EDICT OF VIBIUS ON A CENSUS
   
( AD 104 )
 
 
( Johnson, Coleman-Norton & Bourne, Ancient Roman Statutes, Austin, 1961, p. 167, n. 208 ).
 
 
      The census was taken every fourteen years in Egypt and in preparation for it everyone was ordered to return to his home for registration.
      The papyrus containing this edict was reported in 1907.
 
 
ENGLISH TRANSLATION.
 
 
      Gaius Vibius Maximus, prefect of Egypt.
      As a house-to-house registration has been authorized, it is necessary to order all persons absent from their homes for any reason whatsoever to return to their homes that they may perform the customary business of registration and may apply themselves to the cultivation of the land, as is their proper duty. I realize, however, that the city has need of some of the peasants ; and it is my will that all persons who appear to have good reason to remain in the city shall register themselves with . . . and Festus, the prefect of the cavalry, whom I have assigned to this duty, from whom those persons who prove that it is necessary for them to remain in the city will receive the necessary authorization to remain until Epiph 30 in the current month . . .