ĂRĔTĀLŎGI, persons who amused the company at the Roman dinner tables.
ARGĒI, the name given by the pontifices to the places consecrated
by Numa for the celebration of religious services. Varro calls them
the chapels of the argei, and says they were twenty-seven in number,
distributed in the different districts of the city. There was a
tradition that these argei were named from the chieftains who came
with Hercules, the Argive, to Rome, and occupied the Capitoline,
or, as it was anciently called, Saturnian hill. It is impossible
to say what is the historical value or meaning of this legend; we
may, however, notice its conformity with the statement that Rome was
founded by the Pelasgians, with whom the name of Argos was connected.
The name argei was also given to certain figures thrown into the
Tiber from the Sublician bridge, on the Ides of May in every year.
This was done by the pontifices, the vestals, the praetors, and other
citizens, after the performance of the customary sacrifices. The
images were thirty in number, made of bulrushes, and in the form of
men. Ovid makes various suppositions to account for the origin of
this rite; we can only conjecture that it was a symbolical offering,
to propitiate the gods, and that the number was a representative
either of the thirty patrician curiae at Rome, or perhaps of the
thirty Latin townships.
ARGENTĀRĬI, bankers or money changers. (1) GREEK. The bankers at
Athens were called _Trapezitae_ (τραπεζίται), from their tables
(τραπεζαι) at which they sat, while carrying on their business, and
which were in the market place. Their principal occupation was that
of changing money; but they frequently took money, at a moderate
premium, from persons who did not like to occupy themselves with
the management of their own affairs, and placed it out at interest.
Their usual interest was 36 per cent.; a rate that at present
scarcely occurs except in cases of money lent on bottomry. The only
instance of a bank recognized and conducted on behalf of the state
occurs at Byzantium, where at one time it was let by the republic
to capitalists to farm. Yet the state probably exercised some kind
of superintendence over the private bankers, since it is hardly
possible otherwise to account for the unlimited confidence which they
enjoyed.--(2) ROMAN. The _Argentarii_ at Rome must be distinguished
from the _mensarii_ and _nummularii_, or public bankers. [MENSARII.]
The argentarii were private persons, who carried on business on their
own responsibility, and were not in the service of the republic;
but the shops or _tabernae_ about the forum, which they occupied,
and in which they transacted their business, were state property.
The business of the argentarii may be divided into the following
branches. 1. _Permutatio_, or the exchange of foreign coin for Roman,
and in later times the giving of bills of exchange payable in foreign
towns. 2. The keeping of sums of money for other persons. Such money
might be deposited by the owner merely to save himself the trouble
of keeping it and making payments, and in this case it was called
_depositum_; the argentarius then paid no interest, and the money was
called _vacua pecunia_. Or the money was deposited on condition of
the argentarius paying interest; in this case the money was called
_creditum_. A payment made through a banker was called _per mensam_,
_de mensa_, or _per mensae scripturam_, while a payment made by the
debtor in person was a payment _ex arca_ or _de domo_. An argentarius
never paid away any person’s money without being either authorised by
him in person or receiving a cheque which was called _perscriptio_.
The argentarii kept accurate accounts in books called _codices_,
_tabulae_, or _rationes_, and there is every reason for believing
that they were acquainted with what is called in book-keeping double
entry. When a party found to be in debt paid what he owed, he had
his name effaced (_nomen expedire_ or _expungere_) from the banker’s
books. 3. Their connection with commerce and public auctions. In
private sales and purchases, they sometimes acted as agents for
either party (_interpretes_), and sometimes they undertook to sell
the whole estate of a person, as an inheritance. At public auctions
they were almost invariably present, registering the articles sold,
their prices, and purchasers, and receiving the payment from the
purchasers. 4. The testing of the genuineness of coins (_probatio
nummorum_). This, however, seems originally to have been a part of
the duty of public officers, the mensarii or nummularii, until in
the course of time the opinion of an argentarius also came to be
looked upon as decisive. 5. The _solidorum venditio_, that is, the
obligation of purchasing from the mint the newly coined money, and
circulating it among the people. This branch of their functions
occurs only under the empire. The argentarii formed a collegium,
divided into _societates_ or corporations, which alone had the right
to admit new members of their guild. None but freemen could become
members of such a corporation. It has already been observed that the
argentarii had their shops round the forum: hence to become bankrupt
was expressed by _foro cedere_, or _abire_, or _foro mergi_.
ARGENTUM (ἄργυρος), silver. The relative value of gold and silver
differed considerably at different periods in Greek and Roman
history. Herodotus mentions it as 13 to 1; Plato, as 12 to 1;
Menander, as 10 to 1; and Livy as 10 to 1, about B.C. 189. According
to Suetonius, Julius Caesar, on one occasion, exchanged silver for
gold in the proportion of 9 to 1; but the most usual proportion under
the early Roman emperors was about 12 to 1. The proportion in modern
times, since the discovery of the American mines, has varied between
17 to 1 and 14 to 1. In the earliest times the Greeks obtained their
silver chiefly as an article of commerce from the Phocaeans and the
Samians; but they soon began to work the rich mines of their own
country and its islands. The chief mines were in Siphnos, Thessaly,
and Attica. In the last-named country, the silver mines of Laurion
furnished a most abundant supply, and were generally regarded as
the chief source of the wealth of Athens. The Romans obtained most
of their silver from the very rich mines of Spain, which had been
previously worked by the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, and which,
though abandoned for those of Mexico, are still not exhausted. By
far the most important use of silver among the Greeks was for money.
There are sufficient reasons for believing that, until some time
after the end of the Peloponnesian war, the Athenians had no gold
currency. [AURUM.] It may be remarked that all the words connected
with money are derived from ἄργυρος, and not from χρυσός, as
καταργυρόω, “to bribe with money;” ἀργυραμοιβός, “a money changer,”
&c.; and ἄργυρος is itself not unfrequently used to signify money
in general, as _aes_ is in Latin. At Rome, on the contrary, silver
was not coined till B.C. 269, before which period Greek silver was
in circulation at Rome; and the principal silver coin of the Romans,
the _denarius_, was borrowed from the Greek _drachma_. For further
details respecting silver money, see DENARIUS, DRACHMA. From a very
early period, silver was used also in works of art; and the use of it
for mere purposes of luxury and ostentation, as in plate, was very
general both in Greece and Rome.
ARGỸRASPĬDES (ἀργυράσπιδες), a division of the Macedonian army, who
were so called because they carried shields covered with silver
plates.
ARGỸROCŎPEION (ἀργυροκοπεῖον), the place where money was coined, the
mint, at Athens.
ĂRĬES (κριός), the battering-ram, was used to batter down the walls
of besieged cities. It consisted of a large beam, made of the trunk
of a tree, especially of a fir or an ash. To one end was fastened a
mass of bronze or iron (κεφαλή, ἐμβολή, προτομή), which resembled in
its form the head of a ram. The aries in its simplest state was borne
and impelled by human hands, without other assistance. In an improved
form, the ram was surrounded with iron bands, to which rings were
attached for the purpose of suspending it by ropes or chains from a
beam fixed transversely over it. By this contrivance the soldiers
were relieved from the necessity of supporting the weight of the ram,
and could with ease give it a rapid and forcible motion backwards and
forwards. The use of this machine was further aided by placing the
frame in which it was suspended upon wheels, and also by constructing
over it a wooden roof, so as to form a “testudo,” which protected the
besieging party from the defensive assaults of the besieged.
[Illustration: Aries, Battering Ram. (From Column of Trajan.)]
ĀRISTOCRĂTĬA (ἀριστοκρατία), signifies literally “the government of
the best men,” and as used by Plato, Aristotle, Polybius, &c., it
meant the government of a class whose supremacy was founded not on
wealth merely, but on personal distinction. That there should be
an aristocracy, moreover, it was essential that the administration
of affairs should be conducted with a view to the promotion of the
general interests, not for the exclusive or predominant advantage
of the privileged class As soon as the government ceased to be
thus conducted, or whenever the only title to political power in
the dominant class was the possession of superior wealth, the
constitution was termed an oligarchy (ὀλιγαρχία), which, in the
technical use of the term, was always looked upon as a corruption
(παρέκβασις) of an aristocracy. In the practical application of the
term aristocracy, however, the personal excellence which was held to
be a necessary element was not of a higher kind than what, according
to the deeply-seated ideas of the Greeks, was commonly hereditary in
families of noble birth, and in early times would be the ordinary
accompaniments of noble rank, namely, wealth, military skill, and
superior education and intelligence. It is to be noted that the word
ἀριστοκρατία is never, like the English term _aristocracy_, the name
of a class, but only of a particular political constitution.
[Illustration: Greek Soldier. (From an ancient vase.)