‘In eo solo dominium Populi Romani est vel Caesaris’

Abstract

The doctrine that dominium in provincial soil was vested in the Roman people or in Caesar has been taken far more seriously in modern, than it ever was in ancient, times. There is no evidence, as the late Professor Tenney Frank argued in volume xvii of this Journal, that the doctrine had any effect on the policy of the Roman government under the Republic or in the early years of the Principate. It may be added that there is equally little evidence that it was put to any practical use at any later period. At no time did the Roman government treat provincial landholders as tenants at will, or assume the right of arbitrarily dispossessing them: confiscation always remained a penal measure. Julius Frontinus, writing under Domitian, does, it is true, use the doctrine to explain why provincial landholders pay tribute: ‘possidere enim illis quasi fructus tollendi causa et praestandi tributi condicione concessum est.’ But it may be questioned how seriously Frontinus intended these words to be taken: the ‘quasi’ suggests that he is speaking figuratively. And in any case the theory had no effect on administrative practice. A tenant could be evicted for failing to pay his rent: a landowner who did not pay his tribute remained, despite the theory, liable only for the amount of his debt to the State.