Servi et liberti publici in the Augustan Regions II, III and IV. Social Mobility and Economic Welfare

The paper aims to verify to what extent is founded the widespread opinion that public servants enjoyed a higher status and benefited from better living conditions than those who served private individuals. Epigraphic documents from cities of the three southern regions of Italy in Roman Imperial times are here taken as a sample for research. To investigate the functions and social position of the publici, the analysis expands to include the so-called public freedmen linked, also after the manumission, to the civitas domina.