The ''nobiles'' ( ''nobilis'') were members of a social rank in the

Roman Republic The Roman Republic ( la, Res publica Romana ) was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Ki ...

indicating that one was "well known". This may have changed over time: in

Cicero Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the esta ...

's time, one was notable if one descended from a person who had been elected

consul Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states throu ...

. In earlier periods and more broadly, this may have included a larger group consisting of those who were

patricians The patricians (from la, patricius, Greek: πατρίκιος) were originally a group of ruling class families in ancient Rome. The distinction was highly significant in the Roman Kingdom, and the early Republic, but its relevance waned after ...

, were descended from patricians who had become

plebeians In ancient Rome, the plebeians (also called plebs) were the general body of free Roman citizens who were not patricians, as determined by the census, or in other words " commoners". Both classes were hereditary. Etymology The precise origins of ...

via '' transitio ad plebem'', or were descended from plebeians who had held

curule A curule seat is a design of a (usually) foldable and transportable chair noted for its uses in Ancient Rome and Europe through to the 20th century. Its status in early Rome as a symbol of political or military power carried over to other civilizat ...

offices.

History

The ''nobiles'' emerged after the Conflict of the Orders established legal equality between patricians and plebeians, allowing plebeians to hold all the magistracies; the state of being "known" was connected to the ''nobiless rights to funeral masks ( la, imagines) and actors in aristocratic funeral processions. However, the term is largely unattested to in the middle Republic, having been introduced in the late Republic as a description rather than a status. Earning such a mask required holding one of the qualifying curule magistracies. These elections meant the republican nobility was not entirely closed. Nor in the republic did ''nobiles'' enjoy special legal privileges. In the later Republic, one who became noble was termed a ''

novus homo ''Novus homo'' or ''homo novus'' (Latin for 'new man'; ''novi homines'' or ''homines novi'') was the term in ancient Rome for a man who was the first in his family to serve in the Roman Senate or, more specifically, to be elected as consul. Whe ...

'' ( en, new man), an unusual achievement. Two of the most famous examples of these self-made "new men" were Gaius Marius, who held the consulship seven times, and

. While wholly new men were rare, the political elite as a whole turned over as some families were unable to win elections over multiple generations and other families became more prominent, creating slow-moving and osmotic change. The prestige of the ''nobiles'' was connected directly to their election to high office by the people. During the Roman Republic, the ''nobiles'' never held less than about 70 per cent of the consulships over longer periods; by the time of Cicero, the ''nobiles'' as a whole held more than 90 per cent of the consulships, a proportion "remarkably untouched by the most violent political crises". The narrowing of what made someone part of the ''nobiles'' occurred around the time of the

constitutional reforms of Sulla The constitutional reforms of Sulla were a series of laws enacted by the Roman dictator Lucius Cornelius Sulla between 82 and 80 BC, reforming the Constitution of the Roman Republic in a revolutionary way. In the decades before Sulla had beco ...

with its "much larger senate with a proportionately smaller circle of elite senators... many new Italians in the Sullan senate, and the increased number of

praetors Praetor ( , ), also pretor, was the title granted by the government of Ancient Rome to a man acting in one of two official capacities: (i) the commander of an army, and (ii) as an elected ''magistratus'' (magistrate), assigned to discharge variou ...

" leading the elite to close ranks to preserve their prestige. During the time of

Augustus Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pr ...

, a ''nobilis'' enjoyed easier access to the consulship, with a lowered age requirement perhaps set at 32. Women who descended from Augustan consuls were also regarded as belonging to the Roman nobility. The term still referred to descendants of republican and triumviral consuls, but by the Antonines, most noble families had died out; one of the last were the Acilii Glabriones who survived into the 4th century.

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History

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Further reading