11
Money and Influence
What then is my reward? Just this: that in my proclamation I may make the gospel free of charge, so as not to make full use of my rights in the gospel.
1 Corinthians 9:18
Money and Politics
Everyone knew that money came with strings attached. This was made clear in a number of ways throughout the Vesuvian towns, even from the earliest days after the founding of Pompeii as a Roman colony. In the so-called “Social War” of 91–89 BCE, certain urban centers in the Samnite region of Campania (south of Rome’s direct rule) banded together to assert their mutual muscle in a confrontation with Rome (the nuances of which are complicated and not necessary to reconstruct here). Roman force eventually won the day, of course. In 89 BCE, Pompeii fell in submission to Rome. In 80 BCE, Rome officially colonized Pompeii, incorporating it into Rome’s direct sphere of influence. At that point, the local Samnite population was minimized with respect to their socio-political status and their numerical percentage within the local population. Rome achieved this by inserting a large cadre of former military personnel into Pompeii. These pro-Roman residents, perhaps as many as four thousand of them and their families, were probably rewarded for their services to Rome, being given houses conscripted from the local Pompeian people. It was at this time that the predominant language of Pompeian inscriptions shifted from Oscan (the language of the Samnite people) to Latin (the official language of Rome). And it was at this time that Latin inscriptions in Pompeii started to make it clear (if it wasn’t already) that money came with strings attached.
Figure 11.1. Coins found fused together in a wicker basket in Herculaneum
This is evident, for instance, from official inscriptions that announced the prominence of Quinctius Valgus and Marcus Porcius—Pompeii’s earliest mayors, or duoviri. Two inscriptions set up in Pompeii’s huge amphitheater (or spectacula) announced that Quinctius Valgus and Marcus Porcius erected the amphitheater “at their own expense”—doing so “for the sake of the colony’s honor” and dedicating the amphitheater “to the colonists to use forever” (CIL 10.852; see figure 11.2). The costs involved for the construction of the amphitheater must have been huge. But the enormous funds donated by these duoviri were linked to Pompeii’s new identity as a colony of Rome. Marcus Porcius appears as benefactor of another gift to Pompeii—the altar in the Temple of Apollo (CIL 10.800). Other civic improvements were also undertaken as a result of colonist infusion (e.g., Pompeii’s Forum Baths and Covered Theater, as well as improvements made at the Stabian Baths). This was true for other civic centers as well. For instance, the same Quinctius Valgus who helped pay for Pompeii’s amphitheater was also a public benefactor for three other urban centers at this time (Aeclanum, Cassino, and Frigento; CIL 10.5282, 9.1140; ILLRP 598). (And, by the way, he is also mentioned by Cicero as having prospered massively because of his lack of moral scruples; De lege agraria 3.8.) It was clear to all that new money flooding into Pompeii was linked to a pro-Roman agenda.
Figure 11.2. An inscription (broken off on left side) established in Pompeii’s amphitheater (2.6), advertising the benefaction of Quinctius Valgus and Marcus Porcius and highlighting Pompeii’s status as a colony of Rome
We have seen something similar in the case of Nonius Balbus—the elite friend of Augustus who infused tremendous amounts of money into Herculaneum to accentuate its Roman identity (chapter 6). The same was also true of a man named Marcus Holconius Rufus in Pompeii, who lived about the same time as Nonius Balbus in Herculaneum. He infused so much money into Pompeii (renovating the large theater and other initiatives) that the town councilors erected a four-pillar archway to him and his family at the busiest intersection in Pompeii and, within Pompeii’s large theater, dedicated a special space reserved for him during his lifetime. Centrally placed and five rows back (where the seating on white marble slabs meets the ordinary seating of the plebs), Holconius’s bronze seat inscription still records his social prominence to this day (see figure 11.3), as does the inscription on his statue base. Both inscriptions highlight a number of his roles within Pompeii, each saving for last his identity as “priest of Augustus and patron of the [Roman] colony” (CIL 10.837, 10.838). These civic improvements were splendid, and the money for them came with strings attached to the legitimacy of Roman rule.
Figure 11.3. Two photos from Pompeii’s Large Theater (8.7.20); left: the space for Holconius Rufus’s seat (five rows back from the front), marked out by an inscription in his honor; right: a photo of seating in the Large Theater, with the central place of Holconius Rufus’s seat in the white marble evident toward the center left
Evidence of a similar kind comes from a group of men known as the Augustales. The Augustales (singular Augustalis) were deemed to be “priests” who helped to foster devotion to the emperor cult in their local region. A good many of them (we will never know the percentage, but probably a majority of them) had been born in slavery but earned their freedom and subsequently became men of significant wealth. These men were prohibited from serving in public office by the fact that they had originally been slaves. (Former slaves were not allowed to hold a civic position.) In order to harvest their resources for public initiatives, Tiberius (emperor from 14 to 37) created an order of the Augustales. Regardless of whether they had been born in slavery or not, the Augustales were men whose status was recognized by the emperor. Being promoted to the ranks of the Augustales, these men were then expected to use their wealth for purposes of public beneficence. For instance, an Augustalis from Herculaneum named Lucius Mammius Maximus donated six statues of imperial family members to that Vesuvian town (CIL 10.1413, 10.1415, 10.1417, 10.1418, 10.1419, 10.1422). Once again, the infusion of economic resources into the civic infrastructure was configured with a significant pro-Roman spin.
It is worth lingering with the Augustales for a moment longer, to notice the artwork in what seems to have been the clubhouse of the Augustales in Herculaneum (located at 6.21). Two prominent wall paintings survive that depict two moments in the adventurous life of Hercules, the semi-divine son of the deity Jupiter (or Zeus, who fathered Hercules through the mortal woman Alcmene). One fresco in the clubhouse depicts Hercules with a competitor whom he will go on to defeat in order to marry Deianeira, who became his second wife (see figure 11.4). The other fresco shows Hercules being welcomed into heaven at the end of his life, promoted to the status of a full deity (see figure 11.5). For those Augustales who were former slaves, these two frescos must have represented their favorite parts of the Hercules story. Formerly slaves but now wealthy and prominent members of society and priests of the divine Augustus, these Augustales must have sought out prominent women to be their wives (just as Hercules got the woman he wanted through diligent effort); moreover, they would have resonated with the pattern of promotion and “upward mobility” that Hercules’s ascension into the heavens represents. For these Augustales, the story of Hercules was a mythic template of their own success story.
Figure 11.4. Hercules (left) and Achelous, whom Hercules will defeat in order to marry Deianeira (far right) (from Herculaneum’s College of the Augustales, 6.21, in situ)
Figure 11.5. The fresco of Hercules being welcomed to heaven by Minerva (left), Juno (middle), and Jupiter (in the form of a rainbow) (from Herculaneum’s College of the Augustales, 6.21, in situ)
We have already seen that civic benefactors were not always men. Sometimes circumstances transpired that enabled women to become enormously wealthy. As we have seen (in chapter 6), Eumachia was one of these women, donating a huge public building to Pompeii’s forum in honor of (1) the Roman values of piety and concord and (2) the Roman imperial family of Augustus. Here we should add that Eumachia’s sponsorship of Roman imperial reign was on display by way of two statues placed at the very front of her impressive building, facing the forum. These were statues of Romulus and Aeneas, two men important in the mythology of the founding of Rome’s eternal reign, blessed by the deities. (See further on Aeneas below.) A plaque fixed below the statue of Rome’s founding father notes that Romulus was “received among the deities” upon his death (see figure 11.6). (The plaque honoring Aeneas has not survived well.) Rome and money went hand in hand in the civic initiatives undertaken by this prominent woman in Pompeian society.
Figure 11.6. The Romulus inscription at the front of Eumachia’s building (7.9.1), declaring him to be “among the deities” (in deoru[m])
Money and Temples of Political Significance
At about the same time that the woman named Mamia was contributing funds for a new temple for “the genius of the region” in Pompeii (i.e., early in the first century; see chapter 7), a Pompeian magistrate named Marcus Tullius used “his own land” and “at his own expense” (compare Mamia in both of these aspects) to erect a temple just north of Pompeii’s forum, dedicated to Augustan Fortuna—or the deity Fortuna in her role as the overseer of the Augustan era (CIL 10.820; see figure 11.7). And just as Mamia was honored with a tomb sponsored by the town council (also noted in chapter 7), so too was Marcus Tullius.
Late in the life of Pompeii, funds were given to build a temple in the town’s forum for the imperial cult (7.9.3, which may formerly have been Mamia’s temple to the genius of the region). Alongside it (at 7.9.2), another temple was renovated for the reverential worship of the recently deified Vespasian (who died just months prior to the eruption of Vesuvius in 79). Donating and renovating temples was, of course, expensive business, but those expenses were seen as worthwhile in cases that supported the Roman imperial order.
In the late 60s or early 70s of the first century, the Temple of Isis was also renovated, and here again the fingerprints of influence are all over the rebuilt temple. Above the entrance to the temple stood a commemorative plaque recounting the identity of the benefactor who dedicated the funds for the rebuilding effort (see figure 11.8). It reads as follows:
Numerius Popidius Celsinus, son of Numerius, at his own expense restored from its foundations the Temple of Isis, which had collapsed in the earthquake. Because of his generosity, the councilors enrolled him into their number without fee, although he was six years old.
This inscription advertises a situation in which a six-year-old boy from the Popidius family donated the money for building this temple; as a consequence, he was made a member of the civic ruling council. What really happened was almost certainly this:
- Celsinus’s father, Numerius Popidius Ampliatus (whose name we know from other Pompeian inscriptions), had once been a slave, but he subsequently became enormously wealthy as a freedman.
- Ampliatus himself could never become a civic councilor because of his earlier years in slavery. His son Celsinus, however, had been born free and was therefore eligible to become a civic councilor, if money paved the way for his advancement.
- Ampliatus donated the money to erect the Temple of Isis in return for granting councilor status to his son Celsinus, even though Celsinus was only six years old.
- Probably Ampliatus instructed Celsinus regarding how he should vote in the council meetings.
This example illustrates a number of things. First, as in the case of the father (Ampliatus), the taint of slavery restrained even the most successful freedmen by placing a ceiling on the heights to which they might otherwise have risen after gaining their freedom. Second, as in the case of the son (Celsinus), those same restraints could be bypassed generationally, with the freeborn son able to rise to civic prominence even at six years of age. Third (and most relevant to this chapter’s topic of interest), the position of civic prominence could be purchased by those with wealth. In this case, when a huge donation was orchestrated in the name of Celsinus, the civic councilors awarded him a position of influence (that is, being numbered among the councilors) and bolstered his public prestige (and that of his family) by agreeing to recognize the six-year-old as a person of “generosity.”
Figure 11.7. The Temple of Augustan Fortuna, paid for by Marcus Tullius on his own land (7.4.1)
Money and Games of Political Significance
Another common form of economic infusion in the civic life of Pompeii was sponsorship of gladiatorial competitions in the amphitheater. These sponsored competitions were known as munera, or “gifts” to the local people, paid for by leading officials. Archaeologists have found over seventy notices on Pompeian walls announcing gladiatorial contests. One of the most prominent providers of these “gifts” was the civic official named Gnaeus Alleius Nigidius Maius, self-proclaimed as “leader of the [Roman] colony” (CIL 4.1177). So prolific were the games he sponsored that Nigidius Maius was referred to as the “chief of games” (CIL 4.7990). But his lavish games were not simply for the sake of entertainment. They came with a political agenda that coincided with his identity as a “priest of Caesar Augustus” (= the emperor Vespasian). On one occasion, for instance, the games he sponsored were explicitly said to be “for the well-being of Caesar Augustus and his children,” with the games coinciding with the “dedication of the altar” for the imperial cult (CIL 4.1180).
Figure 11.8. The commemorative inscription highlighting the generosity of Numerius Popidius Celsinus, in whose name funds were donated for the rebuilding of the Temple of Isis
(Interestingly, Eumachia’s huge tomb outside Pompeii’s Nucerian Gate housed the funerary urn containing the cremated remains of Nigidius Maius’s adoptive mother, Pomponia Decharis. Here we see a point of intersection in the lives of two prominent public figures, Eumachia and Maius—both individuals having been public benefactors and advocates of the Roman imperial order.)
Gladiatorial games in general helped to reinforce the narrative of the Roman program. The wild-beast hunts of a gladiatorial event usually paraded a variety of exotic animals whose natural habitats were spread far and wide throughout the world that Rome controlled. Their presence in a local amphitheater extravaganza highlighted Rome’s magnificence and reinforced the narratives of its grandeur. Although the gladiators were usually “scoundrels” to society (i.e., robbers, murderers, villains, escaped slaves, and foreign prisoners of war), they nonetheless embodied some of the characteristics that Rome cherished about itself: bravery, endurance, and might. Amphitheaters were places that reinforced the structures of Roman power, and gladiatorial competitions boosted the narrative of Roman legitimacy. It is little wonder that adding an amphitheater to Pompeii’s infrastructure was one of the first things that Quinctius Valgus and Marcus Porcius did when turning the town into a center of pro-Roman sentiment.
It is not much of an exaggeration to say that all roads led to Rome, at least when those roads were financial. Money was best spent when it brought benefit to (1) the benefactor in terms of increased levels of status, (2) the local urban center in terms of enhanced levels of productivity, and (3) the Roman order in terms of augmented levels of loyalty to Rome’s political ambitions.
But there were voices critical of the way that money enhanced influence. A few residents within the Vesuvian towns seem to have tired of the constant drip of pro-Roman coaxing that civic benefactors seem regularly to have peddled along with their benefactions. Two data of that kind help to make the point: graffiti and artwork. Two graffiti were already discussed in chapter 6—the graffito “I sing of launderers and an owl, not arms and a man” (CIL 4.9131), and the other graffito regarding Rome taking its pleasure from its citizens, who utter what Rome wants to hear, even while being abused (CIL 4.1261). Both of these were probably politically charged articulations that ran against the grain of pro-Roman propaganda.
Figure 11.9. Left: a gladiatorial announcement on a Pompeian tomb (see “GLAD” clearly written toward the top left; the “XX” near the center announces that there will be twenty gladiators fighting; the “NOV” on the bottom line, directly under the “D” of “GLAD,” probably announces the date in November); right: a gladiatorial announcement on an external wall, advertising games sponsored by Alleius Nigidius Maius (with the word “Nigidi[us]” still evident below the large “C”)
Something similar is evident in a curious piece of art that playfully illustrates an incident in the life of Aeneas. The moment of Aeneas’s departure from Troy was depicted in various artistic media in the Vesuvian towns (frescos and figurines). They show Aeneas carrying his father, Anchises, on his left shoulder (who himself carries the penates, or deities of the household, in a box) and holding the hand of his son Ascanius, who obediently trundles along beside him. But one Pompeian residence (sometimes wrongly identified as a residence in nearby Stabia) depicted the same moment in very unflattering terms (see figure 11.10). In a fresco, the great hero Aeneas is depicted as an ape with a canine head and tail, like his father and his son. And beyond the canine tails and heads, Aeneas and the other males of his family are displayed with extremely elongated phalluses—an un-Roman characterization, worthy only of uncouth barbarians (since the Roman ideal was for the Roman phallus to be “diplomatically elegant,” we might say, or “streamlined”). An island in the Bay of Naples was known as the “isle of apes,” and a local tradition claimed that Aeneas had once used the island as a base, so perhaps these factors fed the imagination of the person who commissioned this bizarre fresco. That should not detract, however, from the fact that these degrading images of a great Roman hero were entertained in the first place and that someone thought such a parody was even worthy of portraiture (especially because an adjoining fresco depicted the hero Romulus in similar ways, and no tradition had him visiting the “isle of apes”).
Figure 11.10. Left: Aeneas flees Troy carrying his father, Anchises, on his shoulder while leading his son Ascanius by the hand (a poorly preserved terra-cotta from 7.2.16); right: a Pompeian fresco depicting the same scene in parody, with animal features and bestial phalluses (MANN 9089, from 6.17, although the precise location is unknown)
These two parodies of the famous story of Aeneas exhibit a low-grade form of resistance to the narrative that was supported by huge amounts of pro-Roman money that flowed into the Vesuvian towns. We can easily imagine that people like Nonius Balbus, Eumachia, and Nigidius Maius, together with the Augustales and a sizeable portion of the civic elite, would not have been amused had they come across the parodies of Virgil’s Aeneid in the graffito or the fresco. Following in the wake of Quinctius Valgus and Marcus Porcius, these influential people (along with others beside them) had infused the Vesuvian towns with what today would have amounted to millions of dollars’ worth of civic improvements. To them, the graffito and fresco would have embodied juvenile and unenlightened sentiments that, when taken to their logical conclusion, might dangerously undermine the progress of the Roman imperial order. As sponsors of that progress, they might have taken some personal offense as well. For them, the Roman program was not to be affronted, and neither were those who supported its propaganda within urban contexts of the first-century world.
In Praise of Christian Benefactors
Unsurprisingly, money had influence within early Jesus-groups as well—although to a much smaller scale and without necessarily being attached to support for the Roman imperial order. For instance, here is what Paul says at the end of 1 Corinthians regarding an important Corinthian household of Jesus-devotees who had used their resources in a way worthy of respect.
Now, brothers and sisters, you know that members of the household of Stephanas were the first converts in Achaia, and they have devoted themselves to the service of the saints; I urge you to put yourselves at the service of such people, and of everyone who works and toils with them. . . . Give recognition to such persons. (16:15–16, 18)
Paul probably lauded the household of Stephanus because it was reliable in its loyalty to Paul’s program at a time when Corinthian Jesus-followers were beginning to fragment in their support of him (as his subsequent letter to them clearly illustrates; see 2 Corinthians). Paul’s charge to “give recognition to such persons” as Stephanas was characteristic of the customs of the first-century world.
Something similar probably lies behind Paul’s praise of Philemon’s “faithfulness . . . for the sake of all of Jesus’s followers”:
When I remember you in my prayers, I always thank my God because I hear of your love and faithfulness which you have toward the Lord Jesus and for the sake of all of Jesus’s followers. I pray that the fellowship of your faith may become effective in the realization of every good work that is active among you all, to the glory of Christ. (Philemon 4–6, my translation)
Here, what Paul says of Philemon’s reputation for supporting other Jesus-followers fits the mold of first-century benefaction (for example, benefaction within “associations,” groups that gathered for congenial and/or supportive purposes). Whether he is talking about the household of Stephanas or Philemon, Paul’s comments are miniature versions of the kind of honor-for-benefaction cycle that we see prominently and repeatedly in Roman urban centers like the Vesuvian towns. At times, then, the discourse of early Christian texts flowed very much “with the grain” of how things worked in the Roman world (and beyond). Benefactors within Jesus-groups were to be appreciated for their beneficence. (As we saw in chapter 10, however, Paul wanted to ensure that those efforts were seen to be only one of many initiatives that built up the body of Christ, with no one form of “gifting” taking precedence over another.)
Challenging the Status Quo in Early Christian Texts
At times, however, the discourse of early Christian texts ran “against the grain” with regard to those urban elite who were the primary sponsors of Roman imperial propaganda in indigenous settings. For instance, Luke’s Gospel remembers Jesus as saying:
When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous. (Luke 14:12–14)
Here, Jesus is remembered as turning upside down the system of honor-for-benefaction that undergirded ancient societies. The people who deserve generous initiatives are not the people who can return the favor or enhance the benefactor’s status; instead, they are the outcasts of society who cannot return the favor. People of that kind were rarely targeted by benefactors as the primary recipients of generous initiatives. In this text, those who extend generosity to the outcasts are promised a form of repayment for their efforts, but only “at the resurrection of the righteous.” In the meantime, Jesus-followers were to “expect nothing in return” when they extended generosity toward others; instead, their “reward will be great” in the afterlife (Luke 6:35). Ultimately, then, the forms of benefaction that this text highlights reflect not the merits of the Roman imperial order but the kingdom of the deity who blesses the righteous. In this way, Jesus-followers are being taught to recognize an elongated timeline in the cycle of initiative and reward, with “the resurrection of the righteous” held out as the foremost prize of honor.
A similar challenge to the system of honor-for-benefaction is reiterated in a more pronounced fashion later in the Lukan narrative, when Jesus is remembered to have said:
The kings of the gentiles lord it over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors. But it should not be so with you; rather the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves. (Luke 22:25–26; see also Mark 10:41–45)
This text does not perpetuate the macro-narratives promoted by powerful benefactors but, instead, focuses on the micro-narratives of the socially insignificant people, “the youngest” or “one who serves.” Just as the graffitist wrote “not” in relation to “arms and a man,” so too Jesus says “not” to the narratives that prop up “the kings of the gentiles . . . and those in authority.”
One New Testament text attributes much the same sentiment to James, one of Jesus’s brothers. James was one of the apostolic figures who stipulated that Jesus-devotees should always “remember the poor” (as Paul records in Galatians 2:10; see Looking Further: A Conclusion). Evidently James believed that Jesus-followers were inevitably to be involved in alleviating the desperate poverty that affected so many in the ancient world. The letter that bears his name makes the point this way:
My brothers and sisters, do you with your acts of favoritism really exhibit trust in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ? For if a person with gold rings and in fine clothes comes into your assembly, and if a poor person in dirty clothes also comes in, and if you take notice of the one wearing the fine clothes and say, “Have a seat here, please,” while to the one who is poor you say, “Stand there,” or, “Sit at my feet,” have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters. Has not God chosen the poor in the world to be rich in faith and to be heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him? But you have dishonored the poor. (James 2:1–6)
For James, the stories of the poor are ideally suited to carry the message of the divine “kingdom.” This is quite distinctive. In Roman times, it was the elite whose stories were prominently embedded within the ideology of the Roman imperial program. The early Jesus-movement found a way to embed the stories of the poor prominently within the message of “our glorious Lord Jesus Christ.” Perhaps this is one reason why Paul could say that this “good news . . . is not of human origin” (Galatians 1:11), since any attempt to formulate good news from human origins usually places the powerful front and center, as we often see in the Vesuvian towns. Perhaps, too, this is one reason why Paul sought to proclaim this good news “free of charge” (1 Corinthians 9:18). It was his way of ensuring that the message he preached was not inevitably entangled with the self-interests of the powerful.