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

222 The Roman Army
and Vergil in Eclogues 1 and 9 expresses the distress of farming
communities disrupted by the arrival of veteran soldiers as the new
owners. Moreover, since not all the previous landholders were removed
from their land, and since others had their property returned, the
veterans had to work side by side with the old inhabitants. This practice
was so common that, among their mapping definitions, the
Agrimensores include ‘returned to the original owner’. In some Sullan
and Caesarean colonies these divisions are reflected in the nomenclature
adopted—‘old’ and ‘new’ inhabitants—and the two groups remained
distinct for a time. But there is no clear evidence that these distinctions
persisted in a significant way in the administration of a colony, and
eventually the two groups will have coalesced. It might be expected
that individual veterans would be to the fore in local life and government
in colonies and other communities where they settled, by holding office
and by conferring benefactions. But of ordinary veterans settled in Italy
between 47 and 14 BC, only five are known to have taken part in local
government, and of officers, seven ex-tribunes and centurions, who
are likely to have been greatly enriched by military service and wealthy
enough to meet the entrance requirements for office holding. Indeed,
up to the end of the second century AD there is scant indication of a
substantial impact by ex-soldiers on the development of local
communities. However, the evidence for the role of veterans depends
mainly on memorial inscriptions, and there was no uniform practice in
the erection of these; such evidence may underplay the less well-off,
who may none the less have made a significant contribution to a
community, but did not necessarily celebrate their careers in this way.
Furthermore, inscriptions can reveal only what offices a man held or
how generous he was, not the circumstances of his wealth or the origins
of his status in a community.
Many veterans, we may conjecture, were solid and unadventurous,
consorting in the main with other veterans. Doubtless some failed as
farmers. Whereas in the late Republic there is no reason to suppose that
veteran soldiers would have been incompetent farmers, this is not so
clear in the imperial period, since men recuited young can have had little
farming experience when they were discharged after twenty-five years’
service. But many will have continued to live in small towns and villages,
playing their part in local communities in a way that has not been recorded
for posterity. They brought capital, people, imperial goodwill, and perhaps
initiatives for clearing and draining land, and bringing more under
cultivation. They will have had a certain self-sufficiency and knowhow
which doubtless helped small communities to function, and they provided
a nucleus of Roman citizens and a channel of contact between the army