‘‘Senatorial’’ Provinces provincescorrespondstonodivisionofadministrativepracticeorofpolitical
responsibility,butsimplyreflectsthemethodandconditionsofappointment
andthelengthoftenureoflegatiAugustipropraetore(legatesofAugustuswith
praetorianrank)ontheonehandandofproconsulsontheother.^1 Thatissue
doesnot,Ithink,needtoberehearsedagain,andwillbenotre-arguedhere.
Butitishighlysignificantthatnonethelesstheterm‘‘senatorialprovinces’’
hasremainedinuseasacommondescriptionofthoseprovinceswhichfrom
..onwardsrevertedtobeinggovernedbyproconsulsselectedbylotand
servingnormallyforonlyoneyear.^2 Fortheunreflectingimpositionofthis
termnotonlyfliesinthefaceoftheancientevidencebutexpressesalinger-
ingpresumption—ofaveryprofoundkind—abouttheRomanrevolution
itself.That is to say, that the political and constitutional system as against
which,orfromwithintheframeworkofwhich,amonarchemergedwasone
inwhichthesovereignelementhadbeentheRomanSenate.Therefore,inso
farasthe‘‘settlements’’of..andafter,whichgaveconstitutionalexpres-
siontoAugustus’monarchicposition,werecompromises,theywerecom-
promisesbetweentheSenateandtheEmperor.Consequently,asthenhardly
needstobeargued,thedivisionoftheprovincescarriedoutinJanuary
musthavebeenadivisionbetweenEmperorandSenate.
But it was not.The sovereign body in the Romanres publica, to which
theimperiumandtheprovincesbelonged,wasnottheSenatebuttheRoman
people. As our only contemporary source makes quite explicit, it was the
peopletowhomAugustusgavebackcertainprovincesin..aspartof
theterminationoftheTriumviralsystem.Andthoseprovinceswerehence-
forwardtobeknownaspublicae provinciae(publicprovinces),orevenmore
explicitlyasprovinciae populi Romani(theprovincesoftheRomanpeople).
Beforetheevidenceissetoutinmoredetail,itmayberelevanttorecall
somefeaturesofthepublicvocabulary,orpublicideology,oftheearlyPrin-
cipatealreadydiscussedinrelationtotheTabulaSiarensisandTabulaHebana
of.., two major inscriptions,which together present a single text of
almostlimitlessimportance.^3 Firstly,thewholeEmpire,andnotmerelythe
. F.Millar,‘‘TheEmperor,theSenateandtheProvinces,’’JRS():(chapter
inthisvolume),withrevisionsinTheEmperorintheRomanWorld(),ff.,andin‘‘State
andSubject:TheImpactofMonarchy,’’inF.MillarandE.Segal,eds.,CaesarAugustus:Seven
Aspects(),esp.ff.(chapterinthisvolume).
. See,forinstance,thegenerallyexcellentcommentaryonSuetonius,Divus Augustus
byJ.M.Carter(),ff.(onchap.,).
. F.Millar,‘‘ImperialIdeologyintheTabulaSiarensis,’’inJ.González,ed.,Estudios sobre
la Tabula Siarensis, Anejos de Archivo Español de Arqueología():(chapterinthisvol-
ume), with some further points in ‘‘Government and Diplomacy in the Roman Empire