A research project funded by the Spanish government and designed to meet the lack of dedicated studies of the consulship has borne fruit in Pina Polo's authoritative monograph (The Consul at Rome, reviewed JRS 102 (2012), 309–10) and in this rich and stimulating collection of essays.

The book opens with three papers on the consulship's contentious early history. Smith makes a strong case for the conservative view that the early consular fasti are substantially reliable and that the chief magistracy established after the overthrow of the monarchy was collegiate from the outset, and pertinently warns against privileging antiquarians’ evidence over annalists’. Urso discusses Cassius Dio's treatment of the early consulship, making conveniently accessible some of the conclusions of his valuable monograph, Cassio Dione e i magistrati (2005). Drawing mainly on Zonaras’ epitome, Urso shows that Dio consistently designated the first chief magistrates by their original title praetor (using its normal Greek equivalent strategos) and uniquely dated the switch to the title consul to the overthrow of the Decemvirate in 449 b.c. Urso also argues that Dio regarded the pre-449 consuls as unequal and derived this view from an antiquarian handbook on the magistracies. If true, this would provide striking support for those who doubt that the first chief magistrates were collegiate, but the relevant passages of Zonaras may well not carry this implication.

The Licinio-Sextian laws, traditionally dated to 367 b.c., provided for the election of a praetor alongside the two consuls. Bergk argues that, rather than, as usually supposed, ranking below the consuls from the outset, praetors were initially their equals and only became inferior from the later third century when more praetors were created and the cursus honorum began to develop. However, although the relationship between the offices evidently evolved, the rating of the praetors’ imperium as less than the consuls’, acknowledged in the augurs’ books (Cic., Att. 9.9.3; cf. Gell. 13.15.4) and symbolized by their fewer lictors, seems more likely to have been established when the office was instituted than by a later downgrading.

Next come eight papers dealing with the consulship in its mid-republican heyday. Beck examines the development of the consuls’ powers within the evolving institutional framework of command. Pina Polo discusses the consuls’ religious activities (on substantially the same lines as the corresponding chapter in his monograph), and Marco Simón provides a detailed treatment of the Latin Festival, seeking to explain why it was regarded as essential that the consuls should celebrate it before leaving for their provinces (see also now C. J. Smith in J. R. Brandt and J. W. Iddeng (eds), Greek and Roman Festivals (2012), 267–88). Hölkeskamp explores the consuls’ rôle in the symbolism and ritual of the Roman republican ‘theatre of power’. Roller discusses the shifting presentation of Fabius Cunctator as an exemplum across the Roman tradition — a subtle essay, but of perhaps marginal relevance to the volume, since it was as dictator, not consul, that Fabius established himself as the salutary Delayer. Fronda gives a lucid overview of consuls’ and other Roman aristocrats’ personal connections with the local Italian élites.

Two particularly notable contributions are Rosenstein's paper on ‘war, wealth and consuls’ and Jehne's on ‘the rise of the consular’. Rosenstein provides an illuminating survey of the costs and profits of the Republic's warfare. Using Livy's data, he demonstrates that, although a few campaigns were hugely profitable, over half even of those which yielded triumphs did not bring enough booty into the treasury to cover their costs. Rosenstein accepts Churchill's view that generals were expected to account for any booty retained and to use it for public purposes (TAPhA (1999), 85–116), but notes the (on that view) surprising rarity of prosecutions for its misappropriation. He concludes that commanders mostly contented themselves with other means of enrichment, but it is perhaps more likely that the rules on booty were less clear-cut.

Jehne shows that the life of the ex-consul as we know it from Cicero — the elder statesman, residing mainly in Rome and attending frequent Senate meetings — is likely to have been a development of the later third and second centuries, as empire led to a great increase in senatorial business. He may well be right that tenure of the consulship only conferred precedence in Senate debates after the increase in praetors in the later third century. However, former curule magistrates are likely to have enjoyed precedence over other senators a good deal earlier (cf. their priority in the exceptional lectio after Cannae (Livy 23.23.5)).

Three papers follow dealing with consuls’ involvement in the political struggles of the late Republic. Morstein-Marx brilliantly analyses the appeals to their armies by the consuls Sulla in 88 and Cinna in 87 b.c., arguing cogently that each had a strong case and that civic concerns are likely to have played an important part in motivating the soldiers’ responses. Duplá's paper on consules populares surveys both those radical consuls who engaged in popularis politics and conservatives like Cicero who claimed to be using the office to defend the people's true interests. Arena argues ingeniously that the optimate Catulus and his associates deployed Stoic ethical conceptions in support of the Sullan arrangements, both during Catulus’ dispute with his colleague Lepidus as consul in 78 b.c. and subsequently. She bases her case on Sallust's speech for Catulus’ supporter Philippus and the speech Dio provides for Catulus against the Lex Manilia. However, it is not clear to me that the ethical conceptions deployed in these speeches are distinctively Stoic, and even Sallust's version is questionable evidence for the speech actually delivered, while Dio's is clearly his own composition (cf. B. S. Rodgers, GRBS 48 (2008), 295–318).

The volume concludes with an essay by Hurlet surveying continuity and change in the consulship under Augustus.