Page:The history of Rome. Translated with the author's sanction and additions.djvu/215

Rh tion of the arable land took place, can no longer be ascertained. This much only is certain, that the oldest form of the constitution was based not on freehold-tenure, but on clanship as a substitute for it, while the Servian constitution, again, presupposes the distribution of the land. It is evident from the same constitution that the great bulk of landed property consisted of middle-sized farms, which provided work and subsistence for a family and admitted of the keeping of cattle for tillage as well as of the application of the plough. The ordinary extent of such a Roman full hide has not been ascertained with precision, but can scarcely, as has already been shown (P. 102), be estimated at less than twenty jugera (12$1⁄2$ acres nearly).

Their husbandry was mainly occupied with the culture of the cereals. The usual grain was spelt (far); but different kinds of pulse, roots, and vegetables were also diligently cultivated.

Whether the culture of the vine came to Italy along with Culture of the Italians, or was introduced in very early times by Greek the vine, settlers, cannot be positively determined (P. 20); but the supposition that its culture had begun before the coming of farmers of this period drew from their fields a larger produce than the large landholders of the period of the Empire obtained (P. 37); we may take into account the produce of the fig-trees, and we may assume an after-crop and a considerable superiority especially in the gross yield; but in forming such estimates we must exercise moderation, because we have to deal with a question of general averages and with a method of husbandry conducted neither on rational principles nor with much capital; and in no case can go enormous a deficit be covered by the mere superiority of cultivation.

It is indeed asserted that instances occur of colonies with allotments of two i founded even in historical times; but the only instance of the kind v. 47) is that of the colony of Labici in the year —an instance which will certainly not be reckoned (by such scholars as are worth the arguing with) to belong to the class of traditions that are trustworthy in their historical details, and which is beset by other very serious difficulties (see book ii. ch. 5, note). It is no doubt true that in the non-colonial assigna: land to the burgesses collectively (adsignatio viritana) sometimes only two jugera were granted (as e. g. Liv. viii. 11, 21). In these cases however it was not the intention to create new farms with the allotments, but, on the contrary, as a rule, the intention was to add to the existing farms new parcels from the conquered lands (comp. C. I. R. i. p. 83). At any rate, any supposition is better than an hypothesis which requires us to believe as it were in a miraculous multiplication of the food of the Roman household. The Roman farmers were far less modest in their requirements than their historiographers. They conceived, as has been already stated (P. 101), that they could not subsist even on allotments of seven jugera yielding a produce of one hundred and forty modii.