censor

cēnsor ōris, m

cf. censeo, the title of a Roman magistrate, instituted B.C.443. The censors were two in number (usually patricians of high rank), elected in the Comitia Curiata, originally every five years. Their duties, which they swore to perform without favor or enmity, were to make a census of the people, giving the age, property, and class of each person; to exercise general control over public morals, with power to degrade any citizen to a lower rank, to expel senators, and deprive the equites of horses and rings; to administer, under direction of the Senate, the public finances, to construct and keep in repair public buildings, roads, and aqueducts, and to furnish victims for the sacrifices: Papirium Sempronium que censui agendo populus suffragiis praefecit; censores ab re appellati sunt, L.: video animadvertisse censores in iudices: cum Saturninum censor notasset: qui eum ex senatu censor eiecerat: quem censores senatu moverant, S.: quem censores aerarium reliquisse se subscripserunt. — Meton., the title of a magistrate in a colony or province, whose duties were similar to those of the censor at Rome : censores in Siciliā creati: iurati censores coloniarum, L.—Fig., a severe judge of morals, censurer, critic : pertristis: castigator censorque minorum, H.