Aequitas
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Aequitas (genitive aequitatis) is the Latin concept of justice, equality, conformity, symmetry, or fairness.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> It is the origin of the English word "equity".<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> In ancient Rome, it could refer to either the legal concept of equity,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> or fairness between individuals.<ref>Quentin Skinner, Visions of Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2002), p. 49 online. See also George Mousourakis, The Historical and Institutional Context of Roman Law (Ashgate, 2003), pp. 28, 32–35.</ref>
Cicero defined aequitas as "tripartite": the first, he said, pertained to the gods above (ad superos deos) and is equivalent to pietas, religious obligation; the second, to the Manes, the underworld spirits or spirits of the dead, and was sanctitas, that which is sacred; and the third pertaining to human beings (homines) was iustitia, "justice".<ref>Cicero, Topica 90, as cited by Jerzy Linderski, "Q. Scipio Imperator," in Imperium sine fine: T. Robert S. Broughton and the Roman Republic (Franz Steiner, 1996), p. 175.</ref>
During the Roman Empire, Aequitas as a divine personification was part of the religious propaganda of the emperor, under the name Aequitas Augusti,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> which also appeared on coins.<ref>J. Rufus Fears, "The Cult of Virtues and Roman Imperial Ideology," Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt II.17.2 (1981), pp. 897–898, 900, 903–904.</ref> She is depicted on coins holding a cornucopia and a balance scale (libra),<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> which was more often a symbol of "honest measure" to the Romans than of justice.<ref>Linderski, "Q. Scipio Imperator," p. 175.</ref>
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