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The rediscovery in the summer of 2017 of a large monumental tomb of unusual form outside the Stabian Gate at Pompeii caused an immediate sensation, and the swift initial publication by M. Osanna in JRA 31 (2018) of the long funerary inscription fronting the W side of the base, facing the road, has been welcomed gratefully by the scholarly community. The text — at 183 words, by far the longest funerary inscription yet found at Pompeii — records a series of extraordinary benefactions by an unnamed local worthy, beginning with a banquet held on the occasion of his coming-of-age ceremony and continuing, it seems, well into his adult life, up to the final years of the town when the monument was built. As Osanna and others have recognized, the inscription, which seems to allude to an historical event (Tac., Ann. 14.17), the riot between Nucerians and Pompeians around Pompeii’s amphitheater in A.D. 59, provides valuable if ambivalent new information relevant to the demographic, economic and social history of Pompeii that will require full discussion in a variety of contexts over time. The present collection of remarks, a collaborative effort, is offered in the spirit of debate and is intended as an interim contribution toward a more complete understanding of the text.1

In Ostia, Rome's harbour-town, several parts of an inscription which reveals that the Emperor Vespasian promoted the town's water supply were found in 1983. Eventually references to the text began to circulate, then one more fragment turned up and in 2006 the formal and official publication of the text took place, for which the scholarly world is grateful to Alfredo Marinucci.

The date of a statue dedication in Rome’s harbour Ostia carried out by North African shipowners in honour of a member of the local elite has until now been misunderstood. A new examination of the inscription, still standing in the so-called Piazzale delle Corporazioni, shows that the statue most likely was inaugurated on 19 September, the birthday of the emperor Antoninus Pius. The choice of day is a sign of imperial loyalty and agrees with a typical Ostian pattern for scheduling important events.

Si studiano tre aspetti della capacità delle donne di Ostia di possedere beni mobili e immobili durante l’epoca imperiale. Nel passato gli studiosi hanno presentato stime della percentuale delle ricchezze in mano alle donne nel mondo romano che variano, all’incirca dal venti al quaranta per cento del totale. Ad Ostia, la nostra ricerca si concentra sulla presenza delle donne fra le persone che hanno l’autorità di cedere spazio funerario, sulla frequenza con cui le donne fanno parte di coloro che godono di un condotto idrico privato che preleva acqua dalla rete pubblica (e che sono quindi proprietarie di immobili), e sulla percentuale delle donne fra i proprietari di schiavi e fra i patroni di liberti e liberte. Tutte e tre queste tematiche sono infatti state trascurate nei precedenti studi. Per contestualizzare i risultati, vengono presentati i numeri corrispondenti per Roma, e da ciò risulta che l’impatto delle donne è considerabilmente più forte ad Ostia. La loro presenza fra i proprietari ostiense è più vicina al quaranta che al venti per cento. The women of Roman Ostia as owners of real estate and slaves. This paper investigates three aspects of female property ownership at Ostia during the Principate. In the past, scholars’ estimate of how much of the wealth in the Roman world was in the hands of women have varied between c. twenty and c. forty per cent. At Ostia, the investigation focuses on the extent to which women assigned burial plots, how often women can be found among those who were allowed to draw water from the public supply net via a private conduit (which indicates ownership of real estate), and the presence of women among the owners of slaves and among the patrons of freedmen. None of these aspects have previously received proper attention. Results from a similar investigation carried out in Rome is presented in order to contextualize the Ostian results. Female ownership proves to be much more common at Ostia than at Rome, closer to forty than to twenty per cent of the total.

Durante il periodo repubblicano l’elite romana era sempre più propensa a spendere risorse per scopi stravaganti. La legislazione contro il lusso tenne passo con questa tendenza, in particolare dal II secolo a.C. in poi. Le leges sumptuariae prendevano di mira abiti e gioielleria femminile, banchetti e funerali. Critica da posizioni moralistiche fu rivolta anche alle costruzioni private fuori della norma. Nelle leggi non si fa però mai menzione di aqua, anche se enormi quantità ne furono condotte agli abitanti di Roma e in altri luoghi. Questo contributo analizza il ruolo dell’acqua nel contesto della luxuria romana. Un primo segno di critica contro l’uso eccessivo d’acqua s’incontra in un testo di Varrone. Ciononostante l’uso dell’acqua non divenne mai parte del discorso sul luxus, come lo furono invece i banchetti e i palazzi lussuosi, perché i sistemi di rifornimento urbano non erano ancora sufficientemente sviluppati durante la tarda Repubblica, quando gli elementi del discorso sul luxus furono stabiliti. Più tardi, durante il Principato, i potenti Romani che usarono ingenti quantità d’acqua nei loro horti usufruivano di un permesso dell’imperatore. Era quindi impossibile criticare la loro prassi. Le thermae offrivano l’unico spunto per una critica, perché il concetto moralistico di mollitia poteva essere applicato alla cultura balneare. Extravagant spending by the elite became ever more common as the Roman Republic matured. From the second century BCE onwards many laws were passed in Rome aimed at curbing luxury. The leges sumptuariae restricted spending on female dress and jewelry, on banquets and funerals. Moral critics also targeted extravagant private building. There is never any mention of water, aqua, in these laws, even though enormous quantities were delivered to the inhabitants of Rome and elsewhere. This contribution analyzes the role of aqua in the context of Roman luxuria. A first trace of criticism against the use of water installations in rich domus can be found in Varro. Water use never became a standard point of criticism like, for instance, banquets or lavish private palaces, because the delivery system had not yet developed sufficiently during the late Republic, when the standard elements in the luxuria debate were established. Later, during the Principate, rich Romans who used enormous quantities of water in their gardens at Rome were benefitting from an official grant by the emperor. Criticizing this wasteful behaviour was therefore impossible. The only context where criticism of water use was possible concerned the thermae, where the moral concept of mollitia, unmanly behaviour, could be applied.

One often encounters a lack of clarity about the emperor’s role when it comes to water distribution and the right to draw public water in the Roman world, in cities and towns, in the countryside and from rivers. Certainly, much is known about his involvement in water distribution at Rome, yet it is less clear what role he played in supplying water in the empire more broadly. This article discusses, necessarily in a fairly compressed fashion, the ways in which the Roman emperor legislated on and influenced the management of public water resources in the Roman world. In order to place the emperor’s actions in their proper context, something is said also about other sources of Roman law, and about legislation concerning private water resources.

Michel Humm: Appius Claudius Caecus. La république accomplie. Rome: École française de Rome 2005. 779 S. 14 Abb. 10 Taf. (Bibliothèque des Écoles françaises d’Athènes et de Rome 322.)

Slavery was a fundamental feature of Roman society. This chapter considers how critical epigraphy is for the study of Roman slavery. Questions that epigraphy help to answer include modes of enslavement, the identification of slaves and freed slaves, the slave trade, the private life of slaves (family, wealth, religion), their role in business, manufacture, agriculture, and the household, slave resistance, manumission and the position of ex-slaves in Roman society, and imperial slaves and freedmen (the familia Caesaris).

This chapter introduces the reader to how an epigrapher works with inscriptions. It uses Hans-Georg Pflaum’s publication of an inscription from North Africa honouring Suetonius as a model for how students and scholars should proceed in editing, dating, and interpreting an inscription. Information is also given on how to use twenty-first century aids, such as digital photography .

This chapter presents briefly the history of modern Roman—primarily Latin—epigraphic corpora. The purpose is both to chronicle progress in this field since Theodor Mommsen in the mid-nineteenth century and to provide a roadmap for those who need to find their way through the sometimes bewildering collection of epigraphic corpora and other publications. Regardless of the convenient electronic epigraphic databases available on the internet, it is today, and will for the foreseeable future remain, indispensable to consult the readings and commentaries to be found in the standard epigraphic publications.

This chapter outlines how critical inscriptions are for our understanding of the functioning of the administrative structures of Roman government. The author discusses the best methodology for using epigraphic texts to reconstruct Roman administration, showing how even short texts can provide critical pieces of evidence, especially during the imperial period. Knowing how to use arguments from silence is shown to be a crucial element in the modern study of Roman government .

This chapter shows how epigraphy can enhance our understanding of the city of Rome, which has produced a vast variety of inscriptions that are unparalleled in other cities of the Roman world. It focuses equally on the imperial elite and on the ordinary people of the city, as well as on popular associations and on urban administration. Insights gained from Rome, which has preserved by far the greatest epigraphic patrimony of any place or region in the Roman world, helps us understand Roman society and culture in a wider sense.

This chapter discusses the epigraphic evidence for senators and Roman knights (equites Romani), who had vastly more opportunities to be commemorated in an inscription than the rest of the population. It also covers the characteristics of inscriptions as commissioned by and for this elite group in Roman society. The chapter demonstrates how prosopographers use inscriptions to reconstruct the Roman ruling elite, its career patterns and place in society .

FRONTINO, PAPA PAOLO V E LA CONFUSIONE TRA AQUA ALSIETINA E TRAIANAL'iscrizione sulla Fontana dell'Acqua Paola del Gianicolo, a Roma, contiene un errore significativo. Secondo l'iscrizione, infatti, Papa Paolo V ristorò l'acquedotto augusteo dell'Aqua Alsietina, mentre in realtà i suoi ingegneri usarono l'Aqua Traiana per migliorare il rifornimento idrico della città (c. 1610). Questo errore non è semplicemente casuale. L'amministrazione papale era a conoscenza della presenza dell'Aqua Alsietina sulla sponda destra del Tevere dal trattato De aquae ductu urbis Romae di Frontino, ma non sapeva che i Romani avevano costruito anche un altro acquedotto sulla stessa sponda, poiché questo non veniva invece menzionato da Frontino. In questo articolo si sostiene che Frontino († c. 100 d.C.) doveva essere universalmente conosciuto tra gli ingegneri idraulici e gli amministratori delle risorse idriche in età rinascimentale e barocca (come Vitruvio tra gli architetti). La ‘riscoperta’ moderna dell'Aqua Traiana non avvenne che nel 1680 con Raffaele Fabretti, che fece uso di fonti antiche disponibili anche alla cancelleria di Paolo V, se solo fossero state condotte altre ricerche oltre Frontino. Furono necessari altri 150 anni prima che le conclusioni di Fabretti divennero generalmente note. Per la prima volta, inoltre, questo articolo prende in esame tutta l'evidenza antica e medievale in cui viene nominata l'Aqua Traiana.

A number of conspicuous deeds are attributed to the Roman military hero and statesman Marcus Furius Camillus (ca. 365 bce). There is much debate about the historicity of these events. Keywords: Augustan Age; biography; historians; Roman history