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Municipium
 
 
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A municipium (pl. municipia) belonged to the second highest class
Social class

Social class refers to the hierarchy distinctions between individuals or groups in societies or cultures. Usually most societies have some notion of social class , but concretely defined social classes are not found in every known type of human societies....
 of Roman
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
 cities, being inferior in status
Status

Status is a state, condition or situation. In common usage it may refer to:*Social status*Economic status*HIV status*Status *Status quo*Status symbol...
 to the colonia
Colonia (Roman)

A Roman colonia was originally a Roman Empire outpost established in conquered territory to secure it. Eventually, however, the term came to denote the highest status of Roman city....
. The first municipium was Tusculum
Tusculum

Tusculum is the classical Roman name of a major ancient Alban Hills city, in the Latium region of Italy....
. The distinguishing characteristic
Characteristic

Characteristic has several particular meanings: *in mathematics** characteristic function ** Euler characteristic** characteristic ** characteristic subgroup...
 of the municipium was self-governance
Governance

Governance relates to decisions that define expectations, grant power , or verify performance . It consists either of a separate process or of a specific part of management or leadership processes....
.

Two orders of the municipia
The citizens of municipia of the first order held full Roman citizenship
Roman citizenship

Citizenship in ancient Rome was a privileged social status afforded to certain individuals with respect to laws, property, and governance.It is hard to offer meaningful generalities across the entire Roman period, as the nature and availability of citizenship was affected by legislation, for example, the Lex Iulia....
 and their right
Right

Rights are legal or moral entitlements or permissions. Rights are of vital importance in theories of justice and deontology.Many contemporary notions of rights are Universality and egalitarianism, with equal rights granted to all people....
s (civitas optimo iure) included the right to vote, which was the ultimate right in Rome, and a sure sign of full rights.

The second order of municipia comprised important tribal
Tribe

A tribe, viewed historically or developmentally, consists of a social group existing before the development of, or outside of, states.Many anthropologists use the term to refer to societies organized largely on the basis of kinship, especially corporate descent groups ....
 centres which had come under Roman control
Control

Control is used in a variety of contexts to express "mastery" or "proficiency": e.g. "Music students attending a master class are expected to have full control of basic skills such as rhythm and pitch" and more generally an ability to purposefully direct change....
.






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A municipium (pl. municipia) belonged to the second highest class
Social class

Social class refers to the hierarchy distinctions between individuals or groups in societies or cultures. Usually most societies have some notion of social class , but concretely defined social classes are not found in every known type of human societies....
 of Roman
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
 cities, being inferior in status
Status

Status is a state, condition or situation. In common usage it may refer to:*Social status*Economic status*HIV status*Status *Status quo*Status symbol...
 to the colonia
Colonia (Roman)

A Roman colonia was originally a Roman Empire outpost established in conquered territory to secure it. Eventually, however, the term came to denote the highest status of Roman city....
. The first municipium was Tusculum
Tusculum

Tusculum is the classical Roman name of a major ancient Alban Hills city, in the Latium region of Italy....
. The distinguishing characteristic
Characteristic

Characteristic has several particular meanings: *in mathematics** characteristic function ** Euler characteristic** characteristic ** characteristic subgroup...
 of the municipium was self-governance
Governance

Governance relates to decisions that define expectations, grant power , or verify performance . It consists either of a separate process or of a specific part of management or leadership processes....
.

Two orders of the municipia


The citizens of municipia of the first order held full Roman citizenship
Roman citizenship

Citizenship in ancient Rome was a privileged social status afforded to certain individuals with respect to laws, property, and governance.It is hard to offer meaningful generalities across the entire Roman period, as the nature and availability of citizenship was affected by legislation, for example, the Lex Iulia....
 and their right
Right

Rights are legal or moral entitlements or permissions. Rights are of vital importance in theories of justice and deontology.Many contemporary notions of rights are Universality and egalitarianism, with equal rights granted to all people....
s (civitas optimo iure) included the right to vote, which was the ultimate right in Rome, and a sure sign of full rights.

The second order of municipia comprised important tribal
Tribe

A tribe, viewed historically or developmentally, consists of a social group existing before the development of, or outside of, states.Many anthropologists use the term to refer to societies organized largely on the basis of kinship, especially corporate descent groups ....
 centres which had come under Roman control
Control

Control is used in a variety of contexts to express "mastery" or "proficiency": e.g. "Music students attending a master class are expected to have full control of basic skills such as rhythm and pitch" and more generally an ability to purposefully direct change....
. Residents of these did not become full Roman citizens (although their magistrates could become so after retirement). They were given the duties
Duty

Duty is a term that conveys a sense of moral commitment to someone or something. The moral commitment is the sort that results in action, and it is not a matter of passive feeling or mere recognition....
 of full citizens in terms of liability
Liability

In the most general sense, a liability is anything that is a wikt:hindrance, or puts individuals at a disadvantage. It can also be used as a slang term to describe someone that puts a team or group of which they are a member at a disadvantage, and would thus be better off without....
 to tax
Tax

To tax is to impose a financial charge or other levy upon an individual or Legal person by a state or the functional equivalent of a state.Taxes are also imposed by many subnational entity....
es and military service
Military service

Military service in its simplest sense, is service by an individual or group in an army or other military organization, whether as a chosen job or as a result of an involuntary draft ....
, but not all of the rights: most significantly, they had no right to vote.

Executive power in municipium was held by four annually elected
Election

An election is a decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual to hold formal office. This is the usual mechanism by which modern Representative democracy fills offices in the legislature, sometimes in the executive and judiciary, and for regional government and local government....
 official
Official

An official is someone who holds an office in an organisation or government and participates in the exercise of authority .A government official or functionary is an official who is involved in public administration or government, through either election, appointment, or employment....
s, composed of two duumvirs and two aedile
Aedile

Aedile was an office of the Roman Republic. Based in Rome, the aediles were responsible for maintenance of public buildings and regulation of public festivals....
s, all under the thumb of Roman rule. Advisory powers were held by the decurions
Decurion (administrative)

A decurion was a member of a city senate in the Roman Empire. Decurions were drawn from the curiales class, which was made up of the wealthy, middle class citizens of a town society....
, appointed members of the local equivalent to the senate
Roman Senate

The Senate of the Roman Republic was a political institution in the ancient Roman Republic. According to the Greek historian Polybius, our principal source on the Constitution of the Roman Republic, the Roman Senate was the predominant branch of government....
. In later years, these became hereditary.

Municipia in Britain

According to the forgery De Situ Britanniae
De Situ Britanniae

De Situ Britanniae is a fictional description of the peoples and places of Roman Britain. Purported to contain the account of a Roman Empire general preserved in the manuscript of a fourteenth century English people monk, it was considered the premier source of information on Roman Britain for more than a century after it was made availa...
 by Charles Bertram
Charles Bertram

Charles Bertram was the author of the forgery manuscript De Situ Britanniae , a spurious history that was highly influential in the reconstruction of the history of Roman Britain for over a century....
, forged under the name of Richard of Cirencester
Richard of Cirencester

Richard of Cirencester , historical writer, was a member of the Benedictine abbey at Westminster, and his name first appears on the chamberlain's list of the monks of that foundation drawn up in the year 1355....
, there were two municipia in Brittania: Verulamium
Verulamium

Verulamium was the third-largest city in Roman Britain. It was sited in the southwest of the modern city of St Albans in Hertfordshire. A large portion of the Roman city remains unexcavated, being now park and agricultural land, though much has been built upon ....
 (now St. Albans
St Albans

Saint Albans is a city in southern Hertfordshire, England, around north of central London, which forms the main urban area of the City and District of St Albans....
) and Eboracum
Eboracum

Eboracum was a castra and city in Roman Britain. Today it is known as York, located in North Yorkshire, England....
 (now York
York

York is a walled city, sited at the confluence of the rivers River Ouse, Yorkshire and River Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city status in the United Kingdom is noted for its rich heritage and it has played an important role throughout much of its almost 2,000 year existence....
), with the latter having become a municipium under Antonius Pius. An assertion was made in the 19th century that York was changed to a colonia by Severus
Severus

Severus is Latin cognomen, most often used for Septimius Severus, Alexander Severus and other members of the Severan dynasty.Severus can also refer to:...
, based upon a coin, supposedly inscribed "COL. EBORACVM LEGIO vi. VICTRIX". However, many antiquarians at the time doubted the existence of this coin, the evidence for whose existence came solely from the testimony of Goltzius, which they regarded as suspect. Several, such as Ruding and Akerman, doubted that any coinage had been minted in Britain. However, similar doubts were raised about De Situ Britanniae, and its assertions about York being anything other than a colonia. For example: The Reverend J. Kenrick, writing in the proceedings of the Yorkshire philosophical society in 1849, said "I must declare my adherence to the opinion of those critics, who hold that Richard's Description of Britain is no genuine work.", noting that "the latinity of the Description appears to me to be to be the same as that of the preface which Bertram has prefixed to it".

Kenrick further went on to note that the distinction between colonia and municipium "are hardly applicable to Britain", observing that "I am not aware that any inscription exists, in which the name of municipium is given to a town in Roman Britain". In fact, the evidence for Verulamium being a municpium comes not from an inscription but from book 14 of the Annals
Annals (Tacitus)

The Annals is a history book by Tacitus covering the reign of the four Roman Emperors succeeding to Caesar Augustus. The parts of the work that survived from antiquity cover the reigns of Tiberius and Nero....
 of Tacitus
Tacitus

Publius Cornelius Tacitus was a Roman Senate and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories —examine the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those that reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors....
.

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