Pompey And Accumulation Of Wealth

[Neeoth]

In "The History of Rome" Grant suggests that Pompeys campaign in the eastern provinces during 70-65 BC generated an increase in the roman treasury by 40-60%. Does any one have any idea of the amount of money/grain/whatever unit that denotes value this represents by that days or todays standard??

[Favonius Cornelius]

Difficult to say, but I would venture a guess at hundreds of millions of sestercies worth in loot, or the equivalent of trillions of American dollars.

[Neeoth]

What glorious times But seriously, what seems all the more incredible, is that I've gathered that all of this wealth was reduced to almost nothing with GJ Caesars rise to absolute power?!

[Favonius Cornelius]

Yes probably, but the money was mostly put to good use in paying soldiers to buy land and put them to productive work.

 

As a benchmark I use Augustus' Res Gestae which gives money that Augustus generally had. If he paid out a few billion sesterces, then I think some hundreds of millions of sestercies would be a pretty good approximation for Pompey.

[Pompieus]

M Cary and H.A. Omerud in volume IX of the Cambridge Ancient History say Pompey distributed 384 million sestertii to his troops, which they equate to 3,360,000 pounds sterling (1951 pounds). After the distribution, Pompey still had 480 million sestertii to hand over to the treasury which they equate to 4,200,000 pounds, and he increased the annual revenue of the Roman state by 200-340 million sestertii.

 

There is some disagreement as to how much was provided to the treasury, Plutarch says Pompey handed over 120 million denarii, while Pliny says 50 million. (What was the relationonship of sestertii to denarii? 16-1?)

 

Each private soldier in Pompeys' army apparently received 1500 denarii in the distribution (Pliny NH xxxvii, Plut. Pomp 45.3, App. Mith. 126). The annual pay of a soldier according to Polybius (poly vi.39) was 120 denarii per annum (later there was a re-evaluation of the coins that confuses things). H.M.D. Parker in"The Roman Legions" and Suetonius say Caesar doubled the soldiers' pay to 225 denarii and Parker equates this to 8 pounds sterling (1928 pounds). So before Caesar raised it the private soldier got something like 110-120 denarii a year from which stoppages were made for rations and equipment etc. - about 4 pounds sterling according to Parker.

 

I don't know how these eminent scholars made their calculations to arrive at equivalent modern values for the ancient money (weight of the actual silver?), but clearly purchasing power was FAR greater in the past (even in 1951!) than it is now! If a soldier could live on 120 denarii or 4 pounds a year, or even on 225 or 8 pounds, that has to equate to at least 10 or $15,000 in todays money doesn't it? I think an "Imperial Grunt" in the U.S. Army (an E-1) gets about that today.(?)

 

I tried the arithmetic but was reminded why I'm not an engineer. But Pompey brought home a whole slug of denaro (or denarii) and still left the East in better conditions than it had experienced in two centuries.

[M. Porcius Cato]

Difficult to say, but I would venture a guess at hundreds of millions of sestercies worth in loot, or the equivalent of trillions of American dollars.

 

Wow! You are so far off it's not even funny--how did you arrive at "trillions of American dollars"?

 

Even with the most optimistic figures given, Pompey plundered the equivalent of 216 million denarii, which is equivalent to 21.6 million troy ounces of silver. At $10/troy ounce (which is a pretty high price to pay for silver), that's only US$ 216 million--a VERY VERY VERY far distance from "trillions of American dollars".

 

In fact, even if someone were to find the ACTUAL denarii distributed by Pompey, the current price of a denarius on ebay would not yield the equivalent of "trillions of American dollars".

 

Think about it--do you know how few nations today have a GNP worth a "trillions of American dollars"?

 

In fact, I don't think a fleet of ships could even CARRY the 100,000,000,000 troy ounces of silver that would equal one trillion let alone "trillions of American dollars".

 

(And, yes, I was pretty surprised to see that the silver value of a denarius is currently worth about a dollar. If the average wage in Rome was $20/day back then, Romans were earning about the same as most people in the world today, given an annual rate of $7000/year. In terms of purchasing power, I'd bet you can probably buy a sheep today for about the same price (in silver) as you could then.)

[Favonius Cornelius]

Um...Cato, I'm speaking in terms of buying power.

[M. Porcius Cato]

I was also referring to purchasing power--that's why I denominated the values in terms of silver content. The buying power of silver then is similar to the buying power of silver now. Consider the lex Julia Papiria De Mulctarum Aestimatione (BC 43) which fixed a money value according to which fines were paid, which formerly were paid in sheep (10 asses = 1 sheep). From this we have a very good source on how to convert silver to sheep, and then we can look at how many dollars are required to buy sheep today, and thus look at the purchasing power of Pompey's spoils. The result will not even come close to your estimate that Pompey brought back the equivalent of "trillions of American dollars"--you're off by several orders of magnitude.

 

If you have a better method for calculating purchasing power, let's hear it--I'd really love to see the mathematical steps by which you reached "trillions of American dollars".

[Favonius Cornelius]

If you have a better method for calculating purchasing power, let's hear it--I'd really love to see the mathematical steps by which you reached "trillions of American dollars".

 

Obviously a guesstimation. I bow to your all encompassing assertive efforts to be more correct.

 

I wonder what the total cost would be to purchase a few acres of land in prime realestate in the US for nearly every member of the American armed forces. That was generally what I was thinking of. I think there is plenty of flexibility in judging costs of things with such a comparison.