ut.[272] These lists of municipal
officers show a number of names that belong with certainty to the older
families of Praeneste, and thus warrant the statement that the colonists
did not have better rights than the old settlers, and that not even in
the duovirate, which held an effective check (maior potestas)[273] on
the aediles and quaestors, can the names of the new colonists be shown
to outnumber or take the place of the old settlers.

THE QUINQUENNALES.

There remains yet the question in regard to the men who filled the
quinquennial office. We know that whether the officials of the municipal
governments were praetors, aediles, duovirs, or quattuorvirs, at
intervals of five years their titles either were quinquennales,[274] or
had that added to them, and that this title implied censorial
duties.[275] It has also been shown that after 46 B.C. the lex Iulia
compelled the census in the various Roman towns to be taken by the
proper officers in the same year that it was done in Rome. This implies
that the taking of the census had been so well established a custom that
it was a long time before Rome itself had cared to enact a law which
changed the year of census taking in those towns which had not of their
own volition made their census contemporaneous with that in Rome.

That the duration of the quinquennial office was one year is
certain,[276] that it was eponymous is also sure,[277] but whether the
officers who performed these duties every five years did so in
addition to holding the highest office of the year, or in place of that
honor, is a question not at all satisfactorily answered. That is, were
the men who held the quinquennial office the men who would in all
probability have stood for the duovirate in the regular succession of
advance in the round of offices (cursus honorum), or did the government
at Rome in some way, either directly or indirectly, name the men for the
highest office in that particular year when the census was to be taken?
That is, again, were quinquennales elected as the other city officials
were, or were they appointed by Rome, or were they merely designated by
Rome, and then elected in the proper and regular way by the citizens of
the towns?

At first glance it seems most natural to suppose that Rome would want
exact returns from the census, and might for that reason try to dictate
the men who were to take it, for on the census had been based always the
military taxes, contingents, etc