Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/142

 106 THE FAMILY. BOOK II, festivals, so also it had its common tomb. We read in, an oration of Demosthenes, "This man, having lost his children, buried them in the tomb of his fathers, in that tomb that is common to all those of his gens." The rest of the oration shows that no stranger could be buried in this tomb. In another discourse, the same orator sjDcaks of the tomb where the gens of the Busel- idae buried its members, and where every year it per- formed its funeral sacrifices : " this burial-jdace is a large field, surrounded with an enclosure, according to the ancient custom." ' The same was the case among the Romans. Vel- leius Paterculus speaks of the tomb of the Quintilian gens, and Suetonius informs us that the Claudian gens had one on the slope of the Capitoline Hill. The ancient law of Rome permits the members of a gens to inherit from each other. The Twelve Tables declare that, in default of sons and of agnates, the gentilis is the natural heir. According to this code, therefore, the gentiles are nearer akin than the cog- nates ; that is to say, nearer than those related through females. Nothing is more closely united than the members of a gens. United in the celebration of the same sa- cred ceremonies, they mutually aid each other in all the needs of life. The entire gens is responsible for the debt of one of its members ; it redeems the prison- er and pays the fine of one condemned. If one of its members becomes a magistrate, it unites to pay the expenses incident to the magistracy.* The accused was accompanied to the tribunal by all • Demosthenes, in Macaii., 79; in Euhul., 28.
 * Livy, V. 32. Dion. Ilalic, XIII. 5. Appian, Annib., 28.