Deeds of the Divine Augustus

Deeds of the Divine Augustus • Trade and Currency The Roman currency is sestertius (HS). Augustus paid to the Roman plebs, HS 300 per man from his father’s will and in his own name, he gave HS 400 from the spoils of war when he was consul for the fifth time (29 BCE); furthermore, he again paid out a public gift of HS 400 per man in his tenth consulate (24 BCE) from his own patrimony; and in his twelfth year of tribunician power (12-11 BCE), he gave HS 400 per man for the third time. And these public gifts of his never reached fewer than 250,000 men. In his eighteenth year of tribunician power, as consul for the twelfth time (5 BCE), he gave HS 240 to 320,000 plebs of the city. And when he consul the fifth time (29 BCE), he gave from his war spoils to colonies of his soldiers each HS 1,000, about 120,000 men in the colonies received this triumphal public gift. He paid the towns money for the fields, which he had assigned to soldiers in his fourth consulate (30 BCE) and then when Marcus Crassus and Gnaeus Lentulus Augur were consuls (14 BCE); the sum was about HS 600,000,000, which he paid out for Italian estates, and about HS 260,000,000 for which he paid for provincial fields. He was the first and alone who did this among all who founded military colonies in Italy or the provinces according to the memory of his age. And afterwards, he paid out rewards in cash to the soldiers whom he had led into their towns when their service was completed, and in this venture, he spent about HS 400,000,000. He helped the senatorial treasury with his money four times, so that he offered HS 150,000,000 to those who were in charge of the treasury. And when Marcus Lepidus and Lucius Arruntius were consuls (6 BCE), he offered HS 170,000,000 from his patrimony to the military treasury, which was founded by his advice and from which rewards were given to soldiers who had served twenty or more times. All the expenditures, which he gave either into the treasury or to the Roman