civitas
Americannoun
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civitates
plural
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the body of citizens who constitute a state, especially a city-state, commonwealth, or the like.
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citizenship, especially as imparting shared responsibility, a common purpose, and sense of community.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of civitas
From Latin cīvitās; literally, “commmunity of citizens, citizenship,” equivalent to cīvis “citizen, fellow citizen” + -tās -ty 2 ( def. )
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
To gain civitas at birth, a person needed to be the child of two citizens.
From Textbooks ● Apr. 19, 2023
In addition to maintaining their frontier with an army, Romans carried on a perpetual debate about citizenship, or civitas, and whether to extend its benefits to different groups.
From Textbooks ● Apr. 19, 2023
Bell's book is the year's most promising start on the long road back to civitas.
From Time Magazine Archive
Harvey, a self-educated college dropout, talks a lot about William James, agora, public squares and preaching civitas.
From Time Magazine Archive
A civitas is necessarily stationary; but a populus may consist of Nomades, or wanderers from one pasture to another.
From Döderlein's Hand-book of Latin Synonymes by Ludwig Döderlein
When the legions departed, the neatly defined "civitates" quickly frayed as rivalries resurfaced.
From BBC ● Nov. 6, 2014
Utica became a Roman colony under Hadrian, and the civitates liberae, municipia, castella, pagi and turres were peopled with Latins.
From The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia Volume 1 of 28 by Project Gutenberg
The towns which had fought on the side of the Romans during the Third Punic War were declared civitates liberae, and became exceedingly prosperous.
From The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia Volume 1 of 28 by Project Gutenberg
The bulk of British local government must have been carried on through Roman municipalities, through imperial estates, and still more through tribal civitates using a Romanized constitution.
From The Romanization of Roman Britain by F. (Francis) Haverfield
The Duchy of Beneventum seems to have been divided into gastaldata, divisions of territory similar to the civitates of Lombardy, but presided over by a gastald instead of by a dux or comes.
From The Communes of Lombardy from the VI. to the X. Century An Investigation of the Causes Which Led to the Development Of Municipal Unity Among the Lombard Communes. by William Klapp Williams
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