2. Appended to the land survey was a register of the labourers, slaves, and animals employed by the possessors of estates; and upon every ordinary adult of this caste a poll-tax was imposed.[622] Similarly with respect to every animal which performed a task, horses, oxen, mules, and asses for draught purposes, and even dogs.[623] For this demand the landowner alone was dealt with by the authorities, but he was entitled to recover from his labourers whatever he paid on account of themselves or their families. As this capitation was very moderate, the individual was freed from it by the possession of the smallest holding, and subjected to the land-tax instead;[624] but the farmer still paid vicariously for his work-people, even when assessed on property of their own. Slaves were always, of course, a mere personal asset of their masters, and incapable of ownership. A sweeping immunity from poll-tax was conferred on all urban communities,[625] whence nobles and plutocrats escaped the impost for the hosts of servants they sometimes maintained at their city mansions; but even in the rural districts, virgins,[626] widows, certain professional men, and skilled artizans generally, were exempt.[627]
3. Port or transit dues, called vectigalia,[628] were levied on all merchandise transported from one province to another for the sake of gain, that is, for resale at a profit; but for purely personal use residents were permitted to pass a limited quantity of goods free of tax. In this category may be included licenses for gold-mining, which cost the venturer about a guinea a year.[629] Taxes of this class were let out by public auction for a term of three years to those who bid highest for the concession of collecting them.[630] Export of gold from the Empire was forbidden, and those who had the opportunity, were exhorted to use every subterfuge in order to obtain it from the barbarians.[631]
4. A tax, peculiar in some respects to the Byzantine Empire, was the lustral collation or chrysargyron, a duty of the most comprehensive character on the profits of all commercial transactions.[632] Trade in every shape and form was subjected to it, not excepting the earnings of public prostitutes, beggars, and probably even of catamites.[633] The chrysargyron was collected every fourth year only, and for this reason, as it appears, was felt to be a most oppressive tax.[634] Doubtless the demand was large in proportion to the lapse of time since the last exaction, and weighed upon those taxed, like a sudden claim for accumulated arrears. When the time for payment arrived, a wail went up from all the small traders whose traffic barely sufficed to keep them in the necessaries of life. To procure the money, parents frequently, it is said, had to sell their sons into servitude and their daughters for prostitution.[635] There were limited exemptions in favour of ministers of the orthodox faith and retired veterans, who might engage in petty trade; of artists selling their own works; and of farmers who sold only their own produce.[636] The most popular and, perhaps, the boldest measure of Anastasius, was the abrogation of this tax.[637] Fortifying himself with the acquiescence of the Senate, he proclaimed its abolition, caused all the books and papers relating to this branch of the revenue to be heaped up in the sphendone of the Hippodrome, and publicly committed them to the flames.[638] The chrysargyron was never afterwards reimposed.
5. With some special taxes reaped from dignitaries of state, the income derived from crown lands and state mines, and with fines, forfeitures, and heirless patrimonies, the flow of revenue into the Imperial coffers ceased. From a fiscal point of view there were four classes of Senators, or to consider more accurately, perhaps, only two: those who were held to contribute something to the treasury in respect of their rank, and those who were absolved from paying anything. Wealthy Senators, possessed of great estates, paid an extraordinary capitation proportioned to the amount of their property, but lands merely adjected to fill up the census were exempt under this heading; those of only moderate means were uniformly indicted for two folles, or purses of silver, about £12 of our money; whilst the poorest class of all were obliged to a payment of seven solidi only, about £4, with a recommendation to resign if they felt unequal to this small demand.[639] Members who enjoyed complete immunity were such as received the title of Senator in recognition of long, but comparatively humble, service to the state; amongst these we find certain officers of the Guards, physicians, professors of the liberal arts, and others.[640] Not even, however, with their set contributions were the Senators released from the pecuniary onus of their dignity, for they were expected to subscribe handsome sums collectively to be presented to the sovereign on every signal occasion, such as New Year’s day, lustral anniversaries of his reign, birth of an heir, etc.[641] When any of the great functionaries of state, during or on vacating office, were ennobled with the supreme title of patrician, an offering of 100 lb. of gold (£4,000) was considered to be the smallest sum by which he could fittingly express his gratitude to the Emperor; this accession of revenue was particularly devoted to the expenses of the aqueducts.[642] An oblation of two or three horses was also exacted every five years for the public service from those who acquired honorary codicils of ex-president or ex-count.[643] Finally a tax, also under the semblance of a present, was laid on the Decurions of each municipality, who, in acknowledgement of their public services, were freed from all the lesser imposts. To this contribution was applied the name of coronary gold, the conception of which arose in earlier times when gold, in the form of crowns or figures of Victory, was presented to the Senate, or to the generals of the Republic who had succeeded in subjecting them, by conquered nations in token of their subservience.[644] These presentations were enjoined on every plausible occasion of public rejoicing and the Imperial officials did not forget to remind the local Curiae of their duty to overlook no opportunity of conveying their congratulations in a substantial manner to the Emperor. The Imperial demesnes lay chiefly in Cappadocia, which contained some breadths of pasture land unequalled in any other part of the Empire.[645] The province was from the earliest times famous for its horses, which were considered as equal, though not quite, to the highly-prized Spanish breeds in the West.[646] Mines for gold, silver, and other valuable minerals, including marble quarries, were regularly worked by the Byzantine government in several localities both in Europe and Asia; but history has furnished us with no precise indications as to the gains drawn from them.[647] Under the penal code, to send criminals to work in the mines was classed as one of the severest forms of punishment.[648]
The exaction of the annones and tributes, expressions which virtually included all the imposts, was the incessant business of the official class. At the beginning of each financial year the measure of the precept to be paid by each district was determined in the office of the Praetorian Praefect, subscribed by the Emperor, and disseminated through the provinces by means of notices affixed in the most public places.[649] A grace of four months was conceded and then the gathering in of the annones or canon of provisions, which included corn, wine, oil, flesh, and every other necessary for the support of the army and the free distributions to the urban populace, began. Delivery was enjoined in three instalments at intervals of four months,[650] but payments in gold were not enforced until the end of the year.[651] The Exactors, who waited on the tributaries to urge them to performance, were usually decurions or apparitors of the Rector.[652] The Imperial constitutions directed with studied benignity that no ungracious demeanour should be adopted towards the tax-payers,[653] that no application should be made on Sundays,[654] that they should not be approached by opinators, that is, by soldiers in charge of the military commissariat,[655] that they should, when possible, be allowed the privilege of autopragias or voluntary delivery,[656] and that, if recalcitrant, they should not be sent to prison or tortured, but allowed their liberty under formal arrest.[657] Only in the last resource was anything of their substance seized as a pledge, to be sold “under the spear” if unredeemed,[658] but in general any valid excuse was accepted and the tributaries were allowed to run into arrears.[659] Consonantly, however, to the prevailing principle every effort was made by the Exactors to amass the full precept from the locality, and those who could pay were convened to make up for the defaulters.[660] The actual receivers of the canon were named Susceptors, and their usual place of custom was at the mansions or mutations of the public posts.[661] Scales and measures were regularly kept at these stations,[662] and on stated occasions a Susceptor was in attendance accompanied by a tabularius, a clerk who was in charge of the censual register which showed the liability of each person in the municipality.[663] The tabularius gave a receipt couched in precise terms to each tributary for the amount of his payment or consignment, particulars of which he also entered in a book kept permanently for the purpose.[664] The system of adaeratio, or commutation of species for money, was extensively adopted to obviate difficulties of delivery in kind; and this was especially the case with respect to clothing or horses for the army, or when transit was arduous by reason of distance or rough country.[665] The transport of the annones and tributes to their destination was a work of some magnitude, and was under the special supervision of the Vicar of the diocese.[666] Inland the bastagarii, the appointed branch of the public service, effected the transmission by means of the beasts of burden kept at the mansions of the Posts;[667] by sea the navicularii performed the same task. The latter formed a corporation of considerable importance to which they were addicted as the decurions were to the Curia. Selected from the seafaring population who possessed ships of sufficient tonnage, their vessels were chartered for the conveyance of the canon of provisions as a permanent and compulsory duty.[668] Money payments, in coin or ingots, went to the capital;[669] provisions to the public granaries of Constantinople or Alexandria, the two cities endowed with a free victualling market,[670] or were widely dispersed to various centres to supply rations for the troops.[671] Besides the ordinary officials engaged in exaction there were several of higher rank to supervise their proceedings: Discussors, the Greek logothetes, who made expeditions into the provinces from time to time to scrutinize and audit the accounts;[672] surveyors of taxes, Senators preferably, whose duties were defined by the term protostasia,[673] to whom the Susceptors were immediately responsible; and lastly Compulsors, officers of the central bureaucracy, Agentes-in-rebus, palatines attached to the treasury, even Protectors, who were sent on special missions to stimulate the Rectors when the taxes of a province were coming in badly.[674]
As to the revenue of the Roman Empire at this or at any previous period, the historian can pronounce no definitive word, but it concerns us to note here one important fact, viz., that Anastasius during the twenty-seven years of his reign saved about half a million sterling per annum, so that at his death he left a surplus in the treasury of nearly £13,000,000.[675]
II. The political position of the Roman Empire in respect of its foreign relations presents a remarkable contrast to anything we are accustomed to conceive of in the case of a modern state. Having absorbed into its own system everything of civilization which lay within reach of its arms, there was henceforth no field in which statesmanship could exert itself by methods of negotiation or diplomacy in relation to the dwellers beyond its borders. Encompassed by barbarians, to live by definite treaty on peaceful terms with its neighbours became outside the range of policy or foresight; and its position is only comparable to that of some great bulwark founded to resist the convulsions of nature, which may leave it unassailed for an indefinite period, or attack it without a moment’s warning with irresistible violence. The vast territories stretching from the Rhine and the Danube to the frontiers of China, nearly a quarter of the circumference of the globe, engendered a teeming population, nomads for the most part, without fixed abodes, who threatened continually to overflow their boundaries and bring destruction on every settled state lying in their path. Among such races the army and the nation were equivalent terms; the whole people moved together, and inhabited for the time being whatever lands they had gained by right of conquest. But their career was brought to a close when they subdued nations much more numerous than themselves, with fixed habitations and engaged in the arts of peace; and they then possessed the country as a dominant minority, which, whilst giving a peculiar tincture to the greater mass, was gradually assimilated by it. In classical and modern times conquest usually signifies merely annexation, but in the Middle Ages it implied actual occupation by the victors. Such was the fate of the Western Empire, when Italy, Africa, Spain, Gaul, and Britain were dissevered from each other by various inroads; and those countries at the time I am writing of are found to be in such a transitional state.[676] Nor can Thrace and Illyricum, though forming a main portion of the Eastern Empire, be properly omitted from this list; for, exposed to barbarian incursions[677] during more than two centuries, they enjoyed a merely nominal settlement under the Imperial government; and if we contemplate the Long Wall[678] of Anastasius, at a distance of only forty miles from the capital, we shall need no further evidence that the Byzantines exercised no more than a shadow of political supremacy in these regions.[679] But an exception to the foregoing conditions was generally experienced by the Romans on their eastern frontier, where the Parthian or Persian power was often able to meet them with a civil and military organization equal to their own.[680]
The elaborate scheme for the defence of the Empire against its restless and reckless foes was brought to perfection under Diocletian and Constantine. Armies and fleets judiciously posted were always ready to repel an attack or to carry offensive operations into an enemy’s country. A chain of muniments guarded the frontiers in every locality where an assault could be feared. Forts and fortified camps sufficiently garrisoned lined every barrier, natural or artificial, at measured distances. Suitable war vessels floated on the great circumscribing waterways; and where these were deficient their place was supplied by walls of masonry, by trenches, embankments, and palisades, or even by heterogeneous obstructions formed of felled trees with their branches entangled one with the other.[681] Border lands were granted only to military occupants, who held them by a kind of feudal tenure in return for their service on the frontier.[682] Every important station was guarded by from 2,000 to 3,000 soldiers; and in the Eastern Empire the division of the army to which such duties were assigned may have amounted to over 200,000 men of all soldiers, arms,[683] etc. These forces were called the Limitanei Milites, or Border Soldiers, and in each province of the exterior range were under the command collectively of a Count or Duke.[684] Such were the stationary forces of the Empire, of whose services the frontiers could not be depleted should a mobile army be required to meet the exigences of strategic warfare. Large bodies of troops were, therefore, quartered in the interior of the country, which could be concentrated in any particular locality under the immediate disposition of the Masters of the Forces. This portion of the army was organized in two divisions to which were given the names of Palatines and Comitatenses. The former, which held the first rank, were stationed in or near the capital under the two Masters[685] at head-quarters; and, in accordance with their designation, were identified most nearly with the conception of defending the Imperial Palace or heart of the state. The latter were distributed throughout the provinces under the three Masters whose military rule extended over the East, Thrace, and Illyricum respectively. The Palatine troops comprised about 50,000 men, the Comitatenses about 70,000.[686] Cavalry formed a large proportion of all the forces, and may be estimated at about one third of the Limitanei and nearly one fourth of the other branches. In addition to these troops a fourth military class, the highest of all, was formed, the Imperial Guards already mentioned,[687] viz., the Excubitors, Protectors, Candidates, and Scholars. The latter body consisted of seven troops of cavalry, each 500 strong, 3,500 in all.[688] Owing their position solely to birth or veteran service, the three former groups were probably much less numerous, but their actual number is unknown.[689] The usual division of the infantry was the legion of 1,000 men, that of the horse the vexillatio containing 500.[690] The various bodies of foot soldiers were distinguished by the particular emblems which were depicted on their brightly painted shields,[691] but amongst horse and foot alike each separate body was recognizable by an ensign of special design, for the former a vexillum, for the latter a dragon. The Imperial standard, or that of the general in chief command, was a purple banner embroidered with gold and of exceptional size. The vexilla were dependent horizontally from a cross-bar fixed to the pole or spear by which they were elevated. Mounted lancers displayed small pennons or streamers near the points of their weapons,[692] but these were removed as an encumbrance on the eve of battle.[693] Full armour was worn, in some troops even by the horses.[694] Besides the weapons adapted for close conflict, much reliance was placed on missiles, javelins and slings, but especially bows and arrows in the hands of mounted archers.[695] In replenishing the ranks great discrimination was exercised; and not only the physical fitness of the recruit,[696] but the social atmosphere in which he had sprung up was made the subject of strict inquiry. No slave was accepted as a soldier,[697] nor any youth whose mind had been debased by menial employment or by traffic for petty gains in the slums of a city.[698] The sons of veterans were impressed into the service,[699] and the landowners had periodically either to provide from their own family or to pay a computed sum for the purchase of a substitute among such as were not liable to conscription.[700] Many of the turbulent barbarian tribes on being subdued were obliged by the articles of a treaty to pay an annual tribute of their choicest youths to the armies of the Empire.[701] In addition to the regular forces, barbarian contingents, called foederati,[702] obeying their own leaders, were often bound by a league to serve under the Imperial government. In Europe the Goths, in Asia the Saracens, were usually the most important of such allies. Of the former nation Constantine at one time attached to himself as many as 40,000, an effort in which he was afterwards emulated by the great Theodosius.[703] The warships of the period were mostly long, low galleys impelled by one bank of oars from twenty to thirty in number, built entirely with a view to swiftness and hence called dromons or “runners.” The smaller ones were employed on the rivers, the larger for operations at sea.[704] After a period of service varying from fifteen to twenty-four years the soldier could retire as a veteran with a gratuity, a grant of land, and exemption from taxation on a graduated scale for himself and his family.[705]
Such was the carefully digested scheme of military defence bequeathed to his successors by Constantine, who doubtless anticipated that he had granted a lease of endurance to the regenerated Empire for many centuries to come. But in the course of a hundred and fifty years this fine system fell gradually to pieces; and by the beginning of the sixth century no more than a cento of the original fabric can be discerned in the chronicles of the times. The whole forces were diminished almost to a moiety of their full complement;[706] the great peripheral bulwark of the Limitanei, scarcely discoverable on the Illyrian frontier, in other regions was represented by meagre bodies of one or two hundred men;[707] whilst the Palatines and Comitatenses betrayed such an altered character that they could claim merely a nominal existence.[708] The very name of legion, so identified with Roman conquest, but no longer available in the deteriorated military organization, became obsolete. In a Byzantine army at this period three constituents exist officially, but with little practical distinction. They appear as the Numeri,[709] the Foederati, and the Buccellarii. 1. The Numeri are the regular troops of the Empire, horse and foot, enrolled under the direct command of the Masters of the Forces, but the principle of strict selection has been virtually abandoned, applicants are accepted indiscriminately,[710] and even slaves are enlisted and retained under any plausible pretext.[711] 2. The Foederati now consist of bodies of mercenaries raised as a private speculation by soldiers of fortune, with the expectation of obtaining lucrative terms for their services from the Imperial government.[712] Such regiments were formed without regard to nationality, and might be composed mainly, or in part, of subjects of the Empire, or be wholly derived from some tribe of outer barbarians who offered themselves in a body for hire. On being engaged, each band received an optio or adjutant, who formed the connecting link between them and the central authorities, and arranged all matters relating to their annones and stipend.[713] But the tie was so loose that even on a foreign expedition they might arbitrarily dissolve the contract for some trivial reason, and possibly join the enemy’s forces.[714] 3. The Buccellarii[715] are the armed retainers or satellites of the Byzantine magnates, whether civil or military, but especially of the latter. Officially they are reckoned among the Foederati,[716] and are obliged to take an oath of allegiance, not only to their actual chief, but also to the Emperor.[717] Their number varied according to the rank and wealth of their employers, and in the case of the Praetorian Praefects, or the Masters of the Forces, might amount to several thousands.[718] In each company they were divided into two classes, named respectively the lancers and the shieldmen. The former were selected men who formed the personal guard of their leader, the latter the rank and file who were officered by them.[719] The lancers were invariably cavalry, the shieldmen not necessarily so. These satellites were recruited preferably amongst the Isaurians,[720] a hardy race of highlanders, who, though within the Empire, always maintained a quasi-independence in their mountain fastnesses, and devoted themselves openly to brigandage.[721] To check their depredations a military Count was always set over that region, which thus resembled a frontier rather than an interior province. A fleet of warships was not kept up systematically at this epoch, but in view of an expedition, owing to the small size of the vessels, a navy could be created in a few weeks.[722]
From the foregoing specification it will be perceived that the method of enrollment constituted the only practical difference between the three classes of soldiers who marched in the ranks of a Byzantine army. The maintenance of the Empire rested, therefore, on a heterogeneous multitude, trained to the profession of arms no doubt, but without the cohesion of nationality or uniform military discipline.[723] In the multifarious host the word of command was given in Latin, which Greek and barbarian alike were taught to understand.[724]