Roman municipal administration

My aim in this essay is to elucidate the meaning of the phrase collegia sodalicia, which occurs only in Digests 47.22.1 pr. (= Marcian F 73a Lenel), the introductory section of the Digests’ title De collegiis et corporibus (47.22).

In the first part of this essay, I outline some salient features of Marcian F 73a and briefly contextualize Marcian’s Institutes, the work of late Severan date from which Justinian’s compilers excerpted Digests 47.22.1 pr.-1.2.

In the second part, I demonstrate that the purported “sodalician associations” of Digests 47.22.1 pr. never existed. That phrase originated from a textual misunderstanding, which one can trace already in the Digests, if not before. I propose that Marcian wrote collegia sodaliciaue, “collegia or sodalicia”. I then segue to some of the implications my reinterpretation of Marcian F 73a holds for the study of associations in the Roman world.

The focus of Regional Urban Systems in the Roman World is on urban hierarchies and interactions in large geographical areas rather than on individual cities. Based on a painstaking examination of archaeological and epigraphic evidence relating to more than 1,000 cities, the volume offers comprehensive reconstructions of the urban systems of Roman Gaul, North Africa, Sicily, Greece and Asia Minor. In addition it examines the transformation of the settlement systems of the Iberian Peninsula and the central and northern Balkan following the imposition of Roman rule. Throughout the volume regional urban configurations are examined from a rich variety of perspectives, ranging from climate and landscape, administration and politics, economic interactions and social relationships all the way to region-specific ways of shaping the townscapes of individual cities.

ENGLISH: The exact location of Berua – a town recorded by Pliny the Elder among the Raetica oppida in the Regio X – and the tribe in which its inhabitants – the Beruenses – were enrolled are still unknown. In section 1, the paper provides an overview of the available sources concerning Berua and the Beruenses. In section 2, all previous hypotheses of identifying the town and its inhabitants’ tribe are discussed. In section 3, a new interpretation, which suggests to identify the tribe of the Beruenses with the Scaptia tribus and Berua with the modern Italian town of Montebelluna (Treviso), is proposed. ITALIAN: La localizzazione del centro dei Beruenses, citato da Plinio il Vecchio tra i Raetica oppida della decima regio e verosimilmente identificabile con la città nota da alcune fonti epigrafiche con il toponimo Berua, rappresenta a tutt’oggi una vexata quaestio. Altrettanto dibattuto dagli studiosi moderni – e ugualmente irrisolto – è il problema relativo all’ascrizione tribale dei suoi abitanti. Lo studio intende formulare una nuova ipotesi interpretativa che non ha affatto la pretesa di risolvere una questione così annosa e complessa, quanto piuttosto la precisa volontà di aggiungere altri dati alla discussione, nella speranza che futuri rinvenimenti archeologici possano contribuire alla risoluzione di un problema, il cui interesse scientifico travalica la storia locale. Nel primo paragrafo viene offerta una panoramica delle esigue fonti a disposizione su Berua e i Beruenses, mentre nel secondo sono presentate e discusse criticamente le ipotesi finora avanzate circa la localizzazione del centro e l’identificazione della tribù prevalente dei suoi abitanti. Nel terzo e ultimo paragrafo, alla luce di quanto esposto nei precedenti, viene avanzata la nuova proposta, che suggerisce di individuare nella Scaptia la tribù dei Beruenses e in Montebelluna (Treviso) il centro di Berua.

This monograph surveys the advances in scholarship made in the quarter-century since the publication of the author's The Local Magistrates of Roman Spain (1990). It includes extensive revisions to the Catalogue of Magistrates, and entries for more than 200 new magistrates, based on epigraphic and numismatic discoveries. There is a full bibliography, and an index nominum of the new magistrates.

Since the late 1970s, historians have questioned the links between the classical city and the Christian city. Some consider the Christian city as a creation of the late Roman era. Others, on the contrary, defend the thesis of the permanence of the urban fact but take for original the nature and functions of the late-ancient city. There is no doubt that urban life after the 4th century is very different from that of the Roman Empire because of the dominant position occupied by the Church, the new nature of the institutions, and the social composition of the urban population. Yet, the city of the Early Christian era often occupied the same site as the city of the classic period. The African example shows that the late-Antic city remained largely dependent on an urban fabric established in the classical era, despite the many changes that marked Africa from the 5th century onward.

The primary sources for this book were epigraphic monuments and accounts of Graeco-Roman authors. The focus was on the monuments mentioning provincial and local officials (provincial governors, military prefects, praepositi, principes, decurions, duumviri, aediles, quaestors, mining procurators, etc.). Moreover, this thesis also analyses the inscriptions mentioning the names of indigenous communities, Roman municipia, and colonies. Such methodology facilitated the study of administrative units that are unknown from written records such as municipium Faustinianum or the mining district of northwestern Bosnia. The book is accordingly structured in such a way that each thematic unit is followed by a catalogue of epigraphic monuments.

Slavery played a crucial economic and social role in the Roman history. Unfree individuals were employed to perform a wide range of duties in both the domestic environment and the public sphere. Along with the large population of private slaves who were owned by individual masters, and the smaller but influential group of Imperial slaves who were property of the emperors, there was another category of slaves: the so-called 'public slaves' (servi publici). They were unfree individuals, owned by a community rather than a single master.

Based on primary evidence, Franco Luciani aims to provide a comprehensive study of public slavery in the Roman world. By focusing on the use of public slaves in both Rome and in other cities of the Western Empire, as well as on the development of public slavery from the Middle Republic to Late Antiquity, Luciani attempts to define public slavery and to explore the historical significance of public slavery across time. He also analyses the role played by public slaves in the life of the community they belonged to. Specific attention is then drawn to manumission of public slaves and the legal status of freed public slaves. Finally, Luciani addresses the issue of the position of public slaves in Roman society.

Prendendo le mosse dal paragrafo 72 della cosiddetta Lex Irnitana, nel quale è riportata la prassi giuridica necessaria alla manomissione di uno schiavo pubblico, l’articolo intende esaminare le relazioni che si instauravano tra i liberti publici e i loro patroni, vale a dire le città. In particolare, attraverso una serie di fonti epigrafiche, giuridiche e letterarie, la ricerca offre una panoramica sugli obblighi ai quali erano sottoposti gli ex schiavi pubblici nei confronti delle città, quali per esempio le operae e obsequium. Infine, particolare attenzione sarà rivolta alle testimonianze di atti evergetici promossi da schiavi e liberti pubblici a favore della collettività.

Sample (first page) of an article published in: Cuadernos de Estudios Gallegos (Instituto de Estudios Gallegos Padre Sarmiento), 64/130 (2017), pp. 15-48. Please download here the complete file: http://estudiosgallegos.revistas.csic.es/index.php/estudiosgallegos/article/view/412/419

Language: Galician. Abstracts in Galician, Spanish and English

ABSTRACT: "Changes and continuIty of the municipium in late Roman Gallaecia (3rd-5th centuries)". This paper examines the evolution of local organizative framework of Gallaecia between the 3rd and 5th centuries, determining certain transformations of the municipium settled since the previous centuries and contextualizing them in the analogous evolution of the contemporary West. Finally it is stressed the apparent post-roman permanence of the basic structure of this organizative regime.

CONTENTS: Persistencia do municipium na Gallaecia baixo-imperial — O réxime municipal galaico-romano — Historiografía do municipium baixo-imperial: crise ou transformación? — Os comprometedores condicionantes estruturais — Fundus e patrocinium — Cargos imperiais no municipium: un curator en Asadur? — Implicación fiscal das curias: o moio de Ponte Puñide — O municipium sen o Estado: a irrupción bárbara — Liderados e representacións circunstanciais — As plebes galaicas na terminoloxía hidaciana — A ineludíbel remanencia estrutural do municipium — Conclusións.

UPDATE: Several mentions of dekaprotoi already known at the time of publication had not been included in the catalogue, e.g.:
- Metodi Manov, Selishtniyat zhivot v dolinata na Sredna Struma spored antichnite epigrafski pametnitsi ot IV/III v. pr. Hr. - III v. sl. Hr., Sofia, 2008 (= Razkopki i prouchvaniya / Fouilles et recherches, vol. 38), 127–128 Nr. 170 from Ilindentsi, ancient Neine, not Sandanski (Parthicopolis), as stated in ed. pr. (vgl. AE 2012, 1295) (pointed out to me by N. Sharankov).
- A. Sideris, A Dekaprotos in Antikyra of Phokis, in: Festschrift Pavel Oliva. Eirene 49, 2013, p. 54-74; cf. D. Rossset, CRAI 2012, 1673–1674 Nr. 3 (= SEG 62,310).
- Nr. 4 of the catalogue is a forgery and should be excluded.
- A new inscription from Iulia Gordos published by H. Malay – M. Ricl, EA 45, 2012, 80–86 Nr. 2 (= SEG 62,918) and dated to 69/70 A.D. has proved my theories about the chronology of introduction of the dekaprotoi wrong.

Die Dekaproten, die für die Einhebung römischer Steuern verantwortlich waren, erscheinen in griechischen Städten ab dem späten 1. Jh. Der Artikel befasst sich in erster Linie mit der Frage nach der Entstehung und der Verbreitung dieses Amtes, die wahrscheinlich auf Anregung römischer Behörden geschah. Die Dekaprotie ist in den verschiedenen Städten und Provinzen des Reiches sehr unterschiedlich gut belegt und die konkrete Ausgestaltung des Amtes scheint lokalen und regionalen Besonderheiten unterworfen gewesen zu sein. In Kleinasien lässt sich vor allem in Lykien eine frühe und wohl flächendeckende Einführung des Amtes zeigen, möglicherweise gleichzeitig mit der Provinzgründung, während das Amt in anderen Regionen vielleicht erst später eingeführt wurde und nicht überall die gleiche Bedeutung erlangte.

In communities of Latium adiectum the phenomenon of local curae manifests in less marginal form than in other regions. The curae documented here relate to: aedes publicae, annona, aquae, arca decurionum, lusus iuvenum, munuis gladiatorium publicum, pecunia annonaria, pecunia legata and viae. In the attachment it is proposed the epigraphic dossier.

La legitimidad es un espacio político en continua construcción. Sin embargo, el respeto al legado augústeo y la explotación de su recuerdo, en aras de proyectar una imagen de continuidad con la casa imperial precedente, son constantes en la actuación política de Vespasiano y sus hijos. El propósito del presente trabajo es analizar el papel de de los símbolos y referentes ideológicos augústeos en la construcción y consolidación del Principado flavio a través de su reflejo en la documentación hispana. En particular, a través del estudio de un conjunto de inscripciones procedentes de la Bética, fechadas entre el reinado de Vespasiano y Domiciano, dedicadas a los miembros de la familia imperial y a divinidades asociadas a ellas, como Venus y Apolo.
    Un aspecto sumamente interesante es el perfil de los dedicantes: exmagistrados que elevan su agradecimiento a los emperadores flavios por la obtención de la ciudadanía romana en el marco del nuevo ordenamiento institucional. Por tanto, el análisis de estas dedicatorias constituye una excelente oportunidad para evaluar la recepción por parte de estas oligarquías municipales de la propaganda oficial flavia. A su vez, nos permitirá reflexionar cómo la difusión de estos modelos imperiales, y en particular aquellos orientados a la exaltación dinástica, influyen en el comportamiento y la proyección pública de estas élites sociales.

Book chapter. Corona Encinas, Á. “Apuntes sobre la fundamentación política de las reformas justinianeas ante la crisis de las estructuras administrativas protobizantinas”, in Pérez González, J. & Bermúdez Lorenzo, J.M. (eds.). The Romans before adversity. Forms of reaction and strategies to manage change. Rome: Aracne, 2021, pp. 265-278

This article deals with the main Roman municipal magistracy, the duovirate, by analyzing its tasks as well as its relations with the local society. First it raises the singular characteristics of such function, the factors that gave special prestige to it, and its importance within the cursus honorum. Next it approaches the relations of the duovirs with the others magistrates (aediles and quaestores) and their assistants (apparitores), as well as their responsibilities concerning the municipal senate. In a second part it analyzes the main tasks of the duovirate: the management of the municipal finances, the supervision of the public works, the direction of the comitia and the religious ceremonies, among others, as well as the official control of all these activities. Finally the public image of the duovirs is considered from two perspectives: their public liberalities and the official tributes paid to them.

Previous studies of the status of local magistrates in the Late Empire are unsatisfying and fail to explain when and why local magistracies ended. With the aid of legal, epigraphic, papyrological and literary sources, the author re-examines the functions and chronology of both regular and quasi-magistrates, among them the curator, defensor and pater civitatis.  He finds that the expense of office-holding was only part of the reason for the extinction of regular magistracies. More critical was the failure of local magistrates to control finances and protect the plebeians.