Rarely in recorded history has there been a louder and more persistent chorus of R complaint against the taxes than under the later Roman Empire. Already under Diocletian (284-305) Lactantius declares that the burden was intolerable, and under Justinian (527-565) Procopius raises the same lament. Nor was it only the taxpayers who complained. Valentinian III in 444-5 publicly admitted that ‘if we claim these expenses from the landowner in addition to what he pays already, such an exaction will crush his last feeble strength: if again we demand them from the merchants, they will inevitably sink under the weight of such a burden.’