Resumen de Evectiones et tractoriae. Identifying the permits for the cursus publicus in the 4th century
The article focuses on the permits required for the use of the cursus publicus during the 4th century CE. The central interest is to arrive at a precise definition for the document referred to in the sources as tractoria and its significance vis-à-vis the most common permit type, the evectio. Through a reassessment of existing explanations in previous scholarship and a review of the available documentary evidence, a novel definition is proposed: the tractoria’s primary purpose was to allow access to the (slower) vehicles of the cursus publicus (such as redae, angariae, mules, oxen); the evectio enabled users to use the cursus publicus at large. In all other regards, evectio and tractoria seem to have been identical. The results are then placed into the context of the development of the cursus publicus at the turn from the 3rd to the 4th century and the wider historical developments of the early 4th century.
