From its earliest times, Rome had a hereditary nobility, the patrician families. All other Romans were plebians, who were further divided by class into:

• Nobles (nobiles, families that had more than 1 million sesterces in property, and were therefore eligible to run for senatorial offices).
• Knights (equites, familes that had more than 400,000 sesterces in property)
• The rest (families that had less than 400,000 sesterces in property). These were typically just referred to as plebians (plebs). The lowest of the low were the Head Count (capite censi), who held no property.

Over the history of the Republic, the power of the patricians was slowly stripped away, as the wealth of the nobles and knights asserted itself over the blood of the patricians. In addition, many patrician families lost their fortunes over time, forcing them to marry into wealthy plebian families to try to maintain their station. In the end, many patrician families sided against Julius Caesar and later his avengers, and were wiped out in the civil wars. By 81AD, little remains of the patricians.

The Roman Empire was built by accretion, with the nascient and somewhat paranoid original city-state conquering its neighbors in "pre-emptive self-defense," only to find itself confronted with new neighbors nervous about Rome's militaristic tendancies... Rome thus grew to encompass first the Italian peninsula, then adjacent and overseas territories, and finally, all of the land bounded by the Atlantic, the Sahara, the German forests, the Russian steppes, and the Parthian Empire to the East.

 

In general, Romans treat foreigners according to their geographic and cultural distance from Rome. Thus, Italians and Greeks (southern Italy was controlled by Greeks until the 3rd century BC, and much of Rome's civilized behavior comes either from directly immitating Greeks, or from the Etruscans, who themselves absorbed much Greek culture) rate highest, followed by Romanized Celts ("Italy" officially ends at the top of the "boot;" Romans consider the Po River valley to be "Gaul on this side of the Alps"), the Hellenized peoples of the eastern Mediterranean, and finally non-Hellenized/Romanized Celts,  Germans,  Africans,  Arabs, and the  like.

Citizenship entails voting rights, protection under Roman law, and property rights. Originally, citizenship extended only to Romans, each of whom were enrolled at birth in one of thirty "tribes." In the early 1st century BC, the cities of Italy, which paid the majority of Rome's taxes and supplied the majority of her soldiers, demanded citizenship rights as well. They were suppressed in the Social War, but eventually were granted citizenship status by Augustus. Subsequent emperors have granted citizenship to cities or even entire provinces of the empire, which instantly become his clients. Non-citizen subject have fewer rights, although they may enjoy "ally"status.

 

The Roman economy is built, to a large extent, on slaves. All but the poorest citizens have at least one slave, and slaves perform much of the empire's menial manual labor of farming and mining, as well as domestic tasks. Slaves (at least domestic ones) have some protections against harsh or cruel treatment, but they are property. It is not uncommon for educated or skilled individuals outside Rome to sell themselves into slavery to Roman masters, for example as tutors or craftsmen.

 

At their masters' discretion, slaves may be able to earn money in their spare time and eventually buy their freedom, becoming freedmen. Kind masters frequently free their slaves on their deaths. Freedmen become their former master's (or family's) clients. Masters of senatorial rank, who are forbidden from engaging in business, sometimes free their slaves and set them up in businesses, from which they can indirectly benefit. Beginning with Augustus, the imperial civil service to a large extent depended on educated freedmen, even at its highest ranks, much to the annoyance of men of the senatorial and equestrian classes.

 

The children of freedmen are free men, who enjoy full citizen status, although still with some stigma of the servile origins of their family.

The fabric of Roman social order depends in large part on the patron/client relationship, whereby a weaker party (the client) serves, and receives protection and favor from, a stronger party (the patron). Freedmen automatically become their former owner's clients, but patron/client relationships extend well beyond this, crossing generations. The patron may be (or his ancestor may have been) the most important person in a particular district. Conquered territories and rulers become the clients of the conquering general. Free individuals and even entire nations may choose to make themselves clients in order to gain a voice in government or higher social circles. The emperor is the ultimate super-patron.

 

Clients support their patron in public, providing votes, muscle, or just their presence acknowledging the patron's power and dignity. In return, the patron helps the client out in times of need, with money, a job, legal protection, and so on, or represents the needs of his clients as a body, class, or nation in the Senate.

 

Part of a client's duty is the salutatio, the morning visit to the patron's house. The patron's doorkeeper will allow a certain number of clients (usually the more important or powerful ones) into the house, and the patron will hear a some of their petitions or give them gifts. The patron may also provide money or food to be handed out to the clients at large. When the patron finishes the morning's business, the clients may be required to follow him down to the forum, to support him as he gives a speech or enters a court or the senate, or just to make a showing.

Under Roman law, the eldest male in a family, the paterfamilias, has authority over all members of his family, including money, property, marriage, and even (theoretically) life or death. Adult sons remain under their father's authority.

 

In general, women have only the most meager rights under Roman law. Women don't really even have their own names--they're known by the feminine version of their family names, such as Julia or Cornelia, and if there's more than one girl in the family, they'll be designated the Elder or Younger. Unmarried women are under the authority of their paterfamilias their emtire lives, unless, when they marry, they move to the authority of their husband and his paterfamilias. Women can theoretically be manumitted by their paterfamilias (or their husband's), but even then they must be under the protection and guidance of an appointed "tutor." However, women are free to move about the city as they please. In the lower classes, women often work beside men in their daily occupations. If the family can afford it, however, women are expected to stay home and run the household, and engage in morally dignified activities like weaving the family's clothes.

 

Children, both boys and girls, generally go to school for a few years to learn reading, writing, and arithmetic, and perhaps a little poetry and Greek. Wealthier families will engage a private tutor, often an educated Greek who has sold himself into slavery. Most schools are run by a teacher who has a dozen or so students, and meet wherever the teacher can find space, sometimes even out on the steps of a temple or public building. Poorer families may only send their boys to school; the cruel figure of the poor, angry schoolmaster beating his students is a common character in comedy and satire. Wealthy girls may be educated in poetry, music, or dance after their primary education; poorer girls generally help their mothers around the house until they're married. Wealthy boys learn rhetoric and public speaking; the wealthiest may travel to Greece for an advanced education in Greek, rhetoric, oratory, or even science or philosophy.

Roman citizens have three names: their praenomen, or personal name; nomen, family name; and cognomen, clan name. The list of praenomina is very limited: Aulus, Caelus, Decimus ("tenth"), Flavius, Gaius, Gnaeus, Lucius, Manius, Marcus, Publius, Quintus ("fifth"), Secundus ("second"), Septimus ("seventh"), Servius, Sextus ("second"), Spurius, Tertius ("third"), Tiberius, and Titus. Clans typically reuse the same praenomina in sequence for their sons - thus Gaius Julius Caesar's father and grandfather were also both Gaius Julius Caesar. The cognomen typically refers to something famous or notable about that branch of the family; for example, "Caesar" means "hairy," and refers ironically to that branch's male-pattern baldness, while "Cicero" means "garbonzo," referring to the cleft ball shape of the ends of their noses. Particularly famous men may get fourth or additional names called an agnomen related to their deeds, typically military campaigns for which they were famous, such as Africanus or Germanicus. Women typically do not have their own names; they're known by the feminine form of their family name, such as Julia, or a diminutive form of it, such as Julilla. After they marry, they may be known by the feminine form of their husband's family's name, or by a combination of their own and their husband's family's names, such as Claudia Marcella. When slaves are freed, they take their former master's nomen and cognomen. Foreigners, of course, have their own naming conventions; a personal name and either a family name or a patronymic (name based on one's father's name) are typical.

Roman citizens are entitled to wear the toga, a long (about 8 feet) garment that drapes from the left shoulder, crosses the front of the body, wraps under the right arm, and then drapes back over the left shoulder, with the left arm supporting multiple folds of the garment. A tunic is worn under the toga. Young men before they reach adulthood wear the toga praetexta, which has a thin purple border. Senators and knights also wear a toga praetexta, the senators' with the broader border, the latus clavus. Candidates for public office whiten their togas with chalk to make them stand out; this is the toga candidata, the whitened toga.

 

Togas are quite cumbersome; it's impractical to do much in a toga except stand still or make a speech, gesturing with your right arm. The toga is generally only worn on formal occasions, but Romans will wear smaller, more colorful versions to parties or festive events, and forgo them altogether day-to-day.

Romans distinguish between two types of power: auctoritas, the power that one wields according to the law, one's political office; and dignitas, the power that comes from one's family's name and historical achievements, as well as one's personal virute and abilities. Of the two, the Romans rate dignitas more highly.

Romans have a different conception of homosexuality than most modern people do. "Romantic" love generally is a rather new concept to Romans, whose poets like Catullus and Ovid "imported" it from Greek poets in the 1st centuries BC and AD. Prior to that, marriage and sex were seen as primarily for procreation and maintaining the family line, and Romans didn't give much thought to attraction to members of either sex. As far as homosexuality goes, though, the main stigma whether you are on the giving or receiving end--that is, are you fellating or being fellated, being buggered or buggering. To fellate or be buggered by another man, to Romans, is a sign of a weakling, an inferior, effeminate position, and therefore to be ridiculed and scorned. In fact, under Roman law, a cuckholded husband can demand that his wife's adulterer fellate him, to reaffirm his position of power.