The Letters of Cassiodorus
swallowed up that of Princeps, and accordingly the single Adjutor, who
was sufficient at the compilation of the 'Notitia,' had to be
multiplied by two.
[Sidenote: Commentariensis, or Commentarisius.]
(4) The _Commentariensis_. Here we come again to an officer who is
mentioned by all our three authorities, though in Cassiodorus he seems
to be degraded some steps below his proper rank (but this may only be
from an accidental transposition of the order of the letters), and
though Lydus again gives us two of the name instead of one. The
last-named authority inserts next after the Primiscrinii 'two
Commentarisii--so the law calls those who are appointed to attend to
the drawing up of indictments[142].'
[Footnote 142: [Greek: kommentarisioi duo (houto de tous epi ton
hypomnematon graphe tattomenous ho nomos kalei)] (iii. 4). I accept
the necessary emendation of the text proposed in the Bonn edition.]
The Commentariensis (or Commentarisius, as Lydus calls him[143]) was
evidently the chief assistant of the Judge in all matters of criminal
jurisdiction[144]. We have a remarkably full, and in the main clear
account of his functions in the pages of Lydus (iii. 16-18), from
which it appears that he was promoted from the ranks of the
_Exceptores_ (shorthand writers), and had six of his former colleagues
serving under him as Adjutores[145]. Great was the power, and high the
position in the Civil Service, of the Commentariensis. The whole tribe
of process-servers, gaolers, lictors[146]--all that we now understand
by the police force--waited subserviently on his nod. It rested with
him, says Lydus, to establish the authority of the Court of Justice
by means of the wholesome fear inspired by iron chains and scourges
and the whole apparatus of torture[147]. Nay, not only did the
subordinate magistrates execute their sentences by his agency, he had
even the honour of being chosen by the Emperor himself to be the
minister of vengeance against the persons who had incurred his anger
or his suspicion. 'I myself remember,' says Lydus, 'when I was serving
as Chartularius in the office of the Commentariensis, under the
praefecture of Leontius (a man of the highest legal eminence), and
when the wrath of Anastasius was kindled against Apion, a person of
the most exalted rank, and one who had assisted in his elevation to
the throne[148], at the same time when Kobad, King of Persia, blazed
out into fury[149], that then all the confiscations and banishments
which were ordered by the enraged Emperor were entrusted to no one
else but to the Commentarienses serving under the Praefect. In this
service they acquitted themselves so well, with such vigour, such
harmonious energy, such entire clean-handedness and absence of all
dishonest gain, as to move the admiration of the Emperor, who made use
of them on all similar occasions that presented themselves in the
remainder of his reign. They had even the honour of being employed
against Macedonius, Patriarch of Constantinople, when that prelate had
provoked the Emperor by suspending all intercourse with him as a
heretic; and that, although Celer, one of the most intimate friends of
Anastasius, was at that very time holding the rank of Magister
Officiorum.'
[Footnote 143: To avoid confusion I will use the term
'Commentariensis' throughout.]
[Footnote 144: So Bethmann Hollweg (p. 179), 'Diess ist der Gehuelfe
des Magistrats bei Verwaltung der Criminaljustiz.' I compare him in
the following translation of Cassiodorus to a 'magistrate's clerk.']
[Footnote 145: See iii. 9 (p. 203, ed. Bonn), and combine with iii.
16. The _Augustales_ referred to in the latter passage were a higher
class of Exceptores.]
[Footnote 146: Applicitarii, Clavicularii, Lictores.]
[Footnote 147: [Greek: sidereois desmois kai poinaion organon kai
plektron poikilia saleuonton to phobo to dikasterion] (iii. 16).]
[Footnote 148: [Greek: kai koinonesantos auto tes basileias].]
[Footnote 149: [Greek: hote Koades ho Perses ephlegmaine]. The whole
passage is mysterious, but we seem to have here an allusion to the
outbreak of the Persian War (A.D. 502).]
An officer who was thus privileged to lay hands on Patriarch and
Patrician in the name of Augustus was looked up to with awful
reverence by all the lower members of the official hierarchy; and
Lydus, with one graphic touch, brings before us the glow of gratified
self-love with which, when he was a subordinate _Scriniarius_, he
found himself honoured by the familiar conversation of so great a
person as the Commentariensis[150]: 'I too am struck with somewhat of
my old awe, recurring in memory to those who were then holders of the
office. I remember what fear of the Commentarisii fell upon all who at
all took the lead in the _Officium_, but especially on the Scriniarii;
and how greatly he who was favoured with a chat with a Commentarisius
passing by valued himself on the honour.' Lydus also describes to us
how the Commentariensis, instructed by the Praefect, or perhaps even
by the Emperor himself, would take with him one of his faithful
servants, the Chartularii, would visit the abode of the suspected
person (who might, as we have seen, be one of the very highest
officers of the State), and would then in his presence dictate in
solemn Latin words the indictment which was to be laid against him,
the mere hearing of which sometimes brought the criminal to confess
his guilt and throw himself on the mercy of the Emperor.
[Footnote 150: iii. 17 (p. 210).]
It was from this _commentum_, the equivalent of a French _acte
d'accusation_, that the Commentariensis derived his title.
[Sidenote: Ab Actis (Scriniarius Actorum?).]
(5) The _Ab Actis_. The officer who bore this title (which is perhaps
the same as the Scriniarius Actorum of Cassiodorus[151]) seems to have
been exclusively concerned with civil cases, and perhaps held the same
place in reference to them that the Commentarienses held in criminal
matters[152]. Practically, his office appears to have been very much
what we understand by that of _Chief Registrar_ of the Court. He (or
they, for in Lydus' time there were two _Ab Actis_ as well as two
Commentarienses[153]) was chosen from the select body of shorthand
writers who were known as Augustales, and was assisted by six men of
the same class, 'men of high character and intelligence and still in
the vigour of their years[154].' His chief business--and in this he
was served by the _Nomenclatores_, who shouted out in a loud voice the
names of the litigants--was to introduce the plaintiff and defendant
into the Court, or to make a brief statement of the nature of the case
to the presiding magistrate. He then had to watch the course of the
pleadings and listen to the Judge's decision, so as to be able to
prepare a full statement of the case for the Registers or
Journals[155] of the Court. These Registers--at least in the
flourishing days of Roman jurisprudence--were most fully and
accurately kept. Even the _Dies Nefasti_ were marked upon them, and
the reason for their being observed as legal holidays duly noted.
Elaborate indices, prepared by the Chartularii, made search an easy
matter to those who wished to ascertain what was the decision of the
law upon every point; and the marginal notes, or _personalia_,
prepared in Latin[156] by the Ab Actis or his assistants, were so
excellent and so full that sometimes when the original entry in the
Registers had been lost the whole case could be sufficiently
reconstructed from them alone.
[Footnote 151: Var. xi. 22.]
[Footnote 152: This seems to be Bethmann Hollweg's view (p. 181).]
[Footnote 153: This we learn from iii. 20. They are not mentioned in
iii. 4, where we should have expected to find them.]
[Footnote 154: [Greek: hex andres erastoi kai nounechestatoi kai
sphrigontes eti] (Lydus iii. 20).]
[Footnote 155: [Greek: rhegeston e kottidianon (anti tou ephemeron)].]
[Footnote 156: [Greek: Italisti]. Of course the emphasis laid on this
point proceeds from the Greek nationality of our present authority.]
The question was already mooted at Constantinople in the sixth century
whence the Ab Actis derived his somewhat elliptical name; and our
archaeology-loving scribe was able to inform his readers that as the
officer of the household who was called _A Pigmentis_ had the care of
the aromatic ointments of the Court; as the _A Sabanis_[157] had
charge of the bathing towels of the baths; as the _A Secretis_ (who
was called Ad Secretis by vulgar Byzantines, ignorant of the niceties
of Latin grammar) was concerned in keeping the secret counsels of his
Sovereign: so the _Ab Actis_ derived his title from the Acts of the
Court which it was his duty to keep duly posted up and properly
indexed.
[Footnote 157: [Greek: sabanon] = a towel.]
[Sidenote: Numerarii.]
(6) The _Numerarii_ (whose exact number is not stated in the
'Notitia'[158]) were the cashiers of the Praefect's office. Though
frequently mentioned in the Theodosian Code, and though persons
exercising this function must always have existed in a great Court of
Justice like the Praefect's, we hear but little of them from
Cassiodorus[159]; and Lydus' notices of the [Greek: diapsephistai],
who seem to correspond to the Numerarii[160], are scanty and
imperfect. Our German commentator has collected the passages of the
Theodosian Code which relate to this class of officers, and has shown
that on account of their rapacity and extortion their office was
subjected to a continual process of degradation. All the Numerarii,
except those of the two highest classes of judges[161], were degraded
into _Tabularii_, a name which had previously indicated the cashiers
of a municipality as distinguished from those in the Imperial service;
and the Numerarii, even of the Praetorian Praefect himself, were made
subject to examination by torture. This was not only to be dreaded on
account of the bodily suffering which it inflicted, but was also a
mark of the humble condition of those to whom it was applied.
[Footnote 158: Except, as before stated, those in the office of the
Praetorian Praefect for Illyricum. These were four in number, and one
of them had charge of 'gold,' another of '[public] works.' Further
information is requisite to enable us to explain these entries.]
[Footnote 159: They are alluded to in Var. xii. 13. The Canonicarii
(Tax-collectors) had plundered the Churches of Bruttii and Lucania in
the name of 'sedis nostrae Numerarii;' but the Numerarii with holy
horror declared that they had received no part of the spoils.]
[Footnote 160: See Bethmann Hollweg, 184.]
[Footnote 161: Illustres and Spectabiles.]
[Sidenote: Scriniarius Curae Militaris.]
We may perhaps see in the _Scriniarius Curae Militaris_ of
Cassiodorus[162] one of these Numerarii detailed for service as
paymaster to the soldiers who waited upon the orders of the Praefect.
[Footnote 162: xi. 24.]
[Sidenote: Subadjuvae.]
(7) The _Subadjuvae_. This is probably a somewhat vague term, like
Adjutores, and indicates a second and lower class of cashiers who
acted as deputies for the regular Numerarii.
[Sidenote: Cura Epistolarum.]
(8) _Cura Epistolarum._ The officer who bore this title appears to
have had the duty of copying out all letters relating to fiscal
matters[163]. This theory as to his office is confirmed by the words
of Cassiodorus (Var. xi. 23): 'Let Constantinian on his promotion
receive the care of the letters relating to the land-tax' (Hic itaque
epistolarum _canonicarum_ curam provectus accipiat).
[Footnote 163: This is Bethmann Hollweg's interpretation of the words
of Lydus, [Greek: hoi tas men epi tois demosiois phoitosas psephous
graphousi monon, to loipon kataphronoumenoi] (iii. 21). In another