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Procurator Augusti

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 August 2013

A. N. Sherwin-White
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Extract

The origin of the imperial civil service is generally attributed to Augustus, and its development to Claudius; but a precise understanding of what were the original elements due to Augustus and what the additions of Claudius is to seek, despite much sound piecemeal work on the activity of the latter. The problem has not been tackled as a whole. To speak of the ‘civil service’ of Augustus is perhaps to use a metaphor of dubious value. The term ‘civil service’ implies a regular and highly organised body of bureaucratic officials forming an administrative and executive personnel which, under the general guidance of the Government, or, in classical terminology, of the Magistrates, manages, often in minute detail, the affairs of the country concerned. Such systems were not unknown in antiquity, notably in Ptolemaic Egypt, but such was not the system of the Principate in general, even at the fullest development of the procuratorial service. Still less was such a system originated by Augustus, despite the retention in Egypt of Ptolemaic methods.

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Research Article
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Papers of the British School at Rome , Volume 15 , November 1939 , pp. 11 - 26
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Copyright © British School at Rome 1939

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References

1 Even Hirschfeld in his momumental work, Die Kaiserliche Verwaltungsbeamten (Berlin, 1904Google Scholar), which is the basis of all research, made no serious attempt to explain the gradual growth of the procuratorial cursus or the way in which it worked during the early Principate. That, and only that, is the object of this study. Throughout I owe a great deal to the advice and criticism of Professor Last on points of detail and doctrine.

2 For the date cf. Dio 55, 31, 4. Hirschfeld op. cit. 233 ff., 253 f.

3 Dio 55, 10, 10.

4 Hirschfeld, op. cit. 382 ff.

5 Strabo 4, 6, 4 (203 C) on the Maritime Alps: . Cf. Dio 55, 28, 1, who says that Sardinia was overrun by pirates in A.D. 6, . Rushforth, G. M. (Latin Historical Inscriptions, 40, Oxford, 1893Google Scholar) calls attention to a Republican parallel in Cic., , Ad Att. 5, 21, 6Google Scholar. But Q. Volusius was sent to administer justice to the resident Romans of Cyprus, not to control unruly natives. Mommsen, (St. R. I, 231Google Scholar n. 3) suggests that he was praefectus fabrum.

The following prefects were of centurion's rank: C. Baebius Atticus, ‘praefectus civitatium Moesiae et Treballiae’ and ‘praefectus civitatium in Alpibus mantumis’ between his primipilate and his military tribunate: ILS 1349. Sextus Pedius Hirrutus, ‘pra(ef) Raetis Vindolicis vallis Poeninae et levis armaturae’: ILS 2689. Sextus Rufus, ‘praefectus cohortis Corsorum et civitatum Barbariae in Sardinia’: ILS 2684. But Baebius Atticus was trib. mil. before governing Noricum under Claudius. L. Vibrius Punicus, an early prefect of Corsica (CIL XII 2455) and Sextus Aulienus, ‘praefectus levis armaturae’ and ‘praefectus classis’ under Augustus and Tiberius (ILS 2688), were of equestrian rank, as presumably was ‘M. Iulius regis Donni f. Cottius,’ prefect of the Cottian Alps (ILS 94). The status of T. Proculus pro legato of Sardinia in A.D. 13/14 (ILS 105) on the analogy of ILS 233 would be equestrian, as was that of the praefectus Bernicidis (ILS 2698). For primipili as praefecti cf. A. von Domaszewski, Die Rangordnung des römischen Heeres, 113 (Bonner Jahrbücher, Heft 117).

6 Cf. n. 5, also Tac., Ann. 4, 72Google Scholar, ‘Olennius e primipilaribus Frisiis impositus.’

7 The original tide of the governor of Judaea remains uncertain: cf. Hirschfeld, op cit. 384 f. The sources are inconsistent or non-technical. Tac., Ann. 15, 44Google Scholar (procurator) is probably proleptic. The balance of probability inclines towards praefectus, though less on the analogy of Egypt, which Hirschfeld puts forward, than on that of Sardinia and the Maritime Alps. Judaea was very small and unruly. Herod, the predecessor of the Roman governors, might be regarded as holding a similar position to Cottius, especially if he allowed the Romans to take a census in his kingdom, part of which was provincialised after his death.

A. Horowitz (‘Le Principe de Création des Provinces procuratoriennes,’ Rev. de Philolologie, 1939, 46 ff.), misses the chronological development of the minor prefectures into procuratorships, and holds that the praefecti always remained distinct from procuratorial governors, although they were sometimes called procurator by courtesy. Hence his theory that procuratorial provinces proper were always and only frontier provinces with auxiliary, but without legionary, troops does not correspond with the facts. Epirus notably violates his canons, as he admits, despite the plea that it became a frontier province when Nero freed the rest of Achaia (ibid. 220 ff.). Cf. also his views in Rev. belge de Philol. et d'Hist., 1938, 51 ff, 775 ff.

8 ILS 9007.

9 ibid. 2689: above, n. 5.

10 Cf. above, n. 5.

11 Sagitta was appointed procurator in Raetia not later than 2 B.C.—sixteen years before A.D. 14 at latest, according to the inscription. But Raetia seems to have been under a legate till A.D. 9 (cf. Syme, R. in CAH X 350 n. 7Google Scholar), if the archaeological evidence for a legionary camp at Oberhausen can be accepted as chronologically precise (Wagner, F., Die Römer in Bayern, Munich, 1924, p. 9Google Scholar and n. 4) and the arguments based on the disposition of the legions—positing two in Raetia—are just (cf. Ritterling's restoration of ILS 847 in RE s.v. Legio 1226). The procurator would then be the grandfather of the Sagitta who was tribune in A.D. 58 (Tac., Ann. 13, 44Google Scholar. Stein, A., Die römische Ritterstand, Munich, 1927, p. 326Google Scholar).

12 ILS 2698, above, n. 5.

13 OGIS 660. AE 1910, n. 207.

14 Cf. Tac., Ann. 11, 20Google Scholar. Mining and soldiering were close allies in the early Principate.

15 ILS 1338, 1394, are the first known censitores of the new type (cf. Hirschfeld, op. cit., 56).

16 Cf. Domaszewski, op. cit. 112 f. E.g. ILS 2688.

17 The fleet at Misenum, being more concerned with the Court, remained under freedmen (Pliny, NH 9, 62Google Scholar. ILS 1986, 2815—A.D. 52. Tac., Ann. 14, 3Google Scholar. Tac., Hist. 1, 87Google Scholar) till Vitellius gave the charge to knights (Tac., Hist. 2, 100Google Scholar. Cf. below, n. 66). The view of V. Chapot (La Flotte de Misène, 111 ff.) that the freedmen prefects were given the anuli aurei (for the effect of which cf. Duff, A. M., Freedmen in the Early Roman Empire, Oxford 1928, 214 ff.Google Scholar) and equestrian status is not borne out by the inscription of Optatus, who calls himself Aug. lib. Nor is it certain that they were a Claudian innovation. More likely Tiberius made the change after his move to Capri, when the fleet became the imperial transport service (Optatus was a freedman of Tiberius: Hirschfeld, op. cit., 226 n. i, despite Pliny, NH 9, 62Google Scholar). Or the earlier prefects may have been in charge of the whole fleet. They bear no special title. Despite Chapot (op. cit. 148) Aulienus, whose inscription comes from Venafrum, not Misenum (ILS 2688), is not necessarily the prefect of Misenum.

18 Cf. nn. 20–22 and p. 21, below.

19 Dio 54, 21. Suet., Aug. 67, 1Google Scholar. Apocolocyntosis, 6.

20 Tac., Ann. 4, 6Google Scholar. ‘Res suas spectatissimo cuique mandabat … si quando cum privatis disceptaret forum ac ius.’

21 ibid. 4, 15. ‘Non se ius nisi in servitia et pecunias familiares dedisse: quod si vim praetoris usurpasset manibusque militum usus foret spreta in eo mandata sua.’ Cf. Dio 57, 23, 5.

22 Cf. Cic., Ad Fam. 12, 24Google Scholar, 3 ‘(T. Pinarius) procurat rationes negotiaque Dionysi nostri.’ ibid. 13, 43, 1 ‘L. Oppius … negotia procurat L. Egnati.’ Also the general relation of Atticus to Cicero, who for all his complaints was a very rich man. For the use of the term res procurare of the imperial procurators, cf. the passages cited above, nn. 20, 21. Also Pliny, (NH 2, 199Google Scholar) uses res Neronis procurans as a synonym for procurator Caesaris. Tac., Ann. 16, 17Google Scholarprocurations administrandis principis rebus. Only in the second century does Suetonius speak of die government of a province, and that Egypt, as procuratio (Nero 35). Despite Bell (Jews and Christians in Alaxandria, 33), the Vitrasius Pollio referred to by Claudius in his letter as ἐπίτροπος is not the prefect of A.D. 39/41, but the procurator mentioned by Pliny, (NH 36, 57Google Scholar) who was probably holding some post similar to the praefectus Bernicidis (K. Fitzler's suggestion, cf. above, nn. 5, 13), whence his connexion with stone statues. (Possibly the same man is the Gallic procurator of CIL X 3871, rather than the prefect as Hirschfeld, op. cit. 418 n. 4, holds). For Claudius uses ἒπαρχος in the letter, and Pliny regularly uses praefectus, for prefect (cf. NH 6, 181, 19, 3; 11, 36, 69). So the Pollio of the letter must be a procurator unless ἐπίτροπος is a dittography from the line above.

23 ILS 9007, above, n. 11.

24 AE 1919, 5. ‘P. Caninius Agrippa proc. Caesaris Aug. prov. Achaiae.’

25 ILS 1375.

26 Strabo 3, 4, 20 (167 C), of Hither Spain. .

27 Suet. De Gramm. 20, 21.

28 Suet. Div. Iulius. 56.

29 ILS 1321.

30 Above, nn. 5–13.

31 Strabo 13, 2, 3 (618 C).

32 For Ostorius Scapula, cf. Dio 55, 10, 10: De Sanctis, Riv. Fil. 1937, 337. Lusius Geta, pretorian prefect with Crispinus till A.D. 51 (Tac., Ann. 12, 42Google Scholar) was prefect of Egypt in 54 (OGIS 664). The promotion of Macro by Caligula likewise was normal, despite Hirschfeld (op. cit. 347) precisely because it was a trick to get rid of him (Dio 59, 10, 6. Philo, In Flaccum, 10 ff.). Cf. below, nn. 36–41.

33 There is no reason to doubt the identity of the C. Turranius who was prefect of Egypt in 4 B.C. (Reinmuth, Klio Beiheft 34, ‘The Prefect of Egypt,’ 131) with the man who was prefect of the annona in A.D. 14, and who apparently held that office since its institution in about A.D. 8 (cf. Hirschfeld, op. cit. 240, n. 2).

34 That the prefect of Egypt Maximus to whom the Tarraconenses set up an inscription at Aeclanum in Italy (CIL IX 1125) had been procurator in Spain, as Stein (in P-W XIV, col. 442), suggests, is very far from certain. For the Vitrasii Polliones cf. above n. 22.

35 Tac., Hist. 2, 100Google Scholar. Cf. Plotius Firmus, Otho's pretorian prefect (ibid. 1, 46) ‘e manipularibus quondam, tum vigilibus praepositum.’ Conversely Graecinius Laco after being praefectus vigilum, was a procurator in Gaul (Dio 58, 9, 3; 60, 23, 3. ILS 1336–1337).

36 Caecina Tuscus, the son of Nero's nurse (Suet. Nero 35) had indeed been iuridicus Alexandriae in A.D. 51 (P. Ryl. 2, 119, 4). He was an established court favourite by 55 (Tac., Ann. 13, 20Google Scholar) when there was a rumour of his appointment to the pretorian prefecture, and became prefect of Egypt in A.D. 63 (Dio 63, 18, 1). Tigellinus' court connexions are well attested (Schol. on Juvenal I, 155. Dio 59, 23, 9. Tac., Hist. 1, 72Google Scholar) ‘praefecturam vigilum et praetorii et alia praemia virtutum … vitiis adeptus’ (cf. Ann. 14, 51 and Furneaux ad loc.). Nymphidius Sabinus, like Tigellinus (Tac., Ann. 15, 72Google Scholar)—‘matre libertina ortus quae corpus decorum inter servos libertosque principum vulgaverat ex C. Caesare se genitum ferebat’—had a long standing connexion with the court before his preferment.

37 Tac., Ann. 13, 22Google Scholar; 14, 51.

38 ibid. 14, 57. ‘Perculso Seneca promptum fuit Rufum Faenium imminuere Agrippinae amicitiam in eo criminantibus.’

39 ibid. 1, 24: ‘Magna apud Tiberium auctoritate.’ More fully in 4, 1: ‘Prima iuventa Gaium Caesarem divi Augusti nepotem sectatus.’ Cf. Dio 57, 19, 5. For his senatorial connexions on his mother's side cf. Velleius 2, 127, 3. ILS 8996. PIR s.v.

40 Philo, In Flaccum 1, 2, 3, 9, 19, 158. Also friendship with Macro, above, n. 32.

41 Tac., Ann. 12, 42Google Scholar. Cf. 15, 71, 16, 17. ‘Cura exsolverentur Lusius Geta et Rufrius Crispinus quos Messallinae memores et liberis eius devinctos credebat (Agrippina).’ Crispinus made a very distinguished marriage (Tac., Ann. 13, 45Google Scholar; Suet. Nero, 35) with the later notorious Poppaea, daughter of an equally famous mother (Tac., Ann. 11, 2Google Scholar): but this presumably was after his appointment, and after the death of her mother almost at his hands, though the opposite—no less gruesome—is also possible. Whether the Iulius Postumus closely associated with Agrippina in Tiberius', reign (Ann. 4, 12Google Scholar) is the prefect of Egypt of A.D. 45/48 (CIL VI 918; P. Oxy. 2, 283) is less certain.

42 Pliny, , NH 19, 3Google Scholar. Seneca, , Ad Helviam, 19, 6Google Scholar. Reinmuth, op. cit., 5. Cantarelli, , ‘Per l' Amministrazione … dell' Egitto Romano,’ Aegyptus 8, 89–96Google Scholar.

43 Tac. Ann. 16, 17. ‘Ut eques Romanus consularibus potentia aequaretur: simul adquirendae pecuniae brevius iter credebat per procurationes administrandis principis negotiis.’ The words italicised deserve more attention than is given them by some students of the Principate. Apparently he achieved his ambition, for Tacitus classes him with Crispinus as ‘eques Romanus dignitate senatoria’ (ibid.).

44 Tac., Ann. 12, 42Google Scholar. ILS 1321. Tacitus seems to stress this point, ‘transfertur regimen cohortium ad Burrum Afranium egregiae militaris famae gnarum tamen cuius sponte praeficeretur.’

45 There are two notorious instances of undue influence in the promotion of equestrian officials other than prefects. Felix the brother of Pallas became governor of Judaea (Tac., Ann. 12, 54Google Scholar. Hist. 5, 9. Suet. Claudius, 28), probably after receiving the anuli aurei, cf. below, n. 89. Iulius Privignus, the venal procurator of Cappadocia was ‘Claudio perquam familiaris cum privatus olim conversatione scurrarum iners otium oblectaret’ (Tac., Ann. 12, 49Google Scholar). Apparently he was the court jester, cf. Furneaux (ad loc.).

46 For the possible identification of Ti. Claudius Balbillus the librarian of Alexandria with Claudius' friend Ti. Claudius Barbillus—according to the text of the Alexandrine letter (P. Land. 1912, 1. 36)—cf. below, n. 68.

47 One wonders whether Catonius Iustus would have been pretorian prefect in A.D. 43 if he had not been sent from Pannonia on a special mission to Rome in A.D. 14 (Tac., Ann. 1, 29Google Scholar. Dio 60, 18, 3, etc.).

48 Cf. the letter of Claudius to the Alexandrines, where Barbillus and Archibius are each described as ὁ ἐμὸς ἐταïρος (ll. 105–107), but not Vitrasius Pollio. Also ILS 206, ‘Plantam Iulium amicum et comitem meum.’ Bruns 80, ‘Sagittam amicum et procuratorem meum.’

49 In Flaccum 1, 3. .

50 Reinmuth, op. cit. 131 f. Also De Sanctis, Riv. Fil. 1937, 337 ff. for Ostorius Scapula. Cornelius Gallus, a knight of provincial origin (Stein, op. cit. 384) had led the invasion of Egypt (Dio 51, 9, 1), and was a person of obvious importance. Of Aelius Gallus nothing is known beyond his friendship with the geographer Strabo; he may have been the adoptive father of Seianus (cf. PIR 2s.v.), in whose conspiracy another Aelius Gallus was involved (Tac., Ann. 5, 8Google Scholar). P. Octavius, possibly an equestrian relative of Augustus, and Ostorius Scapula, previously or later the first prefect of the pretorians with P. Salvius Aper (Dio 55, 10, 10) had descendants in the Senate (OGIS 659 n. 3 and Tac., Ann. 12, 31Google Scholar); but a possible son of C. Iulius Aquila followed an equestrian career under Claudius and Nero (Tac., Ann. 12, 15Google Scholar. CIL III 346. CIG 5790). Of the origins and descendants of C. Perronius, P. Rubrius Barbaras, C. Turranius, even less is known. Tacitus mentions one Rubrius as a ‘modicus eques Romanus’ (Ann. 1, 73). For M. Magius Maximus cf. n. 34, above.

51 Strabo 17, 1, 12 (797 C). Not despite Reinmuth (op. cit. 4) ‘men of tried ability… promoted … after a long official career.’

52 ILS 8996. Velleius 2, 127, 3.

53 ILS 2690. ‘M. Vergilio … Gallo Lusio … trib. mil. … cohort, primae idio(lo)go ad Aegyptum,’ evidently under Tiberius. In ILS 2691 L. Volusenus Clemens was ‘trib. mil praef. equit. praef. tironum’ and possibly assisted in the census of Aquitania (… accepit). Then ‘cum hic mitteretur a Ti. Caes. Aug. in Aegypt. ad iur. dict. decessit provinc. Aquitania.’

54 Cf. Jones, Stuart, Fresh Light on Roman Bureaucracy (Oxford 1920), 11 fGoogle Scholar. For the original scope of the department cf. Strabo loc. cit.

55 Cf. Philo, , In Flaccum I, 3Google Scholar, above, n. 49.

56 Cf. Reinmuth, op. cit. 127. The average term of office was even shorter in the later Principate. Galerius' sixteen years were quite exceptional.

57 IGRR I 1302, in 17/16 B.C.

58 Martin, Les Épistratèges, 84 ff. Lists of epistrategi ibid., also in J. G. Milne, History of Egypt under Roman Rule. Q. Corvius Flaccus was the first (known). None of the earlier, including M. Clodius Postumus, A. Folmius Crispus, Ragonius Celer, before Ti. Iulius Alexander, is known elsewhere in the imperial service or even mentioned in the extensive prosopographic material of the early Principate; yet their names suggest Italian rather than provincial citizens. Possibly they were recruited from the Egyptian legions, and so had no chance of promotion while the senior posts were filled from outside.

59 Suet. Aug. 67, and below, n. 90.

60 Suet., Horatius 45 (p. 297Google Scholar).

61 Gellius, Aulus, NA 17, 9, 1Google Scholar, refers to a collection of letters of Caesar to Oppius and Balbus ‘qui res eius absentis curabant.’ But one would hardly call them procurators.

62 Cf. also the ‘praefecti aerarii Saturni,’ ‘praefecti frumenti dandi,’ and the ‘praefecti aerarii militaris’—the latter a late creation of Augustus—all senatorial posts. Cf. Hirschfeld, op. cit. 260, 265. Augustus also experimented with senatorial commissioners of the annona, before establishing the equestrian prefecture (Dio 55, 26, 2; 31, 4). Trajan left the oversight of his alimenta to senatorial commissioners. This disguised centralisation, which increased at the end of Augustus' reign, is the point of Tac. Ann. 1, 2, ‘munia senatus in se trahere,’ cf. above, p. 11.

63 Cf. n. 5 for the earlier usage. In Raetia the transitional form procurator et pro legato, a procurator in exceptional charge of legionary troops (Hirschfeld, op. cit. 390 ff.) appears under Claudius: ILS 1348 (Hirschfeld's original view that this is Claudian by its spelling must be right; for procurator Augustorum at this period cf. CIL IX 3019, Pliny, NH 2, 199Google Scholar). C. Baebius Atticus after several praefecturae civitatum under Tiberius appears under Claudius as ‘procurator in Norico’ (ILS 1349). Procurator is found in Sardinia by A.D. 69: ILS 5947 (but the older title was combined with the newer in the formula procurator et praefectus by 83, cf. ILS 5350; 1358), and in Corsica by A.D. 72 (CIL X 8038). At Sparta C. Iulius Spartiaticus was styled ‘procurator Caesaris et Augustae’ by Claudius to regularise his position as the descendant of kings, instead of praefectus (AE 1927, n.2). Cf. Cottius, above n. 5. Cf. also the probable application of the term procurator to the overseer of the mines in Egypt under Claudius, above n. 22. The title of the praefectus Bernicidis remained unchanged (ILS 2699, 2700).

64 Hirschfeld, op. cit. 385. The earliest known Claudian procurator of Mauretania was pro legato (AE 1924, n. 66), as in Raetia, n. 63 above.

65 Tac., Ann. 12, 60Google Scholar. ‘Mox alias per provincias et in urbe pleraque concessa sunt quae olim a praetoribus noscebantur,’ referring to the period between the institution of the prefecture of Egypt and the grant of jurisdiction by Claudius to the financial procurators, may well cover the grant of such powers, probably in Tiberius' reign, to the equestrian governors and the city officials such as the prefect of the corn supply; indeed there is nothing else to which this passage can refer, and of course Pontius Pilate had extensive powers (Hirschfeld, op. cit. 401 ff.). Cf. above, n. 5 and below, n. 67.

66 ILS 2702, Tac., Ann. 13, 30Google Scholar. Palpellius Clodius Quirinalis held the post of ‘praefectus classis Ravennatis’ after a procuratorship, at some date between A.D. 42 and 56 (trib. mil. leg. C.p.f.). By A.D. 69 the classis Misenensis was an equestrian procuratorship (Tac., Hist. 2, 100Google Scholar)—held later by the elder Pliny after a procuratorship in Spain (Pliny, , Ep. 3, 5, 17Google Scholar; 6, 16, 4). Cf. n. 17, above. Chapot (op. cit. 111) seems to misunderstand this change, which corresponds to the increasingly civil character of the fleet's duties, and regards the fleet as a purely military unit.

67 Tac., Ann. 12, 60Google Scholar. ‘Eo anno saepius audita vox principis parem vim rerum habendam a procuratoribus suis iudicatarum ac si ipse statuisset.’ Comparison with Ann. 4, 6 ‘si quando cum privatis disceptaret (Tiberius) forum et ius,’ and 4, 15—the case of Lucilius Capito— shows that only equestrian procurators were concerned (above, n. 21), despite the misleading last sentence of the chapter, ‘Claudius libertos quos rei familiari praefecit sibique et legibus adaequaverit.’ This jibe is extraneous, and cannot mean that any freedmen agents were given jurisdiction; for the freedmen were either the subordinates of the executive knights (below, p. 23) or were secretaries, not actual administrators of provinces. Felix’ appointment to Judaea is not relevant here, cf. below, n. 89.

68 For Burrus, cf. above, n. 44. Whether the learned prefect of Egypt in A.D. 55–59 (Tac. Ann. 13, 22. OGIS 666. Pliny, , NH 19, 3Google Scholar. Seneca, , Nat. Q. IV, 2, 13Google Scholar), the Alexandrine friend of Claudius (above, n. 48), and theequestrian procurator of Asia, etc. (AE 1924 n. 78, below, p. 22), all known as Ti. Claudius Balbillus (or Barbillus, a frequent eastern variant for Balbillus: A. Stein, Aegyptus, 1933, 125 nn. 3–4), are the same man or three different men, has been much disputed. The ground on which Stein (art. cit. 132) rejects the identification of the procurator with the friend of Claudius is the best reason for accepting it, namely that Claudius' Greek friend had to go through die equestrian cursus from the beginning, despite his eminent position at Alexandria and his mature years. So had odier Greeks of like status, Xenophon, Spartiaticus, etc. (below, nn. 69–70, 98). This wasdeliberate policy: cf. below, p. 25.

The identification of the procurator of Asia with the prefect of Egypt is disputed on chronological grounds. His inscription was set up at Ephesus after the death of Claudius late in A.D. 54, and the prefect sailed from Italy to Egypt in A.D. 55. But the inscription might well have been to honour his departure, and Pliny quotes Balbillus' voyage to Egypt as a record-breaking passage. So the time-table and the threefold identification is quite possible, and, as Stein admits, on all other grounds very probable. The Alexandrine legation contained persons whose identification widi other famous scholars, including one other future librarian, Dionysius, (below n. 70) is reasonably certain (Bell, Jews and Christians 29). Why Stein says that Balbillus' writings—‘perfectus in omni genere litterarum’—were in Latin is obscure (art. cit. 127 n. 1).

Ti. Julius Alexander was epistrategus of the Thebaid in A.D. 42 (OGIS 663), procurator of Judaea in 46 (Jos., Ant. 20, 100Google Scholar), minister bello datus under Corbulo in 63 (Tac., Ann. 15, 28Google Scholar), prefect of Egypt in 66 (cf. OGIS 669 n. 2 and PIR s.v.). Cn. Vergilius Capito, like Balbillus, was (Άι) Уύπτου καὶ Άσίας ἐπίτροπος (AE 1909 n. 136) and was later prefect of Egypt (OGIS 665). Less exalted but still complicated was the career of Sergius Proculus, who was iuridicus Alexandriae and, under Nero, procurator of Cappadocia with Cilicia (AE 1914 n. 128). Cf. also Palpellius Clodius (above n. 66) and Seneca's general reference to the procuratorial career, ‘procurationes officiorumque per officia processus’ (Epp. 17–18, 101, 6, and ibid. 2, 19, 5).

69 AE 1924 n. 78. ‘Procurator Asiae et Aegypti’ occurs separately at this period elsewhere (n. 68 above). The charge of the Museum and the High Priesthood commonly went together at this period (Hirschfeld, op. cit. 363). There is a clear break of office also at per annos. Ad responsa Graeca also recurs separately in the career of C. Stertinius Xenophon, Claudius' doctor (SIG II3, 804), and combined with other charges in Dionysius' career (below n. 70).

70 Suidas, s.v. . The latter post, held also by Xenophon, n. 69, above, is threefold, and corresponds to the ‘epistularumque et legationum simul et anuli curam’ held under Julius Caesar by the father of Pompeius Trogus, a Roman knight of provincial origin (Justin 43, 5, 12), and is not to be confused with the ab epistulis and a libellis. A similar combination is found in the career of L. Julius Vestinus under Hadrian (CIG 5900). The responsa were the replies of the Princeps not to minor appellants but to the embassies and petitions of the cities and kings of the East (cf. SIG II3 804 n. 3). Dionysius was free born, and may be identified with the Dionysius of Claudius' letter to the Alexandrines: l. 17 (though not with the Dionysius son of Theon: ibid. l. 76).

71 Cf. the appointment by Vitellius in A.D. 69 of Lucilius Bassus to the conjoint command of the fleets of Ravenna and Misenum, directly after his praefectura alae (Tac., Hist. 2, 100Google Scholar).

72 Tac., Ann. 15, 35Google Scholar. The charge was made against the elder Torquatus Silanus ‘inter libertos habere quos ab epistulis et libellis et a rationibus appellaret, nomina summae curae,’ and repeated against his nephew (ibid. 16, 8) ‘tamquam disponeret imperii curas.’ This suggests the emancipation of these posts from their domestic connexions as normal positions in the service of any aristocratic family. Also the grant of ornamenta quaestoria etc. (Ann. 11, 38; 12, 53).

73 Tac. Ann. 13, 14 on the retirement of Pallas is consciously satirical non absurde, ‘ire Pallantem ut eiuraret,’ ‘sane pepigerat Pallas ne cuius facti in praeteriturn interrogaretur paresque rationes cum republics haberet.’ Such terms were properly applicable only to magistrates. Contrast Augustus' behaviour (Suet, 101, 4) quoted in the text.

74 Tac., Ann. 11, 33Google Scholar shows that normally the limits of freedman authority were respected, ‘Narcissus non aliam spem incolumitatis Caesaris adfirmat quam si ius militum uno illo die in aliquem libertorum transferret.’

75 Tac., Hist. 1, 58Google Scholar. ‘Vitellius ministeria principatus per libertos solita agi in equites Romanos disponit.’ Cf. ILS 1447 for one of these. That this measure was taken solely because Vitellius was with his army is not a complete explanation, for the implication is that the knights were pleased to hold such posts.

76 Cf. on these new posts, Momigliano, A., Claudius 46 (Oxford, 1934Google Scholar).

77 Frontinus, De Aquis 105.

78 ILS 1533.

79 ibid. 1567, cf. 1578, procurator ad elephantos.

80 ibid. 1546.

81 ibid. 9027, cf. 1567.

82 ibid. 1587.

83 ibid. 1487, cf. below, n. 85.

84 ibid. 6071.

85 ibid. 1487 reads ‘Ti. Cl. Marcellinus (proc) Aug. a patrimonio.’ This directly violates the normal rule of reserving the title of proc. Aug. for equestrian officials (Hirschfeld, op. cit. 381 n. 4; 411 n. 4). Assuming the pre-Vitellian date Marcellinus must be, as is usually believed, a freedman, and the restoration should be not proc. but lib. (cf. n. 75).

86 Tac., Ann. 13, 22Google Scholar. Cf. also 11, 35 for an equestrian procurator ludi under Claudius.

87 The quaestor might replace the procurator as over-seer in public provinces, though few were without their equestrian procurator by this time. E.g. for Achaia even earlier—whence comes the proc. XX hereditatium of ILS 1546—cf. n. 24, above. The procurator portus Ostiensis would function beneath the praefectus annonae, and the curator de Minucia beneath the senatorial praefecti frumenti dandi, when such existed. Suetonius (Claudius 24, 2) shows that there was nothing tendentious in the abolition of the quaestor Ostiensis. The new procurator did not necessarily take over the quaestor's work, but was perhaps more particularly connected with Claudius' new harbour, portus. Cf. Momigliano (op. cit. 51), who, however, tends to an extremer view.

88 Frontinus, De Aquis, Preface 2. Hirschfeld, op. cit. 277.

89 Nor should the appointment of Felix, the brother of Pallas, be interpreted to mean that Claudius treated Judaea as a domestic affair. Suetonius (Claudius 28) ‘Felicem quern cohortibus et alis provinciaeque Iudaeae praeposuit,’ and (ibid. 25, 1) ‘libertinos qui se pro equitibus Romanis agerent publicavit,’ suggest that Felix had been given the anuli aurei together with equestrian status in the fashion of the time, and his servile origin thereby virtually annulled, and that he followed the normal career of a knight, cf. A. Stein: Der römische Ritterstand, 114.

90 Cf. ILS 1588 for the a bibliothece, 9028 for the castrensis department, 1514 for the bureau of the fiscus Gallicus under Tiberius; CIL VI 3962, 4014, and Scribonius Largus 162 for the patrimonium and hereditates at an early date: cf. Hirschfeld (op. cit. 40 f.). The cursus publicus existed before Claudius, but no officials are known before the Flavian period (Hirschfeld, op. cit. 193), though tabellarii are testified from Tiberius on (op. cit. 199 f.).

91 ILS 1567, cf. 9504.

92 Cf. below, n. 101.

93 Above, nn. 35–36.

94 Above, n. 35.

95 Above, nn. 69–70.

96 Caecina Tuscus, iuridicus in 51/2, prefect in A.D. 63, above n. 36. Proculus, above, n. 68.

97 Also the iuridicus Proculus had served in the Egyptian army (above, n. 68).

98 Xenophon, Alexander, Spartiaticus, Felix and Balbillus—if he really was of Greek extraction—served or commenced their service, under Claudius: above, nn. 63, 68–70, 89. Dionysius probably made his name known at this time, though his preferment came under Nero: above, n. 70. Caecina Tuscus and Nymphidius Sabinus seem to have had Greek blood in them (above, n. 36), but cannot be classed among the Greeks. Why Ponticus, prefect of Egypt in about 66, should be regarded as a freedman (Reinmuth, op. cit. 132) is not clear; Tac., Ann. 14, 41Google Scholar mentions a Valerius Ponticus.

99 For Xenophon's military tribunate cf. SIG II3, 804. Also Felix (n. 89, above) and Balbillus (n. 68), who, like Xenophon, was ad responsa Graeca after his military tribunate. For Nymphidius Sabinus, ILS 1322. Alexander had some military experience, for he was minister bello for Corbulo before his prefecture of Egypt (n. 68, above).

100 AE 1927, n. 2.

101 Between Claudius and Hadrian it was Vespasian and Trajan who made the most important individual contributions to the development of the procuratorial system, if the indications of bare epigraphy can be trusted. Briefly, die procuratorial career increased in complexity between A.D. 69 and 117 because of four factors:

i. The gradual accretion of equestrian officials for the supervision of taxation, such as the procuratores XX hereditatium and the nationalised promagistri and conductores vectigalium.

ii. The growing size and number of the imperial estates in the provinces led to the appointment of special procuratores saltuum and regionum, and also of procuratores ferrariarum, of equestrian rank, for their administration.

These two factors came about largely through the financial reforms of Vespasian: cf. Rostovtzeff, Geschichte der Staatspacht in der römische Kaiserzeit, 381 ff., 432 ff. (Philologus S. IX), Hirschfeld, op. cit. 122 ff. H. Mattingly, The Imperial Civil Service of Rome, 76 ff.

iii. The conversion of freedman executive posts into junior equestrian posts. E.g., the ‘procurator monetae,’ ‘procurator aquarum,’ and ‘procurator loricatae’ (the superintendant of the actual Fiscus).

iv. The conversion into senior equestrian posts of the secretariats. The ab epistulis, a rationibus and a patrimonio were equestrian by Trajan's time (ILS 1448. AE 1913, n. 143a).

These four tendencies were assisted by the increasing recruitment of the equestrian order from the eastern provinces and from the descendants of the imperial freedmen (cf. above n. 98; also Juvenal VII 14–16 and Stein, op. cit. 397 ff.). A large number of minor equestrian posts came into being and gave the service what it lacked under the Julio-Claudians, a junior division for the new men, the future procuratores sexagenarii. So the known careers of Trajanic date represent a system not very different in essentials from diat which was established by the Hadrianic reorganisation. Cf. in general Lacey, R. H., The Equestrian Officials of Trajan and Hadrian (Princeton, 1917)Google Scholar. He rather underestimates the forces at work: cf. the cumulative effect of ILS 1338, 1350, 1352, 1374, 1419, 1435, 1448, 2728, 7193, and AE 1913 n. 143a, 1922 n. 19, 1934 n. 2.

Addendum. The clearest account of an equestrian procurator in the Republic (n. 22) is given by Cic. Pro Quinctio, 27–29; 61–73.

To the instances of favouritism collected in nn. 36–45 add the appointments in Tac., Ann. 13, 22Google Scholar—all are the friends of Agrippina mentioned in 21 as receiving rewards. So Balbillus (n. 68) was a courtier.

To the evidence quoted nn. 86–87 add Tac., Ann. 13, 1Google Scholar. ‘P. Celer eques Romanus et Helius libertus, rei familiari principis in Asia imposti.’