Servi publici as plumbarii. Some Remarks on the Manufacture of Public Lead Pipes in Roman Cities

In a number of Roman cities, both in Italy and in the Western provinces, public slaves could be entrusted with the task of producing lead pipes for supplying water to the community. Some of them continued to produce conduits after their manumission, as stamps on lead pipes mentioning them as public freedmen clearly demonstrate. This paper, besides providing an updated corpus of the stamps on lead pipes mentioning public slaves and freedmen (and possible instances of them), aims to draw some conclusions of historical and administrative interest about the management of the manufacture of public lead pipes in Roman cities.