The Economics of Agriculture on Roman Imperial Estates in North Africa 9783666251887, 3525251882, 9783525251881

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HYPOMNEMATA 89

V&R

H Y P O M N E M A T A UNTERSUCHUNGEN ZUR ANTIKE UND ZU IHREM NACHLEBEN

Herausgegeben von Albrecht Dihle/Hartmut Erbse/Christian Habicht Hugh Lloyd-Jones/ Günther Patzig/Bruno Snellf

HEFT 89

VANDENHOECK & RUPRECHT IN GÖTTINGEN

DENNIS P. KEHOE The Economics of Agriculture on Roman Imperial Estates in North Africa

VANDENHOECK «fe RUPRECHT IN GÖTTINGEN

dP-Titelaufnahme

der Deutschen Bibliothek

Kehoe, Dennis P. : The economics of agriculture on Roman imperial estates in North Africa / Dennis P. Kehoe. Göttingen : Vandenhoeck u. Ruprecht, 1988 (Hypomnemata ; H. 89) ISBN 3-525-25188-2 NE: GT

© Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht in Göttingen 1988 Printed in Germany. Ohne ausdrückliche Genehmigung des Verlages ist es nicht gestattet, das Buch oder Teile daraus auf foto- oder akustomechanischem Wege zu vervielfältigen. Druck: Hubert & Co., Göttingen

For my Mother and in Memory of my Father

Contents Preface List of Abbreviations Map

ix xiii xvii

I. INTRODUCTION: IMPERIAL ESTATES AND PRODUCTION FOR THE ROMAN MARKET a) Geography and History of the Bagradas Valley b) Imperial Estates and a Market Economy c) Previous Analyses of the Coloni

1 7 12 20

Π. THE EVIDENCE FOR LAND TENURE IN THE BAGRADAS VALLEY a) The Henchir-Mettich Inscription b) The Aïn-el-Djemala and Αϊη-Wassel Inscriptions c) The Souk-el-Khmis Inscription and the Petitions to Commodus d) Conclusion

28 29 55 64 69

ΙΠ. INVESTMENT BY COLONI a) Resources of the Coloni b) The Cultivation of Vines c) The Cultivation of Subseciva d) Economic Goals of the Coloni e) The Economic Leverage of the Coloni

71 71 100 103 105 112

IV. THE CONDUCTORES AND MANAGEMENT a) Management of Estates in Italy b) The Conductores as Managers c) The Incentives of the Conductores d) Leverage against the Coloni e) Conflicts between the Coloni and the Conductores

117 117 123 127 140 146

V. SHARE RENT, RISK AND MANAGEMENT a) Tenancy and Production b) The Economics of S harecropping c) Sharecropping on the Imperial Estates in the Bagradas Valley d) Sharecropping and Productivity e) The Conductores and Sharecropping

154 154 155 163 177 182

Contents

vili

V I . COMMUNAL STRUCTURES AND THE ECONOMY OF THE IMPERIAL ESTATES a) The Organization of the Coloni b) Civic Centers on Estates c) Imperial Domains in Mauretania Caesariensis d) Estates and Markets e) Communal Structure and the Exploitation of an Estate

188 188 202 205 215 220

VII. THE EXPLOITATION OF A PROVINCE

224

APPENDIX. THE SIZES OF FARMS OCCUPIED BY THE COLONI BIBLIOGRAPHY

229 235

Index of Ancient Sources General Index

253 266

Preface This study examines the general question of how Rome in the early empire formulated an economic policy in order to exploit the resources of the provinces for the long-term needs of the empire. I approach this question by analyzing the specific case of the second-century Roman imperial estates located in the Bagradas valley in the province of Africa Proconsularis. I have chosen the imperial estates in the Bagradas valley as a case study for this larger issue for two compelling reasons. First, the Roman provinces in North Africa occupy an important place in the economy of the Roman empire, since they played a major role in supplying the empire, especially the city of Rome, with grain and olive oil, a role that began under the Republic, but only came into full prominence during the early empire. Second, the extensive imperial estates in the Bagradas valley are atttested by a coherent body of evidence, a series of six inscriptions discovered around the tum of the last century, which contain regulations for the management and exploitation of these estates during the second century. These inscriptions can hardly be said to provide a complete picture of the agricultural history of the Bagradas valley. But they do attest a continuing program on the part of the imperial government to increase production on farmland in a region vital for supplying food for the city of Rome, and so they offer evidence unparalleled in other provinces for the relationships between the Roman government and the farmers on whom Rome depended for vital revenues. This study therefore analyzes the economic relationships that arose as a result of a particular form of land tenure between the groups involved in the production of food on these estates. These groups included 1) small-scale farmers called coloni who cultivated the land directly; 2) wealthier middlemen, or conductores, who collected the rent and other services from the coloni; and 3) the imperial government, which retained direct control over the land, administering it through the imperial treasury, or Fiscus, and so had a vital interest in maximizing the production of food for export to the city of Rome. I will thus seek to identify the principal economic interests of these three groups, and to examine how each was able to exercise economic leverage in order to defend them. This analysis will allow me to formulate a model for the economic relationships between these groups, and to determine how the continuing struggle between them affected the ability of the imperial government to exploit the agricultural resources of a fertile province. The Roman imperial government maintained control over extensive estates in the Bagradas valley in order to devote this land to the production of vital

χ

Preface

foodstuffs.

Thus the revenue that the Fiscus derived from the imperial estates

through the conductores

must have at least in part consisted of produce rather

than money. A s the best means of ensuring that its estates continued to produce enough food to meet the empire's needs, the Fiscus fostered the development of intensive agriculture, based on small-scale cultivation by coloni.

In its effort to

promote such intensive agriculture, the Fiscus invested the coloni with perpetual leaseholds, offering them incentives to bring abundant unused lands under cultivation, and consequently depended on them to provide the labor and capital to keep the imperial estates productive. The coloni thus occupied a favorable position in relationship to the Fiscus, which in turn took important measures to safeguard their tenure. The Fiscus, however, did not entrust the coloni

alone with the task of

cultivating the imperial estates, but set above them the conductores,

who as

middlemen with temporary leases for the estates, had a financial incentive to induce the coloni to pay as high a rent as possible. The Fiscus maximized its revenues from its estates by taking advantage of the conflicts that inevitably arose between the coloni and the conductores, each entrusted with a separate but vital task in the cultivation o f the imperial estates.

The coloni

continually

sought to take advantage of the incentives offered by the Fiscus to cultivate unused lands by foregoing immediate revenues in order to invest for the future in higher-yielding crops. The conductores, produced each year by the coloni,

whose revenues depended on the crops

tended to oppose such investment, and so

sought to compel the coloni to cultivate existing plantations as intensively as possible.

But because of the shortage of coloni

in comparison to the land

available for cultivation, the Fiscus was forced to balance its need for high revenues from the estates against the desirability of keeping the

coloni

cultivating their land productively, and so had to intervene on the side of the coloni

when their interests came into open conflict with those of the

conductores. The basis for my study will be the Bagradas valley inscriptions themselves, since they alone allow us to examine the relationships between the groups involved in the cultivation of the estates in all their dynamics, with the Roman government offering coloni incentives to cultivate unused lands, the

conductores

overstepping their own obligations in order to exact more rent and labor out of the coloni,

and finally the coloni

seeking to vindicate their rights before the

emperor. The major source of evidence will therefore be epigraphical; in addition to the Bagradas valley inscriptions, inscriptions from other regions in Roman North Africa provide evidence for the organization of estates.

Archaeological

evidence, especially rural surveys of comparable areas in Roman North Africa,

Preface

xi

can also illuminate the epigraphical evidence by suggesting how agricultural regions were occupied over long periods of time. But because epigraphical and archaeological evidence by their very nature can provide but an incomplete picture of ancient agriculture, I analyze the evidence from the inscriptions in light of comparative evidence for pre-industrial agriculture from better documented periods of history. Such comparative evidence makes possible an analysis of the major economic factors affecting agriculture on the imperial estates, especially the peculiar conditions under which the coloni occupied their land, and thereby helps to provide a historical context for the inscriptions in the Bagradas valley. I must emphasize that I restrict myself to considering the economic factors affecting agriculture on these estates. I must therefore leave aside as not essential to my immediate purpose such non-economic questions as the internal dynamics of life within a peasant community, for the investigation of which modern studies of peasant anthropology offer a fruitful basis. I also will not be primarily concerned with tracing the origins of tenancy as a form of land tenure in Roman North Africa or with providing a general history of the Bagradas valley under Roman rule, which are subjects for larger and more general studies of Roman agriculture in North Africa. The formulation of an economic model of agriculture on this single group of estates, however, can tell us more about the economic relationships involved in ancient agriculture than a more general study of North African land under Roman rule. Thus this study provides a foundation upon which larger issues in the economic history of the Roman empire can be analyzed, such as the ability of the Roman government to formulate economic policy, and the degree to which Roman rule transformed the rural economy of its provinces. Chapter I defines the premise on which my analysis of the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley will be based, that the Roman government promoted intensive agriculture by small-scale cultivators on the Bagradas valley estates as a means of producing food for overseas markets, in particular the city of Rome. Chapter II investigates how the imperial treasury, or Fiscus, implemented this policy by examining the nature of the regulations represented in the Bagradas valley inscriptions, which established the terms of tenure for the coloni, namely the lex Mandano and the lex Hadrìana de rudibus agris. Chapter III analyzes how the program of the Fiscus to exploit its estates depended on the abilty of these coloni to make the investments of labor and capital necessary for intensive agriculture. Chapter IV examines the interests of the conductores, the middlemen who leased from the Fiscus the right to collect the rent from the coloni, and analyzes what role that group of middlemen played in managing the

xii

Preface

imperial estates. Chapter V considers the sharecropping arrangement under which the coloni occupied their land. Since sharecropping has unique characteristics as a form of land tenure, we must determine what effect the sharecropping contracts of the coloni had on the productivity of the estates and on the relationships between the coloni and the conductores. Finally, the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley reveal that the coloni on the imperial estates formed themselves into communities within the estates, with quasimunicipal communal structures. Chapter VI, therefore, studies how the existence of communal organizations on the imperial estates affected the relationships among the coloni, the conductores and Fiscus, and what role the existence of such communal organizations played in the efforts of the Fiscus to exploit its estates. I am grateful to a number of people for helping me to complete this study. My work on North African agriculture began as my doctoral dissertation at the University of Michigan. I am deeply indebted to my teacher, Bruce W. Frier, for his guidance both during my stay at Michigan and afterwards. Brent D. Shaw provided offprints of his important work, from which I have learned a great deal about Roman North Africa. Participation in a National Endowment for the Humanities summer seminar on agriculture and rural society provided me with a broad historical perspective on Roman agriculture. The seminar was held at the University of California, Berkeley, during the summer of 1984, and was directed by Richard Herr. In addition, I benefited from a summer of study at the American Academy in Rome and from a visit to Tunisia, where I enjoyed the kind hospitality of Naomi Norman. I am grateful to the Harry Herman Memorial Fund for helping to underwrite publication of this volume. Established by Helen and Shael Herman, Lisa and Mark Herman, Mollie and Avram Herman, and Morris Herman, all of New Orleans, Louisiana, the fund memorializes their uncle and brother, Mr. Harry Herman, also of New Orleans. Parts of this study were presented as conference papers, and I have benefited from comments and suggestions made in these settings, especially from Sherrill Taylor. I am grateful to Dr. Christian Habicht, who read my manuscript for HYPOMNEMATA and who expedited its publication. Ludwig Koenen and Erich Gruen also offered support and advice. Finally, I thank Lora Holland Kehoe and my colleagues, R.M. Frazer, Alan Avery-Peck and Joe Park Poe, for reading this manuscript and for providing many corrections as well as much encouragement. New Orleans, Louisiana November, 1987

D.P.K.

Abbreviations A AT

Abbott and Johnson

AE

E. Babelon, R. Cagnat, S. Reinach, Atlas archéologique de la Tunisie (Paris 1893). F.F. Abbott, A.C. Johnson, Municipal Administration in the Roman Empire (Princeton 1926, repr. New York 1968). L'année épigraphique.

ANRW

Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt, edd. H. Temporini, W. Haase (BerlinNew York 1972 -).

Broughton, MRR

T.R.S. Broughton, Magistrates of the Roman Republic vols. 1-2 (New York 195152), vol. 3 (Atlanta 1986).

Broughton, Romanization

, The Romanization of Africa Proconsularis (Baltimore 1929, repr. New York 1968).

CIL Duncan-Jones, Economy

Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. R. Duncan-Jones, The Economy of the Roman Empire, Quantitative Studies2 (Cambridge 1982).

ESAR FIRA2 Flach 1

Flach 2

T. Frank, ed., An Economic Survey of Ancient Rome, 6 vols. (Baltimore 1933-40). S. Riccobono, Fontes Iuris Romani Antejustiniani. Pars Prima Leges, second edition (Florence 1968). D. Flach, "Inschriftenuntersuchungen zum römischen Kolonat in Nordafrika," Chiron 8 (1978) 441-92. , "Die Pachtbedingungen der Kolonen und die Verwaltung der kaiserlichen Güter in Nordafrika," ANRW 2.10.2 (1982) 427-73.

IL Afr.

R. Cagnat, L. Chatelain, Inscriptions latines d'Afrique (Paris 1923).

IL Alg. 1

S. Gsell, Inscriptions latines de l'Algérie I (Rome 1965, first pubi. 1922).

xiv IL Alg. 2.1 IL Alg. 2.2 ILS IL Tun.

Abbreviations

S. Gsell, H.-G. Pflaum, Inscriptions latines de l'Algérie II.l (Paris 1957). S. Gsell, H.-G. Pflaum, Inscriptions latines de l'Algérie II.2 (Algiers 1976). H. Dessau, Inscriptiones Latinae selectae, 3 vols. (Berlin 1892, repr. 1962). A. Merlin, Inscriptions latines de la Tunisie (Paris 1944).

Imperialism in the Ancient World P. Garnsey, C.R. Whittaker, edd., Imperialism in the Ancient World (Cambridge 1978). Kolendo, Le colonat J. Kolendo, Le colonat en Afrique sous le haut-empire, Annales littéraires de l'Université de Besançon (Paris 1976). K.-P. Johne, J. Köhn, V. Weber, Die Kolonen Kolonen in Italien und in den westlichen Provinzen des römischen Reiches (Berlin 1983). Pflaum, Carrières

H.-G. Pflaum, Les carrières procuratoriennes équestres sous le haut-empire romain, 3 vols. (Paris 1960-61).

Rostovtzeff, Studien

M. Rostovtzeff (Rostowzew), Studien zur Geschichte des römischen Kolonates (Leipzig-Berlin 1910).

Rostovtzeff, SEHRE2

. The Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire2 (Oxford, 1957, revised P.M. Fraser). M.I. Finley, ed., Studies in Roman Property (Cambridge 1976).

Studies in Roman Property Thomasson, Statthalter

Weber no.

B. Thomasson, Die Statthalter der römischen Provinzen Nordafrikas von Augustus bis Diocletianus, 2 vols. (Lund 1960). Inscriptions as published by V. Weber, in Kolonen.

When referring to the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley imperial estates, I use the following abbreviations: Henchir-Mettich inscription (HM): CIL 8.25902 = S. Riccobono, FIRA2 no. 100; Αϊη-el-Djemala (AD): CIL 8.25943 =

Abbreviations

XV

FIRA2 no. 101; Aïn-Wassel, CIL 8.26416 = FIRA2 no. 102; Souk-el-Khmis (SK): CIL 8.10570, 14454 = PIRA2 no. 103; Gasr-Mezuar (GM): CIL 8.14428; Aïn-Zaga (AZ): CIL 8.14451. My text of the HM inscription is based on that of D. Flach, Chiron 8 (1978) 441-92, with some alterations. I also use the text of Flach for the AD, AW and SK inscriptions; for the GM and AZ inscriptions, I use the text of V. Weber, in Kolonen, who presents texts for all the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley imperial estates: HM: no. 68, 392-96; AD: no. 69, 396-97; AW: no. 70, 397-99; SK: no. 72, 399-400; AZ: no. 73, 401; GM: no. 74,401. For the dates of the various inscriptions, see the detailed discussions of Weber ad locc.

CHAPTER I

Introduction: Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market The ability of the Roman empire to feed its population depended on its successful exploitation of the agricultural resources of its provinces. The development of an urban culture throughout the empire is one of the principal hallmarks of Roman rule, but the growth of the numerous urban centers in all the provinces, let alone of giant cities such as Rome, Carthage, Alexandria and Antioch, would not have been possible without significant transformations of the rural economy supporting them. The historian of the ancient economy seeks to trace how the Roman empire harnessed the resources of the provinces in order to sustain this urban culture. The lack of evidence for the ancient economy, however, makes this task difficult. Little of the evidence survives that forms the basis for the economic histories of later periods, and such evidence as does exist for the economy of the Roman empire, archaeological, epigraphical, and literary, is too fragmentary to offer more than an incomplete picture of the agricultural history of even a single province. This ability of the Roman empire to exploit the resources of its provinces was particularly vital for maintaining an adequate supply of food for the city of Rome. Rome in the early empire had a huge population of approximately one million inhabitants, which consumed annually on the order of 200,000 metric tons wheat equivalent (thirty million modii).' Rome thus could not be fed from ' For this estimate, see P. Garnsey, in Trade in the Ancient Economy, edd. P. Garnsey, K. Hopkins, C.R. Whittaker (Berkeley-Los Angeles 1983) 118-19; Garnsey conjectures that grain imports represented 75% of this food. For a similar estimate, see K. Hopkins, Conquerors and Slaves (Cambridge 1978) 39 note 32, and in Trade and Famine in Classical Antiquity, edd. P. Gamsey, C.R. Whittaker (Cambridge 1983) 85: average individual nutritional requirements approximated 200-220 kg of wheat equivalent (ca. 31 modii), with total annual consumption of grain in Rome on the order of 200,000 metric tons. 200-220 kg of wheat might represent 75% of an individual's calories: L. Foxhall and H.A. Forbes, Chiron 12 (1982) 71. Higher estimates are provided by G. Rickman, The Corn Supply of Ancient Rome (Oxford 1980) 232, and in The Seaborne Commerce of Ancient Rome, edd. J.H. D'Arms, E.C. Kopf, Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 36 (Rome 1980) 262-63: forty million modii (ca. 270,000 metric tons), based on an annual individual consumption of 4 0 modii (270 kg); and L. Casson, ibid. 21-22: sixty million modii (ca. 400,000 metric tons). The corn dole, with monthly distributions of five modii to some 200,000 recipients, annually required some twelve million modii, or ca. 80,000 metric tons of wheat.

2

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

nearby farmland in Italy, but instead depended on food imported from overseas. From the very beginning of the principate the Roman emperors recognized the need to take direct governmental action in order to maintain adequate supplies of food, rather than relying exclusively on private businessmen operating in an entirely free market. Under the Republic the Roman state had played an increasing role in supervising the importation of grain into the city of Rome and the monthly distributions of grain to the recipients of the corn dole, and Augustus completed this process by establishing the office of the praefectus annonae as a permanent institution. 2 Later emperors took further steps to stimulate the private importation of grain into Rome. Claudius offered special incentives for shippers, or navicularii, who engaged in the importation of grain into the city of Rome. 3 This same emperor and later Trajan sought to provide a safe haven for grain-laden ships by undertaking extensive improvements of the harbors at Ostia and Portus. 4 The concern of the Roman government with the annual harvest, or annona, moreover, was not just limited to the provisioning of the city of Rome. Rome also had to harness the resources of its provinces in 2 I n a recent study, H. Pavis d'Escurac, La Préfecture de l'annone, Service administratif impérial d'Auguste à Constantin (Rome 1976), attributes to the praefectus annonae extensive powers of regulation over the grain market in Rome. Other commentators, however, have seen the praefectus annonae as exercising but a limited control outside of supervising the acquisition of grain for the monthly distributions. See especially Casson, in Seaborne Commerce 21-33; cf. Rickman, ibid. 268-72, and Gamsey, in Trade in the Ancient Economy 126-28.

^Claudius provided indemnities for shippers who suffered losses transporting grain to Rome, and granted privileges to shippers with ships of at least 10,000 modii (ca. 65 metric tons) who served the grain trade for Rome: citizens gained exemption from the lex Papia Poppaea, while Latins gained citizenship, and women the ius III liberorum (Suet., Claud. 18.2-19.1, Gaius, Inst. 1.32c). In the second century these rights were further defined: an individual building a ship of 50,000 modii (ca. 350 metric tons) or five ships of no less than 10,000 modii received exemption from muñera as long as these ships continued to serve the annona of the city of Rome (Scaevola, Dig. 50.5.3; cf. Callistratus, Dig. 50.6.6.5) To qualify for exemption from muñera, navicularii apparently had to invest more than one half of their property in ships serving Rome; cf. the rescript of M. Aurelius and L. Verus cited by Callistratus, Dig. 50.6.6.6; see also id., Dig. 50.6.6.8-9 for the concern on the part of Hadrian and Antoninus Pius to check abuses of such privileges. On this question, see Gamsey, in Trade in the Ancient Economy 123-24. 4

S e e Suet., Claud. 20, Dio 60.11.1-5, and R. Meiggs, Roman O stia2 (Oxford 1973) 149-71, 591-93.

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

3

order to feed its armies as well as to support the increasingly large and complex imperial government. 5 The efforts of the Roman government in the early empire to manage the annona went beyond supervising private trade in grain. Rather, the institutionalized practices of bequeathing property to the emperor by aristocrats, and governmental confiscation of the property of the condemned or the intestate allowed the emperor to acquire extensive estates in both Italy and in the provinces. 6 These estates were administered by the Fiscus, the treasury directly responsible to the authority of the emperor, and the revenues produced from such imperial properties provided an important supplement to the revenues gained from taxation. 7 The growth of this system of imperial estates throughout the empire thus allowed the Roman government to exercise some direct control over not only the distribution but also the production of the foodstuffs so vital to the welfare of the empire. The symbiosis of rural and urban development is a particularly important theme in the history of the Roman provinces of North Africa. An urban culture flourished under Roman auspices, while this same region served as one of the major producers of food for the rest of the empire. Roman North Africa supplied perhaps two thirds of the grain consumed at Rome in the first century, and beginning in the second century North African olive oil was exported all over the western Mediterranean. 8 Epigraphical evidence, moreover, suggests that the 5 S e e Rickman, in Seaborne Commerce 262, and A.H.M. Jones, The Roman Empire (Oxford 1964) 2.821-23 and notes.

Later

^On the emperor's acquisition of properties, see D.J. Crawford, in Studies in Roman Property 40-44, and F. Millar, The Emperor in the Roman World (Ithaca 1977) 153-74. 7 On the exploitation of imperial estates as sources of revenue, see Crawford, in Studies in Roman Property 35-70, and Millar (above, note 6) 175-201. I will use the term Fiscus throughout this study to denote the administration of imperial properties. Over the course of the early empire distinctions between various categories of imperial properties appear, such as the Patrimonium and the res or ratio privata, and certain emperors reserved property for their own private use, e.g. Antoninus Pius (SHA, Ant. Pius 7.9, 12.8). On the problem of terminology, see G. Boulvert, Esclaves et affranchis impériaux sous le haut-empire, rôle politique et administratif (Naples 1970) 300-02, and Millar 625-30. On the development of the Fiscus in the early empire, see P.A. Brunt, JRS 56 (1966) 75-91, and H. Bellen, in ANRW 2.1 (1974) 91-112; cf. earlier A.H.M. Jones, JRS 40 (1950) 2229, and Millar, JRS 53 (1963) 29-42. 8

On the role of North Africa in supplying grain for Rome, see especially Rickman, Corn Supply 108-12, 231-35; cf. earlier R. Cagnat, MM 4 0 (1916)

4

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

imperial government controlled extensive tracts of productive farmland in North Africa, and so intervened directly in the agricultural economy of this region in its efforts to provision Rome. Imperial estates are attested throughout Roman North Africa, in such diverse regions as fertile northern Africa Proconsularis, the grain-producing plains surrounding Cirta (Numidia) and Sitifis (Mauretania Caesariensis), the semi-arid plains of Byzacena, and even the frontier of the Roman empire in southern Numidia. 9 Thus Roman North Africa is an important testing ground for tracing how Roman rule brought about changes in the rural economy of a province. Egypt, the other major granary of the empire, is less suitable in this respect, since Egyptian agriculture, dependent on the annual flooding of the Nile, was subject to historical and geographical factors markedly different than those affecting the other provinces. Evidence for the agricultural economy of Roman North Africa, however, is limited, as is the case throughout the western Roman empire. But 247-77, and G. Charles-Picard, CT 14 (1956) 163-73. Josephus has Agrippa II report that Africa fed Rome for eight months of the year and Egypt four (Β J 2.383), while Tacitus, Ann. 12.43, lists Africa first and Egypt second as Rome's most important suppliers of food. These passages cannot be pressed too closely, but they do indicate that Africa had become Rome's most important source of grain by the reign of Nero. If Rome consumed 30-40 million modii of grain annually, Africa would have supplied 20-27 million modii (130,000- 180,000 metric tons). It is not possible to set alongside Josephus the report in Epit. de Caes. 1.6 that at the time of Augustus Egypt sent to Rome 20 million modii of wheat each year, and to see this 20 million modii as representing one third of Rome's consumption; cf. above, note 1. For the cultivation of the olive in North Africa, see H. Camps-Fabrer, L'olivier et l'huile dans l'Afrique romaine (Algiers 1953); cf. A. Carandini, in Trade in the Ancient Economy 145-62, and for the export of olive oil from Mauretania Caesariensis, J.-P. Laporte, BCTH 12-14 Fase. Β (197678) 131-57. For more general treatments of North African agricultural products, see R.M. Haywood, ES AR 4 3-25, 39-55, as well as A. Deman, in ANRW 2.3 (1975) 17-83, and H. Freis, Chiron 10 (1980) 357-90. 9

F o r lists of imperial estates in North Africa, see Crawford, in Studies in Roman Property 57-59, and J. Kolendo, Le colonat 77-78. E.W.B Fentress, Numidia and the Roman Army, BAR International Series 53 (Oxford 1979) 134-42, Opus 2 (1983) 166 argues that the frontier zone in Numidia had extensive imperial properties, but cf. B.D. Shaw, Opus 2 (1983) 140-41. J.-M. Lassère, Ubique Populus (Paris 1977) 313-34 offers a detailed list of rural establishments in North Africa, with a map. On the procuratorial administration of North African imperial estates, see most recently Flach 2 456-68, with special reference to the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley; for a contrasting view, see Kolendo, REL 46 (1968) 319-29. See also in general Pflaum, Carrières 3.1092-98, and Boulvert (above, note 7) 193-96, 214-17, 291-95, 319-21.

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

5

around the tum of the last century, six inscriptions from estates belonging to the emperor were discovered in the fertile Bagradas (modern Medjerda) valley in northern Tunisia. The sites where the inscriptions were discovered lay in the province of Africa Proconsularis, just outside the fossa regia, the ancient boundary that separated the original province of Africa from the Numidian kingdom. 10 These inscriptions, which were concerned with the management of imperial estates during the second century AD, reveal that the estates were cultivated by sharecroppers, coloni, who paid rent of generally one third of their produce to middlemen called conductores. The coloni raised a variety of crops, including wheat, barley, beans, wine, olive oil, honey, figs and other fruits. The conductores, who held temporary leases for the imperial estates, also cultivated land not occupied by coloni. In addition to the share rent, the coloni also had to provide the conductores with a certain number of services each year to help them cultivate this land, including six or twelve days of agricultural labor and the use of draft animals. Finally, the imperial estates were under the general administration of imperial procurators, the representatives of the Fiscus. Three of the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley attest a concern on the part of the imperial government to increase the production of its estates during the second century AD. In the earliest, from Henchir-Mettich (AD 116-17; henceforth I shall use the abbreviation HM), imperial procurators authorized the cultivation of certain unused lands on an imperial estate in accordance with a regulation called the lex Manciana. The inscription from Aïn-el-Djemala (Hadrianic; henceforth AD) published a letter written by imperial procurators, called the sermo procuratorum, that authorized the occupation of unused lands in accordance with a lex Hadriana de rudibus agris, "Hadrianic law concerning unused lands." This same sermo was republished during the reign of Septimius Severus in the Aïn-Wassel inscription (AW). The other three inscriptions, from Souk-el-Khmis (AD 182; SK), A'in-Zaga (AD 182; AZ), and Gasr-Mezuar (or Kasr Mezouar, AD 181; GM), all concern petitions made by coloni of several 10

O n the sites where the Bagradas valley inscriptions were discovered, see the conjectural discussion of J. Carcopino, MEFR 26 (1906) 423-40; cf. J.J. van Nostrand, University of California Publications in History 14 (1925) 65-67, and T. Frank, AJPh 47 (1926) 56-57. It is not possible, however, to assign boundaries to any of these estates, or to estimate their size. For additional topographical details, see AAT 28.118 (f. XXVI, Oued-Zerga): HM, 35.37 (f. XXXIII, Téboursouk): AD, 35.112: AW, 19 (f. XVII, Zaouiet Medienn), 27 (f. XXV, Souk-el-Khremis): SK, 19.35: AZ, 20.89 (f. XVIII, Béja): GM. I use the more customary spelling Bagradas, even though the Latin nominative was properly Bagrada; see J. Gascou, AntAfr 17 (1981) 15-19.

6

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

imperial estates to the emperor Commodus. In these petitions the coloni complained of abuses that they were suffering at the hands of the conductores, including arbitrary increases of the share rent and unlawful exactions of labor. 11 These six inscriptions attest a program to increase the production of the imperial estates in the Bagradas valley, and also record the conflicts that arose as a result of that program. Thus the inscriptions afford a rare opportunity to examine how the imperial government managed the agricultural resources of a province vitally important in the production of food for the empire. The role of the Roman government in supervising the importation and distribution of grain has drawn the recent attention of a number of scholars, but these studies have not addressed the question how the imperial government harnessed agriculture in the food-producing regions of the empire. 12 The inscriptions from the Bagradas valley, however, offer evidence for the economic relationships between the various groups involved in the cultivation of land vital for the production of food for Rome, including the coloni, the conductores and the Fiscus. Thus these inscriptions make it possible to formulate an economic model for agriculture on the imperial estates, and to analyze the most important economic factors affecting the interests of these groups, such as the availability of land for cultivation, and the unique features of sharecropping as a form of land tenure. The analysis undertaken in this study will strictly speaking be applicable to the imperial estates in the Bagradas valley, since the scanty state of the evidence does not permit us to generalize and conclude that the system of land tenure attested in the Bagradas valley was in practice elsewhere in North Africa. 1 3 Nevertheless, such an analysis of agriculture on a particular group of estates can make an important contribution to our understanding of agriculture throughout 11 For the dates of the inscriptions, see the discussion of V. Weber, in Kolonen, who presents texts for all the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley imperial estates: HM: no. 68, 392-96; AD: no. 69, 396-97; AW: no. 70, 397-99; SK: no. 72, 399-400; AZ: no. 73, 401; GM: no. 74, 401. 12 C f . the recent discussions of the grain trade reported above, note 1, as well as Pavis d'Escurac (above, note 2), and, for the export of grain from North Africa to Rome during the later empire, E. Tengström, Bread for the People, Studies of the Corn-Supply of Rome during the Late Empire (Stockholm 1974). 13

The lex Manciana is attested during the reign of Septimius Severus on an imperial estate at Djenân-ez-Zaytoûna (Tunisia), also near the Fossa Regia (IL Tun. 629), and in the Albertini Tablets, acts of sale from the Vandal period found further inland along the border between Algeria and Tunisia; see below, chapter II at notes 30-31. Kolendo, Le colonat 54-55 cautiously views the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley as providing evidence for the condition of coloni throughout Roman North Africa.

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

7

the western Roman empire, for it will allow us to trace the dynamic relationships that existed among the groups involved in the cultivation of the land, including the cultivators of the land, the wealthier middlemen who collected the rent and acted as landlords, and the government, which depended on its estates for important supplies of food. a) Geography and History of the Bagradas Valley The middle Bagradas (Medjerda) valley is located southwest of Carthage, between roughly sixty and eighty km from the northern Mediterranean coast, in the region of northern Tunisia known as the Tell intérieur. The term Tell designates those areas in Algeria and Tunisia subject to a "Mediterranean" climate, that is to say a climate with at least roughly 400 mm of rainfall each year, sufficient to allow the cultivation of cereals without irrigation. The Medjerda cuts across the northern Tunisian Tell, flowing from eastern Algeria in a roughly easterly direction until it bends to the northeast in north-central Tunisia and goes on to empty into the Gulf of Tunis. Near Souk-el-Khmis two rivers flowing from the south, the Mellègue and the Tessa, join the Medjerda, while further downstream near Testour the Medjerda is met by an additional river flowing from the south, the Siliana. The imperial estates of the Bagradas valley were located in what is today an important agricultural region, and dotted an area extending from west of the modem town of Bou Salem (formerly Souk-el-Khmis) eastward more than fifty km to Testour, and on a north-south axis more than fifty km from north of Béja (ancient Vaga) to Dougga (ancient Thugga). This region offers a changing appearance of rich rolling farmland along the Medjerda, but interrupted frequently by steep hills, some of which are barren and uncultivated. In general the region changes from broader rolling plains to a more hilly landscape as one moves from west to east, but all of the sites where the inscriptions were discovered are characterized by rolling plains flanked by hills. Thus the HM inscription was discovered in the hills roughly ten km west of Testour. The AD inscription was found in a hilly area alongside the Wadi Kalled, roughly seven km northwest of Téboursouk (Thubursicum Bure) and twelve km northwest of Dougga (Thugga), while the AW inscription was found in a moderately hilly region at a site some seven km west of Dougga, about twenty km west of Aïn-el-Djemala. The estate of the S Κ inscription included apparently the rolling plains along the Medjerda near Bou Salem, as well as more hilly country further north, while the estates of the AZ and GM inscriptions comprised rolling farmland with some abrupt hills. The climate of the Medjerda valley is classified as sub-humid. During the twentieth century, the Tunisian Tell has been characterized by the cultivation of

8

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

wheat and barley, as well as of olives, vines, figs and almonds. The annual rainfall in this region of some 500-700 mm is sufficient to allow the cultivation of leguminous crops such as beans and vetches and also of other fodder crops in alternation with cereals, so that the region is favorable not only for the production of grain, but also for intensive livestock raising. As in all of North Africa, the irregular distribution of rainfall from year to year and even within a year limits the possibilités for agriculture, but the annual rainfall of the Medjerda valley seldom falls below 300 mm, and seldom exceeds 800 mm. 1 4 The Medjerda valley is one of the most fertile regions of Tunisia. During the twentieth century, the middle Medjerda valley was one of the principal areas colonized by the French, and it was in this region that French investment in agriculture paid off in the highest yields of wheat.1-' Today the Medjerda valley is characterized by large-scale mechanized farming, with the principal crops including grain and olives. Similarly, in the ancient world this rich agricultural region had a long history of cultivation. The Numidian king Massinissa, who undertook an ambitious program of developing agriculture, took over parts of the Bagradas valley (cf. Appian, Pun. 68, Livy 42.23). When Massinissa died shortly before the third Punic War, he bequeathed substantial estates to his children; these estates may well have been located in the Bagradas valley (cf. Polyb. 36.16.7-8, Diodorus 32.16). After the death of Massinissa, Numidian princes continued to draw revenues from their estates until Caesar's victory in 46 BC, when the Numidian kingdom passed into direct Roman administration (Cicero, de leg. agr. 2.58; cf. Bell. Afr. 97.1). 1 6 During the Jugurthine War, the definition of the "Mediterranean" climate, see J. Despois, R. Raynal, Géographie de l'Afrique du Nord-Ouest (Paris 1967) 48-49; on the geography of the Medjerda valley, see ibid. 237-40. See also J.M. Houston, The Western Mediterranean World, an Introduction to its Regional Landscapes (London 1964) 661. On the irregularity of rainfall, see J. Poncet, La colonisation et l'agriculture européennes en Tunisie depuis 1881 (Paris 1961) 23-24, Raynal 24-25, B.D. Shaw, Ant Afr 20 (1984) 135-36, and below, chapter V note 29. For questions concerning the continuity of geographical conditions in the Maghreb from ancient times, see B.D. Shaw, in Climate and History, edd. T.M.L. Wigley, M.J. Ingram, G. Farmer (Cambridge 1981) 379-403. l^For the French cultivation of cereals in the middle Medjerda valley, see Despois (above, note 14) 238. Poncet (above, note 14) 126-29 describes the region as being inhabited prior to French colonization in 1881 by a combination of sedentarized farmers, seasonal laborers and pastoral nomads. 16

On

the Numidian cultivation of the Bagradas valley, see Kolendo, Le colonat 9-10. T.R.S. Broughton, Romanization 7-9, 34, follows S. Gsell, Histoire ancienne de l'Afrique du Nord (Paris 1918-30) 2.102, 4 1 0 f., in arguing that the

Geography and History of the Β agradas Valley

9

moreover, the town of Vaga (Béja), just north of the Bagradas, was an important trading center and was frequented by Italian negotiatores (Sallust, BJ 4 7 . 1 ) . 1 7 The first Roman effort to exploit directly the agricultural potential of this region came in 103 (or 100) BC, when the tribune L. Apuleius Satuminus carried a law Carthaginians had already begun cultivating the Bagradas valley before Massinissa. Gsell 3.312-13, 321 discusses further the development of this region by Massinissa. It is possible that some of the Gracchan colonists in 122 BC settled in this area; cf. Broughton 20-21. This region would have helped the Carthaginians and later the Numidians produce grain for export to foreign markets. For further discussion of Numidian and pre-Roman agriculture, see Gsell 5.186210; G. Camps, Aux origines de la berberie, Massinissa ou les débuts de l'histoire, Libyca 8.1 (1960) 209-13; Kolendo, in Neue Beiträge zur Geschichte der alten Welt II: Römisches Reich (Berlin 1965) 45-56; H. Kreissig, in Afrika und Rom in der Antike, ed. H. Diesner, et al. (1968/9) 135-42; M. Bénabou, La résistance africaine à la romanisation (Paris 1976) 54-55 (on the Augustan colonization in this area); and C.R. Whittaker, Klio 60 (1978) 338-41; cf. Rickman, Corn Supply 108-09, Garnsey, in Imperialism in the Ancient World 235-36, and P. Romanelli, In Africa e a Roma (Rome 1981) 319 f. 17-The veterans of Marius were settled on a viritane basis, despite the repeal of much of the legislation of Satuminus (cf. Cie., Balb. 48, de legg. 2.14); see E. Badian, Foreign Clientelae (Oxford 1958) 199; but cf. Gsell, HAAN 8.10, 67 f., and P.A. Brunt, Italian Manpower 225 B.C.-A.D. 14 (Oxford 1971) 577-80. Three towns under the empire claimed the title of being "Marian" foundations: Uchi Maius, raised to the status of colonia under Alexander Severus (e.g. ILS 1334 = CIL 8.15454); Thubumica (AE 1951.81; cf. P. Quoniam CRAI [1950] 332-36: a dedication to Marius as conditori coloniae); and Thibaris, a municipium (ILS 6970, muni(c)ipi Mariani Thibartitanorum). For the Marian settlement, see Frank, AJPh 47 (1926) 61-67, Broughton, Romanization 31-35, F. Vittinghof, Römische Kolonisation und Bürgerrechtspolitik unter Caesar und Augustus (Mainz-Wiesbaden 1951) 113, R. Chevallier, MEFR 70 (1958) 79-85, L. Teutsch, Das römische Städtewesen in Nordafrika in der Zeit von C. Gracchus bis zum Tode des Kaisers Augustus (Berlin 1962) 6-27, and Lassère, Ubique Populus 115-32, and in ANRW 2.10.2 (1982) 403-05. For the date see Broughton, MRR 1.565 note 3, 2.645. For the Gaetuli, see J. Gascou, MEFR 81 (1969) 555-68, MEFR 82 (1970) 72336; E.W.B. Fentress, MEFR 94 (1982) 325-34 argues for 87 as the date for this assignation of lands. Cf. B.D. Shaw, Pastoralists, Peasants, and Politics in Roman North Africa (Diss. Cambridge 1978) 82 f., who argues that the Marian veterans settled by Satuminus were Gaetulians. Cf. also in general L.A. Thompson, in Africa in Classical Antiquity, edd. L.A. Thompson, J. Ferguson (Ibadan 1969) 133-38. In 82 BC Carbo fled from Clusium to Africa with refugees from the civil war against Sulla (Appian, BC 1.92); the presence of an Etruscan community near Thuburbo Maius is confirmed by three boundary stones inscribed in Etruscan; cf. Lassère, Ubique Populus 132-35, and in ANRW 2.10.2 (1982) 401, and J. Heurgon, CRAI (1969) 526 - 551, REL 47 (1969) 284-94.

10

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

to settle some of Marius' veterans from the Jugurthine War with allotments of 100 iugera (25 hectares, de Vir. III. 73.1). In addition, Marius allotted lands to certain Gaetulian tribesmen who had served under him, either against Jugurtha or possibly later during the civil wars in 87 BC. Under the early principate, the Bagradas valley attracted large-scale Roman landowners. The region drew the particular attention of proconsuls of Africa, and became an important center for their investment in land. The evidence for such investment comes from the names of the estates mentioned in the Bagradas valley inscriptions, several of which were derived from the cognomina of former proconsuls. Thus the fundus Villae Magnae Varianae, the imperial estate regulated by the Henchir-Mettich inscription, apparently numbered among its former private owners P. Quintilius Varus, who was consul in 13 BC and proconsul of Africa ca. 14 BC. Likewise the sermo procuratorum in the Aïn-elDjemala and Aïn-Wassel inscriptions mentions estates apparently owned at one time by former proconsuls. 18 The saltus Blandianus et Udensis contained an estate once the property of C. Rubellius Blandus, suffect consul in AD 18 and proconsul in AD 35-36. The saltus Lamianus et Domitianus was also formed from estates belonging to former proconsuls. The first estate was probably named after L. Aelius Lamia, consul in AD 3 and proconsul ca. AD 15-17 (PIR2 A 200); Lamia's grandfather, moreover, was a knight in the late Republic with business interests in Africa (Cie., F am. 12.29). The saltus Domitianus, the only one of these estates to derive its name from a gentilicium rather than from a cognomen, was probably named after Cn. Domitius Lucanus (PIR2 D 152) and Cn. Domitius Tullus (PIR2 D 167), two brothers and business partners who spent much of their public careers in Africa under the Flavians, eventually serving as proconsuls in the eighties; it is less likely that L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, consul in 16 BC and proconsul in 12 BC, gave his name to this estate. 19 ^Large-scale Roman investment in African land may have begun with the sale of ager publiais in the second century BC; see the Lex Agraria of 111 BC (FIRA2 I no. 8) v. 48, and Rostovtzeff, SEHRE2 1.316-17. For the date of the proconsulship of Varus, see Thomasson, Statthalter 2.13-14, and RE Suppl. Bd. 13 (1973) 2-3 s.v. 'Africa.' On the acquisition of estates in Africa by proconsuls, see Kolendo, Le colonat 11; cf. earlier Carcopino, MEFR 26 (1906) 433-37, and A. Schulten, Klio 7 (1907) 208. For this phenomenon in other provinces, see Frank, ESAR 5.25 and note 45. Gamsey, in Imperialism in the Ancient World 226-30 discusses large-scale ownership of land in North Africa. Flach 2 446 hesitates to identify an owner for the fundus Villae Magnae Varianae. 19 O n these proconsuls, see Thomasson, Statthalter 2.12-13, 2.21-23, 2.27-28, and in RE (above, note 18). On Rubellius Blandus, see also G. Charles-Picard, CT

Geography and History of the Bagradas Valley

11

These names commemorating senatorial landowners in the Bagradas valley survive by chance, and may represent a much larger landowning elite that carved out estates in this fertile region. 20 By the second century the Bagradas valley had become a major center for imperial estates, although the evidence for the growth of imperial ownership of land in this area is incomplete. Pliny the Elder reports that Nero put to death (and therefore confiscated their property) six possessores who owned half of Africa (NH 18.35). Pliny may be exaggerating, but his testimony does suggest that the extent of imperial ownership of land in Africa increased substantially under Nero. Some of the farmland held by these six possessores must have been located in the Bagradas valley, in view of the region's long tradition of exploitation by Roman landowners. 21 The region around the Bagradas valley, however, had a peculiar municipal history. A long tradition of sedentarized agriculture and town-life helped make this area a center for Roman colonization under Caesar and Augustus, but the development of civic institutions in the urban centers of this region was slow in comparison with other areas of Roman North Africa. In spite of its tradition of settled agriculture and urban life, few communities in the area around the Bagradas valley were raised to the status of municipia or coloniae during the first two centuries AD. Rather, much of the region remained administratively dependent on the colonia at Carthage. 22 The organization of vast private and imperial estates may well have been a factor in the slow development of civic 11 (1963) 69-74, and U. Vogel-Weidemann, Die Statthalter von Africa und Asia in den Jahren 14-68 η. Chr. (Bonn 1982) 109-14; cf. ibid. 59-66 on Lamia. On the Domitii, see below, chapter II at notes 38-44. 2

° S e e Broughton, Romanization 35-38 on the development of Roman estates in this region, as well as Kolendo, Le colonat 7-14. 21

For the means by which certain private estates may have passed to imperial control, see below, chapter Π at notes 38-43, and Kehoe, Law and History Review 2.2 (1984) 241-63. 22

F o r the development of urban institutions in this region under Roman rule, see H.-G. Pflaum, AntAfr 4 (1970) 75-117; cf. J. Gascou, La politique municipale de l'empire romain en Afrique proconsulaire de Trajan à Septime-Sévère (Rome 1972) 115-30, 158-62, 168-91, and in ANRW 2.10.2 (1982) 201-02, 209-17, 271-98. The Siliana (Miliana) valley was an important center for Augustan colonization, with colonics including Maxula, Uthina, Thuburbo Minus, Simmithu, Thuburnica, and further south, Sicca Veneria, and other settlements of veterans at Medeli and Suturnica; Semta was raised to the status of municipium under Augustus. See Broughton, Romanization 68-70; cf. further Teutsch (above, note 17) 167-74, Bénabou (above, note 16) 54-55, and Lassere, Ubique Populas 143-248, especially 211-19, and in ANRW 2.10.2 (1982) 412-17.

12

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

institutions, as the imperial government sought to channel the resources of the region into its estates rather than to autonomous municipalities. b) Imperial Estates and a Market Economy The scanty evidence adduced here docs not yield an agricultural history of the Bagradas valley during the late Republic and early principale. But the region seems to have been especially favored to play a major role in making North Africa one of the most important food producers for the empire. The Bagradas valley was fertile and well-watered, and was located in close proximity to Carthage and to ports on the northern coast of Tunisia such as Tabarka and Hippo Diarrhytus. Because of its tradition of occupation, the Bagradas valley must have long been exploited to produce food for markets, helping supply both Carthage and markets overseas. 23 This conclusion that the imperial estates in the Bagradas valley served overseas markets is crucial for our interpretation of the evidence offered by the inscriptions for the practice of agriculture. For the major factor that affects the methods of cultivation adopted by an agricultural community is the size of the population consuming its production. As the population consuming the production of a rural community grows, methods of cultivation previously sufficient to feed it will no longer produce enough food, so that more intensive use will have to be made of existing farmland, or else additional farmland will have to be brought under cultivation. 24 Clearly an agricultural community with •"The middle Bagradas valley lay within a network of roads accessible to the major route connecting Carthage and Theveste; see P. Salama, Les voies romaines de l'Afrique du Nord (Algiers 1951) 37 f. Evidence from legal sources indicates that in the later empire grain was transported to Carthage and other ports from fiscal storehouses on heavy four-wheeled wagons, drawn by two pairs of oxen; such wagons carried 50-75 modii. This system of transport was in the fourth century organized by the state as the cursus clabularius; see Tengström (above, note 12) 29-31. 24

S e e D. Grigg, The Dynamics of Agricultural Change (London 1982) 101-17 for a discussion of the changes in agriculture necessitated by the development of an urban population. E. Boserup, The Conditions of Agricultural Growth (Chicago 1965) sees the growth of population as the independent variable that necessitates agrarian change. She is primarily concerned with the intensification of methods of cultivation necessitated by growth of the rural population; for a theoretical expression of Boserup's views, see W. Robinson, W. Schutjer, Economic Development and Cultural Change 32.2 (1984) 355-66. On the changes in peasant agriculture caused by population change and urbanization, see also B.H. Slicher van Bath, The Agrarian History of Western Europe A.D. 500-1850, trans. O. Ordish (London 1963) 1-25, and J. dc Vries, The Dutch Rural Economy in the

Imperial Estates and a Market Economy

13

a growing population will be forced to change its methods of cultivation in order to survive. But if an agricultural community begins to produce food for an urban population not directly involved in farming, the changes in methods of cultivation are no less dramatic. An extensive economy of livestock raising combined with some cultivation of cereals, which was characteristic of much of Tunisia before the establishment of the French protectorate in 1881, may sustain a self-sufficient rural population, but cannot produce a surplus large enough to feed a large urban population. 25 Farmers producing for a market must cultivate their land intensively enough to produce a substantial surplus, whether they are motivated to do so by attractive market conditions or constrained by a powerful urban government. Thus a region such as the Bagradas valley, providing food to supply a huge imperial capital as well as a burgeoning governmental structure, had to make ever more intensive use of its land, either by applying additional labor and capital to each unit of land or else by cultivating crops with higher yields. 2 6 Thus lands formerly set aside as long-term fallow in order to yield a crop with a minimum of labor and capital had to be cropped more frequently, Golden Age, 1500-1700 (New Haven - London 1974) 1-21. K. Hopkins, JRS 70 (1980) 101-25 discusses the importance of taxation as a stimulus to surplus production and trade. In an essay on the economic development of the city in the ancient world, in Towns and Societies, edd. P. Abrams, E.A. Wrigley (Cambridge 1978) 35-77, Hopkins analyses the relationship between urban growth (often supported by taxation) and the expansion of agriculture (see especially 68-77). In the same volume, E.A. Wrigley considers the growth of prc-industrial cities as providing the impetus for expanded production in the countryside and eventually for more profitable agriculture (295-309). E. van Young, Hacienda and Market in Eighteenth-Century Mexico (Berkeley-Los Angeles 1981) 344-57, traces the development of commercial agriculture in the hinterland of eighteenth-century Guadalajara more to the development of an urban market than to the growth of the rural population itself. I. Wallerstein, The Modern World-System (New York 1974) 67-129, argues that in the sixteenth century, the state bound rural populations to the soil in 'peripheral' regions such as eastern Europe and the Americas in order to produce cash crops to feed the more urbanized 'core' regions of northern Europe. For the development of peasant agriculture in twentieth-century eastern Europe, see D. Warmer, The Economics of Peasant Farming2 (London 1964) 1-26. 26

D . Grigg, Population Growth and Agrarian Change (Cambridge 1980) 33-36; Boserup (above, note 24) 35-42, 73; C. Clark, M. Haswell, The Economics of Subsistence Agriculture2 (London - New York 1970) 112-13. Clark and Haswell also discuss the importance of transportation for agricultural development; cf. Grigg, Dynamics (above, note 24) 135-50.

14

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

with a corresponding increase in costs of production, while land formerly serving as permanent pasture had to be designated for more intensive cultivation. 27 Where unused lands were abundant, we should expect farmers not to have intensified their methods of cultivating existing fields so much as to have brought additional lands under cultivation. 28 By harnessing the imperial estates in the Bagradas valley for the production of food for the Roman market, the Fiscus forced its tenants to work harder than they would have had to as simple owner-cultivators outside the control of Roman administration. To illustrate this increased effort, let us examine how the exaction of a share rent might change the size of a farm that a single selfsufficient family would have to cultivate with grain, the most important staple produced on the imperial estates, in order to meet its own nutritional requirements, provide seed for the next year's crop, and at the same time pay one third of the produce as rent. Any estimate of farm sizes on the imperial estates will necessarily be crude and hypothetical, since we have inadequate evidence for the practice of agriculture in North Africa, or for that matter, in other parts of the empire. But we can make some rough estimates, which, even if inexact, will still provide a conceptual framework for analyzing how production for a market affected agriculture on the imperial estates. The minimum amount of food needed to sustain a family in the ancient world has long been the subject of controversy, 29 but recent research has provided a basis for calculations. Following the analysis of L. Foxhall and H.A. Forbes, based on the recommendations of the World Health Organization, let us assume that a typical household of six members required 15,495 calories each day, an average of 2,582 calories for each person. We must recognize that this figure represents a very generous estimate, as many families in the ancient world must have had diets inadequate by today's standards. Thus whatever calculations emerge about the land needed to produce this amount of food will also tend to be high. 3 0 In order to keep our calculations simple, we will measure nutritional 27 B o s e r u p (above, note 24) especially chapters 1-2, and pp. 75-76, treats the reduction of fallow for more intensive agriculture as a major result of population growth; see also Grigg, Dynamics (above, note 24) 37-43. 28 O n migration and settlement of previously underpopulated areas, see Grigg, Population (above, note 26) 31-33. On the large-scale land clearance of early medieval France, see M. Bloch, French Rural History, an Essay on its Basic Characteristics, tr. J. Sondheimer (Berkeley-Los Angeles 1966) 5-17; for the later middle ages, 17-20. 29

S e e the discussion of L. Foxhall, H.A. Forbes, Chiron

30

F o x h a l l and Forbes, ibid. 4 9 note 26 envision a hypothetical household

12 (1982) 41-90.

Imperial Estates and a Market Economy

15

requirements in terms of wheat, although acknowledging that ancient farmers cultivated a variety of cereal crops important for their daily consumption, especially barley. If wheat provided 75% of our family's daily nutritional requirements, again a very generous estimate, 3 1 and if a single kilogram of wheat produces 3,340 calories, 3 2 then wheat had to provide an average of 1,937 calories each day per person, the equivalent of 0.58 kg. Thus each person required an average of 212 kg of wheat each year, or 31.4 modii (for the purposes of these calculations I consider a modius the equivalent of 6.75 kg). Our family of six ihus needed approximately 180 modii of wheat each year. 3 3 How much land would be required for a colonus on an imperial estate in the Bagradas valley to produce such an amount of grain? In making our estimate, we must include the seed required for the next year's crop. According to the Roman agronomists, farmers in the Roman world sowed 4-5 modii for each with the following food requirements, based on the standards of the FAO/WHO, Energy and Protein Requirements (Rome 1973, rcpr. 1977): 1) adult female, 52 kg, 60-69 years, "very active": 1947 cal.; 2) adult male, 62 kg, 20-39 years, "very active": 3337 cal.; 3) adult female, 52 kg, 20-39 years, "very active": 2434 cal.; 4) male child, 13-15 years, "very active": 3237 cal.; 5) female child, 10-12 years, 2350 cal.; 6) child, 7-9 years, 2190 cal. The total daily requirement is 15,495 calories. J.K. Evans, CQ 31 (ii) (1981) 433-34 bases his calculations for the requirements of grain in classical Italy (see below, note 31) on a model family of five members. 31

See Foxhall and Forbes, Chiron 12 (1982) 71, 74. Evans, AJAH 5.2 (1980) 134-73 develops a model for the nutritional requirements of the peasant family in imperial Italy for which wheat provided 52% of a daily average requirement of 3200 calories. Evans discusses the other foods that would have supplemented wheat, including cheese, olives, figs, cabbage, mushrooms, endive, parsley, carrots, walnuts, radishes, garlic, eggs, and wine. Peasants may also have gathered some of their food from plants growing in the wild, as is argued by J.M. Frayn, Subsistence Farming in Roman Italy (London 1979) 57-72 = JRS 65 (1975) 32-39. 32

F o x h a l l and Forbes, Chiron standards. 33

12 (1982) 46, based on the WHO/FAO

S e e ibid. 71; cf. Evans, CQ 31 (ii) (1981) 433-34, who estimates nutritional requirements for a model family of five as roughly 1150-1375 kg of wheat equivalent each year (10,500-12,600 calories each day), which translates into 170204 modii of wheat, not counting requirements for seed. Hopkins, Conquerors and Slaves 39 note 52 provides a lower estimate of nutritional requirements for a model family, 1,000 kg of wheat equivalent, or roughly 150 modii. See also Hopkins in Trade and Famine in Classical Antiquity 85; Brunt, Italian Manpower 194 estimates that 120 modii of wheat were required each year for a family of four. See also above, note 1.

16

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

iugerum (0.25 ha) of land (Varrò, de Re Rust. 1.44.1, Columella 2.9.1-2, 2.9.5, 11.2.75, Pliny, NH 18.198-200). Estimating the size of the yield that a Roman farmer might expect presents difficulties, and variations from one region to another must have been substantial. But Columella does remark that a yield-seed ratio of 4:1 was scarcely ever obtained in Italy (3.3.4). Although other regions of the empire must sometimes have produced higher yields, Columella's modest figure accords with what is known about yields from the early Middle Ages, and so offers a reasonable basis for estimates about the productivity of Roman agriculture. 3 4 In order to produce enough wheat to provide for 75% of its nutritional requirements as well as to provide seed for the next year's crop, therefore, our model family, if it paid no rent or taxes, had to cultivate twelve iugera (three ha), sowing 60 modii of wheat, and realizing a gross product of 240 modii. In a system of biennial fallowing, a family farming at subsistence level accordingly required a minimum of 24 iugera (six ha) of land. But the amount of land required by such a family increases dramatically when we add a payment of one third of the produce as rent to the grain needed for food and seed. Instead of cultivating twelve iugera, our family now had to sow some twenty iugera (five ha) with wheat, that is approximately sixty percent more land than a family paying no rent or taxes at all. 35 The production of this food for an overseas market not only forced individual farmers to apply greater effort to their land, but also necessitated the mobilization of a huge work force. If Rome consumed annually 20 million modii of North African grain (133,000 metric tons, two thirds of Rome's annual consumption of 30 million modii), then approximately 160,000 such families such as I have decribed had to produce a share rent of 120 modii in order to meet the city's requirements. If, moreover, another 800,000 of Roman North Africa's inhabitants were not involved in agriculture (10% of an estimated total population for the second century of eight million), their annual consumption of some 24 million modii (160,000 metric tons) required similar production from 34

S e c Evans, CQ 31 (ii) (1981) 428-35, and AJAH 5.2 (1980) 136, 164; on medieval yield ratios see Slicher van Bath (above, note 24) 18-21. For further discussion of the productivity of ancient wheat farming, see K.D. White, Antiquity 37 (1963) 207-10, Brunt, Italian Manpower 194, P.W. de Neeve, Colonus (Amsterdam 1984, Dutch version 1981) 14 note 53, and below, chapter IV note 44. 35

O n biennial fallowing, see below, chapter III note 69. If wheat provided ca. 50% of the daily nutritional requirements of a colonus and his family, we would have to reduce the minimum size of his plot to approximately 9 iug. if he paid no rent or taxes, and to approximately 15 iug. with a share rent of one third.

Imperial Estates and a Market Economy

17

nearly 200,000 families. 3 6 Finally, we must consider the requirements of the armed forces stationed in North Africa. The Roman army in Numidia numbered some 10,000 troops (the legio III Augusta, with about 5,000 soldiers, as well as an similar number of auxiliaries), and required on the order of 300,000 modii of wheat each year (2,000 metric tons). This amount of grain required production from a further 2,500 families. 3 7 It is not possible to estimate how many of the hypothetical 160,000 peasant families producing food for Rome would have farmed land on imperial estates, let alone imperial estates in the Bagradas valley, since the grain exported to Rome was produced on both private and imperial land. But these estimates, crude as they are, do suggest the enormity of the task of harnessing North Africa's agricultural resources. The successful completion of this task would not have been possible without profound changes in the North African countryside. The spread of olive culture throughout Roman North Africa, even to semi-arid regions in southern Tunisia 36

T h e size is uncertain of the market in North Africa that was fed by imperial or private estates. Various estimates have been offered of the population of Roman North Africa (reaching its peak during the Severan period). The figure cited in the text represents the highest: 8,000,000 (mean AD 98-244), and is that of R.P. Duncan-Jones, PBSR 31 n.s. 18 (1963) 170. Duncan-Jones argues that the population of North Africa increased substantially during the second century, a view shared by Lassere, Ubique Populas 565-96. Duncan-Jones' estimate of the population is based on a generally higher assessment of the number of inhabitants in cities; see JRS 53 (1963) 85-90, Historia 13 (1964) 199-208, and Economy 259-87. For much lower estimate of urban populations in Roman North Africa, see A. Lézine, AnlAfr 3 (1969) 69-82. Other estimates of Roman North Africa's population include: 4,000,000, C. Courtois, Les Vandales et l'Afrique (Paris 1955) 196; 4,271,000 (second century), J.C. Russell, Late Ancient and Medieval Population, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 48.3 (Philadelphia 1958) 75; 6,000,000, K.J. Beloch, Die Bevölkerung der griechischrömischen Welt (Leipzig 1886) 507; 6,500,000, G. Charles-Picard, La civilisation de l'Afrique romaine (Paris 1959) 54-59. Hopkins, in Trade and Famine in Classical Antiquity 84-109 argues for a high volume of trade in grain in the Roman empire, based on a non-agricultural population of 10-15%. Cf. also P. Salmon, Population et dépopulation dans l'empire romain (Brussels 1974) 36-39. Duncan-Jones, in Tecnologia Economica e Società nel Mondo Romano (Como 1980) 67-80, discusses the difficulty of measuring demographic and economic change in the Roman world. 37

Fentress, Numidia and the Roman Army 124-49 discusses the changes in the agrarian economy of southern Numidia necessitated by the presence of the Roman army; she estimates the food requirement at 1,825 metric tons of wheat each year (125), but further argues that a minimum of only 651 households would be required to produce this food.

18

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

such as Sbeitla, attests a long-term intensification of land use and the growth of production to support urban markets, if only on a limited and local scale. 3 8 Such an intensification of land use, however, was necessary for the development of the urban centers characteristic of Roman North Africa. 3 ^ In some regions Roman rule fostered intensive agriculture in order to support larger urban markets. P. Leveau, who has made extensive surveys of the countryside around Caesarea (Cherchel, Algeria), links the impressive growth of that city with the development of a "Roman" system of agriculture. This system of agriculture involved a more intensive use of land than that practiced by the native groups inhabiting the region. During the first two centuries AD, substantial agricultural installations, villae, dominated the economy of the plains surrounding the city. Occupied by Romans or by Romanized natives, these villae were cultivated intensively to produce a variety of crops, especially olive oil. Further away in the hills surrounding Caesarea, Leveau traces the roughly simultaneous development of less substantial villae, which however still contained olive presses and so were still cultivated intensively for an urban market. Grain and other foodstuffs from these villae fed the urban population of Caesarea, while the production of cash crops such as olive oil provided the wealth that sustained the city's elite. Finally in the more distant hill country, the villae gave way to a village economy, in which natives engaged in more 3 8 θ η North Africa olive culture, see above, note 8. Whittaker, Klio 60 (1978) 331-62, however, argues that Roman rule did not fundamentally alter the social and economic structure of the North African countryside. But Carandini, in Trade in the Ancient Economy 156-58, argues that increased urbanization in North Africa and the expansion of overseas commerce beginning in the Flavian period were accompanied by significant transformations in rural life; cf. Studi Miscellanei 15 (1969-70) 95-119, where Carandini links the production of ceramic ware for export with changes in agriculture. On the cultivation of arid regions, see Lassère, Ubique Populus 305-12. Shaw, AntAfr 20 (1984) 121-73 argues that intensive agriculture based on irrigation had already developed substantially in arid regions of North Africa before Roman rule; Shaw's conclusions allow for the further intensification of agriculture under Roman rule, however. 9 F o r a recent general discussion of the phenomenon of urbanism in Roman North Africa, see P.-A. Février, in ANRW 2.10.2 (1982) 321-76. P. Trousset, AntAfr 11 (1977) 175-207 discusses the gradual transformation of the countryside east of Thysdrus (El Djem) in southeastern Tunisia: an extensive pastoral economy practiced by nomads gradually gave way to sedentarized agriculture based on the cultivation of cereals; the final stage of development was a more intensive polyculture based on the cultivation of the olive. For the intensification of landuse in more urbanized areas of Africa Proconsularis, see Romanelli, In Africa e a Roma 389. 3

Imperial Estates and a Market Economy

19

traditional methods of subsistence agriculture. Leveau also notes a continuing conflict between the villa-based economy and that of the traditional villagers, and argues that the villa economy began to recede before pressure from native tribes during the third century. 40 Leveau's analysis of the development of the countryside supporting the urban growth of Caesarea provides a parallel for the context in which we must analyze the evidence from the Bagradas valley inscriptions. The agricultural economy of the Bagradas valley, which in some sense served as a hinterland for the city of Rome, also had to undergo profound changes as the Roman government relied on this region increasingly for food. In order to effect such changes, the Roman government intervened directly in the economy of the Bagradas valley and exercised control over much of the region's productive farmland. This control allowed the Fiscus to promote a more intensive system of agriculture than might have existed if the Bagradas valley had remained exclusively in private control. Thus the imperial government could designate for the production of grain or other foodstuffs land that might otherwise be set aside as pasture, either by a private landowner or by native pastoralists practicing a traditional economy. 4 1 In addition, the direct control of important farmland allowed the imperial 40

S e e P. Leveau, MEFR 87 (1975) 857-71 Β CT H n.s. 8 (1975) 3-26, especially 19-20, MEFR 89 (1977) 257-311, especially 309-10, where Leveau argues that the tribal chieftans whose estates were destroyed in the revolt of Firmus in 371 were practicing "Roman" agricultural techniques; cf. Leveau in ANRW 2.10.2 (1982) 689-98, Caesarea de Mauritanie, une ville romaine et ses campagnes (Rome 1984) 463-85, 501-05, and in Villes et campagnes dans l'empire romain, edd. P.-A. Février, P. Leveau (Aix en Provence 1982) 77-93. P.A. Février, CT 57-60 (1967) 63-64, describes the juxtaposition in the plains surrounding Sitifis of sedentarized tribes and imperial domains (which may have incorporated some of the native tribes, the Mediani; see below, chapter VI section c). On the juxtaposition of sedentarized agriculture and pastoralism in the Tunisian Tell before French colonization in 1881, see above, note 15. 41

The policy of maintaining control over imperial estates need not be considered an obvious solution to the problem of securing revenues from agriculture. The agrarian reform of Pertinax in 193 (Herodian 2.4.6) offered to prospective cultivators all vacant land in Italy and in the provinces, including land on imperial estates. Dio, moreover, has Maecenas propose that Augustus sell off all but the most useful and necessary public properties, and use the proceeds to finance private farmers, who in the long run would be able to pay higher taxes (Dio 52.28.3-4). Earlier Pliny {Pan. 50) had praised Trajan for restoring imperial estates to private ownership. But cf. Whiltaker, in Studies in Roman Property 140-41, who considers these latter two passages topoi. See also below, chapter II note 50.

20

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

government to check the excessive influence of large-scale landowners, who potentially could undertake to manipulate the food supply and use it as a political weapon. Such considerations as these could well have motivated Nero to engage in his widespread confiscation of North African farmland.4^ Clearly the imperial government considered control over these rich agricultural lands essential in order to ensure the steady provision of adequate supplies of food for the empire. The imperial government, as represented by the Fiscus, continued to administer the imperial estates directly in order to exercise greater control over the harvest produced on them. Thus the Fiscus measured its revenues from its estates not in terms of money, but rather in terms of food; its overriding economic goal was to harness the resources of the imperial estates in order to feed a distant market in the city of Rome. In broad terms, the Fiscus sought to achieve this goal by promoting the intensive cultivation of grain and other foodstuffs such as olive oil. But how could such a system of agriculture based on small-scale cultivation by sharecroppers produce an adequate surplus of food? In order to answer this question, the factors affecting intensive cultivation by small-scale farmers must be analyzed. I will assume that the Fiscus maintained this system of agriculture as part of a deliberate policy, even if the inscriptions show that the coloni were cultivating their land under conditions in some respects similar to those under which their ancestors cultivated their lands before Roman occupation. 43 c) Previous Analyses of the Coloni The major problem in analyzing agriculture on the Bagradas valley imperial estates concerns the status of the farmers cultivating the bulk of the land, the coloni. The controversy concerning these coloni is whether they represented a class of poor farmers who were pressed into service by the imperial government and the conductores, or whether they had substantial resources of their own, and cultivated their land under more favorable conditions. The inscriptions from the 4 2 l n the civil wars of 69 Vespasian intended to invade Africa in order to starve out Vitellius (Tac., Hist. 3.48). The revolt of the legionary legale Clodius Macer in 68 also threatened Rome. The rumor of a revolt by the proconsul L. Piso in 70 provoked in Rome widespread fear of starvation (Tac., Hist. 4.38). T h e construction of an African fleet by Commodus (SHA, Comm. 17.7) and the measures taken by Septimius Severus to prevent Pescervnius Niger from seizing Africa and starving Rome (SHA, Sept. Sev. 8.7, Pese. Nig. 5.4) attest t h e continuing importance of controlling that region's resources. On the fleet o f Commodus see Bénabou (above, note 16) 162, and below, chapter IV note 64.

« C f . the views of Whiltaker, above, note 38.

Previous Analyses of the Coloni

21

Bagradas valley have often attracted the attention of ancient economic historians, and have provided the starting point for analyses of North African agriculture. The almost unanimous verdict of scholarship on the Bagradas valley inscriptions has been that the coloni represented a poor class of farmers that tended to become increasingly exploited as they grew to be economically dependent on a powerful elite. Scholarship on the Bagradas valley inscriptions has thus largely centered not on questions concerning the economic interests of the coloni, but rather on questions of their origin and their place in the social structure of the empire as a whole. The early commentators on the Bagradas inscriptions indeed considered the coloni to represent a poor class of farmers, and concerned themselves with the problem whether the existence of such a class of coloni helped explain the bound colonate of the later Roman empire. Thus the most influential of these early commentators, M. Rostovtzeff, considered the coloni on the imperial estates as part of a labor force that gradually replaced the slave labor characteristic of Italian agriculture during the early empire. Rostovtzeff argued moreover that Roman emperors actively encouraged the development of a class of farmers directly subject to them, similar to the tenants working royal estates in the Hellenistic kingdoms, as a means of gaining greater leverage against powerful senatorial landowners. Rostovtzeff generalized from the evidence of the Bagradas valley inscriptions, and saw the North African coloni as part of a poor class of farmers throughout the empire that became increasingly subject to exploitation by a powerful elite. 44 Subsequent commentators have reacted against this tendency to generalize from the Bagradas valley inscriptions. Instead, such scholars have seen the coloni as representing an essentially local institution, and thus have investigated the particular conditions in North Africa which might have fostered the development of agriculture based on the small-scale labor of tenants rather than on that of slaves. T.R.S. Broughton has provided an influential statement representative of this school of thought. In a synthetic analysis of Roman rule in Africa Proconsularis, Broughton accords Roman rule but a minor role in the development of the North African rural economy. Thus the coloni on the 44

M . Rostovtzeff, Studien 313-402, SEH RE2 1.327, 368-69; the theory that the collection of a rent in kind was based on a Hellenistic model is accepted by K.-P. Johne, in Kolonen 144. For discussion and review of the earliest literature on the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley, see R. Clausing, The Roman Colonate, The Theories of its Origin, Studies in History, Economics and Public Law 117.1 (New York 1925) 138-201. See also W.E. Heitland, Agricola (Cambridge 1921) 342-61, and van Nostrand (above, note 10) 71-78.

22

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

imperial estates in the Bagradas valley were forced to cultivate land for the emperor under conditions similar to those under which they had lived prior to Roman occupation. 45 In a recent study of agricultural labor in North Africa C.R. Whittaker has stated the case in even more radical terms. Whittaker denies that Roman rule brought about anything but minimal changes in North African rural life, and instead sees the coloni on the Bagradas valley estates as cultivating their lands in accordance with an ancestral tribal system of agriculture. The coloni in the Bagradas valley would accordingly have represented sedentarized farmers of a tribal group, and would have been closely associated with nomadic tribesemen. The imperial regulations attested in the inscriptions, such as the lex Manciana and the lex Hadriana de rudibus agris, would thus not have produced significant changes in the tenure arrangements on the imperial estates, but would simply have codified in Roman terms native systems of land tenure. 46 Other writers, by contrast, have attributed a major influence to Roman economic policy in transforming the North African countryside. Thus commentators such as C. Saumagne, G. Charles-Picard and J.-M. Lassere have credited imperial policy, as represented in the lex Manciana and the lex Hadriana de rudibus agris, with creating the conditions necessary for the economic prosperity that characterized North Africa during the second century. In general such commentators argue that imperial policy successfully suppressed nomadism in favor of sedentarized agriculture, and so created the conditions under which the countryside could become densely populated and intensively cultivated by prosperous farmers. This policy has been moreover traced to a general concern on the part of the Roman government to promote the welfare of the small-scale farmer throughout the empire. 47 Indeed imperial legislation has been seen as an

45 B r o u g h t o n , Romanization 157-75; cf. also Frank, AJPh 153-70, and Haywood, ESAR 4 88-101.

Al (1926) 55-73,

46

Whittaker, Klio 60 (1978) 331-62, especially 355-61, and in Non-Slave Labour in the Greco-Roman World, ed. P. Gamsey (Cambridge 1980) 73-99; see also above, note 38. 47

S e e especially G. Charles-Picard, Civilisation 59-76, id. and J. Rougé, Textes et documents relatifs à la vie économique et sociale dans l'empire romain, 31 avant J.C. - 235 après J.C. (Paris 1969) 218, and Lassère, Ubique Populus 297305. Cf. earlier Carcopino, MEFR 26 (1906) 403, 480-81, and C. Saumagne, in Tablettes Albertini, edd. and comm. C. Courtois, L. Leschi, C. Perrat, C. Saumagne (Paris 1952) 81-142 for similar views. On a general policy of Hadrian to favor the small farmer, see A. Piganiol, in Les Empereurs romains d'Espagne (Paris 1965) 135-46.

Previous Analyses of the Coloni

23

essential factor in the spread of olive culture throughout North Africa, 48 and also as a factor in creating the conditions favorable for upward social mobility among the North African peasantry. 49 Such analyses as these, however, are open to criticism, since they attribute prosperity to an imperial policy without analyzing the factors that made such a policy necessary or even possible. Marxist historians have also found in the Bagradas valley inscriptions a fruitful source for analyzing the development of agriculture based on the labor of coloni rather than on that of slaves. Marxist analyses of North African agriculture thus return to some of the basic questions formulated by Rostovtzeff, but have been especially concerned to trace the development of the conditions that caused the coloni to become increasingly exploited by a wealthy elite. Writers such as E.M. Staerman 50 have sought to analyze the institution of the colonate by tracing the processes by which an agricultural economy based on slave labor gave way to one based on the labor of coloni. In general such analyses consider slave labor as an unprofitable mode of exploitation on the large estates that characterized Roman North Africa, but argue that the use of agricultural slavery did persist on smaller fundi. Another commentator, N. Brockmeyer, writing a general analysis of agricultural labor in the Roman empire in reaction to Marxist analyses of the ancient economy, also addresses the relative profitability of various modes of agricultural production. In applying his theories to the North African imperial estates, Brockmeyer argues that the imperial administration sought to create a class of semi-independent farmers occupying their land under perpetual leasehold precisely because traditional forms of short-term tenancy had proved unprofitable. 51 A more important contribution of Marxist analyses of North African agriculture has been to raise the question how the Roman empire might exploit the resources of its provinces to serve the needs of a capital city and a ruling elite. Thus A. Deman analyzes the lex Manciana and the lex Hadriana de rudibus agris as the instruments by which Rome compelled North African peasants, some of whom would have been nomads forced to give up their traditional way 48

Camps-Fabrer (above, note 8) 16-17.

49

P . Romanelli, Storia delle Province Romane dell'Africa (Rome 1959) 344, In Africa e a Roma 356. -*®E.M. Staerman (Schtajerman), Die Krise der Sklavenhalterordnung des römischen Reiches, tr. W. Seyfarlh (Berlin 1964) 185-204.

im Westen

Brockmeyer, Arbeitsorganisation und ökonomisches Denken in der Gutswirtschaft des römischen Reiches (Diss. Bochum 1968), especially 204-27, 245-51.

24

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

of life, to practice a monoculture of wheat on imperial estates. 52 Similarly, V. Weber, who analyzes the evidence from North Africa as part of a general study of tenancy during the early Roman empire in the west, considers the North African coloni as a class of farmers forced to work on land belonging to an elite and to produce a surplus over which they exercised no control. Weber accordingly sees the relationship between the landowning elite and the coloni as essentially one of exploitation. Weber is primarily concerned with two issues, namely to analyze the various forms which tenancy took on North African estates, and to examine how coloni might resist exploitation by the elite. 53 J. Kolendo also has made an important recent contribution to the study of North African agriculture. In his study of the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley, Kolendo again considers the coloni as representing a local system of land tenure, and traces its pre-Roman origins. But Kolendo's more important contribution is to recognize the conflicting economic interests of the conductores and (he Fiscus, and to suggest how such conflicts might affect the fortunes of the coloni. Kolendo thus advances our understanding about the economic concerns of the wealthy elite on whom he envisions the coloni as becoming increasingly dependent. 54 All of these approaches to North African agriculture envision the coloni as representing a mode of production distinct from the kind of slavery associated with Italian agriculture. Thus agriculture in North Africa during the early empire would have been subject to conditions very different from those found in Italy, where the use of agricultural slavery was widespread. This theory seems valid, since in spite of the evidence for slaves in administrative positions on imperial and private estates, no convincing argument has been made that the use of slave labor in agriculture was as widespread in North Africa as it was it Italy during the early empire. 5 5 Archaeological surveys have not yielded the kind of 52

D e m a n , in ANRW 2.3 (1975) 17-83, especially 36-43; cf. also J.-H. Michel ibid. 84-94, especially 89-91. The views of Deman have been criticized by Freis, Chiron 10 (1980) 357-90, and Lassère, REA 81 (1979) 67-104. 53

Weber, in Kolonen 289-343, especially 326, 338 f. For an earlier Marxist treatment of North African coloni as part of an empire-wide class of farmers, see W. Held, Altertum 11 (1965) 223-33, in Afrika und Rom in der Antike 143-53, and in fullest form Klio 53 (1971) 239-79. Cf., from a contrasting (non-Marxist) viewpoint, the comprehensive treatment of coloni in Italy during the late Republic and the early empire by de Neeve (above, note 34). 54

K o l e n d o , Le colonat, and in Terre et paysans dépendents dans les sociétés antiques, ed. E.-Ch. Welskopf (Paris 1979) 391-439, with discussion. On Kolendo's analysis of agriculture in pre-Roman North Africa, see above, note 16. 55

S e e Charles-Picard, Civilisation

146-50.

The evidence for rural slavery in

Previous Analyses of the Coloni

25

evidence, such as slave-barracks, that might indicate extensive use of slave labor. 56 On the other hand, several legal, literary and epigraphical references do indicate that slavery was an important factor in North African agriculture. Legal sources in the Theodosian Code attest that slavery was common in Africa during the fourth century. 5 7 A legal source from the second century, moreover, assumes that slaves could form part of the instrumentum of a hypothetical fundus located in Africa (Scaevola, Dig. 33.7.27.1). Apuleius refers to a fundus owned by his wife Pudentilla that produced wheat, barley, wine, olive oil and other crops, and numbered some four hundred slaves among its work force (Apol. 93). Apuleius in another passage mentions slave labor alongside the cooperative exchange of labor with neighbors as characteristic methods of cultivation (Apol. 17); Apuleius also knew of chained slaves, vincti, housed in slave-barracks, or ergastula (Apol. 47). The evidence provided by Apuleius may not be relevant to the imperial estates in the Bagradas valley, since he is describing conditions that obtained near Oea in Tripolitania. But Petronius in the Satyricon (117) provides evidence suggesting that slave labor was common in other parts of North Africa. When Eumolpus tries to pass himself off as wealthy by claiming ownership of estates in Numidia with a slave-staff (familia) large enough to capture Carthage, the basis of his ruse must be an impression that large slave estates were

North Africa is discussed by S. Gsell, in Mélanges Gustave Glotz (Paris 1932) 397-415; attested slaves for the most part occupied administrative posts. See also W.L. Westermann, The Slave Systems of Greek and Roman Antiquity (Philadelphia 1955) 95. On the difficulty of finding evidence for agricultural slaves, see Duncan-Jones, JRS 53 (1963) 87-88, and Lassere, Ubique Populus 427. Staerman (above, note 50) views slaves as characteristic of smaller estates in North Africa; cf. Brockmeyer, Arbeitsorganisation 209-14, who argues that conductores of imperial estates employed slaves. 56 C f . the findings of Leveau in the countryside around Caesarea, in 2.10.2 (1982) 691-92; for further discussion see Garnsey, in Imperialism Ancient World 236-38.

ANRW in the

57 E . g . Cod. Theod. 10.1.2 (319), Cod. Theod. 11.27.2 (322); cf. Ammianus Marcellinus 29.5.36. Lassere, REA 81 (1979) 82 cites the case of St. Melanie the Younger (fl. ca. A D 400), who donated to the Church an estate near Thagaste containing 8,000 slaves (Lausiac History 61).

26

Imperial Estates and Production for the Roman Market

common in North Africa. ^ ® An inscription regulating a dispute between herdsmen and sedentarized farmers from the late second century in Africa Proconsularis mentions slaves used as shepherds ( C I L 8 . 2 3 9 5 6 ,

Henchir-

Snobbeur, A D 1 8 6 ) . ^ in addition, the third-century customs regulation from Zaraï in southern Numidia lists mancipio

among the commodities liable for the

tariff, which indicates the existence of a regular slave-trade (CIL 8 . 4 5 0 8 , 1 8 6 4 3 , AD 202).60 The evidence adduced here indicates that agricultural slavery did exist, but does not invalidate the general conception of tenancy as the most common mode of production in North African agriculture. In all likelihood, such slaves as were CIL 8.5704, from Sigus, Numidia, refers to a familia r[ustica (?)]', cf. also ILS 2927 ( C I L 8.22721), which commemorates an alimentary program to f e e d approximately 100 freedmen and freedwomen established by Q. Servaeus Fuscus Cornelianus, a senator from Gigthis during the Severan period. On t h i s inscription, see Duncan-Jones, JRS 53 (1963) 88. Literary evidence suggests that agricultural slavery was common in pre-Roman North Africa. In 396 BC, slaves participated in a revolt by Carthage's allies (Diod. 14.77.3), while in the same period Hanno called slaves to freedom in an attempted coup, and assembled a force of 20,000 slaves (Justin 21.4.6). During the first Punic war, Regulus raided farms near Carthage, capturing 20,000 slaves (Polyb. 1.29.6-7). During the Social War, the rebels were reduced to such straits that they ate their own slaves (Polyb. 1.85.1). Near the end of the second Punic war truce proposals included terms for the return of captured animals and slaves (Polyb. 15.18.1.). At this time Hasdroubal even called slaves to freedom (Appian, Punica 24). In the Jugurthine war, Metellus sought to prevent Roman soldiers from seizing animals and slaves (mancipio) in the countryside (Sallust, BJ 44.5). In 82 BC the Roman governor C. Fabius Hadrianus was burned to death in Utica by Roman businessmen after he had reportedly tried to take over the province with a band of slaves (Oros. 5.20.2; cf. Livy, Per. 86, Val. Max. 9.10.2, Cie., Verr. 2.1.70, Ps. Ascon. p. 241 [Stangl]); see Thompson (above, note 17) 136-37. Finally, during the Civil Wars, slaves fought in the Pompeian army (Bell. Afr. 23.1, 36.1; cf. 88.1); while Caesar accused his opponents of pressing the children of native nobles into slavery (Bell. Afr. 26.5). Whittaker, Klio 60 (1978) 338-42, argues that such evidence does not refer to chattel slavery. 5 9 o n this inscription, see below, chapter IV note 37. 60

J . P . Darmon, CT 12, no. 47-48 (1964) 6-23 argues that the tarif regulated commerce between pastoral nomads at the edge of the empire and sedentarized peoples within the empire; cf. Whittaker, Klio 60 (1978) 346, Fentress, Numidia and the Roman Army 183-84, and Deman, in ANRW 2.3 (1975) 51-54. T h e nomads passing through Zaraï were probably on their passage to summer pastures further north: see B.D. Shaw, in Revue de l'Université d'Ottawa 52 (1982) 42-43. Fentress 186 and note 30 quotes the Expositio Totius Mundi 505, which refers to Mauretania as famous for the export of slaves during the fourth century.

Previous Analyses of the Coloni

27

employed on North African estates worked alongside tenants cultivating small plots; these slaves would have been distinguished foremost by their juridical status. 61 Clearly North African agriculture depended on the labor of tenants, and agriculture based on the labor of gangs of slaves never developed in North Africa to the extent that it did in Italy. But the recognition of the important place of tenants in North African agriculture provides only a starting-point for analyzing agriculture on the imperial estates. The purpose of this study, as I have said, will be to analyze how the Roman government exploited the imperial estates in the Bagradas valley in its efforts to provide a substantial surplus of food for export. Thus I will be concerned to trace how the Roman government adapted the form of land tenure attested on the Bagradas valley imperial estates to the empire's needs; the crucial questions for analyzing agriculture on these estates concern the ability of the Roman government to harness the resources of the coloni, and the degree to which the coloni could exercise economic leverage of their own against the Fiscus and obtain more favorable conditions for cultivating their land.

Brockmcyer, Antike Sklaverei (Darmstadt 1979) 206-12 comes to a similar conclusion concerning the use of slave labor on estates in the Rhine provinces.

CHAPTER I I

The Evidence for Land Tenure in the Β agradas Valley The evidence for the tenure arrangements of the coloni in the Bagradas valley comes from a series of six inscriptions concerned with the administration of imperial estates during the second century AD. Three of these inscriptions, from Henchir-Mettich (AD 116-117), Ai'n-el-Djemala (reign of Hadrian) and ΑϊηWassel (AD 198-209), established terms under which coloni might occupy unused lands. 1 These three inscriptions reveal that the coloni cultivating the imperial estates were sharecroppers; they paid their rent and furnished certain labor services to middlemen, called conductores. The leases of the coloni were based on a regulation called the lex Manciana, or law of Mancia; the latter two inscriptions, moreover, attest a regulation governing the occupation of unused lands called the lex Hadriana de rudibus agris, or "the law of Hadrian concerning vacant lands." The other three inscriptions all date to the early years of the reign of Commodus, and concern petitions by coloni of several imperial estates to the emperor. In the best preserved of these inscriptions, from Souk-el-Khmis (AD 182), the coloni of an imperial estate accused a procurator of cooperating dishonestly with the conductores in raising their share rent and imposing other obligations upon them. The inscription from Gasr-Mezuar (AD 181) preserves fragments of a petition from coloni with similar complaints. Both of these inscriptions close with a favorable rescript from Commodus. A third inscription, from Aïn-Zaga, preserves a fragment of the same rescript found in the SK inscription.^ These six inscriptions have presented complex problems of interpretation, so that before we can analyze the economics of agriculture on the imperial estates in the Bagradas valley, we must define carefully the exact terms of tenure under which the coloni cultivated their land. I accordingly present texts and translations of the inscriptions, and summarize my previously published intepretation of the regulations contained in these documents. 3 ^The abbreviations for the inscriptions from the Bagradas valley are listed in the table of abbreviations. For the dates, see the discussion of V. Weber, cited above, chapter I note 11. ^On the proximity of the sites of the AZ and SK inscriptions, see CIL 8, p. 1406, and below, chapter VI note 3. 3 This chapter summarizes the arguments that I have made concerning the regulations in the inscriptions in ZPE 56 (1984) 193-219, ZPE 59 (1985) 151-72. For other recent discussions of the inscriptions and contrasting views, see J.

The Henchir-Mettich Inscription

29

a) The Henchir-Mettich Inscription (CIL 8.25902) 4 Text: I [Pro sal]ute [A]ug(usti) n(ostri) im[p(eratoris)] Caes(aris) Traiani prin[c(ipis)] 'totiusqu[e] domus divin(a)e' [op]timi Germanici Pa[r]thici data a Licinio [Majximo et Feliciore Aug(usti) lib(erto) proc(uratoribus) ad exemplu[m] [leg]is Man[c]ian(a)e. qui eorum [i]ntra fund Villae Mag[n](a)e Varian(a)e id est Mappalia Siga cvillas habebunt>, eis eos agros qui su[b-] [c]esiva sunt excolere permittitur lege Manciana vw ita, ut es qui excoluerit usum proprium habeat. ex fructibus qui eo loco nati erunt dominis au[t] conductoribus vilicisve eius f(undi) partes e lege Manciana pr(a)estare debebunt hac condcione coloni: fructus cuiusque cultur(a)e quos ad area deportare et terere debebunt summas r[edd]ant arbitratu [s]uo conductoribus vilicisfve ei]us f(undi); et si conduct[o-] [r]s vilicisve eius f(undi) in assem p[artes c]olicas daturs renuntiaverint, tabellfis intra dies tr]es caveant eius fructus partes qu[as in assem dar]e debent conductors vilicisve eius [f(undi): ita col]oni colonic as partes pr(a)estare debeant. qu[i i]n f(undo) Villae Magnae si ve Mapali(a)e Siga villas [habe]nt habebunt, domini{ca}s eius f(undi) aut conductoribus vilicisv[e] eorum in assem partes fructum et vineam ex consuetudine Mancian, cu[i]usque generis habet, pr(a)estare debebunt: tritici ex a[r]ea{m} partem tertiam, hordei ex areafm} [pa]rtem tertiam, fab(a)e ex area(m) partem qu[arjtam, vin de lac partem tertiam, ol[e-] [i co]acti partem tertiam, mellis in alve-

4

8

12

16

20

24

28

Kolendo, REA 65 (1963) 80-103, Le colonat, passim; Flach 1 441-92, Flach 2 42773; and Weber, in Kolonen 313-43. 4

For the text of the HM inscription, based on that of Flach (above, note 3), see ZPE 56 (1984) 198-201; Weber, in Kolonen provides a fuller critical apparatus of earlier readings.

30

The Evidence for Land Tenure in the Β agradas Valley

[is] mellaris sextarios singulos qui supra 6

[i]ntra Flach: [ex]tra Saumagne

Flach interpunxit Weber

9 eas HM

fundo HM

7 Kehoe:

12 condecione HM

15-6 conduct[or]es HM

obsignatis sine] s(ua) Weber

post

16-7 daturas HM

condcione 17 tabellfis

18 qu[as praestar]e debent Weber

conductors Flach: conductores HM

19

vilici{s}ve--[-col]oni Rostovtzeff

22 domini{ca}s Riccobono, Saumagne, Weber: dominicas, Flach

24

Manciane HM: Mancian(a)e Weber

28

vinu de laco HM

27-8 qu[ar]tam vel qu[in]tam Flach

30 post singulos interpunxit

Flach

Π

4

8

12

16

20

24

quinqué álveos habebit in tempore qu[o vin]demia mellaría fu[it fuerit], dominis aut conducto[ribus vili]cisve eius f(undi) qui in assem [ 6-8 ] d(are) d(ebebit). Si quis álveos, examina, apes, [vasa] mellaría ex f(undo) Villae Magn(a)e sive Mappali(a)e Sig(a)e in octonarium agru[m] transtulerit, quo fraus aut dominis au[t] conductoribus vilicisve eis quam fiat, a[lv]ei{s}, exama, apes, vasa mellaría, mei qui in[lati] erunt conductor v[ili]corumve in assem e[ius] f(undi) erunt. ficus arid(a)e arbor[es eius f(undi)] qu(a)e extra p o m a rio erunt qua pomarium [ita int]ra villam ips[am] sit, ut non amplius iu[geris tot pate]at, colfon]us arbitrio suo co[actorum fructuu]m con[ducto]ri vilicisve eius f(undi) parftem tertiam d(are) d(ebebit)]. ficeta ve[te]ra et oliveta qu(a)e ante [h(anc) lege]m [sata sunt e] consuet[u]dine{m) fructum conductori vilicisve eius pr(a)estar[e] debeat, si quod ficetum postea factum erit, eius ficfeti] fruct{uct}um per continuas ficationes quinqué arbitrio suo e qui se(r) verit percipere permittitur, post quintam ficationem eadem legefm) qua s(upra) s(criptum) est conductoribus vilicisve eius f(undi) p(raestare) d(ebebit). vineas serere colere loco veterum permittitur ea condicione, u[t] ex ea satione proxumis vindemis quinqué fructu[m] earum vinearum is qui ita verit suo arbitro per-

31

The Henchir-Mettich Inscription

28 cipat itemque post quinta vindemia quam ita sata erit, fructus partes tertias e lege Manciana conduc30 toribus 3 fu[it fuerit] Schulten: fue[rit aut] Flach

5 [exigunt] Kehoe dubitanter:

qui in

assem [colunt] Kolendo: qui in assem [partem] Flach: qui in assem Seeck: [partes tertias] de Dominicis HM

arbor[esve aliae] Schulten Kehoe HM

4

8

12

16

20

24 25

10 Flach

13 ficus arid(a)e arbor[es eius f(undi)] Flach: 15 [tot] Flach 27 fuerit HM

14 17

12 conductoribus

arbor[um earum] Weber:

[ita in]tra Flach: [ita ex]tra vel [ita ul]tra par[tem tertiam in assem] coniecit

mavult

Flach

27-8 percipeat HM

m v[ilicisv]e eius in assem dare debebu[nt. o]livetum serere colere in eo loc[o] qua quis incultum excoluerit permittitur ea condici {ci} one ut ex satione eius fructus oliveti qud ita satum est per olivationes próximas decern arbitrio suo per{mittere}at, item pos[t] olivationes ole[i] coacti partem t[e]rtia[m c]onductoribus vilicisve ei[us f(undi)] d(are) d(ebebit). [q]ui inse(r}verit oleastra, post [vindemias quijnque partem tertiam d(are) d(ebebit). q[ui agri herbosi] in f(undo) Vill(a)e Magn(a)e Var[ian(a)e sive] Mappaliae Sig(a)e sunt eruntve extr[a eos] agros qui vicias habent, eorum a[g]rorum fructu {u ) s conductoribus vilicisvfe de]nt[u]r. custodes exigere debebut pro pecor q[u]ae intra f(undum) Villae Magne Mappali(a)e Sig[(a)e] pascentur: in pecora singula aera quattu conductoribus vilicisve dominorum eius f(undi) pr(a)estare debeb[u]nt. si quis ex f(undo) Vill(a)e Magn(a)e sive Mappali(a)e Sig(a)e fructus stantem pendentem maturum inmaturum caeciderit exciderit exportaverit deportaverit conbuserit desecouerit, sequ(entis) [b]ienii detrimentum conductoribus vilicisve ei' us f(undi)

22 eo

32 5-6

The Evidence for Land Tenure in the Bagradas Valley quid HM

7-8

permitiere debeat HM

[olivationes-] Saumagne:

[annos-} CIL

con]siti Weber secundum

Schulten

pecora HM 17-8 Mlagnee HM

11

[vindemias-] Flach:

12 q[ui agri herbosi] Flach: [-herbis

17 post

19 quattus HM

debebut interpunxit

Weber

23-4 desequerit HM

IV [c]oloni erit, ei cui det[rimentum intulerit, quanti fuerit], tantum pr(a)estare dfebebit. qui in f(undo) Vill(a)e Magn(a)e Varia]n(a)(v}e siv Mappali(a)e Sig[(a)e superficiem se]4 verunt severin[t, eis earn superficiem heredibus] qui e legitim[is matrimoniis nati sunt eruntve] testamenfto relinquere permittitur. si quae sup]erficies [post] hoc tempus lege Mafnciana pigno]8 ri[s iure] fiduci(a)eve data(e) sunt dabuntur, [heredi][bus] ius fiduciae lege Mancian serva[bitur. qui] [su]perficiem ex inculto excoluit excoluer[it eive qui] [ibi] aedificium deposuit posuerit eive qui [coluerit, si] 12 desierit perdesierit, eo tempore quo ita eä superficies] coli desit desierit, e fuit fuerit ius colendi dumta[xa] bienno proximo ex qua die colere desierit servatufr] servabitur, post biennium conductors vilicisve eor[um], 16 ea superficies qu(a)e proxumo anno (f) culta fuit et coli [desi]erit conductor vilicusve eius f(undi) ea superficies esse d[icit]ur denuntiet superficiem cultam testato negita[visse] denuntiationem-denuntiatur Maçpaliasigalis testa[nd]20 o~itemque n sequentem annum [si negi]tat, ea sine que [rei] a eius {eius f] post bienium conductor vilicusve cole[re de]beto. ne quis conductor vilicusv[e colonu]m in[q]uilinu[m eius] f(undi) , coloni qui intra f(undum) Vill(a)e Magn[(a)e sive Mapp]ali(a)e Sig(a)e ha[bit]24 abunt dominis aut conduct[oribus vilicisve eorum] in assem [q][u]oannis in hominibus [singulis in aratio]nes operas n(umero) II et in messem opferas n(umero) II et cuiusqu]e generi[s] [s]ingulas operas bin[as] p[r(a)estare debebun]t. colon[i] 28 inquilini eius f(undi) [int]ra [pr(idie) kal(endas) primas cuiusque] anni nomina sua con[duc]tor[ibus vilicisve i]n custodias singulas qu[as in agris pr(a)estare debent nomi]nent, ratam seorsum [ + 20 seor]sum.

33

The Henchir-Mettich Inscription

32 stipendiarior[um qui intra f(undum) Vill(a)e Magn(a)e sive M]appali(a)e Sig(a)e habitabufnt, nomina sua nominent in custodias q]uas conductoribus vil[icisve eius f(undi) pr(a)estare debenlt. custodias f(undi) servis dominic[is + 20 ] est ···· · lines, which cannot be restored 5 additional 3-4

superficiem se]verunt Kehoe:

pigno]lri[s iure] Kehoe 11 13-4

[coluerit, si] Flach: dumta[xa]d HM

colonu]m Kehoe:

ficetum olivetum vineas se]verunt Flach

9 Mandane HM [coluit postea] Weber 15

13 e Kehoe: ea quo HM

conductores HM

{eoru]m} Flach

20

nnsequentem HM

vilicusv[e eoru]m Weber

quam ter binas operas praestare praecipiat> coniecit HM

7f.

10 [eive-] Flach: [ibique-] Weber

Flach

26 -et cuiusquje Flach: -in sarritiones cuiusqu]e Schulten

23 24-5

22