Italy, at Tarentum and Capua, whose territories had been hitherto reserved
as a source of revenue to the treasury,[3] he went a step beyond his
brother and made this also liable to be parcelled out; not, however,
according to the method of Tiberius, who did not contemplate the
establishment of new communities, but according to the colonial system.
There can be little doubt that Gaius designed to aid in permanently
establishing[4] the revolution by means of these new colonies in the most
fertile part of all Italy. His overthrow and death put a stop to the
establishment of the contemplated colonies and left this territory still
tributary to the treasury.

[Footnote 1: Scipio must have caused a plebiscitum to be enacted, for
the repeal of this clause, as an existing law could not be repealed by a
_senatus consultum._ See Ihne, IV, 414, note.]

[Footnote 2: Momm., III, 137.]

[Footnote 3: Cicero, _De Leg. Agr._, II, c. 29-32; Marquardt u. Momm.,
_Röm. Alter._, IV, 106: "ager publicus mit Ausnahme einiger dem Staate
unenbehrlicher Domainen, wozu namentlich das Gebiet von Capua und das
stellatische Feld bei Cales gehörte."]

[Footnote 4: Ihne, IV, 438-479. Plutarch, _Gaius Gracchus_, 13.]




CHAPTER III.