It could not be said that Augustus had made a desert and called it peace. Within a decade after Actium the Mediterranean knew such economic quickening as no tradition could parallel. The restoration of order was in itself a stimulus to recovery. The renewed safety of the seas, the stability of government, the conservatism of Augustus, the consumption of Egypt’s hoarded treasure, the opening of new mines and mints, the reliability and accelerated circulation of the currency, the easing of congested population into agricultural allotments and colonial settlements—how could prosperity resist so unanimous an invitation? A group of Alexandrian sailors, landing at Puteoli when Augustus was near by, approached him in festal dress and offered him incense as to a deity. It was because of him, they said, that they could voyage in safety, trade in confidence, and live in peace.8
Augustus was convinced, as became the grandson of a banker, that the best economy was one that united freedom with security. He protected all classes with well-administered laws, guarded the highways of trade, lent money without interest to responsible land-owners,9 and mollified the poor with state grain, lotteries, and occasional gifts; for the rest he left enterprise, production, and exchange freer than before. Even so, the works directed by the state were now of unprecedented magnitude, and played some part in restoring economic life. Eighty-two temples were built; a new forum and basilica were added to facilitate the operations of finance and the courts; a new senate house replaced the one that had incinerated Clodius; colonnades were erected to temper the sun; the theater that Caesar had begun was completed and named after Marcellus, son-in-law of Augustus; and rich men were prodded by the Emperor into spending part of their fortunes in adorning Italy with basilicas, temples, libraries, theaters, and roads. “Those that celebrated triumphs,” says Dio Cassius, “he commanded to erect out of their spoils some public work to commemorate their deeds.”9a Augustus hoped to make the majesty of Rome enhance and symbolize her power and his own. Toward the close of his life he remarked that he had found Rome a city of brick and had left it a city of marble.9b It was a forgivable exaggeration: there had been much marble there before, and much brick remained. But seldom had any man done so much for a city.
His indispensable aide in the reconstruction of Rome was Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa. This perfect friend had shared with Maecenas the guidance of Augustus’ policy. In his year as aedile (33 B.C..) Agrippa had won the public to Octavian by opening 170 public baths, distributing free oil and salt, presenting games for fifty-five successive days, and providing free barbers for all citizens for a year—apparently all at his own expense. His ability might have made him another Caesar; he preferred to serve Augustus for a generation. So far as we know, his life was unstained by public or private scandal; Roman gossip, which sooner or later besmirched everyone else, left him untouched. He was the first Roman to realize the importance of sea power. He planned, built, and commanded the fleet, defeated Sextus Pompey, suppressed piracy, and won a world for Augustus at Actium. After these victories and his pacification of Spain, Gaul, and the Bosporan kingdom, he was thrice offered a triumph and always refused. Enriched by a grateful prince, he continued to live without luxury, and devoted himself as ardently to public works as he had done to the preservation of the state. Out of his own purse he hired hundreds of laborers to repair roads, buildings, and sewers, and reopen the Marcian aqueduct. He constructed a new aqueduct, the Julian, and further improved the water supply of Rome with 700 wells, 500 fountains, and 130 reservoirs. When the people complained of the high price of wine Augustus slyly remarked, “My son-in-law Agrippa has seen to it that Rome shall not go thirsty.”10 This greatest of Roman engineers created a spacious harbor and shipbuilding center by connecting the Lucrine and Avernian lakes with the sea. He built the first of the imposing public baths that were to distinguish Rome among the cities. He constructed, again out of his own funds, a temple to Venus and Mars, which was rebuilt by Hadrian, is known to us as the Pantheon, and still bears on its portico the words, M. AGRIPPA . . . FECIT. He organized a thirty-year survey of the Empire, wrote a treatise on geography, and made in painted marble a map of the world. Like Leonardo he was a scientist, an engineer, an inventor of military projectiles, and an artist. His early death at the age of fifty (12 B.C.) was among the many sorrows that darkened the later years of Augustus, who had given him his daughter Julia in marriage, and had hoped to bequeath the Empire to him as the man best fitted to govern it honestly and well.
Costly public works combined with extended governmental services to raise state expenditures beyond precedent. Salaries were now paid to provincial and municipal officials, bureaucrats and police; a large army and navy were maintained; buildings were put up or restored without number; corn and games bribed the populace to peace. Since expenses were met out of current revenue, and no national debt was laid upon the future, taxation under Augustus became a science and an unremitting industry. Augustus was not relentless; often he forgave taxes to harassed individuals and cities or paid them out of his personal funds. He returned to the municipalities 35,000 pounds of gold offered him as a “coronation gift” on the occasion of his fifth consulate; and he refused many other donations.12 He abolished the land tax laid upon Italy in the Civil War; in its stead he levied upon all citizens in the Empire a five per cent tax on bequests to any persons except near relatives and the poor.13 A tax of one per cent was placed upon auction sales, four per cent upon the sale of slaves, five per cent upon their manumission; and custom dues from two and a half to five per cent were collected on nearly all ports of entry. All citizens were subject also to municipal taxes, and Roman realty did not share in Italy’s exemption from the tax on land. Taxes were paid for water supplied from the public mains. Considerable revenue came from the leasing of public lands, mines, and fisheries, from the state monopoly of salt, and the fines imposed by the courts. The provinces paid a tributum soli, or land tax, and a tributum capitis—literally a head or poll tax, actually a tax on personal property. Taxes flowed into two coffers at Rome, both stored in temples: the national Treasury (aerarium) controlled by the Senate, and the imperial Treasury (fiscus) owned and managed by the Emperor.I To the latter came the income not only from his vast personal properties, but bequests from well-wishers and friends. Such legacies, in the lifetime of Augustus, amounted to 1,400,000,000 sesterces.
All in all, taxation under the Principate was not oppressive, and until Commodus the results were worth the cost. The provinces prospered and raised altars of gratitude or expectation to Augustus the god; even in sophisticated Rome he had to censure the people for the extravagance of their eulogies One enthusiast ran through the streets calling upon men and women to “devote” themselves to Augustus—i.e., promise to kill themselves when he died. In 2 B.C.. Messala Corvinus, who had captured Octavian’s camp at Philippi, proposed that the title of pater patriae should be conferred upon Augustus. The Senate, pleased to have so little responsibility while retaining honors and wealth, gladly heaped upon the Emperor this and other titles of praise. The business classes, now richer than ever, celebrated his birthday with a two-day festival year after year. “All sorts and conditions of men,” says Suetonius,14 “brought him gifts on the kalends of January”—New Year’s Day. When fire destroyed his old palace every city, apparently every tribe and guild, in the Empire sent him a contribution to rebuild it; he refused to take more than a denarius from any individual, but nevertheless he had more than enough. All the Mediterranean world, after its long ordeal, seemed happy; and Augustus might believe that his patience and labor had accomplished his great task.