said to have 
 blasting by 
n’s Gazetteer 
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re shut up. 
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llery. The 
June 1857; 
ty devolved 
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e governor, 
treets ; but 
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r Residency. 
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endure the 
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. 45° 49’ N., 
b in 1266 to 
uence of its 
The town 
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These are 
, built upon 
vn ; and the 
' the bishop. 
, Who carry 
and tobacco. 
t in appear- 
talian roofs. 
of Croatia, 
the Croats, 
esses a royal 
arious other 
me of A. L. 
abolition of 
stribution of 
Romans was 
received by 
1 in 21798, 
ny one who 
by the term 
tizens. Now, 
omans, with 
- could ever 
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ne, Savigny, 
ned the true 
aws. There 
matter, but 
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ite property, 
1, a portion 
- was confis- 
omain. All 
  
AGRARIAN LAW. 
  
  
  
laws respecting the disposition of these lands were 
called A. laws ; which are therefore of various kinds. 
‘What made these laws be so long mistaken for an 
interference with private rights, and excited such 
opposition to them at the time, was the use which 
was made of the public domains while unappro- 
priated. ‘It was the practice at Rome,” says Dr 
Arnold, ‘and doubtless in other states of Italy, to 
allow individuals to occupy such lands, and to enjoy 
all the benefits of them, on condition of paying to 
the state the tithe of the produce, as an acknow- 
ledgment that the state was the proprietor of the 
land, and the individual merely the occupier. Now, 
although the land was undoubtedly the property of 
the state, and although the occupiers of it were in 
relation to the state mere tenants-at-will, yet it is in 
human nature that a long undisturbed possession 
should give a feeling of ownership ; the more so as, 
while the state’s claim lay dormant, the possessor 
wasg, in fact, proprietor, and the land would thus be 
repeatedly passing by regular sale from one occupier 
to another.’ 
The state, however, was often obliged to interfere 
with these occupiers of the public lands, and resume 
its rights. The very idea of a citizen, in ancient 
times, involved that of a landholder, and when new 
citizens were to be admitted, they had each to 
receive their portion out of the unallotted public 
domain ; which was attended, of course, with the 
ejection of the tenants-at-will. It appears, also, 
that the right to enjoy the public lands in this 
temporary way was confined to the old burghers 
or patricians. This, taken in conjunction with the 
tendency, strong at all times, of larger possessions to 
swallow up smaller, kept up an ever-increasing 
number of landless commons, whose destitution and 
degradation came from time to time to such a piteh, 
that alleviation was necessary, to prevent the very 
dissolution of the state. It is easy, however, to see 
what motive the patricians, as a body, had to oppose 
all such measures, since it was their interest, though 
not their right, to keep the lands unallotted. 
The enactment of A. laws occasioned some of the 
most memorable struggles in the internal history of 
tome. Most of the kings of Rome are said to have 
carried an A. L., that is, to have divided a portion 
of the public land among those whom they admitted 
to the rights of citizenship. ‘The good king,’ 
Servius Tullius, may be looked upon as the first 
victim of the hostility of the nobles to A. laws. 
About twenty-four years after the expulsion of the 
Tarquins, the distress of the commons called aloud 
for remedy, and the consul, Spurius Cassius, proposed 
an A. L. for a division of a certain proportion of the 
public land, and for enforcing the regular payment 
of the rent or tithe from the occupiers of the 
remainder. The aristocracy, however, contrived to 
defeat the proposal, and when the year of his 
consulship was out, Cassius was accused of trying to 
make himself king, was condemned, scourged, and 
beheaded, and his house razed to the ground. 
The first important A. L. of a permanent nature, 
actually passed, was that proposed by the tribune, 
Licinius Stolo, and carried, after a struggle of five 
years, in the year of Rome 383. The provisions of 
Liciniug’s bill, or rogation, were as follows: ¢ Every 
toman citizen shall be entitled to occupy any portion 
of the unallotted state land not exceeding 500 jugera 
(see AcrE), and to feed on the public pasture-land 
any number of cattle not exceeding 100 head of 
large, or 500 head of small, paying in both cases 
the usual rates to the public treasury. Whatever 
portions of the public land beyond 500 jugera are at 
present occupied by individuals, shall be taken from 
them, and distributed among the poorer citizens as 
absolute property, at the rate of seven jugera apiece. 
Occupiers of public land shall also be bound to 
employ a certain number of freemen as labourers.’ 
This law produced for a time very salutary effects. 
But before the year 621, when Tiberius Gracchus 
was elected tribune, the Licinian law had been 
suffered to fall into abeyance; and although vast 
tracts had been acquired by the Italian, the Punic, 
and the Greek wars, no regular distribution of land 
among the destitute citizens had taken place for 
upwards of a century. Numerous military colonies 
had indeed been founded in the conquered districts, 
and in this way many of the poorer Romans or their 
allies had been provided for ; but still there remained 
large territories, the property of the state, which, 
instead of being divided among the poorer members 
of the state, were entered upon, and brought into 
cultivation, by the rich capitalists, many of whom 
thus came to hold thousands of jugera, instead of 
the five hundred allowed by the Licinian law. To a 
Roman statesman, therefore, looking on the one 
hand to the wretched pauper population of the 
meaner streets of Rome, and on the other, to the 
enormous tracts of the public land throughout Italy 
which the wealthy citizens held in addition to their 
own private property, the question which would 
naturally present itself was—Why should not the 
state, as landlord, resume from these wealthy 
capitalists, who are her tenants, as much of the 
public land as may be necessary to provide little 
farms for these pauper citizens, and so convert them 
into respectable and independent agriculturists? 
This question must have presented itself to many ; 
but there were immense difficulties in the way. Not 
only had long possession of the state lands, and the 
expenditure of large sums in bringing them into 
cultivation, given the wealthy tenants a sort of 
proprietary claim upon them, but in the course of 
generations, during which estates had been bought, 
sold, and inherited, the state lands had become so 
confused with private property, that in many cases 
it was impossible to distinguish between the two. 
Notwithstanding these difficulties, Tiberius Gracchus 
had the boldness to propose an A. L., to the effect, 
that every father of a family might occupy 500 
jugera of the state land for himself, and 250 jugera 
additional for each of his sons; but that, in every 
case where this amount was exceeded, the state 
should resume the surplus, paying the tenant a price 
for the buildings, &c., which he had been at the 
expense of erecting on the lands thus lost to him. 
The recovered lands were then to be distributed 
among the poor citizens ; a clause being inserted in 
the bill to prevent these citizens from selling the 
lands thus allotted to them, as many of them would 
have been apt to do. 
According to the laws and constitution of Rome, 
there was nothing essentially unjust in this proposal, 
which was, in private, at least, approved of by some 
of the most distinguished men of the time. The 
energy of Gracchus carried the measure, in spite of 
the opposition of the aristocratic party, whose 
vengeance, however, could only be satisfied with the 
assassination of Gracchus and his brother. See 
Graccaus. The attempts to carry out the ¢ Sem- 
pronian law,” as it was called, were attended with 
great difficulties, and although not formally repealed, 
1t continued to be evaded and rendered inoperative. 
Various A. laws were subsequently passed, some by 
the victorious aristocratic party, in a spirit directly 
opposed to the Licinian and Sempronian laws. 
Besides A. laws having for their object the division 
among the commons of public lands usurped by the 
nobles, there were others of a more partial and local 
nature, for the establishment of colonies in particular 
conquered districts : thege naturally met with less 
  
opposition. Still more different were those violent 
79