tribes that occurred later. Rome was still superior to her adversaries
in military organization and skill, and under fairly equal conditions
able to defeat them in pitched battles. Thus Claudius II gained great
victories over the Goths, and the biographer[1367] tells us of the
sequel. ‘The Roman provinces were filled with barbarian slaves and
Scythian tillers of the soil. The Goth was turned into a settler on the
barbarian frontier. There was not a single district but had some Gothic
slave whose bondage attested the triumph.’ Here we seem to have the echo
of a somewhat boastful contemporary version. The mention of both slaves
and frontier colonists is to be noted. We have no statistics to guide us
in an attempt to estimate the relative numbers of the two classes. But
the settlement of defeated barbarians on the frontier as Roman subjects
is clearly regarded as a worthy achievement. So indeed it might have
been, had it been possible to civilize them as Romans, only profiting by
the introduction of new blood. But this process was no longer possible:
its opposite, the barbarizing of Roman lands, steadily went on. Claudius
only reigned about two years. The great soldier who followed him in
270-5, Aurelian, had a plan for employing prisoners of war[1368] on the
cultivation of waste lands in Italy itself, but we have no reason to
think that much came of it. And the true state of things was confessed
in his abandonment of Trajan’s great Province of Dacia. Aurelian
withdrew[1369] the army and the provincials, whom he settled south of the
Danube in Moesia; putting the best face he could on this retirement by
giving Moesia the name of Dacia.
These phenomena attest an obvious truth, sometimes ignored, that
territorial expansion needs something more than military conquest to
give it lasting effect. In order to hold conquered lands the conquerors
must either occupy them or thoroughly assimilate the native population.
Emperors in this period became aware that they could do neither.
Alexander Severus (222-35) gained a great victory[1370] over the Persians
and took a number of prisoners. It was a tradition of Persian kings not
to let their subjects pass into foreign slavery, and Alexander allowed
them to redeem these captives by a money payment. This he used partly in
compensating the masters of those who had already passed into private
ownership, and the rest he paid into the treasury. This conciliatory
policy may have been wise. In any case the treasury was in this age
chronically in need of ready money. But dealing with the great oriental
monarchy was a simpler undertaking than that of dealing with the rude
peoples of the North, who pressed on in tribal units, offering no central
power with which to negotiate. Probus (276-82) seems to have been sorely
troubled by their variety and independence of action. We hear that when
operating in Thrace he settled 100,000 Bastarnae[1371] on Roman soil,
and that all these kept faith with him. But he went on to transplant
large bodies of Gepidae Gruthungi and Vandals. These all broke their
faith. While Probus was busy putting down pretenders in other parts of
the empire, they went on raiding expeditions at large by land and sea,
defying and damaging the power of Rome. True, the emperor broke them by
force of arms, and drove the remnant back to their wilds: but we can
see what the biographer ignores, that such raids did mischief which the
empire was in no condition to repair. What were the terms made with
these barbarians, to which the Bastarnae faithfully adhered, we are not
told. Probably the grant of lands carried with it the duty of furnishing
recruits to Roman armies and accepting the command of Roman officers.
In connexion with agricultural conditions we must not omit to notice
the change that was passing over Roman armies. The straits to which
Marcus had been reduced by the years of plague and losses in the field
had compelled him to raise fresh troops by any means, enrolling slaves,
hiring barbarian mercenaries, and so forth. With this miscellaneous
force he just managed to hold his ground in the North. But the army
never recovered its old tone. The period 180-284 shews it going from
bad to worse. It is full of sectional jealousy and losing all sense
of common imperial duty; only effective when some one strong man
destroys his rivals and is for the moment supreme. The rise and fall
of pretenders[1372] is a main topic of the imperial history. As from
the foundation of the Empire, the numbers of the army were inadequate
for defence against simultaneous attacks on several frontiers. The lack
of cooperation among their enemies, and the mobility of Roman frontier
armies, had sufficed to keep invaders at bay. But as pressure became
more continuous it was more difficult to meet the needs of the moment
by moving armies to and fro. More and more they took on the character
of garrisons, their chief camps grew into towns, local recruits filled
up their ranks, and they were less and less available for service as
field-armies. But it was obviously necessary that the country round
about their quarters should be under cultivation, in order to supply
them with at least part of their food. It may safely be assumed that
this department was carefully attended to in the formation of all these
military stations. And it seems that under the new conditions one of the
evils that had hitherto embarrassed the empire was gradually brought to
an end. For the fact remains that, after all the wholesale waste of lives
in the bloody wars of the third century, it was still possible to raise
great and efficient armies. Reorganized by Diocletian and Constantine,
the empire proved able to defend itself for many years yet, even in the
West. The new system may have been oppressive to the civil population,
but it certainly revived military strength. This could not have been
achieved without an improvement in the supply of man-power. It has
been maintained[1373] that this improvement was due to the permanent
settlements of barbarians, mostly of German race, within the territories
of the empire during the third century. Whether planted on the vacant
lands as alien settlers (_inquilini_)[1374] on easy terms, but bound to
provide recruits for the army, or enlisted from the first and settled
in permanent stations, they were year by year raising large families and
turning deserted border-lands into nurseries of imperial soldiers. This
picture may be somewhat overdrawn, but it has the merit of accounting
for the phenomena. Without some explanation of the kind it is very hard
to understand how the empire came to survive at all. With it, the sequel
appears natural and intelligible. These barbarians were so far Romanized
as to be proud of becoming Romans: the empire was barbarized so far as to
lend itself to institutions of a more and more un-Roman character, and
to lose the remaining traditions of literature and art: and when ruder
barbarians in the fifth century assailed the empire in the West they
found the control of government already in the hands of kinsmen of their
own.
If we are to take the very meagre gleanings from the general records
of this period and combine them with the information gathered from the
African inscriptions referred to below, we can provisionally form some
sort of notion of the various classes of labour employed on the land.
First, there were _coloni_, freemen[1375] in the eye of the law, however
much local conditions, or the terms of their tenancies and the tendency
for tenancies to become hereditary, may have limited the practical use
of their legal freedom. Secondly, there were, at least in some parts,
protected occupants encouraged to turn to account parcels of land
that had for some reason or other lain idle. Thirdly, there were also
rustic slaves who did most of the work on large farms. The stipulated
services of tenants[1376] at certain seasons to some extent supplemented
their labour, at least in some parts: and the falling supply of slaves
tended to make such auxiliary services more important. For the value
of agricultural land depends mainly on the available supply of labour.
Fourthly, chiefly if not entirely in the northern Provinces, a number
of barbarians had been planted upon Roman soil. Some entered peacefully
and settled down as willing subjects of the empire on vacant lands
assigned to them. Some had surrendered after defeat in battle, and came
in as prisoners. But, instead of making them rustic slaves on the old
model, Marcus had found a new and better use for them. A new status,
that of _inquilini_[1377] or ‘alien denizens’ was created, inferior to
that of free _coloni_ but above that of slaves. They seem to have been
generally left to cultivate plots of land, paying a share of the produce,
and to have been attached to the soil, grouped under Roman landlords
or chief-tenants. They had their wives and families, and their sons
recruited Roman armies. Lastly, we have no right to assume that small
cultivating owners[1378] were wholly extinct, though there can hardly
have been many of them.
We have an account[1379] of the rising in Africa (238 AD) which, so
far as it goes, gives us a little light on the agricultural situation
there in the middle of this period. The barbarian emperor Maximin was
represented in the Province by a _procurator fisci_ whose oppressions
provoked a conspiracy against him. Some young men of good and wealthy
families drew together a number of persons who had suffered wrong. They
ordered their slaves[1380] from the farms to assemble with clubs and
axes. In obedience[1381] to their masters’ orders they gathered in the
town before daybreak, and formed a great mob. For Africa is naturally a
populous[1382] country; so the tillers of the soil were numerous. After
dawn the young leaders told the mass of the slaves to follow them as
being a section of the general throng: they were to conceal their weapons
for the present, but valiantly to resist any attack on their masters. The
latter then met the procurator and assassinated him. Hereupon his guards
drew their swords meaning to avenge the murder, but the countrymen in
support of their masters[1383] fell upon them with their rustic weapons
and easily routed them. After this the young leaders, having gone too
far to draw back, openly rebelled against Maximin and proclaimed the
proconsul Gordian Roman emperor. In this passage we have before us young
men of landlord families, apparently holding large estates and working
them with slave labour. They are evidently on good terms with their
slaves. Of tenant farmers there is no mention: but there is a general
reference to support given by other persons, already wronged or afraid
of suffering wrong. The Latin biographer[1384], who drew from Herodian,
speaks of the murder as the work of ‘the rustic common folk[1385] and
certain soldiers.’ Now Frontinus[1386], writing in the latter part of
the first century AD, tells us that in Africa on their great estates
individuals had ‘a considerable population[1387] of common folk.’
The language can hardly refer to slaves: and a reference to levying
recruits[1388] for the army plainly forbids such an interpretation. But
it does not imply that there were no slaves employed on those great
estates; the writer is not thinking of the free-or-slave labour question.
In regard to the writers who record this particular episode, are we to
suppose that by ‘slaves’ Herodian loosely means _coloni_? Surely not.
Then does Capitolinus by ‘rustic common folk’ mean slaves? I cannot
believe it. More probably the writer, contemporary with Diocletian and
Constantine, uses a loose expression without any precise meaning. If
we are to attempt any inference from the language of Herodian, we must
accept him as a witness that in Africa, or at least in parts of Africa,
agriculture was still being carried on by slave labour. This does not
exclude the existence of a small-tenancy system side by side with it. And
the state of things disclosed[1389] in the African inscriptions referred
to above is consistent with both systems: for that the manor-farm on
a great estate employed a slave staff for its regular operations, and
drew from tenants’ services only the help needed at certain seasons,
seems the only possible conclusion from the evidence. Therefore, while
agreeing with Heisterbergk[1390] that the narrative of Herodian shews the
populousness of Africa, we need not go so far as to ignore the fact of a
considerable farm-slave element in the Province.
Meanwhile there are signs that rural Italy was suffering from the
disorders and insecurity that had so often hindered the prosperity of
agriculture. Even under the strong reign of Severus, with a larger
standing army in Italy than ever before, a daring brigand[1391] remained
at large for two years and was only captured by treachery. Though we do
not hear of his attacking farmers directly, such a disturbance must have
been bad for all country folk. That he black-mailed them is probable:
that they were plundered and maltreated by the licentious soldiery
employed against him, is as nearly certain as can be from what we know of
the soldiery of this time.
XLVII. THE AFRICAN INSCRIPTIONS.
Certain inscriptions[1392] from the Roman Province of Africa, dating
from the second and third centuries AD or at least referring to matters
of that period, throw some light upon the management of great imperial
domains in that part of the world. To discuss these in full one by
one would be beyond the scope of this work, and would require several
chapters of intolerable length. I shall content myself with giving
a short account of each case, confined to those details which have
direct bearing on my subject and which can be gathered with reasonable
certainty from the often mutilated texts. French and German savants have
contributed freely to the deciphering and interpretation, with happy
results: but some of the proposed ‘restorations’ are much too bold to
serve as a basis for further argument. After the details, I purpose to
consider the points common to these interesting cases, and their place
in the history of agriculture and agricultural labour under the earlier
Roman Empire, say from Trajan to Severus.
(1) The inscription of Henschir Mettich[1393] belongs to the year 116-7
AD, at the end of Trajan’s reign. It deals with a domain called _fundus
villae magnae Variani_, and does not refer to it by the term _saltus_ at
all. There is no reference to arrears of rent, the _reliqua colonorum_
of which we often hear in the jurists and other writers. Indeed there
is no mention of money-rents, unless we reckon as such the little dues
(4 _as_ per head) payable for grazing stock on the common pasture. The
_coloni_ are _partiarii_, paying certain shares (generally ⅓) of their
yearly produce as rent. These are paid, not to an imperial official but
to the lords or head-tenants of the estate (_dominis aut conductoribus
eius fundi_) or to their stewards (_vilicis_). It seems certain therefore
that it was the chief tenants who were responsible to the imperial
treasury for the amounts annually due, and that upon them rested the
troublesome duty of collection. That this charge was a new one, laid
upon them by Trajan, is perhaps possible, but hardly probable. For this
statute regulating the domain (a _lex data_) is expressly declared to
be modelled on a _lex Manciana_[1394], which can hardly be other than a
set of regulations issued by a former owner of the estate, and adopted
with modifications by the imperial agents (_procuratores_) specially
appointed to organize it as an imperial domain. In Roman practice it was
usual to follow convenient precedents. How long the estate had become
Crown-property, and by what process, inheritance purchase confiscation
etc, we do not know. Nor is it certain whether the new statute was
prepared as a matter of course on the cessation of private ownership, or
whether it was issued in response to an appeal to the emperor complaining
of oppressive exactions on the part of the head-tenants. But of the
latter situation there is no sign, and I am inclined to accept the
former alternative. In that case it appears necessary to suppose that
the system of letting a great estate to one or a few great lessees, who
might and did sublet parcels to small tenant farmers, was not unknown
in the practice of great private landlords. This may well have been the
case in Africa, still populous and prosperous, though such a system never
took root in depopulated and failing Italy. It required willingness on
the part of men of substance to risk their capital in a speculation that
could only succeed if good sub-tenants were to be found. This condition
could not be fulfilled in Italy, but in Africa things were very different.
It is however easier to note this difference by unmistakeable signs
than to ascertain it in detail. One point is clear. The _coloni_ on
this domain were bound to render fixed services to the head-tenants
at certain seasons of the year. These services consisted of two days’
work (_operas binas_) at the times of ploughing hoeing and harvest, six
in all. The falling-off in the supply of slaves, despite occasional
captures of prisoners in war, was a consequence of the _pax Romana_, and
how to provide sufficient labour was a standing problem of agriculture.
The guarantee of extra labour at seasons of pressure was doubtless a
main consideration with speculators in inducing them to venture their
substance by becoming lessees of large tracts of land. Of hired labour
available for the purpose the statute gives no hint, nor is it likely
that such labourers were to be found in Africa. Thus the _colonus_, and
perhaps his whole household, were bound to certain compulsory services,
and thereby made part of an organization strictly regulated and liable to
further regulation. Further regulation was not likely to give the peasant
farmer more freedom of movement, since the leading motive of the system
was to secure continuous cultivation, and this could best be secured by
long tenancies, tending to become hereditary. Therefore this statute
offers various inducements to keep the peasant contentedly engaged in
bettering his own position by developing the estate. The head-tenants are
strictly forbidden to oppress him by exacting larger shares of produce
or more _operae_ than are allowed by the regulations. He is encouraged
to cultivate parcels of waste land, not included in his farm, by various
privileges: in particular, a term of rent-free years is guaranteed to him
in case he plants the land with fruit trees. This term, varying from five
to ten years according to species of trees, is meant to give him time to
get a taste of profit before he becomes liable to rent: its effect in
making him loth to move is obvious.
The statute tells us nothing on another important point. From the
jurists and other sources[1395] we know that in Italy it was normally
the custom for the stock of a farm let to a _colonus_ to be found for
the most part by the landlord. It was held[1396] that in taking over
this _instrumentum_ at a valuation the tenant virtually purchased it, of
course not paying for it in ready money, but standing bound to account
for the amount on quitting the tenancy. Thus a small man was left free
to employ his own little capital in the actual working of the farm. He
could add to the stock, and his additions gave to the landlord a further
security for his rent, over and above that given by the sureties usually
required. What stock was found by landlords, and what by tenant, was
a matter for agreement generally following local convention. But on
this African domain we are not told how the question of _instrumentum_
was settled. Probably there was a traditional rule so well established
that no reference to the point in the statute seemed necessary. The
sole landlord was now the emperor. Without some direct evidence to
that effect, I can hardly suppose that the provision of farm stock
was entrusted to his _procuratores_. On the other hand, if the chief
tenants, the _conductores_, were expected to undertake this business, as
if they had been landlords, this too seems to call for direct evidence.
Possibly the need of finding stock for an African peasant farmer was
not so pressing as in Italy: still some equipment was surely required.
How it was provided, seems to me a question for answering which we have
not as yet sufficient materials. But it may be that on these domains
the practical necessity for dealing with it seldom occurred. If, when
the formal term of a tenancy expired, the same tenant stayed on either
by tacit renewal (_reconductio_) or by grant of a new lease, the stock
originally supplied would surely remain for use on the farm, upkeep
and renewals of particular articles being of course allowed for. If a
farmer’s son succeeded him as tenant, the situation would be the same, or
very nearly so. Therefore the manifest desire of emperors to keep tenants
in permanence probably operated to minimize questions of _instrumentum_
to the point of practical insignificance.
That the _coloni_ on this estate were themselves handworkers can
hardly be doubted. The _operae_ required of them suggest this on any
natural interpretation. But there is nothing to shew that they did not
employ[1397] slave labour—if and when they could get it. We are not
to assume that they were all on one dead level of poverty. That the
head-tenants kept slaves to work those parts of the domain that they
farmed for their own account, is indicated by the mention of their
_vilici_, and made certain by the small amount of supplementary labour
guaranteed them in the form of tenants’ _operae_. Only one direct mention
of slaves (_servis dominicis_) occurs in the inscription, and the text
is in that place badly mutilated. Partly for the same defect, it seems
necessary to avoid discussing certain other details, such as the position
of the _stipendiarii_ of whom we hear in a broken passage. Nor do I
venture to draw confident inferences from the references to _inquilini_
or _coloni inquilini_, or to discover an important distinction between
the tenants who actually resided on the estate and those who did not.
It may be right to infer a class of small proprietors dwelling around
on the skirts of the great domain and hiring parcels of land within it.
It may be right to regard the _inquilini_ as _coloni_ transplanted from
abroad and made residents on the estate. But until such conclusions are
more surely established it is safer to refrain from building upon them.
The general effect of this document is to give us outlines of a system
of imperial ‘peculiars,’ that is of domains on which order and security,
necessary for the successful working and continuous cultivation, were not
left to the operation of the ordinary law, but guaranteed in each case by
what we may call an imperial by-law.