Consular tribune

The tribuni militum consulari potestate ("military tribunes with consular power"), in English commonly also Consular Tribunes, were tribunes elected with consular power during the so-called "Conflict of the Orders" in the Roman Republic, starting in 444 BC and then continuously from 408 BC to 394 BC and again from 391 BC to 367 BC.

According to the histories of Livy and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, the magistracy of the tribuni militum consulari potestate was created during the Conflict of the Orders, along with the magistracy of the censor, in order to give the Plebeian order access to higher levels of government without having to reform the office of consul; plebeians could be elected to the office of Consular Tribune.

The choice whether a collegium of Consular Tribunes or consuls were to be elected for a given year was made by senatus consultum, thereby (according to Livy) accounting for the periods of either office interspersed with the other. The number of Consular Tribunes varied from 2 to 6, and because they were considered colleagues of the two censors, there is sometimes mention of the "eight tribunes".

Modern scholars now believe, however, that the creation of the consular tribunes was due to the changing military and administrative requirements of the expanding Roman state. In the beginning during the 440s, the consular tribunes, elected from the three ancient tribes of the Titienses, Ramnenses, and Luceres, were part of an overall redesign of the military structure of the Roman state to maximise military efficiency, which included the creation of the Censorship (responsible for taking the census to identify the numbers of men capable of military duty) and the Quaestorship (responsible for the supply of money and goods for the armies). Originally patrician office holders, they were referred to as "military tribunes", and were responsible for leading the armies into battle. It was only much later that they were given the anachronistic addition of "with consular power", in an attempt to distinguish them from the Military tribunes who were the legionary officers of the middle and late Republic.

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