The ‘Fiscus’ and its Development

Abstract

In a recent article Mr. Fergus Millar has propounded the hypothesis that in the first two centuries of the Principate the term ‘fiscus’ always refers to the emperor's private wealth and is indistinguishable from such terms as ‘res familiaris’. In support of this view he has collected a great mass of useful material where the term ‘fiscus’ is actually used. Some of this evidence undoubtedly accords very well with his contention, and indeed no one can reasonably deny that the term is often employed in the sense stated. But many other texts which he cites only fortify his thesis if what he seeks to prove is already assumed, and can readily be interpreted in accordance with the view that ‘fiscus’ has more than one meaning. In my judgment he has failed to disprove Professor A. H. M. Jones' theory that ‘fiscus’ has diverse senses: it may mean (1) in the Republic the private funds of an individual; (2) in the Principate the private funds of the emperor ; (3) in both the Republic and the Principate a chest, provincial or departmental, containing public monies ; (4) in Jones' words, ‘the whole financial administration controlled by the emperor’ ; hence to say that property or income was fiscal may simply denote that it was under the emperor's administration and control, whether in strict law it was owned by the emperor in his private capacity or by the res publica. In this sense we may call the ‘fiscus’ the imperial treasury, without implying that it was ever a single chest in which coin or bullion was kept.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 187 citations exist upstream.