Chapter 33
The restored Empire of Diocletian and Constantine was still recognizably Roman. Nevertheless, such changes had taken place in the Roman world by the beginning of the fourth century that scholars generally identify it as the beginning of a new period of ancient history, called Late Antiquity. In the more stable atmosphere created under Diocletian and Constantine, economic, social, and cultural changes in the fourth century were more evolutionary and less revolutionary than they had threatened to become in the latter part of the third. Furthermore, the pace and scope of change, as always, were uneven.
Economic conditions
A lack of silver undermined Constantine’s attempt to revive the silver coinage (p. 590). Hyperinflation from too many copper and billon coins continued throughout the fourth century. In 334, the ratio of the denarius (now only a unit of account based on copper or bronze nummi) to gold was 300,000 to the Roman pound. By Constantine’s death in 337, it was 20 million to the pound, and 330 million by 357! Constantine did, however, manage to stabilize the gold coinage with his new solidi, not only by minting them at seventy-two per pound, but also by measures designed to release hoarded gold. The long-term stability of gold, however, rested on increased measures to recover gold coins through taxation and forced purchases from moneychangers and the rich. The production of gold mines was also steadier as a result of increased security and political stability. Silver supplies were inadequate because the available ores were of low quality or difficult to mine.
In effect, the Roman government created a two-tiered system, a stable one based on gold and an unstable one based on copper. The gold system benefited the government and the wealthy. The stable purchasing power of gold enabled the government to retain the loyalty of the armies by regular cash donatives. Gold was also used to pay officials, to buy and subsidize food and entertainments for the urban plebs of Rome and Constantinople, and to provide annual subsidies and diplomatic payoffs to ensure peaceful frontiers. The rich were the only ones with enough income to acquire gold in sufficient quantities to protect themselves against inflation. The lower ranks of the curial class and the poor saw their copper and billon currency continually lose its purchasing power and had to avoid using money as much as possible. Under such conditions, the rich continued to get richer as the rest got poorer.
Agriculture
The economic advantage enjoyed by wealthy senatorial landowners and emperors meant the continued amassing of vast landholdings in a few hands. Nevertheless, the total amount of land under cultivation shrank in some areas. Particularly in the less developed and less defensible parts of the West, the invasions and civil wars of the third century had caused much hardship. The large landowners who had been able to protect themselves or find refuge elsewhere were able to buy or take over the lands of the less fortunate when more favorable conditions returned. They shrewdly spread their holdings over many provinces, particularly in relatively productive and protected areas.
In the East, land remained more in the hands of smaller independent proprietors, particularly in Asia Minor, Syria–Palestine, and Egypt. Those areas had not suffered so badly during the third century. A senate at Constantinople had only recently been created from the ranks of moderately wealthy local aristocrats (p. 613). They had not been able to emulate the wealth of the old western senatorial families. Also, the proximity of more large and relatively prosperous cities gave eastern farmers access to urban markets where they could find good prices.
Trade and industry
On the whole, markets were more regional than empire-wide during the fourth and subsequent centuries. Still, the situation was not so bleak as once imagined. It is true that the great landowners tried to be as self-sufficient as possible. They maintained their own staff of craftsmen to produce many of the articles needed to run their domestic and other operations. To make up for what they did not produce themselves, they often exchanged different products with each other. Yet, markets and independent tradesmen and craftsmen did not disappear. The great proprietors often made handsome profits by selling in bulk to wholesale traders, to municipal governments, and even to the army and the imperial government.
Some of these profits were exchanged in urban markets for specialty items that could not be made on country estates. Essential commodities like metals, marble, papyrus, spices, salt, and slaves had to be purchased via major trade networks. As the fourth century progressed, some taxes in kind were commuted to payment in gold, and troops were paid more in gold than in rations. Therefore, the buying and selling of goods increased.
In the East, large cities and towns had always been more numerous and were generally more able to recover from the third century (p. 612). Demand from private purchasers was enough to support a large number and variety of independent craftsmen and shopkeepers. Itinerant merchants made the rounds of smaller villages that could not support specialized craftsmen. The trade in luxuries from beyond the Empire revived in the fourth century. The state tried to control foreign trade through a few official gateways such as Clysma (Suez) in Egypt, Hieron on the Bosphorus (Bosporus), Nisibis in Mesopotamia, and Carnuntum on the Danube. Exports of strategic material were forbidden, and a duty of 12.5 percent was collected on imports. In comparison, the levy on goods transported internally was only 2 to 2.5 percent. Internal trade in western Europe and the Mediterranean was as free as it had been in the glory days of the second century or would be until the creation of the modern European Economic Community. The high cost of transportation, however, and the limited private market still kept private trade and industry restricted to a few basic commodities, luxuries, and specialized craft goods.
The economic influence of the state
The state’s increased military expenditures from Diocletian onward made the state a greater economic force than ever, particularly in the East. The great sums expended on building up the defenses of the eastern frontier helped to stimulate the economic prosperity of the region in general. All over the Empire, the state played a larger role in the production and distribution of goods during the fourth century through taxes in kind, the establishment of large state-run workshops (fabricae), and heavy utilization of the cursus publicus, the state’s transport system that moved messages, officials, and military materials across the Empire. Approximately forty fabricae turned out all of the arms and armor needed by the army. Others turned wool and linen into some of the uniforms and clothing worn by soldiers and government officials. State-owned dyeworks produced their own dyes and dyed the cloth. The fabricae were originally under the praetorian prefect and then the master of the offices. The count of the sacred largesses oversaw other operations. Hereditary groups of workers supplied the labor. They received rations, fuel, and raw materials from in-kind taxes and had to meet annual production quotas. The state also had its own mines and quarries. Some employed convicts for labor. At others, labor was requisitioned from local landowners as needed.
Because transport by water was much more efficient than by land, the state tried to ship large cargoes, such as grain, stone, timber, and military supplies, by water as much as possible. Seaborne goods were carried by state-mandated guilds of shippers (navicularii). They were wealthy individuals who financed ships dedicated to government service. They were paid half the commercial rate but received valuable reductions in taxes, freedom from curial duties, and protection against loss from shipwreck. They could also carry deck passengers and consignments of small high-value items for extra revenue. Similar guilds of barge operators on the Tiber between Rome and Portus brought grain and firewood to Rome. The state also ran its own boats on major rivers like the Rhine and the Po.
The state-run cursus publicus provided enormously expensive transportation over land. It operated two levels of service: the express post (cursus velox) supplied light transportation from saddle horses to four-wheeled carriages pulled by eight or ten mules for fast couriers, small loads of valuables, and authorized travelers. The wagon post (cursus clabularis) carried heavy freight such as food, clothing, building materials, arms, and military baggage.
There were way stations every ten or twelve miles on the trunk roads: mansiones provided travelers’ services as well as fresh animals; mutationes provided changes of animals only. Both were staffed by public slaves who repaired equipment and took care of the animals. They were given rations of state food and clothing. The state acquired animals through an annual levy. Local landowners provided fodder as a tax in kind. Provincial governors had to maintain the buildings out of provincial taxes.
The praetorian prefect and master of the offices issued warrants to use the cursus publicus. Provincial governors received only two, one for sending messages to superiors and one for local matters. Important senators, bishops, and dignitaries often obtained warrants, too. Inspectors from the Agents of Affairs (agentes in rebus) watched out for unauthorized users.
The growing economic influence of the Church
The Christian Church became a major economic influence. Constantine first allowed churches to inherit property. By the end of the century, churches had acquired vast landholdings. Many wealthy Christians piously donated their land and wealth to their local churches or founded monasteries and church-run charities. Bishops, who often came from the class of wealthy aristocratic landowners, operated these holdings just as any secular owner. Taking on the traditional aristocratic role of public benefactors, the bishops distributed food, clothing, and money to the needy from the Church’s own resources.
The Church also replaced aristocratic benefactors and municipal councils as the biggest local builders of the fourth century. The building of magnificent public buildings gave way to the building of magnificent churches as more and more wealth flowed into the Church and away from secular benefactions. Other buildings included hospitals, orphanages, homes for the elderly, shrines to martyrs, and even baths.
Pilgrimages to shrines like that of St. Martin at Tours or St. Felix at Nola, to the Holy Land, and to the abodes of renowned holy men brought prosperity to those places and stopping points along the way. Pilgrims needed food, accommodations, and transportation. They bought souvenirs, amulets, holy water, and pictures or statuettes. Saints’ feast days provided the opportunity to hold lively market fairs.
The social context
The fourth century saw continuing demographic change, increasing social stratification and regimentation, the declining status of the curial class, and a growing public role for upper-class women. The eastern and western halves of the Empire experienced these changes differently, however. Demographically, for example, the western provinces in the fourth century do not seem to have recovered all of the population lost during the third. The East was growing in population by the end of the fourth, a factor that helped the eastern sector’s economy recover, too.
The urban scene
Some cities did not recover from the shocks of the third century (p. 547). Still, local circumstances stimulated the growth of others, perhaps at the expense of neighboring communities. For example, as imperial residences or other strategic centers on the great military highways, western cities like Augusta Treverorum (Trier), Arelate (Arles), Mediolanum (Milan), Ravenna, Aquileia, Vindobona (Vienna), and Sirmium were able to prosper from the stimulus of public expenditures. In Thrace, Constantinople, the Empire’s new eastern capital, grew into a great city. Other eastern cities benefited from greater expenditures on frontier defenses against Persia. The continued export of grain from North Africa also provided a solid economic base for cities like Carthage, Hippo Regius, and Thamugadi (Timgad).
In Italy, Rome largely recovered from the disasters of the third century. The emperors maintained and even expanded benefactions of food and entertainment. They also financed new construction and the restoration of old buildings, which provided employment. The last great period of secular public building in Rome occurred during the reigns of Diocletian and Constantine (pp. 645–7). Constantine and his Christian successors lavished enormous resources on the building of Christian churches (pp. 647–8). The great nobles also built extravagant private mansions for themselves that rivaled imperial palaces. By 367, therefore, Rome’s population seems to have approached 1 million again.
It used to be thought that the great landowners had abandoned the cities to reside on their great rural estates, particularly in the West. New research indicates that this view is too stark. While wealthy aristocrats did spend time visiting their rural properties, they also maintained their city residences and still participated in urban life.
In Rome and many other western cities, local leadership began to shift to Christian bishops. Often these bishops were connected with or patronized by important families. Bishops could have great influence over a Christian emperor, as did the powerful St. Ambrose, bishop of Milan. The growing economic importance of their churches increased their influence and patronage at the expense of secular officials. Indeed, their charitable activities created large groups of loyal dependents. In the late third century, the bishop of Rome was already supporting between 1500 and 2000 widows, orphans, and poor men. No comparable figures for western cities are available from the fourth century, but the fourth-century bishops of Antioch in Syria supported 3000 needy widows and virgins alone.
In the East, the secular municipal councils still played an important and active role in the lives of their cities. Although members of eastern elites were individually less wealthy than in the West, they were more numerous. If some wealthy decurions were drawn away to imperial service, the Church, or the senate in Constantinople, enough remained to keep up the traditional competition for patronage and prestige that gave Greco-Roman urban life its vitality.
Now the competition often centered on the ability to gain the favor of the emperor or his representatives. They had the vast wealth and power to provide the benefits that urban elites could not supply by themselves. Whereas the elites of Rome and Italy had previously drained off the wealth of the East to the West, the emperors based in the East spent their revenues there. Constantinople, splendidly founded by Constantine and nourished by later fourth-century emperors, grew into one of the great cities of the world. It became an economic engine that pulled other major eastern cities in its train. Alexandria, for example, always prosperous, prospered even more as it supplied grain to the new imperial city and turned imported materials from Africa, India, and the Far East into luxuries for the imperial Court. The prosperity of the major cities then rippled through the smaller surrounding cities and towns into the countryside.
The political role of cities
If a monarchy is not to be a tyranny, rule depends upon the consent, or at least the acquiescent awe, of the governed. In many ways, the politics of the Empire were an elaborate form of theater. Cities were the stage and their large lower-class populations the audience whose applause and approval validated the emperor’s legitimate power. In major administrative centers, imperial subsidies augmented the local funds expended on the distribution of food and popular entertainments such as theatrical performances, beast hunts (often involving public executions), chariot races, and athletic games. Imperial processions marking the visit of the emperor were elaborately theatrical. Diocletian sprinkled gold dust in his hair on such occasions to create a soft halo of reflected light.
When bread, circuses, and other spectacles failed to keep the masses happy, however, a grimmer drama often played out. Religious tensions, conflicts between the infamous circus factions (pp. 677–8), food shortages, higher taxes, and other sources of discontent often led to violence and riots. They might undermine an emperor’s authority if not properly handled with theatrical displays of rage, clemency, or some combination of the two. Two incidents in the reign of Theodosius are illustrative.
In 387, rioting tax protesters at Antioch insulted Theodosius’ name and dragged the toppled statues of him and his wife through the streets. Theodosius sent in troops, executed many rioters, and ordered harsh penalties for the city and its leaders. Then he kept the populace in a state of suspense and anxiety while he listened to lengthy appeals for clemency from the local pagan notables and Christian leaders. Dramatically yielding to the Christians’ entreaties just in time for Easter, Theodosius solidified his support among the single most powerful group in Antioch and reinforced their growing dominance in the city’s affairs.
The second incident occurred three years later, in 390, at Thessalonica, the city most closely linked to Theodosius’ rise to power. After rioters had lynched a local Gothic military commander, Theodosius and his military advisors ordered the execution of the culprits. In carrying out their orders, the Gothic soldiers instituted a vengeful massacre that sent shudders throughout the Empire. After his point had been made, Theodosius again donned the mask of Christian piety by performing a minor act of penance before St. Ambrose at the cathedral in Milan. It then became the setting for another great theatrical show of imperial pomp in celebrating with Honorius and Valentinian II the concord of his dynasty. By such displays, Theodosius maintained his authority in the cities that constituted the essence of the Empire.
The growing “barbarian” presence
Demographically, the intermingling of the Roman and “barbarian” populations along the frontiers proceeded. In fact, the distinction between so-called “barbarians” and Romans was largely an artificial one. It reflects the attitudes of the educated upper classes toward those who did not have the level of education, refinement, and social pedigree that they considered to be hallmarks of civilized life. Upper-class authors left most of the literary records that have shaped the modern view of uncouth barbarian hordes destroying the Roman Empire. From their narrow perspective, it might have been true. In terms of Roman society at large, assimilation between the Roman and non-Roman populations in the frontier zones had been going on for a long time. The fourth century saw only an intensification of an ongoing process in both the East and the West.
In the East, Egypt, and North Africa, the situations along the frontiers were very fluid. Trade and the movements of nomadic tribes produced a constant flow of goods, people, and influences. Whereas Christianity spread Roman influence in Persia, Manichaeism spread Persian influence in the Roman Empire. The mutual capture of each other’s soldiers and towns as a result of frequent warfare further mingled the populations. Both used nomadic Arabic tribes (often identified as Saracens) as proxies against each other. Many of the Saracen tribes bordering Rome’s eastern provinces were ruled by Roman-appointed tribal chiefs (phylarchs).
Archaeological evidence shows that along the northern frontiers there was little difference in the material cultures of the Romans and non-Romans. Romans had adopted the local style of dress, which was more suited to northern climes, utilized wood more extensively for construction, drank beer, bought Germanic slaves, and may have adopted such non-Roman innovations as coulters and asymmetrical plowshares for agriculture. The non-Roman upper class adopted villa-style agriculture, drank imported Roman wine, ate off imported Roman tableware, and eagerly sought other high-status Roman goods such as silver plate, gold coins, spices, and jewelry.
By the end of the fourth century, even Germanic tribes that were relative newcomers on the Roman frontier had been undergoing heavy Romanization for over a century. The Franks, Vandals, Burgundians, and Alemanni in the West and the Goths (also called Tervingi and Scythians in the sources) in the East had all occupied territories along the frontier since the mid-third century. Constantius II had supported efforts of the Arian bishop Ulfila to convert the Goths to Christianity. When they petitioned for admittance to the Roman Empire as laeti in 376 to escape the terrifying Huns, the Romans had already used some of them as auxiliaries in the Persian campaigns of Gordian III in 242 and Julian in 363. Valens, therefore, had hoped to welcome them as a permanent source of valuable military manpower. The dynamic, long-standing—but not always pretty—Roman process of integrating new ethnic and cultural groups into the state and society was still at work.
Under Valens, Valentinian, Gratian, and Theodosius, strongly Romanized Germans were everywhere. They provided more and more of the forces that accompanied the emperor (the comitatenses). They also occupied the most important military offices. These Germanic generals were usually the sons of men who had fought in Rome’s armies and settled on Roman lands. They fought and thought as members of Rome’s military elite. They loyally served their emperors or advanced their own personal careers within the imperial system. The civilian aristocratic literati who labeled such men “barbarians” had no objection to them doing Rome’s fighting. They were jealous that a new class of Romans was achieving the political power and social prestige that they considered their birthright. The contemptuous aristocrats conveniently forgot the origins of their own families.
The ruling class
Diocletian had greatly increased the size of the Empire’s ruling class. His administrative and military reforms dramatically enlarged the number of high-ranking bureaucrats and officers. Local notables were now directly responsible for meeting the local tax levies. Ironically, this broadening of the ruling class had the effect of increasing the height and steepness of the hierarchical pyramid that had always characterized Roman society.
Under Diocletian, the senatorial class at the top of the Roman social pyramid consisted of 500 or 600 families. A man of that class held the rank of clarissimus (most renowned). The men who held administrative posts under Diocletian often rose from the ranks of the army and were granted equestrian titles of various degrees. The highest was eminentissimus (most eminent), the lowest egregius (outstanding).
During the fourth century, the tendency was to cheapen the value of these ranks by letting people have titles of higher rank without higher achievement. Ever-higher ranks had to be created to distinguish those at the top of the pyramid from those lower down. Constantine, for example, watered down the rank of clarissimus by appointing many holders of equestrian rank to it or by increasing the number of offices that bestowed such rank. For the highest-ranking senators, he revived the title patricius (patrician). Constantius II created a completely separate senate at Constantinople. It had 300 members drawn largely from new families. By the time of Theodosius, it reached 2000 members. The senate at Rome had increased in a corresponding manner. Already, therefore, Valentinian I had begun to distinguish a senator who had held the office of consul or been made patricius by calling him illustris (illustrious). Below the illustris now were the spectabilis (notable) and comes (companion, count). In the next century, the gloriosus overtopped the illustris.
Rank, of course, does not always equal status. Many of the men who reached high senatorial rank under the fourth-century emperors were of relatively low social status. Emperors promoted loyal and talented men from nonsenatorial families to offices that bestowed senatorial rank. They gave outright grants to those who had earned their favor. Other men, particularly from the curial class (p. 547), obtained senatorial rank through bribery and influence. Therefore, the senatorial class in the fourth century was characterized by great social, geographic, and ethnic diversity. It included men who originated from every class and province and not a few foreign tribes and nations. A number of Persians, Germans, and Sarmatians, for example, had become generals in Roman armies and thereby achieved senatorial rank. Slaves, peasants, and higher civil servants all made their way into the senatorial class. Some made it through service in the army and imperial ministries, others via successful careers as doctors, advocates, architects, and professors.
There were strong reasons for wanting to achieve senatorial rank in the fourth century. For most of it, senators were free of extraordinary taxes and did not have to supply corvée labor or perform curial duties. By the end of the fourth century, however, those privileges had been legally denied to all senators except those of the highest rank (the illustres). Nevertheless, senatorial rank gave a man useful influence. It enabled him, regardless of the law, to avoid performing curial duties or paying his taxes. Above all, it freed him from the humiliation of being flogged by public officials. Legally, the curial class was free from such demeaning treatment, but high-ranking officials increasingly violated the law as they sought to assert their own or the state’s authority. They would not dare, however, to establish the precedent of abusing a man of equal rank. Some men even hoped to pursue high political office and join those families who already enjoyed elite social status from generations of power and privilege.
Opportunities were especially available in the East because Constantinople and its senate were new foundations. They, in contrast to Rome and its senate, had no noble families who had controlled them for generations. Therefore it was easier for men of obscure origin to found great families. For example, Flavius Philippus, son of a sausage manufacturer, went from a simple notary to become a consul in 348. He founded a family that included a praetorian prefect, two consuls, and the Emperor Anthemius. The Pannonian peasant Gratian became a high-ranking military officer and father of the emperors Valens and Valentinian I.
Members of new senatorial families (or those aspiring to be) improved their social status through the pursuit of land, education, friendship, and marriage. To be accepted by the best families, one had to acquire the cultural accoutrements of upper-class paideia through rigorous training in rhetoric and the ancient classics. Landed wealth and education opened the way to influential friendships (often formed at school) and intermarriage. They, in turn, linked large landowning families together in ever-growing networks of wealth and influence. By the end of the fourth century, these elite families had attached their networks firmly to the highest-ranking offices and often managed to ensnare the emperor himself.
For example, Justina, mother of the Emperor Valentinian II and stepmother of Emperor Gratian, came from a prominent Roman family. As a young girl, she had become the second wife of Gratian’s father, Valentinian I. He was a son of the peasant-born Pannonian officer Gratian mentioned earlier. Justina brought up her stepson and son in the traditions of the landed nobles. They favored those nobles with imperial appointments at the expense of the rough Pannonian officers preferred by their father. When Gratian needed someone to take over the East after the death of his uncle, the co-emperor Valens, at Adrianople, he chose Theodosius, who came from a prominent landowning family in Spain. The name of Theodosius’ first wife, Aelia Flaccilla, even recalls the Hispano-Roman family to which Aelius Hadrianus, Emperor Hadrian, belonged.
Theodosius’ father (p. 602) had been well connected with prominent senatorial families at court. His friends even included the great Q. Aurelius Symmachus (see below and pp. 633–4). After the death of Valentinian, he had fallen victim to a powerful faction of Pannonian officers at court, whom Gratian later purged. Upon coming to power, Theodosius himself appointed many senatorial aristocrats from Gaul and Spain to positions at court. Eventually, he took Justina’s daughter Galla, sister of Valentinian II, as his second wife.
By the end of Theodosius’ reign, the networks of aristocratic power and patronage had produced higher and higher concentrations of wealth and power in the hands of a few fabulously rich families, particularly in the West. For example, about twenty great families in six large clans owned most of the land in Gaul and Italy. Some of them like the Acilii Glabriones, Anicii, Caeionii, Petronii Probi, and Valerii traced their lines back to the Republic and the Principate. Others like the Aurelii Symmachi were more recent arrivals. Still, Q. Aurelius Symmachus, consul at Rome in 391 and famous champion of traditional paganism, had nineteen houses or estates in Italy, Sicily, and North Africa and could spend 2000 pounds of gold on his son’s praetorian games. One of his close relatives, probably his sister, was married to one of the Anicii. His daughter married Nicomachus Flavianus, son of the very influential Virius Nicomachus Flavianus, twice praetorian prefect and consul in 394. Symmachus’ son married a granddaughter of that same man, and one of his son’s great-granddaughters married another of the Anicii.
The father of the famous noblewoman and, later, Christian saint Melania the Younger was a Valerius. Her mother came from the Caeionii. Melania inherited their vast properties from all over the western provinces. Rents from these properties provided her an annual income of 120,000 solidi (ca. 1700 Roman pounds of gold [see p. 115 for weights]). Melania’s cousin Petronius Probus had immense holdings all around the Empire. Among the rich senators, one who ranked in the middle by wealth could expect an annual income just of gold in the range of 1000 to 1500 Roman pounds.
The aristocrats who dominated the eastern court were not so wealthy or so closely intermarried as those in the West. As already noted, the senate at Constantinople was too new to be dominated by a handful of families. Power and wealth were distributed among a number of major cities and their notables, the large local landowners whose families had dominated them for generations. Antioch alone had ten such families. To one of them belonged the famous rhetorician Libanius, friend of Julian the Apostate and zealous supporter of paganism (p. 636).
The middle classes
Beneath the small number of great senatorial landowners and officeholders—the honorati (literally, honored with public office)—there was a broad middle class often distinguished as honestiores (more honorable). Soldiers comprised the largest single group in the class. Although military life could be hard and dangerous, the prospect of regular pay, food, clothing, and shelter plus a nice bonus along with a grant of land upon retirement could be very attractive to men in the less-developed provinces.
After the soldiers, the second largest bloc among the honestiores was the curiales, the men of property who comprised the decurions of the local municipal councils (curiae). Their position continued to deteriorate in the fourth century. As the demands of the government and exactions of corrupt imperial officials increased, being a decurion could easily mean financial ruin. The local decurions were personally liable for any shortfall in the imperial tax receipts from their territory. They were also subject to heavy requisitions of labor and supplies to support the cursus publicus and nearby troops.
The class as a whole became poorer in both status and wealth. Local magnates like Libanius were able to obtain high offices and senatorial rank, which conferred immunity from curial obligations. Some, by the sheer weight of their wealth and influence, could with impunity refuse to perform their curial duties. Others gave their property to the Church in return for clerical appointments. Since the time of Constantine, such appointments procured exemption from curial burdens. Repeated decrees to prevent the desertion of decurions show the extent of the problem. As those who had the resources escaped, their places had to be filled by men of lower wealth and status. Diocletian decreed that anyone who owned at least twenty-five iugera (about sixteen acres) of land—even the illiterate, illegitimate, or slave born—belonged to his local curia. By 376, the status of curiales was so low that they became legally subject to flogging. To that extent, they were now no better than slaves and lowest-ranking citizens, the humiliores.
Still, despite their increasing problems and justified complaints, many curiales were upwardly mobile during the fourth century. Although their status was supposed to be hereditary, the constant need for educated personnel to run the machinery of government and provide vital services presented opportunities for advancement to those with the proper education. Many decurions, even of restricted means, did everything they could to ensure that their sons (rarely their daughters) received such an education. Doctors, advocates, and professors were in high demand and received good incomes. Successful advocates in the imperial courts could look forward to obtaining high-ranking offices. Professors of rhetoric, literature, law, and philosophy sought imperial appointments to salaried chairs. Major cities like Rome, Constantinople, Athens, Alexandria, and Berytus (Beirut) had many such chairs. Important smaller cities, such as provincial capitals, all had at least two. Any city of consequence had at least one publicly salaried doctor. Carthage, for example, had five. There were also private doctors and teachers who could make good incomes on private fees. Those with public salaries could receive extra fees and gifts.
The clergy of the Christian Church became paid professionals and attracted the educated sons of decurions. Famous bishops (later saints) like Augustine of Hippo, Athanasius of Alexandria, Eusebius of Caesarea, Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory of Nazianzus, and Synesius of Cyrene all came from the curial class. For example, Augustine’s father was only a minor decurion from the African town of Thagaste. He struggled to pay for Augustine’s education, but he had connections. After he died, Augustine was able to continue higher studies at Carthage with the help of a wealthier family friend. As bishops, these men achieved tremendous power and influence by controlling the resources, wealth, and income of their churches (p. 609). Being born into the curial class, therefore, could still be a ticket to success.
The lower classes
The lower classes, humiliores (more humble), had less chance to improve their lot than the curiales. In the cities, they were generally the merchants, shopkeepers, craftsmen, and wage laborers. The tax on businesses, the collatio lustralis or chrysargyron (gold and silver tax) instituted by Constantine, weighed heavily on craftsmen and small businessmen. It was payable every five years in gold or silver on the total worth of the business. Assessments were subjective and left much room for official abuse. It was difficult for small operators to save the gold or silver required. Tax collectors used beatings and torture to extract what they demanded. Poor workers were lucky to earn between one twenty-fourth and one forty-eighth of a solidus per day. Often, they could not survive without handouts from the emperor and wealthy benefactors or, increasingly, the highly effective charity of the Church.
The vast majority of the humiliores and of the Empire’s population were rural peasants. The numbers of independent proprietors continued to shrink in the fourth century, and more became coloni (tenants) on the great estates (pp. 544–5). In both East and West, laws were made to bind both peasant proprietors and coloni to their lands in order to ensure production and the collection of taxes. They were, however, difficult to enforce. The demand for labor was so high that landlords were willing to protect fugitives, who could, therefore, bargain for favorable terms of tenancy.
The persistence of slavery
Slaves in the home, workshop, and field remained a major part of Roman life in the fourth and later centuries. Sometimes slaves on great estates became tenants as the practical difference between coloni and slaves became blurred. Supplies of new slaves were not so cheap and plentiful as in the days of imperial conquest, but Roman victories on the frontiers still resulted in large numbers of captives. Those who were not settled as laeti or made to serve in Roman armies right away were enslaved. Kidnappings, the sale of children by the poor, and slave-breeding also kept up the numbers. An idea of the scale of slave ownership by the rich can be found in the 8000 slaves freed by Melania the Younger when she adopted the life of a Christian ascetic (p. 620). Nor was Christianity a force against slavery. Melania was not making a moral statement about slavery in granting her slaves freedom. Rather, she was freeing herself from property. In view of the increasingly harsh treatment of free citizens from all but the highest rank, there is no reason to believe that the treatment of slaves improved significantly either. Slavery remained as the brutally logical consequence of a social system that emphasized hierarchical power relationships right through the Middle Ages.
Private life
The roles of men and women and the nature of marriage and the family were complex in the fourth century c.e. as a result of changing laws, certain medical theories, and the growing influence of Christian ideas and attitudes.
Men and women in the eyes of the law
Under Diocletian, men still had an advantage over women in terms of legal rights and privileges. Christian emperors issued laws that restricted a wife’s ability to divorce a husband. Constantine even ruled out a husband’s drinking, gambling, and philandering as valid causes for divorce. The only permitted grounds for divorcing a husband were murder, sorcery, or desecrating tombs. If a wife sought divorce and could not prove one of those charges, Constantine called her “presumptuous” and required that she forfeit everything she owned down to her last hairpin and suffer deportation to an island. A man could not divorce a woman except for adultery, sorcery, or pimping, but if he sent away a wife for any other reason, he had only to give back her dowry and could not remarry. If he did remarry, his first wife could confiscate the second wife’s dowry. Notice how the man’s second marriage is not voided and the second wife pays for his transgression!
Julian returned to earlier laws, which gave women greater freedom in obtaining a divorce. Still, the double standard for sexual behavior remained. Women who had sex outside of marriage or formal concubinage continued to be condemned. Yet, even under Christian emperors, the law allowed married men to have sex with slaves, prostitutes, and unmarried women of low status. Women who worked in certain occupations, actresses and waitresses, for example, were still considered to be no better than prostitutes. The assumption always was that any unchaperoned woman who had public contact with men was sexually available. Therefore, a man was not guilty of unlawful intercourse (stuprum) with such a woman.
On the other hand, Constantine blamed even a respectable woman if a man abducted her. If she connived in the abduction to force her father to consent to a marriage that he opposed, she had robbed him of his rights (having been abducted, she was no longer a suitable bride for any but her abductor). If she had truly been abducted, she had not screamed loudly enough for help from her family. If she had been where her family could not have come to her aid, she should not have been there.
On the prevailing assumption that women were weak and needed protection, they were normally excused any ignorance of the law. Constantine ruled, however, that women could not be allowed to profit from ignorance of the law either. Legally, women were excluded from being guardians and standing surety for another’s debts. In 373, however, widowed mothers and grandmothers were allowed to become guardians of their children and grandchildren if they promised not to remarry.
The chaste life
During the fourth century, many factors combined to cause both men and women to advocate and adopt a life that emphasized sexual continence, celibacy, virginity, and asceticism. For Christian women, the powerful image of the Virgin Mary encouraged them to accept the superiority of virgin or celibate status. For Christian men, the story of Eve and the serpent causing man’s fall from grace in the Garden of Eden reinforced the negative view of women that had often prevailed in the pagan world of Greece and Rome. The dangers represented by the “daughters of Eve” could be avoided if men lived chaste and celibate lives. If a man and a woman did choose to marry, the leaders of the Church could not advocate dissolution of a “union sanctioned by God.” They could, however, hope that the couple would give up sexual relations after the birth of a child or two, as the Gallic Bishop Sidonius Apollinaris urged a young friend and his wife to do.
The Christian emphasis on chastity and celibacy meshed with secular medical theories and pagan beliefs. Many educated men became convinced to do everything possible to conserve and retain their sperm and expend it only rarely for the sole purpose of obtaining legitimate children. According to Galen and many doctors after him, men needed to retain their sperm as much as possible because it contained their vital spirit, pneuma, and was essential for their strength and health. Therefore, many men had begun to practice rigorous continence and even gave up sexual activity after obtaining children. Galen and other medical writers like Soranus and Oribasius believed, in contrast with Aristotle, that women also produced pneuma-laden sperm that was expended during intercourse. Therefore, many women wished to avoid sexual activity as much as possible, too.
Retaining the pneuma allowed it to be concentrated and refined into purely psychic pneuma, which strengthened the soul and brought one closer to the divine as one became a more spiritual being. That seems to be the long-standing motivation behind the self-castration of the priests of the Great Mother (Cybele) and the requirement that her priestesses be virgins. These ideas also seem to be inherent in the words ascribed to Jesus in Matthew 19:12, “For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by others, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let anyone accept this who can.” In the same vein, St. Paul reinforced the idea that a life of continent celibacy is spiritually superior for Christians (1 Corinthians 7:8 and 25–39). Ideas like those probably influenced Constantine to abolish the Augustan penalties for men who did not marry. That in turn, may have decreased some of the pressure on women to be married.
Women in the Church
Of course, the theories and ideology concerning virginity were articulated primarily by men. Fourth-century Church Fathers like saints Ambrose, Jerome, John Chrysostom, Basil of Caesarea (the Great), and Gregory of Nazianzus preached and wrote to persuade women to choose virginity and the celibate life. Bishops in major cities kept legions of widows on their charity rolls. These women performed valuable services as members of Christian religious communities or as deaconesses in churches. Many women of wealthy and illustrious families dedicated their fortunes as well as their bodies to the service of God. Attempts were made to ensure that wealthy heiresses and widows did not deny their children and other close kin their rightful shares of family fortunes. Still, nothing could stop them from using their own money for good works after taking a religious vow of celibacy. Indeed, such women were eagerly cultivated by bishops and influential churchmen, who sometimes became suspected of impure motives.
St. Jerome had such a large following of pious noblewomen in Rome that suspicions finally forced him to leave and resettle in Palestine. Some of the women followed him there, among them Fabiola, a rich widow who sold her property and used the proceeds to finance a hospital, monasteries, and a trip to Palestine. Similarly, the wealthy widow Paula and her daughter Eustochium left Rome in 385 for Palestine. They founded monasteries in Bethlehem and helped take care of the cantankerous Jerome until they died. Widowed at twenty-two, Melania the Elder, grandmother of Melania the Younger, went to Egypt to visit Christian hermits in the desert. Then she went to Palestine and lived there for over twenty-five years after founding a monastery in Jerusalem. She was a friend of Jerome’s erstwhile friend and later rival Rufinus (p. 704).
In the late third and early forth centuries, Melania the Younger was married at age twelve or thirteen to her paternal cousin Valerius Pinianus (Pinian). Their two children died as infants, and at age twenty, she persuaded Pinian to join her in a life devoted to continence and Christian charity. They supported the work of Paulinus at Nola in Italy. Then, in 410, they went to the province of Africa to escape the advancing Visigoths (pp. 655–6). There they met St. Augustine and founded some monasteries. Later, they visited the hermit monks of Egypt. They finally settled in Palestine, where they built more monasteries and became acquainted with Jerome. The sale of properties in Britain, Spain, Gaul, Italy, Sicily, and North Africa supported all of these activities. At Constantinople, the young widow Olympias founded a community of women who performed works of charity. She also used her great wealth to support bishops Nectarius and John Chrysostom at Constantinople, as well as numerous other churchmen there and in other cities.
The Church Fathers of the fourth century also had to take women seriously not only as providers of services and monetary support but also as spiritual and intellectual beings. In the Bible, woman was viewed as God’s creation, and it was asserted that God’s son, Savior of the human race, had been born of Mary, a mortal woman. Fourth-century Christian thinkers generally agreed with Plato and against Aristotle that the soul was not sexed. Women, though physically inferior, were men’s equals in soul and potential for virtue. Although the Church Fathers were adamant about not letting women be public teachers and preachers, they often formed intellectual friendships with women that seem amazing in retrospect. Because Christianity rested on a body of scriptures, upper-class Christian women frequently received a thorough grounding in the Bible and other important Christian texts. Jerome discussed many theological issues with his friends Marcella and Paula. Paula and her daughters, like Jerome, had learned Hebrew, and Jerome even dedicated some of his biblical commentaries to Paula. St. Augustine addressed a book on widowhood to a great noblewoman, Anicia Juliana. John Chrysostom carried on a vigorous correspondence with his friend Olympias at Constantinople. She is also the subject of a significant early Christian biography.
Olympias’ biography is an example of Christian writers’ increased attention to women. The biography of St. Melania (Melania the Younger) appeared in both Greek and Latin and was widely read. Gregory of Nyssa wrote a loving biography of his sister Macrina as a model of the Christian virgin. In it, he compares her to Thecla, one of the most famous female figures in works of the fourth-century Church Fathers. Thecla’s first appearance in Christian literature may be as early as the second century c.e. in the apocryphal work known as the Acts of Paul and Thecla. As a young girl, she supposedly heard St. Paul teaching at Iconium in Asia Minor, was converted, and immediately took a vow of chastity. Her horrified mother and fiancé unsuccessfully tried to force her to relent and then had her and Paul arrested. After a series of miraculous escapes from horrible punishments, she accompanied Paul briefly and then settled in Seleucia as a holy woman teaching and healing for many years. In the third century, Methodius, author of the Symposium of the Ten Virgins, actually designated her as a disciple of Paul and portrayed her as giving the prizewinning speech in a rhetorical contest on virginity. Whether she had really existed is of little consequence. Christians of the fourth century believed that she had. Just about every major Christian author of the period praised her as the paragon of Christian womanhood.
Elite pagan women
Just as educated upper-class Christian women achieved prominence in fourth-century Christian intellectual circles, so did women of the educated pagan elite in the secular world. The most notable in the fourth century are Sosipatra of Pergamum (ca. 315–375) and Hypatia of Alexandria (ca. 355–415). Sosipatra’s wealthy father gave her an expensive education in mystical religious and Neoplatonic lore because she was thought to have clairvoyant powers. She married a famous Neoplatonic follower of Iamblichus (p. 635), Eustathius of Cappadocia. After his death, she established herself as a highly sought after teacher at Pergamum. Coincidentally, her son Antoninus became a famed pagan priest and theurge at Canopus. In nearby Alexandria, Hypatia studied mathematics, astronomy, and Neoplatonic philosophy with her father, Theon. She collaborated with Theon on many of his mathematical and astronomical works. As a renowned teacher and scholar in her own right, she produced her own work in those fields, too (p. 636). Among her many well-to-do male students was the famous fifth-century Church Father and bishop of Ptolemais, Synesius of Cyrene (p. 708).
Marriage, the family, and children
The fourth century saw some significant developments in ideas and attitudes concerning marriage, the family, and children, particularly as Christianity became a powerful force in Roman life. Influential Christians like St. Augustine, Basil of Caesarea, and John Chrysostom tried to eliminate the double standard enshrined in Roman custom and law by defining adultery as the infidelity of either husband or wife. In general, they had little success. Men did not want to lose their sexual freedom; wives often found it convenient to let them have it in order to avoid ill temper or an unwanted pregnancy. Constantine, however, did rule that married men could not have concubines.
Both pagan and Christian moralists condemned contraception. One of the main purposes of ancient marriage was the production of legitimate children. Contraception in both pagan and Christian eyes was for prostitutes, and using it in marriage was considered to reduce nuptial relations to a sordid transaction for the gratification of lust. To Christian writers like John Chrysostom, contraception was even equivalent to murder because it took away life from the child who would have been born. For the moralist, therefore, the only way to avoid pregnancy in marriage was abstinence.
Despite the moralists, however, contraception was neither illegal nor even officially condemned by any council of the Church until 572. Various forms of contraception were available. They ranged from practicing intercourse in ways that would avoid fertilization to charms, spells, and amulets. Some, such as suppositories made from wool dipped in olive oil or vinegar, worked fairly well and safely. A number of herbs and drugs could be useful. Others were often dangerous poisons. The latter frequently resulted in an abortion if a woman were already pregnant.
Roman law, as well as pagan and Christian moralists, condemned abortion and infanticide. Disagreement arose over what constituted abortion. Hippocratic medical writers did not think that conception was complete before the end of the first three months of pregnancy. Therefore, they considered terminating a pregnancy in the first trimester to be contraception, not abortion. Christian writers, however, were opposed to the termination of a pregnancy at any stage. A law of 374 agreed with the Church in considering infanticide a capital crime. Still, there was no law against the widespread practice of exposure, the parental abandonment of infants whom passersby might or might not rescue, as chance would have it.
The fourth century saw considerable disagreement over who might be permitted to marry and have children. All agreed that incestuous marriages should be forbidden, but the definition of incest in the Greek-speaking East traditionally was less strict than in the Latin West. For the Romans, “degree of kinship,” which determined incest, was measured by “acts of generation.” A parent and child or brother and sister were the products of two acts of generation and were in the second degree of kinship. An aunt and nephew or uncle and niece were in the third degree as products of three acts of generation, which produced two siblings and the child of one. First cousins were in the fourth degree through four acts of generation, which produced two siblings and a child of each. Except for the special law passed as a favor to Emperor Claudius that allowed a man to marry his brother’s daughter, Roman law had forbidden marriage within the third degree. Moreover, Roman custom frowned heavily upon marriages in the fourth degree.
During the fourth century, both Roman law and the Church were imposing tighter restrictions. The Church banned all marriages within the fourth degree. In 295, Diocletian had reiterated the prohibition on marriage within the third degree (except for the exemption noted earlier) and also banned marriage between all ascendants and descendants in the same direct line or between a man and his former stepmother, stepdaughter, mother-in-law, or daughter-in-law. In 355, a brother’s former wife and the sister of a former wife were excluded. Sometime later, Theodosius I outlawed marriage between first cousins. In the Greek East, however, marriages in the third and fourth degrees or even between half-siblings had been a common practice to keep property within the family. As a result, there were constant petitions from eastern subjects for exemption from the law and constant opposition from the Church Fathers to practices they thought immoral.
Except for the rare archaic form of Roman marriage known as confarreatio (p. 57), a pagan marriage ceremony was basically a civil act that served the interests of the state and the families concerned. It involved a public declaration by both bride and groom (or their fathers) that a marriage should be made, and this was usually symbolized by the giving of rings and the joining of right hands. It would be preceded by appropriate sacrifices and the observance of auspicia on the day of the wedding, but it does not seem that the Romans observed anything like a modern wedding ceremony presided over by a priest and fraught with religious meaning. Its celebration was mainly secular, with much feasting and entertainment among those who could afford it.
For Christians in the fourth century, marriage took on greater and greater spiritual meaning as a divine institution, not just a civic or familial duty. To the traditional customs, which also included veiling and, in the East, crowning the bride, Christians added the consent of a bishop, prayer, and often Holy Communion. Jesus was depicted as actually joining the couple. Attempts to eliminate the feasting and entertainment were not successful, however.
Because the Christian model of marriage was the love of Jesus for the Church, mutual consent and conjugal love received greater emphasis in Christian thought on marriage. Although heretical extremists might reject marriage in favor of holding women in common or rejecting sex entirely, orthodox thinkers declared that God approved sex with pure motives within marriage and that marriage was no hindrance to salvation. It was a sacrament worthy of praise for those who remained faithful to each other. In emphasizing mutual respect and love, the Christian ideal emphasized the equal spiritual worth of men and women. Nevertheless, because the male leaders of the Church viewed women as being weaker and less able to resist sin than men, they still advocated the subordination of wives to husbands. On the other hand, when a pagan man married a Christian woman, they adamantly rejected the traditional notion that a woman should follow her husband’s lead in religion.
Clearly, the more spiritual view of marriage among Christians raised problems for non-Christians. The fourth-century Church Fathers disapproved of marriage between Christians and Jews or pagans. Under civil law, marriages between Christians and Jews could even be punished by death.
The high mortality rate, particularly for women of childbearing age, meant that many families might include the children of two or more wives. Fathers often died before their children were grown, so that a stepfather and children from the new marriage were not unusual in a household. The orphaned children of relatives might also be present. A further complication might be the presence of a child born to the husband by a slave or concubine.
Among the upper classes, there were not only numerous household slaves but also clients, relatives like a widowed mother or unmarried sister, and long-term house guests. The result was a household far more complex than the simple nuclear family. The opportunities for significant interactions between diverse individuals in such an environment were extensive. For example, many upper-class Roman mothers used slave wet nurses to care for their young children. Strong affective bonds often developed between nurses and their charges as witnessed by numerous inscriptions.
There is plenty of evidence from grave inscriptions and literary sources that parents often had much love and affection for their children in previous centuries. Nevertheless, affective bonds between parents and children and the value of children as human beings seem to have received more stress during the fourth century. That is also reflected in Christian sources. It has been argued, for example, that the use of wet nurses reduced the affective bonds between mother and child. Significantly, the fourth-century Church Fathers condemned the practice for that reason.
Christian writers also condemned the exposure of infants. Bishops established funds for widowed mothers, set up homes for abandoned babies, and urged families to adopt orphans. Constantine, perhaps motivated as much by a concern for manpower as by sentiment, reinstituted the alimenta for the whole Empire to help poor parents so that they would not be driven to infanticide or selling their children. Interestingly, he provided for boys and girls equally instead of favoring boys. He also ruled that parents who had abandoned a child could not reclaim it later from a person who took it in. (He also, however, gave the finder the option of raising the child as free or slave.)
Children’s legal rights were reinforced in relation to their parents. For example, although the age of adulthood was twenty-five, Constantine ruled that boys could take over their savings or inheritances at twenty and girls at eighteen. The need for Christians to be able to read the Scriptures spurred churches to set up grammar schools open to all boys and girls. Thus, the status of children as well as women was not revolutionized during the fourth century but seems to have become greater than in earlier centuries.
Overview
Clearly, the fourth century was an improvement over the third. The economy revived even if it did not reach the heights of the first and second centuries. The overproduction of copper and billon coins made them virtually worthless, but the stable gold solidus was economically beneficial, particularly to the government and the wealthy. The upper classes, especially in the West, amassed far-flung agricultural properties. Small farmers, burdened by the government’s need for more taxes, often became tenants, coloni, of large landowners. The latter still bought and sold in urban-based markets. In general, markets tended to be regional, but international trade revived. Not all cities regained what they had lost in the third century. Nevertheless, expenditures by the state and the growing Christian Church stimulated the growth of a significant number of cities around the Empire.
Wealthy landowners did not abandon the cities to live only on their rural properties. Many of them, including heavily Romanized “barbarians,” were people whom the emperors had promoted in imperial service. While they became richer, the middle-class curiales and the poor sank in wealth and status. Increasingly, the Church tried to provide relief to the poor, but their lives always remained precarious.
Women’s rights were still more restricted than men’s in Roman law. Christian thinkers recognized women as the spiritual equal of men, but still did not let them have the most prestigious roles in the Church. They encouraged women to read and study Christian texts and be models of chaste virtue and benevolent piety. A number of women, however, became prominent intellectually, religiously, and, as will be seen, politically. Both Christians and pagans stressed a more ascetic lifestyle that limited sex to the begetting of children. They also took measures to protect the lives of those children and provide equally for the welfare and basic schooling of both boys and girls.
Suggested reading
Cameron , A. The Last Pagans of Rome. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
Harper , K. Slavery in the Late Roman World, AD 275–425. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
Kaster , R. A. Guardians of Language: The Grammarian and Society in Late Antiquity. Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press, 1997.
Humphries , M. Early Christianity. New York: Routledge, 2006.