Lex Arria de patriciis Romanis (Nova Roma)

This page is maintained under authority of the Praetores. Make no unauthorized changes .

 Home| Latíné | Deutsch | Español | Français | Italiano | Magyar | Português | Română | Русский | English

In this sacred 25th Anniversary year of Nova Roma, the New Roman people of the Quirites enacts this law in tribute and honor of the Old Roman people which we are reviving and restoring to its formal glory. This law is the fruit of decades of growing consideration that the Nova Roman people should be fully united with the renascent Roman people as the organic continuation of the Old Roman people, and that those who are patricians according to the law and mos maiorum of the Roman people should be patricians in Nova Roma, as well. Since the Nova Roman people has been subsumed by the renascent Roman people of the world recently in the year of the consular tribunes Sex. Lucilius, C. Claudius, P. Annaeus and Q. Catulus, and Nova Roma has become the possesion of all Romans of the world, in this solemn year of our 25th Anniversary it is a very appropriate time to mark this milestone and celebrate our new era by further integrating the the Romans inside and outside of our res publica. The instructions set forth in this law serve this purpose.

I. As a gesture of celebrating a quarter century of glorious history of revival, the 25th Anniversary of Nova Roma, all Roman patricians whose nomen and cognomen combination were recognized in the ancient Roman Republic as a marking patrician status shall henceforth be recognized as patricians of Nova Roma, as well, if they are, or become, citizens of Nova Roma. In same rare cases the nomen gentile alone marked patriciatus: this shall also be recognized accordingly. The elevation of these citizens to the patriciatus is part of the celebrations of the 25th Anniversary of Nova Roma, it is not a retroactive act dating back to the start of their citizenship, but it is dated and takes effect on the day of the enactment of this law.

I.A. It shall be within the authority of the Onomastic Office of the censors to determine which ancient Roman nomen-cognomen combinations were patricians, but the decision can be regarded as valid if there is published, academic evidence in research and scholarship demonstrating the patrician status of the stirps. The members of the Onomastic Office department of the Censorial Office shall be Latinists with an a university degree from Classics (Classical Pholology).

I.B.In uncertain cases where modern scholarship is undecided, the determining factor shall be what the communis opinio is about the family in the extant ancient Roman authors; if there is no such communis opinio evidenced, the censors may not enroll the stirps among the patricians of Nova Roma. Stirpes with consuls until the consulship of L. Aemilius Mamercinus and L. Sextius Sextinus Lateranus shall be regarded as patricians even if there is no clear evidence about their status in scholarship or in the Roman authors.

I.B.1. For a stirps that is defined by this regulation as patrician, but is found as plebeian in later history (an example would be the Iunii Bruti, patricians at first but plebeians in the late republic), it shall be possible to choose between the patriciatus and the plebs.

I.B.2. This decision is made by a voting of the patres familias of the stirps organized by the censors. The vote of the patres familias has an effect on those members of the stirps who are genetically related to them or who are their adopted or recognized relatives whom they represent: such citizens shall be uniformly in the same genus gentilicium. Those who bear the same nomen-cognomen combination but are not bound by such connection are also not bound by the the decision of another pater familias in the stirps. If part of a stirps decides to be plebeian, the other part patrician, those two will be considered separate stirpes from that point on.

II. If a citizen wishes to correct his or her name to the name of an existing stirps (with the approval of that stirps) which has a different genus gentilicium than their own, the genus gentilicium of the correcting citizen shall change to the genus gentilicium of his or her new stirps with the following restructions:

II.A. Patrician citizens from the founding years of Nova Roma, that is, who obtained citizenship between Year I to Year XX shall keep their patrician status regardless to whatever their name is changed through administrative name correction described in the lex Apula Popillia. They shall be patricians in their person, not only in their names, as long as they are not officially transitioned to the plebs by the Comitia Curiata. Plebeian genus gentilicium is not fixed the same way, if a plebeian citizen joins a patrician stirps by administrative name correction (subject to approval by that stirps), that citzen immediately and retroactively receives the patriciatus, however, this kind of administrative name correction shall not be possible for citizens have already held a title that is open only to plebeians. Patrician citizens from the founding period of Nova Roma cannot change their patrician status to plebeian by any other mechanism but transitio ad plebem or adrogatio, that is, through the procedure at the Comitia Curiata.

II.B. Citizens enrolled after Year XX ANRC shall be patricians in their name, so their patrician or plebeian status changes not only by official act of the Comitia Curiata, but also by administrative name correction. For such citizens administrative name correction that would result in a change of genus gentilicium shall not be possible at all if they have already held a title that is open only to patricians or only to plebeians.

III. The nomen-cognomen combination of those Nova Roman patricians who are currently cives incensi or former citizens, which are originally Roman plebeian stirpes, shall continue to be regarded as patrician in Nova Roma. New citizens taking these names shall receive the patriciatus. Exception to this rule are those Nova Roman stirpes (both patrician and plebeian) that are judged as incorrectly formed names by the Onomastic Office of the censors: these are forbidden to continue, a new citizen cannot join such stirpes and any unregistered or former citizen who wishes to resume their full status in Nova Roma shall change their name to a correct form according to the classical Roman naming conventions before they are allowed to be reinstated.