liv. 30. 33. 2 (‘cuius… eo anno quaestoris extra sortem ex senatus consulto opera utebatur’) presumes this. On other appointments extra sortem cf. Thompson, art. cit., 17–25.

116 As De Martino suggested, op. cit. ii3. 209, n. 86.

117 Mommsen, op. cit. ii3. 532, n. 3.

118 Frontinus, De aq. 1. 7. This interpretation depends on the reading collega, for which see MRR i. 473, n. 1. See further Astin, A.E., Scipio Aemilianus (Oxford 1967), 109–10.Google Scholar

119 Mur. 18.

120 Schol. Bob. p. 145St. quotes this passage in commenting on the reference to the provincia aquaria in Vat. 12.

121 Cf. Wesener, art. cit., 810.