The early reforms and economic policies of Hadrian (#Hadrian1900)

Upon his return to Rome (see previous post here), Hadrian’s first task was to regain the people’s favour after the killing of four ex-consuls who were accused of plotting against him. To boost his popularity and win public opinion in Rome, the new princeps introduced a number of important financial reforms, including distributing largesses and remitting debts.

Hadrian’s best-known and most important reform was the cancellation of all unpaid debts owed by individual citizens to both the fiscus (state treasury) and the aerarium (Senate’s treasury). He issued a proclamation announcing the remission of unpaid taxes amounting to 900 million sesterces, dating back 15 years. The debt records were burned in a public ceremony in the Forum of Trajan, and this decree was so popular that a monument was erected on the site of the ceremonial pyre. The inscription celebrating Hadrian’s wise generosity has survived (CIL VI 967, ILS 309).

“…the first of all principes and the only one who, by remitting nine hundred million sestertii owed to the fiscus, provided security not merely for his present citizens but also for their descendants by this generosity.”

The Sestertii of Hadrian issued in AD 118 confirm the sum given on the inscription with their reverse legend RELIQVA VETERA HS N[OVIES] MILL ABOLITA. One of the reverse types shows a lictor setting fire to a heap of records lying on the ground in the presence of three citizens.

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Another version of the debt-burning event appears to be represented on a carved relief discovered in Rome in 1844, known as the “Chatsworth Relief.” The scene shows soldiers of the Praetorian Guard with Hadrianic beards carrying containers full of debt records against the remains of an architectural backdrop thought to depict the porticoes of the Forum of Trajan, where the event took place.

Another carved relief, found in 1872 in the Roman Forum near the Column of Phocas and now on display in the Curia, also appears to depict the destruction of records of unpaid taxes. Formerly thought to date to the time of Trajan and consequently named Anaglypha Traiani, this relief is generally accepted as dating to the early Hadrianic period on stylistic grounds. The sculptured panel is part of two balustrades carved in Greek marble, which portray sacrificial animals (suovetaurilia) on the outer sides and historical events on the inner sides. These balustrades are thought to have stood on each end of the rostra, a large platform in the Forum Romanum on which magistrates, politicians, advocates, and other orators stood to speak to the assembled people of Rome.

The relief depicts a line of Praetorian Guards carrying bundles of records and throwing them on the heap, to which a lictor is putting the torch. The scene appears to be taking place in the Forum Romanum, as shown by the architectural background, which includes the Basilica Julia, the Temples of Saturn, Vespasian, and Concord, the rostra, and a representation of the statue of Marsyas and the fig tree. However, the scene on the anaglyph is problematic as the ancient sources locate the burning of the records in the Forum of Trajan, not in the Forum Romanum. M. Hammond (1953) suggests that the records were possibly “burned in more than one place; those affecting the fiscus in Trajan’s Forum and those affecting the senate’s treasury, the aerarium Saturni, in the Forum Romanum near the Temple of Saturn, as shown on the anaglyph”.

The other interior scene appears to commemorate the alimenta, the organised charity system for supporting poor and orphaned children instituted by Trajan and continued by Hadrian. According to Ulpian, a Roman jurist writing in the 3rd century, Hadrian increased the age at which children could receive alimenta (dig. XXXIV 1.14.1). Poor parents would now receive financial support for girls up to the age of fourteen and boys up to the age of eighteen.

The alimentary relief shows two distinct actions. On the left, a toga-clad emperor (Hadrian?), accompanied by lictors and standing on the rostra, addresses an assembled crowd (adlocutio) consisting of senators, equestrians, and poor people of Rome. The temples of Divus Julius and Castor, the Arch of Augustus, and the Basilica Julia of the Forum Romanum serve as the backdrop. On the right, another togate emperor sits in a chair, his feet resting on a footstool. Before him stands a woman holding a child and placing her right hand on another child’s head (missing). Both scenes are thought to celebrate Hadrian’s extension of Trajan’s alimentary program, as the Historia Augusta recalls. However, some scholars hypothesize that the adlocutio scene celebrates the congiarium (distribution of money) of Trajan of AD 103 or 107, while the other scene celebrates Trajan’s alimentary program, not Hadrian’s, on the basis that sestertii of Trajan minted between AD 109 and 111 show on the reverse a very similar group with the legend Alim. Ital.

“He made additional appropriations for the children to whom Trajan had allotted grants of money.” HA Hadr. 7.8

Hadrian then donated six gold aurei to all Roman citizens on top of the three aurei that had already been given while the Emperor was away. Further measures included a law reform assigning the property of condemned people to the public treasury (aerarium publicum) rather than to the Emperor’s treasury (fiscus privatus). Hadrian also decreed a law that prohibited the killing of slaves except after a juridical condemnation (HA Hadr. 18.7).

Hadrian’s acts of generosity were commemorated on coins to spread the good news around the world. The reverse of one such coin depicted Hadrian on a platform, seated in his chair of state, while an official distributed money, with the legend liberalitas Aug (imperial generosity) in the exergue.

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Another way of establishing better relationships with the Senate was to consecrate his predecessor and adoptive father, Trajan. Soon after the optimus princeps’ death in Selinus, and while still in the East, Hadrian requested from the Senate that a ceremony of deification (divanos honores) be carried out.

“This request he obtained by a unanimous vote; indeed, the senate voluntarily voted Trajan many more honours than Hadrian had requested.” HA Had. 6.1

The new Emperor was offered a Triumph (cum triumphum) to mark Trajan’s victories in the East, but declined the offer. Instead, Hadrian authorised one for his deceased adoptive father, who would be represented as an effigy carried in a triumphal chariot.

“When the senate offered him the triumph which was to have been Trajan’s, he [Hadrian] refused it for himself, and caused the effigy of the dead Emperor to be carried in a triumphal chariot, in order that the best of emperors might not lose even after death the honour of a triumph.” HA Had. 6.3

Trajan’s triumph and the official ceremony of his apotheosis had to wait until after Hadrian’s return to the capital (9 July AD 118). The recording of Trajan’s deification was to appear on a reverse aureus of Hadrian with the legend Divo Traiano.

Trajan’s posthumous triumph was commemorated on a very rare aureus bearing on the obverse the head of Trajan with the legend Divo Traiano Parth(ico) Aug(usto) Patri. The reverse bears a four-horse chariot driven by the deceased Emperor, who holds a laurel branch and a sceptre, with the legend Triumphus Parthicus.

The reform package would be a success. The lavish donations to the troops and the people would help boost the economy and stabilise the new regime. As a result, Hadrian became more popular than he had ever been.

Sources & references:

• Birley, Anthony R. (1997). Hadrian. The restless Emperor (pp. 93-100)
• Everitt, A. (2009). Hadrian and the Triumph of Rome. Random House Publishing Group.
  
• Boatwright, Mary T. (1987). Hadrian and the City of Rome. Princeton University Press.
• Opper, T. (2008). Hadrian: Empire and Conflict. The British Museum Press. (pp. 100-9)
• Hammond, M. (1953). A Statue of Trajan is Represented on the “Anaglypha Traiani”. Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome, 21, 125-183.
• Kleiner, D. (1992) Roman Sculpture. Yale University Press