Roman Senate

[Gaius Sempronius Gracchus]

This is sort of linked with my experimenting with modding EB.... but is a historical question which I have been unable to really get a definitive answer to. The question is this; By 272BC were all magistrates (including the Plebian Tribunes and Plebian Aediles) automatically entered into the Senate, or was this only the 'higher' magistracies?

[Skullheadhq]

All

[Ludens]

All

Source?

[Duguntz]

Source?

In a book...

[Mulceber]

Actually, if I recall (and I could be mistaken on this), quaestors did not qualify as Senators until Sulla's reforms to the constitution. -M

[Atilius]

By 272BC were all magistrates (including the Plebian Tribunes and Plebian Aediles) automatically entered into the Senate, or was this only the 'higher' magistracies?

Probably not. What little information we can glean from the ancient sources on this matter tends to indicate that a man would normally have been required to serve in a curule office (curule aedile, praetor, consul, dictator, or magister equitum) before being considered eligible for the Senate. This interpretation is based on Livy 22.49 and Livy 23.23.

The first passage enumerates the high-ranking men killed at Cannae:

Amongst the dead were... a number of ex-consuls and of men who had the rank of praetor or aedile... eighty distinguished men who were either members of the Senate, or had held offices which qualified for membership...

The second tells how Marcus Fabius Buteo, appointed dictator for the purpose of bringing the Senate back up to strength after the serial disasters that opened the second Punic war, filled out the senatorial list:

...Buteo first chose in succession to the deceased members men who, after the censorship of Aemilius and Flaminius, had held curule office but had not previously been senators. These were chosen in the order of seniority. Next came men who had been aediles or people's tribunes or quaestors; lastly, men who had held no public office but either had spoils taken from the enemy hung up on their houses or had won the corona civica. On this principle he elected to the Senate with universal and enthusiastic approval 170 new members, ...

Taken together, these tend to indicate that prior to Cannae, a man who had held curule office could reasonably expect to be named to the Senate. The distinction between the curule and plebeian aediles is not made clear, but the fact that the first group of men chosen by Buteo "had held curule office but had not previously been senators" and that the second group lumps (plebeian) aediles with plebeian tribunes and quaestors (men who would not normally have been eligible) indicates men who had served as curule aediles could expect appointment to the Senate, but those who'd served as plebeian aediles could not.

Note that both these passages also indicate that Senate membership would not have been immediate for a man who had held a qualifying office, but would have to await the next censorial term.

We observe apparent changes in the qualifications for Senate membership for the rest of the life of the republic. Clearly, in the immediate aftermath of Cannae, men who had not yet served even as quaestor became senators. In the following century, there are indications that plebeian aediles had become eligible for the Senate, and that in the late 2nd C BC, serving as a plebeian tribune had the same effect. Sulla, probably as a consequence of his enlargement of the body, allowed former quaestors to qualify for Senate membership.