Biglino's monograph adds to a growing corpus of scholarship exploring the economy of Italy during the Middle Republic and its relationship to Rome's intensive military activity and dramatic conquests. Revised from his 2016 Royal Holloway PhD dissertation, the book offers a relatively optimistic vision of a prosperous and demographically robust Italy, whose baseline wealth and population enabled the ambitious warfare of the period, augmenting the work of scholars such as Nathan Rosenstein and Luuk de Ligt. [1]

Chapter One relitigates the thorny problem of Roman military pay, presenting three models based on whether Polybius' two obols (6.39.12) should be converted to five, four, or three asses a day; he does not take a hard stance, but seems to favor the three-ass solution. Chapter Two offers a potted history of the Roman army from 450-218 BC. Chapter Three considers the economic impact of the Hannibalic War, positing that the stimulus of military pay and the ready availability of land may have significantly boosted the economic prospects of the survivors. I am inclined to agree with this optimistic vision of recovery after the war, in contrast to Toynbee's enduring desolation, although clearly not every part of Italy bounced back evenly. Chapter Four considers military service in the second century BC, noting the transition from annually levied legions to longer deployments in the provinces, with fresh supplementa to keep units at strength. The chapter largely focuses on census returns and reconstructions of military deployments, making modest upwards adjustments to the annual legionary roster proposed by P. A. Brunt for 167-100 BC. [2]

Chapter Five, "The War Economy", shares the main title of the book. The term harkens back to the World Wars, which saw intensive state involvement managing both industrial and agricultural production, combined with broad-based societal mobilization of human resources and material. This required extensive bureaucracies, even outside of the command economy of the Soviet Union. The Roman state lacked any comparable apparatus. Biglino focuses on shipbuilding during the First Punic War, certainly the results of state contracts (curiously omitting the Egadi rams and their probatio inscriptions), as well as the considerable arms industry that must have supplied the legions. On the latter point, he controversially posits state-sponsored mass production of weapons. Mass production of weapons is attested at Carthage (as well as New Carthage, where Scipio redirected the efforts of the captured arsenal slaves), while Italian cities amassed weapons and supplies for Scipio's fleet. The fact that legionaries could have the cost of weapons deducted from their pay (Polyb. 6.39.14) suggests some aspect of state provision, probably replacement items produced in camp. Still, most soldiers brought their own weapons with them, and it is far more likely that these were the product of numerous small private workshops (like the fourth-century BC swordsmith Tr. Pomponios) rather than state-facilitated mass production. Biglino does correctly note that armies would have exerted enormous economic gravity, attracting traders and craftsmen, which likely included arms manufacturers and salesmen.

Chapter Six, "The Forgotten Workforce", is the best chapter in the book, considering how women, minors, and the enslaved were mobilized to maintain levels of agricultural production despite the mass-mobilization of men in their prime working age. Biglino concludes by examining the dynamics of the small farms attributed to the consul Atilius Regulus (seven iugera) and the centurion Spurius Ligustinus (one iugerum), although he admits that the extremely small sizes of these landholdings were likely exaggerated in the sources.

Chapter Seven, "Italy and the Roman War Economy", considers the benefits of military activity to Romans and Italians broadly: pay, indemnities, loot, and colonization. Biglino makes the case for expansive colonization outside of Italy from 218 BC onwards, and certainly the foundations of Italica and Gracchuris in Spain suggest that at least some former soldiers obtained overseas land. Biglino does not estimate the size and scope of this diaspora (Italica seems to have been quite small) nor the impact of this settlement on Italian demographics. The chapter then switches gears to consider the increased prominence of villas in central Italy, speculating that these commercial enterprises may have originated to supply the army. This is entirely possible, although the silence of Cato on the matter, a man familiar with both villas and military logistics, is notable.

The book provides a competent synthesis, but its analysis is often limiting. Biglino has a frustrating tendency to raise a controversial point that deserves its own chapter - be it the mass production of weapons, the extent of colonization outside of Italy, or the origin and impact of villas - only to quickly breeze on to a different subject. While the inclusion of census records and legionary deployments are necessary hard data, they often seem to substitute for more holistic economic analysis. One expects to hear far more about crop yields, labor requirements, and energy inputs to explore this topic fully: for instance, how long does it take to plow a iugerum or how much charcoal is needed to forge a gladius? The book provides a serviceable recapitulation of the known outputs of the Roman war economy (armies, fleets and their payrolls) but many of the economic inputs and logics that sustained and impelled it remain veiled.

Notes:

[1] Nathan Rosenstein: Rome at War: Farms, Families and Death, Chapel Hill 2004; Luuk de Ligt: Peasants, Citizens Soldiers: Studies in the History and Demography of Roman Italy 225 BC-100AD, Cambridge 2012.

[2] P.A. Brunt: Italian Manpower, Oxford 1972.

Michael J. Taylor