Note 561 — Chapter V · PUNIC WARS AND WARS OF MACEDONIA AND ASIA. (From 488 to 621.)

The ancient mode of division by curiæ had lost all significance and ceased to be in use. (Ovid, Fasti, II. 1. 531.) So Cicero says, speaking of them: “The comitia, which are retained only for the sake of form, and because of the auspices, and which, represented by the thirty lictors, are but the appearance of what was before. Ad speciem atque usurpationem vetustatis.” (Oration on the Agrarian Law, II. 12.)—In the latter times of the Republic, the curiæ, in the election of the magistrates, had only the inauguration of the flamens, of the king of the sacrifices (rex sacrificulus), and probably the choice of the grand curion (curio maximus). (Titus Livius, XXVII. 8.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, V. 1.—Aulus Gellius, XV. 27.—Titus Livius, XXVII. vi. 36.)