COLLEGE, an assemblage of several bodies or societies, or of several persons into one society.
College, among the Romans, served indifferently for those employed in the offices of religion, of government, the liberal and even mechanical arts and trades; so that, with them, the word signified what we call a corporation or company.
In the Roman empire, there were not only the college of augurs, and the college of capitolini, i. e. of those who had the superintendence of the capitoline games; but also colleges of artificers, collegium artificum; college of carpenters, fabricorum or fabrorum tignariorum; of potters, figulorum; of founders, arrariorum; the college of locksmiths, fabrorum ferrariorum; of engineers of the army, tignariorum; of butchers, lanorum; of dendrophori, dendrophorum; of centonaries, centonariorum; of makers of military casques, sagariorum; of tent-makers, tabernaculariorum; of bakers, pistorum; of musicians, tibicinum, &c. Plutarch observes, that it was Numa who first divided the people into colleges, which he did to the end that each consulting the interests of their colleges, whereby they were divided from the citizens of the other colleges, they might not enter into any general conspiracy against the public repose.
Each of these colleges had distinct meeting places or halls; and likewise, in imitation of the state, a treasury and common chest, a register, and one to represent them, upon public occasions, and acts of government. These colleges had the privilege of manumitting slaves, of being legates, and making by-laws for their own body, provided they did not clash with those of the government.
There are various colleges on foot among the moderns, founded on the model of those of the ancients. Such are the three colleges of the empire, viz.