ABSTRACT
The Iberian Peninsula is unique for the volume of bronze inscriptions – decrees, tesserae hospitales, municipal laws – that elucidate the mechanisms employed by the Roman State to establish relations with provincial communities. Although the Romans did employ coercive measures, generally they endeavoured to use persuasion to win over the indigenous elite.2 According to Ernst Badian these ties were essentially personal and based on the relationship of client and patron: “the basis of Roman control over the provinces was, in an important sense, not political, but personal”.3 Inherent in this was the conferring of mutual benefit: the client-patron relationship carried no fixed legal obligations; rather, it was a declaration of intended mutual aid and collaboration.4 It is not the purpose of this paper to reconsider the extent and character of patronage in the Roman World as this has already received considerable scholarly attention.5 This paper explores the mechanisms by which patronage came to be extended to the provincial communities of the Iberian Peninsula in the 2nd and 1st centuries BC. Particularly significant are three decrees issued by L. Aemilius Paulus in 190/189 BC, L. Caesius in 104 BC and C. Valerius Flaccus in 87 BC that reflect the creation of relationships with provincial communities. These relationships in turn engendered support and facilitated the incorporation of the indigenous elite into the wider Roman World.
