1 gen 501 anni a. C. - Office of Dictator Established

Descrizione:

With the abolition of the Roman monarchy in 509 BC, the imperium, or executive power, of the king was divided between two annually-elected magistrates, known as praetors. In time they would come to be known as consuls, although probably not until the creation of a third, junior praetor in 367 BC. Neither consul was superior to the other, and the decisions of one could be appealed to the other (provocatio). Their insignia were the toga praetexta and the sella curulis, and each was attended by an escort of twelve lictors, each of whom bore the fasces, a bundle of rods topped by an axe; but by custom the lictors had to remove the axes from their fasces within the pomerium, the sacred boundary of Rome, to signify that the people, and not the consuls, were sovereign.

After several years, the fear of impending war with both the Sabines and the Latin League, combined with widespread suspicion that one or both of the consuls favoured the restoration of the monarchy, led to the call for a praetor maximus, or dictator ("one who gives orders"), akin to the supreme magistrate of other Latin towns. According to most authorities, the first dictator was Titus Lartius in 501 BC, who appointed Spurius Cassius his magister equitum.

Although there are indications that the term praetor maximus may have been used in the earliest period, the official title of the dictator throughout the history of the Republic was magister populi, or "master of the infantry". His lieutenant, the magister equitum, was the "master of the horse" (that is, of the cavalry[iv]). However, the use of dictator to refer to the magister populi seems to have been widespread from a very early period.

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