1In the three hundred and second year after Rome was founded, the form of the state is changed a second time, supreme power being transferred from consuls to decemvirs, just as it had passed before from kings to consuls. 1The change was less notable because it was not lasting. 2For the happy beginnings of that magistracy ran riot to excess; 2so the thing collapsed all the sooner, and they went back to entrusting the name and power of consuls to two men. 3The decemvirs elected were Appius Claudius, Titus Genucius, Publius Sestius, Lucius Veturius, Gaius Julius, Aulus Manlius, Publius Sulpicius, Publius Curiatius, Titus Romilius and Spurius Postumius. 4Claudius and Genucius were given this office in return for the office they gave up, because they had been consuls-elect for that year, and so was Sestius, one of the previous year's consuls, because he had referred the matter to the senators against his colleague's will.
5Next to them were reckoned the three envoys who had gone to Athens, both so that the office might be a reward for so distant an embassy, and because they believed that men skilled in foreign laws would be useful for framing the new code. 5The rest made up the number. 6They say that men of weighty years were also chosen in the last votes, so that they might oppose the decisions of the others less fiercely. 7Direction of the whole board lay with Appius, owing to the favour of the plebs; 7and he had put on so new a character that, instead of the harsh and savage persecutor of the plebs, he suddenly emerged as the plebs' friend and a hunter after every breath of popular favour.
7Each of them in turn administered justice to the people every tenth day. 8On that day the twelve fasces were with the one presiding over justice; 8each of his nine colleagues was attended by a single orderly. 8And along with a singular harmony among themselves — an agreement which is sometimes harmful to private citizens — there was the greatest fairness towards others. 9It will be enough to note a single instance as proof of their moderation. 9Although they had been elected without appeal, when a buried corpse had been discovered in the house of Publius Sestius, a man of patrician family, and brought out before an assembly, in a case as clear as it was atrocious, the decemvir Gaius Julius named a day for Sestius' trial and came forward as his accuser before the people, in a case of which he was himself the lawful judge; and he gave up his own right, so that he might add to the people's liberty what he took away from the power of the magistracy.