An Empire Requires Delicate Balancing

The Roman empire did not have the mechanism to collect revenue on its own, points out Adrian Goldsworthy in Pax Romana. It therefore outsourced that job to private individuals called the publicani. Not surprisingly, the publicani got rich by siphoning off some of the tax collected.

 

Obviously, some publicani would loot without a thought for tomorrow. Given the wealth and thus power of these groups, it wasn’t easy for Rome to rein them in. Both the emperor and the Roman Senate were wary of taking them on. It was the eternal political problem:

“Balancing the needs of the influential publicani and saving the provincials from penury demanded a ‘divine’ virtue.”

 

While Rome demanded a certain amount of revenue from the provinces, the emperor and senate often demanded the provincial governors not loot too much. The aim was steady year-on-year revenue flow, as emperor Tiberius once angrily reminded a provincial governor. The aim was “to shear the sheep, not skin them”.

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With Rome being as powerful as it was, neighboring kingdoms would often submit to Roman superiority, even as they technically remained outside the empire. Inevitably, rivals in such kingdoms would try and cultivate Roman backing to strengthen their claims to their regional thrones.

 

This was always tricky for Rome. On the one hand, they had no interest in putting Romans at risk by getting engaged in actual conflict. On the other hand, the mere declaration of Roman support for one contender could tilt the scale in his favour and win him the throne – and such a man could then be expected to pay Rome for the favour. But if “their” man lost, and if Rome then did not intervene, it might hit the credibility and fear for Rome in other neighboring kingdoms…

 

Delegations from other kingdoms would often have to come to Rome to lobby their case. This meant bribing enough Senators to back their cause. If rival ambassadors came to Rome at the same time, it would set off a bidding war.

“On one occasion, the Senate formally barred a group of ambassadors from borrowing any more cash at Rome.”

 

Cleopatra’s father, Ptolemy II, bribed the Roman Senate on a grand scale to get their backing for his claim to the throne. But then, as today, mere statements don’t achieve anything. He then had to bribe even more to get a Senate decree enacted. And yet more bribes to finally get the Roman army to act on that decree and restore him to the throne.

 

No wonder then that such sentiment was all too common:

“(Rome is) a city up for sale, and doomed to speedy destruction if it ever found a buyer.”

Of course, corruption doesn’t necessarily mean doom. The Roman empire, as we know, lasted for a very long time.

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Bandits, robbers and pirates. In Roman times, they didn’t just rob, they often killed their victims. No matter where they came from – within or outside the Roman empire – or how large their groups were, Rome differentiated them from “enemies”. The term “enemy” was only for people on whom Rome had declared war, or those who had declared war on Rome.

 

This may sound like nitpicking over definitions, but like today, there was a reason for this differentiation. Policing the state was costly, and Rome was calculating in the cost v/s benefit of the same. By assigning them a different term than “enemy”, Rome could avoid the perception that they were too weak or unwilling to take on challenges to their authority.

 

The differentiation had other consequences too. Just as POW’s fall under the Geneva convention whereas terrorists don’t, Rome’s enemies could expect some civility if defeated (take that with a pinch of salt – they were often enslaved after all), but bandits, robbers and pirates could expect no mercy.

“Bandits and pirates were criminals rather than legitimate foes worthy of respect.”

 

Inevitably, as in modern times, it was common to “brand opponents as such outlaws in order to demonize them”.