Page:Municipal Administration in the Roman Empire (1926, Abbot and Johnson, municipaladminis00abbo).pdf/30

 in some instances, trace their growth from the earliest settlement by Roman citizens up to the granting of a municipal charter. This is true, for example, of Apulum, Aquincum , Carnuatum , and notably of Lambaesis. Some of these settlements, like Carnuntum, even attained the dignity of a colony.

The pagus differed essentially from all the communities which have been mentioned thus far. The meaning of the term varied somewhat from one period to another and from part of the Roman world to another, but the canton was always thought of as a rural administrative unit, and was opposed in sense to civitas, urbs, or oppidum. The Romans found these rural subdivisions in their conquest of Italy and of other parts of the western workd, and they were frequently preserved intact, but were usually given a Roman name. Caesar uses the term to indicate part of a native tribe, but under the empire it came to designate very definitely a territorial unit.

The inhabitants of a canton might live dispersed or in hamlets (vici). They formed a commune for such religious purposes as the celebration of festivals and the maintenance of the local cult, and for such administration purposes as the repairing of roads and the apportionment of the water supply. The religious side of the community life is indicated by such names as pagus Martius and pagus Apollinaris, although other cantons bore a local name, e.g. pagus Veronensis, or even a gentile name, as was the case, for instance, with the pagus Valerius. The cantons enjoyed a certain degree of autonomy. We read in the inscriptions