THE ROMAN COLLEGIA.
44
were exempted by Constantine from all personal duties.^
and the Collegia Fahrorum, or colleges of workmen, are
different descriptions are envTmerated,
Amongst them both the Architecti
"-
frequently mentioned, but ih.ovL^ fabri ferrarii (blacksmiths), lignarii and tignarii (carpenters),
materiarii (timber-workers), cerarii (coppersmiths), and other crafts are constantly named
by the ancient writers, there is no distinct reference to the fahri lapidarii, or masons.
That companies or colleges of stone-cutters then existed there can be little doubt, although
no record of their actual being has come down to us in inscr iptions and classical allusions.
It is also highly probable that the collegia
or guild the
workmen
fahrorum
of various crafts.
^
Tliis
served the purpose of associating in a
indeed is almost placed beyond doubt
company
by a letter of the younger Pliny, when pro-consul of Asia Minor, to the Emperor Trajan,
which he informs him of a most destructive fire at Nicomedia, and requests permission
in
to
establish a collegium fabrorxtm for the rebuilding of that city.*
The leading feature
of these provincial colleges
was
their connection with tlie religion of
Furthermore, these bodies adopted as a fundamental principle, that they conferred
an hereditary privilege or duty. The son succeeded to the occupation of his father, just as in
His trade was his
the later companies and guilds the son became a freeman by birthright.
the people.
best estate and inheritance.
Under
certain conditions, however, the civil
law permitted the
and in some cases the trade was a service appendant to the possession
of edifices or laud.
An analogous system appears to have prevailed in Egypt, and the
appropriation of trades and callings amongst the lower classes of Hindostan is governed by the
aggregation of strangers
same
;
principles.^
"It
is
evident," says Sir F. Palgrave, "that the colleges
were not of a uniform constitution.
grounded on personal obligations others, if we may borrow from our legal
nomenclature, savoured of the realty; and the supposition that the Eoman jurists, either
willingly or inadvertently, forgot or confounded the primitive distinction, may partly account
Some were
entirely
;
perplexed organisation which the colleges assumed."®
Amongst the handicrafts pursued by these operative communities, must be included
for the
The qualifications, indeed, required by Vitruvius for
architecture, sculpture, and painting.
the profession he himself adorned, would seem to have demanded an amount of laborious study
and sedulous
''
application, almost incompatible witli the daily toil of an ordinary artisan yet
the ]\Iasonic square, the level, and tlie mallet, all carefully displayed upon the memorial of the
Pioman
;
architect, display
how important
a feature the mechanical practice of the art was
considered, in estimating the calling to which the master belonged."
It has
'
been generally believed, and the common impression has been formulated by a recent
"
That from Constantinople, as the centre of
ability,
Masonic writer with equal clearness and
'
Palgrave, Eise and Progress of the English
^
Amongst the Roman
Colleges,
Edinburgh Review, April 1839,
'
" Several sorts of
the
Commonwealth, 1833,
company
vol.
i.,
331
;
Spence,
of hereditary architects held a
p.
23.
conspicuous place (Palgrave, in
p. 87).
workmen were included under the name
kind of building" (Horsley, Britannia Romana, 1732,
p. 334).
of Fahri, particularly those that were concerned in
See also Massman,
any
p. 77, § 181.
*
Plinii Epistolee, lib. x., epist. xlii.
°
The custom of applying lands as the recompense for various laborious or menial duties, practised amongst the
still flourishes in Hindostan, and the Roman
usage appears to have been founded upon an ancient traditional
Celts,
See pp. 38, 41, ante.
system greatly modified by more recent law (Palgrave, Rise and Progress of tlie British Commonwealth, vol. i., p. 334).
«
'
Ibid., vol. i., p. 334.
Edinburgh Review, April 1839 (Palgrave), citing Gruter, vol. i., p. 644.