Just how wealthy?

[Carlton Bach]

OK, this is not really something I expect to hear a straightforward answer to, but I'd like to sound you out. In your estimation, opinion or educated guesswork, how wealthy (or poor) were Roman soldiers compared to people in their environment?

Some writers assumed they received little more than pocket money. I can't quite square that with the evidence showing that soldiers owned highly decorated equipment, jewelry, and significant sums in cash.

On the other hand, while it was said that troops in the Augustan era were better off than ever, the descriptions of the revolting legionaries do not sound like a wealthy provincial elite.

There is evidence of soldiers owning horses and slaves (it was argued that this was captured loot, but I'm not convinced. Aside from the question of fair distribution - except when the legion nabs 6,000 slaves at once - it strikes me as foolish to keep a domestic slave you captured personally). The law makes provision for soldiers making substantial bequests. Yet surviving documents also show soldiers asking relatives to send them individual items of clothing or inexpensive foodstuffs which surely a well-paid force could afford.

How do you read this? Is the average Roman soldier a poor slob in unwashed woolens begging his relatives for morsels from their table? A well-paid functionary of the Empire? Does this change significantly over time (declining fortunes from Augustus to the Severans)? Or is it more of a case of soldiers being paid in cash in an environment where the economy is only partly monetised, and thus having better access to status goods but limited access to non-monetised exchange items?

Curious

[Caius Fabius]

perhaps sometimes the requests are made by young soldiers who have not had time to save up some money. Even well paid soldiers away from home often write home for things they want or can't get on the local economy. Perhaps they wanted clothing from home, even if they could afford to buy something locally. I have guys in Iraq and Afghanistan asking for specific food items they just cannot get there, and they aren't poor, they just want a taste from home....

[floofthegoof]

I've read a great deal about republican Rome, and from this period it seems their fortunes depended almost entirely on the loot they gained. Some spoils went into the public treasury, but most I think went to the soldiers on the spot. I see many references of soldiers wanting to go on campaign for the money.

If you are a new citizen, I think you start out poor and landless, go on campaign to get some capital, and use that to increase your holdings and bribe who you need to in order to get ahead.

[Aryaman2]

There was a wide disparity among ranks, in the Early Empire retired centurions were considered local elite in small towns, and they are found serving as IIViri or Aedilesm while lower ranks were pretty much average low class

[Carlton Bach]

There was a wide disparity among ranks, in the Early Empire retired centurions were considered local elite in small towns, and they are found serving as IIViri or Aedilesm while lower ranks were pretty much average low class

Ah, well, centurions are a whole different kettle of fish. If you were a centurion you already lived better than 'middle class'. But we have documents indicating that Other Ranks disposed of sums in the thousands of sesterces, loaned money, owned slaves and horses. The same class of people that begged for a basket of leeks or a pair of socks from home. That is what has me stumped.

[floofthegoof]

There was a wide disparity among ranks, in the Early Empire retired centurions were considered local elite in small towns, and they are found serving as IIViri or Aedilesm while lower ranks were pretty much average low class

Ah, well, centurions are a whole different kettle of fish. If you were a centurion you already lived better than 'middle class'. But we have documents indicating that Other Ranks disposed of sums in the thousands of sesterces, loaned money, owned slaves and horses. The same class of people that begged for a basket of leeks or a pair of socks from home. That is what has me stumped.

I think you're talking about different people though, even if they are the same 'class' as you put it. If your father went on campaign and did well for himself, you could already be quite wealthy upon joining the army. I think there was a wide disparity among individual soldiers, rank notwithstanding. You could be a full citizen of Rome, qualified for military service, and still be destitute. One of the big problems in Gracchus' time, was that unlanded citizens of Rome had no way to support themselves, because landowners had access to slaves performing almost any imaginable service from ditch digging(Guals) to architechture(Greeks). There were no employment opportunities. Slaves could at least count on being fed. For an unlanded citizen, your only hope was the army going on campaign. This I read from Appian.

Along with these desparate citizens, you also had the sons of the landowners in the army as well. It's probable that rank could be bought or inherited to some degree (equestrians), but only for the very wealthy families. Upper middle class citizens probably started their career at the bottom just like the poor citizens.

[Crispvs]

"But we have documents indicating that Other Ranks disposed of sums in the thousands of sesterces, loaned money, owned slaves and horses. The same class of people that begged for a basket of leeks or a pair of socks from home. That is what has me stumped."

Perhaps that is, in itself, the answer to the problem. If you loan someone money, you do not have the use of that money for a period of time. Similarly, if you take out a loan at interest, you end up being in debt. If Decimus lends Gnaeus 100 sesterces at twenty percent interest (and there are I believe there are surviving records of the Romans charging greater rates of interest than this), even if the interest is not compounded and Gnaeus pays back the loan on time, he still ends up with twenty sesterces less than he had to begin with, increasing the possibility that he will need to take out another loan in the future. After a while virtually all of Gnaeus' available cash will be being spent on debt repayment to Decimus, resulting in Gnaeus not being able to afford to buy basic items and having to beg them off other people.
There is a surviving pay reciept of a cavalryman named Clua who took all of his savings out of the 'bank' and borrowed another 150 sesterces against his next pay. I would be somewhat surprised if his signifer did not decide to feather his own nest a little by adding a sum of interest to the loan. How much do we know about debt in the Roman army of the early empire?

Crispvs

[floofthegoof]

Here's what I know about debt, not in the early empire really, but in the late republic. The payment of interest in return for a loan did not enjoy legal protection. It was an under-the-table arrangement, and laws were proposed to make the practice illegal, because it was the cause of a great deal of strife and abuse. If someone did not pay interest, the lendor had to use less-than legal means to get the agreed sum. This also went hand in hand with bribery, another officially frowned upon, yet popular practice. Court cases were commonly decided by bribing jurors. Though laws were proposed to ban both practices, I can't find that anything passed, because the practice was so widespread and the laws could not get the support they needed. Machiavelli says that no matter how much a society suffers from it's ills, there are always people who learn to thrive and become powerful in that environment, and will resist change bitterly.

Julius Caesar was famous for his generosity and for bribes. He did this by borrowing massive amounts of money. He had to be the poorest man in the army during his campaign in Gaul! I believe strongly that Caesar had hoped to cover himself with the profits from the Gaul campaign, but he perhaps failed. I think his primary motivation for 'casting the die' and crossing the rubicon, was not so much to become a monarch or an emperor, but he really faced ruination if he could not find a way to cancel this massive debt. He could not risk being challenged for pilfering public money for his own benefit, and that would have been the easiest way for his enemies in Rome to dispose of him.