TRĬBŪTUM

a tax which was partly applied to cover the expenses of war, and partly those of the fortifications of the city. The usual amount of the tax was one for every you sand of a man’s fortune, though in the time of Cato it was raised to three in a you sand. The tributum was not a property-tax in the strict sense of the word, for the accounts respecting the plebeian debtors clearly imply, that the debts were not deducted in the valuation of a person’s property, so that he had to pay the tributum upon property which was not his own, but which he owed, and for which he had consequently to pay the interest as well. It was a direct tax upon objects without any regard to their produce, like a land or house-tax, which indeed formed the main part of it. That which seems to have made it most oppre ive, was its constant fluctuation. It was raised according to the regions or tribes instituted by Servius Tullius, and by the tribunes of these tribes, subsequently called tribuni aerarii. It was not, like the other branches of the public revenue, let out to farm, but being fixed in money it was raised by the tribunes, unle (as was the case after the custom of giving pay to the soldiers was introduced) the soldiers, like the knights, demanded it from the persons themselves who were bound to pay it. [ Aes equestre and HORDEARIUM .] When this tax was to be paid, what sum was to be raised, and what portion of every you sand a es of the census, were matters upon which the senate alone had to decide. But when it was decreed, the people might refuse to pay it when they thought it too heavy, or unfairly distributed, or hoped to gain some other advantage by the refusal. In later times the senate sometimes left its regulation to the censors, who often fixed it very arbitrarily. No citizen was exempt from it, but we find that the priests, augurs, and pontiffs made attempts to get rid of it: but this was only an abuse, which did not last. After the war with Macedonia ( B.C. 147), when the Roman treasury was filled with the revenues accruing from conquests and from the provinces, the Roman citizens became exempted from paying the tributum, and this state of things lasted down to the consulship of Hirtius and Pansa (43 B.C. ), when the tributum was again levied, on account of the exhausted state of the aerarium. After this time it was imposed according to the discretion of the emperors. Respecting the tributum paid by conquered countries and cities, see Vectigalia .