ABSTRACT
Rome was a society of legally constituted ranks or orders. First, there were citizens and non-citizens. Citizens were registered by the censors in five classes according to wealth below which were the propertyless proletarians. There were three distinct grades within the first class: senators, equestrians and decurions. Although membership of these grades was not legally hereditary, in practice it was. A tiny élite monopolized power, wealth and high culture. But there was a degree of social mobility which varied from period to period without ultimately upsetting the overall framework. The élite did not reproduce itself biologically, and “new men” had therefore to be recruited. Factors countervailing the hereditary tendency in the Republican period were the need to get elected to office and generally the requirement that high office be maintained in a family for it to retain high rank and this was not a foregone conclusion. In the imperial era, emperors often favoured those from outside the élite who were more dependent on them, but they were unable to do without the aristocracy. Below the citizens were free-born non-citizens and a large number of slaves. Rome was peculiar among slave-owning societies in that emancipation was readily granted, and there was a constant flow therefore of ex-slaves into the citizen body. This body was also greatly increased as Rome expanded its frontiers. At all levels, status was expressed in nomenclature.
