8. Vacuos...penates.] Empty, because his rivals abovementioned were now dead. So 'inanis regia' and 'vacui Colchi' in ch. 34.

9. Morum...diversa.] 'There were distinct epochs in his character.'

10. Egregium.] Understand 'tempus.' 'It was a glorious epoch,' &c.

11. Imperiis.] 'Military commands,' as in Germany and on the Danube.

12. Occultum.] To be referred to 'tempus'; 'a time of dissembling.'Occultus' is used for a close, reserved person.

13. Intestabilis.] See note ch. 40. have used a stronger word.

Tacitus could not

14. Suo tantum ingenio utebatur.]

'Simply followed

his own inclinations.'

NOTE ON CHAPTERS 16, 17 OF BOOK VI.

THE FINANCIAL CRISIS AT ROME IN A.D. 33.

THESE two chapters require some detailed explanation, both historically and as to certain expressions which occur in them. The financial crisis and the ruin in which it involved many families, are represented by Tacitus as due to a sudden and wholesale prosecution of the money-lenders, who had been carrying on their business in a way forbidden by Julius Cæsar's legislation on this matter. The legal proceedings arising out of the affair were on too great a scale to be dealt with in the usual manner by the prætor, and he therefore referred them to the Senate. Nearly all the senators appear to have been implicated in these transactions, and so they begged the emperor to settle the business as gently and leniently as he could. The usury-laws of the dictator could not be revived in a moment. A year and a half was granted, within which their requirements were to be enforced. During this period all monies lent on mortgage were called in; this led to a number of forced sales, under the direction of the treasury officials, and a large proportion of the specie found its way into the exchequer, where it remained locked up. Cæsar's law was now applied, and the Senate ordered that, in each case, the creditor should have landed security in Italy for only twothirds of the amount he had advanced. This was intended to relieve the debtor and bring back money into circulation. The creditor who had been exacting high interest would have, under this arrangement, to submit to a loss of one-third of his invested capital. Suetonius says that the Senate's order was to the following effect: that the money-lenders were to invest two-thirds of their property in land, and the debtors were to pay off at once two-thirds of their debt. However, it seems clear that the debtor was to be relieved altogether of one-third of his debt, and this it was which the whole body of creditors resisted. They claimed payment in full (in solidum

1 Life of Tiberius, 48. Cum per senatus consultum sanxisset ut foeneratores duas patrimonii partes in solo collocarent, debitores totidem aeris alieni statim solverent. What Suetonius terms "patrimonium," is with Tacitus "fenus" (invested capital).

C. T.

6

appellabant). With the debtor, too, such payment was a point of honour. It could, however, be accomplished only by a multitude of forced sales. Thus an immense number of estates were suddenly thrown on the market, and the value of landed property was greatly depreciated. The money-lenders who had hoarded up their capital with this view, purchased at an unfair advantage, while the unfortunate mortgager, the deeper his obligation, suffered all the greater loss, as he had to sell under the most unfavourable circumstances. "Aegrius distrahebant," says Tacitus of the debtors; that is, they were all the more grieved at having to sell their properties, "distrahere" being a technical word in this sense, and meaning "to sell in lots." The emperor met the crisis by allowing loans from the treasury on which no interest was to be paid for three years, these loans being secured on landed property worth double the amount.

The law of the dictator Cæsar, which, Tacitus says, the money-lenders had transgressed in their dealings, was a law regulating the terms of lending and of holding property in Italy. By "lex " he probably means Cæsar's general legislation with respect to the relations of creditors and debtors rather than any specific enactment. As the leader of the popular party, Cæsar had to provide for the relief of the debtor. It was an urgent crisis. A vast amount of the capital of the country was locked up in the hands of the money-lenders. Many of Cæsar's party clamoured for what the Romans called "novæ tabulæ," that is, an entire cancelling of all existing debts. This demand he effectually resisted. However, in в.c. 49, he let a law be passed which prohibited any one from having more than 60,000 sesterces, or about £500, in actual cash. Money beyond that amount was to be invested in land. This law was soon dropped. But debtors were relieved by another2 law, which reduced the amount of each debt by a deduction from it of all arrears of interest, as well as of all interest already paid. It was further provided that the creditor's claims were to be satisfied by his taking the debtor's property according to its value before the civil war. In this way, too, he would be a loser, as all property in land must have been temporarily depreciated after that period. The deduction of the interest from the capital, according to Suetonius, had the effect of reducing the debt, as it then stood, by 25 per cent. This was a substantial relief to the debtor. Cæsar did not stop here. He endeavoured to devise a method of checking for the future the accumulation of capital in the hands of the money-lenders. How he did this has been pointed out by Mommsen in his

1 De modo credendi possidendique intra Italiam.

2 Suetonius (Julius Casar, 42).

History of Rome 1." He prescribed, it seems, the amount of loans at interest, and fixed the proportion each loan was to bear to the value of the estate on which it was secured. It was, perhaps, not to exceed half the value. The object of his legislation was to make every capitalist a landowner in Italy, and so to hinder the growth of a class which might be able to lock up in its coffers all the ready money of the country. Mommsen thinks that he went farther than this, and prescribed not only the maximum amount of loans, but also maximum rates of interest. It was this legislation of Cæsar which the usurers, described in this passage of the Annals, had set at nought. It would seem that properties had been mortgaged for their full, or nearly their full value, that high rates of interest had been exacted, and that arrears of interest had been added to the original loan. In many ways, no doubt, the money-lenders had laid themselves open to prosecution under the laws of the first Cæsar.

There cannot be much question, we think, as to the meaning of the phrase "unciarium fenus." It is absurd to suppose, as some do, that it can mean interest at one per cent. per annum. This could not have been possible in a community in which money was so scarce, as was the case with Rome in her early days. In such states the rates of interest are always what we should consider high. As Niebuhr long ago pointed out, "unciarium fenus" denotes interest equal to of the capital, or 8 per cent. This was for a year of ten months, the old Roman year. On twelve months it would be 10 per cent.,

and in this view Mommsen concurs.

It is less easy to say what Tacitus means by "versura." Does he mean simply "usury," and is he referring to a law carried by Lucius Genucius, a tribune of the plebs, B.C. 341, which, according to Livy (VII. 42), forbade usury altogether? He has just said that the interest was reduced from 10 to 5 per cent. (semuncia), and Livy (VII. 27) tells us that this was done B.C. 344. The total prohibition of usury seems to us very preposterous, and possibly Livy may have misunderstood what Genucius attempted. Still, we can conceive that a tribune in a time of popular excitement may have really carried such a law. To this view Niebuhr inclined, and, though Orelli thinks it quite untenable, Mommsen2 appears to adopt it. "The taking of usury," he says, was at length altogether forbidden." We observe that Ritter, too, in his note on this passage (in his last edition) takes ". versura as simply equivalent to "fene. ratio," and quotes Livy, vII. 42, in support of his opinion. This interpretation has generally found favour with the translators of Tacitus. It is possible that " versura may have this meaning, but it is rather strange to suppose that Tacitus

66

1 Vol. IV., part II., chap. 11.

2 History of Romé, vol. 1., book ii., chap. 3.

uses it here in this sense, unless he had really intended to perplex his readers. Orelli therefore gives the word its proper technical signification, which Niebuhr1 had explained in his "History of Rome." "Versura" is properly" changing one's creditor," or "borrowing money to pay off an old debt." Thence it passed into meaning what we call "compound interest." We have already seen that Cæsar had forbidden any arrears of interest to be calculated in estimating a debtor's obligation. Similar laws had been passed before his time, and the law of Genucius may really have been one of them. Livy perhaps used the expression "fenerari" loosely, or may have simply taken it from Annalists who did not clearly understand the matter. The tribune's law may have been only an anticipation of Cæsar's legislation, and not a sweeping prohibition of usury altogether. There is a possibility that Tacitus, in these few words, may have meant to correct what he regarded as a popular misapprehension of the subject.

1 History of Rome, III. p. 78.

2 His words are-Invenio apud quosdam, i.e. scriptores.