Lucius Genucius (Aventinensis) was a nobleman of the Genucia gens of

ancient Rome In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Em ...

who lived in the 4th century BCE. He was

tribune of the plebs Tribune of the plebs, tribune of the people or plebeian tribune () was the first office of the Roman Republic, Roman state that was open to the plebs, plebeians, and was, throughout the history of the Republic, the most important check on the pow ...

in 342 BCE, and brought forward a number of reforms in the wake of the

Samnite Wars The First, Second, and Third Samnite Wars (343–341 BC, 326–304 BC, and 298–290 BC) were fought between the Roman Republic and the Samnites, who lived on a stretch of the Apennine Mountains south of Rome and north of the Lucanian tribe. ...

, known as the ''

Leges Genuciae ''Leges Genuciae'' (also ''Lex Genucia'' or ''Lex Genucia de feneratione'') were laws passed in 342 BC by Tribune of the Plebs Lucius Genucius Aventinensis. These laws covered several topics: they banned lending that carried interest, which soon ...

'', abolishing

usury Usury () is the practice of making loans that are seen as unfairly enriching the lender. The term may be used in a moral sense—condemning taking advantage of others' misfortunes—or in a legal sense, where an interest rate is charged in e ...

, preventing the same person from holding two curule magistracies in the same year, or the same office twice within the next ten years (until 332 BCE), and requiring that at least one

consul Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states thro ...

had to be plebeian. These reforms were, with the

Licinio-Sextian rogations The Licinio-Sextian rogations were a series of laws proposed by Tribune of the Plebs, tribunes of the plebs, Gaius Licinius Stolo and Lucius Sextius Lateranus, enacted around 367 BC. Livy calls them ''rogatio'' – though he does refer to th ...

, the capstone legislation of the centuries-old

Conflict of the Orders The Conflict of the Orders or the Struggle of the Orders was a political struggle between the plebeians (commoners) and patricians (aristocrats) of the ancient Roman Republic lasting from 500 BC to 287 BC in which the plebeians sought political ...

that defined much of Roman politics for the early history of the Republic.

References

Year of birth unknown Year of death uncertain Genucii Tribunes of the plebs 4th-century BC Romans {{DGRBM, author=WS, title= Aventinensis (3) , volume=1, page=418, url=https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/moa/acl3129.0001.001/433