An Economic History of Rome to the End of the Republic

📖 The Scoop

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1920 edition. Excerpt: ...rich and the race of slaves multiplied, while the Italian people dwindled in numbers and strength being oppressed by penury, taxes, and service in the army. If they had any respite from these evils they passed their time in idleness, because the land was held by the rich who employed slaves instead of freemen." The redundancy of Appian's phrases does no more than justice to the deluge of evils that he describes. The new generation that grew up, excluded from opportunities to acquire land in Italy, drifted into the back eddies of urban slums or emigrated to the new provinces that were constantly being opened, ' and such men were to a great extent lost to Rome's body of citizens./ For 3 Bell. Civ. I, 7. 4 The Roman governors found enough Roman citizens resident in such provinces as Spain, Asia, and Africa to levy a legion of them in time of need: see for example Cic. Ad. Att. V, 18, 2; Caesar, Bell. Civ. III, 4, 3; Bell. Alex. XXXIV, 5. Cf. Kornemann, art. C onventus, Pauly-Wissowa. 'Z forty years' after the Second Punic War there was despite a constant manumission of slaves but a slight increase of 1.3 per cent. annually in the citizens' rolls, and thereafter for thirty years, a period during which Rome added Macedonia, Africa, and Asia to the Empire, there was an annual decrease of one fourth of one per cent. A complete statement of the causes of decline in population would necessitate a discussion of the Malthusian law, the social evil, birth control and much else, and for these problems we have of course but few data. Some considerations however may be indicated in passing. There is the striking fact which all readers of Rome's literature quickly notice that of the many families of which we...

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