Note 1813 — Chapter XIII · THE COMITIA TRIBUTA AND THE RISE OF POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY From 449 to 287

Livy vii. 21, 5; cf. Herzog. Röm. Staatsverf. i. 245. That the bank commission owed its existence to a law is an inference from the circumstances. The form of assembly is unknown. With this Valerian-Marcian law, 352, Lange, Röm. Alt. ii. 621 f., conjecturally identifies the lex Marcia against usurers; Gaius iv. 23. In his opinion also (ibid. ii. 622; cf. Rudorff, Röm. Rechtsgesch. i. 51) the lex Furia de sponsu mentioned by Gaius, iii. 121; iv. 22, “discharging the sponsor and fide-promissor of liability in two years and limiting the liability of each to a proportionate part” (Poste’s interpretation) belongs to L. Furius, dictator in 345 (Livy vii. 28. 2); whereas others assign it to the year 95 (cf. Poste, Gai. Inst. 359) and others to a time subsequent to Cicero (cf. Roby, Rom. Priv. Law, ii. 30). It was later than the lex Appuleia de sponsu, which is referred to by Gaius iii. 122, and which must have been enacted after the establishment of the provincial system. It is to be attributed, accordingly, to the famous tribune of 103, 100 (Poste, ibid. 359) rather than to the like-named tribune of 390 (Livy v. 32. 8; Lange, Röm. Alt. ii. 621). These considerations render the later dating of the lex Furia the more probable. The lex Publilia de sponsu, the date of which is also unknown, granted the surety (sponsor) an action against the principal debtor in case the latter failed to reimburse him within six months; Gaius iii. 127; iv. 22, cf. 171.