The First Man in Rome (139 page)

pilaster   
A column or pillar engaged within a wall, so that only a part of it showed on the outside of the wall.

pilum, pila
(pl.)   
The Roman infantry spear, particularly as modified by Gaius Marius. It had a very small, wickedly barbed head of iron that was continued as an iron shaft for perhaps three feet (one meter); this was joined to a shaped wooden stem which fitted the hand comfortably. Marius modified it by introducing a weakness into the junction between iron and wooden shaft sections, so that upon lodging in shield, body, or ground after throwing, it broke apart, and thus was of no use to the enemy. However, Roman craftsmen within the legions could repair these broken specimens of
pilum
very quickly.

pipinna  
A little boy's penis.

Pisae   
Modern Pisa, in Italy.

Placentia
Modern Piacenza, in northern Italy. It was one of the largest and most important towns in Italian Gaul, and was a Latin Rights colony from 218 B.C. Its importance increased enormously after the censor Marcus Aemilius Scaurus Princeps Senatus caused the building of a good road from the Tyrrhenian coast through Dertona to Placentia and the Padus Valley.

plebeian, plebs
All those Roman citizens who were not patricians were plebeians—that is, they belonged to the plebs (the
e
is short, so the word "plebs" has the same
e
sound as "February"—it is not pronounced
pleebs,
as at West Point military academy). At the beginning of the Republic, no plebeian could be a priest, a curule magistrate, or even a senator. This situation lasted only a very short while; one by one the exclusively patrician institutions crumbled before the onslaught of the plebs, until by the time of Gaius Marius only a very few politically unimportant posts remained the province of the patricians. However, the plebs created a new nobility to distinguish the stars in its firmament from the rest, by calling a man who had attained the consulship a
nobilis
(nobleman), and ordaining that his direct descendants would also be noble.

plebiscite,
Strictly speaking, a law enacted in the Plebeian Assembly was not called a
lex
or law, but a
plebiscitum
(hence our modern English word "plebiscite"). From very early in the history of the Republic, plebiscites were regarded as legally binding, but the
lex Hortensia
of 287 B.C. made this a formal fact. From then on, there was virtually no difference at law between a
plebiscitum
and a
lex.
By the time of Gaius Marius, almost all the legal clerks who were responsible for putting the laws on tablets and recording them for posterity neglected to qualify whether they were recording a true
lex
or a
plebiscitum;
simply, they had all been classified in the minds of the clerks as laws.

podex
The Latin obscenity—a mild one—for the posterior fundament or anus.

Pollux
The "forgotten twin"—Castor's brother the boxer. Of the four children of King Tyndareus and his wife, Leda—born as quadruplets—two were sired by Tyndareus, and two by Zeus, who had ravished Leda in the guise of a swan. Castor and Helen belonged to Zeus; Pollux (Polydeukes) and Clytemnestra belonged to Tyndareus. Doomed always to be mentioned after his brother, very often Pollux was not mentioned at all. Romans called the temple of Castor and Pollux in the Forum Romanum simply "Castor's" (see Castor).

pomerium
The sacred boundary of the city of Rome. Marked by stones called
cippi,
it was reputedly inaugurated by King Servius Tullus, and remained the same until the time of Sulla the Dictator. The
pomerium
did not exactly follow the Servian Walls, one good reason why it is doubtful that the Servian Walls were actually built by King Servius Tullus—who would surely have caused the walls to follow the same course as the
pomerium.
The whole of the ancient Palatine city of Romulus was enclosed within the
pomerium,
but the Aventine was not, nor was the Capitol. Tradition held that the
pomerium
could be enlarged only by a man who significantly increased the size of Roman territory. In religious terms, Rome herself existed only within the
pomerium;
all outside it was merely Roman territory.

pons
A bridge.

pontifex
The Latin word for a priest; it has survived to be absorbed unchanged into most modern European languages. Many
philologists consider that in very early Roman times, the
pontifex
was a maker of bridges, these being deemed magical structures. Be that as it may, by Republican times the
pontifex
was a priest of special kind; incorporated into a college, he served as an adviser to Rome's magistrates in religious matters—for Rome's religion was administered by the State. At first all the
pontifices
had to be patrician, but in 300 B.C. a
lex Ogulnia
stipulated that half the members of the college must be plebeian.

Pontifex Maximus
The head of the State religion, and most senior of all priests. He seems to have been an invention of the infant Republic, a typically masterly Roman way of getting around an obstacle without ruffling too many feelings; for the Rex Sacrorum (a title held by the kings of Rome) had been the chief priest. Rather than upset the populace by abolishing the Rex Sacrorum, the new rulers of Rome in the person of the Senate simply created a new
pontifex
whose role and status was superior to that of the Rex Sacrorum. He was called the Pontifex Maximus, and he was elected rather than co-opted, in order to reinforce his statesmanlike position. At first he was probably required to be a patrician, but by the middle Republic he was more likely to be plebeian. He supervised all the various members of the various priestly colleges—
pontifices,
augurs, fetials and other minor priests, and the Vestal Virgins. In Republican times he occupied the most important Domus Publicus, or State-owned house, but shared it with the Vestals. His official headquarters (it had the status of a temple) was the little old Regia in the Forum Romanum.

Pontus
The large state at the southeastern end of the Euxine Sea (the Black Sea).

Populonia
   A port city on the western, Tyrrhenian coast of the Italian Peninsula.

porta
  
A gate.

porticus
A roofed-over colonnade, either in the form of a long straight arcade, or a rectangle enclosing a courtyard (peristyle). It was commonly a place of business, public as well as commercial; the Porticus Margaritaria at the top of the Forum Romanum was named after the pearl merchants who had their shops or stalls therein; the Porticus Metelli adjacent to the temple of Jupiter Stator on the Campus Martius contained offices for the censors as well as many business offices; the Porticus Minucia, at the Circus Flaminius, held the grain supply offices of the aediles as well as business offices; the Porticus Aemilia, fronting onto the wharves of the Port of Rome, was a true emporium, containing the offices of those engaged in the import and export of goods.

Port of Rome
The Romans simply called it Portus. It was that bank of the Tiber downstream from the Pons Sublicius or Wooden Bridge on the city side of the river, where wharves and emporia were built to take the constant barge and lighter and small merchantman traffic which came up from Ostia. Cargo unloaded from merchantmen in Ostia was here finally discharged for Rome. The Port of Rome lay outside the Servian Walls, and was confined to a fairly narrow strip of riverbank by the Aventine cliffs, in which lay the State granaries.

praefectus fabrum
"He who supervises the making." One of the most important men in a Roman army, he was technically not a part of it, but a civilian appointed to the position
of praefectus fabrum
by the general. He was responsible for the equipping and supplying of the army in all respects, from its animals and their feeding to its men and their feeding. Because he let out the contracts to businessmen for equipment and supplies, he was very powerful and, unless a man of strong integrity, in a position to enrich himself.

praenomen, praenomina
(pl.)
The first name of a Roman man. There were very few of them in use, perhaps twenty at most during the time of Gaius Marius, and half of that twenty were not common. Each
gens
or family clan favored
certain praenomina
only, which further reduced the number available. A modern scholar can often tell from a man's
praenomen
whether or not that man was a genuine member of the
gens;
the Julii, for instance, favored "Sextus," "Gaius," and "Lucius" only, so a man called Marcus Julius was unlikely to be a true Julian of the patrician
gens;
the Licinii favored "Publius," "Marcus," and "Lucius"; the Pompeii favored "Gnaeus," "Quintus," and "Sextus"; the Cornelii favored "Publius" and "Lucius." Some families had
praenomina
peculiar to their families alone; "Appius" belonged only to the Claudii, and "Mamercus" to the Aemilii Lepidus. One of the great puzzles for modern scholars concerns that Lucius Claudius who was Rex Sacrorum during the late Republic; "Lucius" is not a Claudian
praenomen,
but as he was certainly a patrician, Lucius Claudius must have been a true Claudian; I have postulated that there was a branch of the Claudian
gens
bearing the
praenomen
"Lucius," and which traditionally always held the post of Rex Sacrorum.

praetor
Praetorship was the second most senior rung on the Roman
cursus honorum
of magistrates (excluding the office of censor, which was a special case). At the very beginning of the Republic, the two highest magistrates of all were called praetors. But by the end of the fourth century B.C., the word "consul" was being used to describe these highest magistrates. One praetor was the sole representative of this position for many decades thereafter; he was very obviously the
praetor urbanus,
for his duties were confined to the city of Rome (thus freeing up the consuls for engaging in war). In 242 B.C. a second praetor was created; he was the
praetor peregrinus.
There followed the acquisition of overseas possessions requiring governance, so in 227 B.C. two more praetors were created to deal with Sicily and Sardinia. In 197 B.C. the number increased from four to six, to cope with governing the two Spains. However, no more praetorian positions were created after that; in the day of Gaius Marius, the number of praetors still stood at six. There is, I must add, some debate about this: there are two schools of modern scholarly thought, one that it was Sulla as dictator who increased the praetors to eight, the other that the number was increased from six to eight during the time of the Brothers Gracchi. I have preferred to keep the number of praetors at six.

praetor peregrinus
I have translated this as "foreign praetor," because he dealt only with legal matters and lawsuits where at least one of the parties was not a Roman citizen. By the time of Gaius Marius, his duties were confined to the dispensation of justice; they took him all over Italy, and sometimes further afield than that. He was also responsible for looking after cases involving noncitizens within the city of Rome herself.

praetor urbanus
I have translated this as “urban praetor.'' By the time of Gaius Marius his duties were almost purely in litigation, and he was responsible for the supervision of justice and the law courts within the city of Rome. His imperium did not extend beyond the fifth milestone from Rome, and he was not allowed to leave Rome for more than ten days at a time. If both the consuls were absent from Rome, he was its senior magistrate and was empowered to summon the Senate to a meeting, as well as to organize the defense of the city if in danger of an attack. It was his decision whether two litigants might proceed to court; in most cases, he decided the matter there and then, without benefit of the full legal trial process.

primus inter pares
"The first among equals." This was the cry, the catch-phrase of all those Romans engaged in the political arena. It summed up the aim of a Roman politician—to stand at the forefront of his peers. By definition, this meant he had to have peers—men who were his equals in birth, experience, background, family, status, achievements,
dignitas.
It was a strong indication of the fact that the Roman nobleman did not want to be a king or a dictator, this being standing above all others, and having no peers. Romans loved the competition.