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[German version] As documented in literary and legal texts as well as in inscriptions from the end of the Roman Republic to Late Antiquity, the navicularii undertook the transporting goods by sea on ships which were either rented or owned. At times the navicularius was referred to as navicularius marinus (ILS 1432; 6971; 7029). The position, tasks and specific relationship of the navicularii in relation to the public administration were in a constant state of flux and, as a consequence, the navicularii of the Early Principate are not identical with those of Late Antiquity. The relationsh…

[German version] The Latin term negotiator, apparent in literary texts from the end of the Republic and during the Principate in legal texts as well as in inscriptions, changed its meaning under Augustus. In the latter years of the Republican era, negotiator referred to a Roman citizen of Italian descent or to a non-Roman whose permanent place of residence, from where he pursued his private business interests, was outside of Italy or of the empire: agriculture, banking transactions, moneylending, trade - the decisive factor was that th…

[German version] The Latin word negotium is the negation of otium and originally meant the nonexistence of leisure. However by the time of the earliest recorded Latin texts, negotium had acquired a positive meaning : it corresponds to the English word business, the German word ‘Geschäft’, and the French affaire. Even if the etymology of the word otium and the influence of the Greek ἀσχολία ( ascholía) on the concept is unclear, it is obvious that negotium and otium were regarded as opposites. In the sphere of politics, negotium sometimes stands for one particular undertaking, but m…

[German version] The term manceps (formed from manus and capere) denotes a person who lays his hand on something in order to acquire it, as well as one who takes something on by means of a lease or acquires something by public auction. The term could also apply to entrepreneurs who undertook private contracts. Thus Suetonius refers to the great grandfather of Vespasian, the father of T. Flavius Petro, as manceps operarum, recruiting entire teams of agricultural workers in Umbria and hiring them out to the great estates in the Sabine territories (Suet. Vesp. 1,4; cf…

[German version] The term exactor has two different meanings: on the one hand, exactores worked as supervisors and controllers in various sectors, on the other hand, within the Roman financial administration, an exactor was a debt collector. As evident in one of Pliny's letters (Plin. Ep. 9,37,3), on large estates exactores supervised that the coloni carried out their work correctly. In the building trade and in public building projects, exactores are epigraphically attested (CIL VI 8480 = ILS 1601; 8481; 8673; 8677 = ILS 1628; CIL XII 3070 = ILS 4844); in these …

[German version] PL, which is legally to be understood as the leasing of work (Latin locatio operarum), should not be confused with the leasing of a person, e.g. a slave ( locatio rei). The locatio operis faciundi must also be distinguished from the locatio operarum, being a contract for the completion of specific work (construction projects, public works, manufacture or repair of an object by an artist). An inscription from Puteoli (105 BC) gives a good example of such a locatio operis (CIL X 1781 = ILS 5317), the building of a wall on public land in front of the Temple of …

[German version] The Roman calendarium was a register of  loans; the meaning of the word stems from the fact that loan agreements often came into force on the Kalendae, the first day of the month, and that the Kalendae or the Idus (mid-month) were commonly set as the day the loan became due. In their calendarium, private individuals kept a record in their of the sums they had loaned with interest, of the debtors, the provisions of the loan agreements and the due dates of the loans (Sen. Ep. 87,7; cf. Dig. 15,1,58). In the area of  public finances, the word calendarium could refer to the totalit…

[German version] I. Introduction The collection of taxes and revenues in a city or larger community through the system of tax farming and by public auction was widespread in Antiquity; it is encountered in both the Greek poleis and the Hellenistic monarchies. In Rome, the public revenues were called publica and those who concluded contracts for them publicani. Some of these contractors operated independently, others belonged to various large societates (‘societies’). The publicani are recorded from the 3rd cent. BC on, but their major period began in the final decad…

[German version] The Romans were aware of the fact that the term locuples was derived from the word locus, ‘place, area’. They believed that in the early Roman period the adjective always denoted citizens who possessed a lot of land. Thus Gellius reflects the view of P. Nigidius with the following words: item ‘locupletem’ dictum ait ex compositis vocibus, qui pleraque loca, hoc est qui multas possessiones teneret (‘Just as, he says, locuples is composed of various words, to describe someone who has much property or land, i.e. has many possessions at his disposal’; G…

[German version] Society (κοινοπραξία/ koinopraxía) based on a contract, known to Roman law from the late Republic. In its origins, it was probably influenced by archaic forms of a community based on kinship, esp. the consortium ercto non cito ('partnership by undivided inheritance') of brothers who did not wish to divide their father's estate (Gai. Inst. 3,154, v. also communio ). However, this influence was no longer of import to the legal development of the societas after the 2nd cent. BC. The societas was created by the conclusion of a contract of consent ( consensus …

[German version] In ancient Greek, a maritime loan (ML) was called ναυτικά/ nautiká, ναυτικὸς τόκος/ nautikòs tókos or ναυτικὸν δάνεισμα/ nautikòn dáneisma (cf. nautikòn dáneion ) and in Latin it was called traiectitia or pecunia nautica; the expression fenus nauticum cannot be found before Diocletian. The first mention of a ML occurs in Babylonian texts; ML are documented in Greece from the 5th cent. BC on and continued into the Roman period and the Middle Ages. Although there are fewer sources available for the R…

[German version] The Latin term licitatio, signifying a price offered during a sale, generally refers only to auctions; accordingly, the bidder is called licitator. Bidding took place by raising a finger ( digito licitus sit: Cic. Verr. 2,3,27; cf. 2,1,141). Beyond that, licitatio can generally denote the sale at auctions. In a figurative sense the word licitatio denotes illegal trade or corrupt behaviour (Cic. Verr. 2,2,133; Suet. Nero 26,2). Auctiones; Purchase Andreau, Jean (Paris) Bibliography 1 M. Talamanca, Contributi allo studio delle vendite all'asta nel mondo an…

[German version] The coactores, first mentioned in Cato (Agr. 150), were tasked with collecting revenue. They had an intermediary function between creditors and debtors. For the most part they were active at auctions, partly in collaboration with argentarii. They conducted the tabulae auctionariae and received a fee that mostly amounted to one per cent of the sale price. Several indicators suggest that their occupation disappeared in the course of the 2nd cent. AD. The theory that the coactores and the coactores argentarii were identical is not convincing. The coactores argentarii s…

[German version] As a state magistrate, the mensarius exercized the function of a money-changer or banker, and was responsible above all for state payments and expenditures. Some Greek city-states, e.g. Tenos in the 1st cent. BC (Cic. Flacc. 44) had such official bankers constantly available: they were called δημόσιοι τραπεζῖται ( dēmósioi trapezîtai). At Rome, this function existed only in exceptional situations, as during a debt crisis in the 4th cent. B.C. (352 B.C., Liv. 7,21,5ff.) and during the Second Punic War ( triumviri mensarii, Liv. 23,21,6; 24,18,12; 26,36,8). In ad…

[German version] About 70 wax tablets were found in 1959 in a house, which may have been the seat of a guild ( collegium [1]), on the Agro Murecine bordering on the river harbour of Pompeii on the Sarno. After the first incomplete edition by C. Giordano and F. Sbordone an exemplary edition was published by G. Camodeca in 2 volumes. The tablets belonged to a group of four freedmen or sons of freedmen, among whom C. Sulpicius Faustus and C. Sulpicius Cinnamus above all played an important role. As one of the tablets con…

[English version] Der m. übte als städtischer Magistrat die Funktionen eines Geldwechslers oder Bankiers aus und nahm v.a. Ein- und Auszahlungen für die Stadt vor. Einige griech. Städte - z.B. Tenos im 1. Jh.v.Chr. (Cic. Flacc. 44) - verfügten ständig über solche öffentlichen Bankiers, die δημόσιοι τραπεζῖται ( dēmósioi trapezítai) genannt wurden. In Rom bestand dieses Amt nur in Ausnahmesituationen, so im 4. Jh.v.Chr. während einer Schuldenkrise (352 v.Chr., Liv. 7,21,5ff.) und im 2. Pun. Krieg ( triumviri mensarii, Liv. 23,21,6; 24,18,12; 26,36,8). Außerdem bezeichnet…

[English version] Auf dem Agro Murecine, der an den Flußhafen von Pompeii am Sarno angrenzt, wurden 1959 etwa 70 Wachstäfelchen in einem Haus gefunden, das vielleicht Sitz einer Berufsvereinigung ( collegium [1]) war. Nach der ersten unvollständigen Ed. von C. Giordano und F. Sbordone wurden sie vorbildlich von G. Camodeca in 2 Bd. herausgegeben. Die Täfelchen gehörten einer Gruppe von vier Freigelassenen oder Söhnen von Freigelassenen; unter ihnen spielten vor allem C. Sulpicius Faustus und C. Sulpicius Cinnamus eine wichti…

[English version] Der Begriff m. (gebildet aus manus und capere) bezeichnet eine Person, die die Hand auf eine Sache legt, um sie zu erwerben, sowie denjenigen, der eine Sache durch einen Pachtvertrag übernimmt oder bei einer öffentlichen Versteigerung erwirbt. Der Begriff konnte auch auf Unternehmer angewendet werden, die Privatverträge abschlossen. Suetonius bezeichnet etwa den Urgroßvater von Vespasianus, den Vater des T. Flavius Petro, als m. operarum, der in Umbria ganze Mannschaften von Landarbeitern rekrutierte und sie als Saisonarbeiter an die Großgru…

[English version] I. Einleitung Die Einziehung der Steuern und Einkünfte einer Stadt oder eines größeren Gemeinwesens durch das System der Steuerpacht und durch öffentliche Versteigerung war in der Ant. weitverbreitet und begegnet sowohl in den griech. Poleis als auch in den hell. Monarchien. In Rom wurden die öffentlichen Einkünfte als publica und diejenigen, die darüber Verträge abschlossen, als p. bezeichnet. Einige von ihnen waren eigenständig tätig, andere gehörten unterschiedlich großen societates (“Gesellschaften”) an. Die p. sind seit dem 3. Jh. v. Chr. belegt…

[English version] Das Wort e. hat zwei unterschiedliche Bed.: Einerseits beaufsichtigten und kontrollierten exactores in verschiedenen Bereichen Arbeiten, andererseits handelte es sich im röm. Finanzwesen um Eintreiber von Geldrückständen. Wie ein Brief des Plinius (Plin. epist. 9,37,3) zeigt, überwachten die e. auf dem Großgrundbesitz die korrekte Ausführung der Arbeiten der coloni. Im Bauhandwerk und im öffentlichen Bauwesen sind e. inschr. belegt (CIL VI 8480 = ILS 1601; 8481; 8673; 8677 = ILS 1628; CIL XII 3070 = ILS 4844); sie waren hier mit der B…