ruddert1112
New member
any help would be greatly appreciated
Thanks
Rudi
Thanks
Rudi
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Was there law enforcement at any time in acient rome?
- Thread starter ruddert1112
- Start date
The law was Caesar, the arm of that law was the army and therefore the Centurions were the law enforcement of the time. They enforced the "Pax Romana" - the roman peace.
If you are talking about their being a police-force outside of the military then you are a few centuries off. The first such police-force appeared in the first nation that had the industrial revolution, England, in the 19th century. It's why Marxists have always wondered aloud if the need for a police-force and the need to force people into factories were simply coincidental....
If you are talking about their being a police-force outside of the military then you are a few centuries off. The first such police-force appeared in the first nation that had the industrial revolution, England, in the 19th century. It's why Marxists have always wondered aloud if the need for a police-force and the need to force people into factories were simply coincidental....
Ancient Roman Police
Police forces as such did not exist in ancient world. They were created during 18th and 19th centuries. Ancient societies recognized the need for publicly appointed officials to carry out functions of of social regulation. In ancient Rome and cities of the Latin west these functions were performed by the aediles and their equivalents.
There were also magistrates appointed to deal with certain aspects of criminal activity. In Rome these were minor magistrates called tresviri capitales, who 'may also have exercised summary jurisdiction over slaves and humble citizens' (Oxford Classical Dictionary). These magistrates were only assisted by a small number of public slaves and had neither the authorityy nor the resources to act as a police force.
At Rome the lictors who attended the senior magistrates were only symbols of the state's authorityy to discipline and punish; they had no effective power to coerce. The authority of magistrates depended absolutely on the acceptance by the citizens of their political institutions and the men who operated them.
Generally the state was not getting involved into any investigation and prosecution of criminal activity, which were left to the citizens, their families and friends. Small-scale disturbances were resolved locally by neighbours and passers-by, who were expected to take sides and usually did so.
The state became involved only when violence had a political dimension or when it became a threat to the community as a whole. In such cases the authorities organized ordinary citizens who took u arms on behalf of the state. This happened in Rome in 186 BC at the time of the Bacchanalian affai (Livy 39. 16. 13). In the political crises of 121 and 100 BC the senators and knights armed themselves and their dependants in order to crush Gaius Sempronius Gracchus and L. Appuleius Saturninus.
The need to call upon the armed support of the citizens in a crisis was stated in Roman colonial charters (e.g., lex Coloniae Genetivae 103).
After the breakdown of public order in the late republic the Roman emperors instituted more permanent forces to police the cityy of Rome. These were the urban chorts, commanded by the prefect of the city and the vigiles, a corps of 7 000 freed slaves under an equestrian prefect, whose principal task was to act as a fire brigade, but could be used to enforce order if necessary.
The praetorian guard was also on hand to suppress major public distrubances. Urban cohorts similar to those at Rome existed in certain large cities, including Lugdunum and Carthage. Several cities apparently had fire brigades, which were treated with suspicion by the central government which saw them as potentially subversive. Trajan advised Pliny to provide firefighting equipment for the citizens of Nicomedia to use when needed, rather than to set up a permanent fire brigade (Pliny Ep. 10.34)
The above forces came closer to a police force than anything else in antiquity. None of them, however, was involved in every day law enforcement, which remained the responsibility of private citizens action on their own behalf.
Source: Cornell, T.J, "Police", Oxford Classical Dictionary. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Police forces as such did not exist in ancient world. They were created during 18th and 19th centuries. Ancient societies recognized the need for publicly appointed officials to carry out functions of of social regulation. In ancient Rome and cities of the Latin west these functions were performed by the aediles and their equivalents.
There were also magistrates appointed to deal with certain aspects of criminal activity. In Rome these were minor magistrates called tresviri capitales, who 'may also have exercised summary jurisdiction over slaves and humble citizens' (Oxford Classical Dictionary). These magistrates were only assisted by a small number of public slaves and had neither the authorityy nor the resources to act as a police force.
At Rome the lictors who attended the senior magistrates were only symbols of the state's authorityy to discipline and punish; they had no effective power to coerce. The authority of magistrates depended absolutely on the acceptance by the citizens of their political institutions and the men who operated them.
Generally the state was not getting involved into any investigation and prosecution of criminal activity, which were left to the citizens, their families and friends. Small-scale disturbances were resolved locally by neighbours and passers-by, who were expected to take sides and usually did so.
The state became involved only when violence had a political dimension or when it became a threat to the community as a whole. In such cases the authorities organized ordinary citizens who took u arms on behalf of the state. This happened in Rome in 186 BC at the time of the Bacchanalian affai (Livy 39. 16. 13). In the political crises of 121 and 100 BC the senators and knights armed themselves and their dependants in order to crush Gaius Sempronius Gracchus and L. Appuleius Saturninus.
The need to call upon the armed support of the citizens in a crisis was stated in Roman colonial charters (e.g., lex Coloniae Genetivae 103).
After the breakdown of public order in the late republic the Roman emperors instituted more permanent forces to police the cityy of Rome. These were the urban chorts, commanded by the prefect of the city and the vigiles, a corps of 7 000 freed slaves under an equestrian prefect, whose principal task was to act as a fire brigade, but could be used to enforce order if necessary.
The praetorian guard was also on hand to suppress major public distrubances. Urban cohorts similar to those at Rome existed in certain large cities, including Lugdunum and Carthage. Several cities apparently had fire brigades, which were treated with suspicion by the central government which saw them as potentially subversive. Trajan advised Pliny to provide firefighting equipment for the citizens of Nicomedia to use when needed, rather than to set up a permanent fire brigade (Pliny Ep. 10.34)
The above forces came closer to a police force than anything else in antiquity. None of them, however, was involved in every day law enforcement, which remained the responsibility of private citizens action on their own behalf.
Source: Cornell, T.J, "Police", Oxford Classical Dictionary. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1996.