The Development of the Consulship in the Early Republic: Evidence for an Alternative Version in Livy

Abstract

The traditional version of the establishment of the consulship in 509 BC and its restoration in 449 and 367 BC was a product of a long period of historiographical development. A great problem is inconsistencies in early republican chronology due to later annalistic historians combining earlier versions. In pre-Fabian oral tradition, it was the capture of Veii that inspired the creation of a new legion with its own praetor to protect new Roman tribes on the Etruscan bank of the Tiber. Early Roman historiography shaped two possible versions of the establishment of the (patrician) consulship after the Veientine war, dating it to 483–474 and 406–396 BC. According to one version, the original title of the early magistracy was changed from ‘praetor’ to ‘consul’ in