Editing Pontifex maximus (section)

===Election and number===
The number of Pontifices, elected by ''co-optatio'' (i.e. the remaining members nominate their new colleague) for life, was originally five, including the ''pontifex maximus''.<ref name="lacus">{{cite dictionary|url=https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/secondary/SMIGRA*/Pontifex.html|title=Pontifex Maximus|via=[[LacusCurtius]]|access-date=August 15, 2006|first=William|last=Smith|author-link=William Smith (lexicographer)|dictionary=[[A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities]]|publisher=[[John Murray (publishing house)|John Murray]]|location=London|year=1875|pages=939–942}}</ref><ref name=livius/> The ''pontifices'', moreover, could only come from the old nobility. In effect, this was only members of the patrician class. However, in 300&ndash;299&nbsp;BC the ''[[lex Ogulnia]]'' opened the office of ''pontifex maximus'' to public election and permitted the ''[[plebs]]'' (plebeians) to be co-opted as priests, so that part of the exclusivity of the title was lost. But it was only in 254&nbsp;BC that [[Tiberius Coruncanius]] became the first plebeian ''pontifex maximus''.<ref>[https://www.livius.org/li-ln/livy/periochae/periochae016.html Titus Livius. ''Ex Libro'' XVIII] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180819095111/http://www.livius.org/li-ln/livy/periochae/periochae016.html |date=August 19, 2018 }} Periochae, from livius.org retrieved August 16, 2006</ref>

The ''lex Ogulnia'' also increased the number of pontiffs to nine (the ''pontifex maximus'' included). In 104&nbsp;BC the ''lex Domitia'' prescribed that the election of all pontiffs would henceforward be voted by the ''comitia tributa'' (an assembly of the people divided into voting districts); by the same law only 17&nbsp;tribes, chosen by lot from the 35&nbsp;tribes of the city, could vote. The law's promulgator, L[ucius] Domitius Ahenobarbus, was shortly afterwards elected pontifex maximus after the death of the incumbent [[Metellus Dalmaticus]]: Something of a personal revenge because, the previous year, he had expected to be co-opted as a pontiff to replace his late father, but the pontifical college had appointed another candidate in his place. The office's next holder, [[Quintus Mucius Scaevola Pontifex|Q[uintus] Mucius Scaevola]], was also elected under the same law, though without controversy or opposition since he was a former consul and long-serving pontiff.

This law was abolished in 81&nbsp;BC by [[Lucius Cornelius Sulla|Sulla]] in his dictatorship, in the ''lex Cornelia de Sacerdotiis'', which restored to the great priestly colleges their full right of ''co-optatio''.<ref>Liv. Epit. 89</ref><ref>Pseudo-Ascon. in Divinat. p&nbsp;102, ed. Orelli</ref><ref>Dion Cass. xxxvii. 37</ref> Also under Sulla, the number of pontifices was increased to fifteen, the ''pontifex maximus'' included, and Sulla appointed [[Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius]] as the next holder of the office – the only truly unelected ''pontifex maximus'' in history, since even the other pontiffs did not get a vote in the matter.

In 63&nbsp;BC, the law of Sulla was abolished by the tribune [[Titus Labienus]], and a modified form of the ''lex Domitia'' was reinstated providing for election by ''comitia tributa'' once again: [[Julius Caesar|Gaius Julius Caesar]] followed Ahenobarbus's precedent by being elected by public vote, although Caesar at least had previously been a pontiff. Marcus Antonius later restored the right of ''co-optatio'' to the college,<ref>Dion Cass. xliv. 53</ref> in time for the election of [[Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (triumvir)|Marcus Aemilius Lepidus]]. Also under [[Julius Caesar]], the number of pontifices were increased to sixteen, the ''pontifex maximus'' included. (Possibly because Caesar's own long absences from Rome necessitated the appointment of a deputy pontiff for those occasions when fifteen needed to be present.) The number of pontifices varied during the Empire but is believed to have been regular at fifteen.<ref name=lacus/>