COMMODUS TO DIOCLETIAN
The death of Marcus Aurelius in 180ADbrings us to the beginning of a long period of troubles, in which the growing weakness of the empire was exposed, the principate-system of Augustus finally failed under the predominance of military power, and the imperial government was left to be reorganized by Diocletian on a more Oriental model. There is no doubt that during some hundred years the internal wellbeing of the Roman empire was being lowered, and that the parts most open to barbarian invasion suffered terribly. But the pressure of taxation to supply military needs bore heavily on all parts and impaired the vitality of the whole. Reactions there were now and then, when a strong man, or even a well-meaning one, became emperor and had a few years in which to combat present evils and for the moment check them. But the average duration of reigns was very brief; emperors were generally murdered or slain in battle; from 249 to 283 the chief function of an emperor was to lead his army against barbarian invaders. It is a remarkable fact that the first half of this unhappy century was the classical period of Roman jurisprudence. The important post of Praetorian Prefect, which began with a dignified military command and was more and more becoming the chief ministry of the Empire, was again and again held by eminent jurists. But in the long run the civil power could not stand against the jealousy of the military, and the murder of Ulpian in 228 practically ends the series of great lawyer-ministers, leaving the sword in undisputed control. The authorities for this century of troubles are meagre and unsatisfactory. With the help of contemporary inscriptions, modern writers are able to compose some sort of a history of the times, so far as public events and governmental activities are concerned. But the literature of private life, the source of our best evidence on agricultural labour, is for the time at an end, and the facts of farm life were not of the kind thought worthy of record in inscriptions.
There is therefore nothing to be done but to glean the few scraps of information that in any way bear upon the condition of tillers of the soil in this period. They are as a rule of little value, and they come from writers of little authority. But it is something if they are of a piece with the general record of these unhappy times. Even the imperial biographies of Marius Maximus survive only in the meagre abstracts of later writers, and modern historians are quite unable toreconstruct any clear picture of the inner life of the period 180-284ADowing to the lack of materials.
The most significant piece of information relates to Pertinax. We are told[1363]that one of the useful reforms contemplated by him was the reclamation of waste lands throughout the empire. He ordained that any one might occupy derelict lands, even on the imperial estates: on careful cultivation thereof, the farmer was to become owner[1364]. For a space of ten years he was to be exempt from all taxation, and his ownership was to be guaranteed against future disturbance. This passage is good evidence of the decay of agriculture, agreeing with what we have learnt from other sources. But we cannot gather from it that the well-meant design had any practical effect. Pertinax was only emperor for the inside of three months, and could not realize his virtuous aspirations. About 80 years later we find Aurelian[1365]planning the development of waste lands in Etruria, and Probus[1366]giving allotments in the wilds of Isauria to his veterans as settlers with obligation of military service. There can be little doubt that the depopulation and decline of cultivation, made sadly manifest in the calamitous times of Marcus Aurelius, had never ceased to undermine the vital forces of the empire. How to fill up deserted lands, and make them productive of food and revenue, was the problem that every serious ruler had to face. And there was in fact only one resource available to meet the need. The native population of the empire, stationary at best, had been further reduced by pestilence and famine, and was not able to fill up the spaces laid waste by frontier wars. Hence the policy of bringing in masses of barbarians, adopted by Marcus, had to be repeated again and again.
We must not confuse these settlements with the immigrations of conquering tribes that occurred later. Rome was still superior to her adversaries in military organization and skill, and under fairly equal conditions able to defeat them in pitched battles. Thus Claudius II gained great victories over the Goths, and the biographer[1367]tells us of the sequel. ‘The Roman provinces were filled with barbarian slaves and Scythian tillers of the soil. The Goth was turned into a settler on the barbarian frontier. There was not a single district but had some Gothic slave whose bondage attested the triumph.’ Here we seem to have the echo of a somewhat boastful contemporary version. The mention of both slaves and frontier colonists is to be noted. We have no statistics to guide us in an attempt to estimate the relative numbers of the two classes. But the settlement of defeated barbarians on thefrontier as Roman subjects is clearly regarded as a worthy achievement. So indeed it might have been, had it been possible to civilize them as Romans, only profiting by the introduction of new blood. But this process was no longer possible: its opposite, the barbarizing of Roman lands, steadily went on. Claudius only reigned about two years. The great soldier who followed him in 270-5, Aurelian, had a plan for employing prisoners of war[1368]on the cultivation of waste lands in Italy itself, but we have no reason to think that much came of it. And the true state of things was confessed in his abandonment of Trajan’s great Province of Dacia. Aurelian withdrew[1369]the army and the provincials, whom he settled south of the Danube in Moesia; putting the best face he could on this retirement by giving Moesia the name of Dacia.
These phenomena attest an obvious truth, sometimes ignored, that territorial expansion needs something more than military conquest to give it lasting effect. In order to hold conquered lands the conquerors must either occupy them or thoroughly assimilate the native population. Emperors in this period became aware that they could do neither. Alexander Severus (222-35) gained a great victory[1370]over the Persians and took a number of prisoners. It was a tradition of Persian kings not to let their subjects pass into foreign slavery, and Alexander allowed them to redeem these captives by a money payment. This he used partly in compensating the masters of those who had already passed into private ownership, and the rest he paid into the treasury. This conciliatory policy may have been wise. In any case the treasury was in this age chronically in need of ready money. But dealing with the great oriental monarchy was a simpler undertaking than that of dealing with the rude peoples of the North, who pressed on in tribal units, offering no central power with which to negotiate. Probus (276-82) seems to have been sorely troubled by their variety and independence of action. We hear that when operating in Thrace he settled 100,000 Bastarnae[1371]on Roman soil, and that all these kept faith with him. But he went on to transplant large bodies of Gepidae Gruthungi and Vandals. These all broke their faith. While Probus was busy putting down pretenders in other parts of the empire, they went on raiding expeditions at large by land and sea, defying and damaging the power of Rome. True, the emperor broke them by force of arms, and drove the remnant back to their wilds: but we can see what the biographer ignores, that such raids did mischief which the empire was in no condition to repair. What were the terms made with these barbarians, towhich the Bastarnae faithfully adhered, we are not told. Probably the grant of lands carried with it the duty of furnishing recruits to Roman armies and accepting the command of Roman officers.
In connexion with agricultural conditions we must not omit to notice the change that was passing over Roman armies. The straits to which Marcus had been reduced by the years of plague and losses in the field had compelled him to raise fresh troops by any means, enrolling slaves, hiring barbarian mercenaries, and so forth. With this miscellaneous force he just managed to hold his ground in the North. But the army never recovered its old tone. The period 180-284 shews it going from bad to worse. It is full of sectional jealousy and losing all sense of common imperial duty; only effective when some one strong man destroys his rivals and is for the moment supreme. The rise and fall of pretenders[1372]is a main topic of the imperial history. As from the foundation of the Empire, the numbers of the army were inadequate for defence against simultaneous attacks on several frontiers. The lack of cooperation among their enemies, and the mobility of Roman frontier armies, had sufficed to keep invaders at bay. But as pressure became more continuous it was more difficult to meet the needs of the moment by moving armies to and fro. More and more they took on the character of garrisons, their chief camps grew into towns, local recruits filled up their ranks, and they were less and less available for service as field-armies. But it was obviously necessary that the country round about their quarters should be under cultivation, in order to supply them with at least part of their food. It may safely be assumed that this department was carefully attended to in the formation of all these military stations. And it seems that under the new conditions one of the evils that had hitherto embarrassed the empire was gradually brought to an end. For the fact remains that, after all the wholesale waste of lives in the bloody wars of the third century, it was still possible to raise great and efficient armies. Reorganized by Diocletian and Constantine, the empire proved able to defend itself for many years yet, even in the West. The new system may have been oppressive to the civil population, but it certainly revived military strength. This could not have been achieved without an improvement in the supply of man-power. It has been maintained[1373]that this improvement was due to the permanent settlements of barbarians, mostly of German race, within the territories of the empire during the third century. Whether planted on the vacant lands as alien settlers (inquilini)[1374]on easy terms, but bound to provide recruits for the army, orenlisted from the first and settled in permanent stations, they were year by year raising large families and turning deserted border-lands into nurseries of imperial soldiers. This picture may be somewhat overdrawn, but it has the merit of accounting for the phenomena. Without some explanation of the kind it is very hard to understand how the empire came to survive at all. With it, the sequel appears natural and intelligible. These barbarians were so far Romanized as to be proud of becoming Romans: the empire was barbarized so far as to lend itself to institutions of a more and more un-Roman character, and to lose the remaining traditions of literature and art: and when ruder barbarians in the fifth century assailed the empire in the West they found the control of government already in the hands of kinsmen of their own.
If we are to take the very meagre gleanings from the general records of this period and combine them with the information gathered from the African inscriptions referred to below, we can provisionally form some sort of notion of the various classes of labour employed on the land. First, there werecoloni, freemen[1375]in the eye of the law, however much local conditions, or the terms of their tenancies and the tendency for tenancies to become hereditary, may have limited the practical use of their legal freedom. Secondly, there were, at least in some parts, protected occupants encouraged to turn to account parcels of land that had for some reason or other lain idle. Thirdly, there were also rustic slaves who did most of the work on large farms. The stipulated services of tenants[1376]at certain seasons to some extent supplemented their labour, at least in some parts: and the falling supply of slaves tended to make such auxiliary services more important. For the value of agricultural land depends mainly on the available supply of labour. Fourthly, chiefly if not entirely in the northern Provinces, a number of barbarians had been planted upon Roman soil. Some entered peacefully and settled down as willing subjects of the empire on vacant lands assigned to them. Some had surrendered after defeat in battle, and came in as prisoners. But, instead of making them rustic slaves on the old model, Marcus had found a new and better use for them. A new status, that ofinquilini[1377]or ‘alien denizens’ was created, inferior to that of freecolonibut above that of slaves. They seem to have been generally left to cultivate plots of land, paying a share of the produce, and to have been attached to the soil, grouped under Roman landlords or chief-tenants. They had their wives and families,and their sons recruited Roman armies. Lastly, we have no right to assume that small cultivating owners[1378]were wholly extinct, though there can hardly have been many of them.
We have an account[1379]of the rising in Africa (238AD) which, so far as it goes, gives us a little light on the agricultural situation there in the middle of this period. The barbarian emperor Maximin was represented in the Province by aprocurator fisciwhose oppressions provoked a conspiracy against him. Some young men of good and wealthy families drew together a number of persons who had suffered wrong. They ordered their slaves[1380]from the farms to assemble with clubs and axes. In obedience[1381]to their masters’ orders they gathered in the town before daybreak, and formed a great mob. For Africa is naturally a populous[1382]country; so the tillers of the soil were numerous. After dawn the young leaders told the mass of the slaves to follow them as being a section of the general throng: they were to conceal their weapons for the present, but valiantly to resist any attack on their masters. The latter then met the procurator and assassinated him. Hereupon his guards drew their swords meaning to avenge the murder, but the countrymen in support of their masters[1383]fell upon them with their rustic weapons and easily routed them. After this the young leaders, having gone too far to draw back, openly rebelled against Maximin and proclaimed the proconsul Gordian Roman emperor. In this passage we have before us young men of landlord families, apparently holding large estates and working them with slave labour. They are evidently on good terms with their slaves. Of tenant farmers there is no mention: but there is a general reference to support given by other persons, already wronged or afraid of suffering wrong. The Latin biographer[1384], who drew from Herodian, speaks of the murder as the work of ‘the rustic common folk[1385]and certain soldiers.’ Now Frontinus[1386], writing in the latter part of the first centuryAD, tells us that in Africa on their great estates individuals had ‘a considerable population[1387]of common folk.’ The language can hardly refer to slaves: and a reference to levying recruits[1388]for the army plainly forbids such an interpretation. But it does not imply that there were no slaves employed on those great estates; the writer is not thinking of the free-or-slave labour question. In regard to the writers who record thisparticular episode, are we to suppose that by ‘slaves’ Herodian loosely meanscoloni? Surely not. Then does Capitolinus by ‘rustic common folk’ mean slaves? I cannot believe it. More probably the writer, contemporary with Diocletian and Constantine, uses a loose expression without any precise meaning. If we are to attempt any inference from the language of Herodian, we must accept him as a witness that in Africa, or at least in parts of Africa, agriculture was still being carried on by slave labour. This does not exclude the existence of a small-tenancy system side by side with it. And the state of things disclosed[1389]in the African inscriptions referred to above is consistent with both systems: for that the manor-farm on a great estate employed a slave staff for its regular operations, and drew from tenants’ services only the help needed at certain seasons, seems the only possible conclusion from the evidence. Therefore, while agreeing with Heisterbergk[1390]that the narrative of Herodian shews the populousness of Africa, we need not go so far as to ignore the fact of a considerable farm-slave element in the Province.
Meanwhile there are signs that rural Italy was suffering from the disorders and insecurity that had so often hindered the prosperity of agriculture. Even under the strong reign of Severus, with a larger standing army in Italy than ever before, a daring brigand[1391]remained at large for two years and was only captured by treachery. Though we do not hear of his attacking farmers directly, such a disturbance must have been bad for all country folk. That he black-mailed them is probable: that they were plundered and maltreated by the licentious soldiery employed against him, is as nearly certain as can be from what we know of the soldiery of this time.
Certain inscriptions[1392]from the Roman Province of Africa, dating from the second and third centuriesADor at least referring to matters of that period, throw some light upon the management of great imperial domains in that part of the world. To discuss these in full one by one would be beyond the scope of this work, and would require several chapters of intolerable length. I shall content myself with giving a short account of each case, confined to those detailswhich have direct bearing on my subject and which can be gathered with reasonable certainty from the often mutilated texts. French and German savants have contributed freely to the deciphering and interpretation, with happy results: but some of the proposed ‘restorations’ are much too bold to serve as a basis for further argument. After the details, I purpose to consider the points common to these interesting cases, and their place in the history of agriculture and agricultural labour under the earlier Roman Empire, say from Trajan to Severus.
(1) The inscription of Henschir Mettich[1393]belongs to the year 116-7AD, at the end of Trajan’s reign. It deals with a domain calledfundus villae magnae Variani, and does not refer to it by the termsaltusat all. There is no reference to arrears of rent, thereliqua colonorumof which we often hear in the jurists and other writers. Indeed there is no mention of money-rents, unless we reckon as such the little dues (4asper head) payable for grazing stock on the common pasture. Thecoloniarepartiarii, paying certain shares (generally ⅓) of their yearly produce as rent. These are paid, not to an imperial official but to the lords or head-tenants of the estate (dominis aut conductoribus eius fundi) or to their stewards (vilicis). It seems certain therefore that it was the chief tenants who were responsible to the imperial treasury for the amounts annually due, and that upon them rested the troublesome duty of collection. That this charge was a new one, laid upon them by Trajan, is perhaps possible, but hardly probable. For this statute regulating the domain (alex data) is expressly declared to be modelled on alex Manciana[1394], which can hardly be other than a set of regulations issued by a former owner of the estate, and adopted with modifications by the imperial agents (procuratores) specially appointed to organize it as an imperial domain. In Roman practice it was usual to follow convenient precedents. How long the estate had become Crown-property, and by what process, inheritance purchase confiscation etc, we do not know. Nor is it certain whether the new statute was prepared as a matter of course on the cessation of private ownership, or whether it was issued in response to an appeal to the emperor complaining of oppressive exactions on the part of the head-tenants. But of the latter situation there is no sign, and I am inclined to accept the former alternative. In that case it appears necessary to suppose that the system of letting a great estate to one or a few great lessees, who might and did sublet parcels to smalltenant farmers, was not unknown in the practice of great private landlords. This may well have been the case in Africa, still populous and prosperous, though such a system never took root in depopulated and failing Italy. It required willingness on the part of men of substance to risk their capital in a speculation that could only succeed if good sub-tenants were to be found. This condition could not be fulfilled in Italy, but in Africa things were very different.
It is however easier to note this difference by unmistakeable signs than to ascertain it in detail. One point is clear. Thecolonion this domain were bound to render fixed services to the head-tenants at certain seasons of the year. These services consisted of two days’ work (operas binas) at the times of ploughing hoeing and harvest, six in all. The falling-off in the supply of slaves, despite occasional captures of prisoners in war, was a consequence of thepax Romana, and how to provide sufficient labour was a standing problem of agriculture. The guarantee of extra labour at seasons of pressure was doubtless a main consideration with speculators in inducing them to venture their substance by becoming lessees of large tracts of land. Of hired labour available for the purpose the statute gives no hint, nor is it likely that such labourers were to be found in Africa. Thus thecolonus, and perhaps his whole household, were bound to certain compulsory services, and thereby made part of an organization strictly regulated and liable to further regulation. Further regulation was not likely to give the peasant farmer more freedom of movement, since the leading motive of the system was to secure continuous cultivation, and this could best be secured by long tenancies, tending to become hereditary. Therefore this statute offers various inducements to keep the peasant contentedly engaged in bettering his own position by developing the estate. The head-tenants are strictly forbidden to oppress him by exacting larger shares of produce or moreoperaethan are allowed by the regulations. He is encouraged to cultivate parcels of waste land, not included in his farm, by various privileges: in particular, a term of rent-free years is guaranteed to him in case he plants the land with fruit trees. This term, varying from five to ten years according to species of trees, is meant to give him time to get a taste of profit before he becomes liable to rent: its effect in making him loth to move is obvious.
The statute tells us nothing on another important point. From the jurists and other sources[1395]we know that in Italy it was normally the custom for the stock of a farm let to acolonusto be found for the most part by the landlord. It was held[1396]that in taking over thisinstrumentumat a valuation the tenant virtually purchased it, of course notpaying for it in ready money, but standing bound to account for the amount on quitting the tenancy. Thus a small man was left free to employ his own little capital in the actual working of the farm. He could add to the stock, and his additions gave to the landlord a further security for his rent, over and above that given by the sureties usually required. What stock was found by landlords, and what by tenant, was a matter for agreement generally following local convention. But on this African domain we are not told how the question ofinstrumentumwas settled. Probably there was a traditional rule so well established that no reference to the point in the statute seemed necessary. The sole landlord was now the emperor. Without some direct evidence to that effect, I can hardly suppose that the provision of farm stock was entrusted to hisprocuratores. On the other hand, if the chief tenants, theconductores, were expected to undertake this business, as if they had been landlords, this too seems to call for direct evidence. Possibly the need of finding stock for an African peasant farmer was not so pressing as in Italy: still some equipment was surely required. How it was provided, seems to me a question for answering which we have not as yet sufficient materials. But it may be that on these domains the practical necessity for dealing with it seldom occurred. If, when the formal term of a tenancy expired, the same tenant stayed on either by tacit renewal (reconductio) or by grant of a new lease, the stock originally supplied would surely remain for use on the farm, upkeep and renewals of particular articles being of course allowed for. If a farmer’s son succeeded him as tenant, the situation would be the same, or very nearly so. Therefore the manifest desire of emperors to keep tenants in permanence probably operated to minimize questions ofinstrumentumto the point of practical insignificance.
That thecolonion this estate were themselves handworkers can hardly be doubted. Theoperaerequired of them suggest this on any natural interpretation. But there is nothing to shew that they did not employ[1397]slave labour—if and when they could get it. We are not to assume that they were all on one dead level of poverty. That the head-tenants kept slaves to work those parts of the domain that they farmed for their own account, is indicated by the mention of theirvilici, and made certain by the small amount of supplementary labour guaranteed them in the form of tenants’operae. Only one direct mention of slaves (servis dominicis) occurs in the inscription, and the text is in that place badly mutilated. Partly for the same defect, it seems necessary to avoid discussing certain other details, such as the position of thestipendiariiof whom we hear in a broken passage. Nordo I venture to draw confident inferences from the references toinquiliniorcoloni inquilini, or to discover an important distinction between the tenants who actually resided on the estate and those who did not. It may be right to infer a class of small proprietors dwelling around on the skirts of the great domain and hiring parcels of land within it. It may be right to regard theinquiliniascolonitransplanted from abroad and made residents on the estate. But until such conclusions are more surely established it is safer to refrain from building upon them. The general effect of this document is to give us outlines of a system of imperial ‘peculiars,’ that is of domains on which order and security, necessary for the successful working and continuous cultivation, were not left to the operation of the ordinary law, but guaranteed in each case by what we may call an imperial by-law.
(2) The inscription of Souk el Khmis[1398]deals with circumstances between 180 and 183AD. The rescript of Commodus, and the appeal to which it was the answer, are recorded in it. The imperial estate to which it refers is calledsaltus Burunitanus. A singleconductorappears to have been the lessee of the whole estate, and it was against his unlawful exactions that thecoloniappealed. Through the connivance of the responsibleprocurator(corruptly obtained, thecolonihint,) this tyrant had compelled them to pay larger shares of produce than were rightly due, and also to render services of men and beasts beyond the amount fixed by statute. This abuse had existed on the estate for some time, but the proceedings of the presentconductorhad made it past all bearing. Evidently there had been some resistance, but official favour had enabled him to employ military force in suppressing it. Violence had been freely used: some persons had been arrested and imprisoned or otherwise maltreated; others had been severely beaten, among them even Roman citizens. Hence the appeal. It is to be noted that the appellants in no way dispute their liability to pay shares of produce (partes agrarias) or to render labour-services at the usual seasons of pressure (operarum praebitionem iugorumve). They refer to a clause in alex Hadriana, regulating these dues. It is against the exaction of more than this statute allows that they venture to protest. They judiciously point out to the emperor that such doings are injurious to the financial interest[1399]of his treasury (in perniciem rationum tuarum), that is, they will end by ruining the estate as a source of steady revenue. The officials of the central department in Rome were evidently of the same opinion, for the rescript ofCommodus[1400]plainly ordered hisprocuratoresto follow closely the rules and policy applicable to the domains, permitting no exactions in transgression of the standing regulations (contra perpetuam formam). In short, he reaffirmed the statute of Hadrian.
In this document also we hear nothing of tenants’ arrears or of money-rents. Naturally enough, for thecoloniarepartiariiwhose rent is a share of produce. In connexion with such tenants the difficulty[1401]ofreliquadoes not easily arise. They are labouring peasants, who describe themselves ashomines rustici tenues manuum nostrarum operis victum tolerantes. Of course they are posing as injured innocents. Perhaps they were: at any rate the great officials in Rome would look kindly on humble peasants who only asked protection in order to go on unmolested, producing the food which it was their duty to produce,—food, by the by, of the need of which the Roman mob was a standing reminder. Ofvilicior ordinary slaves this document says nothing, for it had no need to do so; but the right tooperaeat certain seasons implies slave labour on the head-tenant’s own farm, probably attached to the chiefvillaorpalatium. In a notable phrase at the end of their appeal thecolonispeak of themselves[1402]as ‘your peasants, home-bred slaves and foster-children of your domains’ (rustici tui vernulae et alumni saltuum tuorum). Surely this implies, not only that they arecoloni Caesaris, standing in a direct relation to the emperor whose protection[1403]they implore against theconductores agrorum fiscalium; but also that their connexion with the estate is an old-established one, passing from fathers to sons, a hereditary tie which they have at present no wish to see broken.
In this case the circumstances that led to the setting-up of the inscription are clear enough. Evidently the appeal represented a great effort, both in the way of organizing concerted action on the part of the peasant farmers, and in overcoming the hindrances to its presentation which would be created by the interested ingenuity of those whose acts were thereby called in question. The imperial officials in the Provinces were often secretly in league with those in authority at Rome, and to have procured an imperial rescript in favour of the appellants was a great triumph, perhaps a rare one. Theforma perpetuacontaining the regulations governing the estate was, we learn,already posted up on a bronze tablet. It had been disregarded: and now it was an obvious precaution to record that the emperor had ordered those regulations to be observed in future. How long the effect of this rescript lasted we are left to guess. Officials changed, and reaffirmation of principles could not guarantee permanent reform of practice. Still, the policy of the central bureau, when not warped by corrupt influence, was consistent and clear. To keep these imperial ‘peculiars’ on such a footing as to insure steady returns was an undoubted need: and, after the extreme strain on the resources of the empire imposed by the calamitous times of Marcus, it was in the reign of Commodus a greater need than ever.
(3) The Gazr Mezuâr inscription[1404], very fragmentary and in some points variously interpreted, belongs to the same period (181AD). A few details seem sufficiently certain to be of use here. The estate in question is imperial property, apparently one of the domanial units revealed to us by these African documents. It seems to record another case of appeal against unlawful exaction ofoperae, probably by aconductororconductores. It also was successful. But it is notable that the lawful amount ofoperaeto be rendered bycolonion this estate was just double of that fixed in the other cases—four at each of the seasons of pressure, twelve in all. We can only infer that the task-scale varied on various estates for reasons unknown to us. One fragment, if a probable restoration[1405]is to be accepted, conveys the impression of a despairing threat on the part of the appellants. It suggests that on failure of redress they may be driven to return to their homes where they can make their abode in freedom. On the face of it, this is an assertion of freedom of movement, a valuable piece of evidence, if it can be trusted. We may safely go so far as to note that it is at least not inconsistent with other indications pointing to the same conclusion. We may even remark that the suggestion of going home in search of freedom agrees better with the notion that thesecoloniwere African natives than with the supposition of their Italian origin. The Roman citizens on the Burunitan estate will not support the latter view, for they are mentioned as exceptional. Seeck (rightly, I think,) urges that Italy was in sore need of men and had none to spare for populous Africa. I would add that the emigration of Italians to the Provinces as working farmers seems to require more proof than has yet been produced. As officials, as traders, as financiers and petty usurers, as exploiters of other men’s labour, they abounded in the subject countries; but, so far as I can learn, not as labourers. Many of them no doubt held landed estates, for instance in the southern parts of Spain and Gaul. But when we meet with loose generalexpressions[1406]such as ‘The Roman is dwelling in every land that he has conquered,’ we must not let them tempt us into overestimating the number of Italian settlers taking an active part in the operations of provincial agriculture.
(4) The inscription of Ain Ouassel[1407]belongs to the end of the reign of Severus. The text is much broken, but information of no small importance can be gathered from what remains. Severus was himself a native of Africa, and may have taken a personal interest in the subject of this ordinance. In point of form the document chiefly consists of a quoted communication (sermo) from the emperor’sprocuratores[1408], one of whom, a freedman, saw to its publication in an inscription on anara legis divi Hadriani. A copy of thelex Hadriana, or at least the relevant clauses thereof, was included. The matter on which the emperor’s decision is announced was the question of the right to occupy and cultivate rough lands (rudes agri)[1409], which are defined as lands either simply waste or such as theconductoreshave neglected to cultivate for at least ten years preceding. These lands are included in no less than five differentsaltusmentioned by proper names, and the scope of the ordinance is wider than in the cases referred to above. It appears that, while it may have contained some modifications or extensions of the provisions of thelex Hadriana, its main bearing was to reaffirm and apply the privileges granted by that statute. It is not rash to infer that we have here evidence of a set of regulations for all or many of the African domains, forming a part of Hadrian’s great work of reorganization.
If the remaining words of this inscription are rightly interpreted, as I think they are, it seems that the policy of encouraging the cultivation of waste and derelict lands was at this time being revived by the government. We have seen it at work in Trajan’s time, promoted by guarantee of privileges and temporary exemption from burdens. But the persons then encouraged to undertake the work of reclamation were to all appearance only thecoloniat the time resident on the estate. In the case of these fivesaltus, the offer seems to be made more widely, at least so far as the remaining text may justify such conclusions. It reads like an attempt to attract enterprising squatters of any kind from any quarter. They are offered not merely undisturbed occupation and a heritable tenure of some sort, but actualpossessio.Now this right, which fills a whole important chapter in Roman law, was one protected by special legal remedies, and even on an imperial domain can hardly have been a matter of indifference. It was quite distinct from merepossessio naturalis[1410], which was all that the ordinarycolonusenjoyed on his own behalf. This new-type squatter is allowed the same privilege of so many years of grace, free of rent, at the outset of his enterprise, that we have noted above. The details are somewhat different. For olives the free term is ten years: for fruit trees (poma, here mentioned without reference to vines) it is seven years. It is expressly provided that thedivisio, which implies the partiary system of tenancy, shall apply only to suchpomaas are actually brought[1411]to market. This suggests that in the past attempts to levy the quota as a proportional share of the gross crop, without regard to the needs of the grower’s own household, had been found to discourage reclamation. It has been pointed out that the effect of the new policy would be to create a sort of perpetual leasehold, similar to that known by the Greek termemphyteusis, which is found fully established in the later empire. But the land was not all under fruit-crops. The disposal of corn crops is regulated in a singular clause thus. ‘Any shares of dry[1412]crops that shall be due are, during the first five years of occupation, to be delivered to the head-tenant within whose holding[1413]the land occupied is situate. After the lapse of that time they are to go to the account (of the Treasury[1414]).’ Why is theconductorto receive thesepartes aridae? It is reasonably suggested that the intention was to obviate initial obstruction on the part of the big lessee, and thus to give the reclamation-project a fair start.
For we have no right to assume that the parcels of land thrown open to occupation had hitherto been included[1415]in no tenancy. The whole import of the document shews that they often belonged to this or that area held by one or other of the big lessees. That there was at least oneconductorto each of the fivesaltusseems certain. That there was only one to each, is perhaps probable, but hardly to be gathered from the text. Now, so long as theconductorregularly paid his fixed rent (canon) and accounted for the taxes (tributa) due from the estate, why should the imperial authority step in to take pieces of land (and that the poorest land) out of his direct control? Theanswer to this is that the Roman law[1416]recognized the right of a private landlord to require of his tenants that they should not ‘let down’ the land leased to them: and proof of neglected cultivation might operate to bar a tenant’s claim for abatement of rent. What was the right of an ordinary landlord was not likely to be waived by an emperor: though his domains might be administered in fact by a special set of fiscal regulations, he claimed a right analogous to that recognized by the ordinary law, and none could challenge its exercise. A big lessee might often find that parts of his holding could not be cultivated at a profit under existing conditions. Slave labour was careless and inefficient; it was in these times also costly, so costly that it only paid to employ it on generous soils. The task-work ofcolonidid not amount to much, and it was no doubt rendered grudgingly. He was tempted to economize in slaves[1417]and to employ his reduced staff on the best land only. We need not suppose that he got an abatement of his fixed rent from the fiscal authorities: he was most unlikely to attract their attention by making such a claim. He had made his bargain with eyes presumably open. That he had agreed to thecanonassures us that it must have been low enough to leave him a comfortable margin for profit. We may be fairly sure that he sat quiet and did what seemed to pay him best.
In the remaining text of this statute there is no reference tooperaedue from the new squatters, and nothing is said ofcoloni. This does not seem to be due to injury of the stone. The persons for whose benefit the statute is enacted are apparently a new or newly recognized element[1418]in the population of these domains, notcoloni. But the rights offered to them are expressly referred to as rights granted by the statute of Hadrian. If so, then thelex Hadrianacontemplated the establishment of a new peasant class, notcoloni, and the present statute was merely a revival of Hadrian’s scheme. The men are eventually to pay shares of crops, and Schulten’s[1419]view, that they are on the way to becomecoloni, is possible, if not probable. When he remarks that they might find the position ofcolonia doubtful boon, we need not challenge his opinion.
(5) The inscription of Ain el Djemala[1420], a later discovery (1906) is of special importance as belonging to the same neighbourhood as thepreceding one. It is a document of Hadrian’s time. It refers to the same group of estates as the above, and deals with the same matter, the right to cultivate waste or derelict parcels of land. Indeed the connexion of the two inscriptions is so close that the parts preserved of each can be safely used to fill gaps in the text of the other. In a few points this inscription, the earlier in date, supplies further detail. The most notable is that another estate, asaltusorfundus Neronianus, is mentioned in it, and not in the later one. Thus it would seem that it referred to six estates, a curious coincidence, when we recall the six great African landlords made away with by Nero. Another little addition is that waste lands are defined as marshy or wooded. Also that the land is spoken of as fit for growing olives vines and corn-crops, which supplements a mutilated portion of the Ain Ouassel stone. But in one point the difference between the two is on the face of it difficult to reconcile. In addressing the imperialprocuratoresthe applicants base their request on thelex Manciana, the benefit of which they seek to enjoy[1421]as used on the neighbouringsaltus Neronianus. Here the broken text is thought to have contained a reference to the enhanced prosperity of that estate owing to the concession. In any case we may fairly conclude that thelex Mancianawas well known in the district, and its regulations regarded by the farmers as favourable to their interests. But the reply to their petition does not refer to it as the immediate basis of the decision given. The communication (sermo) of Hadrian’s procurators is cited as the ground of the leave granted for cultivation of waste lands. Yet the broken sentence at the end of the inscription seems at least to shew that the rules of thelex Mancianawere still recognized as a standard, confirmed and perhaps incorporated, or referred to by name, in thelex Hadrianaitself. It is ingeniously suggested that the farmers rest their case on theMancianabecause theHadrianawas as yet unknown to them; while the reply refers to Hadrian’s statute as authority. Whether thesaltusorfundus Neronianus, on which the Mancian regulations were in force, is another estate-unit similar to the five named both here and in the later inscription, is a point on which I have some doubts, too little connected with my subject for discussion here. The general scope of the concession granted by Hadrian is the same as the later one of Severus.
If Hadrian issued a statute or statutes regulating the terms of occupancy on the African domains, and some attempts to evade it were met by its reaffirmation under Commodus, it is quite natural that neglect or evasion of it in some other respects should be met by reaffirmation under Severus. This consideration will account for the identity of the concessions granted in these two inscriptions. And itagrees perfectly with the evidence of later legislation in the Theodosian code. The normal course of events is, legislation to protect the poorer classes of cultivators, then evasion of the law by the selfish rich, then reenactment of evaded laws, generally with increased penalties. That under the administrative system of the domains much the same phenomena should occur, is only what we might expect.
In reviewing the state of things revealed to us by these inscriptions we must carefully bear in mind that they relate solely to the Province Africa. Conditions there were in many ways exceptional. When Rome took over this territory after the destruction of Carthage in 146BC, it was probably a country divided for the most part into great estates worked on the Carthaginian system by slave labour. Gradually the land came more and more into the hands of Roman capitalists, to whose opulence Horace refers. Pliny tells us that in Nero’s time six[1422]great landlords possessed half the entire area of the Province, when that emperor found a pretext for putting them to death and confiscating their estates. Henceforth the ruling emperor was the predominating landlord[1423]in a Province of immense importance, in particular as a chief granary of Rome. We are not to suppose that any change in the system of large units was ever contemplated. Punic traditions, probably based on experience, favoured the system; though the Punic language, still spoken, seems to have been chiefly confined to the seaboard districts. What the change of lordship effected was not only to the financial advantage of the imperial treasury: it also put an end to the creation of what were a sort of little principalities that might some day cause serious trouble. At this point we are tempted to wonder whether the great landlords, before the sweeping measure of Nero, had taken any steps towards introducing a new organization in the management of their estates. Trajan’s statute refers to alex Mancianaand adopts a number of its regulations. These regulations clearly contemplate a system of head-tenants and sub-tenants, of whom the latter seem to be actual working farmers living of the labour of their own hands, as those who some 65 years later described themselves in appealing to Commodus. The former have stewards in charge of the cultivation of the ‘manor farms’ attached to the principal farmsteads, and evidently employ gangs of slaves: but at special seasons have aright to a limited amount[1424]of task-labour from the free sub-tenants of the small farms. That these labour-conditions were devised to meet a difficulty in procuring enough slaves to carry on the cultivation of the whole big estate, is an inference hardly to be resisted. That we find it on more than one estate indicates that for the time it was serving its purpose. But, in admitting that it probably began under the rule of great private landlords, we must not lose sight of the fact that it was liable to grievous abuse, and that even the regulations of Hadrian did not remove the necessity of pitiful appeals for redress.
An important characteristic of these estates was that they were outside the municipal[1425]system. Each of the so-calledcivitateshad its own charter or statute (lex) conforming more or less closely to a common[1426]model, under which the municipal authorities could regulate the management of lands within its territory. But these great estates were independent[1427]of such local jurisdictions. And this independence would seem to date from the times of private ownership, before the conversion of many of them into imperial domains. Mommsen thought that this separate treatment of them as ‘peculiars’ began in Italy under the Republic, and was due to the influence of the landowning aristocracy, who were bent upon admitting no such concurrent authority on theirlatifundia. This may have been so, and the extension of large-scale possessions to the Provinces may have carried the system abroad. At all events there it was, and it suited the convenience of a grasping emperor: he had only to get rid of the present possessor and carry on the administration of the domain as before: his agents stepped into the place of those employed by the late landlord, and only slight modification of the current regulations would be required. He issued a statute for management of ‘crown-property’ as he would for a municipality. It was in effect a local law, and it does not appear that the common law administered by the ordinary courts could override it. The imperialprocuratorwas practically the magistrate charged with its administration in addition to his financial duties, for government and extraction of revenue were really two sides of the same function. Obviously the interests of the emperor, of his agent, of the head-tenants, and of the peasant cultivators, were not the same. But the peasant, who wanted to pay as little as possible, and the emperor who wantedto receive steady returns—as large as possible, but above all things steady—had a common interest in preventing unlawful exactions, by which a stable income was imperilled and the prosperity of the cultivator impaired. On the other hand theprocuratorand theconductorcould only make illicit profits through combining to rob the emperor by squeezing hiscoloni. How to accomplish this was no doubt a matter of delicate calculation. How much oppression would thecolonistand without resorting to the troublesome and risky process of an appeal? We only hear of one or two appeals made with success. Of those that were made and rejected or foiled by various arts, and of those abandoned in despair at an early stage, we get no record. Yet that such cases did occur, perhaps not seldom, we may be reasonably sure.
It is well to remember that Columella, in whose treatise letting of farms to tenants first appears, not as an occasional expedient but as part of a reasoned scheme of estate-management, makes provision for aprocurator[1428]as well as avilicus. One duty of the former is to keep an eye on the latter. In the management of great estates an atmosphere of mistrust is perhaps to some extent unavoidable. In an agricultural system based on slave labour, this mistrust begins at the very bottom of the structure and reaches to the very top, as is shewn by all experience ancient and modern. Industry in slaves, diligence and honesty in agents and stewards, are not to be relied on when these subordinates have no share in the profit derived from the practice of such virtues. And mistrust of slaves and freedmen did not imply a simple trust in free tenants. Columella only advises[1429]letting to tenants in circumstances that make it impracticable to cultivate profitably by a slave-staff under a steward. The plan is a sort of last resort, and it can only work well if the tenants stay on continuously. Therefore care should be taken to make the position of thecolonipermanently attractive. This advice is primarily designed for Italy, but its principles are of general application, and no doubt justified by experience. Their extension tolatifundiaabroad, coupled with a falling-off in the supply of slaves, led to similar results: great estates might still be in part worked by slave labour under stewards, but letting parcels to small tenants became a more and more vital feature of the system. But to deal directly from a distance with a number of such peasant farmers would be a troublesome business. We need not wonder that it became customary to let large blocks of land, even wholelatifundia, to big lessees, speculative men who undertook the subletting and rent-collecting of part of their holdings, while they could work the central manor-farm by slave labour on their own account, and generally exploit the situation for their own profit. Thus, as once thelatifundiumhad absorbed little properties,so now its subdivision was generating little tenancies, with chief-tenants as a sort of middlemen between thedominusand thecoloni. To protect thecolonus, the powers of theconductor[1430]had to be strictly limited: to ease the labour-problem and retain theconductor, a certain amount of task-work had to be required of thecolonus. And this last condition was ominous of the coming serfdom.
If the economic situation and the convenience of non-resident landlords operated to produce a widespread system of letting to small tenants, it was naturally an object to levy the rents in such a form as would best secure a safe and regular return. To exact a fixed money-rent would mean that the peasant must spend time in marketing his produce in order to procure the necessary cash, and thereby lessen the time spent in actual farm-labour. In bad years he would look for an abatement of his rent, nor would it be easy to satisfy him: here was material for disputes and discontent. Such difficulties were known in Italy and elsewhere, and jurists recognized[1431]an advantage of the ‘partiary’ system in this connexion. An abatement of rent due in a particular year need not imply that the landlord lost the amount of abatement for good and all. If the next year produced a ‘bumper’ crop, the landlord was entitled to claim restitution of last year’s abatement in addition to the yearly rent. This too, it seems, in the case of a tenant sitting at a fixed money-rent. But thepartiarius colonusis on another footing: he shares gain and loss with thedominus, with whom he is a quasi-partner[1432]. It was surely considerations of this kind that led to the adoption of the share-rent system on these great African estates. By fixing the proportion on a moderate scale, the peasant was fairly certain to be able to pay his rent, and he would not be harassed with money transactions dependent on the fluctuations in the price of corn. Under such conditions he was more likely to be contented and to stay on where he was, and that this should be so was precisely what the landlord desired. On the other hand the bigconductormight pay rent either in coin or kind. He was a speculator, doubtless well able to take care of his own interests: probably the normal case was that he agreed to a fixed cash payment, and only took the lease on terms that left him a good prospect of making it a remunerative venture. But on this point there is need of further evidence.
When the emperor took over an estate of this kind, such an existingorganization would be admirably fitted to continue under the fiscal administration. Apparently this is just what happened. One small but important improvement would be automatically produced by the change. Thecoloniwould now becomecoloni Caesaris[1433]and whatever protection against exactions ofconductoresthey may have enjoyed under the sway of their former lords was henceforth not less likely to be granted and much more certain of effect. To the fiscal officials any course of action tending to encourage permanent tenancies and steady returns would on the face of it be welcome: for it was likely to save them trouble, if not to bring them credit. The only influence liable to incline them in another direction was corruption in some form or other, leading them to connive at misdeeds of the local agents secretly in league with the head-lessees on the spot. That cases of such connivance occurred in the period from Trajan to Severus is not to be doubted. During the following period of confusion they probably became frequent. But it was not until Diocletian introduced a more elaborate imperial system, and increased imperial burdens to defray its greater cost, that the evil reached its height. Then the corruption of officials tainted all departments, and was the canker ever gnawing at the vital forces of the empire. But that this deadly corruption was a sudden growth out of an existing purity is not to be imagined. All this is merely an illustration of that oldest of political truisms, that to keep practice conformable to principle is supremely difficult. The only power that seems to be of any effect in checking the decay of departmental virtue is the power of public opinion. Now a real public opinion cannot be said to have existed in the Roman Empire; and, had it existed, there was no organ through which it could be expressed. And the Head of the State, let him be ever so devoted to the common weal, was too overburdened with manifold responsibilities to be able to give personal attention to each complaint and prescribe an equitable remedy.
How far we are entitled to trace a movement of policy by the contents of these African inscriptions is doubtful. They are too few, and too much alike. Perhaps we may venture to detect a real step onward in the latest of them. The renewal of the encouragement of squatter-settlers[1434]on derelict lands does surely point to a growing consciousness that the food-question was becoming a more and more serious one. Perhaps it may be taken to suggest that the system of leasing the African domains to bigconductoreshad lately been found failing inefficiency. But it is rash to infer much from a single case: and the African Severus may have followed an exceptional policy in his native province. It is when we look back from the times of the later Empire, with its frantic legislation to bindcolonito the soil, and to enforce the cultivation of every patch of arable ground, that we are tempted to detect in every record symptoms of the coming constraint. As yet the central government had not laid its cramping and sterilizing hand on every part of its vast dominions. Moreover the demands on African productivity had not yet reached their extreme limit. There was as yet no Constantinople, and Egypt still shared with Africa the function of supplying food to Rome. Thus it is probably reasonable to believe that the condition of the working tenant-farmers was in this age a tolerable[1435]one. If those on the great domains were bit by bit bound to their holdings, it was probably with their own consent, so far at least that, seeing no better alternative, they became stationary and more or less dependent peasants. In other parts of Africa, for instance near Carthage, we hear of wealthy landowners employing bodies of slaves. Some of these men may well have been Italians: at least they took a leading part later in the rising against Maximin and the elevation of Gordian.
In connexion with the evidence of this group of inscriptions it may be not out of place to say a few words on the view set forth by Heisterbergk, that the origin of the later serf-colonate was Provincial, not Italian. He argues[1436]that what ruined small-scale farming in Italy was above all things the exemption of Italian land from taxation. Landlords were not constrained by the yearly exaction of dues to make the best economic use of their estates. Vain land-pride and carelessness were not checked: mismanagement and waste had free course, and small cultivation declined. The fall in free rustic population was both effect and cause. In the younger Pliny’s time good tenants were already hard to find, but great landlords owned parks and mansions everywhere. In the Provinces nearly all the land was subject to imperial taxation in kind or in money, and owners could not afford to let it lie idle. The practical control of vast estates was not possible from a distance. The direction of agriculture, especially of extensive farming (corn etc) from a fixed centre was little less difficult. There was therefore strong inducement to delegate the business of cultivation to tenants, and to let the difference in amount between their rents and the yearly imperial dues represent the landlord’s profit. Thus the spread oflatifundiaswallowed up small holdings in theProvinces as in Italy; but it converted small owners into small tenants, and did not merge the holdings into large slave-gang plantations or throw them into pasture. The plan of leasing a large estate as a whole to a big head-tenant, or establishing him in the central ‘manor farm,’ was quite consistent with the general design, and this theory accounts for the presence of a population of freecoloni, whom later legislation might and did bind fast to the soil.
This argument has both ingenuity and force, but we can only assent to it with considerable reservations. Letting to freecoloniwas a practice long used in Italy, and in the first centuryADwas evidently becoming more common. It was but natural that it should appear in the Provinces. Still, taken by itself, there is no obvious reason why it should develope into serfdom. With the admitted scarcity and rising value of labour, why was it that the freeman did not improve his position in relation to his lord, indeed to capitalists in general? I think the presence of the big lessee, theconductor, an employer of slave labour, had not a little to do with it. Labour as such was despised. The requirement of task-work to supplement that of slaves on the ‘manor farm’ was not likely to make labour more esteemed. Yet to get his little holding thecolonushad to put up with this condition. It may be significant that we hear nothing ofcoloniworking for wages in spare time. Was it likely that they would do so? Then, when theconductorcame to be employed as collector of rents and other dues on the estate, his opportunities of illicit exaction gave him more and more power over them; and, combined with their reluctance to migrate and sacrifice the fruits of past labour, reduced them[1437]more and more to a state ofde factodependence. At the worst they would be semi-servile in fact, though free in law; at the best they would have this outlook, without any apparent alternative to escape their fate. This, I imagine, was the unhappy situation that was afterwards recognized by law.
I must not omit to point out that I have said practically nothing on the subject[1438]of municipal lands and their administration by the authorities of the severalres publicaeorcivitates. Of the importance of this matter I am well aware, more particularly in connexion with the development ofemphyteusisunder the perpetual leases granted by the municipalities. In a general history of the imperial economics this topic would surely claim a significant place. But it seems to have little or no bearing on the labour conditions with which I am primarily concerned, while it would add greatly to the bulk of a treatise already too long. So too the incidence of taxation, and the effects ofdegradation[1439]of the currency, influences that both played a sinister part in imperial economics, belong properly to a larger theme. Even the writers on land-surveying etc, theagrimensoresorgromatici, only touch my subject here and there when it is necessary to speak of tenures, which cannot be ignored in relation to labour-questions. All these matters are thoroughly and suggestively treated in Seeck’s great history of the Decline and Fall of the ancient world. Another topic left out of discussion is the practical difference, if any, between the terms[1440]fundusandsaltusin the imperial domains. I can find no satisfactory materials for defining it, and it does not appear to bear any relation to the labour-question. The meaning of the terminquilinusis a more important matter. If we are to accept Seeck’s ingenious conclusions[1441], it follows that this term, regularly used by the jurists of a house-tenant (urban) as opposed tocolonusa tenant of land (rustic), in the course of the second century began to put on a new meaning. Marcus settled large numbers of barbarians on Roman soil. These ‘indwellers’ were labelled asinquilini, a word implying that they were imported aliens, distinct from the proper residents. An analogous distinction existed in municipalities between unprivileged ‘indwellers’ (incolae) and realmunicipes. Now a jurist’s opinion[1442]in the first half of the third century speaks ofinquilinias attached (adhaerent) to landed estates, and only capable of being bequeathed to a legatee by inclusion in the landed estate: and it refers to a rescript of Marcus and Commodus dealing with a point of detail connected with this rule of law. Thus theinquilinateseems to have been a new condition implying attachment to the soil, long before thecolonateacquired a similar character. For the very few passages, in which the fixed and dependent nature of the colonate is apparently recognized before the time of Constantine, are with some reason suspected of having been tampered with by the compilers of the Digest, or are susceptible of a different interpretation. It is clear that this intricate question cannot be fully discussed here. If these rusticinquiliniwere in their origin barbarian settlers, perhaps two conclusions regarding them may be reasonable. First, they seem to be distinct from slaves, the personal property of individual owners. For the evidence, so far as it goes, makes them attached[1443]to the land, and only transferable therewith. Secondly, they are surely labourers, tilling with their own hands the holdings assigned to them. If this view of them be sound, we may see in them the beginnings of a serf class. But it does not follow that the later colonate was a direct growth from this beginning. We have noted above several other causes contributing to that growth; in particular the state ofde factofixity combined with increasing dependence, in which the freecolonuswas gradually losing his freedom. Whether the later colonate will ever receive satisfactory explanation in the form of a simple and convincing theory, I cannot tell: at present it seems best to admit candidly that, among the various influences tending to produce the known result, I do not see my way[1444]to distinguish one as supremely important, and to ignore the effect of others. The opinion[1445]of de Coulanges, that the origin of the later colonate is mainly to be sought in the gradual effect of custom (local custom), eventually recognized (not created) by law, is perhaps the soundest attempt at a brief expression of the truth.