hundred times its prime cost”(a sestertius was the principal bronze coin of
the Roman Empire valued at a quarter-denarius; the average soldier or
working man made about one to two denarii a day). Later he made a more
general reckoning as to the cost of trade with the East whilefingering the
culprits responsible:“By the lowest reckoning India, China and the Arabian
peninsula take from our empire 100 million sesterces every year–that is the
sum which our luxuries and our women cost us.”The emperor Tiberius (14–
37 CE) deplored“the ladies and their baubles transferring our money to for-
eigners,”and later the emperor Vespasian (69– 79 CE) tried to ban the export
of precious metals. All of this did little to deter the Romans from enjoying
their imported luxuries, and in any case the Roman government with its
huge import tax was one of the main beneficiaries of the trade. The silver
drain would cease only when the Romans debased their coinage enough that
other people, including the Indians, didn’t want it. Gold coins, which were
not used for paying soldiers’ wages or for other mundane government
expenses, suffered less debasement and remained an Indian import.
98 When India was the center of the world