FASCES, in Rome, bundles of elm or birch rods from which the head of an axe projected, fastened together by a red strap. As the emblem of official authority, they were carried by the lictors, in the left hand and on the left shoulder, before the higher Roman magis trates, at the funeral of a magistrate, be hind the bier. The lictors and the fasces were so inseparably connected that they came to be used as synonymous terms.
The fasces represented the power over life and limb possessed by the kings; later, the consuls were preceded by 1 2 fasces. Within the precincts of the city the axe was re moved, in recognition of the right of ap peal (provocatio) to the people in a matter of life and death ; outside Rome, however, each consul retained the axe. Valerius Publicola established the custom that the fasces should be lowered before the people, as the real representatives of sovereignty; lowering the fasces was also the manner in which an inferior saluted a superior magistrate. A dictator had 24 fasces (including the axe, even within the city) ; other magistrates had fasces vary ing in number, with the exception of the censors, who, possessing no executive authority, had none. A victorious general, who had been saluted "imperator" by his soldiers, had his fasces crowned with laurel. Under the empire, the laurel was regarded as dis tinctive of the imperial fasces.
In recent years in Italy, the fasces were adopted as the emblem of the Fascist Party (see FASCISM).
See J. E. Sandys, Companion to Latin Studies (1921).