2-11. Tax Assessments and Other Imposts
The assessment of communities and individuals was managed by an elaborate process. The newly arranged burdens fell on land. The territorium attached to every town was surveyed and the land classified according to its use for growing grain or producing oil or wine. A certain number of acres (iugera) of arable land was called a iugum. The number varied, partly according to the quality of the soil, which was roughly graded, partly according to the province in which it was situated. In the case of oil, the taxable unit was often arrived at by counting the number of olive trees; and this was sometimes the case with vines. The iugum was however supposed to be fixed in accordance with the limits of one man's labour, and therefore caput (person) and iugum, from the point of view of revenue, became convertible terms. But men and women and slaves and cattle were taxed separately, and in addition to the tax on the land. Each man or slave on a farm counted as one caput and each woman as half a caput. A certain number of cattle constituted also a iugum and thus there was no need to divide up the pasture lands as the arable lands were divided. Meadows were rated for the supply of fodder. The total requirements of the government were stated in the indictio, and every community had to contribute in accordance with the number of taxable units which the survey had disclosed. All the produce which the taxpayers handed over was stored in great government barns (horrea).
The system of collection, though decentralised, was bad. The decurions or senators of each town, or the ten chief men of each town (decemprimi) were responsible for handing over to the government all that was due. A revision took place every five years, and was generally carried through with much unfairness and oppression of the poorer landholders. Apparently a fresh survey was not made, but evidence taken by the town-officers in the town itself. From 312 onwards we find a fifteen-year indiction-period, which came to be largely used as a chronological instrument. It would seem that every fifteenth year a re-allotment of taxes was made which was based on actual survey. But evidence for this is scanty. An imperial revenue officer called censitor was restricted to the duty of receiving the dues from a community as a whole. Outside imperial officers were called in to assist in the collection of dues from recalcitrant taxpayers. This happened at first occasionally, then regularly. Naturally another door was thus opened to oppression, from which the rich would manage to escape more lightly than the poor. The special arrangement made by Diocletian for Italy will be explained later, also the exemptions accorded to privileged classes of individuals.
Along with the payment of government dues in kind went the payment of stipends in kind. A certain amount of corn, wine, meat, and other necessaries, grouped together, constituted a unit to which the name annona was applied, and salaries, military and civil, were largely calculated in annonae. Where allowance was made for horses, the amount granted for each was called capitum. When stability was in some degree secured for the currency, these annonae were again expressed in money, by a valuation called adaeratio. The government, to be on safety's side, of course exacted as a rule more produce from the soil than was needed for use, and the excess was turned into money, naturally at low prices.
In addition to the burdens on the land, many other imposts were levied. The maintenance of the Post Service along the main roads was most oppressive. In the towns every trade was taxed, the contribution bearing the name of lustralis cottatio or chrysargyrum. The customs dues at the ports and transit dues at the frontier were maintained. Revenues were derived from government monopolies in mines, forests, salt factories, and other possessions. Some of the old Republican imposts, such as the tax on manumitted slaves, still survived. Persons of distinction were subject to special exactions. Imperial senators paid several dues, especially the so-called aurum oblaticium, which like many inevitable forms of taxation, professed in its name to be a free-will offering. Senators of municipal towns (decuriones) were weighted both by local and by imperial burdens. Every five years of his reign the emperor celebrated a festival, at which he dispensed large sums to the army and to civil functionaries. At the same time the decuriones of the municipalities had to pay an oppressive tax known as aurum coronarium, the beginnings of which go right back to the time of the Republic. As is shewn below, certain trading corporations were hereditarily bound to assist in the provisioning of the two capitals; and some other miscellaneous services were similarly treated.
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