Sec. 18 —Distribution of Land After the Civil War Between Cæsar and Pompey.
After Pompey had been vanquished at Pharsalia, and the republicans in Africa, Cæsar proceeded to distribute lands to his soldiers in accordance with his promise to give them lands, "not by taking them from their proprietors as Sulla did; not by mixing colonists with citizens despoiled of their goods and thus breeding perpetual strife,—but by dividing both public land and his own private property,[1] and, if this were not sufficient, by buying what was needed." Appian says that Caesar did not succeed in carrying out these promises in full, but that veterans were in some cases settled upon lands legally belonging to others.[2] However, his soldiers were not huddled together like those of Sulla, in military colonies of their own, but when they settled in Italy they were scattered[3] as much as possible throughout the entire peninsula in order to make them more easily amenable to the laws.[4] In Campania, where Cæsar had lands at his disposal, the soldiers were settled in colonies, and so, close together. According to a letter of Cicero to Paetus, among the lands distributed were those of Veii and Capena. Historians have estimated that there were 100,000 soldiers who received lands in Italy by this distribution.
[Footnote 1: App., 94.]
[Footnote 2: App., II, 120.]
[Footnote 3: Long; Momm.]
[Footnote 4: Suetonius, Julius Cæsar, 38.]
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