Honestiores

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Honestiores ( honorable ) were called the members of the essential upper social classes in Roman law of antiquity. Specifically, they included members of the senatorial class ( ordo senatorius ), the knightly class ( ordo equester ) and the decurion class ( ordo decurionum ) and, with the latter, the economically important provincial upper class of large landowners, large merchants and owners of large companies. The veterans were also called honestiores , which is due to the central position of the army in the Roman Empire. The entire remaining population was called humiliores ( lower ).

Since the Roman citizenship was AD during the first centuries.. And more often awarded and down the Constitutio Antoniniana of 212 even open to all free inhabitants of the empire, disappeared with time, the privileges, for example, a citizen in the republican period one against Had had non-citizens. Instead, these privileges were gradually limited to the group of honestiores .

The first signs of this development could already be seen in the republic. From the beginning of the imperial era , the honestiores enjoyed certain clear privileges in legal practice. So they were not allowed to be questioned embarrassingly and had a far-reaching right of provocation . If convicted, they were exempt from the dishonorable death penalty ( crucifixion or damnatio ad bestias ), corporal punishment or forced labor. In general, an execution was only used in serious cases such as lese majesty or killing of relatives. From the 2nd century onwards, only the emperor was allowed to condemn honestiores or had to confirm the governors' judgments before they were carried out. Previously, all free citizens had had this privilege, as the story of Paul of Tarsus shows , among other things . Under Antoninus Pius , in the middle of the 2nd century, all of these regulations were also written down theoretically.

In terms of conceptual history, the distinction between honestiores and humiliores took the place of the republican antagonism between patricians and plebeians , which continued to exist but lost its practical significance. In linguistic usage, honestiores referred not only to legal privileges, but to the ideal position of a Roman, which was based on honesty ( honestas ), reputation and dignity ( dignitas ), influence ( auctoritas ) and a good reputation ( fama ). Belonging to this class required a certain wealth, since public responsibility and thus respectability arose from wealth. The social rank gained in this way obliged to adhere to moral values ​​and to lead a virtuous way of life. The humiliores , on the other hand, were seen as underage and incapable of exercising power. This legitimized their discrimination by the judiciary, as it was believed that they should have more control and more strict control. But also rich people who were viewed as dishonorable (for example because of the practice of a disreputable professional activity, a criminal record or unfree birth ) or who were not politically or militarily active were not counted among the honestiores .

The distinction between honestiores and humiliores , however, was not a fully articulated conception of society; the terms were never mentioned or even defined together before the 3rd century. Rather, they were a new legal structure of society based on the old notions of venerability. Social criteria such as pure wealth only played a marginal role. Nevertheless, it can be assumed that there was a sense of class and that, for example, the local upper class in the provinces (the decurions) increasingly felt obliged to and belonging to the imperial aristocracy than to the population of their hometown, especially since they had often received Roman citizenship long before it.

literature

  • Wilhelm Kierdorf : Honestiores. In: The Little Pauly (KlP). Volume 2, Stuttgart 1967, column 1210.
  • Jochen Bleicken : Constitutional and social history of the Roman Empire. Vol. 2, UTB Schöningh, Paderborn 1978, ISBN 3-506-99257-0 , especially p. 22 and p. 41 f.
  • François Jacques, John Scheid : Rome and the Empire. Constitutional law – religion – army – administration – society – economy. Licensed edition, Nikol, Hamburg 2008, ISBN 978-3-86820-012-6 , esp. Pp. 90–92 and pp. 329–331.