These festivals, as in the case of those of the Greeks, had their origin in the belief that the gods delighted in the exhibition of feats of skill, strength, or endurance; that their anger might be appeased by such spectacles; or that they might be persuaded by the promise of games to lend aid to mortals in great emergencies. At the opening of the year it was customary for the Roman magistrate, in behalf of the people, to promise to the gods games and festivals, provided good crops, protection from pestilence, and victory were granted the Romans during the year. So, too, a general in great straits in the field might, in the name of the state, vow plays to the gods, and the people were sacredly bound by his act to fulfil the promise. Plays given in fulfilment of vows thus made were called votive games.
Towards the close of the republic these games lost much of their religious character, and at last became degraded into mere brutal shows given by ambitious leaders for the purpose of winning popularity.
THE EARLY ROMAN REPUBLIC: CONQUEST OF ITALY, (509-264 B.C.)
THE FIRST CONSULS.--With the monarchy overthrown and the last king and his house banished from Rome, the people set to work to reorganize the government. In place of the king, there were elected (by the _comitia centuriata_, in which assembly the plebeians had a place) two patrician magistrates, called consuls, [Footnote: That is, _colleagues_. Each consul had the power of obstructing the acts or vetoing the commands of the other. In times of great public danger the consuls were superseded by a special officer called a _dictator_, whose term of office was limited to six months, but whose power during this time was as unlimited as that of the kings had been.] who were chosen for one year, and were invested with all the powers, save some priestly functions, that had been held by the monarch during the regal period.
In public each consul was attended by twelve servants, called lictors, each of whom bore an axe bound in a bundle of rods (_fasces_), the symbols of the authority of the consul to flog and to put to death. Within the limits of the city, however, the axe must be removed from the _fasces_, by which was indicated that no Roman citizen could be put to death by the consuls without the consent of the public assembly.