10 Bagaudeae
Historians make the end of the so-called crisis of the III coincide with the rise of C. Aurelius Valerius Diocletian whose reforms bring to a conclusion the long process of overcoming the Augustan administrative and social systems, marking at the same time the beginning of the late ancient age or early Christian. Diocletian's political program was mainly based on the strengthening and defense of the borders, as well as on political stability within an empire which during the 3rd century had seen countless emperors belonging to the military class one after the other: political instability together with constant barbarian pressures and an incipient demographic and economic crisis had in fact led to the shattering of the empire and the birth of "regional empires" such as the
imperum Galliarum or the kingdom of Palmyra, during the reign of Gallienus. [1]
Diocletian understood from the first years of his reign that these objectives would not be achievable without an internal reorganization of the government of the border provinces: a reorganization that can be glimpsed with the tetrarchic ideology, an attempt to regulate the internal succession and to maintain stable military control in the entire empire, thanks to the presence of four imperial figures. In particular, it was the Germanic and Gallic provinces that were the scene of the greatest military actions, both against gentes externae and against the native populations.
In these territories there had been successive economic crises and famines, consequences of the destruction of the fields and the neglect caused by the barbarian invasions and military usurpations and of climate change, which had progressively decreased agricultural productivity. The lower-middle class of farmers and small landowners was undoubtedly the social stratum most affected by these crises, and in 285 the popular intolerance was such that it led to an armed revolt, which was given the name of
Bagaudae
The first testimonies are provided by Aurelio Vittore [2] and Eutropius. The reported name of the movement is of Celtic origin, deriving from the root Bag, attested in Gaelic, meaning fighter, which testifies to its relevance to rural Gaul. Another fundamental source that reflects the thinking and vision of events on the part of the ruling class is the Gallic panegyrics. In particular, the panegyric written by Mamertin in honor of Maximian, although not directly naming the bagaudi, provides important information on the phenomenon. In the description of the revolt, the warrior characterization of the movement shines through, and in the panegyric the peasants are transformed into knights and infantry, almost becoming monsters for the author, while in the next passage it is reported that the rebels devastated the fields of the barbarians, defined as enemies .
Given the relative scarcity of sources, it is difficult to understand and outline an exact tactic within the Bagaudic movement: it would appear to be an application of the scorched earth tactic implemented by the rebels as part of a guerrilla strategy against a hostis barbarus, perhaps the Alamanni or the Franks. To this struggle with external raids, the Bagaudi combined the social revolt and peasant struggle against the Gallic powerful, thus burning the lands that they worked as settlers. Revolt whose roots were in the social transformation underway in the empire starting from the 3rd century following the
Constitutio Antoniniana.
In 212 the emperor Caracalla extended Roman citizenship to all the inhabitants of the empire. This provision is still controversial today, since on the one hand it was praised by both ancient and modern authors, who saw in it a sort of general leveling of the conditions of the cives. The
constitutio remains a sign of contradiction, interpretable as a sign of equality within the empire, but also as a legal prototype of a despotic regime characterizing the late ancient age.
Legalizing de facto an already existing situation, the edict resulted in the vertical development of society, accentuating the gap between
honestiores, senators and large landowners located at the top of the social ladder, and
humiliores, the humbler peasant class and plebs urban. The terms "
honestiores" and "
humiliores" were legally used in late antiquity to indicate the differences in rights between the two classes, differences which concerned, for example, corporal punishment, from which the top group was exempt, while low-ranking citizens
damnatio ad bestias [3] was due, as well as crucifixion.
During the third century, the difference between Roman and provincial cives ceased, while the class division was accentuated, also, as seen, in the context of Roman law, and, with the
constitutio, a vertical conquest of society was undertaken. In short, by universally granting citizenship, in an act of hypothetical social equalization, the legal equality of the civitas that has characterized Roman law since the Republican age dissolves. This factor, together with the decline of the slave workforce caused by the end of wars of conquest, led to radical changes in agricultural society.
Starting from the tetrarchic age, free peasants belonging to the lower-middle class progressively became settlers of the rich landowners within the villae, divided in late antiquity into a part managed by the owner, and one used for the colonists' crops. leading to the progressive formation of a mixed class, of legally free men, however linked to the master's land by inheritance. We are therefore witnessing a transformation of society in late antiquity, no longer predominantly slave-based, but composed of peasants and other enslaved
humiliores, and therefore the birth of the phenomenon of colonization and patronage.
Another social aspect in relation to the worsening of the gap between the possessores and the lower classes is the late imperial legislation regarding agricultural deserts. If economic and political life in late antiquity, and especially starting from the tetrarchic age, was more controlled by the state, through a tightening of the bureaucratic apparatus and a succession of monetary reforms as well as greater control of professional colleges, this occurred in some territories, such as in
Belgica, an enlargement of the territories of the
villae, in which it is possible to hypothesize some sort of subsistence or autarky domestic economy.
The possessores were nothing other than high state officials, who during the 4th century built large fortunes in the territories in which they carried out their functions, and taking into account the importance of a city like Trier in the 4th century, it is no coincidence that in the territories on the left bank of the Rhine there is evidence of numerous
villae. But how could they obtain land to expand their territories?
Thanks to the occupation, the agricultural deserts, caused by the abandonment and flight of the colonists and the poorest owners from the lands, both public, therefore belonging to the emperor's patrimony, and private, who fled from the lands to avoid paying the taxes that the lower middle class could not support, causing serious losses for state coffers.
The escape was a desperate reaction to the profound social crisis, and involved the transformation of medium-small landowners into settlers, under the protection of a
patronus. The farmers preferred to abandon, or in other cases give up their land to the
patronus, in rare cases working it under a rental contract, so as not to have to pay taxes, which were covered by the
possessores, who were given an aura of protectors of the peasant class. To overcome this problem, the state had to provide through incentives and exemptions, and sometimes by trying to force the old owners to pay taxes.
Much of the agrarian legislation of the 4th century denotes the empire's desire to reassign the care of abandoned territories, also granting tax incentives. It was possible to obtain land through voluntary management, or through auctions. In the case of voluntary management, an edict of Theodosius provided that if the ancient owners had not returned to their funds by May following the issuing of the edict, the territories would be automatically entrusted to the voluntary farmers. In the absence of the latter, an auction would have been held for the concession.
However, when the land had been abandoned for some time and needed to be brought into cultivation, offers would hardly have been submitted. According to a constitution of Valentinian, in these cases immunity from taxes was granted for at least three years, in order to encourage the redistribution of land.
It would be superfluous to cite every legal case concerning the granting of abandoned land: it will suffice to point out that with privileges towards volunteers, the state hoped to secure landowners to the land, avoiding abandonment. In imperial legislation it is not clear who were those who obtained the concession of the abandoned lands, but it is nevertheless likely that they were rich owners who were encouraged to obtain the territories, given the need for economic investment in them. There could have been territorial differences regarding this process, such as the repopulation of the harsh deserts carried out by Maximian in Gaul through the use of
laeti, prisoners of war of Gallo-Roman origin freed following victorious military campaigns, and Frankish prisoners, as witnessed in panegyrics.
The legislation is certainly the clearest evidence of a widespread social malaise, which led to the abandonment of property and the birth of the colonate, which is equally not only a fiscal but a social phenomenon, in which the enrichment of the powerful to the detriment of the subjugation of the lower middle class. In this interpretation, we could consider the bagaudae as a classist reaction towards the top class.
The sources provide us with two names as leaders of the movement, Amando and Eliano. We are unable to know anything, however, either about their social background or the purpose they wanted to pursue with the revolt. The same sources highlight greater interest in the Bagaudic movement as a whole, rather than in individuals. This factor could refute the hypotheses of usurpation attempts by at least Amando.
Instead, we have more elements to try to define the ethnic origin of the rebels more clearly. Salviano of Marseille, in
De gubernatione Dei, [4] dealing with the Bagaudian wars of the 5th century, attempts to describe the identity of Gaul, dividing it into three typologies: Gallo-Romans, barbarians and Bagaudians.
In any case, the bagaudic phenomenon was considered a sufficiently serious problem to require Massimiano's intervention. The concern could derive both from the continuous pressures of neighboring peoples and from the nearby memory of the continuous usurpations in the territory, which culminated in the previous twenty years with the
imperum galliarum. The intervention of the Caesar and the imperial army gave even greater importance and authority to the movement, enhancing its war prerogative. Mamertine himself in his eulogy to Maximian, in a symbolist key, gives an aura of danger to the
gigantes, the
"exhibit biformia" [5], or the bagaudi, who would have attacked Olympus, defended however by Hercules in this case, or Maximian, and not from Jupiter-Diocletian, as in the myth. The Bagaudi are therefore farmers, but also warriors, not simple bandits who would have limited themselves to plundering the villas of the rich Gallo-Romans. The war, if it took place, was ended in a short time by Maximian, who won the revolt using
fortitudo et clementia, [6] as Mamertin indicates.
The author of the panegyric himself does not know whether to celebrate the feat or whether to remain silent about what happened, caustically underlining the contempt towards this social class. In any case, the episode of the bagaudae profoundly marked the political life of Maximian, who was recognized for the merits of the undertaking by Diocletian, who elevated him to the rank of Augustus in Nicomedia the following November. The choice of elevation to
Augustus may be related to the defection of Carausius, admiral of the fleet in the North Sea who in 286 began to have claims of independence, continuing in a certain sense the secessionist tradition of the western lands of the empire over the span of time of the disastrous third century.
The attempt by Carausius, who declared himself emperor in 287, was stemmed first by Maximian, through a campaign against the Franks, allies of the secessionist, and later by the newly elected Caesar Constantius Clorus, who in 293 conquered Gerosianum, a port city located on the sea of north, as well as home to the rebel fleet. Following the defeat of the Frisians and Camavi, his allies, Carausius retreated to Britain, where the rebellion continued until 296, with the landing on the island by Constantius Clorus himself.
If this attempt at usurpation was not as successful as the previous ones, it is undoubtedly thanks to the tetrarchic policy, which guaranteed an authoritarian and military presence in the "hot" areas of the empire. Due to these disorders, although contained, the policy of reorganisation, reconstruction of the territory and repopulation of the countryside was not immediately successful. We can imagine the Gallic agricultural reality in the period following the Bagaudae as desolate, with abandoned and ruined crops, cities and farmhouses destroyed following years of unrest. Evidence of this is the city of Augustodunum, today Autun, destroyed in a siege in 269 and rebuilt only thirty years later at the behest of Costanzo Cloro. The panegyrics report the repopulation work of Maximian, who, in addition to rehabilitating the Bagaudi, sent numerous "laeti" to Gallia Belgica.
The latter at the turn of the 3rd and 4th centuries are to be understood not as barbarian immigrants, a development which will have the name laetus, but rather, as already mentioned, they can be identified with the Gallo Roman prisoners of war that the Franks were forced to release following the Maximian's campaign. This is confirmed by the text of the same anonymous panegyric of 297, which in a subsequent passage speaks of the Frankish prisoners of war, who were sent to work the land of the great landowners, with a jurisdiction different from the
Laeti. These are
"restituti postliminio", referring to the
ius postliminius, the principle according to which a
cives romanus, returning from an iniusta servitus such as the one forced into prison, reacquired the status of
libertas and reacquired the lost rights. We must question ourselves about the actual use of
laeti following the campaigns of Maximian and Constantius Clorus. If the Bagaudi probably returned to their possessions, it is possible to hypothesize that the former prisoners of war were directed to different civitates based on need and used to put the land back into cultivation.
From what can be seen from the panegyrics, the official voice of the environment of the imperial court of Trier, we are provided with a panorama of general recovery starting from 289/290, if already in 291 Mamertine praised the abundance and the crops, the demographic increase and the health of the population, while before the arrival of the august there was only famine and pestilence. The text, rhetorically emphasised, alludes to a progressive increase in manpower and new commercial flows, therefore an abundance of manpower, archaeologically attested with the enlargement of the rooms and the reuse of the productive spaces of the villae between the end of the III and especially during the 4th century.
The economic and social growth, this time "due" to the figure of Costanzo Cloro, is resumed in the aforementioned anonymous panegyric IV of 297, and in panegyric V, written by Eumenius. In the anonymous one, topics such as the reconquest of Britain are discussed, underlining its economic importance, the aforementioned reconstruction of Augustodunum, but as regards the agrarian world, the information provided to us in paragraph IX is relevant, regarding the distributions of Frisian prisoners in the territory and Camavi, who now work the land and are occasionally employed in border defense. To this news Eumenius adds a recognition to the British artisans, who came to work for the reconstruction of the city, in which culture and art now flourishes, new villas are built and new plantations cultivated.
The greatest difficulty in reconstructing the historical and social panorama of the Gallic countryside in the Tetrarchic age lies in the veracity of the official sources taken into consideration up to this moment. Is it enough to rely on the testimonies of panegyrists? They certainly provide us with necessary, yet not sufficient, testimony. It must not be forgotten that the ideas and opinions regarding the topics covered in the panegyrics are those coming from the ruling class, whether senatorial or in any case from the imperial establishment. Nonetheless, topics such as cultural flourishing, the construction of villas and the subjugation of barbarian populations are discussed, topics that inexorably fall into political propaganda.
Although it is impossible in the context of Roman historiography to obtain a source belonging to the middle-lower classes of the imperial population, we can see in Lactantius' work,
De mortibus persecutorum, [7] a voice out of the chorus, which acquires authority if we consider that the the author, during the drafting of the treatise, resided in Trier. The author, speaking of the actions of Diocletian and Maximian, reports the abandonment of the fields and the conversion of the crops into forest, refuting the panegyric V.
However, it would be wrong to think that Lactantius' version contradicts the "official" one. First of all, it must be considered that the
de mortibus persecutorum is not directly a historiographical work, but rather a treatise coming from a Christian environment, therefore deliberately critical of the tetrarchs, with the exception of Costanzo Cloro, of whom the author provides a positive image , a literary trick to enhance the figure of the Caesar's son, Constantine.
From the words of Lactantius, therefore, it seems that the agricultural context in Gaul was in crisis in the Tetrarchic age, continuing the trend that occurred throughout the third century. The testimonies of Lactantius and the panegyrists, therefore, may not conflict. The first, carrying out a discussion from below, would testify to the fiscal oppression of the
capitatio iugatio [8] and the harshness of the tax collection of the Diocletian reform, particularly serious for the free peasants, of whom the panegyrists do not concern themselves in their treatment except in one passage of the panegyric VIII which in fact validates the theory. On the other hand, the panegyrists exalt the return of barbaric labor and the reconstruction of city structures, while remaining silent on the social component of the agrarian reality.
Only by combining these two different testimonies can we have an overall vision of the agricultural reality in Gaul in the Tetrarchic age, reducing the positivist vision of economic and social changes. The greatest concern for the tetrarchs (including Costanzo Cloro himself) is to create and import manpower through military campaigns, repopulating cities and deserted lands. This is evident in Gaul due to the proximity of countless nearby populations, who often came into conflict with the imperial army, but above all because the panegyrists, who extensively describe the phenomenon, gravitate around Trier and directly experience the Gallic reality. This does not mean that this did not also happen in the rest of the empire: it is indeed testified in Panegyric IV that Diocletian provided for the transplant of colonists and prisoners from the province of Asia, in order to repopulate Thrace. In the Tetrarchic age the lands were put under cultivation and yielded immediate benefits, however a targeted and long-term agrarian policy did not take place. The barbarians transplanted to Gaul did work the land, however this was a short-lived event. The panegyrics already anticipate their military function, furthermore we know that during the 4th and 5th centuries the Franks, through a long process of immigration, entered the ranks of the army, in a certain way abandoning the work of the fields. Without German manpower the famines mentioned by Lactantius and Eusebius of Caesarea can be explained.
To conclude, the tetrarchs found a disastrous economic situation in Gaul, part of the Celtic component of the population in revolt and the cities destroyed. They were able to put a stop to these crises, introduced reforms that were necessary at the time, such as the
capitatio iugatio, and concentrated on the transplantation of the Germanic populations. With the oppressive tax pressure they caused a point of no return for the free farmers, who, unable to pay the taxes, had the extreme solution of fleeing and abandoning their possessions. Starting from the tetrarchic age, the process of polarization of wealth and rural property in the hands of the
honestiores, the ruling groups, was consolidated, which then continued with Constantine, under whom brigandage events occurred in Gaul, even if not with a bagaudic component. , very similar to it. The social disparity and the wealth accumulated by the possessores will contribute to the loss of rights, graduated over time, of the lower classes, and to the birth of the servile class.
But in the long term, the interventions of Maximian and Costanzo Cloro, by not intervening on the process of economic and social evolution, limited themselves to hiding the dirt under the carpet. Thus, in the 5th century, when state control in Northern Gaul entered into crisis, to react both to the pressure of the Franks and to the new collapse of agricultural production, a second Baugauda revolt was unleashed, which also had a political component: in 408 , Armorica and other areas in the north of Gaul expelled the Roman magistrates and officials and decided to govern themselves.
This implies that, unlike the first Bagaudic revolt, it was not only the less well-off classes who conducted this "experiment", which both Zosimos and Anicius Severus define as
Res Publica Armoricarum, but rather patronal relations had a decisive role on the one hand. , capable of providing the managerial cadres necessary for the establishment of a local power, and on the other the contribution of the so-called "middle class", i.e. the weakest among the honestiores, in a constant struggle to avoid falling into a state of poverty. The contribution of the nobles is demonstrated for example by Salviano, who states that among those who chose to live among the Bagaudi there were also people descended from families known and educated as free people, while the presence of representatives of the middle class is proven by
Gallic chronicle of 432 which, among the leaders of the movement, mentions a certain Eudoxius, a doctor by profession
From what Anicius Severus tells in the
Res Gestae Getarum, but probably the description of him was very idealized, the basic unit of Bagauda society was made up of the so-called phratry, which included three or four families related to each other. About ten phratries made up the
pagus, the local community which every year saw to the division of cultivable lots between the phratries, the collection of taxes and the organisation, training and arming of a group of soldiers.
According to Anicius Severus, the private property of each baguad, in fact, was limited to his house, pets and tools; at the same time, each phratry possessed community rights, so the plots of arable land were divided and annually redistributed according to the number and needs of each phratry and the productivity of the lot itself. Common rights were also associated with the uses of pastures and woods: the
pagus annually elected their representatives, one per
pagus, to the legislative assembly of Armorica, which Anicius Severus calls
Senatus. In turn, the members of the Senatus, which in addition to being a legislative body, also acted as a court of justice, elected both the head of the civil administration, which the Latin historian calls
Consul and the
Dictator, the military leader of the Bagaudi.
Despite the accusations that the Bagauds enriched themselves by plundering the territories south of the Loire, we have some testimonies, starting with Zosimos, who speak of a recovery of the agricultural economy of the area: furthermore, both Anicius Severus and the
Cronica Alana [9]testify how the main culprits of these raids were the Franks. As proof of this, there is the Comes Aetius expedition, which we will talk about in the future
Even though the social roots of the movement escaped him, Honorius was certain of three things:
- They were Romans and not Goths, with whom one could negotiate and reach an agreement
- They were enemies of the Gallo Roman senatorial nobility, allied with Galla Placidia, so they could be potential allies of Ravenna, applying the principle "The enemy of my enemy is my friend"
- They constituted an important military force, capable of countering barbarian incursions, which could be integrated in some way into the Roman army, to fight against Athaulf in the future.
Added to this was the information coming from bishop Patroclus of Arles, who, exploiting the ecclesiastical hierarchies of Armorica, had set up his own espionage network: the Bagaudi, due to the diversity of the classes they came from and the different interpretation of the Roman past, were divided into two factions: on the one hand there were those who were in favor of re-establishing ties between the Celtic communities and Ravenna; on the other there were those who now considered the achievement of full independence inevitable. Therefore, to prevent the latter faction from gaining the upper hand and to reconquer the North of Gaul by resorting to force, which, in addition to favoring Athaulf, would have slowed down the recovery of the state coffers, Honorius decided on a diplomatic approach.
In March 418 he appointed Exuperantius of Poitiers,[10] a cousin of Rutilius Numatian, [11]
Vicarius Galliae, [12] taking advantage of a small oversight in the treaty of Classe, in which Priscus Attalus had no right of veto on any imperial appointments among his subordinates: now, if Rutilius, in addition to boasting of his kinship, tells us very little in the passage from
De Reditu suo
Esuperantius is now teaching the littorial Armoricus to love the restoration of peace; he re-establishes the laws, restores freedom and ensures that the inhabitants do not have to be slaves to civil discord [13]
Anicius Severus tells us something more
Exuperantius, a great connoisseur of the laws, alien to any dispute and faction, had made a career in the imperial administration due to his equanimity and integrity. Due to his incorruptibility and being an expert in the language and customs of the Bagaudi, he was sent by Honorius on a mission to Armorica.
Given that, from a scholium of the
Res Gestae Getarum, we know that the jurist Palladius, who will have a chair in Rome and collaborate in the drafting of the
Codex Theodosianus,[14] was his son, we can hypothesize that Exuperantius also studied law in Rome. Furthermore, as no epigraphs or papyri recalling his actions have been found to date, it is probable that despite the praise of Anicius Severus, he was a second-rate bureaucrat: Honorius chose him, with his usual cynicism, because he was expendable and because he spoke Celtic.
Now, a sine qua non condition, to make it appear, in the event of a positive outcome, an imperial success and that the Goths would not participate: to obtain this result, Honorius put his duplicity to rest. He sent a rescript to Wallia, in which praising the courage and blood shed by the Goths in Hispania, seeing that his people had already suffered so much for the empire, he granted him the possibility of not sending soldiers to accompany Exuperantius, but of limiting himself to pay logistics costs. Wallia, given the discontent of the Goths, who were not very enthusiastic about abandoning the Garonne fields again, accepted. It goes without saying that Wallia received a letter full of insults from Athaulf and Galla Placidia as soon as they realized what Honorius was up to.
Exuperantius was also accompanied by the knights of the
Scola armarum seniorum [15] and by a Alan contingent: recent archaeological excavations in Tours and Nantes have shown how at the time there was extensive cross-border trade between the territories entrusted to the Alans and the
Res Publica Armoricarum. At the beginning, relations between the counterparts were probably tense, so much so that the Alana Chronicle speaks of a battle with the Bagaudi, or at least with the exponents of the anti-Roman faction, in the
Civitas Redonum [16]which was held on 6 April 418. From that which the chronicle describes, the Alans fell into a trap and were saved only thanks to the intervention of the imperial knights
However, already in mid-May 418 negotiations began between Exuperantius and Tibattus, the Consul of the Bagaudi, with the mediation of an old friend of the Gallian vicarius, Bishop Germanus of Auxerre. Germano was the son of Rustico and Germanilla,[17] large landowners, of senatorial rank. After studying trivium in his hometown, he went to Rome to acquire a doctorate in law and practice as a lawyer, where it is possible he met Exuperantius. Both dedicated themselves to public careers, deepening their friendship, until Germano, after his parents' death, in order to take care of his properties, obtained the appointment of
consulares [18]of the Fourth Province of Lyon to which Auxerre belonged; on 1 May 418 the bishop of the city Amatore died, who had remained neutral in the disputes between Honorius and Galla Placidia, and the clergy, the nobility and the people, as was the custom then, elected Germanus the new bishop of the city, despite him being married. Patroclus, convinced that Germanus, due to his previous history, was pro-imperial, approved his appointment. The new bishop, who like Exuperantius spoke Celtic, must have had great diplomatic skills: he was highly esteemed by the Alans, despite being Arian Christians, and maintained excellent relations with the pro-Roman faction of the Baguadi
On 9 June 418, again in
Civitas Redonum, the treaty between the Empire and Baguadi was signed: the Celts recognized the authority of Honorius and his successors, they would pay a share of the taxes in Ravenna and their troops would fight alongside the imperial army against invaders, rebels and usurpers. In exchange Tibattus would have been named
Comes Armonicarum and they would have kept their peculiar political and social system unchanged.
Satisfied with the result and hoping to obtain some benefits from Ravenna, in early July Exuperantius was preparing to move to Arleate, to put himself in the service of Priscus Attalus, when he received a new order from Honorius: the emperor had started the second part of his plan
[1] The reflections on the Bagaudi are a reworking of an article by Fabrizia Ruggio on the economic evolution of Late Roman Gaul
[2] Roman historian of the 4th century
[3] Death sentence, which involved being devoured alive by wild beasts in the arenas.
[4] Book in which Saviano contrasts the vices of the Romans with the virtues of the barbarians, maintaining that they were the instrument of Providence to strike transgressors of its law.
[5] In English,
they show deformity
[6] In English,
strength and mercy
[7] Book by Lactantius in which the author, with a taste that today we would define as pulp, describes the atrocious deaths of the persecutors of Christians
[8] Taxes introduced by Diocletian. The capitatio (from the late Latin derivative of caput, capitis which in the primary sense indicates the head, the head with reference to individuals) or direct tax which weighed on individuals of working age from 14 to 65 years. I. The iugatio (from the Latin iugerum, iugeri, agricultural measure of surface area equal to approximately 25 ares, i.e. 240 feet in length and 120 in width) which instead burdened the units of cultivable surface area.
[9] Another invented book
[10] Real character, who will end up better in this Timeline than in OTL
[11] Also true OTL
[12] Civil collaborator of the Prefect, a sort of governor general of the Gallic provinces
[13] Slightly changed from the original
[14] This also happens OTL
[15] One of the scholae palatine, the imperial guards, stationed in Ravenna
[16] Our Rennes
[17] All of this also happens OTL
[18] Governor of a province
