Knights and Plebs. Who Were They?

In 46 BC, Decimus Laberius performed a short farce of his own making during one of the shows Julius Caesar had put on to celebrate giving everyone a jolly good kicking in the Civil Wars.

Laberius performed a sombre little prologue on how miserable it was to be getting old, as he had recently turned sixty, which, one would think, wasn't really the sort of thing to get the crowd on their feet, particularly when you took into account that this was meant to be a competition. He tried to rally by throwing in some sardonic bites at the Dictator at the end, but it was all a bit shit.

He lost.

Now, you might think, given Rome's reputation for casual violence, that he was promptly hauled off the stage and thrown in the Tiber. But, for coming second to the admittedly quite famous actor Publilius Syrus, Decimus Laberius, and his miserable little farce, was awarded a cool 500,000 sesterces, a gold ring, and was allowed to take a seat in the fourteen rows of the theatre normally reserved for the equites - Rome's equivalent of the medieval knight.

At first, this might seem like a crazy reward for losing. Five hundred thousand smackeroonies was a huge amount of money at a time when the average soldier was paid around 1,000 a year. However, reading between the lines, you might find that Laberius didn't win 500,000 sesterces, a gold ring, and a seat among the knights; he was given them back.

What we are seeing in this episode is a snapshot of how the snobbery of the Roman social ranking system worked because writing your own plays, even shit ones, was seen as a mark of great learning and culture, a fine and gentlemanly pursuit worthy of a Roman knight. But acting in one was tantamount to being a prostitute. Acting was uncouth and an activity that only the lowest in society would engage in, even if, like Syrus, it could make you a lot of money and bring you a lot of fame. The money it made you was dirty money. Other people's money, sullied by having been touched by so many hands. A gentleman's money was 'clean' and virgin. A gentleman gave money to other people, but they didn't give it back to him. That's what prostitutes and gladiators did.

So, in order to take part in his own play, at the behest of Caesar, Laberius had to be stripped, however temporarily, of his status as an equite. And, when he was done, he was given back his status, signified by the gold ring, his prime position in the theatre, and the 500,000 sesterces that he would have had to possess in order to qualify as a knight.

Rome's hierarchical social system was, on the face of it, quite simple. Right at the top was the emperor, the princeps; below him, the nobility, mostly old Roman families who were senators; then the equites; then the plebs and, right at the bottom, all the dregs of society who nobody much cared about, including slaves. And actors.

Roman history, if you're being a bit grumpy, can effectively be summed up as the history of generals and emperors. Those are the people whom the sources wrote about, after all. Nobody thought to jot down the thoughts and feelings, trials and tribulations, of the classes below them unless they were temporarily walking through the stage set for the big boys, usually on their way to have their heads caved in for some reason.

So we know all about those people, and I have written, and will continue to write, about my favourite of all Rome's milling millions - prostitutes. But who were those people in the middle? The plebs and the equities?

Plebs

The plebeian class in the city of Rome itself was comprised of the common people who were not part of the aristocracy or patrician class. They formed the majority of the urban population and were essential to the functioning of the city. The plebeians in Rome were primarily comprised of small landowners, artisans, labourers, merchants, and freed slaves.

The provision of free corn to the plebs had been instigated by Clodius Pulcher in 58 BC as a means of increasing popularity at a time when it was considered that the people’s vote actually had some power. As such, appealing to this class specifically became the focus of later Emperors, even if the democratic power was all but gone. Augustus, who made a point of letting everyone know his generosity to the plebs, redefined them as no longer ‘everyone else’ but as a distinct set of people entitled to the free corn dole by the provision of a special ticket. Incongruously, the dole of free corn was given not to the destitute or poor, who might have benefited most from it, but to the more respectable plebs of middle-class means whose support the emperor could rely more on. These were the people who would take such pride in their status as citizens and in their city that maintaining the status quo was in their own best interests and, hence, the emperor's. The actual poor people could fend for themselves. Nobody cared about them.

The living conditions of the plebeians in ancient Rome were often challenging. Many lived in cramped and poorly constructed multi-story apartment buildings, where they faced the constant threat of fire, collapse, and unsanitary conditions. The majority of plebeians worked as labourers, artisans, and merchants and struggled to make ends meet in a highly competitive and stratified society.

Despite their economic challenges, the plebeians played a vital role in the daily life of ancient Rome. They formed the backbone of the urban workforce, contributing to the construction, trade, and commerce of the city. Many plebeians were also involved in the production of goods and services that sustained the urban population.

The plebeians in Rome also had their own political and social institutions. They were represented in the Roman government by tribunes, who advocated for their interests and had the power to veto the decisions of the patrician magistrates. The plebeians also had their own assembly, the Plebeian Council, where they could voice their concerns and pass resolutions that directly affected their lives.

Over time, the plebeians in Rome gained greater rights and opportunities. They were eventually allowed to hold public office, and some rose to prominence as successful businessmen, artisans, and even military leaders. Interactions between the plebeian and patrician classes became more common, contributing to a more integrated and cohesive society within the city of Rome.

Equites

Before the emergence of the equites as a distinct social class of their own, Roman society was divided into pretty much two sections. Senators and everyone else. Originally, as the name might suggest, the equites were wealthy individuals who could afford to serve in the Roman cavalry, where providing your own horse and equipment was required of you. By the end of the second century BC, this was redundant as the cavalry was provided by allied auxiliaries instead. They only became prominent as a social class when a law was introduced that judges in jury trials should be drawn from their number, and their organisation as a distinct order, like that of the senate, can probably be assigned to the same time period.

The number of equites available was strictly defined at first as the first eighteen centuries of the centuriate assembly. Still, their number may have been more significant, particularly after their introduction to jury cases.

There were financial requirements, beginning with a minimum of 400,000 sesterces per man, a figure that increased over time, so broadly speaking, anyone who was more prosperous than that was, as long as the census confirmed their wealth, able to be called an eques. This financial threshold was the same level of property value that was required of a man to enter the senate. As you can see, moving from the equite class to the senatorial one was relatively smooth in financial terms. All that was required, once you had demonstrated that you had enough money, was to be of the right age (25 or older) and ambitious enough to dedicate oneself to the pursuit of public office. Those who lacked the ambition or were too protective of their neck to enter the cut-throat world of public office were perfectly welcome to stay at equite rank, and it wasn't unknown for members of the same family to move up to senatorial rank and others to remain as equites. These two classes shared common interests, being the preserve of the landed gentry classes. However, they might also find themselves occasionally at odds, such as when contract disputes arose involving laws made by the senate or when a senator was on trial for something that he might expect his peers to do him a 'favour' in respect of.

Equites themselves had no political power or voice. They didn't need to. If that's what you wanted, you could move into public life. One could look at them as somewhat disinterested rich playboys. Gentlemen about town who spent their days at the club and whose broad interests were also those of the state. If one needed a political favour or two brought in, all one had to do was give a nudge or a wink in the right direction and then slip back to the couch with a glass of something red.

An annual parade of selected equites (5,000 of them, apparently) would be held by the younger members of the senate house, and roughly the same number held the office of juror under Augustus. Under Tiberius, all these and more came to be honoured under the broad title of ‘the public horse’ and were given the right to wear a unique gold ring and sit in the theatre's front row, as did the Senators. This official window-dressing might have given the equites some sort of public-facing role. A lot of them were the sons or nephews of Senators who not only didn’t want to move into public life but, if they chose to, might have dislodged a father or uncle on the way up. It kept them happy and gave them a sheen of respectability that they otherwise might not merit.

Newly minted citizens could proudly boast of their new equestrian rank, even if they held no official or unofficial position, and were equites only because they had a lot of money. Add to that the title of procurator, which was often appointed directly by the emperor from the equestrian ranks, and soon enough, there was an underclass of political ambition under the senatorial level to rival the clamour of that for public office.

Augustus’s promotion of the equites was a pivotal moment in the social structure of ancient Rome. While he professed to be restoring the old ways of Roman tradition, his changes were far-reaching and innovative. He broadened the class by introducing a diverse range of Italian municipal families and wealthy provincials, some with no prior connection to Rome. This inclusivity extended to the Senate as well. By elevating the equestrian rank, he effectively bolstered the power and prestige of the senatorial classes, thereby enhancing their influence and status. Under Augustus, for the first time, the financial requirements for those in the senatorial class were higher than those for the equestrian. With the new prestige a senator could expect to enjoy, he was expected to be able to prove he had a cool 1 million sesterces.