Evaluation

The partial fusion of repetundae and maiestas, both under the second wave of repetundae legislation and before the advent of any legislation, is reasonably secure. The only qualification that need be added is a further note on mass enslavement.

As already observed, this fell under the general head of actions calculated to besmirch the imperial image; it therefore fell under maiestas minuta. But it was only if there had been a dedition in fidem that this was unequivocally the case; the Romans had to honour their fiduciary commitments. But if enslavement followed the capture of a place by storm, that is, where the inhabitants preferred to resist rather than entrust themselves to the fides of the Roman people, no holds were barred; the laws of war (ius gentium) imposed no limits on savagery.⁷⁵ Greek and Roman thinkers urged humanitas on victors, but with mixed results. Scipio showed common humanity to the Carthaginians in the closing stages of the Second Punic War, but earlier he had shown New Carthage a degree of severity that appalled Polybius. Aemilianus went further; he interpreted deditio in fidem in the light of the public interest. His natural father, Aemilius Paullus, had been even less humane to the Epirots.

When the Sicilians complained about Marcellus in 210, he gave the senate an interesting exposition of the imperial image:

He had always been mindful of the maiestas and empire of the Roman people. Whatever he had done in Sicily had been done under the laws of war, for they had closed their city and defended it with an army of Carthaginians.

When some of their leading men tried to surrender the city, he had refused to accept it.

(Livy 26.31)

MarcellusвЂ™ case was thus that Syracuse was capta, taken by storm, not recepta, received into fides.⁷⁶

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Source: Baumann Richard A.. Human Rights in Ancient Rome. Routledge,2000. вЂ” 208 p. вЂ” (Routledge Classical Monographs). 2000

Evaluation

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