Page:Roman Constitutional History, 753-44 B.C..djvu/56

42 The First Secession. — Believing the wars to be the chief cause of their miseries, the common people in 494 obeyed the summons to arms only when the popular Manius Valerius was appointed dictator. He was victorious in the field, returned home, and proposed reforms, but was thwarted by the senate.

Thereupon the army, which had remained before the city, marched under the leadership of military tribunes to a hill beyond the Anio, in the neighborhood of Crustumerium, and threatened to found a new city. The patricians were forced to agree to a compromise. Probably the dictator negotiated the terms. The ordinary people thenceforth called him 'the greatest' (maximus), and named the hill beyond the Anio the Sacred Mount (mons sacer). They had won a great but bloodless victory, which they ever remembered with pride and pleasure, and which influenced the history of the republic for all time.

Organization of the Plebeians. — Besides measures for remedying the urgent distress of the debtors and the founding of colonies, Valerius carried in constitutional form a law which established a new office, the tribunate, for the protection of the plebeians. He caused all the citizens to confirm it by oath, and then deposited a copy of it in a temple under the charge of two plebeian officials (aediles). The transgressors of the law were to be outlaws (homines sacri), and might be killed with impunity by any one. The law itself was called sacred (lex sacrata or leges sacratae).

II. The Plebeian Tribunes, Aediles, and Assembly.

Number and Term of the Tribunes. — The plebeian tribunes received their name from the military tribunes, but in other respects they resembled the consuls. There were two of