To take these from the
occupants would suddenly ruin a multitude of people. In Italy
especially, if this were done, all the people of a city would be
expelled. Thus Augustus deprived the inhabitants of Mantua of the
whole of their territory; Vergil was among the victims, but, thanks to
his verse, he obtained the return of his domain, while the other
proprietors who were not poets remained in exile. These lands thus
recovered were sometimes distributed to poor citizens of Rome, but
most frequently to old soldiers. Sulla bestowed lands on 120,000
veterans at the expense of the people of Etruria. The Agrarian Laws
were a menace to all the subjects of Rome, and it was one of the
benefits conferred by the emperors that they were abolished.
FOOTNOTES:
[123] Wisps or bundle of hay were twisted around poles.--ED.
[124] Regarding all these Italian wars the Romans had only a number of
legends, most of them developed to glorify the heroism of some ancestor
of a noble family--a Valerius, a Fabius, a Decius, or a Manlius.
[125] These songs were mingled with coarse ribaldry at the expense of
the general.
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