Page:A history and description of Roman political institutions (IA historyanddescri00abbo).pdf/14

2 which was the property of the clan as a whole, was enjoyed by the individual only by virtue of his membership in one of those organization. Attached to the various gentes, or to families belonging to the gentes, were hereditary dependents called clientes, who enjoyed some of the privileges of members of a clan, and in return therefor owed to their patronus such services as assisting in the payment of his ransom, if captured in time of war, and contributing to his daughter's dower. The control of clan affairs rested probably with the members of the clan, or with its representatives. Had the organization been under the headship of an individual, some traces of such a system would be discernible to historic times.

2. Pagi and their Confederation. The simplest purely political community was formed by the settlement of several clans about an arx or fortified point. These communities, called pagi, were, like the gentes, either purely democratic, or controlled by the elders. The union of "hill settlements" adjacent to one another for mutual protection in trade intercourse naturally followed. Perhaps several of these confederacies were formed in Latium, but of course the confederacy of greatest historic importance is the one having Alba Longa for its common point of meeting. The choice of that town as the place at which, even in historic times, the members of the confederacy met to offer a joint sacrifice to Jupiter Latiaris, shows plainly enough that Alba Longa was originally at the head of the league, but before the dawn of history Rome had succeeded her in the headship of at least this group of communities.

3. The Founding of Rome. According to the picturesque account which Roman writers have left us in prose and verse of the founding of their native city, Rome was