Page:Roman Constitutional History, 753-44 B.C..djvu/133

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REFORM OF THE ASSEMBLY OF CENTURIES.
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about $242 (11,000 asses sextantarii) to about $88 (4000 asses), or half an acre of land. In the city districts he probably assigned each citizen to a class according to the value of all his property; in the country districts, according to the amount of his real estate.

Relation of the Districts to the Centuries. — The districts had not been closely connected with the old centuries, but they formed the basis, the foundation, of the reformed centuries. While before this time each district was expected to furnish a contingent to every one of the one hundred and ninety-three centuries, Flaminius now treated every district as a separate whole: he assigned all its members, in so far as they owned sufficient property, to the five Servian classes, in which they formed five separate groups. He divided each group, according to the age of the individuals composing it, into a century of seniors and one of juniors. In this way the members of each district (tributes) formed two centuries of every class, or ten complete and distinct centuries in all; and the members of the thirty-five districts formed five classes of seventy centuries each, or three hundred and fifty centuries, in place of the one hundred and seventy Servian centuries of infantry (p. 22).

Centuries of Horsemen, Workmen, and Musicians. — Flaminius probably admitted plebeians also to the six patrician centuries of horsemen (sex suffragia), and thus deprived the patricians of one of their few remaining privileges. In other respects he left the equestrian centuries unchanged. He retained the four centuries of workmen and musicians. All the citizens who did not belong to these four centuries or did not have sufficient property or respectability to enter the classes, formed the century, or division, of persons merely enrolled (centuria capite censorum). This very large century must have been greatly reduced through the change