SUPPLYING THE ROMAN EMPIRE 119shortage sold grain much more cheaply than the current price, and when the
emperor’s army was passing through provided for the annona 400 medimnoi
of wheat, 100 of barley and 60 of beans, plus 1,000 metretae of wine at a
much cheaper rate than the current price.’ The city was Lete in Macedonia
and the emperor Hadrian, whose two visits to Sparta brought two subsistence
crises on that city. On the other side, some fortunate host- cities benefi ted
from imperial largesse.^18
The third century, when warfare was more frequent, and in the middle
decades constant, is usually represented as a period of fundamental change
in the method of military supply. First, extraordinary exactions became
more common and played a more vital part in the supply of the army than
previously. Furthermore, as civic order and military discipline degenerated,
authorized limits were bypassed and payment became desultory or vanished
altogether. Secondly, the range of foods that were dispensed as normal
rations expanded to include oil and wine, while grain was no longer deducted
from pay. These developments (for which the evidence is very thin) may
have been introduced by the Severan emperors as part of their policy of
improving the material conditions of the army, but they gained an additional
raison d’être by the middle of the third century, as infl ation gathered pace
and the value of military pay plummeted. In earlier periods soldiers had
been able to supplement their basic rations by purchase; this was no longer
possible. The question is, whether these developments justify talk of a new
military tax, instituted by Septimius Severus and later formalized and
systematized by Diocletian. This is the annona militaris, defi ned in the
literature as the pay of the soldiers raised as tax and distributed to them in
kind.^19
Soldiers had always received rations and equipment as stoppages of their
pay, which was calculated in money. Under Diocletian, and a fortiori under
Septimius Severus, they were still paid their annual stipendium in three
instalments in the traditional way.^20 The difference was that infl ation had
reduced the value of money and left the soldiers with nothing after the
standard deductions had been made. Any ‘profi t’ came to the soldier in the
form of donatives and extraordinary exactions from the civilian population.
Both were frequent in the third century, were administered or connived at by
the Roman authorities, and constituted a practical alternative to a new tax.
Distribution of the burden
At the risk of oversimplifi cation, we propose a broad three- fold division of
provinces by function. The three functions are: the provision of wheat for
the city of Rome; the provision of wheat and other necessities for the army;
the provision of cash for soldiers and offi cials. The hypothesis is that there
was not a province that did not play one of these roles. The category of dual-
function province is not excluded – Egypt is an obvious candidate.