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Diocletian and the Decline of the Roman Municipalities

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

C. E. van Sickle
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Extract

It has for a long time been recognized that a sharp decline in the prosperity and strength of municipal life in the Roman Empire took place during and shortly after the reign of Diocletian, and this has been attributed largely to his bureaucratic administrative system and heavy increases in taxation, with their consequent pressure upon the urban middle class—the curiales. Of the essential correctness of this view there can be no doubt; and apart from possible new evidence there is little more to be said on that phase of the subject. But there are other aspects of this important problem which seem to have received less attention than they deserve. Bureaucracies and crushing taxes have not always destroyed the middle classes of the countries in which they have existed, as the case of France under the Old Régime clearly proves; so there must be other contributory factors which helped to produce this result in the case under consideration. Some of these have been dealt with ; but one at least—the continuance under the new system of a type of internal municipal government suited only to the most prosperous period of the system which it replaced—seems to have been largely, if not entirely, ignored by investigators. Diocletian not only tried to make the municipia of his empire efficient agents of the central government, but in addition attempted to render them once more the energetic and prosperous organisms which they had been before the Military Anarchy ; and, as his efforts in the end contributed powerfully to produce exactly the opposite result, this portion of his work is worthy of note, if for no other reason than to serve as a warning for would-be benevolent despots in other ages.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 28 , Issue 1 , 1938 , pp. 9 - 18
Copyright
Copyright © C. E. van Sickle 1938. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 Abbott and Johnson, Mun. Adm. in the Roman Empire, 66 and 186. Fiebiger, P-W, s.v. ‘decuriones.’

2 Abbott and Johnson, o.c. chapters 8 and 10.

3 Paulus, writing under Severus Alexander, first lays down the rule that only men of curial rank can hold the duumvirate or similar offices. Dig. l, 2, 7. The Lex Visellia, passed under Tiberius, disqualified freedmen from curial offices unless they had received the ius aureorum anulorum. Fiebiger, l.c., and CJ ix, 21, 1.

4 CIL ii, 1964, c. 51.

5 The first twelve titles of Book 1 of the Digest treat this subject very fully. l, 1, 1, 3–9, and 17 define origo and domicilium, legal doctrines used to fasten public burdens upon all, regardless of changes of location. l, 2, 1 enables a city to sue for the return of a fugitive decurion. l, 4, 14 provides for compulsory repetition of offices when other suitable candidates cannot be found. All of these are from the early third century.

6 Herodian vii, 3.

7 Blanchet, Enceintes romaines de la Gaule, 282–285; also plates i-iii and v, which illustrate the type of masonry used in rebuilding the lower courses of the Gallic city walls after the Military Anarchy. The British towns as a whole fared better than those of Gaul, but were themselves troubled by pirate-raids and civil wars. Aur. Victor, de Caess. xxxix, 20–21Google Scholar, also 39–43, Incerti Panegyricus Constavtio Caesari dictus (in Panegyrici Latini, ed. Baehrens, p. 244.). On the whole subject of city walls in the third and fourth centuries, see the excellent article by Wheeler, R. E. M., ‘The Roman Town-walls in Aries,’ in JRS xvi (1926), 174–193Google Scholar.

8 Eusebius, HE vii, 22Google Scholar. The number of citizens between the ages of fourteen and eighty was less than that between the ages of forty and seventy had once been. The percentages are based upon a comparison with the U.S. Census of 1930.

9 For some literary evidences of this see Incerti Panegyricus, c. 9 (in Pan. Lat. ed. Baehrens viii, pp. 237–8), also ibid., c. 21, and Aurelius Victor, de Caess. xxxix, 43Google Scholar.

10 Eumenius, , Pro Instaurandis Scholis, xviii, 1Google Scholar (in Panegyrici Latini, ed. Baehrens, p. 260).

11 Jullian, , Histoire de la Gaule, vii, 88–95Google Scholar. For Cularo and Vitodurum, CIL xii, 2229 and xiii, 5149. On Bordeaux, Blanchet, op. cit., 309.

12 Blanchet (op. cit. 337 and plates i, ii, and v) concludes that the foundations and lower courses of many of the Gallic city walls were laid during times of danger and disorder, but that the super structures were built in relatively peaceable times. This would mean that they were begun during the Military Anarchy and carried on during the reign of Diocletian.

13 CJ xi, 42, 1.

14 Eph. Ep. v, 946 = ILS 638.

15 Aurelius Victor, de Caess. xxxix, 45Google Scholar.

16 See the present writer's ‘The Public Works of Africa in the Reign of Diocletian’ in Cl. Phil. xxv (1930), 173–179Google Scholar.

17 de mort. pers. c. 7.

18 CJ x, 40, 6: ‘privilegio speciali civitatis non interveniente.’

19 Ibid. xi, 30, 4: ‘si secundum legem civitatis—.’

20 Ibid. x, 53, 5.

21 Ibid. x, 47, 1–2.

22 Ibid. x, 10, 1. This was likewise the rule under the Severi. Callistratus in Dig. xlix, 1Google Scholar.

23 As in P. Ryl. 77, in which the entrance-fee of the cosmete was the most important fact in his administration, or CPR 20, in which the whole issue revolves about the financial aspect of the office involved. See also Dig. l, 4, 8–10.

24 Particularly the decemprimatus or its equivalents, which were for the most part confined to curials.

25 CJ x, 21, 1 and x, 33, 1.

26 Ibid. vii, 16, 11 and 38, and x, 33, 2.

27 Ibid. x, 32, 2; marked ‘sine die et consule.’ but placed before rescripts of A.D. 285 in the same title.

28 Dig. l, 4, 1 and 18.

29 P. Oxy. vi, 908: ‘τοῖς ε γυμνασιά/[χαις] καὶ ἐνθηνιάρχαις.’

30 Ibid. viii, 1252.

31 Ibid. xiv, 1642.

32 CJ ix, 47, 12 and x, 32, 4. Cf. Dig. xlviii, 19, 9 and 15.

33 Ibid. x, 32, 9. Cf. Papinian in Dig. 1, 2, 6Google Scholar.

34 Dig. xxvii, 1, 6, 7.

35 Ibid. l, 5, 8, sect. 4.

36 CJ x, 42, 6: ‘professio et desiderium tuum inter se discrepant. nam cum philosophum te esse proponas, vinceris avaritiae caecitate,’ etc.

37 Ulpian in Dig. 1, 1, 1Google Scholar. Cf. CJ x, 40, 7, which cites Hadrian's ruling.

38 Ulpian in Dig. 1, 4Google Scholar, 3, and l, 5, 2. Cf. CJ x, 32, 10 and x, 51, 2–4.

39 Dig. l, 8, 4. Cf. CJ xi, 36, 4.

40 P. Lipsius 44, col. 2: ‘familiare nobis, praerogativas integras inlibatas servare, quas divorum parentorum (sic) Augg. constitutiones in suos quibusque concedunt.’

41 Dig. l, 2, 1.

42 For the whole question of the collegia, to which this study can only devote a very casual notice, see Kornemann, P-W, s.v. ‘Collegia.’

43 CTh. xiii, 5, 2–3, xiv, 3, 1 and xiv, 4, 1 may be taken as examples of Constantine's policy. xiii, 5, 2 in particular seems to presuppose earlier legislation on the same subject.

44 CJ x, 43, 2.

45 Ibid. x, 32, 13.

46 Ibid. x, 47, 1.

47 Ibid. x, 42, 6.

48 Ibid. x, 42, 7.

49 Ibid. xii, 33, 2.

50 Boak, A. E. R., ‘Early Byzantine Papyri in the Cairo Museum,’ Études de Papyrologie ii (1933), 1–22Google Scholar.