Condemnation to Hard Labour 133whichthetermopuspublicummighthaveapplied.Twogeneralconsiderations
suggestthatthereferenceistothe‘‘publicwork’’oftheprovincial(orItal-
ian) cities. Firstly, there is thewell-known semantic shift by which in the
generalvocabularyoftheimperialperiod‘‘publicus’’tendstobeappliedto
thingsassociatedwiththecities,ratherthanwiththe‘‘respublica’’ofRome.
Ulpianindeedprotested,invain:‘‘Thingsbelongingtoacivitasareimprop-
erlycalled‘public,’foronlythosethingsare‘public’whichbelongtothepopu-
lusRomanus’’(Dig.50,16,15).Butitwasalreadywellestablishedthateventhe
termres publicaitselfcommonlymeantsimply‘‘acity,’’ofanystatus.^18 Sec-
ondly,tosupportthepossibilitythat‘‘publicwork’’couldmeanhardlabour
intheserviceofacity,eventhoughthecondemnationhadbeenpronounced
byaprovincialgovernor,thereisthefactthatsuchcondemnationsbygov-
ernorsfrequentlyledtoconvictsappearinginthearena,eitherasgladiators
oras passivevictims for the beasts, in shows put on bycity magistrates or
highpriestsofprovincialcouncils.Condemnedcriminalscould,ofcourse,
beusedintheshowsputonbymagistratesorbytheemperorinRomeitself.
Thisseemstobefirstattestedin65b.c.,andcontinuedundertheEmpire.^19
CriminalsmightalsobesenttoRomefromtheprovincestodieinthearena.
StrabosawafamousbanditwhohadbeensentfromSicilytobekilledby
beastsinashowinRome(Geog.273);and,forinstance,BishopIgnatiusof
Antioch,onhiswayunderguardtoRomeinthereignof Trajan,washap-
pilyanticipatingbeing‘‘groundbytheteethofbeasts’’(Ep. Rom.4,1–2).In
theearlythirdcenturyHerenniusModestinuswrote:‘‘Agovernoroughtnot
toreleasedamnati ad bestias[personscondemnedtobethrowntothebeasts]
asafavourtothepeople.Butiftheyareofsuchstrengthorskillthatthey
can worthily be exhibited to the Romanpopulus, he ought to consult the
emperor’’(Dig.48,19,31).
In these cases therefore the Roman state not only, in the person of the
governor,passedsentencebutalsoprovidedtheorganisationandcontextfor
execution.However,theimplicationwhichmightbedrawnfromModes-
tinus’words,thatgovernorsthemselvesmightalsogiveshowsintheprov-
inces, at which criminals condemned by them might meet theirdeaths, is
misleading.Governorsmightwellbepresentatsuchshows,butallourevi-
denceindicatesthatthepersonsgivingthemwouldnormallybecitymagis-
- SeeA.Mócsy,‘‘Ubiquerespublica,’’Acta Antiqua Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 10
(1962):367. - ForCaesar’saediliciangamesin65b.c.,seePliny,NH33,53(noxii—orslavesbeing
punished?).SeeG.Ville,La gladiature en Occident des origines à la mort de Domitien(1981),232–
33.Cf.L.Robert,Les gladiateurs dans l’Orient grec(1940),320–21.