Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

178 7. government and administration
of the imperial treasury, had long intertwined lawyers and government;
‘more and more of the law, in the late Roman empire, was administrative’. 57
In 469, Leo described the legal profession as a militia as important to the
empire as the army. 58 The empire conventionally defined itself, over against
the barbarians, as the domain of law. Every official with judicial duties
(including generals) had his own bar of registered advocates, the most senior
of whom briefly served, with a high salary and with retirement honours, as
advocatus fisci, presenting cases for the emperor. Magistrates also picked out
advocates to serve as their judicial assessors, with salaries from the state, and
many lawyers passed on to government office. The emperors did much to
regulate the career structures and rewards of lawyers at the official bars: from
460 onwards they even demanded of them some measure of formal professional
qualifications, a requirement probably unique in the ancient world.
Even high-ranking officials used the title scholasticus, which denoted their
legal qualifications, though for the advocate the skills of jurisprudence never
quite seem to have outclassed those of rhetoric. 59
From the time of the Hellenistic monarchies onwards it had been seen
as a ruler’s duty to foster scholars and teachers. In the sources for the late
empire, this duty becomes so conspicuous that it is possible to speak of an
étatisation of higher (but not of primary) education. When appointed to the
chair of rhetoric at Autun by Constantius I in 298, Eumenius likened his
promotion to a military command (compare Leo on the lawyers’ militia) and
acclaimed his role in teaching potential imperial barristers and secretaries;
in about 310 a panegyrist from Autun described as sons his ex-pupils who
had moved on to such service. 60 Gratian increased the number of endowed
chairs of grammar and rhetoric in the provincial capitals of the Gallic prefecture,
Theodosius II those of grammar, rhetoric, philosophy and law in
Constantinople; in both Rome and Constantinople, public teachers and
students were regulated by the emperors and supervised by the urban prefects.
In 370 Gratian ordered the prefect of Rome to despatch annual registers
of students to the imperial scrinia ‘in order that we may learn of the
merits and education of the various students and may judge whether they
may ever be necessary to us’. 61 In 533 king Athalaric described the teachers
of Rome as ‘those through whom good morals are advanced and the
talent of rhetoric is nurtured to serve my palace’. 62
All the same, education was never fully a function of the central authorities.
No bureau was specifically dedicated to its supervision; control was
exercised mainly by the cities which had endowed the majority of the
57 Crook (1995) 192. 58 CJ ii.7.14.
59 Roueché, Aphrodisias 76–7; Crook (1995) 188–94. In the fifth century, scholastici were usually
described as ‘most eloquent’.
60 Pan. Lat. 9.5.4; 6.23.2. See further Cameron in CAH xiii.673–9, and ch. 29 (Browning), pp. 871,2
below. 61 C.Th. xiv.9.1 (trans. C. Pharr). 62 Cass. Variae ix.21.8.
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