means simply "town";[223] third, the fact that Praeneste, along with
Tibur, had clung so jealously to the title of federated state (civitas
foederata) from some uncertain date to the time of the Latin rebellion,
and more proudly than ever from 338 to 90 B.C., makes it very unlikely
that so great a downfall of a city's pride would be passed over in
silence; fourth and last, the fact that the Praenestines asked the
emperor Tiberius to give them the status of a municipium,[224] which he
did,[225] but it seems (see note 60) with no change from the regular
city officials of a colony,[226] shows clearly that the Praenestines
simply took advantage of the fact that Tiberius had just recovered from
a severe illness at Praeneste[227] to ask him for what was merely an
empty honor. It only salved the pride of the Praenestines, for it gave
them a name which showed a former sovereign federated state, and not the
name of a colony planted by the Romans.[228] The cogency of this fourth
reason will bear elaboration. Praeneste would never have asked for a
return to the name municipium if it had not meant something. At the very
best she could not have been a real municipium with Roman citizenship
longer than seven years, 89 to 82 B.C., and that at a very unsettled
time, nor would an enforced taking of the status of a municipium, not to
mention the ridiculously short period which it would have lasted, have
been anything to look back to with such pride that the inhabitants would
ask the emperor Tiberius for it again. What they did ask for was the
name municipium as they used and understood it, for it meant to them
everything or anything but colonia.

Let us now sum up the municipal history of Praeneste down to 82 B.C.
when she was made a Roman colony by Sulla. Praeneste, from the earliest
times, like Rome, Tusculum, and Aricia, was one of the chief cities in
the territory known as Ancient Latium. Like these other cities,
Praeneste made herself head of a small league,[229] but unlike the