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diff --git a/12638-8.txt b/12638-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c7af5f0 --- /dev/null +++ b/12638-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4110 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Public Lands and Agrarian Laws of the Roman +Republic, by Andrew Stephenson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Public Lands and Agrarian Laws of the Roman Republic + +Author: Andrew Stephenson + +Release Date: June 16, 2004 [EBook #12638] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUBLIC LANDS AND AGRARIAN *** + + + + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Lesley Halamek and PG Distributed +Proofreaders + + + + + + + +JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES +IN +HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL SCIENCE + +HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor + + + * * * * * + +History is past Politics and Politics present History--_Freeman_ + + * * * * * + + +NINTH SERIES +VII-VIII + +PUBLIC LANDS AND AGRARIAN LAWS +OF THE +ROMAN REPUBLIC + +BY ANDREW STEPHENSON, PH.D. +_Professor of History, Wesleyan University_ + + + * * * * * + + + +BALTIMORE + +THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS + +JULY-AUGUST, 1891 + + + +Copyright, 1891, BY THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS. + + + + +PREFACE. + + +In the following pages it has been my object to trace the history of the +domain lands of Rome from the earliest times to the establishment of the +Empire. The plan of the work has been to sketch the origin and growth of +the idea of private property in land, the expansion of the _ager publicus_ +by the conquest of neighboring territories, and its absorption by means of +sale, by gift to the people, and by the establishment of colonies, until +wholly merged in private property. This necessarily involves a history of +the agrarian laws, as land distributions were made and colonies established +only in accordance with laws previously enacted. + +My reason for undertaking such a work as the present is found in the fact +that agrarian movements have borne more or less upon every point in Roman +constitutional history, and a proper knowledge of the former is necessary +to a just interpretation of the latter. + +This whole question presents numerous obscurities before which it has been +necessary more than once to hesitate; it offers, both in its entirety and +in detail, difficulties which I have at least earnestly endeavored +to lessen. These obscurities and difficulties, arising in part from +insufficiency of historical evidence and in part from the conflicting +statements of the old historians, have been recognized by all writers and +call forth on my part no claim for indulgence. + +This monograph is intended as a chapter merely of a history of the public +lands and agrarian laws of Rome, written for the purpose of a future +comparison with the more recent agrarian movements in England and America. + +ANDREW STEPHENSON. + +MlDDLETOWN, CONN. _May_ 8, 1891. + + + +TABLE OF CONTENTS. + +CHAPTER I. + +Sec. 1. LANDED PROPERTY + " 2. QUIRITARIAN OWNERSHIP + " 3. AGER PUBLICUS + " 4. ROMAN COLONIES + +CHAPTER II. + +Sec. 5. LEX CASSIA + " 6. AGRARIAN MOVEMENTS BETWEEN 486 AND 367 + (a) Extension of Territory by conquest up to the year 367 B.C. + (b) Colonies Founded between 454 and 367 + +Sec. 7. LEX LICINIA + " 8. AGRARIAN MOVEMENTS BETWEEN 367 AND 133 + (a) Extension of Territory by conquest between 367 and 133 + (b) Colonies Founded between 367 and 133 + +Sec. 9. LATIFUNDIA + " 10. INFLUENCE OF SLAVERY + " 11. LEX SEMPRONIA TIBERIANA + " 12. LEX SEMPRONIA GAIANA + +CHAPTER III. + +Sec.13. LEX THORIA + " 14. AGRARIAN MOVEMENTS BETWEEN 111 AND 86 + " 15. EFFECT OF THE SULLAN REVOLUTION + " 16. AGRARIAN MOVEMENTS BETWEEN 86 AND 59 + " 17. LEX JULIA AGRARIA + " 18. DISTRIBUTION OF LAND AFTER THE CIVIL WAR BETWEEN CÆSAR AND POMPEY + " 19. DISTRIBUTIONS FROM THE DEATH OF CÆSAR TO THE TIME OF AUGUSTUS + (a) Lex Agraria of Lucius Antonius + (b) Lex de Colonis in Agros Deducendis + (c) Second Triumvirate + + + + + +PUBLIC LANDS AND AGRARIAN LAWS OF THE ROMAN REPUBLIC. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + +SEC. 1.--LANDED PROPERTY. + + +The Romans were a people that originally gave their almost exclusive +attention to agriculture and stock-raising. The surnames of the most +illustrious families, as Piso (miller), Porcius (swine-raiser), Lactucinius +(lettuce-raiser), Stolo (a shoot), etc., prove this. To say that a man was +a good farmer was, at one time, to bestow upon him the highest praise.[1] +This character, joined to the spirit of order and private avarice which +in a marked degree distinguished the Romans, has contributed to the +development among them of a civil law which is perhaps the most remarkable +monument which antiquity has left us. This civil code has become the basis +of the law of European peoples, and recommends the civilization of Rome to +the veneration of mankind. + +The corner-stone of this legislation was the constitution of the law of +property.[2] This property applies itself to everything in the law of Rome, +to land, to persons and to obligations. + +_Urbs_, the name of the village, takes its origin, according to an +etymology given by Varro,[3] from the furrow which the plow traced about +the habitations of the earliest dwellers. But what is of more interest to +us is that the legal signification of _Urbs_ and _Roma_ was different. The +former was the village comprised within the sacred enclosure; the latter +was the total agglomeration of habitations which composed the village, +properly[4] so called, and the outskirts, or suburbs. The powers of +certain magistrates ceased with the sacred limits of the _Urbs_, while the +privileges accorded to a citizen of Rome extended to the village and the +suburbs and finally embraced the entire Roman world. + +The most ancient documents which have reached us from the history of India +and Egypt reveal that they had landed property fully established, while +Roman annals reveal to us the very creation of this institution. Whatever +modern criticism may deduce, Dionysius, Plutarch, Livy, and Cicero agree in +representing the first king of Rome as merely establishing public property +in Roman soil. This national property, the people possessed in common and +not individually. Such appears to us to be the quiritarian property _par +excellence_[5] and its primitive form was a variety of public community[6] +of which individual property was but a later solemn emancipation. To this +historic theory attaches the true notion of quiritarian land of which we +will speak in greater detail hereafter. + +As regards the organization and constitution of individual and private +property, the traditions themselves attribute this to the second king of +Rome, the real founder of Roman society, who divided the territory among +the citizens, marking off the limits of individual shares and placing them +under the protection of religion. In this way a religious charter was +granted to the institutions of private property. Thus a primitive division +of territory appears to have been the basis of these varied traditions, but +the precise form of this division eludes us. + +The Roman territory was confined for many ages to a surface of very limited +extent, which properly bore the name of _Ager Romanus_. This name with +signification slightly changed appeared to be still in use in the time of +the empire, and even at the present day a portion of the Roman territory +which very nearly corresponds to the ancient territory of the imperial +period is called _Agro Romano.[7]_ That which was properly called _Ager +Romanus_ at first only occupied the surface of a slightly expanded arc +whose chord was the river Tiber.[8] Primitive Rome did not extend beyond +the Tiber into Etruria, and toward Latium her possessions did not extend +beyond the limits of some five or six miles reckoning from the Palatine. +Toward the east the towns of Antemnae, Fidenae, Caenina, Collatia and Gabia +lay in the immediate neighborhood, thus limiting the extension of the city +in that direction within a radius of five or six miles;[9] and northward +the Anio[10] formed the limit. To the southwest as you approach Lavinium, +the sixth milestone marked the boundary of Rome. Thus with the possible +exception of a small strip of land extending upon either bank of the Tiber +to its mouth, and embracing the old site[11] of Ostia, have we marked out +all of ancient Rome. Strabo[12] says it could be gone round in a single +day. And according to this same author it was within these limits that the +annual auspices[13] could be taken. + +Both city and land increased with time. Property seemed to have been added +and lost successively during the reign of the kings.[14] The last increase +of the _Ager Romanus_ was due to the labors of Servius Tullius, and it was +in the reign of this king that it reached its greatest limit. Dionysius[15] +says: "As soon as he (Servius) was invested with the government, he divided +the public lands among such of the Romans as having no lands of their own, +cultivated those of others.... He added two hills to the city, that called +the Viminal and the Esquiline hill, each of which forms a considerable +city; these he divided among such Romans as had no houses, to the intent +that they might build them.... This king was the last who enlarged the +circumference of the city by the addition of these two hills to the other +five, having first consulted the auspices as the law decided, and performed +the other religious rites. Further than this the city has not since then +been extended." Without doubt these possessions received great additions in +later times,[16] but they were not incorporated in the _Ager Romanus_ as +the preceding had been. The subjugated territories kept their ancient names +while their lands were made the object of distributions to the people, of +public sales to the citizens who also extended their possessions outside of +Roman[17] territory, or else the new conquests were abandoned to municipia, +given up to colonies, or became a part of that which was called _Ager +Publicus_. In fine, it was a fundamental principle of the public law of +Rome that the lands and the persons of the people conquered belonged to the +conqueror, the Roman people, who either in person or by their delegates +disposed of them as it seemed best. Among the ancients war always decided +concerning both liberty and property. + +The result of all these facts was that the Roman territory was made the +object of a division or a primitive distribution either among the three +races of the first population, or a little later among the citizens or +inhabitants. This very same principle has been frequently observed in +recent times in regard to confiscated[18] territories and conquered +peoples. + +Now what was the allotment of the first distribution of land? + +Upon this topic the ancient authorities are blind and confusing to such an +extent as to be wholly inadequate for the solution of the difficulty. Among +the more recent authorities, two opposing systems have been sustained, the +one represented by Montesquieu, and the other by Niebuhr. (1) According to +Montesquieu, the kings of Rome divided the land into perfectly equal lots +for all the citizens and the title of the law of the Twelve Tables relative +to successions was for no other object than to establish this ancient +equality of the division of lands.[19] (2) Niebuhr,[20] on the contrary, +claimed that territorial property was primitively the attribute of the +patriciate and everyone who was not a member of this noble race was +incapable of possessing any part of the territory. From this theory the +author deduced numerous consequences which are important both to law and +history. Neither of these systems is free from errors. Montesquieu seems to +have made no difference between patrician and plebeian in using the term +_citizen_, while it is no longer disputed that the plebeian was not a +burgess and consequently had no civic rights save those granted to him by +the ruling class. His idea of goods must have, at least, become chimerical +at a very early date, as this equality was so little suspected by the +ancients that Plutarch,[21] after having spoken of the efforts of Lycurgus +to overturn the inequality of wealth among the Spartans, accuses Numa of +having neglected a necessity so important. It is moreover difficult to +see how Montesquieu could think that testamentary disposition tended to +maintain equality when the privilege was accorded to every citizen of +disposing of his entire patrimony by will even to the prejudice of his +children.[22] Again, the law of debts was hardly favorable[23] to equality. + +Niebuhr clearly[24] denied the existence of the plebs until Ancus +incorporated the Latins and bestowed upon them peculiar privileges thus +forming a new and third class distinct from both patricians and clients. +Had Niebuhr succeeded in establishing this view, the right to landed +property would appear to be wholly vested in the patricians, for a client, +from the very nature of his position, could hold nothing independent of +his master. But this theory has fallen to the ground and no writer of the +present day pretends to uphold it. The plebeians existed from the very +first and some of them held land in full private ownership very little +different from the quiritarian ownership of the patricians. Cicero, who in +his Republic[25] has occupied himself with the ancient constitution of Rome +and has spoken in detail of the division of the lands, always speaks of the +distribution among the citizens without regard to quality of patrician +or plebeian, _divisit viritim civibus_. He has nowhere written that +territorial riches were the exclusive appanage of the patriciate. It must +be confessed, however, that it is doubtful whether he intended to embrace +the plebeians in his _civibus_. For more than two centuries before the time +of Cicero the plebeians had enjoyed the full rights of Roman citizenship, +but for more than that length of time property had been concentrated in +the hands of the aristocracy. This result was the consequence of the Roman +constitution[26] and the establishment of a populous city in the midst of a +narrow surrounding country. Roman policy had never been conducive to this +concentration, and it will hereafter appear that the nobility who had the +chief direction and administration of public affairs had little by little +usurped the property which formed the domain of the state, _i.e. Ager +Publicus_, and swallowed up the revenues due the treasury. + +[Footnote 1: Cato, _De Re Rustica_, I, lines 3-8. "Majores nostri ... virum +bonum cum laudabant, ita laudabant, bonum agricolam bonumque colonum. +Amplissime laudari existimabatur, qui ita laudabatur."] + +[Footnote 2: Muirhead, _Roman Law_, 36 _et seq_.] + +[Footnote 3: Varro, _De Lingua Latina_, V, 143.] + +[Footnote 4: Frag, to Digest, 287 and 147 of Title 16, Bk. 50 with notes of +Schultung and Small.] + +[Footnote 5: Plutarch's _Romulus_, § 19.] + +[Footnote 6: Mommsen, _History of Rome_, l, 194.] + +[Footnote 7: Sismondi, _Etudes sur l'econ. polit._, 1, 2, § 1.] + +[Footnote 8: Pseudo Fabius Pictor, Bk. I, p. 54; Plut., _Numa_, 16; Festus +V° Pectustum Palati, p. 198 and 566, Lindemann.] + +[Footnote 9: Arnold, _Roman History_, I, ch. 3, par. 4.] + +[Footnote 10: Mommsen, I, 75.] + +[Footnote 11: Strabo, Bk. 5, 253.] + +[Footnote 12: Strabo, Bk. 5, ch. 3, § 2.] + +[Footnote 13: Arnold, I, ch. 3.] + +[Footnote 14: Dionysius, II, 55; V, 33, 36; III, 49-50; Livy, I, 23-36.] + +[Footnote 15: Dionysius, IV, 13.] + +[Footnote 16: Varro, _De Lingua Latina_, V, 33.] + +[Footnote 17: Sigonius, _De Antiq. Juris Civ. Rom_., Bk. I, ch. 2.] + +[Footnote 18: Hume's _Hist, of Eng_., I, ch. 4: IV, ch. 61.] + +[Footnote 19: _Esprit des lois_, Liv. 27, c. 1.] + +[Footnote 20: _Roman Hist_., II, 164; III, 175 and 211.] + +[Footnote 21: Lycurgus and Numa, II; Cicero, _De Repub_., II, 9.] + +[Footnote 22: Muirhead, _Roman Law_, 46 and note--"uti legasset suae rei +ita jus esto."] + +[Footnote 23: Muirhead, 92-96.] + +[Footnote 24: Niebuhr, I.] + +[Footnote 25: Momm., I, 126; Ihne, I; Nitzsch, _Geschichte der römischen +Republik_, 52; Lange, _Römische Geschichte_, I, 18.] + +[Footnote 26: Dureau de la Malle, _Mém. sur les pop. de l'Italie, 500 et +seq_.] + + + + +SEC. 2.--QUIRITARIAN OWNERSHIP. + + +Citizenship was the first requisite to the right of property in Roman +territory. This rule, although invariable and inherent in the Roman state, +bent under the influence of international politics or the philosophy of +law, yet its severity affords us a notable characteristic of the law of +ancient Rome. Cicero and Gaius have preserved to us an important monument +of this law in a fragment of the Twelve Tables which proclaims the solemn +principle, _adversus hostem aeterna auctoritas esto.[1] Hostis_ in the old +Latin language was synonymous with stranger, _perigrinus_[2] This Roman +name was moreover applied to a person who had forfeited the protection +of the law by reason of a criminal condemnation, and who was therefore +designated _peregrinus_.[3] + +_Auctoritas_ also had in old Latin a different signification from what it +has in later Latin. It expressed the idea of the right to claim and defend +in equity. It was very nearly equivalent to the right of property.[4] The +sense of the Roman law was, then, that the _peregrinus_ could not bar or +proceed against a Roman, a disposition somewhat similar to the old law of +England.[5] And as it was necessary to be a citizen in order to acquire by +the civil and solemn means which dominated the law of property in Rome, it +followed that the _peregrini_ were excluded from all right to property in +land by these laws. This exclusive legislation for a long time governed +Europe and did not disappear even from the Code Napoleon of 1819.[6] + +We have a forcible example of the severity of the old Roman law in this +regard in the text of Gaius,--_Aut enim ex jure quiritium unusquisque +dominus erat, aut non intelligebatur dominus._[7] + +_Dominium_ was therefore inseparable from _Jus Quiritium,_ the law of +the Roman city, the _optimum jus civium Romanorum_. The _peregrinus_ was +excluded from landed property both Roman and private; he could neither +inherit nor transmit; claim nor defend in equity. Moreover the name +_peregrinus_ was not confined to the stranger proper but was also bestowed +upon subjects of Rome[8] who, being deprived of their property and also +of political liberty by right of conquest, had not received the right of +citizenship which was for a long time confined within very narrow limits. +It would thus appear conclusive from the law quoted that the client and +plebeian could not at first hold land _optimo ex jure quiritium_. + +Thus the tenure of the patricians was threefold: First, they had full +property in the land; second, they had a seigniorial right, _jus in re_, in +the land of their clients and the plebeians whose property belonged to the +_populus, i.e._ the generality of the patricians; in the third place, in +their own hands, they held lands which were portions of the domain and +which were held by a very precarious tenure called _possessio_. + +According to Ihne, all lands in Rome were held by the above mentioned +tenure until the enactment of the Icilian law _de Aventino publicando_ +which involved a change of tenure by converting the former dependent and +incumbered tenure of the plebeians into full property. + +[Footnote 1: De Officiis, I, 12; Gaius, Frag., 234: Digest, 50, 16.] + +[Footnote 2: Varro, De L.L.V. 14; Plautus, _Trinummus_, Act I, Scene 2, V. +75; Harper's _Latin Dictionary_; Cicero, _De Off_., I, 12: "Hostis enim +apud majores nostros is dicibatur, quem nunc peregrinum dicimus."] + +[Footnote 3: Cic., _loc. cit._; Gaius, Frag., 234.] + +[Footnote 4: Forcellini, _Lexic._; Harper's _Latin Lex_.] + +[Footnote 5: _i.e._ The descendents of a person escheated could bring no +action for the recovery of the property.] + +[Footnote 6: Giraud, _Recherches sur le Droit de Propriété_, p. 210.] + +[Footnote 7: Gaius, Bk. II, 40.] + +[Footnote 8: Ulpian, Frag., Title XIX, 4; Giraud, 216.] + + + + +SEC. 3.--AGER PUBLICUS. + + +In her early history Rome was continually making fresh conquests, and in +this way adding to her territory.[1] She steadfastly pursued a course of +destruction to her neighbors in order that she might thereby grow rich and +powerful. In this way large tracts of territory became Roman land, the +property of the state or _Ager Publicus._[2] + +This public land extended in proportion to the success of the Roman arms, +since the confiscation of the territory of the vanquished was, in the +absence of more favorable terms, a part of the law of war. All conquered +lands before being granted or sold to private individuals were _Ager +Publicus_[3] a term which with few exceptions came to embrace the whole +Roman world. + +This _Ager Publieus_ was farther increased by towns[4] voluntarily +surrendering themselves to Rome without awaiting the iron hand of war. +These were commonly mulcted of one-third of their land.[5] "The soil of +the country is not the product of labor any more than is water or air. +Individual citizens cannot therefore lay any claim to lawful property in +land as to anything[6] produced by their own hands." The state in this +case, as the representative of the rights and interests of society, decides +how the land shall be divided among the members of the community, and the +rules laid down by the state to regulate this matter are of the first and +highest importance in determining the civil condition of the country and +the prosperity of the people. Whenever but one class among the people +is privileged to have property in land a most exclusive oligarchy is +formed.[7] When the land is held in small portions by a great number and +nobody is legally or practically excluded from acquiring land, there we +find provided the elements of democracy. + +According to the strictest right of conquest in antiquity the defeated lost +not only their personal freedom, their moveable and landed[8] property, but +even life itself. All was at the mercy of the conquerors. In practice a +modification of this right took place and in Rome extreme severity was +applied only in extreme cases, generally as a punishment for treason.[9] + +This magnanimity was not rare and it even went so far as to restore the +whole of the territory to the people subdued.[10] But let us not suppose +that this humanity toward a conquered people sprang from any pity inspired +by their forlorn condition. It was due merely to the interest of the +conquerors themselves. The conquered lands must still be cultivated and the +depleted population restored. For this reason the conquered had generally +not only life and freedom left them but also the means of livelihood, +_i.e._ some portion of their land. This portion they held subject to no +restrictions or services save those levied upon quiritarian property. It +was private property to the full legal extent of the expression, thus being +in the unlimited disposition of the individual.[11] These people formed +the nucleus of the plebeians, the freemen who were members of the Roman +state[12] without actually having any political rights. + +The _Ager Publicus_ was the property of the state and as such could be +alienated only by the state.[13] This alienation could be accomplished in +two ways: + +(a). By public sale; + +(b). By gratuitous distribution. + +(a). The public sale was merely an auction to the highest bidder and in the +later days of the monarchy and early part of the republic, rich plebeians +must have become possessed of large tracts of land in this way; the +privilege of acquiring property in land having been extended to them some +time before the Servian reform.[14] + +(b). The gratuitous distribution of land was accomplished by means of +Agrarian Laws or royal grant and had for its object the establishment of +colonies for purposes of defence, the rewarding of veterans or meritorious +soldiers,[15] or in later times, the providing for impoverished plebeians. + + + +But even in the earliest times a portion of the domain lands was excluded +from sale or private appropriation,[16] in order to serve as a resource for +the needs of the state. + +This was the general usage of ancient republics and this maxim of reserved +lands was recommended[17] by Aristotle as the first principle of political +economy. + +Such reserved _ager publicus_ was leased either in periods of five years +(quinquennial leaseholds) or perpetually, _i.e. _, by emphyteutic lease +or copyhold. From these lands[18] the treasury received an income of from +one-tenth to one-fifth of the annual crops. + +Besides these legal methods mentioned there was another very common one +which was seemingly never established by any law and therefore existed +merely by title of tolerance. I speak of the indefinite _possessio_ which +was nothing but an occupation on the part of the patricians[19] of the land +belonging to the state and was in nature quite similar to the so-called +"squatting" commonly practiced in some of our western states and +territories. The title to the enjoyment of the public lands was at first +clearly vested in the patricians nor was this right extended to the +plebeians until after they had been admitted to full citizenship. With +regard to the state the _possessor_[20] was merely a tenant at will and +could be removed whenever desired; but as regarded other persons he was +like the owner of the soil and could alienate the land which he +occupied either for a term of years, or forever, as if he were the real +proprietor.[21] The public land thus occupied was looked to as a resource +upon the admission of new citizens. They customarily received a small +freehold according to the general notion of antiquity that a burgess must +be a landowner. This land could only be found by a divison of that which +belonged to the public, and a consequent ejectment of the tenants at will. +In the Greek states every large accession to the number of citizens was +followed by a call for a division of the public lands and, as this division +involved the sacrifice of many existing interests, it was regarded with +aversion by the old burgesses as an act of revolution. + +A great part of the wealth of the Romans consisted in domains of this kind, +and the question will occur to the thoughtful mind how the government +was able to keep the most distinguished part of her citizens in a legal +position so uncertain and alarming. English law is very different from the +Roman in this respect and would decide in favor of the tenant and against +the state. It is fairly possible that this uncertainty of tenure tended to +render the government more stable and less liable to sudden revolutionary +movements, thus having the same effect upon the Roman government which +funded debts have upon the nations of to-day. + +[Footnote 1: Long, _Decline of the Roman Rep_., I, ch. 11.] + +[Footnote 2: Muirhead, _Roman Law_, 92.] + +[Footnote 3: Ortolan, _Histoire de la legislation Romaine_, p. 21.] + +[Footnote 4: Mommsen, I, 131; Arnold, I, 157.] + +[Footnote 5: Dionysius, IV, 11, Livy.] + +[Footnote 6: Ihne, I, 175.] + +[Footnote 7: Ihne, I, 175.] + +[Footnote 8: Livy, Bk. I, c. 38, with note by Drachenborch; Livy, Bk. VII, +c. 31.] + +[Footnote 9: Siculus Flaccus, _De Conditione Agrorum_, 2, 3: "Ut vero +Romani omnium gentium potiti sunt, agros alios ex hoste captos in victorem +populum partiti sunt, alios verro agros vendiderunt, ut Sabinorum ager qui +dicitur quaestorius."] + +[Footnote 10: Cicero, in Verrem, II, Bk. 3, § 6.] + +[Footnote 11: Giraud, _Droit de propriété chez les romains_, 160.] + +[Footnote 12: Ihne, I, 175.] + +[Footnote 13: Muirhead, 92; Giraud, 165.] + +[Footnote 14: Higin., _De Limit. Const. apud Goes. Rei Agr. Script._, pp. +159-160.] + +[Footnote 15: Giraud, 164.] + +[Footnote 16: Dionysius, II, 7.] + +[Footnote 17: Aristotle, _Polit._, [Greek: Z. Keph. th. 7: Anagkaion toinun +eis duo merae diaeraesthai taen choran kai ton men einai koinaen, taen de +ton idioton.]] + +[Footnote 18: Giraud, 163.] + +[Footnote 19: Festus, p. 209, Lindemann; Cicero, ad Att. II, 15; Philipp. +V, 7; De Leg. Agr. I, 2, III, 3; De Off. II, 22; Livy, II, 61, IV, 51, 53, +VI, 4, 15; Suet. Julius Cæsar, 38; Octavius, 13, 32; Cæsar, De Bell. Civ., +I, 17; Orosius, V, 18.] + +[Footnote 20: Aggenus Urbicus, p. 69, ed. Goes.] + +[Footnote 21: Giraud, 185-187; Mommsen, I, 110; Ortolan, 227; Hunter, +_Roman Law,_ 367.] + + + + +SEC. 4.--ROMAN COLONIES. + + +Probably in no other way does the Roman government so clearly reveal its +nature and strength as in its method of colonization. No other nation, +ancient or modern, has ever so completely controlled her colonies as did +the Roman. Her civil law, indeed, reflected itself in both political and +international relations. In Greece, as soon[l] as a boy had attained a +certain age his name was inscribed upon the tribal rolls and henceforth he +was free from the _potestas_ of his father and owed him only the marks +of respect which nature demanded. So too, at a certain age, the colonies +separated themselves from their mother city without losing their +remembrance of a common origin. This was not so in Rome. The children[2] +were always under the _potestas_ of their parents. By analogy therefore, +the colonies ought to remain subject to their mother city. Greek colonies +went forth into a strange land which had never been conquered by Hellenic +arms or hitherto trod by Grecian foot. Roman[3] colonies were established +by government upon land which had been previously conquered and which +therefore belonged to the Roman domain. The Greek was fired with an +ambition to obtain wealth and personal distinction, being wholly free to +bend his efforts to personal ends. Not so the Roman. He sacrificed self for +the good of the state. Instead of the allurements of wealth he received +some six jugera of land, free from taxation it is true, but barely enough +to reward the hardest labor with scanty subsistence. Instead of the hope of +personal distinction, he in most cases sacrificed the most valuable of his +rights, _jus suffragii et jus_[4] _honorum_ and suffered what was called +_capitis diminutio_. He devoted himself, together with wife and family, to +a life-long military service. In fact the Romans used colonization as a +means to strengthen their hold upon[5] their conquests in Italy and to +extend their dominion from one centre over a large extent of country. Roman +colonies were not commercial. In this respect they differed from those of +the Phoenicians and Greeks. Their object was essentially military[6] +and from this point of view they differed from the colonies of both the +ancients and moderns. Their object was the establishment of Roman power. +The colonists marched out as a garrison into a conquered town and were +exposed to dangers on all sides. Every colony acted as a fortress to +protect the boundary and keep subjects to their allegiance to Rome. This +establishment was not a matter of individual choice nor was it left to any +freak of chance. A decree of the senate decided when and where a colony +should be sent out, and the people in their assemblies elected individual +members for colonization. + +From another point of view Roman colonies were similar to those of Greece, +since their result was to remove from the centre to distant places the +superabundant population, the dangerous,[7] unquiet, and turbulent. + +But the difference in the location of the colonies was easy to distinguish. +In general the Phoenicians and the Greeks as well as modern people founded +their colonies in unoccupied localities. Here they raised up new towns +which were located in places favorable to maritime and commercial +relations. The Romans, on the contrary, avoided establishing colonies in +new places. When they had taken possession of a city, they expelled from it +a part of the inhabitants, whether to transfer them to Rome as at first, +or a little later, when it became necessary to discourage the increase of +Roman population, to more distant places. The population thus expelled was +replaced with Roman and Latin citizens.[8] Thus a permanent garrison was +located which assured the submission of the neighboring countries and +arrested in its incipiency every attempt at revolt. In every respect these +colonies remained under surveillance and in a dependence the most complete +and absolute upon the mother city, Rome. Colonies never became the means +of providing for the impoverished and degraded until the time of Gaius +Gracchus. When new territory was conquered, there went the citizen soldier. +Thus these colonies mark the growth of Roman dominion as the circumscribed +rings mark the annual growth of a tree. These colonies were of two kinds, +Latin and Roman. + +1. Latin colonies were those[9] which were composed of Latini and Hernici, +or Romans enjoying the same rights as these, _i.e._ possessed of the Latin +right rather than the Roman franchise. They were established inland as road +fortresses and being located in the vicinity of mountain passes or main +thoroughfares acted as a guard to Rome, and held the enemy in check. + +2. Roman, or Burgess, colonies[10] were those composed wholly of Roman +citizens who kept their political rights and consequent close union with +their native city. In some cases Latini were given the full franchise and +permitted to join these colonies. In position as well as rights, these +colonies were distinguished from the Latin, being with few exceptions +situated upon the coast and thus acting as guards against foreign invasion. + + + + +_Table of Latin Colonies in Italy_. + + +------------------+----------------+-------+------------------------------- + COLONIES. | LOCATION. | B.C. | AUTHORITIES. +------------------+----------------+-------+------------------------------- + 1 Signia. | Latium. | ? | Livy, 1, 56; Dionys., 4, 63. + 2 Cerceii. | " | ? | Id. + 3 Suessa Pometia.| " | ? | Livy, 2, 16. + 4 Cora. | " | ? | Livy, 2, 16. + 5 Velitrae. | " | 494 | Livy, 2, 30, 31 ; Dionys., + | | | 6, 42, 43. + 6 Norba. | " | 492 | Livy, 2, 34; Dionys , 7, 13. + 7 Antium. | " | 467 | " 3, 1; " 9, 59. + 8 Ardea. | " | 442 | " 4, 11; Diodor., 12,34. + 9 Satricum. | " | 385 | " 6, 14. +10 Sutrum. | Etruria. | 383 | Vell., 1, 14. +11 Nepete. | " | 383 | Livy, 6, 21; Vell. +12 Setia. | Latium. | 382 | Vell., 1,14; Livy, 6, 30. +13 Cales. | Campania. | 334 | " 1,14; " 8,16. +14 Fregellae. | Latium. | 328 | Livy, 8, 22. +15 Luceria. | Apulia. | 314 | " Epit., 60. +16 Suessa. | | 313 | " 9, 28. +17 Pontiae. | Isle of Latium.| 313 | " 9, 28. +18 Saticula. | Samnium. | 313 | " 9, 22; Vell., 1, 14; + | | | Festus, p. 340. +19 Interamna | | | + Lirinas. | Latium. | 312 | Livy, 9, 28; Vell, 1, 14; + | | | Diodor., 19, 105. +20 Sora. | " | 303 | Livy, 10, 1; Vell., 1, 14. +21 Alba. | " | 303 | " 10, 1; " 1, 14. +22 Narnia. | Umbria. | 299 | " 10, 10. +23 Carseola. | Latium. | 298 | " 10, 13. +24 Venusia. | Apulia. | 291 | Vell., 1, 14; Dionys. Ex., + | | | 2335. +25 Hatria. | Picenum. | 289 | Livy, Epit., 11. +26 Cosa. | Campania. | 273 | " " 14; Vell., 1, 14. +27 Paestum. | Lucania. | 273 | Id. Id. +28 Ariminum. | | 268 | Vell., 1, 14; L. Epit., 15; + | | | Eutrop., 2, 16. +29 Beneventum. | Samnium. | 268 | Vell., 1, 14; L. Epit., 15; + | | | Eutrop., 2, 16. +30 Firmum. | Picenum. | 264 | Vell., 1, 14. +31 Aesernia. | Samnium. | 263 | " 1, 14; L. Epit., 16. +32 Brundisium. | Calabria. | 244 | " 1, 14; " 19. +33 Spoletium. | Umbria. | 241 | " 1, 14; " 20. +34 Cremona. | Gallia Cis. | 218 | Tacitus, _Hist_., 3,35. +35 Placentia. | " " | 218 | L. Epit., 20; Polyb., 3, 40; + | | | V. 1, 14, 8. +36 Copia. | Lucania. | 193 | Livy, 34, 53. +37 Valentia. | Bruttii. | 192 | " 34, 40; 35,40. +38 Bononia. | Gallia Cis. | 189 | " 37, 57; Vell., 1, 15. +39 Aquileia. | Gallia Trans. | 181 | " 40, 34; " " +------------------+----------------+-------+------------------------------- + + + + +_Table of Civic Colonies in Italy._ + +------------------+----------------+-------+------------------------------- + COLONIES. | LOCATION. | B.C. | AUTHORITY. +------------------+----------------+-------+------------------------------- + 1 Ostea. | Latium. | 418 | Livy, 1, 33; Dionys., 3, 44; + | | | Polyb., 6, 29; Cic. de R.R., + | | | 2, 18, 33. + 2 Labici. | " | 418 | Livy, 4, 47, 7. + 3 Antium. | " | 338 | " 8, 14. + 4 Auxur. | " | 329 | " 8, 21; 27, 38; Vell. 1, 14. + 5 Minturnae. | Campania. | 296 | Livy, 10, 21. + 6 Sinuessa. | " | 296 | " 10, 21; 27, 38. + 7 Sena Gallica. | Umbria. | 283 | " Epit., 11; Vell., 1, 14, 8. + 8 Castrum Novum. | Picenum. | 283 | Livy, Epit., 11; Vell.,1,14,8. + 9 Aesium. |Umbria. | 247 | Vell., 1, 14, 8. +10 Alsium. | Etruria. | 247 | " 1, 14, 8; L. Epit., 19; + | | | L., 36, 3. +11 Fregena. | " | 245 | Livy, 36, 3. +12 Pyrgi. | " | 191 | " " +13 Puteoli. | Campania. | 194 | " 34, 45. +14 Volturnum. | " | 194 | Id. +15 Liturnum. | " | 194 | Id. +16 Salernum. | " | 194 | Id. +17 Buxentum. | Lucania. | 194 | Livy, 34, 45. +18 Sipontum. | Apulia. | 194 | Id. +19 Tempsa. | Bruttii. | 194 | Id. +20 Croton. | " | 194 | Id. +21 Potentia. | Picenum. | 184 | Livy, 39, 44. +22 Pisaurum. | Umbria. | 184 | " " " +23 Parma. | Gallia Cis. | 183 | " " 55. +24 Mutina. | Gallia Cis. | 183 | Livy, 39, 55. +25 Saturnia. | Etruria. | 183 | " " " +26 Graviscae. | " | 181 | " 40, 39. +27 Luna. | " | 180 | " 41, 13. +28 Auximum. | Picenum. | 157 | Vell., 1, 15, 3. +29 Fabrateria. | Latium. | 124 | " 1, 15, 4. +30 Minervia. | Bruttii. | 122 | " 1, 15, 4; Appian B.C., + | | | 2, 23. +31 Neptunia. | Iapygia. | 122 | Id. +32 Dertona. | Liguria. | 100 | Vell., 1, 15, 5. +33 Eporedia. | Gallia Trans. | 100 | " " " +34 Narbo Martius. | " Narbo. | 118 | Mommsen. (sic.) +------------------+----------------+-------+------------------------------- + + +[Footnote 1: Bouchaud, M.A., _Dissertation sur les colonies romaines_, pp. +114-222, en Memoires de l'institut Sciences, Morals et Politique, III.] + +[Footnote 2: Muirhead's Article on _Roman Law_ in Ency. Brit.; Ihne, I, +235.] + +[Footnote 3: Momm., I, 145.] + +[Footnote 4: Momm., _loc. cit_.] + +[Footnote 5: Brutus (App. B.C., II, 140) calls the colonists, [Greek: +phylakas ton pepolemaekoton].] + +[Footnote 6: Ihne, I, 236.] + +[Footnote 7: Cicero, Ad Att., I,19: "Sentinam urbis exhaurire, et Italiae +solitudinem frequentori posse arbitrabor."] + +[Footnote 8: Momm., I, 145.] + +[Footnote 9: Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 35-51; Momm., _History of Rome_, I, +108, 539; Madvigi Opuscula Academica, I, 208-305.] + +[Footnote 10: Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 35-51; Ihne, vols. I-V; Momm., vols. +I-V; Madvigi Opus., _loc. cit_.] + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + + + +Sec. 5.--Lex Cassia. + + +Every year added to the difference between the patrician and plebeian, the +rich and the poor; a difference which had now grown so great as to threaten +seriously the very existence of the state. The most sagacious of all the +plans which had been proposed to stop this evil, was that set forth by +Spurius Cassius, a noble patrician now acting as consul for the third[l] +time. In the year 268, he submitted to the burgesses[2] a proposal to have +the public land surveyed, that portion belonging to the populus set aside +and the remainder divided among the plebeians or leased for the benefit[3] +of the public treasury. + +He thus attempted to wrest from the senate the control of the public land +and, with the aid of the Latini and the plebeians, to put an end to the +system of occupation.[4] The lands which he proposed to divide were solely +those which the state had acquired through conquest since the general +assignment by king Servius, and which it still retained.[5] This was the +first measure by which it was proposed to disturb the possessors in their +peaceful occupation of the state lands, and, according to Livy, such a +measure had never been proposed from then to the time in which he was +writing, under Augustus, without exciting the greatest disturbance.[6] +Cassius might well suppose that his personal distinction and the equity +and wisdom of the measure would carry it through, even amidst the storm of +opposition to which it was subjected. Like many other reformers equally +well meaning, he was mistaken. + +The citizens who occupied this land had grown rich by reason of its +possessions. Some of them received it as an inheritance, and doubtless +looked upon it as their property as much as the _Ager Romanus_. These to a +man opposed the bill. The patricians arose en masse. The rich plebeians, +the aristocracy of wealth, took part with them. Even the commons were +dissatisfied because Spurius Cassius proposed in accordance with federal +rights and equity to bestow a portion of the land upon the Latini and +Hernici, their confederates and allies.[7] The bill proposed by Cassius, +together with such provisions as were necessary, became a law, according to +Niebuhr,[8] because the tribunes had no power to bring forward a law of any +kind before the plebeian tribes obtained a voice in the legislature by the +enactment of the Publilian law in 472 B.C.; so that when they afterwards +made use of the agrarian law to excite the public passions it must have +been one previously enacted but dishonestly set aside and, in Dionysius' +account, this is the form which the commotion occasioned by it takes.[9] +Though this is doubtless true, yet the law, by reason of the combined +opposition, became a dead letter and the people who would have been most +benefited by its enforcement joined with Cassius' enemies at the expiration +of his term of office to condemn him to death. In this way does ignorance +commonly reward its benefactors. This agitation aroused by Cassius, stirred +the Roman Commonwealth, now more than twenty years old, to its very +foundations, but it had no immediate effect upon the _ager publicus_. The +rich patrician together with the few plebeians who had wealth enough to +farm this land, still held undisputed possession. The poor plebeian still +continued to shed his blood on the battle field to add to Roman territory, +but no foot of it did he obtain. Wealth centralized. Pauperism increased. + +[Footnote 1: Dionysius, VIII, 68; "[Greek: Oi de para touton taen upateian +paralabontaes poplios Ouerginios kai Sporios Kassios, to triton tote +apodeichtheis upotos, k. t. l.]"] + +[Footnote 2: Dionysius, VIII, 69; Livy, II, 41, _seq_.] + +[Footnote 3: Dionysius, VIII, 81.] + +[Footnote 4: Dionysius, VIII, 69; Mommsen, I, 363.] + +[Footnote 5: Niebuhr, II, 166.] + +[Footnote 6: Livy, II, 41; "Tum primum lex agraria promulgata est nunquam +deinde usque ad hanc memoriam sine maximus motibus rerum agitata."] + +[Footnote 7: Livy, II, 41; Dionysius, VIII, 69.] + +[Footnote 8: Niebuhr, II.] + +[Footnote 9: Dionysius, VIII, 81: [Greek: "Ekklaesiai te sunegeis hypo ton +tote daemarchon eginonto kai apaitaeseis taes hyposcheseos." See also VIII, +87, line 25 _et seq._].] + + + + +SEC. 6.--AGRARIAN MOVEMENTS BETWEEN 486 AND 367. + + +Modern historians who have written upon the Roman Republic have, so far as +I know, passed immediately from the consideration of the _Lex Cassia_ to +the law of Licinius Stolo. Meanwhile more than a century had passed away. +Cassius died in 485, Licinius Stolo proposed his law in 376. During this +century which had beheld the organization of the republic and the growth, +by tardy processes, of the great plebeian body many agrarian laws were +proposed and numerous divisions of the public land took place. Both +Dionysius and Livy mention them. The poor success of the proposition of +Cassius and the evil consequences to himself in no way checked the zeal +of the tribunes. Propositions of agrarian laws followed one another with +wonderful rapidity. Livy enumerates these propositions, but almost wholly +without detail and without comments upon their tendencies or points of +difference from one another or from the law of Cassius. As this law failed +of its object by being disregarded, we may safely conclude that the most of +these propositions were but a reproduction of the law of Cassius. + +In 484, and again in 483, the tribune proposed agrarian laws but what their +nature was, Livy, who records them, does not tell us. From some vague +assertions which he makes we may conclude that the point of the law was +well known, and was but a repetition of that of Cassius.[1] The consul +Caeso Fabius, in 484, and his brother Marcus in the following year, secured +the opposition of the senate and succeeded in defeating their laws. + +Livy (II, 42,) mentions very briefly a new proposition brought forward +by Spurius Licinius in 482. Here we are able to complete his account by +reference to Dionysius,[2] who says that, in 483, a tribune named Caius +Maenius had proposed an agrarian law and declared that he would oppose +every levy of troops until the senate should execute the law ordaining the +creation of decemvirs to determine the boundaries of the domain land and, +in fine, forbid the enrolment of citizens. The senate was able through the +consuls, Marcus Fabius and Valerius, the ancient colleague of Cassius, to +invent a means of avoiding this difficulty. The authority of the tribunes +by the old Roman law,[3] did not reach without the walls of the city, while +that of the consuls was everywhere equal and only bounded by the limits of +the Roman world. They moved their curule chairs and other insignia of their +authority without the city walls and proceeded with the enrolments. All who +refused to enroll were treated as enemies[4] of the republic. Those who +were proprietors had their property confiscated, their trees cut down, and +their houses burned. Those who were merely farmers saw themselves bereft +of their farm-implements, their oxen and all things necessary for the +cultivation of the soil. The resistance of the tribunes was powerless +against this systematic oppression on the part of the patricians; the +agrarian[5] law failed and the enrolment progressed. + +There is some difficulty in determining the facts of the law proposed by +Spurius Licinius[6] of which Livy speaks. Dionysius calls this tribune, not +Licinius but [Greek: Spurios Sikilios]. The Latin translation of Dionysius +has the name Icilius and this has been the name adopted by Sigonius and +other historians. Livy tells us that the Icilian family was at all times +hostile to the patricians and mentions many tribunes by this name who were +staunch defenders of the commons. In accepting this correction, therefore, +it is not necessary to confound this Icilius with the one who proposed the +partition of the Aventine among the plebeians. Icilius, according to both +Livy and Dionysius,[7] made the same demand as the previous tribunes, +_i.e.,_ that the decemvirs should be nominated for the survey and +distribution of the domain lands, according to previous enactment. He +further declared that he would oppose every decree of the senate either for +war or the administration of the interior until the adoption and execution +of his measures. Again the senate avoided the difficulty and escaped, by +a trick, the execution of the law. Appius Claudius, according to +Dionysius,[8] advised the senate to search within the tribunate for a +remedy against itself, and to bribe a number of the colleagues of Icilius +to oppose his measure. This political perfidy was adopted by the senate +with the desired effect. Icilius persisted in his proposition and declared +he would rather see the Etruscans masters of Rome than to suffer for +a longer time the usurpation of the domain lands on the part of the +possessors.[9] + +This somewhat circumstantial account has revealed to us that at this time +it took a majority of the tribunes to veto an act of their colleague. At +the time of the Gracchi the veto of a single tribune was sufficient to +hinder the passage of a law, and Tiberius was for a long time thus checked +by his colleague, Octavius. Then the tribunician college consisted of ten +members, and it would be no very difficult thing to detach one of the +number either by corruption or jealousy. But it is evident that, at the +time we are considering, it took a majority of the tribunes to veto an +act of a colleague; moreover, the college consisted of five members. This +latter fact is seen in the statement of Livy,[10] when he mentions +the opposition which four of the tribunes offered to their colleague, +Pontificius, in 480. In this same case he attributes to Appius Claudius +the conduct which Dionysius attributed to him in the previous year. But he +causes Appius to state, in his speech favoring the corruption of certain +tribunes, "that the veto of one tribune would be sufficient to defeat all +the others."[11] This is contrary to the statement of Dionysius[12] +and would seem improbable, for, if the opposition of one tribune was +sufficient, the patricians would not have deemed it necessary to purchase +four. That would be contrary to political methods. + +Of the two propositions of the tribunes, Icilius, in 482, and Pontificius, +in 480, the results were the same. The opposition of their colleagues +defeated them. But this persistent opposition rather than crushing seemed +to stir up renewed attacks. We have seen the tribunes, Menius, Icilius, and +Pontificius, successively fail. The next movement was led by a member of +the aristocracy, Fabius Caeso,[13] consul for the third time in 477. He +undertook to remove from the hands of the tribunes the terrible arm of +agrarian agitation which they wielded constantly against the patricians, by +causing the patricians themselves to distribute the domain lands equally +among the plebeians, saying: "that those[14] persons ought to have the +lands by whose blood and sweat they had been gained." His proposition was +rejected with scorn by the patricians, and this attempt at reconciliation +failed as all the attempts of the tribunes had. The war with Vaii which, +according to Livy, now took place hindered for a while any agrarian +movements; but, in 474, the tribunes Gaius Considius and Titus Genucius +made a fruitless attempt at distribution, and, in 472, Dionysius speaks of +a bill brought forward by Cn. Genucius which is probably the same bill. + +In 468, the two consuls, Valerius and Aemilius, faithfully supported the +tribunes in their demand[15] for an agrarian law. The latter seems to have +supported the tribunes because he was angry that the senate had refused +to his father the honor of a triumph; Valerius, because he wished to +conciliate the people for having taken part in the condemnation of Cassius. + +Dionysius, according to his custom, takes advantage of the occasion to +write several long speeches here, and one of them is valuable to us. He +causes the father of Aemilius to set forth in a formal speech the true +character of the agrarian laws and the right of the state to again assume +the lands which had been taken possession of. He further says: "that it +is a wise policy[16] to proceed to the division of the lands in order to +diminish the constantly increasing number of the poor, to insure a far +greater number of citizens for the defense of the country, to encourage +marriages, and, in consequence, to increase the number of children and +defenders of the republic." We see in this speech the real purpose, the +germ, of all the ideas which Licinius Stolo, the Gracchi, and even Cæsar, +strove to carry out. But the Roman aristocracy was too blind to comprehend +these words of wisdom. All these propositions were either defeated or +eluded. + +_Lex Icilia._ In the year 454,[17] Lucius Icilius, one of the tribunes for +that year, brought forward a bill that the Aventine hill should be conveyed +to the plebeians as their personal and especial property.[18] This hill had +been the earliest home of the plebeians, yet they had been surrounded by +the lots and fields of the patricians. That part of the hill which was +still in their possession was now demanded for the plebeians. It was a +small thing for the higher order to yield this much, as the Aventine stood +beyond the Pomoerium,[19] the hallowed boundary of the city, and, at best, +could not have had an area of more than one-fourth of a square mile, and +this chiefly woodland. The consuls, accordingly, made no hesitation about +presenting the bill to the senate before whom Icilius was admitted to speak +in its behalf. The bill was accepted by the senate and afterwards confirmed +by the Centuries.[20] The law provided,--"that all the ground which has +been justly acquired by any persons shall continue in the possession of the +owners, but that such part of it as may have been usurped by force or fraud +by any persons and built upon, shall be given to the people; those persons +being repaid the expenses of such buildings by the estimation of umpires +to be appointed for that purpose, and that all the rest of the ground +belonging to the public, be divided among the people, they paying no +consideration for the same."[21] When this was done the plebeians took +possession of the hill with solemn ceremonies. This hill did not furnish +homes for all the plebeians, as some have held; nor, indeed, did they wish +to leave their present settlements in town or country to remove to the +Aventine. Plebeians were already established in almost all parts of the +city and held, as vassals of the patricians, considerable portions of Roman +territory. This little hill could never have furnished[22] homes of any +sort to the whole plebeian population. What it did do was to furnish to +the plebeians a trysting place in time of strife with their patrician +neighbors, where they could meet, apart and secure from interruption, to +devise means for resisting the encroachments of the patricians and to +further establish their rights as Roman citizens. Thus a step toward their +complete emancipation was taken. For a moment the people were soothed +and satisfied by their success, but soon they began to clamor for more +complete, more radical, more general laws. An attempt seems to have been +made in 453 to extend the application of the _lex Icilia_ to the _ager +publicus,_[23] in general, but nothing came of it. In 440, the tribune, +Petilius, proposed an agrarian law. What its conditions were Livy has not +informed us, but has contented himself with saying that "Petilius made a +useless attempt to bring before the senate a law for the division of the +domain lands."[24] The consuls strenuously opposed him and his effort came +to naught. + +In our review of the agrarian agitation we must mention the forceless and +insignificant attempt made by the son of Spurius Melius, in 434. Again, in +422, we find that other attempts were made which availed nothing. Yet the +tribunes who attempted thus to gain the good will of the people set forth +clearly the object which they had in view in bringing forward an agrarian +bill. Says Livy; "They held out the hope to the people of a division of the +public land, the establishment of colonies, the levying of a _vectigal_ +upon the possessors, which _vectigal_ was to be used[25] in paying the +soldiers." + +In the year 419, and again in 418, unavailing attempts were made for the +division of lands among the plebeians. Spurius Maecilius and Spurius +Metilius, the tribunes[26]for the year 412, proposed to give to the people, +in equal lots, the conquered lands. The patricians ridiculed this law, +stating that Rome itself was founded upon conquered soil and did not +possess a single acre of land that had not been taken by force of arms, +and that the people held nothing save that which had been assigned by the +republic. The object, then, of the tribunes was to distribute the fortunes +of the entire state. Such vapid foolishness as this failed not of the +effect which the patricians aimed at. Appius Claudius counselled the +adoption of the excellent means invented by his grandfather. Six tribunes +were bought over by the caresses, flatteries, and money of the patricians +and opposed their vetoes to their colleagues who were thus compelled to +retire.[27] + +In the following year, 411, Lucius Sextius, in no way discouraged by the +ill success of his predecessors, proposed the establishment of a colony +at Bolae, a town in the country of the Volscians, which had been recently +conquered. The patricians[28] opposed this by the same method which they +had adopted in the preceding case, the veto by tribunes. Livy criticises +the impolitic opposition of the patricians in these words: "This was a most +seasonable time, after the punishment of the mutiny, that the division of +the territory of Bolae should be presented as a soother to their minds; by +which proceeding they would have diminished their eagerness for an agrarian +law, which tended to expel the patricians from the public land unjustly +possessed by them. Then this very indignity exasperated their minds, that +the nobility persisted not only in retaining the public lands, which they +got possession of by force, but would not even grant to the commons the +unoccupied land lately taken from the enemy, and which would, like the +rest,[29] soon become the prey of the few." + +In 409, Icilius, without doubt a member of that plebeian family which had +furnished so many stout defenders of the liberties of the people, was +elected tribune of the people and brought forward an agrarian bill, but +a plague broke out and hindered any further action. In 407, the tribune, +Menius, introduced an agrarian bill and declared that he would oppose the +levies until the persons who unjustly held the public domains consented to +a division. A war broke out and agrarian legislation was drowned amid the +din of arms. Some years now elapsed without the mention of any agrarian +laws. The siege of Veii commenced in 406 and lasted for six years, during +which time military law was established, giving occupation and some sort +of satisfaction to the plebeians. In 397, an agrarian movement was set on +foot, but the plebeians were partially satisfied by being allowed to elect +one of their number as _tribunus consularis_ for the following year, thus +obtaining a little honor but no land. After the conquest of Veii, there was +a movement on the part of the plebeians to remove from Rome and settle upon +the confiscated territory of the Veians; this was only staid by concessions +on the part of the patricians. A decree of the senate was passed,--"that +seven jugera, a man, of Vientian territory, should be distributed to the +commons and not only to the fathers of families, but also that all persons +in their house in the state of freedom should be considered, and that they +might be willing to rear up children[30] with that prospect." In 384, six +years after the conquest of Rome by the Gauls, the tribunes of the year +proposed a law for the division of the Pomptine territory (_Pomptinus +Ager_) among the plebeians. The time was not a favorable one for the +agitation of the people, as they were busy with the reconstruction of their +houses laid waste by the Gauls, and the movement came to nothing. The +tribune, Lucius Licinius, in 383, revived this movement but it was not +successfully carried till the year 379, when the senate, well disposed +towards the commons by reason of the conquest of the Volscians, decreed the +nomination of five commissioners to divide the Pomptine territory[31] among +the plebs. This was a new victory for the people and must have inspired +them with the hope of one day obtaining in full their rights in the public +domains. + +We have now passed in review the agrarian laws proposed and, in some cases, +enacted between the years 485 and 376, _i.e._ between the _lex Cassia_ and +the _lex Licinia_, which the greater part of the historians have neglected. +We have now come to the propositions of that illustrious plebeian whose +laws, whose character, and whose object have been so diversely appreciated +by all those persons who have studied in any way the constitutional history +of Rome. We wish to enter into a detailed examination of the _lex Licinia_, +but before so doing have deemed it expedient to thus pass in review the +agrarian agitations. The result of this work has, we trust, been a better +understanding of the real tendency, the true purpose, of the law which is +now to absorb our attention. It was no innovation, as some writers of the +day assert, but in reality confined itself to the well beaten track of its +predecessors, striving only to make their attainments more general, more +substantial and more complete. + +[Footnote 1: "Solicitati, eo anno, sunt dulcedine agrariae legis animi +plebis,. . . vana lex vanique legis auctores." Livy, II, 42.] + +[Footnote 2: Dionysius, VIII, 606, 607.] + +[Footnote 3: Livy, _loc. cit._: Dionysius, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 4: Dionys., VIII, 554.] + +[Footnote 5: Dionys., VIII, 555.] + +[Footnote 6: Val. Max., Fg. of Bk. X: "Spurii, patre incerto geniti."] + +[Footnote 7: Livy, _loc. cit._; Dionys., _loc. cit.] + +[Footnote 8: Dionys., IX, 558; Livy, II, 43.] + +[Footnote 9: Dionys., IX, 559-560: "[Greek: tous kategontos taen choran +taen demosian." . . . "Kai Sikilios oudenos eti kurios aen.]".] + +[Footnote 10: Livy, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 11: Livy, II, 44: "Et unum vel adversus omnes satis esse ... +quatuorque tribunorum adversus unum."] + +[Footnote 12: Dionys., IX, 562.] + +[Footnote 13: Livy, _loc. cit._; Dionys., _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 14: Livy, II, 48: "Captivum agrum plebi, quam maxime aequaliter +darent. Verum esse habere eos quorum sanguine ac sudore partus sit. +Aspernati Patres sunt."] + +[Footnote 15: Livy, II, 61, 63, 64.] + +[Footnote 16: Dionys., IX, 606, 607; Livy, III, 1. The authorities are +somewhat conflicting at this point, and I have followed the account of +Dionysius.] + +[Footnote 17: Schwegler, _Römische Geschichte, _II, 484; Dionys., X, 31, p. +657, 43.] + +[Footnote 18: Dionys., X, 31, l. 13; Ihne, _Hist. of Rome_, I, 191, +note; Lange, _Röm. Alter._, I, 619. Also see art. in Smith's _Dict. of +Antiquities_.] + +[Footnote 19: _I.e._ outside of the _'quadrata'_' but _[Greek: +emperiechomenos tae poleis]_, Dionys., X, 31, l. 18: "pontificale +pomoerium, qui auspicato olim quidem omnem urbem ambiebat praeter +Aventinum." Paul, ex Fest., p. 248, Müll.] + +[Footnote 20: Dionys., X, 32.] + +[Footnote 21: Dionys., X, 32.] + +[Footnote 22: Momm., I, 355.] + +[Footnote 23: Dionys., X, 34.] + +[Footnote 24: Livy, IV, 12: Neque ut de agris dividendis plebi referrent +consules ad senatum pervincere potuit.... Ludibrioque erant minae tribuni.] + +[Footnote 25: "Agri publici dividendi, coloniaramque deducendarum +ostentatae spes, et vectigali possessoribus imposito, in stipendium militum +erogandi aeris." Livy, IV, 36.] + +[Footnote 26: Livy, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 27: Livy, IV, 48.] + +[Footnote 28: Livy, IV, 49.] + +[Footnote 29: Livy, IV, 51.] + +[Footnote 30: Livy, VI, 5.] + +[Footnote 31: Quinque viros Pomptino agro dividendo. Livy, VI, 21.] + + + + +(a) _Extension of Territory by Conquest up to the Year 367 B.C._ + + +1. Coreoli, captured in 442. +2. Bolae, captured in 414. +3. Labicum, captured in 418. +4. Fidenae, captured in 426 and all the territory confiscated. +5. Veii, captured in 396. This was the chief town of the + Etruscans, equal to Rome in size, with a large tributary + country; territory confiscated. + +Approximate amount of land added to the Roman domain, +150 square miles. + + + + + +(b) _Colonies Founded between 454 and 367._ + + + CIVIC COLONIES. +-----------+---------+------+------------+---------+-----------+----------- + | | | NO. OF | NO. OF | TOTAL NO.| +COLONIES. | PLACE | DATE.| COLONISTS. | JUG. TO | OF JUG. | ACRES. + | | | | EACH. | | +-----------+---------+------+------------+---------+-----------+----------- + | | | | | | + Labici. | Latium. | 418 | 1500 | 2 | 3000 | 1875 + | | | | | | +-----------+---------+------+------------+---------+-----------+----------- + + + + + LATIN COLONIES. +-----------+---------+------+------------+---------+-----------+----------- + Ardea. | Latium. | 442 | 300 | 2 | 600 | 375 + Satricum. | " | 385 | 300 | 2 | 600 | 375 + Sutrium. | Etruria.| 383 | 300 | 2 | 600 | 375 + Nepete. | " | 383 | 300 | 4 | 1200 | 750 + Setia. | Latium. | 382 | 300 | 4 | 1200 | 750 +-----------+---------+------+------------+---------+-----------+----------- + | Total | 7200 | 4500 +-----------------------------------------+---------+-----------+----------- + + + + +SEC. 7.--LEX LICINIA. + + +Party lines were, at the time of the enactment of the Licinian Law, +strongly marked in Rome. One of the tribunes chosen after the return of the +plebeians from Mons Sacer was a Licinius. The first military tribune with +consular power elected from the plebeians was another Licinius Calvus. The +third great man of this distinguished family was Caius Licinius Calvus +Stolo, who, in the prime of life and popularity, was chosen among the +tribunes of the plebs for the seventh year following the death of Manlius +the Patrician. Another plebeian, Lucius Sextius by name, was chosen tribune +at the same time. If not already, he soon became the tried friend of +Licinius. Sextius was the younger but not the less earnest of the two. Both +belonged to that portion of the plebeians supposed to have been latterly +connected with the liberal patricians. The more influential and by far the +more reputable members of the lower estate were numbered in this party. +Opposed to it were two other parties of plebeians. One consisted of the few +who, rising to wealth or rank, cast off the bonds uniting them to the lower +estate. They preferred to be upstarts among patricians rather than leaders +among plebeians. As a matter of course, they became the parasites of the +illiberal patricians. To the same body was attached another plebeian party. +This was formed of the inferior classes belonging to the lower estate. +These inferior plebeians were generally disregarded by the higher classes +of their own estate as well as by the patricians of both the liberal and +illiberal parties. They were the later comers, or the poor and degraded +among all. As such they had no other resource but to depend on the +largesses or the commissions of the most lordly of the patricians. This +division of the plebeians is a point to be distinctly marked. While there +were but two parties, that is the liberal and the illiberal among the +patricians, there were no less than three among the plebeians. Only one of +the three could be called a plebeian party. That was the party containing +the nerve and sinew of the order, which united only with the liberal +patricians, and with them only on comparatively independent terms. The +other two parties were nothing but servile retainers of the illiberal +patricians. + +It was to the real plebeian party that Licinius belonged, as also did his +colleague Sextius,[1] by birth. A tradition of no value represented the +patrician and the plebeian as being combined to support the same cause +in consequence of a whim of the wife and daughter through whom they were +connected. Some revolutions, it is true, are the effect of an instant's +passion or an hour's weakness. Nor can they then make use of subsequent +achievements to conceal the caprices or the excitements in which they +originated. But a change, attempted by Licinius with the help of his +father-in-law, his colleague, and a few friends reached back one hundred +years and more (B.C. 486) to the law of the martyred Cassius, and forward +to the end of the Commonwealth. It opened new honors as well as fresh +resources to the plebeians. + +Probably the tribune was raised to his office because he had shown the +determination to use its powers for the good of his order and of his +country. Licinius and Sextius together brought forward the three bills +bearing the name of Licinius as their author. One, says the historian, ran +concerning debts. It provided that, the interest already[2] paid being +deducted from the principal, the remainder should be discharged in equal +installments within three years. The statutes against excessive rates of +interest, as well as those against arbitrary measures of exacting the +principal of a debt, had utterly failed. It was plain, therefore, to any +one who thought upon the matter,--in which effort of thought the power of +all reformers begins,--that the step to prevent the sacrifice of the debtor +to the creditor was still to be taken. Many of the creditors themselves +would have acknowledged that this was desirable. The next bill of the three +related to the public lands. It prohibited any one from occupying more than +five hundred jugera, about 300 acres; at the same time it reclaimed all +above that limit from the present occupiers, with the object of making +suitable apportionments among the people[3] at large. Two further clauses +followed, one ordering that a certain number of freemen should be employed +on every estate; another forbidding any single citizen[4] to send out more +than a hundred of the larger, or five hundred of the smaller cattle to +graze upon the public pastures. These latter details are important, not +so much in relation to the bill itself as to the simultaneous increase of +wealth and slavery which they plainly signify. As the first bill undertook +to prohibit the bondage springing from too much poverty, so the second +aimed at preventing the oppression springing from too great opulence. A +third bill declared the office of military tribune with consular power +to be at an end. In its place the consulate was restored with full[5] +provision that one of the two consuls should be taken from the plebeians. +The argument produced in favor of this bill appears to have been the urgent +want of the plebeians to possess a greater share in the government than was +vested in their tribunes, aediles, and quaestors. Otherwise, said Licinius +and his colleague, there will be no security that our debts will be settled +or that our lands will be obtained.[6] It would be difficult to frame three +bills, even in our time, reaching to a further, or fulfilling a larger +reform. "Everything was pointed against the power of the patricians[7] +in order to provide for the comfort of the plebeians." This to a certain +degree was true. It was chiefly from the patrician that the bill concerning +debts detracted the usurious gains which had been counted upon. It was +chiefly from him that the lands indicated in the second bill were to be +withdrawn. It was altogether from him that the honors of the consulship +were to be derogated. On the other hand the plebeians, save the few +proprietors and creditors among them, gained by every measure that had been +proposed. The poor man saw himself snatched from bondage and endowed with +an estate. He who was above the reach of debt saw himself in the highest +office of the state. Plebeians with reason exulted. Licinius evidently +designed reuniting the divided members of the plebeian body. Not one of +them, whether rich or poor, but seems called back by these bills to stand +with his own order from that time on. If this supposition was true, then +Licinius was the greatest leader whom the plebeians ever had up to the time +of Cæsar. But[8] from the first he was disappointed. The plebeians who +most wanted relief cared so little for having the consulship opened to the +richer men of their estate that they would readily have dropped the bill +concerning it, lest a demand should endanger their own desires. In the same +temper the more eminent men of the order, themselves among the creditors of +the poor and the tenants of the domain, would have quashed the proceedings +of the tribunes respecting the discharge of debt and the distribution of +land, so that they carried the third bill only, which would make them +consuls without disturbing their possessions. While the plebeians continued +severed from one another, the patricians drew together in resistance to the +bills. Licinius stood forth demanding, at once, all that it had cost his +predecessors their utmost energy to demand, singly and at long intervals, +from the patricians. Nothing was to be done but to unite in overwhelming +him and his supporters. "Great things were those that he claimed and not to +be secured without the greatest contention."[9] The very comprehensiveness +of his measures proved the safeguard of Licinius. Had he preferred but one +of these demands, he would have been unhesitatingly opposed by the +great majority of the patricians. On the other hand he would have had +comparatively doubtful support from the plebs. If the interests of the +poorer plebeians alone had been consulted, they would not have been much +more active or able in backing their tribunes, while the richer men would +have gone over in a body to the other side with the public tenants and the +private creditors among the patricians. Or, supposing the case reversed and +the bill relating to the consulship brought forward alone, the debtors and +the homeless citizens would have given the bill too little help with hands +or hearts to secure its passage as a law. The great encouragement therefore +to Licinius and Sextius must have been their conviction that they had +devised their reform on a sufficiently expanded scale. As soon as the bills +were brought forward every one of their eight colleagues vetoed their +reading. Nothing could be done by the two tribunes except to be resolute +and watch for an opportunity for retaliation. At the election of the +military tribunes during that year, Licinius and Sextius interposed[10] +their vetoes and prevented a vote being taken. No magistrates could remain +in office after their terms expired, whether there were any successors +elected or not to come after them. The commonwealth remained without any +military tribunes or consuls at its head, although the vacant places were +finally filled by one _interrex_ after another, appointed by the senate to +keep up the name of government and to hold the elections the moment the +tribunes withdrew their vetoes, or left their office. At the close of the +year Licinius and Sextius were both re-elected but with colleagues on the +side of their antagonists. Some time afterwards it became necessary to let +the other elections proceed. War was threatening,[11] and in order to go to +the assistance of their allies Licinius and Sextius withdrew their vetoes +and ceased their opposition for a time. Six military tribunes were chosen, +three from the liberal and three from the illiberal patricians. The +liberals doubtless received all the votes of the plebeians as they had +no candidates. They had in all probability abstained from running for an +office, bills for the abolition of which were held in abeyance. They showed +increasing inclination to sustain Licinius and his colleague, both by +re-electing them year after year and by at length choosing three other +tribunes with them in favor of the bills. The prospects of the measure were +further brightened by the election of Fabius Ambustus, the father-in-law +of Licinius and his zealous supporter, to the military[12] tribunate. This +seems to have been the seventh year following the proposal of the bills. +This can not be definitely determined, however. During this long period of +struggle, Licinius had learned something. It was constantly repeated[13] +in his hearing that not a plebeian in the whole estate was fit to take +the part in the auspices and the religious ceremonies incumbent upon the +consuls. The same objections had overborne the exertions of Caius Canuleius +three-quarters of a century before. Licinius saw that the only way to +defeat this argument was by opening to the plebeians the honorable office +of _duumvirs_, whose duty and privilege it was[14] to consult the Sibyline +books for the instruction of the people in every season of doubt and peril. +They were, moreover, the presiding officers of the festival of Apollo, to +whose inspirations the holy books of the Sibyl were ascribed, and were +looked up to with honor and respect. This he did by setting forth an +additional bill, proposing the election of _decemvirs_.[15] The passage of +this bill would forever put to rest one question at least. Could he be a +decemvir, he could also be a consul. This bill was joined to the other +three which were biding their time. The strife went on. The opposing +tribunes interposed their vetoes. Finally it seems that all the offices of +tribune were filled with partisans of Licinius, and the bills were likely +to pass when Camillus, the dictator, swelling with wrath against bills, +tribes and tribunes,[16] came forward into the forum. He commanded the +tribunes to see to it that the tribes cast no more votes. But on the +contrary they ordered the people to continue as they had begun. Camillus +ordered his lictors to break up the assembly and proclaim that if a man +lingered in the forum, the dictator would call out every man fit for +service and march from Rome. The tribunes ordered resistance and declared +that if the dictator did not instantly recall his lictors and retract his +proclamation, they, the tribunes, would, according to their right, subject +him to a fine five times larger than the highest rate of the census, as +soon as his dictatorship expired. This was no idle threat, and Camillus +retreated so fairly beaten as to abdicate immediately under the pretense +of faulty auspices.[17] The plebeians adjourned satisfied with their day's +victory. But before they could be again convened some influence was brought +to bear upon them so that when the four bills were presented only the two +concerning land and debts were accepted. This was nothing less than a fine +piece of engineering on the part of the patricians to defeat the whole +movement and could have resulted in nothing less. Licinius was disappointed +but not confounded. With a sneer at the selfishness as well as the +blindness of those who had voted only for what they themselves most wanted +he bade them take heed that they could not eat if they would not drink.[18] +He refused to separate the bills. The consent to their division would +have been equivalent to consenting to the division of the plebeians. His +resolution carried the day. The liberal patricians as well as the plebeians +rallied to his support. A moderate patrician, a relation of Licinius, was +appointed dictator, and a member of the same house was chosen master of the +horse. These events prove that the liberal patricians were in the majority. +Licinius and Sextius were re-elected for the tenth time, A.C. 366, thus +proving that the plebeians had decided to eat and drink.[19] + +The fourth bill, concerning the decemvirs was almost instantly laid +before the tribes and carried through them. It was accepted by the higher +assemblies and thus became a law. It is not evident why this bill was +separated from the others, especially when Licinius had declared that they +should not be separated. Possibly it was to smooth the way for the other +three more weighty ones, especially the bill concerning the consulship.[20] +There seems to have been an interruption here caused by an invasion of the +Gauls.[21] As soon as this was over the struggle began again. The tribes +assembled. "Will you have our bills?" asked Licinius and Sextius for the +last time. "We will," was the reply. It was amid more violent conflicts, +however, than had yet arisen that the bills became laws[22] at last. + +It takes all the subsequent history of Rome to measure the consequences of +the Revolution achieved by Licinius and Sextius; but the immediate working +of their laws could have been nothing but a disappointment to their +originators and upholders. We can tell little or nothing about the +regard paid to the _decemvirs_. The priestly robes must have seemed an +unprecedented honor to the plebeian. For some ten years the law regarding +the consulship was observed, after which time it was occasionally[23] +violated, but can still be called a success. The laws[24] of relief, as may +be supposed of all such sumptuary enactments, were violated from the first. +No general recovery of the public land from those occupying more than five +hundred[25] jugera ever took place. Consequently there was no general +division of land among the lackland class. Conflicting claims and jealousy +on the part of the poor must have done much to embarrass and prevent the +execution of the law. No system of land survey to distinguish between +_ager publicus_ and _ager privatus_ existed. Licinius Stolo himself was +afterwards convicted of violating his own law.[26] The law respecting debts +met with much the same obstacles. The causes of embarrassment and poverty +being much the same and undisturbed, soon reproduced the effects which no +reduction of interest or installment of principal could effectually remove. +It is not our intention, however, to express any doubt that the enactments +of Licinius, such as they were, might and did benefit the small farmer +and the day laborer.[27] Many were benefited. In the period immediately +following the passing of the law, the authorities watched with some +interest and strictness over the observance of its rules and frequently +condemned the possessors of large herds and occupiers of public domain to +heavy fines.[28] But in the main the rich still grew richer and the poor +and mean, poorer and more contemptible. Such was ever the liberty of the +Roman. For the mean and the poor there was no means of retrieving their +poverty and degradation. + +These laws, then, had little or no effect upon the domain question or the +re-distribution of land. They did not fulfil the evident expectation of +their author in uniting the plebeians into one political body. This was +impossible. What they did do was to break up and practically abolish the +patriciate.[29] Henceforth were the Roman people divided into rich and poor +only. + +[Footnote 1: Livy, VI, 34.] + +[Footnote 2: Livy, VI, 35: "unam de aere alieno, ut deduco eo de capite, +quod usuris pernumeratum esset, id, quod superesset, triennio aequis +portionibus persolveretur."] + +[Footnote 3: Livy, VI, 35; Niebuhr, III, p.16; Varro, De R.R., 1: "Nam +Stolonis illa lex, quae vetat plus D jugera habere civem Romanorum." Livy, +VI, 35: "alteram de modo agrorum, ne quis plus quingenta jugera agri +posideret." Marquardt u. Momm., _Röm. Alterthümer,_ IV, S. 102.] + +[Footnote 4: Appian, _De Bello Civile_, I, 8.] + +[Footnote 5: Livy VI, 35; See Momm., I, 382; Duruy, _Hist. des Romains_, +II, 78.] + +[Footnote 6: Livy, VI, 37.] + +[Footnote 7: Livy, VI, 35: "creatique tribuni Caius Licinius et Lucius +Sextius promulgavere leges adversus opes patriciorum et pro commodis +plebis."] + +[Footnote 8: Ihne, I, 314.] + +[Footnote 9: Livy, VI, 35: "Cuncta ingentia, et quae sine certamine +obtineri non possent."] + +[Footnote 10: Livy, VI, 35.] + +[Footnote 11: Livy, VI, 36.] + +[Footnote 12: Livy, VI, 36. Fabius quoque tribunis militum, Stolonis socer, +quarum legum auctor fuerat, earum sua.] + +[Footnote 13: Livy, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 14: Appian, _De Bell. Civ._, I, 9.] + +[Footnote 15: Momm., I, 240: "decemviri sacris faciundis." Lange, _loc. +cit._] + +[Footnote 16: Livy, VI, 38; Momm., _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 17: Livy, VI, 38; Momm., _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 18: Dion Cassius, Fragment, XXXIII, with Reimer's note.] + +[Footnote 19: Livy, VI, 42.] + +[Footnote 20: Livy, VI, 42: et comitia consulum adversa nobilitate habita, +quibus Lucius Sextius de plebe primus consul factus.] + +[Footnote 21: Livy, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 22: Livy, VI, 42; Ovid, Faustus, I, 641, seq.: + + "Furius antiquam populi superator Hetrusci + Voverat et voti solverat ante fidem + Causa quod a patribus sumtis secesserat annis + Vulgus; et ipsa suas Roma timebat opes."] + +[Footnote 23: Momm., I, 389.] + +[Footnote 24: Momm., I, 384.] + +[Footnote 25: Arnold, _Roman History_, II, 35; Ihne, _Essay on the Roman +Constitution_, p. 72. Ihne, _Roman Hist._, I, 332-334. Long, I, ch. XI. +Lange, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 26: Livy, VII, 16: "Eodem anno Caius Licinius Stolo a Marco +Popillio Laenate sua legi decem milibus aeris est damnatus, quod mille +jugerum agri cum filio possideret, emancipandoque filium fraudem legi +fecisset." Appian, _Bell. Civ._, 1, 8; "_[Greek: taen gaen es tous +oikeious epi upokrisei dienemon.]_"] + +[Footnote 27: Momm., I, 389.] + +[Footnote 28: Momm., I, 389, 390.] + +[Footnote 29: Momm., I, 389, 390.] + + + + +SEC. VIII.--AGRARIAN MOVEMENTS BETWEEN 367 AND 133. + + +The first agrarian movement after the enactment of lex Licinia took place +in the year 338, after the battle of Veseris in which the Latini and their +allies were completely conquered. According to Livy,[1] the several peoples +engaged in this rebellion were mulcted of a part of their land which was +divided among the plebeians. Each plebeian receiving an allotment in the +territory of the Latini had 2 jugera assigned him, while those in Privernum +received 2-3/4, and those in Falernian territory received 3 jugera each (p. +252). This distribution of domain lands seems to have been spontaneous on +the part of the senate. But it led to grave consequences as the Latini, +indignant at their being despoiled of their lands, resorted again to arms. +The plebeians, moreover, were roused to the verge of rebellion by the +consul Aemilius who had been alienated from the patricians by their +refusing him a triumph, and now strove to ingratiate himself with the +commons by making them dissatisfied with their meagre allotments. The +law, however, was carried into execution, and thus showed that the senate +acquiesced in and even initiated laws when they did not in any way +interfere with their possession, but referred only to territory which had +just been conquered. + +_Agrarian Law of Curius._ Beyond the distribution of the _ager publicus_ +which formed the basis of the numerous colonies of this period and which +will be considered in their proper place, the next agrarian movement was +that of Curius Dentatus. At the close of the third Samnite War the +people were in great distress, as agricultural pursuits had been greatly +interrupted by continued warfare. Now there seemed to be a chance of +remedying this. Large tracts of land had been taken from the Samnites and +Sabines, and it was now at the disposal of the Roman[2] state for purposes +of colonization and division among the impoverished citizens. In the year +287,[3] a bill was introduced by Manius Curius Dentatus, the plebeian +consul for this year, and hero of the third Samnite War. He proposed +giving to the citizens assignments of land in the Sabine country of seven +jugera[4] each. It is certain that this bill met with great opposition but +we have not been informed as to the causes.[5] It is safe to conclude, +however, that the question was whether assignments of land with full right +of property should be made in districts which the great land-owners wished +to keep open for occupation in order that they might pasture herds thereon. +The senate and the nobility so bitterly opposed the plan that the plebeians +despairing of success, withdrew to the Janiculum and only on account of +threatening war did they consent to the proposals of Quintus Hortensius.[6] +By this move the _lex Hortensia_[7] was passed and, doubtless, the _agraria +lex_ was enacted at the same time although nothing definite is known +concerning this point. The people must have been pacified by some other +means than the mere granting of more political power. Nothing less than a +share of the conquered territory would have satisfied them or induced them +to return and again take up the burden of war. + +_Lex Flaminia._ Fifty four years after the enactment of the law of Curius +Dentatus, in the year 232, the tribune Caius Flaminius,[8] the man who +afterwards was consul and fell in the bloody battle of lake Trasimenus, +brought forward and carried a law for the distribution of the _Gallicus +Ager_[9] among the plebeians. This territory[10] had been taken from the +Galli Semnones fifty-one years before and was now occupied as pasture land +by some large Roman families. This territory lay north of Picenum and +extended as far as Ariminum[11](Rimini.) This was an excellent opportunity +for awarding lands to Roman veterans for military service, and thus to +establish a large number of small farms, rather than to leave the land in +the possession of the rich who resided in Rome and, consequently, formed no +frontier protection against the inroads of barbarians from the north. By +alloting the land, the Latin race and Latin tongue would help to Romanize +territory already conquered by Roman arms. The only thing opposed to this +was the possession of the land by the aristocracy. But they had no legal +claim to the land and could be dispossessed without any indemnification. +The senate opposed this measure to the utmost of their ability and, after +all other means had failed, threatened to send an army against the tribune +if he urged his bill through the tribes. They further induced his father to +make use of his _potestas_ in restraining his son.[12] When Flaminius was +bringing up the bill for decision he was arrested by his father. "Come +down, I bid thee," said the father. And the son humbled "by private +authority,"[13] obeyed. It finally became necessary for the plebeians to +take their stand on the formal constitutional law and to cause the _agraria +lex_ to be passed by a vote of the assembly of the tribes without a +previous resolution or subsequent approbation of the senate.[14] Polybius +dates a change for the worse in the Roman constitution from this time.[15] +The relief of the plebeians was further promoted by the foundation[16] of +new colonies. + +In the year 200, after Scipio returned as conqueror of Carthage, the senate +decreed that he should be assigned some lands for his soldiers, but Livy +does not tell us where they were to be assigned; whether they were to be +a part of the ancient _ager publicus_ or of the territory of Carthage, +Sicily, or Campania, _i.e._ the new conquests of Rome. He merely says that +for each year of service in Spain or Africa the soldiers were to receive +two jugera each, and that[17] the distributions should be made by the +_decenvirs_. In spite of the insufficiency of these details the passage +reveals to us two important facts: + +1. Decemvirs as well as triumvirs were at times appointed to make +distributions of domain lands in accordance with the provisions of an +agrarian law. + +2. It reveals the profound modifications which Roman customs had passed +through. The riches which began at this time to flow into Rome by reason +of the many successful wars revolutionized the economic conditions of +the city. It is not necessary to see only a proof of corruption in this +tendency of all classes to grasp for riches and to desire luxury and ease. +We must also consider that comfort was more accessible and that the price +of everything, especially of the necessaries of life, had increased. In +consequence of this it was difficult for soldiers to support themselves +with their pay. The presents of a few sesterces given them as prize money +in no way made sufficient recompense for all the miseries and privations +which they had passed through during their long absence. Grants of land +were the only means of recompensing their military services. This is the +first example that we have found of soldiers being thus rewarded, and it +consequently initiated a custom which became most frequent especially in +the time of the empire. Upon the conquest of Italy which followed the +expedition of Pyrrhus, the Romans found themselves led into a long series +of foreign wars; Sicily furnished the stepping-stone to Africa; Africa to +Spain; all these countries becoming Roman provinces. As soon as the second +Punic war closed, Hannibal formed an alliance with the king of Macedonia. +A war-cloud rose[18] in the east. The Ætolians asked aid from Rome, and +statesmen could foretell that it would be impossible for Roman armies not +to interfere between Greece and Macedonia. But these countries had been +from ancient times most intimately connected with the orient, _i.e._, Asia, +where the Seleucidae still ruled, so that a war with Greece, which was +inevitable, could not fail to bring on a war with the successors of +Alexander, and, these hostilities once engaged in, who could say where +these accidents of war would cease, or when Roman arms could be laid aside? +In this critical condition it was prudent to attach the soldiers to the +republic by bonds and interests the most intimate, to make them proprietors +and to assure subsistence to their families during their long absence. +These wars did not much resemble those of the early republic which had for +a theatre of war the country in the immediate vicinity of Rome. + +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."] + +[Footnote 2: Mommsen states that this privilege was limited to 1000 jugera +in all, and Wordsworth follows him, making the same statement. Lange, Röm. +Alterthümer, III, 9, agrees with Mommsen and cites, App. B.C., I, 9, 11; +Vell., 2, 6; Livy, Ep., 58; Aurelius Victor, 64; Sic. Flacc., p. 136, Lach. +I find no direct proof in the places mentioned of what Lange asserts while +App. (I, 11), says: [Greek: "kai paisi, ois eisi paides ekasto kai touton +ta aemisea."]. Long says there is no proof of any limitation as to number +of sons, while Ihne, Duruy and Nitzsch are agreed in following the +statement of Appian, as I have here done. See Marquardt u. Momm., Röm. +Alter, 106.] + +[Footnote 3: App., I, 11.] + +[Footnote 4: Momm., III, 114; Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus, 9, 1. 9.] + +[Footnote 5: App., I, 1. 3.] + +[Footnote 6: [Greek: App., I, 9: "Tiberios Grakchos...daemarchon +esemnologaese peri tou Italikou genous hos eupolemotatou te kai sungenus +phtheiromenou de kat oligon es aporian kai oligandrian]. Also App. B.C., I, +13; [Greek: Grakchas de megalauchoumenos epi to nomo ... oia dae ktistaes +ou mias poleos oud henos genous alla panton osa en Italia ethnae es taen +oikian parepempeto."]. Ihne, IV, 385. Lange says (III, 10): "Das Gracchus +die Latiner und Bundesgenosen nicht berücksichtigte, war bei der Gesinnung +der römischen Bürgerschaft gegen die Latiner ganz natürlich." I can not +see how he harmonizes this statement with that of App., [Greek: Italikou +genous] and [Greek: Italia ethnae]. Momm., Röm. Ge., II, 88.] + +[Footnote 7: Sallust, Jugertha, XLII.] + +[Footnote 8: App., I, XII; Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus, X-XII; Julii Flori +Epitoma, II, (Biblioth. Teubner, p. 67): "Sit ubi intercedentem legibus +suis C. Octavium vidit Gracchus, contra fas collegii, juris, potestas, is +injecta manu depulit rostris, adeoque praesenti metu mortis exterruit, ut +abdicare se magistratu cogeretur."] + +[Footnote 9: Momm., III, 115.] + +[Footnote 10: App., I, 9; Livy, Epit., LVIII, 12; Plut., Tib. Gr., 8-14; +Cic., De Leg. Agr., II, 12, 13; Velleius, 2, 2; Aurelius Vic., De Vir. +Illus., 64.] + +[Footnote 11: Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus, 13.] + +[Footnote 12: Momm., III, 115. See Ihne's just condemnation of this clause; +IV, 387.] + +[Footnote 13: Plutarch, Tib. Grac., XIII, ln. 12; Duruy, Hist. Rom., vol. +II, pp. 339-420 of Translation.] + +[Footnote 14: Long, I, 183; Ihne, IV, 387; Lange, III, 10-12; Nitzsch, +Die Gracchen, 294 et seq.] + +[Footnote 15: Plutarch, Tib. Grac., 14; Florus, II.] + +[Footnote 16: Cicero, De Amicitia, 12. "Tiberius Gracchus regnum occupare +conatus est vel regnavit is quidem paucas menses."] + +[Footnote 17: Momm., II, p. 417.] + +[Footnote 18: Professor Long thinks that the law of Tiberius soon became a +dead letter. Lange (Röm. Alter., III, 26-29), inclines to this view. Duruy +(II, 419-420), and most other modern writers agree with Mommsen.] + + + + + +SEC. 12.--LEX SEMPRONIA GAIANA. + + +Gaius Gracchus really enacted no new agrarian law but merely re-established +the power of the commission which had been appointed by his brother ten +years before; which power they had lost by the law of Scipio.[1] Gaius' law +was enacted merely to preserve the principle, and the distribution of land, +if resumed at all, was on a very limited scale. This is made known from +the fact that the burgess-roll showed precisely the same number capable of +bearing arms in 124 and 114. As has already been stated, the domain +land had been exhausted by the commission before losing its power, and, +therefore, Gaius had none to distribute.[2] The land held by the Latini +could only be taken into consideration with the difficult question of the +Roman franchise. But when Gaius proposed the establishment of colonies in +Italy, at Tarentum and Capua, whose territories had been hitherto reserved +as a source of revenue to the treasury,[3] he went a step beyond his +brother and made this also liable to be parcelled out; not, however, +according to the method of Tiberius, who did not contemplate the +establishment of new communities, but according to the colonial system. +There can be little doubt that Gaius designed to aid in permanently +establishing[4] the revolution by means of these new colonies in the most +fertile part of all Italy. His overthrow and death put a stop to the +establishment of the contemplated colonies and left this territory still +tributary to the treasury. + +[Footnote 1: Scipio must have caused a plebiscitum to be enacted, for +the repeal of this clause, as an existing law could not be repealed by a +_senatus consultum._ See Ihne, IV, 414, note.] + +[Footnote 2: Momm., III, 137.] + +[Footnote 3: Cicero, _De Leg. Agr._, II, c. 29-32; Marquardt u. Momm., +_Röm. Alter._, IV, 106: "ager publicus mit Ausnahme einiger dem Staate +unenbehrlicher Domainen, wozu namentlich das Gebiet von Capua und das +stellatische Feld bei Cales gehörte."] + +[Footnote 4: Ihne, IV, 438-479. Plutarch, _Gaius Gracchus_, 13.] + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + + + +SEC. 13.--LEX THORIA.[1] + + +According to Appian, during the years which followed the death of Gaius +Gracchus up to the tribunate of Saturninus, that is to say, between the +years 120 and 100, three agrarian laws were proposed and adopted. + +1. A law "That the holders of the land which was the matter in dispute +might legally sell[2] it." Appian, who is the only authority for this +period, does not give the date of the law nor the name of the tribune who +proposed it, but Ihne[3] makes the date 118, and Mommsen assigns the law to +Marcus[4] Drusus. This law was a repeal of all the restrictions which the +Gracchi had placed upon assignments of public land. The object of this +clause was to secure the success of their great reforms, and to establish +a number of small proprietors who would cultivate their little farms, and +breed citizens and soldiers. But forced cultivation is impossible, and +sumptuary laws have never yet succeeded in increasing[5] population. Again +it is inconsistent to give land to a man and deprive him of the power of +sale, for this is an essential part of that domain which we call property +in land. If a man wishes to sell, he will always have sufficient reasons +for so doing, and a rich man can afford to pay[6] the highest price, +freedom of exchange thus bringing ultimate good to both parties. It is easy +to comprehend the consequences of this law. It was the commencement of +a reaction entirely aristocratic in its nature.[7] It was skillfully +conducted with the ordinary spirit of the Roman senate, the ruses, mental +reservations, and dissimulations under guise of public interest. The +aristocracy presented to the plebeian farmers, established by the lex +Sempronia, a means of promptly and easily satisfying their passions. +They had never earned their little farms, nor did they appreciate the +independence of the tiller of the soil. Unaccustomed to farm labor,[8] and +the plodding unexciting life of the Roman _agricola_, they made haste to +abandon a toilsome husbandry, the results of which seemed to them slow and +uncertain, and with the pieces of silver which they received as the price +of their lands, returned to Rome to swell the idle and vicious throng[9] +which enjoyed the sweet privilege of an existence sustained without labor. + +Thus the nobles re-entered promptly and cheaply into the possession of the +lands of which Tiberius had but a short time before deprived them, and, +by means of a little sacrifice, substantially and legally converted their +possessions into real property, while the plebeians whom Tiberius had +wished to elevate by means of forcing[10] upon them the necessity of labor, +fell back into their accustomed poverty and brutality. But the object for +which the nobles were striving was not yet completely gained. The present +victory was theirs; they now strove to guarantee the future, and so render +impossible dangers similar to those already passed through. + +2. A second law was thus enacted: "Spurius Borius, a tribune, proposed a +law to this effect; that there should be no more distribution of the public +land, but it should be left to the possessors who should pay certain +charges (_vectigalia_) for it to the state ([Greek: daemo]) and that the +money arising from these payments should be distributed."[11] + +It is easy to comprehend the effect of a law so conceived. On the one hand +it guaranteed to the possessors full property in the public lands which +they held. From this point of view it was aristocratic. But on the other +hand it aimed to unite the interests of the common people with those of the +aristocracy, by placing a tax of one tenth of the produce upon the holders +of these lands,[12] thus reëstablishing the law which had been annulled by +Drusus. This took the place of distributions of land, which had now been +made impossible[13] in Italy. In reality this law was disastrous to the +plebeians as it established a tax[14] for their benefit, a _congiarium_, +and placed a premium upon laziness. + +The narration of Appian presents some grave difficulties. In all the +manuscripts of Appian the name of the tribune proposing the second law is +Spurius Borius.[15] Cicero mentions a tribune by the name of Spurius[16] +Thorius and Schweighäuser in his edition of Appian has changed 'Borius' to +'Thorius.' But this does not lessen the difficulty, as the law which Cicero +attributes to Thorius is entirely different from the second law of Appian +which, according to him was introduced by Spurius Borius. Cicero says that +Spurius Thorius "freed the public lands from the vectigal."[17] Appian +says that Spurius Borius guaranteed the _possessions_ in the public lands, +levying a tax on them for the benefit of the people. It is a sheer waste +of time to attempt to harmonize these two statements.[18] Granting that +Spurius Borius and Spurius Thorius are one and the same person, the +statements still remain diametrically opposed according to a simple and +commonly accepted translation of Cicero's words: "Sp. Thorius satis valuit +in populari genere dicendi, is qui agrum publicum vitiosa et inutile lege +vectigali levavit." Mommsen makes Cicero agree with Appian by changing +"vectigali" into the instrument, and rendering[l9] "relieved the public +land from a vicious and useless law by imposing a vectigal." No other +writer agrees with Mommsen in making such a translation. + +3. The third law is mentioned by Appian alone who says: "Now when the law +of Gracchus had once been evaded by these tricks, an excellent law and most +useful to the state if it could have been executed, another tribune not +long after [Greek: oupolu husteron] abolished even the vectigalia."[20] +This is evidently the same law which Cicero mentions as that of Spurius +Thorius and as he also mentions him in another place (_De Or_., II, 70, +284), we may possibly accept him as the author. + +There are still extant some fragments of a bronze tablet which contains +upon its smooth surface the Lex Repetundarum and has cut upon its rough[21] +back an agrarian law. These fragments were discovered in the 16th century +among the collections in the Museum of Cardinal[22] Bembo at Padua. +Sigonius attempted the reconstruction of this law and after him Haubold and +Klentze, but Rudorff has completed the reconstruction as far as possible +and made the law the subject of an interesting essay.[23] Mommsen has a +commentary in the Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum[24] upon this law. From +all these sources the date of this law has been established almost beyond +doubt as 111. Sigonius assigned it to Spurius Thorius, and, as the name is +immaterial and[25] his arguments moreover for this title are not easily set +aside, we can do no better than adopt it. + + + + +_Argument of the Lex Thoria._[26] + +The law evidently consists of three parts, although the rubricae are +absent. + +I. De agro publico p. R. in Italia (1-43). + +II. De agro publico p. R. in Africa (44--95). + +III. De agro publico p. R. qui Corinthorum fuit (96-105). + + +I. On the Ager Publicus in Italy. + +This part may be divided roughly into three sections: (1) Lines 1-24, +defining _ager privatus_; (2) 24-32, defining _ager publicus_; (3) 33-43, +on disputed cases. + +It thus embraces the first forty-three lines of the law, and is concerned +with the public land of Italy, from the Rubicon southwards. It commences +by referring to the condition of this land in the year 133, when Tiberius +Gracchus was tribune. The law does not affect to touch any thing which +had been enacted concerning this land prior to 133. It either confirms or +alters what had been done in 133, and since that time. All the public land +which was exempted from the operation of the Sempronian laws, _i.e._, _Ager +Campanus_ and _Ager Stellatis_, was also excluded from the operation of the +_lex Thoria_. + +(1) The first ten lines of the law relate to that part of the ager publicus +which was occupied before the time of the Gracchi, if the amount of such +land did not exceed the maximum fixed by the Sempronian laws; + +(2) Also, to the assignments made by lot (_sortito_) to Roman citizens +by the commissioners since the enactment of the Sempronian laws, if such +assignments were not made out of land which had been guaranteed to the old +possessors; + +(3) Also, to all lands taken from an old possessor, but on his complaint +restored to him by the commissioners; + +(4) Also, to all houses and lands, in Rome or in other parts of Italy, +which the commissioners had granted without lot, so as such grants did not +interfere with the guaranteed title of older possessors; + +(5) Also, to all the public land which Gaius Sempronius, or the +commissioners, in carrying out his law, had used in the establishment of +colonies or given to settlers, whether Roman citizens, Latini, or Italian +Socii, or which they had caused to be entered on the "_formae_" or +"_tabulae_." + +All the lands comprised in the above are declared in lines seven and eight +to be private property, in these words: "Ager locus omnis quei supra +scriptus est, extra eum agrum locum, quei ager locus ex lege plebeivescito, +quod C. Sempronius Ti. f. tr. pl. rogavit, exsceptum cavitumve est nei +divideretur ... privatus esto." + +Lines 8-10 declare that the censors shall, from time to time, enter this +land upon their books like any other private property; and it is further +declared that nothing shall be said or done in the senate to disturb the +peaceful enjoyment of this land by those persons possessing it. + +Of lines 11-13 (ch. II) nothing definite can be said, because of the few +words which have been preserved.[27] Rudorff explains them as referring to +land granted to _viasii vicani_ (dwellers in villages along the roads), by +the Sempronian commissioners; such lands to remain in their possession, but +to be theoretically _ager publicus._ + +Lines 13-14 refer to lands occupied since 133 _agri colendi causa_. They +allow to every Roman citizen the privilege of occupying, for the purpose of +cultivation, thirty jugera of public land; they further declare that he +who shall possess or have not more than thirty jugera of such land, shall +possess and have it as private property,[28] with the provision that +land so occupied shall be no part of the public land excepted from +appropriation, and further, that such occupation shall not interfere with +the guaranteed lands of a previous possessor. + +Lines 14-15 relate to holders of pasture land (_ager compascuus_). This +_ager compascuus_ was land which had been left undivided, and had not +become the private property of any individual, but was the common property +of the owners of the adjacent lands. These persons had the right to pasture +stock upon this land by paying pasture dues (_scriptura_ or _vectigal_) +to the state. The _Thoria lex_ freed these lands from the _vectigal_ or +_scriptura_, and granted free pasturage to each man for ten head of +large beasts--cattle, asses, and horses--and fifty head of smaller +animals--sheep, goats, and swine. This common pasture must be carefully +distinguished from the communal property which was granted to the settlers +in a Colonia and called "_compascua publica_" with the additional title[29] +of the colony, as "_Julienses_." + +These rights of common resemble, in some respects, the English common +of pasture as described by Bracton.[30] By English customary law, every +freeholder holding land within a manor, had the right of common of +pasturage on the lord's wastes as an incident to his land. + +Lines 15-16. The possession of land, granted by the commissioners in a +colony since 133, to be confirmed before the Ides of March next. + +Lines 16-17. The same rule applied to lands granted otherwise by the same +commissioners. + +Line 18. Such occupants if forcibly ejected to be restored. + +Lines 19-20. Land assigned by the Sempronian commission, in compensation +for land in a colony which had been made public, to become private. + +Lines 23-24. Confirmation of the title or restitution of such land to be +made before the Ides of March next. + +Lines 24-25. Land besides this which remains public is not to be occupied, +but to be left free to the public for grazing. A fine for occupation is +imposed. The law allowed all persons to feed their beasts great and small +on this public pasture, up to the number mentioned in lines 14-15 as the +limit to be pastured on the _ager campascuus_, free of all tax. This, +according to Rudorff, was done for the benefit of the small holders. Those +who sent more than this number of animals to the public pastures must pay a +_scriptura_, for each head. + +Line 26. While the cattle or sheep were driven along the '_calles_,' or +beast-tracks, and along the public roads to the pasture grounds, no charge +was made for what they consumed along the road. + +Line 27. Land given in compensation out of public land, to be _privatus +utei quoi optuma lege_. + +Line 27. Land taken in this way from private ownership to be _publicus_, as +in 133. + +Lines 27-28. Land given in compensation for _ager patritus_ to be itself +_patritus_. + +Line 28. Public roads to remain as before. + +Line 29. Whatever Latins and _peregrini_ might do in 112, and whatever is +not forbidden citizens to do by this law, they may do henceforward. + +Lines 29-30. Trial of a Latin to be the same as for a Roman citizen. + +Lines 31-32. Territory (1) of borough towns or colonies (2), in +trientabulis, to be, as before, public. + +Lines 33-34. Cases of dispute about land made private between 133 and 111, +or by this law, to be judged by the consul or praetor before next Ides of +March. + +Lines 35-36. Cases of dispute after this date to be tried by consuls, +praetors, or censors. + +Lines 36-39. Judgment on money owing to publicani to be given by consuls, +proconsuls, praetors or propraetors. + +Line 40. No one to be prejudiced by refusing to swear to laws contrary to +this law. + +Lines 41-42. No one to be prejudiced by refusing to obey laws contrary to +this law. + +Lines 43-44. On the colony of Sipontum (?). + +Thus we see that the _lex Thoria_ had two main objects in view: (1) The +guaranteeing to possessors full property in the land which they occupied. +(2) The freeing from _vectigal_ or _scriptura_ the property of every one. + +In this way was the reaction of the aristocracy completed. It left nothing +of the Sempronian law. Appian[31] has fully comprehended all this, and, in +his enumeration of the three laws, connection between which he indicates, +we see clearly the entire revolutionary system, conducted, we must admit, +with a rare address and a perfidy which rendered the effect certain. The +aristocracy did not rest. As soon as they had gained the people by their +new bait of money and food, soothed them by their apparent generosity, and +familiarized them with the idea that the _possessions_ of the nobles were +not only legally acquired but inviolable, then they raised the mask, and +by a bold step swept away the _vectigal_,[32] thus leaving their property +free. The enactment of this law virtually closed the long struggle between +patrician and plebeian over the public lands of Rome, and left them as full +property in the hands of the rich nobility. The results could hardly have +been otherwise. Sumptuary laws, false economic principles, had closed all +channels[33] of trade and manufacture to the nobility, while conquest had +filled their hands with gold and placed at their disposal vast numbers[34] +of slaves. There was but one channel open for the investment of this +gold,--the agrarian.[35] Farming and cattle-raising were the only +occupations in which slaves could be used with advantage and so, as a +natural result of Roman economics, the plebeian, with little or no money +and subject to the military call, was compelled to enter into a one-sided +contest with capital and slave labor. So long as these conditions existed +so long would all the laws of the world fail to save him from abject +poverty and its attendant evils. + +[Footnote 1: Rudorff, _Ackergesetz des Spurius Thorius_, Zeitschrift für +geschichtliche Rechtswissenschaft, Band X, s. 1-158. Corpus Inscriptionum +Latinarum, vol. V, pp. 75-86. Wordsworth, _Specimens and Fragments of Early +Latin_, 440-459.] + +[Footnote 2: Appian, _Bell. Civ._, I, c. 27.] + +[Footnote 3: Ihne, _Roman History_, V, 9.] + +[Footnote 4: Momm., _Rom. Hist._, III, 165.] + +[Footnote 5: Long, _Decline of the Rom. Rep._, I, 352. See Lange, _Röm. +Alter._, III, 48.] + +[Footnote 6: Long, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 7: Momm., III, 161; Ihne, V, 10.] + +[Footnote 8: Long, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 9: Lange, III, 48-49; Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 108.] + +[Footnote 10: Long, _loc. cit._ Momm., III, 167-168; Ihne, V, 8-10.] + +[Footnote 11: Appian, I, c. 27.] + +[Footnote 12: Long, I, 353.] + +[Footnote 13: Long, I, 354.] + +[Footnote 14: Ihne, V, 10-11.] + +[Footnote 15: Long, I, 353; Wordsworth, 440; Momm., III, 165, note; Ihne, +V, 9; Lange, III, 48; Appian, I, c. 27.] + +[Footnote 16: Cicero, _Brut._, 36.] + +[Footnote 17: Cicero, _De Orat._, II, 70.] + +[Footnote 18: Marquardt u. Momm., _Röm. Alter._, IV, 108, n. 4; Wordsworth, +441.] + +[Footnote 19: Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, vol. I, p. 74.] + +[Footnote 20: Appian, I, c. 27.] + +[Footnote 21: Long, I, 355; Wordsworth, 440.] + +[Footnote 22: Long, I, 355; Wordsworth, 440; See Rudorff, Ack. des Sp. +Thor.] + +[Footnote 23: Zeitschrift für geschichtliche Rechtswissenschaft, Band X, s. +1-194.] + +[Footnote 24: C.I.L., I, pp. 75-86.] + +[Footnote 25: Long, I, 356.] + +[Footnote 26: Wordsworth, 447. See the text of this law in C.I.L., vol. I, +pp. 79-80.] + +[Footnote 27: Long, I, 359.] + +[Footnote 28: "Quom quis ceivis Romanus agri colendi causa in eum agrum +agri jugera non amplius xxx possidebit habebitue, is ager privatus esto."] + +[Footnote 29: Long, _loc. cit._; Wordsworth, 446.] + +[Footnote 30: Digby, _History of the Law of Real Property in England_, p. +157.] + +[Footnote 31: Long, I, 357.] + +[Footnote 32: Appian, I, c. 27.] + +[Footnote 33: Long, _loc. cit._; Ihne, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 34: Ihne, _loc. cit._; Long, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 35: Momm., _loc. cit._] + + + + +SEC. 14.--AGRARIAN MOVEMENTS BETWEEN 111 AND 86. + + +In the year following the enactment of the _lex Thoria_, or, by some other +authorities, in 105, an agrarian law was proposed by a tribune named Marcus +Philippus. Cicero is the only writer who mentions it, and he has given us +no information concerning its tendency and dispositions. We only know +from him that it was rejected.[1] Probably the whole thing was merely a +political ruse in order to gain an election or to be handsomely bought off +by the nobility. It, however, presents one point of interest to us. The +introduction of the bill was preceded by a speech, in which the tribune, +in justifying his undertaking, affirmed that there were not two thousand +citizens who had wealth. Cicero has made no attempt to refute this, and +must, therefore, have judged it true. It reveals the fact that Rome was in +a deplorable condition. + +In chronological order the first agrarian law after the vain attempt of +Philippus was that of Lucius Appuleius Saturninus. In the year 100, he +brought forward a bill for the distribution of land in Africa[2] to the +soldiers of Marius. Each soldier was to receive one hundred jugera of land. +No distinction was to be made between Roman and Latin. This bill received +the sanction of the assembly and became a law, but force was the chief +instrumentality in bringing this about. This law, so far as can be +ascertained, was never enforced, so that when the same man, three years +later, brought forward another agrarian bill, he took the precaution to add +a clause binding every senator, under heavy penalty, to confirm the law by +the most solemn oath.[3] The first law was enacted in order to provide the +soldiers of Marius with suitable farms when they returned from the campaign +in Numidia. The author doubtless acted with the aid and hearty coöperation +of Marius. When Saturninus brought forward his second bill, Marius[4] had +returned from the north as the hero of Aquae Sextiae and was present to +help. The nobility as one man opposed the scheme; the town-people were the +clients of the rich. If Marius[5] and Saturninus were to succeed, it must +be by the aid of the country burgess and the soldier. With the legions that +fought at Vercellae drawn up in the town, amid riot and bloodshed, the +assembly passed the bill. The senate, together with Marius himself, for a +time demurred from taking the oath. Finally,[6] at the instigation of "the +man from the ranks," who had come to the conclusion that it was best to +subscribe, all save one, Metellus, took the oath. The law enacted that +assignments of land in the country of the Gauls, in Sicily, Achaia, and +Macedonia, should be made; that colonies should be established, and +that Marius should be the head of the commission entrusted with the +establishment of all these settlements.[7] These colonies were to consist +of Roman citizens; and, in order that Latini,[8] their companions in arms, +might participate in the grants, Marius was invested with power to bestow +the franchise upon a certain number of these. But no one of these colonies +was ever founded. The only colony of the year 100 was Eporedia[9] (Ivrea), +in the northwestern Alps, and it is not likely that this was established in +accordance with the provisions of the enactment. The law was to take effect +in 99, and a change of party took place before that time which sent Marius +into practical banishment and rewarded his partisan, Saturninus, with +death. The optimates who were now in office paid no attention to the law, +and the senators forgot their oath. Another injury is added to the many +which the Latini had suffered. + +In the year 99, _i.e._, in the year following the death of Saturninus, an +agrarian law was proposed by the tribune Titius, but we know nothing of its +conditions. Cicero is the only writer who mentions it and even his text +is doubtful.[10] According to one of his statements Titius was banished +because he had preserved a portrait of Saturninus, and the knights deemed +him for this reason a seditious citizen. Valerius Maximus, who without +doubt borrowed his facts from Cicero, states that "Titius had rendered +himself dear to the people by having[11] brought forward an agrarian law." +Cicero mentions in another place, the _lex Titia_[12] upon the same page +as the _lex Saturnina_ and implies that it had been enacted. If so it was +disregarded and thus rendered void. + +In 91 an agrarian law was proposed by Livius Drusus, the son of the +adversary of Gaius Gracchus, and, with his new judiciary, the measure was +carried and became a law.[13] The Italians were embraced in this law and +were to have equal rights with Roman citizens, but Drusus died before he +had time to carry his law into execution, and his law died with him. + +[Footnote 1: Cic., _De Off._, II, 21.] + +[Footnote 2: Lucius Appuleius Saturninus, tribunus plebis seditiosus ut +gratiam Marianorum militum pararet, legem tulit ut veteranis centena agri +jugera in Africa dividerentur.... Siciliam, Achaiam, Macedoniam novis +colonis destinavit; et aurum, dolo an scelere, Caepionis partum, ad +emtionem agrorum convertit. Aurel. Victor. De Vir. Illus., 73.] + +[Footnote 3: App., I, 29; Plutarch, _Marius_, 29.] + +[Footnote 4: Plutarch, _Marius_, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 5: App., _Bell. Civ._, I, 30-33.] + +[Footnote 6: App., _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 7: Aurelius Victor, 73.] + +[Footnote 8: Cicero, _De Orat._, II, c. 7, I; _pro Balbo_, XIV; _pro +Rabirio_, XI.] + +[Footnote 9: Long, I.] + +[Footnote 10: Cicero, _Pro Rabirio_, 9.] + +[Footnote 11: Val. Max., VIII, 1, §2: "Sext. Titius... agraria lege lata +gratiosus apud populum."] + +[Footnote 12: _De Legibus_, II, 6. _De Orat._, II, 11.] + +[Footnote 13: Ihne, V, 176-186; App., I, 35; Val. Max., IX, 5, 2: Cicero, +_De Orat._, III, 1; Livy, _Epit._, 71.] + + + + +SEC. 15.--EFFECT OF THE SULLAN REVOLUTION. + + +As soon as Sulla found himself established, he caused a bill to pass the +Comitia Centuriata by means of which he was empowered to inflict punishment +upon certain Italian communities. For the accomplishment of this purpose +commissioners were appointed to coöperate with the garrisons established +throughout all Italy. The less guilty were required to pay fines, pull down +their walls, and raze their citadels.[1] Those that had been guilty of +continued opposition, as Samnium, Lucania, and Etruria, had their territory +in whole or in part confiscated, their municipal rights cancelled, +immunities taken from them, which had been granted by old treaties, and the +Roman franchise,[2] which they had been granted by the Cinnan government, +annulled. Such persons received, instead, the lowest Latin rights which did +not even imply membership in any community and rendered them destitute of +civic constitution and the right of making a testament.[3] This latter +treatment applied only to those whose land was confiscated. Thus Sulla +vindicated the majesty of the Republic and at the time avoided furnishing +his enemies with a nucleus in Italian communities. In Campania, the +democratic colony established at Capua by Cinna[4] was done away with and +the domain given back to the state, thus becoming _ager publicus_. The +whole territory of Praeneste and Norba in Latium, and Spoletium in Umbria +was confiscated. The town of Sulmo in Pelignium was razed. But more direful +than all this was the punishment which fell upon Etruria[5] and Samnium. +These people had marched upon Rome and, with the avowed determination of +exterminating the Roman people, had engaged in battle at the Colline gate. +They were utterly destroyed and their country left desolate. The territory +of Samnium was not even opened up for settlement, but left as a lair for +wild beasts. Henceforth from the Rubicon to the Straits of Sicily there +were to be none but Romans; the laws and the language of the whole +peninsula were to be the laws[6] and the language of Rome. + +To accomplish such an object as this, it was not enough to destroy and make +desolate, it became necessary to repopulate the waste places and rebuild +that which had been torn down. Roman citizens had to be sent as colonists +into the desolate regions. Sulla, accordingly, undertook to carry out his +plans of colonization, the grandest and most comprehensive which Rome +had ever seen, and which indeed have had no parallel in history till +the settlement of the north of Ireland by Cromwell and William III. The +arrangements as to the property of the Italian soil placed at the disposal +of Sulla[7] all the Roman domain lands which had been placed in usufruct to +the allied communities, and which now reverted to the Roman government. +It also placed at his disposal all the confiscated territories of the +communities incurring punishment. Upon these territories he established +military colonies, and thus obtained a three-fold result.[8] He remunerated +his soldiers for the faithful service rendered him in long years of toil +and danger. He repeopled the regions desolated by war (except Samnium). He +provided a military protection for himself and the new constitution which +he established. + +Most of his new settlements were directed to Etruria, Faesulae and Arretium +being among the number; others, to Latium[9] and Campania, where Praeneste +and Pompeii became Sullan colonies. A great part of these colonies were, +after the Gracchan manner, merely grafted upon town-communities already +existing. The comprehensiveness of these settlements may be seen in this +fact that 20,000 allotments were[10] made in different parts of Italy. +Notwithstanding this vast disposal of territory, Sulla gave lands to the +temple of Diana at Mt. Tifata, while the territory of Volaterrae and +Arretium remained undisturbed. He also revived the old plan of occupation +which had been legally forbidden in the year 118. Many of Sulla's intimate +friends availed themselves of this method of becoming masters of large +estates. + +[Footnote 1: App., _Bell Civ._, I, 94-100; Livy, _Epit._, 89. Plutarch, +_Life of Sulla._] + +[Footnote 2: Ihne, V, 391.] + +[Footnote 3: Momm., III, 428, note. See article on Sulla, in Brittannica.] + +[Footnote 4: Momm., III, 401.] + +[Footnote 5: Momm., III, 429; Ihne, V, 392; Long.] + +[Footnote 6: Momm., III, 429.] + +[Footnote 7: Momm., _loc. cit._; Ihne, V, 391-395.] + +[Footnote 8: Momm., III, 429.] + +[Footnote 9: Momm., III, 430; Marquardt u. Momm., _Röm. Alter._, IV, 111, +totam Italiam suis praesidiis obsidere atque ocupare; Cicero, _De Leg. +Agr._, 2, 28, 75.] + +[Footnote 10: App., I, 100; Cicero, _De Legibus Agrariis_, II, 28, 78; +Ihne, V, 394; Marquardt u. Momm., IV, 111; Zumpt, _Comm. Epigr._, 242-246; +Cicero, _Ad Att._, I, 19, 4: "Volaterranos et Arretinos, quorum agrum Sulla +publicarat."] + + + + +SEC. 16.--AGRARIAN MOVEMENTS BETWEEN 86 AND 59. + + +The first agrarian movement after the Sullan Revolution was that +inaugurated by the tribune Rullus. This has become the most famous of all +the agrarian laws because of the speeches made against it by the great +adversary of Rullus, Cicero, who succeeded in defeating the measure by +reason of his brilliant rhetoric. Plutarch[1] has thus analyzed this +proposition. "The tribunes of the people proposed dangerous innovations; +they demanded the establishment of ten magistrates with absolute power, +who, while disposing, as masters, of Italy, Syria, and the new conquests of +Pompey, should have the right to sell the public lands; to prosecute those +whom they wished; to banish; to establish colonies; to draw upon the public +treasury for whatever money they had need; to levy and maintain what troops +they deemed necessary. The concession of so widely extended power gained +for the support of the law the most powerful men in Rome. The colleague of +Cicero, Antonius, was one of the first to favor it, in the hope of being +one of the decemvirs. Cicero opposed the new law in the senate and his +eloquence so completely overpowered even the tribunes that they had not +one word to reply. But they returned to the charge and having gained the +support of the people, they brought the matter before the tribes. Cicero +was in no way alarmed; he left the senate, appeared on the rostrum before +the people and spoke with so great force that he not only caused the law +to be rejected but took from the tribunes all hope of being successful in +similar enterprises." + +In 61 we find Cicero advocating a bill similar in nature to the one he had +so brilliantly combatted in 64. In the last instance, however, the law was +proposed by Pompey, and in favor of Pompey's soldiers and that made all +difference to a man who ever curried favor with the great. Flavius, who +proposed this law, was but the creature of Pompey. Cicero has made known +to us, in one of his letters to Atticus, the conditions of the law which +Flavius proposed and the modifications which he himself wished to apply to +it. Flavius proposed to distribute lands both to the soldiers of Pompey and +the people; to establish colonies; to use for the purchase of the lands for +colonization, the subsidies which should accrue in five years, from the +recently conquered territories.[2] The senate rejected this law entirely, +in the same spirit of opposition which it had shown to all agrarian laws, +probably thinking that Pompey would thereby obtain too great an increase of +power.[3] This was the last attempt at agrarian legislation until the year +59, when Julius Caesar enacted his famous law. + +[Footnote 1: Plutarch, _Cicero_, 16-17.] + +[Footnote 2: Cicero, _Ad. Att._, I, 19.] + +[Footnote 3: Ibid.: "Huic toti rationi agrariae senatus adversabatur, +suspicans Pompeio novam quamdam potentiam quaeri."] + + + + +SEC. 17.--LEX JULIA AGRARIA. + + +During the first consulship of Caius Julius Cæsar, he brought forward an +agrarian[1] bill at the instigation of his confederates. The main object of +this bill was to furnish land to the Asiatic army[2] of Pompey, In fine, +this bill was little more than a renewal of a bill presented by Pompey the +previous year (58), but rejected. Appian gives the following account of +this bill: "As soon as Cæsar and Bibulus[3] (his colleague) entered on the +consulship, they began to quarrel and to make preparation to support their +parties by force. But Cæsar who possessed great powers of dissimulation, +addressed Bibulus in the senate and urged him to unanimity on the ground +that their disputes would damage the public interests. Having in this way +obtained credit for peaceable intentions, he threw Bibulus off his guard, +who had no suspicion of what was going on, while Cæsar, meanwhile, was +marshalling a strong force, and introducing into the senate laws for +favoring the poor, under which he proposed to distribute land among them +and the best land in Italy, that about[4] Capua which at the present time +was let on public account.[5] He proposed to distribute this land among +heads of families who had three children, by which measure he could gain +the good will of a large multitude, for the number of those who had three +children was 20,000. This proposal met with opposition from many of the +senators, and Cæsar, pretending to be much vexed at their unfair behavior, +left the house and never called the senate together again during the +remainder of his consulship, but addressed the people from the rostra. He, +in the presence of the assembly, asked the opinion of Pompeius and Crassus, +both of them approving, and the people came to vote on them (the bills), +with concealed daggers. Now as the senate[6] was not convened, for one +consul could not summon the senate without the consent of the other consul, +the senators used to meet at the house of Bibulus, but they could make no +real opposition to Cæsar's power.... Now Cæsar secured the enactment of the +laws, and bound the people by an oath to the perpetual observance of them, +and he required the same oath from the senate. As many of the senators +opposed him, and among them Cato, Cæsar proposed death as a penalty for not +taking the oath and the assembly ratified this proposal. Upon this all took +the oath immediately because of fear, and the tribunes also took it, for +there was no longer any use in making opposition after the proposal was +ratified." + +This agrarian law did not affect the existing rights of property and +heritable possession. It destined for distribution only the Italian domain +land, that is to say, merely the territory of Capua, as this was all that +belonged to the state.[7] If this was not enough to satisfy the demand, +other Italian lands were to be bought out of the revenue from the eastern +provinces at the taxable value rated in the censorial rolls. The number +of persons settled on the _Campanus ager_ is said[8] to have been 20,000 +citizens who had each three children or more. The land was not distributed +by lot, but at the pleasure of the commissioners, each one receiving some +30 jugera.[9] If 20,000 heads of families with their wives and three +children in each family were settled in Campania, the whole number of +settlers would be 100,000. This great number could scarcely leave Rome at +one time, and we find that as late as 51 the land was not all assigned.[10] +While the tenor of the law does not imply that it was the intention to +reward military service with grants of land, yet we may be sure that the +veterans of Pompey were not forgotten.[11] There are no extant authorities +which speak of the settlement of the Campanian land that say any thing +about the soldiers settled there, unless it be Cicero. He speaks of the +Campanian territory being taken out of the class that contributed a revenue +to the state in order that it might be given to soldiers,[12] and he +appears to refer to this time (59). Mommsen says that "the old soldiers as +well as the temporary lessees to be ejected were simply recommended to the +special consideration of the land distributors."[13] These latter were a +commission of twenty appointed by the state. Cæsar, at his own request, +was excused from serving, but Pompey and Crassus were the chief ones, thus +furnishing sufficient reason for supposing that the soldier was provided +for. The passage of this bill amounted in substance to the reëstablishment +of the democratic colony founded by Marius and Cinna and afterwards +abolished by Sulla.[14] Capua now became a Roman colony after having had no +municipal constitution for one hundred and fifty-two years, when the city +with all its dependencies was made a prefecture administered by a prefect +of Rome. The revenues from this district were doubtless no longer +needed, as those from Pontus and Syria[15] supplied all the needs of the +government, but it is difficult to see what benefit could be reaped +from the ejection of the thrifty farmers who, as tenants of the state, +cultivated this territory and paid their rents regularly into the state +coffers. Wherever the new settlers were brought in, the old cultivators +were turned out. No ancient writer says anything about the condition of +these people. Cicero, in his second speech upon the land bill of Rullus, +when speaking of the consequences that would follow its enactment, declared +that if the Campanian cultivators were ejected they would have no place +to go, and he truly says that such a measure would not be a settlement of +plebeians upon the land, but an ejection and expulsion of them from it.[16] + +Did it pay to send out a swarm of 100,000 idle paupers[17] who, for two +generations, had been fed at the public charge from the corn-bins of Rome, +simply in order that a like number of honest peasants, who had been not +only self-supporting but had paid a large part of the Roman revenue, should +be compelled to sacrifice their goods in a glutted market and become +debauched and idle? + +[Footnote 1: Livy, _Epit._, 103.] + +[Footnote 2: Momm., IV, 244.] + +[Footnote 3: App., _Bell. Civ._, II, c. 10.] + +[Footnote 4: Compare Dio Cassius, Bk., XXXVIII, c. 1: "[Greek: Taen de +choran taen de koinaen hapasan plaen taes Kampanidos eneme, tautaen gar en +to daemosio ezaireton dia taen aretaen synebouleusen einai.]"] + +[Footnote 5: Compare Suetonius' _Cæsar_, c. 20: "Campum Stellatem, +majoribus consecratum, agrumque Campanum, ad subsidea reipublicae (sic) +vectigalem relictum."] + +[Footnote 6: App., II, c. 11.] + +[Footnote 7: App., II, c. 20, and Suetonius, _Julius Caesar_, c. 20.] + +[Footnote 8: Suetonius, _loc. cit._] + +[Footnote 9: Lange, _Röm. Alter._, III, 273.] + +[Footnote 10: Cicero, _ad. Att._, VIII, 4.] + +[Footnote 11: Dion Cassius, 45, c. 12; Cicero, _ad Att._, X, 8.] + +[Footnote 12: Cicero, _Phil._, II, 39: "agrum Campanum, qui cum de +vectigalibus eximebatur, ut militibus daretur." Marquardt u. Momm., _Röm. +Alter._, IV, 114.] + +[Footnote 13: Momm., IV. 244.] + +[Footnote 14: Momm., III, 392, 428.] + +[Footnote 15: Momm., III, 392, 428.] + + + + +SEC. 18.--DISTRIBUTION OF LAND AFTER THE CIVIL WAR BETWEEN CÆSAR AND +POMPEY. + + +After Pompey had been vanquished at Pharsalia, and the republicans in +Africa, Cæsar proceeded to distribute lands to his soldiers in accordance +with his promise to give them lands, "not by taking them from their +proprietors as Sulla did; not by mixing colonists with citizens despoiled +of their goods and thus breeding perpetual strife,--but by dividing +both public land and his own private property,[1] and, if this were not +sufficient, by buying what was needed." Appian says that Caesar did not +succeed in carrying out these promises in full, but that veterans were in +some cases settled upon lands legally belonging to others.[2] However, +his soldiers were not huddled together like those of Sulla, in military +colonies of their own, but when they settled in Italy they were +scattered[3] as much as possible throughout the entire peninsula in order +to make them more easily amenable to the laws.[4] In Campania, where Cæsar +had lands at his disposal, the soldiers were settled in colonies, and so, +close together. According to a letter of Cicero to Paetus, among the lands +distributed were those of Veii and Capena. Historians have estimated +that there were 100,000 soldiers who received lands in Italy by this +distribution. + +[Footnote 1: App., 94.] + +[Footnote 2: App., II, 120.] + +[Footnote 3: Long; Momm.] + +[Footnote 4: Suetonius, _Julius Cæsar_, 38.] + + + + +SEC. 19.--DISTRIBUTIONS FROM THE DEATH OF CÆSAR TO THE TIME OF AUGUSTUS. + + +The death of Cæsar in no way stopped the assignment of lands, but rather +rendered all possession of land in Italy unsafe. A few weeks after +his death two new laws were promulgated, one by the tribune, Lucius +Antonius,[1] a _lex agraria_, and the other the _lex de colonis in agros +deducendis_ by the consul Marcus Antonius. The first was enacted on the 5th +of June,[2] and ordered that all the _ager publicus_ still at the disposal +of the state, including the Pomptine marshes which Cæsar had at one time +planned to drain, but had not, be divided among the veterans and citizens. +It was abrogated by a _senatus consultum_ of the 4th of January, 43,[3] +but was nevertheless carried into execution almost immediately with great +relentlessness towards the enemies[4] of Antonius. The second, the _Lex +Antonia_, perished in April of 44, and had as a result the establishment +of a colony near Casilinum,[5] which Cæsar had already colonized; the +remainder of the domain lands, the _ager Campanus_ and _ager Leontinus_, +was converted into a reward for the supporters of Antonius.[6] This was +also set aside by the new law of the consul C. Vibius Pansa, in February, +43.[7] + + + + +_Second Triumvirate._ When Antony, Lepidus, and Octavius were reconciled, +thus forming the second triumvirate, the treaty sanctioning this new state +of affairs stipulated, in favor of the soldiers, a new distribution of +lands, _i.e._, a new agrarian law; Appian says:--"In order to increase the +zeal of the army, the triumvirs promised to the soldiers, independent[8] +of other results of victory and a gratuity of colonies, 18 Italian towns, +important by means of their wealth and the richness of their lands. +These were divided among the soldiers with their lands and buildings, as +conquered towns. Among the number were Capua, Rhegium, Venusia, Beneventum, +Nuceria and Vibo. Thus the most beautiful part of Italy became the prey of +the soldiers." + +Dion Cassius, Suetonius and Velleius Paterculus all mention these +assignments. After the battle of Philippi and the defeat and death of +Brutus and Cassius, 170,000 men were provided for, in accordance with these +promises, out of the goods of the proscribed and the lands confiscated to +the state. The lands of the towns mentioned in Appian were taken under the +form of a forced sale, but the purchase money was never paid owing to the +bankrupt condition of the treasury. + +If we examine into the nature of these agrarian laws since the death of +Julius Caesar, we shall find that they differ in all respects from previous +enactments: + +1. They were executed at the expense not only of public domains but also of +private property. + +2. They were the work of one man and not of the entire people. + +3. The name of the people was never mentioned in these laws; they were +enacted wholly for the profit of the soldiery. Before the distributions +made by the triumvirate, the public lands had been absorbed, or at least +the fragments remaining were in no way sufficient to recompense the service +of the veterans. + +Upon the establishment of the empire, the public lands became a vast +manorial estate whose over-lord was the emperor himself. + +[Footnote 1: L. Langii, Commentationis de Legibus Antoniis a Cicerone +Phil., V, 4, 10; Commemoratis particula prior et posterior; Lipsiae, +1882; Lange, _Röm. Alter._, III, 499, 503, 526; Marquardt u. Momm., _Röm. +Alter._, IV, 116.] + +[Footnote 2: Lange, _Comm._, II, 14.] + +[Footnote 3: Cicero, _Phil._, VI, 5, 14; XI, 6, 13.] + +[Footnote 4: _Phil._, V, 7, 20.] + +[Footnote 5: Langii, _Comm._, II, 14.] + +[Footnote 6: Cic., _Phil._, II, 17, 43; II, 39, 101; III, 9, 22; VIII, 8, +26; Dio Cass., 45, 30; 46, S.] + +[Footnote 7: Cic., _Phil._, V, 4, 10; V, 19, 53; X, 8, 17; VIII, 15, 31.] + +[Footnote 8: [Greek: "Dosesi ton Italikon poleon oktokaideka ... osper +autois anti taes polemias dorilaeptoi genomenai.... Outo men ta kallista +taes Italias to strato diegrephon."] App., IV, 3.] + + + + +FINIS. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Public Lands and Agrarian Laws of the +Roman Republic, by Andrew Stephenson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PUBLIC LANDS AND AGRARIAN *** + +***** This file should be named 12638-8.txt or 12638-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/6/3/12638/ + +Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Lesley Halamek and PG Distributed +Proofreaders + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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