o the Sicilian towns which they had not to fear, a certain
federative organization, and probably even general Siceliot diets
with a harmless right of petition and complaint.(6) In monetary
arrangements it was not indeed practicable at once to declare the
Roman currency to be the only valid tender in the islands; but it
seems from the first to have obtained legal circulation, and in like
manner, at least as a rule, the right of coining in precious metals
seems to have been withdrawn from the cities in Roman Sicily.(7) On
the other hand not only was the landed property in all Sicily left
untouched--the principle, that the land out of Italy fell by right of
war to the Romans as private property, was still unknown to this
century--but all the Sicilian and Sardinian communities retained self-
administration and some sort of autonomy, which indeed was not assured
to them in a way legally binding, but was provisionally allowed.
If the democratic constitutions of the communities were everywhere
set aside, and in every city the power was transferred to the hands
of a council representing the civic aristocracy; and if moreover the
Sicilian communities, at least, were required to institute a general
valuation corresponding to the Roman census every fifth year; both
these measures were only the necessary sequel of subordination
to the Roman senate, which in reality could not govern with Greek
--ecclesiae--, or without a view of the financial and military
resources of each dependent community; in the various districts
of Italy also the same course was in both respects pursued.

Tenths and Customs
Communities Exempted

But, side by side with this essential equality of rights, there was
established a distinction, very important in its effects, between the
Italian communities on the one hand and the transmarine communities
on the other. While the treaties concluded with the Italian towns
imposed on them a fixed contingent for the army or the fleet of
the Romans, such a contingent was not imposed on the transmarine
communities, with which no binding paction was entered into at all,
but they lost the right of arms,(8) with the single exception that
they might be employed on the summons of the Roman praetor for the
defence of their own homes. The Roman government regularly sent
Italian troops, of the strength which it had fixed, to the islands;
in return for this, a tenth of the field-produce of Sicily, and a toll
of 5 per cent on