A.D. 330-334.] CHIEF OFFICERS OF THE PALACE. 223 treasures. 1. The private apartments of the palace were governed by a favourite eunuch, who, in the language of that age, was styled the præpositus or prefect of the sacred bedchamber. His duty was to attend the emperor in his hours of state, or in those of amusement, and to perform about his person all those menial services which can only derive their splendour from the influence of royalty. Under a prince who deserved to reign, the great chamberlain (for such we may call him) was a useful and an humble domestic; but an artful domestic, who improves every occasion of unguarded confidence, will insensibly acquire over a feeble mind that ascendant which harsh wisdom and uncomplying virtue can seldom obtain. The degenerate grandsons of Theodosius, who were invisible to their subjects and contemptible to their enemies, exalted the prefects of their bedchamber above the heads of all the ministers of the palace;* and even his deputy, the first of the splendid train of slaves who waited in the presence, was thought worthy to rank before the respectable proconsuls of Greece or Asia. The jurisdiction of the chamberlain was acknowledged by the counts, or superintendants, who regulated the two important provinces, of the magnificence of the wardrobe, and of the luxury of the imperial table.+ 2. The principal administration of public affairs was committed to the diligence and abilities of the master of the offices. He was the supreme magistrate of the palace, inspected the discipline of the civil and military schools, and received appeals from all parts of the empire; in the causes which related to that numerous army of privileged persons, who, as the servants of the court, had obtained for themselves and families, a right to decline the authority of the ordinary judges. The of that prince as relative to the ornaments, rather than to the office, of the consulship. *Cod. Theod. 1. 6, tit. 8. + By a very sin gular metaphor, borrowed from the military character of the first emperors, the steward of their household was styled the count of their camp (comes castrensis). Cassiodorus very seriously represents to him, that his own fame, and that of the empire, must depend on the opinion which foreign ambassadors may conceive of the plenty and magnificence of the royal table. (Variar. lib. 6, epistol. 9.) Gutherius (de Officiis Domus Augusta, 1. 2, c. 20. 1. 3,) has very Accurately explained the functions of the master of the offices, and the Constitution of his subordinate scrinia. But he vainly attempts, on the most doubtful authority, to deduce from the time of the Anto 224 THE CHIEF SECRETARIES. [CH. XVII. correspondence between the prince and his subjects was managed by the four scrinia, or offices of this mister of state. The first was appropriated to memorials, the second to epistles, the third to petitions, and the fourth to papers and orders of a miscellaneous kind. Each of these was directed by an inferior master, of respectable dignity, and the whole business was dispatched by a hundred and fortyeight secretaries, chosen for the most part from the profes sion of the law, on account of the variety of abstracts of reports and references which frequently occurred in the exercise of their several functions. From a condescension, which in former ages would have been esteemed unworthy of the Roman majesty, a particular secretary was allowed for the Greek language; and interpreters were appointed to receive the ambassadors of the barbarians: but the depart ment of foreign affairs, which constitutes so essential a part of modern policy, seldom diverted the attention of the master of the offices. His mind was more seriously engaged by the general direction of the posts and arsenals of the empire. There were thirty-four cities, fifteen in the east, and nineteen in the west, in which regular companies of workmen were perpetually employed in fabricating defensive armour, offensive weapons of all sorts, and military engines, which were deposited in the arsenals, and occasionally delivered for the service of the troops. 3. In the course of nine centuries, the office of quæstor had experienced a very singular revolution. In the infancy of Rome two inferior magistrates were annually elected by the people, to relieve the consuls from the invidious management of the public treasure; a similar assistant was granted to every proconsul, and to every prætor, who exercised a military or provincial command: with the extent of conquest, the two nines, or even of Nero, the origin of a magistrate who cannot be found in history before the reign of Constantine. Tacitus (Annal. 11, 22) says, that the first questors were elected by the people, sixtyfour years after the foundation of the republic; but he is of opinion, that they had, long before that period, been annually appointed by the consuls, and even by the kings. But this obscure point of antiquity is contested by other writers. [M. Niebuhr (Lectures, vol. i, p. 324) says, that "Tacitus, Plutarch, even Ulpian himself, (not so Gaius), are mistaken with regard to this point," and confound the two "Quæstores parricidii," the public accusers, who impeached political offenders before the Curia, with the six "Quastores Classici," referring to the A.D. 330-334.] DECAY OF THE QUESTORSHIP. 225 quæstors were gradually multiplied to the number of four, of eight, of twenty, and, for a short time, perhaps, of forty; and the noblest citizens ambitiously solicited an office which gave them a seat in the senate, and a just hope of obtaining the honours of the republic. Whilst Augustus affected to maintain the freedom of election, he consented to accept the annual privilege of recommending, or rather indeed of nominating, a certain proportion of candidates; and it was his custom to select one of these distinguished youths to read his orations or epistles in the assemblies of the senate.t The practice of Augustus was imitated by succeeding princes; the occasional commission was established as a permanent office; and the favoured quæstor, assuming a new and more illustrious character, alone survived the suppression of his ancient and useless colleagues. As the orations, which he composed in the name of the emperor,§ acquired the force, and at length, the form, of absolute edicts, he was considered as the representative of the legislatter what applies only to the former.-ED.] * Tacitus (Annal. 11, 12) seems to consider twenty as the highest number of quæstors; and Dion. (1.43, p. 374) insinuates, that if the dictator Cæsar once created forty, it was only to facilitate the payment of an immense debt of gratitude. Yet the augmentation which he had made of prætors subsisted under the succeeding reigns. Sueton. in August. c. 65. and Torrent. ad loc. Dion. Cas. p. 755. The youth and inexperience of the quæstors, who entered on that important office in their twentyfifth year (Lips. Excurs. ad Tacit. 1. 3. D.), engaged Augustus to remove them from the management of the treasury; and though they were restored by Claudius, they seem to have been finally dismissed by Nero. (Tacit. Annal. 22, 29. Sueton. in Aug. c. 36., in Člaud. c. 24. Dion. p. 696-961, &c. Plin. Epistol. 10. 20, et alibi). In the provinces of the imperial division, the place of the quæstors was more ably supplied by the procurators, (Dion. Cass. p. 707. Tacit. in Vit. Agricol. c. 15,) or, as they were afterward called, rationales. (Hist. August. p. 130.) But in the provinces of the senate we may still dis cover a series of quæstors till the reign of Marcus Antoninus. (See the Inscriptions of Gruter, the Epistles of Pliny, and a decisive fact in the Augustan History, p. 64.) From Ulpian we may learn (Pandect. 1. 1, tit. 13,) that under the government of the house of Severus, their provincial administration was abolished; and in the subsequent troubles, the annual or triennal elections of quæstors must have naturally ceased. § Cum patris nomine et epistolas ipse dictaret, et edicta conscriberet, orationesque in senatu recitaret, etiam quæstoris vice. (Sueton. in tit. c. 6.) The office must have acquired new dignity, which was occasionally executed by the heir apparent of the empire. Trajan entrusted the same care to Hadrian, his quæstor and cousin. Sea Dodwell, Prælection. Cambden. 10, 11. p. 362–394. VOL II. 226 THE COUNT OF THE LARGESSES. [CH. XVII. lative power, the oracle of the council, and the original source of the civil jurisprudence. He was sometimes invited to take his seat in the supreme judicature of the imperial consistory, with the prætorian prefects, and the master of the offices; and he was frequently requested to resolve the doubts of inferior judges; but as he was not oppressed with a variety of subordinate business, his leisure and talents were employed to cultivate that dignified style of eloquence, which, in the corruption of taste and language, still preserves the majesty of the Roman laws.* In some respects, the office of the imperial quæstor may be compared with that of a modern chancellor; but the use of a great seal, which seems to have been adopted by the illiterate barbarians, was never introduced to attest the public acts of the emperors. 4. The extraordinary title of count of the sacred largesses was bestowed on the treasurer-general of the revenue, with the intention perhaps of inculcating, that every payment flowed from the voluntary bounty of the monarch. To con ceive the almost infinite detail of the annual expense of the civil and military administration in every part of a great empire would exceed the powers of the most vigorous imagination. The actual account employed several hundred persons, distributed into eleven different offices, which were artfully contrived to examine and control their respective operations. The multitude of these agents had a natural tendency to increase; and it was more than once thought expedient to dismiss to their native homes the useless supernumeraries, who, deserting their honest labours, had pressed with too much eagerness into the lucrative profes sion of the finances.† Twenty-nine provincial receivers, of whom eighteen were honoured with the title of count, corre sponded with the treasurer; and he extended his jurisdic tion over the mines from whence the precious metals were extracted, over the mints in which they were converted into the current coin, and over the public treasuries of the most important cities, where they were deposited for the service -Terris edicta daturus; Supplicibus responsa.-Oracula regis Eloquio crevere tuo; nec dignius unquam Claudian in Consulat. Mall. Theodor. 33. See likewise Symmachu + Cod. Theod 227 A.D 330-331.] THE COUNT OF THE PRIVATE ESTATE. of the state. The foreign trade of the empire was regulated by this minister, who directed likewise all the linen and woollen manufactures, in which the successive operations of spinning. weaving, and dyeing, were executed, chiefly by women of a servile condition, for the use of the palace and army. Twenty-six of these institutions are enumerated in the west, where the arts had been more recently introduced, and a still larger proportion may be allowed for the industrious provinces of the east.* 5. Besides the public revenue, which an absolute monarch might levy and expend according to his pleasure, the emperors, in the capacity of opulent citizens, possessed a very extensive property, which was administured by the count, or treasurer of the private estate. Some part had perhaps been the ancient demesnes of kings and republics; some accessions might be derived from the families which were successively invested with the purple ; but the most considerable portion flowed from the impure source of confiscations and forfeitures. The imperial estates were scattered through the provinces, from Mauritania to Britain; but the rich and fertile soil of Cappadocia tempted the monarch to acquire in that country his fairest possessions, and either Constantine or his successors embraced the occasion of justifying avarice by religious zeal. They suppressed the rich temple of Comana, where the high-priest of the goddess of war supported the dignity of a sovereign prince; and they applied to their private use the consecrated lands, which were inhabited by six thousand subjects or * In the departments 16. tit. 30. Cod. Justinian. 1. 12, tit. 24. of the two counts of the treasury, the eastern part of the Notitia happens to be very defective. It may be observed, that we had a treasury-chest in London, and a gyneceum or manufactory at Winchester. But Britain was not thought worthy either of a mint or of an arsenal. Gaul alone possessed three of the former, and eight of the latter. [Cunobeline had a mint at Camalodunum, from which in his time, the tribute money of Britain was issued. There is certainly no such evidence of a similar establishment after his capital became a Colonia, and the land of the Trinobantes part of a regular Roman province. But Morant (Hist. of Essex, vol. i, p. 424) supposes that the Comes Littoris Saxonici had a residence on the neighbouring island of Mersey. This was most probably the Toliapis, placed by Ptolemy on that coast (Geog. 1. 2. c. 3), and its name, a nautical abbreviation or corruption of the Tituli lapis, where the mariners, who were the geographer's informants, usually paid their portorium, at the entrance of the double harbour, on both branches of which innumerable vestiges of Roman dominion have been discovered.---ED.] + Cod. Theod. |