Talk:Conscript Fathers

Roman Senate

This text parallels Roman Senate and should be edited into that article, under the title by which it will be searched by Wikipedia readers. --Wetman (talk) 21:11, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. It looks like parts could go at the end of the first paragraph of Senate of the Roman Kingdom and other parts into Role as sovereign power. Does that sound correct to you? I could start on this tomorrow with merging some of these parts into the article Roman Senate to see how it looks then as it goes. I see now in Senate's role in the election of a new king the part pertaining to interregnum is pretty much covered there. Does that sound correct as to merging parts at a time to see how it goes and looks? Then the merged parts could be corrected as it goes along, if need be. Or should there be a complete Section called "Conscript Fathers" within the Roman Senate article?--Doug ^talk 22:08, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Parts have been merged into Roman Senate with a hatnote back to this article as the main article. --Doug ^talk 20:57, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

conscript fathers

Hello, I saw your posting on my talk page. I have a few suggestions for your Conscript Fathers page.

First, you might want to read History of the Constitution of the Roman Kingdom, Senate of the Roman Kingdom, and Constitution of the Roman Kingdom for more background on this subject.

Second, when you talk about early Roman history, much of it is legendary. For example, when you talk about Romulus (who was king and the person who made these appointments) and Remus (who never was king, and was killed by Romulus before Rome's founding) appointing 100 individuals to the senate, this is purely legend. Livy believed these legends to be historical fact. Most historians assumed these legends to be true up until the late 19th century.

At the Battle of the Allia in 390 BC, an army of Gauls sacked Rome. This was the last time Rome was sacked by a foreign army until the final century of the Roman Empire. In the sacking, all historical records were destroyed. Thus, later Romans invented legends (such as Romulus and Remus) to explain events that they had no other explanation for. Regular historical records (called annals) were not maintained until about the time of the Second Punic War in the late 3rd century BC. In other words, events up until 390 BC that contemporary historians reported were probably mostly legend (legends, however, that may be based on fact). Events over the next 150 years that contemporary historians reported were probably a mixture of legend and historical fact.

In my Roman constitution entries, I have tried to focus on what likely happened, rather than the legends. This is why, for example, I suggest that the early senators were just the heads of the leading families, and that there was not a concerted effort to appoint 100 members of each of the three ethnic groups (Latins, Sabines and Etruscans, as the legends suggest) to the senate. Just be aware of this when you write about early Roman history, and be sure to qualify statements that cite the legends.

Third, I think that your distinction between patres and patricians is somewhat incomplete. Patricians (the word derives from patre, which means "father" in Latin) were the original inhabitants of Rome. Later, when Rome began conquering neighboring cities, the citizens of those cities would sometimes come to Rome. Eventually, these people would become plebeians. All non-patricians were plebeians. It was the heads of these patrician families who became senators. It was the decedents of the members of these families who were the patricians of later centuries. I think you should clear this up in your entry.

Fourth, the censorship wasn't created until 443 BC (about 70 years after Lucius Junius Brutus' consulship). During these early years, the two consuls conjointly held all of the powers that had been held by the king. This included the power to conduct a census, and with it to appoint new senators (a processed called "lectio"). Thus, Brutus held "lectio" powers, and thus he (not any censor) appointed those first plebeians to the senate (according to the legends, anyway). The censors could remove senators from office for any or no reason, but only if that censor acted in conjunction with this censorial colleague (as was the case in any class demotion, since senators were senators because they were members of the elite senatorial class). Senators were never independent of the censors, and only served for life if the censors didn't remove them from the senate. Senators could be removed for immorality (although the Roman concept of 'morality' was vastly different from our own), but also for acts such as a criminal conviction, incompetence, disregarding precedent or a magistrate’s veto, or many other reasons.

Fifth, there were no "old senators" or "new senators". The patrician senators were the patres, while the plebeian senators were the conscripti. There also were no "privileged patricians". All patricians were of the same class, with the same legal rights. They constituted the aristocracy in Rome, since only they could trace their family heritage to the individuals who founded the city. This was why they were given so many legal rights.

Sixth, the senate consisted of 300 members up until the consulship of Lucius Cornelius Sulla. He increased it to 600 members. Julius Caesar increased it again to 900 members. Augustus, the first Roman Emperor, decreased it back to about 600. It stayed at 600 throughout the next several centuries. I am not sure where you are getting the figure of 2,000 senators. There were never that many senators. You might be thinking of the citizens who were eligible to vote in the legislative assemblies (the Roman senate was not a legislature).

I think what you should do is condense this to about 4 or 5 paragraphs, and make it into an entry on Roman senators. There is a lot of repetition in this entry, and you skip the 400 years between Brutus' consulship in 509 BC and Sulla's consulship in 88 BC.RomanHistorian (talk) 06:50, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

• I'll try to answer and respond to each of your points. I'll follow in the order of your response --

First
Did read over these three articles, however did not find anything on Conscript Fathers (patres conscripti) nor Conscript Men. Keep in mind the article is about Conscript Fathers.

Second
Thanks for pointing out that much of the Roman history is legendary. This is the way I also understand it. In the sub-heading "Early history" I have worded it ...possibly going back to legendary Romulus in the 8th century BCE, the Romans instituted a senate... I also worded it Livy writes... and then backed it up with the appropriate reference (i.e. # 4 with the exact reference wording from Book 1 first passage). I also wrote that the early senators were just the heads of the leading families with the wording In these very early times the patrician senate selected only members from heads of families.[6] In most cases whereever Livy is the reference I gave the appropriate exact wording in the footnotes. I also gave the exact wording of the reference in the footnotes for Plutarch. I believe I backed up all statements in the sub-headings with the appropiate reference and some have multiple references. This referencing is carried through up to the time of the Byzantine Senate of the fourth century.

Third
I believe the wording is clear between the distinction of patres and patricians and plebeians with what I wrote in the sub-heading "Early history" of Plutarch points out that they were gentlemen who could show their Roman pedigree proudly. The later members who were selected from the commonalty were called "Patres Conscripti." See reference # 9 of Plutarch's Morals. Also to be sure this was clear I wrote in the sub-heading "Roman Republic" Patres Conscripti (Conscript Fathers) literally means "fathers enrolled" as originally referring to two distinct groups of senators: patres and conscripti.[33] They were the patrician senators (patres) and the non-patrician (constricti) senators that entered at the start of the Roman Republic. I then further described the differences and that The conscripti were second-class senators.

Fourth
I believe I did make it clear that Brutus appointed those first plebeians to the senate in the sub-heading "Roman Republic" with the wording The vacancies of Tarquinius were then replaced by Lucius Junius Brutus whom brought the number up to 300 members.[6][18][19] The new members that were enrolled by Brutus then in the senatorial register were called conscripti and replaced by equestrian noblemen, not patricians.[3][6][20] Reference # 19 of Livy is given in the footnotes with the exact wording of Book 1 passage 7 pertaining to Brutus and the fact that he was the one that filled the number of members back up to 300. Changed the wording to reflect that censors could remove members for any reason. Here shows the Britannica Concise Encyclopedia reference relating to ...by the late republic the Senate became independent of the consuls...

Fifth
In googling "conscripti 'new senators'" I get this that shows reference that the new senators were taken from the equestrian order and were plebeians. To distinguish the new from the old senators, the new senators were styled conscripti. This is further backed up by references by Livy and Festus and Plutarch here that the new senators are said to have been distinguished from the old by the name of conscripti... The reference # 33 shows that the patres were designated patricians and that they had special privileges outside the Senate - for example, access to the magistracies and priesthoods. This reference page 173 goes on to explain further special privileges the patricians had over the conscripti.

Sixth
Here shows the Britannica Concise Encyclopedia reference relating to The number of conscript fathers later in the time of the Roman Republic increased to about two thousand members.[8] Many of these were provincials, the most important being landowners of large parcels of land.[8] This reference also shows that Augustus dropped the number to 300 senate members. That is the reason I wrote The number was later reduced to somewhere between 300 and 600 by Augustus.[40][41]. I have come across various references that state numbers of 300, 400, and 600.

Did already condense this to about 4 or 5 paragraphs and made it into an entry on Roman senators on June 10 under the sub-heading Patres conscripti: origins of the Senate. Most of the material in Conscripti Fathers is new material not in any other Wikipedia article. The only parts I see duplicated is that I wrote in the sub-heading "Early history" that the Latin title patres originally meant heads of families. I believe this is unpreventable as this is part of the early history how the wording patres conscripti came about. Keep in mind what the main theme of the article is about. The theme is not about patres. It is about conscripti - meaning that the senate members after the Roman Republic (509 BCE) were drafted into service (conscription).

I believe I did cover already the 400 year period between Brutus and Sulla when in the sub-heading "Later history" I wrote This number of 300 members of the senate established by Brutus stayed about the same until the time of Lucius Cornelius Sulla, whom increased it then himself to some number of at least 400. Don't know of any other pertinent history related to the article between Brutus' consulship in 509 BC and Sulla's consulship in 88 BC. Perhaps you could add whatever you are referring to, if it pertains directly to the article.

If you need additional information on my response, just ask and I'll give you more detail. --Doug ^talk 22:33, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

First and foremost. There is absolutely no difference between "conscript fathers" and "Roman senators". They are one in the same. Therefore, everything that was written about "Roman senators" is about "conscript fathers" as well. The term was just an honorary title, much like imperator or pater patriae for various generals. This is why it is more appropriate to have an entry on Roman Senators than an entry on "conscript fathers". What we have now is similar to having an article about pater patriaes but not Roman generals.

You may have briefly qualified the entry as coming from ancient historians, but the line is easy to miss. The rest of the article treats these legendary accounts as though they were historical fact. In addition, 90% of the article concerns events up until the end of the 6th century BC. Technically you may cover the other 1,000 years of Roman history, but such coverage is almost non existent.

The line you show says "As the new senators were taken from the equestrian order they were in many instances plebeians". In this context, "new senators" is not a proper name or title, as you seem to suggest in the article.

Regarding the number of senators, you shouldn't use answers.com as a historical reference source. Its numbers are wrong. Augustus never reduced the senate to 300 members. It was never at 400 members either. After the founding of the republic, it was set at 300 members. Sulla increased it to 600, Caesar increased that to 900, and Augustus decreased it back down to 600. If you can find other numbers quoted in a book of equal academic standing as "A History and Description of Roman Political Institutions", which is where my numbers come from, please let me know.

And there is still a ton of repetition. RomanHistorian (talk) 04:02, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Redirecting

As RomanHistorian says, the patres conscripti are the Senators, and thus there is no reason why this article should have an existence separate from Roman Senate. The text that appears on the page is based on a hodgepodge of poor sources, poorly understood. There's nothing here worth merging into Roman Senate. (Unfortunately, that article also appears to be in need of some serious, serious help.) --Akhilleus (talk) 02:10, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

So, sorry, I should have titled this section "Redirecting", not "Merging". I'm changing the title now. --Akhilleus (talk) 02:11, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Instead of redirecting the article, please consider making any improvements you feel should be done. If you have any suggestions on how the article can be improved further I am willing to hear them. If you have any questions on certain sections of the article please ask. I believe I provided all the necessary references. The article was selected for a Did You Know with a fact on the main page June 13 so apparently those administrators felt it was not to far off from what it should be. --Doug ^talk 16:34, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

The "improvement" that needs to happen is that everyone needs to realize that "patres conscripti" means the Roman Senate. As such, there's no reason for this article to have an existence separate from that of Roman Senate. There may be a few things worth saying about the usage of the term in the Roman Senate article, but there's no reason to have a separate Conscript Fathers article--especially when much of the text is in error, and based upon wonderful sources such as this. --Akhilleus (talk) 16:48, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Akhilleus for your response. I do believe there should be a seperate article on Conscript Fathers, but of course I am biased since I started the article. Some of the reasons I believe this, is because in the section "Early history" I explain from the legendary Romulus in the 8th century BCE that Livy writes that first the Senate members were called patres. Then as the Roman Republic came in around 509 BCE the new members that were "enrolled" (drafted) by Brutus then in the senatorial register were called conscripti and replaced by equestrian noblemen, not patricians. The original "old men" senators were called patres and the later ones conscripti and both were written upon the same list. The conscript men were drafted, very much like Conscription. In the Roman Republic the complete body was called patres et conscripti and later all were referred to as patres conscripti, "Conscript Fathers." Prior to this the Senate members were just called patres - from about 750 BCE to about 500 BCE. From 500 BCE to about 500 CE then the term patres conscripti was used, in our English of today known as "Conscript Fathers." In the section of "Later history" I explain that in the Byzantine Senate (about 500 CE) then the influence of the patres conscripti had disappeared from history records. Does that help explain why the article should exist? --Doug ^talk 17:37, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

I am assuming Akhilleus you have not yet seen the above response, so please keep a cool head and consider the above. I realize that you personally don't like my articles and have tried deleting them in the past, however consider the article itself on its own merit. I have written several dozen articles since our last encounter and have received over 40 DYKs without any trouble from others. Yes, they have edited my articles to make improvements, which is what Wikipedia is all about. It's not about personal attacks. In fact, many times there are compliments on how well I have written the article. Check out the last DYK which was a double DYK at the end of my Talk page. Recently I even received "The Original Barnstar" for George Edward Pendray from an editor that specializes in deleting new articles whenever he sees a poorly written one. When he came across this new article he gave me an accolade instead. You are quite familiar with the procedures, so what I would recommend is to involve other editors. Ask for a "third opinion" instead of just redirecting the article so that you don't have to go through the proper procedures. If after a "third opinion" there is a consenses that the article should not exist, then I would recommend you follow the procedure of putting the article up for deletion - however please try the "third opinion" from others first. Does that sound fair to you? --Doug ^talk 19:58, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

I personally don't like your articles on classical and medieval topics because in the past you've created bad articles: you've plagiarized, you've misinterpreted sources, you've used extremely poor sources, you've magnified trivial subjects into major ones, and you've been extremely resistant to any outside input. On this particular article, you've used poor sources, including a novel by Colleen McCullough and random webpages.

All of this to create what is basically an alternate history of the Roman Senate, which is either inaccurate or a repetition of material that should be in the Roman Senate article.

As for your DYK awards, they are no evidence of this article's quality or accuracy. I seem to remember that you had an article on DYK before that had extensive plagiarism.

And yes, Wetman praised you for George Edward Pendray. He also suggested above that this article should be merged into Roman Senate, did he not? --Akhilleus (talk) 20:49, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Appreciate your response and answers. Actually it was User:Brewcrewer that gave me the The Original Barnstar accolade and Wetman suggested a "hatnote" to the Roman Senate article, which I did put in. He said there was no need to delete the article. If you feel the article is that bad, why not put it up for formal deletion? --Doug ^talk 21:04, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

It hasn't been deleted; it's been turned into a redirect. It's quite plausible that a Wikipedia user might be searching for "Conscript Fathers" or "patres conscripti"; what these readers need to see is information on the Roman Senate. Information on the term patres conscripti ought to be included in Roman Senate. --Akhilleus (talk) 21:13, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

On June 10 I did include information on the term patres conscripti by adding the sub-heading Patres conscripti: origins of the Senate which User:Wetman added a "hatnote" back to the main article I started of "Conscript Fathers" on June 11. Wetman never praised me for George Edward Pendray, however did give me an accolade on the double DYK today on the articles Thornwell Jacobs and Crypt of Civilization saying they were an outstanding read. Would you consider putting back in this sub-heading Patres conscripti: origins of the Senate which material describes perfectly the term patres conscripti and with a "hatnote" directing the reader to the article "Conscript Fathers" for more details. With the article "Conscript Fathers" and a redirect of "patres conscripti" to "Conscript Fathers" then the reader can just go directly to the article for details, instead of going to Roman Senate and searching through everything to find whatever information they can on this topic. Again I suggest the formal procedure to DELETE the article if you feel it is that bad, unless you don't feel the article is that bad afterall. I believe the article is an excellent referenced article and will stand on its own. Apparently the only objection you have is a book I put in the Secondary Sources of "McCullough, Colleen; The Grass Crown HarperCollins (1992), ISBN 038071082X" - why don't we just delete that book and the only problem is solved. My Primary Source is Livy, Roman History (Ab Urbe Condita). There are also 50 footnote references you have no objections to. The evidence of this article's quality and accuracy is that it was selected as a DYK on June 13. --Doug ^talk 22:56, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Doug, I don't have objections to just one footnote. I mentioned that (and several other items) as an example of a general problem with the research that you put into articles. As far as I can tell, you perform a Google search on whatever term has caught your fancy, and include a healthy dose of your results, with insufficient discrimination between the quality of source that you're using. Eliminating the novel as a source will really not fix this flaw, which is a fundamental one. You have used a few quality sources, but it appears to me that you haven't really understood them--for instance, the Raaflaub book cited in footnote 33 in this version is an edited collection, containing articles by many authors. You have multiple citations to one page in this collection (p. 173), which is in an article by Arnaldo Momligliano, "The rise of the plebs in the Archaic Age of Rome." If this were properly sourced the footnote would tell us that the author was Momligliano. At least two articles from the Raaflaub collection might be relevant, but it's hard to say because the Google Books preview is limited (and I have to register my doubt that you have tracked down the volume and read those articles--and the complete Momligliano article isn't available through the preview). Footnote 50 (a and b) is a citation to p. 181 of a volume of the Cambridge Ancient History (which volume?) but what's found on that page doesn't support the text in this article.

References aside, there's the problem that the material in this article overlaps with Roman Senate. Patres conscripti (or patres et conscripti) is a term for the members of the Roman Senate. What material do you think belongs in this article that doesn't belong in Roman Senate? --Akhilleus (talk) 23:31, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

My only objection to the current redirect is that it hasn't transferred anything from Conscript Fathers to Roman Senate at all. The page redirects but the term patres conscripti doesn't even appear in Roman Senate. Otherwise I don't see what the problem is with the proposed merger/redirect. One sensible argument against the existence of separate articles seems to me to ask how well-known the term patres conscripti is anyway? Isn't it far more likely that, anyone looking for information on the Roman Senate, uses Roman Senate as a jumping point instead of Conscript Fathers? Just my 2 cents. --Steerpike (talk) 14:48, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

I would concur with Steerpike that some of the information should be included in Roman Senate. Much is mirrored between the two articles and it would be nice to include this in an effort to make Roman Senate more complete. Just because the name has a history in itself doesn't mean that the information should stand alone. Since the term has never referred to anything but Roman Senators, I maintain that it should be fit somewhere into Roman Senate I would also like to protest using historical fiction as a factual source. A fictional novel, however much based on actual history, should not be considered as a source for an encyclopaedic article on a factual group, except as a reference in popular culture. Trekkie4christ (talk) 17:50, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Let's see what the information from the article was:

• Conscript Fathers (patres conscripti) are the senator members of the ancient Roman Senate. Sic. What is this intended to mean, if anything? Does Doug intend to suggest that there were non-senator members of the Senate?
• A lengthy passage which summarizes Livy's account of the formation of the senate. This is a shining instance of why not to use primary sources; Livy is not a reliable source on the eighth century BC, because he didn't look at the documents or read authors who had; any reliable secondary source would have said so.
• The etymological question, from Livy, a website which quotes Livy, and McCullough. The views of a modern historian on the subject would be interesting; Livy is guessing.
• An assertion that Patres et Conscripti became patres conscripti in the reign of Marius and Sulla, sourced to McCullough. McCullough did a lot of research, but here she is making something up to fill a hole in the sources; I would hope she also did better than to write of a reign for either Marius and Sulla, who were not kings. I know she knew better than to suggest they held power together.
• A paragraph on the history of the Roman Senate, done better there.

The only candidate for inclusion in the article on the Senate is the existence of the phrase conscript fathers in English and Latin, to reassure those who follow the redirects they are in the right place. But Wiktionary may be better even for that. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:43, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

On the nature of DYK

Akhilleus has asked here about whether the statement that "The evidence of this article's quality and accuracy is that it was selected as a DYK" is justified, and I've given a reply there. The short answer, though, is definitely "no". Olaf Davis | Talk 09:19, 3 July 2008 (UTC)