In many respects civil government was effectively the same as fiscal administration: the main function ofthe administration was the assessment, collection and redistribution of fiscal resources, in whatever form, towards the maintenance of the state. The amount of tax required by the government varied year by year according to the international political situation and according to internal requirements. By the time of Constantine I state finances had come to be controlled and administered through three departments, the praetorian prefectures, the ‘sacred largesses’ (sacrae largitiones) and the ‘private finance department’ (res privata).
The most important was the praetorian prefecture, through which the land-tax assessment was calculated, collected and redistributed. Each prefecture comprised a specific territory, although they were reorganised and redistributed on several occasions: at the beginning of Constantine’s reign there were three major prefectures: Oriens (stretching from Moesia and Thrace in the Balkans around to Upper Libya in Africa); Illyricum, Italy and Africa; and the Gauls, including Britain and Tingitana in North Africa. By the 440s these had been rearranged into four prefectures: the Gauls, Italy, with North Africa and parts of Illyricum; and the east (Oriens). The Gallic, Italian and much of the North African prefectures were lost during the middle and later fifth century, leaving Illyricum and Oriens only, but with Justinian’s reconquests new prefectures for Italy and for Africa were established. Each prefecture was subdivided into dioceses (dioecesae, ‘directorates’), under a deputy - vicarius - of the praetorian prefect; and each diocese was divided into provinces under provincial governors. The lowest unit of administration was then the city - civitas or polis - each with its district - territorium - upon which the assessment and collection of taxes ultimately devolved.
Taxes were raised in a variety of forms, but the most important regular tax was the land-tax. This could be raised in money, and traditionally had been so; but during the financial crisis which the state suffered in the later third century, and as a result of the restructuring of finances and military arrangements under Diocletian and Constantine, much of it was actually raised in kind - grains, other foodstuffs and so forth - and deposited in a vast network of state warehouses, where it could be drawn on by both soldiers and civil administrators, who received a large portion of their salaries in the form of rations, annonae. As the financial situation of the government improved during the fourth and into the fifth century, so these rations could be commuted once again for cash - assuming the producers were able to obtain it - but the government always kept available the option of raising revenues in kind, especially when military requirements demanded it. The prefectures, through their diocesan and more particularly their provincial levels of administration were also responsible for the administration of justice, the maintenance of the public post, the state weapons and arms factories, and provincial public works.
The two remaining finance departments had evolved out of earlier Roman palatine departments, and had more limited functions. The sacred largesses were responsible for bullion from mines, minting coin, state-run clothing workshops, and the issue of military donatives - regular and irregular gifts of coin to the troops for particular occasions such as an imperial birthday, accession celebration and so forth. It had local branches in each diocese, and representatives in the cities and provinces to administer the revenues drawn from civic lands (which it administered after the middle of the fifth century) and from other income, such as the cash for the commutation of military service or the provision of horses for the army. The res privata, under its comes, was essentially responsible for the income derived as rents from imperial lands, whatever their origin (from confiscation, for example, or by bequest or escheat). It was as complex as that of the comes sacrarum largitionum, with different sections responsible for its various tasks. During the sixth century its responsibilities were divided between income destined for state purposes and that employed to maintain the imperial household, and a new department, the patrimonium, was established.
During the course of the sixth century the sacred largesses and the private finance department continued to evolve: the various estates administered by the latter were organised into five sections, each independent (including the original res privata), responsible for different types of estate and expenditure; while the diocesan level of the activities of the sacred largesses was gradually subsumed by the provincial level of the praetorian prefectures. Under Heraclius, mint production was centralised - mints at Ravenna, Carthage, Alexandria and Constantinople continued to function, while the rest were closed down. In the same period, and over the following 20 or so years, the sacrae largitiones disappears as a separate department, while the praetorian prefecture of the east (that of Illyricum disappeared as imperial control over most of the Balkans was lost) was broken up, so that each of its subsections becomes an independent bureau, mostly under its own logothetes, or accountant, placed directly under the emperor and a senior officer at court, often the sakellarios.
The role of the sakellarios, as superintendant of the imperial household finances, is illustrative of the sorts of changes which occurred. His close association with the emperor and the imperial household shows that a process of centralisation was taking place in which the emperors played a much more active managerial role, a reflection of the crisis in the empire’s financial and political situation in the years from 640 on.
World History
