Chapter II: Sec. 5.--Lex Cassia (2)

The senate continued to take the initiative in agrarian movements. In 172, after the close of the wars against the Ligurians and Gauls, we again see the senate spontaneously decreeing a new division of the lands. A part of the territory of Liguria and Cisalpine Gaul was confiscated and a _senatus consultum_ ordered a distribution of this land to the commons. The praetor of the city A. Atilius, was authorized to appoint _decemvirs_, whose names Livy gives, to assign ten jugera to Roman citizens and three jugera to Latin[19] allies. Thus the senate, with a newly-born sagacity, rendered useless the demands of the tribune and recognized the justice and the utility of the agrarian laws against which it had so long protested. Indeed, it justified the propositions of the first author of an agrarian law by admitting to a share in the conquered lands the Latin allies who had so often contributed to their growth. This is the last agrarian law which Livy mentions. The Persian war broke out in this year, and an account of it fills the remaining books of this author which have come down to us. However, prior to the proposition of Tiberius Gracchus, we find in Varro[20] the mention of a new assignment of land of seven jugera _viritim_, made by a tribune named Licinius in the year 144; but the author has given such a meagre mention of it that we are unable to determine where these lands were located. If we join to these facts the cession of public territories to the creditors of the state, in 200, we shall have mentioned all agrarian laws and distributions of territory which took place before the _lex Sempronia Tiberiana_ in 133.

_Condition of the Country at the time of the Gracchan Rogations._ During the period between 367 and 133 we find no record of serious disputes between the patricians and commons. Indeed, the senate usually took the lead in popular measures; lands were assigned without any demand on the part of the plebeians. We must not be deceived by this seeming harmony. In the midst of this apparent calm a radical change was taking place in Roman society. It is necessary for us to understand this new condition of affairs in the republic before it will be possible to comprehend the rogations of the Gracchi.

One of the greatest dangers to the republic at this time reveals itself in the claims[21] of the Italians. These people had poured out their blood for Rome; they had contributed more than the Romans themselves to the accomplishing of those rapid conquests which, after the subjugation of Italy, quickly extended the power of Rome. In what way had they been rewarded? After the terrible devastations which afflicted Italy in the Hannibalic war had ceased, the Italian allies found themselves ruined. Whilst Latium, which contained the principal part of the old tribes of citizens, had suffered comparatively little, a large portion of Samnium, Apulia, Campania, and more particularly of Lucania and Bruttium, was almost depopulated; and the Romans in punishing the unfaithful "allies" had acted with ruthless cruelty.[22] When at length peace was concluded, large districts were uncultivated and uninhabited. This territory, being either confiscated from the allies for taking part with Hannibal, or deserted by the colonists, swelled the _ager publicus_ of Rome, and was either given to veterans[23] or occupied by Roman capitalists, thus increasing the revenues of a few nobles.

If a nation is in a healthful condition politically and economically so that the restorative vigor of nature is not impeded by bad restrictive laws, the devastations of land and losses of human life are quickly repaired. We might the more especially have expected this in a climate so genial and on a soil so fertile as that of Italy. But Roman laws so restricted the right of buying and selling land that in every Italian community none but members of that community, or Roman citizens, could[24] buy or inherit. This restriction upon free competition, by giving the advantage to Roman citizens, was in itself sufficient to ruin the prosperity of every Italian town. This law operated continually and unobservedly and resulted in placing,[25] year by year, a still larger quantity of the soil of Italy in the hands of the Roman aristocracy. In order to palliate the evils of conquest or at least to hide their conditions of servitude, the Romans had accorded to a part of the Italians the title of allies, and to others the privileges of _municipia_.[26] These privileges were combined in a very skillful manner in the interest of Rome, but this skill did not hinder the people from perceiving that they depended upon the mere wish of the conquerors and consequently were not rights, but merely favors to be revoked at will. The Latini, who had been the first people conquered by Rome and who had almost always remained faithful, enjoyed under the name of _jus Latii_ considerable privileges. They held in great[27] part the civil and political rights of Roman citizens. They were able by special services individually to become Roman citizens and thus to obtain the full _jus Romanum_. There were other peoples who, although strangers to Latium, had been admitted, by reason of their services[28] to Rome, to participate in the benefits of the _jus Latii_. The other peoples, admitted merely to the _jus Italicum_, did not enjoy any of the civil or political rights of Roman citizens, nor any of the privileges of Latin[29] allies; at best they kept some souvenirs of their departed independence in their interior administration, but otherwise were considered as subjects of Rome. And yet it was for the aggrandizement of this city that they shed their blood upon all the fields of battle which it pleased Rome to choose; it was for the glory and extension of the Roman power that they gained these conquests in which they had no share. Some who had attempted to regain their independence were not even accorded the humble privileges of the other people of Italy, but were reduced to the state of prefectures. These were treated as provinces and governed by prefects or proconsuls sent[30] out from Rome. Such were Capua, Bruttium, Lucania, the greater part of Samnium, and Cisalpine Gaul, which country, indeed, was not even considered as a part of Italy. Those who had submitted without resistance to the domination of the Romans, and had rendered some services to them, had bestowed upon them the title of _municipia_.[31] These _municipia_ governed themselves and were divided into two classes:

(1.) _Municipia sine suffragio_, for example, Caere and Etruria, had only interior privileges; their inhabitants could not vote at Rome and, consequently, could not[32] participate in the exercise of sovereignty.

(2.) _Municipia cum suffragio_ had, outside of their political and civil rights, the important right of voting[33] at Rome. These citizens of villages had then, as Cicero said of the citizens of Arpinum, two countries, one _ex natura_, the other _ex jure_. Lastly, there were some cities in the south of Italy, _i.e._ in Magna Graecia, that had received[34] the name of federated cities. They did not appear to be subject to Rome; their contingents of men and money were looked upon as voluntary[35] gifts; but, in reality, they were under the domination of Rome, and had, at Rome, defenders or patrons chosen because of their influence with the Roman citizens and charged with maintaining their interests. Such was the system adopted by Rome. It would have been easy for a person in the compass of a few miles to find villages having the _jus Latii_, others with simply the _jus Italicum_, colonies, prefectures, municipia _cum_ et _sine suffragio_. The object of the Romans was evident. They planned to govern. Cities alike in interests and patriotic motives were separated by this diversity of rights and the jealousies and hatreds which resulted from it. Concord, which was necessary to any united and general insurrection, was rendered impossible between towns, some of which were objects of envy, others, of pity. Their condition, moreover, was such that all, even the most fortunate, had something to gain by showing themselves faithful; and all, even the most wretched, had something to fear if they did not prove tractable. These Italians, with all the varied privileges and burdens enumerated above, far outnumbered the Roman citizens.[36] A comparison of the numbers of the census of 115 and that of 70 shows that the numbers of Italians and Romans were[37] as three to two. All these Italians aspired to Roman citizenship, to enjoy the right to vote to which some of their number had been admitted, and the struggle which was sometime to end in their complete emancipation had already commenced. During the first centuries of Roman history, Rome was divided into two classes, patricians and plebeians. The plebeians by heroic efforts had broken down the barriers that separated them from the patricians. The privilege of intermarriage, the possibility of obtaining the highest offices of the state, the substitution of the _comitia tributa_ for the other two assemblies, had not made of Rome "an unbridled democracy," but all these benefits obtained by tribunician agitation, all the far-reaching advances gained by force of laws and not of arms, had constituted at Rome a single people and created a true Roman nation. There were now at Rome only rich and poor, nobles and proletariat. With intelligence and ability a plebeian could aspire to the magistracies and thence to the senate. Why should not the Italians be allowed the same privilege? It was neither just nor equitable nor even prudent to exclude them from an equality of rights and the common exercise of civil[38] and political liberty. The Gracchi were the first to comprehend the changed state of affairs and the result of Roman conquest and administration in Italy. Their demands in favor of the Italians were profoundly politic. The Italians would have demanded, with arms in their hands, that which the Gracchi asked for them, had not this attempt been made. They failed; Fulvius[39] Flaccus, Marius,[40] and Livius Drusus[41] failed in the same attempt, being opposed both by the nobility and the plebs.

The agrarian laws, as we have seen, had been proposed by the senate, in the period which we are considering. How was it then that the Gracchi had been compelled to take the initiative and that the senate had opposed them? This contradiction is more apparent than real. It explains itself in great part by the following considerations. Upon the breaking down of the aristocracy of birth, the patriciate, the senate was made accessible to the plebeians who had filled the curule magistracies and were possessed of 800,000 sesterces. Knights were also eligible to the senate to fill vacancies, and it was this fact which caused the equestrian order to be called _seminarium senatus_. For some time the new nobles, in order to strengthen their victory and make it permanent, had formed an alliance with the plebeians. For this reason were made the concessions and distributions of land which the old senators were unable to hinder. These concessions were the work of the plebeians who had been admitted to the senate. But when their position was assured and it was no longer necessary for them to make concessions to the commons in order to sustain themselves, they manifested the same passions that the patricians had shown before them. Livy has expressed the situation very clearly: "These noble plebeians had been initiated into the same mysteries, and despised the people as soon as they themselves ceased to be despised by the patricians."[42] Thus, then, the unity and fusion which had been established by the tribunician laws disappeared and there again existed two peoples, the rich and the poor.

If we examine into the elements of these two distinct populations, separated by the pride of wealth and the misery and degradation of poverty, we shall understand this. The new nobility was made up partially of the descendants of the ancient patrician _gentes_ who had adapted themselves to the modifications and transformations in society. Of these persons, some had adopted the ideas of reform; they had flattered the lower classes in order to obtain power; they profited by their consulships and their prefectures to increase or at least conserve their fortunes. Others having business capacity gave themselves up to gathering riches; to usurious speculations which at this time held chief place among the Romans. Even Cato was a usurer and recommended usury as a means of acquiring wealth. Or they engaged in vast speculations in land, commerce, and slaves, as Crassus did a little later. The first mentioned class was the least numerous. To those nobles who gave their attention to money-getting must be added those plebeians who elevated themselves from the masses by means[43] of the curule magistracies. These were insolent and purse-proud, and greedy to increase their wealth by any means in their power. Next to these two divisions of the nobility came those whom the patricians had been wont to despise and to relegate to the very lowest rank under the name of _aerarii_; merchants,[44] manufacturers, bankers, and farmers of the revenues. These men were powerful by reason of their union and community of interests, and money which they commanded. They formed a third order and even became so powerful as to control the senate and, at times, the whole republic. In the time of the Punic wars the senate had been obliged to let go unpunished the crimes committed by the publican Posthumius and the means which he had employed in order to enrich himself at the expense of the republic, because it was imprudent to offend[45] the order of publicans. Thus constituted an order or guild, they held it in their hands at will to advance or to withhold the money for carrying on wars or sustaining the public credit. In this way they were the masters of the state. They also grasped the public lands, as they were able to command such wealth that no individual could compete with them. They thus became the only farmers of the domain lands, and they did not hesitate to cease paying all tax on these. Who was able to demand these rents from them? The senate? But they either composed the senate or controlled it. The magistrates? There was no magistracy but that of wealth. The tribunes and the people? These they had disarmed by frequent grants of land of two to seven jugera each, and by the establishment of numerous colonies. This was beyond doubt the real reason for their frequent distributions. They had all been made from land recently conquered. The ancient _ager_ had not been touched, and little by little the Licinian law had fallen into disuetude.

[Footnote 1: Livy, VIII, 11, 12.]

[Footnote 2: Ihne, I, 447.]

[Footnote 3: I have followed Ihne and Arnold in giving this date, but there is reason for placing it later as Valerius Maximus says, IV, 3,5: "Manius Curius cum Italia Pyrrhum regem exegisset ... decretis a senatu septenis jugeribus agri populo."]

[Footnote 4: "Manii Curii nota conscio est, perniciosum intellegi civem cui septem jugera non essent satis." Pliny, _Hist. Nat._, XVIII.; Aurelius Victor, De Viris Illus.: Septenis "jugeribus viritim dividendis, quibus qui contentus non esset, eum perniciosum intellegi civem, nota et praeclare concione Manius Curius dictitabat." The same author speaks of four jugera being given by Curius, "Quaterna dono agri jugera viritim populo dividit." Juvenal implies a distribution of two jugera; Sat. XIV, V, 161-164:

"Mox etiam fructis aetate, ac Punica passis
Proelia vel Pyrrhum immanem glacosque Molossos,
Tandem pro multis vix jugera bina dabantur
Vulneribus Merces ea sanguinis atque labores."]

[Footnote 5: Appian, III, 5: Zonarius, VIII, 2.]

[Footnote 6: Ihne, I, 447.]

[Footnote 7: Gellius, XV, 27: "Postea lex Hortensia late, qua cautum est, ut plebisipa universum populum tenerent." Marquardt u. Momm., _Röm. Alter.,_ IV, 102.]

[Footnote 8: Polyb., II, 21, 8.]

[Footnote 9: Varro, De R.R., I, 2; De L.L., VI, 5.]

[Footnote 10: Ihne, IV, 26. See Long, I, 157, who disputes this statement.]

[Footnote 11: Varro, De R.R., I, 2.; De L.L., VI, 5.]

[Footnote 12: Val. Max., V, 4, 5.]

[Footnote 13: 1 Val. Max., V, 4, 5; Cicero, _De Juventute,_ II, 17.]

[Footnote 14: Ihne, IV, 26; Cicero, _De Senectute,_ 4.]

[Footnote 15: Polybius, II, 21.]

[Footnote 16: Livy, Epit., XX, 19.]

[Footnote 17: "De agris militum ejus decretum, ut quod quisque eorum annos in Hispania aut in Africa militasset, in singulos annos bina jugera acciperet, eum agrum decemviri assignarent." Livy, XXXI, 19.]

[Footnote 18: Momm., II, 230-241.]

[Footnote 19: Livy, XLII, 4: "Eodem anno, quum agri Ligustini et Gallici, quod bello captum erat, aliquantum vacaret, senatus-consultum factum ut is ager viritim ex senatus consulto creavit A. Atilius praetor urbanus.... Divers[=e]runt dena jugera in singulos, sociis nominis Latini terna."]

[Footnote 20: Ihne, IV, 370.]

[Footnote 21: Livy, XXXI, 4, 1; Ihne, IV, 370-372.]

[Footnote 22: Livy, XXXI, 4, 1; Ihne, IV, 370-372.]

[Footnote 23: Livy, _loc. cit._]

[Footnote 24: Ihne, IV, 148.]

[Footnote 25: Ihne, IV, 371.]

[Footnote 26: Ihne, IV, 354; Momm., III, 277.]

[Footnote 27: Momm., I, 151-162; Ihne, IV, 179. Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 26-27, 63.]

[Footnote 28: Livy, IX, 43, 23; Ihne, IV, 181.]

[Footnote 29: Ihne, IV, 185-186. Marquardt u. Momm., 46, 60.]

[Footnote 30: Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 41-43.]

[Footnote 31: Ibid, IV, 26.]

[Footnote 32: Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 27-34.]

[Footnote 33: Ibid.]

[Footnote 34: Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 44.]

[Footnote 35: Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 45-46.]

[Footnote 36: Momm., _Röm. Ge._, II, 225.]

[Footnote 37: Ihne, IV, 370.]

[Footnote 38: Momm., Lange, Ihne, Long--as given.]

[Footnote 39: Momm., III, 132.]

[Footnote 40: Momm., III, 252, 422.]

[Footnote 41: Momm., III, 281.]

[Footnote 42: Livy, XXII, 34.]

[Footnote 43: Ihne, IV, 354-356.]

[Footnote 44: Ihne, IV, 354-356.]

[Footnote 45: Livy, XXV, 3: "Patres ordinem publicanorum in tali tempore offensum nolebant."]

(a) _Extension of Territory by Conquest between 367 and 133_.

1. Caere submitted in 353, yielding all southern Etruria to Rome.

2. Volcian territory and all Latium fell to Rome at the close of the Latin war in 339.

3. Capua, taken in 337.

4. Cales, taken in 334. In this struggle all Campania became Roman territory.

5. Sabine territory submitted in 290.

6. Tarentum, captured in 272.

7. Rhegium, captured in 270.

8. The Galli Senones were destroyed in 283 and their whole territory (Umbria) was confiscated.

9. In 293, Liguria and Transpadana Gallia were added to the Roman confederation.

10. In 222, Italy was extended to its natural boundary, the Alps, by the subjugation of the Gauls north of the Po. Of the entire territory of Italy, 93,640 square miles, fully one-third belonged to Rome. Thus, in the 287 years of the Republic, Roman territory had expanded from 115, to 31,200 square[1] miles.

At the close of the war with Hannibal, Rome further added to her territory by the confiscation of the greater part of the Gallic territory, Campania, Samnium, Apulia, Lucania, and Bruttii.

(b) _Colonies Founded between 367 and 133._

(a). CIVIC COLONIES. --------------+---------------+--------+-------+---------+---------+------- | | | NO. | SIZE OF | | COLONIES. | PLACE. | DATES. | OF C. | ALLOT. | JUGERA. |ACRES. --------------+---------------+--------+-------+---------+---------+------- | | | | | | Antiuim. | Latium. | 338 | 300 | 2 | 600 | 375 Anxur. | " | 329 | 300 | 2 | 600 | 375 Minturnae. | Campania. | 296 | 300 | 2 | 600 | 375 Sinuessa. | " | 296 | 300 | 2 | 600 | 375 Sena Gallica. | Umbria. | 283 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Castrum Novum.| Picenum. | 283 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Aesium. | Umbria. | 247 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Alsium. | Etruria. | 247 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Fregenae. | " | 245 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Pyrgi. | " | 191 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Puteoli. | Campania. | 194 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Volturnum. | " | 194 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Liternum. | " | 194 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Buxentum. | Lucania. | 194 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Salernum. | Campania. | 194 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Sipontum. | " | 194 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Tempsa. | Bruttii. | 194 | 300 | 4 | 1,200 | 750 Croton. | " | 194 | 300 | 4 | 1,200 | 750 Potentia. | Picenum. | 184 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Pisaurum. | Umbria. | 184 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Parma. | Gall. Cisalp. | 183 |1,000 | 6 | 6,000 | 3,750 Mutina. | " " | 183 |1,000 | 6 | 6,000 | 3,750 Saturnia. | Etruria. | 183 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Graviscae. | " | 181 | 300 | 5 | 1,500 | 938 Luna. | " | 173 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Auximum. | Picenum. | 157 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 --------------+---------------+--------+-------+---------+---------+------- | Total..|38,900 |30,500 -----------------------------------------------+---------+---------+-------

(b). LATIN COLONIES. ------------+-----------------+--------+-------+---------+---------+------- | | | NO. | SIZE OF | | COLONIES. | PLACE. | DATES. | OF C.| ALLOT. | JUGERA. | ACRES. ------------+-----------------+--------+-------+---------+---------+------- Calles. | Campania. | 334 | 300 | 4 | 1,200 | 750 Fregellae. | Latium. | 328 | 300 | 4 | 1,200 | 750 Luceria. | Apulia. | 314 | 300 | 4 | 1,200 | 750 Suessa. | Latium. | 313 | 300 | 4 | 1,200 | 750 Pontiae. | Isle of Latium. | 313 | 300 | 4 | 1,200 | 750 Saticula. | Samnium. | 313 | 300 | 4 | 1,200 | 750 Sora. | Latium. | 312 | 4,000 | 4 | 16,000 | 10,000 Alba. | " | 303 | 6,000 | 6 | 36,000 | 22,500 Narnia. | Umbria. | 299 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Carseoli. | Sabini. | 298 | 4,000 | 6 | 24,000 | 15,000 Venusia. | Apulia. | 291 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Hatria. | Picenum. | 289 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Cosa. | Campania. | 273 | 1,000 | 6 | 6,000 | 3,750 Paestum. | Lucania. | 273 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Ariminum. | Agr. Gallicus. | 268 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Beneventum. | Samnium. | 268 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Firmum. | Picenum. | 264 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Aesernia. | Samnium. | 263 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Brundisium. | Calabria. | 244 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Spoletium. | Umbria. | 241 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Cremona. | Gaul. | 218 | 6,000 | 6 | 36,000 | 22,500 Placentia. | " | 218 | 6,000 | 6 | 36,000 | 22,500 Copiae. | Lucania. | 193 | 300 | 6 | 1,800 | 1,125 Bononia. | Gaul. | 192 | 3,000 | 6 | 18,000 | 11,250 Aquileia. | " | 181 | 4,500 | 6 | 27,000 | 16,875 ------------+-----------------+--------+-------+---------+---------+------- Total ...................|226,000 |141,250 Civic Colonies ..........| 38,900 | 30,500 |---------|------- Grand Total .............|264,900 |171,750 | | or | | 268.36 | |Sq. Mi. ---------------------------------------------------------+---------+-------

[Footnote 1: I have not here added Roman conquests outside of the peninsula of Italy, as these conquests were not treated as Roman territory until nearly a century later.]

SEC. 9.--LATIFUNDIA.

"After having pillaged the world as praetors or consuls during time of war, the nobles again pillaged their subjects as governors in time of peace;[1] and upon their return to Rome with immense riches they employed them in changing the modest heritage of their fathers into domains vast as provinces. In villas, which they were wont to surround with forests, lakes and mountains ... where formerly a hundred families lived at ease, a single one found itself restrained. In order to increase his park, the noble bought at a small price the farm of an old wounded soldier or peasant burdened with debt, who hastened to squander, in the taverns of Rome, the modicum of gold which he had received. Often he took the land without paying anything.[2] An ancient writer tells us of an unfortunate involved in a law suit with a rich man because the latter, discommoded by the bees of the poor man, his neighbor, had destroyed them. The poor man protested that he wished to depart and establish his swarms elsewhere, but that nowhere was he able to find a small field where he would not again have a rich man for a neighbor. The nabobs of the age, says Columella, had properties which they were unable to journey round on horseback in a day, and an inscription recently found at Viterba, shows that an aqueduct ten miles long did not traverse the lands of any new proprietors.... The small estate gradually disappeared from the soil of Italy, and with it the sturdy population of laborers.... Spurius Ligustinus, a centurian, after twenty-two campaigns, at the age of more than fifty years, did not have for himself, his wife, and eight children more than a jugerum of land and a cabin."[3]

To this masterly sketch quoted from Duruy, we can but add a few facts. Pliny affirms that under Nero only six men possessed the half of Africa.[4] Seneca, who himself possessed an immense fortune, says, concerning the rich men of his time, that they did not content themselves with possessing the lands that formerly had supported an entire people; they were wont to turn the course of rivers in order to conduct them through their possessions. They[5] desired even to embrace seas within their vast domains. We must here, it is true, make some allowance for rhetoric. So, too, in the writings of Petronius, some allowance for satire must be made, where he represents the clerk of Trimalchio making a report of that which has taken place in a single day upon one of the latter's farms near Cumae. Here on the 7th of the calends[6] of July, were born 30 boys and 40 girls; 500,000 bushels of wheat were harvested and 500 oxen were yoked. The clerk goes on to say that a fire had recently broken out in the _Gardens of Pompey_, when he is interrupted by Trimalchio asking when the _Gardens of Pompey_ had been purchased for him, and is informed that they had been in his possession for a year.[7] So it appears that Trimalchio, in whom Petronius has personified the pride, the greed, and the vices of the rich men of his time, did not know that he was the possessor of a magnificent domain. In another place Petronius causes Trimalchio to say that everything which could appeal to the appetite of his companions is raised upon one of his farms which he has not yet visited and which is situated in the neighborhood of Terracina and Tarentum, towns[8] which are separated by a distance of 300 miles. Finally, led on by his immoderate desire to augment his riches and increase his possessions, the hero of Petronius asks but one thing before he dies, i.e., to add Apulia[9] to his domains; he, however, admits that he would not take it amiss to join Sicily to some lands which he owned in that locality or to be able, should envy not check him, to pass into Africa[10] without departing from his own possessions. All this has a basis of fact. Trimalchio would never have been created, had not the favorite freedmen of Nero crushed the people by their luxury, debauches, and scandals.

But the condition of society pictured by Seneca and Petronius is that of the first century of the Christian era and might not be taken to represent the condition of affairs in the second century B.C., had we not some data which go to prove the concentration of property, the disparity between classes, and the depopulation of Italy within the same century as the Gracchi. Cicero was not considered one of the richest men in Rome, yet he possessed many villas, and he has himself told us that one of them cost him 3,500,000 sesterces, about $147,000.[11] Cornelia, the mother of the Gracchi, had a country residence in the vicinity of Micenum which cost[12] 75,000 drachmae ($14,000); Lucullus some years afterwards bought it for 500,200 drachmae ($100,040). According to Cicero,[13] Crassus had a fortune of 100,000,000 sesterces ($4,200,000). This does not astonish us when we see upon the _via Appia,_ near the ruins of the circus of Caracalla and but a short distance from the Catacombs of St. Sebastian and the fountain of Aegeria, the still important remains of the tomb of Caecilia Metella, daughter of Metellus Creticus and wife of the tribune Crassus, as the inscription testifies. It is a vast "funereal fortress" constructed of precious marble, and which gives us the first example of the luxury afterwards so common among the Romans. Then, too, we remember that Crassus was wont to say that no one was rich who was not able to support an army with his revenues, to raise six legions and a great number of auxiliaries, both infantry and cavalry.[14]

Pliny confirms this statement concerning Crassus, but adds that Sulla was even richer.[15] Plutarch gives us fuller details and also explains the origin of the colossal fortune of Crassus. According to him Crassus had 300 talents ($345,000), with which to commence. Upon his departure for the Parthian war in which he lost his life, he made an inventory of his property and found that he was possessed of 7,100 talents, $8,165,000, double what Cicero attributes to him. How did Crassus increase his fortune so enormously? Plutarch says that he bought the property confiscated by Sulla at a very low figure. Then, he had a great number of slaves distinguished for their talents; lecturers, writers, bankers, business men, physicians, and hotel-keepers, who turned over to him the benefits which they realized in their diverse industries. Moreover, he had among his slaves 500 masons and architects. Rome was built almost entirely of wood and the houses were very high, consequently fires were frequent and destructive. As soon as a fire broke out, Crassus hastened to the place with his throng of slaves, bought the now burning buildings--as well as those threatened--at a song, and then set his slaves to work extinguishing the fires. By this means he had become possessed of a large[16] part of Rome.

Some other facts confirm that which Plutarch tells us of Crassus. Athenaeus[17] says that it was not rare to find Roman citizens possessed of 20,000 slaves. At the commencement of the civil war between Cæsar and Pompey, the future dictator found opposed to him, in Picenum, Domitius[18] Ahenobarbus at the head of thirty cohorts. Domitius seeing his troops wavering, promised to each of them four jugera out of his own possessions, and a proportionate part to the centurians and veterans. What must have been the fortune of a man who was able to distribute out of his own lands, and surely without bankrupting himself, about 100,000 jugera?

[Footnote 1: Cicero says these exactions were common and that the provinces were even restrained from complaining. Verres apologized for his exactions by saying that he simply followed the common example. In Verrem, II, 1-3, 17.]

[Footnote 2: "Parentes aut parvi liberi militum, ut quisque potentiori confinis erat, sedibus pellebantur." Sall., _Jugertha_, 41. Horace, Ode II, 18.]

[Footnote 3: Duruy, _Hist. des Romains_, II, 46-47.]

[Footnote 4: "Sex domini semissem Africae possidebant." _Hist. Nat._, XVIII, 7.]

[Footnote 5: Seneca, Epist., 89.]

[Footnote 6: Petronius, Sat., 48: VII. calendas sextilis in praedio Cumano, quod est Trimalchionis, nati sunt pueri, XXX, puellae, XL; sublata in horreum, ex area, tritici millia modium quingenta; boves domiti quingenti ... eodem die incendium factum est in hortis Pompeianis, ortum ex aedibus nastae, villici.]

[Footnote 7: Quid? inquit Trimalchio: quando mihi Pompeiani horti emti sunt? Anno priore, inquit actuarius. (_Ibid._ 53.)]

[Footnote 8: Vinum, inquit, si non placet, mutabo; vos illud, oportet faciatis. Deorum beneficio n[=o]n emo, sed nune, quidquid ad salivam facit, in suburbano nascitur eo quod ego adhue non navi. Dicitur confine esse Tarracinensibus et Tarentinis.]

[Footnote 9: Quod si contigerit Apuliae fundos jungere, satis vivus pervenero, _(Ibid. _77.)]

[Footnote 10: Nunc conjungere agellis Siciliam volo, ut quun Africam libuerit ire, per meos fines navigem. Sat.,48.]

[Footnote 11: Ad Fam., V, 6: "quod de Crasso domum emissem emi eam ipsam domum H.S., XXXV."]

[Footnote 12: Plutarch, _Life of Marius._]

[Footnote 13: De Repub., III, 7: Cur autem, si pecuniae modus statuendus fuit feminis, P. Crassi filia posset habere, si unica patri esset, aeris millies, salva lege?]

[Footnote 14: Cicero, _Paradoxia_, VI.]

[Footnote 15: Pliny, _Hist. Nat.,_XXXIII, 10.]

[Footnote 16: Plutarch, _Crassus_, c. 1 and 2.]

[Footnote 17: Athenaeus, _Deipnosophistae,_VI, 104.]

[Footnote 18: Cæsar, _Bell. Civ.,_I, 17.]

SEC. 10.--THE INFLUENCE OF SLAVERY.

The last of the evils which we wish to mention as bringing about the deplorable condition of the plebeians at the time of the Gracchi, and which brought more degradation and ruin in its train than all the others, is slavery. Licinius Stolo had attempted in vain to combat it. Twenty-four centuries of fruitless legislation since his death has scarcely yet taught the most enlightened nations that it is a waste of energy to regulate by law the greatest crime against humanity, so long as the conditions which produced it remain the same. The Roman legions, sturdy plebeians, marched on to the conquest of the world. For what? To bring home vast throngs of captives who were destined, as slaves, to eat the bread, to sap the life blood, of their conquerors. The substitution of slaves for freemen in the labors of the city and country, in the manual arts and industries, grew in proportion to the number of captives sold in the markets of Rome. All the rich men followed more or less the example of Crassus; they had among their slaves, weavers, carvers, embroiderers, painters, architects, physicians, and teachers. Suetonius tells us that Augustus wore no clothing save that manufactured by slaves in his own house. Atticus hired his slaves to the public in the capacity of copyists. Cicero used slaves as amanuenses. The government employed slaves in the subordinate posts in administration; the police, the guard of monuments and arsenals, the manufacture of arms and munitions of war, the building of navies, etc. The priests of the temples and the colleges of pontiffs had their familiae of slaves.

Thus in the city, plebeians found no employment. Competition was impossible between fathers of families and slaves who labored _en masse _in the vast work-shops of their masters, with no return save the scantiest subsistence, no families, no cares, and most of all no army service. In the country it was still worse. It would appear that none but slaves were employed in the cultivation of the land. Doubtless the number of slaves in Italy has been greatly exaggerated, but it is certain that the substitution of slave labor for free, was an old fact when Licinius[1] attempted by the formal disposition of his law to check the evil. In the first centuries of Rome, slaves must have been scarce. They were still dear in the time of Cato, and even Plutarch mentions as a proof of the avarice of the illustrious[2] censor, that he never paid more than 15,000 drachmae for a slave. After the great conquests of the Romans, in Corsica, Sardinia, Spain, Greece, and the Orient, the market went down by reason of the multitude of human beings thrown upon it. An able-bodied, unlettered man could be bought for the price of an ox. Such were the men of Spain, Thrace, and Sardinia. Educated slaves from Greece and the East brought a higher price. We learn from Horace, that his slave Davus whom he has rendered so celebrated, cost him 500 drachmae.[3] Diodorus of Siculus says that the rich caused their slaves to live by their own exertions. According to him the knights employed great bands of slaves in Sicily, both for agricultural purposes and for herding stock, but they furnished them with so little food that they must either starve or live by brigandage. The governors of the island did not dare to punish these slaves for fear of the powerful order which owned them.[4] Slave labor was thus adopted for economic reasons, and, for the same reasons, agriculture in Italy was abandoned for stock raising.

Says Varro:[5] "Fathers of families rather delight in circuses and theatres than in farming and grape culture. Therefore, we pay that wheat necessary for our subsistence be imported from Africa and Sardinia; we pick our grapes in the isles of Cos and Chios. In this land where our fathers who founded Rome instructed their children in agriculture, we see the descendants of those skillful cultivators, by reason of avarice and in contempt of laws, transferring arable lands into pasture fields, perhaps ignorant of the fact that agriculture and fatherland were one."

Fewer men were needed for the care of these pasture lands; but the evil did not stop here. Little by little these pasture lands were transformed into mere pleasure grounds attached to villas. This had already begun to take place as early as the second Punic war, when the plains of Sinuessa[6] and Falernia were cultivated rather for pleasure than the necessaries of life; so that the army of Fabius could find nothing upon which to sustain itself. Under these influences the plebeians, in 133, had become merely a turbulent, restless mass, but full of the activity and the energy which had characterized them in the early centuries of the republic. They were composed chiefly of the descendants of the ancient plebeian families, decimated by wars and by misery. They were the heirs of those for whom Spurius Cassius, Terentillius Arsa, Virginius, Licinius Stolo, Publilius Philo, and Hortensius had endured so many conflicts and even shed their blood; but they had become brutalized by poverty, debauchery, and crime. No longer able to support themselves by labor, they had become beggars and vagabonds.

[Footnote 1: M. Bureau de la Malle, _Ec. polit. des Romains,_ch. 15, p. 143; ch. 2, p.231.]

[Footnote 2: Plutarch, _Cato the Censor,_6 and 7.]

[Footnote 3: Horace, Sat. II, 7; v. 42-43: "Quid? si me stultior ipso quingentis empto drachmis, deprehenderis."]

[Footnote 4: Diodorus, Siculus, Fg. of Bk. XXXIV.]

[Footnote 5: Varro, _De R.R. Proem. _3, 4.]

[Footnote 6: Livy, XXII, 15.]

SEC. 11.--LEX SEMPRONIA TIBERIANA.

In 133, more than two centuries after the enactment of the law of Licinius Stolo, Tiberius Gracchus, tribune of the people for that year, brought forward a bill which was in fact little less than a renewal of the old law. It provided that no one should occupy more than five hundred jugera of the _ager publicus, _with the proviso that any father could reserve[1] 250 jugera for each son.[2] This law differed from that of Licinius in that it guaranteed permanent possession of this amount to the occupier and his heirs forever.[3] Other clauses were subjoined providing for the payment[4] of some equivalent to the rich for the improvements and the buildings upon the surrendered estates, and ordering the division of the domain thus surrendered among the poorer citizens in lots of 30 jugera each, on the condition that their portions should be inalienable.[5] They bound themselves to use the land for agricultural purposes and to pay a moderate rent to the state. It appears that the Italians were not excluded from the benefit of this law.[6]

The design of this bill was to recruit the ranks of the Romans by drafts of freeholders from among the Latins. Such as had been reduced to poverty were to be restored to independence. Such as had been sunk beneath oppression were to be lifted up to liberty.[7] No more generous scheme had ever been brought before the Romans. None ever met with more determined opposition, and for this there was much reason. There might have been some like the tribune's friends ready to part with the lands bequeathed to them by their fathers; but where one was willing to confess, a hundred stood ready to deny the claim upon them. Nor had they any such demands to meet as those of the olden times. Then the plebeians were a firm and compact body which demanded a share of recent conquests that their own blood and courage had gained. Now it was a loose and feeble body of various members waiting for a share in land long since conquered, while their patron rather than their leader exerted himself for them.

Tiberius, like Licinius, met with violent opposition, but he had not like him the patience and the fortitude to wait the slower but safer process of legitimate agitation. He adopted a course[8] which is always dangerous and especially so in great political movements. Satisfied with the justice of his bill and stung by taunts and incensed by opposition, he resolved to carry it by open violation of law. He caused his colleague, Octavius, who had interposed his veto, to be removed from office by a vote of the citizens--a thing unheard of and, according to the Roman constitution, impossible--and in this way his bill for the division of the public land was carried and became a law. It required the appointing of three commissioners to receive and apportion the public domain.[9] This collegium of three persons,[10] who were regarded as ordinary and standing magistrates of the state, and were annually elected by the assembly of the people, was entrusted with the work of resumption and distribution. The important and difficult task of legally settling what was domain land and what was private property was afterward added to these functions. Tiberius himself, his brother Caius, then at Numantia, and his father-in-law, Claudius, were nominated, according to the usual custom of intrusting the execution of a law to its author and his chosen adherents.[11] The distribution was designed to go on continually and to embrace the whole class that should be in need of aid. The new features of this agraria lex of Sempronius, as compared with the Licinio-Sextian, were, first, the clause in favor of the hereditary possessors; secondly, the payment of quit-rent, and inalienable tenure proposed for the new allotments; thirdly, and especially, the permanent executive, the want of which, under the older law, had been the chief reason why it had remained without lasting practical application.[12]

The dissatisfaction of the supporters of the law concurred with the resistance of its opponents in preventing its execution or at least greatly embarrassing the collegium. The senate refused to grant the customary outfit to which the commissioners[13] were entitled. They proceeded without it. Then the landowners denied that they occupied any of the public land, or else asked such enormous indemnities as to render the recovery impossible without violence. This roused opposition. The _ager publicus_ had never been surveyed, private boundaries had in many cases been obliterated, and, except where natural boundaries marked the limit of the domain land, it was impossible to ascertain what was _ager publicus_ and what _ager privatus_. To avoid this difficulty the commission adopted the just but hazardous expediency of throwing the burden of proof upon the occupier. He was summoned before their tribunal and, unless he could establish his boundaries or prove that the land in question had never been a part of the domain land, it was declared _ager publicus_ and confiscated.[14]

On the other hand the newly made proprietors were contending with one another, if not with the commissioners. The Italians were, in some cases, despoiled instead of relieved by the law. The complaints of those turned out of their estates to make room for the clamorous swarms from the city, drowned the thanks of such as obtained a portion of the lands. Not even with the wealth of Attalus had Tiberius bought friends enough to aid him at this time.[15] The same spirit of lawlessness which he himself had invoked in the passing of his law, was in turn made use of by his enemies to crush him. Having been absent from Rome while performing his duties as commissioner, he now returned as a candidate for re-election to the tribunate, a thing in itself contrary to law, and in the struggle which arose over his re-election, was slain a little more than six months after his appointment[16] to membership in the collegium.

_Uncertainty as to the Details of the Lex Sempronia._ We are very imperfectly informed upon many points in Tiberius' agrarian law. In the first place, the question arises, were those persons holding less than 500 jugera at the time of its enactment given their lands as _bona fide_ private property with the privilege of making up the deficiency? If not, then the law, instead of punishing, would seem to reward violation of its tenets, and he who had with boldness appropriated the greatest quantity of domain land would now be an object of envy to his more honest but less fortunate neighbors.

Secondly, what arrangement was made as to the buildings and improvements already upon the land? Were these handed over to the new owners without any payment on their part? This would work great inequality in the value of allotments made, and yet we cannot see where the poor man was to obtain the money to pay for these. Then again, what was to become of the numerous slaves which had hitherto carried on the agriculture now destined to be performed by small holders? Their masters would have no further use for them and would consequently swell the lists of freedmen in order to avoid the expense of feeding them. This law was passed in the midst of the Sicilian slave war and Tiberius Gracchus would surely not have neglected to make some provision to meet this exigency. The law as it stands in its imperfect condition seems to be the work of an ignorant, unprincipled political charlatan, but we are convinced Tiberius was not that. Moreover, we know that he had the help of one of Rome's most able lawyers, Publius Mucius Scaevola, and the advice of his father-in-law, Appius Claudius, who was something of a statesman. We are therefore convinced that some conditions which were to meet these obstacles were enacted. We must admit, however, that it is a little surprising that no fragment of such conditions has ever reached us in the literature of Rome.

_Results of this Law._ Although Tiberius was dead, yet his law still lived, and, indeed, received added force from the death of its author. The senate killed Gracchus but could not annul his law. The party which was favorable to the distribution of the domain land gained control of affairs. Gaius Gracchus, Marcus Fulvius Flaccus, and Gaius Papirius Carbo, were the chief persons in carrying the law into effect. Mommsen (vol. III, p. 128) says: "The work of resuming and distributing the occupied domain land was prosecuted with zeal and energy; and, in fact, proofs to that effect are not wanting. As early as 622(i.e. from the Foundation of Rome, =132 B.C.) the consul of that year, Publius Popillius, the same who presided over the prosecution of the adherents of Tiberius Gracchus, recorded on a public monument that he was 'the first who had turned the shepherd out of the domains and installed farmers in their stead;' and tradition otherwise affirms that the distribution extended over all Italy, and that in the formerly existing communities the number of farmers was everywhere augmented--for it was the design of the Sempronian agrarian law to elevate the former class, not by the founding of new communities, but by the strengthening of those already in existence.

"The extent and the comprehensive effect of these distributions are attested by the numerous arrangements in the Roman art of land-measuring referable to the Gracchan assignations of land; for instance, the due placing of boundary stones, so as to obviate future mistakes, appears to have been first suggested by the Gracchan courts for defining boundaries and by the distribution of land.

"But the number on the burgess-rolls gives the clearest evidence. The census, which was published in 623, and actually took place probably in the beginning of 622, yielded not more than 319,000 burgesses capable of bearing arms, whereas six years afterwards (629), in place of the previous falling off (p. 108), the number rises to 395,000, that is 76,000 of an increase beyond all doubt solely in consequence of what the allotment commission did for Roman burgesses."

Ihne says, concerning this same commission (vol. IV, p. 409): "The triumvirs entered upon their duties under the most unfavorable circumstances.... We may entertain serious doubts whether they or their immediate successors ever got beyond this first stage of their labors, and whether they really accomplished the task of setting up any considerable number of independent freeholders." Ihne further says (vol. IV, p. 408, n. 1), in answer to the statements made by Mommsen, which we have quoted above: "There is an obvious fallacy in this argument, for how could the assignment of allotments to poor citizens increase the number of citizens? There is nothing to justify the assumption that non-citizens were to share in the benefit of the land-law, and that by receiving allotments they were to be advanced to the rank of citizens. If the statements respecting the census of 131 B.C. and 125 B.C. are to be trusted, the great increase in the number of citizens must be explained in another way. It is possible ... that after the revolt of Fregellae (125 B.C.) a portion of the allies were admitted to the Roman franchise by several plebiscites. We know nothing of such plebiscites; but it is not unlikely that the Roman senate in 125 B.C. acted on the principle of making timely concessions to a portion of the rebels, and thus preventing unanimous action among them. This is what was done in 90 B.C. during the great Social War. By such an admission of allies, the increase of citizens between 131 and 125 might possibly be explained."

If we examine the objections which Ihne raises we shall not find them so formidable as first appears. Mommsen does not say that the number of citizens was increased. What he does say is that the number of burgesses capable of bearing arms was increased (vol. III, p. 128). In 570-184, the Servian Military Constitution was so modified as to admit to service in the burgess army, persons possessed of but 4,000 asses ($85). In case of need all those who were bound to serve in the fleet, _i.e._ those rated between 4,000 and 1,500 asses and all freedmen, together with the free-born rated between 1,500 asses ($30) and 375 asses ($7.50), were enrolled in the burgess infantry.[17] It is easy enough to see that the gift on the part of the government of 30 jugera (24 acres) of land to each poor citizen, would raise him from the ranks of the proletariate and make him liable to military service.

This is sufficient to establish Mommsen's thesis;[18] and it is not necessary to consider the second point, viz., that non-citizens were not to share in the benefit of the land law nor thereby to be raised to the rank of citizens, although to us it would be no more difficult to believe this than that 76,000 allies had been admitted to the Roman franchise "by several plebiscites" no trace or rumor of which had been preserved.

It can hardly be supposed that the Italian farmers were multiplied at the same ratio as were the Romans; but the result must have been most beneficial even to them.

In the accomplishing of this result, respectable interests and existing rights were no doubt violated. The commission itself was composed of violent partisans who, being judges unto themselves, did not scruple to carry out their plans even at the cost of recklessness and tumult. Loud complaints were made, but usually to no avail. If the domain question was to be settled at all, the matter could not be carried through without some such rigor of action. Intelligent Romans wished to see the plan thoroughly tested. But this acquiescence had a limit. The Italian domain was not all in the hands of Roman citizens. Allied communities held the usufruct of large tracts of it by means of decrees of the people or the senate, and other portions had been taken possession of by Latin burgesses. These in turn were attacked by the commissioners; but to give fresh offense to these Latini, who were already overburdened with military service, without share in the spoils, was a matter of doubtful policy.

The Latini appealed to Scipio in person, and by his influence a bill was passed by the people which withdrew from the commission its jurisdiction and remitted to the consuls the decision as to what were private and what domain lands. This was a mild way of killing the law, and resulted in that. It had, however, in great measure, fulfilled its object and left little territory in the hands of the Roman state.

[Footnote 1: App., I,9; Livy, Epit., LVIII, XII: "possessores, qui filios in potestate haberent, supra legitimum modum ducena quinquagena jugera in singulos retinerent."]