s, the ancient colleague of Cassius, to
invent a means of avoiding this difficulty. The authority of the tribunes
by the old Roman law,[3] did not reach without the walls of the city, while
that of the consuls was everywhere equal and only bounded by the limits of
the Roman world. They moved their curule chairs and other insignia of their
authority without the city walls and proceeded with the enrolments. All who
refused to enroll were treated as enemies[4] of the republic. Those who
were proprietors had their property confiscated, their trees cut down, and
their houses burned. Those who were merely farmers saw themselves bereft
of their farm-implements, their oxen and all things necessary for the
cultivation of the soil. The resistance of the tribunes was powerless
against this systematic oppression on the part of the patricians; the
agrarian[5] law failed and the enrolment progressed.

There is some difficulty in determining the facts of the law proposed by
Spurius Licinius[6] of which Livy speaks. Dionysius calls this tribune, not
Licinius but [Greek: Spurios Sikilios]. The Latin translation of Dionysius
has the name Icilius and this has been the name adopted by Sigonius and
other historians. Livy tells us that the Icilian family was at all times
hostile to the patricians and mentions many tribunes by this name who were
staunch defenders of the commons. In accepting this correction, therefore,
it is not necessary to confound this Icilius with the one who proposed the
partition of the Aventine among the plebeians. Icilius, according to both
Livy and Dionysius,[7] made the same demand as the previous tribunes,
_i.e.,_ that the decemvirs should be nominated for the survey and
distribution of the domain lands, according to previous enactment. He
further declared that he would oppose every decree of the senate either for
war or the administration of the interior until the adoption and execution
of his measures. Again the senate avoided the difficulty and escaped, by
a trick, the execution of the law. Appius Claudius, according to
Dionysius,[8] advised the senate to search within the tribunate for a
remedy against itself, and to bribe a number of the colleagues of Icilius
to oppose his measure. This political perfidy was adopted by the senate
with the desired effect. Icilius persisted in his proposition and declared
he would rather see the Etruscans masters of Rome than to suffer for
a longer time the usurpation of the domai