Tribuni militum consulari potestate - Who Were They?
Koptev Alexander V.
The author undertakes a research of the origin of tribuni militum consulari potestate who were first mentioned in Fasti Consulares and in Roman historical tradition in 443 BC and stopped to exist in 366 BC. Modern historians consider the title either as a real term for an ancient magistrate or as a fictive term covering real competence, which had changed considerably by the beginning of the historical period. In the latter case consular tribunes are thought to have been in fact either military tribunes or praetors (consuls) with their assistants (tribunes). The author puts forward his own scheme of social development of the early republic. Consular tribunes could have been military leaders of the first three, and later of four and six tribes constituting Roman community in the second half of the 5th and in the early 4th century BC. As for the traditional view that 21 tribes existed at that time, he explains it with the way in which Roman historical tradition was formed. This tradition believed that the Latin War of 340-338 BC had taken place in the 6th and the early 5th century BC. Consular tribunes were listed among the eponyms only because it was necessary to fill in the gap in Fasti Consulares. The gap was discovered by Roman annalists when they compared the real length of the list of consuls with the chronology of the early republic adopted in the 3rd century BC. The discrepancy between them came about as a result of lengthening of Roman chronology by Cn. Flavius (304 BC) in imitation of Athenian chronology.