The province was treated as a conquered country, though the towns retained somewhat of their municipal freedom, but the constitution of many of them at least was re-fashioned upon the model of Rome, though In this respect there were probably considerable varieties. Under the emperors the political organisation of the whole empire became more uniform. The towns had the management of their revenue, and the right of coining; but only towns of the highest class could coin silver. They had a senate like those in the Italian towns, but no magistrates with corresponding powers. The religion of the people was not interfered with.
In some cases part of the land of conquered foreign countries was seized by the Roman state, and let by the censors ; or the forfeited land was restored, subject to the payment of a rent. All provincial land differed in some essential particulars from Italian land: it could not be the subject of quiritarian ownership, that is, it had not the privileges of-Italian land, and it was capable of being transferred without the forms required in the case of Italian land. There was private property in provincial lands, but the ultimate ownership, in the Imperial period at least, was considered to be in the Cesar or in the Roman state (populus Romanus). (Gains, ii 7.) All provincial lands paid taxes (vectigalia et tributa). But certain provincial towns received as a special favour the Jus Italicum, the legal effect of which was to give the land included within the limits of such town all the qualities of Italian land, and consequently freedom from taxation. Such towns also received, as a part of the Jus Italicum, a free consti tution like that of the Italian towns, and with it the various magistrates, decemviri, quinquennales (censors), mdiles ; and also jurisdictio, or the power of holding courts of justice. Various towns which enjoyed this privilege are enumerated, in Spain, Illyria, Gaul, and elsewhere. The origin of this privilege is assigned by some writers to the Imperial period ; but perhaps it commenced earlier. In all the provinces the regular jurisdiction was in the hands of the Roman governor, who exercised it by himself and his quiestor and legati; and for this purpose he made circuits in his province. In reference to this part of his duties, the governor is sometimes called Judea Ordinarius under the later emperors. These circuits, sometimes called conventus, formed
what we may call the divisions of a province for judicial purposes. Thus Pliny (iii. 3) says that Hispania Citerior was divided into seven couventus, which he enumerates. The towns which had the Jus Italic= were not comprised in the conventus ; they had their magis trates, in the Italian sense of the term, who had jurisdictio; but there was an appeal to the governor. At these conventus there were present a great number of Roman citizens, who were engaged in commerce in the province, or who were publicani, farmers of the revenues. These conventus, which are frequently mentioned by the Roman writers, were not accidental assemblages of persons, but meetings at stated times and places appointed by the governor, and principally for the purpose of judicial decision on matters in dispute, both between Roman citizens, and Roman citizens and the provincials. The judices were chosen, after the Roman fashion, from the persons who attended the conventus, or circuit courts. It appears that the fundamental laws of a province were not interfered with, for, as we have seen, the soil retained its former legal character, and was not invested with that of Italic soil, and the personal status or condition of Roman citizens was not communicated to the provincials merely as such. Some of the provinces, as Sicily, obtained the Latinitas [LaTususi Jus] from Julius Cesar, and the Civitas, or complete Roman citizenship, was given to the Sicilians after his death (Cie., Ad Att.,' xiv. 12); but this was not the general rule. By means of the edict, which the praetor published on entering upon his duties, and which was often framed upon the prstorian edict at Rome [Pn.E'rou], many important changes must have been gradually introduced into the legal system of the provinces, and particularly with reference to matters of contract and forms of procedure, in which there could bo no ground for the same distinction that was maintained between provincial and Italic land, and which necessarily influenced the rights of landholders and the forms of action. The praetor had complete jurisdiction in criminal as well as civil matters, and both over provincials and Roman citizens; but a Roman citizen could appeal to Rome in a criminal matter.