PRŎBOULI (πρόβουλοι), a name applicable to any persons who are
appointed to consult or take measures for the benefit of the
people. Ten _probouli_ were appointed at Athens, after the end of
the Sicilian war, to act as a committee of public safety. Their
authority did not last much longer than a year; for a year and a half
afterwards Pisander and his colleagues established the council of
Four Hundred, by which the democracy was overthrown.
PRŌCONSUL (ἀνθύπατος), an officer who acted in the place of a
consul, without holding the office of consul itself. The proconsul,
however, was generally one who had held the office of consul, so
that the proconsulship was a continuation, though a modified one,
of the consulship. The first time when the imperium of a consul
was prolonged, was in B.C. 327, in the case of Q. Publilius Philo,
whose return to Rome would have been followed by the loss of most of
the advantages that had been gained in his campaign. The power of
proconsul was conferred by a senatusconsultum and plebiscitum, and
was nearly equal to that of a regular consul, for he had the imperium
and jurisdictio, but it differed inasmuch as it did not extend over
the city and its immediate vicinity, and was conferred, without the
auspicia, by a mere decree of the senate and people, and not in the
comitia for elections. When the number of Roman provinces had become
great, it was customary for the consuls, who during the latter
period of the republic spent the year of their consulship at Rome,
to undertake at its close the conduct of a war in a province, or its
peaceful administration, with the title of proconsuls. There are some
extraordinary cases on record in which a man obtained a province with
the title of proconsul without having held the consulship before. The
first case of this kind occurred in B.C. 211, when young P. Cornelius
Scipio was created proconsul of Spain in the comitia centuriata.
PRŌCŪRĀTOR, a person who has the management of any business committed
to him by another. Thus it is applied to a person who maintains
or defends an action on behalf of another, or, as we should say,
an attorney [ACTIO]: to a steward in a family [CALCULATOR]: to an
officer in the provinces belonging to the Caesar, who attended to the
duties discharged by the quaestor in the other provinces [PROVINCIA]:
to an officer engaged in the administration of the fiscus [FISCUS]:
and to various other officers under the empire.
PRŌDĬGĬUM, in its widest acceptation, denotes any sign by which the
gods indicated to men a future event, whether good or evil, and thus
includes omens and auguries of every description. It is, however,
generally employed in a more restricted sense, to signify some
strange incident or wonderful appearance which was supposed to herald
the approach of misfortune, and happened under such circumstances as
to announce that the calamity was impending over a whole community
or nation rather than over private individuals. The word may be
considered synonymous with _ostentum_, _monstrum_, _portentum_.
Since prodigies were viewed as direct manifestations of the wrath of
heaven, it was believed that this wrath might be appeased by prayers
and sacrifices duly offered to the offended powers. This being a
matter which deeply concerned the public welfare, the necessary rites
were in ancient times regularly performed, under the direction of the
pontifices, by the consuls before they left the city, the solemnities
being called _procuratio prodigiorum_.
PRODŎSĬA (προδοσία) included not only every species of treason,
but also every such crime as (in the opinion of the Greeks) would
amount to a betraying or desertion of the interest of a man’s
country. The highest sort of treason was the attempt to establish a
despotism (τυραννίς), or to subvert the constitution (καταλύειν τὴν
πολιτείαν), and in democracies καταλύειν τὸν δῆμον or τὸ πλῆθος.
Other kinds of treason were a secret correspondence with a foreign
enemy; a betraying of an important trust, such, as a fleet, army,
or fortress, a desertion of post, a disobedience of orders, or any
other act of treachery, or breach of duty in the public service. But
not only would _overt acts_ of disobedience or treachery amount to
the crime of προδοσία, but also the neglect to perform those active
duties which the Greeks in general expected of every good citizen.
Cowardice in battle (δειλία) would be an instance of this kind; so
would any breach of the oath taken by the ἔφηβοι at Athens; or any
line of conduct for which a charge of disaffection to the people
(μισοδημία) might be successfully maintained. The regular punishment
appointed by the law for most kinds of treason appears to have been
death, which, no doubt, might be mitigated by decree of the people,
as in the case of Miltiades and many others. The goods of traitors,
who suffered death, were confiscated, and their houses razed to the
ground; nor were they permitted to be buried in the country, but had
their bodies cast out in some place on the confines of Attica and
Megara. Therefore it was that the bones of Themistocles, who had been
condemned for treason, were brought over and buried secretly by his
friends. The posterity of a traitor became ἄτιμοι, and those of a
tyrant were liable to share the fate of their ancestor.