coloni labourers 395 



that such acquisition carried with it the tax-liability for the whole of 

 the derelict land. The landlord was therefore kept firmly in the grip 

 of the central power, and not left free to build up a little principality 

 by consolidating at will all the labour-resources that he could annex 

 as dependants. Moreover he was watched by a host of imperial agents 

 and spies whose interests could only be reconciled with his own by the 

 costly method of recurrent bribery. 



When we return to the main question of the actual farm-labour, 

 and ask who toiled with their own hands to raise crops, we find our- 

 selves in a curious position. The evidence, whether legal or literary, 

 leaves us in no doubt that the tenant farmer of this period was normally 

 himself a labourer. And yet it is not easy to cite passages in which 

 this is directly affirmed. The pompous and affected language of the 

 imperial laws is throughout a bad medium for conveying simple facts ; 

 nor was the question, who did the work, of any interest to the central 

 authority, concerned solely with the regular exaction of the apportioned 

 dues. The real proof that coloni, whether still holding some land of 

 their own or merely tenants, and inquilini, whether solely barbarian 

 dependants or not, were actual handworkers, is to be found in legitimate 

 inference from certain facts. First, the increase in the value of labour 

 compared with the decline in that of land. The binding of tenant to 

 soil was a confession of this. Secondly, the general poverty of the 

 farmers 1 and their helplessness against oppression and wrong. Of this 

 the description of Salvian gives a striking, if rhetorical, picture, and it 

 is implied in many laws designed 2 for their protection. That persons 

 in so weak an economic position could have carried on their business 

 as mere directors of slave-labour is surely inconceivable : and we are 

 to remember that not only they themselves but their families also were 

 bound to the soil. It was their presence, that is to say their labour, 

 that gave value to the land, and so paid the taxes. Hence it was that 

 in forming taxable units (capita) it was generally the practice to include 

 in the reckoning 3 not only the productive area (iugatio) but also the 

 ' heads ' that stocked it (capitatid). In other words, productiveness must 

 in the interest of the state be actual, not merely potential. 



The importance of keeping the real locally-bound coloni strictly to 

 their business of food-production was fully recognized in the regulations 

 for recruiting the armies. Landlords, required to furnish 4 recruits, were 



1 Wallon, Esclavage in 266, 282. 



8 For instance cod Th xi u (date somewhere 368-373), iv 13 2, 3 (321). Also xi 

 7-10, 16 10, etc. 



8 Seeck, Schatzungsordnung pp 285-308, with an account of local variations. For in- 

 stance, in Africa and Egypt there was no capitatio. 



4 See cod Th vn 13 7, 8 (375, 380). Even the imperial estates made liable, ibid 12 

 (397). Dill p 196. In 379 Theodosius had to raise recruits from yeupyoi, Libanius xxiv 16. 



