Answer:
B) patricians
Step-by-step explanation:
The early Roman society was roughly divided into two classes, one of them was the ruling class, and the other one was consisted of all the other free people. The people of the ruling class were called patricians, while the other people were called plebeians.
The patricians enjoyed lot of privileges in the early Roman society, and they were controlling pretty much everything, with only the emperor being above them in the hierarchy. They were making the decisions about the empire, later republic, and they were controlling the majority of the wealth as well.
That didn't lasted forever though, as the frustrated plebeians revolted against the patricians, and the patricians lost their power in the Roman society, remaining only as nominal title.
The title had its original significance in what later became Byzantium up until the Middle Ages, but it was far gone in Rome.