[Footnote 1: M. Bureau de la Malle, _Ec. polit. des Romains,_ch. 15, p.
143; ch. 2, p.231.]

[Footnote 2: Plutarch, _Cato the Censor,_6 and 7.]

[Footnote 3: Horace, Sat. II, 7; v. 42-43: "Quid? si me stultior ipso
quingentis empto drachmis, deprehenderis."]

[Footnote 4: Diodorus, Siculus, Fg. of Bk. XXXIV.]

[Footnote 5: Varro, _De R.R. Proem. _3, 4.]

[Footnote 6: Livy, XXII, 15.]




SEC. 11.--LEX SEMPRONIA TIBERIANA.


In 133, more than two centuries after the enactment of the law of Licinius
Stolo, Tiberius Gracchus, tribune of the people for that year, brought
forward a bill which was in fact little less than a renewal of the old law.
It provided that no one should occupy more than five hundred jugera of the
_ager publicus, _with the proviso that any father could reserve[1] 250
jugera for each son.[2] This law differed from that of Licinius in that
it guaranteed permanent possession of this amount to the occupier and his
heirs forever.[3] Other clauses were subjoined providing for the payment[4]
of some equivalent to the rich for the improvements and the buildings upon
the surrendered estates, and ordering the division of the domain thus