[1]: Gabinius is meant here; but Graevius thinks that there is a good deal of corruption in this passage.
[2]: When the number of pontifices was increased to eight, it was provided that one half of that number should always be plebeians. See Livy, x 6.
[3]: When the civil and military powers of the king were transferred to the two consuls, these magistrates were not invested with that part of the royal dignity by virtue of which he had been the highest of his nation; but this priestly part of his office was transferred to a priest called rex sacrificulus, or rex sacrorum. He was always elected and inaugurated in the comitia calata, under the presidency of the pontiffs, and was always a patrician, for as he had no influence upon the management of political affairs, the plebeians never coveted this dignity.
[4]: Flamen was the name for any priest who was devoted to the service of one particular god.
[5]: The Salii were the priests of Mars Gradivus, and were said to have been instituted by Numa. They were twelve in number, chosen from the patricians only, even down to the very latest times.
[6]: An interrex was an officer first appointed on the death of Romulus. Under the republic interreges were appointed for holding the comitia for the election of consuls, when the consul, through civil commotions or other causes, had been unable to do so during their year of office. Each interrex held the office for only five days. Plebeians were not admissible to this office; and consequently after plebeians were admitted into the Senate, the patrician senators met without the plebeian members to elect an interrex.
[7]: A Lex curiata was a law passed by the comitia curiata. And these comitia were held (among other causes) for the purpose of carrying into effect the form of adoption called arrogatio. When the question to be proposed had relation to sacred things, the pontifices presided in them.
[8]: When a law comprised very various provisions relating to matters essentially different, it was called Lex satura and the Lex Caecilia Didia forbade the proposing of a Lex satura, on the ground that the people might be compelled either to vote for something which they did not approve, or to reject something which they did approve, if it was proposed to them in this manner. Vide Smith, Dict. Ant. pp. 559, 561, v. Lex.
[9]: The Latin is “trinum nundinum prodicta die”. “Nundina, the ninth day inclusive; this was the Roman market day; because every ninth day the country people came to Rome to transact business......three such nundinae formed a trinum nundinum, or trinundinum, i.e. a space of seventeen days. Every bill was posted up during three nundinae, that all persons might read it.”—Riddle, Lat. Dict. in v. Nundinus.
[10]: He refers here to Vatinius, who had lately been an unsuccessful candidate for the aedileship.
[11]: The Palatine tribe was composed of artisans and needy citizens, of whose aid Clodius availed himself largely in creating disturbances.
[12]: Because a lex, properly so called, was only passed in the comitia centuriata, not in the senate. Vide Smith, Dict. Ant. v. Lex.
[13]: The Latin is pagani aut montani, and whether it refers to portions of the city, or to people in the suburban districts, Graevius professes himself quite ignorant, saying that this is the only mention of such classes. Riddle translates it (v. paganus) “countrymen and mountaineers.” Yet the next words, plebei urbanae, seem to show that they refer to some division of the citizens of the city itself.
[14]: Vitruvius Vaccus (as Livy calls him) was the leader of the Fundani in the war between Rome and Privernum. He was taken prisoner in Privernum, and put to death. See Livy, lib. viii. c. 19, 20.
[15]: The Pontifex Maximus was Julius Caesar; and it was in his house that the mysteries of the Bona Dea were being celebrated when Clodius got access to it. On which account Caesar divorced his wife Pompeia.
[16]: In voting at the election of magistrates, the ballot tickets given to the voters were only marked with the initial of each candidate's name.
[17]: Some editions read Mummius.
[18]: “The Latin word fictor, and the fictores were among the regular attendants of the priests their office appears to have been when there was a scarcity of victims or when the worshippers could not afford living animals, to make sham figures in flour and paste, or wax: they also made the cakes which were offered.”—Graevius.