The Roman Army, 31 BC–AD 337: A Sourcebook

The army, the local community, the law 179
To the police chief [ _ _ _ ]
Dyke tax 1 drachma
Cattle tax (?) 1 drachma
To the soldier at his demand 400 drachmae
Currency exchange 15 drachmae
It is extraordinary that in a private account entries are made so casually for
payments to soldiers and for extortion; as it stands, with one exception, these
are by far the most expensive items on the account and it looks as if the owner
has quietly written off these sums without any hope of redress. Payments to the
police agents, the chief of police, and the stationarius (a junior officer or soldier
holding a post which ensured the security of an area or a road) must also be
viewed as suspicious. This is a vivid example of how commonplace were theft
and blackmail at the hands of soldiers.
298 Epictetus (1st C.AD), Discourses 4. 1. 79
If a requisition is taking place and a soldier takes (your mule), let it go,
do not hold on to it, and do not complain. For if you do, you will get a
beating and lose your mule all the same.
299 OGIS 609=AJ 113, inscription, Phaenae, Syria, AD 185–6
Julius Saturninus (governor of Syria) to the people of Phaenae, chief
village of the district of Trachonitis, greetings. If any soldier or private
person establishes a billet for himself by force in your houses, contact
me and you will receive redress. For you are not obliged to provide any
joint contribution for visitors, nor, since you have a public hostel, can
you be compelled to receive visitors into your homes. Publish this letter
of mine in a conspicuous location in your chief village, so that no one
can argue that he did not know of it.
Phaenae was situated on the north-west corner of the Trachonitis, on the road
running from Bostra to Damascus. Security for the roads in southern Syria was
provided by legionary troops and there is some evidence that in the second half
of the second century a garrison may have been stationed at Phaenae (Isaac
1992:135–6, 298). The public hostel had presumably been built to protect the
inhabitants from requests for billets by soldiers passing along the road, and the
idea of such hostels was apparently common in southern Syria.
300 Columella (1st C.AD), On Agriculture 1. 5. 6–7
The buildings (of an estate) should not be close to a marshy area or on a
military road… A road is a plague to an estate because of the depredations