PLEBEIANS (OF. !dairies', Fr. ph'bOicn, from 1-nt. p/ehrius. relating to time common peo ple. film] plebs. common connected with picni/..is full, k. auarXivac, pimplr'nei. Ski, per, pre*, to till, nt'horc1 Slay. Wing, Olr. bin, God]. fulls, 011G. fob, (:er. roll. AS., Eng. full). The common people of Rome; One of the two elements of which time Roman nation consisted. Their origin, as a separate ela to be traced partly to natural and partly to artificial causes. The foundation of Rome, prob ably as a frontier emporium of Latin traffic (according to Alonmsen's suggestion), would bring about the place a number of inferior em ployees, clients, or hangers-on, of the enterpris ing commercial agriculturists who laid the primi tive basis of the material and moral prosperity of the city. These hangers-on were the original plebeians or non-burgesses of Rome, whose nuu hers were constantly increased by the subjugation of the surrounding cities and States. Thus, tradi tion states that, on the capture of Alba, while the most distinguished citizens of that town were received among the Roman patricians. the greater part of the inhabitants, likewise transferred to Rome, were kept in submission to the pohocfus or patricians of Rome—ill other words, swelled time ranks of the plebeians. Similar transfers of some of the inhabitants of conquered towns are assigned to the reign of Anens Nartins. The. order of plebeians thus gradually formed soon exceeded the patricians in numbers, partly in habiting Pone, and partly the adjoining country. Though citizens, they were neither comprehended in the three tribes, nor in the curi', nor in the patrician genies, and were therefore excluded from time comities the senate, and all the civil and priestly offices of the State. They could not intermarry with the patricians.
The first step (according to traditionary be lief) toward breaking down the barrier between the two classes was the admission, under Tar quinins Prisms, of some of the more considerable plebeian families into the three tribes. Servius
Tullius divided the part of the city and the adjacent eon n t ry whieh was inhabited by plebeians into regions or local tribes, assigning land to those plebeians who were yet without it. The plebeian tribes, with tribunes at their head, formed an organization similar to that of the patricians. The same king further extended the rights of the plebeians by dividing the whole body of citizens, patrician and plebeian, into tire classes. according to their wealth, and form ing a great national assembly called the militia rentarinta, in whielm the plebeians met the patri eians on a footing of equality; but the patricians continued to he alone eligible to the senate, time highest magistracy, and the priestly offices. These newly acquired privileges were lost in the reign of Tau•quiuiuS Superbus, but restored on the establishment of the Republic. Soon afterwards the vacancies which had occurred in the senate during time reign of the last king were filled up by the most distinguished of time plebeian equites, and the plebeians acquired a variety of new privileges by the laws of Valerius Publieola. The encroachments on those privileges on the part of the patricians began time long-continued struggle between the two orders, which eventually led to the plebeians gaining access to all the civil and religious offices, acquiring for their decrees (plebiscite) the force of law. Under the Hor tensian law (n.c. 286) the two hostile classes were at last amalgamated in one general body of Boman citizens with equal rights. Henceforth the term papulus is sometimes applied to the plebeians alone, sometimes to the whole body of citizens assembled in the comitia centuriata or tributa, and plebs is occasionally used in a loose way for the multitude or populace. in opposition to the senatorial party. See PATRIcIAN ; ROME, HISTORY.