the funeral piles of the noble and wealthy.
dark foliage also gave it a funereal air.1
*CUPRUM, Copper. (Vid. Es and CHALCOS.)
CURA. (Vid. CURATOR.)
CURATE LA. (Vid. CURATOR.)
CURATIO. (Vid. CURATOR.)

Its

tio:" the prætor set aside transactions of this description, not only on the ground of fraud, but on a consideration of all the circumstances of the case. But it was necessary for the minor to make application to the prætor, either during his minority or within one year after attaining it, if he claimed the CURA TOR. Up to the time of pubertas, every restitutio; a limitation probably founded on the lex Roman citizen was incapable of doing any legal Plætoria. The provisions of this lex were thus suact, or entering into any contract which might be perseded or rendered unnecessary by the jurisdicinjurious to him. The time when pubertas was at- tion of the prætor, and, accordingly, we find very tained was a matter of dispute; some fixed it at few traces of the Plætorian law in the Roman jurists. the commencement of the age of procreation, and Ulpian and his contemporaries speak of adosome at the age of fourteen. In all transactions by lescentes, under twenty-five years of age, being the impubes, it was necessary for the auctoritas of under the general direction and advice of cura the tutor to be interposed. (Vid. AUCTORITAS, TU-tores, as a notorious principle of law at that time.1 TOR.) With the age of puberty, the youth attained The establishment of this general rule is attributhe capacity of contracting marriage and becoming ted by Capitolinus to the Emperor M. Aurelius, a paterfamilias: he was liable to military service, in a passage which has given rise to much disand entitled to vote in the comitia; and, consist- cussion. We shall, however, adopt the explanaently with this, he was freed from the control of a tion of Savigny, which is as follows: Up to the tutor. Females who had attained the age of pu- time of Marcus Aurelius there were only three berty became subject to another kind of tutela, which cases or kinds of curatela: 1. That which was is explained in its proper place. (Vid. TUTELA.) founded on the lex Plætoria, by which a minor who wished to enter into a contract with another, asked the prætor for a curator, stating the ground or occasion of the petition (reddita causa). One object of the application was to save the other contracting party from all risk of judicial proceedings in consequence of dealing with a minor. Another object was the benefit of the applicant (the minor); for no prudent person would deal with him, except with the legal security of the curator3 ("Lex me perdit quinavicenaria: metuunt credere omnes"). 2. The curatela, which was given in the case of a man wasting his substance, who was called "prodigus." 3. And that in the case of a man being of unsound mind, "demens," "furiosus." In both the lastmentioned cases provision was made either by the law or by the prætor. Curatores who were determined by the law of the Twelve Tables were called legitimi; those who were named by the prætor were called honorarii. A furiosus and prodigus, whatever might be their age, were placed under the cura of their agnati by the law of the Twelve Tables. When there was no legal provision for the appointment of a curator, the prætor named one. Curatores appointed by a consul, prætor, or governor of a province (præses), were not generally required to give security for their proper conduct, having been chosen as fit persons for the office. What the lex Plætoria required for particular transactions, the Emperor Aurelius made a general rule, and all minors, without exception, and without any special grounds or reasons (non redditis causis), were required to have curatores.

With the attainment of the age of puberty by a Roman youth, every legal capacity was acquired which depended on age only, with the exception of the capacity for public offices, and there was no rule about age, even as to public offices, before the passage of the lex Villia. (Vid. EDILES, p. 25.) It was, however, a matter of necessity to give some legal protection to young persons, who, owing to their tender age, were liable to be overreached; and, consistently with the development of Roman jurisprudence, this object was effected without interfering with the old principle of full legal capacity being attained with the age of puberty. This was accomplished by the lex Plætoria (the true name of the lex, as Savigny has shown), the date of which is not known, though it is certain that the law existed when Plautus wrote. This law established a distinction of age, which was of great practical importance, by forming the citizens into two classes, those above and those below twenty-five years of age (minores viginti quinque annis), whence a person under the last-mentioned age was sometimes simply called minor. The object of the lex was to protect persons under twenty-five years of age against all fraud (dolus). The person who was guilty of such a fraud was liable to a judicium publicum, though the offence was such as in the case of a person of full age would only have been matter of action. The punishment fixed by the lex Platoria was probably a pecuniary penalty, and the consequential punishment of infamia or loss of political rights. The minor who had been fraudulently led to make a disadvantageous contract might protect The following is the result of Savigny's investihimself against an action by a plea of the lex Pla-gations into the curatela of minors after the constitoria (exceptio legis Plætoria). The lex also appears tution of M. Aurelius. The subject is one of conto have farther provided that any person who dealt siderable difficulty, but it is treated with the most with a minor might avoid all risk of the consequen- consummate skill, the result of complete knowledge ces of the Plætoria lex, if the minor was aided and and unrivalled critical sagacity. The minor only assisted in such dealing by a curator named or received a general curator when he made application chosen for the occasion. But the curator did not to the prætor for that purpose: he had the right of act like a tutor: it can hardly be supposed that his proposing a person as curator, but the prætor might consent was even necessary to the contract; for the reject the person proposed. The curator, on being minor had full legal capacity to act, and the busi- appointed, had, without the concurrence of the miness of the curator was merely to prevent his being nor, as complete power over the minor's property defrauded or surprised. as the tutor had up to the age of puberty. He could sue in respect of the minor's property, get in debts, and dispose of property like a tutor. But it was only the property which the prætor intrusted to him that he managed, and not the acquisitions of the minor subsequent to his appointment; and herein he differed from a tutor, who had the care of all the

The prætorian edict carried still farther the principle of the lex Plætoria, by protecting minors generally against positive acts of their own, in all cases in which the consequences might be injurious to them. This was done by the "in integrum restitu

1. (Plin., H. N., xvi., 33.-Virg., Æn., v., 64.-Horat., Carm., ii., 14, 23.)-2. (Gaius, i., 196.)-3. (Pseudolus, i., 3, 69.)-4. (Cic., De Nat. Deor., iii., 30.)

1. (Dig. 4, tit. 4.-De Minoribus xxv. Annis.)—2. (M. ADton, c. 10.)-3. (Plaut., Pseudolus, i., 3, 69.)

and he was bound, when appointed, to accept the duty, unless he had some legal exemption (excusatio). The curator was also bound to account at the end of the curatela, and was liable to an action for misconduct.

property of the pupillus. If it was intended that the curator should have the care of that which the minor acquired after the curator's appointment, by will or otherwise, a special application for this purpose was necessary. Thus, as to the property which was placed under the care of the curator, The word cura has also other legal applications : both as regards alienation and the getting in of 1. Cura bonorum, in the case of the goods of a debtdebts, the minor was on the same footing as the or, which are secured for the benefit of his creditors. prodigus: his acts in relation to such matters, with-2. Cura bonorum et ventris, in the case of a woman out the curator, were void. But the legal capacity being pregnant at the death of her husband. 3. Cuof the minor to contract debts was not affected by ra hereditatis, in case of a dispute as to who is the the appointment of a curator, and he might be sued heres of a person, when his supposed child is under on his contract either during his minority or after. age. 4. Cura hereditatis jacentis, in the case of a Nor was there any inconsistency in this: the minor property, when the heres had not yet declared could not spend his actual property by virtue of the whether or not he would accept the inheritance. power of the curator, and the preservation of his 5. Cura bonorum absentis, in the case of property property during minority was the object of the cu- of an absent person who had appointed no manager rator's appointment. But the minor would have of it. been deprived of all legal capacity for doing any act This view of the curatela of minors is from an if he could not have become liable on his contract. essay by Savigny, who has handled the whole matThe contract was not in its nature immediately in-ter in a way equally admirable, both for the scienjurious, and when the time came for enforcing it tific precision of the method, and the force and peragainst the minor, he had the general protection of spicuity of the language.1 the restitutio. If the minor wished to be adrogated (vid. ADOPTIO), it was necessary to have the consent of the curator. It is not stated in the extant authorities what was the form of proceeding when it was necessary to dispose of any property of the minor by the mancipatio or in jure cessio; but it may be safely assumed that the minor acted (for he alone could act on such an occasion) and the curator gave his consent, which, in the case supposed, would be analogous to the auctoritas of the tutor. But it would differ from the auctoritas in not being, like the auctoritas, necessary to the completion of the legal act, but merely necessary to remove all legal objections to it when completed.

The cura of spendthrifts and persons of unsound mind, as already observed, owed its origin to the laws of the Twelve Tables. The technical word for a person of unsound mind in the Twelve Tables is furiosus, which is equivalent to demens; and both words are distinguished from insanus. Though furor implies violence in conduct, and dementia only mental imbecility, there was no legal difference between the two terms, so far as concerned the cura. Insania is merely weakness of understanding (stultitia constantia, id est, sanitate vacans1), and it was not provided for by the laws of the Twelve Tables. In later times, the prætor appointed a curator for all persons whose infirmities required it. This law of the Twelve Tables did not apply to a pupillus or pupilla. If, therefore, a pupillus was of unsound mind, the tutor was his curator. If an agnatus was the curator of a furiosus, he had the power of alienating the property of the furiosus. The prodigus only received a curator upon application being made to a magistratus, and a sentence of interdiction being pronounced against him (ei bonis interdictum est3). The form of the interdictio was thus: "Quando tibi bona paterna avitaque nequitia tua disperdis, liberosque tuos ad egestatem perducis, ob eam rem tibi ea re commercioque interdico," The cura of the prodigus continued till the interdict was dissolved. It might be inferred from the form of the interdict, that it was limited to the case of persons who had children; but perhaps this was not so.

It will appear from what has been said, that, whatever similarity there may be between a tutor and a curator, an essential distinction lies in this, that the curator was specially the guardian of property, though in the case of a furiosus he must also have been the guardian of the person. A curator must, of course, be legally qualified for his functions, 1. (Cic., Tusc. Quæst., iii., 5.)-2. (Gaius, ii., 64.9—3. (Compare Cic., De Senec., c. 7.)

CURATORES were public officers of various kinds under the Roman Empire, several of whom were first established by Augustus." The most important of them were as follow:

I. CURATORES ALVEI ET RIPARUM, who had the charge of the navigation of the Tiber. The duties of their office may be gathered from Ulpian." It was reckoned very honourable, and the persons who filled it received afterward the title of comites.

II. CURATORES ANNONE, who purchased corn and oil for the state, and sold it again at a small price among the poorer citizens. They were also called curatores emendi frumenti et olei, and oirovai and éλaivai. Their office belonged to the personalia munera; that is, it did not require any expenditure of a person's private property; but the curatores received from the state a sufficient sum of money to purchase the required amount."

III. CURATORES AQUARUM. (Vid. AQUÆ DUCTUS, p. 75.)

IV. CURATORES KALENDARII, who had the care in municipal towns of the kalendaria, that is, the books which contained the names of the persons to whom public money, which was not wanted for the ordinary expenses of the town, was lent on interest. The office belonged to the personalia_munera. These officers are mentioned in inscriptions found in municipal towns."

V. CURATORES LUDORUM, who had the care of the public games. Persons of rank appear to have been usually appointed to this office. In inscriptions, they are usually called curatores muneris gladiatorii, &c.

VI. CURATORES OPERUM PUBLICORUM, who had the care of all public buildings, such as the theatres, baths, aquæducts, &c., and agreed with the contractors for all necessary repairs to them. Their duties, under the Republic, were discharged by the ædiles and censors. (Vid. CENSORES, p. 229.) They are frequently mentioned in inscriptions."

VII. CURATORES REGIONUM, who had the care of the fourteen districts into which Rome was divided

1. (Von dem Schutz der Minderjährigen, Zeitschrift., x.-Savigny, Vom Beruf, &c., p. 102.-Garus, i., 197.-Ulp., Frag., xi-Dirksen, Uebersicht, &c., Tab. v., Frag. 7.-Mackeldey, Lehrbuch des heutigen Römischen Rechts.-Thibaut, System des Pandekten-Rechts.-Marezoll, Lehrbuch, &c.-A reference to these authorities will enable the reader to carry his investiga tions farther, and to supply what is purposely omitted in the 4. (Dig. 50, tit. 5, s. 18, 5.)-5. (Dig. 50, tit. 8, s. 9, ◊ 5.)-6. above sketch.)-2. (Suet., Octav., 37.)-3. (Dig. 43, tit. 15.)(Dig. 50, tit. 4, s. 18, 2; tit. 8, s. 9, 7.-Heinecc., Antiq. Rom., iii., 15, 4.)-7. (Orelli, Inscrip., No. 3940, 4491.)-8. (Tacit., Ann., xi., 35; xiii., 22.-Suet., Cal., 27.)-9. (Orelli, In scrip., No. 24, 1506, 2273.)

said to have been so called from calare, because the pontifex minor there proclaimed to the people the number of days between the kalends and the nones of each month. But the most important of all was the curia in which the senate generally met; sometimes simply called curia, sometimes distinguished by the epithet Hostilia, as it was said to have been built by Tullus Hostilius. This, however, was destroyed by fire, and in its place Augustus erected another, to which he gave the name of Curia Julia, though it was still occasionally called the Curia Hostilia.3

under the emperors, and whose duty it was to pre- | Palatine; of the Curia Calabra, on the Capitoline, vent all disorder and extortion in their respective districts. This office was first instituted by Augustus. There were usually two officers of this kind for each district; Alexander Severus, however, appears to have appointed only one for each; but these were persons of consular rank, who were to have jurisdiction in conjunction with the præfectus urbi. We are told that Marcus Antoninus, among other regulations, gave special directions that the curatores regionum should either punish, or bring before the præfectus urbi for punishment, all persons who exacted from the inhabitants more than the legal taxes."

The reader of Niebuhr will be aware that the curia (we are now speaking of the corporations) were formed of the original burghers of the three

VIII. CURATORES REIPUBLICÆ, also called LoGISTÆ, who administered the landed property of municipia. Ulpian wrote a separate work, De Of-patrician tribes, whose general assembly was the ficio Curatoris Reipublicæ.

(Vid. VIÆ.)

IX. CURATORES VIARUM.
KYRBEIS (κύρβεις). (Vid. AXONES.)
CURIA. (Vid. CURIE.)

CU'RIE. The accounts which have come down to us of the early ages of Rome, represent the burghers or proper citizens (the populus of the Annals) to have been originally divided into three tribes, the Ramnes, Titienses, and Luceres. (Vid. TRIBUS.) Each of these tribes was composed of a union of ten curiæ (øparρíaι) or wards, so that the whole number of the latter was thirty. Again, each of these thirty curia was formed of gentes or houses, the families constituting which were not of necessity related; just as at Athens the yεvvnτa or members of a yέvos, also called oμoyúkaкTEÇ, were no way akin, but bore this name solely in consequence of their union. Dionysius' farther informs us that Romulus divided the curiæ into decads, i. e., decads of gentes or houses, at the head of which were officers called decurions: each of the three tribes, therefore, was originally composed of one hundred gentes (vid. GENS); and as in the old legion the three centuries of horse corresponded to the three tribes, so did the thirty centuries of foot represent the same number of curiæ. We need not, however, infer from this that the number of soldiers in each century was always a hundred.

comitia curiata, and whose representatives originally formed the smaller assembly or senate. They were, in fact, essentially exclusive bodies, in whose hands were the whole government and property of the state; for the plebs which grew up around them, formed as it was of various elements, but not included in the curiæ, had for a long time no share in the government of the state or its property. Our own country, before the alteration in the laws relating to the franchise and municipal government, exhibited a parallel to this state of things. The freemen in many instances enjoyed the franchise, and possessed the property of their respective boroughs, though their unprivileged fellow-citizens often exceeded them both in numbers and influence. But it is the nature of all exclusive corporations to decline in power and everything else and so it was at Rome; for in the later ages of the Republic, the curiæ and their comitia were little more than a name and a form. The oblatio curia, under the emperors, seems to show that to belong to a curia was then no longer an honour or an advantage, but a burden.*

In later ages, curia signified the senate of a colo-
ny in opposition to the senatus of Rome.
(Vid.
COLONIA, p. 282.) Respecting the etymology of the
word, see COMITIA, p. 295.

CURIA TA COMITIA. (Vid. COMITIA.)
CURIO. (Vid. CURIE.)

The curiæ whose names have come down to us are only seven: the Forensis, Rapta, Faucia or KYRIOS (Kúpinç) signifies generally the person Saucia, Tatiensis, Tifata, Veliensis, and Velita. that was responsible for the welfare of such memAccording to Livy, these names were derived from bers of a family as the law presumes to be incapathe Sabine women carried off during the consualia; ble of protecting themselves; as, for instance, miaccording to Varro,10 from their leaders (uvopes nye- nors and slaves, and women of all ages. Fathers, poves), by which he may mean Heroes Eponymi; therefore, and guardians, husbands, the nearest male others, again, connect them with the neighbouring relatives of women, and masters of families, would places. 12 The poetical story of the rape of the Sa- all bear this title in respect of the vicarious funcbine women probably indicates, that at one time notions exercised by them in behalf of the respective connubium, or right of intermarriage, existed between the Romans and the Sabines till the former extorted it by force of arms. A more intimate union would, of course, be the consequence.

objects of their care. The qualifications of all these, in respect of which they can be combined in one class, designated by the term kúptog, were the male sex, years of discretion, freedom, and, when citizens, a sufficient share of the franchise (¿πitiuía) to enable them to appear in the law-courts as plain

Each of these thirty curiæ had a president (curio), who performed the sacred rights, a participation in which served as a bond of union among the mem-tiffs or defendants in behalf of their several charbers.13 The curiones themselves, forming a college of thirty priests, were presided over by the curio maximus. Moreover, each of these corporations had its common hall, also called curia, in which the citizens met for religious and other purposes." 14 But, besides the halls of the old corporations, there were also other curiæ at Rome used for a variety of purposes thus we read of the Curia Saliorum, on the

1. (Suet., Octav., 30.)-2. (Lamprid., Alex. Sev., 33.)-3. (Jul. Capitol., M. Anton., 12.)-4. (Dig. 50, tit. 8, s. 9, 2; 2, tit. 14, s. 37.)-5. (Liv., x., 6.)-6. (Niebuhr, Hist. Rom., i., 311, transl.)-7. (11., 7.)-8. (Varro, De Ling. Lat., lib. iv.-Arnold, Hist. Rom., vol. i., p. 25.)-9. (i., 13.)-10. (Dionys., ii., 47.)-11. (Niebuhr, Hist. Rom., i., 313, transl.) - 12. (Plut., Rom.)-13. (Dionys., ii., 7, 64.)-14. (Dionys., i., 23.)

ges; in the case of the Kúploc being a resident alien, the deficiency of franchise would be supplied by his Athenian patron (πрoσráτns). The duties to be performed, and, in default of their performance, the penalties incurred by guardians, and the proceedings as to their appointment, are mentioned under their more usual title. (Vid. EPITROPOI.)

The business of those who were more especially designated kúptot in the Attic laws was, to protect the interests of women, whether spinsters or widows, or persons separated from their husbands. If a citizen died intestate, leaving an orphan daughter,

1. (Cic., De Div., i., 11.)-2. (Facciol., s. v.)--3. (Cramer's Italy, vol. i., p. 402.)-4. (Ileinecc., x., 24.)

CURU'LIS SELLA. (Vid. SELLA CURULIS.) CURRUS, dim. CURRICULUM (úpμa), a Chariot, a Car. These terms appear to have denoted (d.) The tire, Eniowтрov, canthus. Homer1s dethose two-wheeled vehicles for the carriage of per- scribes the chariot of Juno as having a tire of sons which were open overhead, thus differing from bronze upon a golden felly, thus placing the harder the carpentum, and closed in front, in which they metal in a position to resist friction, and to protect differed from the cisium. One of the most essen- the softer. On the contrary, Ovid's description is tial articles in the construction of the currus was more ornamental than correct: "Aurea summa curthe vrug, or rim; and it is accordingly seen in all vatura rotæ.' The tire was commonly of iron.20 the chariots which are represented either in this ar- All the parts now enumerated are seen in an anticle, or at p. 66, 209, 253. (Vid. ANTYX.) Another cient chariot preserved in the Vatican, a representindispensable part was the axle, made of oak (ønyt-ation of which is given in the following woodcut. vos aswv), and sometimes also of ilex, ash, or elm.10 The cars of Juno and Neptune have metallic axles (σidпpéos, xúλkeo ). One method of making à chariot less liable to be overturned was to lengthen its axle, and thus to widen the base on which it stood. The axle was firmly fixed under the body

rings at the extremities of the yoke. All the par- | overthrown in passing the goal at the circus. The ticulars which have been mentioned are still more distinctly seen in the second figure, taken from a terra-cotta at Vienna." It represents a chariot