Chapter X: The Principate (3)

Although the authority of the Princeps rested virtually on the support of the army, his position might have been unsafe, and would have been embarrassing, had he not secured for the work of administration at home and abroad an official class, that was dependent to some extent on imperial creation and, therefore, worked in harmony with himself. The old Republican nobility, so far as it had not been extinguished, might be utilised; but it could be employed only by being kept in fetters, and by power being given to the Princeps to recruit its ranks at his will. We have already considered his control of office, his right of _adlectio_, and his power of creating Patricians. But a wider power, cognate to the gift of the Patriciate, was needed, to make him the patenter of a nobility from which alone senators and magistrates were to be chosen. Such a power had been usurped by Augustus, and the recognition of a “senatorial order” was its result. Perhaps in the later Republic society had already recognised the right of the prospective senator to wear the broad scarlet stripe (_latus clavus_) on his tunic, but the right became more clearly defined with the commencement of the Principate; and the _laticlavii_ are prospective senators and holders of Republican offices, either recognised as such by the Princeps or endowed by him with the symbol of senatorial rank. The senator’s son possesses the right to wear the _latus clavus_ and to attend the meetings of the _curia_, in which he will one day take an active part;[1900] the eques to whom the symbol has been given may qualify for the Senate through the vigintivirate and the quaestorship. The first steps to office and to the Senate were, as we have seen, usually through the army; but the young soldier who was destined for the Senate differed, in service and in title, from his purely equestrian compeer. The _tribuni laticlavii_[1901] are a special class of officers, who may often have started their service, as mounted officers of the legions, with the brevet rank of tribune, and whose service was shorter than that of the other equites in order that they might be qualified for the quaestorship by the age of twenty-five.[1902] The possessors of the _latus clavus_ must always have been expected to pursue a senatorial career;[1903] by the time of Claudius they might be compelled to this course, the penalty of refusal being the deprivation of the broad stripe, but sometimes of equestrian rank as well.[1904]

Great care was taken to preserve the dignity and purity of this senatorial order. The _latus clavus_ was granted only to those who could trace free birth through four generations, and Claudius was forced to excuse his conduct in giving it to a freedman’s son.[1905] The Julian marriage laws prohibited marriage with freedwomen or actresses, not only to senators, but to their sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons.[1906] “The order” was reckoned to include the wives of senators and all descendants in the male line,[1907] together with adoptive children, until they were emancipated, and even those natural children who had been emancipated.[1908] The commercial disabilities of senators were perpetuated and sharpened. The Republican prohibition that they should not be purchasers of public contracts[1909] was renewed by an edict of Hadrian.[1910] They were permitted to invest capital at a moderate rate of interest, but at times even this was disallowed.[1911]

These disabilities were, however, to some extent compensated by privileges. As the senators ceased to be purely Roman, the question of their duties to their native states had to be considered, and the rule was fixed that, while they were allowed to retain their domicile of origin (_origo_), they owed no public duties (_munera_) to the cities of their birth.[1912] We have already mentioned the growth of the principle which reserved criminal jurisdiction on a senator to the senatorial court.[1913]

In the early Principate there was no distinct title reserved for the order, but after the close of the first century the epithet _clarissimus_ came to be applied to its members, and the title _clarissima_ is even given to women of senatorial rank.[1914] A distinction in office and dignity but no distinction in rank separates the Princeps from the senators. They are his “peers” (ὁμότιμοι),[1915] and this peerage is chiefly shown in their sole participation in Republican offices. They might, indeed, be delegates of the Princeps, but not his servants in the sense in which the procurators were. Besides filling the regular offices of state, senators possessed a monopoly of provincial government, where the country governed was a true _provincia_ and not a department assigned temporarily or permanently to a procurator or praefect; they were the sole commanders of the legions, and, as Caesar’s nominees, they filled the office of praefect of the city and the various commissionerships (_curationes_) for duties which he had undertaken, such as the care of the water-supply, of the roads, of public works, and of the banks and channel of the Tiber (_curatores aquarum, viarum, operum publicorum, alvei et riparum Tiberis_).[1916]

We have already spoken of the military training and attitude of this nobility,[1917] and also of its gradually increasing provincial character.[1918] Both these characteristics were in harmony with its sphere of duties, which were mainly provincial. A successful member of the order could have seen but little of Rome or Italy until his declining years. If his early military service was real and not nominal,[1919] he spent most of the years between eighteen and twenty-five in the camps and on the frontiers. If he had shown military ability, he might be sent back as an ex-quaestor to take command of a legion, although such a legateship was usually reserved to men of praetorian rank.[1920] The praetorship and consulship qualified him for long terms of service in successive Caesarian provinces, and for the annual governorship of those still under the control of the Senate.[1921] This identification with provincial life was an identification with the Principate, for there were few Republican associations to impress the mind when the bounds of Italy had been passed. The principles of selection, training, and habituation to which this nobility was subject were thus directed to inspire it with a belief in, if not with an enthusiasm for, the accepted order of things.

The second order which supported the throne and did the work of the Empire was that of the Equites. The word _eques_ has now, as in the Republic, a dual signification. Tacitus employs it to describe the capitalist class, presumably the possessors of a census of 400,000 sesterces,[1922] and it is obvious that current terminology did not accept the restrictions which the Principate may have wished to impose on the use of the term. It is uncertain what these restrictions were, for literature and inscriptions mention two methods of conferring equestrian rank, and it is not known whether these methods—the gift of the rank through the gold ring and through the public horse—were sometimes alternative or always concurrent. But the grant of knighthood to freedmen is described as having been effected by the gift of the gold ring[1923]—a gift which, as early as the time of Hadrian, had come to confer free birth (_ingenuitas_) merely and not equestrian rank,[1924] and it cannot be shown that the public horse was always given to members of this class when they were endowed with the _insignia_ of knighthood.[1925] It is not improbable, however, that when the gold ring had lost its earlier signification and become merely a means of conferring free birth, only one order of official equites was recognised, and that the title in its proper sense was restricted to the order whose members had, from the time of Augustus, been pre-eminently the bearers of the name. This order was the old one of the _equites equo publico_, which was reorganised and vastly extended in scale at the very beginning of the Principate. We are told that even under Augustus the annual parade might witness the appearance of five thousand knights,[1926] and these could have been but a portion of the order, for many members of the corps must have been detained on financial, administrative, and military duties in the provinces. This increase in numbers seems to have led to the abandonment of the old centuriate organisation, for the equites of the Principate are grouped in _turmae_ and commanded by _seviri_.[1927] Selection for the order was entirely in the hands of the Princeps,[1928] and probably any one with the requisite qualifications—free birth, good character, and a property of 400,000 sesterces—could get this patent of nobility from the Emperor’s hands. At the times when the censorship was revived in the person of the Princeps,[1929] the selection and elimination of equites may have followed the rules prevailing under the Republican system of revision;[1930] but, as the censorship was no part of the constitution of the Principate, some department must have existed from the first for the purpose of registering the names of applicants. We find a permanent bureau eventually established for this purpose. It bore the title _a censibus equitum Romanorum_, and seems to have been a branch of the general department of petitions (_a libellis_).[1931] Although this office was concerned primarily with the duty of admission to the order, yet its holders must have pointed out to the Princeps cases where the qualifications requisite for knighthood had ceased to exist, and they must thus have acted as the board that really controlled the tenure of the rank. The formal control in this particular was, however, effected, now as in the Republic, by a solemn and public act. The act, although a Republican survival, was not employed with its Republican meaning. The parade of the knights (_transvectio equitum_) on the Ides of July had, during the Republic, been a mere procession; it was now given the significance of the censorian review in the Forum,[1932] and became the means of testing the qualifications of members of the order (_probatio equitum_).[1933] The knights now passed on horseback, not on foot; they could not ask for their discharge (_missio_), for the tenure of their rank was no longer conditioned by military service, although Augustus finally permitted all members of the age of thirty-five, who were unwilling to continue in the corps, to return their public horses;[1934] but the knights were still questioned and made to give an account of their conduct,[1935] and those whose answers were unsatisfactory were dismissed from the ranks.[1936] That Augustus took this duty seriously is shown by the fact that he more than once asked the Senate for committees, whether of three or ten members, to assist him in the work.[1937] But, although this parade is found in the reigns of subsequent Emperors,[1938] and can be traced as late as the fourth century A.D.,[1939] the serious duty of rejection was probably exercised more and more by the permanent bureau which admitted to the order.

The eighteen centuries of Roman knights had, even at the end of the Republic, never lost touch with the army. They had ceased to be the citizen cavalry, but they were composed of the young nobility who furnished the mounted officers of the legions. This secondary military character was retained by the corps in the Principate; but it had an additional significance as well. There can be no doubt that it was from the _equites equo publico_ that the Emperors chose those members of the official hierarchy—procurators and praefects—who were of equestrian rank. It is less certain whether this corps furnished all the _judices_ during the early Principate. Jurisdiction, whether civil or criminal, was a burden (_munus_), and this may have been imposed on all who possessed the requisite census, whether they had made profession for the order or not.[1940]

It was natural that an order thus definitely constituted, and which became more rigid as time went on, should end by enjoying titles of honour peculiar to itself. This stage had been attained by the second century; but the titular designations are not strictly those of the equestrian order, but of the grades of office to which it led. After the reign of Marcus Aurelius the equestrian hierarchy was divided into three classes; the first contained only the praefect of the praetorian guard who was called _vir eminentissimus_; the second the other equestrian praefects and higher procurators, who bore the title _perfectissimi_; the third—the possessors of all other equestrian posts—were _egregii_.[1941] The equestrian officers of the army were not graduated on a similar scale of rank, and the municipal knights of Italy are designated only by the old Republican and non-official epithet of _splendidi_.[1942] The more definite, but equally non-official, epithet of _illustris_ may have been applied to individuals who possessed the senatorial census and the _latus clavus_, but who were passing through the equestrian service in the army (_equestris militia_), which was preparatory to entrance into the Senate.[1943] But the name more particularly designated men who, possessed of a senatorial fortune, preferred to retain their equestrian rank, and even perhaps any equites of fortune and dignity such as the holders of the great praefectures.[1944]

§ 7. _The Functionaries of the Princeps_

The Princeps, since he is not a king, has neither magistrates nor ministers subject to his will; but he possesses a number of delegates and servants who assist in the performance of his vast duties of administration. Some of these, such as the legates, praefects, and curators, find analogies in the Republican constitution; others, such as the procurators and secretaries of departments, are borrowed from the organisation of a Roman household and are transferred from the life of the palace to that of the state. We may neglect for the moment the legates and provincial praefects, who will be considered in the section dealing with the organisation of the provinces, and fix our attention on the offices of the central government, which are either peculiar to Rome and Italy or common to them and the provincial world.

(i.) _The Praefects._—The four great praefectures, which were concerned originally with the administration of Italy and Rome, were those of the city (_urbi_), the praetorian guard (_praetorio_), the corn-supply (_annonae_), and the watch (_vigilum_). Of these the first stands entirely out of relation to the others so far as the career and qualification of its holders were concerned; for, while the praefecture of the city was a senatorial post, all the others were, during the greater part of the Principate, equestrian. Of the three latter offices the praefecture of the praetorian guard was the highest in rank, next came that of the corn-supply, and thirdly that of the watch.[1945]

The praefecture of the city was the continuation in name, and to some extent in functions, of one of the oldest offices in Rome;[1946] but the historical continuity is rendered somewhat imperfect by the fact that the ancient praefecture, which had originated with the kings and had ceased to be a reality only with the appointment of the first praetor,[1947] still continued in a shadowy form during the Principate as the praefecture created when the days of the Latin festival drew the magistrates away from Rome.[1948] But the new office of the Principate was, in a sense, a continuation of the old one of the monarchy. Both were products of personal rule and were based on the theory of delegation; the later office was suggested by the earlier, and both had much the same sphere of administration. The link between the Republican office and that of the Principate is found in the arrangements of the dictator Caesar and in the earlier procedure of Augustus. The link was broken when, under Tiberius, the praefecture became a permanent and not an occasional office. In 46 B.C. Caesar had left six _praefecti_ in Rome to administer the affairs of the city during his absence;[1949] Maecenas had had a similar, though less definite, position given him by Augustus;[1950] and when the latter became Princeps, the praefecture between the years 27 and 24 B.C. became a more regular, although still an occasional office, and was renewed from time to time by Augustus during his absences from the capital.[1951] Tiberius’ long periods of retirement made it practically perpetual,[1952] and under subsequent reigns the praefect remains in office even when the Princeps is present in Rome.[1953] It was, perhaps, due to its associations with the Republican magistracy that this office was filled by a senator and a consular.[1954] The same associations may account for the facts that the praefect of the city, although a delegate of the Princeps and nominated by him for an indefinite period,[1955] is yet accounted a magistrate, and is even credited with _imperium_.[1956]

One of the early occupants of the office[1957] sent in his resignation six days after his appointment on the ground that he had held an _incivilis potestas_; and indeed the scope of the praefect’s duties and the extent of summary jurisdiction and coercive power which they involved, might easily lead a sensitive mind to shrink from such un-Republican authority. The praefect was briefly the guardian of the city (_custos urbis_), and nothing that could be construed as a part of that _tutela_[1958] was exempt from his control. It was his duty to keep order everywhere, at the games as in the market, and for this purpose he had at his disposal the city cohorts (_cohortes urbanae_) established by Augustus,[1959] three divisions of which were quartered in Rome during the reign of Tiberius.[1960] But the preservation of order implied interference with a great many departments of civic life. The praefect controlled the theatre, the money-changers, the sale of meat, the trading and religious guilds; he listened to the grievances of slaves, or to the complaints of _patroni_ about their freedmen, and finally even had cognisance of serious offences committed by guardians.[1961] The criminal jurisdiction, which was the complement of his authority, was so indefinite that at a very early period it crossed that of the _quaestiones perpetuae_,[1962] and, as the tendency of the Principate was to make the latter give way before the former, we are not surprised at the unlimited criminal jurisdiction described by Dio Cassius and recorded in the _Digest_ as vested in the praefect in the third century A.D.[1963] He might at this time inflict the severest punishments, even deportation or condemnation to the mines.[1964] His police control and criminal jurisdiction extended to the limit of a hundred miles from Rome.[1965] Within the city he might judge in person; jurisdiction in Italy he exercised through delegates.[1966] He also possessed a certain civil jurisdiction connected with his functions of preserving order,[1967] and finally became the court of appeal, in civil cases, from officials in Rome.[1968] But he was not a final court, for a further appeal lay from the praefect to the Emperor.

The _praefectus praetorio_ was in origin the commander of the Emperor’s bodyguard. This _corps d’élite_, which even in the Republic had grouped itself round a commander in the field, was given a definite existence and organisation in the year 28 B.C.,[1969] and became the police of Italy, the selected home force composed, unlike the legions, mainly of Italian citizens,[1970] and the protector, often the transmitter, of the throne. Its praefects at this early stage represent the military character of the despotism perhaps more purely than any other officials, and even the reign of the second Caesar could show in Sejanus one of the most formidable of those praefects who were almost partners of the throne. The danger threatened by the office illustrates its power, and this was recognised when Vespasian sought security by giving the praefecture to his own son Titus,[1971] or Severus married his elder son to the daughter of his praefect Plautianus.[1972] A more favourite method was to increase the number of its holders. Two were frequently appointed, and three are found on two occasions since the time of Commodus.[1973] Gradually the military functions of the office ceased to be the most important, although its military history had determined its character. The praefect of the guard had always been the man who stood next the throne; he was a truer _alter ego_ of the Princeps than the praefect of the city, for his activity was not confined to Rome and Italy. It was he who issued rapid injunctions for the organisation of the army or for the guidance of the civil service throughout the Empire, and at times we find two praefects, such as Adventus and Macrinus in the reign of Caracalla, representing respectively the military and civil spheres. But jurisdiction, the most constant of the Emperor’s cares, and the framing of legal decrees, also demanded the attention of the praefect, and hence it was necessary to entrust the office to the first jurists of the Empire. Papinian, Ulpian, and Paulus were all praefects of the guard. The change in the character of the office perhaps began with Hadrian; it was carried on during the reigns of the Antonine Emperors, and finally achieved in that of Septimius Severus. The judicial aspect of the office was now paramount. The praefect has become the highest criminal judge in Italy outside the hundredth milestone;[1974] he is the court of appeal in criminal cases from all provincial governors,[1975] and judges in those cases which the provincial governor was not competent to decide.[1976] He is also the court of appeal from provincial governors in civil cases.[1977] This extensive jurisdiction was a result of the centralisation of judicial power in the Emperor, which we have already traced.[1978] It had to be delegated, and no fitter delegate could be found than the praefect. Convenience also dictated that the delegation should be final, and the principle was finally arrived at that there should be no appeal from the praefect to the Emperor.[1979] This did not mean that the Emperor ceased to judge; for at any moment he might displace his praefect and hear the case himself. As the praefect judged _vice principis_, it is natural to suppose that he presided over the imperial _consilium_,[1980] which attained a definite organisation in the reign of Hadrian;[1981] and this probability is scarcely shaken by the fact that we find special _consiliarii_ nominated for the praefect,[1982] for he exercised a varied jurisdiction and might be holding a court at the same time as the Emperor. Apart from jurisdiction, his general mandates and ordinances had legal force, provided that they did not conflict with laws or imperial constitutions.[1983]

During the greater part of the Principate equestrian rank was a necessary qualification for this praefecture. Senators first began to hold this office from the time of Severus Alexander, who gave his praefects _senatoria dignitas_ and the title _clarissimus_,[1984] for it was held that one who pronounced judgment on a senator should himself be of senatorial rank.[1985] At the time when the praefect was a knight, dismissal from office often took the form of making him a senator or a member of the senatorial order.[1986]

The _praefectus annonae_ was the final product of a question that had never ceased to agitate Rome from the close of the Punic wars. Anxiety about the supply of corn to the capital had raised Pompeius to an extraordinary position in 57 B.C.,[1987] and in 43 the Senate, alarmed at the possible designs of Antonius and Octavian, had agreed that no individual _curator_ for corn should again be appointed.[1988] In the early Principate the duty belonged technically to the _aediles cereales_ instituted by Caesar;[1989] but epochs of scarcity led to its being taken over by the Princeps. Augustus accepted the task in 22 B.C.,[1990] but whether as a permanent cura is uncertain,[1991] and in 18 B.C. and 6 A.D. experiments were made to carry it through by the appointment of _curatores_ of praetorian or consular rank.[1992] Finally, as a definite _cura_ of the Princeps, it was given to a praefect. The _cura annonae_ as undertaken by the Princeps involved two charges; firstly, the gratuitous distribution of corn to the poorer classes at Rome, and secondly, the placing of corn on the Roman market for purchasers as well as recipients. It was with the latter of these duties that the praefect was chiefly, perhaps exclusively, concerned.[1993] He had to see that the requisite mass of grain was brought to the market, and that it was sold at a moderate and stable price.[1994] Assistance was furnished him by subordinate officials in Rome itself, in the harbours of Italy, and in the provinces, senatorial as well as imperial; but the number of these procurators was not large, since the lower departments of the corn-supply were managed by guilds, such as those of the _mensores_ and _navicularii_,[1995] “associations that originally leased their services to the state and finally became its instruments.”[1996] The praefect possessed a jurisdiction arising from his administrative duties. He listened to criminal informations touching the public supply of corn,[1997] and seems even to have heard certain civil actions arising out of the corn trade.[1998] The appeal from his judgment went immediately to the Emperor.[1999]

The institution of the _praefectus vigilum_ was equally the result of the Emperor’s undertaking a special department of administration that had formerly belonged to Republican magistrates. The guardianship of the town against fires and nocturnal disturbances had belonged chiefly to the _triumviri capitales_,[2000] and in a more general way to the aediles. But the Republican appliances were found insufficient, and Augustus formed an early scheme for giving the curule aediles a fire-brigade of six hundred slaves.[2001] Even this did not prove satisfactory, and in A.D. 6 he undertook the new _cura_—an undertaking which was followed by the establishment of seven cohorts of _vigiles_, one for every two of the fourteen regions of the city, and the creation of a praefect set over the tribunes who were commanders of these divisions.[2002] This praefecture was, like that of the corn-supply, equestrian, and the two differ little in rank; for, although the _praefectura annonae_ was reckoned superior, direct promotion from the command of the _vigiles_ to that of the praetorian guard is found.[2003] The praefect protected the town and patrolled the streets by night, and he exercised a jurisdiction closely connected with his police functions, and resembling, in a lower degree, that of the praefect of the city. He tried cases of arson, robbery, burglary, and thefts in baths;[2004] but the higher jurisdiction in such cases belonged to the _praefectus urbi_, and the praefect of the watch could not try Roman citizens on capital charges.[2005] In the third century he possessed some civil jurisdiction in matters connected with leases and house-rent.[2006]

(ii.) _The Curators._—There were certain _curae_ undertaken by Augustus which he did not give to equestrian praefects, but to senatorial _curatores_. These _curae_ of the roads of Italy, of the public works, of the public water-supply, and of the channel and banks of the Tiber (_viarum, operum publicorum, aquarum publicarum, alvei et riparum Tiberis_), were filled by nomination of the Princeps, but their holders were perhaps, like the praefects of the _aerarium_, regarded as officials of the people or of the Senate rather than of the Emperor; the reason for this view probably being that the care of the roads, _opera publica_, and the like was concerned with _solum publicum_, and “the public soil in Rome and Italy was, even after the foundation of the Principate, not the property of the Emperor but of the people or the Senate.”[2007] Hence in the early Principate the pecuniary means for this administration was guaranteed from the _aerarium_, the _fiscus_ merely contributing.[2008] Hence too the occupation of these posts by senators and their method of appointment. In 11 B.C. Augustus nominated _curatores aquarum_ with the consent of the Senate (_ex consensu senatus, ex senatus auctoritate_);[2009] the _curatores operum publicorum_ and _viarum_ were perhaps nominated in the same way, and the _curatores_ of the Tiber were in Tiberius’ reign appointed by lot.[2010]

(iii.) _The Procurators._—The quasi-magisterial position of the occupants of the higher imperial posts could not be reflected in the lower grades of office. So far as the detailed _ministeria principatus_[2011] were concerned, the Princeps adopted the analogy of the Roman house, not of the Roman state, and employed either general agents (_procuratores_) or assistants designated by the secretarial or other duty which they performed (_ab epistulis_, _a rationibus_, etc.). There was always a distinction between the two classes, which was still preserved now that they had become official. The agent of domestic life might indeed approximate to the condition of a mere bailiff, and might be a slave; but the necessity for representing the absent _dominus_ in courts of law had made it convenient that the procurator should be a free man; and the idea of agency, usually of general agency (_procuratio omnium rerum_),[2012] was closely associated with the word. On the other hand, the slaves and freedmen of the household who copied and kept accounts, were not agents; and, in accordance with this distinction, the officials of the Principate who bear such titles as _ab epistulis_, _a libellis_, _a rationibus_, are not spoken of as procurators, although one of these posts might rise to the dignity of a procuratorship, as that _a rationibus_ did.

Although from the point of view of functions the two classes must be kept distinct, from that of qualification they may be discussed together. In both we observe the tendency for the household to become a bureau, for the freedman and slave to give place to the Roman knight. Tiberius’ household consisted mainly of freedmen,[2013] and their influence reached its zenith in the reign of Claudius. An Emperor who sought popularity might, like Vitellius, transfer the _ministeria_ of the Principate to Roman knights;[2014] but no comprehensive attempt seems to have been made to reorganise the bureaucracy on this footing until the time of Hadrian.[2015] Henceforth the higher grades were held as a rule by knights, only the lower being possessed indifferently by equites or freedmen.[2016] The procuratorship was the patent of equestrian nobility (_equestris nobilitas_),[2017] and we have seen that titles were finally devised to express the differences in procuratorial rank.[2018] The civil service now became closely connected with the army, and the occupants of civil posts were mainly retired officers, men who had held at least one of the three positions in the equestrian service,[2019] and who, after the second century, had generally filled every grade before they took the procuratorship.[2020] This militarising of the administrative service is one of the most curious features of the Principate. It gave that service its precision, its rigidity, its tendency to work as a smooth machine almost independently of personal control. This tendency was a blessing in so far as it was calculated to diminish the influence due to the idiosyncrasies of the Princeps, or of any individual holder of office; but one cannot help suspecting that a great deal of the administrative tyranny, which darkened the closing years of the Principate and weakened the Empire, was due to the ineradicable habits of routine inspired by a military life, and that the Greek or Graeco-Asiatic freedman, although a more corrupt, was, on the whole, a more capable administrator. The military supply was not, however, altogether sufficient, and from the time of Hadrian a civil career was also open, which gave a chance to the aspiring lawyer.

Theoretically the procurator’s duties were those of mere agency, and he had little discretionary authority and no general official power. Tiberius’ emphatic statement that his procurator’s business was merely to manage the Emperor’s slaves and personal property[2021] is echoed in the language of the _Digest_, which tells us that the duties of these servants of the Emperor were strictly defined, that they were accountable to their master for the use made of the finances or property under their care, that they could not give, sell, or transfer it, and that “careful management” was the limit of their power.[2022] It was only when they kept within these bounds that their acts had all the authority of those of the Princeps himself.[2023] But the extending spheres of their operations rendered it impossible for these limits to be rigorously preserved. Claudius asked and obtained that his procurators should be permitted jurisdiction within their own financial departments[2024]—an almost necessary result of the fact that in the provinces (and especially in those under senatorial management) there was no convenient court of arbitration to decide when money was or was not owing to the Princeps.[2025] The consent of the Princeps, also, to the procurator’s acts must eventually have meant the consent of the chief bureau at Rome; for, in spite of the extraordinary capacity for personal government possessed by the Roman Emperors, the fiscal system was too complicated for every detail to reach their ears.

The chief duties of the procurators were financial, and most of these agents can be summed up under the title _procuratores fisci_. A number of titles are met with which clearly have reference to the central department at Rome. Such are _procurator summarum_ found in an inscription of Nero’s time and borne by a freedman,[2026] _procuratores rationum summarum_,[2027] _rationalis summae rei_,[2028] _dispensator_ or _dispensator summarum_,[2029] and _vilicus summarum_.[2030] The titles belong to different epochs, and it is difficult to establish their precise import. It is generally agreed that from the time of Claudius the title _a rationibus_ was reserved for the chief controller of the _fiscus_. After the reign of Hadrian this post was reserved for equites,[2031] and the members of the central bureau had a higher standing than the financial agents in the provinces. The title _procurator rationum summarum_, which belongs to the second century, denotes some highly placed official connected with this central chest; but, as it does not seem to be identical with the title _a rationibus_, it has been thought to represent a subordinate controller perhaps instituted by Marcus Aurelius.[2032] The title _rationalis_, which was often identical with _procurator_,[2033] seems at some period within the third century to have replaced _a rationibus_ as the designation of the chief officer of the _fiscus_.[2034]

Amongst provincial procurators we may enumerate first those who were confined to the imperial provinces. The procurator here occupied the position which the quaestor held in the public provinces; he was the chief officer of the provincial _fiscus_, collected the taxes due to it, and managed the disbursement of its funds. There was also a treasury connected with the military station in the province (_fiscus castrensis_), and at the head of it a _procurator castrensis_, who superintended the payments made to the soldiers,[2035] and military expenses in general. Other procurators were common to all the provinces; for even those that were “public” paid certain dues to the Emperor.[2036] Such were lapsed legacies and the goods of the condemned (_bona caduca_ and _damnatorum_), after the _fiscus_ had asserted its claim to these revenues,[2037] and the taxes owed by Roman citizens everywhere, such as the _vicesima hereditatum_ and the _centesima rerum venalium_. But the public provinces owed more direct dues to the Princeps as well. Thus Africa, a corn-supplying but not an imperial province, was brought into the closest relation with his _cura annonae_, and even the most peaceful districts must have defrayed the expense of the necessary military protection, and surrendered certain revenues to be collected by imperial officials.

Common, too, to all the provinces were the agents who managed the imperial estates (_procuratores patrimonii_ or _patrimonii privati_).[2038] We have already noticed that after the time of Severus a distinction was drawn between the _res privata_ and the _patrimonium_ of the Emperor.[2039] From this time onward the _procurator rerum privatarum_ is distinct from the _procurator patrimonii_.[2040]

The non-financial procurators, who were actually governors of districts, will be discussed when we are dealing with the organisation of the provinces.

The tenure of office by a procurator was indefinite, and depended on the imperial pleasure. Technically their posts expired when the Princeps who had appointed them died,[2041] and the renewal of their office by his successor, although it must have been the rule, was treated as a new appointment. The posts were well paid and procurators bore the titles _trecenarius_, _ducenarius_, _centenarius_, and _sexagenarius_, according as their salaries varied from 300,000 to 60,000 sesterces. The salaries of the procurators at Rome were probably higher than those belonging to the same departments in Italy and in the provinces. Thus the _procuratio rationis privatae_ was probably in Rome a _trecenaria_, in the provinces a _ducenaria_, in Italy, where it would be merely a branch of the central office, a _centenaria procuratio_.[2042] Promotion seems to have been determined chiefly by merit, and one of the strong points of the system was that there was no mechanical system of advancement. It was possible for a secretary, who had never been a procurator proper, to be appointed to a praefecture,[2043] but, as a rule, several procuratorships were passed through before this summit of equestrian ambition was attained.[2044]

(iv.) _Personal Assistants._—The secretariate of the Principate was, as we have seen, but the business side of the organisation of a Roman household, but so rapidly did the importance and official aspect of these posts develop that already by Nero’s reign a Roman noble, who kept assistants with such titles as _ab epistulis_ and _a libellis_, might be suspected of treasonable designs.[2045] These secretaryships became, in fact though not in law, great offices of state. They required more highly trained ability than most of the procuratorships, and, as they brought their holders into close relations with the Princeps, the influence and the power of patronage which they conferred must have been enormous.

The official _ab epistulis_ put into shape all the decisions of the Princeps which took the form of letters, so far as these were not written personally by the Princeps himself. The answers to the _consultationes_ of officials, to the despatches of generals and provincial governors, or to deputations from foreign communities, together with the nomination of officials and officers and the conferment of privileges, passed through his hands.[2046]

The official _a libellis_ drew up the answers to petitions (_preces_, _libelli_)[2047] made by private individuals to the Emperor. The answer was generally given in a short _subscriptio_ appended to the document.[2048] The framing of such replies required considerable legal knowledge; hence it is not surprising to find that jurists like Papinian and Ulpian held this post.

The official _a cognitionibus_ was the adviser of the Emperor on legal points, which were settled by imperial decree. The points on which advice was given were perhaps wholly those of civil jurisdiction, and were probably such as did not need to come before the imperial _consilium_.[2049] The office was in existence at the beginning of the third century,[2050] but is thought to have been subsequently merged in that _a libellis_.[2051]

The official _a memoria_ is first mentioned about the time of the Emperor Caracalla. His function was probably to put into form and reduce to writing (often by dictation to a secretary)[2052] such speeches and verbal decisions of the Emperor as did not fall under the competence of the other officials.

(v.) _The Consilium._—The _consilium_ of the Princeps[2053] was merely a renewed manifestation of that eternal principle of Roman public life which directed that a magistrate should seek advisers. A council was necessary for public confidence, but an imperial _consilium_ was originally no part of the constitution of the Principate. Tiberius imitated Augustus in seeking advice before coming to a decision on important matters;[2054] yet when he sat as a high court of criminal jurisdiction, his board of assessors could be described as consisting of a “few friends.”[2055] The board may have become more determinate in succeeding reigns, but the first Princeps whom we hear of as giving it a definite organisation was Hadrian. That Emperor, we are told, when he held a court of justice, summoned as his advisers jurisconsults approved by the Senate.[2056] It is only a _judicial_ council that is here described, and there is nothing to show that these legal experts were necessarily consulted on administrative matters. The basis, however, was laid for a permanent council of state, and the _consiliarii Augusti_ of this period became a definite and salaried class.[2057] They included both senators and equites,[2058] and some bore the title _jurisperiti_.[2059] Others may not have been gifted with special knowledge of the law, and may have been employed in cases where general ability or experience may have been of more value than juristic training. Actual jurisdiction was not, however, the only occasion on which legal knowledge was indispensable in an adviser. The help of the jurist had to be sought in the framing of the imperial _constitutiones_,[2060] and we are told that for this purpose Severus Alexander was assisted by twenty _jurisperiti_ out of a _consilium_ numbering seventy in all.[2061] A difference of personnel for different branches of administration is easily comprehensible, for it is improbable that the Emperor needed to summon all his councillors on every occasion on which he took advice.[2062] The mode of consultation was wholly informal and depended on the discretion of the Princeps. Augustus in the exercise of his jurisdiction distributed voting tablets (_tabellae_) to his councillors, on which they could inscribe acquittal or condemnation or a modified verdict.[2063] We cannot imagine that the votes were reckoned as in the jury system. The _tabellae_ were for the enlightenment of the Princeps, and he may have decided according to the weight of the names of those who handed them in. Nero, we are told, took opinions on paper, and, after reading them, gave his own judgment as though it were that of the majority of his advisers.[2064] Under Severus Alexander opinions were given verbally and taken down in short-hand.[2065]

We have already shown that it is probable that the imperial _consilium_ in its developed form was employed by the praefect of the praetorian guard when he gave judgment _vice_ the Princeps.[2066]