334 tribute or the chronology of the middle ages, was derived from the regular The general practice of the Roman tributes. The emperor subindiction. scribed with his own hand, and in purple ink, the solemn edict, or indiction, which was fixed up in the principal city of each diocese during two months previous to the first day of September. And, by a very easy connection of ideas, the word indiction was transferred to the measure of tribute which it prescribed, and to the annual term which it allowed for the payment. This general estimate of the supplies was proportioned to the real and imaginary wants of the state; but as often as the expense exceeded the revenue, or the revenue fell short of the computation, an additional tax, under the name of superindiction, was imposed on the people, and the most valuable attribute of sovereignty was communicated to the Prætorian præfects, who, on some occasions, were permitted to provide for the unforeseen and extraordinary exigencies of the public service. The execution of these laws (which it would be tedious to pursue in their minute and intricate detail) consisted of two distinct operations: the resolving the general imposition into its constituent parts, which were assessed on the provinces, the cities, and the individuals of the Roman world; and the collecting the separate contributions of the individuals, the cities, and the provinces, till the accumulated sums were poured into the Imperial treasuries. But as the account between the monarch and the subject was perpetually open, and as the renewal of the demand anticipated the perfect discharge of the preceding obligation, the weighty machine of the finances was moved by the same hands round the circle of its yearly revolution. Whatever was honourable or important in the administration of the revenue was committed to the wisdom of the præfects and their provincial representatives; the lucrative functions were claimed by a crowd of subordinate officers, some of whom depended on the treasurer, others on the governor of the province; and who, in the inevitable conflicts of a perplexed jurisdiction, had frequent opportunities of disputing with each other the spoils of the people. The laborious offices, which 171 The first twenty-eight titles of the eleventh book of the Theodosian Code are filled with the circumstantial regulations on the important subject of tributes; but they suppose a clearer knowledge of fundamental principles than it is at present in our power to attain. years, is called an indiction. Thus, when the seventh indiction occurs in a document, this document belongs to the seventh year of one of those periods of fifteen years, but to which of them is uncertain. This continued to be the usage of the word till the twelfth century, when it became the practice to call the period of fifteen years the indiction, and to reckon from the birth of Christ the number of indictions, that is, periods of fifteen years. An event was then said to take place in a particular year of a particular indiction; for example, Indictionis LXXIX., anno V. Savigny, Ueber die Römische Steuerverfassung, in Vermischte Schriften, vol. ii. p. 130.-S. 173 could be productive only of envy and reproach, of expense and danger, were imposed on the Decurions, who formed the corporations of the cities, and whom the severity of the Imperial laws had condemned to sustain the burthens of civil society.12 The whole landed property of the empire (without excepting the patrimonial estates of the monarch) was the object of ordinary taxation; and every new purchaser contracted the obligations of the former proprietor. An accurate census,' or survey, was the only equitable mode of ascertaining the proportion which every citizen should be obliged to contribute for the public service; and from the well-known period of the indictions, there is reason to believe that this difficult and expensive operation was repeated at the regular distance of fifteen years. The lands were measured by surveyors, who were sent into the provinces ; their nature, whether arable or pasture, or vineyards or woods, was distinctly reported; and an estimate was made of their common value from the average produce of five years. The numbers of slaves and of cattle constituted an essential part of the report; an oath was administered to the proprietors which bound them to disclose the true state of their affairs; and their attempts to prevaricate, or elude the intention of the legislator, were severely watched, and punished as a capital crime, which included the double guilt of treason and sacrilege. 174 A large portion of the tribute was paid in money; and of the current coin of the empire, gold alone could be legally 173 The title concerning the Decurions (1. xii. tit. i.) is the most ample in the whole Theodosian Code; since it contains not less than one hundred and ninety-two distinct laws to ascertain the duties and privileges of that useful order of citizens." 173 Habemus enim et hominum numerum qui delati sunt, et agrorum modum. Eumenius in Panegyr. Vet. viii. [vii.] 6. See Cod. Theod. 1. xiii. tit. x. xi. with Godefroy's Commentary. 174 Siquis sacrilegâ vitem falce succiderit; aut feracium ramorum fœtus hebetaverit, quo declinet fidem Censuum, et mentiatur callide paupertatis ingenium, mox detectus capitale subibit exitium, et bona ejus in Fisci jura migrabunt. Cod. Theod. 1. xiii. tit. xi. leg. 1. Although this law is not without its studied obscurity, it is, however, clear enough to prove the minuteness of the inquisition, and the disproportion of the penalty. The Decuriones, also called Curiales, were the members of the senate in the municipal towns. This senate was called Ordo Decurionum, subsequently Ordo simply, and sometimes also Curia. In the times of the republic admission into the Ordo Decurionum was considered an honour; but under the despotism of the empire the position of the Decurions was most lamentable, as we see from the Theodosian Code. The plebeians carefully avoided this dangerous distinction, and the Decurions themselves sought to escape from it in every possible way. Many became soldiers and even slaves in order to con ceal themselves, but they were sought after and dragged back to the Curia. Their miserable condition arose from the oppression of the government. For the Decurions had not simply to collect the taxes, but they were responsible for their colleagues; they had to take up the lands abandoned by the proprietors on account of the intolerable weight of taxes attached to them; and they had finally to make up all deficiencies in the taxes out of their own private resources. Savigny, Geschichte des Römischen Rechts, vol. i. p. 40, seq., 2nd ed.-S. 336 THE INDICTION. CHAP. XVII. accepted. 175 The remainder of the taxes, according to the proportions determined by the annual indiction, was furnished in a manner, still more direct, and still more oppressive. According to the different nature of lands, their real produce in the various articles of wine or oil, corn or barley, wood or iron, was transported by the labour or at the expense of the provincials to the Imperial magazines, from whence they were occasionally distributed, for the use of the court, of the army, and of the two capitals, Rome and Constantinople. The commissioners of the revenue were so frequently obliged to make considerable purchases, that they were strictly prohibited from allowing any compensation, or from receiving in money the value of those supplies which were exacted in kind. In the primitive simplicity of small communities this method may be well adapted to collect the almost voluntary offerings of the people; but it is at once susceptible of the utmost latitude and of the utmost strictness, which in a corrupt and absolute monarchy must introduce a perpetual contest between the power of oppression and the arts of fraud.176 The agriculture of the Roman provinces was insensibly ruined, and, in the progress of despotism, which tends to disappoint its own purpose, the emperors were obliged to derive some merit from the forgiveness of debts, or the remission of tributes, which their subjects were utterly incapable of paying. According to the new division of Italy, the fertile and happy province of Campania, the scene of the early victories and of the delicious retirements of the citizens of Rome, extended between the sea and the Apennine from the Tiber to the Silarus. Within sixty years after the death of Constantine, and on the evidence of an actual survey, an exemption was granted in favour of three hundred and thirty thousand English acres of desert and uncultivated land, which amounted to one-eighth of the whole surface of the province. As the footsteps of the barbarians had not yet been seen in Italy, the cause of this amazing desolation, which is recorded in the laws, can be ascribed only to the administration of the Roman emperors. 177 175 The astonishment of Pliny would have ceased. Equidem miror P. R. victis gentibus [in tributo] semper argentum imperitasse, non aurum. Hist. Natur. xxxiii, 15. 176 Some precautions were taken (see Cod. Theod. 1. xi. tit. ii. and Cod. Justinian. 1. x. tit. xxvii. leg. 1, 2, 3) to restrain the magistrates from the abuse of their authority, either in the exaction or in the purchase of corn: but those who had learning enough to read the orations of Cicero against Verres (iii. de Frumento) might instruct themselves in all the various arts of oppression, with regard to the weight, the price, the quality, and the carriage. The avarice of an unlettered governor would supply the ignorance of precept or precedent. 177 Cod. Theod. 1. xi. tit. xxviii. leg. 2, published the 24th of March, A.D. 395, by the emperor Honorius, only two months after the death of his father Theodosius. He speaks of 528,042 Roman jugera, which I have reduced to the English measure. The jugerum contained 28,800 square Roman feet. Either from design or from accident, the mode of assessment seemed to unite the substance of a land-tax with the forms Assessed in a capitation. of a capitation.178a The returns which were sent of every the form of province or district expressed the number of tributary subjects, and the amount of the public impositions. The latter of these sums was divided by the former; and the estimate, that such a province contained so many capita, or heads of tribute, and that each head was rated at such a price, was universally received, not 178 Godefroy (Cod. Theod. tom. v. p. 116 [1. xiv. tit. x. leg. 2]) argues with weight and learning on the subject of the capitation; but while he explains the caput as a share or measure of property, he too absolutely excludes the idea of a personal assessment. a Gibbon and most other writers have fallen into error respecting the finances of this period of the empire, by supposing that the word capitatio had only one signification. Savigny, however, in his masterly dissertation on the finances of the empire, has shown that capitatio signified both a land-tax and a poll-tax, which were the two principal taxes at this period. I. The Land-tax.-For the purposes of the land-tax the whole land of the empire was measured and divided into a certain number of pieces, each of which had to pay the same sum of money as a tax. Such a piece of land was called caput, sometimes jugum, whence the tax was named capitatio and sometimes jugatio. Since each caput was of the same value, and paid the same tax, its size must of course have varied according to the nature of the land composing it. It appears from an edict of Majorian that the assessed value of the capital of each caput was 1000 solidi, or 500. (see note on p. 328), but whether this was its real value or not may be doubted: probably its real value was greater than its assessed value. (Nov. Majoriani in the Berlin ed. of the Jus Civ. Antejust. Nov. xcii. § 16.) The nature of the census or general register of the land of the empire is described at length by Ulpian (Dig. 50, tit. 15, 1. 4). In the middle ages the registers were called capitastra, because they contained lists of the capita. Hence the word catastrum, which continues in use on the continent down to the present day. There was a periodical revision of the census, in the time of Ulpian every ten years, and at a later period every fifteen years. For each financial year, which commenced on the 1st of September, the whole amount of the land-tax was fixed, and was then divided among the capita. The payment had to be made in three instalments-on the 1st of January, the 1st of May, and VOL. II. the 1st of September. The tribute appointed for each year was called indictio, a term which also came to be applied to the financial year. (See preceding note, p. 333.) 1. II. The Poll-tar.-The poll-tax was called sometimes simply capitatio, sometimes humana capitatio, capitalis illatio, and capitatio plebeia. The amount of this tax is unknown. Every person in the empire was liable to pay it, with the exception of the following classes. All persons who paid the land-tax were exempt from the poll-tax. Consequently the poll-tax was a kind of supplement to the land-tax, and was intended as a direct tax upon those persons who would otherwise have escaped direct taxation, because they possessed no landed property. 2. All persons above the rank of plebeians were also exempt. The expression plebeia capitatio shows that it was a peculiar burthen of the plebeians; but if the latter possessed property in land, it follows from the preceding exemption that they did not pay the poll-tax as well as the land-tax. Consequently the classes from whom the poll-tax was chiefly levied were1. The free inhabitants of towns, who possessed neither rank nor landed property. 2. The Coloni in the country. 3. The slaves. But by an edict of Diocletian, which, though repealed by Galerius, was renewed by Licinius, the plebs urbana and their slaves were exempt, so that the tax henceforth fell exclusively upon the Coloni and agricultural slaves. proprietor of the land had to pay the tax for the Coloni upon his estate, from whom he recovered it. In like manner, the owners of slaves had to pay the tax upon their slaves; but as the latter had no property, the tax was in reality a tax upon the masters. Savigny, ut supra, vol. ii. p. 67, foll.-S. The 338 THE CAPITATION. CHAP. XVII. only in the popular, but even in the legal computation. The value of a tributary head must have varied, according to many accidental, or at least fluctuating circumstances: but some knowledge has been preserved of a very curious fact, the more important since it relates to one of the richest provinces of the Roman empire, and which now flourishes as the most splendid of the European kingdoms. The rapacious ministers of Constantius had exhausted the wealth of Gaul, by exacting twenty-five pieces of gold for the annual tribute of every head. The humane policy of his successor reduced the capitation to seven pieces.179 A moderate proportion between these opposite extremes of extraordinary oppression and of transient indulgence may therefore be fixed at sixteen pieces of gold, or about nine pounds sterling, the common standard, perhaps, of the impositions of Gaul,180 But this calculation, or rather indeed the facts from whence it is deduced, cannot fail of suggesting two difficulties to a thinking mind, who will be at once surprised by the equality and by the enormity of the capitation. An attempt to explain them may perhaps reflect some light on the interesting subject of the finances of the declining empire. I. It is obvious that, as long as the immutable constitution of human nature produces and maintains so unequal a division of property, the most numerous part of the community would be deprived of their subsistence by the equal assessment of a tax from which the sovereign would derive a very trifling revenue. Such, indeed, might be the theory of the Roman capitation; but, in the practice, this 179 Quid profuerit (Julianus) anhelantibus extremâ penuriâ Gallis, hinc maxime claret, quod primitus partes eas ingressus, pro capitibus singulis tributi nomine vicenos quinos aureos reperit flagitari: discedens vero septenos tantum, munera universa complentes. Ammian. 1. xvi. c. 5. 180 In the calculation of any sum of money under Constantine and his successors, we need only refer to the excellent discourse of Mr. Greaves on the Denarius for the proof of the following principles: 1. That the ancient and modern Roman pound, containing 5256 grains of Troy weight, is about one-twelfth lighter than the English pound, which is composed of 5760 of the same grains. 2. That the pound of gold, which had once been divided into forty-eight aurei, was at this time coined into seventytwo smaller pieces of the same denomination. 3. That five of these aurei were the legal tender for a pound of silver, and that consequently the pound of gold was exchanged for fourteen pounds eight ounces of silver, according to the Roman, or about thirteen pounds according to the English weight. 4. That the English pound of silver is coined into sixty-two shillings. From these elements we may compute the Roman pound of gold, the usual method of reckoning large sums, at forty pounds sterling, and we may fix the currency of the aureus at somewhat more than eleven shillings." a According to Savigny's calculations, the aureus in the time of Constantine was equal to three thalers eight groschen (Saxon), that is ten shillings English. After the preceding note, it need hardly be observed that the capita in Gaul were not "heads of tribute," but pieces of land. Each piece of land had to pay before Julian's administration twenty-five aurei, or 127. 10s., which he reduced to seven aurei, or 31. 10s. Properly these sums should be somewhat less in English money, since the relation of silver to gold in Constantine's time was 1 to 143, while the difference at present is somewhat greater. Savigny, ut supra, vol. ii. p. 144.-S. |