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Money, Capital and Inequality in the Age of Augustus

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Capital in Classical Antiquity

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Ancient Economies ((PASTAE))

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Abstract

When Octavian returned to Rome in the summer of 29 BCE, he enjoyed a triumphal procession accompanied by a series of massive monetary pay-outs. Not only did these payments directly and disproportionately benefit elites but they did so before land values and prices could adjust to the changes in the money supply, and therefore became reflected in the overall price structure. Thus, those who owned Italian land were given a period of time in which the spending power of their cash, the returns on their capital and their expanded access to credit silently transferred real wealth away from economic consumers. The monetary intervention shifted real economic resources (labour, land and ultimately future consumption as the new investments moved down the chain of production) towards servicing elite investments and interests.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Piketty 2014, 211–2.

  2. 2.

    Piketty 2014, 528–55.

  3. 3.

    Easterly and Fischer 2001.

  4. 4.

    Schumpeter 1954, 1103; Fisher 1913; de Cecco 1985, 814–5.

  5. 5.

    Elliott 2020, 110–17.

  6. 6.

    See, for example, the discussions in von Reden 1995; Kurke 1999; Seaford 2004.

  7. 7.

    Weber 1968, 188. Emphasis added.

  8. 8.

    Blaug 1997, 21.

  9. 9.

    Piketty 2014, 455.

  10. 10.

    On the connection between villas and large landholdings see Launaro 2015.

  11. 11.

    Plin. HN 18.4. A summary of the archaeological surveys is found in Lomas 2004, 216–17.

  12. 12.

    Marzano 2013; 2020.

  13. 13.

    Piketty 2014, 46.

  14. 14.

    Tac. Ann 6.16–7. Elliott 2020, 90–6.

  15. 15.

    Tac. Hist. 1.20.1.

  16. 16.

    Dio Cass. 73.14.3.

  17. 17.

    P. Rylands 607.

  18. 18.

    Whitby 2004, 180; Lo Cascio 2000, 80; Duncan-Jones 1994, 176; Rodewald 1976.

  19. 19.

    Tac. Hist. 1.20.1. See also Suet. Ner. 30. “Proximity” is discussed throughout Saller’s book on Roman patronage, but most especially see Saller 1982, 63–9.

  20. 20.

    Lo Cascio 2000, 80–1.

  21. 21.

    Howgego 1994, 6; Bedford 2007, 325.

  22. 22.

    Dio Cass. 50.21.4.

  23. 23.

    Dio Cass. 51.21.4–5.

  24. 24.

    Suet. Aug. 41.

  25. 25.

    E.g. Harris 2006, 21; Goldsmith 1987, 41.

  26. 26.

    No new sestertii were minted until almost a decade after Actium. Also, Greek inscriptions sometimes use δηνάρια. See Scheid 2007. On Octavian reusing Mark Antony’s “legionary” denarii, see Dillon 2007.

  27. 27.

    RG 15.

  28. 28.

    Holleran 2012, 133–6.

  29. 29.

    Plin. HN 18.90.

  30. 30.

    RG 15.

  31. 31.

    Gurval 1998, 59; Dillon 2007, 41; Keppie 1983, 78–9.

  32. 32.

    Cooley 2009, 173. Antony’s veterans seem to have been settled mostly outside of Italy; see Keppie 1983, 79–80.

  33. 33.

    Suet. Div.Jul. 26.

  34. 34.

    Kay 2018, 167; Hopkins 1978, 47 n. 65.

  35. 35.

    Garnsey and Saller 2014, 72; Roselaar 2010, 189; Andreau 1999, 24–5.

  36. 36.

    Cic. Off. 2.76. See also Lavan 2013, 28; Potter 2014, 54.

  37. 37.

    RG 16.

  38. 38.

    Dio Cass. 50.16.3, 51.4.6. See Dillon 2007, 41–4.

  39. 39.

    Cato, Agr. 2.7.

  40. 40.

    Marzano 2007, 82; Morley 2000, 216.

  41. 41.

    Verboven 2009, 117; Morley 2000, 217–8.

  42. 42.

    Morley 2000, 219.

  43. 43.

    Erdkamp 2005, 113; Andreau 1999, 149–50.

  44. 44.

    Erdkamp 2005, 141.

  45. 45.

    Hopkins 1980.

  46. 46.

    Scheidel 2017, 72.

  47. 47.

    Jaczynowska 1962.

  48. 48.

    The low number is Evans 1997, 85. The high number is Lintott 2009, 86.

  49. 49.

    Or perhaps HS 1,200,000. See Suet. Aug. 14.1 and Dio Cass. 55.13.6.

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  1. Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA

    Colin P. Elliott

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  1. Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Alte Geschichte, Bochum, Germany

    Max Koedijk

  2. Department of Classics and Ancient History, University of Exeter, Exeter, Devon, UK

    Neville Morley

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Elliott, C.P. (2022). Money, Capital and Inequality in the Age of Augustus. In: Koedijk, M., Morley, N. (eds) Capital in Classical Antiquity. Palgrave Studies in Ancient Economies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-93834-5_9

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