Note 224 — Chapter II · THE SOCIAL COMPOSITION OF THE PRIMITIVE POPULUS

Dionysius, i. 85. 3, states that the colonists from Alba were mostly plebeians, but that a considerable number of the highest nobility accompanied them. It is a significant fact, however, that no patrician family is known to have derived its origin from this earliest colony. Those who claimed Alban and Trojan descent preferred to connect their admission to citizenship with the Roman annexation of Alba Longa, e.g. the Tullii, Servilii, Quinctii, Geganii, Curiatii, and Cloelii; Livy i. 30. 2. On the Alban and Sabine origin of most of the nobility, Livy iv. 4. 7. In so far as the local cognomina are indicative of origin (cf. Willems, Sén. Rom. i. 11 ff.), they point to a diversity of foreign connections. The Tarquinian gens, which in later time was thought of as patrician, came from Etruria, ultimately from Greece. The Aemilii were Greek (Plut. Aem. 1; Fest. ep. 23) or Sabine (Plut. Num. 8) or Oscan (Fest. 130. 1).