BOOK XXXIII. VI. 27-vii. 30 



about the 230th year of the city of Rome. Still the 523 b.c. 

 employment of a signet-ring must have begun to be 

 much more frequent with the introduction of usury. 

 This is proved by the custom of the lower classes, 

 among whom even at the present day a ring is 

 whipped out when a contract is being made ; the 

 habit comes down from the time when there was 

 as yet no speedier method of guaranteeing a bargain, 

 so we can safely assert that w-iih us money begarf 

 first and signet-rings came in afterwards. About 

 money we shall speak rather later. 



VII. As soon as rings began to be commonly wearing of 

 worn, they distinguished the second order from the Eqftlstrian 

 commons, just as a tunic distinguished the senate ^'"''^- 

 from those who wore the ring, although this distinc- 

 tion also was only introduced at a late date, and 

 we find that a wider purple stripe on the tunic was 

 commonly worn even by heralds, for instance the 

 father o'f Lucius Aehus Stilo Praeconinus, who 

 received his surname ^ from his father's office. But 

 wearing rings clearly introduced a third order, inter- 

 mediate between the commons and the senate, and 

 the title ^ that had previously been conferred by the 

 possession of a war-horse is now assigned by money 

 rates. This however is only a recent introduction : 

 when his late lamented Majesty Augustus made 

 regulations for the judicial panels the majority of the 

 judges belonged to the iron ring class, and these 

 used to be designated not Knights but Justices; 

 the title of Knights remained with the cavalry 

 squadrons mounted at the pubhc charge. Of the 

 Justices also there were at the first only four panels, 

 and in each panel scarcely a thousand names were 

 to be found, as the provinces had not yet been 



25 



VOL.IX. B 



