City Cohorts and Vigiles

[Anonymous]

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I have read that Rome had NO police force, that they relied on peer pressure to force a person to appear in court to answer a charge. Then contradicting that are the accounts of the City Cohorts being used as police and the vigiles which sound like the counterparts of our modern police forces. Taken that in our "Modern Era" police forces did not exist until the middle of the 19th century its surprising Rome had such advance police forces.I had always heard that the City Cohorts were for the defense of the city against external enemies until the legions could be recalled in case of emergency.<br>
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I have several questions. Where the city cohorts under the same rules as the Praetorians, that is no soldier could wear armor and helmet? Were the city cohorts combat veterans,picked from the legions and rotated back and forth?<br>
How did they enforce the law? Did they just patrol dark streets in squard with torches looking for lawbreakers or keep order just by their prescence? Used for crowd control? Were they sent out to arrest people charged with crimes? I understand there were no large prisions but just the one "Mamerime" with two cells under the Capitoline Hill..where they executed prisoners and threw them into the sewer below. Did Rome have any kind of "Detective" police not political but for crime?<br>
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About the vigiles, how were they armed? Like the legions? Are there any illustrations or descriptions of them?<br>
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www.vroma.org/~bmcmanus/romanarmy.html<br>
The Urban Cohorts: When Augustus instituted the office of city prefect (praefectus urbi), he also established 3 cohorts (the cohortes urbanae) to constitute a sort of police force for the city of Rome. These troops were also stationed in the camp of the praetorians in Rome, though they served under the command of the city prefect, a man of senatorial rank. Outstanding service in the urban cohorts could lead to promotion into the more prestigious praetorian guard<br>
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The Vigiles: The vigiles, also founded by Augustus, served as fire fighters and night watchmen in the city of Rome. They were originally drawn from the ranks of freedmen and were not really soldiers, although they were organized on a quasi-military basis. The commander of the vigiles was a prefect of equestrian rank (the praefectus vigilum). They were divided into seven cohorts led by tribunes; each cohort was responsible for two of the 14 regions of the city. <p>Blaine DIxon<BR>

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[Anonymous]

I think the Urban Cohorts were generally there for 'keeping the peace' (and perhaps the defence of the city?) rather than any sort of modern policing. Think of them more as riot police than bobbies on the beat.<br>
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I don't think the Vigiles had any sort of weapon, apart perhaps from a fustis (club). As far as I can make out, firefighting was their primary role, and any policing they may have done was simply because they would be out and about at night looking for fires, so might have been able to deal with the odd burglary.<br>
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I don't really think that Rome's 'police' were really much more advanced than the usual nightwatchmen, trained bands, militia and so on that most European Cities had thoughout the Middle Ages and beyond. <p></p><i></i>

[Jeroen Pelgrom]

the organisation of the cohortes urbanae en cohortes vigiles matched those of the praetorian guard (even initially numbered in sequence with them). They would likely to have matched them in appearance, although full equipment was not worn within the pomerium. The cohortes urbanae differed from the legionaries in that they were provided with their equipment by the imperial fiscus rather than having to buy their own. Like the praetorian guard they had fisci curatores on strength instead of custodes armorum.<br>
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Info about the vigiles and urban cohorts is very limited. In Greece and Rome at War by Peter conolly, there is a montefori-type helmet of the Urban Cohorts, stationed at Lyon.<br>
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An example from the <em>Epigraphik-Datenbank</em>:<br>
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<strong>Belegstelle</strong>: CIL 08, 04874 = ILAlg-01, 01223<br>
<strong>Provinz</strong>: Africa proconsularis Ort: Khamissa / Thubursicum Numidarum<br>
Fortunae reduci / Aug(usti) sacr(um) / C(aius) Vasidius C(ai) fil(ius) Palat(ina) / Bellicus miles co/hort(is) X urbanae / optio centuriae / signifer fisci cu/rator optio ab actis / urbi veteranus Aug(usti) / decurio aedil(is) praef(ectus) / IIvir(um) i(ure) d(icundo) ob honorem / aedilitatis inlatis rei / p(ublicae) HS IIII(milibus) n(ummum) legitimis am/plius ex HS V(milibus) n(ummum) posuit / idemq(ue) dedicavit <p>-------------------------------------------------------<br>
Rome did not create a great empire by having meetings -- they did it by killing all those who opposed them.<br>
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[Anonymous]

Interesting topic.<br>
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I find it hard to believe that there wasn't a more established "police force" or that the city cohorts didn't fill this function more.<br>
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In a city that reached 1/2million - 1million at its peak there HAD to be rampant crime. The Roman empire and its total population of 69 million did not survive as long as it did without law and order. Rome relied of commerce and thrived on the city style of life. Not until the 15th-16th century did Europe see cities again that even neared the size of the Roman ones.<br>
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If the average civilian could not even walk down the streets without getting murdered or mugged there would not have been these large cities in my opinion........<br>
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Some sort of policing had to be in place. You don't think anyone hunted down the guys making all those fake coins? I'm sure there was a fraud/counterfeiting mastermind or two around back then. It was in Romes best interest to quel these people because it undermined everything that had built.<br>
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[Anonymous]

The vigiles did not originally have a police function; when founded (date debated; could be as early as 22 BC but did not reach final form until AD7) they were a fire brigade, originally numbering in the mere hundreds:<br>
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"To the curule aediles he entrusted the putting out of fires, for which purpose he granted them six hundred slaves as assistants." Cassius Dio LIV.2).<br>
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Their fire-fighting functions were paramount:<br>
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"When many parts of the city were at this time [AD 6] destroyed by fire, Augustus organized a company of freedmen, in seven divisions, to render assistance on such occasions, and appointed a eques in command over them, expecting to disband them in a short time. He did not do so, however; for he found by experience that the aid they gave was most valuable and necessary, and so retained them." (Cassius Dio LV.26).<br>
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But consider the logistics even when the vigiles were around; there were 7000 of them, charged with fire-fighting and enforcing buikding regulations relating to fire prevention. In a city of a million. And not all 7000 would be on duty at once. Strabo (an exact contemporary) describes their functions as follows:<br>
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"Now Augustus Caesar concerned himself about such impairments of the city, and organized for protection against fires a militia composed of freedmen, whose duty it was to render assistance and also to provide against collapses, reducing the heights of the new buildings and forbidding that any structure on the public streets should rise as high as seventy feet." (Strabo V.3.7)<br>
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That Augustus did not consider that he had a sufficient police force is suggested by Suetonius, who suggests that in times of crisis Augustus had to recruit extra riot squads:<br>
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"Apart from the city vigiles, and militia companies raised to keep order during food shortages, he enlisted freedmen in the army only twice." (Suetonius, Augustus xxv).<br>
<p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p200.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=shaunhullis>ShaunHullis</A> at: 5/27/04 11:57 am<br></i>

[Anonymous]

[The rest of my post got cut off...]<br>
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<p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p200.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=shaunhullis>ShaunHullis</A> at: 5/27/04 12:00 pm<br></i>

[Anonymous]

But it does seem that the vigiles came to have what we would call police functions with time. But the sources are ambiguous:<br>
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"On these occasions [the games] he posted guards in different parts of the city, to prevent ruffians from turning the emptiness of the streets to their own advantage." (Suetonius, Augustus 43)<br>
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Suetonius unhelpfully does not say who these guards were.<br>
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Before Augustus, however, pretty much NOTHING existed. Look at the gang warfare of the 50s BC; even the Senate House was burned down by the mob at Clodius' funeral; politicians were regularly set upon by their opponents' gangs; in 59 BC the consul Bibulus, Caesar's enemy, had a bucket of excrement dumped on his head.<br>
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Even under the later emperors, access to the princeps was close and personal – on one occasion Claudius was set upon by a mob throwing bread crusts and apparently escaped a beating only by ducking into a side-door of the palace (see Suetonius, Claudius).<br>
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Juvenal's Third Satire (though exaggerated) is interesting on this subject; he talks of the perils of walking the streets of Rome at night; how if you do not have slaves to guard you and light your way you are in great danger of mugging; how it is wise to make a will before going out to dinner...<br>
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Roman law and law enforcement did rely to a large extent on local community policing. We hear, for example, of one of the proscribed of 43 BC being found hiding in a swamp by a local posse out after bandits near Minturnae. (Incidentally, proscription is a great example of Roman privatization; the list goes up of those whom the state wants killed, and private individuals are free to go after those on the list, take their head and claim the reward.)<br>
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The Romans had a very different view of the role of the state to us; they went for minimum government wherever possible. Even tax collection was often contracted out to the highest bidder. Many of the functions of state which we would expect government to carry out simply did not occur to them. Look at the system of prosecution; there were no state prosecutors, and cases were brought by anyone who thought that they could make the charge stick, their incentive being a share in the proceeds of a successful conviction. This led to the emergence of the infamous "delatores" (informers), famously under Domitian.<br>
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Sorry if this post is a bit long and dry.<br>
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Shaun <p></p><i></i>