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 times, as the viginti-sex-viri. This group was merely a collection of small colleges and not itself a collegium. It is probable that most of its members were originally nominated by superior magistrates; in later times they were all elected in the ''comitia tributa'', although doubtless a separate elective act was required for each college.

(a) The viri capitales, sometimes called by the less technical name of viri nocturni, probably from their duty of extinguishing fires, were introduced as a standing institution about the year 289 Their general function was that of assistance to the other magistrates in criminal jurisdiction. After the judgment had been pronounced, they guarded the prisoners and carried out the death sentence. Their duties preliminary to a criminal trial were the preventive imprisonment of the accused and the conduct of a first examination after a criminal charge had been made. They also heard ordinary police-court charges, such as those of vagrancy or nocturnal disturbance of the peace, and they exercised police duties in the town, such as that of preserving order in the streets. When acting as magistrates who could give a final judgment, their dealings seem to have been with slaves and foreigners. There is no evidence that they possessed any right of sentencing citizens or any higher jurisdiction which would bring them into contact with the people.

(b) The triumvirate of the masters of the mint (viri monetales), originally an occasional, first becomes a standing office about the time of the social war.

(c) Six sanitary commissioners, acting probably as subordinates to the aediles and bearing the titles viri viis in urbe purgandis (or viarum curandarum), ''viri viis extra propiusve urbem Romam passus mille purgandis'', are first mentioned in Caesar's Municipal Law (45 ). The first looked to the cleansing of the streets within Rome, the second perhaps of those within the radius of a mile from the walls.