Roman Citizenship


	In contrast to the habits of the Greek  polis  (in which one usually was either a full citizen or no citizen at all),  the Romans developed a notion of `belonging' to the Roman State  (Senatus Populusque Romanus)  in which the  `citizenship'  was thought of as consisting of a collection of rights and privileges, which any particular person or group of persons might have in whole or in part.  These rights included:
(a)  the privilege of holding public office		(Ius honorum)
(b)  the right  to vote						(Ius suffragii)
(c)  the right  to marry  a Roman citizen				(Ius matrimonii)
(d)  the right  to do business  in Roman markets under the protection
				 of Roman legal codes and courts (Ius commercii)

NUMBERS   of Citizens  (the  census):  For military purposes, as well as for voting purposes, the State, from the time of the Kings, was in the habit of keeping and revising lists of:
(a) the   SENATORIAL ORDER  	(Senators and their families)
(b) the   EQUESTRIAN ORDER	  (Important and wealthy non-Senators, including (later on) the tax-farmers,  military supply contractors, etc.
(c) the   POPULUS ROMANUS    (citizens, who did not qualify for higher status).
	From these lists, apparently,  some numbers  (not without some exaggeration and fictional additions) have been transmitted to us  (mostly through the Roman historian  LIVY, who was writing in the time of the Emperor Augustus,  ca. 29 B.C.  to   17 A.D.).
___________________________________________________________________

under King		84,000	
	
Servius 		80,000	
			83,000	
	
					
508 B.C.		130,000	
	
					
498 			150,000	
	
					
493			110,000	
	
474			103,000	
	

465			104,714	
	

459			117,319	
	

393			152,573	
	
   __________________
					

340		165,000	

334		250,000 or	
		150,000 or
		130,000	

294		ca.	260,000 to	
			272,000
					
290/87	272,000
					
280		287,000
					
276		271,000

224       270,212

265 B.C.	382,234 or 292,334

252		297,797

247		241,212

241		260,000

224		270,212		

225		273,000		

209		137,108		

204		214,000		

   ____________			

194		143,000		

189		258,318		

179		258,294		

174		269,015

169		312,805

164		337,452

159		328,316

154		324,000

147		322,000

142		328,442

136		317,933

131		318,823

125		394,736

115		394,336

  86		463,000

  70		910,000
    



UnderAugustus:

  28 4,063,000

   8   4,233,000
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
	-Arnold J. Toynbee, Hannibal's Legacy (Oxford 1965) I,  Chapter III Annex 10.
	-Tenney Frank,   "Roman Census Statistics from 508 to 225 B.C.," American Journal of Philology  51 (1930) 313-324.
	
	

Note: All the figures given are problematical, in various ways.  First, there is the problem of the correct transmission
 of numbers in the manuscripts.  Second, there is the issue of who precisely are being counted in each census. 
  Third, there is the question as to whether complete census returns were ever made.  Most authorities find it difficult
   to believe that statistics prior to 340 B.C. are anything but fictitious.