Spain As a New Roman Province
November 9, 2008 nnyq.com editIn addition, state contractors or publicani were active outside of Italy, although the extent of their operations is unclear. As we saw above, during the Second Punic War publicani in Rome contracted to supply the forces in Spain with food, clothing, and equipment; almost half a century later, others would contract to provide clothing and horses to Roman forces in Greece. Arrangements such as these may not have been the norm, however. On other occasions, the senate instructed governors of provinces such as Sicily to purchase grain locally and arrange for its shipment to the combat zone. Yet there were areas in which the use of publicani did expand, although it remains uncertain whether these individuals were Romans, citizens of other Italian communities, or residents of the provinces. From at least the 170s, Roman magistrates, acting on decrees of the senate, leased the exploitation of certain lands and resources. Toward the end of the second century, officials in Rome would also arrange contracts for the collection of taxes and rents from entire provinces and cities; this was to become the most prominent and controversial function of publicani in the first century.
To judge from its actions, the senate seems to have had no welldefined notion of how to proceed in Spain following the end of the Second Punic War. Some senators may have wished to disengage, but Rome had become too entangled in the affairs of the peninsula to leave easily. Other senators were evidently eager to punish communities that they thought had betrayed Rome or had proven to be especially bitter enemies; Roman commanders did in fact take such punitive action over several years. Roman officials also had allies and interests to protect, and these allies often attempted to persuade Rome to intervene in struggles with their neighbors. Toward the end of his time in Spain, Scipio Africanus had settled some of his wounded veterans at Italica not far from modern Seville in the lower valley of the Baetis River probably to protect his forces against any return by the Carthaginians. This town would become a major center of Roman power. From the start, it was a mixed settlement with firm local roots: The Roman and Italian veterans who formed the core of its population would have sought wives locally. The decision in 198 to choose two more praetors each year may well amount to an acknowledgment by the senate that Rome’s involvement in the peninsula was to be long lasting.
The nature of a command in Spain during the early second century can be appreciated from the campaigns of 195 and 194, one of the few instances at this date when Nearer Spain received a consul as governor. Accounts are especially detailed, and they probably derive in large part from the writings of the commander himself, Marcus Porcius Cato the Elder, who was lavish with self praise. Once arrived in Spain, he first assisted the citizens of Greek Emporiae (Rome’s main port of entry into the peninsula), who were so frightened of their Iberian neighbors that they refused to leave the town at night except in large groups, and forbade Iberians to come inside their city walls. At the same time, Cato sought to supply his troops as well as train them by seizing crops and plundering the countryside, thereby in all likelihood only worsening much of the tension around Emporiae. Later in his term of office, Cato campaigned in the lower Ebro Valley and farther south along the coast. In the course of these wars, he plundered freely, ignored arrangements made by earlier commanders, and claimed to have firmly settled the affairs of his province. The amount of captured treasure he displayed in his subsequent triumph and the size of the “donatives” a commander’s distributions of money to his soldiers at the end of a campaign together testify to his success in plundering, but later events confirm that Nearer Spain was far from settled; succeeding governors would continue campaigning in the same areas for several decades.
