On The Cursus Publicus In The Early Empire Of Rome

“Cursus publicus” is a public postal system for the the early Empire of Rome, Itbears the important task of passing official documents,letters, officers and nationalmaterials.In the republic the messages were delivered by couriers (tabellarii), they sentprivate correspondence for the government officials. so there is the absence of a postalservice under the Roman Republic. During the period of the Augustus, He would needa centrally administered communications, then he created “cursus publicus”.“cursuspublicus” means the “public postal system”.It ensured the own security andbuttressed the stability of the empire.This paper is mainly divided into four parts.The first part tells the meaning of the cursus publicus, by analysising the points ofthe foreign and domestic scholars, combining with the original literature and drawsthe meaning of the “cursus publicus”.The second part is divided into two sections, the first section describes a postalservice under the Republic. the second section tells the establishment of the cursuspublicus.The third part describes the management and maintaince of the “cursus publicus”.The last part is the basic functions of the cursus publicus.Finally, with the above content, I try to analyze and summarize the “cursuspublicus”, indicating its important historical position.