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53-423: The word comes originally meant "companion" or "follower", deriving from " com- " ("with") and " ire " ("go"). The special lasting meaning derives from the position of a follower within a comitatus , which was a retinue, or group of followers, such as those of magnates . In some instances these were sufficiently large and/or formal to justify specific denomination, such as a " cohors amicorum ". The word comes

106-460: A Roman governor . They included: Exceptionally, a gubernatorial position was styled " comes ". For example, the comes Orientis , actually one of the vicarii , was an official who controlled the large and strategically important Imperial Diocese of the East by supervising the governors of this collection of provinces, but he was in turn supervised by the praefectus praetorio Orientis . Further,

159-471: A " Grossgau ". The essential competences of the comes were comprehensive in his pagus : martial, judicial, and executive; and in documents he is often described as the " agens publicus " ("public agent") of the King or " judex publicus/fiscalis " ("royal judge"). He was at once public prosecutor and judge, and was responsible for the execution of the sentences as well. As the delegate of the executive power, he had

212-735: A capacity, Quintus Aurelius Symmachus played a prominent role in the controversy over the Altar of Victory in the late 4th century. The urban prefecture survived the fall of the Western Roman Empire , and remained active under the Ostrogothic Kingdom and well after the Byzantine reconquest . The last mention of the Roman urban prefect occurs as late as 879. When the Emperor Constantine

265-473: A man in a high social position, by birth, wealth or other qualities in Western Christian countries since the medieval period. It also includes the members of the higher clergy, such as bishops , archbishops and cardinals . In reference to the medieval , the term is often used to distinguish higher territorial landowners and warlords , such as counts , earls , dukes , and territorial- princes from

318-629: A secular title granted to trusted officials of the Imperial Curia ("Court"), present or former, and others as sign of Imperial confidence. It developed into a formal, dignitary title, derived from the " Companions " of Alexander the Great and rather equivalent to the Hellenistic title of " philos basilikos " or the paladin title of a knight of the Holy Roman Empire and a Papal Palatinus . Thus

371-676: A survivalistic mistrust of nobles from his father. Henry VIII ennobled very few men, and the ones he did were all " new men ": novi homines , greatly indebted to him and with very limited power. The term was specifically applied to the members of the Upper House of the Diet of Hungary in the Apostolic Kingdom of Hungary , the Főrendiház , that can be translated as the House of Magnates , an equivalent to

424-401: Is part of the rendering, not always exclusive, of derived inferior titles containing such words, notably " vicecomes " for "viscount" and " burgicomes " and " burgravio " for "burgrave". Magnate The term magnate , from the late Latin magnas , a great man, itself from Latin magnus , "great", means a man from the higher nobility, a man who belongs to the high office-holders or

477-436: Is the origin of the much later terms for counts within the medieval nobility, and counties as their territorial jurisdictions. Comes was a common epithet or title that was added to the name of a hero or god in order to denote relation with another god. The coinage of Roman Emperor Constantine I declared him " comes " to Sol Invictus ("Unconquered Sun") qua god. Historically more significant, " comes " became

530-543: The Western Empire : comes Italiae , comes Africae , comes Tingitaniae , comes Tractus Argentoratensis , comes Britanniarum and comes Litoris Saxonici ; as well as two in the Eastern Empire: comes (limitis) Aegypti and comes Isauriae . As the number of comites increased, that dignity became devalued. This resulted in the introduction of classes of comites , denominated and ranked

583-472: The parathalassitēs (παραθαλασσίτης), an official responsible for the capital's seashore and ports, as well as their tolls, and several inspectors ( epoptai ), the heads of the guilds ( exarchoi ) and the boullōtai , whose function was to check and append the seal of the eparch on weights and scales as well as merchandise. The office continued until the early 13th century with its functions and authority relatively intact, and may possibly have survived into

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636-470: The praitōr of the demoi ( πραίτωρ τῶν δήμων ; praetor plebis in Latin), who commanded 20 soldiers and 30 firemen, was put in charge of policing and firefighting, while in 539, the office of the quaesitor (κοιαισίτωρ) was established and tasked with limiting the uncontrolled immigration to the city from the provinces, with supervising public mores, and with prosecuting sexual offenders and heretics. In

689-531: The Eparch from his Greek title ( ὁ ἔπαρχος τῆς πόλεως , ho eparchos tēs poleōs ). The prefect was one of the emperor's chief lieutenants: like his Roman counterpart, the Constantinopolitan prefect was a member of the highest senatorial class, the illustres , and came immediately after the praetorian prefects in the imperial hierarchy. As such, the office possessed great prestige and extensive authority, and

742-720: The Latin Empire following the capture of the city in the Fourth Crusade in 1204, being equated in Latin with the castellanus of the city. After the reconquest of the city by the Byzantines, however, the office of the Eparch was replaced throughout the Palaiologan period (1261–1453) by several kephalatikeuontes (sing. kephalatikeuōn , κεφαλατικεύων, "headsman"), who each oversaw a district in

795-591: The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth . Velikaš is the Serbo-Croatian word for 'magnate', derived from veliko ('great, large, grand'). It was used to refer to the highest nobility of Serbia in the Middle Ages and Croatia in the Middle Ages. In Spain, since the late Middle Ages, the highest class of nobility hold the appellation of Grandee of Spain and was known earlier as ricohombres . In Sweden,

848-674: The Roman Emperors instituted a casual practice of appointing faithful servants to offices. This had been done elsewhere, e. g. regarding the Prefect of the Praetorian Guard and the amici principis . As Imperial administration expanded, however, new offices became necessary and decentralization demanded modifications. The result was the institution of the rank of " comes ". The " comites ", often translated as "counts", though they were neither feudal nor hereditary, became principal officials of

901-460: The baronage . In Poland the szlachta (nobles) constituted one of the largest proportions of the population (around 10-12%) and 'magnat' refers to the richest nobles, or nobles of the nobility - even though they had equal voting rights in Poland's electoral monarchy. In England , the magnate class went through a change in the later Middle Ages. It had previously consisted of all tenants-in-chief of

954-457: The praefectus urbi all the powers needed to maintain order within the city. The office's powers also extended beyond Rome itself to the ports of Ostia and the Portus , as well as a zone of one hundred Roman miles (c. 140 km) around the city. The Prefect's office was called the secretarium tellurense (secretariat of Tellus ). The find-spots of inscriptions honouring Prefects suggest that it

1007-420: The " graf " became a noble count. In the feudal tradition, Latin was, especially in law, the official language, and therefore the rendering in Latin was equal in importance to the vernacular title. Thus, " comes " has been used as the Latin equivalent, or part of it, of all titles of comital office, whether containing " count " or some other word etymologically derived from " comes " or " graf ". Similarly, it

1060-554: The British Peers. In feudal Japan, the most powerful landholding magnates were known as daimyo . In the 11th and 12th centuries, the daimyo became military lords of samurai clans with territorial and proprietary control over private estates. Magnates were a social class of wealthy and influential nobility in the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland and Grand Duchy of Lithuania , and later

1113-529: The City of Rome), and was stripped of most of its powers and responsibilities, becoming a merely ceremonial post. Most of the office's powers and responsibilities had been transferred to the urban praetor ( praetor urbanus ). The praefectus urbi was appointed each year for the sole purpose of allowing the consuls to celebrate the Latin Festival , which required them to leave Rome. The praefectus urbi no longer held

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1166-506: The Great ( r.   306–337) named Constantinople the capital of the Roman Empire, he also established a proconsul to oversee the city. In the late 350s, Constantius II ( r.   337–361) expanded the city's Senate and set it as equal to that of Rome. Correspondingly, on 11 September or 11 December 359, Constantinople was also granted an urban prefect, commonly called in English

1219-458: The Port"). The title " comes consistorianus " or " comes consistorialis " indicated specially appointed members to the consistorium , the council of the Roman emperor's closest advisors. The comes rei militaris held martial appointments, and commanded comitatenses . He ranked superior to a dux but inferior to the magister peditum or magister equitum ; he functioned as

1272-522: The Republic and Empire, and held high importance in late Antiquity . The office survived the collapse of the Western Roman Empire , and the last urban prefect of Rome, named Iohannes, is attested in 599. In the East, in Constantinople, the office survived until the 13th century. According to Roman tradition, in 753 BC when Romulus founded the city of Rome and instituted the monarchy , he also created

1325-513: The Senate and Comitia Curiata , and, in times of war, levying and commanding legions . The first major change to the office occurred in 487 BC, when the office became an elective magistracy , elected by the Comitia Curiata . The office was only open to former consuls. Around 450 BC, with the coming of the decemvirs , the office of the custos urbis was renamed the praefectus urbi (Prefect of

1378-600: The Tudor period, after Henry VII defeated Richard III at Bosworth Field , Henry made a point of executing or neutralising as many magnates as possible. Henry would make parliament attaint undesirable nobles and magnates, thereby stripping them of their wealth, protection from torture, and power. Henry also used the Court of the Star Chamber to have powerful nobles executed. Henry VIII continued this approach in his reign; he inherited

1431-511: The beginning of the AD 5th century in the Notitia Dignitatum , but as offices were later added, it is not historically exhaustive. The following sections describe examples of the kinds of comites . Several of the major departments of the Imperial Curia ("Court") and household had a principal official who was styled " comes " and assisted by an " officium " ("staff") very similar to that of

1484-517: The city jail was located at the basement of his official residence, the praetorium , located before the Forum of Constantine . As with the Prefect of Rome, the night watch came under a subordinate prefect, the νυκτέπαρχος ( nykteparchos , "night prefect"). In the 530s, however, some authority for the policing and regulation of the city passed to two new offices, created by Justinian I (r. 527–565). In 535

1537-408: The city's large population with the grain dole was especially important; when the Prefect failed to secure adequate supplies, riots often broke out. To enable the Prefect to exercise his authority, the cohortes urbanae , Rome's police force, and the nightwatchmen ( vigiles ) under their prefect ( praefectus vigilum ), were placed under his command. The Prefect also had the duty of publishing

1590-503: The crown, a group of more than a hundred families. The emergence of Parliament led to the establishment of a parliamentary peerage that received personal summons, rarely more than sixty families. A similar class in the Gaelic world were the Flatha . In the Middle Ages, a bishop sometimes held territory as a magnate, collecting the revenue of the manors and the associated knights' fees . In

1643-486: The departments of their royal households, including but not limited to the: The Frankish kings of the Merovingian dynasty retained much of Roman administration, including the office and title of " comes ", the original meaning of which they preserved, i. e., a companion of the king and a royal servant of high dignity. Under the early Frankish kings some comites did not have definite functions: they were merely attached to

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1696-417: The first, second, and third " ordines ". The comites dominorum nostrorum (plural of comes dominorum nostrorum ; lit.   ' Companions of Our Lords [Emperors] ' ) were a mounted Imperial bodyguard during the tetrarchy of Emperor Diocletian in circa 300 AD. The Goths that ruled Spain and Italy followed the Roman tradition of granting the title of " comes " to the various principals of

1749-512: The germs of discord, on account of the confusion of his public and private obligations. According to philologists, the Anglo-Saxon word " gerefa ", denoting "illustrious chief", however, is not connected to the German " Graf ", which originally meant "servant"; compare the etymologies of the words "knight" and "valet". It is the more curious that the " gerefa " should end as a subservient reeve while

1802-547: The later Roman Empire . They held offices of all kinds from the army to the civil service, while retaining their direct access to the Emperor. Emperor Constantine I finalized them as the governmental echelon of " comites provinciarum " ("counts of the provinces"); the comites of the new echelon were assigned alongside the vicarii in the civil dioceses of the latter so that the comites became permanent fixtures of Imperial government. The comites were fully enumerated as early as

1855-402: The laws promulgated by the Emperor, and as such acquired a legal jurisdiction. This extended to legal cases between slaves and their masters, patrons and their freedmen , and over sons who had violated the pietas towards their parents. Gradually, the judicial powers of the Prefect expanded, as the Prefect's office began to re-assume its old powers from the praetor urbanus . Eventually there

1908-407: The middle Byzantine period (7th–12th centuries), the prefect was regarded as the supreme judge in the capital, after the emperor himself. His role in the economical life of the city was also of principal importance. The 10th-century Book of the Prefect stipulates the various rules for the various guilds that fell under the prefect's authority. The prefect was also responsible for the appointment of

1961-421: The office gained in effective power, as the imperial court was removed from the city, meaning that the prefects were no longer under the emperor's direct supervision. The office was usually held by leading members of Italy's senatorial aristocracy, who remained largely pagan even after Emperor Constantine the Great's conversion to Christianity . Over the following thirty years, Christian holders were few. In such

2014-406: The office of custos urbis (guardian of the city) to serve as the king's chief lieutenant. Appointed by the king to serve for life, the custos urbis served concurrently as the princeps Senatus . As the second highest office of state, the custos urbis was the king's personal representative. In the absence of the king from the city, the custos urbis exercised all of his powers, which included

2067-472: The old Roman civitates ("cities", or polities) which became the basis of the new medieval bishoprics. In Carolingian times, the governor of a pagus was a Comes , corresponding to the German Graf . The King appointed the comites to serve at his pleasure. The modern German-derived term sometimes for a count who governed a whole gau is " Gaugraf ", and a gau containing several counties is sometimes called

2120-619: The person of the King and executed his orders. Others filled the highest offices, e. g. the Comes Palatii and Comes Stabuli (from which the contemporary title of " constable " derives). Yet other comites served as regional officials. For administrative purposes, the Merovingian kingdoms were still divided into small Roman districts denominated " pagi " (hence the French " pays "), or similarly sized new creations " Gaue ". These were smaller than

2173-581: The power to convoke the Senate, or the right of speaking in it, and was appointed by the Consuls instead of being elected. When the first Roman Emperor , Augustus ( r.  27 BC – AD 14 ), transformed the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire in 27 BC, he reformed the office of Prefect at the suggestion of his minister and friend Maecenas . Again elevated into a magistracy , Augustus granted

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2226-450: The powers of convoking the Senate , the popular assemblies and the exercise of force in the event of an emergency. However, the imperium he possessed was only valid within the walls of Rome. Under the kings, only three men held the position. The first king Romulus appointed Denter Romulius to serve as the first custos urbis , the third king Tullus Hostilius appointed Numa Marcius , and

2279-413: The prefect's wearing of the toga as a ceremonial garb. The prefect was solely responsible for the administration of the city of Constantinople and its immediate area. His tasks were manifold, ranging from the maintenance of order to the regulation and supervision of all guilds, corporations and public institutions. The city police, the ταξιῶται ( taxiōtai ), came under the prefect's authority, and

2332-569: The principal officials of some less important governmental departments who were under the authority of otherwise styled, high ranking, territorial officials could be titled " comes ", e. g. under the praefectus urbi of Rome , himself a vir illustris , was a comes formarum , comes riparum et alvei Tiberis et Cloacarum ("Count of the Coast of the Tiber and the Canalisation"), and comes Portus ("Count of

2385-453: The right to exercise the " bannis regis " ("royal ban "), which gave him the right to command his military in the name of the King and to act as necessary to preserve the peace. As the King's representative, he exercised the royal right of protection (" mundium regis ") of churches, widows, orphans, and the like. He enjoyed a triple " wergeld ", but had no definite salary, being remunerated by receipt of specific revenues, which system contained

2438-504: The seventh king Tarquinius Superbus appointed Spurius Lucretius . After the expulsion of Tarquinius Superbus in 510 BC and the formation of the Republic in 509 BC, the office of custos urbis remained unaltered: having power only within the actual city of Rome and a life term appointed by the consuls . The custos urbis exercised within the city all the powers of the consuls if they were absent from Rome. These powers included: convoking

2491-469: The superior of a series of military stations, each commanded by a praepositus limitis ("border commander") and/or as a unit commander, e. g., of tribunes of cohorts, of alae (auxiliary equivalents), of numeri , and in the Eastern Empire even of legions . The Notitia Dignitatum of the early-5th century AD enumerates six such offices, being of the dignity of vir spectabilis , in

2544-547: The teachers to the University of Constantinople , and for the distribution of the grain dole to the city. According to the late 9th-century Klētorologion , his two principal aides were the symponos and the logothetēs tou praitōriou . In addition, there were the heads ( γειτονιάρχαι , geitoniarchai , the old curatores regionum ) and judges ( kritai ) of the city's districts (Latin regiones , in Greek ρεγεῶναι , regeōnai ),

2597-494: The title was retained when the titulary was appointed, often promoted, to an office away from court, frequently in the field or a provincial administration. Subsequently, it was thought logical to connect the title to specific offices that demanded an incumbent official of high dignity, and even to include it as part of the official title. As the Imperial Roman Curia increased in number and assimilated all political power,

2650-452: The wealthiest medieval lords were known as storman (plural stormän ), "great men", a similar description and meaning as the English term magnate. Praefectus urbi The praefectus urbanus , also called praefectus urbi or urban prefect in English, was prefect of the city of Rome, and later also of Constantinople . The office originated under the Roman kings , continued during

2703-624: Was located on the Oppian Hill , near the Baths of Trajan . Acting as a quasi- mayor of Rome, the Prefect was the superintendent of all guilds and corporations ( collegia ), held the responsibility (via the praefectus annonae ) of the city's provision with grain from overseas , the oversight of the officials responsible for the drainage of the Tiber and the maintenance of the city's sewers and water supply system , as well as its monuments. The provisioning of

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2756-493: Was no appeal from the Prefect's sentencing, except to that of the Roman Emperor , unlike the sentencing of other officials. Even the governors of the Roman provinces were subject to the Prefect's jurisdiction. The Prefect also possessed judicial powers over criminal matters. Originally these powers were exercised in conjunction with those of the quaestors , but by the 3rd century, they were exercised alone. In late Antiquity,

2809-452: Was one of the few high state offices which could not be occupied by a eunuch . The prefect was also the formal head of the Senate, presiding over its meetings. Hence, the prefect's nomination had to be formally ratified by the Senate, and unlike the other senior administrative positions of the state ( praetorian prefects and diocesan vicars ) with their military connotations, the office's ancient and purely civilian origins were emphasized by

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