The Civil Service

Abstract

The early emperors had to build up their civil service out of nothing. To handle their financial business they appointed, as we have seen, men of equestrian rank as private agents or procurators in the several provinces; these procurators gradually acquired official status. At Rome, to keep their accounts and to handle their correspondence, they used their slaves and freedmen. The chief freedmen clerks, who were in effect ministers of finance and secretaries of state, acquired great power and were greatly hated by the senate and senatorial nobility. Later these posts were given to men of equestrian rank (see No. 42). Imperial slaves and freedmen were also employed as assistants of the procurators in the provinces.