ad held only the lower magistracies or even new-comers, sons of Roman knights . Of the latter, in the main deriving from the loc

essary to conciliate the second order in state and society, the Roman knights , converted into a ruinous political force by the

at bulk of the senators: the contrast lay in rank and prestige. The knights preferred comfort, secret power and solid profit

itatem. ’ PageBook=>014 from ambition and wedded to quiet, the knights could claim no title of civic virtue, no share in

nts or slaves, and financial magnates like Crassus. But the wealth of knights often outstripped many an ancient senatorial fami

rs, allies or advocates. Concord and firm alliance between Senate and knights would therefore arrest revolution or even reform,

f its rule with vice and corruption, obscurantism and oppression. The knights must not be left out of the indictment. Among the

e forces that lay behind or beyond it, next to the noble families the knights were the most important. Through alliance with gr

ape at first in his consulate as concordia ordinum between Senate and knights against the improbi, but later widened to a conse

der at Rome again through violence and bloodshed. Sulla decimated the knights , muzzled the tribunate, and curbed the consuls. B

Pompeius and Crassus abolished the Sullan constitution (70 B.C.). The knights received a share in the jury-courts, the tribunes

ed chill comfort in political defeat. 4 Cato went too far. When the knights who farmed the taxes of Asia requested a rebate f

rely nobiles but patrician; on the outer fringe, many excellent Roman knights , ‘the flower of Italy’. The composition of Caesar

1 He won over many former opponents, sons of the nobiles or of Roman knights , and not for the worst of reasons. A huge bribe d

y comprised diverse elements, noble and patrician as well as new men, knights and municipal aristocrats. 3 Certain distinguishe

atorial families that had not reached the consulate and sons of Roman knights : the latter class does not show a conspicuously h

There were other representatives of his class, excellent men. Many knights were to be found in the following of a proconsul,

l developed into the cabinet of the Dictator. Most of them were Roman knights : but Pansa, and possibly Hirtius, had already ent

ppointed him chief minister of finance in the kingdom. Senators and knights , such was the party of Caesar. With the Roman ple

e, was the friend and host of the proconsul:4 among his officers were knights from the aristocracy of the towns. 5 Benefits ant

ed and characterized by the names of representative members senators, knights and centurions, business men and provincials, kin

after Sulla must have contained in high proportion the sons of Roman knights . 1 The same arguments hold for Caesar’s Senate, w

ominees of Caesar the Dictator were in truth highly respectable Roman knights , men of property and substance, never too warmly

f the established order. No mere concordia ordinum, with senators and knights keeping to their allotted functions a new governm

break through their monopoly of patronage. Through alliance with the knights and personal ties with the leading men in the tow

or. C. Maecenas from Arretium is named among the strong and steadfast knights who offered public opposition to M. Livius Drusus

provoked a sacred and transient union of interest between Senate and knights . 5 The episode also revealed what everybody knew

Caesarians Vatinius and Sallustius. 6 They were no doubt followed by knights whom Caesar promoted. Campania, again, a prospero

ed for certain of Caesar’s partisans, whether ex-Pompeian senators or knights promoted under the Dictatorship. 5 The union of

State which hitherto had produced very few. Cautious or frugal, many knights shunned politics altogether. Sulla had taught the

a law permitting all ex-centurions, whether of the standing of Roman knights or not, to serve on juries, and another agrarian

ure of the Caesarian novi homines in the Senate, or, failing them, to knights , to financiers and to individuals commanding infl

, had the Fourth, cf. Phil. 3, 39, &c. PageBook=>133 Roman knights in standing, Salvidienus, Agrippa and Maecenas: t

alliance between the wealthiest members of the two orders, Senate and knights , should withstand the People, maintain the rights

they set one hundred and thirty senators and a great number of Roman knights . 3 Their victory was the victory of a party. 4 Ye

too low. Appian gives 300 senators (BC 4, 5, 20, cf. 7, 28) and 2,000 knights . Plutarch’s figures range from 200 to 300 (Cicero

here is such a lack of evidence for the significant category, that of knights . In all, nearly 100 names of the proscribed have

e list: the bulk is made up by the names of obscure senators or Roman knights . The nobiles were not necessarily the wealthiest

vendetta against the rich,2 whether dim, inactive senators or pacific knights , anxiously abstaining from Roman politics. That w

financed by the spoils of the provinces, extorted by senators and by knights in competition or in complicity, and spent by sen

or their own magnificence and for the delight of the Roman plebs; the knights had saved their gains and bought landed property.

idienus was not unique: foreigners or freed slaves might compete with knights for military command in the wars of the Revolutio

geBook=>212 The captives were a problem. Many senators and Roman knights of distinction had espoused the cause of liberty

ion and credulity into a hecatomb of three hundred Roman senators and knights slaughtered in solemn and religious ceremony on t

mpeius, in whose company stood a host of noble Romans and respectable knights , the survivors of the proscriptions, of Philippi,

vation, the better cause ‘meliora et utiliora’. 2 Many senators and knights , being peaceful members of the propertied classes

office, if not wealth as well, to the Triumvirs; and a mass of Roman knights , by their incorporation in that order, reinforced

nsuls of their respective families (not all, of course, sons of Roman knights : there were a number of sons of highly respectabl

hy could not rule without help from the old oligarchy. The order of knights had everything to gain from the coercion of the g

of the military ambition of the proconsuls and the extortions of the knights . The empire, and especially the empire in the Eas

sade against the East were no doubt to be found in the order of Roman knights and among those senators most nearly allied to th

nate by Caesar the Dictator; and there was an imposing total of Roman knights to be found in provincial cities like Gades and C

ssed by no town of Italy save Patavium (Strabo, p. 169). For numerous knights at Corduba, subjected to a levy in 48 B.C., cf. B

ʋῦν ἔχʋɩ. PageBook=>293 the Senate and a large number of Roman knights : they followed him from conviction, interest or f

extended the process and abbreviated the stages, so that the sons of knights , knights themselves and finally Thracian and Illy

the process and abbreviated the stages, so that the sons of knights, knights themselves and finally Thracian and Illyrian brig

ere reserved for members of the equestrian order, that is to say, for knights (including senators’ sons who had not yet held th

turally not be excluded, if they had acquired the financial status of knights (which was not difficult): but there was no regul

ies arose for service, for distinction and for promotion that in time knights were willing to divest themselves temporarily of

er is recruited in two ways. First, soldiers or soldiers’ sons become knights through military service. T. Flavius Petro, from

tted the choice flower of its own members to the Senate. The class of knights , indeed, is the cardinal factor in the whole soci

roughout the provinces, blocking reform and provoking revolution. The knights paid for it in the proscriptions for knights were

rovoking revolution. The knights paid for it in the proscriptions for knights were the principal and designated victims of the

ovinces are now let out to tax-farmers. Banished from politics, the knights acquire from the Princeps both usefulness and dig

o be acknowledged. Centurions had no monopoly of long service certain knights , active for years on end, won merit and experienc

prime example. 3 Again, in Egypt, a land forbidden to senators, Roman knights commanded each of the legions in garrison. 4 Nor

1 (Agricola’s grandfathers). PageBook=>357 Not only that Roman knights could govern provinces, some of them quite small

d parallel in the middle years of Augustus’ rule when a pair of Roman knights was chosen to command the Praetorian Guard. Less

ed that a sharp line of division had hitherto separated senators from knights . They belonged to the same class in society, but

The old nobility of Rome, patrician or plebeian, affected to despise knights or municipal men; which did not, however, debar m

nherited traditional prejudice: it was often expressed by the sons of knights themselves, sublime or outrageous in their snobbe

lthy distaste for political ambition. 4 In itself, the promotion of knights to the Senate was no novelty, for it is evident t

ing almost at once into the Senate, others after a military career as knights . C. Velleius Paterculus, of Campanian and Samnite

opertied classes in two ways by creating an official career for Roman knights and by facilitating their entry to the Senate. Th

ipal family, was true in character and in habits to his origin; Roman knights were among his most intimate friends and earliest

oing back upon his earlier supporters the plebs, the veterans and the knights who had won the War of Actium. In the crisis of 2

ted the wealth and splendour of Maecenas and Sallustius Crispus, mere knights in standing. NotesPage=>380 1 Dio 55, 13,

broadens as it descends from consulars to senators of lower rank, to knights , freedmen and plain citizens, with pervasive rami

ory of wisdom; both centurions passing into the militia equestris and knights promoted to the Senate, like Velleius Paterculus,

nt in Rome. NotesPage=>397 1 Fleets are now commanded by Roman knights , e.g. ILS 2688 and 2693. Later imperial freedmen

rtain services in the city Augustus devised posts to be held by Roman knights . For the rest, he called upon senators; and the p

iety or hanging ambiguous about its fringes, the influence of wealthy knights , whether as individuals or as corporations all th

ew to its close, now showing three new posts in the city of Rome; and knights as well as senators have their place in the diffe

s senators have their place in the different councils of state. Roman knights had been amongst the earliest friends of Augustus

In these matters Augustus required expert advisers. As time went on, knights who had served in the provinces as procurators be

ted dispensation for the supreme magistracy: the corporation of Roman knights hailed him as Princeps Iuventutis. 4 NotesPage=

it of the Republic and the Republican virtues, were all sons of Roman knights , of municipal extraction; and the author of a pat

f.) gives the list. He says that there were others, both senators and knights . 2 Dio 55, 10, 15; Tacitus, Ann. 1, 10; 4, 44.

ty over the nobiles. Being recruited in so large a measure from Roman knights of the towns of Italy, it found itself rewarded w

ble actions of the Triumvirs. The people might be fooled and fed, the knights persuaded to disguise greed and gain under the fa

spasian. 1 Thenceforward a newer nobility, sons or grandsons of Roman knights for the most part, govern the great military prov

n inheritance from a lower and commercial order of society, the Roman knights . He might have to sink further yet, to make his p

h subservience or through adulation, with the real forces in politics knights and freedmen, courtiers male and female. Quies pr

sly. The power of the nobiles was passing to the novi homines, to the knights , the army and the provinces. After novi homines

ervour of other classes in society. It is precisely the sons of Roman knights who have handed down the most typical and most ma

t for their preservation and standing. As more and more sons of Roman knights passed by patronage into the ranks of the governi

ith its own exemplars and its own phraseology. Quies was a virtue for knights , scorned by senators; and neutrality had seldom b

an Italian victory, 453. Administration, imperial, 387 ff.; role of knights , 355 ff., 409, 411; of freedmen, 354,410. Admir

368, 372 f., 376 ff., 382, 404 f., 419 ff.,453, 490 ff., 510 f.; with knights and novi homines, 129 ff., 235 ff., 289 f., 328,

74 f.; Caesarian partisans, 74 f.; senators from, 79 f., 367, 502 f.; knights , 356; soldiers, 457; poets, 252 f.; emperors, 360

s. Militarism, 448 f.; distaste for, 466, 467. Military service, of knights , 70 f., 353, 356, 395 f.; of senators, 395 ff.; a

rica, 401. Patavinitas, nature of, 485 f. Patavium, 465; total of knights at, 292; senator from, 363; conspirator from, 478

.D. 3), 518. Vulcanius, haruspex, 190, 218. Wealth, of senators and knights in the Republic, 12, 14; transference through the