Note 304 — Chapter III · THE THIRTY-FIVE TRIBES

There might remain the conjecture that the regiones, or pagi, had the same constitution as the tribes, but in that case the difference between pagus and tribus would be one of name only, and would therefore be without historical significance. Meyer’s view (Gesch. d. Alt. v. 135, 142) that the sixteen earliest country tribes were not formed till after the institution of the plebeian tribunate depends partly on his notion that the tribunes were originally the heads of the four urban tribes and partly on the difference in the naming, the city tribes being named after localities and the country tribes after gentes; cf. Hermes, xxx. 11. The latter circumstance, he asserts, establishes a later origin for the rural tribes. This argument is by no means convincing; the difference may have arisen from different conditions in country and city; probably no urban ward had one patrician gens so predominant as to give its name. If one kind of name is earlier than another, we should naturally suppose the gentile name to be the earlier, and in that case we should prefer the view of Pais, Stor. di Rom. I. i. 320, n. 1; Leg. of Rom. Hist. 140; cf. above, p. 52, n. 2.

The patrician gentile name does not imply patrician domination any more than the eupatrid name of an Attic deme implies eupatrid domination of that deme.