The following post is written by Dante Figueroa, a senior legal information analyst at the Law Library of Congress. He has recently written for In Custodia Legis on the Italian Parliamentary Library; Spanish Legal Documents (15th to 19th Century); Recent Legislation Enacted by Italy to Tackle COVID-19; and Italy: A New Silk Road Between Italy and China – the Belt and Road Initiative.
The Ancient Roman Senate – The Senatus Populusque Romanus
The king, the people’s assembly, and the senatus (from senex, or elder) were the three main pillars of the ancient Roman state.
The Senate was the representative of the Roman people and the repository of Roman sovereignty. However, its power wavered during the different stages of Roman history, from the republican phase to the empire.
According to tradition, Romulus instituted a Senate composed of 100 members, which was in turn divided into 10 decuries (from the decuria [pl. decuriae], i.e. a group of ten persons, under one commander, called a decurio). The number of senators varied during republican and imperial times, with a peak of 600 under Caesar Augustus.
The Roman Senate during the Republic
The composition of the Roman Senate varied greatly throughout the centuries. Originally, only male members over 60 years of age who had retired from the Army were admitted to membership. Over time, and based on the dignity of the office held by senate candidates, that minimum age decreased. [Senato, Treccani, id.]. The republican era saw the first plebeians join the heretofore exclusively patrician