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A Roman Postal Service under the Republic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

A. M. Ramsay
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Extract

Modern writers have remarked with surprise upon the absence of a postal service under the Roman Republic. The fact that Latin literature makes no mention of any such service would not, taken alone, be sufficient to prove that it did not exist; but Suetonius in his account of the institution of the Imperial post by Augustus speaks as if it were a new departure in the history of Roman administration, and it is clear from many incidental references in Cicero's correspondence that in his time there was no government postal service which an official could make use of. A provincial governor sent his despatches by one of his own lictors or orderlies (statores) or by the tabellarii of the tax-farming companies, there being no other means of transmission available. “Your orderly has brought me two letters from you,” writes Cicero, then governor of Cilicia, to Sallustius, proquaestor of Syria. “I have thought it advisable to send my orderlies and lictors to you with despatches,” he writes about the same time to his own quaestor.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 10 , November 1920 , pp. 79 - 86
Copyright
Copyright © A. M. Ramsay 1920. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

page 79 note 1 Cf. Mommsen, R. Staatsrecht, 3rd ed. ii, 1029. Marquardt, R. Staatsverwaltung, i, 2, p. 560. Hudemann, R. Postwesen, pp. 11–12.

page 79 note 2 Div. Aug. c. 49.

page 79 note 3 The stator was at this time one of the attendants of important provincial officials. Cf. Tyrrell and Purser, note on Cic, . ad Fam. ii, 17, 1Google Scholar.

page 79 note 4 ad Fam. ii, 17.

page 79 note 5 ad Fam. ii, 19.

page 79 note 6 ad Fam. x, 21.

page 80 note 1 Caes., Bell. Civ. iii, 101Google Scholar, nuntii de Caesaris victoria per dispositos equites allati.

page 80 note 2 Auct. de bell. Hisp. 2, tabellarios, qui a Cn. Pompeio dispositi omnibus locis essent, quo certiorem Cn. Pompeium de Caesaris adventu facerent.

page 80 note 3 Hudemann, op. cit. p. 12.

page 80 note 4 Hdt. viii, 98; Xen, . Cyrop. viii, 6, 17Google Scholar.

page 80 note 5 Livy, xxvii, 43.

page 81 note 1 Strabo, v, 4, 13, p. 251, ἀντὶ δὲ στρατέιας ἡμεροδρομεῖν καὶ γραμματαϕορεῖν ἀπεδέιχθησαν (i.e. the people of Salernum) ἐν τῷ τότε δημοσίᾳ, καθάπερ καὶ Λευκανοὶ καὶ Βρέττιοι κατὰ τὰς αὐτὰς αἰτίας. Gell. 10, 13, 9, Postquam Hannibal Italia decessit superatique Poeni sunt, Bruttios ignominiae causa non milites scribebant … sed magistratibus in provincias euntibus parere et praeministrare servorum vicem iusserunt.

page 81 note 2 C.I.L. i, 551 = Dessau, 23.

page 82 note 1 Sitzungsber. der k. pr. akad. der Wissenschaften, 1907, ix.

page 82 note 2 More than a hundred milestones bearing inscriptions, set up by M'. Aquillius in the Roman province of Asia in 133, have been found.

page 83 note 1 In Daremberg and Saglio, Diet. des Ant. s.v. Cursus Publicus.

page 83 note 2 Augustus und seine Zeit, ii, p. 601.

page 86 note 1 Div. Aug. c. 49.

page 86 note 2 Mitteil. des k. d. Arch. Instituts, 1911, Bd. xxvi.