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Contributing Op-Ed Writer: Let Refugees Settle Italy’s Empty Spaces
Credit
Gianni Cipriano for The New York Times
Milan
— AS Europe frets over what to do about the hundreds of thousands of
refugees pouring onto the Continent, it occurs to me that the ancient
Romans, as they so often do, might offer a solution.
The
ancient Romans used to reward their legionnaires with plots of land,
through a system known as “centuriation.†The Romans adopted the
system in the fourth century B.C., when Rome was still a vibrant
republic. But it lasted for hundreds of years, involving former
servicemen from all over the empire.
Centuriation
had several advantages. The first was, obviously, strategic, as it
created a permanent military presence. The second was economic: Veterans
would farm uncultivated areas, produce wealth that went back into the
community, and take care of themselves. The third was demographic: Those
early pioneers and their families populated vast tracts of Italy and
the lands beyond.
One
particularly aggressive proponent of centuriation was Emperor Septimius
Severus, who ruled from A.D. 192 to 211 and whose 400,000-man army was
spread across an empire of 70 million people, from the Atlantic to the
eastern shores of the Black Sea and from northern England to southern
Egypt. Severus didn’t want to leave his veterans idle, and when they
retired he gave them plots of uncultivated or abandoned land, either
free or for a very low price.
Traces
of Roman centuriation are still to be found in southern France and
parts of Spain, but most of those soldiers-turned-pioneers developed
vast, underpopulated parts of Italy. The typical Roman layout of a
square grid, appearing in the form of roads, canals and agricultural
plots, can still be spotted in Lombardy, near Bergamo; in Tuscany,
around Florence; in Romagna and in Campania. Around Padua, in the Veneto
region, a large area is still known as “Graticolato Romano,†the
Roman Gridiron.
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