Note 39 — Chapter I · THE EARLIEST CONSTITUTION OF ROME

The theory of the artificial origin of the gens is based on the symmetrical figures given by tradition. The full numbers of the early gentes are given as 300; these are symmetrically divided, ten into each of the thirty curiae, as the curiae are divided into the three original tribes. Hence Niebuhr (Hist. Rome i. p. 319) says, “The numerical scale of the gentes is an irrefragable proof that they were not more ancient than the constitution, but corporations formed by a legislator in harmony with the rest of his scheme.”