Domitian

Roman emperor (ad 81–96) who, in the words of the eulogy by the contemporary poet Statius (Silvae 4. 3. 11–12), restored ‘to chaste Ceres the acres which had so long been denied her and lands made sober’. By a famous edict, possibly from ad 92, Domitian banned the planting of new vineyards in Italy and ordered the destruction of at least half of the vineyards in the provinces (Suetonius, Domitian 7). He may also have sought to ban the planting within cities of small vineyards, of the sort which have been found at pompeii. His purpose was not, as some have supposed, an attempt to protect the price of Italian wine at a time of general over-production, but a heavy-handed attempt to divert investment into the production of cereals, the supply of which was a perennial problem for the large cities of the Roman empire. There was no way that Domitian could enforce such a ban and, following the protests which we know came from Asia, he did not persist with the measure. Hence the much later efforts of the Emperor Probus (ad 276–82) to encourage the planting of vineyards should not be taken as a sign that the ban lasted for centuries, as has often been thought.