As to captures at sea, the Jurisconsult Valneius Maecianus said, "I am master of the earth, but the law is mistress of the sea."[13] Grotius has nothing to say directly of maritime captures among the Romans, though he implies that the same laws applied to them as to land captures. A case of naval prize arose during the Punic war in the capture of the Carthaginian woman, Saphonoba, from a vessel at sea. The Roman general considered that all prize of war belonged to the Roman people and was to be divided by the senate, so ordered that she be sent to Rome. The lady settled the matter by taking poison.[14]
The Romans were a land people. They very much disliked naval warfare,[15] consequently they never supported much of a fleet.[16] True, on meeting a naval power like Carthage they created a very effective navy on short notice[17] but whenever they could they avoided naval warfare. Piracy was extremely prevalent on the Mediterranean during Roman times. Often Roman generals made use of pirate vessels both for transport and to harass the enemy.[18] In these cases of course the state put up no claim to control prizes. Later, pirates became so powerful that Rome saw the necessity of crushing them. Servilius actively engaged in suppressing piracy and he felt bound to render full account to Rome of all captures.[19] Pompey finally crushed the pirates in the battle of Coracesum B.C. 67 and completely drove them out of the Mediterranean.[20] The Romans recognized the right of reprisal and according to Chancellor Kent they required the carriage of a commission by vessels engaged in that business.[21]
Roman law, then, recognized that captures were the property of the state, that apportionment should be governed by law, that in special cases the state could waive all right in favor of the immediate captors.
Rome's policy was directed toward the securing of order through law. Discipline and authority were the fundamental principles on which her greatness was founded. Her military policy was to subordinate individuals to the general good, to make each soldier a cog in the wheel working in harmony with the whole. Individual freedom of action was curtailed not in the interests of humanity but in the interests of the efficiency of the general army. Her rules of prize distribution are completely in harmony with these principles. No private right of aggrandizement in war existed, all was controlled by the state. The state was the combatant in war, the state bore the losses and to the state accrued the gains. State authority overshadowed every act of the individual.[22]
In practical effects the Roman laws of prize money probably accomplished the purpose for which they were intended, that is, they lessened the chance for insubordination among the soldiers. Under them soldiers remained at their post of duty instead of going on journeys of pillage. It made war regular and public instead of guerrilla and private.
Humanitarian effects were slight or none at all. Though not impelled by the hope of personal gain the Roman soldiers seem to have captured, devastated and destroyed without compunction. Wheaton says of Roman warfare, "Victory made even the sacred things of the enemy profane, confiscated all his property, moveable and immoveable, public and private, doomed him and his posterity to perpetual slavery and dragged his kings and generals at the chariot wheels of the conqueror thus depressing an enemy in his spirit and pride of mind, the only consolation he has left when his strength and power are annihilated."[23]
Though Roman warfare was cruel, it was regulated by law. Roman civilization recognized the supremacy of the state, the public character of regular war, and of immediate interest to the present subject, the exclusive control by the state of all military captures.