Social Mobility in the Later Roman Empire: The evidence of Ausonius

M. K. Hopkins

doi:10.1017/S0009838800015548

Social Mobility in the Later Roman Empire: The evidence of Ausonius

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009

M. K. Hopkins

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M. K. Hopkins: Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, University of Leicester

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The description Ausonius has given us of his family and of the teachers and professors of Bordeaux in the mid-fourth century is exceptional among our sources because of its detail and completeness. There is no reason to suppose that the picture he gives is untypical of life in the provinces and it makes a welcome change from the histories of aristocratic politics at Rome or Constantinople. It provides an excellent opportunity for a pilot study in which we may see how the conflicting elements of social status were in practice reconciled and applied. In the traditional, and still prevalent view, the society of the Later Roman Empire was ‘crushed … in the iron clamp of castes separated from one another by barriers which could not be passed’. The evidence of Ausonius suggests that this judgement should be qualified. The society of the fourth century may have been stable. It was not static.

Type: Research Article
Information: The Classical Quarterly , Volume 11 , Issue 3-4 , December 1961 , pp. 239 - 248

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0009838800015548 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © The Classical Association 1961

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^{page 239 note 1} Alföldi, A., A Conflict of Ideas in the Later Roman Empire (Oxford, 1952), p. 28.Google Scholar To the same effect: Seeck, O., Geschichte des Untergangs der Antiken Welt (Berlin, 1901), ii. 301;Google ScholarCharanis, P., ‘On the Social Structure of the Later Roman Empire’, Byzantion xvii (1944-1945), 39.Google Scholar

^{page 239 note 2} It may be useful to distinguish between class, status-group, and caste in the Weberian manner. Class refers to the economic, or, more specifically, market situation of people as this is affected by their possession of goods or their opportunities for income. Status- groups possess an emotional consciousness of unity (in the Weberian terminology, are communities), and are determined by every social estimation of honour. Castes are highly developed status-groups, typified by exclusiveness and endogamy. Cf. From Max Weber, ed. Gerth, H. H. and Wright Mills, C. (London, 1948), pp. 180–95.Google Scholar

^{page 239 note 3} Professors were to some extent atypical. Through their public speeches they subjected talents to public judgement and more than in other professions their competence became a significant factor in their success. The most able, therefore, and not necessarily the most gentlemanly, had an easier path to the top. But the evidence for mobility even in Ausonius is not confined to professors.

^{page 240 note 1} Seep. 239, n. 1.

^{page 240 note 2} Symm. Or. 6. 1–3; 7. 4.

^{page 240 note 3} Roman figures refer to the genealogical tree (p. 249).

^{page 240 note 4} Aus. 4. 4. 4. (All references unless otherwise specified are to R. Peiper's edition of Ausonius, Leipzig, 1886.) ‘Noble’ (Nobilitas, nobilis) has to be taken with a pinch of salt. It covered a wide range of respectability, from squires to aristocrats. Perhaps nobilis is best rendered, well-born.

^{page 240 note 5} 4. 4. 8–9, 11–12. It may well have been Ausonius' great-grandfather and his great-great-grandfather who were proscribed, so Seeck, , R.E. ii. 3. 419 (1). The text and the chronology are difficult, but the matter is not germane to our problems. In either case the family was impoverished.Google Scholar

^{page 240 note 6} 4. 4. 14; 5. 16. 8.

^{page 240 note 7} 4. 4. 15–16. Jullian, C. (‘Ausone et son Temps’, Rev. Hist. xlvii [1891], 245) thinks that Caecilius Argicius Arborius turned his astrological knowledge to profit.Google Scholar

^{page 240 note 8} 3. 1. 2–3, 9. The case for this view is argued below.

^{page 240 note 9} 3. 1. 21–23.

^{page 240 note 10} Aemilius Magnus Arborius (V) died before 337; if we read at 4. 4. 25: amissum flesti post trina decennia natum (post with V), he must have been born c. 307, in which case his career is remarkable but has the support of iweni (5. 16. 10). Peiper emends post to per, and Seeck dêcennia to vicennia (!), R.E. ii. 3. 420 (2), preferring him to have died aged sixty. Yet in either case, in 308, when his sister married Julius Ausonius, he would have been of little social importance, either a rhetor at Toulouse or a child. Cf. 4.3.11.

^{page 241 note 1} 4. 25. 5–8.

^{page 241 note 2} 4. 6. tit. ‘avowed virgin’ is H. G. E. White's fine translation of virgo devota, Loeb edition, i. 67.

^{page 241 note 3} Taking the scale worked out by Professor Jones, A. H. M. (J.R.S. xliii [1953], 49–50Google Scholar) from an inscription from Thera, Ausonius' estate would have been roughly equal to seven iuga. At Tralles, a Roman Senator had 75 iuga and three decurions 20½, 17, and 57½ iuga each. On the other hand, seven iuga is very much larger than the average holding. Finally, it must be observed that the assessment of land and the quali fications for the decurionate differed from town to town.

^{page 241 note 4} 1. 1. 3–5; 3. 4. 1. 4.

^{page 241 note 5} 3. 4. 9–10: sermone impromptus Latio, verum Attica lingua / suffecit culti vocibus eloquii. I agree with Martino, P., Ausone et les commencements da Christianisme en Gaule, Thése de lettres (Paris, 1906), p. 27;Google Scholar contra, Jullian, (Rev. Hist. xlvii [1891], 244)Google Scholar, who for no apparent reason except the desire to claim Ausonius as the first Gallic poet, says that Ausonius' natural language was Gallic. He is followed by Pichon, R. (Les derniers écrivains profanes [Paris, 1906], pp. 302–3)Google Scholar and Favez, C. (Mus. Helv. iii [1946], 122)Google Scholar, who argue from the awkward turn of phrase. Professor Jones has suggested that this was a polite way of saying his Latin was not literary; and in Gaul his medical Greek would probably have passed muster.

^{page 241 note 6} 3. 1. 1–3: Maiorum regno meorum / quod proavus, quod aims, quod pater excoluit / quod mihi iam senior … reliquit. Cf. Pichon, , op. cit., p. 302;Google ScholarFavez, , op. cit., pp. 122–3, n- 25.Google Scholar

^{page 241 note 7} Grimal, P., R.E.A. lv (1953), 113–25;Google ScholarPeiper, , op. cit., cix-cx.Google Scholar

^{page 241 note 8} 3. 4. 37–38.

^{page 241 note 9} Cf. C. Th. 3. 13. 3; 8. 18 passim.

^{page 242 note 1} 4. 7. 2–4.

^{page 242 note 2} 4. 7. 10.

^{page 242 note 3} 4. 26. 3–4.

^{page 242 note 4} 4. 27.

^{page 242 note 5} 18. 19. 13. For the chronology cf. Marx, F., R.E. ii. 4. 2562(2).Google Scholar

^{page 242 note 6} 3. 4. 7, 17, 7.

^{page 242 note 7} 3. 4. 11–12.

^{page 242 note 8} 4. 26. 5–6: et mihi, quod potuit, quamvis di paupere summa, mater uti adtribuit.

^{page 242 note 9} Favez, (op. cit., p. 122) says a legacy but without argument.Google Scholar

^{page 242 note 10} 4. 3. 8–11.

^{page 242 note 11} 5. 16. 9–12.

^{page 242 note 12} 4. 3. 12–14.

^{page 242 note 13} 4. 3. 16; 5. 16. 15.

^{page 242 note 14} 5. 16. 17–18.

^{page 242 note 15} 4. 12. 3–4, 9–11; 4. 15. 3, 6–7.

^{page 242 note 16} A gratnmaticus was a teacher of literature, second in standing to a professor (rhetor). He would take boys and girls when they could read and write. The rhetor took children over 14. Cf. p. 245, n. 3 below.

^{page 242 note 17} 1. 1. 17–18.

^{page 242 note 18} 4. 9. 5.

^{page 243 note 1} 4. 8. 7–8.

^{page 243 note 2} 4. 8. 11–12.

^{page 243 note 3} 4. 15. 4.

^{page 243 note 4} 5. 11. 3.Itis interesting to see the son of a leader of the curia, even if orphaned, become a grammaticus.

^{page 243 note 5} 4. 24. 5–12. Cf. Stroheker, K. F., Der senatorische Adel im spätantiken Gallien (Tübingen, 1948), p. 201, no. 289.Google Scholar

^{page 243 note 6} 4. 14. Cf. Stroheker, , op. cit., p. 170. no. 132.Google Scholar

^{page 243 note 7} Cf. Marx, F., R.E. ii. 4. 2562 ff.Google Scholar

^{page 243 note 8} Pichon, , op. cit., pp. 194–6. It is a pity, because odierwise Pichon's is by far the most penetrating account of Ausonius which I have found, especially pp. 192–4.Google Scholar

^{page 244 note 1} 20. 1. 34.

^{page 244 note 2} 20. 8. 230–40.

^{page 244 note 3} 20. 4. 105–10.

^{page 244 note 4} 18. 12 passim.

^{page 244 note 5} 18. 1–3.

^{page 244 note 6} e.g. Symmachus and his father, Symm. Ep. 1. 1–3.

^{page 244 note 7} Libanius was given the honorary rank of praetorian prefect. Prohaeresius was honoured by Constans and made strato-pedarch, Eunapius, , Vita Sophistarum, ed. Giangrande, G. (Rome, 1956), 10. 7. 5; 16. 2. 8. In the fifth century the top professors at Constantinople were given high rank regularly, C. Th. 6. 21.Google Scholar

^{page 245 note 1} Cf. Symm. Ep. 7. 94.

^{page 245 note 2} Ausonius mentions five professors of Bordeaux with curial backgrounds; cf. also Libanius, Or. 1. 2; Eunapius, , Vita Sophistarum, 6. 1. 1,7. 1. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 245 note 3} By Diocletian's edict on prices, the paedagogus and the elementary teacher received 50 denarii per pupil per month; the teacher of arithmetic 75. An unskilled labourer received 25 and a skilled labourer received 50 denarii a day, with maintenance as well. Although a teacher could expect presents in kind, he may well at this level have had to have thirty pupils to earn as much as a skilled labourer. A grammaticus earned much more, 200 denarii per pupil per month, and a rhetor 250, C.I.L. iii. 809.Google Scholar In 376 Gratian passed a law fixing the salaries of municipal teachers; grammatici were to receive 12 annonae, and rhetores 24, C. Th. 13.3. 11.

^{page 245 note 4} 5. 17.

^{page 245 note 5} This process is always an important factor in social mobility, cf. Gouldner, A., Patterns of Industrial Bureaucracy (London, 1955). pp. 73–75.Google Scholar

^{page 245 note 6} 18. 20, tit. Ausonius' son, Hesperius, beat a hasty retreat from court.

^{page 245 note 7} 5. 4. 7–9; 5. 10. 22–30.

^{page 245 note 8} 5. 6. 16–19.

^{page 245 note 9} For both Attius Patera and Delphidius, cf. Jerome, Ep. 120, praef.

^{page 246 note 1} 5. 5. 19–30.

^{page 246 note 2} 5. 5. 31–4.

^{page 246 note 3} Amm. Marc. 18. 1. 4.

^{page 246 note 4} 5. 18.

^{page 247 note 1} e.g. Aedesius, a Cappadocian, went to university in Athens, and was a pupil in Syria as well; he taught at Pergamum, 5. 3. 10–6. 1. 4. Libanius moved from Antioch to Athens, Constantinople, Nicomedeia, Nicaea, and finally back to Antioch, 16. 1 and R.E. xxiv. 2485 ff.Google Scholar This kind of movement is an important factor in social mobility, cf. Lipset, S. M. and Bendix, R., Social Mobility in Industrial Society (University of California Press, 1959), pp. 204–6.Google Scholar

^{page 248 note 1} 5. 4. 19; 5.7. 1; 5. 15. 3; 5. 51. 9; 5. 24. 9.

^{page 248 note 2} 4. 16. 3–4.

^{page 248 note 3} 18. 28. 6–7, 32–35.

^{page 248 note 4} 3. 4. 11–12.

^{page 248 note 5} 5. 2. 15–18.

^{page 248 note 6} 5. 3. 11.

^{page 248 note 7} 5. 5. 19–30.

^{page 248 note 8} 18. 26.

^{page 248 note 9} Of Severus Pertinax, 14. 21. 3–4.

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