The
iron ring, the only one originally, was at first regarded as a mark of
individual honor, awarded by the sovereign or in his name. From the
earliest times of the Roman Republic, a senator sent on an embassy
received a gold ring, all other senators being restricted to iron
ones. Soon, however, senators of noble birth, and, later on, all
senators without distinction, enjoyed the right of wearing gold rings.
In the third century b.c. this
privilege was then extended to the knights, and in the last years of
the Republic, as well as under the emperors, many other classes of
citizens were made partakers of the privilege, so that before long
even some freedmen and certain of those pursuing the least reputable
vocations were permitted the enjoyment of a distinction once so
jealously guarded.
Toward the latter part of the third century a.D. all
Roman soldiers could lawfully wear gold rings, although in the late
Republican and earlier Imperial periods this right was accorded only to
the military tribunes. Thus, finally, all class distinctions in this
respect were done away with. Every freeborn man could wear a gold ring,
freedmen, with a few exceptions, were confined to silver rings, and the
iron ring became the badge of slavery.
After the battle of Cannai (August 2, 216 b.c.), in
which the Romans were totally defeated by Hannibal, the Carthaginian
leader ordered that the gold rings should be taken from the hands of
the dead Romans and heaped up in the vestibule of his quarters. Enough
were collected to fill a bushel basket (some authorities say three
bushel baskets), and they were sent to Carthage, not as valuable spoils
of war, but as proof of the great slaughter among the Roman patricians
and knights, for at this time none beneath the rank of knights, and
only those of highest standing among them, those
