The Constitutio Antoniniana

The Constitutio Antoniniana — edition

P.Giss. I 40, col. i Αὐτοκράτωρ Καῖσαρ Μάρκος Αὐρήλιος Σεουῆρος Ἀντωνῖνος Εὐσεβὴς λέγει· η μᾶλλον αντὰς αἰτίας καὶ τοὺς λογισμοὺς θεοῖς τοῖς ἀθανάτοις εὐχαριστήσαιμι, ὅτι τῆς τοιαύτης ησμε συνετήρησαν. τοιγαροῦν νομίζω οὕτω με ως δύνασθαι τῇ μεγαλειότητι αὐτῶν τὸ ἱκανὸν ποι- εῖνὁσάκις ἐὰν ὑπεισέλθωσιν εἰς τοὺς ἐμοὺς ἀνθρώπους ν θεῶν συνεισενέγκοιμι. δίδωμι τοῖς συνάπα- σινκατὰ τὴν οἰκουμένην πολιτείαν Ῥωμαίων, μένοντος τοῦ δικαίου τῶν πολιτευμάτων, χωρὶς τῶν δειτικίων. ὀφείλει γὰρ τὸ νειν πάντα αα ἤδη καὶ τῇ νίκῃ ἐνπεριει- ληφαγμα λώσει τὴν μεγαλειότητα τοῦ Ῥωμαί- περὶ τοὺς υς γεγενῆσθαι ᾗπερ δ αλειφων τῶν ἑκάστης ητωος θη ολω το α νελλη μω υπο κυ ιειη οιεσαν εγδια ος

P.Giss. I 40, col. ii κατανέμειν ημ ἀποκατασταθεῖσιν νε ἵππον δημόσιον προεσχηκόσιν ἀποδίδωμι καὶ οὐσιῶν ἐπίκρισις εσει παρὰ σημεί- ωσις ἀποφάσεως εἰς τὸ διακατέχειν ἢ λαμβάνειν τὰς πολιτικὰς τιμὰς. καὶ τούτοις τοῖς μετὰ ταῦτα τῆς τάξεως ἑαυτῶν ἢ συνηγορίας πρὸς χρόνον κωλυθεῖσι μετὰ τὸ πληρωθῆναι τὸ τοῦ χρόνου διάστημα οὐκ ὀνειδισθήσεται ἡ τῆς ἀτιμίας παραση- μείωσις. καὶ εἰ φανερόν ἐστιν, πῶς πλήρη τὴν χάριτά μου παρενέθηκα, ὅμως ἵνα μή τις στενότερον παρερμηνεύσῃ τὴν χάριτά μου ἐκ τῶν ῥημάτων τοῦ προτέρου διατάγματος, ἐν ᾧ οὕτως ἀπεκρινάμην· ὑποστρεφέτωσαν πάντες εἰς τὰς πατρίδας τὰς ἰδίας ἐλευθέραν με τούτοις πᾶσιν τὴν ἐπάνοδον δεδωκέναι εἰς ἅπασαν τὴν γῆν καὶ εἰς τὴν Ῥώμην τὴν ἐμὴν δηλωτέον ἐδοκίμασα, ἵνα μὴ παρʼ αὐτοῖς ἢ δειλίας αἰτία ἢ παρὰ τοῖς κακοήθεσιν ἐπηρείας ἀφορμὴ ὑπολειφθῇ. προετέθη πρὸ ε Εἰδῶν Ἰουλίων δυσὶ Ἄσπροις ὑπάτοις, ὅ ἐστιν κ ἔτους Ἐπεὶφ ιϛ ἐν δὲ Ἀλεξανδρείᾳ ὑπὸ τοῦ ἐπιτρόπου τῶν οὐσιακῶν κα ἔτους Μεχεὶρ ιϛ γενομένου ὑπομνήματος ἐπὶ τοῦ λαμπροτάτου ἡγεμόνος Βαιβίου Ἰουγκίνου τῇ δ τοῦ αὐτοῦ μηνὸς Μεχείρ. ἄλλο· Αἰγύπτιοι πάντες, οἵ εἰσιν ἐν Ἀλεξανδρείᾳ, καὶ μάλιστα ἄγροικοι, οἵτινες πέφευγαν ἄλλοθεν καὶ εὐμαρῶς εὑρίσκεσθαι δύναται, πάντῃ πάντως ἐγβλήσιμοί εἰσιν. οὐχὶ μέντοι γε χοιρέμποροι καὶ ναῦται ποτάμιοι ἐκεῖνοί τε, οἵτινες κάλαμον πρὸς τὸ ὑποκαίειν τὰ βαλανεῖα καταφέρουσι. τοὺς δὲ ἄλλους ἔγβαλλε, οἵτινες τῷ πλήθει τῷ ἰδίῳ καὶ οὐχὶ χρήσει ταράσσουσι τὴν πόλιν. Σαραπείοις καὶ ἑτέραις τισὶν ἑορ- τασίμοις ἡμέραις εἰωθέναι κατάγειν θυσίαις ἕνεκεν ταύρους καὶ ἄλλα τινὰ ἔνψυχα ἢ καὶ ἄλλαις ἡμέραις Αἰγυπτίους μανθάνω, διὰ τοῦτο οὔκ εἰσι κωλυτέοι. ἐκεῖνοι κωλύεσθαι ὀφείλουσιν, οἵτινες φεύγουσι τὰς χώρας τὰς ἰδίας ἵνα μὴ ἔργον ἄγροικον ποιῶσι, οὐχὶ μέντοι τὴν πόλιν τὴν Ἀλεξανδρέων τὴν λαμπρο- τάτην ην ἰδεῖν θέλοντες εἰς αὐτὴν συνέρχονται ἢ πολιτικωτέρας ζωῆς ἕνε- κεν ἢ πραγματείας προσκαίρου ἐνθάδε κατέρχονται. μεθʼ ἕτερα. ἐπιγεινώσκε- σθαι γὰρ εἰς τοὺς λινούφους οἱ ἀληθινοὶ Αἰγύπτιοι δύνανται εὐμαρῶς φωνῇ ἢ ἄλλων αὐτοὶ ἔχειν ὄψεις τε καὶ σχῆμα. ἔτι τε καὶ ζωῇ δεικνύει ἐναντία ἤθη ἀπὸ ἀναστροφῆς πολιτικῆς εἶναι ἀγροίκους Αἰγυπτιούς.

The Constitutio Antoniniana — translation

The proem and the grant of citizenship (ll. 1–12)

[Emperor Caesar Ma]rcus Aurelius [Severus] Antoninus [Augustus] Pi[ou]s proclaims: … rather … the causes and the reckonings … I would give thanks to the immortal gods, because, when [such a peril came], they preserved me. Therefore I hold that I can in this way render a service worthy of their majesty … as often as they enter among my people … I would bring [all of them] together to the worship of the gods. I grant to all [the foreigners] throughout the inhabited world the citizenship of the Romans, the law of the [communities] remaining in force, apart from the [de]diticii. For the whole [population] ought … everything … and now, by the victory, I have taken all in …

The remainder of the column (ll. 13–27)

[The rest of the column is too fragmentary for connected translation: only scattered words and letter-groups survive, including a reference to ‘the majesty of the Roman [people/empire]’.]

The restoration, and the free return of the exiles (ll. 1–15)

… to assign … to those who have been restored … I give back the public horse to those who held it before; and the adjudication of properties … a marginal notation of a verdict, for the holding or the receiving of the civic honours. And to those who, after this, were for a time barred from their rank or from advocacy, once the interval of time has been completed, the marginal note of disgrace shall not be cast in their teeth. And although it is plain how full a grace I have inserted, nevertheless, lest anyone construe my grace too narrowly from the words of the earlier edict, in which I answered thus — ‘Let all return to their own homelands’ — I have judged that it must be declared that I have granted to all these the free return to all the earth and to my own Rome, so that there be left among them neither a charge of cowardice nor, among the malicious, an occasion for spite. Posted on the fifth day before the Ides of July, in the consulship of the two Aspri — that is, year 20, Epeiph 16; and at Alexandria, by the procurator of the imperial estates, year 21, Mecheir 16, a memorandum having been made before the most distinguished prefect Baebius Iuncinus on the fourth of the same month, Mecheir.

The expulsion of the rustic Egyptians (ll. 16–30)

Another. All the Egyptians who are in Alexandria, and especially the country folk, who have fled from elsewhere and can readily be detected, are by every means and in every way to be expelled — not, however, the pig-dealers and the river-boatmen, and those men who bring down reeds for the heating of the baths. But expel the others, who by their numbers — being of no use — disturb the city. I am informed that the Egyptians are accustomed, at the Sarapeia and on certain other festal days, and indeed on other days too, to bring down bulls and other animals for sacrifice; for this they are not to be hindered. Those ought to be hindered who flee their own districts to avoid rustic labour — not, however, those who gather into the most glorious city of the Alexandrians to see it, or who come down here for the sake of a more civilised life, or of business for a season. (After other matters.) For the true Egyptians can easily be recognised among the linen-weavers by their speech … and they have the look and dress of others; moreover, their way of life shows their manners to be the opposite of civilised conduct — they are country Egyptians.

The Constitutio Antoniniana — commentary

The first column of the papyrus carries the constitutio by which Caracalla granted Roman citizenship across the empire — the most consequential single act of Roman legal history after the Twelve Tables. The column is gravely damaged: the proem (a thanksgiving to the immortal gods for the emperor's preservation) and the operative clause survive only in fragments, heavily restored (Thür 2021; the DDbDP edition).

The decisive sentence is lines 7–9: ‘I grant to all … throughout the inhabited world the citizenship of the Romans, the law of the communities remaining in force, apart from the dediticii.’ Two cruxes have generated a century of scholarship — what stood in the lost phrase before ‘throughout the inhabited world’, and who the excepted dediticii were. The edition presents the text as the papyrus gives it, restorations marked, so the reader can see exactly how much is read and how much is reconstructed (Thür 2021).

The second constitution is an act of clemency: a recall of those who had been exiled or otherwise disgraced. Caracalla restores the equus publicus to those who had held it, regularises the status and property of the returned, and rules that the time lost to their disgrace shall not afterward be held against them (the DDbDP edition; cf. Chrest.Mitt. 378).

Its great interest is that it quotes Caracalla's own earlier edict — ‘Let all return to their own homelands’ — and then expands it, lest the grace be read too narrowly: the return is to be free, to the whole earth and to ‘my Rome’. The constitution then dates itself precisely (11 July 212, the consulship of the two Aspri) and records its posting at Alexandria — a model of how an imperial act was published and archived in a province.

The third constitution, headed simply ‘Another’, orders the expulsion from Alexandria of rural Egyptians who have drifted into the city — but with careful exceptions: the pig-dealers, the river-boatmen, those who bring reeds for the baths, and those who come for festivals, for trade, or simply to see ‘the most glorious city’. The target is the idle countryman who has abandoned his land and labour (the DDbDP edition).

The constitution is a vivid document of Roman population policy in Egypt — the state's concern that the agricultural workforce not melt away into the city. Its closing lines, on telling the ‘true Egyptians’ from others by speech and bearing, are among the most discussed in the papyrus. That a measure so local should share a sheet with the universal grant of citizenship is itself instructive: P.Giss. 40 shows the imperial chancery's output as the provinces actually received it — the world-historic and the parochial, copied side by side.

Critical apparatus [Αὐτοκράτωρ Καῖσαρ Μά]ρκος Αὐρήλι[ος Σεουῆρος] Ἀντωνῖνο[ς] — The emperor's name is heavily restored from the visible letters; the reading is secure in substance — M. Aurelius Severus Antoninus (Caracalla). δίδωμι τοῖς συνάπα[σιν — The grant: 'I grant to all …'. What stood in the lacuna after συνάπασιν — the noun defining the beneficiaries — is the first great crux of the text. χωρὶς τῶν [δε]δειτικίων — 'apart from the dediticii'. The word is partly restored; the identity of this excepted class is the central, still-unsettled problem of the Constitutio Antoniniana (see Thür 2021). ὑποστρεφέτωσαν πάντες εἰς τὰς πατρίδας τὰς ἰδίας — The second constitution quotes Caracalla's own earlier edict — 'Let all return to their own homelands' — and then widens it. πρὸ ε Εἰδῶν Ἰουλίων δυσὶ Ἄσπροις ὑπάτοις — Posted 11 July, in the consulship of the two Aspri (C. Iulius Asper and his son) = AD 212; 'year 20, Epeiph 16' in the Egyptian reckoning. ἄλ(λο) — 'Another' — the one-word heading that separates the third constitution from the second on the papyrus. {ην} — The scribe cut a surplus letter-group ην; bracketed for deletion.

Editions and commentary Papyri Giessenses (O. Eger, E. Kornemann, P. M. Meyer) I, Leipzig–Berlin 1910–12, no. 40. L. Mitteis, Grundzüge und Chrestomathie der Papyruskunde II.2, Leipzig 1912, nos. 377–378. S. Riccobono, Fontes Iuris Romani Antejustiniani I², Florence 1941, no. 88 (the first constitution). J. H. Oliver, Greek Constitutions of Early Roman Emperors, Philadelphia 1989, nos. 260–262 (the three documents of P.Giss. 40; no. 260 is the Constitutio Antoniniana itself). G. Thür, ‘The dediticii in P.Giss. 40 I 7–9 (Constitutio Antoniniana)’ (2021) — on the central crux of the grant. The Duke Databank of Documentary Papyri (DDbDP) EpiDoc edition, papyri.info — the text followed here, with its published corrections. Trismegistos / HGV 19436 (the papyrological metadata record).