Municipal Freedmen and Intergenerational Social Mobility in Roman Italy

This book uses the rich epigraphic evidence left behind by the municipal freedmen and freedwomen of communities in Roman Italy (liberti publici) to explore social and economic mobility among the lower classes in Ancient Roman society. Contents Contents 6 Acknowledgements 8 List of Figures and Tables 9 Abbreviations 10 Introduction: Trimalchio’s Shadow: Former Slaves and Social Mobility in the Roman World 12 1 Social Mobility in the Roman Empire 16 2 The Case-Study of Roman Municipal Freedmen and Freedwomen and Their Families 24 Chapter 1 Leaving a Mark: Municipal Freedmen and Roman Epigraphy 33 1 Cataloguing the Evidence 34 1.1 Municipal gentilicia and Status 34 1.1.1 Chronological Considerations 43 1.1.2 Morphology and Etymology 47 1.1.3 Electoral Tribes 53 1.2 Municipal Freedmen with Private gentilicia 58 1.3 The Publicii 59 2 Former Municipal Slaves and Their Families 70 3 Final Methodological Thoughts 75 Chapter 2 From Everyone’s Slave to Patronless Freedman 79 1 The Size of the Municipal familia publica 82 2 Manumission and the familia publica 93 2.1 Demography in the familia publica: Sex Ratio 96 2.2 Demography in the familia publica: Family Groups 98 2.3 Practical Concerns of Manumission 105 2.4 The Practice of Manumission in the familia publica 111 3 Conclusions 113 Chapter 3 Starting from Scratch 115 1 Staying Close to Home: Settlement Patterns 118 2 Marriage Patterns and Social Connections 123 3 Municipal Freedmen and the Associative Order 127 3.1 Trying to Get Ahead in the Augustales 128 3.2 Professional and Voluntary Associations and the Urban Labor Market 140 3.3 A familia publica Civic Association 150 4 Conclusions 163 Chapter 4 Little Fish in a Big Labor Market 165 1 Shallow Roots: Settlement Patterns 166 1.1 Freeborn Children and Former Personal Slaves 167 1.2 Descendants 168 2 Social and Economic Mobility of the Descendants 175 2.1 The Imperial Elite 175 2.1.1 Senatorial Order 175 2.1.2 The Case of M. Arrecinus Clemens 178 2.1.3 The Campanii of Capua 182 2.1.4 Equestrian Order 184 2.1.5 M. Publicius Sextius Calpurnianus of Brixia 187 2.1.6 The Lucii Publicii of Picenum 190 2.2 The Municipal Elite 192 2.2.1 Decurions and Their Family Lines 197 2.2.2 Status in the Town Council 198 2.2.3 Setting for Advancement to the Decurionate 200 2.3 Social Mobility and the Roman Army 208 2.3.1 Citizen Legions 209 2.3.2 Auxiliary Cohorts 213 2.3.3 Praetorian Guard and Urban Cohorts 214 2.3.4 Vigiles in Rome 217 2.4 Urban Associations, Occupations, and the Wider Economy 218 3 Conclusions 223 Chapter 5 Conclusions: Names on a Tombstone 225 Appendix 1: Demographic Estimates of Select Cities in Italy 232 Appendix 2: Catalogue of Municipal Freedmen and Freedwomen (L) 233 Appendix 3: Catalogue of Descendants of Municipal Freedmen and Freedwomen (D) 262 Bibliography 342 Index of Sources 367 General Index 375 This book challenges prevailing models of the ways formerly enslaved individuals in Ancient Rome navigated their social and economic landscape. Drawing on the rich epigraphic evidence left behind by municipal freedmen and freedwomen, who had been owned and manumitted by the communities of Roman Italy, it pushes back against ameliorating views of slavery as a temporary condition and positive notions of a prosperous and consciously proud Roman freedman class. Manumission was a far more complex process, and it did not always put former slaves and their descendants on the straight and narrow path of upward mobility.