Note 2085 — Chapter XV · COMITIAL LEGISLATION From Hortensius to the Gracchi 287-134

Livy xxv. 5. 2, for the first instance and for the pontifical presidency. Such a departure in favor of the people was hardly possible in the period of comitial stagnation preceding the tribunate of Flaminius, 232; and the law must have been passed, or at least amended, after the institution of the last two tribes; for it specified definitely seventeen tribes; Cic. Leg. Agr. ii. 7. 16. On this measure, see Mommsen, Röm. Staatsr. ii. 27 f.; Wissowa, Relig. u. Kult. d. Röm. 437; Lange, Röm. Alt. ii. 131. Pais, L’elezione del pontefice massimo, etc. (1908), maintains on the contrary that the plebiscite in question was passed about 254, and that it resorted to seventeen tribes as the legal half of the total number (33) then existing. On the use of the word comitia, see p. 130 above.