Pompei - Itinerari e Guide - Portale Numismatico dello Stato

Step 10 - Workshop of granius romanus

Workshop of Granius Romanus. Entrance. ©SSBAPES

A woman in financial difficulties pawned a pair of earrings as collateral for a loan with usurer Faustilla This is documented by the inscription incised on the wall of Granio Romano's workshop. It was estimated that the monthly interest for this transaction was set at 3.3%.

Pawning and usury

CIL IV 8203

On 15th July I pawned my earrings to Faustilla for two denarii. She deducted the lending of a bronze as coin as a thirtieth of the sum.

Comment

The inscription is written by a woman who fell into financial difficulties, forcing her to pawn a pair of earrings to a usurer, Faustilla, to guarantee a loan.

From the evaluation of the possession which was two denarii, or 32 asses, Faustilla kept one as for herself at a premium, corresponding to one thirtieth of the rounded-up sum and gave 31 asses to the creditor.

The monthly interest rates for the pledge are therefore 3.3%, competitive with respect to 3.75%, the equivalent to 45% of that annually granted by Faustilla and the others (see CIL IV 4528).

It should be noted that, as another inscription located in the same room informs us (CIL IV 8204), a few days earlier, on the fourth of July, a cloak and a hood had gone down the same route of Faustilla, a woman well known in Pompeii for loaning and usury but under different names and disguises. Each time and place Faustilla, speculating on the demands and needs of others, managed to gain high rates of interest and thus evidently performed the same role in Pompeii in the 1st century AD as performed by the modern "Mounts of Piety" or institutional pawnbrokers.