Managing Economic Public Information in Rome: The Aerarium as Central Archive of the Roman Republic

Cristina Rosillo-López Marta García Morcillo Editors Managing Information in the Roman Economy CHAPTER 3 Managing Economic Public Information in Rome: The Aerarium as Central Archive of the Roman Republic Alejandro Díaz Fernández and Francisco Pina Polo In the beginning, Rome was a small town in Latium struggling to survive among others. Rome had a small territory, in which a limited number of citizens lived and worked; its army was also limited, its political system was under construction, and its relationship to other towns and countries was likewise constrained. Under these circumstances, it is reasonable to assume that Rome had not yet reached a high level of bureaucratisation, although a treasury and a modest archive must have already existed. However, the small Latin town became, throughout the Republic, first the ruler of Italy and then of the whole Mediterranean, which led to the creation of a huge empire. Under these new circumstances it also seems reasonable to assume that bureaucracy increased exponentially, giving birth to countless documents and needing hundreds of servants and officers. This is a far cry from A. Díaz Fernández Universidad de Málaga, Málaga, Spain F. Pina Polo (*) Universidad de Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain e-mail: franpina@unizar.es © The Author(s) 2021 C. Rosillo-López, M. García Morcillo (eds.), Managing Information in the Roman Economy, Palgrave Studies in Ancient Economies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-54100-2_3 43 44 A. DÍAZ FERNÁNDEZ AND F. PINA POLO the false idea of Rome as a great empire virtually without documents—a view that appeared to flourish several decades ago—as scholarship has progressively adopted the perspective that a deep level of bureaucratisation was necessary within a wide and powerful administration, both within Rome and in the provinces.1 What kind of public documents can we expect to have been recorded in the Roman official archives, in particular in the aerarium populi Romani? To what extent were these documents accessible? How relevant was access to this information for the development of economic activity? For example, what kind of information did a societas publicanorum have when they intended to obtain a public contract in a province of the empire, and to what extent was the aerarium a source of information on this? This essay aims to reflect on the aerarium populi Romani as a possible public source of economic information. In this respect, it is necessary to keep in mind that the evidence available to us is (very) limited and partial. That is why our proposal for reconstruction is, at least in part, hypothetical if not conjectural, although it may open up new perspectives. According to tradition, the temple of Saturn at the Forum was, from the beginning of the fifth century, the location of the public treasury and archive of Rome, the so-called aerarium populi Romani.2 This seems to mean that the idea of a general archive existed in Rome from the very beginning of the Republic, and from then on its complexity and magnitude increased in line with Roman expansion.3 The administration of the aerarium populi Romani was the main duty or provincia of the quaestores urbani.4 Tacitus will refer later to the general 1 In this regard, the works and publications of Claude Nicolet (and those inspired by him) have been decisive: Nicolet (1988); Demougin (1994); Moatti (1998, 2011). See now David (2019: 65): “l’élargissement de l’Empire, les nécessités de son administration et la pratique de la codification qui se fit jour donnèrent au document écrit un poids croissant. Il fallait connaître, archiver, classer, retrouver des documents dispersés, hors de portée désormais de la mémoire collective.” 2 Liv. 2.21.2; Plut. Publ. 12.3. 3 This is not the place to develop the discussion on other buildings in which official documents must have been collected and preserved, such as the Tabularium and the Atrium Libertatis. The point is that various different archives existed during the Republic. See Purcell (1993); Tucci (2005); Coarelli (2010). 4 This is attested by a number of Republican legal documents. See for instance the following paragraph from the lex Cornelia de XX quaestoribus: q(uaestorem) urb(anum), quei aerarium provinciam optinebit, eam mercedem deferto, quaestorque quei aerarium provinciam optinebit, eam pequniam ei scribae scribeisque heredive eius solvito, idque ei sine fraude 3 MANAGING ECONOMIC PUBLIC INFORMATION IN ROME… 45 duties of the urban quaestors as cura tabularum publicarum;5 although he is speaking of the Principate, this terminology can also be likely applied to the Republican period. This meant the management and control of the money and the metals reserves, in particular gold, which were deposited in the treasury. It also meant the supervision of all public expenses and incomes in Rome was in the hands of the urban quaestors, always under the command of the Senate,6 as well as the validation and archiving of all official documents generated by the Roman bureaucracy and administration.7 The quaestors were of course given support by assistants (apparitores), whose numbers increased considerably throughout the Republic as Rome’s administration became more and more complex.8 The Lex Cornelia de XX quaestoribus, promulgated by the dictator Sulla in 81, offers some information on how the quaestorian apparitores (scribae, viatores and praecones) were nominated.9 Among them, the scribae enjoyed a higher status that corresponded to their greater responsibilities.10 In fact, the many complex functions of the urban quaestors during their term of sua facere liceto, quod sine malo pequlatuu fiat, olleisque hominibus eam pequniam capere liceto. (Lex Cornelia de XX quaestoribus ll. 1–6. Crawford 1996: 1.294 and 297: “[−--] he is to register [with] the urban quaestor, who shall have the treasury as his province, that fee, and the quaestor, who shall have the treasury as his province, is to pay that sum to that scribe, or (those) scribes, or to his heir, and it is to be lawful for him to do so without personal liability, in so far as it be done without wrongful enrichment, and it is to be lawful for those persons to accept that sum”). In general, on the tasks performed by the urban quaestors see Mommsen, Röm.St. II 523–541; Kunkel – Wittmann (1995: 515–523); Lintott (1999: 136–137); Muñiz Coello (2014: 512–520), and now Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019: 79–124). On the aerarium in the Imperial period, see Corbier (1974). 5 Tac. ann. 13.28: dein princeps curam tabularum publicarum a quaestoribus ad praefectos transtulit. Cf. Ps.-Ascon. in Verr. 1.11 p.226 St.: Quaestores urbani aerarium curabant, eiusque pecunias expensas et acceptas in tabulas publicas referre consueverant. 6 See Pol. 6.13.2: οὔτε γὰρ εἰς τὰς κατὰ μέρος χρείας οὐδεμίαν ποιεῖν ἔξοδον οἱ ταμίαι δύνανται χωρὶς τῶν τῆς συγκλήτου δογμάτων πλὴν τὴν εἰς τοὺς ὑπάτους (“the quaestors are not authorised to make any expenditure without a decree of the Senate, except for the service of the consuls”). There is no doubt that Polybius is speaking at this point about the urban quaestors, whereas he refers to the consular quaestors in 6.12.8. 7 Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019: 84–97). 8 On the selection, duties and careers of apparitores, see Purcell (1983); Muñiz Coello (1982; 1983, esp.119–125). 9 See Keil (1902); Gabba (1983); Varvaro (1995); Crawford (1996). See especially now David (2019). 10 Gabba (1983: 489); Purcell (2001). On the importance and excessive influence of the scribae working in the aerarium see Plut. Cat.min. 16.2 (cf. David 2019: 63–65 and 224–225). Nonetheless, the scribae were of course subject to controls, and could be brought 46 A. DÍAZ FERNÁNDEZ AND F. PINA POLO office could not have been properly developed without the continuous intervention of the scribes, who very likely served for several years, allowing them to get to know the administration well—at any rate much better than the inexperienced young quaestors who remained in office for just a year.11 All official documents (tabulae publicae) generated by the Roman republican administration (Senate, magistrates, assemblies, courts, etc.) were recorded and kept in the aerarium, and were consequently the direct responsibility of the urban quaestors, the magistrates who ensured their accuracy and preservation.12 It was the act of depositing a document in the aerarium that made it a public document. In this way, the urban quaestors became general public notaries of the Republic. To provide a complete inventory of documents registered in the public treasury is beyond the scope of this article.13 However, at least some of them will be mentioned in order to better understand the vastness of the documentation and the complexity of the functions for which the urban quaestors—and ultimately their assistants in the aerarium—were responsible. To begin with, senatorial decrees had to be registered in the aerarium, including the name of the proposer, the content and the date of issue;14 in fact, the date of a senatus consultum was probably the reference used to archive the decrees in chronological order.15 In a letter to Atticus, Cicero alludes to the volume (liber) containing the senatorial decrees approved during the consulship of Cn. Cornelius and L. Mummius, which suggests to trial for fraud. Cf. Plut. Cat.min. 16.3; Cic. Mur. 42: scriba damnatus, ordo totus alienus. On scribes brought to trial see Rosillo-López (2010: 127–131). 11 The continuity in their office can be deduced from Plutarch’s narration of how Cato struggled against the corruption of the scribes of the aerarium (Plut. Cat.min. 16). Cf. Gabba (1983: 489); David (2007: 44); Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019: 84–85). 12 A survey of the type of documents kept in the aerarium, in particular during the Principate, can be found in Millar (1964). See now Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019: 112–115). 13 See Mommsen, Röm.St. II 532–535; Kunkel – Wittmann (1995: 518–521). The scarcity of concrete references to these documents in the ancient sources should be emphasised. 14 A general reference is found in Liv. 39.4.8: …senatus consultum factum ad aerarium detulerit. 15 The existence of that register is proved by Josephus, who quotes a senatorial decree from 44 copied from the treasury, from the tabulae publicae belonging to the urban quaestors of that year, Quintus Rutilius and Gaius Cornelius (Ios. AJ 14.219). Cicero, for his part, accuses Antonius of bringing senatus consulta that had never existed to the aerarium:…senatus consulta numquam facta ad aerarium deferebantur (Cic. Phil. 5.12). Cf. Cic. fam. 12.1.1. 3 MANAGING ECONOMIC PUBLIC INFORMATION IN ROME… 47 that each year the decrees were compiled and archived in a book.16 The exact texts of the laws that were passed in the popular assemblies were also registered in the aerarium, a procedure that was necessary to ensure the impossibility of a falsification or alteration of their contents.17 This legal provision was supplemented in 62, when the lex Iunia Licinia, sponsored by the consuls D. Iunius Silanus and L. Licinius Murena, was passed. Although its content has been the subject of debate, the law probably set forth that it was mandatory to submit to the aerarium a copy of every bill (rogatio) when it was made public, before its discussion in contiones and the vote in comitia.18 Lists of the allies and friends of the Roman people (formula sociorum and formula amicorum populi Romani) were also kept in the aerarium.19 The SC de Asclepiade makes it clear that this list of friends did exist: “[Uteiq]ue Q. Lutatiu[s M.] Aemilius co(n)s(ules) a(lter) a(mbove), s(ei) e(is) v(ideretur), eos in ameicorum formulam referundos curarent….”20 Even though direct evidence does not always exist in the ancient sources, the aerarium must have contained many other public documents, such as census lists,21 and perhaps the minutes of magistrates,22 comitia,23 and trials or legal processes. The urban quaestors had a number of assignments that were directly related to the public finances. To begin with, it was through their assistants in the aerarium that the magistrates were responsible for the general accounting of the Roman state—its supervision, control and preservation. One of their most important tasks was the supervision of all public income 16 Cic. Att. 13.33: …reperiet ex eo libro, in quo sunt senatus consulta Cn. Cornelio, L. Mummio coss. 17 Cf. Sisenna fr. 117 P.: idemque perseveraverunt, uti lex perveniret ad quaestorem ac iudices quos vellent instituerent praefestinatim et cupide. 18 See Gagliardi (2009), with supplementary bibliography. Cf. Mommsen (1858: 186) (294). 19 Kunkel – Wittmann (1995: 521). 20 S.C. de Asclepiade l.17 (= l. 25 of the Greek text). This list of allies and friends is likewise implied in a text from Livy which refers to 170. An embassy from Lampsacus declared that they had revolted against Perseus as soon as the Roman legions appeared in Macedonia and had given all possible assistance to the Roman commanders. As a reward for their behaviour, they requested the Senate to be included amongst the friends of Rome, and the Senate instructed the praetor Q. Maenius to enrol the Lampsacans among the states allied to Rome: Lampsacenos in sociorum formulam referre Q. Maenius praetor iussus (Liv. 43.6.10). 21 Kunkel – Wittmann (1995: 518). 22 Mommsen, Röm.St. II 533. 23 Cic. Pis. 15. 48 A. DÍAZ FERNÁNDEZ AND F. PINA POLO and expenses—thus assuming the role of comptrollers of the Republic— and each operation had to leave a documented trail.24 The money for every payment the state made came from the treasury, and as a result it was expected that all expenses were to be controlled by the urban quaestors. They did not take the initiative to pay a public expense, as they simply followed orders given by the Senate, or directly by a higher magistrate in the name of the Senate. Nevertheless, all public expenses required authorisation for payment by the urban quaestors, who had the ultimate accounting responsibility.25 They also supervised all the public income that ended up in the aerarium. First, the extraordinary types of income, including: war reparations that defeated peoples or cities were obliged to pay to Rome, as well as those derived from auctions in which different items were sold; part of the spoils, such as prisoners of war; the property of individuals who declared themselves insolvent, or became outlaws by proscriptions; and public land.26 The urban quaestors also supervised the regular forms of income, such as the tributum paid by every Roman citizen, and consequently the amount paid by every citizen had to be registered in the tabulae publicae.27 The urban quaestors also had to supervise the accounts of all magistrates after they completed their offices, both in Rome and in the provinces of the empire.28 Every magistrate who handled public money during his term in office was obliged to put in writing and bring to the aerarium detailed accounts after returning from his province.29 The scribae working Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019: 95–97). Trisciuoglio (1998: 102). Cf. Mommsen, Röm.St. II 541. 26 Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019: 91–94). 27 Tributes brought by an embassy to Rome were also given to the urban quaestors for the aerarium, for example the stipendium of Antiochus brought by the leader of the envoys of the king, Apollonius: quaestores urbani stipendium, vasa aurea censores acceperunt… (Liv. 42.6.11). 28 Let us take as an example Verres’ accountability after his quaestorship. Verres was quaestor in 84 and proquaestor probably in 83–82. After his return to Rome, he was obliged to present his accounts (rationes) in detail to the urban quaestors. Cicero reproduces the heading of Verres’ report: “Accounts related to the urban quaestors P. Lentulus and L. Triarius.” (Cic. Verr. 2.1.37: P. Lentulo L. Triario quaestoribus urbanis res rationum relatarum). Lentulus Sura and Triarius were the urban quaestors in 81. 29 In general, on the rules about bookkeeping in the late Roman Republic, see Fallu (1979) and now Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019: 86–90). Cf. Rosillo-López (2010: 110–111); Cuomo (2011: 198). 24 25 3 MANAGING ECONOMIC PUBLIC INFORMATION IN ROME… 49 in the treasury had to check these,30 and the urban quaestors had to give their approval to say that the accounts were appropriate.31 The presumed inaccuracy of the rationes submitted by a magistrate could obviously be used as a weapon for a political attack or even for a judicial process, as was habitual in the last two Republican centuries. Some testimonies show that these rationes could indeed be decisive proof in a trial.32 For example, Ti. Sempronius Gracchus was concerned by having lost his tablets of accounts (πινακίδες) after the Numantines surrounded the army of his consul, C. Hostilius Mancinus, in 137, as he knew he risked being attacked by his political enemies in Rome for not being able to give an account of his quaestorship in Hispania.33 When referring to the supposedly imprecise accounts presented by Verres after his quaestorship, Cicero hints at how these rationes had to be structured. There were three major sections: the income that the magistrate had at the beginning of his office; the expenses throughout his mandate; and the final balance.34 Within these sections, every element had to be described item by item, something that undoubtedly implied a considerably complex process.35 The lex Iulia de repetundis, which was passed in 59, signified a concerted effort to avoid the manipulation of public accounts. Cicero alludes to this law in his correspondence, both during his stay as governor in Cilicia and after his return to Rome, which allows us to see broadly how 30 Cf. Cic. Pis. 25: Ita enim sunt perscriptae scite et litterate ut scriba ad aerarium qui eas rettulit perscriptis rationibus secum ipse caput sinistra manu perfricans commurmuratus sit… 31 According to Callistratus, a Roman jurist of second-third century AD, the accountability followed several stages: a review of the documentation (legendas rationes); a supervision of the calculations (computandas rationes) as well as a delivery of the remains (reliqua solvere); and finally an approval and closure of the accounts (subscribere rationes) (Dig. 35.1.82). These stages may also have existed during the Republic. See Rosillo-López (2010: 112 n.176). 32 The quaestor P. Albius had to present his accounts in the trial against his superior, Q. Mucius Scaevola Augur, for the maladministration of the latter in the province of Asia, ca. 120–119 (Cic. de orat. 2.281); see Alexander (1990), no. 32. On the importance of these tabulae in trials, cf. also Cic. Scaur. 18; Att. 1.16.4; Val. Max. 2.10.1. 33 Plut. Ti. Gr. 6.1–3. 34 Cic. Verr. 2.1.36: Accepi…viciens ducenta triginta quinque milia quadringentos decem et septem nummos. Dedi stipendio, frumento, legatis, pro quaestore, cohorti praetoriae hs mille sescenta triginta quinque milia quadringentos decem et septem nummos. Reliqui Arimini hs sescenta milia. Cf. Fallu (1979: 102). 35 Cicero reproaches Verres for the excessive conciseness of his accounts, an unmistakable proof of his culpability according to him, and wonders: “Is this the way of presenting accounts?” (Cic. Verr. 2.1.36: Hoc est rationes referre?). 50 A. DÍAZ FERNÁNDEZ AND F. PINA POLO the procedure worked.36 In agreement with the lex Iulia, it was compulsory to deposit two copies of the accounts in two cities within the province.37 This meant that accounts had to be in their final form before the governor left his province and returned to Rome. An exact duplicate had to be brought as a third copy to the aerarium in Rome, for supervision by the urban quaestors through their scribes.38 The purpose of this measure was to make it possible to compare the different copies, if necessary. The accounts could not be amended once deposited in the provincial cities.39 Cicero claims the accuracy and integrity of his accounts, but in any case he places the greater responsibility on his scriba, M. Tullius. This was obviously a way for Cicero to distance himself from any potential irregularities, but it also shows that in practice the scribae were in charge of all the bureaucratic issues.40 The final task performed by any Roman commander after his return to the Urbs ought to be a presentation to the urban quaestors of a thorough catalogue of spoils taken from the enemy: money, gold, silver and every kind of asset.41 This documentation, kept in the aerarium, should be implicitly considered as a statement of public ownership. As in other cases, the duty of the urban quaestors was consequently to act as public notaries 36 See Cic. fam. 5.20.1, where Cicero contrasts the ius vetus et mos antiquus with the new regulations introduced by the Iulian law. Cicero sent this letter to L. Mescinius Rufus, his quaestor in Cilicia. Cf. Venturini (1979: 471–477); Coudry (2009: 58–59); Rosillo-López (2010: 112); Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019, 87–88). 37 Cic. Att. 6.7.2: ego Laodiceae quaestorem Mescinium exspectare iussi, ut confectas rationes lege Iulia apud duas civitates possem relinquere; fam. 2.17.4: Rationes mei quaestoris nec verum fuit me tibi mittere nec tamen erant confectae. Eas nos Apameae deponere cogitabamus. 38 Cic. fam. 5.20.2. It seems that the scribae of the aerarium made themselves one further copy of the accounts, which suggests that the magistrate kept the original in his personal archives. Cf. Rosillo-López (2010: 112). 39 Cic. fam. 5.20.8. 40 Fallu (1979: 110); Cuomo (2011: 190). 41 In a letter written to Caninius Sallustius, Cicero declares categorically that the booty he had been able to acquire during his expedition in Cilicia was to be sent to the urban quaestors, that is, to the Roman people, without anyone else touching it, he says. Cicero adds that in Laodicea he would take all necessary measures to ensure that the public money would reach Rome without problems in its transportation (Cic. fam. 2.17.4: De praeda mea praeter quaestores urbanos, id est populum Romanum, terruncium nec attigit nec tacturus est quisquam. Laodiceae me praedes accepturum arbitror omnis pecuniae publicae, ut et mihi et populo cautum sit sine vecturae periculo). 3 MANAGING ECONOMIC PUBLIC INFORMATION IN ROME… 51 on behalf of the civitas,42 and failure to do so could result in prosecution.43 Cicero forcefully contrasts the behaviour of Verres in Sicily with that of P. Servilius Vatia Isauricus—not only had Verres illegitimately plundered Sicily, he also kept the spoils for himself and his friends instead of giving them to the public treasury. On the contrary, Servilius had obtained his booty in accordance with the law of war (“imperatorio iure”), brought it to Rome, exhibited it in his ceremony of triumph, and eventually “took care of registering all in public documents in the treasury.”44 These documents, under the heading “Rationes relatae P. Servili” (“The accounts delivered by Publius Servilius”), were available, since Cicero specifically mentions their contents: “You see not only the number of the statues, but the size, the form, and the state of each one accurately characterised in writing.”45 The aerarium populi Romani thus collected and preserved an impressive compilation of official political, administrative and civil documents (lists of citizens, senatorial decrees, texts of laws, lists of allies and friends of Rome, etc.), as well as financial and fiscal documents (accounts of magistrates within Rome and abroad, public income and expenses, taxes, etc.). It should be added that among these financial documents were the lists of debtors and creditors of the state (as the activity of Cato during his 42 See Churchill (1999: 103): “This document would serve as a concrete record of what the public had already seen (*during the triumph), and would make it possible for those with access to the aerarium to confirm their recollections.” On the accounts of booty, see Coudry (2009: 52–60); Pina Polo – Díaz Fernández (2019, 88–91). 43 For example, Manius Acilius Glabrio was prosecuted because a part of the booty that had apparently been taken from Antiochus’ camp was not exhibited in the procession of triumph and was not brought to the aerarium. See Liv. 37.57.12: …quod pecuniae regiae praedaeque aliquantum captae in Antiochi castris neque in triumpho tulisset, neque in aerarium rettulisset. 44 Cic. Verr. 2.1.57: P. Servilius quae signa atque ornamenta ex urbe hostium vi et virtute capta belli lege atque imperatorio iure sustulit, ea populo Romano adportavit, per triumphum vexit, in tabula publica ad aerarium perscribenda curavit. Cf. Coudry (2009: 53). 45 Cic. Verr. 2.1.57: Non solum numerum signorum, sed etiam unius cuiusque magnitudinem, figuram, statum litteris definiri vides. Cf. Liv. 39.7.1, where a detailed list of what Cn. Manlius Vulso contributed to the treasury on the occasion of his triumph is given: 200 golden crowns, 220.000 pounds of silver, 2103 pounds of gold, and so on. It is obvious that this information comes from the official report delivered by Manlius Vulso. 52 A. DÍAZ FERNÁNDEZ AND F. PINA POLO quaestorship shows),46 as well as certificates of property,47 and no doubt public contracts.48 This all set up an extraordinary and essential source of information for the Roman administration. Was this documentation accessible? Was it available only to magistrates and senators, or open to all citizens? Due to the lack of evidence, these questions are difficult to answer conclusively. In his biography of Cato Uticensis, Plutarch offers the first possible answer. He states that once Cato laid down his quaestorship in 64, he made some of his slaves go to the archive every day and copy the new transactions. Additionally, Cato himself paid five talents for a copy of the books containing accounts of the public business from the times of Sulla to his own quaestorship.49 Five talents is a considerable amount of money for a copy, which must have been made by librarii in the service of Cato.50 Were these librarii professional copyists belonging to the staff of the aerarium and working according to the demands of customers who requested copies of documents? Were they slaves or freedmen of Cato, and five talents was the price paid to the aerarium? Was there a market for financial information services? In any case, this passage from Plutarch implies that public documents in the aerarium were available for private use, and were accessible to citizens who did not hold office, since Cato was certainly a senator after his quaestorship, but he was not a magistrate at the moment. In the trials that took place in the quaestiones perpetuae during the second and first centuries, defendants were accused of misconduct as governors of a province, corruption, illegal access to Roman citizenship, and 46 According to Plutarch’s account, when Cato found in the archive that many persons owed debts of long standing to the public treasury and the treasury to many persons, he immediately demanded payment from debtors and made payment to creditors (Plut. Cat. min. 17). Cf. Millar (1964: 35–36). 47 Cic. Flacc. 80: illud quaero sintne ista praedia censui censendo, habeant ius civile, sint necne sint mancipi, subsignari apud aerarium aut apud censorem possint. 48 Plut. Quaest.Rom. 42. Cf. Millar (1964: 35). 49 Plut. Cat.min. 18.5: οὐ μὴν οὐδὲ ἀπαλλαγεὶς τῆς ταμιείας ἀφῆκε τῆς φρουρᾶς ἔρημον τὸ ταμιεῖον, ἀλλ᾽ οἰκέται μὲν αὐτοῦ καθ᾽ ἡμέραν ἀπογραφόμενοι τὰς διοικήσεις παρῆσαν, αὐτὸς δὲ βιβλία λόγους περιέχοντα δημοσίων οἰκονομιῶν ἀπὸ τῶν Σύλλα χρόνων εἰς τὴν ἑαυτοῦ ταμιείαν ὠνησάμενος πέντε ταλάντων ἀεὶ διὰ χειρὸς εἶχεν. 50 The use of copyists was common. For instance, once the tribune of the plebs Rullus presented his agrarian rogatio in December 64, Cicero, who was still a consul designatus, immediately ordered several librarii to transcribe the text of the bill and had it sent to him (Cic. leg.agr. 2.13). On the use of librarii to obtain copies of public documents, see Cic. leg. 3.46, where Cicero shows distrust towards apparitores and librarii. 3 MANAGING ECONOMIC PUBLIC INFORMATION IN ROME… 53 more, and it was thus essential that prosecutors and advocates were as prepared as possible for their intervention before the court. This implied a careful knowledge of economic, technical and juridical information, which could in part be obtained from oral evidence given by witnesses, but a large part of which had to be extracted from documents. When Cicero explains in De oratore that in the first phase of the work carried out by an advocate it is necessary to collect proofs and establish facts, he mentions as sources “documents (tabulae), testimonies, agreements, examinations, laws, senatorial decrees, court decisions, magisterial decrees, reports, and whatever else is not produced by the orator but it is supplied to the orator by the case itself or by the parties.”51 Cicero first mentions tabulae, a presumably general reference to official documents recorded in the aerarium, but later refers to other kinds of information that, as we have seen, could also be found in the general archive of Rome.52 The correct preparation of a trial thus involved a previous investigation by the orators who were going to intervene in it, which presumably in most cases meant carrying out, at least partially, an inquiry in the aerarium, which was very likely accomplished by slaves or freedmen at the service of prosecutors and advocates, just as Cato used his slaves to be updated. Many of the discourses delivered by Cicero at the court—and also in the Senate or before the people—such as the Verrinae, De lege agraria and others, are a good example of how thorough research work should be done beforehand. In order to prepare his Verrinae, as an advocate Cicero would have utilised a great number of fiscal and financial documents generated by the administration in Sicily, which means that local and provincial archives were also open to obtain information. In fact, Cicero alludes to an article of the lex Cornelia repetundarum according to which he, as prosecutor, was allowed to consult all documents and records (tabulae et litterae).53 Something similar can be said about the agrarian rogatio Servilia, which must have implied previously meticulous work on the part of the tribune Servilius Rullus, as it was an agrarian law that was 51 Cic. de orat. 2.116: …ut tabulae, testimonia, pacta conventa, quaestiones, leges, senatus consulta, res iudicatae, decreta, responsa, reliqua, si quae sunt, quae non reperiuntur ab oratore, sed ad oratorem a causa [atque a re] deferuntur. Cf. Pugliese (1964: 308–310). 52 This could perhaps explain the arson of certain archives with the purpose of destroying evidence, something that would indirectly support open access to archives to obtain copies of documents. Cf. Moreau (1994: 141–143). 53 Cic. Verr. 4.149: Ego legem recitare, omnium mihi tabularum et litterarum fieri potestatem. 54 A. DÍAZ FERNÁNDEZ AND F. PINA POLO required to precisely designate the public lands to be distributed, and Cicero answered in his speeches against the bill with the same degree of precision, using information that was obviously taken from official documents.54 As Nicolet presumed, this may signify that the aerarium contained detailed information about the territories under Roman control, including cadastral-type figurative documents.55 Once again, the important point is that the information brought together within the aerarium had to be available to privati, presumably including men who had not held yet a magistracy—and were thus not senators—and used trials as a springboard for their political careers. This does not necessarily mean, however, that the Roman general archive was open to queries from any citizen. In the case of trials, it seems likely that an authorisation from the praetor presiding over the quaestio was needed to gain access to official documents. In any case, it is probably realistic to assume that only educated well-off people of prominent social (and political) standing were regular customers of the aerarium.56 Having established the at least partial availability of the information contained in the archive, the next and final question is to explore how this affected economic and financial transactions, and once again the problem is the paucity of evidence. Asymmetric information can lead to market failure and inefficient economic results. These asymmetries of information are at times difficult to avoid in certain markets, for example the real estate market, in which it is very common that one party involved in the transaction, usually the seller, has more complete information than the other.57 Asymmetric information in this field can stimulate deception on the part of the seller and annoyance on the side of the buyer, whose outlay may result in disaster. If this principle is applied to the investments implemented by a large company, then the risk of failure and negative economic implications is multiplied, as companies—whether large or small—cannot afford to lack See Roselaar’s article in this volume. Nicolet (1994: 153–155). Nicolet even asserted that “les archives romaines étaient donc exactes.” 56 In a passage from De legibus (leg. 3.46), Cicero refers to copyists who made copies of the texts of laws on request (a librariis petimus). The text once again shows the practice of copying official documents contained in the aerarium for private individuals, although it does not seem realistic to read petimus as an allusion to all Roman citizens; rather, Cicero is thinking exclusively of people like himself, that is of his social class. 57 See Rosillo-López in this volume. 54 55 3 MANAGING ECONOMIC PUBLIC INFORMATION IN ROME… 55 up-to-date information if they wish to succeed as a business. Let us take the societates publicanorum as an example. There were obviously companies of very different size and prominence in Rome, but they all had the goal of gaining a concession in a province, for example to exploit a mining district or salt mines, to collect taxes, and so on. The locatio to exploit these business opportunities was obtained or renewed through public auction, usually every five years. A company had to make an economic proposal to win the auction against other companies and obtain the benefits for the following period, which was not possible without a market study, or without having all the information.58 It is reasonable to assume that the societates publicanorum had their own scribae, who were permitted—and perhaps even had privileged contacts—within the archives. Nicolet has argued that documents in the aerarium were classified by chronologically and by category—which would certainly have been the case for senatus consulta and laws—but not geographically, a fact that would have made researching a particular territory problematic.59 However, before a company assumed any financial risk, it would need to have as accurate an idea as possible of the potential market it aspired to exploit; without this, its financial proposal would have been made blind, and the societas would have run a serious risk of failing. First, the company needed to know the situation in the territory where the locatio would be auctioned: was the situation stable? Was there any risk of military conflict or destabilisation? What was the relationship between the publicani and the local people? How was the economic situation? What was the financial situation of the cities that had to pay taxes to the company? In this respect, the company could gather information from their business networks and could talk to recent governors and publicani who had been involved in the province to know their opinions first-hand, but they could also consult the reports from these governors and their financial accounts kept in the aerarium, in which it was possible to find objective economic and financial information.60 If the auction dealt with the 58 Of course the calculations could be wrong, as seems to have occurred in 61 with the publicans of Asia, who claimed from the Senate a relaxation of the conditions of the locatio (remissio mercedum), adducing that they had paid too high a price. See Cic. Att. 1.17.9; Suet. Caes. 20. 59 Nicolet (1988: 137; 1994: 151). 60 Nicolet (1994: 163), considered that before the lex Iulia of 59 the rationes of a governor had to be sent or brought to Rome, and served as a source of information about the economy of a province. 56 A. DÍAZ FERNÁNDEZ AND F. PINA POLO renovation of a locatio that was already underway, it was even more important to know as accurately as possible how the concession had functioned in the last few years, as well as how much rent the societas in charge of it had obtained. Otherwise, there would be asymmetric information between the societas in charge of the locatio and its potential rivals. However, it is almost certain that the societates publicanorum were controlled by the Roman administration. They had to declare their earnings to the state, either through annual accounting balances (rationes) or at the very least every five years when the locatio was renewed.61 It seems probable that such official reports would have had to be delivered to the aerarium populi Romani.62 Were these accessible to other societates? In this respect, one can only conjecture, but it appears reasonable that legal agents of societates who were interested in competing for a public contract would be authorised to obtain copies of those reports, and in general to get as much information as possible. This official information, if it was accessible to all competitors, was certainly not the only source the publicani had to base their bidding strategy on, but it would have helped to reduce the uncertainties and make the competition fairer. Ultimately, this benefitted the state: the greater the competition, the greater the profits could be. Every state needs a central archive to record and preserve its bureaucratic production. In Rome, the aerarium populi Romani was the depository for official documents throughout the Republican period. Among these documents, we can reasonably conclude that there were global accounts, both at a provincial and Roman level, which were accessible under certain circumstances and for certain individuals. As Nicolet has correctly asserted: “les chiffres n’étaient apparemment pas des secrets d’État.”63 The aerarium has been overlooked as a location where magistrates and senators—but also at least some influential private citizens— could go to look for economic and financial information, for example to be used in a trial or to make an investment. If this partially hypothetical 61 Cf. Cic. Att. 4.11.1: dixit mihi Pompeius Crassum a se in Albano exspectari ante diem IIII Kal.; is cum venisset, Romam (eum) et se statim venturos ut rationes cum publicanis putarent. 62 Nicolet (1994: 164–168). The accounts of the societates publicanorum certainly existed and were deposited where they were acting, as Cicero, who speaks of tabulae publicanorum, shows (Cic. Verr. 2.187). Cicero adds in this context that it was forbidden to bring the accounts to Rome, as they were essential for the Sicilian administration (Moreau 1994: 133), but these accounts do not necessarily coincide with the annual balances. 63 Nicolet (1994: 171). 3 MANAGING ECONOMIC PUBLIC INFORMATION IN ROME… 57 but in any case worth exploring interpretation is correct, the access to the data contained in the general archive of the Roman Republic would have likely reduced the risk of asymmetric access to information and its potential economic effects. BIBLIOGRAPHY Alexander, M.C. 1990. Trials in the Late Roman Republic, 149 BC to 50 BC. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Churchill, J.B. 1999. Ex qua quod vellent facerent: Roman Magistrates’ Authority over Praeda and Manubiae. Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, 129, 85-116. Coarelli, F. 2010. Substructio et Tabularium. Papers of the British School at Rome 78: 107–132. Corbier, M. 1974. 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