Abstract

Scholars have generally underestimated the level of Roman involvement in Africa in the period between the annexation of Carthage in 146 b.c. and Caesar's victory at Thapsus in 46 b.c., and the land in Africa which the Romans annexed has been conventionally called public land (ager publicus). This paper analyses the surviving text of the African provisions of the epigraphic lex agraria of 111 b.c. and notes that the term ager publicus is not attested in the provincial section of the law. The land in Africa appears simply as ager in Africa and the term ager publicus is confined exclusively to Italy in the law of 111. However, Cicero's references to Rullus’ agrarian proposal in 64/3 b.c. in the De lege agraria suggest that the term ager publicus was used to qualify land existing outside Italy in Rullus’ proposal. This paper argues that the concept of ager publicus as opposed to private land developed in Africa between 111 and 63 b.c., and that this was linked to privatization of ager in Africa in this period. The results of this study suggest a high degree of Roman exploitation of African land prior to the Caesarean and Augustan colonies in the 40s b.c.