Centuriate assembly

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The centuriate assembly (Latin: comitia centuriata) was a popular assembly of ancient Rome. In the Roman Republic, its main function was electing the consuls, praetors, and censors. It was made up of 193 centuries (Latin: centuriae) which were apportioned to Roman citizens by wealth and age, hugely overweighting the old and wealthy. The assembly, according to the ancient sources, dates to the regal period and initially closely resembled the Roman army of the period in form, with the equestrians serving as cavalry, the upper census classes serving as heavy infantry, and the lower classes serving as light infantry. Whether this was ever the case is unclear; regardless, by the third century BC the assembly did not closely resemble the Roman people under arms and it served a largely electoral purpose, as it was rarely called to vote on legislation or to decide – as was its theoretical legal right as place of final appeal – capital cases. Assembly procedure was weighted towards the upper classes...

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