Vigiles
The Vigiles or more properly the Vigiles Urbani ("watchmen of the City") or Cohortes Vigilum ("cohorts of the watchmen") were the firefighters and police of Ancient Rome.
History
The Triumviri Nocturni (meaning three men of the night) were the first men, being privately owned slaves, organized into a group that combated the common problems of fire and conflagrations in Rome. The privately operated system became ineffective, so in the interest of keeping himself and Rome safe, Augustus instituted a new public firefighting force called the Vigiles. Augustus modeled the new firefighters after the fire brigade of Alexandria, Egypt. The Vigiles were also known by their nickname Spartoli or "little bucket fellows" which was given to them because of the buckets they carried water in, which were made of rope sealed with pitch.
In AD 6, Augustus levied a 4% tax on the sale of slaves and used the proceeds to set up the new force. The first Vigiles units were under the command of Aediles and the Vicomagistri. There were only 6000 Vigiles and they were all slaves. In 22 AD they were commanded by the praefectus vigilum, who was of equestrian rank, and subpraefectus and were divided into seven cohorts commanded by a tribune. Usually tribunes would begin their career by commanding a unit of the Vigiles. Each cohort was divided into seven centuries, each of 70–80 men commanded by a centurion. Each cohort patrolled two of the city's fourteen administrative regiones. The cohorts were doubled in size in AD 205. The Vigiles were made up of freedman.
The Vigiles also acted as a night watch, keeping an eye out for burglars and hunting down runaway slaves, and were on occasion used to maintain order in the streets. Their most famous prefect, Naevius Sutorius Macro, succeeded Lucius Aelius Sejanus as Prefect of the Praetorian Guard after his men had been used by the Emperor Tiberius to retake control of the city from Sejanus's soldiers.
Vigiles were stationed at the harbor cities of Ostia and Portus. A vexillatio (detachment) of four centuries was detached from Rome for four months at a time, with two centuries being stationed at each city.
During the Great Fire of Rome the Vigiles took to looting the city rather than enforcing law and fighting the fires.
The Vigiles appear to have lost their status as an independent unit and come under the authority of the Praetorian prefects sometime in the early 3rd century.
Organization
