Baldor
Baldor
About Baldor
Baldor Resources
Chapter 01
Chapter 02
Chapter 03
Chapter 04
Chapter 05
Chapter 06
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Baldor
Chapter Two, Page D
The _AEdileship_ was originally a Plebeian office, instituted at the same time as the Tribuneship of the Plebs.[39] To the two Plebeian AEdiles two Curule AEdiles were added in B.C. 365. The four AEdiles in common had the charge of the public buildings,[40] the care of the cleansing and draining of the city, and the superintendence of the police. They had also the regulation of the public festivals; and the celebration of the Ludi Magni, or Great Games, was their especial function. Originally they received a sum of money from the state to defray the expenses of these games, but the grant was withdrawn about the time of the First Punic War; a measure attended with important consequences, since the higher magistracies were thus confined to the wealthy, who alone could defray the charges of these costly entertainments. After the Macedonian and Syrian wars, the Curule AEdiles often incurred a prodigious expense, with the view of pleasing the people, and securing their votes in future elections.
The earlier history of the Roman constitution has been already related. We have seen how, after a long struggle, the Plebeians acquired complete political equality with the Patricians. In the Second Punic War, the antagonism between the two orders had almost disappeared, and the only mark of separation between them in political matters was the regulation that, of the two Consuls and two Censors, one must be a Patrician and the other a Plebeian. Even this fell into disuse upon the rise of the new Nobility, of which we shall speak in the next chapter. The Patricians gradually dwindled away, and it became the custom to elect both Consuls and Censors from the Plebeians.
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