Chapter XXII: Appendix: Some Byzantine Authorities (21)

Unhappily this exaction and distribution in kind was at best a wasteful process. At worst it was simply ruinous. The empire was subject to constant menace of attack, and was in dire need of the largest possible income raised on the most economical system. If the ultimate basis of imperial strength was to be found in the food-producers, it was all-important to give the farming classes a feeling of security sufficient to encourage industry and enterprise, and at all costs to avoid reducing them to despair. Nor was the new census as designed by Diocletian on the face of it an unjust and evil institution. Taking account of arable lands and of the persons employed in cultivating them, it aimed at creating a fixed number[1559] of agricultural units each of which should be liable to furnish the same amount of yearly dues in kind. But it is obvious that to carry out this doctrinaire scheme with uniform neatness and precision was not possible. To deal fairly with agriculture a minute attention to local differences and special peculiarities was necessary, and this attention could not be given on so vast a scale. Perhaps careful observation and correction of errors might have produced a reasonable degree of perfection in a long period of unbroken peace: but no such period was at hand. The same strain that drove the imperial government to the new taxation also prevented any effective control of its working.

It is perhaps inevitable that the exaction of dues in kind should lead to abuses. At all events, abuses in this department were no new thing: the sufferings of such Provinces as Sicily and Asia were notorious in the time of the Republic. A stricter control had made the state of things much better in the first two centuries of the Empire. The exploitation of the Provincials was generally checked, and the imperial government was not as yet driven by desperate financial straits to turn extortioner itself. Caracalla’s law of 212, extending the Roman franchise[1560] to all free inhabitants, was a symptom of conscious need, for it brought all estates under the Roman succession-tax. At the same time it did away with the old distinction between the ruling Roman people and the subject nationalities: henceforth, wherever there was oppression within the Roman world, it necessarily fell upon Roman[1561] citizens. Time had been when the Roman citizen, free to move into any part of the Roman dominions and to acquire property there[1562] under protection of Roman law, made full use of the opportunities afforded him, to the disadvantage of the subject natives. Now all alike were the helpless subjects of a government that they could neither reform nor supersede; a government whose one leading idea was to bring all institutions into fixed grooves in which they should move mechanically year after year, unsusceptible of growth or decay. True, the plan was absurd, and some few observers may have detected its absurdity. But the power of challenging centralized officialism and evoking expression of public opinion, never more than rudimentary in the Roman state, was now simply extinct. Things had come to such a pass that, speaking generally, a citizen’s choice lay between two alternatives. Either he must bear an active part in the system that was squeezing out the vital economic forces of the empire, making whenever possible a profit for himself out of a salary or illicit gains; or he must submit passively to all such extortions as the system, worked by men whose duty and interest alike tended to make them merciless, was certain to inflict. The oppressors, though numerous, could only be few in proportion to the whole free population. Therefore the vast majority stood officially condemned to lives of penury and wretchedness. The system became more hard-set and the outlook more hopeless with the lapse of time.

The dues exacted from the various parts of the empire varied in quality[1563] according to local conditions, and to some extent in methods of collection. In the frontier Provinces the quantity was sometimes reduced[1564] by remissions, when a district ravaged by invaders was relieved for a few years that it might recover its normal productiveness. The details of these variations are beyond the scope of the present inquiry. The general principle underlying the whole system was the fixing of taxation-units equal in liability, and the organizing of collection in municipal groups. Each municipal town or _civitas_ was the administrative centre of a district, and stood charged in the imperial ledgers as liable for the returns from a certain number of units, this number being that recorded as existing at the last quinquennial census. For the collection the chief municipal authorities were responsible; and they had to hand over the amount due to the imperial authorities, whether they had received it in full or not. Already burdened with strictly municipal liabilities, the members of municipal senates (_curiales_) were crushed by this additional and incalculable pressure. Unable to resist, they generally took the course of so using their functions and powers as to protect their own interests as far as possible. One obvious precaution was to see that the number of taxable units[1565] in their district was not fixed too high by the census officials. This precaution was certainly not overlooked, and success in keeping down the number may well have been the chief reason why the system was able to go on so long. The _curiales_ were mostly considerable landlords, residing in their town and letting their land to tenants. But there were other landlords, smaller men, some also resident in the towns, others in the country. We still hear of men farming land[1566] of their own, and it seems that some of these held and farmed other land also, as _coloni_ of larger landlords. When any question arose as to the number of units for the tax on which this or that farm was liable, it is clear that the interests of different classes might easily clash. And the _curiales_ undoubtedly took care[1567] that their own and those of their friends did not suffer.

These remarks imply that the system practically worked in favour of the richer classes[1568] as against the poorer. And so it certainly did, not only in the time of revision at the census each fifth year, but on other occasions. If an invasion or some other great disaster led the emperor to grant temporary relief, this would normally take the form of reducing the number of taxable units in the district for a certain period. But the local authorities were left to apportion this reduction[1569] among the several estates, and the poor farmers had no representative to see that they got their fair share of relief. Moreover, outside taxation, the farmers were often subjected to heavy burdens and damage by the irregular requisitions of imperial officials. For instance, the staff of the imperial post-service (_cursus publicus_)[1570] were a terror. They pressed the goods of farmers into the service of their department on various pretexts, and exacted labour on upkeep of roads and stations. For their tyranny there was no effective compensation or redress. Like other officials, they could be bought off by bribes: but this meant that the various exactions[1571] were shifted from the shoulders of the rich to those of the poor. Another iniquity, the revival of a very old[1572] abuse, was connected with the question of transport, an important consideration in the case of dues in kind, often bulky. For instance, in the case of corn, the place at which it had to be delivered might easily count for more in estimating the actual pressure of the burden than the amount of grain levied. In making the arrangements for delivery there were openings for favouritism and bribery. Circumstances varied greatly in various parts of the empire. In some Provinces delivery was made at a military depot within easy reach. Transport by sea from Egypt or Africa was carried on by gilds[1573] of shippers, who became more and more organized and regulated by law. But in many parts good roads were few, and laid out for strategic reasons; the country roads inconvenient and rough: and for transport in bulk the post-service provided no machinery available for the use of private persons.

It is not necessary here to follow out in detail all the particular discomforts and grievances of the farming classes under the system devised by Diocletian and developed by his successors. Enough has been said to shew that they were great, and to remove all ground for wondering that the area of arable land actually under tillage, and with it population, continued to decline. Constantine’s law confirming the bondage of _coloni_ to the soil by forbidding movement was the confession of a widespread evil, but no remedy. Repeated legislation to the same purpose only recorded and continued the failure. When all the resources of evasion were exhausted, the pauperized serf fled to a town and depended for a living on the pitiful doles of private or ecclesiastical charity, or turned brigand and took precarious toll of those who still had something to lose. In either case he was an additional burden on a society that already had more than it could bear. In 382 we find an attempt[1574] made to put down ‘sturdy beggars.’ The law rewarded anyone who procured the conviction of such persons by handing over the offenders to him. An ex-slave became the approver’s own slave, and one who had nothing of his own beyond his freeborn quality was granted to him as his _colonus_ for life. But this law seems to have been ineffectual like others. Desertion of farms might to some extent be checked, but mendicity and brigandage remained.

There was however another movement, later in time and less in volume, but not less serious as affecting the practical working of the imperial machine. With the increase of poverty life in municipal towns became less attractive. Local eminence was no longer an object of ambition; for to local burdens, once cheerfully borne, was now added a load of imperial responsibilities which lay heavy on all men of property, and which they could neither shake off nor control. In hope of evading them, well-to-do citizens took refuge[1575] in the country, either on estates of their own or under the protection of great landlords already settled there. But to allow this would mean the depletion of the local senates (_curiae_) on whose services as revenue-collectors the financial system of the empire depended. To prevent men qualified for the position of _curiales_ from escaping that duty was the aim of legislation[1576] which by repeated enactments confessed its own failure. That there were country magnates, men of influence (_potentes_), whose protection might seem able to screen municipal defaulters, is a point to be noted. They were the great _possessores_[1577] (a term no longer applied to small men), who held large estates organized on a sort of manorial model, and sometimes ruled them like little principalities, territorial lordships[1578] standing in direct relations with the central authorities and not hampered by inclusion in the general municipal scheme. Such ‘peculiars’ had existed under the earlier Empire, and evidently continued to exist: the Crown-lands of the emperors, especially in Africa, were the most signal cases. But the great private Possessor could not secure to his domain the various exemptions[1579] that emperors conferred on theirs. He had to collect and pay over[1580] the dues from his estate, as a municipal magistrate did from the district round his town-centre. But he had a more immediate and personal interest in the wellbeing of all his tenants and dependants, whose presence and prosperity gave to his land by far the greater part[1581] of its value.

That territorial magnates should be free to build up a perhaps dangerous power in various corners of the empire by gathering dependants round them, could hardly be viewed with approval by the jealousy of emperors. Not only was the system of letting land in parcels to tenants spreading, but the power of the landlords over them was increasing, long before Constantine took the final step of treating them as attached permanently to the soil. Whether they were the landlord’s free tenants who had gradually lost through economic weakness the effective use of freedom; or small freeholders who had found it worth their while to part with their holdings to a big man and become his tenants for the sake of enjoying his protection; or former slaves to whom small farms had been entrusted on various conditions; they were in a sort of economic bondage. Doubtless most of them lived from hand to mouth, but we have no reason to believe that poverty, so long as they had plenty to live on, was the motive[1582] that made them wish to give up their holdings and try their luck elsewhere. It was the cruel pressure of Diocletian’s new taxation, and the army of officials employed to enforce it, that drove them to despair. A contemporary witness[1583] tells us, referring to this very matter, ‘the excess of receivers over givers was becoming so marked that farms were being abandoned, and tillages falling to woodland, the resources of the tenants being exhausted by the hugeness[1584] of the imposts.’ And this evidence does not stand alone. So Constantine sought a remedy in prevention of movement, binding down the tenants to the soil. Henceforth the land to which a _colonus_[1585] was attached by birth, and the _colonus_ himself, were to be legally and economically inseparable. Attempts at evading the new rule were persistently met by later[1586] legislation. The motive of such attempts may be found by remembering that depopulation was steadily lowering the value of land and raising that of labour. If an individual landlord could add to the value of his own estate by getting more _coloni_ settled on it, withdrawn from other estates, he might profit by the transaction: but the government, whose policy was to keep the greatest possible area under cultivation, could not allow one part to be denuded of labourers to suit the interest of the owner of another part.

When the law stepped in to deprive the tenant, already far gone in dependence on his landlord, of such freedom of movement as he still retained, it is remarkable that rustic slaves were not at the same time legally attached to the soil. That inconvenience was caused by masters selling them when and where they chose, is shewn by Constantine’s law[1587] of 327, allowing such sales to take place only within the limits of the Province where they had been employed. No doubt their removal upset the arrangements for that part of a taxable unit in which the number of adult heads[1588] was taken into account, and so had to be checked. But it seems not to have been till the time of Valentinian[1589], somewhere between 367 and 375, that the sale of a farm-slave off the land was directly prohibited, like that of a _colonus_. In referring to this matter, the significance of the difference of dates is thus brought out[1590] by Seeck: ‘That this measure was carried through much sooner in the case of the small farmers than in that of the farm-slaves, is very characteristic of the spirit of that age. Where court favour is the deciding factor that governs the entire policy, the government is even more reluctant to limit the proprietary rights of the great landlord[1591] than the liberties of the small man.’ This is very true, but we must not forget that in both cases the binding of the labourer to the soil did in fact restrict the landlord’s freedom of disposal. He as well as his dependants came under a system not designed to promote his private convenience or interest, but to guarantee a maximum of total cultivation in the interest of the empire as a whole. So we find that he was not allowed[1592] to raise at will the rents of his tenants: they could sue their landlord (a right which in practice was probably not worth much), and even when this right was restricted[1593] in 396 they still retained it in respect of unfair increases of rent and criminal cases. So too, if he acquired extra slaves, either by receiving them as volunteers from derelict farms or in virtue of an imperial grant, it was strictly ordained[1594] that such acquisition carried with it the tax-liability for the whole of the derelict land. The landlord was therefore kept firmly in the grip of the central power, and not left free to build up a little principality by consolidating at will all the labour-resources that he could annex as dependants. Moreover he was watched by a host of imperial agents and spies whose interests could only be reconciled with his own by the costly method of recurrent bribery.

When we return to the main question of the actual farm-labour, and ask who toiled with their own hands to raise crops, we find ourselves in a curious position. The evidence, whether legal or literary, leaves us in no doubt that the tenant farmer of this period was normally himself a labourer. And yet it is not easy to cite passages in which this is directly affirmed. The pompous and affected language of the imperial laws is throughout a bad medium for conveying simple facts; nor was the question, who did the work, of any interest to the central authority, concerned solely with the regular exaction of the apportioned dues. The real proof that _coloni_, whether still holding some land of their own or merely tenants, and _inquilini_, whether solely barbarian dependants or not, were actual handworkers, is to be found in legitimate inference from certain facts. First, the increase in the value of labour compared with the decline in that of land. The binding of tenant to soil was a confession of this. Secondly, the general poverty of the farmers[1595] and their helplessness against oppression and wrong. Of this the description of Salvian gives a striking, if rhetorical, picture, and it is implied in many laws designed[1596] for their protection. That persons in so weak an economic position could have carried on their business as mere directors of slave-labour is surely inconceivable: and we are to remember that not only they themselves but their families also were bound to the soil. It was their presence, that is to say their labour, that gave value to the land, and so paid the taxes. Hence it was that in forming taxable units (_capita_) it was generally the practice to include in the reckoning[1597] not only the productive area (_iugatio_) but also the ‘heads’ that stocked it (_capitatio_). In other words, productiveness must in the interest of the state be actual, not merely potential.

The importance of keeping the real locally-bound _coloni_ strictly to their business of food-production was fully recognized in the regulations for recruiting the armies. Landlords, required to furnish[1598] recruits, were free to name some of their _coloni_ for that purpose. But there was no fear that they would be eager to do this, for the work of their tenants was what gave value to their properties. And the imperial officers charged with recruiting duty were ordered[1599] (and this in 400, when the need of soldiers was extreme) not to accept fugitive tenants belonging to an estate (_indigenis_): these no doubt if found were to be returned to their lords. The military levy was to fall upon sons of veterans, for in this class as in others no effort was spared to make the ways of life hereditary; or on wastrels (_vagos_)[1600], of whom the laws often make mention; or generally on persons manifestly by the circumstances of their birth (_origo_) liable to army service. Here we have the service still in principle confined to freemen. But it is not to be doubted that many a slave (and these would be nearly all rustic slaves) passed muster with officers hasting to make up their tale of men, and so entered the army. At a much later date (529) we find Justinian[1601] contemplating cases of slaves recruited with the consent of their owners, in short furnished as recruits. He enacts that such men are to be declared _ingenui_[1602], that is freeborn not freedmen, the master losing all rights over them: but, if they are efficient soldiers, they are to remain in the service. And the power of commuting[1603] the obligation of furnishing a recruit for a payment of money, which was to some extent allowed, introduced a method of recruiting[1604] by purchase. A recruit being demanded, it did not follow that the emperor got either the particular man (inspected of course and passed as fit) or a fixed cash-commutation. The recruiting officer conveniently happened to have a man or two at disposal, picked up in the course of his tour. The landlord, anxious to keep his own staff intact, came to terms with the officer for one of these as substitute. These officers knew when they could drive hard bargains, and did not lose their chances. In a law of 375, this system is directly referred to, and an attempt is made to regulate it[1605] on an equitable footing. To abolish it was clearly impossible. Eventually the state undertook to work it officially, and bought its own ‘bodies’ (_corpora_, like σώματα, of slaves) with the composition-money or _aurum_ _temonarium_. That some of these ‘bodies’ were escaped slaves is highly probable. Some may have been stray barbarians, not included in the various barbarian corps which more and more came to form the backbone of the Roman army. But the majority would probably be indigent wretches to whom any change seemed better than the miserable lives open to them in the meanest functions of the decaying civilization of the towns. In any case such recruits[1606] would be but a poor substitute for the pick of the rustic population.

The same anxiety to spare the rustics unnecessary exactions, that they might not sink under their present burdens, appears in other regulations. The subordinates employed in the public services such as the Post, or as attendants on functionaries, were tempted to ease their own duties by demanding contributions from the helpless countryfolk. This we find forbidden[1607] in 321 as interfering with the farmers’ right to procure and carry home things required for agriculture. So too a whole Title[1608] in the _Codex_ is devoted to the prevention of _superexactiones_, a form of extortion often practised by officials, chiefly by the use of false weights and measures or by foul play with the official receipts. The laws forbidding practices of this kind seem to belong to the latter part of the fourth century and the earlier part of the fifth. But the evil was clearly of old standing, and the laws almost certainly vain. That illicit exactions were a particular affliction of the poorer rustics, who could not bribe the officials, is confessed[1609] by a law of 362, which ordains that the burdens of supplying beasts fodder etc for service of the Post, upkeep of the roads and so forth, are to be laid on all _possessores_ alike. Further enactments follow in 401 and 408. But these rules for equitable distribution of burdens, even if carried out, only spread them over all landowners and _coloni_. All the upper ranks[1610] of the imperial service carried exemption from _sordida munera_ in some form or other, and personal grants of exemption were often granted as a favour. It is true that such exemption only extended to the life of the grantee, that exemptions were revocable, and that in course of time extreme necessities led to revocations. But all this did not operate to relieve the unhappy rustic on whom the whole imperial fabric rested. The rich might have to lose their privileges, but it was too late for the poor to gain a benefit. That the underlings of provincial governors were a terror to farmers, levying on them illicit services and generally blackmailing them for their own profit, is clear from the law[1611] (somewhere 368-373) announcing severe punishment for the offence and declaring that it had become a regular practice. The law of 328, enacting[1612] that no farmer (_agricola_) was to be impressed for special service in the seasons of seed-time or harvest, is on rather a different footing. It expressly justifies the prohibition on the ground of agricultural necessity: in short, it is not to protect the farmer, but, to leave him no excuse for not producing food.

A great critic[1613] has commented severely on the intellectual stagnation that fell upon the Roman empire and was one of the most effective causes of its decline. That literature fed upon the past and dwindled into general imbecility is commonly recognized: but the lack of material inventions and the paucity of improvements is perhaps not less significant than the decay of literature and art. The department of agriculture was no exception to this sterile traditionality. Since the days of Varro there had been no considerable change. So far as labour is concerned, the system of Columella can hardly be called an advance; for it employs directly none but slave labour, a resource already beginning to fail, and causing landlords to seek help from the development of tenancies. In modern times the dearness of labour has stimulated human ingenuity to produce machines by which the efficiency of human labour is increased and therefore fewer hands required for a given output. But in the world under the Roman supremacy centuries went by with hardly any modification of the mechanical equipment. A small exception may perhaps be found in a sort of rudimentary reaping-machine. It was briefly referred to by the elder Pliny[1614] in the first century of our era, and described by Palladius in the fourth. The device was in use on the large estates in the lowlands of Gaul, and was perhaps a Gaulish invention. It is said to have been a labour-saving[1615] appliance. From the description it seems to have been clumsy; and, since it cut off the ears and left the straw standing, it was only suited to farms on which no special use was made of the straw. Its structure (for it was driven by an ox from behind) must have made it unworkable on sloping ground. That we hear nothing of its general adoption may be due to these or other defects. But I believe there is no record of attempts to improve the original design. The lack of interest in improvement of tools has been noted as a phenomenon accompanying the dependence on slave labour. And when under the Roman empire we see the free tenant passing into the condition of a serf-tenant, we are witnessing a process that steadily tended to reduce him to the moral labour-level of the apathetic and hopeless slave. To make the agriculture of a district more prosperous was to attract the attention of greedy officials. To resist their illicit extortions was to attract the attention of the central government, whose growing needs were ever tempting it to squeeze more and more out of its subjects. Why then should the rustic, tied to the soil, trouble himself to seek more economical methods, the profits of which, if ever realized, he was not himself likely to enjoy?

LII. LIBANIUS.

In order to get so far as possible a living picture of the conditions of rustic life and labour we must glean the scattered notices preserved to us in the writers of the period of decline. Due allowance must be made for the general artificiality and rhetorical bent of authors trained in the still fashionable schools of composition and style. For even private letters were commonly written as models destined eventually to be read and admired by the public, while in controversial works and public addresses the tendency to attitudinize was dominant. The circulation of literary trivialities and exchange of cheap compliments, especially prevalent in Gaul, was kept up to the last by self-satisfied cliques when the barbarians were already established in the heart of the empire. Nevertheless valuable sidelights on questions of fact are thrown from several points of view. This evidence agrees with that drawn from the imperial laws, and is in so far better for our purpose that it deals almost exclusively with the present. When it looks to the future, it is in the form of petition or advice; while the normal substance of the laws is to confess the existence of monstrous abuses by threatening offenders with penalties ever more and more severe, and enjoining reforms that no penalties could enforce. A writer very characteristic of his age (about 315-400) is the ‘sophist’ =Libanius=, who passed most of his later years at Antioch, the luxurious chief city of the East. For matters under his immediate observation he is a good authority, and may help us to form a notion of the extent to which imperial ordinances were practically operative in the eastern parts of the empire.

Two of the ‘orations,’ or written addresses, of Libanius are particularly interesting as appeals to the emperor Theodosius for redress of malpractices affecting the rustic population and impairing the financial resources of the empire. The earlier[1616] (about 385) exposes gross misdeeds of the city magistrates of Antioch. What with the falling of old houses and clearing of sites for new buildings there were great quantities of mixed rubbish to be removed and deposited elsewhere. Apparently there was now no sufficient staff of public slaves at disposal; at all events the city authorities resorted to illegal means for procuring the removal. When the country folk came into town to dispose of their produce, the magistrates requisitioned their carts asses mules (and themselves as drivers) for this work. Thus the time of the poor rustics was wasted, their carts and sacks damaged, and they and their beasts sent back to their homes in a state of utter exhaustion. No law empowered the city magnates to act thus. From small beginnings a sort of usage had been created, which nothing short of imperial ordinance could now break and abolish. That the magistrates were conscious of doing wrong was shewn by what they avoided doing. They did not impress slaves or carts from houses in the city. They did not exact like services from the military or powerful landlords. Nor did they lay the burden on the estates[1617] of the municipality, the rents from which were part of the revenues of Antioch. Favour is only justified by equity; and there is, says Libanius, no equity in sparing the luxurious rich by ruining the poor. So he entreats his most gracious[1618] Majesty to protect the farms as much as the cities, or rather more. For the country is in fact the foundation on which cities rest. Without it they could never have existed: and now it is on the rise and fall of rural wellbeing that urban prosperity depends. This appeal speaks for itself. But it is significant that the skilled pleader thinks it wise to end on a note of imperial interest. ‘Moreover, Sire, it is from the country that your tribute is drawn. It is to the cities that you address your orders[1619] for taxation, but the cities have to raise it from the country. Therefore, to protect the farmers is to preserve your interests, and to maltreat the farmers is to betray them.’

In the oration numbered 47 the abuse dealt with is of a very different kind. The date is 391 or 392, and the subject is the ‘protections’ (_patrocinia_)[1620] of villages. The pressure of imperial taxation and the abuses accompanying its collection had driven the villagers to seek help in resisting the visits of the tax-gatherers. This help was generally found in placing the village under the protection of some powerful person, commonly a retired soldier, who acted as a rallying-centre and leader, probably in most cases backed by some retainers of his own class. Of course these men did not undertake opposition to the public authorities for nothing. But it seems that their exactions were, at least in the earlier stages, found to be less burdensome than those of the official collectors. The situation thus created was as follows. The local senators (_curiales_) whose turn it was to collect the dues from the district under their municipality (a duty that they were not allowed to shirk) went out to the villages for the purpose. They were beaten off[1621] by use of force, often wounded as well as foiled. They were still bound to pay over the tax, which they had not received, to the imperial treasury. In these latter days default of payment rendered them liable to cruel scourging. So the unhappy _curiales_ had to sell their own property to make up the amount due. The loss of their means strikes them out of the _curia_ for lack of the legal qualification. And this was not only a loss to their particular city: it damaged imperial interests, bound up as the whole system was with maintaining unimpaired the supply of qualified _curiales_. The evil of these ‘protections’ was, according to Libanius, great and widespread. The protectors had become a great curse to the villagers themselves by their tyranny and exactions. Their lawless sway had turned[1622] farmers into brigands, and taught them to use iron not for tools of tillage but for weapons of bloodshed. And the trouble was not confined to villages where the land belonged to a number of small owners: it extended also to those[1623] under one big proprietor. The argument that the villagers have a right to seek help in resistance to extortion, is only sound if the means employed are fair. To justify this limitation two significant analogies[1624] are applied. Cities near the imperial frontier must not call in the foreign enemy to aid them in settling their differences with each other: they must seek help within the empire. A slave must not invoke the aid of casual bystanders against ill-usage: he stands in no relation to outsiders, and must look to his master for redress. The full bearing of these considerations is seen when we remember that the farmers are serf-tenants. They are owned[1625] by masters, as the municipal city exists only in and for the empire, and the slave has no legal personality apart from his lord.

It is a fact, says[1626] Libanius, that through such evasion of their liabilities on the part of the rustics many houses have been ruined. He is surely referring to the _curiales_ and other landlords resident in the city, the numbers of which class it was the imperial policy to maintain at full strength. In moral indignation[1627] he urges the iniquity of beggaring poor souls who have nothing to live on but the income from their lands. ‘Say I have an estate, inherited or bought, farmed by sensible tenants who humbly faced the ups and downs of Fortune under my considerate care. Must you then stir them up by agitation, arousing unlooked-for conflicts, and reducing men of good family to indigence?’ This appeal would not sound overdrawn in the society of that age, though it might fall somewhat coldly upon modern ears. But the most notable point in this oration is the nature of the remedy[1628] for which the writer pleads, and which none but the emperor can supply. It is simply to enforce the existing law. Some years before, probably in 368, the emperor Valens had strictly forbidden[1629] the ‘protections’ that were the cause of this trouble. So now the appeal to Theodosius is ‘give the law sinews, make it a law indeed[1630] and not a bare exhortation.’ For, if it is not to be observed, it had better be repealed. That a leading writer of the day could so state the case to the ruler of the Roman world is a fact to be borne in mind by readers of the imperial laws.

LIII. SYMMACHUS

In passing on to =Q. Aurelius Symmachus=[1631] (about 345-405) we find ourselves in very different surroundings. The scene is in Italy, and the author a man of the highest station in what was still regarded as the true centre of the Roman world. He was _praefectus urbi_ in 384-5, consul in 391, and the leading figure in Roman society and literary circles. From the bulky collection of his letters, and the forty reports (_relationes_) addressed to the emperor by him as city prefect, we get much interesting evidence as to the condition of rural Italy and the anxieties of the corn-supply of Rome. With his championship of the old religion, by which he is best known, we have here nothing to do; and his literary affectations, characteristic of most writers of the later Empire, do not discredit him as a witness. A remarkable feature of his letters is their general triviality and absence of direct reference to the momentous events that were happening in many parts of the empire. His attention is almost wholly absorbed by matters with which he was immediately connected, his public duties, his private affairs, the interests of his relatives and friends, or the exchange of compliments. His time is mostly passed either in Rome or at one or other of his numerous country seats: for he was one of the great landlords of his day, and the condition of Italian agriculture was of great importance to him. As a representative of the landed interest and as a self-conscious letter-writer he resembles the younger Pliny, but is weaker and set in a less happy age.

A topic constantly recurring[1632] in his correspondence is the apprehension of famine in Rome and the disturbances certain to arise therefrom. The distribution of imperial powers among several seats of government (of which Rome was not one) since the changes of Diocletian had left to the ancient capital only a sort of traditional primacy. The central bureaus were elsewhere, and Rome was only the effective capital of the southern division of Italy. Yet the moral force of her great past was still a living influence that expressed itself in various ways, notably in the growth of the Papacy out of the Roman bishopric. For centuries it had been the licensed lodging of a pauperized mob, fed by doles to keep them quiet, enjoying luxurious baths at nominal cost, and entertained with exciting or bloody shows in the circus or amphitheatre. This rabble had either to be kept alive and amused or got rid of; but the latter alternative would surely have reduced Rome to the condition of a dead city. It was morally impossible for a Roman emperor to initiate so ominous a policy. So the wasteful abomination dragged on, and every hitch in the corn-supply alarmed not only the _praefectus annonae_ but the _praefectus urbi_ with the prospect of bread riots. And the assignment of the Egyptian corn to supply Constantinople made Rome more than ever dependent on the fortunes of the African[1633] harvest. When this failed, it was only by great departmental energy that temporary shortage was made good by importations[1634] from Macedonia Sardinia or Spain or even by some surplus from Egypt. Even lower Italy, where little corn was grown, was at a pinch made to yield some. But bad seasons were not the only cause of short supplies. The acts of enemies might starve out Rome, as the rebellion of Gildo in Africa (397-8) nearly did. Moreover the slackness and greed of officials[1635] sometimes ruined the efficiency of the department, and ‘profiteering’ was practised by unscrupulous[1636] capitalists. Nor even with good harvests abroad were the prefects always at ease, since the corn-fleets might be delayed or scattered by foul weather, and meanwhile the consumption did not cease. And it sometimes happened that the cargoes were damaged and the public health suffered[1637] from unwholesome food. Among these various cares the _praefectura annonae_ was no bed of roses. No wonder the worthy Symmachus tells us of private charity[1638] to relieve the necessities of the poor, and even gives a hint of voluntary rationing at the tables of the rich. But in appealing to the gods for succour he rather suggests that human benevolence would be unequal to the strain.

That agriculture was not on a sound footing in most of Italy is evident from several passages in the letters. In one of the earliest (before 376) he tells his father that, though he finds Campania charming, he should like to join him at Praeneste. ‘But’ he adds ‘I am in trouble about my property. I must go and inspect it wherever it lies, not in hope of making it remunerative, but in order to realize the promise of the land by further outlay. For things are nowadays come to such a pass[1639] that an owner has to feed the farm that once fed him.’ Some of the references to the management of estates are rather obscure. In speaking of one near Tibur he mentions[1640] stewards (_vilicorum_) and complains of their neglect. ‘The land is badly farmed, and great part of the returns (_fructuum_) is in arrear (_debetur_): the _coloni_ have no means left[1641] to enable them to clear their accounts or to carry on cultivation.’ The exact status of these stewards and tenants and their relations to each other are far from clear, and the case may have been a peculiar one. Again, writing to bespeak the good offices of an influential man on behalf of an applicant, he says ‘I do this for him rather as a duty[1642] than as an act of free grace, for he is a farm-tenant of mine.’ The tenant’s name is Theodulus, which invites a conjecture that this was a case of an oriental Greek slave placed as tenant on a farm, either for his master’s account, or for his own at a rent, and afterwards manumitted. A reference to _servi_, dependants (_obnoxii_)[1643] who are owing him rents which his agents on the distant estate in question do not take the trouble to collect, may point to the same sort of arrangement. In another passage he mentions[1644] a man who was for a long time _colonus_ under a certain landlord, but here too the lack of detail forbids inference as to the exact nature of the relation. That slave labour was still employed on some Italian farms appears from a request[1645] for help in recovering some runaways. They may have been house slaves, but if a neighbouring landlord gave them shelter no doubt he made them pay for it in work. The control of slaves in the country was never easy, and the quasi-military discipline described by Columella was a confession of this. And it was only on a large scale that a staff of overseers sufficient to work it could be provided. The time for it was indeed gone by. Slaves employed in hunting[1646] are mentioned by Symmachus as by Pliny. No doubt they took to this occupation with zest. The degeneracy of hunting by deputy is contemptuously noted as a sign of the times by the soldier critic[1647] Ammianus. But it was no new thing.

That the general state of the countryside was hardly favourable to the quiet development of agriculture may be gathered from many notices. For instance, when he would have been glad to be out of Rome for the good of his health, he complains[1648] that the prevalence of brigandage in the country near forces him to stay in the city. A friend urges him to come back to Rome for fear of a violent raid on an estate apparently suburban: he can only reply[1649] that a breach of possession during his absence will not hold good in law. Whether the _militaris impressio_[1650] on his farm at Ostia, to which he casually refers, was the raid of foreign foes suddenly landing on that coast, or the lawless outrage of imperial troops, is not certain: I rather suspect the latter. For, fifteen years later (398), after the overthrow of Gildo, he writes[1651] that the soldiers are all back from Africa, and the Appian way is clear: here the meaning seems plain. And his endeavour[1652] to prevent the commandeering of an old friend’s house at Ariminum for military quarters is significant of the high-handed treatment of civilians by army men in those days, of which we have other evidence. Nevertheless men were still willing to buy estates. Symmachus himself was still adding to his vast possessions. We see him in treaty[1653] for a place in Samnium, where there was apparently some queer practice on the part of the seller: in another case he is annoyed[1654] that his partner in a joint purchase has contrived to secure the whole bargain as sole transferee, and rather sulkily offers to waive his legal claims on being reimbursed what he has already paid to the transferor. It seems strange that a man who, beside his numerous properties in Italy, owned estates[1655] in Mauretania (where he complains that the governors allow his interests to suffer) and in Sicily (where the lessee is called _conductor_, probably a tenant in chief subletting to _coloni_), should have had an appetite for more investments of doubtful economic value. But other investments were evidently very hard to find in an age when industry and commerce were fettered by the compulsory gild-system. And a man of influence like Symmachus was better able than one of the common herd to protect his own interests by the favour of powerful officials.

We get glimpses of the condition of agriculture in Italy under the strain of events. It must be borne in mind that Italy was no longer exempt from the land-burdens of the imperial system. For many years, certainly from 383 to 398, Rome was hardly ever free from the fear of famine. It was necessary to scrape together all the spare food that could be found in the country in order to eke out the often interrupted importations from abroad. The decline of food-production in rich Campania is indicated by many scattered references. The district was probably too much given over to vines, and a great part of it occupied by unproductive villas. In 396 Symmachus is relieved to know that the corn-supply of Rome is assured, at least for twenty days. He goes on to mention[1656] that corn has been transferred from Apulia to Campania. Whether this was for Campanian consumption, or eventually to be forwarded to Rome, is not stated. I am inclined to the former alternative by the consideration of the quarrel between Tarracina and Puteoli referred to below. That corn should have been brought from Apulia[1657] is a striking fact. A great part of that province was taken up by pastures and oliveyards. It can only have had corn to spare by reason of sparse population and good crops. If we had the whole story of this affair, the explanation might prove to be simpler than it can be now. In 397 he writes[1658] to a friend that the Apulians are having a bad time. They are erroneously supposed to be in for a good harvest, and so are being required to supply corn. This will be stripping the province without materially helping the state. For winter is coming on, and there is not time left to bring such a great crop of ripeness. Symmachus had friends dependent on property in Apulia. Writing some four years later[1659] he refers to this estate as rated for taxation on a higher scale than its income would warrant: he asks the local governor to see that it shall not be crushed by ‘public burdens.’

For to Symmachus, as to all or most men in this passive and cruelly selfish age, the first thought was to protect their own interests and those of their friends by engaging the favour of the powerful. Many of the passages cited above illustrate this, and many more could be given. The candour of some of his applications is remarkable. On behalf of one dependant in trouble he says[1660] to the person addressed ‘but he will get more help from the partiality of your judgment, for he really has some right on his side.’ To another he writes[1661] that of course right is always to be considered, but in dealing with _nobiles probabilesque personas_ a judge should feel free to qualify strict rules, letting the fairness of his decision appear[1662] in the distinction made. This proposition introduces a request on behalf of his sister. Some farms of hers are overburdened with the dues exacted by the state, and are now empty for lack of tenants. Only the governor’s sanction can give them the relief needed to restore them to solvency; and Symmachus trusts that his friend will do the right thing by the lady. In another case[1663] he asks favour for a dependant, significantly adding a request that his friend will see to it that the case does not come before another judge. Now, what chance of asserting their own rights had humble folk in general, and poor working farmers in particular, when governors and judges of all sorts were solicited like this by men whose goodwill was worth securing,—men for the most part unscrupulous greedy and prone to bear grudges, not such as the virtuous and kindly Symmachus? Perhaps nothing shews the selfishness of the rich more than their attempts to shirk the duty of furnishing recruits for the army. Yet we find in one letter[1664] a request to a provincial governor to check the activities of the recruiting agents. That the writer accuses these latter of overstepping their legal powers can only be viewed with some suspicion, considering his readiness to use private influence. Early in 398, when a force was being raised to operate against Gildo, it was thought necessary to enlist slaves from the city households. The protests[1665] of their owners, in which Symmachus shared, were loud: the compensation allowance was too low, and so forth. Yet, if any one was interested in suppressing the rebel, it was surely these wealthy men.