condition of Italian agriculture in a large part of the country. But
things were no better in certain Provinces, more particularly in Greece.
Plutarch deplores[1200] the decay and depopulation of his native land,
but the most vivid and significant picture preserved to us is one
conveyed in a public address[1201] by the famous lecturer =Dion of
Prusa=, better known as Dion[1202] Chrysostom. It describes conditions
in the once prosperous island of Euboea. The speaker professes to
have been cast ashore there in a storm, and to have been entertained
with extraordinary kindness by some honest rustics who were living an
industrious and harmless life in the upland parts, the rocky shore of
which was notorious as a scene of shipwrecks. There were two connected
households, squatters in the lonely waste, producing by their own
exertions everything they needed, and of course patterns of every amiable
virtue. The lecturer recounts the story of these interesting people as
told him by his host. How much of it is due to his own imagination, or
put together out of various stories, we cannot judge: but it is manifest
that what concerns us is to feel satisfied that the experiences described
were possible, and not grotesquely improbable, in their setting of place
and time. I venture to accept the story as a sketch of what might very
well have happened, whether it actually did so or not.
We live mostly by the chase, said the hunter, with very little tillage.
This croft (χωρίον) does not belong to us either by inheritance or
purchase. Our fathers, though freemen, were poor like ourselves, just
hired herdsmen, in charge of the herds of a rich man who owned wide
farm-lands and all these mountains. When he died, his estate was
confiscated: It is said that the emperor[1203] made away with him to
get his property. Well, they drove off his live-stock for slaughter,
and our few oxen with them, and never paid our wages. So we did the
best we could, taking advantage of the resources of the neighbourhood
in summer and winter. Since childhood I have only once visited the
city[1204]. A man turned up one day demanding money. We had none, and I
told him so on my oath. He bade me come with him to the city. There I
was arraigned before the mob as a squatter on the public land, without
a grant from the people, and without any payment. It was hinted that we
were wreckers, and had put together a fine property through that wicked
trade. We were said to have valuable farms and abundance of flocks and
herds, beasts of burden, slaves. But a wiser speaker took a different
line. He urged that those who turned the public land to good account
were public benefactors and deserved encouragement. He pointed out that
two thirds of their territory was lying waste through neglect and lack
of population. He was himself a large landowner: whoever was willing to
cultivate his land was welcome to do so free of charge,—indeed he would
reward him for his pains—the improvement would be worth it. He proposed
a plan for inducing citizens to reclaim the derelict lands, rent-free
for ten years, and after that rented at a moderate share of the crops.
To aliens less favourable terms might be offered, but with a prospect of
citizenship in case of reclamation on a large scale. By such a policy the
evils of idleness and poverty would be got rid of. These considerations
he enforced by pointing to the pitiful state of the city itself. Outside
the gates you find, not a suburb but a hideous desert. Within the walls
we grow crops and graze beasts on the sites of the gymnasium and the
market-place. Statues of gods and heroes are smothered in the growing
corn. Yet we are forsooth to expel these hard-working folks and to leave
men nothing to do but to rob or steal.
The rustic, being called upon to state his own case, described the
poverty of the squatter families, the innocence of their lives, their
services to shipwrecked seafarers, and so forth. On the last topic he
received a dramatic confirmation from a man in the crowd, who had himself
been one of a party of castaways hospitably relieved three years before
by these very people. So all ended well. The stress laid on the simple
rusticity of the rustic, and the mutual distrust and mean jealousy of
the townsfolk, shew in numerous touches that we have in this narrative
a highly coloured scene. But the picture of the decayed city, with its
ancient walls a world too wide for its shrunk population, is companion to
that of the deserted countryside. Both panels of this mournful diptych
could have been paralleled in the case of many a city and territory in
Italy and Greece. The moral reflexions, in which the lecturer proceeds
to apply the lessons of the narrative, are significant. He enlarges on
the superiority of the poor to the rich in many virtues, unselfishness
in particular. Poverty in itself is not naturally an evil. If men will
only work with their own hands, they may supply their own needs, and
live a life worthy of freemen. The word αὐτουργεῖν occurs more than once
in this spirited appeal, shewing clearly that Dion had detected the
plague-spot in the civilization of his day. But he honestly admits the
grave difficulties that beset artisans in the various trades practised
in towns. They lack necessary[1205] capital: everything has to be paid
for, food clothing lodging fuel and what not, for they get nothing free
but water, and own nothing but their bodies. Yet we cannot advise them to
engage in foul degrading vocations. We desire them to live honourably,
not to sink below the standards of the greedy usurer or the owners of
lodging-houses or ships or gangs of slaves. What then are we to do with
the decent poor? Shall we have to propose turning them out of the cities
and settling them on allotments in the country? Tradition tells us rural
settlement prevailed throughout Attica of yore: and the system worked
well, producing citizens of a better and more discreet type than the
town-bred mechanics who thronged the Assemblies and law-courts of Athens.
It may be said that Dion is a mere itinerant philosopher, who travels
about seeing the world and proposing impracticable remedies for
contemporary evils in popular sermons to idle audiences. But he knew his
trade, and his trade was to make his hearers ‘feel better’ for attending
his discourses. When he portrays the follies or vices of the age, he is
dealing with matters of common knowledge, and not likely to misrepresent
facts seriously. When he suggests remedies, it matters little that
there is no possibility of applying them. Present company are always
excepted, and the townsfolk who listened to the preacher would neither
resent his strictures on city life nor have the slightest intention of
setting their own hands to the spade or plough. That there was a kind of
moral reaction[1206] in this period, and that lecturers and essayists
contributed something to the revival of healthier public sentiment, I do
not dispute; though I think too much success is sometimes[1207] ascribed
to their good intentions. At any rate they cannot be credited with
improving the conditions of rustic life. To the farmer the voice of the
great world outside was represented by the collectors of rents and taxes,
the exactors of services, not by the sympathetic homilies of popular
teachers.
XLI. NEW TESTAMENT WRITERS.
The authors of the books of the New Testament, whom it is convenient
to view together as a group of witnesses bearing on the condition of a
part of the Roman East under the early Empire, supply some interesting
matter. We read of an agriculture that includes corn-growing, the culture
of vines, and pastoral industry: the olive, and above all the fig-tree,
appear as normal objects of the countryside. Plough spade and sickle,
storehouse threshing-floor and winepress, are the familiar appliances
of rustic life, as they had been from time immemorial. Farmers need not
only hard work, but watchfulness and forethought, for the business of
their lives. Live stock have to be protected from beasts of prey, and
need endless care. And the rustic’s outlook is ever clouded by the fear
of drought and murrain. All this is an ordinary picture, common to many
lands: only the anxiety about water-supply is perhaps specially Oriental.
The ox and the ass are the chief beasts of draught and burden. In short,
country life goes on as of old, and much as it still does after many
changes of rulers.
From the way in which farmers are generally spoken of I infer that they
are normally peasant[1208] landowners. That is to say, not tenants of
an individual landlord, but holding their farms with power of sale and
right of succession, liable to tribute. The Roman state is strictly
speaking the owner, having succeeded to the royal ownership assumed by
the Seleucid kings. But that there was also letting[1209] of estates
to tenant-farmers is clear, for we read of collection of rents. At the
same time we find it suggested, apparently as a moral rather than legal
obligation, that the toiling farmer has the first claim[1210] on the
produce, and the ox is not to be muzzled. Such passages, and others
insisting on honesty and the duty of labour, keep us firmly reminded of
the moral aims pervading the works of these writers. In other words, they
are more concerned to define what ought to be than to record what is.
Many of the significant references to rustic matters occur in parables.
But we must not forget that a parable would have little force if its
details were not realistic.
Of the figures appearing on the agricultural scene we may distinguish
the wealthy landlord[1211], whether farming for his own account or
letting his land to tenants: the steward[1212] farming for his lord’s
account: the tenant-farmer: probably the free peasant on a small holding
of his own. Labour is represented by the farmer working with his own
hands, and by persons employed simply as labourers. These last are
either freemen or slaves. Slavery is assumed as a normal condition, but
a reader can hardly help being struck by the notable passages in which
the wage-earner appears as a means of illustrating an important point.
Does the occurrence of such passages suggest that in these Oriental
surroundings wage-service was as common a system as bond-service, perhaps
even more so? I hesitate to draw this conclusion, for the following
reason. Accepting the fact of slavery (as the writers do), there was not
much to be said beyond enjoining humanity on masters and conscientious
and respectful service on slaves. But the relation between hirer and
hired, presumably a bargain, opened up far-reaching issues of equity,
transcending questions of formal law. Hence we hear much about it. That
the workman is worthy of his meat (ἐργάτης ... τροφῆς) is a proposition
of which we have an earlier[1213] version, referring to slaves. The
cowardice of the hireling shepherd points a notable moral. The rich who
defraud the reaper of his hire[1214] meet with scathing denunciation. For
to him that worketh the reward is not reckoned[1215] of grace but of debt.
This last proposition seems to furnish a key to the remarkable
parable[1216] of the Labourers in the Vineyard, which has been subjected
to many diverse interpretations. If we accept the view that the wages
represent the Kingdom of God, and that this reward is granted not of debt
but of grace, it is clear that great stress is laid on the autocratic
position of the householder (οἰκοδεσπότης). His treatment of the hired
labourers is an assertion of entire indifference to what we call
‘economic’ considerations. How it is to be interpreted as equitable,
theologians must decide, or be content to leave modern handworkers to
draw their own conclusions. My interest in the matter may be shewn in the
question whether this householder is to be regarded as a typical figure,
or not. I trust I am guilty of no irreverence in saying that to me he
seems a purely hypothetical character. That is to say that I take the
gist of the parable to be this: if an employer chose to deal with his
hirelings on such arbitrary principles, he would be acting within his
rights. I do not infer that such conduct was likely in ordinary life, or
even that a concrete case of its occurrence had ever been known. I cannot
believe that in a country where debts[1217] and usury are referred to
as matters of course, and where masters entrusted money[1218] to their
slaves for purposes of trade, where sales of land[1219] were an ordinary
business transaction, a sane individualistic capitalist would act as the
man in this parable. Those who think differently must clear up their own
difficulties. I would add that this parable, the details of which seem to
me non-realistic, only occurs in one of the Gospels. Is it possible that
it is based on some current Oriental story?
XLII. MARTIAL AND JUVENAL.
Among the witnesses, other than technical writers, from whom we get
evidence as to the conditions of agriculture under the Empire, are two
poets, Martial and Juvenal. The latter, a native of Aquinum in the old
Volscian part of Latium, never shook off the influence of his connexion
with rural Italy. The former, a native of Bilbilis in Spain, was one of
the gifted provincials who came to Rome as the literary centre of the
world. He spent more than thirty years there, and made an unrivalled name
as a writer of epigrams, but his heart was in Spain. The attitude of
these two men towards the facts of their time is very different, and the
difference affects the value of their evidence. In the satires of Juvenal
indignant rhetoric takes up a high moral position, and declaims fiercely
against abominations. Now this attitude is beset with temptations to
overstate an evil rather than weaken effect. Moreover, in imperial Rome
it was necessary to be very careful: not only were personal references
dangerous, but it was above all things necessary to avoid provoking
the Emperor. Yet even Emperors could (and did) view attacks upon their
predecessors with indifference or approval: while vicious contemporaries
were not likely to put on the cap if their deceased counterparts were
assailed. So the satirist, confining his strictures mainly to the past,
is not often a contemporary witness of the first order. It is fortunate
that his references to rustic conditions are not much affected by this
limitation: but they mostly refer to the past. =Martial= on the contrary
is a mere man of his time. His business is not to censure, still less to
reform, but to find themes for light verse such as will hit the taste of
average Roman readers. He soon discovered that scandal was the one staple
topic of interest, and exploited it as a source of ‘copy’ down to the
foulest dregs. Most of the characters exposed appear under fictitious
Greek names, but doubtless Roman gossips applied the filthy imputations
to each other. We need not suppose that Martial’s ruling passion was
for bawdy epigram. But he knew what would hit the taste of an idle and
libidinous world. For himself, nothing is clearer than that he found
life in the great city a sore trial, not solely from the oppressive
climate at certain seasons of the year. He was too clever a man not to
suffer weariness in such surroundings. He had to practice the servility
habitually displayed by poor men towards the rich and influential, but
he did not like it. It seems to have been through patronage that he got
together sufficient wealth to enable him eventually to retire to his
native country. The din and dirt and chronic unrest of Rome were to him,
as to Juvenal, an abomination: and from these ever-present evils there
was, for dwellers in mean houses or crowded blocks of sordid flats, no
escape. Both writers agree that the Rome of those days was only fit
for the wealthy to live in. Secure in his grand mansion on one of the
healthiest sites, with plenty of elbow-room, guarded against unwelcome
intrusions by a host of slaves and escorted by them in public, the
millionaire could take his life easily: he could even sleep. Martial
had his way to make as a man of letters, and needed to keep brain and
nerves in working order. For this, occasional retirement from the
urban pandemonium was necessary. So he managed to acquire a little
suburban[1220] property, where he could spend days in peace and quiet.
Many of his friends did the same. To keep such a place, however small,
in good order, and to grow some country produce, however little, it was
necessary to have a resident[1221] _vilicus_. He had also a _vilica_,
and there would probably be a slave or two under them. The poet was now
better off, and doing as others did. These _suburbana_, retreats for
the weary, were evidently numerous. Their agricultural significance
was small. Martial often pokes fun at the owners who withdraw to the
country for a holiday, taking with them[1222] their supplies of eatables
bought in the markets of Rome. Clearly the city markets were well
supplied: and this indicates the existence of another class of suburban
properties, market-gardens on a business footing, of which we hear little
directly. An industry of this kind springs up round every great centre
of population: how far it can extend depends on the available means
of delivering the produce in fair marketable condition. Round Rome it
had no doubt existed for centuries, and was probably one of the most
economically sound agricultural undertakings in central Italy. That it
was conducted on a small scale and was prosperous may be the reason why
it attracted little notice in literature.
Though Martial cannot be regarded as an authority on Italian agriculture,
it so happens that passages of his works are important and instructive,
particularly in connexion with matters of land-management and
farm-labour. He gives point to his epigrams by short and vivid touches,
above all by telling contrasts. Now this style of writing loses most of
its force if the details lack reality. He was therefore little tempted
to go beyond the truth in matters of ordinary non-bestial life, such
as agricultural conditions; we may accept him as a good witness. To
begin with an all-important topic, let us see what we get from him on
the management of land, either for the landlord’s account under a slave
_vilicus_, or by letting it to a free _colonus_. In explaining the
gloomy bearing of Selius, he remarks[1223] that it is not due to recent
losses: his wife and his goods and his slaves are all safe, and he is
not suffering from any failures of a tenant or a steward. Here _colonus_
as opposed to _vilicus_ must mean a free tenant, who might be behindhand
with his rent or with service due under his lease. The opposition occurs
elsewhere, as when he refers[1224] to the produce sent in to a rich man
in Rome from his country estates by his steward or tenant. So too on
the birthday of an eminent advocate all his clients and dependants send
gifts; among them[1225] the hunter sends a hare, the fisherman some
fish, and the _colonus_ a kid. The _venator_ and _piscator_ are very
likely his slaves. In protesting[1226] against the plague of kissing as
it strikes a man on return to Rome, he says, ‘all the neighbours kiss
you, and the _colonus_ too with his hairy unsavoury mouth.’ It seems to
imply that the rustic tenant would come to Town to pay his respects to
his landlord. Barring the kiss, the duty of welcoming the squire makes
one think of times not long gone by in England. In one passage[1227]
there is a touch suggestive of almost medieval relations. How Linus has
managed to get through a large inherited fortune, is a mystery in need
of an explanation. He has not been a victim of the temptations of the
great wicked city. No, he has always lived in a country town, where
economy was not only possible but easy. Everything he needed was to be
had cheap or gratis, and there was nothing to lead him into extravagant
ways. Now among the instances of cheapness is the means of satisfying
his sexual passions when they become unruly. At such moments either
the _vilica_ or the _duri nupta coloni_ served his turn. The steward’s
consort would be his slave, and there is no more to be said: but the
tenant-farmer’s wife, presumably a free woman, is on a different footing.
There is no suggestion of hoodwinking the husband, for the situation is
treated as a matter of course. It would rather seem that the landlord
is represented as relying on the complaisance of a dependent boor. If I
interpret the passage rightly, we have in it a vivid sidelight on the
position of some at least of the _coloni_ of the first century AD. That
_vilici_ and _coloni_ alike were usually clumsy rustics of small manual
skill, is suggested by two passages[1228] in which they are credited with
bungling workmanship in wood or stone. Perhaps we may detect reference
to a _colonus_ in an epigram on a man who spends his money lavishly on
his own debaucheries but is meanly niggardly to necessitous friends. It
says ‘you sell ancestral lands to pay for a passing gratification of your
lust, while your friend, left in the lurch, is tilling land[1229] that
is not his own.’ That is, you might have made him a present of a little
farm, as many another has done; but you have left him to sink into a mere
_colonus_. Enough has now been said to shew that these tenant-farmers
were a humble and dependent class of men, and that the picture drawn
from passages of Martial corresponds to that drawn above in Weber’s
interpretation of Columella.
It is not necessary to set out with the same fulness all the evidence
of Martial on agricultural matters regarded from various points of
view. The frequent reference to the land is a striking fact: like his
fellow-countryman Columella, he was clearly interested in the land-system
of Italy. He shews wide knowledge of the special products of different
districts; a knowledge probably picked up at first in the markets of
Rome, and afterwards increased by experience. No writer draws the line
more distinctly between productive and unproductive estates. That we
hear very much more of the latter is no wonder: so long as the supremacy
of Rome was unshaken, and money poured into Italy, a great part of the
country was held by wealthy owners to whom profit was a less urgent
motive than pleasure or pride. To what lengths ostentation could go is
seen[1230] in the perverse fancy of a millionaire to have a real _rus in
urbe_ with grounds about his town house so spacious that they included
a real vineyard: here in sheltered seclusion he could have a vintage in
Rome. This is in truth the same vulgar ambition as that (much commoner)
of the man who prides himself on treating guests at his country mansion
to every luxury procurable in Rome. It is merely inverted.