Zhengyuan Zhang (PhD, 2026) has just published a new article, "How did the Romans exploit a mine? New insights into the second tablet of Vipasca," Journal of Epigraphic Studies 9 (2026), 185-98.
ABSTRACT:
This article proposes a new interpretation of the so-called second bronze tablet of Vipasca (AE 1906, 151) and, thereby, a new reconstruction of the regime of exploitation of the local copper and silver mines. Previous reconstructions fail to understand a key term in the text, pars dimidia ad fiscum pertinens. The fiscus allowed private entrepreneurs to exploit the Vipascan mines on condition that they share part of their profit. The miner first bought prospecting rights to a mineshaft from the fiscus; subsequently, when the shaft started to produce ore, for as long as the miner exploited that shaft, he had to continue paying, in money, for half of the extracted ore. Hadrian introduced a reform in the case of silver mineshafts. Thereafter, when his shaft first struck ore, the miner could buy the state’s permanent claim to the extracted ore for a lump sum of HS 4,000. By this act, he would own all the ore the shaft produced from then on. Both before and after the Hadrianic reform, the fiscus acquired only money, not metal, from the Vipascan mines.