The Roman municipal regimen, which is described in M. Guizot’s L’Essais sur l’Histoire de France (1st Essay, pp. 1-44), did not everywhere perish with the empire; it kept its footing in a great number of towns, especially in those of Southern Gaul, Marseilles, Arles, Nismes, Narbonne, Toulouse, &c.  At Arles the municipality actually bore the name of commune (communitas), Toulouse gave her municipal magistrates the name of Capitouls, after the Capitol of Rome, and in the greater part of the other towns in the south they were called Consuls.  After the great invasion of barbarians from the seventh to the end of the eleventh century, the existence of these Roman municipalities appears but rarely and confusedly in history; but in this there is nothing peculiar to the towns and the municipal regimen, for confusion and obscurity were at that time universal, and the nascent feudal system was plunged therein as well as the dying little municipal systems were.  Many Roman municipalities were still subsisting without influencing any event of at all a general kind, and without leaving any trace; and as the feudal system grew and grew they still went on in the midst of universal darkness and anarchy.  They had penetrated into the north of Gaul in fewer numbers and with a weaker organization than in the south, but still keeping their footing and vaunting themselves on their Roman origin in the face of their barbaric conquerors.  The inhabitants of Rheims remembered with pride that their municipal magistracy and its jurisdiction were anterior to Clovis, dating as they did from before the days of St. Remigius, the apostle of the Franks.  The burghers of Metz boasted of having enjoyed civil rights before there was any district of Lorraine:  “Lorraine,” said they, “is young, and Metz is old.”  The city of Bourges was one of the most complete examples of successive transformations and denominations attained by a Roman municipality from the sixth to the thirteenth century under the Merovingians, the Carlovingians, and the earliest Capetians.  At the time of the invasion it had arenas, an amphitheatre, and all that characterized a Roman city.  In the seventh century, the author of the life of St. Estadiola, born at Bourges, says that “she was the child of illustrious parents who, as worldly dignity is accounted, were notable by reason of senatorial rank; and Gregory of Tours quotes a judgment delivered by the principals (primores) of the city of Bourges.  Coins of the time of Charles the Bald are struck with the name of the city of Bourges and its inhabitants (Bituriges).  In 1107, under Philip I., the members of the municipal body of Bourges are named prud’hommes.  In two charters, one of Louis the Young, in 1145, and the other of Philip Augustus, in 1218, the old senators of Bourges have the name at one time of bons hommes, at another of barons of the city.  Under different names, in accordance with changes of language, the Roman municipal regimen held on and adapted itself to new social conditions.