¹ See Jones, A. H. M., The Cities of the Eastern Roman Provinces (Oxford 1937) 339f. Google Scholar

² Preisigke, , P. Strassi ), p. 89, thinks that the land tax had to be paid by the lessee and that the usual form (τν τς γς δημοσίων πάντων ὄντων πρòς σὲ τòν γεoχov) was intended to derogate to the opposite principle laid down by the law. Piganiol, , L'impôt de capitation sous le Bas-Empire romain (Paris 1916) agrees with Preisigke on the basis of an incorrect interpretation of Dig. 50 15, 4. The contrary is true. The tax was always paid by the landowner (see Waszyńsky, , Die Bodenpacht [Leipzig 1905] 115ff.). See, e.g., P.Amh. 106 (282), where the landowner assumes the δημόσια πάντα and the ἐπιµερισμοί; CPR 44, where he pays δημόσια πάντα, ἐπιβολή, ἀννώναι, ἐπιμερισμοὶ πάντες; BGU 519, where he pays δημόσια, άννώναι, ἐπιβλαί ἐργασία τν χωμάτων. The principle that the landowner pays the land tax is laid down in Nov. 128 (530), Μηδεὶς δὲ τὸ σύνoλον ἐvοχλείσθω ὑπὲρ συντελείας γηδίωv ἂπερ οὐ κἑκτηται, ἀλλὰ καὶ εἰ συμβαίη γεωργoύς τινι προσήκοντος ἢ ἐπαναπογράφονς ἰδίαν ἒχειν κτσιν and in Cassiod. Variae 4,14, ‘is solvat tributum qui possessionis noscitur habere compendium.’ Google Scholar

³ Boak, , P. Cairo 57374 = Étud . Papyr. 3, 24 no. 12 = Pr.SB 7673 (309 A.D.): Aurelius Isidoros, 40 years old, registers himself as ὑποτελής and his son Πεηoς, 3 years old, as ἀτελής. The census reckons (line 15f.) the figures of the ὑποτελεȋς and of the άτελεȋς in each family. Probably plebei rustici 12 years old were already ὑποτελεȋς. In Syria under Elagabalus, boys of 14 and girls of 12 were liable to the tributum capitis (Dig. 50, 15, 2). The Syrian ἐπικεφάλαιον of the Roman age, however, was not connected with the tributum capitis of the plebs rustica under Diocletian. It seems, however, that some provinces in the early Byzantine age assessed a tributum capitis on women as well as on men. It may be that the Syrian capitatio was a munus mixtum assessed on properties (now landed properties) and on persons.Google Scholar

⁴ The word tributarius has been often misunderstood, see e.g. Piganiol, , op. cit. 66. It means tax payer. In some texts, tributarius is certainly a rusticus who paid his own capitatio, as in Cod. 11, 52, 1, (Theodosius Arcadius and Honorius): ‘Per universam dioecesim Thraciarum sublato in perpetuum humanae capitationis censu iugatio tantum terrena solvatur. Et ne forte colonis tributariae sortis nexibus absolutis vagandi et quo libuerit recedendi facultas permissa videatur, ipsi quidem … servi tamen terrae ipsius cui nati sunt aestimentur nec recedendi quo velint aut permutandi loca habeant facultatem, sed possessor eorum iure utatur et patroni sollicitudine et domini potestate.’—‘ϒπoτελής, tributarius, as will be shown later, is undoubtedly connected with the tributum paid by the possessor of an ager tributarius. Although the coloni tributarli in Cod. 11, 52, 1, appear to have been sub patrocinio, the ὑποτέλής essentially is a peasant who pays the τέλoς, i.e., the tributum to the Treasury. In Salvian. De gubernatione dei 5, 8, 35, tributarius means taxpayer. In the Ptolemaic age, ὑποτελεȋς were the royal cultivators and the workers of the royal manufactures (see Wilcken, , Grundzüge 226ff. and 276). In Egypt, after the Arabic conquest people without land were assessed as ἀτελεȋς with the head tax and even the ἐμβoλή (see Wilcken, , Grundzüge 235).Google Scholar

⁵ Gelzer, , Studien zur byzantinischen Verwaltung Aegyptens (Leipz. Hist. Abh. 13, 1909) 64ff. Google Scholar

⁶ In 314 there existed probably no more δημόσιοι γεωργoί as supposed by Vitelli, , P. Flor. 54, p. 97 and Gelzer 65 (but only δημόσια γ : see Preisigke, , Wtb. s.v. δημόσιος. Google Scholar

⁷ κοινόν of πρωτοκομήται, σνντελεσταί and κτήτορες. See Wilcken, , Grundzüge 84 and P.Cairo 67001 (514), 67105 (302), where Aurelius Paulus, a συντελϵστής of the κοινόν of Aphrodito became a lessee of a piece of land in the village of Φθλά belonging to the κοινόν of Aphrodito. See also Steinwenter, , Stud.Pal. 19, 46; P.Oxy. 19, 1835 (late 5th or 6th cent.) n. 12, p. 16f. The protocometae are the principal landowners and the officials of the village.Google Scholar

⁸ Nexus tributariae sortis refers to the capitatio. The tributarius is mentioned as paying a capitatio in Cod.Th. 7, 4, 32 (412): ‘nam cum adaerationis aestimatio prius per centum et viginti capita exactione solidi teneretur, per sexaginta recens redegit aviditas exindeque iam nutrita licentia ad tredecim tributarios non dubitavit artare.’ Google Scholar

⁹ See Lot, L'impôt fonçier et la capitation personnelle sous le Bas-Empire (Paris 1928) 75.Google Scholar

¹⁰ The possible confusion between tributarius in the sense of the peasant who pays the land tax, and tributarius as connoting the colonus who paid a rent, was caused by the confusion existing between land tax and rent. Long leases on public land were sometimes called leases and sometimes sales (see Segrè, A., An Essay on the Nature of Real Property [New York 1943] 119ff.). Vectigal means land tax but also the rent paid by the agri vectigales, and the payment for the recognition of the agri vedigales as property of the Roman people. The land tax was farmed by the contractors, mancipes; the rental was paid by the coloni who rented the agri vedigales from the mancipes. Google Scholar

¹¹ Metrocomiae did not exist in Egypt. de Zulueta, F., De patrocinio vicorum (Oxford Studies in Social and Legal History ed. Vinogradoff, 1, Oxford 1909) 22ff. supposes that the expression, metrocomiae communi vocabulo, in Cod. 11, 56, 1 (468) is an unofficial term applied to a special type of Egyptian village. But no Egyptian metrocomiae have ever been found. See also Gelzer, , Studien 78; Lewald, , Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung 32 (1911) 478; Kornemann, PWK Suppl. 4, 978, s.v. κώμη; Hoelscher, PWK s.v. ‘Metrocomia’. For the metrocomiae in Syria, see Schürer, , Geschichte des jüdischen Volkes II, 228f.; A. Η. Jones, M., op. cit. 294. The arurae mentioned in Cod.Th. 11, 24, 6 are Syrian arurae. The officials mentioned have the same names as Egyptian officials; cephaleotae = κεφαλαιωτής (see Pr. Wtb. III, 125) irenarchae = εἰρηνάρχης, εἰρηνάρχος (Pr. Wtb. III, 110) associated with cephaleotae; see also Rouillard, , L'administration de l'Égypte byzantine (2nd ed. Paris 1928) 156 n. 3. Λαογράψοι χωμάτων are not registered s.v. Λαογράφοι in Pr. Wtb. III, 133.Google Scholar

¹² In Egypt, homologus means usually ὁμόλογος λαογραφίας, i.e., an Egyptian who did not object to his classification as λαογραφούμενος (see Pr. Wtb. III, 275).Google Scholar

¹³ Cod. Th. 11, 24, 6, 3 (415): ‘Ii sane qui vicis quibus adscripti sunt derelictis et qui homologi more gentilicio nuncupantur, ad alios seu vicos seu dominos transierunt, ad sedem desolati ruris constrictis detentatoribus redire cogantur, qui si exsequenda protraxerint, ad functiones eorum teneantur obnoxii et dominis restituant, quae pro his exsoluta constiterit.’ According to Zulueta, , De patrociniis vicorum 57 and 65, the homologus was a small possessor; while Gelzer, , Studien 76, refers to Salvianus, , De gubernatione dei 5, §38, ‘tradunt (clientes) se ad tuendum protegendumque maioribus, dediticios se divitum faciunt et quasi in ius eorum dicionemque transcendunt’ (cf. also Lewald loc. cit 478). The homologus was a cliens. But Cod. Th. 11, 24, 6 speaks of coloni vicis adscripti who escape from their villages and their domini to other villages and domini. In Palestine, as distinct from other regions, coloni were not attached to the soil before the provision of Cod. 11, 51, 1 (383–92). See Gelzer, , Studien 71.Google Scholar

¹⁴ See Segrè, , Rend. Acc. Pont. 16 (1940) 188.Google Scholar

¹⁵ As e.g., the peasants in the famous inscription of Laodicea in OGI 225 = Welles, , Royal Correspondence in the Hellenistic Period (New Haven 1934) 36; see Bikerman, , Institutions des Séleucides (1930) 177f. More gentilicio in Cod.Th. 11, 24, 6 means that the peasants were homologi at least since the Roman period.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Rostovtzeff, , Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire (Oxford 1926) 245 and 566 n. 23.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Rostovtzeff, , ibid. points to the evidence of Iulianus, Misop. 362c. These rich landowners in addition to μυρίους κλήρους γς ἰδίας κεκτημένη took further 3700 κλήροι σποροι, probably as emphyteutic land. Julian speaks repeatedly of the landowners, members of the Antiochean Senate, who opposed the measure taken by him to establish normal prices for products of first necessity (Misop. 350), cf. Bouchier, E. S., Syria as a Roman Province (Oxford 1916) 63, and Short History of Antioch (Oxford 1921) 152.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Rostovtzeff, , ibid.; Vance, J. M., Beiträge zur byzantinischen Kulturgeschichte (Jena 1907) 48ff. St. John Chrysostom in Matth. hom. 61 (7, 614Aff. PG 58, 591ff.); in Acta apost. hom. 18 (9, 150: PG 60, 147f.). According to the picture given by St. John Chrysostom the peasants were subject to heavy payments (τὰ τελέσματα διενεκὴ καὶ ἀφόρητα ἐπιτιθέαχτι) and to personal services (καί διακονίας ἐπιπόνους ἐπιτάττονσι). The exactors were the procurators of the owners: καί το λιμο τούτου καί το ναυαγίου τὰς τν ἐπτιτρόπων βασάνους καὶ τοὺς ἑλκυσμοὺς καὶ τὰς απαιτήσεις καί τὰς ἀπαγωγὰς καὶ τὰς ἀπαραιτήτους λειτουργίας μλλον δεδοικότες καὶ φρίττοντες. The poor peasants depended mostly on the rich landowners from whom they had borrowed money at high interest. In the vineyards the peasants worked for money.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Rostovtzeff, M., Studien zur Geschichte des rőmischen Kolonates (Leipzig 1910); Barrow, , Slavery in the Roman Empire (London 1928) 89ff.Google Scholar

²⁰ Barrow, , op. cit. 3ff. and 74; cf. Appian. 1, 7.Google Scholar

²¹ Columella 176. Barrow, , op. cit. 75ff. Google Scholar

²² Segrè, A., Byzantion 15 (1941) 249ff. Google Scholar

²³ Some interesting parallels from medieval and modern slavery are suggested by Sombart, W., Der moderne Kapitalismus II, 687ff. Google Scholar

²⁴ For the organization of Byzantine large estates on the pattern of the imperial estates, see Hardy, E. R., The Large Estates of Byzantine Egypt (New York 1931) 44.Google Scholar

²⁵ Ἀλλόφυλοι, i.e., belonging to another village, BGU 2, 419 = Wilcken, Chrest. 343 (276.7), see introd. p. 437. In BGU 7 = Johnson, , Economic Survey of Ancient Rome II, 51 (247 A.D.) the decaprotoi had been unable to collect the dues (probably rentals) from certain tenants in the divisions of Themistes and Polemon in the Arsinoite nome. The strategos thereupon issued an order that all tenants in the district called ‘little Phrou’ whose names were indicated in a list were bound to their tenancy without excuse.Google Scholar

²⁶ von Lingenthal, Zachariae, Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung 9 (1888) 284, showed that in laws of the fourth century, Cod.Th. never mentions coloni adscripticii but only coloni. Cod.Th. 2, 25 (334?), referring to Sardinia: ‘servi’ replaced in Cod. Just. 3, 38, 2 by ‘servi vel coloni adscripticiae conditionis.’ Cod.Th. 13, 10, 3 (357), with the parallel Cod. Just. 11, 48, 2, mentions only coloni. Adscriptio is mentioned for the first time in Cod.Th. 11, 1, 26 (339), in a provision for Gaul: to keep the peasants attached to the soil, ‘haec retinendae plebis ratio adscriptioque servatur.’ The registration of the peasants in the 4th cent. was a purely fiscal measure; in the 5th cent. it became a device to keep the peasants attached to the estates as coloni adscripticii. Google Scholar

²⁷ The ἰδία κτσις of the ἐπαναπoγράφος in Nov. 48, 4 means terra peculiaris. See von Lingenthal, Zachariae, Geschichte des griechisch- römischen Rechtes 232. Sources speak of peculium only in the case of coloni adscripticii, cf. Cod.Th. 5, 18, 1, 2 (419); 16, 5, 54, 8 (414); Cod. Just. 11, 48, 8, 1 (Valentinianus and Valens); 11, 48, 8, 19 (Anastasius); 11, 50, 2 (Arcadius and Honorius); Nov. Val. 27, 4; Nov. Just 162, 2 (539).Google Scholar

²⁸ All the lessees, tributarii and coloni adscripticii, paid a rent to the landowners as lessees; therefore the τἑλoς of the μισθωτοί means taxation and not rent.Google Scholar

²⁹ v. Lingenthal, Zachariae, op. cit. 278ff. stated clearly the difference between the adscripticii who have no property (ἀννποστάτοι or ἀκήμονες in late Byzantine sources; p. 281) and the μισθωτοὶ ὑποστάτοι. See also note 10 supra for the easy confusion between τἑλoς and μισθός. Gelzer, , Studien 87 showed that rents and taxes for all land sub patrocinio had to be paid at the same time, ἐv καιρ ἀπαιτήσεως τν δημοσίων (P. Oxy. 8, 1126, see also BGU 310).Google Scholar

³⁰ See P. Ross. Georg. III, 8 (4th cent.). The peasants of the village of Euhemeria write to their patronus Necho of Hatees that they did not give their σμα (i.e., they did not become adscripticii) under his father nor under him, but that they pay each year their taxation (ἐvrάγiov, line 11) and that in the village there where no fugitive peasants of other places. See the valuable introduction of Zereteli. In Cod.Th. 11, 1, 14 (366, 372 or 374?) coloni originales in loco censi are opposed to other peasants ‘quibus terrarum erit quantulacumque possessio, qui in suis conscripti locis proprio nomine libris censualibus detinentur’ and who pay their own annonariae functiones. This distinction between the tributarii and the coloni adscripticii appears also in Nov. Just. 128, 13 (545): ‘nobody may be molested for the tribute of the land which he does not own. But if it happens that peasants sub patrocinio or adscripticii have their property, these peasants have to pay for their own property and their master has not to be molested for their taxation if he did not undertake a responsibility for the taxation of his peasants.’ Google Scholar

³¹ Cod.Th. 11, 1, 14.Google Scholar

³² In the Byzantine Papyri after the Edict of Optatus, ὄνομα means the name under which the property is registered in the census. See e.g. P.Grenf. 1, 54, 7 (4th cent.), and for other instances, Pr. Wtb. s.v. ὄνομα (p. 105). Therefore ὄνομα may mean capitatio and caput as in the instances collected by Rouillard 80 n. 6.Google Scholar

³³ See the case of Paulinus a Pella, Eucharisticon (ed. Brandes, , CSEL 16) v. 574.Google Scholar

³⁴ Cod. 11, 52, 1 (Theodosius, Arcadius and Honorius): ‘Et ne forte colonis tributariae sortis nexibus absolutis vagandi et quo libuerit recedendi facultas permissa videatur, ipsi quidem originario iure teneantur et licet quidem videantur ingenui, servi tamen terrae ipsius cui nati sunt aestimentur, nec recedendi quo velint nec permutandi loca habeant facultatem, sed possessor eorum iure utatur et patroni sollecitudine et domini potestate.’ Google Scholar

³⁵ Cod. 11, 46, 6 and 12. The word ὑπεύθυνος means only ‘dependent’.Google Scholar

³⁶ Leipoldt, , Schenute von Atripe (Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur, Neue Folge 10, 1 [1903]) 23 and 174 shows that in the middle of the fifth century the population of Upper Egypt was composed presumably mostly of independent peasants. See Gelzer, , Studien 67.Google Scholar

³⁷ Cod.Th. 11, 24, 5.Google Scholar

³⁸ ibid. 11, 24, 6, 1.Google Scholar

³⁹ ibid. 11, 24, 1.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ Πρωτοκομήται (5th cent.); πρωτοκομήται with συντελεσταί and κτήτορες in P.Cairo 67001 (514) make a κοινότης. See Wilcken, , Grundzüge 84 and Hardy, , op. cit. (note 24 supra) 20. Cf. also Cod.Th. 5, 16, 34 (425).Google Scholar

⁴¹ von Lingenthal, Zachariae, op. cit. 211ff. A case of consortium of peasants is probably shown in P.Flor. 53.Google Scholar

⁴² See Hardy, , op. cit. 70.Google Scholar

⁴³ For the patrocinium of the Church and of the officers of the army see infra, ch. 6.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Stud.Pal. 20, 147 (Herakleopolis 463) P.Lond. (Hermoupolis 472); see Hardy, , op. cit. 76. Other instances of bonds of surety for coloni are found in P.Oxy. 135, 200, 996, 1979; P.Lond. 778; PSI 61, 62, and 180; see Hardy 75 n. 4.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ See von Lingenthal, Zachariae, op. cit. 233.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ It is uncertain whether this principle was actually applied. Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Usually, coloni remained in the same estate for generations, as shown by Cod. 11, 48, 6 (Valentinianus and Valens): ‘Omnes omnino fugitivos adscripticios colonos … ad antiquos penates ubi censiti atque educati natique sunt, provinciis praesidentes redire compellant’ (see Hardy op. cit. 78). Coloni could not even be ousted from their estates for debts contracted with other persons, cf. Nov. 32, 33 and 34 (535) for Thracia and Illyricum.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Cod. 11, 50, 1 (Constantine).Google Scholar

⁴⁹ We shall here not analyze further the condition of the adscripticii. The best study on this subject is still, I believe, the article by von Lingenthal, Zachariae, ‘Zur Geschichte des römischen Grundeigentums,’ Zeitschr. der Sav. Stift. 9 (1888) 261ff. where the legal condition of the colonus adscripius and that of the tributarius are kept distinct as they really were, while in the researches of many recent authors there is much confusion on this point (not correct, e.g., Francisci, De, Storia del diritto romano III, Milan 1936, p. 166).—From the very extensive literature on the colonate we may mention, in addition to the authors cited on the preceding pages: Rodbertus, , Jahrb. für Nationalökonomie und Statistik 2 (1864) 261; O. Seeck, PWK s.v. ‘Colonatus’; Collinet, P., Congr. Studi bizantini V, 800ff.; Kübler, , Geschichte des römischen Rechts 363; Gino Segrè, Studi Giuridici (1933); Collinet, , ‘Le colonat dans l'empire romain,’ reprinted from the Recueil de la Société Jean Bodin ; Lot, La fin du monde antique (Paris 1927) 124.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Gai. 2, 7: ‘in provinciali solo … dominium populi Romani est vel Caesaris, nos autem possessionem tantum et usum fructum habere videmur.’ Google Scholar

⁵¹ Gai. 2, 21.Google Scholar

⁵² Gai. toc. cit.: ‘praedia stipendiaria sunt ea quae in his provinciis sunt quae propriae populi romani esse intelleguntur, tributaria sunt ea quae in his provinciis sunt quae propriae Caesaris esse creduntur.’ Google Scholar

⁵³ Dig. 50, 16, 27, 1: ‘Stipendium … etiam tributum appellari Pomponius ait.’ Cf. Mommsen, , Röm. Staatsr. II, 1095 n. 1.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ Mommsen II, 1913.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ The principle expressed in Inst. 2, 1, 40: ‘Vocantur … stipendiaria et tributaria praedia, quae in provinciis sunt, inter quae nec non italica praedia ex nostra constitutione (i.e. Cod. 12, 31, 1) nulla differentia est,’ was established probably since the age of Diocletian.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ The ager vectigalis seems to have disappeared with Diocletian according to v. Schilling, C., Studien aus der röm. Agrargeschickte (Abhandl. des Herderinstituts II, 1; Riga) 96ff. and Eisser, G., Zeitschr. der Sav. Stift. 50, 637; in my opinion rather under Constantine.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ See Segrè, A., Byzantion 15, 249ff. Google Scholar

⁵⁸ For possessores see Kübler, , Geschichte 340 n. 4.Google Scholar

⁵⁹ The Greek equivalent for possessio and possessor are κτμα and κτήτωρ. These words did not necessarily imply property, they could mean dominium as well as possessio of the kind which is had in solo provinciali.—Already in the second century A. D., private land seems to have been nearly as extended as public land as is shown by the cadastre of the village of Naboo Apollonites Heptacomiae to which P.Giss. 60, p. 23 (introd. of P. Meyer) and P.Flor. 331 refer. See Appendix I infra. Google Scholar

⁶⁰ See the table, Kraemer-Westermann I, 132ff. The editors do not interpret P.Col. 1, 20 as a revision of the cadastre, but in a different manner. They seem to argue from the small figures of the arurae owned and from the proportions between private and ownerless land that P.Col. 1, 20 treats of small possessores. Probably however, the figures of the arurae refer only to the changes in the cadastre. In P.Cairo inv. 57077 (Études Papyrologiques 5, 93 n. 22 Boak) two women complain that at the death of their father their uncle had seized the movable property which their father had possessed and turned over to them only some arurae of public land sown in wheat. They claim to be unable, since they are women, to meet the rentals on the land ὑπαντν τoς φόροις τν ἀρούρων. For exemptions in general, and of women particularly, from the cultivation of unproductive land, see Oertel, , Die Liturgie (Leipzig 1918) 105. For the cultivation of ownerless land see also P.Oxy. 1746 (4th cent.), a list of advances of seedcorn to various villages of the Oxyrhynchites and to cultivators of derelict land owned by inhabitants of the metropolis. For ἅπορα ἀνὁματα see P.Oxy. 1746, Wilcken, , Chrest. 381, introd. and Oertel, , Liturgie 101.Google Scholar

⁶¹ Milne, J. G., History of Egypt under the Roman Rule (3rd ed. Oxford 1924) 86ff. Google Scholar

^61a Possibly P. Princeton III 136 (4th–5th cent.), a register of estates of large holders redacted in a form which has no parallel in the Byzantine age. This text has many items, all of the same kind, verso lin. 1ff.: X son of Paulus living in the same hamlet (ίποίκνον) pays as rent (τελεȋ) for the 20 arurae cultivated by him in the estate of N.echache on 1 arurae as follows: arurae in wheat at 7 artabae with supplement of 1% yields 7 artabae wheat; arurae in flax at 14 bundles with supplement of 5% yields 13 bundles. Also from 22 arurae cultivated in the estate of Melanthius, 1 arurae: arurae in flax at 17 bundles with supplement of 5% yields 14 bundles; arurae in fodder grass at 2 artabae of barley with supplement of 1% yields 1 artabae 2 choenices of barley. Out of 89 arurae in the verso only 12 are recorded as paying a rent. There is no doubt that the payments refer to rents and not to taxes because the arurae are registered as paying ἀvà πυρο ἀρτάβαι. Moreover, the people registered as holders of the estates ἐδάφη are qualified as cultivators and not as owners of the estates. Possibly the text deals with the partial revision of rents.Google Scholar

⁶² Segrè, A., An Essay on the Nature of Real Property 97ff. Google Scholar

⁶³ For the fundi fiscales of the emperors, see Wilcken, , Grundzüge 155.Google Scholar

⁶⁴ The large estates of private individuals were assessed with taxes while imperial estates were immune. See e.g. Preisigke, SB 4226 (Arsinoite, 2nd cent.) = Johnson, , Economic Survey n. 62, immunity of imperial estates from taxation and angary.Google Scholar

⁶⁶ Wilcken, , Grundzüge 117 ff. See P Oxy. 1274 (3rd cent.) introd. p. 211.Google Scholar

⁶⁶ Wilcken, , Grundzüge 155.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Seeck, PWK 4, 611ff. 655ff. 667; Gelzer, , Studien 41 and Wilcken, , Grundzüge 162.Google Scholar

⁶⁸ P. Lond. 2, 324, p. 287 (346) = Wilcken, , Chrest. 179. The comes sacri patrimonii in charge, since the year 509, of the patrimonium had the title of κόμης τς ἰδικς κτήσεως. Google Scholar

⁶⁹ In the Byzantine age, public land (δημόσια γ ) was the land belonging to the towns. Publicus = civilis = πολιτικός = ἀστικός, see e.g. Cod. 11, 61, 2 (398); Wilcken, , Grundzüge 167. As far as we know, the extent of the land belonging to the towns was not considerable in Egypt. In other provinces, public land may well have been turned over to the towns in the early Byzantine age. In this period, however, the towns were in a very distressed financial situation.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ See Wilcken, , Grundzüge 228ff. Google Scholar

⁷¹ See P.Oxy. 2124 (316). In this text three local collectors of corn dues, ἀπαιτηταὶ σίτον κώμης give to the praepositus pagi the names of three persons to act in the same capacity for the current year, line 8ff.: εἰς ἀπαίτησιν σίτου τς αὐτς κώμης γεvήμa(τoς) ι καὶ η (ἒτoυς) ι[δ]ιωτικ[ο] καν[ό]νος. The editors (note to line 10) understand apparently a novel collocation meaning land tax on private land opposed to δημόσιος κάνων. See Preisigke, Wtb. s.v. δημόσιος .Google Scholar

⁷² See supra at n. 64. Hardy, E. R., op. cit. 44, sketches the organization of the imperial patrimonial estates of the sixth century. At this time the divine house was probably not the largest landowner of Egypt. The οὐσίαι of the large estate owners were apparently even bigger than the δωρεαί of the Ptolemaic age. In an account of the most magnificent Christodora of Cynopolis, P.Oxy. 2026, the expenses in grain reached the sum of 40117 artabae (Hardy 41). The Church, too, owned a large quantity of land in Egypt (Hardy 44), probably even more than the emperor. It was usually rented on hereditary (emphyteutic) lease (Hardy 45). For its organization see Hardy 45ff. Monasteries were among the most important ecclesiastical proprietors (Hardy 46).Google Scholar

⁷³ Head tax, συντελεία κεφαλς in the accounts of the Apiones in PSI 954; 196, 21; P.Oxy. 1911, 86; 1912, 30; Hardy 52. For the assessment of the capita, see Traditio 3 (1945) 114ff. 121ff. Google Scholar

⁷⁴ See ibid. 116ff. Google Scholar

⁷⁵ For the collection of taxes in the estates see Hardy, 51ff. Google Scholar

⁷⁶ Hardy 50. For the autopragia see Gelzer, , ‘Zum αὐτόπρακτον σχμα der P. Aphrodito Cairo,’ Arch. f. Pf. 5, 188–189; Hardy, 54ff. Google Scholar

⁷⁷ A group of items of the Apion accounts records payments on private land, P.Oxy. 1912, 87; 2037, 10, 30, 32, or on public land, PSI 954, 23. Hardy (p. 53) supposes that these texts refer to payments of peasants who had come under the patronage of the Apiones. See also the taxation of the villages under patrocinium, Mouchis and Pinuris in P.Oxy. 1855 (Hardy, 53ff.).Google Scholar

⁷⁸ Hardy, 59ff. Google Scholar

⁷⁹ For a similar evidence in Syria see Cod.Th. 11, 25, 6 (415).Google Scholar

⁸⁰ Thibaut, , ‘Patrocinia vicorum,’ Vierteljahrschrift für Social- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte 2 (1904) 414ff. de Zulueta, F., op. cit. (n. 11 supra) 51ff. Rostovtzeff, , Studien zur Geschichte des römischen Kolonates 220–23; Social and Economic History 446. For Egypt particularly, Gelzer, , op. cit. 72–77; Wilcken, , Grundzüge 59ff.; Chrest. 88; Η. Bell, I., ‘The Byzantine Servile State in Egypt,’ Journ. Egypt. Archaeol. 4 (1917) 86, 109; Rouillard 9ff.Google Scholar

⁸¹ One of the greatest punishments imposed upon the towns in this age was the assessment of the inhabitants of the towns with the tributum of the plebei rustici. The towns thus were not considered more than mere villages.Google Scholar

⁸² Zulueta, , op. cit. 16. The peasants took refuge in the estates of the mighty possessores to escape the burden of heavy taxation, and the Administration was concerned with the fiscal consequences of the desertion of the peasants. According to Cod.Th. 11, 24, 1 = Cod. Just. 11, 54 (360), a multitude of Egyptian coloni took refuge in the estates of the mighty patroni who ‘variis honoribus fulciuntur,’ even duces. They helped the peasants to escape taxation ‘aditum implendae devotionis obclaudant.’ The emperor decreed that the patroni should pay the taxes which the villagers previously paid as contributarii and that the deserters should be restored to their former places. Cod.Th. 11, 24, 3 (395), addressed to the comes Aegypti: ‘Possessores (patroni) autem competenter coherciti etiam inviti statutis imperialibus oboedire et muneribus publicis satisfacere cogantur.’ According to Cod. Th. 11, 24, 4 (300), patroni, magistri utriusque militiaey comites ex proconsulibus, ex vicariis, ex Augustalibus, ex tribunis, curiales, or officials of other dignities are liable to pay 40 pounds of gold for each estate which they take under patrocinium (cf. Cod.Th. 11, 24, 2). The penalty had to be paid in duplum by those people who ‘fraudandorum tributorum causa ad patrocinia solita fraude confugerint.’ Google Scholar

⁸³ Libanius (ed. Foerster, 3, 47, 4–10) describes the patrocinium in Syria in the κμαι μεγάλάι τολλν ἑκόιστη δεστότων (§11): ἀγρoὶ oἱ πολλν εἰσι τν ἐχόντων ἑκάστον µέρoς οὐ πολὺ κεκτημένου. He says (§4): καὶ ὁ μισθòς ἀφ’ν δίδωσι ἡ γ, τυροὶ καὶ κριθαὶ καὶ τὰ ἀτὸ τν δένδρων ἢ χρυσòς ἢ χρυσίου τιµή. The patronus is called ὁ τòν μισθòν εἰληφώς. See Gelzer, 76 and Zulueta, 21.Google Scholar

⁸⁴ See P.Lond. V 1686 (565) with the introduction of Bell, p. 253. Three arurae of waterless land had been given to the Monastery of Zminos (Panopolites) in payment of the taxes of the ἀστικὴ συvτελεία of 14 arurae of arable land in the village of Phtala. The συvτελεία included the canon for the 14th indiction: παντοίων χρυσικν τίτλων καὶ διαγραφν καὶ τ ς ἐπιβολς of the 14th indiction καὶ προσθήκης αὐτς καὶ τν ναύλων καὶ τν ἅλλων ἀνα[λ]ωμάτων. The three arurae, following the principle of Cod.Th. 11, 24, 6, did not change their qualification with the change of owner.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ The landowners generally colluded with the officials of the cadastre, to transfer the burden of the taxes on the small landowners, as appears in Cod. 11, 58, 1: ‘tabularii civitatum per collusionem potentiorum sarcinam ad inferiores transferunt.’ Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Wilcken, , Grundzüge 272ff. Google Scholar

⁸⁷ Wilcken, , Grundzüge 297ff. Google Scholar

⁸⁸ Ibid. 291ff. Google Scholar

⁸⁹ We know very little of the property owned by the villages in the Roman age (see Wilcken, , Grundzüge 309; Chrest. 407; P.Lond. III, p. 141) and in the Byzantine age (Wilcken, , Grundzüge 314). In Egypt the villages never owned much land.Google Scholar

⁹⁰ Many of the results of the researches on conditions in Egypt in the fourth century may be applied to the rest of the Roman Empire.Google Scholar

⁹¹ The contract of suffragium ( Cod.Th. 11, 29, 1 [362]; 11, 29, 2 [394] = Cod. 4, 3; Coll. I nov. 12 c. 4) is called also πατρωκίνων (v. Lingenthal, Zachariae, Zeitschr. Sav. Stift. 9 [1888] 227). Patrocinium was again forbidden by Tiberius and Romanus Lacapenus (Coll. I nov. 12 c. 4; Coll. III nov. 2 c. 2). For patrocinium in the early Middle Ages in the Western provinces, see Dopsch, A., Wirtschaftliche und soziale Grundlagen der europäischen Kulturentwicklung II (Wien 1924) 133ff. and Wirtschaftsentwicklung der Karolingerzeit II (Weimar 1913) 12ff. and 15ff. Dopsch considers a standard example of patrocinium the act of a destitute man who se commendat to a potentior to be maintained (patrocinium = commendatio). More seldom people who could not pay a composition (obnoxiatio) entered a contract of patrocinium. Google Scholar

⁹² According to the Roman law of the Byzantine period the sale of an estate required the payment of the price and the traditio. In the Eastern provinces the katagraphe was required instead of the traditio. The scriptura was required in the Western as well as in the Eastern provinces (see Segrè, , Essay on the Nature of Real Property 49ff.). The traditio was usually effected in the case of precarium by a change of the animus of the peasant who had sold the estate—the peasant remained in the estate as a lessee (constitutum possessorium). Many legal texts show that the registration in the libri censuales did not make the sale effective if the other requirements of the sale had not been fulfilled. The sale of the estate of the tributarius was a genuine sale which could have been registered in the gesta. The buyer, however, did not register the deed to avoid taxation, while the seller went on paying the taxes of the estate which he actually rented. Sometimes the sale of land may have been intended as a temporary arrangement similar to the ancient πρσις ἐπὶ λύει which played such an important part in the ancient Athenian colonate of the ἑκτήµoρι .Google Scholar

⁹³ The patrocinium could be established by several kinds of contracts—Salvianus (5, 8, 39–44) describes the contract of patrocinium as a deed by which the potentior sold the patrocinium to the small landowner. The peasant received nothing, says Salvianus. In spite of the fact that he had transferred the property to the potentior, he still had to pay the iugalio and the capitatio. Google Scholar

⁸⁴ Wallon, , L'histoire de l'esclavage dans l'antiquité (Paris 1879) III, 268. Thibaut and Piganiol insist on the importance of the human element in the agricultural economy of the Roman Empire. Piganiol (L'impôt de capitation 29) even inscribes a chapter, The Peasant More Precious Than the Soil (see Lot, L'impôt fonçier 35). These authors overlook the question of the lack of capital in this age.Google Scholar

⁹⁵ Wilcken, Grundzüge 318.Google Scholar

⁹⁶ In P.Oxy. VIII 1134, line 7, I understand that the peasants of the village of Mesmimis are sub patrocinio. I prefer this interpretation to the other given by the editors. As Hardy noted (op. cit. 134) a settlement under patronage of the fourth and fifth centuries is probably commemorated by the very name of Aetius’ Little Theruthis in P.Oxy. 1983.Google Scholar

⁹⁷ Hardy, 132.Google Scholar

⁹⁸ Hardy, 133.Google Scholar

⁹⁹ Ibid .Google Scholar

¹⁰⁰ Hardy 90. The passage of P.Oxy. 1915, 4–6, 21–23, refers to a memorandum which explains why certain Apion fields which had been sown from immemorial time by the men of Pempo, a possession of the Divine House, had been transferred to other cultivators. The estate had been requested to pay 1 solidus per arura on plough land, and 3 solidi on vineyards. I do not think that the rate paid by the men of Pempo, 1 solidus per arura on all their land, should be considered a rent, and still less that the higher bid could have been a mere rent. One solidus corresponded to the price of about 10 artabae, which is the whole product of an average arura. Google Scholar

¹⁰¹ Wilcken, , Grundzüge 315.Google Scholar

¹⁰² I disagree with Wilcken, , Grundzüge 306, and believe that the ἰδιόκτητος γ was a βασιλικὴ γ ἐv τάξει ἰδιοκτήτου given on hereditary lease to a private individual. He paid a fixed rental to the Administration and could dispose of the land like a Byzantine emphyteuta and a Roman possessor of the ager vectigalis. In the early Byzantine period the category of γ ἰδιόκτητος disappeared.Google Scholar

¹⁰³ Wilcken, , Grundzüge 290ff. Google Scholar

¹⁰⁴ Ibid. 292ff. Google Scholar

¹⁰⁵ Ibid. 314ff. Google Scholar

¹⁰⁶ Ἐπιβολή in Syria in Cod.Th. 11, 24, 6, 1 (415). ‘Et quicumque in ipsis vicis terrulas contra morem fertiles possederunt pro rata possessionis suae glebam inutilem et coniationem eius et munera (ne) recusent.’ Google Scholar

¹⁰⁷ Ἐπιβολή in P.Tebt. 734 (141–139 B.C.). Rostovtzeff, , Soc. and Econ. Hist. of the Hellenistic World (Oxford 1941) 3, 1495. Ἐπιβολή of γ αἰγιαλιτίς in P. Princeton III, 172 (2nd cent. A.D.). Later in P.Oxy. VI, 899, 1, 24 = Wilcken, , Chrest. 361 (200 A.D.). See Grundzüge 320 and P.Ryl. II, 202, with extended commentary, p. 270f. and P. Brem. 42 (117–118 A.D.).Google Scholar

¹⁰⁸ Wilcken, , Chrest. 229 lin. 5ff. Google Scholar

¹⁰⁹ CPR 19, p. 63; Zur Geschichte der Erbpacht im Altertum (Leipzig 1901) 35.Google Scholar

¹¹⁰ Grundzüge 311.Google Scholar

¹¹¹ Cod.Th. 11, 24, 6, 1 is illustrated by Bruns 97a = Abbot, and Johnson, , Municipal Administration in the Roman Empire (Princeton 1926) 500. Rescriptum Valentiniani Valentis Gratiani de moenibus instaurandis et de reditibus fundorum civitatum Asiae lines 13ff. 6736 opima atque idonea iuga support 703 deserta atque defeda ac sterilia iuga (‘per illa quae idonea diximus sustinentur’). The proportion is about 10% as it is in Egypt. See P.Flor. 71, a very extensive cadastre of Hermoupolis and CPR 19 and P.Cairo Preisigke 4 (320) = W. Chrest. 379, where imperial patrimonial land was given on long lease. The two texts are closely related. According to CPR 19, a woman, Demetria, tried to sell to another woman, Eus, 42 arurae οὐσιακ γς ὑποτελος, mostly barren, together with 12 and a fraction arurae of her own private land, which also was barren. The 42 arurae seem to have been an epibole to all the property of Demetria, which probably amounted to about 500 arurae. Eus wished to withdraw from the sale. In P.Flor. 71, 1, 143–4, Demetria appears to have leased to Eus 12 arurae of private land. Probably Eus was a lessee. Later she wished to purchase the estate of Demetria, but in CPR 19 she no longer desired to do so.Google Scholar

¹¹² See e.g. BGU III, 648 = W. Chrest. 360 (164 or 196) and chiefly P.Oxy. VI, 899 = W. Chrest. 361 (200); Wilcken, , Grundzüge 321ff. In P.Oxy. VI, 899 (200) many parcels (1.22) of royal land and public land had been allotted (διατάσσεσθαι) to the father of a woman Apollinarion, owner of a large estate. Apollinarion inherited from her father the estate with the allotments of public land. In P.Oxy. VI, 899 she asked to be relieved from the burden of cultivating the public soil because she had grown poor through a new assessment. Apollinarion based her claim on an edict of Tib. Jul. Alexander written in the second year of Galba. This edict released women from ἐπιβoλαί of this sort. In the time of Severus the privilege appears to have been applied only to women without children, while in the fourth century it appears to have been entirely abolished, as far as women were concerned.Google Scholar

¹¹³ For the main lines of the Byzantine epibole, a much discussed topic, see v. Lingenthal, Zachariae, Griech. röm. Recht 228.Google Scholar

¹¹⁴ In the Ptolemaic period, according to P.Tebt. 26 = W. Chrest. 330 (114 B.C.), the royal peasants of Kerkeosiris left their estates and took refuge in the temple of Narmouthis. For patronage in the Ptolemaic age, see Rostovtzeff, , Soc. and Econ. History of the Hellenistic World 149ff. Examples of strikes in the Roman period have been collected by Rostovtzeff, , Kolonat (n. 19) 205: P.Flor. 91, 17ff. P.Fayum 296, P.Lond. III, p. 134, 18f. (at the time of the plague under M. Aurelius). BGU III, 902 and 904 (Wilcken, in Festschrift f. Hirschfeld 129f.). Political troubles were often accompanied by ἀναχωρήσεις of the peasants, as in BGU II, 372 (154) = Wilcken, , Chrest. 19, an edict of Sempronius Liberalis referring to an amnesty of the emperor for the peasants who had deserted their estates. In P.Upss. 7 = Johnson, , Economic Survey 43 (163 A.D.: Lagis and Tricomia in the Arsinoite nome) we are confronted with the flight of peasants from the farms. In Pr. SB 4284 (207 A.D.) = Abbot and Johnson 190 (Arsinoites) some villagers of Soknopaiou Nesos had fled from their homes and engaged in a life of brigandage. This text is the earliest documentary evidence for the encroachment of wealthy landed proprietors on the holdings of the peasants and of the defiance of the local authority by the rich, see Abbot and Johnson 345 and pp. 203, 216ff.; Wilcken, , Chrest. 545f.; Archiv f. Pf. 3 (1906) 548ff. P. Giss. 40, II = Wilcken, , Chrest. 22 (216) shows how the emperor tried to hinder the migration of Egyptian peasants to the capital. In BGU I, 159 = W. Chrest. 408 (216) we are confronted with the case of a peasant deserting his village to escape its too heavy liturgy, in P.Gen. 16 = W. Chrest. 354 (207) with public cultivators of Soknopaiou Nesos deserting their estates. For other cases of ἀναχωρήσεις in texts published after Wilcken's Grundzüge, see PSI IX, 1043 (103); Wilcken, , Archiv. f. Pf. 9, 83; and see Meyer, , Zeitschr. Sav. Stift. 48, 600 and 50, 543. For the depopulation of the Egyptian villages see PSI 102 = Johnson, , Economic Survey n. 148, p. 253 (170 A.D.).Google Scholar

¹¹⁵ Rostovtzeff, , Kolonat 206.Google Scholar

¹¹⁶ Hardy, , Large Estates 77 with ample documentation of the texts.Google Scholar

¹¹⁷ See particularly P.Tebt. 5, 83 (118 B.C.) and Wilcken, , Grundzüge 96.Google Scholar

¹¹⁸ Wilcken, , ibid. 324.Google Scholar

¹¹⁹ v. Woess, F., Das Asylwesen Aegyptens (Munich 1923) 229–37; Hardy, , op. cit. 77.Google Scholar

¹²⁰ Waszyński, , Bodenpacht (n. 2) 90ff.; Bell, Η. I., ‘The Byzantine Servile State in Egypt,’ Journ. Egypt. Archaeol. 4 (1917) 86ff.; ‘An Epoch in the Agrarian History of Egypt,’ Recueil Champollion (1922) 261ff; ‘The Decay of a Civilization,’ Journ. Egypt. Arch. 10 (1924) 20ff. ¹²¹ Rouillard, , op. cit. 11.Google Scholar

¹²² Comfort, H., ‘Late Byzantine Land Leases ἐφ’ ὃσον χρόνον βούλει,’ Aegyptus 14 (1934) 286ff. Google Scholar

¹²³ Gelzer, , Studien 107 ff. Google Scholar

¹²⁴ For the individual property of the Celts, whose higher classes were constituted by the equites and the druids, and the lower classes by the clientes, see Grenier, A., Econ. Survey of the Roman Empire III (1937) 406ff. Google Scholar

¹²⁵ Grenier, , op. cit. 598.Google Scholar

¹²⁶ For the settlement of the barbari in the Empire, see Seeck, O., Gesch. des Untergangs der antiken Welt I, 384 nn. 12 and 21 (p. 532).Google Scholar

¹²⁷ Franke, PWK s.v. ‘Marcomanni,’ p. 1628; Dio Cass. 71, 2, 4.Google Scholar

¹²⁸ Hist. Aug. Marcus 12, 13; Rhoden, PWK s.v. ‘Anni us,’ p. 2295; W. Weber, CAH 11, 348ff. Google Scholar

¹²⁹ Rostovtzeff, , Soc. Hist. 424.Google Scholar

¹³⁰ Grenier, , op. cit. 592ff. Google Scholar

¹³¹ Eumenes, , Paneg. V (VIII [311]) 6, 216 and 7, 1–4. The same conditions existed some years earlier, cf. Mamert. Paneg. X ad Maximianum Augustum (308) 4, 3.Google Scholar

¹³² Grenier, , op. cit. 595.Google Scholar

¹³³ Ibid. Google Scholar

¹³⁴ Paneg. VI (VII) 6, 2; Grenier, , op. cit. 597.Google Scholar

¹³⁵ Mamert, , Paneg. XI (III) 15; Grenier, loc. cit. Google Scholar

¹³⁸ Usually the alienation of estates did not require a registration, which in the Byzantine age was called insinuatio, allegatio gestis (see Steinacker, , Die antiken Grundlagen der frühmittelalterlichen Privaturkunde [Leipzig 1927] 89, 101ff. 105). The insinuatio, which was quite similar to the registration of the Egyptian document of the imperial age, was only required for certain transactions and particularly for gifts. It was also particularly requested for the suffragium in order to avoid fiscal frauds, see Cod. 4, 3, 1, 2 (394): ‘Quod si praedia rustica vel urbana placitum continebit, scriptura, quae ea in alium transferat emittatur, sequatur traditio corporalis et rem fuisse completam gesta testentur; aliter enim ad novum dominum transire non possunt neque de veteri iure discedere.’ For the allegatio gestis in Egypt, see Druffel, , Papyrol. Studien zum Byzantinischen Urkundenwesen (Munich 1915) 48ff.Google Scholar

¹³⁹ See Gelzer, , Studien 74f., following Godefroy, see Lewald, loc. cit. (n. 11) 476.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁰ ‘Patronorum nomen penitus extinctum iudicetur, possessiones autem athuc in suo statu constitutae penes priores possessores residebunt si pro antiquitate census functiones publicas et liturgos quos homologi coloni praestare noscuntur pro rata sint absque dubio cognituri.’ Google Scholar

¹⁴¹ See Zulueta, , op. cit. 21ff. Google Scholar

¹⁴² For the munera sordida in the Byzantine period see Cod.Th. 11, 24, 6, 7 and Wilcken, , Grundzüge 337ff. where P.Rein. 57 (4th cent.) = W. Chrest. 390 is quoted for the naubia assessed on the head of the peasants.Google Scholar

¹⁴³ Cod.Th. 15, 3, 5 (412) = Cod. Just. 10, 25, 2: ‘Per Bithyniam ceterasque provincias possessores et reparationi publici aggeris et ceteris eiusmodi muneribus pro iugorum numero vel capitum, quae possidere noscuntur, adstringi cogantur.’ Google Scholar

¹⁴⁴ OGI 225; Welles, , Royal Correspondence (n. 15) 36; Rostovtzeff, , Kolonat 257ff.; Bikerman, , Institutions des Séleucides (Paris 1938) 178ff.; Rostovtzeff, , Soc. and Econ. Hist. of the Hell. World 508.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁵ The last sentence of Cod.Th. 11, 24, 6 is not intelligible.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁶ See, e.g., the case of Cod.Th. 7, 24, 4 (325) where the law insists on the performance of the munera sordida by the mighty possessores. Google Scholar

¹⁴⁷ Wilcken, , Grundzüge 311.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁸ Ibid. Google Scholar

¹⁴⁹ Ibid. 313.Google Scholar

¹⁵⁰ Ibid . 314.Google Scholar