Rome’s particular speciality, from its very first days until the end of its empire, was simply to plunder its provinces to pay for bribes, luxuries, triumphs and soldiers’ pensions nearer to home. There were four respectable ways for a prominent Roman to gain wealth: land-owning, booty from war, money lending and bribery. Cicero pocketed over two million sesterces (three times the sum he had previously quoted to illustrate ‘luxury’) from his governorship of Cilicia in 51 and 50 BC – and he had a reputation as an especially honest governor.
