Editing Marian reforms (section)

== Background ==

The Roman army traditionally found its manpower by [[conscription]] from the top five census classes. Those classes were assigned in decreasing order of wealth and allotted citizens to a corresponding century in the {{lang|la|[[comitia centuriata]]}}. These citizens were called {{lang|la|adsidui}}. Citizens who owned less wealth than that required for bottom of the fifth census class were called {{lang|la|capite censi}} ({{lit|those counted by head}}) or {{lang|la|proletarii}}.{{sfn|Lintott|2012}} These least-wealthy citizens were grouped into a single century which voted after all the others.{{sfn|Derow|2012}} Under this scheme, the {{lang|la|proletarii}} were exempt from conscription except when an emergency, called a {{lang|la|[[tumultus]]}}, was declared; under such circumstances, the poorest were levied as well. The first documented instance of the {{lang|la|proletarii}} being called up was some time in the fourth century; they first received arms at state expense in 281&nbsp;BC, probably related to the start of the [[Pyrrhic War]].<ref>{{harvnb|Treves|Cornell|2012|ps=, citing, among others, Cassius Hermina fr 21 P.}}</ref>

For much of the 20th century, historians held that the property qualification separating the five classes and the {{lang|la|capite censi}} was reduced over the course of the second century to a nugatory level due to a shortage of manpower. The basis for that belief, however, was merely three undated Roman figures for the amount of property required to serve which would serve as evidence for reductions only if forced into a descending order.{{sfn|Cadiou|2018|pp=52–53}}<ref>{{Cite book |last=Rosenstein |first=Nathan S |title=Rome at war: farms, families and death in the middle republic |date=2004 |publisher=University of North Carolina Press |isbn=978-0-8078-2839-7 |series=Studies in the history of Greece and Rome |location=Chapell Hill, NC |pages=14, 235 n. 75}} The figures of 11,000, 4,000, and 1,500 {{lang|la|asses}} are reported in the sources; "nothing warrants the presumption that the figures are to be arranged in a descending sequence" however.</ref> Many scholars have also now abandoned the notion that Italy suffered in the second century&nbsp;BC any deficit of manpower which would have driven such putative reductions.{{sfn|Cadiou|2018|pp=42 n. 24, 49–50}}<ref>{{harvnb|Cadiou|2018|p=48 n. 64|ps=, also mentioning an alternative theory – given in {{harvnb|Shochat|1980|pp=62–64}} – that reductions in property qualifications, if they happened, were driven not by a quantitative shortage of {{lang|la|assidui}} but rather a shortage of {{lang|la|assidui}} willing to serve. }}</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Rich|1983|p=316|ps=. "The view that the property qualification... was progressively reduced derives much of its plausibility from the fact that it fits well with received doctrine on Roman manpower... It would thus smack of circularity to use the supposed second century reduction in the property qualification as evidence for the shortage of {{lang|la|assidui}}."}}</ref>