Roman Identity: Between Ideal and Performance (Antiquite Et Sciences Humaines, 8) 9782503599229, 2503599222

Table of contents :
FRONT MATTER
LAUTARO ROIG LANZILLOTTA. INTRODUCTION. DEFINING SELF AND OTHERIN CHANGING SITUATIONS AND DISCOURSES: THE DYNAMISM AND FLUIDITY OF THE NOTION OF IDENTITY
FRANCESCO GINELLI. SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES. ROMAN IDENTITY AND MODELS OF BEHAVIOUR IN NEPOS’ PUNIC LIVES
HELEN KAUFMANN. IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY
NUNO SIMÕES RODRIGUES. LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL. SHAPING THE IDENTITY OF ROME’S WOMEN IN THE AUGUSTAN PERIOD
DAVIDE MORELLI. PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMILIUS PAULLUS
EELCO GLAS. OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME. FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS AND THE RHETORIC OF IDENTITY IN THE BELLUM JUDAICUM
JOSÉ LUÍS BRANDÃO. PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS
CLÁUDIA TEIXEIRA. WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER. PERCEPTIONS OF IDENTITY IN THE HISTORIA AUGUSTA’S LIFE OF MAXIMINUS
CARLO PELLOSO. QUIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS. NEW IDENTITIES AND OLD FIGURES IN ΑRCHAIC LEGAL FORMULAS
FEDERICA LAZZERINI. ROME IN THE MIRROR. VARRO’S QUEST FOR THE PAST, FOR A PRESENT GOAL
CLAUDIA BELTRÃO. SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO. A READING OF CICERO’S DE LEGIBUS
ÁLIA RODRIGUES. ROMAN MAIESTAS. BECOMING IMPERIAL, STAYING REPUBLICAN
KELLY NGUYEN. WHAT’S IN A NATIO. NEGOTIATING ETHNIC IDENTITY IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE
INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

Citation preview

ANTIQUITÉ ET S CI E NC ES H U MA INES LA TRAVE RSÉ E DE S FRONT IÈRE S

86

DIRECTEURS DE COLLECTION

Corinne Bonnet Pascal Payen SCIENTIFIQU UE COMITÉ SCIENTIFIQ  E

Zainab Bahrani

(Columbia University, New York)

Nicola Cusumano

(Università degli Studi di Palermo) (Università

Erich Gruen

of California, Berkeley) (University of 

Nicholas Purcell

(St John’s College, Oxford)

Aloys Winterling

(Humboldt Universität, Berlin)

ROMAN IDENTITY Between Ideal and Performance

Edited by Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta José Luís Brandão Cláudia Teixeira and Ália Rodrigues

This work is funded by national funds through FCT – Foundation for Science and Technology, I.P., under the project “Rome our Home: (Auto)biographical Tradition and the Shaping of Identity(ies)” (PTDC/LLT-OUT/28431/2017). This is an open access publication made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0.

© 2022, Brepols Publishers n.v., Turnhout, Belgium.

All rights reserved. No part of  this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission of  the publisher.

D/2022/0095/43 ISBN 978-2-503-59922-9 e-ISBN 978-2-503-59923-6 DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128199 ISSN 2466-5916 e-ISSN 2565-9200 Printed in the EU on acid-free paper.

CONTENTS

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 7 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 9

Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta Introduction: Defining Self  and Other in Changing Situations and Discourses. The Dynamism and Fluidity of  the Notion of  Identity 11 I.

ROMAN IDENTITY IN (AUTO)BIOGRAPHICAL TEXTS Francesco Ginelli Similarities and Dissimilarities: Roman Identity and Models of  Behaviour in Nepos’  Punic Lives

39

Helen Kaufmann Identity in Latin Verse Autobiography 71 Nuno Simões Rodrigues Lucretia, Tullia and Tanaq uil: Shaping the Identity of  Rome’s Women in the Augustan Period 91 Davide Morelli Pythagoreanism and Roman Identity in Plutarch’s Aemi­lius Paullus 121 Eelco Glas Overcoming Otherness in Flavian Rome: Flavius Josephus and the Rhetoric of  Identity in the Bellum Judaicum 5

163

CONTENTS

José Luís Brandão Performing Roman Identity in Suetonius’ Caesars 185 Cláudia Teixeira When the Emperor is  the Other: Perceptions of  Identity in the Historia Augusta’s Life of  Maximinus 225 II.

ROMAN IDENTITY IN POLITICAL AND LEGAL DISCOURSES Carlo Pelloso Q uirites and Populus Romanus: New Identities and Old Figures in Αrchaic Legal Formulas 255 Federica Lazzerini Rome in the Mirror: Varro’s Q uest for the Past, for a Present Goal 279 Claudia Beltrão Sacra privata perpetua manento: A Reading of  Cicero’s De Legibus 313 Ália Rodrigues Roman Maiestas: Becoming Imperial, Staying Republican 335 Kelly Nguyen What’s in a Natio: Negotiating Ethnic Identity in the Roman Empire

371

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM 395

6

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This volume was conceived within the framework of  the project “Rome our Home: (Auto)biographical Tradition and the Shaping of  Identity(ies)” (PTDC/LLT-OUT/28431/2017), funded by the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), Portugal. Approved by the FCT in 2018, this project examines the idea of  identities (rather than identity) in European antiquity through biographical sources and other texts. This volume addresses questions posed in the first stage of  the project, in particular, the issue of  how the Romans perceived and constructed their own identity. The completion of  this volume would not have been possible without the support of  several individuals. We  would like to thank to Delfim Leão (University of  Coimbra) for his advice and help, Greg Woolf  (Institute of  Classical Studies, University of  London) for his prompt feedback and suggestions, Salam Rassi (University of  Oxford) for his valuable insights, and an anonymous referee whose recommendations greatly improved the volume as a whole. Finally, we would like to express our gratitude to the Editorial Board and to Tim Denecker for their continuous guidance and patience throughout this process.

7

CONTENTS

LIST OF  ABBREVIATIONS

Unless listed below, abbreviations follow L’Année philologique. BMCRR = Grueber H., Coins of  the Roman Republic in The British Museum, 3 vol., London, British Museum, 1910. MRR = Broughton T. R. S., The Magistrates of  the Roman Republic, 3 vol., New York, American Philological Association, 1951-1960. RRC

= Crawford M. H., Roman Republican Coinage, 2 vol., Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1974.

9

LAUTARO ROIG LANZILLOTTA University of  Groningen

INTRODUCTION DEFINING SELF  AND OTHER IN CHANGING SITUATIONS AND DISCOURSES: THE DYNAMISM AND FLUIDITY OF  THE NOTION OF  IDENTITY Identity is nowadays ubiquitous: cultural identity, political identity, and religious identity all contribute to explaining people’s behaviour and decisions,1 while ethnic and national identities help to clarify many of  the numerous global conflicts of  the present day.2 According to sociology, psychology and philosophy, we either already have a personal and social identity, or we develop it based on a self-concept of  this identity, or in relation to others. In fact, the search for self  and identity permeates books, films, and songs; and many individuals look for it in travel, psychotherapy, or spirituality. Advertising and marketing readily exploit this drive in the pursuit of  commercial goals, offering an ever-increasing range of  products intended to sell us our identity.3 Despite this arduous quest undertaken by many, others nonetheless take their identities for granted,4 even if  the need to use documents, biometrics or other means to prove who we are might seem to affirm the very opposite. In fact, our identity is never fully guaranteed and may be falsified, changed, transformed or even appropriated by others with more or less mala fide intentions.  R. Jenkins, Social Identity, London, Routledge, 2004, p. 14.  See contra R. Brubaker, “Ethnicity without Groups”, Archives européens de sociologie 43 (2002), pp.  163–89; R.  Brubaker, Ethnicity without Groups, Cambridge, Mass., London, Harvard University Press, 2004, pp. 7–27. But see already P.  J. Geary, “Ethnic Identity as a  Situational Construct in the Early Middle Ages”, Mitteilungen der Anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien 113 (1983), pp. 15–26. 3  M. Lamont, V. Molnár, “How Blacks Use Consumption to Shape their Collective Identity”, Journal of  Consumer Culture 1 (2001), pp. 31–45. 4  See below note 18. 1 2

This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 11–35 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.129646

11

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

Despite this ubiquity,5 or perhaps precisely because of  it, some sociologists remarkably claim that there is no such thing as identity. Identity, they affirm, is  not something people can assert that they “are” or “have”.6 All that exists is a rather open-ended process of  identification.7 However, people draw on the notion of  identity as a  means of  justifying their actions, opinions and behaviour, and we should thus beware misuses of  the notion, for example, for the sake of  strategies of  exclusion. In this sense, some sociologists even contend that the term identity is a “conceptually, operationally and politically seriously troubled idiom” that lacks analytical value. From this perspective, identity is an “operational phantom”,8 a  term that, in any case, is  unsuitable for social analysis.9 Mistrust and denial of  the concept of  identity is  not, however, a new phenomenon. In fact, the history of  philosophy shows various attempts to abjure the notion of  identity or the self.10 While René Descartes and John Locke in the seventeenth century allowed for a very thin definition of  the self, regarding it as the subject of  thinking and consciousness, David Hume in the eighteenth century denied the existence of  a self  that allegedly linked together the numerous perceptions he observed within himself.11 We find the same diffidence in Immanuel Kant, who could not 5  On the ubiquity of  identity, see, M. F. Bendle, “The Crisis of  ‘Identity’ in High Modernity”, British Journal of  Sociology 53 (2002), pp. 1–18 at 2–4. 6  R.  Brubaker, Ethnicity without Groups, pp.  28–63 instead thinks that identity is a “matter of  processes of  identification that do not determine in any sense, what individuals do” (R. Jenkins, Social Identity, p. 9). 7 R. Brubaker, Ethnicity without Groups, pp. 28–63; R. Brubaker, F. Coo­ per, “Beyond ‘Identity’ ”, Theory and Society 29 (2000), pp. 1–47. 8 S. Malešević, “Identity: Conceptual, Operational and Historical Critique”, in S. Malešević, M. Haugaard (eds), Making sense of  Collectivity: Ethnicity, Nationalism and Globalization, London, Pluto, 2002; S. Malešević, “Researching Social and Ethnic Identity: A Sceptical View”, Journal of  Language and Politics 2 (2003), pp. 265–87; S. Malešević, The Sociology of  Ethnicity, London, Sage, 2004; S. Malešević, Identity as Ideology: Understanding Ethnicity and Nationalism, Basingstoke (U.K.), New York, Palgrave Macmillan, 2006, p. 56. 9  R. Brubaker, F. Cooper, “Beyond ‘Identity’ ”, p. 1. 10  I follow the overview given by R.  Sorabji, Self. Ancient and Modern Insights about Individuality, Life, and Death, Chicago, The University of  Chi­ cago Press, 2006, pp. 17–31. 11 D. Hume, A Treatise of  Human Nature, book 1, part 4, section 6, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1998 [1888]), p. 252.

12

INTRODUCTION

assure whether there was one or multiple subjects of  consciousness.12 This negation, however, seems to resonate more intensely with Friedrich Nietzsche: for him “the deed is  everything” and any attempt to find a subject behind it, a doer responsible for this action, is  simply a  fiction.13 While, more recently, Daniel Dennett has also argued that the self  is a fiction,14 albeit on different grounds, G. E. M. Anscombe and Norman Malcolm point in turn to the lack of  referentiality of  the pronoun “I”, something that, according to Tony Kenny in the wake of  Ludwig Wittgenstein’s criticism,15 shows that the notion of  the self  is itself  a grammatical mistake.16 Amidst these polarised views, however, sociologists like Richard Jenkins defend a middle ground between a total rejection of  the notion of  identity, and an uncritical acceptance of  its existence and significance. In his view, classification plays a crucial role in human knowledge; it is based on identification, namely the need to know who is  who and what is  what in order to orient ourselves in the world. Both classification and identification consist in establishing similarities and differences, and we do this mainly by comparing ourselves to the other.17 Identity, in the sense of  12 A. Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation, vol. 2 (transl. R. B. Haldane and J. Kemp), London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1896, pp. 139–40. 13 F. Nietzsche, Zur Genealogie der Moral: Eine Streitschrift. 1. Auflag. Insel Taschenbuch, 1308. Frankfurt am Main, Insel, 1991, I.13. 14  D. Dennett, Consciousness Explained, Boston, 1991; D. Dennett, “Why Everyone is  a  Novelist”, Times Literary Supplement 16–22 September, 1988, p. 1016. 15 L.  Wittgenstein, Tractatus logico-philosophicus, Werkausgabe in 8 Bänden - Band 1: Tractatus logico-philosophicus. Tagebücher 1914–1916. Philosophische Untersuchungen (Neu durchgesehen von Joachim Schulte). Frankfurt am Main, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1984, p.  60: “Von zwei Dingen zu sagen, sie seien identisch, ist Unsinn, und von Einem zu sagen, es sei identisch mit sich selbst, sagt gar nichts”. 16 G. E. M. Anscombe, “The First Person”, in G. E. M. Anscombe, Collected Philosophical Papers, vol.  2: Metaphysics and the Philosophy of  Mind. Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1981, pp. 21–36; N. Malcolm, “Whether ‘I’ is a referring expression”, in Cora Diamond, J. Teichman (eds), Intention and Intentionality (Ithaca N.Y. 1979), pp. 15–24; A. J. P. Kenny, The Self  (The Aquinas Lecture), Marquette University, Milwaukee (Wisconsin, 1988–1989) and “Body, Soul, and Intellect in Aquinas”, in J. Crabbe (ed.), From Soul to Self  (London and New York, 1999), pp. 33-48. 17  R. Jenkins, “Categorization: Identity, Social Process and Epistemology”, Current Sociology 48 (2000), pp. 7–25 at 7.

13

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

a generic notion that we and others are either this or that, is both useful and necessary to determine our position in the world.

1. Identity in Antiquity Identity and the Self. The question as to whether antiquity recognised a notion of  identity, as we understand it today, has also caused some controversy. Even if  they acknowledge the idea of  identity in modernity, sociologists such as Roy  F. Baumeister deny its existence in antiquity. His preliminary review of  philosophers dealing with the notion begins, on the one hand, with Montaigne’s and Descartes’s self-confidence regarding the self; on  the other hand, the point of  departure of  his study is  the “Medieval and Early Modern History of  Identity”.18 In a similar vein, Anthony Giddens argues that identity is a modern invention which reaches its climax in high modernity with “the  increasingly intertwined development of  mass printed media and electronic communication, although its roots go back at the most to the 16th century”.19 In his Sources of  the Self, Charles Taylor also denies the existence of  the notion of  identity in antiquity. Admittedly, Taylor does not analyse the concept of  identity in general, but rather the “modern notion of  identity”, and consequently sees its beginning in Descartes. However, he locates the origins of  the notion of  an inner world, of  our interiority, in Augustine of  Hippo, through his words, “the first to make the first-person standpoint fundamental in our search for the truth”.20 Up until this moment, ancient philosophy, according to Taylor, simply presents variations on Platonic themes, namely a  pseudo-interiority that does not reside in one’s interior world, but rather consists in attuning oneself  to the structure of  the outer world.21 Philip Cary has more  R.  F. Baumeister, Identity: Cultural Change and the Struggle for Self, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1986, pp. 11–50. 19 A.  Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity: Self  and Society in the Late Modern Age, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1991, p. 33. My emphasis. 20 C. Taylor, Sources of  the Self. The Making of  the Modern Identity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1989, p. 133. 21  C. Taylor, Sources of  the Self, pp. 124–26. 18

14

INTRODUCTION

recently restated the importance, in his view, of  Augustine’s innovation.22 It was Michel Foucault who first refuted sceptics regarding the existence of  the self  in antiquity. He  not only affirms the prominence of  the notion of  selfhood among the ancients, but also contests the view that considers it an innovation by Augustine. Indeed, in  his opinion, the self  “…  is  not a  modern trait born of  the Reformation or of  romanticism; it is one of  the most ancient Western traditions. It  was well established and deeply rooted when Augustine started his Confessions”.23 As a  matter of  fact, Michel Foucault not only claims its existence in late antiquity, but also finds its roots in Classical Greece, to be more precise in (Pseudo-) Plato’s First Alcibiades.24 Admittedly, he discerns a  great evolution in the notion of  the self  in the eight centuries between Socrates and Gregory of  Nyssa.25 While the notion of  identity in Greece was originally centred on “care of  the self ”, based on the Delphic “gnothi sauton”, Plato transforms it into a notion built on knowledge of  the self. In the final stage of  development, in Gregory, this knowledge allows the individual to detach him or herself  from everything that distracts him or her from God.26 In addition to Michel Foucault, in recent years Richard Sorabji, Christopher Gill and others have also dealt with this issue.27 22 P. Cary, Augustine’s Invention of  the Inner Self, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000. 23 M. Foucault, “Technologies of  the Self ”, in L. H. Martin, H. Gutman, P. H. Hutton (eds), Technologies of  the Self. A Seminar with Michel Foucault, Amherst, The University of  Massachusetts Press, 1988, pp. 16–49 at 27. 24  M. Foucault, “Technologies of  the Self ”, pp. 19–22. 25 M. Foucault, “Technologies of  the Self ”, pp. 20–21: “Gregory did not mean the movement by which one takes care of  oneself  and the city; he meant the movement by which one renounces the world and marriage and detaches oneself  from the flesh and, with virginity of  heart and body, recovers the immortality of  which one has been deprived”. 26 M. Foucault, Technologies of  the Self, pp. 19–22. 27  See R.  Sorabji, “Graeco-Roman Varieties of  Self ”, in P.  Remes, J.  Sihvo­la (eds),  Ancient Philosophy of  the Self, Dordrecht, Springer, 2008, pp. 17–34; C. Gill, “The Ancient Self: Issues and Approaches”, in P. Remes (ed.), Ancient Philosophy of  the Self, Dordrecht, London, Springer, pp. 35–56. See now also the articles included in R.  Seaford, J.  Wilkins, M.  Wright (eds), Selfhood and the Soul. Essays on Ancient Thought and Literature in Honour of  Christopher Gill, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2017.

15

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

Taking his starting point from the existence of  an intuitive notion of  selfhood, expressed through a first-person viewpoint and the ownership of  one’s body, Sorabji believes that the notion of  self  was omnipresent in antiquity. In  his definition, “a  self  […] is an embodied individual owner who sees himself  or herself  as me and me again”, and this perspective, Sorabji insists, was crucial “for the preservation of  a human (or higher animal) way of  life”.28 In his view, an ancient Greek interest in the first person is proved both linguistically, by the existence of  the Greek reflexive “oneself ” (heautos) and the emphatic “himself ” (autos), and philosophically, by Plato’s question about “that which is  each of  us truly” (Laws 959B3).29 On the one hand, there  is a  wide spectrum of  ancient answers to this question: among others, the self  is either reason or the intellect (Plato),30 the human as embodied social being (Aristotle),31 or the fusion of  mind and body (the Stoic Hierocles).32 However, the self  could also be seen as a narrative (Plutarch),33 as a will (Epictetus),34 or else as a bundle of  qualities that cannot be shared by any other individual (Porphyry).35 On the other hand, Greek philosophy also provided arguments against the possibility of  finding a continuous self, mainly based on the idea that due to processes of  growth and decay, permanence, and with it the self, was a fallacy.36 Among the authors who accept the existence of  identity in antiquity, some even detect a strengthening of  the notion of  self  in Hellenism and, especially, in the early Roman Empire, namely “an  intensification of  the values of  the private life, or that the importance accorded to the relation to self  is associated with the exaltation of  personal singularity”.37 While the tension between   R. Sorabji, “Graeco-Roman Varieties of  Self ”, p. 13.  R.  Sorabji, Self, 32; see also Foucault, “Technologies of  the Self ”, p. 25. 30 Plato, Phaedo 63BC; 115C; I Alcibiades 133C4–6; Republic 589A6–B6. 31 Aristotle, NE 1166a32; 1169b7; 1170b6; 1161b28–29; EE 1245a30. 32   Hierocles in Stobaeus, Florilegium (Hense) pp. 671, 7–16. 33  Plutarch, On tranquility 473B–474B. 34 Epictetus, Discourses 1.1.23. 35 Porphyry, Isagoge 7, 6–24. 36  See R. Sorabji, Self, pp. 38–42 for the arguments in favour and against this view. 37  M. Foucault, Care of  the Self, p. 42. 28

29

16

INTRODUCTION

Greekness and Romanness in the literature of  the period is for Tim Whitmarsh a  general expression of  this intensification,38 others find the best particular examples in Epictetus. For Charles Kahn Epictetus’ notion of  prohairesis or “will”, for example, marked a  huge step forward in the development of  selfhood. Prohairesis “is presented not only as the decisive factor in practical existence but as the true self, the inner man, the ‘I’ of  personal identity”.39 Conversely, A.  A. Long saw the real turning point in Epictetus’ notion of  phantasiai or “appearances”. Given that phantasiai are appearances to this individual and not to others, appearances become “something irreducibly unique  … they are mental affections of  this and only this person”.40 Foucault also recognises in Epictetus a greater focus on the self  and reflexivity. However, in his view, it is the idea of  an “examining of  representations” that plays a  crucial role, since this control establishes a “relationship between oneself  and that which is represented, so as to accept in the relation to the self  only that which can depend on the subject’s free and rational choice”.41 Even if  these scholars recognise a  degree of  subjectivity that draws close parallels between ancient and modern notions of  identity, authors such as Christopher Gill have adopted a more nuanced position. In contrast to the views of  Bruno Snell 42 and A.  W.  H. Adkins,43 and their belief  in a  progressive evolution through antiquity towards the modern notion of  the self, Gill claims that one should distinguish between a “more participant and objective” notion of  the self  and a “subjective-individualist” conception. While he refrains from explicitly relating the former 38 T. Whitmarsh, Greek Literature and the Literature of  the Roman Empire (Oxford, 2001). 39 C.  H. Kahn, “Discovering the Will: From Aristotle to Augustine”, in J. Dillon, A. A. Long (eds), The Q uestion of  “Eclecticism”: Studies in Later Greek Philosophy, Berkeley, CA, California University Press 1988, pp. 234–59. 40  A. A. Long, Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2002, p. 275. 41 M. Foucault, Care of  the Self  (translated from the French by R. Hurley), New York, Random House, 1986, p. 64. 42 B. Snell, Die Entdeckung des Geistes, Hamburg, Claassen & Goverts, 1948. 43  A.  W.  H. Adkins, Merit and Responsibility: A  Study in Greek Values, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1960; A. W. H. Adkins, From the Many to the One: A  Study of  Personality and Views of  Human Nature in the Context of  Ancient Greek Society, London, Ithaca, New York, Cornell University Press, 1970.

17

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

to antiquity and the latter to modernity, he does claim that, in order to achieve a proper understanding of  the notion in antiquity, we should try “to counteract the more individualist and subjective dimensions of  our own thinking”.44 In this sense, scholars have paid heed to the importance of  imitation, of  mimesis, in the development of  identity. A  “more participant” notion of  identity comes to the fore in this view of  identity, since the individual, the I, necessarily inherits and is part of  the discourse “that enables that ‘I’ who stands behind the discourse and executes its volition through discourse”.45 Imitation, however, is not only slavish repetition, but especially transformation and appropriation,46 which allows individuality to appear, an individuality that is intrinsically anchored in the communal. From this perspective, more attention has been recently paid to the ways in which this identity is articulated in our texts, what Tim Whitmarsh calls the “politics” of  imitation. Texts do not simply reflect a set of  views, but dynamically engage with tradition, images, views, and identities in order to state new understandings and worldviews.47 This conscious adoption and transformation of  previous models shows that Literature is  no naïve reflection or picture of  identity, but rather the “space in which identity is constructed and disseminated”.48 This could not be otherwise: as Jan Assmann has pointed out cultural memory “comprises that body of  reusable texts, images, and rituals specific to each society in each epoch, whose ‘cultivation’ serves to stabilize and convey that society’s self-image. Upon such collective knowledge, for the most part (but not exclusively) of  the past, each group bases its awareness of  unity and particularity”.49   C. Gill, “The Ancient Self ”, p. 39.   J.  Buttler, Bodies that Matter: on the Discursive Limits of  “Sex”, New York, 1993, p. 225. 46  T. Whitmarsh, Greek literature, pp. 26–29. 47 T. Whitmarsh, ibid., p. 32. 48  V. Turner, Dramas, Fields, and Metaphors: Symbolic Action in Human Society (Ithaca, 1974), p.  57, as quoted in T.  Whitmarsh, Greek Literature, p. 32. 49   J.  Assmann, “Collective Memory and Cultural Identity”, New German Critique 65 (Spring - Summer, 1995), Cultural History/Cultural Studies (Spring - Summer, 1995), pp. 125–33 at 132. 44 45

18

INTRODUCTION

2. Roman Identity Consequently, can we affirm that there was such a thing as Roman identity, as the title of  this book seems to imply? The question might sound paradoxical, but we need to pose it, given the reluctance of  some scholars, referenced in previous pages, to admit the existence of  identity in either modernity or antiquity. Can we assume there was a Roman identity? And if  there was, what did it actually look like? Predictably, this question has received numerous answers. In the first place, some scholars contend that identity has a limited significance in historiography, since the sources cannot provide us access to what we are looking for. According to Walter Pohl, the confluence of  two different theoretical positions accounts for this denial. On the one hand, the scepticism emerging from poststructuralism and postmodernism, which saw texts as representing a self-contained textual world that offers no access to the outside world.50 On the other hand, what he calls “historical positivism”, which claims that identity is too vague a phenomenon to be demonstrated in actuality and consequently conceives of  it as a modern projection into texts.51 In his view, however, this position is not justified.52 Once we assume the dynamism and fluidity of  the notion of  identity and understand it as happening at the boundary between individual and group, we may recognise that identity is  not an immanent quality “of  the text, but emerge[s] from different strategies of  identification and of  distinction”.53 It is precisely this point of  his approach that interests us here, since he sees social identity as the result of  serial acts of  communication and interaction that mani J.  Derrida, Writing and Difference (translated by Alan Bass), Chicago, University of  Chicago Press, 1978; R. Barthes, Writing Degree Zero, London, Jonathan Cape, 1967; B. Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of  Nationalism (rev. ed.), London, Verso, 2006. 51 T. Reuter, “Whose Race, Whose Ethnicity? Recent Medievalists’ Discussions of  Identity”, in T. Reuter, J. L. Nelson (eds), Medieval Polities and Modern Mentalities, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2006, p. 102. 52 W.  Pohl, “Historiography and Identity: Methodological Perspectives”, in W. Pohl, V. Wieser (eds), Ancient and Early Christian Narratives of  Community, Turnhout, Brepols, 2019, pp. 7–50 at 16–17. 53  W. Pohl, “Historiography and Identity”, p. 39. 50

19

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

fest themselves in three forms of  identification: 1)  the personal act of  expressing allegiance to a social group, 2) the collective selfrepresentation of  a  group through its spokespeople or as a  collective, and 3)  the classification of  social groups by outsiders.54 These forms of  interaction all generate a discourse that necessarily reflects a reality, namely a group that was recognised as such by different characters. Given that historiography is a form of  communication and, as such, of  identification, we might expect to observe at least some of  the previous forms. In the preface to his Ab urbe condita, Livy asserts the seminal role of  historiography in providing good and bad examples, some of  which must be imitated and others avoided, either by the individual or by the State itself.55 History is a source of  lessons that include perspectives on “useful History” and “historiography’s didacticism”.56 The first form of  identification, the individual’s alliance with a social group, appears in Nuno S. Rodrigues’ study, “Lucretia, Tullia and Tanaquil: Shaping Women’s Identity in Augustan Period” (Chapter 3). Through his portrayal of  three women inextricably related to Roman culture, Livy provides models and anti-models of  identity. In  this sense, Lucretia, Tullia, and Tanaquil are thus able to define a concept of  femininity for Augustan Rome. Davide Morelli’s “Pythagoreanism and Roman Identity in Plu­ tarch’s Aemi­lius Paullus” (Chapter 4) provides, in turn, an example of  the third mode of  identification, namely the classification of  social groups by outsiders. Plutarch’s characterisation of  Aemi­ 54  W. Pohl, “Introduction: Strategies of  Identification: A Methodological Profile”, in W. Pohl, G. Heydemann (eds), Strategies of  Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, Turnhout, Brepols, 2013, p. 3. 55 Livy, Praef. 10. 56  On the importance of  exemplum in Livian historiography and how  it should be grasped by its audience, see mainly J.  D. Chaplin, “Livy’s use of  Exempla”, in B. Mineo (ed.), A Companion to Livy, Oxford, Wiley Blackwell, 2015, pp.  102–13, esp. 103–04; J.  D. Chaplin, Livy’s Exemplary History, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000, pp. 23, 29; J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações da identidade romana em Tito Lívio e Tácito, São Paulo, Universidade de São Paulo, 2007, pp. 9–10, 31–33; R. M. Ogilvie, A Commentary on Livy. Books 1–5, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1965, p. 25. This is also connected with the so-called “Moral Historiography” or “Moral History”. On this subject, see L. I. Hau, Moral History from Herodotus to Diodorus Siculus, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2016.

20

INTRODUCTION

lius Paullus in the Life of  the same name has several elements in common with Italiote Pythagoreanism, the same Pythagorean cultural environment that gave rise to a mid-Republican Aemilian tradition. Based on an examination of  the traditional literary elements of  Plutarch’s characterisation of  Paullus, Morelli shows, on the one hand, the fluidity of  Roman identity and the changes it underwent from Late Republican to Imperial times, and on the other hand, how Plutarch defined a mid-Republican Roman identity that had disappeared forever. Other scholars, however, point to the highly ambiguous character of  the notion of  Romanness. While urban in origin, Roman identity ended up as an imperial notion. The term could have originally referred to a  civic, regional, or transnational entity of  the Roman Empire.57 This fluctuation increased with time and, by late antiquity, it was also used to represent cultural, territorial, political, and ethnic undercurrents.58 In the context of  the Roman world, this fluctuation is amply exemplified in Kelly Nguyen’s “What’s in a  Natio? Rethinking Ethnic Identity in the Roman Empire” (Chapter 12), which shows the constant redefinition of  Roman identity by focusing on the changing meaning of  the concept of  natio. If   natio is a poorly understood term, this  is due to its multifaceted meaning, ranging from communities with shared traits to those with shared boundaries. Nguyen explains that these broad semantic traits arise from the transformation of  a notion that was defined and redefined due to changes in the Roman geopolitical landscape of  the provinces. This approach to the concept of  natio, seen as adopted and adapted by different peoples within the Roman Empire, offers a case study on the use of  natio in the funerary epitaphs of  people with Pannonian origins. It is  precisely this continuous transformation that has led some scholars to affirm that the Roman project was never entirely accomplished. Indeed, Andrea Giardina called the Roman enter57 M. Maskarinec, “Who Were the Romans? Shifting Scripts of  Romanness in Early Medieval Italy”, in W. Pohl, G. Heydemann (eds), Post-Roman Transitions, Turnhout, Brepols Publishers, pp. 297–364 at 297–98. 58  See G. Greatrex, “Roman Identity in the Sixth Century”, in S. Mitchell, G.  Greatrex (eds), Ethnicity and Culture in Late Antiquity, London, Duckworth, 2000, pp. 267–92.

21

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

prise an “incomplete identity”, not intended in a  derogatory sense, but rather to underline the dynamic nature of  the Roman “identitarian” project. Up to the Augustan period, the formative process of  Italic identity was characterised by advances and relapses, pauses and interruptions, until it reduced its intensity in the first years ce. In fact, at the very moment when one would have expected the climax of  Roman identity, it instead revealed its highest point of  tension before suddenly evolving its meaning, with Roman identity transforming from italic into imperial.59 In this sense, the tension between the local and the global in the Roman empire is an important aspect to understand both identity and the notion of  Romanness,60 since local identities gave form to imperial identity and vice-versa.61 We see this tension in Suetonius’ presentation of  the Emperor, who is, in his view, the first and most important representative of  Roman identity. Indeed, José Luis Brandão’s “Performing Roman Identity in Suetonius’ Caesars” (Chapter 6) highlights a number of  composite and entangled identifications in the description of  Roman identity, as well as the pivotal role of  the Roman emperor in providing this variety and overarching unity. On the one hand, the good emperors of  Suetonius act as guardians of  Roman identity, especially with regard to traditional customs, and their actions can thus be seen as performances of  Romanness. On the other hand, there is also space for a moderate introduction of  external (Greek) elements, in language, literary culture and religion, provided this does not call into question Roman identity and class dignity. The secret is to keep the right balance so as not to endanger the dignity of  the imperial office, at a time when ongoing political, cultural and territorial changes placed the notion of  identity under continuous pressure.

59  A.  Giardina, L’italia Romana: storie di un’identità incompiuta, Roma, Laterza, 1997, pp. ix–x. 60  On the issue see C. Ando, “Imperial Identities”, in T. Whitmarsh (ed.), Local Knowledge and Microidentities in the Imperial Greek World (Cambridge, 2010), pp. 17–45. 61  The notion of  local identity is  dealt with by S.  Goldhill, “What is a Local Identity? The Politics of  Cultural Mapping”, in T.  Whitmarsh (ed.), Local Knowledge, 46–68. See also A. C. Johnston, The Sons of  Remus. Identity in Roman Gaul and Spain (Cambridge, Ma: Harvard University Press, 2017).

22

INTRODUCTION

Notwithstanding the lapses and relapses of  Roman identity, it is precisely these transformations and fluctuations of  the very notion that underline the success of  the Roman project. As the Empire developed, the notion of  Romanness gradually extended to include more and more foreign elements. In  fact, this mix of  external elements characterised Roman identity from the beginning.62 Our sources reflect a  constant drive to overcome this fusion by proposing various overarching notions and ideas that allowed Romans to conceive of  diversity in terms of  unity. The essays included in this volume explore at least three different ways of  coping with this hybridisation: language, law, and religion. Federica Lazzerini focuses, in particular, on the role Varro attributed to the common language. Her study, “Rome in the Mirror: A Q uest for the Past, for a Present Goal” (Chapter 9), with its analysis of  Varro’s testimony, shows that, to begin with, Roman identity was culturally and ethnically multilayered. After describing the historical context in which Varro writes, Laz­ze­rini analyses his antiquarian and linguistic writings in pursuit of  the author’s position regarding ongoing discourse on Roman identity. She concludes that Varro aimed to draw his readers’ attention to the fact that Roman citizenry was the result of  a multitude of  identities merging together, as well as to the central role played by the Latin language as a unifying element in the construction of  a common identity.63 Other essays focus instead on the unifying force of  the common law that was imposed on a varied group of  founders, which in Livy’s opinion served to bring together a diverse range of  origins.64 Ália Rodrigues’ “Roman Maiestas: Becoming Imperial, Staying Republican” (Chapter 11) explores Roman political selfperception through changes that occurred in Roman law between   See W. Pohl, “Introduction: Strategies of  Identification”, pp. 23–24.   On the importance of  language for identity, see in general, S.  Swain, “Language and Identity”, in S. Swain, Hellenism and Empire. Language, Classicism, and Power in the Greek World ad 50–250 (Oxford, 1996), pp. 17–42. 64  See Livy, Ab urbe condita, 1.8: “Rebus divinis rite perpetratis vocataque ad concilium multitudine quae coalescere in populi unius corpus nulla re praeterquam legibus poterat, iura dedit”. 4.3.13: “Dum nullum fastiditur genus, in quo eniteret virtus, crevit imperium Romanum”. See W. Pohl, “Introduction: Strategies of Identification”, pp. 23–24. 62 63

23

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

the Late Republic and Early Empire. Paying heed to the idea of  maiestas as a  legal concept, Rodrigues examines the interplay between literary sources on maiestas and its emergence in legal discourse, together with the motivations for its relatively late adoption in criminal law. She  demonstrates that the gradual incorporation of  maiestas into the legal lexicon shaped not only a specific institutional identity, but also contributed to the emergence of  an unprecedented (imperial) power, despite being the legacy of  a republican discourse. The importance of  religion and religious laws in enhancing the social cohesion of  the Roman Empire is the focus of  Cláudia Beltrão’s “Sacra privata perpetua manento: A Reading of  Cicero’s De Legibus” (Chapter 10). The prologues of  De natura deorum and Tusculanae disputationes reflect, on the one hand, Cicero’s plan regarding the creation of  a new élite to reconstruct the libera res publica. On the other hand, they show that the highly elitist religious laws in De legibus were the political and institutional foundations of  the same philosophical project. Such a plan was not only theoretical, but was also based on very practical questions aimed at establishing Roman identities and attitudes compatible with religious and political republican tradition. In  this sense, Cicero insists on the importance of  the sacra privata, which regulated and disciplined the funeral customs and family cults of  all citizens, overseen by public priests of  high expertise. To reach his goal of  social cohesion in the Roman Republic, Cicero proposed an extension of  the traditional élite’s way of  life, attitudes and religious beliefs to all Roman citizens, who would ultimately be under the aegis of  a new élite of  philosophically educated optimates. Identity and the Other. In  the quest for an ancient notion of  identity, however, other scholars have moved away from the individual and its perception of  the self  to focus instead on perceptions of  the other. Based on the idea that “all human identities are, by definition, social identities”,65 this strand of  scholarship might expect to yield better results by taking identity as a social phenomenon. This is  not striking, since if  identity is  not fixed  R. Jenkins, Social Identity, p. 17.

65

24

INTRODUCTION

and is very much dependent on social and cultural factors, then in order to know who we are, we need, at the same time, to know who the other is and how the other sees us. Consequently, similarity and difference reveal themselves as crucial elements of  identification.66 For other authors, however, what is important is not the other’s perspective but rather our perspective of  the other. Jonathan Z. Smith analyses how, from a religious studies and anthropological perspective, theories of  exclusion contributed to the formation of  Jewish and Early Christian notions of  identity.67 In searching for the definition of  our own identity, we describe and imagine the other in different ways. Smith distinguishes three types of  discourses about the other: (1) the “other” represented metonymically in terms of  the presence or absence of  one or more cultural traits, (2) the “other” represented topographically in terms of  its centre and periphery, and (3) the “other” represented linguistically and/or intellectually in terms of  intelligibility. In fact, these three ways of  conceptualising the other help us to define our own identity, perhaps even more clearly than through self-perception. It is not alterity, but rather similarity, little differences, that are important for identity.68 All these elements are stored 66  R.  Jenkins, Social identity, chapter 2. See in G.  Simmel, The Sociology of  Georg Simmel (ed. K.  H. Wolff), Glencoe, Illinois, Free Press, 1950, p.  30: “[T]he practical significance of  men for one another … is determined by both similarities and differences among them. Similarity as a fact or tendency is no less important than difference. In the most varied forms, both are the great principles of  all internal and external development. In  fact, the cultural history of  mankind can be conceived as the history of  the struggles and conciliatory attempts between the two”. 67 J.  Z. Smith, “Differential Equations: On Constructing the Other”, in J. Z. Smith, Relating Religion: Essays in the Study of  Religion, Chicago, University of  Chicago Press, 2004, pp. 230–50, at 231. 68  J. Z. Smith, “Differential Equations”, p. 245: “The issue of  difference as a  mode of  both culturally encoding and decoding, of  maintaining and relativizing internal as well as external distinctions, raises the last point, the observation that, rather than the remote ‘other’ being perceived as problematic and/or dangerous, it is the proximate ‘other’, the near neighbour, who is most troublesome. That is to say, while difference or ‘otherness’ may be perceived as being either LIKE-US or NOT-LIKE-US, it becomes most problematic when it  is TOO-MUCH-LIKE-US or when it claims to BE-US. It  is  here that the real urgency of  theories of  the ‘other’ emerges, called forth not so much by a requirement to place difference, but rather by an effort to situate ourselves. This, then, is not a matter of  the ‘far’ but preeminently of  the ‘near’. The deepest intellec-

25

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

in Assmann’s cultural memory, which allows the “concretion of  identity” or link to the group. Cultural memory is characterized “by sharp distinctions made between those who belong and those who do not, i.e., between what appertains to oneself  and what is foreign”.69 The presence or absence of  cultural traits in the perception of  the other comes to the fore in Francesco Ginelli’s “Similarities and Dissimilarities: Roman Identity and Models of  Behaviour in Nepos’ Punic Lives” (Chapter 1). His analysis of  Cornelius Nepos’ use of  Hamilcar and Hannibal, in the Liber de excellentibus ducibus exterarum gentium, to illustrate behaviours that were both contrary to national identity and typical of  Roman culture, focuses on the representation of  the other in the construction of  our identity. The essay compares words and iuncturae used to describe the Carthaginians with those that describe Romans and other foreign duces. Based on previous studies on Roman political and social language, Ginelli claims that Nepos’ biographies are texts designed to activate and reinforce elements of  cultural identity, against the backdrop of  concepts such as proximity-distance that are implicit in the notions of  amity and enmity. The interdependence between defining the self and the other can also be illustrated by looking at Josephus’ rhetorical strategies in negotiating Judaean and Roman identity in the Bellum Judaicum. This is the focus of Eelco Glas’s essay, “Overcoming Otherness in Flavian Rome. Flavius Josephus and the Rhetoric of Identity in the Bellum Judaicum” (Chapter 5). Particular attention is paid to the way in which the Judaean historian Flavius Josephus (c. 37–100 ce) attempts to renegotiate boundaries between Judaean and Roman identities and how he uses the literary motif of civil war in his Bellum Judaicum to explain internal Judaean problems to an audience situated in Flavian Rome. By analysing the deeper roots of the Judaean war against the Romans and comparing them to numerous civil wars that afflicted Rome, Josephus intends to demonstrate that two rather different peoples actually have similar social identities. tual issues are not based upon perceptions of  alterity, but, rather, of  similarity, at times, even, of  identity”. 69 J. Assmann, “Collective Memory and Cultural Identity”, 130.

26

INTRODUCTION

Identity and Rhetoric. In this sense, one could say that discourses about otherness become a rhetorical matter in which we seek to define ourselves more than the other. Conceiving of  otherness as a relational and situational category,70 scholars see identity as a dynamic process in which both identity and otherness become a “matter of  rhetoric and judgement”,71 which are not fixed categories, but remain in continuous transformation and negotiation. In this process of negotiation, it is not the radical other that is important but rather the proximate other. Otherness matters when it  is a  question of  proximity and not of  alterity. “The problem is not alterity, but similarity – at times, even identity. A ‘theory of  the other’ is but another way of  phrasing a ‘theory of  the self ’ ”.72 The panel that gave rise to this book intended to focus on the issue of  Roman cultural identity, conceived of  as a system of  cultural representations and symbolic patrimonies shared, historically, by individuals within the same community. In  order to do  so, it presents two axioms. Firstly, that the concept of  Roman identity is  the result of  multiple influences proceeding from Greek and Italic cultures, which dynamically guided the construction of  a Roman cultural identity over time. Secondly, that the renegotiation of  identities during the Empire enabled the assimilation of  groups of  people with different cultural backgrounds into the Roman cultural community, in turn creating a common culture of  identity. According to Emma Dench “readings of aspects of  Roman society, her perceived ‘generosity’ with the citizenship, the plurality of  the ethnic origins of  the Roman people, the coexistence or appropriation of  different cultures and religions, might at first sight make Rome appear a worthy model for aspirational European ‘multiculturalism’ at the beginning of  the twenty‐first century”.73 70  P. J. Geary, “Ethnic Identity as a Situational Construct”, p. 16, affirms that ethnicity does not exist as “an objective category but rather as a subjective and malleable category by which various preexisting likenesses could be manipulated symbolically to mold an identity and a community”. 71 J.  Z. Smith, “What a  Difference a  Difference Makes”, in J.  Z. Smith, Relating Religion, Essays in the Study of  Religion, Chicago, University of  Chicago Press, 2004, pp. 251–302 at 275. 72 J. Z. Smith, “What a Difference a Difference Makes”, p. 275. 73   E. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum: Roman Identities from the Age of  Alexander to the Age of  Hadrian (Oxford, 2005).

27

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

Carlo Pelloso’s study, “Q uirites and Populus Romanus: New Identities and Old Figures in Archaic Legal Formulas” (Chapter 8), highlights this aspect through its focus on the use and development of  the terms quirites and populus Romanus, which appear together in archaic legal formulas. After raising the question as to what social and legal identity lies behind these rather cryptic terms, Pelloso seeks to explain the intrinsic relationship between the two. From a  legal, political, religious and military perspective, Rome is, on the one hand, a  new reality that incorporates and develops the earlier pre-civic and quiritarian system. On the other hand, a more striking element of  novelty emerges, i.e. the Roman people and its army. It  is  against the backdrop of  the structural and functional ambivalence of  the “new” populus that the “ancient” status enjoyed by the quirites emerges, rewritten and recontextualised, as the foundation of  a new identity whose legal, political and religious significance overshadows any ethnic connotations and enhances its sense of  belonging. In his opinion, this coexistence of  quirites and populus Romanus means that, from the point of  view of  Roman identity, past and present coexisted: new identities did not replace old figures, while the firm belief  in such harmonisation safeguarded and enhanced the future. As noted above, literary writing in the Roman Empire has recently been claimed as the locus where an identity could be negotiated, even though, admittedly, there were other non-literary settings for which our evidence is  always limited.74 “Literature”, in this sense, “is an ever incomplete, even unstable process of  self-making”.75 This is particularly the case with the (auto)biographical genre and one of  the focal points of  both the panel and the present book is  the notion of  Roman identity as expressed in these texts. While the genre of  biography was well known in antiquity, this  is not the case with autobiography, which, some claim, is  a  modern construct.76 In  any case, ancient discussions 74   G. Williamson, “Aspects of Identity”, in C. Howgego, V. Heuchert, A. Burnett (eds), Coinage and Identity in the Roman Provinces. Oxford University Press, UK, 2007, pp. 20–27 at 27. 75 T. Whitmarsh, Greek Literature, 2. See also S. Goldhill (ed.), Being Greek under Rome. Cultural identity, the Second Sophistic and the Development of  Empire. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001. 76 T. Whitmarsh, The Second Sophistic, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005, p. 79; A. M. Riggsby, “Memoir and Autobiography in Republican

28

INTRODUCTION

of  genre have notably ignored autobiography.77 Other scholars, however, call for a broader definition of  autobiography in order for it to also include self-references in works of  other genres.78 With this definition in mind, the spectrum widens considerably and so does our corpus of  relevant texts. We mentioned earlier an increased focus on the self  and exaltation of  personal singularity, discerned in Hellenism and the Roman Empire by authors such as Foucault, Kahn, Long and Gill.79 Together with this intensification, we see a remarkable proliferation of  self-references, especially in the Roman period.80 In the search for Roman identity, it therefore seemed interesting to focus on this period in which both concern for the self  and writing about oneself  coincide. This approach is well represented in this book, with two essays centred on biography or autobiography. With regard to the former, Chapter 7 explores issues of  identity in the biographies of  third century emperors (Historia Augusta). Cláudia Teixeira’s essay, “The Life of Maximinus in the Historia Augusta: Perceptions of Identity”, pays special attention to the emperors of  the so-called period of  crisis (235–84 ce) in order to discuss the relationship between crisis and identity. Departing from the concept of  “hyper-identity”, an optimistic and hyperbolic view of  the Roman past conveyed, among others, by Livy, this text addresses the emergent challenges posed to dom­i­nant culture in the second half  of  the third century, as well as the responses given by imperial power in order to reinforce a unifying view of  Roman culture. In what concerns autobiography, drawing on the wider definition of  this term (as claimed by some scholars) has allowed us to include the numerous self-representations contained in Latin verse. This is the focus of  Helen Kaufmann’s “Identity in Latin Verse Autobiography” (Chapter 2), which provides a  unique Rome”, in J.  Marincola (ed.), A  Companion to Greek and Roman Historiography, Malden, Blackwell, 2007, pp.  266–74 at 266, however, put its origin in Augustine’s Confessions. 77   A. M. Riggsby, “Memoir and Autobiography”, pp. 266–67. 78  See R. Mellor, The Roman Historians, London and New York, Routledge, 2002 [1999], pp. 165–84 at 165. 79  See above, pp. 16–18. 80  There are a  couple of  previous Greek examples, but the vast majority of  writings studied in this category come from Republican and Imperial Rome, see R. Mellor, The Roman Historians.

29

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

insight into the way in which Roman poets wished to represent themselves to their readers in the Augustan and late antique periods. Three categories appear consistently across the centuries: family, location and career, even if  all three categories naturally undergo important historical developments. Based on Seamus Heaney’s idea of  life as a series of  stepping stones that collectively make up someone’s identity, in contrast to the idea of  life as a destination, Kaufmann examines how poets understood their identity. The author concludes that their preference for either a stepping stone or destination model is actually based on personal choice, rather than on historical circumstances or religion. All in all, the essays in this volume assess, from numerous perspectives, two key issues that were the focus of  the first stage of  the BioRom Project.81 They explore, on the one hand, essentialist claims based on the values and reality “common to all”, which also entail an awareness of  an existing border between Romanness and the Other. On the other hand, these essays foreground the integrative feature of  Roman identity, not only regarding the assimilation of  groups of  people with different cultural backgrounds into the Roman cultural community, but also in terms of  its own genesis, which combined multiplicity and difference from the very outset. Whether ever truly completed or not, the Roman project to define and establish a  Roman identity appears in this book in all its complexity, reinforcing the dynamic and fluid character of  both ancient and modern notions of  the self.

Bibliography Adkins A.  H., Merit and Responsibility: A  Study in Greek Values, Oxford, Clarendon, 1960. Adkins A. H., From the Many to the One: A Study of  Personality and Views of  Human Nature in the Context of  Ancient Greek Society, Ithaca, New York, Cornell University Press, 1970. Anderson B., Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of  Nationalism, rev. ed. London, Verso, 2006.

  See “Acknowledgements”, p. 7.

81

30

INTRODUCTION

Ando C., “Imperial Identities”, in T.  Whitmarsh (ed.), Local Knowledge and Microidentities in the Imperial Greek World, Cambridge University Press, 2010, pp. 17–45. Anscombe G. E. M., “The First Person”, in G. E. M. Anscombe, Collected Philosophical Papers, vol. 2: Metaphysics and the Philosophy of  Mind, Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1981, pp. 21–36. Assmann J., “Collective Memory and Cultural Identity”, New German Critique 65 (Spring - Summer, 1995), Cultural History/Cultural Studies (Spring - Summer, 1995), pp. 125–33. Barbiera I., “Remembering the Warriors: Weapon Burials and Tombstones between Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages in Northern Italy”, in W. Pohl, G. Heydemann (eds), Post-Roman Transitions, Turnhout, Brepols Publishers, pp. 407–36. Barthes R., Writing Degree Zero, London, Jonathan Cape, 1967. Baumann G., Gingrich A. (eds), Grammars of  Identity/Alterity: A Structural Approach, New York, Berghahn Books, 2004. Baumeister R. F., Identity: Cultural Change and the Struggle for Self, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1986. Bendle M., “The Crisis of  ‘Identity’ in High Modernity”, British Journal of  Sociology 53 (2002), pp. 1–18. Brubaker R., “Ethnicity without Groups”, Archives européens de sociologie 4 (2002), pp. 163–89. Brubaker R., Cooper F., “Beyond ‘Identity’ ”, Theory and Society 29 (2000), pp. 1–47. Brubaker R., Ethnicity without Groups, Cambridge, Mass., London, Harvard University Press, 2004. Buttler, J., Bodies that Matter: on the Discursive Limits of  “Sex” (New York, 1993). Cary P., Augustine’s Invention of  the Inner Self: the legacy of  a Christian Platonist, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000. Chaplin J. D., “Livy’s use of  Exempla”, in B. Mineo (ed.), A Companion to Livy, Oxford, Wiley Blackwell, 2015, pp. 102–13. Chaplin J. D., Livy’s Exemplary History, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000. Dench E., Romulus’ Asylum: Roman Identities from the Age of  Alexander to the Age of  Hadrian, Oxford University Press, 2005. Dennett D., “Why Everyone is a Novelist”, Times Literary Supplement 16–22 September (1988), p. 1016. Dennett D., Consciousness Explained, Boston, Little, Brown, 1991. 31

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

Derrida J., Writing and Difference (translated by Alan Bass), Chicago, University of  Chicago Press, 1978. Edwards C., Woolf  G.,  Rome the Cosmopolis, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2003. Everson S.,  Psychology. Companions to Ancient Thought, 2, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1991. Foucault M., Care of  the Self  (translated from the French by R. Hurley), New York, Random House, 1986. Foucault M., Technologies of  the Self  (translated from the French by R. Hurley), New York, Random House, 1986. Geary P. J., “Ethnic Identity as a Situational Construct in the Early Middle Ages”, Mitteilungen der Anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien 113 (1983), pp. 15–26. Giardina A.,  L’italia Romana: Storie di un’identità incompiuta, Roma, Laterza, 1997. Giddens A., Modernity and Self-Identity: Self  and Society in the Late Modern Age, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1991. Gill C., “Is There a  Concept of  Person in Greek Philosophy”, in S.  Everson (ed.), Companions to Ancient Thought 2: Psychology, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp. 166–93. Gill C., “The Ancient Self: Issues and Approaches”, in P.  Remes (ed.), Ancient Philosophy of  the Self, Dordrecht, London, Springer, pp. 35–56. Goldhill S., “What is  a  Local Identity? The Politics of  Cultural Mapping”, in T. Whitmarsh (ed.), Local Knowledge, pp. 46–68. Greatrex G., “Roman Identity in the Sixth Century”, in S. Mitchell, G. Greatrex (eds), Ethnicity and Culture in Late Antiquity, London, Duckworth, pp. 267–92. Hau L.  I., Moral History from Herodotus to Diodorus Siculus, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2016. Howgego, C., Heuchert V., Burnett A. (eds), Coinage and Identity in the Roman Provinces, Oxford University Press, UK, 2007. Hume D., A  Treatise of  Human Nature, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1998 ([1888]). Jenkins R., “Categorization: Identity, Social Process and Epistemology”, Current Sociology 48 (2000), pp. 7–25. Jenkins R., Social Identity, London, Routledge, 20042. 32

INTRODUCTION

Johnston A. C., The Sons of Remus. Identity in Roman Gaul and Spain, Cambridge, Ma: Harvard University Press, 2017. Kahn C.  H., “Discovering the Will: From Aristotle to Augustine”, in J.  Dillon, A.  A. Long (eds), The Q uestion of  “Eclecticism”: Studies in Later Greek Philosophy, Berkeley, CA, California University Press, 1988, pp. 234–59. Kenny A. J. P., “Body, Soul, and Intellect in Aquinas”, in J. Crabbe (ed.), From Soul to Self, London and New York, 1999. Kenny A. J. P., The Self  (The Aquinas Lecture), Marquette University, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 1988–1989. Lieu J. M., Christian Identity in the Jewish and Graeco-Roman World, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2004. Long A.  A., Epictetus: A  Stoic and Socratic Guide to Life, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2002. Malcolm N., “Whether ‘I’ is a referring expression”, in C. Diamond, J. Teichman (eds), Intention and Intentionality. Essays in Honour of  G. E. M. Anscombe, Brighton, Harvester, 1979, pp. 15–24. Malešević S., “Identity: Conceptual, Operational and Historical Critique”, in S. Malešević, M. Haugaard (eds), Making sense of  Collectivity: Ethnicity, Nationalism and Globalization, London, Pluto, 2002. Malešević S., “Researching Social and Ethnic Identity: A Sceptical View”, Journal of  Language and Politics 2 (2003), pp. 265–87. Malešević S., Haugaard M., Making Sense of Collectivity: Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Globalisation. Interpreting the Modern World, London, Pluto Press, 2002. Malešević S., Identity as Ideology: Understanding Ethnicity and Nationalism (Basingstoke U.K.; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006. Malešević S., The Sociology of  Ethnicity, London, Sage, 2004. Marq  ues J. B., Tradição e renovações da identidade romana em Tito Lívio e Tácito, São Paulo, Universidade de São Paulo, 2007. Maskarinec M., “Who Were the Romans? Shifting Scripts of  Romanness in Early Medieval Italy”, in W. Pohl, G. Heydemann (eds), Post-Roman Transitions. Christian and Barbarian Identities in the Early Medieval West, Turnhout, Brepols, 2013, pp. 297–364. Mellor R., The Roman Historians, London and New York, Routledge, 2002 [1999]. Mitchell S., Geoffrey G. (eds), Ethnicity and Culture in Late Antiquity, London, Duckworth, 2000. 33

L. ROIG LANZILLOTTA

Nietzsche F., Zur Genealogie Der Moral: Eine Streitschrift. 1. Aufled. Insel Taschenbuch, 1308. Frankfurt am Main, Insel, 1991. Ogilvie R. M., A Commentary on Livy. Books 1–5, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1965. Pohl W., “Comparing Communities - the Limits of  Typology”, History and Anthropology 26, no. 1 (2015), pp. 18–35. Pohl W., “Introduction: Strategies of  Identification: A Methodological Profile”, in W. Pohl, G. Heydemann (eds), Strategies of  Identification: Ehtnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, Turn­ hout, Brepols, 2013. Pohl W., Heydemann, G. (eds), Post-Roman Transitions. Christian and Barbarian Identities in the Early Medieval West, Turnhout, Brepols, 2013. Remes P., Sihvola J. (eds), Ancient Philosophy of  the Self, Dordrecht, Springer, 2008. Reuter T., “Whose Race, Whose Ethnicity? Recent Medievalists’ Discussions of  Identity”, in T. Reuter, J. L. Nelson (eds), Medieval Polities and Modern Mentalities, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2006, pp. 100–09. Riggsby A. M., “Memoir and Autobiography in Republican Rome”, in J. Marincola (ed.), A Companion to Greek and Roman Historiography, Malden, Blackwell, 2007, pp. 266–74 Rummel P. von, “The Fading Power of  Images: Romans, Barbarians, and the Uses of  a Dichotomy in Early Medieval Archaeology”, in W. Pohl, G. Heydemann (eds), Post-Roman Transitions. Christian and Barbarian Identities in the Early Medieval West, Turnhout, Brepols, 2013, pp. 365–406. Schopenhauer, A.  The World as Will and Representation, vol.  2 (transl. R. B. Haldane and J. Kemp), London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1896. Seaford R., Wilkins J. Wright M. (eds), Selfhood and the Soul. Essays on Ancient Thought and Literature in Honour of  Christopher Gill, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2017. Simmel G., The Sociology of  Georg Simmel (ed. K. H. Wolff), Glencoe, Illinois, Free Press, 1950. Simon S., “Language and Identity”, in S. Simons, Hellenism and Empire. Language, Classicism, and Power in the Greek World ad 50– 250, Oxford University Press, 1996, pp. 17–42. Smith J. Z., “What a Difference a Difference Makes”, in J. Z. Smith, Relating Religion: Essays in the History of  Religions, Chicago, London, University of  Chicago Press, pp. 251–302. 34

INTRODUCTION

Smith J.  Z., “Differential Equations: On Constructing the Other”, in J. Z. Smith, Relating Religion: Essays in the History of  Religions, Chicago, London, University of  Chicago Press, pp. 230–50. Smith J. Z., Relating Religion: Essays in the Study of  Religion, Chicago, University of  Chicago Press, 2004. Snell B., Die Entdeckung des Geistes, Hamburg, Claassen & Goverts, 1948. Sorabji R., “Graeco-Roman Varieties of  Self ”, in P. Remes, J. Sihvola (eds),  Ancient Philosophy of  the Self, Uppsala, Springer, pp. 17–34. Sorabji R., Self. Ancient and Modern Insights about Individuality, Life, and Death, Chicago, The University of  Chicago Press, 2006. Taylor C., Sources of  the Self. The Making of  the Modern Identity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1989. Turner V., Dramas, Fields, and Metaphors: Symbolic Action in Human Society (Ithaca, 1974). Whitmarsh T., The Second Sophistic, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005. Whitmarsh T., Greek Literature and the Literature of  the Roman Empire, Oxford University Press, 2001. Williams B., Shame and Necessity, Berkeley, CA, California University Press, 1993. Williamson G., “Aspects of  Identity”, in C. Howgego, V. Heuchert, A.  Burnett (eds), Coinage and Identity in the Roman Provinces, Oxford University Press, UK, 2007, pp. 20–27. Wittgenstein L., Tractatus logico-philosophicus, Werkausgabe in 8 Bänden - Band 1: Tractatus logico-philosophicus. Tagebücher 1914–1916. Philosophische Untersuchungen (Neu durchgesehen von Joachim Schulte). Frankfurt am Main, Suhrkamp Verlag, 1984.

35

I.

ROMAN IDENTITY IN (AUTO)BIOGRAPHICAL TEXTS

FRANCESCO GINELLI University of  Milan

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES ROMAN IDENTITY AND MODELS OF  BEHAVIOUR IN NEPOS’ PUNIC LIVES

Nowadays, it is widely accepted that Cornelius Nepos’ Liber de excellentibus ducibus exterarum gentium (“Book on the eminent commanders of  foreign nations”) cannot be seen as a mere collection of  biographies written for documentary and entertainment purposes only. On the contrary, the Liber has been designed and organised in line with specific aims and attitudes, which are as much political as ethical.1 It therefore follows that the selection of  subjects and anecdotes, at least in this specific book,2 complies 1  Among the most recent and general studies on this point see M. L. Amerio, “I duces di Cornelio Nepote, la propaganda politica di Ottaviano ed Antonio e le proscrizioni triumvirali”, InvLuc 13–14 (1991–1992), pp. 5–46; L. Piccirilli, “I testi biografici come testimonianza della storia della mentalità”, in W.  W. Ehlers (ed.), La biographie antique, Vandœuvres-Geneva, Fondation Hardt, 1998, pp. 156–58; P. Schenk, “At id quidem nostris moribus nefas habetur: rhetorische Kunst und interkultureller Diskurs in der praefatio des Cornelius Nepos”, GFA 7 (2004), pp. 163–83; M. Pfeiffer, R. Nickel (eds), Cornelius Nepos, Berühmte Männer, Düsseldorf, Sammlung Tusculum, 2006, pp. 371–74 and 384–91; M. Ledentu, “Les Vies de Cornélius Népos: une nuovelle manière d’écrire l’histoire à Rome?”, Interférences [En ligne] 5 (2009), pp. 2–14 [1–26]; T.  Hägg, The Art of  Biography in Antiquity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2012, pp. 185–97 (specifically on the Life of  Atticus); R. Stem, The Political Biographies of  Cornelius Nepos, Ann Arbor, University of  Michigan Press, 2012, pp. 96–127 and 162–228); M. Bettini, “Cornelio Nepote e un modo di pensare molto romano”, in G. Solaro (ed.), La Roma di Cornelio Nepote, Roma, Aracne, 2013, pp. 13–20. 2  Very little is known on the contents, arrangements, and narrative strategies of  the other (at least sixteen) libri that originally constituted the De viris illustribus. Attempts to reconstruct the general contents of  these deperditi libri can be found in T. G. McCarty, Cornelius Nepos. Studies in his Technique of  Biography, Diss. Univ. of  Michigan, 1970, pp. 23–30; J. Geiger, Cornelius Nepos and Ancient Political Biography, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner, 1985, pp. 87–88 with C. Tuplin, This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 39–69 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128691

39

F. GINELLI

with those same political and moralistic principles. Every character in the Liber seems to be portrayed as the exemplary proponent of  a  specific typology of  moral behaviour or political parabola. From this point of  view, one may note that, in Nepos’ Liber, Miltiades and Themistocles become the paradigmatic examples of  the politician who rescued his homeland, but is  the victim of  the envy of  his fellow-citizens, Aristides is  the champion of  virtue, Pausanias and Lysander are examples of  what a will for absolute power can lead to, and Cimon demonstrates how virtue and intellect can help men to reach success starting from humble origins. This catalogue, which arguably continues until the last vita of  the Liber,3 exemplifies an interest in paradigmatic individualities (and, therefore, for the history of  these individualities, i.e. for biographical writing) 4 that was developing in Rome during the first century bce. Volcatius Sedigitus, a Roman erudite and poet who flourished around the beginning of  the first century, enumerated the principal Latin comics in a  Canon written in iambic senarii and arranged in order of  merit.5 Just a few years later, “Nepos and the Origin of  Political Biography”, Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History 10 (2000), pp. 124–61; Stem, The Political, pp. 11–30. See also the introductory chapters on the De viris illustribus and the Liber in F. Ginelli, Cornelius Nepos: The Commanders of  the Fifth Century bce. Introduction, Text, and Commentary, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2021, pp. 4–17. 3  See, for example, the close examination of  the long biographies of  Epaminondas, Agesilaus, and Pelopidas made by Stem, The Political, pp.  162–228. In this chapter, Stem rightly asserts that Nepos described these commanders as the exemplary models of  three different political and military virtues, respectively Epaminondas, or he “who achieves preeminence”, Pelopidas, or he “who resists tyranny”, and Agesilaus, or he “who respects limits”. See also L. Agnes, Cornelio Nepote, Opere, Torino, UTET, 1977, pp.  23–24 and the introductory chapter on “Themes” in Ginelli, Commentary, pp. 37–40. Similar observations can be applied also to other biographers, see in this volume J. Brandão, “Performing Roman Identity”, on the characters of  Suetonius’ Twelve Caesars. 4   On the development of  Latin biography during the first century bce see, as a preliminary study, G. Brugnoli, “Nascita e sviluppo della biografia romana: aspetti e  problemi”, in I.  Gallo, L.  Nicastri (eds), Biografia e  autobiografia degli antichi e dei moderni, Napoli, ESI, 1995, pp. 79–108. 5   Fr. 1 Morel preserved in Gellius  XV,  24. On the fragment from Gellius and the contents of  the Canon see A.  Lehmann, “Volcacius Sedigitus, auteur du premier canon des poètes comiques latins”, Latomus 70/2 (2011), pp. 330– 55; A.  Barbieri, “Gellio e  il canone di Volcacio Sedigito”, Philologia Antiqua 6 (2013), pp. 35–48.

40

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

Varro Reatinus had developed an even deeper interest in personalities, as shown by the Imagines (which, according to Pliny and Gellius,6 collected 700 portraits of illustrious men with brief  descriptions in verse and prose, all arranged in formations of seven, as suggested by the parallel Greek title Hebdomades) 7 and by an autobiographical work known as De  vita sua (“On his life”).8 Varro also delved into the connection between the identity of  a  character and a  specific behaviour, as one may infer through the analysis of  fragments from the Logistoricon libri: 76 books composed of  prosaic dialogues on moral, philosophical, and antiquarian issues, with the title of  each book based on the name of  a  character who was deemed to model a  specific topic, such as the Marius, de fortuna (“Marius, on fortune”), or Cato, de liberis educandis (“Cato, on the education of  children”), or Messala, de valetudine (“Messala, on health”).9 To suggest that these works 6   See the passages collected in E. Norden, Varro’s Imagines. Mit Vorw. und einer Einf. hrsg. von Kytzler Bernhard, Berlin, Akademie-Verlag, 1990. 7  Atticus was the author of  a similar work, also known as Imagines. The connection and the chronology between the two collections are still debated due to the lack of  textual evidence. See F. M. Prokoph, “Cornelius Nepos und ein Stück Literaturgeschichte: Indizien zur Chronologie der Imagines des Atticus und des Varro”, in B.  Dunsch, F.  M. Prokoph (eds), Geschichte und Gegenwart: Beiträge zu Cornelius Nepos aus Fachwissenschaft, Fachdidaktik und Unterrichtspraxis, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 2015, pp. 85–133, who suggests that the date of  composition of  Atticus’ Imagines should be altered: the project of  this collection was quite contemporary, or even precedent, to that of  Varro. Nevertheless, the flourishing of  similar works in such a short interval of  time is a further proof  of  a rising interest in biographical matters in the first century bce Rome. 8  H.  Dahlmann, “Varro De  vita sua ad Libonem”, Philologus 97 (1948), pp. 365–68; A. Momigliano, The Development of  Greek Biography. Expanded Ed., Cambridge (Mass.)-London, Harvard University Press, 1993, p. 97, n. 36; J. Tatum, “The Late Republic: Autobiographies and Memoirs in the Age of  the Civil Wars”, in G.  Marasco (ed.), Political Autobiographies and Memoirs in Antiquity. A Brill Companion, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2011, pp. 161–87. 9  On the genre and contents of  Varro’s Logistorici see E. Bolisani, I Logi­ sto­rici varroniani, Padova, Tip. Del Messaggero, 1937; B. Zucchelli, “Sui Logi­ sto­rici di Varrone”, in Studi su Varrone, sulla retorica, storiografica e poesia latina. Scritti in onore di Benedetto Riposati, Rieti-Milano, Centro di studi varroniani Università cattolica del S. Cuore di Milano, 1979, pp. 587–602; Y. Lehmann, “Les Logistorici de Varron: morphologie d’un genre littéraire”, in P.  Defosse, Hommages à  Carl Deroux. 2: Prose et linguistique, medicine, Collection Latomus 267, Bruxelles, Latomus, 2002, pp. 252–55; Y. Lehmann, “Originalité et finalité des Logistorici de Varron”, in J-Y. Guillaumin, S. Ratti (eds), Autour de Lactance : hommages à Pierre Monat, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 2003, pp. 297– 300; L. Piacente, “Sopravvivenze dei classici: i Logistorici di Varrone”, InvLuc

41

F. GINELLI

influenced Cicero’s dialogues, such as the Laelius, de amicitia (“Laelius, on friendship”) and the Cato Maior, de senectute (“Cato the Elder, on oldness”), would be plausible.10 As already noted, this interest in the connection between “illustrious men” and “models of  behaviour” also pertains to Nepos’ Liber. Based on this premise, it follows that, from Nepos’ point of  view, biography is a literary genre that can (and should) have pedagogic aims, since it offers the opportunity to select a (historical) character and to “design” or “propose” him in such a way as to convey specific information to an audience.11 The study of  characters and personalities implies, however, a  preliminary analysis of  social identity and of  qualities or traditions that best distinguish a  group, culture, or people as a  single individuality. This kind of  analysis therefore requires a  common ground of  values and morals. In  such a  context, the history of  illustrious subjects and the way they acted at specific moments of  their lives can be used to propose models of  behaviour through a process of  comparison: the biographer selects specific anecdotes that underline similarities and dissimilarities between what the biographical subject did and what the reader should do in a similar situation or context.12 This “learning through comparison” process can 20 (1998), pp.  191–99. Varro also dealt with literary genres and methodological issues, as can be inferred from a dialogue titled Sisenna, de historia (“Sisenna, on history”), see A.  Lehmann, Y.  Lehmann, “Philosophie et rhétorique dans le logistoricus Sisenna, de historia de Varron”, CEA 42 (2005), pp.  225–36. See also Y.  Lehmann, “Le merveilleux scientifique dans le Logistoricus Gallus Fundanius de admirandis de Varron”, in J.  Champeaux, M.  Chassignet (eds), Aere perennius: en hommage à Hubert Zehnacker, Paris, Pr. de l’Université de Paris-­Sorbonne, 2006, pp.  553–62; Y.  Lehmann, “Rhétorique et religion dans le logistoricus Marius, de Fortuna de Varron”, in D. Briq  uel, C. Février, C. Guittard (eds), Varietates Fortunae: religion et mythologie à Rome: hommage à Jacqueline Champeaux, Paris, Pr. de l’Université de Paris-Sorbonne, 2010, pp. 175–85. 10 See G. Castelli, “Il Cato maior de senectute come Ἡρακλείδειον”, RSA 20 (1972), pp. 5–12; J. G. F. Powell, Cicero: Cato Maior de Senectute. Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1988, pp. 6–9. 11  See, for example, Hannibal 13, 4, where Nepos explains why he decided to write a pair of  books on this same theme: to judge (iudicare) which imperatores, foreign or Roman, are to be preferred (praeferendi sint). 12  It is a principle common to ancient historiography, as effectively explained in this volume by N. S. Rodrigues, “Lucretia, Tullia and Tanaquil”.

42

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

be applied to many kinds of  subjects, even to enemies; however, it  demands a  favorable reception by the reader through the socalled “cultural relativism”, which is  the most appropriate tool used by biographers to render cultural and social differences more acceptable for their audience.13 Given these preliminary remarks, the paper intends to focus on one particular aspect of  Cornelius Nepos’ pedagogic and ethical use of  biography. More specifically, it aims to explain how Nepos employed the biographies of  Hamilcar and Hannibal (the only two vitae of  enemies of  Rome included in the Liber) not only to illustrate behaviours which are commonly dismissed as contrary to national identity, but also to underline that even (illustrious) enemies can display values that are typical of  Roman culture and identity or that should be judged in a positive light. By doing so, the following chapters will focus on a small but significant number of  case studies taken from both these biographies.

13  On Nepos’ “cultural relativism” see, among the most recent studies, F.-H. Mutschler, “Moralischer Relativismus bei Nepos?”, in A.  Haltenhoff, F.-H.  Mutschler (eds), Hortus litterarum antiquarum. Festschrift fur Hans Armin Gärtner zum 70. Geburtstag, Heidelberg, C. Winter Universitätsverlag, 2000, pp.  391–406; J.-P.  Hallett, “Cornelius Nepos and Constructions of  Gender in Augustan Poetry”, in P.  Defosse (éd.), Hommages à  Carl Deroux. Vol. 1. Poésie, Collection Latomus 266, Bruxelles, Latomus, 2002, pp.  254–66; P.  Schenk, At  id quidem; B.  Truschnegg, “Genderaspekte in den Viten des Cornelius Nepos”, in C. Ulf, R. Rollinger, K. Schnegg (eds), Frauen und Geschlechter. Bilder - Rollen - Realitäten in den Texten antiker Autoren zwischen Antike und Mittelalter, Wien-Köln-Weimar, Böhlau, 2006, pp. 187–207; A. Borgo, “La biografia e  il suo pubblico: convenzioni di genere e nuove istanze culturali nella prefazione delle Vite di Cornelio Nepote”, BStudLat 38/2 (2008), pp. 474– 75; R. Stem, “Shared Virtues and the Limits of  Relativism in Nepos’ Epaminondas and Atticus”, CJ 105/2 (2009–2010), pp.  123–36; Stem, The Political, pp. 140–61; A. Sebastiani, “Il relativismo etico nella Praefatio di Nepote tra obbedienza al mos maiorum e apertura cosmopolita. Due sistemi di valori a confronto”, in F. Introna, A. Sebastiani, Cornelio Nepote: Vite dei massimi condottieri. Introduzione di F. Introna. Traduzione e note di A. Sebastiani, Siena, Barbera, 2012, pp. 301–31; L. Prandi, “Storie dei Greci in Cornelio Nepote”, in G. Bernardi Perini, A. Cavarzere (eds), Orizzonti culturali di Cornelio Nepote dal Po a Roma. Atti del Convegno: Ostiglia 27 aprile 2012 - Mantova 28 aprile 2012, Firenze, Olschki, 2013, p.  63‒74; Bettini, Cornelio; G.  Bonaccorso, “Non eadem omnibus esse honesta: elementi di scetticismo nella prefazione di Cornelio Nepote”, Pan n.s. 4 (2015), pp. 21–27.

43

F. GINELLI

1. Hamilcar: The Model of  a Commander Who Never Surrenders Nepos’ biography of  Hamilcar 14 is among the mid-length biographies of  the Liber and consists of  five sections: 1) a  short introduction (Hamilcar 1, 1–2), in which Nepos gives a general overview of  Hamilcar’s military virtues; 2) the inflexible defense of  Eryx (Hamilcar 1,  2–5); 3) the war against the mercenaries in Africa (Hamilcar 2); 4) the campaigns in Hispania and the rumored relationship with Hasdrubal the Fair (Hamilcar 3); 5) the death of  Hamilcar in a battle against the Vettones (Hamilcar 4). From this summary, it is evident that Nepos omits many important details about Hamilcar’s life, such as the composition of  the family, his military skills, especially in guerrilla warfare and in the use of  cavalry and elephants, or his politics in Carthage. Even the military operations in Sicily, the war against the mercenaries in North Africa, and the campaigns in Hispania are described generically. This biographical strategy and arrangement of  narrative material exemplify the criterion of  selectivity that lies at the heart of  biographical writing, especially when a biographer is forced to provide the most complete portrait of  a subject in a reduced narrative space.15 Nepos aims to label the subjects of  the Liber as models of  specific behaviours, and so he selects only those episodes and anecdotes which are most suitable for describing the model, identity, or behaviour he has in mind. Regarding Hamilcar, Nepos ostensibly seeks to portray the Carthaginian as the model of  a com14  All quotations from Nepos’ texts are from P. K. Marshall, Cornelii Ne­ potis vitae cum fragmentis, Leipzig, B. G. Teubner, 19852. [First. ed. 1977]. Translations follow J. C. Rolfe, Cornelius Nepos, On Great Generals, On Historians, Cambridge (Mass.)-London, Harvard University Press, 19942. [First. ed. with Florus 1929]. 15 See Momigliano, The Development, p. 11. More specifically on Nepos’ concept of  biography see McCarty, Cornelius, pp.  111–16; J.  Beneker, “Nepos’ Biographical Method in the Lives of  Foreign Generals”, CJ 105/2 (2009– 2010), pp. 118–20; Ledentu, Les Vies, pp. 4–8; Stem, The Political, pp. 128–61; Ginelli, Commentary, pp. 17–27. See also the preface to the Liber (esp. 1, 8) and Epaminondas 4, 6 on the small narrative space available for the biographer; Epaminondas 1 and Pelopidas 1 on the importance of  selectiveness for biographical writing (on this topic see also the opening remarks in Plutarch’s biography of  Alexander).

44

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

mander who never retreats or surrenders in the face of  an enemy, even when that enemy is  clearly better equipped and armed than he. Therefore, the episodes concerning the defense of  Eryx against the Romans or the war against the mercenaries who revolted against Carthage are better described than Hamilcar’s youth or his relationship with Hasdrubal, or even the successful military campaigns in Hispania. Nepos evidently knows that his audience, notwithstanding its lack of  historical understanding,16 is  aware that Hamilcar was one of  the most dangerous enemies Rome has ever encountered: Punic wars were an important part of  national history and the memory of  these events (especially those concerning the Second Punic War) lived on in collective consciousness.17 Therefore, Nepos does not omit anecdotes related to Hamilcar’s hostile nature. Even though Carthage was 16  Nepos addressed his public generically at Praefatio 1,  1–3. Here Nepos asserts that he is sure that most of  his readers, unfamiliar with Greek language and culture, will probably criticise him for having written about Greeks and their un-Roman customs. In Pelopidas 1, 1 Nepos is uncertain of  how to describe Pelopidas’ merits because Pelopidas is  better known to historians than to the general public. According to most interpreters, Nepos is  addressing a  middleclass reader, who is interested in history and Greek culture. Geiger, Cornelius, pp. 70–71 and N. Horsfall, Cornelius Nepos. A Selection Including the Lives of  Cato and Atticus, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1989, p. xix argued that Nepos’ audience was Greekless middle-cultured public, but leisured. Other scholars described a better-educated public, see M. Citroni, “I destinatari contemporanei”, in G. Cavallo, P. Fedeli, A. Giardina (eds), Lo spazio letterario di Roma antica. Vol. III. La ricezione del testo, Roma, Salerno, 1990, pp. 72–73; Piccirilli, Testi, p.  158; Schenk, At  id quidem; A.  I. Martín Ferreira, “Cornelio Nepote: revisión de un clásico a  través de su público”, Minerva 18 (2005), p.  125 and pp.  129–35; Borgo, La biografia; G.  O. Hutchinson, Greek to Latin: Frameworks and Contexts for intertextuality, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013, p. 240 and n. 37. E. Rawson, Intellectual Life in Late Roman Republic, London, Duckworth, 1985, p.  49. R.  Syme, Sallust, BerkleyLos Angeles, University of  California Press, 1964, p.  261 suggested that the De viris illustribus was a sort of  textbook, but see also the persuading confutation by Tuplin, Nepos, pp. 154–59. 17 See, as preliminary study on the memories of  the First Punic War, B. Bleckmann, “Roman Politics in the First Punic War”, in D. Hoyos (ed.), A  Companion to the Punic Wars, Oxford-Malden (Mass.), 2011, pp.  167–83; more copious bibliography on the Second, such as the monumental A. J. Toynbee, Hannibal’s Legacy. The Hannibalic War’s Effects on Roman Life. Vols  I and II, London, Oxford University Press, 1965 and D.  Hoyos, Hannibal’s Dynasty. Power and Politics in the Western Mediterranean, 247–183 bc, LondonNew York, Routledge, 2003; G. Brizzi, “Carthage and Hannibal in Roman and Greek memory”, in Hoyos (ed.), A Companion, pp. 483–98.

45

F. GINELLI

exhausted by a  long and unsuccessful war in Sicily, Hamilcar brooded over the idea of  attacking the Romans, cf.  Hamilcar 1, 3–4: Ille [scil. Hamilcar] etsi flagrabat bellandi cupiditate, tamen paci seruiundum putauit, quod patriam exhaustam sumptibus diutius calamitates belli ferre non posse intellegebat, sed ita ut statim mente agitaret, si paulum modo res essent refectae, bellum renouare Romanosque armis persequi.18 Nepos employs specific expressions, such as flagrabat bellandi cupiditate and mente agitaret, which evoke the image of  someone with an insane and burning desire for war. Hamilcar’s hatred of  the Romans does not originate from personal defeats suffered on the battleground; rather, it stems from being unable to resolve the disasters of  war (calamitates belli ferre non posse intellegebat). The feeling of  powerlessness and the love for his (defeated) country, Carthage, urge Hamilcar to renew the fight against Rome in every way. Subsequently, after having described the long war led by Hamilcar against the rebellious mercenaries in North Africa, Nepos recounts the Barcid campaigns in Hispania. The biographer asserts that Hamilcar was driven by the need to find a pretext for bringing the Romans to war, cf. Hamilcar 3, 1: Rebus his ex sententia peractis fidenti animo atque infesto Romanis, quo facilius causam bellandi reperiret, effecit ut imperator cum exercitu in Hispaniam mitteretur.19 Even after eight years of  successful battles in Hispania, Hamilcar was still plotting war against Italy (Hamilcar 4, 2: Hic cum in Italiam bellum inferre meditaretur). The hatred that Hamilcar displayed against Rome ran so deep that it persisted even after his death, and it became one of the causes of the Second Punic War.20 Hamilcar filled his son, Hannibal, with feelings of  18   Transl.: “Though he burned with desire for war, yet Hamilcar thought that he ought to strive for peace; for he knew that his country was in financial straits and could no longer support the disasters of  war. But in so doing he at once began to plan to renew the war, if  only Chartage should recover a little strength, and to bear arms against the Romans”. 19  Transl.: “After finishing these tasks to his satisfaction, confident in spirit and hating the Romans, with the view of  more readily finding a pretext for war, he contrived to be sent to Spain in command of  an army”. 20  A long-debated topic. Among the most recent studies see A. Giovannini, “Le droit fécial et la déclaration de guerre de Rome à Carthage en 218 avant J.-C.”, Athenaeum 88/1 (2000), pp. 69–116; J. C. Domínguez Pérez, “El potencial económico de Saiganthé como casus belli en el estallido de la segunda Guerra Púnica”, Latomus 64/3 (2005), pp.  590–600; G.  Manuwald, “The Trojans,

46

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

hatred towards the Romans, cf. Hamilcar 4, 3: Huius perpetuum odium erga Romanos maxime concitasse uidetur secundum bellum Poenicum. Namque Hannibal, filius eius, assiduis patris obtestationibus eo est perductus, ut interire quam Romanos non experiri mallet.21 However, readers of  the Liber do not typically regard Nepos’ Hamilcar with disdain. The biographer describes him as an “honourable” enemy who appears to earn the respect of  the Roman public. In the context of  the Liber, Hamilcar becomes a model of  military excellence and ability who should be imitated by others. From the beginning of  the biography, Nepos describes Hamilcar as a skilful general who has never been formally defeated on the battleground. In  the final stages of  the First Punic War, when Carthage began to suffer the effects of  such a long conflict, Hamilcar was given command of  a small army in Sicily: his forces were mainly comprised of  mercenaries, who had become quite undisciplined because of  overdue payments. Nevertheless, Hamilcar was able to prevent the Romans from leading a successful guerrilla warfare, which created a sort of  stalemate in Sicily, cf. Hamilcar 1,  2: Cum ante eius aduentum et mari et terra male res gererentur Karthaginiensium, ipse ubi adfuit, numquam hosti cessit neque locum nocendi dedit, saepeque e contrario occasione data lacessiuit semperque superior discessit.22 Military genius, strategic intellect and outstanding bravery are the qualities that most clearly define the identity of  Nepos’ Hamilcar, and these qualities are worthy of  being imitated, even by the Romans.23 Nepos stresses two Dido and the Punic war: Silius Italicus on the causes of  the conflict between Romans and Carthaginians”, Aevum(ant) n.s. 6 (2006), pp.  65–83; H.  Beck, “The reasons for the war”, in Hoyos (ed.), A Companion, pp. 225–41; F. Russo, “Sagunto nei trattati romano-cartaginesi”, PP 66 (2011), pp. 81–99. 21 Transl.: “It was this man’s inveterate hatred of  Rome that seems to have been the special cause of  the second Punic war. For his son Hannibal was so affected by his father’s constant entreaties that he preferred to die rather the fail to measure his strength against the Romans”. 22  Transl: “Although before his arrival the Carthaginians were faring badly by land and sea, wherever he was present in person he never yielded to the enemy or gave them a chance to do harm; on the contrary, he often attacked them, when opportunity offered, and invariably came off  victor”. 23   The praise of  Hamilcar’s military skill and abilities in this vita has probably been influenced by the Greek sources that preceded Nepos, especially Polybius, but the moral background of  the biography remains a typical feature of  Nepos’

47

F. GINELLI

elements in this passage: firstly, Hamilcar never once retreated from the enemy (numquam hosti cessit); moreover, he was never defeated (semperque superior discessit).24 A similar context recurs few lines below, at Hamilcar 1, 4–5. Here Nepos asserts that, while Hamilcar was successfully defending Eryx (the last Punic stronghold in Sicily),25 the Carthaginians were defeated by Gaius Lutatius Catulus in the naval battle of  the Aegates Islands (it was 241 bce). Following this massive defeat, the exhausted Carthaginians resolved to put an end to the war and entrusted its negotiation to Hamilcar. Although he ardently desired to continue the fight, it was necessary to make peace with the Romans. Indeed, Hamilcar was aware of  how important the peace treaty was for the future of  Carthage at that specific moment. He was nonetheless planning to resume the war, if  the economic and military conditions of  his country improved a little. He therefore needed to preserve both his arms and honbiographical technique. On the praise of  Hamilcar’s tactical genius among Greek sources see esp. J.  F. Gómez de Caso Zuriaga, “Amílcar Barca y el fracaso militar cartaginés en la última fase de la Primera Guerra Púnica”, Polis 7 (1995), pp. 105–26; Carlos G. Wagner, “Los Bárquidas y la conquista de la Península Ibérica”, Gerión 17 (1999); G. Brizzi, “Amilcare e Santippo: storie di generali”, in Y. Le Bohec (ed.), La première guerre punique : autour de l’œuvre de M. H. Fantar: actes de la table-ronde de Lyon, mercredi 19 mai 1999, Paris, De Boccard, 2001, pp.  29–38; J.  F.  Gómez de Caso Zuriaga, “Amílcar Barca, táctico y estratega: una valoración”, Polis 13 (2001), pp. 33–68. 24  It  is  worth noting that, before Nepos, Polybius proposed a  similar portrait of  Hamilcar. The Roman soldiers around Eryx were worried by the bravery of  Hamilcar, which was what they feared most (1,  60,  8). See also 1,  64,  5–6: πλὴν ἔν γε τῷ προειρημένῳ πολέμῳ τὰς μὲν τῶν πολιτευμάτων ἀμφοτέρων προαιρέσεις ἐφαμίλλους εὕροι τις ἂν γεγενημένας οὐ μόνον ταῖς ἐπιβολαῖς ἀλλὰ καὶ ταῖς μεγαλο­ ψυχίαις, μάλιστα δὲ τῇ περὶ τῶν πρωτείων φιλοτιμίᾳ, τούς γε μὴν ἄνδρας οὐ μικρῷ πολλῷ δὲ γενναιοτέρους ἐν παντὶ Ῥωμαίους: ἡγεμόνα δὲ καὶ γνώμῃ καὶ τόλμῃ θετέον ἄριστον Ἀμίλκαν τῶν τότε γεγονέναι τὸν Βάρκαν ἐπικαλούμενον, πατέρα δὲ κατὰ φύσιν Ἀννίβου τοῦ μετὰ ταῦτα πολεμήσαντος Ῥωμαίοις, “As regards, however, the war of  which we are speaking, one will find its purpose and prosecution on the part of  the two states equally characterized on both sides by enterprise, by lofty spirit, and above all by ambition for supremacy. In  individual courage indeed the Romans were far superior on the whole, but the general to whom the palm must be given both for daring and for genius is Hamilcar called Barcas, the actual father of  that Hannibal who afterwards made war on the Romans”. (Translations from Polybius follow W. R. Paton, Polybius, The Histories. Vol. I, Cambridge (Mass.)-London, Harvard University Press, 1922). On Polybius’ positive opinion on Hamilcar see Gómez de Caso Zuriaga, Fracaso militar, p. 112. 25  On Hamilcar’s outstanding defense of  Eryx see Gómez de Caso Zuriaga, Fracaso militar; Hoyos, Hannibal, pp. 15–20.

48

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

our. With these objectives in mind, he concluded a peace treaty, but handled the negotiations with extraordinary spirit (ferocia). When Catulus refused to end the war unless the Carthaginians laid down their arms and departed from Sicily, Hamilcar replied that, although his country was capitulating, he would rather perish than return home with such great dishonour. It went against his values to hand over to his enemies the very arms he was given to fight against them on behalf  of  his country. Catulus was so impressed by Hamilcar’s principles that he yielded to his firm resolution and granted the enemy the honours of  war.26 Moreover, Catulus conceded that Hamilcar held Roman and Italic prisoners and deserters.27 In  this portrayal, Nepos’ Hamilcar not only preserved his arms and honour, but remains undefeated, at least formally. Nepos also shapes Hamilcar as the model of  a  general who has skills and abilities to impose order and control during warfare. As seen above, the biographer asserts that, towards the end of  the war, Hamilcar (when he was still quite young) was appointed commander of  a  small composite army in Sicily. Although the Carthaginians were defeated many times, both on land and sea, and suffered the loss of  almost all their strongholds in Sicily, Hamilcar, on the contrary, was so capable of  defending Eryx that the war did not even seem to be happening there, cf. Hamilcar 1,  2: Q uo facto, cum paene omnia in Sicilia Poeni amisissent, ille Erycem sic defendit, ut bellum eo loco gestum non uideretur.28 It is only Hamilcar, among the other twenty subjects of  the Liber, 26   In 1, 62–63 Polybius does not mention the honours of  the war that Romans granted Hamilcar, but underlines Hamilcar’s wisdom and practical good sense. Having received full powers from Carthage, Hamilcar realised that he had no reasonable way of  saving his soldiers and therefore he sent Romans an embassy to treat for peace. This is, according to Polybius, a quality of  a good general, see 1, 62, 6. The episode of  the surrender of  the Carthaginian army in Sicily probably echoes philo-chartaginian sources, see F. W. Walbank, A Historical Commentary on Polybius. Vol. 1: Commentary on Books 1–6, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1957, p. 126: “Similarly P. [sc. Polybius] gives full credit to Hamilcar (§§ 3–5; cf. 60. 8, iii. 9.7, and Diod. xxiv. 5.1–2); whereas to the Roman annalistic tradition Sicily was nimis celeri desperatione rerum concessam (Livy, xxi. 1. 5)”. 27 See G. Brizzi, Annibale, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2014, p. 23. 28  Transl.: “Besides that, when the Carthaginians had lost almost everything in Sicily, he defended Eryx with such success that one might have thought that there had been no war in that quarter”.

49

F. GINELLI

who displays this peculiar quality, and this topic has such a meaningful importance that it re-emerges in another passage of  Hamilcar’s biography. Following the end of  the war, Carthage fell under threat by a violent rebellion of  the mercenaries, who had served against the Romans.29 Numerous attempts to subdue the revolt down had been carried out, but all unsuccessfully. The Carthaginians therefore appointed Hamilcar as general. He repelled the enemies away from Carthage and drove them into such narrow and inhospitable spaces that many of  them perished from hunger. Moreover, Hamilcar recovered the allegiance of  rebellious towns, extended the bounds of  the Punic influence, and restored peace to the extent that it seemed as if  there had been no war in Africa for many years, cf. Hamilcar 2, 5: Neque eo fuit contentus, sed etiam finis imperii propagauit, tota Africa tantum otium reddidit, ut nullum in ea bellum uideretur multis annis fuisse.30 Through this analysis, it  is evident that Nepos’ Hamilcar is a complex subject who has multiple identities. On the one hand, he is plainly described as an enemy, who is overcome by an obsessive hatred and implacable desire for revenge against Romans. Such a description presents him as a bad model: Hamilcar is situated alongside the consul Gaius Lutatius Catulus, who emerges, by contrast, as a tempered and reasonable character. This kind of  description aims to define the border between a dangerous enemy (the Carthaginians) and the immediate audience (the Romans). At  the same time, however, Hamilcar’s ferocia and pertinacia shape him as a  model of  military virtue. Note that Nepos here uses ferocia with positive implications, such as “boldness” or “selfconfidence”.31 Nepos and his readers are obviously aware that 29   It  is  the mercenary war of  241–37, also called the “Truceless War”, see L.  Loreto, La Grande Insurrezione Libica contro Cartagine del 241–37 a.C.: una Storia Politica e Militare, Rome, École Française de Rome, 1995; D. Hoyos, Truceless War: Carthage’s Fight for Survival, 241 to 237 bc., Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2007. 30  Transl.: “And not content with that, he even extended the Carthaginian frontiers, and brought about such a state of  peace all over Africa as to make it seem that there had been no war there for many years”. 31  Transl.: “he was so self-confident that”; A-M. Guillemin, Cornélius Népos, Oeuvres, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 19703, p.  132 [First ed. 1923]: “il fit preuve d’une noble fierté”; H. Färber, Cornelius Nepos, Kurzbiographien und fragmente, München, Heimeran, 1952, p.  120: “aber mit solcher Hartnäckigkeit”. Nepos employs ferox/ferocia with the same positive meaning in Themistocles 2,  1, but

50

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

boldness can easily become “arrogance”, flowing into excessive self-confidence, and leading to a (military) defeat. Nepos’ Hamilcar, however, reached his intent (to not lay down his arms) and therefore he displayed an admirable use of  his ferocia.32 In  the same way also pertinacia has a  positive implication in Nepos’ Hamilcar. As  noted by T.  J. Moore, pertinacia, contrary to the label given by Cicero in de inventione 2, 165 (where it is the vice corresponding to the virtue perseverantia), has a wider semantic spectrum. It can be considered a praiseworthy behaviour when it avoids self-destruction and leads to the intended result, especially in the context of  war.33 The tactical genius Hamilcar displays and the value he employs in defending the places he is assigned bring him closer to the image of  the ideal commander. Nepos also includes a  long digression (Hamilcar 3) to contextualise the rumors concerning Hamilcar’s alleged sexual misconduct. When the Carthaginian invaded Hispania, he was accompanied by his son-in-law Hasdrubal the Fair (so called to distinguish him from Hasdrubal Barca, son of  Hamilcar and brother of  Hannibal and Mago). Nepos asserts that with a  negative hint in Eumenes 11,  1 and 4. It  is  worth noting that in these last passages it is used in connection with words pronounced by the enemies of  Eumenes. 32  From this point of  view, Nepos’ characterisation of  Hamilcar’s ferocia recalls that of  Tullus Hostilius in Livy. On Hostilius’ ferocia see G.  Dumézil, Horace et les Curiaces, Paris, Gallimard, 1942, pp. 61–88, but esp. R. J. Penella, “Vires/robur/opes and ferocia in Livy’s account of  Romulus and Tullus Hostilius”, CQ  40 (1990), pp. 211–13. On the ambivalent use of  ferocia see H. W. Traub, “Tacitus’ use of  ferocia”, TAPhA 84 (1953), pp.  250–61 (mainly on Tacitus); K. Eckert, “Ferocia. Untersuchung eines ambivalenten Begriffs”, AU 13/5 (1970), p. 97; J.-H. Michel, “La folie avant Foucault ; furor et ferocia”, AC 50 (1981), pp. 517–25. 33  T.  J. Moore, Artistry and ideology: Livy’s Vocabulary of  Virtue, Frankfurt am Main, Athenäum 1970, pp. 68–72; see esp. p. 70: “The basic difference between pertinacia and perseverantia, however, is not that one is good and successful, the other bad and subject to failure, but that while perseverantia applies only to active pursuance of  a goal (e.g. seeking election, besieging a town, chasing one’s enemies), pertinacia is used more often of  resistance to someone else’s action”. What is  more interesting is  that Livy, who is  little later than Nepos, “considered the Romans to be especially adept at pertinacia. […] Twice the reader [scil. of  Livy] that the Romans besieged Capua pertinacious that Hannibal de­ fended it (26.12.1, 26.38.1), and Roman troops show greater pertinacia than both Punic and Spanish enemies (23.29.8) and their Pergamene allies (35.51.8)” (p. 71).

51

F. GINELLI

Hasdrubal (the Fair) was a person of noble birth and great beauty, who, as some have said, was beloved by Hamilcar less honourably than was expected: quem nonnulli diligi turpius, quam par erat, ab Hamilcare loquebantur (Hamilcar 3,  2). From Nepos’ point of  view, rumours 34 are the consequence of  success: many of  the illustrious men of  the Liber suffered the envy of  their fellow citizens, e.g. Miltiades (Miltiades 8), Themistocles (Themistocles 8), Aristides (Aristides 1), Cimon (Cimon 3), Chabrias (Chabrias 3), Timotheus (Timotheus 3), Datames (Datames 5), Epaminondas (Epaminondas 7), Phocion (Phocion 2), Timoleon (Timoleon 1). Nepos’ Hamilcar, however, is aware of  Hasdrubal’s talent 35 and, aiming to elude the restrictions imposed by moral censorship,36 gives Hasdrubal his daughter’s hand in marriage: 37 according to Nepos, Carthaginian tradition could not prevent a father-in-law from fraternising with his son-in-law.38 Nepos realised that such a digression could confuse his readers and therefore feels the need to justify it: he introduces Hasdrubal because he takes command of  the army following Hamilcar’s death, and then goes on to achieve great things. However, Hasdrubal deserves further attention in Nepos’ opinion, since he was the first to corrupt the ancient manners of  the 34  The same rumors are also attested in Livy (22, 2, 3–4), but, as in Nepos’ texts, they seem to be the effect of  envy towards Hasdrubal’s political and military ability, see G. Cipriani, “L’assassinio di Asdrubale: aspetti ‘capitali’ di lessico e di rito (Livio 21, 2)”, BSL 22 (1992), pp. 233–34; Hoyos, Truceless War, p. 35; E.  MacDonald, Hannibal: a  Hellenistic life, New Haven (Conn.)-London, Yale University Press, 2015, p. 68. 35   On Hasdrubal’ talent in politics and warfare see Cipriani, Assassinio; B. D. Hoyos, “Barcid ‘proconsuls’ and Punic politics, 237-218 B.C.”, RhM 137/3-4 (1994), pp. 246–74; Hoyos, Truceless War, pp. 73–86. 36   Hamilcar 3, 2. Note that Nepos, here as in other biographies, “translates” foreign political offices in Roman terms, see Stem, Political, p. 147: “Nepos collapses the differences himself  through elision or syncretism”. See also F. Ginelli, “Interpolazioni in Cornelio Nepote (a proposito di Cim. 3.1 e Con. 3.3)”, Prometheus 41 (2015), pp.  186–88. It  is  a  narrative strategy that helps readers to better perceive foreign cultures; moreover, it positions the general context of  the biography (and, therefore, of  the virtues that Nepos finds to be exemplary) more closely to contemporary Roman society. 37  Hamilcar 3,  2. From Nepos’ passage it  is not clear when Hamilcar gave his daughter’s hand in marriage to Hasdrubal. However, the fact that Hasdrubal went to Hispania with Hamilcar suggests that the marriage was celebrated before Hamilcar’s expedition, see Hoyos, Hannibal, pp. 21–22; 35. 38  This law, however, seems not to be attested elsewhere.

52

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

Carthaginians through monetary gifts: princeps largitione uetustos peruertit mores Karthaginiensium (Hamilcar 3, 3).39 This is a short clause, placed in the middle of  a  longer chapter; nevertheless, it has a striking effect on the general background, in that it highlights the contrast between Hamilcar and Hasdrubal and depicts Hamilcar as an upstanding and virtuous man, far from lavishness. It must also be noted that Nepos produces a distorted interpretation of  the facts in order to move Hamilcar closer to Roman models of  honesty and virtue. Hasdrubal tried to claim a personal power over the model of  Hellenistic monarchies; however, the increasing degree of  richness and luxury in Carthage was partially caused by Hamilcar’s politics of  conquest.40 This must be regarded as further evidence that biography can be shaped and “appropriately” designed to present specific examples of  virtue to its reader, who will adopt and imitate what he considers corresponding to his own models of  behaviour, but who, in the meantime, will also reject what he perceives as unrelated to his (Roman) identity. This mechanism becomes increasingly evident as Nepos turns to his biography of  Hannibal.

2. Nepos’ Hannibal: An Enemy with a Double Identity From the Second Punic War until the first century bce, Hannibal was the (foreign) enemy par excellence. Nobody, except him, was able to keep Rome in check for so many years. It is therefore understandable that Hannibal has become a point of  reference: not only for Roman history, but also for Roman identity itself. The presence of  an enemy (either real or fictitious; that is another matter) contributes to defining the “identity” and “values” of  39 In Nepos’ Liber, largitio is a kind of  corruption often ascribed to political leaders. Nepos sees it (sometimes forcing historical evidence) as one of  the causes of  the moral corruption of  an entire people. On allusions to contemporary politics in the Liber, here specifically to largitiones and political corruption, see A. C. Dionisotti, “Nepos and the generals”, JRS 78 (1988), p. 39. 40  It is worth noting that Hamilcar had already tried to establish a kind of  “personal” power in Hispania, see Hoyos, Barcid “proconsuls” and Punic politics and Truceless War, p.  52; Wagner, Los Bárquidas; on numismatic evidences, see A. Fariselli, “Il progetto politico dei Barcidi”, Pallas 70 (2006), 105–22.

53

F. GINELLI

a nation. As observed by U. Eco, challenging an enemy promotes a deeper sense of  unity that can prevent the collapse of  a national identity.41 From the very beginning of  the vita of  Hannibal, Nepos pursues this idea: according to the biographer, the Romans excelled all others in virtue since they were able to defeat Hannibal, who had equally surpassed all other commanders in ability, cf. Hannibal 1, 1: si uerum est, quod nemo dubitat, ut populus Romanus omnes gentes uirtute superarit, non est infitiandum Hannibalem tanto praestitisse ceteros imperatores prudentia, quanto populus Romanus antecedat fortitudine cunctas nationes.42 Nepos underscores here the sheer extent of  the existing border between the populus Romanus and omnes gentes or cunctas nationes. Moreover, the victory over Hannibal should not be ascribed to a single man, but (again) to the populus Romanus. Nepos seems to suggest that one of  the main virtues of  the Roman people is its cohesion, and this “mark of  identity” 43 becomes clearer when compared to the inuidia and obtrectatio of  the Carthaginians, which undermined Hannibal’s chances of  victory. As in the previous biography of  Hamilcar, Nepos emphasises Hannibal’s hatred against the Romans. It  is  part of  his father’s legacy, cf.  Hannibal 1,  3: Hic autem uelut hereditate relictum odium paternum erga Romanos sic conseruauit, ut prius animam quam id deposuerit, qui quidem, cum patria pulsus esset et alienarum opum indigeret, numquam destiterit animo bellare cum Romanis.44 From Nepos’ point of  view, Hannibal possessed a relentless spirit of  revenge: he turned King Philip V of  Macedonia into an enemy of  the Romans, albeit distanced, and inflamed Antiochus, the

  See the essay Costruire il nemico in U. Eco, Costruire il nemico e altri scritti occasionali, Milano, Bompiani, 2011, pp. 9–36. 42  Transl.: “If   it is true, as no one doubts, that the Roman people have surpassed all other nations in valour, it must be admitted that Hannibal excelled all other commanders in skill as much as the Roman people are superior to all nations in bravery”. 43  On this topic see in this volume the paper by C. Pelloso, “Q uirites and Populus Romanus”. 44   Transl.: “Yet after all, he so cherished the hatred of  the Romans which had, as it were, been left him as an inheritance by his father, that he would have given up his life rather than renounce it. Indeed, even after he had been driven from his native land and was dependent on the aid of  the foreigners, he never ceased to war with the Romans in spirit”. 41

54

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

most powerful of  all kings of  that period, with such a craving for war that he even tried to bring armies against Rome from the Red Sea, cf. Hannibal 2, 1: Nam ut omittam Philippum, quem absens hostem reddidit Romanis, omnium iis temporibus potentissimus rex Antiochus fuit. Hunc tanta cupiditate incendit bellandi, ut usque a  rubro mari arma conatus sit inferre Italiae.45 Hannibal also influenced Prusias of  Bithynia, the last king to give him protection, cf. Hannibal 10, 1–2: Sic conseruatis suis rebus Poenus illusis Cretensibus omnibus ad Prusiam in Pontum peruenit. Apud quem eodem animo fuit erga Italiam neque aliud quicquam egit quam regem armauit et exercuit aduersus Romanos. Q uem cum uideret domesticis opibus minus esse robustum, conciliabat ceteros reges, adiungebat bellicosas nationes.46 Nepos’ interpretation of  the facts is clearly contrived, since the causes of  the war between Rome and, respectively, Philip V of  Macedonia, Antiochus, and Prusias were indeed more complicated, and Hannibal played only a marginal role in these conflicts. However, Nepos needs this kind of portrait in order to pursue his aims: the greater the enemy, the greater the valour of  the nation. From this premise a second aspect emerges: Nepos describes Hannibal as a  man who drives every person he meets towards conflict.47 In Hannibal 2, 2, when the Romans became aware that Hannibal was trying to bring Antiochus into the war, they sent ambassadors to the king in order to render Hannibal an object of suspicion, alleging that the Romans had bribed him and, therefore, that he had changed his sentiments towards Antiochus. When Hannibal learned of  this plot, he tried to persuade Antiochus of  his loyalty, recalling the oath of  eternal hatred against 45   Transl.: “For not mention Philip, whom from afar he made an enemy of  the Romans, he fired Antiochus, the most powerful of  all kings in those times, with such a desire for war, that from far away on the Red Sea he made preparations to invade Italy”. 46  Transl.: “Thus he saved his goods, and having tricked all the Cretans, the Carthaginian joined Prusias in Pontus. At  his court he was of  the same mind towards Italy and gave his entire attention to arming the king and training his forces to meet the Romans. And seeing that Prusias’ personal resources did not give him great strength, he won him the friendship of  the other kings of  that region and allied him with warlike nations”. 47  On the biographical tradition concerning Hannibal after the Second Punic War see Ginelli 2020.

55

F. GINELLI

the Romans that he made in front of  his father, Hamilcar, when he was still young. Similarly, in Hannibal 7 Hannibal ignored the peace treaty signed by the Carthaginians after Zama and remained in command of  the army, continuing the war in North Africa until Publius Sulpicius and Caius Aurelius were elected consuls. However, when Carthaginian ambassadors came to Rome in order to negotiate the status of  their hostages and prisoners, the Romans answered that they would not return the prisoners, because Hannibal, the very cause of  the war, still held military command. Nepos’ Hannibal, however, never becomes an unpleasant subject; on the contrary, he gradually emerges as a figure of fascination. Even if  Hannibal is the enemy who endangered not only the freedom but also the very existence of  Rome, readers of  Nepos’ biography may feel a sort of  affinity with this character. Among the various Latin authors who have written about Hannibal and the Punic wars, Nepos seems to be the one who portrays Hannibal in the best light. Nepos’ Hannibal embodies qualities that typically characterise the identity of  the good Roman general. Furthermore, the numerous military successes that Hannibal achieved – sometimes with poorly prepared and ill-equipped armies  – shape him as better than Roman generals. He surpassed all other commanders in prudentia (Hannibal 1, 1), “the practical wisdom and knowledge of warfare which is expected in a military leader”,48 so that he was superior (Hannibal 1,  2) every time he engaged   Moore, Artistry, p.  110. Moore notes that prudentia is  the virtue of  good sense, connected with knowledge and experience, and it helps politicians and commanders to avoid imprudent and mindless actions. On prudentia as a political and military virtue in the general context of  the late Roman republic see J. Hellegouarc’h, Le vocabulaire latin des relations et des partis politiques sous la republique, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1963, pp. 256–58; E. L. Wheeler, Stratagem and the Vocabulary of  Military Trickery, Leiden-New York-Copenhagen-Cologne, Brill, 1988, pp. 72–73; I. Tondo, Uomini dal naso di cane: figure dell’intelligenza in Roma antica, Roma, Carocci, 2007, pp.  35–89; S.  AubertBaillot, “De  la φρόνησις à  la prudentia”, Mnemosyne (Ser. 4) 68/1 (2015), pp.  68–90. For a  survey of  the bibliography on prudentia up to 2005, mainly in philosophical studies, see S.  Schmuhl, “Klugheit/prudentia/prudence: eine Bibliographie”, in W.  Kersting (ed.), Klugheit, Weilerswist, Velbrück Wissenschaft, 2005, pp. 318–53. Prudentia (and, therefore, prudens) is a virtue that recurs in many biographies of  the Liber, see Miltiades 2,  2; Themistocles 5,  3; Cimon 2, 1; Alcibiades 5, 1; Thrasybulus 1, 4; Conon 1, 2; 4, 3; Epaminondas 3, 1; Eumenes 3, 5; 11, 3; Timoleon 3, 6. 48

56

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

Roman armies in Italy: Longum est omnia enumerare proelia. Q uare unum hoc satis erit dictum, ex quo intellegi possit, quantus ille fuerit: quamdiu in Italia fuit, nemo ei in acie restitit, nemo aduersus eum post Cannensem pugnam in campo castra posuit (Hannibal 5, 4).49 Furthermore, it  is worth noting that Nepos does not depict Hannibal as invoking the stereotypical portrait of  the perfidus Punicus.50 On the contrary, Nepos sees Hannibal as the only Carthaginian to be truly virtuous, eliciting the discredit (obtrectatio) of  his countrymen (Hannibal 1, 2). From Nepos’ point of  view, the stratagems that Hannibal used to win battles against better equipped and larger armies (as when he was commander of  the fleet of  Prusias in the war against Eumenes) are described using the word dolus (Hannibal 10, 4), which is employed here with the neutral meaning of  “trick, stratagem”.51 Nepos, in fact, describes the strategy employed by Hannibal against Eumenes as 49  Transl.: “It would be a long story to enumerate all his battles. Therefore it will suffice to add this one fact, to show how great a  man he was: so long as he was in Italy, no one was a match for him in the field, and after the battle of  Cannae no one encamped face to face with him on open ground”. 50  This, in other sources, is typically referred to the character of  Hannibal, see Livy at 22, 4, 9. On the perfidia or Punica fides see, among others, L. Prandi, “La fides punica e  il pregiudizio anticartaginese”, CISA 6  (1979), pp.  90–97; G. Devallet, “Perfidia plus quam punica: l’image des Carthaginois dans la littérature latine, de la fin de la République à l’époque des Flaviens”, Lalies 16 (1996), pp. 17–28; G. H. Waldherr, “Punica fides: das Bild der Karthager in Rom”, Gymnasium 107/3 (2000), pp. 193–222; G. Brizzi, “Carthage et Rome: quelles prises de contact avec l’hellénisme?”, Pallas 70 (2006), pp. 231–43; A. Pellizzari, “Il pregiudizio anticartaginese nella letteratura tardoantica: la continuità di un cliché”, in P. Desideri (ed.), Antidoron: studi in onore di Barbara Scardigli Forster, Pisa, ETS, 2007, pp. 341–65; A. J. Pomeroy, “Fides in Silius Italicus’ Punica”, in F. Schaffenrath (ed.), Silius Italicus: Akten der Innsbrucker Tagung vom 19.-21. Juni 2008, Bern-Frankfurt am Main, Lang, 2010, pp. 59–76; Brizzi, Carthage, pp. 485–87; I. Eramo, “I triboli di Annibale: nota a Servio ad georg. 1, 153”, InvLuc 35/36 (2013-2014), pp.  85–91; G.  Schade, “ ‘You too, my child?’: on trust and perfidy in classical literature”, SPhP 24/1 (2014), pp. 185–201. Meaningfully, Nepos employs perfidia in the biography of  Lysander to describe his treachery (Lysander 2, 1; 4. 2), see Agnes, Cornelio, p. 120, n. 6: “Lisandro è la perfetta incarnazione dell’autoritarismo terroristico che l’antichità classica ci abbia lasciato”. Other occurrences of  perfidia are in Datames 11,  5; Eumenes 10, 2 and 11, 5, where it describes the behaviour of  those who betrayed Datames and Eumenes. 51  On this (positive) meaning of  dolus in military contexts, and often occurring with prudentia, see Wheeler, Stratagem, pp. 58–63 and 93–103; Tondo, Uomini, pp. 37–39.

57

F. GINELLI

evidence of  Hannibal’s superior consilium and prudentia, cf. Hannibal 11, 7: Sic Hannibal consilio arma Pergamenorum superauit, neque tum solum, sed saepe alias pedestribus copiis pari prudentia pepulit aduersarios.52 Hannibal does not become an example of  perfidia, but he is (paradoxically speaking) a model of fides, which is a distinctive trait of “Romanness”.53 In Nepos’ biography, Hannibal uses the anecdote concerning the oath of  eternal hatred against Rome in order to prove his fides towards Antiochus, who is hosting him (Hannibal 2,  2–3).54 This  is further exemplified by Nepos’ assertion that Hannibal was so loyal to the king that he always offered his support to Antiochus, even when the king was pursuing ill-advised plans (Hannibal 8, 3). Nepos’ Hannibal possesses other physical and intellectual qualities which typically define the identity of  the “ideal Roman”. Nepos praised the Carthaginian for his valetudo: 55 during his military campaign in Italy, he was afflicted with such a violent eye infection that, from then on, he never had good use of his right eye again. However, even while he was being troubled by such ailments and carried in a litter, he defeated the consul Caius Fla52   Transl.: “Thus Hannibal overcame the arms of  Pergamum by strategy; and that was not the only instance of  the kind, but on many other occasions in land battles he defeated his antagonists by a  similar bit of  cleverness”. See also Timotheus 4,  5: Venio nunc ad fortissimum uirum maximique consilii omnium barbarorum, exceptis duobus Karthaginiensibus, Hamilcare et Hannibale, Transl.: “I now pass to the bravest and ablest man of  all the barbarians, with the exception of  the two Carthaginians, Hamilcar and Hannibal”. On consilium as a relevant (military) ethos, see Wheeler, Stratagem, pp. 55–56; Tondo, Uomini, 2007, pp. 69–89; for the Liber see esp. McCarthy, Cornelius, p. 113. 53 See A.  La Penna, “Mobilità dei modelli etici e  relativismo dei valori, da Cornelio Nepote a  Valerio Massimo e  alla Laus Pisonis”, in A.  Giardina, A. Schiavone (eds), Società romana e produzione schiavistica, III. Modelli etici, diritto e trasformazioni sociali, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1981, p. 191, who proposed reading Nepos’ well-balanced biography of  Hannibal as evidence of  a “segno di affrancamento da pregiudizi, ‘angustie nazionali’, di una certa cultura cosmo­ polita”. 54   It is worth noting that, as shown by R. Cristofoli, “Il giuramento di Annibale nei ‘Punica’ di Silio Italico: aspetti storici, ideologici e politici”, BStudLat 39/2 (2009), pp. 474–94, the episode of  Hannibal’s oath was used by Silius Italicus to emphasise continuity of  action between Hamilcar and Hannibal, and this topic was close to the dynastic policy of  the Flavians, who were interested in promoting the idea of  a ruling dynasty that was able to guarantee political continuity. 55   Note that in Timoleon 4, 2 the word valetudo is used to describe the infirmity of  Timoleon.

58

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

minius in the Battle of  Lake Trasimene (Hannibal 4,  3). Hannibal is also a figure to be emulated by politicians thanks to the diligentia that he displayed in both public and political affairs.56 He exhibited in these matters the same zeal that he had employed in war: Hannibal provided, through new taxes, not only the money to be paid to the Romans according to the peace agreement, but also a surplus to be deposited in the treasury (Hannibal 7, 4–5). Along with all his other successes, this was made possible by his calliditas: he was, in fact, uir omnium callidissimus (Hannibal 9,  2, “the most intelligent of  all men”) 57 and fortissimus (Hannibal 13, 1, “the strongest”).

3. Some Conclusions As noted at the beginning of  this paper, Nepos’ biographies cannot be labeled as texts written exclusively for the amusement of  the public. Beyond their interest in great personalities, the vitae of  the Liber also aim to stimulate readers to self-assessment. This reflection on identity clearly emerges in moralising passages, where 56 Cf. Hannibal 7, 4–5. It is a civic and religious quality, often connected with the idea of  accuracy, see Hellegouarc’h, Vocabulaire, pp. 251–52; L. R. Lind, “The idea of  the republic and the foundations of  Roman morality”, in C.  Deroux (ed.), Studies in Latin literature and Roman history, V. Collection Latomus 206, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1989, pp. 5–34; Moore, Artistry, pp. 32–33. In Nepos Liber it also recurs (diligentia/diligens/diligenter) at Themistocles 1, 3; Thrasybulus 4, 4; Conon 1, 2; 5, 3; Dion 1, 4; Datames 1, 2; Epaminondas 3, 1; 7, 1; Eumenes 9, 5. However, it is a quality better related to civic and urban subjects such as Cato and Atticus, cf. Cato 3, 4; Atticus 1, 2; 9, 4; 13, 4 (x2); 13, 5; 18, 1; 21, 5. 57  See also de regibus 5. On magnitudo animi, which translates μεγαλοψυχία (high-mindedness implying the ability to admire one’s own limits, esp. in politics and warfare), see U.  Knoche, Magnitudo animi. Untersuchungen zur Entstehung und Entwicklung eines römischen Wertgedankens, Leipzig, Dieterich, 1935; L. R. Lind, “The tradition of  Roman moral conservatism”, in C. Deroux (ed.), Studies in Latin literature and Roman history, I. Collection Latomus 164, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1979, pp. 7–58; Moore, Artistry, pp. 141–47; R. R. Marchese, “Meritare le responsabilità: il complicato confine tra merito, virtù e gloria in Cice­ rone e in Tacito”, Ὅρμος n.s. 9 (2017), pp. 552–70; S. McConnell, “Magnitudo animi and cosmic politics in Cicero’s De re publica”, CJ 113/1 (2017–2018), pp. 45–70. According to Nepos, it is also a quality of  Themistocles (Themistocles 10, 1); Thrasybulus (Thrasybulus 1, 2), and Eumenes (Eumenes 5, 1). On calliditas as a military quality see Wheeler, Stratagem, pp. 68–69; Tondo, Uomini, p. 71. In the Liber cf. also Themistocles 1, 3; Pausanias 3, 1 (lack of  calliditas); Alcibiades 1, 3; Dion 8, 1; Datames 8, 4; Eumenes 1, 3; 10, 1.

59

F. GINELLI

Nepos interrupts the narration of  events to introduce personal observations and opinions, especially those that concern contemporary politics.58 This moral interest in individuality and identity, however, can also be perceived in the way in which the biographies are arranged and in the narrative strategies adopted by the author. Indeed, the selection of  subjects and anecdotes plays an essential role. Nepos draws on the life and conduct of  his subjects to isolate what he judges to be excellent, and thus worthy of  imitation, from those traits that he blames as unacceptable, and consequently to be avoided by his readers. Nepos clearly proposes his idea and portrait of  the subjects he included in the Liber.59 It  thus becomes clear that the anecdotes collected in the Liber can be used to shape what it means to be a good Roman, at least from the author’s point of view. Nepos uses exemplarity to assign praise and blame to his subjects: 60 they act or re-act in ways that readers will or should emulate.61 Nepos develops them into (good 58  Beside the famous praefatio on the importance of  being open-minded when approaching other cultures and traditions (see also Timotheus 4, 6; Epaminondas 1), cf.  in the Liber: I) placing the good of  the nation before personal interests, cf.  Miltiades 3,  6; Timotheus 1,  3; Agesilaus 4,  3; II) rewards, once highly regarded because they were few and inexpensive, now costly and common, cf. Miltiades 6, 2; Thrasybulus 4, 2–3; III) the envy and volubility of  people Miltiades 8; Themistocles 8, 1; Cimon 3, 1; Dion 10, 2; Chabrias 3, 4; Timotheus 3,  5; Phocion 2,  1; IV) eloquence can prevail over integrity, cf.  Aristides 1,  2; V) the damns of  excessive confidence, cf. Alcibiades 7, 3; Pelopidas 3, 1; VI) volubility of  fortune, cf. Dion 6, 1; Timotheus 4, 1; VII) the unpopularity of  despotism and absolute power, cf. Dion 9, 5; Datames 5, 4; VIII) the lack of  discipline displayed by veterans, cf. Eumenes 8, 2. For a collection of  moralising sentences in Nepos’ biographies see McCarthy, Cornelius, pp. 116–21. 59   On the topic see in this volume the closing remarks by D.  Morelli, “Pythagoreanism and Roman Identity”, esp. p. 155: “There is therefore a historiographical matter: we cannot know how Pythagorean Paullus was, but we can see how Pythagorean Plutarch made him”. 60  On exemplarity see the final remarks in the paper by N. S. Rodrigues, “Lucretia, Tullia and Tanaquil”. 61  As already observed, biography, like other literary genres, stimulates a reflection on mores, see in this volume J. Brandão, “Performing Roman Identity”, p. 185 on Suetonius’ biographies of the twelve Caesars: “While the imperial court helps to modulate transformations serving as an example for society to establish paradigms regarding good and evil, it also reflects the mores of  Roman society. However, in so far as behaviours sometimes reflect trends, tastes and fashions, it is not only a matter of  describing public, but also private, mores, as is stated in the famous partitiones that Suetonius operates in the Lives of  Caesar and Augustus”.

60

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

and bad) examples that comprise a “gallery of  models” for the virtuous Roman of  the late Republican period. Therefore, the models and representations proposed in the Liber recall Nepos’ own perception of  Roman identity and culture. The assimilation and rejection of  qualities, virtues, vices, and behaviours influences the (re)definition, (re)negotiation, and (re)construction of the system of  cultural representations and symbolic patrimonies that mark the border between the “identity of the community” (which shares the same values) and the “otherness”.62 Defining cultural identity through biographies and exemplarity requires that author, reader and text share common values, otherwise comparison, identification, and emulation cannot be activated, as R.  Stem argues: “the definitions of  the virtues and vices have to be normative and static across the relevant historical distance if  the reader is able to apply ethical lessons of  a past event to present circumstances. What Nepos’ exemplary discourse requires, in sum, is the acceptance of  cultural relativism and the rejection of  moral relativism. The virtues have to be timeless, but the context that inculcate them must be variable”.63 It therefore follows that the virtues and behaviours that are generally considered as typical of  the Romans can also be detected in nonRoman subjects, and even in honourable (and defeated) enemies. As underlined in this volume by Teixeira (“When the Emperor is the Other”, p. 228): “the concept of  Roman identity is the result of  multiple influences”, and it is therefore evident that different cultures can have similar models of  behaviour. This is the case of  the Carthaginians of  the Liber, Hamilcar and Hannibal, who, despite evident dissimilarities linked to their status as Carthaginians and enemies, also share evident similarities with Nepos’ ideal portrait of  a  Roman. Nepos aims to show that the virtues and values that usually apply to Roman identity can also be recognisable in unexpected subjects. However, the biographies of  Hamilcar and Hannibal are part of  a broader moralising project which involves all the vitae of  the Liber and Nepos’ idea of  biography: 62  On the rhetorical strategies used to overcome the “identity gap” see in this volume the paper by E. Glas, “Overcoming Otherness in Flavian Rome”, who focuses esp. on Flavius Josephus. 63  Stem, Political, p. 140.

61

F. GINELLI

talking about ethics and identity through cultural relativism and exemplarity. Biographies and anecdotes are presented in such a way as to encourage self-assessment and self-perception, either as single entities or as part of  a community of  people. Comparing the past to the present, otherness with sameness (while always keeping an open-minded and relativistic approach) is  a  way of  shaping a  common cultural identity.64 Nepos’ selection of  distinguished commanders, that was designed and written during a  moment of  transition by a  man of  transition,65 offers a  valid benchmark for studying identity and self-perception in the fields of  Latin and ancient biography.

Bibliography Agnes L., Cornelio Nepote, Opere, Torino, UTET, 1977. Amerio M.  L., “I duces di Cornelio Nepote, la propaganda politica di Ottaviano ed Antonio e  le proscrizioni triumvirali”, InvLuc 13–14 (1991–1992), pp. 5–46. Aubert-Baillot S., “De  la φρόνησις à  la prudential ”, Mnemosyne (Ser. 4) 68/1 (2015), pp. 68–90. Barbieri A., “Gellio e  il canone di Volcacio Sedigito”, Philologia Antiqua 6 (2013), pp. 35–48. Beck H., “The reasons for the war”, D. Hoyos (ed.), A companion to the Punic Wars, Oxford-Malden (Mass.), Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, pp. 225–41. Beneker J., “Nepos’ Biographical Method in the Lives of  Foreign Generals”, CJ 105/2 (2009–2010), pp. 109–21. Bettini M., “Cornelio Nepote e un modo di pensare molto romano”, in G. Solaro (ed.), La Roma di Cornelio Nepote, Roma, Aracne, 2013, pp. 13–20. 64  See the comparative purpose that Nepos states at Hannibal 13, 4: Sed nos tempus est huius libri facere finem et Romanorum explicare imperatores, quo facilius collatis utrorumque factis, qui uiri praeferendi sint, possit iudicari. Biography and exemplarity, again, promote moral and ethical comparison, and support readers in understanding what or who is more worthy of  emulation. On the biographer as a comparative and comprehensive author (who includes whichever materials he thinks are relevant) according to Nepos’ point of  view, see McCarthy, Cornelius, p. 115. 65  See the introduction “Un uomo di transizione” in L.  Canali, Cornelio Nepote, Gli uomini illustri, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1983.

62

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

Bleckmann B., “Roman Politics in the First Punic War”, in D. Hoyos (ed.), A Companion to the Punic Wars, Oxford-Malden (Mass.), Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, pp. 167–83. Bolisani E., I Logistorici varroniani, Padova, Tip. Del Messaggero, 1937. Bonaccorso, G., “Non eadem omnibus esse honesta: elementi di scetticismo nella prefazione di Cornelio Nepote”, Pan n.s. 4  (2015), pp. 21–27. Borgo A., “La biografia e  il suo pubblico: convenzioni di genere e nuove istanze culturali nella prefazione delle Vite di Cornelio Nepote”, BStudLat 38/2 (2008), pp. 463–77. Brizzi G., “Amilcare e Santippo: storie di generali”, in Y. Le Bohec (ed.), La première guerre punique: autour de l’œuvre de M. H. Fantar: actes de la table-ronde de Lyon, mercredi 19 mai 1999, Paris, De Boccard, 2001, pp. 29–38. Brizzi G., “Carthage et Rome: quelles prises de contact avec l’hellénisme?”, Pallas 70 (2006), pp. 231–43. Brizzi G., “Carthage and Hannibal in Roman and Greek memory”, in D.  Hoyos (ed.), A  Companion to the Punic Wars, Oxford-­ Malden (Mass.), Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, pp. 483–98. Brizzi G., Annibale, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2014. Brugnoli G., “Nascita e  sviluppo della biografia romana: aspetti e problemi”, in I. Gallo, L. Nicastri (eds), Biografia e autobiografia degli antichi e dei moderni, Naploli, ESI, 1995, pp. 79–108. Canali L., Cornelio Nepote, Gli uomini illustri, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 1983. Castelli G., “Il Cato maior de senectute come Ἡρακλείδειον”, RSA 20 (1972), pp. 5–12. Cipriani G., “L’assassinio di Asdrubale: aspetti ‘capitali’ di lessico e di rito (Livio 21, 2)”, BSL 22 (1992), pp. 233–59. Citroni M., “I destinatari contemporanei”, in G.  Cavallo, P. Fedeli, A. Giardina (eds), Lo spazio letterario di Roma antica. Vol. III. La ricezione del testo, Roma, Salerno, 1990, pp. 53–116. Cristofoli R., “Il giuramento di Annibale nei ‘Punica’ di Silio Italico: aspetti storici, ideologici e  politici”, BStudLat 39/2 (2009), pp. 474–94. Dahlmann H., “Varro De vita sua ad Libonem”, Philologus 97 (1948), pp. 365–68. Devallet G., “Perfidia plus quam punica: l’image des Carthaginois dans la littérature latine, de la fin de la République à l’époque des Flaviens”, Lalies 16 (1996), pp. 17–28. 63

F. GINELLI

Dionisotti A. C., “Nepos and the generals”, JRS 78 (1988), pp. 35– 49. Domínguez Pérez J. C., “El potencial económico de Saiganthé como casus belli en el estallido de la segunda Guerra Púnica”, Latomus 64/3 (2005), pp. 590–600. Dumézil G., Horace et les Curiaces, Paris, Gallimard, 1942, pp. 61–88. Eckert K., “Ferocia. Untersuchung eines ambivalenten Begriffs”, AU 13/5 (1970), pp. 90–106. Eco U., Costruire il nemico e altri scritti occasionali, Milano, Bompiani, 2011, pp. 9–36. Eramo I., “I triboli di Annibale: nota a Servio ad georg. 1, 153”, InvLuc 35/36 (2013-2014), pp. 85–91. Färber H., Cornelius Nepos, Kurzbiographien und fragmente, München, Heimeran, 1952. Fariselli A., “Il progetto politico dei Barcidi”, Pallas 70 (2006), pp. 105–22. Geiger J., Cornelius Nepos and Ancient Political Biography, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner, 1985. Ginelli F., “Interpolazioni in Cornelio Nepote (a proposito di Cim. 3.1 e Con. 3.3)”, Prometheus 41 (2015), pp. 186–88. Ginelli F., “La tradizione storica e biografica sulla morte di Annibale. Fonti e confronti”, Aevum 94/1 (2020), pp. 91–121. Ginelli F., Cornelius Nepos: The Commanders of the Fifth Century bce. Introduction, Text, and Commentary, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2021. Giovannini A., “Le droit fécial et la déclaration de guerre de Rome à Carthage en 218 avant J.-C.”, Athenaeum 88/1 (2000), pp. 69–116. Gómez de Caso Zuriaga J. F., “Amílcar Barca y el fracaso militar cartaginés en la última fase de la Primera Guerra Púnica”, Polis 7 (1995), pp. 105–26. Gómez de Caso Zuriaga J. F., “Amílcar Barca, táctico y estratega: una valoración”, Polis 13 (2001), pp. 33–68. Guillemin A.-M., Cornélius Népos, Oeuvres, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 19703, 132. [First ed. 1923]. Hägg T., The Art of  Biography in Antiquity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2012. Hallett J.-P., “Cornelius Nepos and Constructions of  Gender in Augustan Poetry”, in P. Defosse (ed.), Hommages à Carl Deroux. Vol. 1. Poésie, Collection Latomus 266, Bruxelles, Latomus, 2002, pp. 254–66. 64

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

Hellegouarc’h J., Le vocabulaire latin des relations et des partis politiques sous la republique, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1963. Horsfall N., Cornelius Nepos. A Selection Including the Lives of Cato and Atticus, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1989. Hoyos D., “Barcid ‘proconsuls’ and Punic politics, 237–18 B.C.”, RhM 137/3–4 (1994), pp. 246–74. Hoyos D., Hannibal’s Dynasty. Power and Politics in the Western Mediterranean, 247–183 bc, London-New York, Routledge, 2003. Hoyos D., Truceless War. Carthage’s Fight for Survival, 241 to 237 bc, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2007. Hutchinson G.  O., Greek to Latin: Frameworks and Contexts for intertextuality, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013. Knoche U., Magnitudo animi. Untersuchungen zur Entstehung und Entwicklung eines römischen Wertgedankens, Leipzig, Dieterich, 1935. La Penna A., “Mobilità dei modelli etici e  relativismo dei valori, da Cornelio Nepote a  Valerio Massimo e  alla Laus Pisonis”, in A. Giardina, A. Schiavone (eds), Società romana e produzione schiavistica, III. Modelli etici, diritto e trasformazioni sociali, RomaBari, Laterza, 1981, pp. 183–206. Ledentu M., “Les Vies de Cornélius Népos: une nuovelle manière d’écrire l’histoire à  Rome?”, Interférences [En ligne] 5  (2009), pp. 2–14 [1–26] URL: http://interferences.revues.org/886. Lehmann A., “Volcacius Sedigitus, auteur du premier canon des poètes comiques latins”, Latomus 70/2 (2011), pp. 330–55. Lehmann A., Lehmann Y., “Philosophie et rhétorique dans le logistoricus Sisenna, de historia de Varron”, CEA 42 (2005), pp. 225–36. Lehmann Y., “Les Logistorici de Varron: morphologie d’un genre littéraire”, in P. Defosse (ed.), Hommages à Carl Deroux. 2: Prose et linguistique, medicine, Collection Latomus 267, Bruxelles, Latomus, 2002, pp. 252–55. Lehmann, Y., “Originalité et finalité des Logistorici de Varron”, in J-Y. Guillaumin, S. Ratti (eds), Autour de Lactance : hommages à Pierre Monat, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 2003, pp. 297–300. Lehmann, Y., “Le merveilleux scientifique dans le Logistoricus Gallus Fundanius de admirandis de Varron”, in J. Champeaux, M. Chassignet (eds), Aere perennius : en hommage à  Hubert Zehnacker, Paris, Pr. de l’Université de Paris-Sorbonne, 2006, pp. 553–62. Lehmann, Y., “Rhétorique et religion dans le logistoricus Marius, de Fortuna de Varron”, in D. Briq  uel, C. Février, C. Guit65

F. GINELLI

tard (eds), Varietates Fortunae: religion et mythologie à  Rome: hommage à  Jacqueline Champeaux, Paris, Pr. de l’Université de Paris-Sorbonne, 2010, pp. 175–85. Lind L.  R., “The tradition of  Roman moral conservatism”, in C. Deroux (ed.), Studies in Latin literature and Roman history, I. Collection Latomus 164, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1979, pp. 7–58. Lind L. R., “The idea of  the republic and the foundations of  Roman morality”, in C.  Deroux (ed.), Studies in Latin literature and Roman history, V.  Collection Latomus 206, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1989, pp. 5–34. Loreto L., La Grande Insurrezione Libica contro Cartagine del 241– 37  a.C.: una Storia Politica e  Militare, Rome, École Française de Rome, 1995. MacDonald E., Hannibal: a Hellenistic life, New Haven (Conn.)London, Yale University Press, 2015. Manuwald G., “The Trojans, Dido and the Punic war: Silius Italicus on the causes of  the conflict between Romans and Carthaginians”, Aevum(ant) n.s. 6 (2006), pp. 65–83. Marchese R. R., “Meritare le responsabilità: il complicato confine tra merito, virtù e  gloria in Cicerone e  in Tacito”, Ὅρμος n.s. 9 (2017), pp. 552–70. Marshall P.  K., Cornelii Nepotis vitae cum fragmentis, Leipzig, B. G. Teubner, 19852. [First. ed. 1977]. Martín Ferreira A.  I., “Cornelio Nepote: revisión de un clásico a través de su público”, Minerva 18 (2005), pp. 117–36. McCarty T. G., Cornelius Nepos. Studies in his Technique of  Biography, Diss. Univ. of  Michigan, 1970. McConnell S., “Magnitudo animi and cosmic politics in Cicero’s De re publica”, CJ 113/1 (2017-2018), pp. 45–70. Michel J.-H., “La folie avant Foucault ; furor et ferocia”, AC 50, 1981, pp. 517–25. Momigliano A., The Development of Greek Biography. Expanded Ed., Cambridge (Mass.)-London, Harvard University Press, 1993. Moore T. J., Artistry and ideology: Livy’s Vocabulary of Virtue, Frankfurt am Main, Athenäum, 1970. Mutschler F.-H., “Moralischer Relativismus bei Nepos?”, in A.  Haltenhoff, F.-H.  Mutschler (eds), Hortus litterarum antiquarum. Festschrift fur Hans Armin Gärtner zum 70. Geburtstag, Heidelberg, C. Winter Universitätsverlag, 2000, pp.  391– 406. 66

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

Norden E., Varro’s Imagines. Mit Vorw. und einer Einf. hrsg. von Kytzler Bernhard, Berlin, Akademie-Verlag, 1990. Paton W. R., Polybius, The Histories. Vol. I, Cambridge (Mass.)-London, Harvard University Press, 1922. Pellizzari A., “Il pregiudizio anticartaginese nella letteratura tardoantica: la continuità di un cliché ”, in P. Desideri (ed.), Antidoron: studi in onore di Barbara Scardigli Forster, Pisa, ETS, 2007, pp. 341–65. Penella R.  J., “Vires/robur/opes and ferocia in Livy’s account of  Romulus and Tullus Hostilius”, CQ  40 (1990), pp. 207–13. Pfeiffer M., Nickel R. (eds), Cornelius Nepos, Berühmte Männer, Düsseldorf, Sammlung Tusculum, 2006. Piacente L., “Sopravvivenze dei classici: i  Logistorici di Varrone”, InvLuc 20, 1998, pp. 191–99. Piccirilli L., “I testi biografici come testimonianza della storia della mentalità”, in W.  W. Ehlers (ed.), La biographie antique, Van­ doeuvres/Geneva, Fondation Hardt, 1998, pp. 147–88. Pomeroy A. J., “Fides in Silius Italicus’ Punica”, in F. Schaffenrath (ed.), Silius Italicus: Akten der Innsbrucker Tagung vom 19.21. Juni 2008, Bern-Frankfurt am Main, Lang, 2010, pp. 59–76. Powell J. G. F., Cicero: Cato Maior de Senectute. Edited with Introduction and Commentary, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1988. Prandi L., “La fides punica e  il pregiudizio anticartaginese”, CISA 6 (1979), pp. 90–97. Prandi L., “Storie dei Greci in Cornelio Nepote”, in G. Bernardi Perini, A.  Cavarzere (eds), Orizzonti culturali di Cornelio Nepote dal Po a Roma. Atti del Convegno: Ostiglia 27 aprile 2012 Mantova 28 aprile 2012, Firenze, Olschki, 2013, pp. 63–74. Prokoph F. M., “Cornelius Nepos und ein Stück Literaturgeschichte: Indizien zur Chronologie der Imagines des Atticus und des Varro”, in B. Dunsch, F. M. Prokoph (eds), Geschichte und Gegenwart: Beiträge zu Cornelius Nepos aus Fachwissenschaft, Fachdidaktik und Unterrichtspraxis, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz Verlag, 2015, pp. 85– 133. Rawson E., Intellectual Life in Late Roman Republic, London, Duckworth, 1985. Rolfe J.  C., Cornelius Nepos, On Great Generals, On Historians, Cambridge (Mass.)-London, Harvard University Press, 19942. [First ed. with Florus 1929; First separated ed. 1984]. 67

F. GINELLI

Russo F., “Sagunto nei trattati romano-cartaginesi”, PP 66 (2011), pp. 81–99. Schade G., “ ‘You too, my child?’: on trust and perfidy in classical literature”, SPhP 24/1 (2014), pp. 185–201. Schenk P., “At id quidem nostris moribus nefas habetur: rhetorische Kunst und interkultureller Diskurs in der praefatio des Cornelius Nepos”, GFA 7 (2004), pp. 163–83. Schmuhl S., “Klugheit/prudentia/prudence: eine Bibliographie”, in W. Kersting (ed.), Klugheit, Weilerwist, Velbrück Wissenschaft, 2005, pp. 318–53. Sebastiani A., “Il relativismo etico nella Praefatio di Nepote tra obbedienza al mos maiorum e  apertura cosmopolita. Due sistemi di valori a confronto”, in F. Introna, A. Sebastiani, Cornelio Nepote: Vite dei massimi condottieri. Introduzione di F. Introna. Traduzione e note di A. Sebastiani, Siena, Barbera, 2012, pp. 301–31. Stem R., “Shared Virtues and the Limits of  Relativism in Nepos’ Epaminondas and Atticus”, CJ 105/2 (2009–2010), pp. 123–36. Stem R., The Political Biographies of  Cornelius Nepos, Ann Arbor, University of  Michigan Press, 2012. Syme R., Sallust, Berkley-Los Angeles, University of  California Press, 1964. Tatum J., “The Late Republic: Autobiographies and Memoirs in the Age of  the Civil Wars”, in G.  Marasco (ed.), Political Autobiographies and Memoirs in Antiquity. A  Brill Companion, LeidenBoston, Brill, 2011, pp. 161–87. Tondo I., Uomini dal naso di cane: figure dell’intelligenza in Roma antica, Roma, Carocci, 2007. Toynbee A.  J., Hannibal’s Legacy. The Hannibalic War’s Effects on Roman Life. Vols I and II, London, Oxford University Press, 1965. Traub H. W., “Tacitus’ use of  ferocia”, TAPhA 84 (1953), pp. 250– 61. Truschnegg B., “Genderaspekte in den Viten des Cornelius Nepos”, in C.  Ulf, R.  Rollinger, K.  Schnegg (eds), Frauen und Geschlechter. Bilder - Rollen - Realitäten in den Texten antiker Autoren zwischen Antike und Mittelalter, Wien-Köln-Weimar, Böhlau, 2006, pp. 187–207. Tuplin C., “Nepos and the Origin of  Political Biography”, Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History 10 (2000), pp. 124–61. Wagner C. G., “Los Bárquidas y la conquista de la Península Ibérica”, Gerión 17 (1999), pp. 263–94. 68

SIMILARITIES AND DISSIMILARITIES

Walbank F. W., A Historical Commentary on Polybius. Vol. 1: Commentary on Books 1–6, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1957. Wheeler E.  L., Stratagem and the Vocabulary of  Military Trickery, Leiden-New York-Copenhagen-Cologne, Brill, 1988, pp. 72–73. Zucchelli B., “Sui Logistorici di Varrone”, in Studi su Varrone, sulla retorica, storiografica e  poesia latina. Scritti in onore di Benedetto Riposati, Rieti-Milano, Centro di studi varroniani - Università cattolica del S. Cuore di Milano, 1979, pp. 587–602.

69

HELEN KAUFMANN University of  Erlangen

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

1. Introduction In his 1995 Nobel prize lecture entitled “Crediting Poetry”, Seamus Heaney describes how his journey from a  crowded rural home to writing poetry began by listening to the kitchen radio through the bedroom wall: I  […] got used to hearing short bursts of  foreign languages as the dial hand swept round from BBC to Radio Eireann, from the intonations of  London to those of  Dublin, and even though I did not understand what was being said in those first encounters with the gutturals and sibilants of  European speech, I  had already begun a  journey into the wideness of  the world beyond. This in turn became a  journey into the wideness of  language, a  journey where each point of  arrival – whether in one’s poetry or one’s life turned out to be a stepping stone rather than a  destination, and it  is that journey which has brought me now to this honoured spot. (S. Heaney, “Crediting poetry”, Nobel lecture, 7 December 19951)

The intricate link between biography and poetry that Heaney suggests here is also at the heart of  Latin verse autobiography. This genre offers a  unique insight into how Roman poets wished to represent themselves to their readers. As a literary form it is only attested at two moments in the history of  the Roman empire, 1  https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1995/heaney/lecture/ [24.06.19]. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 71–90 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128692

71

H. KAUFMANN

and that in a rather small number of  poems. Its first peak coincided with Augustus’ rule in Rome when Horace (Epistles 1,20) and Ovid (Tristia 4,10) each closed a book of  their poetry with sketches of  their origins and lives. The late Roman empire saw its second bloom when a number of  poets such as Ausonius (Preface  1) and Prudentius (Preface) introduced their collections of  poetry by autobiographies, and others used it as a device of  closure, for instance Sidonius Apollinaris (Epistle 9,16,3 vers.) while Paulinus of  Pella (Eucharisticos) and Paulinus of  Nola (Carmen 21,365–487) recounted their lives within praises of  God and a saint respectively. In this chapter I analyse with which attributes the Latin poets typically describe themselves: It will emerge that the poets used the three categories family, location and career to represent themselves consistently across the centuries though in content each of  these three categories underwent historical developments. Secondly, I examine how the poets understood their identity: To do so, I apply Seamus Heaney’s idea of  life as a series of  stepping stones which collectively make up someone’s identity and contrast it to the idea of  life as a destination, which defines someone’s identity from hindsight. It will become clear that the distribution between stepping stones and destination autobiographies is due to personal choice, not to historical circumstances or religion. All  in  all, Latin verse autobiography was very consistent across the first five centuries of  the common era: This demonstrates that ideas of  Roman poetic identities and Latin poetry itself  heavily relied on tradition.

2. The Verse Autobiographies Many Latin poets refer to part of  their lives in their poetry: Catullus, for example, laments the death of  his brother in Carmen 68 and Martial reflects on his 34 year long stay at Rome, away from his Spanish hometown Bilbilis in Epigram 10,103. For this chapter, however, I use the term Latin verse autobiography in a strict sense: coherent, chronological first person verse accounts of  a substantial part of  the poet’s life. I  have therefore excluded poems such as Propertius’ 1,22 as that is  not a  chronological account, Propertius 4,1 as the biographical information there is given by 72

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

Apollo, as well as Horace, Satire 1,6,70–87 and Venantius Fortunatus, Life of  Martin 4,621–80 because these are brief  sections in much longer poems and only detail part of  the poets’ lives. On the basis of this strict definition, Horace published the first verse autobiography at the end of  Epistle 1,20: cum tibi sol tepidus pluris admoverit auris, me libertino natum patre et in tenui re maiores pinnas nido extendisse loqueris, ut, quantum generi demas, virtutibus addas; me primis urbis belli placuisse domique, corporis exigui, praecanum, solibus aptum, irasci celerem, tamen ut placabilis essem. forte meum siquis te percontabitur aevum, me quater undenos sciat inplevisse Decembris, conlegam Lepidum quo duxit Lollius anno. (Horace, Epistle 1,20,19–28) When the sun’s warmth has pulled more ears to you, you will say that I was a  freedman’s son and that in meagre circumstances I spread wings too large for my nest; as much as you qualify my origin, you can add in virtues: that I found favour with the leading men of  the city in war and peace, a  man of  small stature, grey before my time, suitable for sunshine, quick to anger, yet to be reconciled. If, by chance, anyone asks you my age, let him know that I completed my forty-fourth December in the year that Lollius lead forth Lepidus as his colleague.

This brief account contains information about Horace’s age (he was 44 in 21 bc when Lollius and Lepidus were consuls), his humble social origin (me libertino natum patre), his upward social mobility by associating himself  with the leading men of  the city in war and peace (me primis urbis belli placuisse domique), his appearance (corporis exigui, praecanum, solibus aptum) and his character (irasci celerem, tamen ut placabilis essem). He  puts particular emphasis on outgrowing his modest origin by his talents: [me] maiores pinnas nido extendisse / ut, quantum generi demas, virtutibus addas). The poem is addressed to the book of  epistles that it concludes; therefore, the author’s autobiography serves to promote the book. In Tristia 4,10, Ovid focuses on his career as a poet as he starts his autobiography with reference to the Amores (tenerorum lusor amorum) and the reader of  that work (quem legis): 73

H. KAUFMANN

ille ego qui fuerim, tenerorum lusor amorum, quem legis, ut noris, accipe posteritas. (Ovid, Tristia 4,10,1–2) Who I was, the one who played with delicate loves, whom you read, posterity shall hear so that you will know.

Later in the poem (43–54) Ovid presents himself  among the contemporary poets Macer, Ponticus, Bassus, Horace and Vergil, and specifically as the fourth love elegist after Gallus, Tibullus and Propertius (53–54). On the other hand, Ovid also gives details of  his family and origin (an equestrian from Sulmo [3–4 and 7–8]) and other facts of  life such as his three marriages (69–74), his daughter and his two grandchildren (75 –76). The next verse autobiography in Latin was written some 350 years later, between 379 and 383 by Ausonius. At the beginning (1–4), Ausonius establishes a strong link to Ovid’s poem by likewise addressing the reader: Ausonius genitor nobis, ego nomine eodem; qui sim, qua secta stirpe lare et patria, ascripsi ut nosses, bone vir, quicumque fuisses, et notum memori me coleres animo. (Ausonius, Preface 1,1–4 Green) Ausonius is  the name of  my father and myself; who I am, of  what profession, family, household and fatherland, I have written down so that you know me, good man, whoever you are, and when you do, remember and honour me in your heart.

Particularly close are Ausonius’ qui sim (2) and ut nosses (3) to Ovid’s qui fuerim (1) and ut noris (2) respectively. Both poets come back to the reader at the end of  their autobiographies (Ovid, Tristia 4,10,131–32 and Ausonius, Preface 1,39–40), and as Ovid placed himself  among contemporary poets (53–54), so Ausonius defines his places among contemporary teachers of  rhetoric (Preface 1,21–22).2 In  the main part of  his autobiography, however, Ausonius highlights his career, first in teaching at Bordeaux and Gratian’s court in Trier and later in politics as Gratian appointed 2 G.  Luck, P.  Ovidius Naso, Tristia, herausgegeben, übersetzt und erklärt. Vol. 2: Kommentar, Heidelberg, Winter Verlag, 1977, p. 266.

74

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

him as comes, quaestor, praetorian prefect over the two Gauls, Africa and Italy, and finally consul: cuius ego comes et quaestor et, culmen honorum, praefectus Gallis et Libyae et Latio, et, prior indeptus fasces Latiamque curulem, consul, collega posteriore, fui. (Ausonius, Preface 1,35–38 Green) I was his [Gratian’s] companion, quaestor and, at the height of  my career, prefect of  the Gauls, Libya and Latium. I was also consul, having obtained the fasces and Latian curule chair ahead of  my colleague.

Prudentius follows Ausonius’ model in that he also starts his collection of  poetry with an autobiographical preface and also details his political career in it. In tone, however, his poem is very different: It appears to be an old man’s musings on his achievements and failures and how to best use the little time left to him before death: instat terminus et diem vicinum senio iam deus applicat. quid nos utile tanti spatio temporis egimus? (Prudentius, Preface 4–6) The end is close, and the day that God adds now is next to old age. What have we done over such a length of  time that has been useful?

Prudentius answers this question first by a  negative account of  his childhood, youth and early career spent in misery, confusion and sin (7–15), secondly by a proud statement about his political positions (16–21) and finally by explaining his decision to write Christian poetry in order to save his soul (34–42): 3 atqui fine sub ultimo peccatrix anima stultitiam exuat; saltem voce Deum concelebret, si meritis nequit. (Prudentius, Preface 34–36) And yet at the time of  the last ending, let my sinful soul take off  her stupidity; let her praise God at least with a voice, if  she can’t with services. 3 Cf.  A. Coşkun, “Die Programmgedichte des Prudentius: praefatio und epilogus”, ZAC 7 (2003), pp. 212–36, here pp. 215–25.

75

H. KAUFMANN

This answers Prudentius’ earlier question implicitly as he dismisses his previous life and considers his new purpose, to praise God through poetry, to be useful (utile). Paulinus of  Nola founded the cult of  St  Felix in Campania and celebrated the anniversary of  the saint’s death each year with a birthday poem. In his 13th Natalicium (ad 407) he included an autobiographical summary to demonstrate Felix’s constant leadership throughout the poet’s life: In the following excerpt, for example, Felix is praised for guiding Paulinus during his prefecture in Campania, directing him to return to Gaul to his mother and later to marry in Spain: ergo ubi bis terno dicionis fasce levatus deposui nulla maculatam caede securim, te revocante soli quondam genitalis ad oram sollicitae matri sum redditus. inde propinquos trans iuga Pyrenes adii peregrinus Hiberos. illic me thalamis humana lege iugari passus es […] (Paulinus of  Nola, Carmen 21,395–401) So when the six fasces of  my magistracy had been taken off  me and I had put the axe down, which was unblemished by slaughter, you called me back to the shore of  my former native soil to be returned to my worried mother. From there I  travelled across the ridge of  the Pyrenees to our Spanish neighbours as a stranger. There you allowed me to be joined in marriage by human law.

In turn, Paulinus of  Pella, a  grandson of  Ausonius, composed the longest extant Latin verse autobiography in 616 hexameters. The work is entitled Eucharisticos “Thanksgiving”. Paulinus tells us how after a fairly prosperous childhood and youth, he became a  destitute refugee when the Visigoths took and besieged Bordeaux and Bazas, where he lived. Despite the difficulties and dangers, Paulinus interrupts the narrative time and again to thank God or Christ for saving him in particular situations. Once, for example, Paulinus was nearly killed: quam tu, iuste deus, insonti a sanguine avertens ilico paucorum sedasti morte reorum instantemque mihi specialem percussorem me ignorante alio iussisti ultore perire, 76

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

suetus quippe novis tibi me obstringere donis, pro quis me scirem grates debere perennes. (Paulinus of  Pella, Eucharisticos 337–42) You, just God, averted this [slaughter: caedem] from innocent blood, checking it there by the death of  some criminals: Without my knowledge you ordered that the very murderer who was pressing upon me perished by the revenge of  another. You have all along been used to bind me to you by new gifts, for which I would have felt that I owed you eternal thanks.

This excerpt shows Paulinus’ focus on thanksgiving, which leaves many details of  his life vague, despite the length of  the poem: For instance, was he threatened by one (percussorem) or several people (paucorum reorum) and how exactly was he saved “by the death of  the criminals” (morte reorum) and God ordering the attacker to perish (percussorem iussisti perire)? Finally, Sidonius Apollinaris closed the last book of  his letter collection with a poetic autobiography inserted into the last letter (epist. 9,16,3 vers.), which, like that book as a whole, is addressed to Firminus and was published around ad 480.4 In this autobiography in Sapphic stanzas, the author’s two-fold literary production corresponds to his secular and clerical career respectively: As an aristocrat and urban prefect he wrote poetry (vers. 1–41), but that is no longer fitting for a bishop unless it focuses on the praise of  martyrs; hence letter writing is  the more appropriate medium (vers. 42–84).5 As a poem itself, the autobiography challenges this statement by its very existence, and the question of  closure looms large as each potential closure in the poem turns out to be a  false ending: The image of  the poet as a  sailor who 4 For the date see R.  Matthisen, “Dating the letters of  Sidonius”, in J. A. van Waarden, G. Kelly (eds), New Approaches to Sidonius Apollinaris, Leuven, Paris, Walpole, Peeters, 2013, pp. 221–48, here pp. 228–31 and 238–39, and G. Kelly, “Dating the works of  Sidonius”, in G. Kelly, J. van Waarden (eds), The Edinburgh Companion to Sidonius Apollinaris, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2020, pp. 166–94, here pp. 186–89. 5 Cf.  F.  E. Consolino, “Sidonius’ shorter poems”, in G.  Kelly, J.  van Waarden (eds), The Edinburgh Companion to Sidonius Apollinaris, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2020, pp. 341–72, here pp. 367–69, and S. Mratschek, “The letter collection of Sidonius Apollinaris”, in C. Sogno, B. K. Storin, E. J. Watts (eds), Late Antique Letter Collections, Oakland, University of  California Press, 2017, pp. 309–36, here pp. 319–21, both with further literature.

77

H. KAUFMANN

has aimed for the mainland after braving the sea (vers. 1–8) and has finally reached the harbour (vers. 19) is  juxtaposed with his exploration of  new poetic ground as he turns to the praise of  the martyr Saturninus and other saints (vers. 61–80),6 only to dismiss the new material again on the pretext of  poetic inability: singulos quos nunc pia nuncupatim non valent versu cohibere verba; quos tamen chordae nequeunt sonare, corda sonabunt. (Sidonius Apollinaris, Epistle 9,16,3 vers. 81–84) Pious words are unable to contain them [i.e. the saints] individually and by name in metrical form; but my heart will sing of  those whom my chords cannot praise in sound.

The epanalepsis (nunc, nuncupatim), alliteration (valent, versu, verba), consonance (chordae, corda) and polyptoton (sonare, sona­ bunt) in this stanza make it difficult for a  reader to believe the poet’s claim that he is unable to praise martyrs in poetry. Rather, by keeping his poetry away from the praise of saints, he distances himself from Prudentius’ commitment to Christian poetry stated in his autobiography (Preface 37–42).7 Sidonius’ poem is  the most elusive of  the seven poetic autobiographies examined here and differs considerably from the others by providing hardly any non-literary biographical information.

3. Comparison A comparison of  the Latin verse autobiographies shows that the poets used a range of  identity markers, least frequently appearance and character,8 most commonly family, career and location. There 6   On the metaphor of  the sailing see S. Condorelli, Il poeta doctus nel V se­colo d.C.: Aspetti della poetica di Sidonio Apollinare, Naples, Loffredo, 2008, pp. 229–33. 7 Cf. I. Gualandri, Furtiva lectio: Studi su Sidonio Apollinare, Milan, Ci­ salpino – Goliardica, 1979, pp.  4–7 and Mratschek, “The letter collection”, pp. 320–21 and n. 135. 8  Horace describes himself  as small, grey-haired and tanned (Epistle 1,20,24: corporis exigui, praecanum, solibus aptum) and he, Prudentius and Paulinus of  Pella also mention aspects of  their respective characters: Horace his irascibility

78

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

are both continuities and historical developments in each of  the three most popular categories, as we will see in this section. 3.1. Family Nearly all poets who speak about family mention or imply their father’s profession and/or social class: Horace’s father was a freedman (Epistle 1,20,2), Ausonius’ a  doctor (Preface 1,13 Green) and Paulinus of  Pella’s a  deputy prefect and later proconsul (Eucharisticos 26; 35). In addition, Ovid was of  equestrian rank (Tristia 4,10,7–8) and Paulinus of  Nola of  senatorial rank (Carmen 21,458). Some poets also mention their mothers (e.g. Ovid, Tristia 79–82; Ausonius, Preface 1,5–6 Green; Paulinus of  Nola, Carmen 21,398; Paulinus of  Pella, Eucharisticos 250–53), brothers (e.g. Ovid, Tristia 4,10,9–10; 17–18; Paulinus of  Nola, Carmen 21,416; Paulinus of  Pella, Eucharisticos 248), wives and children (e.g. Ovid, Tristia 4,10,69–76; Paulinus of  Pella, Eucharisticos 493–515) and occasionally more distant relatives such as a mother-in-law (Paulinus of  Pella, Eucharisticos 493). Thus, the category of  family was used consistently by the Augustan and late antique poets. However, Paulinus of  Nola transformed it by applying terms usually reserved for blood relatives to Felix. He calls the saint pater (father) several times (e.g. Carmen 21,415; 419) and attributes a  radical redefinition of  his family and origin to him: tu mihi mutasti patriam meliore paratu, te mihi pro patria reddens. tu carnea nobis vincula rupisti. tu nos de labe caduci sanguinis exemptos terrae genitalis ab ora ad genus emigrare tuum et caelestia magnis fecisti spirare animis. tu stemmata nostra mutans de proauis mortalibus inter amicos caelestis domini et libro signata perenni

(Epistle 1,20,25: irasci celerem, tamen ut placabilis essem), Prudentius his sinful character as a young man (e.g. Preface 9: infectum vitiis; 10: lasciva protervitas; 11: luxus petulans; 13–14: turbidos / […] animos; 14–15: male pertinax / vicendi studium), and Paulinus his youthful wantonness (e.g. Eucharisticos 157: iuvenalis […] luxus; 159: lasciva licentia) and later love of  luxury (e.g. 216: spectator deliciarum).

79

H. KAUFMANN

nomina translato mortalis originis ortu deleri facies morti, transcripta saluti. (Paulinus of  Nola, Carmen 21,448–57) You exchanged my fatherland with a better provision in that you gave me yourself  instead of  it. You broke the bonds of  flesh for me. You delivered me from the falling decline of  our blood, you made me emigrate from the shore of  our homeland to your family and aspire heavenly matter with brave spirits. You will change our pedigree from mortal predecessors to be among the friends of  the heavenly lord and cause our names to be signed into the eternal book. By thus transferring the origin of  our mortal existence you will bring it about that our names are removed from the row of  death and written over to the row of  salvation.

Felix has exchanged Paulinus’ geographical and ancestral origin (patria [448], sanguis [451], terrae genitalis ora [451], stemmata nostra [453]) for a heavenly one, which the saint himself  represents. Paulinus also comes to see the poor Christians whom he welcomes at Nola as brothers: Nos fraterna inopum foveamus corpora tecto (“so that we keep the fraternal bodies of  the poor warm under your roof”) (Carmen 21,394). Therefore, while family was a consistent marker of  identity both in the Augustan period and in late antiquity, Christianity allowed for a  reinterpretation, as seen in Paulinus of  Nola’s praise of  Felix. 3.2. Career All poets mention their careers, which, in the case of  Horace and Ovid, culminated in becoming professional poets. Horace implies this by stating that his wings outgrew his nest and that he found favour with the powerful men of  Rome (Epistles 1,20,23– 25: maiores pinnas nido extendisse loqueris, / ut, quantum generi demas, virtutibus addas; / me primis urbis belli placuisse domique) and Ovid includes himself  explicitly as the last of  the love elegists: successor fuit hic tibi, Galle, Propertius illi; quartus ab his serie temporis ipse fui. utque ego maiores, sic me coluere minores, notaque non tarde facta Thalia mea est. (Ov. Tristia 4,10,53–56) 80

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

This [i.e. Tibullus] was your successor, Gallus, and Propertius his; in chronological order I myself  have become the fourth of  these. And as I have revered those before me, so those after me have revered me, and my Thalia has become famous rather quickly.

All late Latin poets, on the other hand, held offices and considered these offices, not their writing, to be their careers though Sidonius is more ambivalent as the two spheres correspond to each other in his poem. Ausonius was comes, quaestor, praetorian prefect and consul (Preface 34–38; see above Section 2), Prudentius, for example, was twice provincial governor, perhaps in Spain, and later called to an office at the imperial court: 9 bis legum moderamine frenos nobilium reximus urbium; ius civile bonis reddidimus, terruimus reos. tandem militiae gradu evectum pietas principis extulit adsumptum propius stare iubens ordine proximo. (Prudentius, Preface 16–21) I have twice held the reins of famous cities with the control of  the laws; I restored civil right to the good citizens and scared those to blame. Finally, the grace of  the emperor promoted me because of  my rank of  service, lifted me up and, having taken me more closely to himself, ordered me to stand in the nearest rank.

In his autobiography, Paulinus of  Nola alludes to a  first office (Carmen 21,374–76), probably his suffect consulship, and mentions that he was governor of  Campania (Carmen 21,395– 98) and later took charge of  Felix’s cult in Nola (Carmen 21,474–84).10 By comparison, Paulinus of  Pella’s exact career is  elusive, but he seems to have gained positions (Eucharisticos 264–70) in the years before Attalus assigned him a comitiva pri-

9  See A. Coşkun, “Zur Biographie des Prudentius”, Philologus 152 (2008), pp. 294–319, here pp. 298–307. 10  On the question of  Paulinus’ secular offices see D. E. Trout, Paulinus of  Nola: Life, Letters, Poems, Berkeley, University of  California Press, 1999, pp. 277–86.

81

H. KAUFMANN

vatae largitionis (295),11 an office that caused him more pain than gain: sed mihi ad sortem praefatae condicionis addita maioris nova est quoque causa laboris, ut me, conquirens solacia vana, tyrannus Attalus absentem casso oneraret honoris nomine, privatae comitivam largitionis dans mihi […] (Paulinus of  Pella, Eucharisticos 291–96) But to the lot of  the circumstances described above a  new cause of  major toil was also added to me so that the usurper Attalus seeking empty solace burdened me in my absence with the empty name of  an office assigning me the ministry for his estate.

Sidonius Apollinaris mentions his urban prefecture (epist. 9,16,3 vers. 30–32: capiens honorem  / qui patrum ac plebis simul unus olim / iura gubernat) and his status as a bishop, the latter of  which clashes with his reputation as a  poet and influences his future writing: neu puter solvi per amoena dicta, schema si chartis phalerasque iungam, clerici ne quid maculet rigorem fama poetae. (Sidonius Apollinaris, Epistle 9,16,3 vers. 53–56) [I have transferred all my literary efforts to writing letters …] lest I am considered to be done for by my charming words, if  I should add rhetorical ornaments to my pages and my reputation as a poet should disgrace my strictness as a cleric.

Sidonius Apollinaris considers his poetic career to have culminated before he became bishop as he struggles to reconcile the two. However, the positive evaluation of  his poetry expressed in the chosen vocabulary, for example, amoena dicta, phaleras, fama 11  See A.  Coşkun, “Notes on the Eucharisticos of  Paulinus of  Pella: towards a new edition of  the autobiography”, ExClass 9 (2005), pp. 113–53, here pp. 120–27, and N. B. McLynn, “Paulinus the Impenitent: a study of the Eucharisticos”, JECS 3 (1995), pp. 461–86, here p. 471.

82

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

poetae, turns his concern into a promotion of  his poetic skills.12 By contrast, writing poetry was the pursuit of  an old man and of  a Christian for both Prudentius and Paulinus of  Pella; it thus also had a religious, non-literary purpose for them. This is also true for Paulinus of  Nola since his life and poetry turned into a celebration of  Saint Felix. In general, we can observe that while profession continued to define identity, the range of  professions changed over time: To be a full-time poet was possible and honourable in the early empire, whereas in the late empire, poets tended to have serious political and/or religious careers alongside, before or after writing poetry. 3.3. Location All poets mention, at least briefly, where they come from, live or lived except Sidonius. Horace denotes Rome by the word urbs (Epistle 1, 20, 23), Prudentius describes the cities that he governed as nobiles urbes (Preface 17). All other poets list the place or places from where they came and where their careers and exiles took them: Ovid mentions Sulmo as his place of  origin (Tristia 4,10,3: Sulmo mihi patria est), Rome (16: urbis), where he studied, and his exile Tomi (97: cum maris Euxini positos ad laeva Tomitas), and Ausonius details his origin of  many places at the beginning of  his preface: Vasates patria est patri, gens Aedua matri de patre, Tarbellis sed genetrix ab Aquis, ipse ego Burdigalae genitus: divisa per urbes quattuor antiquas stirpis origo meae. (Ausonius, Preface 1,5–8 Green) My father’s fatherland is Bazas, my mother is from the tribe of  the Aedui from her father’s side, but her mother was from Aquae Tarbellae. I myself  was born in Bordeaux. The origin of  my family is divided across four old cities.

This list complements a later list of  place names when Ausonius describes his career across the Western empire: Gaul, Libya, Italy 12  Mratschek, “The letter collection”, p.  320 with n.  134 draws a  comparison with Ovid’s exile persona.

83

H. KAUFMANN

and Rome (Preface 1,35–38; see Section 2 above) as the perspective changes from a microscopic focus on Gaul to a macroscopic view of  the empire. Paulinus of  Nola, too, links the various stages of  his life with places, for instance, his return to Gaul after his prefecture in Campania and his move to Spain for marriage (Carmen 21,395–401; see above Section 2). He also states how a connection between Gaul and Nola was established ever since his first childhood visit there (Carmen 21,367: puer occiduis Gallorum advectus ab oris) – despite the geographical distance: ex illo quamvis alio mihi tramite vita curreret atque alio colerem procul absitus orbe, qua maris Oceani circumsona tunditur aestu Gallia: mente tamen numquam divulsus ab ista sede fui semperque sinu Felicis inhaesi. (Paulinus of  Nola, Carmen 21,404–08) Even though my life ran on a  different path as a  result of  that [i.e. my marriage] and I lived far off  in a different world, where Gaul, resounding around, is beaten by the tide of  the Ocean, I was never torn off  this seat and always clung to the lap of  Felix in my mind.

The account of Paulinus of Pella’s birth, early childhood and youth is an itinerary across the Mediterranean. Born at Pella in Macedonia, “the cradle of  King Alexander” (Eucharisticos 24–25: editus […] Pellis inter cunabula quondam / regis Alexandri), he moved across mountains and seas to Carthage (29–31: ninguida perque iuga et sectas torrentibus Alpes / Oceanumque fretum Tyrrheni et gurgitis undas / moenia Sidoniae Carthaginis usque venirem), back 18 months later, on to Rome and finally to his grandfather’s house in Bordeaux: tandem autem exacto longarum fine viarum maiorum in patriam tectisque advectus avitis Burdigalam veni […]. (Paulinus of  Pella, Eucharisticos 42–44) But finally, having reached the end of  long journeys and travelled to the land of  my ancestors and my grandfather’s house, I have come to Bordeaux.

Later in his life, Paulinus continues to move from one place to another though largely within Gaul: between his wife’s estates 84

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

(Eucharisticos 187–201), Bordeaux (309–20), Bazas (329–36) and Marseille (520–44).13 At several points he considers moving to his mother’s property in the East to escape the troubles in Gaul, but the close ties to his family hinder him (Eucharisticos 271–80; 408–30; 482–88). While Ausonius’ world grows as his life and career develops, Paulinus’ narrows down: from long-distance moves across the Mediterranean in the wake of  his father’s imperial appointments and estates in various regions to trying to secure the means to live independently in Marseille (Eucharisticos 572–81). In sum, location, even multiplicity of  locations, was clearly a marker of identity in Latin verse autobiography. This is no surprise as location was often connected to geographical origin and family. The locations mentioned by the Augustan poets gravitate towards Italy, whereas the later poets travelled across almost all of  the Mediterranean. This comparison of  Latin verse autobiography has shown that the three categories family, career and location remained important elements of  Roman poetic identity throughout the centuries though in each case, there has been a development within the category: regarding families from biological to spiritual, with respect to careers from full-time poets with magistrates-cum-poets and in the case of  location from Italy and Rome to the whole Mediterranean.

4. Stepping Stones Versus Destination At the end of this study, I would like to go back to Seamus Heaney’s distinction between viewing one’s life as a series of stepping stones as opposed to conceptualising it as a  destination. Heaney described his life as a poet as “a journey where each point of  arrival –  whether in one’s poetry or one’s life turned out to be a  stepping stone rather than a destination 14”. As has become clear from the excerpts and discussion above, most Latin poets who wrote 13 See McLynn, “Paulinus the Impenitent”, pp. 467–83 and A. Coşkun, “The Eucharisticos of  Paulinus Pellaeus: towards a reappraisal of  the worldly convert’s life and autobiography”, VChr 60 (2006), pp. 285–315, pp. 287–93. 14  Heaney, “Crediting Poetry”.

85

H. KAUFMANN

verse autobiographies, would agree with Heaney: Life is a series of  events, at the end of  which one has taken on a particular identity. This is true of  Horace, who describes how, born the son of  a  freedman, he found approval among the elite because of  his poetry (see above Section 2) as well as of  Ausonius, Prudentius, Paulinus of  Pella and Sidonius Apollinaris. As  we have seen, Ausonius’ stepping stones are described as both offices and locations, and Prudentius turns to writing poetry after a  life of  less useful pursuits such as the passions of  his youth, his career in law and his secular offices. Perhaps Paulinus of  Pella’s autobiography reflects the idea of  life as a series of  stepping stones in most depth as various events gave his life new directions, in  his youth, for example, an illness interrupted his education (119–21), then an arranged marriage dealt with his wantonness and pursuit of  plea­ sure (176–81), and later the political turmoil in Gaul imposed changes to his life. Twice Paulinus considered becoming a monk (96–99; 456) and twice this didn’t work out, according to Paulinus because God had other plans for him (100–05; 451–62). In Sidonius Apollinaris’ case, the stepping stones are represented by the two honours he received for his poetry, a statue in Rome in ad  456 (epist. 9,16,3 vers. 25–28) and the urban prefecture in ad 468 (vers. 29–32), both as a result of  imperial panegyrics (carm. 7 and 2 respectively), as well as by the different literary genres, meters and topics he employed: prose and verse (19–20; 27– 28), hexameter (33), elegiacs (34–36), hendecasyllabi (37–38), Sapphic stanzas (38–39), iambs (39–40), lines fitting the heat of  his youth (41–44; 47–48) and finally the praise of  martyrs as potentially the only appropriate topic for his status as a  bishop (61–84). The false endings (see above Section 2) and the celebration of  Sidonius’ lasting statue (25: statuam perennem), which links this poem with Horace’s Ode 3,30,1 (exegi monumentum aere perennius),15 suggest that the step following his service as a bishop will be eternal fame as a poet. By contrast, Ovid and Paulinus of  Nola describe their lives as the realisation of  a destination. We saw earlier how Paulinus 15 Cf. A. Stoehr-Monjou, “Sidonius and Horace: the art of  memory”, in J. A. van Waarden, G. Kelly (eds), New Approaches to Sidonius Apollinaris, Leuven, Paris, Walpole, 2013, pp. 133–69, here pp. 150–51 and Mratschek, “The letter collection”, p. 320.

86

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

was guided by Felix to a destination, geographical and spiritual, the journey to which, in fact, started when he came to Nola as a child: tu mihi caelestum, si possem attingere, rerum prima salutiferis iecisti semina causis. nam puer occiduis Gallorum advectus ab oris, ut primum tetigi trepido tua limina gressu, […] toto corde fidem divini nominis hausi inque tuo gaudens adamavi lumine Christum. (Paulinus of  Nola, Carmen 21,365–68; 372–73) For reasons that would bring salvation to me you sowed the first seeds of  heavenly matters and [a wish to see] if  I could obtain them. For when I travelled as a boy from the Western shores of  Gaul, as soon as I had touched your threshold with hesitant step  […], I  drank faith in the divine name with all my heart and began to love Christ rejoicing in your light.

Ovid also found out as a boy that he is destined to become a poet: at mihi iam puero caelestia sacra placebant, inque suum furtim Musa trahebat opus. saepe pater dixit: “studium quid inutile temptas? Maeonides nullas ipse reliquit opes”. motus eram dictis, totoque Helicone relicto scribere temptabam verba soluta modis. sponte sua carmen numeros veniebat ad aptos, et quod temptabam dicere versus erat. (Ovid, Tristia 4,10,19–26) But the heavenly rites already pleased me when I was a boy and the Muse was pulling me secretly into her workshop. My father often said, “Why are you attempting a  useless profession? Not even Homer left any riches”. Moved by his words, I left all of  Helicon behind and tried to write words free from metre. However, the poem fell spontaneously into its metre, and whatever I tried to write, was verse.

Furthermore, it is noteworthy that in these passages both Paulinus and Ovid use religious language: caelestum  … rerum, saluti­ feris … causis, divini nominis (Paulinus) and caelestia sacra (Ovid). Like Paulinus (see above Section 3.1), in a later passage, Ovid also addresses his divine mentor, the Muse, as guide and saviour: 87

H. KAUFMANN

ergo quod vivo durisque laboribus obsto, nec me sollicitae taedia lucis habent, gratia, Musa, tibi: nam tu solacia praebes, tu curae requies, tu medicina venis. tu dux et comes es, tu nos abducis ab Histro, in medioque mihi das Helicone locum. (Ovid, Tristia 4,10,115–20) Therefore, for the fact that I live and survive the harsh toils and that regret of  my troublesome life does not have me in its grip, thanks be to you, Muse: For you give me solace, you come to calm worry and as a medicine. You are a leader and companion, you lead me away from Hister and give me a place in the middle of  Helicon.

In both poems, a divine figure (the Muse and Felix) leads the poet away from his earthly location onto higher plains, Helicon and heaven respectively. This strengthens the idea that their lives have a fixed destination which they have been approaching ever since childhood with divine guidance and which, once reached, remains the purpose of  their lives.

5. Conclusion In conclusion, the comparison of  seven Latin verse autobiographies has revealed that certain characteristics continued to define the identity of  Latin poets from the early to the late empire, in particular family, career and location though historical developments took place within each of  these categories. In addition, it has become clear that whether someone’s identity is  what they have always been or what they have become through the series of  events that makes up their lives is a matter of  personal perspective, not of  the time they lived in or of  their religion. Therefore, we can conclude that both Augustan and late antique Latin verse autobiographies represent the identity of  Latin poets in a  consistent way. This finding corresponds to Paul de Man’s idea that it isn’t life that produces autobiography, but autobiography that produces life: We assume that life produces the autobiography as an act produces its consequences, but can we not suggest, with equal justification, that the autobiographical project may itself  88

IDENTITY IN LATIN VERSE AUTOBIOGRAPHY

produce and determine the life and that whatever the writer does is  in fact governed by the technical demands of  self-­ portraiture and thus predetermined, in all its aspects, by the resources of  his medium? (P.  de Man, “Autobiography as de-facement”, MNL 94 (1979), pp. 919–30, here p. 920; original emphasis)

In the case of  the poets discussed, Latin poetry supplied the “resources of  [their] medium”, and since that was itself  heavily shaped by tradition, it comes as no surprise that the Latin poets wrote about their lives in consistently similar terms over the centuries.

Bibliography Condorelli S., Il poeta doctus nel V secolo d.C.: Aspetti della poetica di Sidonio Apollinare, Naples, Loffredo, 2008. Consolino F.  E., “Sidonius’ shorter poems”, in G.  Kelly, J.  van Waarden (eds), The Edinburgh Companion to Sidonius Apollinaris, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2020, pp. 341–72. Coşkun A., “Die Programmgedichte des Prudentius: praefatio und epilogus”, ZAC 7 (2003), pp. 212–36. Coşkun A., “Notes on the Eucharisticos of  Paulinus of  Pella: towards a new edition of  the autobiography”, ExClass 9 (2005), pp. 113–53. Coşkun A., “The Eucharisticos of  Paulinus Pellaeus: towards a reappraisal of  the worldly convert’s life and autobiography”, VChr 60 (2006), pp. 285–315. Coşkun A., “Zur Biographie des Prudentius”, Philologus 152 (2008), pp. 294–319. Green R. P. H., The Works of  Ausonius, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1991. Gualandri I., Furtiva lectio: Studi su Sidonio Apollinare, Milan, Cisalpino – Goliardica, 1979. Heaney S., “Crediting poetry”, Nobel lecture, 7 December 1995, https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1995/heaney/lecture/ [24.06.19] Kelly G., “Dating the works of  Sidonius”, in G.  Kelly, J.  van Waarden (eds), The Edinburgh Companion to Sidonius Apollinaris, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2020, pp. 166–94. Luck G., P. Ovidius Naso, Tristia, herausgegeben, übersetzt und erklärt. Vol. 2: Kommentar, Heidelberg, Winter Verlag, 1977. 89

H. KAUFMANN

de Man P., “Autobiography as de-facement”, MNL 94 (1979), pp. 919–30. Mathisen R., “Dating the letters of  Sidonius”, in J.  A.  van Waarden, G.  Kelly (eds), New Approaches to Sidonius Apollinaris, Leuven, Paris, Walpole, Peeters, 2013, pp. 221–48. McLynn N. B., “Paulinus the Impenitent: a study of  the Eucharisticos”, JECS 3 (1995), pp. 461–86. Mratschek S., “The letter collection of  Sidonius Apollinaris”, in C. Sogno, B. K. Storin, E. J. Watts (eds), Late Antique Letter Collections, Oakland, University of  California Press, 2017, pp. 309–36. Stoehr-Monjou A., “Sidonius and Horace: the art of  memory”, in J. A. van Waarden, G. Kelly (eds), New Approaches to Sidonius Apollinaris, Leuven, Paris, Walpole, Peeters, 2013, pp. 133–69. Trout D. E., Paulinus of  Nola: Life, Letters, Poems, Berkeley, University of  California Press, 1999.

90

NUNO SIMÕES RODRIGUES University of  Lisbon CECH-UC/CH-ULisboa/CEC-ULisboa ORCID: 0000-0001-6109-4096 1

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL SHAPING THE IDENTITY OF  ROME’S WOMEN IN THE AUGUSTAN PERIOD

In Livy’s work, the well-known story of  Lucretia is set in a coherent narrative context, beginning with Lucumo’s arrival in Rome and finishing with the end of  the Tarquinian dynasty’s rule (1.34–60). Over the course of  26 chapters, the historian constructs a  text in which a  logical sequence of  events is  unveiled. Its narration does not, however, dismiss poetic and rhetorical devices through which we can recognise mythological, dramatic, and novelistic elements. These are typical of  the pathetic historiography that prevailed during the Hellenistic period. Some authors have pointed out that, in accordance with the general guidelines of  Latin  / Roman historiography, Livy is  guided mainly by analytical principles, thus distancing himself  from the essentially thematic design of  the Greeks.2 It nonetheless seems that the legend of  Lucretia, in all its contextuality, allows us to state that this is not always the case. In fact, a careful analysis of  this episode leads us to conclude that, at various points, Livy seems to be recovering a Herodoteaninspired historiography, in which the environment of  the nar1  This research was undertaken as part of  the BioRom project (see “Acknowledgements”). Apart from this, I shall also add the project UID/HIS/04311/2013 based at the Centre for History of  the University of  Lisbon, and the project UID/ ELT/00019/2013 based at the Centre for Classical Studies of  the University of  Lisbon. 2 J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações da identidade romana em Tito Lívio e Tácito, São Paulo, Universidade de São Paulo, 2007, p. 6, and bibliography cited there. In fact, we consider that this analytical character is already present in Herodotus and, above all, in Thucydides. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 91–120 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128693

91

N. S. RODRIGUES

rated object is  created through elements that allow for the formulation of  a  pathetic story, with a  special duty to attract an audience accustomed to colourful narratives, enriched with elements prevalent in other literary genres.3 If   Livy seems to share Cicero’s idea that History must be magistra, it does not seem any less valid to us that the historian does not absolutely reject the pathetic, and therefore even playful, possibilities of  History. In fact, it is above all this poetic choice, in both the Greek and literal sense of  the term, that will allow Livy to fulfil the objective stated in his introduction: Hoc illud est praecipue in cognitione rerum salubre ac frugiferum, omnis te exempli documenta in inlustri posita monumento intueri; inde tibi tuaeque rei publicae quod imitere capias, inde foedum inceptu foedum exitu quod uites (Praef. 10). What chiefly makes the study of  history wholesome and profitable is  this, that you behold the lessons of  every kind of  experience set forth as on a conspicuous monument; from these you may choose for yourself and for your own state what to imitate, from these mark for avoidance what is shameful in the conception and shameful in the result.4

3 P. F. Alberto, Tito Lívio. História de Roma – Ab Vrbe Condita, Livro I, Mem Martins, Editorial Inquérito, 1999, p. 14. In Roman culture, the story of  Lucretia has a  historical function similar to Harmodius and Aristogeiton’s in Athens. As in this case, the violation / rape of  Lucretia is not limited to expelling tyrants from Rome. It  leads to the establishment of  a  new political order: the Republic. Besides the historical function, there are similarities in the use of  dramatic elements in the composition of  both episodes, denouncing the use of  literary topoi. See M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, Machiavelli, and Rousseau, University Park, The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000, p. 27; T. J. Cornell, “The Value of  the Literary Tradition Concerning Archaic Rome”, in K. A. Raaflaub (ed.), Social Struggles in Archaic Rome; New Perspectives on the Conflict of  Orders, London, Blackwell Publishing, 2005, pp. 47–74; G. Forsythe, A Critical History of  Early Rome, Berkeley‑London, University California Press, 2005, pp. 147–49; T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome as ‘Exempla’ in Livy. ‘Ab Vrbe Condita’. Book 1”, CW 104/2 (2010/2011), pp. 175–89, p. 186; on the Athenian case, see N. S. Rodrigues, “The Ambiguity of  the Public and the Private Spheres in the Athenian polis of  the Tyrannicides and Pericles”, Res Anti­ quitatis 4 (2013), pp. 79–91, and N. S. Rodrigues, “Os Tiranicidas de Atenas: entre a  representação aristocrática e  a  ideologia democrática”, in B.  B. Seba­ stiani, D. Leão, L. Sano, M. Soares, C. Werner (eds), A Poiesis da Demo­ cracia, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2018, pp. 158–86. 4  Trans. by B. O. Foster.

92

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

Moving beyond a  purely objective, clinical analysis of  facts and events, Livy is  at times concerned with depicting figures that become characters integrated into a  spectacular and theatrical scheme.5 In this way, it gives them the ability to be exemplary and thus give meaning to one of  the main characteristics that define Livian historiography: the circular, pragmatic and exemplary character of  History.6 We therefore seem to be dealing with a compromise solution, assumed by Livy as a historiographical method that, we propose, can therefore be defined as pathetic-analytical. Although, in general, this is one of  the topics typically set out to define Roman historiography – from Sallustius to the Scriptores Historiae Augustae, through Tacitus and Suetonius – Livy’s work gains particular significance in this context, since it dates from the reorganisation of  Rome as a state and as a vehicle of  a culture. Living in this period of  transition from the Republic to the Principate and witnessing the emergence and affirmation of  Octavius Augustus, Livy recounts in Ab Vrbe Condita an idea that in part still shares the old values of  Republican Rome. This is an aspect through which we can glimpse Republican forms of  moralism, namely the vindication of  freedom and the worship of  the Mos Maiorum. However, it also shares the moral principles glimpsed in the Augustan philosophy of  power, which will serve, more or less effectively, as a theoretical basis for the regime instituted at that time. Moreover, Livy’s goal is also to politically and ethically educate the Roman citizen.7 Since the episode of  Lucretia is  therefore understood as a founding moment of  the History of  Rome – the institution of   M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, p. 49.  M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, pp. 2000, 40–41, 44–45, emphasising the more literary rather than analytical character, derived from the topics listed here, of  Livian historiography. See also S. E. Smethurst, “Women in Livy’s History”, G&R 19/56, 1950, pp. 80–87; J. D. Chaplin, Livy’s Exemplary History, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000, pp. 1–5; M. Roller, “The Exemplary Past in Roman Historiography and Culture”, in A. Feldherr (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to The Roman Historians, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009, pp. 214–30. On the importance of  exempla in Roman culture, see R. Langlands, “Roman Exempla and Situation Ethics: Valerius Maximus and Cicero de Officiis”, JRS 101 (2011), pp.  100–22; R.  Langlands, Exemplary Ethics in Ancient Rome, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2018. 7 J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, pp. 22–25. 5 6

93

N. S. RODRIGUES

the Republic – it  is particularly pertinent that the narrative is composed using the above elements, which are clearly vehicles of  affirming identity.8 It is this process that we now propose to analyse, focusing on the experience of  the female figures who comprise the story. In this context, female figures gain specific relevance. As noted more than half a century ago by S. E. Smethurst, the role of women throughout the remaining 35 books of  Livy is disproportionately distributed, focusing mainly on the first two. Of  the 21 episodes in which women are specifically mentioned or have a leading role, nine occur in the first two books of  Ab Vrbe Condita. In the remaining 33 books, women play a role in just five episodes.9 Of all the narratives, the one in which women are essential is precisely the episode concerning the Tarquinian dynasty, which frames the violation of  Lucretia. In this narrative, there are three women who stand out and function as axial elements, in the order in which they appear: Tanaquil, Tullia and Lucretia. As protagonists of  the narrative these are also figures constructed as historiographically exemplary, positive, and negative (or, to use other terminology, heroines and antiheroines). In Livy this aspect is  particularly important, especially as the historian states in his preface that history is  perfectly capable of  providing good and bad examples, some of  which must be imitated and others avoided, either by the individual or by the State itself  (Liv. Praef. 10). As J. Chaplin notes, Livy sees History as a source of  lessons, including a  perspective of  “useful History” and “historiography’s didacticism”.10 Through their portrayal as models and anti-models of  identity, these women are thus able to define a concept of  femininity for Augustus’ Rome. Let’s see how.   On this question, see J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, p. 9.  S. E. Smethurst, “Women in Livy’s History”, p. 80. 10  On the importance of  exemplum in Livian historiography and how it should be grasped by its audience, see mainly J. D. Chaplin, “Livy’s use of  Exempla”, in B. Mineo (ed.), A Companion to Livy, Oxford, Wiley Blackwell, 2015, pp. 102–13, esp. 103–04; J. D. Chaplin, Livy’s Exemplary History, pp. 23, 29; J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, pp. 9–10, 31–33; R. M. Ogilvie, A Commentary on Livy. Books 1–5, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1965, p. 25. This is also connected with the so-called “Moral Historiography” or “Moral History”. On this subject, see L. I. Hau, Moral History from Herodotus to Diodorus Siculus, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2016. 8

9

94

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

1. De stupro infando Lucretiae (Liv. 1.59.8) Although, in terms of  the economy of  the narrative, Lucretia is the last of  these characters to enter the scene, we will begin our analysis here due to her significance as an essentially positive figure. As mentioned earlier, the episode of  Lucretia, told in chapters 57 and 59 of  book 1 of  Livy’s work, fits into the bigger picture of  the Etruscan rule of  Rome through the Tarquinian dynasty (1.34–60). In fact, the 26 chapters of  this second part of  book 1 correspond to a  kind of  family saga (1.57.6).11 Moreover, the episode is narrated as a kind of  explanation for the deterioration and fall of  the monarchical regime in Rome. In  this sense, the image itself  is also exemplary, since it serves to demonstrate what a tyrannical regime can be, which from a Livian perspective is the form that the Roman monarchy would have assumed in its final moments. Lucretia’s character has been the subject of  numerous analyses, which in itself  is indicative of  the importance of  this figure and the episode in which it appears.12 In  Antiquity, it was not just Livy who recorded her story. Valerius Maximus (Facta 6.1.1; Vir. Ilus. 9.1–5), Dionysius of  Halicarnassus (AR 4.64–85), Ovid (Fast. 2.721–852; 6.569–648), Pseudo-Seneca (Oct. 292–309) and Dio Cassius (2.13–20) also referred to it. However, the fact remains that Livy is among the oldest authors reporting it, thus functioning as a possible matrix and model for later ones.13 In addition, his condition as an Augustan author, which he shares with several of  the authors mentioned, shapes him as a paradig11   On the genealogy of  the Tarquinians, see T. J. Cornell, The Beginnings of  Rome. Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000–264 bc), London-New York, Routledge, 2008, pp. 123, 142. 12  In  fact, the episode of  Lucretia also had considerable influence on later European arts, from painting to poetry and drama. In  this regard, see e.g. I. Donaldson, The Rapes of  Lucretia. A Myth and its Transformations, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1982; N. S. Rodrigues, “A Lucrécia de Garrett”, in C. Pimentel, P. Morão (eds), A Literatura Clássica ou os Clássicos na Literatura. Uma (re)visão da Literatura Portuguesa das origens à  contemporaneidade, Lisboa, Campo da Comunicação, 2012, pp. 117–32. 13  This also seems to have been one of  the few legendary Roman themes to be represented in ancient art. See J. P. Small, “The Death of  Lucretia”, AJA 80/4 (1976), pp. 349–60.

95

N. S. RODRIGUES

matic author. As already highlighted, the time of  Augustus was foundational, recovering values and defending traditions from the old republic, while at the same time legitimising the new era that was heralded and would be defined as a Principate. As such, the stories selected to be told were not the result of  chance or of  an unpredictable historical development. These were choices made rationally and thought of  previously in order to achieve a specific goal and fulfil an ideological agenda.14 The impact of Lucretia on the mental portrayal of the Romans was significant. To all intents and purposes, Lucretia is the quintessential Roman matron. She  is, as M.  J. Bravo Bosch recently pointed out, a  symbol of  Rome itself.15 This  is proved by the way in which Ovid, Valerius Maximus and, above all, Livy represent her. In Livy, Lucretia is  the uxor bona, chaste and good hostess, whose universe of  intervention is  the domus, the private space, which by nature belongs to Roman women.16 In  Livian narrative, Lucretia leaves home only when she is dead, at which point her corpse is  displayed at the Collatia forum (1.59.3). As  the victim of  a tragic metabole (as we have pointed out, Livian narrative is formulated using various poetic devices, including those belonging to tragedy 17), it should be noted that it is the misfortune unleashed by her husband’s vanity and arrogance, alongside the abusive libidinous desire (mala libido) of  the aggressor, that, as hybris, strikes Lucretia in the privacy of  her home, as opposed to any action fulfilled as a matron. Particularly significant is the  M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, p. 36; J. D. Chaplin, Livy’s Exemplary History, pp. 2–3, 5, 14–15, 31, this being the page where this author writes: “exempla have special value for a generation whose past had collapsed and whose future was uncertain”. See also pp.  173–74 e  193–96, where the author discusses the nonlinear relations, communions and ideological differences between Augustus and Livy. In this regard, see also J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, pp.  38–49; K.  Galinsky, Augustan Culture, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1996, pp. 280–87. 15 M. J. Bravo Bosch, Mujeres y símbolos en la Roma Republicana, Madrid, Editorial Dykinson, 2017. 16 N. S. Rodrigues, “A heroína romana como matriz de identidade feminina”, in D. F. Leão, M. C. Fialho, M. F. Silva (eds), Mito clássico no Imagi­ nário Ocidental, Coimbra, Ariadne Editora, 2005, pp. 78–80. 17 M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, pp. 23, 46–47, 49 also notes the considerable amount of  prototypical narratives inserted in Livy’s Book 1. 14

96

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

passage in which Livius states that Tarquinius Collatinus and Sextus Tarquinius find Lucretia “sitting at her wool work in the hall, late at night, with her, maids busy round her” (1.57.9). This representation corresponds to the idea of  the Roman matron in its very essence: installed within the home, devoted to eminently feminine tasks. By contrast, the king’s daughters‑in-law are found enjoying themselves at a banquet (1.57.9), this being an essentially masculine space of  conviviality, which lends a  transgressive and inappropriate character to their condition as women. Lucretia’s exemplary behaviour contrasts with that of  her aggressor. Lucretia is the good hostess, while Sextus Tarquinius becomes the violator of  hospitality; Lucretia is the faithful and good wife, Tarquinius the adulterer; Lucretia is  chaste, Tarquinius is libidinous; Lucretia is the picture of  honesty, whereas Tarquinius represents perversion and the denial of  iustitia.18 Lucretia is a brave woman who gives in to dishonest blackmail, yet does not hesitate to reveal the whole truth to her family and thus sacrifice herself  in order to safeguard her honour. Tarquinius is a cowardly blackmailer who feels victorious for having won the honour of an unarmed woman in her own bed. It is, therefore, not by chance that Lucretia is a Roman, daughter of  Spurius Lucretius Tricipi­ tinus (1.58.6), and that Sextus Tarquinius is  a  member of  the Etruscan family who then dominates Rome with tyrannical command. Lucretia is Rome, Tarquinius is the occupying foreigner. Therefore, to rape Lucretia is to rape Rome.19 Valerius Maximus (Facta 6.1.1) also presents Lucrecia as the paradigm of  pudicitia, especially female pudicitia. This is a topic that Livy also claims for the Roman heroine (1.58.10). As far as we are concerned, however, the matron figure may also be associated with other values that the Romans perceived as structuring and foundational of  their culture.20 It is true that, as S. E. Smethurst 18  On iustitia as an Augustan idea, see K.  Galinsky, Augustan Culture, pp. 85–86. 19  See P.  Joplin, “Ritual Work on Human Flesh: Livy’s Lucretia and the Rape of  the Body Politic”, Helios 17 (1990), pp. 51–70. 20  In  this analysis, we follow the presentation of  the uirtutes romanorum as presented by M.  H.  da Rocha Pereira, Estudos de História da Cultura Clássica, vol.  II – Cultura Romana, Lisboa, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 32002, pp. 332–429; see also K. Galinsky, Augustan Culture, pp. 83–88.

97

N. S. RODRIGUES

suggests, one might expect to see in Livy’s text a greater exposition and exploration of  feminine domestic virtues.21 This, in fact, does not happen. By contrast, Livian narrative allows us to intuit the presence of  the Roman virtues quite simply, although these are usually represented in the masculine.22 It is therefore highly pertinent that we also recognise them in a female figure. Lucretia is thus a partisan and defender of  the Roman Fides, as this was an integral part of  the relationship that was established between a citizen and his city. In the case of  Lucretia, fides reveals itself  in the act of  loyalty that she displays towards Rome, which manifests as a  denunciation of  the aggression to which she fell victim: an aggressor like Sextus Tarquinius is not worthy of  being a citizen of  Rome. As such, he must be punished. The rape and its revelation are also grounds for Lucretia to gather four men in her house, including her husband, father and a cousin, Lucius Junius Brutus, and to make them swear that they will punish the rapist (1.58.7). Since fides was also associated with the oath that required two parties to commit themselves to enforcing a  pact, Lucretia is an image of  Roman Fides itself.23 Lucretia is a pia woman. Roman pietas implied the respect and veneration of  the gods, but it was also related to the respect that should be shown to family members, including parents, children, and relatives. By calling her father, husband, and their witnesses to tell them what has happened to her, the matron displays a respect for the family nucleus that is higher than any other value she can assume. Lucretia is therefore a woman of  pietas.24 Since Roman gloria implies public admiration and recognition, we can also consider Lucretia as the glorified matron. In  fact, Livy writes that when Lucretia’s body was transported from her home to the forum, the people were inflamed by the  S. E. Smethurst, “Women in Livy’s History”, p. 86.  H.  W. Litchfield, “National Exempla Virtutis in Roman Literature”, HSPh 25 (1914), pp. 1–71. 23  On the Roman fides, see e.g. P.  Boyancé, “Les Romains, peuple de la fides”, in Études sur la Religion Romaine, Rome, École Française de Rome, 1972, pp. 135–52; J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, pp. 72–85. 24   On the pietas, see e.g. J. Champeaux, “‘Pietas’: piété personelle et piété collective à Rome”, BAGB 3 (1989), pp. 263–79; K. Galinsky, Augustan Culture, pp. 86–88; J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, pp. 86–100. 21

22

98

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

“unheard-of  atrocity of  the crime” (1.59.3). It  is  then to the people of  Rome that Junius Brutus utters a  speech in which he emphasises “the infamous outrage on  Lucretia  and her pitiful death” (1.59.8), shaping the matron as a  victim worthy of  admiration by the Roman people. Lucretia’s suicide becomes a  political event of  public interest.25 The mere public exposure of  the matron’s body in the forum of  Collatia points in that direction.26 Lucretia is therefore glorified by the historian, and his public recognition is also a facet of  what the Romans understood as honos.27 The moderation and modesty revealed by Lucretia, as she appears among her maidservants spinning wool, corresponds to a  kind of  female grauitas, insofar as she expresses herself  in the form of  a  domesticated woman engaged in the activities a matron is supposed to pursue. If, in the masculine, grauitas is a virtue of  the public forum, it seems in the feminine to correspond to private and domestic matters, but with public repercussions.28 Lucretia’s dedication to spinning, in the security of  her home and in the company of  her servants, seems to coincide with the idea of  otium; more specifically, of  otium cum dignitate, which should be related to abstention from public activity.29 However, this same task – intrinsically feminine for the Romans – can also be seen in what that same people meant by labor: a concept which translated the idea of  the citizen who deservedly earned his liv25 F. Balke, “The Image of  Lucretia: On the Creation of  Republican Charisma in Livy”, New German Critique 114 (2011), p. 44. As this author remarks, res atrox becomes res publica. Domestic affairs are thus of  interest to everyone. 26   On Lucretia’s body, see S.  R. Joshel, “The Body Female and the Body Politic: Livy’s Lucretia and Verginia”, in A. Richlin (ed.), Pornography and Representation in Greece and Rome, New York, 1992, pp.  112–30. On the public/ private dialectic, see S. Treggiari, “Home and Forum: Cicero between ‘Public’ and ‘Private’  ”, TAPhA 128 (1998), pp. 1–23. 27  On gloria, see H. Drexler, “Gloria”, Helikon 2 (1962), pp. 3–36. On honos, see H. Drexler, “Honor”, in Römische Wertbegriffe, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967, pp. 446–67; M. Jacotot, Q uestion d’honneur. Les notions d’ honos, honestum et honestas dans la République romaine antique, Paris, École Française de Rome, 2013. 28 On grauitas, vide M. L. J. Apuzzo, “Gravitas, Severitas, Veritas, Virtus”, Neurosurgery 59/2 (2006), pp. 219–21. 29 On otium, J.  P.  V.  D. Balsdon, “Auctoritas, Dignitas, Otium”, CQ  10 (1960), pp. 42–50.

99

N. S. RODRIGUES

ing, thus becoming worthy of  consideration in the community to which he belonged.30 The most famous sentence attributed to Lucretia is undoubtedly to be found in the Livian passage nec ulla deinde impudica Lucretiae exemplo uiuet (“no unchaste woman shall henceforth live and plead  Lucretia’s example”, 1.58.7). This need to have a model behaviour for the future ends up forming a consuetudo that will encompass all Roman women.31 Lucretia therefore establishes a  form of  mos maiorum, another of  the essential ideas of  the Romans, thus gaining, through the example in which Livy transforms her, a kind of  auctoritas typical of  exemplary figures.32 In  practical terms, this would translate into the idea that all Roman women worthy of  the name would demonstrate their integrity as such whenever they behaved or identified with Lucretia. Once violated, or raped, Lucretia must therefore die in order to testify to her own innocence and escape to infamia.33 This nar M. H. da Rocha Pereira, Estudos de História da Cultura Clássica, p. 398; D. Lau, Der lateinische Begriff  Labor, München, Münchener Universitätsschriften. Reihe der Philosophischen Fakultät, 1975. 31 J.  D. Chaplin, Livy’s Exemplary History, p.  168, remarks: “Lucretia behaves as if  she has read the Preface”, Livy’s, obviously. 32  On mos maiorum, see W. Blösel, “Die Geschichte des Begriffes mos maiorum von den Anfängen bis zu Cicero”, in B. Linke, M. Stemmler (eds), Mos maiorum. Untersuchungen zu den Formen der Identitätstiftung und Stabilisierung in der römischen Republik, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner Verlag, 2000, pp.  25–97. Auctoritas was a value associated above all with public life, particularly politics, and as such with the male universe. But, as M. H. da Rocha Pereira, Estudos de História da Cultura Clássica, p. 368, remarks, quoting Cicero, De Off. 2.1.2, it was a concept that could also apply to private and family life. Thus, it seems to us that it is not unusual for it to somehow encompass the feminine universe as well. See also J.  P.  V.  D. Balsdon, “Auctoritas, Dignitas, Otium”, pp.  42–50; J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, pp. 101–10. 33 M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, pp. 30–31, who adds further explanations for the need for Lucretia, even if  a victim, to die. It is also not disregarding the idea that, although involuntary, the stain and pollution that fall on Lucretia would have to be expiated by the imposition of  the consuetudo. On this issue, see e.g. E.  Cantarella, “Women and Patriarchy in Roman Law”, in P.  J.  du Plessis, C. Ando, K. Tuori (eds), The Oxford Handbook of  Roman Law and Society, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp.  423–24; T.  Chiusi, “Fama and infamia in the Roman legal system: the cases of  Afrania and Lucretia”, in A. Burrows, D. Johnston, R. Zimmermann (eds), Judge and Jurist: Essays in Memory of  Lord Rodger of  Earlsferry, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013, pp. 143–65; H. Wiltshire, “ ‘Ere She with Blood stained Excuse’: Graphic Stains in Shakespeare’s The Rape of  Lucrece and Middleton’s The Ghost of  Lucrece”, Études Épistemè 33, 2018. 30

100

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

rative confirms the need for “looking like” in relation to “being”, which is particularly important in the political context of  a society governed by values such as “honor and shame”.34 By sacrificing herself  for the image of  the Roman matron, Lucretia displays an exemplary ethic and acts as a martyr of  her feminine and Roman condition, to which she owes the principle of  her own identity. With her martyrdom, Lucretia contributes to the creation of  the Roman republican charisma.35 With its promotion of  the Romans’ unity against the Tarquinians’ tyranny, followed by their inevitable removal from power and from the throne of  Rome, Lucretia’s suicide proves to be a  form of  concordia, which aims to enforce the common good over the ambitions of  political leaders.36 In fact, concordia was an essential guiding principle for the good of  the State. The removal of  those who are considered tyrants is naturally driven by the desire of  libertas, another of  the main political ideas of  the Romans and one that Octavian Augustus was particularly proud of, claiming to have returned it to the Roman res publica (Mon.  Anc. 1).37 Incidentally, it should be pointed out that as we have noted the episode of  Lucretia serves as a trigger for the founding of  the res publica.38 34 F. Balke, “The Image of  Lucretia”, pp. 38, 42. Inevitably, the topic of  Caesar’s wife must be remembered here. In 63 bce, Caesar was elected to the position of  pontifex maximus, which gave him the right to have a  residence on the Via Sacra. In 62 bce, Caesar’s wife, Pompeia, held a festival in honour of  Bona Dea at her house, which no man could attend. However, a young patrician named Publius Clodius Pulcher managed to enter disguised as a woman, apparently with the aim of  seducing Pompeia. Clodius Pulcher was caught and prosecuted for sacrilege. However, Caesar presented no evidence against Clodius at the trial, and he was eventually acquitted. Even so, Caesar divorced Pompeia, stating “my wife ought not even to be under suspicion”; see Plut. Caes. 9–10; Cícero, ad Att. 1.13. 35   Theme suggested by F. Balke, “The Image of Lucretia”, pp. 35–50. See also M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, pp. 31, 43–44, who for this reason considers Lucretia a feminine pharmakon; S. E. Smethurst, “Women in Livy’s History”, p. 80, and R. Langlands, Exemplary Ethics, p. 237. 36 M. H. da Rocha Pereira, Estudos de História da Cultura Clássica, p. 376; see also J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, pp. 63–72. 37 On libertas, C. Wirszubski, Libertas as a Political Idea at Rome during the Late Republic and Early Principate, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1950; T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, p. 186. 38 On res publica, one of  the main political ideas in the Roman world, see R. Stark, “Res Publica”, in H. Oppermann (ed.), Römische Wertbegriffe, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967, pp. 42–110; H. Drexler, “Res

101

N. S. RODRIGUES

Of  all intrinsically Roman values, however, it is probably uirtus that most clearly correlates to Lucretia, as paradoxical as it may sound. This potential paradox arises from the fact that the Latin word is rooted in the term uir, meaning “man”, as if  renouncing uirtus as an essentially masculine value for the Roman mentality (cf.  Cic.  Tusc. 2.18.43). However, we believe that this may not necessarily be the case. Several authors have highlighted that uirtus is a quality associated with honor. As M. H. da Rocha Pereira writes, by the end of  the first century ad, the Arch of  Titus displayed the allegories of  Victoria, Honos and Virtus in line. For the Romans to be virtuous was to be, above all, of  candid personality, associating ideas like fides, sapientia, modestia, continentia, aequitas and honestas.39 It thus seems clear that Virtus is not confined to a traditional identification with “courage”, although it does not reject it. Indeed, it was from this perspective that Plutarch wrote the treatise Gynaikon aretai, known in Latin as De mulierum uirtutibus. In this way, the Greek moralist recognised women as being able to enjoy the Greek arete expressed in Latin by uirtus.40 Similarly, it seems likely that, for Livy, Lucretia embodies precisely this value: courage and bravery combined with modesty, restraint and moderation (this corresponds to the Roman idea of sapientia, a concept also associated with “political clairvoyance” 41). The way in which the matron remains loyal to Rome and her family, alongside the courage she needs to carry out suicide with the dagger, are, for us, the clearest examples of  the convergence of  ideas we find here. It should be noted that the way in which Lucretia chooses to die diverges from

Publica”, in H. Oppermann (ed.), Römische Wertbegriffe, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967, pp. 111–19. 39  Notwithstanding the fact that, in the Augustan period, the concept ac­ quires new hues and meanings. See M.  H.  da Rocha Pereira, Estudos de História da Cultura Clássica, pp.  408, 412–13. See also W.  Eisenhut, Virtus Romana. Ihre Stellung im römischen Wertsystem, München, Wilhelm Fink, 1973; K. Galinsky, Augustan Culture, p. 84. 40  Some authors have related this issue with the well-known Pauline passage in 1Tim 2.9–15. See A.  J. Malherbe, “The Virtus Feminarum in 1Timothy 2:9–15”, in M. W. Hamilton, T. H. Olbricht, J. Peterson (eds), Renewing Tradition. Studies in Texts and Contexts in Honor of James W. Thompson, Eugene, Pickwick Publications, 2007, pp. 45–65. 41  M. H. da Rocha Pereira, Estudos de História da Cultura Clássica, p. 417.

102

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

that which we often find in classical narratives associated with women, such as tragedy where we would more typically encounter hanging. Lucretia chooses a  traditionally masculine weapon, the blade, as a  means of  ending her life, resulting in a  beautiful death through an andreia, with which she reaches the Greek kleos gynaikon and which ultimately reinforces the idea of  courage associated with the matron.42 Roman uirtus would thus be found not only among the righteous men of  Rome, but also among the women with whom they associate. As  mentioned, it  is above all uirtus that is  needed to form a  Republic. For Livy, Lucretia’s uirtus – far from being a threat to Roman masculinity – is rather a vehicle for the realisation of  male uirtus. In  fact, by instituting the Republic after Lucretia’s death, men are the key players.43 Ultimately, as a symbolic act of rejection and atonement of  the violence Sextus Tarquinius exerts on her, Lucretia’s suicide ends on an idea close to humanitas. For the Romans, this was also the promotion of  civility, in the sense of  opposing a primitive cruelty oblivious to law.44 Indeed, in the Roman cultural framework, one of  the functions of  the legend of  Lucretia is precisely to provide a legal etiological context for cases such as the matron’s, as M. J. Bravo Bosch has rightly pointed out.45 Given this revision of  concepts and their articulation in relation to the legend of  Lucretia, we believe that this is a way of  consolidating the image of  the Roman heroine as a founding figure of  identity among the Romans, particularly of  female identity.

42   On this, see N.  Loraux, Maneiras trágicas de matar uma mulher. Imaginário da Grécia Antiga, Rio de Janeiro, Jorge Zahar Editor, 1988, pp. 33–34, 112; e M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, p. 31. Lucretia’s suicide also suggests some points of  contact with the stoic suicide problematics. We  have left the treatment of  this issue, however, elsewhere. 43 M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, pp. 34–35, 36, 40, 50. 44 M. H. da Rocha Pereira, Estudos de História da Cultura Clássica, p. 425. 45   Notwithstanding the various legal and institutional incongruities that historians of  Roman law recognise in the narrative, especially in its Livian formulation. See M. J. Bravo Bosch, Mujeres y símbolos, esp. pp. 33–161. On Roman humanitas, see H.  Haffter, “Die römische Humanitas. Ursprung und Idee”, in H. Oppermann (ed.), Römische Wertbegriffe, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967, pp. 468–82; W. Schadewaldt, “Humanitas Romana”, in ANRW I.4, Berlin, Walter De Gruyter, 1973, pp. 43–62.

103

N. S. RODRIGUES

In short, Lucretia seems to be what we can consider a true matriarch of  the History of  Rome.46

2. Angebatur ferox Tullia (Liv. 1.46.6) If   in the narrative context of  the beginnings of  Rome, namely in Livy’s version, Lucretia proves to be the Roman “matron’s matriarch” and, indeed, a  model of  identity to emulate, Tullia Minor – depicted before Lucretia – seems to be just the opposite. In fact, throughout the Livian narrative, Servius Tullius’ youngest daughter assumes all the negative characteristics that can be attributed to a female. Livy says that, essentially for political reasons and following the events that led to his becoming king of  Rome, Servius Tullius united in marriage two young princes of  the house of  Tarquinia, Lucius and Arruns (maybe grandsons of  Tarquinius Priscus and Tanaquil 47), with his own daughters, Tullia Maior and Tullia Minor (Liv. 1.42.1). Nevertheless, Livy claims that the fatum would be predisposed for misfortune to fall upon the royal house (Liv. 1.42.2). As a result, in another passage, the historian reveals his awareness of the importance of  intertextuality – the essence of  pathetic historiography – in the composition of  his work, writing: tulit enim et Romana regia sceleris tragici exemplum (“For the royal house of  Rome produced an example of  tragic guilt”,48 Liv. 1.46.3). Part of  this misfortune was precisely due to Tullia Minor and what she represents in the economy of  Ab Vrbe condita and the historiographical tradition associated with her.49 Not enthroned according to custom and thus not acclaimed king by the people 46   On the other hand, in the name of  objectivity, we cannot fail to mention that Lucretia shows no clementia or forgiveness in forcing his witnesses to punish her aggressor (1.58.7). On clementia, see K.  Galinsky, Augustan Culture, pp. 84–85. 47  In fact, Liv. 1.46.4 expresses doubt about the relationship of  Lucius Tarquinius with Tarquinius Priscus, saying he does not know if  Lucius would be the son or grandson of  the king. Still, Livy considers him more likely to be a son. Dionysus of  Halicarnassus tells him grandson (4.6–7), but Fabius Pictor, the oldest known source, had also assumed him as a son (frg. 11 Peter). See also Liv. 1.48.2. 48  Trans. by B. O. Foster. 49  Cf. D.H. 4.29–30, 39; D.C. 2.1.

104

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

or so designated by the “natural order”, but rather as a result of  the behind-the-scenes policy fostered by Q ueen Tanaquil (Liv. 1.41– 42; 1.48.10), Servius Tullius became the target of  severe political critique at the hands of  one of  his own sons-in-law, young Lucius Tarquinius. Lucius sought support from the senators, thus in the public space; however, he was also influenced in the domestic sphere by the political impetuosity of  his then wife, the younger daughter of  Servius Tullius (Liv. 1.46.2–3). Lucius Tarquinius began by marrying Tullia Maior, the eldest daughter of  Servius Tullius, who displayed a  political passivity proper to women (Liv. 1.47.6 writes muliebri cessaret audacia), for marrying a  politically interventionist and ambitious man. In  turn, Tullia Minor, married to Arruns, envied her sister for her husband, and admired her brother-in-law for his political brilliance (Liv. 1.47.5–9). This Tullia is  called Tullia ferox by Livy. The historian’s choice of  this adjective will not seem foreign to the attitudes of  the king’s daughter, whom the historian explicitly accuses: sed initium turbandi omnia a femina ortum est (“but it was the woman who took the lead in all the mischief ”,50 Liv. 1.46.7). Livy recounts the conspiratorial environment that would have been created between Lucius Tarquinius and Tullia Minor and, in turn, culminated in their union, following the desired death of  their spouses (Liv. 1.46.7–9). There is  little, in Livy’s text, that allows us to explicitly state that Lucius Tarquinius or Tullia Minor are directly involved in the deaths of  their partners. Nor, however, can we deny that the historian establishes a  setting in which his reader / auditor may suspect it (Liv. 1.47.8–9), shaping Tullia Minor as doubly homicidal or, more specifically, fratricidal, and sororicidal, for the deaths of  her brother-in-law and her own sister. This idea is reinforced a few lines below; when referring to the threats that have begun to fall on Servius Tullius, Livy says: iam enim ab scelere ad aliud spectare mulier scelus (“For the woman was already looking forward from one crime to another”,51 Liv. 1.47.1).52   Trans. by B. O. Foster.   Trans. by B. O. Foster. 52  D.C. 2.1 explicitly refers to the involvement of  the two in-laws in the death of  their spouses. 50 51

105

N. S. RODRIGUES

In this passage, the historian reveals in particular the functions which Tullia Minor rejected but was supposed to assume as Roman and princess of  the royal house. Livy says: non sibi defuisse cui inupta diceretur, nec cum quo tacita seruiret; defuisse qui se regno dignum putaret, qui meminisset se esse Prisci Tarquini filium, qui habere quam sperare regnum mallet (“She had not wanted a  man just to be called a  wife, just to endure servitude with him in silence; she had wanted one who should deem himself  worthy of  the sovereignty, who bethought him that he was the son of  Tarquinius Priscus, who preferred the possession of  the kingship to the hope of  it”,53 Liv. 1.47.2). That is, instead of  assuming a domestic passivity inherent to her status as a woman, Tullia Minor was too active in political and public matters and, therefore, rejected as a  model. The woman’s political interventionism is associated with even more objectionable practices, such as homicide crimes against her own flesh and blood. In Tullia’s portrayal, these are the corollary of  a  negative and undesirable representation as a model of  positive identity. Rather, they function as a negative or anti‑identity model. It is  paradoxical that, on the one hand, Tullia torments her husband with what Livy describes as muliebribus instinctus furiis (Liv. 1.47.7) and with arguments based on the fact that he is descended from a king, Tarquinius Priscus, thus demanding his respect and claiming the royal condition of his father; on the other hand, she does not hesitate to go over her own father’s corpse (Liv. 1.48.7; 1.59.10). It is also worth recalling Livy’s insinuation of  the princess’ very likely involvement in the regicide of  Servius Tullius (Liv. 1.48.5). Livy then introduces her into the public space, taking advantage of  the carpentum, a covered car used by Roman matrons of  special status and on special occasions,54 as she proclaims her husband king before the men present themselves (Liv. 1.48.5). Clearly, Tullia Minor usurps a function that is not naturally due to her.

  Trans. by B. O. Foster.   About the carpentum and its relationship with women, see J. A. Latham, Performance, Memory, and Processions in Ancient Rome: The Pompa Circensis from the Late Republic to the Late Antiquity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016, pp. 118–21. 53 54

106

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

The moment when Tullia, without hesitation, drives over her father’s bloody corpse is  particularly poignant in this portrayal, both for the symbolism it evokes and for the religious connotations it implies.55 Livy himself  is explicit in stating, intentionally pathetic, that Tullia was at the time persecuted by the Furies of  her sister and husband (which implies the participation of  Servius Tullius’ youngest daughter in the murder of both family members), who had seized and driven her mad to the point of  disrespecting her own father’s body. This associates her with the nefarious crime of  parricidium (Liv. 1.48.7; see 1.60.13). We recall that the Furies are the Roman entities, equivalent to the Greek Erinyes, charged with avenging the blood crimes committed against members of  the same family. This was a religious conception intrinsic to Roman thought (see Cic. Nat. deorum 3.18.46). On the other hand, the symbolism of  this episode gains even more significant cultural and political connotations: note how Tullia’s disrespect for her father’s body functions as the antithesis of  an action such as Aeneas’, who refuses to leave Troy without carrying his father, unable to walk, on his own back. Aeneas’ attitude evokes essential Roman values such as mos maiorum and pietas. Note also how the historian writes it was said that Tullia per patris corpus carpentum egisse fertur, partemque sanguinis ac caedis paternae cruento uehiculo, contaminata ipsa respersaque, tulisse ad penates suos uirique sui (“drove her carriage over her father’s corpse, and, herself  contaminated and defiled, carried away on her vehicle some of  her murdered father’s blood to her own and her husband’s penates”,56 Liv. 1.48.7). In this sense, Tullia Minor rejects those same values, giving shape to an uxor mala,57 an anti-Roman and a model in Lucretia’s antipodes, for example. The importance of  this episode is  such that, according to Livy, the Romans would have perpetuated it in the name given to the street where everything happened: Sce­le­ ra­tus uicus (Liv. 1.48.7). The etymology of  the alley’s name func55   This episode also deserved the attention of  Ov. Fast. 6.601–20. As referred to by M.  M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, p.  35, the power of  Roman women is more significant for what they represent or symbolise than for what they really are. On Tullia, see also D.H. 4.29–30.39; D.C. 2. 56  Trans. by B. O. Foster. 57 N. S. Rodrigues, “A heroína romana”, p. 80.

107

N. S. RODRIGUES

tions as a  memorial to an objectionable act that should not be repeated by any Roman. Given this evidence, we can say that, according to Livy’s narrative, which should represent a conception inherent in the Augustan era, the figure of  Tullia Minor functions as the negation or antinomy of  many of  the moral and civic ideas that Lucretia represents in the same narrative. We recall, once again, the pertinence of  the exemplary matron inserted in the context of  the Roman rule of  the Tarquinians, with Lucretia’s aggressor being a  close relative of  Lucius Tarquinius and Tullia Minor. To the Roman imagination, Tullia is thus the denial of  fides, for the disloyalty she manifests to her king – she is rather a woman of  perfidy;  58 the denial of  pietas and mos maiorum, for the disrespect she shows towards his father – Tullia is, by the contrary, impia; the denial of  gloria, for the public contempt she arouses; the denial of  uirtus and of  honor, for the denial of  modestia, of  continentia and of  honestas; the denial of  grauitas, for publicly interfering with the male sphere to which she does not belong; the denial of  auctoritas, because she bears it, and it must be an essentially masculine value; the denial of  clementia, which she refuses to her sister and brother-in-law; the denial of  concordia, for the disunion she promotes within her own family and State; the denial of  libertas, for favouring a tyrant’s accession to power; the denial of  otium cum dignitate, for she seems to prefer the bustle of  public life to the tranquillity of  domesticity; the denial of  labor, which she seems to disregard as honest activity; the denial of  sapientia and of  humanitas, for promoting violence rather than rejecting it. In  short, Tullia is  the negation of  the Roman res publica, and a model of  superbia.59 She is therefore a negative matrix or anti‑model of  female identity in Rome.60 It is  thus pertinent to recall the non-Roman roots of  Tullia Minor. Indeed, like Dionysius of  Halicarnassus, Livy reports that   See J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, pp. 77–79.   As referred to by T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, p. 180, superbia is  particularly associated with negative figures like Amulius e  Tarquinius Superbus. 60  See the study by W. L. Godshalk, “Livy’s Tullia: A Classical Prototype of  Lady Macbeth”, Shakespeare Q uarterly 16/2 (1965), pp. 240–41, which pertinently considers the possibility that the famous Shakespearean character was inspired by the Livian Tullia. 58 59

108

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

Servius Tullius was the son of  a  man of  the same name and of  a woman named Ocrisia (according to Dionysius of  Halicarnassus), members of  the nobility of  Corniculum (Liv. 1.39.5–6; D.H. 4.1–2; see Ov. Fast. 6.627–30). Although this was a city of  the Latium, Corniculum was another city, distinct from Rome. Maternally, Tullia was therefore the granddaughter of  a  Greek (Corinthian) and an Etruscan, while paternally she descended from non-Roman Latins.61

3. Tanaquil, perita and peregrina mulier (Liv. 1.34.9; 1.46.6) From a binary perspective, it seems clear to us that Lucretia and Tullia Minor represent, in terms of  the Roman mentality of  the Augustan period, two opposing ideas of  femininity, which function as identity markers for the audience to which they are most directly associated, i.e. women. Lucretia is the heroine, Tullia the antiheroine; Lucretia is the example of  the Roman matron to be followed, Tullia is the model of  woman to be rejected; Lucretia is the strength of  tradition in which Rome is rooted, Tullia is the squalor of  an excessive ambition that threatens Rome. In short, Lucretia is Rome, while Tullia represents all that Rome should not be in the framework of  a  political programme and ideological agenda, such as that which Augustus intends to enforce when he comes into power and reorganises the State. The reality, however, is  far more complex than a  simple dialectic of  antagonizing ideas such as these. Indeed, another aspect of  Livy’s masterfulness seems to be that he was both aware of  and expressed it in his foundational narrative. It is therefore an identity creator. In fact, Livius’ text highlights a third figure, who is also present in other texts 62 and who, objectively, conforms to neither the positive, nor the negative, identity model of  the Roman woman. We  refer here to Tanaquil, wife of  Tarquinius Priscus, Q ueen of  Rome at the time of  the Etruscan dynasty dominion over the city, and relative of  both Tullia Minor and Lucretia. 61  Another legend also considered the Etruscan origin of  Servius Tullius, Oratio Claudii ILS 212. On the various legends about the origin of  Servius Tullius, see P. F. Alberto, Tito Lívio. História de Roma, pp. 146–47, n. 234. See also T. J. Cornell, The Beginnings of  Rome, pp. 131–32. 62  D.H. 3.47; 4.2.7.10.30; 5.3; D.C. 9.

109

N. S. RODRIGUES

In fact, Tanaquil is the first woman to whom Livy, in his work as a whole, devotes more detailed attention.63 This formulation is  supported by the Livian narrative itself, which seems to lend Tanaquil’s portrayal both positive and negative aspects. When the historian first mentions Tanaquil, the impression he gives of  her is  predominantly negative. Coming from the aristocratic family of  Tarquinia (as is suggested in Liv. 1.34.1–5), Tanaquil is presented as a strong woman, married to Lucumo, the son of  a Corinthian emigrant with the same name in Tarquinia, Etruria, and grandson of  Demaratus, a  politically exiled Bacchiad.64 In  this first reference to the wife of  Lucumo, who, however, symptomatically changes his name and adopts the typically Roman formula of  the tria nomina (Lucius Tarquinius Priscus, Liv. 1.34.10), Livy characterises her as an ambitious and formidable woman who would never accept any status other than the one she was born with (Liv. 1.34.4–5). Since her husband was merely the son of  a  Greek immigrant in Tarquinia, Tanaquil’s ambition leads her to persuade him to leave that city and to settle in Rome, where they could find more opportunities for political promotion. She  ends up preferring a  social status that she considers herself  worthy of, over the love she eventually has for her homeland. Through this description, her ambition, pride, rejection of  the homeland, and the manipulative power she seems to have over her husband do not accrue in Tanaquil’s favour, bringing her closer in character to what we recognise in the wife of  her grandson, Tullia Minor. Further readings of  the Livian narrative nonetheless leave room for other reflections. Arriving in Rome, the husband and wife are surprised by an eagle, a  bird of  clear Roman political symbolism, which manifests itself  as a  prodigy of  Jupiter (Liv. 1.34.8–9). Tanaquil, perita ut uolgo Etrusci caelestium prodigiorum mulier (“skilled in celestial prodigies, as was the case with most Etruscans”,65 Liv. 1.34.9), interprets the augury as a  positive sign from the gods that relates to the future of  the newly arrived couple. Tanaquil’s mantic skills could play against her,  T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, p. 183.   The Bacchiads were the ruling family in Corinth in the mid-seventh century bce. See P. F. Alberto, Tito Lívio. História de Roma, p. 133, n. 207. 65  Trans. by B. O. Foster. 63

64

110

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

of  course, in association with the topical image of  the witch and fatal woman. The political character of  the prodigy, as will later be confirmed, nonetheless leads us to reject this hypothesis. It seems moreover that, in this case, Tanaquil’s ability to interpret the signs of  the gods reveals her capability as a companion to her husband and as future queen of  Rome. Indeed, it is the power that Tanaquil seems to possess over her husband that ultimately brings about his royal fate in Rome, while simultaneously making her queen. It is also Tanaquil’s prophetic skills that enable her to understand and translate the message of  the augury around Servius Tullius’ head, sleeping in his cradle as a child (Liv. 1.39.1–4; the topic is also dealt with by D.H. 3.47, referring to the woman as having “a good understanding, through her ancestors, of  the Tyrrhenians’ augural science”). In the general economy of  the Livian text, Servius Tullius turns out to be a good king; Tanaquil’s support and protection – of  him as a child, son-in-law, and candidate for the throne of  Rome – thus become arguments in favour of  the queen’s character (see Liv. 1.41). On the other hand, the political plot that she engenders to fuel the illusions of  the Romans and buy time for Servius Tullius to succeed his father-in-law to the throne, gives Tanaquil a quirkiness typically associated with the female gender, which does not play to her advantage.66 Similarly, the queen’s desire for revenge (Liv. 1.41.2–3) points to an absence of  the clementia which the Romans valued so highly. The presence of  mind and the ability to lead and make political decisions in times of great tension reveal a character of protagonism and public intervention – although manoeuvred behind the scenes of  a conspiratorial room – that is more typical of  men than of  a Roman matron. If  Livy, however, contains the action in the private sphere up to a certain point, he will eventually transfer it to the public domain by placing Tanaquil in a window on the upper floor of the house.67 In this way he exposes her to public life. There, the queen 66  On this see e.g. A. Freisenbruch, As Mulheres dos Césares. Sexo, Poder e Política no Império Romano, Lisboa, Leya, 2013, pp. 31–224. 67 P. F. Alberto, Tito Lívio. História de Roma, p. 150, n. 238, has already stressed the anachronistic character of  this passage, which refers to a type of  house that did not exist in Rome in the sixth century bce. As Alberto notes, the reference underlines the Hellenistic nuances of  the narration; but, we add, it also fits

111

N. S. RODRIGUES

makes a kind of  public harangue in which she urges the Romans to be brave; she also deceives the public by reassuring them that Tarquinius is alive and wants them to heed Servius Tullius’ orders while he is  incapacitated following his attack. Tanaquil thus ensures a captatio beneuolentiae of  the Roman people, in relation to Servius Tullius, obtaining the favour of  the Romans and with it the power and the throne for her son-in-law. At the same time, she reveals a  political talent that is  extraordinary, unusual and, above all, undesirable among Roman women (Liv. 1.41.4–5). Perhaps for this very reason, Livy points out in this passage that the queen would have reaffirmed her nature as peregrina (Liv. 1.41.3; see 1.46.6). The paradox and ambiguity around her character lie in the fact that, despite displaying undesirable characteristics for the ideal Roman woman, Tanaquil also turns out to be capable of  empowering one of  the best kings of  Rome. So, how can we explain this situation? Was Tanaquil a  model of  female identity to be respected and idealised by Roman women? M.  P. Charlesworth does not consider Tanaquil a  negative character: “that legendary queen is treated throughout with great politeness by her chroniclers, as a woman of  coolness and resource, devoted to the cause of  her husband and children. Her name has no sinister connotation, she is  not looked upon as a  plotter or schemer”.68 As the same author also recalls, Seneca even refers to her as a woman of  rare virtue (rara inter feminas uirtus, Sen. De  Matrimonio frg. 50 69) and Plutarch praises her intelligence (synesis, Plut. Mulierum Virtutes 243c). In fact, Seneca’s observation and Plutarch’s insight allow us to conclude that not everyone in Rome or in the imperial period regarded Tanaquil as a negative character. Q uite the contrary. However, this does not nullify the politically active, aspirational, and therefore excessive role of  the wife of  Tarquinius Priscus.70 Indeed, in the end, Tanaquil the Augustan period in which the text is produced and to whose audiences it is directed. See also M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, p. 36. 68 M. O. Charlesworth, “Livia and Tanaquil”, CR 41/2, 1927, p. 56. 69  See L. A. S. R. Coelho, O matrimónio do Sapiens: Estudo e Tradução dos Fragmentos do De Matrimonio de Lúcio Aneu Séneca, Lisboa, FL-ULisboa, 2011, pp. 138–39. 70 T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, p. 184, writes: “Tanaquil fits

112

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

is undoubtedly a woman beyond the limits of  the ideal matron. Too politically interventionist and excessively public, she crosses the boundaries of  what was traditionally ascribed to women by dominant Roman ideology. According to existing narratives, however, Tanaquil is  also someone whose actions ultimately benefit the life of  the Romans. As such, Tanaquil is closer to uxor idonea than uxor bona.71 As we have pointed out, it should not seem strange that this queen is explicitly presented as a foreigner; she is not a pure Roman who is required to be a positive or negative model for the Romans specifically.72 It should be recalled that, among the Etruscans, women’s representations of  funerary art tend to place them in a state of  near equality with their male partners. Tanaquil’s actions converge with these representations and seem to confirm this perception. This may also mean that the relationship between Roman culture and the figure of  Tanaquil – as a possible identity model – may be opportunistic, in the sense that the character can be used as a  model of  positive identity when it suits it and vice versa. As far as Tullia’s origins are concerned, the same applies to this character whose foreign roots guarantee a sense of comfort with her antagonistic character in the Livian text.73 Being genuinely Roman, the figure of  Lucretia will thus be more significant as a  matrix of  Roman female identity. In  turn, Tanaquil is  representative of  an extraordinary figure: not the ordinary matron, but rather a woman associated with the sphere of  power, hence her anomic character.

Conclusion One of  the essential functions of  Roman historiography, as unanimously acknowledged by philologists and historians, is  pragmatism, proper to “useful history”. Latin historiographical texts the pattern of  female aspirations and advice serving to undermine rather than strengthen the State”. 71 N. S. Rodrigues, “A heroína romana”, pp. 78–80. 72 S. E. Smethurst, “Women in Livy’s History”, p. 81. 73  Themes such as otherness and alterity are particularly studied by F.  Gi­ nelli, “Similarities and Dissimilarities” and E. Glas, “Overcoming Otherness in Flavian Rome” in this volume.

113

N. S. RODRIGUES

abound in cases in which personalities, historical or allegedly historical, are characterised, constructed, and presented as exemplary. Thus, these figures emerge in the cultural horizon of  the Romans as formulas of  identity, in which positive examples (x) are understood as models to be followed, i.e. to be Roman is to act like the exemplum x. Negatives examples (y) are perceived as models to be rejected, i.e. to be Roman is not to act, to fight, and to repudiate exemplum y. Or, if  we prefer, to act on the exemplum y is not to be Roman or not to be a good Roman. In concrete terms, it seems to us that this principle is  most applicable when Roman authors  / historians are dedicated to periods of  origins and beginnings. In Livy, the effectiveness of the so-called principle of  exemplarity should have a  higher success rate than in Tacitus or Suetonius, e.g., since Ab Vrbe condita goes back to the origins of  Rome and, as such, to historical, legendary, and mythological characters of  the founding of  the city. The function of the exemplum should be as effective as its applicability is most often found in the narratives of  origins. This principle will also lead to a posteriori figure composition, both in narrative and in absolute chronological terms – which in theory may follow –, using anchored characterisations and bound in previous exempla. Thus, the question of  identity will echo not only in the concrete audience of  the historian himself, but also in the cases and historiographical examples that follow him and his work. Particularly relevant to us are the cases of female figures and the way in which they assume paradigmatic and exemplary functions in Roman culture in general, and in Livy in particular. In fact, the promotion of  female figures in Livy is partly a vehicle or medium for the promotion of  male figures.74 Starting from the examples of  Lucretia, Tullia Minor and Tanaquil, it  is thereby possible to systematise – for the Roman res publica – a notion of  women to follow or to avoid. Written in the Augustan period and constituting a significant part of  the information contained in  it, Livy’s historiographic work is  particularly important in the construction of  this hypothesis and in what it can signify for the Princeps regime. 74 S.  E. Smethurst, “Women in Livy’s History”, p.  85; T.  Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, p. 175.

114

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

Essentially patriarchal, the society of  Augustus’ time was not exactly advocate or enthusiastic about women’s involvement in politics and public life in general. When it was so, it was only for sufficiently superior reasons, such as the defence of  the homeland or the interests of  the Roman people. Lucretia therefore asserts herself  as an uxor bona and example of  virtues, whose matrix will not be unrelated to the composition of  other figures, like Livy’s Verginia,75 or even Lavinia, Hersilia, the Sabine women, who the historian also recounts in book 1; 76 or still others, such as Valerius Maximus’ Sempronia, Tacitus’ Octavia Minor, or the Cornelia that echoes in Plutarch.77 On the other hand, the perfidy of  an uxor mala like Tullia Minor seems to be reflected in characters like Tacitus and Suetonius’ Messalina and Agrippina Minor, Cicero and Plutarch’s Fulvia, or is already present in the portrait of  Sallust’s Sempronia. In turn, the ambiguity of  an uxor idonea like Tanaquil is reflected in the actions – not always categorically positive – of  Tacitus’ Livia and atrox Agrippina Maior; but also of figures like Livy’s Rhea Silvia, Aca Larentia, Tarpeia and Hora­ tia.78 Tanaquil has often been cited as a  possible model for the composition of  Livia’a character in Tacitus. The way in which this historian relates Augustus’ death and Tiberius’ accession to power has been considered a parallel to the way in which Servius Tullius attains the throne of  Rome (see Tac. Ann. 1.5 and Liv. 1.41). In  both accounts, the role of  the widows, Tanaquil and Lívia, is  relevant, even appearing to have been traced to each other.79 There are also authors who consider Livia a mere variant or alter ego of Tanaquil.80 These hypotheses, however, have been disputed for almost a  century, not without relevance, by M.  P. Charlesworth, who considered the possibility that the Tacitian narrative 75 S.  E. Smethurst, “Women in Livy’s History”, p.  80; T.  J. Cornell, The Beginnings of  Rome, p. 275. 76 T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, pp. 175–89. Verginia is indeed a second or a double of  Lucretia. 77   See e.g. K. Milnor, “Women in Roman Historiography”, in A. Feldherr (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Historians, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009, pp. 276–87. 78 T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, pp. 175–89. 79  See e.g. M. O. Charlesworth, “Livia and Tanaquil”, pp. 55–57. 80 M. M. Matthes, Readings in Livy, p. 23.

115

N. S. RODRIGUES

around Agrippina Minor was the matrix that may have influenced the portrait of  Livia traced by the same historian (see Tac. Ann. 12.68).81 This same composition must have subsequently influenced Cassius Dio and the author of  the Vita Hadriani (D.C. 69.1.3; VH 4), who argue that Hadrian’s accession to power after Trajan’s death would have gone through a similar process. Hence the relevance of  Charlesworth’s hypothesis, considering that Tacitus’ Livia, clearly a negative character, owes her composition more to the figure of  Agrippina Minor (another evil character in Roman historiography) than to that of  Tanaquil. Nevertheless, it appears to be Tanaquil who functions as the matrix figure before Livia, and this point should not be disregarded. It is equally symptomatic that positive characters originate from the image of  the ideal Roman woman, while negative characters are associated with women of  foreign origin. For this reason, to violate a Roman like Lucretia is to violate Rome itself. From this perspective, it becomes irrelevant whether, or not, the dramatic episode is factual, historical, or legendary. The important factor is that it fulfils its objective in the service of  an ideology and, indeed, that it allows us to glimpse the past, keeping it alive, in order to build a present and plan for a future.82 In a structuralist‑inspired essay, M. Meulder analyses the three female characters from the perspective of  the well‑known Indo‑European ideology, considering therefore Lucretia, Tullia and Tanaquil essentially expressions of  each of  the three functions which constitute that ideology. But pertinently he also considers they surpass those functions.83 In fact, these characters are not merely stereo81  M. O. Charlesworth, “Livia and Tanaquil”, pp. 55–57; as this author remarks, Aurelius Victor also noticed the parallel, not between the accession of  Nero and Tiberius’, but between the accession of  the last of  Julius Claudius and Servius Tullius’ (de Caes. 4.13; cf. 11.12), which does not fail to confirm the relevance of  the idea itself. Tanaquil, Livia and Agrippina Minor have in common the fact of  being kingmakers, see T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, p. 184. 82 J. D. Chaplin, “Livy’s use of  Exempla”, p. 112. As the author notes, exemplary formulation requires self-knowledge that goes through historical dimensions. See also J. D. Chaplin, Livy’s Exemplary History, pp. 16–17, 21; T. Stevenson, “Women of  Early Rome”, pp. 175–88. 83  This essay remembers Tanaquil as an expression of  sovereignty, Tullia as a representation of  war and Lucretia as the stereotype of  fertility. See M. Meulder,

116

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

types, but rather continually reconstructed figures based on tools for serving this ideological agenda.84 That is why, in one way or another, all women in Rome seem to fit one of  these models.

Bibliography Alberto P.  F., Tito Lívio. História de Roma – Ab Vrbe Condita, Livro I, Mem Martins, Editorial Inquérito, 1999. Apuzzo M. L. J., “Gravitas, Severitas, Veritas, Virtus”, Neurosurgery 59/2 (2006), pp. 219–21. Balke F., “The Image of  Lucretia: On the Creation of  Republican Charisma in Livy”, New German Critique 114 (2011), pp. 35–50. Balsdon J.  P.  V.  D.,“Auctoritas, Dignitas, Otium”, CQ  10 (1969), pp. 42–50. Blösel W., “Die Geschichte des Begriffes mos maiorum von den Anfängen bis zu Cicero”, in B. Linke, M. Stemmler (eds), Mos maiorum. Untersuchungen zu den Formen der Identitätstiftung und Stabilisierung in der römischen Republik, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner Verlag, 2000, pp. 25–97. Boyancé P., “Les Romains, peuple de la fides”, in Études sur la Religion Romaine, Rome, École Française de Rome, 1972, pp. 135–52. Bravo Bosch M.  J., Mujeres y símbolos en la Roma Republicana, Madrid, Editorial Dykinson, 2017. Cantarella E., “Women and Patriarchy in Roman Law”, in P.  J.  du Plessis, C. Ando, K. Tuori (eds), The Oxford Handbook of  Roman Law and Society, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 419–31. Champeaux J., “‘Pietas’: piété personelle et piété collective à Rome”, BAGB 3 (1989), pp. 263–79. Chaplin J. D., “Livy’s use of  Exempla”, in B. Mineo (ed.), A Companion to Livy, Oxford, Wiley Blackwell, 2015, pp. 102–13. Chaplin J. D., Livy’s Exemplary History, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000. Charlesworth M.  O., “Livia and Tanaquil”, CR 41/2 (1927), pp. 55–57.

“Trois femmes, trois fonctions. Tanaquil, Tullia, Lucrèce (Tite-Live, Histoire Romaine, livre I)”, REA 107/2 (2005), pp. 543–57. 84 J. B. Marq  ues, Tradição e renovações, p. 62.

117

N. S. RODRIGUES

Chiusi T., “Fama and infamia in the Roman legal system: the cases of  Afrania and Lucretia”, in A. Burrows, D. Johnston, R. Zimmermann (eds), Judge and Jurist: Essays in Memory of  Lord Rodger of  Earlsferry, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013, pp. 143–65. Coelho L.  A.  S.  R., O  matrimónio do Sapiens: Estudo e  Tradução dos Fragmentos do De Matrimonio de Lúcio Aneu Séneca, Lisboa, FL-ULisboa, 2011. Cornell T.  J., “The Value of  the Literary Tradition Concerning Archaic Rome”, in K. A. Raaflaub (ed.), Social Struggles in Archaic Rome; New Perspectives on the Conflict of  Orders, London, Blackwell Publishing, 2005, pp. 47–74. Cornell T. J., The Beginnings of Rome. Italy and Rome from the Bronze Age to the Punic Wars (c. 1000–264 bc), London-New York, Routledge, 2008. Donaldson I., The Rapes of  Lucretia. A  Myth and its Transformations, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1982. Drexler H., “Gloria”, Helikon 2 (1962), pp. 3–36. Drexler H., “Honor”, in H.  Oppermann (ed.), Römische Wertbegriffe, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967, pp. 446–67. Drexler H., “Res Publica”, in H. Oppermann (ed.), Römische Wertbegriffe, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967, pp. 111–19. Eisenhut W., Virtus Romana. Ihre Stellung im römischen Wertsystem, München, Wilhelm Fink, 1973. Forsythe G., A  Critical History of  Early Rome, Berkeley-London, University California Press, 2005. Foster B. O., Livy. History of  Rome, volume I, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1919. Freisenbruch A., As Mulheres dos Césares. Sexo, Poder e Política no Império Romano, Lisboa, Leya, 2013. Galinsky K., Augustan Culture, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1996. Godshalk W. L., “Livy’s Tullia: A Classical Prototype of  Lady Macbeth”, Shakespeare Q uarterly 16/2 (1965), pp. 240–41. Haffter H., “Die römische Humanitas. Ursprung und Idee”, in H. Oppermann (ed.), Römische Wertbegriffe, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967, pp. 468–82. Hau L.  I., Moral History from Herodotus to Diodorus Siculus, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2016. 118

LUCRETIA, TULLIA AND TANAQ UIL

Jacotot M., Q uestion d’honneur. Les notions d’honos, honestum et honestas dans la République romaine antique, Paris, École Française de Rome, 2013. Joplin P., “Ritual Work on Human Flesh: Livy’s Lucretia and the Rape of  the Body Politic”, Helios 17 (1990), pp. 51–70. Joshel S. R., “The Body Female and the Body Politic: Livy’s Lucretia and Verginia”, in A. Richlin (ed.), Pornography and Representation in Greece and Rome, New York, 1992, pp. 112–30. Langlands R., “Roman Exempla and Situation Ethics: Valerius Maximus and Cicero de Officiis”, JRS 101 (2011), pp. 100–22. Langlands R., Exemplary Ethics in Ancient Rome, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2018. Latham J. A., Performance, Memory, and Processions in Ancient Rome: The Pompa Circensis from the Late Republic to Late Antiquity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016. Lau D., Der lateinische Begriff  Labor, München, Münchener Universitätsschriften. Reihe der Philosophischen Fakultät, 1975. Litchfield H.  W., “National Exempla Virtutis in Roman Literature”, HSPh 25 (1914), pp. 1–71. Loraux N., Maneiras trágicas de matar uma mulher. Imaginário da Grécia Antiga, Rio de Janeiro, Jorge Zahar Editor, 1988. Malherbe A.  J., “The Virtus Feminarum in 1Timothy 2:9–15”, in M. W. Hamilton, T. H. Olbricht, J. Peterson (eds), Renewing Tradition. Studies in Texts and Contexts in Honor of  James  W. Thompson, Eugene, Pickwick Publications, 2007, pp. 45–65. Marq  ues J. B., Tradição e renovações da identidade romana em Tito Lívio e Tácito, São Paulo, Universidade de São Paulo, 2007. Matthes M. M., Readings in Livy, Machiavelli, and Rousseau, University Park, The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000. Meulder M., “Trois femmes, trois fonctions. Tanaquil, Tullia, Lucrèce (Tite-Live, Histoire Romaine, livre I)”, REA 107/2 (2005), pp. 543–57. Milnor K., “Women in Roman Historiography”, in A. Feldherr (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Historians, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009, pp. 276–87. Ogilvie R. M., A Commentary on Livy. Books 1–5, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1965. Rocha Pereira, M. H. da, Estudos de História da Cultura Clássica, vol. II – Cultura Romana, 3ª ed., Lisboa, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 2002. 119

N. S. RODRIGUES

Rodrigues N.  S., “A heroína romana como matriz de identidade feminina”, in D. F. Leão, M. C. Fialho, M. F. Silva (eds), Mito clássico no Imaginário Ocidental, Coimbra, Ariadne Editora, 2005, pp. 67–85. Rodrigues N.  S., “A Lucrécia de Garrett”, in C.  Pimentel, P.  Morão (eds), A  Literatura Clássica ou os Clássicos na Literatura. Uma (re)visão da Literatura Portuguesa das origens à contemporaneidade, Lisboa, Campo da Comunicação, 2012, pp. 117–32. Rodrigues N. S., “Os Tiranicidas de Atenas: entre a representação aristocrática e  a  ideologia democrática”, in B.  B. Sebastiani, D. Leão, L. Sano, M. Soares, C. Werner, (eds), A Poiesis da Democracia, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2018, pp. 158–86. Rodrigues N.  S., “The Ambiguity of  the Public and the Private Spheres in the Athenian polis of  the Tyrannicides and Pericles”, Res Antiquitatis 4 (2013), pp. 79–91. Roller M., “The Exemplary Past in Roman Historiography and Culture”, in A.  Feldherr (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to The Roman Historians, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009, pp. 214–30. Schadewaldt W., “Humanitas Romana”, in ANRW I.4, Berlin, Walter De Gruyter, 1973, pp. 43–62. Small J. P., “The Death of  Lucretia”, AJA 80/4 (1976), pp. 349–60. Smethurst S. E., “Women in Livy’s History”, G&R 19/56 (1959), pp. 80–87. Stark R., “Res Publica”, in H. Oppermann (ed.), Römische Wertbe­ griffe, Darmstadt, Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967, pp. 42– 110. Stevenson T., “Women of Early Rome as ‘Exempla’ in Livy. ‘Ab Vrbe Condita’. Book 1”, CW 104/2 (2010/2011), pp. 175–89. Treggiari S., “Home and Forum: Cicero between ‘Public’ and ‘Private’ ”, TAPhA 128 (1998), pp. 1–23. Wiltshire H., “ ‘Ere She with Blood stained Excuse’: Graphic Stains in Shakespeare’s The Rape of  Lucrece and Middleton’s The Ghost of  Lucrece”, Études Épistemè, 33 (2018), online 9 September 2018, consulted 26 September 2019. URL: http://journals.openedition. org/episteme/2253; DOI: 10.4000/episteme.2253. Wirszubski C., Libertas as a Political Idea at Rome during the Late Republic and Early Principate, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1950.

120

DAVIDE MORELLI Sapienza University of  Rome

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS  1

Roman identity is a fluid concept. Fourth-century Rome did not have the same cultural environment that characterised, for example, the Late Republic or the Early Empire. This means that the same concept of  Romanitas, the ideal of  Roman identity, changed through time and space.2 There are virtually no contemporary sources on fourth-century Rome. This leads us to rely on later witnesses who employed earlier sources, and who are thus able to retrieve missing information from the distant Roman past. Plutarch is clearly one of  the most interesting authors doing so. However, one must be aware of  the risk involved in dealing with later authors talking about the Roman past: every ancient author weaves his own interpre1  I deeply thank Prof. Cláudia do Amparo Afonso Teixeira and Prof. Lau­ taro Roig Lanzillotta, organisers of  the panel “Shaping Roman Identity: SelfPerceptions and its Tensions in Ancient Biography” (12th Celtic Conference in Classics, Coimbra, June 26th–29th, 2019). The discussion during the conference was very helpful in better defining some aspects of  this study. Special thanks to Dr. Valentina Arena, who kindly allowed me to read the draft of  her then forthcoming paper V. Arena, “The Status of  Marsyas, Liber, and Servius: an Instance of  an Ancient Semantic Battle?”, in M. Nebelin, C. Tiersch (eds), Semantische Kämpfe zwischen Republik und Prinzipat, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2021. Finally, my gratitude goes to Prof. John Thornton, for his priceless advice. Every mistake in the paper remains, clearly, my responsibility. 2 E. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum. Roman identities from the Age of  Alexander to the Age of  Hadrian, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, significantly, talks about “Roman identities” in the plural form. E.  Dench, “Roman identity”, in A.  Barchiesi, W.  Scheidel (eds), The Oxford Handbook of  Roman Studies, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2010, pp. 267–80, in part. pp. 267–68, warns against the anachronism of  the term “ethnicity”, besides “identity”, when talking about ancient societies. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 121–162 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128694

121

D. MORELLI

tations and characterisation into his works. This does not mean, nonetheless, that one can ignore their testimony, for historical memory preserves ancient conceptions and traditions even when these same conceptions and traditions are long gone. This seems to be the case of the gens Aemilia, with their familiar traditions changing through time. These traditions defined their identity, which was definitely a Roman one, even in the presence of  “foreign” elements. No one could question the “Romanness” of  mid-Republican personalities such as M.  Aemi­lius Lepidus, cos. 187, L.  Aemi­lius Paullus, cos. 182 and 168, or M.  Aemi­lius Scaurus, princeps Senatus and cos. 115, who undoubtedly embodied the very essence of  a Roman of  their time. One of  their ancient familiar traditions, however, had much to do with Great Greece, and it was born in the historical moment that led Rome to rule over the whole of  Italy. Plutarch knew this, and he seems to have modelled his entire Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus according to this lead. The interesting fact is that, by doing so, he did not in any way diminish the level of  Romanitas of  his character; instead, he succeeded in painting a picture of  the perfect Roman: as politician, general, educator, even as a father. Plutarch did in fact choose to follow an ancient tradition, long gone in first century ce Rome, which helped him to delineate this ideal exemplum of  “Romanness”,3 albeit by following a tradition with Greek origins, as he himself  tells us. Specifically, the Aemilian tradition was a Pythagorising one.4 The emergence of  Pythagoreanism in the Roman world marked an important development for Graeco-Roman relationships.5 In  the following pages, I  will examine some of  the wit3   See R. Laurence, “Territory, ethnonyms and geography. The construction of  identity in Roman Italy”, in R. Laurence, J. Berry (eds), Cultural identity in the Roman Empire, London-New York, Routledge, 1998, pp. 95–110, for the concept of  Romanness from an ethnic perspective. 4  It is “Pythagorising” because, as we will see, we cannot talk about Pythagoreans in Rome in this period. Stating the assumption of  Pythagorising characteristics, principles, and examples in general is more equilibrate. 5 L. Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo nel mondo romano (dalle origini alla fine della Repubblica), Forlì, Victrix, 20082 [or. ed. Cuneo, Giappichelli, 1955] remains the most complete work on this subject. See also, for example, M. Humm, “Les origines du pythagorisme romain. Problèmes historiques et philosophiques I”, LEC 64 (1996), pp. 339–53, and M. Humm, “Les origines du pythagorisme romain. Problèmes historiques et philosophiques II”, LEC 65 (1997), pp. 25–42;

122

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

nesses who connect the gens Aemilia to Roman Pythagoreanism. This gens was one of  the first Roman families to establish a connection with Italiote philosophy and culture. It is  very important to highlight that there are no traces of  Roman Pythagoreanism as a sect until the first century bce, when Nigidius Figulus, the first true Roman Pythagorean, lived.6 However, we can observe a Pythagorean cultural influence on Roman familiar traditions from much earlier periods. This emerges from literary sources in particular. We cannot truly determine whether a  philosophical component was really embraced by these families or not; we have no evidence of  the Romans talking openly about Pythagoras until the discovery of  the “arches of  Numa”, in 181  bce.7 Pythagoreanism did nonetheless leave some traces on Rome, which we can analyse. In the first part of  this paper, I  will examine the Aemilii as a Numaic gens, with its tradition linked to Pythagoras. In the secM. Mahé, “Le pythagorisme d’Italie du Sud vu par Tite-Live”, Ktèma 24 (1999), pp.  147–57; A.  Storchi Marino, Numa e  Pitagora. Sapientia constituendae civitatis, Napoli, Liguori, 1999; A. Storchi Marino, “Il pitagorismo romano. Per un bilancio di studi recenti”, in M.  Tortorelli Ghidini, A.  Storchi Marino, A. Visconti (eds), Tra Orfeo e Pitagora. Origini e incontri di culture nell’antichità, Atti dei seminari napoletani 1996–1998, Napoli, Bibliopolis, 2000, pp. 335–66; C. Riedweg, Pythagoras: His Life, Teaching, and Influence, IthacaLondon, Cornell University Press, 2005 [or. ed. München, C. H. Beck, 2002], pp. 195–97. 6  There are nonetheless interpretations which, in the expression Roma qua­ drata, see a reflection of  Pythagorean influences on Rome: see D. Miano, “Roma quadrata. Un elemento pitagorico nello spazio romano?”, Storia, antropologia e scienze del linguaggio 24.1–2 (2009), pp. 149–80, and related bibliography for the discussion. A further analysis in B. Poulle, “Les réincarnations de Pythagore et de Numa à Rome”, REL 88 (2010), pp. 92–105, who interprets the episode of  the “arches of  Numa” (see also infra) as a witness to active Pythagorean interests in Rome during the second century bce. On P. Nigidius Figulus, see A. Della Casa, Nigidio Figulo, Roma, Edizioni dell’Ateneo, 1962; more recently, and with bibliographical updates, M.  Mayer i  Olivé, “Publius Nigidius Figulus Pythagoricus et magus”, in M. Piranomonte, F. M. Simòn (ed.), Contesti Magici – Contextos Mágicos, Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Roma 4–6 novembre 2009, Roma, De Luca, 2012, pp. 237–45 (with focus on Figulus as a “magician”). 7   Liv. XL 29; Plin. nat. XIII 87. See the discussion, for example, in J.-M.  Pailler, Bacchanalia. La répression de 186 av. J.-C. à Rome et en Italie: vestiges, images, tradition (Bibliothèque des Écoles françaises d’Athènes et de Rome 257), Rome, École française de Rome, 1988, pp. 653–55; Storchi, Numa e Pitagora, pp. 163–96; recently G. Rocca, “I libri di Numa Pompilio”, in D. Maras (ed.), Corollari. Scritti di antichità etrusche e italiche in omaggio all’opera di Giovanni Colonna (Studia erudita 14), Pisa-Roma, Fabrizio Serra, 2011, pp. 84–86.

123

D. MORELLI

ond part, I will define certain elements that can be connected to an aristocratic Pythagorising ethic. These elements are taken from the literary sources that provide us with an account of  Aemi­lius Paullus, in particular from Plutarch’s Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus. I will then observe the survival and decadence of  Numaic familiar traditions in late Republican coins. Finally, I will seek to highlight the importance of  Plutarch in defining this characterisation of  Paullus, which most likely constituted a Roman identity. * * *

1. The Aemilii as a Numaic gens In the first lines of  the Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus, Plutarch tells us that there is a tradition linking the origins of  the gens Aemilia to Pythagoras’ son. His name was Mamercus, but he was known as Αἰμίλιος for his exceptional αἱμυλία, the “charm of  his discourse”: Ὅτι δ’ὁ πρῶτος αὐτῶν καὶ τῷ γένει τὴν ἐπωνυμίαν ἀπολιπὼν Μά‹με›ρκος ἦν, Πυθαγόρου παῖς τοῦ σοφοῦ, δι’αἱμυλίαν λόγου καὶ χάριν Αἰμίλιος προσαγορευθείς, εἰρήκασιν ἔνιοι τῶν Πυθαγόρᾳ τὴν Νομᾶ τοῦ βασιλέως παίδευσιν ἀναθέντων. That the first of  them, and the one who gave his surname to the family, was Mamercus, a  son of  Pythagoras the philosopher, who received the surname of  Aemi­lius for the grace and charm of  his discourse, is the statement of  some of  those writers who hold that Pythagoras was the educator of  Numa the king.8

This paragraph offers some discussion points. Firstly, there is a link between Numa and Pythagoras. The tradition, says Plutarch, considered the former a  pupil of  the latter.9 Cicero declared it not 8 Plut. Aem. 2, 2 (transl. B. Perrin, Plutarch’s Lives, VI, Dion and Brutus, Timoleon and Aemi­lius Paullus, London-Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1970). 9  Most authors who wrote about Numa reported this tradition; see, for example, Liv. I 18, D.H. II 59, Ov. fast. III 151–54, and Dio Chrys. 49, 6. This tradition survived in later times, as witnessed by Eus. PE IX 6, 3 (following Clem. Al. Strom. I  15,  71) and Lyd.  Mens. I  17. See also, among others, K.  R. Prowse, “Numa and the Pythagoreans: a curious incident”, G&R 11.1 (1964), pp. 36–42, P. Panitschek, “Numa Pompilius als Schuler des Pythagoras”, GB 17 (1990), pp. 49–

124

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

only false, but false “in a wrong and absurd way”.10 First-centurybce Romans knew well that this tradition was not possible due to chronological discrepancies, since Pythagoras lived a century after the second Roman king.11 This was certainly known by Plutarch as well, but speaking of  Numa he preferred a  more positive approach: [2] Λεγομένου δὲ οὖν ὡς Νομᾶς γένοιτο Πυθαγόρου συνήθης, οἱ μὲν ὅλως ἀξιοῦσι μηδὲν Ἑλληνικῆς παιδεύσεως Νομᾷ μετεῖναι, καθάπερ ἢ φύσει δυνατὸν καὶ αὐτάρκη γενέσθαι πρὸς ἀρετὴν ἢ βελτίονι Πυθαγόρου βαρβάρῳ τινὶ τὴν τοῦ βασιλέως ἀποδοῦναι παίδευσιν· οἱ δὲ Πυθαγόραν μὲν ὀψὲ γενέσθαι, τῶν Νομᾶ χρόνων ὁμοῦ τι πέντε γενεαῖς ἀπολειπόμενον, [3] Πυθαγόρου δὲ τὸν Σπαρτιάτην Ὀλύμπια νενικηκότα στάδιον ἐπὶ τῆς ἑκκαιδεκάτης Ὀλυμπιάδος, ἧς ἔτει τρίτῳ Νομᾶς εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν κατέστη, πλανηθέντα περὶ τὴν Ἰταλίαν συγγενέσθαι τῷ Νομᾷ καὶ συνδιακοσμῆσαι τὴν πολιτείαν, ὅθεν οὐκ ὀλίγα τοῖς Ῥωμαϊκοῖς ἐπιτηδεύμασι τῶν Λακωνικῶν ἀναμεμῖχθαι Πυθαγόρου διδάξαντος, ἄλλως δὲ Νομᾶς γένος μὲν ἦν ἐκ Σαβίνων, Σαβῖνοι δὲ βούλονται Λακεδαιμονίων ἑαυτοὺς ἀποίκους γεγονέναι. [4] Τοὺς μὲν οὖν χρόνους ἐξακριβῶσαι χαλεπόν ἐστι, καὶ μάλιστα τοὺς ἐκ τῶν Ὀλυμπιονικῶν ἀναγομένους, ὧν τὴν ἀναγραφὴν ὀψέ φασιν Ἱππίαν ἐκδοῦναι τὸν Ἠλεῖον, ἀπ᾽οὐδενὸς ὁρμώμενον ἀναγκαίου πρὸς πίστιν· ἃ δὲ παρειλήφαμεν ἡμεῖς ἄξια λόγου περὶ Νομᾶ, διέξιμεν ἀρχὴν οἰκείαν λαβόντες. [2] Accordingly, when it is said that Numa was an intimate friend of  Pythagoras, some deny utterly that Numa had any Greek culture, holding either that he was naturally capable of  attaining excellence by his own efforts, or that the culture 65, Storchi, Numa e  Pitagora, M.  Humm, “Numa et Pythagore: vie et mort d’un mythe”, in P. A. Deproost, A. Meurant (eds), Images d’origines, origines d’un image. Hommage à  Jacques Poucet, Louvain-la-Neuve, Bruylant-Academia, 2004, pp. 125–37, Poulle, “Les reincarnations de Pythagore”. 10 Cic. resp. II 28: falsum est enim […] id totum, neque solum fictum sed etiam imperite absurdeque fictum. 11 Assuming that the traditional chronology of  the Roman kings is  correct, which is  not certain. See some recent analysis of  this topic in G.  Forsythe, A Critical history of  Early Rome. From Prehistory to the First Punic War, Berkeley-­Los Angeles-London, University of  California Press, 2005, pp. 96–100, A. Koptev, “Reconsidering the Roman king-list”, in C. Deroux (ed.), Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History XIV (Collection Latomus 315), Bruxelles, Latomus, 2008, pp.  5–83, and C.  Smith, “Thinking about Kings”, BICS 54.2 (2011), pp. 21–42, with related bibliography.

125

D. MORELLI

of the king was due to some barbarian superior to Pythagoras. Others say that Pythagoras the philosopher lived as many as five generations after Numa, [3] but that there was another Pythagoras, the Spartan, who was Olympic victor in the foot-race for the sixteenth Olympiad (in the third year of  which Numa was made king), and that in his wanderings about Italy he made the acquaintance of  Numa, and helped him arrange the government of the city, whence it came about that many Spartan customs were mingled with the Roman, as Pythagoras taught them to Numa. And at all events, Numa was of  Sabine descent, and the Sabines will have it that they were colonists from Lacedaemon. [4] Chronology, however, is  hard to fix, and especially that which is  based upon the names of  victors in the Olympic games, the list of  which is said to have been published at a late period by Hippias of  Elis, who had no fully authoritative basis for his work. I shall therefore begin at a convenient point, and relate the noteworthy facts which I have found in the life of  Numa.12

It is clear that Plutarch is not particularly concerned with the reliability of  his historical reconstruction.13 In  this case, Plutarch opts to narrate a  tradition that, for at least a  century, had been considered false because of  its chronological issues; he also references a Pythagoras of  Sparta as potentially being Numa’s teacher. It  seems that Plutarch favours the Pythagorean tradition: 14 the criticism against the Olympic dating system gives lesser credit to the tradition of  Pythagoras of  Sparta. The consequence is that the other tradition, which connects Pythagoras the philosopher and  Plut. Num. 1, 2–4 (transl. Perrin, Plutarch’s Lives).   This subject has been thoroughly investigated. See D.  H.  J. Larmour, “Statesman and self  in the Parallel Lives”, in L.  De  Blois, J.  Bond, T.  Kessels, D. M. Schenkeveld (eds), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, Proceedings of  the Sixth International Conference of  the International Plutarch Society, Nijmegen-Castle Hernen, May 1–5, 2002, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2005, vol. II, pp.  43–51; and L. van der Stockt, “Compositional methods in the Lives”, in M. Beck (ed.), A Companion to Plutarch, Chichester, Wiley Blackwell, 2014, pp. 321–32. 14  Or, better, this Pythagorean tradition. A vast group of  traditions was born around the “Italiote philosopher”. As  for those that concerned Italy and Italic people (including Romans), see briefly S.  Calderone, “La conquista romana della Magna Grecia”, in La Magna Grecia nell’età romana, Atti del quindicesimo convegno di studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto 5–10 ottobre 1975, Napoli, Arte Tipografica, 1976, pp. 33–81, in part. pp. 45–50. 12 13

126

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

Numa, becomes preferable. There is also an element of  irony: how could a  barbarian, such as a  Sabine, learn so many things without listening to Pythagoras? It would not have been possible for Numa to learn such things without him, “naturally”, or worse, with “some barbarian superior to Pythagoras”. The choice of  the Pythagorean tradition (even if  impossible, and Plutarch probably knew it) fits the biographer’s purpose: to give an exemplum uirtutis.15 Whether Plutarch believed the tradition or not, this  is how he reported it. Later, in fact, he insists on the same topic: in chapter 21 of  the Life of  Numa, Plutarch summarises the traditions around Numa’s children. According to some historians, he had four sons: Pompus (or Pompo), Calpus, Pinus, and Mamercus. The Roman gentes of  Pomponii, Calpurnii, Pinarii, and Mamercii descended from them,16 and because of  this, they would have borne the cognomen of  Rex.  For other historians, who consider this tradition artificial and propagandistic in favour of  these gentes, Numa only had a daughter, Pompilia. It is generally agreed,17 however, that Pompilia married Marcius, the son of Numa’s friend who convinced him to accept the crown. This friend would have 15  Plut. Aem. 1 points out this purpose. See also Plut. Num. 8, 16–21, discussed by F. Russo, “Genealogie numaiche e tradizioni pitagoriche”, RCCM 47 (2005), pp. 265–90, in part. pp. 272–75, where Plutarch, on the contrary, seems to attribute lesser credit to this version. If   the biographer wants to give an exemplum, the fact that we find many different versions in his works is  not surprising: the use of  a specific tradition is defined by the work’s purpose. P. Desideri, “Teoria e  prassi storiografica di Plutarco: una proposta di lettura della coppia Emilio Paolo-Timoleonte”, Maia n.s. 41 (1989), pp. 199–214 [now in P. Desideri, Saggi su Plutarco e la sua fortuna (Studi e testi di scienze dell’antichità 29), Firenze, Firenze University Press, 2012, pp. 201–18], p. 214, offers an interesting interpretation: he sees in the Plutarchean couple, Aemi­lius-Timoleon, the “effetto di una riassunzione, da parte degli uomini di oggi, delle motivazioni, degli ideali, delle capacità operative, dei grandi uomini di ieri”. 16  Storchi, Numa e Pitagora, p. 24 and n. 20 (with related bibliography) argues that Pinarii and Mamerci (which is, the Aemilii) were the most ancient gentes to use this tradition, and Calpurnii and Pomponii started to do it only later. See also R. Verdière, “Calpus fils de Numa et la tripartition fonctionnelle dans la société indo-européenne”, AC 34.2 (1965), pp. 425–31, for the gens Calpurnia; T. P. Wiseman, “Legendary Genealogies in Late-Republican Rome”, G&R 21.2 (1974), pp. 153–64, in part. p. 155, for a summary of  this genealogy; K. Bura­ selis, “Numa Pompilius und die gens Pomponia”, Historia 25.3 (1976), pp. 378– 80, for the gens Pomponia. 17 Plut. Num. 21, 4: πάντες δ’οὖν ὁμολογοῦσι.

127

D. MORELLI

become senator and, later, pontifex. The couple’s son would be king Ancus Marcius. This passage is  confused. Rex is  effectively an attested cognomen, but for the Marcii, the family that would have Numaic origins through Pompilia.18 The Mamercii are clearly the Aemilii, who bore the cognomina of  Mamercinus and Mamercus between the fifth and fourth century bce.19 Finally, the same criticism that the historians levelled at the former Numaic genealogies can also be directed towards the latter one, since it provides an ancient and noble origin for the Marcii. Modern studies offer a  series of  hypotheses that attempt to clarify this tradition. Storchi’s analysis is  the most convincing one.20 She thinks that this tradition constitutes an attempt by the gens Marcia to link itself  to both Ancus and Numa Pompilius, but also to Numa Marcius, who is the first pontifex maximus in Livy.21 The struggles for the plebeian pontificate, at the end of  the fourth century bce, led to the birth of  this tradition; in this case, the Numaic aspect involved is  Numa’s role in defining Roman religion, rather than his supposed Pythagoreanism.22 Aemilian 18  F. Münzer, s.v. Marcius nrr. 89–92, RE, XIV.2, 1930, cols 1582–86. There is also a P. Rupilius Rex, friend of  Brutus, proscribed in 43 bce (see F. Münzer, s.v. Rupilius nr. 10, RE, I A.1, 1914, cols 1231–32). Wiseman, “Legendary Genealogies”, p. 155, talks about “a confused reference for the Marcii”, which is very likely. 19  E.  Klebs, s.v. Aemi­lius nrr. 93–101, RE, I.1, 1894, cols  568–72. Some Pinarii brought this cognomen too: see O. Stein, Pinarius nrr. 11–13, RE, XX.2, 1950, cols 1400–01. On the origin of  this cognomen, see L. Deroy, “Les noms latins du marteau et la racine étrusque ‘mar-’ ”, AC 28.1 (1959), pp. 5–31; in part. pp. 19–22. 20   Storchi, Numa e Pitagora, pp. 120–24. 21  The sources reflect this confusion. The kinship between Ancus and Numa is attested, among others, in Liv. I 32, 1, while the same Livy mentions in I 20, 5 a Numa Marcius, Marci filius, as pontifex created by Numa – without pointing out any relationship between them. Storchi thinks that Livy here uses two different sources, which is likely. The other possibility is the existence of  a gens Marcia so numerous that it can, in two different family branches, give both a grandson to Numa and the first pontifex maximus. On Marcian tradition, see specifically A. Storchi Marino, “C. Marcio Censorino, la lotta politica intorno al pontificato e  la formazione della tradizione liviana su Numa”, AION(archeol) 14 (1992), pp. 105–47; F. Russo, “I carmina marciana e le tradizioni sui Marcii”, PP 60 (2005), pp. 5–32; D. Morelli, “The family traditions of  the gens Marcia between the fourth and third centuries bc”, CQ  71 (2021), pp. 189–99. 22  Wiseman, “Legendary Genealogies”, pp. 154–55; Storchi, “C. Marcio Censorino”.

128

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

tradition (with the other gentes) would not have been born much earlier, since the Marcian genealogy is  opposed to the AemilioPinarian one.23 The creation of  a Numaic genealogy for the Aemilii dates back to the fourth century, linking this mid-republican gens to the Sabine king. The connection with Pythagoras must now be analysed. Livy does not provide us with any information about the etymology of  the gentilician name. In his work, Livy refers only to Numa’s daughter, mother of  Ancus, as becoming, more or less voluntarily, part of  the Marcian tradition. The only other source connecting the Aemilii and Pythagoras is Festus. We can read in there that Aemiliam gentem appellatam dicunt a  Mamerco, Pythagorae philosophi filio, cui propter unicam humanitatem cognomen fuerit Aemylos. Alii, quod ab Ascanio descendat, qui duos habuerit filios, Iulium et Aemylon. They say that the Aemilian family is named this way because of  Mamercus, son of  the philosopher Pythagoras, whose cognomen was Aemylus, after his exceptional humanity. Some others state that it descends from Ascanius, who had two sons, Iulius and Aemylus.24

Festus’ work is a synthesis of that of Verrius Flaccus, while Flaccus, in turn, mainly employed Varro as a  source.25 Without considering the question of  the information’s provenience, it remains clear that, in the Late Republic, this information still exists, despite Cicero’s considerations. Together with Aemilian Numaic 23   Storchi, Numa e Pitagora, p. 129; Russo, “Genealogie numaiche”, p. 281; Morelli, “The family traditions”. 24  Paul. Fest. p. 22 L. My translation. 25 W. Schwarze, Q uibus fontibus Plutarchus in Vita L. Aemilii Paulli usus sit, Lipsiae, Typi L.  B. Hirschfeldi, 1891, pp.  13–14, discussing the sources of  Plutarch’s Aemi­lius Paullus, includes Varro. On Flaccus’ work in general, see F.  Bona, Contributo allo studio della composizione del De  verborum significatione di Verrio Flacco, Milano, Giuffrè, 1964. There is  an active discussion on Flaccus’ use of  Varro: see, for example, F. Glinister, “Constructing the past”, in F. Glinister, C. Woods, J. A. North, M. H. Crawford (eds), Verrius, Festus & Paul (Bulletin of  the Institute of  Classical Studies Supplement 93), London, Institute of  Classical Studies, 2007, pp. 11–32, in part. pp. 13–19, with related bibliography.

129

D. MORELLI

and Pythagorean ancestry, there is a second piece of  information: Aemylus would have been Ascanius’ son, and therefore Aeneas’ grandson and Romulus’ ancestor. Plutarch affirms a rather similar fact: Αἰμυλία would have been the daughter of  Aeneas and Lavinia, as well as Romulus’ mother.26 These, for instance, are the accounts of  the Aemilii’s origins: 1) from Mamercus, Pythagoras’ son; 2) from Mamercus, Numa’s son, whose name pays homage to Pythagoras; 3) from Aeneas, either through his grandson (Ascanius’ son) or daughter (Romulus’ mother).27 The Aemilii descended from philosophers, priest-kings, or a Trojan hero. If  we are to listen to the rumours on Numaic genealogy referenced by the historians in Plutarch, it seems that the Aemilii were busy constructing their own noble tradition. Here we will consider just the first two points, linked to Pythagoras. Since this tradition was born at least in the fourth century, when the Mamercini were powerful, it is probable that it emerged during the first contact with Great Greece, where Pythagoreanism was widespread. The use of  this genealogy can be connected to Roman interests in Southern Italy, as has been argued.28 Besides the convincing arguments cited about the Pythagorean origin of  the Aemilian tradition, we must add that the Aemilii were by far the most powerful of  the Numaic gentes in the fourth century bce.29 The birth of  the Pythagorean tradi26  Plut. Rom. 2, 3. For other parallel traditions about Aeneas and Romulus, and in general on Trojan ancestry in Roman myth, see for example E. S. Gruen, Culture and national identity in Republican Rome, Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1992, pp. 14–51. 27  Despite the diversity of  these traditions, they are here listed under the same point, since they belong to the same myth. We must note that, in the Life of  Romulus, Plutarch mentions Aemilia without pointing out any relation to Roman Aemilii. On the political importance of  these Roman traditions before the Greeks, see again Gruen, Culture and national identity, p. 31. 28 See for example Humm, “Les origines du pythagorisme romain II”, pp. 35–36. 29  The Pinarii gave a consular tribune and two consuls in the fifth century and a magister equitum in the fourth; the Pomponii gave a tribune of  the plebs in the fifth, and two other tribunes in the fourth, together with a consular tribune;

130

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

tion would thus most likely be their responsibility, as it would be setting an example for other Roman gentes in terms of  linking their families to Southern Italian culture for political gain. The Aemilii and other Numaic gentes, however, are not alone in their connection with Pythagoras: a  prominent figure of  fourth-century Rome such as Appius Claudius Caecus, for example, has long been identified as a  key representative of  Roman Pythagorising culture in this period.30

2. Pythagorean Elements in L. Aemi­lius Paullus Macedonicus’ Life One of  the most famous exponents of  the Aemilii is L. Aemi­lius Paullus Macedonicus, the main character of  Plutarch’s Life, with which we started. Paullus was born around 229 bce; his homonymous father died at Cannae in 216.31 Becoming Consul for the first time in 182, he was re-elected in 168 to face the war against Perseus of  Macedonia, whom he defeated at Pydna on 22  June 168, after a lunar eclipse. After capturing the king, he organised a  panegyris at Anphipolis where he announced, in Latin, his decision about Macedonian reorganisation under Roman rule. His triumph, the most abundant ever seen until that day, was three days long: the richness of  the plunder allowed the Romans to cancel the tributum for a  century. At  this time, his younger sons died: the first a few days before and the second a few days after the triumph. His elder sons, who had been previously adopted, were P.  Cornelius Scipio Aemilianus and Q .  Fabius there are no Calpurnii among the magistrates of  the period. On the contrary, thirteen Aemilii (mostly Mamercini and Mamerci) fulfilled magistracies in the fifth-fourth centuries. 30  See for example M. Humm, “Una sentenza pitagorica di Appio Claudio Cieco?”, in M.  Tortorelli Ghidini, A.  Storchi Marino, A.  Visconti (eds), Tra Orfeo e  Pitagora. Origini e  incontri di culture nell’antichità, Atti dei seminari napoletani 1996–1998, Napoli, Bibliopolis, 2000, pp.  445–62, and M. Humm, Appius Claudius Caecus. La République accomplie (Bibliothèque des Écoles françaises d’Athènes et de Rome 322), Rome, École française de Rome, 2005, pp. 541–600. We must remark that, in Appius’ case as well, one can talk about Pythagorising, and not fully Pythagorean, culture and cultural influence, since Appius was quite certainly not a proper Pythagorean. 31 See MRR, I, p. 347.

131

D. MORELLI

Maximus Aemilianus. Censor in 164, he died four years later. His coffin was carried by some exponents of  the peoples he subdued (Ligurians, Iberians, Macedonians). In the end, L. Aemi­lius Paullus is in every source one of  the most glittering exempla of  the Roman world.32 To compare his behaviour to the Pythagorean way of  life – if  there were any relation – we must recall some fundamentals of  the doctrine. Firstly, Pythagoreanism is built on multiple beliefs, often with internal divergences. There is, on the one hand, the βίος θεωρητικός, the philosophical contemplative way of  life; on the other hand, there is the βίος πρακτικός, the active life in society and politics.33 We can detect scientific rationalism and natural studies, but also esoteric mysticism (often connected with eastern cults and Orphism).34 The original doctrine, as Pythago32  On Paullus, see generally W. Reiter, Aemi­lius Paullus. Conqueror of Greece, London-New York-Sidney, Croom Helm, 1988. The critical bibliography on him is obviously vast; see recently P. J. Burton, Rome and the Third Macedonian War, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2017, and M. J. Taylor, “The Battle Scene on Aemi­lius Paullus’s Pydna Monument: a  Reevaluation”, Hesperia 85.3 (2016), pp. 559–76, with related studies and sources. 33  The Aristotelian distinction finds its roots in Plato, who learned it from Italiote Pythagoreanism (see for example Archytas apud Stob. II 31, 120, pp. 129– 32 Hense). Much has been said about the connections among these philosophical schools. As  for the relationship between Aristoteles and Pythagoras, see M. Timpanaro-Cardini, “Introduzione”, in G. Reale (ed.), Pitagorici antichi. Testimonianze e frammenti, Milano, Bompiani, 2010, pp. xliii–lxxviii. There are many accounts of  Pythagoreanism and Platonism: Plato was a friend of  Archytas (Cic. resp. I 16; D.L. III 21–22 and VIII 79–81) and many theories, in Platonism, have a Pythagorean origin (see M. Bonazzi, C. Lévy, C. Steel [eds], A Platonic Pythagoras. Platonism and Pythagoreanism in the imperial age, Turnhout, Brepols, 2007, and P. S. Horky, Plato and Pythagoreanism, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013). For an analysis of  Aristotelianism, Platonism and Pythagoreanism in their reciprocal relations in the late Hellenistic world, see also M. Schofield (ed.), Aristotle, Plato and Pythagoreanism in the first century bc, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2013. 34   On Pythagoras’ relationship with the East and Egypt as perceived by Greek culture, see Hdt. II 123 and Isocr. Bus. 28. The link with Orphism, as for the doctrine of  the souls, is mentioned for example in Hdt. II 81. See also W. Burkert, Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1972 [or. ed. Nürnberg, Hans Carl, 1962], pp. 120–65 (Eastern doctrines in Pythagoras’ thought defined as “shamanism”); Riedweg, Pythagoras, pp. 7–8 (his travels in the East and related sources); and Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, pp.  95–103, for the connection between Pythagoreanism and mysticism (with eastern cults and Orphism) and its elaboration, particularly in Philolaus’ school. We  must finally remember that the connection with ancient eastern culture is a philosophical topos.

132

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

ras elaborated on in Croton, has had many inheritors. Archytas of  Tarentum  35 (fourth century) was one of  the most important; his doctrine was based upon the concepts of  harmony, geometrical proportion, and aristocratic government. This trend will arrive in Rome through Great-Greek, Campanian, and even Samnite mediation during the fourth century bce.36 Therefore, it  is particularly important to summarise some concepts from Archytean Pythagoreanism that we can locate in Plutarch’s Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus as well as in earlier sources. Firstly, ὁμόνοια, “concord”, which assumes a political sense.37 Concord, in fact, constituted in Tarentum what Ferrero defined as a “governo di aristocratici illuminati”, in which “la partecipazione del popolo al potere è prospettata come una largizione limitata e  controbilanciata dall’influenza debitamente riservata agli ottimati, come una beneficenza paternalistica”.38 It  is, clearly, the fundamental characteristic of  good government, without which it is impossible to avoid στάσις. 35  On Archytas, see C.  A. Huffman, Archytas of  Tarentum. Pythagorean, philosopher, and mathematician king, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005 and, recently, M. Raffa, “Acustica e divulgazione in Archita di Taranto: il fr. 1 Huffman come ‘Protrettico alla scienza’ ”, in A. Bellia (ed.), Musica, culti e riti nell’Occidente greco, Pisa, Istituti editoriali e poligrafici internazionali, 2014, pp. 95–101, with related bibliography. M. Giangiulio, “L’eredità di Archita”, in Alessandro il Molosso e i condottieri in Magna Grecia, Atti del quarantatreesimo convegno di studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto-Cosenza 26–30 settembre 2003, Taranto, Istituto di Studi per la storia e l’archeologia della Magna Grecia, 2004, pp. 55–81, and M. Lombardo, “Dopo Archita: la vicenda storica di Taranto tra IV e I sec. a.C.”, Notiziario del portale numismatico dello Stato 8 (2016), pp. 60–73 (in part. pp. 60–62), among others, have recently underlined his utter political importance for Tarentum and Great Greece. 36  See A. Mele, “Il pitagorismo e le popolazioni anelleniche d’Italia”, AION­ (archeol) 3 (1981), pp. 61–96; Humm, “Les origines du pythagorisme”; Mahé, “Le pythagorisme d’Italie du Sud”; in particular about Samnites and Pythagoreanism, A. Mele, “Archita e Gaio Ponzio sannita”, in M. Tortorelli Ghidini, A.  Storchi Marino, A.  Visconti (eds), Tra Orfeo e  Pitagora. Origini e  incontri di culture nell’antichità, Atti dei seminari napoletani 1996–1998, Napoli, Bibliopolis, 2000, pp. 433–44, and P. S. Horky, “Herennius Pontius: The Construction of  a Samnite Philosopher”, CA 30.1 (2011), pp. 119–47. It is difficult to consider the Samnites as an active vector (towards Rome) of  philosophical thought; at least, however, they witness the large success of  Pythagoreanism among Italic people. 37  The most important witness, from Archytas’ περὶ μαθημάτων, can be found in D.-K. 47 B 3 (apud Stob. IV 1, 139, p. 88 Hense). See Huffman, Archytas of  Tarentum, pp. 182–224. 38   Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, p. 117.

133

D. MORELLI

Central to Pythagoreanism is also the study of heavens, as both natural phenomenon and otherworldly universe. Many currents addressed this issue in a range of  ways, but cosmology remained a deeply rooted Pythagorean field of  investigation.39 As we have said, there  is a  double approach: naturalistic, with astronomy (following rationalism), and mystic, with astrology (derived from eastern thought and developed particularly in Hellenistic Pythagoreanism). Two other concepts seem to be widespread in Greek thought, but with a  significant role in Archytean doctrine: the subjugation of  Fortune to virtues, and self-control against passions.40 These aspects can also be found in Roman gnomic, for example in Appius Claudius’ sententiae; 41 however, there are also other, more or less clear, attestations.42

39   In  general, for an evolution of  Pythagorean thought on cosmology, see Burkert, Lore and Science, pp. 299–368. The whole volume by Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, refers to various characters who dedicated their life to these investigations. The main role, on this topic, was played by Philolaus and his school (pp. 75–78; see also Burkert, Lore and Science, pp. 218–98, and C. H. Kahn, Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans. A brief History, Indianapolis-Cambridge, Hackett, 2001, pp. 23–38), the Hellenistic and Imperial Pythagorean schools (Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, pp. 102–09, with a focus on the connection with eastern mysticism), and Roman Late-Republican and Early Imperial Pythagoreanism (Ibid., pp. 245–326). Moreover, we must recall Timaeus, the expert on heavenly phenomena in Plato’s homonymous work (Pl. Ti. 27a). Finally, Archytas too was a valid astronomer: see Kahn, Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans, p. 40, and the discussion in Huffmann, Archytas of  Tarentum, pp. 22–23. 40  Archytas apud Stob. III 1, 196 (p. 149 Hense): ἁ δ’ὑπερβολὰ τᾶς εὐτυχίας τοῖς ἀγαθοῖς οὐ κρατεῖσθαι πέφυκεν ὑπὸ τᾶς ψυχᾶς, ἀλλὰ κρατὲν αὐτᾶς, “when fortune changes it is proper, for good men, not to become enslaved by the soul, but to master it”. Archytas is the exemplum of  self-control also in Cic. resp. I 59–60. See also Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, pp.  163–64. As  for the link between ἀρετή and εὐτυχία in pseudo-Pythagorean works and for the influences on Platonism and Aristotelianism, see also B.  Centrone, “The pseudo-Pythagorean writings”, in C.  A. Huffman (ed.), A  history of  Pythagoreanism, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2014, pp. 315–40, in part. pp. 329–32. 41  The most famous sentence is  Ap.Claud. carm., frg. 3 B.  Moreover, Cic.  Tusc. IV 4 calls Appius’ poem Pythagoreum. G. De Sanctis, Storia dei Romani. II. La conquista del primato in Italia, Torino, Fratelli Bocca, 1907, p. 507, already thought that Cicero’s definition was right. 42  As for Fortuna, see for example Cic. parad. 34; Nep. Att. 11, 6; Verg, Aen. VIII 334, defined sententia philosophica in Non. p.  526 M. together with similar passages; for self-control, see Fest. p.  418 L., but also Plaut. Trin. 363 and Val. Max. VII 2, 1.

134

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

Ultimately, the concept of  πολυμαθία has Pythagorean origins too. It  means “to be versed in many fields”, conceived not simply as different topics, but also as an expression of  the world as a whole, and even as a representation of  the divine.43 It was necessary to enumerate these elements because, in the Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus, they seem to emerge as characteristics of  Paullus himself. These behaviours can be found in other sources (such as Polybius, Livy, Diodorus, Appian), but Plutarch bases his representation and reflections upon them, thus giving rise to a peculiar interpretation of  Paullus. 2.1. ὁμόνοια Paullus mentions this principle after the division of  Macedonia into districts, together with εὐνομία: Διῳκημένων δὲ πάντων αὐτῷ καλῶς, ἀσπασάμενος τοὺς Ἕλληνας, καὶ παρακαλέσας τοὺς Μακεδόνας μεμνῆσθαι τῆς δεδομένης ὑπὸ Ῥωμαίων ἐλευθερίας, σῴζοντας αὐτὴν δι’εὐνομίας καὶ ὁμονοίας, ἀνέζευξεν […] When he had put everything in good order, had bidden the Greeks farewell, and had exhorted the Macedonians to be mindful of  the freedom bestowed upon them by the Romans and preserve it by good order and concord, he marched […] 44

The most striking element in the passage is  that the exhortation to concord is not universal, but rather related to a specific political measure following a legislative change: from monarchy to “republic”, the transition from autonomous reign to Roman protectorate. The term ὁμόνοια, therefore, assumes this political and legislative meaning. On the one hand, political connotations 43  On Pythagorean use and origin of  the word, see Burkert, Lore and Science, pp.  208–10, and G.  Lloyd, “Pythagoras”, in C.  A. Huffman (ed.), A  history of  Pythagoreanism, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2014, pp.  24–45. G.  Cornelli, In  search of  Pythagoreanism. Pythagoreanism as an historiographical category (Studia Praesocratica 4), Berlin-Boston, DeGruyter, 2013, pp.  96–99, shows how the term πολυμαθία was used both to define and mock Pythagoras, so being (at least) one of  his main characteristics (see also infra, n. 76). It could be significant that the Latin calque multiscius is attested for the first time in Apul. apol. 31, 5, for Pythagoras. 44 Plut. Aem. 29, 1 (transl. Perrin, Plutarch’s Lives).

135

D. MORELLI

recall the Archytean ideal of  enlightened government (as the Roman one claims to be, with its propagandistic theme of  the libertas restituta). On the other hand, the legislative aspect 45 is itself  a  Pythagorean topos: Pythagoreanism, with Charondas of  Catania, Zaleucus of  Locri, and Diocles of  Syracuse, often assumed the role of  “lawgiving philosophy”. This same element is, partly, the model for Numa’s characterisation as lawgiver.46 This witness could represent a lexical choice made only by Plutarch: there is no mention of  ὁμόνοια in either Polybius (although fragmentary) or Livy (as concordia). Making a  comparison with other passages, the theme of  the libertas restituta (brought into Roman political language by Flamininus in 196  bce) is  shared considerably with Livy and Diodorus Siculus.47 This could mean that Plutarch lifted these words from common sources (Polybius?). If   on libertas there  is no uncertainty and this topic was fully expected from a victorious general in Greece, we cannot see ὁμόνοια and εὐνομία as being linked in the sources before Plutarch. The only exception seems to be Flamininus’ speech at Corinth after his presidency of  the Nemean Games in 195, where ὁμόνοια and εὐνομία are listed among other features (δίκη and σωφροσύνη).48 It might be possible to find further evidence in coinage, specifically a denarius coined by L. Aemi­lius Lepidus Paullus (fig. 1),49 who took his agnomen in honour of  his ancestor. On the reverse we can see a representation of  the Macedonian triumph with its spoils at the centre, the general on the right, and Perseus with his 45  We read Plutarch; but Livy too (XLV 31, 1) remarks on Paullus’ role as lawgiver. 46   Storchi, Numa e Pitagora, pp. 73–75. For Pythagoreanism as “philosophy of  lawgivers”, and especially for Charondas and Zaleucus, see now A. Mele, “Tra Zaleuco, Caronda e Parmenide: legislatori e filosofi in Magna Grecia e Sicilia”, in Polis e Politeiai nella Magna Grecia arcaica e classica, Atti del cinquantatreesimo convegno di studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto 26–29 settembre 2013, Taranto, Istituto per la storia e  l’archeologia della Magna Grecia, 2016, pp. 235–64. 47   Liv. XLV 29, 4 and 30, 1; D.S. XXXI 8, 4. On this subject, see for example J.  J. Walsh, “Flamininus and the propaganda of  liberation”, Historia 45.3 (1996), pp. 343–63, and recently R. Pfeilschifter, Titus Q uinctius Flamininus: Untersuchungen zur römischen Griechenlandpolitik, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2005, pp. 278–342. 48 Plut. Flam. 12, 6. 49  BMCRR Rome 3373 = RRC 415. 62 bce. See also infra for other considerations on Late Republican coinage.

136

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

Fig. 1. RRC 415/1; L. Aemi­lius Lepidus Paullus, denarius, 62 bc. Courtesy of  Goldberg, Los Angeles (Auction 80, 03.06.2014, lot 3045).

Fig. 2. RRC 417/1a; L. Aemi­lius Lepidus Paullus, L. Scribonius Libo, denarius, 62 bc. Courtesy of  Numismatica Ars Classica NAC AG, London-Zürich-Milano (Auction 63, 17.05.2012, lot 279).

sons on the left. On the obverse there is a representation of  the goddess Concordia.50 Crawford thus comments on this choice: “The head of  Concordia on the obverse presumably reflects the concordia ordinum which was central to Cicero’s policy in 63 […]; the moneyer was Cicero’s convinced supporter 51”. There are other representations of  Concordia in late-Republican coinage, but they 50   This  is the first known representation of  Concordia in coins: there  is another similar representation in the same year (62 bce) in a denarius coined by the same moneyer together with L. Scribonius Libo (BMCRR Rome 3383 = RRC 417/1; fig. 2). Its faces are marked differently for the two moneyers: Concordia with the name of  Paullus, the Scribonian puteal with Libo’s name. This adds evidence to the fact that the concept of  Concordia, at least, was chosen by L. Aemi­ lius Lepidus Paullus as a characteristic for himself. 51  RRC, I, p. 441.

137

D. MORELLI

refer mostly to triumviral concord 52 and to the desired peace between Caesar and Pompey,53 while there are also other, more obscure references.54 In general, the presence of  Concordia on this coin cannot suggest any relationship between the Aemilii and the concept (or the goddess). Plutarch’s reference, an uncertain one, remains the only account witnessing the use of  concordia-ὁμόνοια by Paullus in a political key. As a result, this must be considered as a clue, and not as proof. 2.2. Cosmology and Astronomy The episode of  the lunar eclipse preceding the battle of  Pydna (the only one certainly known from the Antiquity 55) is  well recounted in the sources.56 The different versions vary slightly: in Polybius, it is fragmentary, with only a moralising comment. In  Plutarch, the eclipse makes the Romans audacious and the Macedonians discouraged, since it was interpreted as foreshadowing Perseus’ death. Paullus had first-hand knowledge of  the eclipses; despite this, he made a great sacrifice in accordance with Roman rituality. Zonaras, which generally means Dio Cassius, reports that the general is aware of  the event, deciding to explain it to his soldiers. Finally, according to Livy, it was the tribune C. Sulpicius Galus, summoning the army consulis permissu, who explained the natural phenomenon to the soldiers in order to reassure them. The same Galus (cos. 166 bce 57) is mentioned in Cicero’s de re publica, where this eclipse is  described by Scipio Aemilianus, who witnessed it.58 It follows a discussion about the 52  For example, BMCRR East 128  = RRC 529/4; BMCRR Rome 4236  = RRC 494/41; BMCRR Rome 4242 = RRC 494/42. 53  BMCRR Rome 3923 = RRC 436/1. 54  A coin by Fonteius Capito in 55 bce (BMCRR Rome 3856 = RRC 429/2) represents the head of  Concordia. RRC, I, p. 453, also assigns to Capito a relationship with Cicero’s thought. 55  P. J. Bicknell, “The lunar eclipse of  21 June 168 b.C.”, CR 18 (1968), p. 22. 56 Among others: Polyb. XXIX 16, a  fragment from Suida; Liv. XLIV 37, 5–9; Plut. Aem. 17, 7–10; Zonar. IX 23. 57 See MRR, I, p. 623, for his career. 58 Cic. resp. I 21–23.

138

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

usefulness of  science in government matters. Galus’ deep doctrine and investigating spirit act almost as a counterpart to this idea, since he would have been a typical “man of  academia”, far from any maiora occupations (Laelius says: eas artis, quae efficiant, ut usui ciuitatis simus). For this reason, Sex.  Aelius Paetus compares him to an astrologus, quoting Ennius, as a  man who looks high in the sky, but does not see what happens at his feet.59 These words, true or not, recall the Pythagorean distinction between βίος θεωρητικός and βίος πρακτικός. Sulpicius is  here depicted as a pure theorist, versed only in astronomy and astrology (we must remember that this modern distinction was less prominent in ancient times). As  we have said, this dichotomy has Pythagorean origins; we can see in this case the rationalism of  the “Scipionic Circle” 60 – or, better, its Ciceronian version 61 – opposed to the esoteric mysticism that part of  the previous generation assumed to be a distinctive element.62 However, Sulpicius was a military tribune in Spain and Macedonia and became consul; he was certainly not a pure theorist, and this characterisation is used here as a mere rhetorical device. 59   Ibid. I 30. Ennius grew up in a Pythagorean environment: see for example E. Flores, “Ennio e il pitagorismo”, in M. Tortorelli Ghidini, A. Storchi Marino, A. Visconti (eds), Tra Orfeo e Pitagora. Origini e incontri di culture nell’antichità, Atti dei seminari napoletani 1996–1998, Napoli, Bibliopolis, 2000, pp. 507–12. 60  Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, p. 234, talking about βίος θεωρητικός and βίος πρακτικός in the second half  of  the second century bce (the environment of  the so-called Scipionic Circle), says that this distinction was seen “non tanto […] in funzione della conquista dell’immortalità ultraterrena, quanto in funzione di norma pratica, politica, per la direzione degli affari di questo mondo”. 61  Much has been written about the “Scipionic Circle”; its very existence is still debated. The only sources related to it are Cicero’s philosophical dialogues, which may not reflect historical reality. See the critical H. Strasburger, “Der ‘Scipionenkreis’ ”, Hermes 94.1 (1966), pp. 60–72, but also other aspects of  the debate in G. Forsythe, “A philological note on the Scipionic Circle”, AJPh 112 (1991), pp. 363–64, and J. P. Wilson, “Grex Scipionis in De amicitia: a reply to Gary Forsythe”, AJPh 115 (1994), pp. 269–71. 62   In particular Scipio Africanus with his “legend”: see Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, pp.  180–88; F.  W. Walbank, “The Scipionic legend”, PCPhS 13 (1967), pp. 54–69 [now in F. W. Walbank, Selected papers. Studies in Greek and Roman history and historiography, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1985, pp. 120–37]; E. Gabba, “P. Cornelio Scipione Africano e la ‘leggenda’ ”, Athenaeum 53 (1975), pp. 3–17 [now in E. Gabba, Aspetti culturali dell’imperialismo romano, Firenze, Sansoni, 1993, pp. 113–31].

139

D. MORELLI

Returning to the eclipse, the way in which Plutarch and Zonaras narrate the episode diverges from that of  Livy.63 Galus’ cultural mediation is  completely absent; Paullus’ direct knowledge is  therefore privileged. This knowledge of  nature is  present in other anecdotes; for example, when Paullus found water supplies for the army while digging underground wells under Mount Olympus, believing that the luxurious vegetation growing there must be drawing water from somewhere not visible from the surface.64 Similar expedients, however, have much to do with military experience and field study.65 It is not uniquely related to theoretical knowledge; on the contrary, it could well be the result of field experience, which Paullus was far from lacking in.66 Plutarch chooses his anecdote, and he selects the version in which Paullus has a direct naturalistic knowledge, in spite of a different version where his role was more marginal. He  portraits a man versed in philosophical (in this case, naturalistic) matters. The relationship between Plutarch and Dio-Zonaras is not traceable: they could both refer to the same source, or Plutarch himself  could have been Dio’s source. The tradition is twofold, with a narrative line for (Polybius and?) Livy and another one for Plutarch, Cassius Dio and Zonaras.67 Livy’s words consulis permissu mean that, besides the existence of  a chain of  command, Paullus was at least aware of  the situation, and that he trusted Sulpicius Galus. Moreover, in Polybius, the eclipse sparked some rumours, favourable to the Romans and 63  Zonaras attributes to the general not only the knowledge of  the phenomenon, but also the speech to the soldiers. Since the surviving Greek sources (Plutarch and Zonaras, which means Cassius Dio) used this version, it is likely that they found it in a  common source, while Livy used (also?) another one. Livy’s version, with Galus’ intervention, is the most likely. 64  Plut. Aem. 14, 1–2, but also Liv. XLIV 33, 1–4. 65   It is important to underline the military importance of  such naturalistic knowledge on water supplies, which is not uncommon for a general as expert as Paullus. Polybius (IX 16) also includes astronomy among the necessary fields of  expertise for military men, on the model of  Odysseus. 66  In particular, a general who fought in Spain knew the mountain environment very well. 67  This does not mean that these sources could not have had any reciprocal contact: Plut. Aem. 19 explicitly quotes Polybius as a  source for Perseus’ flight from Pydna. This supposed bipartition concerns only the eclipse episode, where different authors made different choices. The fact that Plutarch read Polybius but chose (presumably) to report a different version is in itself  important.

140

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

adverse to the Macedonians; this is nonetheless a mere fragment in the Suida, fairly unreliable without its context. The Plutarchean characterisation suggests that Paullus is conscious of  the phenomenon, while the Livian version also implicitly indicates some kind of  awareness of  it. The latter, moreover, shows that the “expert” Sulpicius Galus was trusted by Paullus. These elements lead us to think that, even if  the Livian version is the most plausible, Paullus’ knowledge of  this natural phenomenon was at least true.68 2.3. Fortune and Virtue, Self-Control and Passions The preliminary theme of  the Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus is  Τύχη, the Roman Fortuna,69 trait d’union with Timoleon (the parallel Plutarchean character).70 From the first chapter, in fact, Plutarch underlines how these characters were οὐ μόνον ταῖς αἱρέσεσιν, ἀλλὰ καὶ ταῖς τύχαις ἀγαθαῖς ὁμοίως κεχρημένων ἐπὶ τὰ πράγματα alike not only in the good principles which they adopted, but also in the good fortune which they enjoyed in their conduct of  affairs.71

Fortune, together with virtue(s), is the main theme underpinning Paullus’ entire career, as many sources point out. Some examples: from his youth, Paullus distinguishes himself  from his fellow   The combination of scientific knowledge and military deployment of it can be seen, with more esoteric meanings, in the known episode of  Scipio Africanus at Cartagena, when he spread the rumour that the low tide in the marsh around the city was a sign of  divine intervention (Polyb. X 15; Liv. XXVI 45). There is also the suggestion of  Pythagorean influences on Scipio Africanus (see Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, pp. 180–87 and 215–16). 69 On Fortuna, see D.  Miano, Fortuna. Deity and concept in Archaic and Republican Italy, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2018. 70  See S.  C.  R. Swain, “Plutarch’s Aemi­ lius and Timoleon”, Historia 38.3 (1989), pp. 314–34, for an analysis of  the topic; I here disagree from his opinion in considering Τύχη present not only in Plutarch, as he says, but also in Polybius and Livy. Plutarch particularly underlines the facts related to Fortuna, but we can read the same facts with similar descriptions in both the other historians (for Polybius, unfortunately, in fragments). On the subject, see also W. J. Tatum, “Another look at Tyche in Plutarch’s Aemi­lius Paullus-Timoleon”, Historia 59.4 (2010), pp. 448–61. 71  Plut. Aem. 1, 6 (transl. Perrin, Plutarch’s Lives). 68

141

D. MORELLI

Romans in preferring the exercise of  virtues rather than factious tribunal speeches.72 He has philosophical ἡσυχία when he loses the consular elections.73 He is νοῦν ἔχων.74 He succeeds in all that he undertakes, for his virtues rather than by fortune (Fortune) 75 – while Perseus, on the contrary, blames Fortune for his own failures.76 He gives a long speech about fate and the transience of  empires.77 Furthermore, the most important evidence of  Paullus’ relationship with Τύχη, a sign of  his enormous self-control, is his speech to the people after the death of  his youngest sons.78 In this speech, the ill luck of  his family is presented as a counterpart to the good luck and glory that the Roman Republic achieved through Paullus’ victory on Perseus. Paullus himself  thanks Fortuna for having taken her pledge from his family and not from Rome. This  is how Appian, Diodorus, and Livy 79 recount the speech, which means that it was probably quite similar in Polybius as well; everybody points out how great an impression it made on the people. Moreover, the restoration of the Temple of  Fortuna Respiciens in Rome is, with good credibility, dated to Paullus’ censorship; a statue of  the general was probably also erected in this temple.80 Together with these findings, the recurrence of  Fortuna in the sources about Paullus has been a striking element for this attribution.   Ibid. 2, 6.   Ibid. 6, 8. 74  Ibid. 10, 1; and Polyb. XXIX 20, where the words νοῦν ἔχων are in general, but clearly referring to Paullus. There is another link between polymathia (see also infra) and being νοῦν ἔχων in a famous fragment by Heraclitus (D.-K. 22 B 40): πολυμαθίη νόον ἔχειν οὐ διδάσκει. Ἡσίοδον γὰρ ἂν ἐδίδαξε καὶ Πυθαγόρην αὖτίς τε Ξενοφάνεά τε καὶ Ἑκαταῖον, “Knowing many things [πολυμαθίη] does not teach to think rightly [νόον ἔχειν]. Otherwise, it would have taught it to Hesiod, Pythagoras, Xenophon, and Hecateus”. Heraclitus mocks Pythagoras, while Paullus, in Polybius, seems to have succeeded in uniting both the qualities. 75 Plut. Aem. 12, 2. 76  Ibid. 26, 10–12. 77   Ibid. 27, 2–6, similar to Demetrius Phalereus “prophecy” in Polyb. XXIX 21. In Plutarch (Aem. 27, 6) and Livy (XLV 8, 6) Paullus speaks to the youngest officers, thus assuming a teaching, educational role. 78 Plut. Aem. 36, 1–37, 1. 79  Liv. XLV 41–42, 1; D.S. XXXI 11; Ap.Mac. 19. 80 F. Coarelli, Palatium. Il Palatino dalle origini all’impero, Roma, Q uasar, 2012, pp. 216–19, and related bibliography. 72 73

142

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

The characterisation of  Paullus’ figure, in this case, again reveals vague Archytean elements. The opposition of  Fortune and virtue is one of  the general’s peculiar marks; so it is his selfcontrol in the face of  passions, especially when related to the topic of  good and ill luck. Archytean Pythagoreanism seems to be personified here in the deeds and words of  L. Aemi­lius Paullus. We must note, however, that both Τύχη and self-control are widespread themes in ancient (and especially Greek) culture. Even if  Pythagoreanism was one of  the first witnesses of  philosophical reflection on them,81 in this case it  is not possible to hypothesise anything more than a reference. 2.4. Polymathia The concept of  polymathia embraces a wide range of  behaviours, attitudes, and characterisations; it  is therefore applied to many “virtuous” personalities in the ancient world. No one could ever doubt that vast culture, practical knowledge and the ability to act quickly in many different situations are positive things. In its context, this polymathia is not a singular characterisation, but rather a further indication that the ancient idea of  Paullus was based on his life’s achievements and deeds. We have already spoken about Paullus’ naturalistic knowledge. To this we can add other elements: the extreme competence and attention Paullus reserved for religious matters in his role of  augur; 82 his precision, from religion to politics; 83 his tacti81   This is also underlined in Horky, “Herennius Pontius”, pp. 138–40, referring to Gavius Pontius’ speech at Caudium. Putting aside the enormous historiographical problem, it is clear that, between Archytean Pythagoreanism and Aristotelianism (the two fourth-century philosophical schools that gave major importance to Τύχη), a Samnite aristocrat would have been closer to the former. 82 Plut. Aem. 3, 2–3. Furthermore, this seems similar to a Pythagorean sententia reported in Cic. leg. II 11, 26: illud bene dictum est a Pythagora, doctissimo uiro, tum maxume et pietatem et religionem uersari in animis, cum rebus diuinis operam daremus, “that most learned man, Pythagoras, was right when he said that piety and religion are uppermost in our minds when we are attending to divine observances” (transl. N.  Rudd, Cicero. The republic and the laws, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1998). See also the considerations of  R. M. Ogilvie, A commentary on Livy. Books 1–5, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1965, p. 89, who sees a smart Roman application of  this Greek concept in Numa’s laws. 83 Plut. Aem. 3, 5–7. A sententia by Nigidius Figulus (fr. 4 Swoboda) in Gell. IV 9, 1–2 seems very similar: religentem esse oportet, religiosus ne fuas [or nefas],

143

D. MORELLI

cal skills against the Ligurians and Iberians (even without taking into account the Macedonian campaign, which would in itself  deserve a  single comprehensive study).84 Moreover, the passion for art and literature he displayed during his travels in Greece,85 a philosopher’s request for the education of  his sons,86 the requisition of  Perseus’ library as only spoil for himself.87 Finally, a γνώμη in which he states that et conuiuium instruere et ludos parare eiusdem esse, qui uincere bello sciret, “the man who knew how to conquer in war could also arrange a  banquet and organize games”.88 In this moment, Paullus surprises the Greek aristocrats by organising a  perfect panegyris, further demonstration of  his mastery of  both mos maiorum and Greek habits.89 This polymathia does not constitute any proof  of  a supposed Pythagoreanism; its presence, however, is undeniable. * * * This characterisation is neither precise nor directly explained by Plutarch; moreover, it is a literary characterisation, which could have nothing to do with Roman identity. There are nonetheless two considerations to make. The first one relates to the Aemilian tradition as a whole: as we will see, in the first century the Aemilii chose not to continue their Pythagorean and Numaic tradition. On the contrary, other Numaic and Pythagorean traditions will endure (for Marcii, Pomponii, and Calpurnii). This means that “[in religion] one must be scrupulous, not superstitious”. Humm, Appius Claudius Caecus, pp. 521–24, thinks that its first author could be Appius Claudius. It could well be a  Pythagorean sententia reported by Figulus, and Humm’s argument (based on versification, language and citation) is convincing. 84 Plut. Aem. 4, 3 and 6, 1–6, but also Frontin. strat. III 17, 2. Moreover, Liv. XLIV 35 describes precisely Paullus’ movements on the Macedonian front. For a military analysis of  the battle of  Pydna, see N. G. L. Hammond, “The battle of  Pydna”, JHS 104 (1984), pp. 31–47, and D. Morelli, “La battaglia di Pidna. Aspetti topografici e strategici”, Klio 103.1 (2021), pp. 97–132. 85 Plut. Aem. 28, 1–5; Liv. XLV 27, 5–28, 6. 86 Plin. nat. XXXV 135. 87  Plut. Aem. 28,  11. Isid. orig. VI 5,  1 tells us that it became the first big private library in Rome. 88  Liv. XLV 32, 8 (transl. A. Schlesinger, Livy: in fourteen volumes, XIII, Books 43–45, London-Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1961). The same sentence can be found in Polyb. XXX 14; Plut. Aem. 28, 5; D.S. XXXI 8, 13. 89 Plut. Aem. 28, 5; Liv. XLV 32, 10.

144

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

Plutarch decided to develop such a philosophical characterisation even when the same Aemilii were no longer interested in associating themselves with their ancient traditions. This is, of  course, a literary choice, favouring Plutarch’s purpose in delineating a perfect Roman exemplum. At the same time, it is also a reconstruction of  what effectively was not “the”, but “a”, Roman identity. Plutarch seems to have chosen; luckily for us, this choice preserved a very important tradition, which guided the entire gens for (at least) over a century in its political relationship with Southern Italy.90 The fact that Plutarch’s choice was a literary one does not diminish the importance of  his account, since he effectively preserved an existing tradition surviving only in historical memory, even if he was not aware of doing such a thing. As we saw, however, he seems to be well aware at least of  his “Pythagorising” choice. The second consideration deals with the very concept of  “identity”. Plutarch gave Paullus a characterisation; this does not automatically mean that his Pythagorising attitude constituted a Roman identity. Nor did it: as we have argued, Roman identity is not a fixed concept, a canonical group of  elements and behaviours, but rather it changed through time and space and, we could assume, even in the same place and at the same time. For Roman familiar traditions in particular, whose origin could have had (as for the Aemilii) political purposes, we cannot define Roman identity as a whole and relate all Roman traditions to it. Instead, we can observe how a philosophical characterisation, starting from Great-Greek elements and underlined by a Greek imperial biographer, could be so Roman.91 This points to the fact that, even in a literary characterisation, even talking about Pythagoreanism, even with Plutarch’s work, the Aemilian tradition was Roman enough; and, by all means, this is the sign of  a strong, unbreakable Roman identity. This may confirm the assumption at the beginning of  this paper: Roman identity truly is a fluid concept. 90  Dench, Romulus’ Asylum, p.  153: “during the Republic and at the beginning of  the imperial period Italy was both the site and itself  the end product of  distinctively Roman modes of  growth, expansion, and self-perception, of  the accommodation and rewriting of  ethnic and cultural diversity”. 91  See also Dench, Romulus’ Asylum, pp.  272–73, and Dench, “Roman identity”, p.  270, for the fictitious division between “Greek” and “Roman” in some ethical characterisations of  identity in the middle Republic and in Plutarch.

145

D. MORELLI

It is very difficult to talk about a “Pythagorean” Paullus, least of  all “Archytean”. However, by examining traces in the literary sources and in his deeds in Rome and elsewhere, some of  his aristocratic elements draw parallels with the Pythagorean tradition, and in particular with the Archytean one. We must ask ourselves whether Paullus and other Romans considered these elements Pythagorean or whether, on the contrary, it was only later sources that characterised them as such. We  cannot, unfortunately, be certain of  the answer, and so the question remains partly open.92 A balanced hypothesis could be found in considering these elements as part of  the Aemilian education, influenced by its role in the first contact with Great Greece during the fourth century bce. What, at that time, was propaganda would have entered the Aemilian paideia, until it became manifest in the figure of  L. Aemi­lius Paullus.93 This evidently happened due to his important role in Roman history, which induced a (limited) abundance of  sources on his character, while we know almost nothing about the Aemilii Paulli from the cos. 302 94 to Macedonicus’ father. The benefit that this interpretation gives us is  the potential to give historical definition to Paullus’ capability in dealing with Greece. Paullus’ distinctive features would be the consequence of  neither an undefined “philhellenism”, nor a  personal appreciation of  Greek culture; they would be the result of  his familiar education. This would have made him very capable of  relating to Greece, without diminishing his adherence to the mos maiorum.95   On the scholarly divergences about Pythagorean presence in Rome, see again Storchi, “Il pitagorismo romano”, in part. pp. 335–38. 93  On education in Roman gentes, see for example P. Scholz, “Imitatio patris statt griechischer Pädagogik. Überlegungen zur Sozialisation und Erziehung der republikanischen Senatsaristokratie”, Jahrbuch des historischen Kollegs 6 (2006), pp. 121–48 (in partic. pp. 132–33) and P. Scholz, Den Vätern folgen. Sozialisation und Erziehung der republikanischen Senatsaristokratie, Berlin, Verlag Antike, 2011, passim. Scholz highlights that the father was the most important figure in Roman education (at least in the early years). This led to continuing and perpetuating familiar traditions as behavioural schemes, which young Roman aristocrats adopted voluntarily. These schemes were also applied during a political career. 94   MRR, I, p. 169. 95  S. C. R. Swain, “Hellenic Culture and the Roman Heroes of  Plutarch”, JHS 110 (1990), pp. 126–45, in part. pp. 132–33, interprets the description of  his “atypical” education in Plut. Aem. 2, 6 as a reflection of  his son’s philhellenism, with a procedure of  transferring this feature from son to father. This hypothesis is persuasive: the “ancestral discipline in which he himself  [Paullus] had been 92

146

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

It is more likely that many of  the concepts we found in the sources reflect an ancient relationship with Greek culture, more ancient than the recent contact with Greece, which leads us to look for another “Greekness”, the Italiote one.96 A second possible explanation is that some Italiote and Pythagorean cultural elements became part of  Roman culture (the mos maiorum, as we know it) when Rome made its first contact with Great Greece.97 This would bring the focus out from both Paullus and the gens Aemilia. This interpretation is not impossible: Ferrero already thought it when analysing Appius Claudius Caecus and his sententiae.98 The analysis of  this pseudo-Pythagorean tradition for Paullus, which is traceable in the sources independently of  his historical veracity, needs further discussion in itself. We must look for some trace of  its survival in later years, in order to understand if  and how it developed. trained” (Plut. Aem. 6, 8) seems to be the mos maiorum, to which he does only add (not substitute) Greek paideia for his sons. This same atypical education is also another part of  Plutarch’s peculiar characterisation. 96  Later philosophical schools developed a reflection upon τύχη and the distinction between theoretical and practical life, but the origin of  this thought is probably Pythagorean. The hypothesis of  such provenience of  these elements is therefore more probable. There is  another detail: before the Macedonian campaign, Paullus does not seem to be particularly versed in Greek culture. However, his “Greek” abilities were already well developed in Macedonia, and the sources largely reported it. For this reason, it is easier to think that these ideas were already present in him than it is to assume a previous, unattested study of  Greek culture for military and, possibly, diplomatic and cultural relations. 97 In Cic. Tusc. IV 1–5 there is such a hypothesis: quin etiam arbitror propter Pythagoreorum admirationem Numam quoque regem Pythagoreum a posterioribus existimatum “On the contrary, I  am persuaded that it was because of  their admiration for the Pythagoreans that later Romans believed King Numa to have been a follower of  Pythagoras” (transl. M. Graver, Cicero on emotions. Tusculan disputation 3 and 4, Chicago-London, Chicago University Press, 2002). There is much difference from Scipio’s words in de re publica (see supra). This sentence occurs in a philosophical work, therefore there is no proof  of  a relationship between Pythagoreanism and mos maiorum. Nevertheless, one cannot deny that it bears some interest in Pythagoreanism by at least a  part of  Roman nobilitas (and by historiography and annalists: the subject is Numa), and that Cicero still knew it. Other passages recounting some Roman appreciation for Pythagoras can be found in Plin. XXXIV 26 and Cic. Cato 21, 78. We have already talked about the denomination of  Pythagoras as “Italic philosopher”: for the Romans, see recently Cornelli, In search of  Pythagoreanism, pp. 27–28. 98  Ferrero, Storia del pitagorismo, pp. 161–65, and Humm, Appius Claudius Caecus, pp. 526–38.

147

D. MORELLI

3. The Decline of  the Tradition: Coins from First Century bce We have talked about the Numaic and pontifical tradition of  the Marcii, as opposed to the Aemilian one (with Pythagorean implications). The plebeian gens had another mythical tradition, linked to Marsyas, possibly in connection with the idea of  liberation from the aristocracy.99 The first-century emissions by C. and L.  Marcius Censorinus (an as and a  denarius in 88  bce and a denarius in 82  bce; see fig.  3) 100 used both these traditions.

Fig. 3. RRC 346/1a; C. Marcius Censorinus, denarius, 88 bc. Courtesy of  Gorny and Mosch, München (Auction 241, 10.10.2016, lot 2049; ph. Lübke & Wiedemann). 99  The link between Marsyas and the Marcii has been defined in various ways. As Crawford, RRC, I, p. 378 notices, the resemblance of  the name is clearly important. M. Torelli, Typology and structure of  Roman historical reliefs, Ann Arbor, University of  Michigan Press, 1982, pp.  99–105 (followed by F.  Coa­ relli, Il Foro romano II. Periodo repubblicano e augusteo, Roma, Q uasar, 1985, pp. 91–119) thought that the Marcii placed the statue of  Marsyas in the Forum (see Hor. Sat. I 6, 120). Torelli too thought, probably with reason, that the resemblance of  the name was not enough to build a genealogy: the symbology of  “freed Marsyas” and the prophetic role of  the satyr contributed to this tradition (recalling, for the Marcian part, the carmina Marciana). This led to dating the statue to the censorship of  C. Marcius Censorinus (294 bce). A second, more recent analysis, which confirms Torelli and Coarelli’s arguments, is in D. Miano, Monimenta. Aspetti storico-culturali della memoria nella Roma medio-repubblicana, Roma, Bulzoni, 2011, pp. 109–41. He examines the diffusion of the myth of  Marsyas in fourth- and third-century Italy. Recently, however, Arena, The Status of  Marsyas, thoroughly investigated and convincingly questioned the association of  Marsyas with liberty; on this subject, see also P. Lòpez Barja de Q uiroga, “The Q uinquatrus of  June, Marsyas and libertas in the late Roman republic”, CQ  68.1 (2018), pp. 143–59, and Morelli, “The family traditions”. 100 The as: BMCRR Rome 2419  = RRC 346/3; Gaius’ denarius (88  bce): BMCRR Rome 2383 = RRC 346/1; Lucius’ denarius (82 bce): BMCRR Rome 2657 = RRC 363/1.

148

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

Gaius put Numa and Ancus’ heads on the obverse; Lucius placed Apollo on the obverse and Marsyas on the reverse. During the first century bce, the Marcian kinship with Numa was an active tradition. Two other emissions represent Numa. L.  Pomponius Molo coined in 97 bce a denarius with Apollo on the obverse and Numa sacrificing a  goat on the reverse (fig.  4); 101 Cn.  Calpurnius Piso coined in 49 bce a denarius with Numa on the obverse (fig. 5).102 These two Numaic gentes also decided to represent their mythical origins and Numaic tradition.103 Aemilian emissions, on the contrary, represent different situations and people. We saw L. Aemi­lius Lepidus Paullus’ coin in

Fig. 4. RRC 334/1; L. Pomponius Molo, denarius, 97 bc. Courtesy of  Nomos AG, Zürich (Obolos Web Auction 9, 25.03.2018, lot 43).

Fig. 5. RRC 446/1; L. Calpurnius Piso, denarius, 49 bc. Courtesy of  Gorny and Mosch, München (Auction 228, 09.03.2015, lot 478; ph. Lübke & Wiedemann).   BMCRR Italy 733 = RRC 334/1.   BMCRR Spain 62 = RRC 446/1. 103  RRC, I, respectively pp. 333 and 737. 101 102

149

D. MORELLI

62 bce with the triumph over Perseus, but there are also other emissions. L.  Aemi­lius Buca coined with various references to his political friend Caesar.104 M. Aemi­lius Lepidus, the triumvir, used many iconographies: the equestrian statue of  his homonymous ancestor (fig. 6), the Aemilian Basilica, his role of  pontifex maximus.105 M. Aemi­lius Scaurus (pr. 56 bce) represented on his denarius of  58 bce (fig. 7) the surrender of  Aretas of  Nabataea,106 which he received personally in 64 bce under the command of  Pompey.107

Fig. 6. RRC 419/1a; M. Aemilius Lepidus, denarius, 61 bc. Courtesy of Gorny and Mosch, München (Auction 228, 09.03.2015, lot 443; ph. Lübke & Wiedemann).

Fig. 7. RRC 422/1; M. Aemi­lius Scaurus, P. Plautius Hypsaeus, denarius, 58 bc. Courtesy of  Bertolami Fine Arts, Roma (Auction 7, 20.05.2013, lot 457).   RRC 480.   See for example Lepidus’ equestrian statue: RRC 419/1; Ptolemaeus’ protector: RRC 419/2; Basilica Aemilia: RRC 419/3; pontifex maximus: RRC 489/ 1–4 (with M. Antonius). 106   RRC 422, with his colleague P. Hypsaeus. 107  See J. AJ XIV 81. 104 105

150

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

No member of  the Late-Republican Aemilii used a  Numaic iconography, despite the critical role their own family had played in the building of  that tradition, and despite the importance of  this same tradition during Roman expansion in Italy. Meanwhile, Numaic tradition is still alive and active in the gentes Calpurnia, Pomponia and Marcia, even if  these gentes seem to have added themselves to this Numaic tradition later than the Aemilii. We must note, however, that the Pinarii, at least apparently, did not use the Numaic tradition on their coins.108 We can infer that, between the second and first centuries, the Aemilii privileged a different tradition, based on their recent historical personalities: Paullus and Lepidus (cos. 187) in primis. In addition, they underlined their own personal merits, like the triumvir Lepidus and Scaurus did in their coins. Finally, they used coins to declare their political proximity, as was becoming common during the Late Republic. The Numaic tradition, for the Aemilii, vanished, while it did not for other gentes. One could also think that this tradition has been abandoned in favour of  the solid familiar list of  exempla that the secondcentury Aemilii constituted, but this would not explain Scaurus and Lepidus’ representation of  their own merits as well. On the contrary, we could hypothesise that, during the second century, some gentes developed criticism against mythical genealogies, preferring more recent familiar glories for more efficient propaganda.109 Nonetheless, these genealogies continued to be used by the Marcii, Pomponii and Calpurnii, plebeian gentes that could still profit from their connection to early Roman history.110   There are very few Pinarian emissions: excluding two mid-second century bce coinages by (perhaps) the Pinarii Natta brothers (BMCRR Rome 756 et al. = RRC 200 and BMCRR Rome 844 = RRC 208), there is only one other emission, too recent to be compared with the others mentioned here. It is BMCRR Cyrenaica 1 et al. = RRC 546 (31 bce). 109   See K.-J.  Hölkeskamp, Reconstructing the Roman republic: an ancient political culture and modern research, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2010 [or. ed. München, Oldenbourg, 2004], p. 112: “Symbolic capital had to be cultivated and regularly refreshed not only by updating it by new ‘deposits’, but also and at the same time by renewing the memory of  the previously accumulated capital, recently acquired as well as that of  old”. The recent glories of  the Aemilii constituted an “update” of  their familiar tradition and symbolic capital, while the old tradition seems to have been abandoned. 110  See generally E.  Fabbricotti, “Numa Pompilio e  tre monetieri di età repubblicana”, AIIN 15 (1968), pp.  31–38; T.  J. Luce, “Political Propaganda 108

151

D. MORELLI

The least we could say with some probability, however, is that the Aemilii voluntarily refused to use Numaic tradition, while other gentes did not.

4. Conclusion: Plutarchean Intervention on Aemilian Pythagorean Tradition The gens Aemilia followed a Pythagorean tradition that was born during the fourth century; the context of  its birth was the first contact between Rome and Great-Greek aristocracy. Italiote and Italic peoples, strictly involved in Archytean policy, were also, in this moment, the mediators of  Pythagoreanism in Rome. This kind of  Archytean Pythagoreanism was, therefore, the kind that Roman culture knew (for example, with Appius Claudius). In Plutarch’s Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus we see a  sort of  canonisation of  Greek virtues and behaviours. Plutarch particularly underlines them, but these elements can be seen in other sources as well, albeit with a  less pronounced characterisation. Plutarch placed Greek aristocratic ethics at the forefront of  his narration: the relationship with Fortuna, polymathia, concordia in law-giving, naturalistic knowledge, astronomy and astrology. Most of  these elements seem to reflect the supporting structure of  Archytean Pythagoreanism. From the second century bce, the Aemilii abandoned this tradition, preferring a more concrete and self-referential culture while exalting their role in Roman history. This seems to bring with it a strong diversification in coinage: the Aemilii produced coins with an iconography based on themselves, while other Numaic gentes continued their previous traditions. We can understand how Numaic-Pythagorean Aemilian tradition, useful during the fourth century, was no longer believed to be as beneficial in the first century. As  for Aemi­lius Paullus, Plutarch’s strong characterisation, so different from the same Aemilian choice and from other sources, is quite surprising.111 Many elements are strikon Roman Republican Coins: Circa 92–82 b.c.”, AJA 72.1 (1968), pp.  25–39 (in part. p. 29); and recently Hölkeskamp, Reconstructing the Roman Republic, pp. 116–20. 111  This is valid for Numa as well: his “Greek” characteristics are underlined by Cicero and Plutarch, but find no witness in Livy: see for example V. Buch-

152

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

ing in his biographic reconstruction: Paullus’ religious characterisation and his precision in augural matters, his naturalistic and physical knowledge, his behaviour in the face of  ill luck, his vast culture and appreciation of  Greek art, philosophy, and culture, and his talent in dealing with Greek aristocracy. Finally, with some doubt, the importance of ὁμόνοια, reported only by Plutarch. Paullus was certainly a  peculiar character: he lived through many significant events, saw Rome change during and after the Hannibalic war, and was a  capable general and politician. Put simply, he was a  “great” Roman, the perfect example of  uirtus. Nonetheless, his familiar history had included a direct link with Numa and Pythagoras since the fourth century. Plutarch therefore chose to underline all the elements that connected his protagonist with his own familiar tradition, even if  the same tradition was abandoned two centuries before he wrote Paullus’ Life. We  could hypothesise many reasons for this. Plutarch’s priesthood in Delphi certainly played a significant role in underlining Paullus’ religious aspects (and, in general, it had a place in most of  Plutarch’s Lives). Many of  the elements in the Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus, however, have nothing to do with religion. Moreover, Paullus’ Life describes, similarly to the Life of  Numa, the behaviour of  the perfect philosopher-statesman.112 Their characterisation is certainly different, and so are their characters: Numa was Rome’s lawgiver in peace, while Paullus struck the ancient Macedonian kingdom, and a  characterisation too similar would have been neither credible nor possible. Nonetheless, both Lives have a  Pythagorean presence: in the Life of  Numa, many deeds and laws ordered by the king would have heit, “Plutarch, Cicero und Livius über die Humanisierung Roms durch König Numa”, SO 66 (1991), pp. 71–96, on the concept of  peace in both “Greek” and “Roman” Numa. This leads us to consider with interest how voluntarily Plutarch chose his characterisations. 112 B. Boulet, “Is Numa the genuine philosopher-king?”, in L. De Blois, J. Bond, T. Kessels, D. M. Schenkeveld (eds), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, Proceedings of  the Sixth International Conference of  the International Plutarch Society, Nijmegen-Castle Hernen, May 1–5, 2002, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2005, vol. II, pp. 245–56; L. Holland, “Plutarch’s Aemi­lius Paullus and the model of  the philosopher statesman”, ibid., pp. 269–79; B. Boulet, “The philosopher King”, in M. Beck (ed.), A Companion to Plutarch, Chichester, Wiley Blackwell, 2014, pp. 449–62.

153

D. MORELLI

been inspired by Pythagorean tradition.113 As for Paullus, the references are less direct, but no less striking; and, in his case, they are closer to an Archytean kind of  Pythagoreanism, more recent (and apt) than the “original” Numaic Pythagoreanism. Plutarch seems to operate a choice in defining not only the pseudo-Pythagoreanism of  his characters, but also the kind of  Pythagoreanism that would model them. Many people have written about a “Pythagorean moment” in Plutarch’s life; 114 one could cautiously ascribe these Pythagorising elements in Plutarch’s Lives to this particular moment. We are unable to date with certainty the composition of  the Lives of  Numa and Aemi­lius Paullus: we only know that they are late, but we are quite certain that they were composed in the same period.115 The common presence of  Pythagoreanism could strengthen the idea that the temporal distance between these two works was minimal. Unfortunately, in the parallel Lives (Timoleon and Lycurgus), we have no Pythagorean elements; this means nothing, however, for both the characterisation of  the Roman characters and the date of  composition. Plutarch wanted to delineate, through Paullus, the perfect example of  the philosopher-statesman; yet with a  characterisation perfectly acceptable for both Greeks and Romans (a distinction that in first-second century ce was much less striking than in Paullus’ years). Weaving Pythagoreanism into Numa’s Life leads to a unification of  these two cultural identities.116 We can consider that the elements stressed by Plutarch have the same aim in Paullus’ Life: to make this exemplary Roman “more Greek”   For example: Plut. Num. 8; 11; 14.   See J. Dillon, “Plutarch and Platonism”, in M. Beck (ed.), A Companion to Plutarch, Chichester, Wiley Blackwell, 2014, pp.  61–72, in part. p.  61. On the relationship between Plutarch and the Imperial philosophical schools the words of  E.  Zeller, Die Philosophie der Griechen in ihrer geschichtlichen Entwicklung, 2 vol., Tübingen, Fues Verlag, 1856–1862, vol. I [1856], pp. 141– 45, seem still valid: Plutarch as a “Pythagoraisirende Platoniker”, but underlining his philosophical eclecticism. 115 J. Geiger, “Plutarch’s Parallel Lives: the choice of  Heroes”, Hermes 109.1 (1981), pp. 85–104, p. 88; see also Swain, “Plutarch’s Aemi­lius and Timoleon”, p. 315, n. 6. 116  Boulet, “The philosopher king”, pp. 254–55, also discerns the attempt to unify Greece and Rome in other elements. 113 114

154

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

without diminishing his perfect adherence to the mos maiorum. This mos maiorum is used in the same manner, as shown by Paullus’ precision in relation to religious rituals.117 There is therefore a historiographical matter: we cannot know how Pythagorean Paullus was, but we can see how Pythagorean Plutarch made him. As for the first question, the answer is probably negative.118 The second consideration, on the contrary, explains why several historians doubted the historical reliability of  Plutarch’s account. In conclusion, in his Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus Plutarch wanted to delineate and provide an exemplum of  the perfect Roman character in highlighting his Greek, Pythagorean identity, thus creating another, different Roman identity, suitable to everyone. We can see in this biography the extent to which self-perception and tension emerge in defining this Roman identity. Self-perception is placed by Plutarch in Paullus’ Life, along with religion and Pythagoreanism, and with the ideal of  the philosopher-statesman. Tension arises in characterising Paullus in a  very different way (pseudo-Pythagoreanism) from his historical context (we could say, mos maiorum), without doing any wrong to his memory and his reception in the Early Empire, and trying to re-unite this diversity. Plutarch, incidentally, moves past this tension, using an ancient Roman identity to provide a perfect exemplum uirtutis for both Greeks and Romans, theoretical and practical people, philosophers and generals: which is exactly what, in the end, he wanted to do.

117  Swain, “Hellenic Culture and the Roman Heroes”, p. 142, thinks that Plutarch underlines Roman religion as being similar to Greek religion in practice, but in this case, this is not entirely true. On Paullus and mos maiorum in Plutarch, see recently M.  Tröster, “Plutarch and mos maiorum in the Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus”, AncSoc 42 (2012), pp. 219–54. 118 See Cornelli, In search of  Pythagoreanism, pp. 52–85, for Pythagorean basic characteristics. The scholar isolates two of them, maths and metempsychosis. This is valid, however, for the scholarchs and proper Pythagoreans, while a different Pythagorean characterisation could also be seen in more practical elements – especially if  we start from Archytean Pythagoreanism, the basis of  which was political.

155

D. MORELLI

Bibliography Arena V., “The Status of  Marsyas, Liber, and Servius: an instance of  an Ancient Semantic Battle?”, in M. Nebelin, C. Tiersch (eds), Semantische Kämpfe zwischen Republik und Prinzipat, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2021. Bicknell P. J., “The lunar eclipse of 21 June 168 b.C.”, CR 18 (1968), p. 22. Bona F., Contributo allo studio della composizione del De  verborum significatione di Verrio Flacco, Milano, Giuffrè, 1964. Bonazzi M., Lévy C., Steel C. (eds), A Platonic Pythagoras. Platonism and Pythagoreanism in the imperial age, Turnhout, Brepols, 2007. Boulet B., “Is Numa the genuine philosopher-king?”, in L. De Blois, J.  Bond, T.  Kessels, D.  M. Schenkeveld (eds), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, Proceedings of  the Sixth International Conference of  the International Plutarch Society, Nijmegen-Castle Hernen, May 1–5, 2002, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2005, vol.  II, pp. 245–56. Boulet B., “The philosopher King”, in M. Beck (ed.), A Companion to Plutarch, Chichester, Wiley Blackwell, 2014, pp. 449–62. Buchheit V., “Plutarch, Cicero und Livius über die Humanisierung Roms durch König Numa”, SO 66 (1991), pp. 71–96. Buraselis K., “Numa Pompilius und die gens Pomponia”, Historia 25.3 (1976), pp. 378–80. Burkert W., Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1972 [or. ed. Nürnberg, Hans Carl, 1962]. Burton P.  J., Rome and the Third Macedonian War, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2017. Calderone S., “La conquista romana della Magna Grecia”, in La Magna Grecia nell’età romana, Atti del quindicesimo convegno di studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto 5–10 ottobre 1975, Napoli, Arte Tipografica, 1976, pp. 33–81. Centrone B., “The pseudo-Pythagorean writings”, in C. A. Huffman (ed.), A  history of  Pythagoreanism, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2014, pp. 315–40. Coarelli F., Il  Foro romano II. Periodo repubblicano e  augusteo, Roma, Q uasar, 1985. Coarelli F., Palatium. Il  Palatino dalle origini all’impero, Roma, Q uasar, 2012. 156

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

Cornelli G., In  search of  Pythagoreanism. Pythagoreanism as an historiographical category (Studia Praesocratica 4), Berlin-Boston, DeGruyter, 2013. De Sanctis G., Storia dei Romani. II. La conquista del primato in Italia, Torino, Fratelli Bocca, 1907. Della Casa A., Nigidio Figulo, Roma, Edizioni dell’Ateneo, 1962. Dench E., Romulus’ Asylum. Roman identities from the Age of  Alexander to the Age of  Hadrian, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005. Dench E., “Roman identity”, in A. Barchiesi, W. Scheidel (eds), The Oxford Handbook of  Roman Studies, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2010, pp. 267–80. Deroy L., “Les noms latins du marteau et la racine étrusque ‘mar-’ ”, AC 28.1 (1959), pp. 5–31. Desideri P., “Teoria e prassi storiografica di Plutarco: una proposta di lettura della coppia Emilio Paolo-Timoleonte”, Maia n.s. 41 (1989), pp.  199–214 [now in P.  Desideri, Saggi su Plutarco e la sua fortuna (Studi e  testi di scienze dell’antichità 29), Firenze, Firenze University Press, 2012, pp. 201–18]. Dillon J., “Plutarch and Platonism”, in M. Beck (ed.), A Companion to Plutarch, Chichester, Wiley Blackwell, 2014, pp. 61–72. Fabbricotti E., “Numa Pompilio e  tre monetieri di età repubblicana”, AIIN 15 (1968), pp. 31–38. Ferrero L., Storia del pitagorismo nel mondo romano (dalle origini alla fine della Repubblica), Forlì, Victrix, 20082 [or. ed. Cuneo, Giappichelli, 1955]. Flores E., “Ennio e il pitagorismo”, in M. Tortorelli Ghidini, A. Storchi Marino, A. Visconti (eds), Tra Orfeo e Pitagora. Origini e incontri di culture nell’antichità, Atti dei seminari napo­ letani 1996–1998, Napoli, Bibliopolis, 2000, pp. 507–12. Forsythe G., “A philological note on the Scipionic Circle”, AJPh 112 (1991), pp. 363–64. Forsythe G., A  Critical history of  Early Rome. From Prehistory to the First Punic War, Berkeley-Los Angeles-London, University of  California Press, 2005. Gabba E., “P.  Cornelio Scipione Africano e  la ‘leggenda’ ”, Athenaeum 53 (1975), pp. 3–17 [now in E. Gabba, Aspetti culturali del­l’im­perialismo romano, Firenze, Sansoni, 1993, pp. 113–31]. Geiger J., “Plutarch’s Parallel Lives: the choice of  Heroes”, Hermes 109.1 (1981), pp. 85–104. 157

D. MORELLI

Giangiulio M., “L’eredità di Archita”, in Alessandro il Molosso e  i condottieri in Magna Grecia, Atti del quarantatreesimo convegno di studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto-Cosenza 26–30 settembre 2003, Taranto, Istituto di Studi per la storia e l’archeologia della Magna Grecia, 2004, pp. 55–81. Glinister F., “Constructing the past”, in F. Glinister, C. Woods, J.  A. North, M.  H. Crawford (eds), Verrius, Festus & Paul (Bulletin of  the Institute of  Classical Studies Supplement 93), London, Institute of  Classical Studies, 2007, pp. 11–32. Graver M., Cicero on emotions. Tusculan disputation 3 and 4, ChicagoLondon, Chicago University Press, 2002. Gruen E. S., Culture and national identity in Republican Rome, Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1992. Hammond N.  G.  L., “The battle of  Pydna”, JHS 104 (1984), pp. 31–47. Hölkeskamp K.-J., Reconstructing the Roman republic: an ancient political culture and modern research, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2010 [or. ed. München, Oldenbourg, 2004]. Holland L., “Plutarch’s Aemi­lius Paullus and the model of  the philosopher statesman”, in L.  De Blois, J.  Bond, T.  Kessels, D.  M. Schenkeveld (eds), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, Proceedings of  the Sixth International Conference of  the International Plutarch Society, Nijmegen/Castle Hernen, May 1–5, 2002, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2005, vol. II, pp. 269–79. Horky P.  S., “Herennius Pontius: The Construction of  a  Samnite Philosopher”, CA 30.1 (2011), pp. 119–47. Horky P. S., Plato and Pythagoreanism, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013. Huffman C.  A., Archytas of  Tarentum. Pythagorean, philosopher, and mathematician king, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005. Humm M., “Les origines du pythagorisme romain. Problèmes historiques et philosophiques I”, LEC 64 (1996), pp. 339–53. Humm M., “Les origines du pythagorisme romain. Problèmes historiques et philosophiques II”, LEC 65 (1997), pp. 25–42. Humm M., “Una sentenza pitagorica di Appio Claudio Cieco?”, in M. Tortorelli Ghidini, A. Storchi Marino, A. Visconti (eds), Tra Orfeo e  Pitagora. Origini e  incontri di culture nell’an­ tichità, Atti dei seminari napoletani 1996–1998, Napoli, Biblio­ polis, 2000, pp. 445–62. 158

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

Humm M., “Numa et Pythagore: vie et mort d’un mythe”, in P.  A. Deproost, A.  Meurant (eds), Images d’origines, origines d’un image. Hommage à  Jacques Poucet, Louvain-la-Neuve, Bruylant-­ Academia, 2004, pp. 125–37. Humm M., Appius Claudius Caecus. La République accomplie (Bibliothèque des Écoles françaises d’Athènes et de Rome 322), Rome, École française de Rome, 2005. Kahn C. H., Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans. A brief  History, Indianapolis-Cambridge, Hackett, 2001. Koptev A., “Reconsidering the Roman king-list”, in C.  Deroux (ed.), Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History XIV (Collection Latomus 315), Bruxelles, Latomus, 2008, pp. 5–83. Larmour D.  H.  J., “Statesman and self  in the Parallel Lives”, in L. De Blois, J. Bond, T. Kessels, D. M. Schenkeveld (eds), The Statesman in Plutarch’s Works, Proceedings of the Sixth International Conference of the International Plutarch Society, NijmegenCastle Hernen, May 1–5, 2002, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2005, vol. II, pp. 43–51. Laurence R., “Territory, ethnonyms and geography. The construction of  identity in Roman Italy”, in R.  Laurence, J.  Berry (eds), Cultural identity in the Roman Empire, London-New York, Routledge, 1998, pp. 95–110. Lloyd G., “Pythagoras”, in C.  A. Huffman (ed.), A  history of  Pythagoreanism, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2014, pp. 24–45. Lombardo M., “Dopo Archita: la vicenda storica di Taranto tra IV e  I sec. a.C.”, Notiziario del portale numismatico dello Stato 8 (2016), pp. 60–73. Lòpez Barja de Q uiroga P., “The Q uinquatrus of  June, Marsyas and libertas in the late Roman republic”, CQ  68.1 (2018), pp. 143– 59. Luce T. J., “Political Propaganda on Roman Republican Coins: Circa 92–82 b.c.”, AJA 72.1 (1968), pp. 25–39. Mahé M., “Le pythagorisme d’Italie du Sud vu par Tite-Live”, Ktèma 24 (1999), pp. 147–57. Mayer i Olivé M., “Publius Nigidius Figulus Pythagoricus et magus”, in M. Piranomonte, F. M. Simòn (ed.), Contesti Magici – Contextos Mágicos, Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Roma 4–6 novembre 2009, Roma, De Luca, 2012, pp. 237–45. Mele A., “Il pitagorismo e le popolazioni anelleniche d’Italia”, AION­ (archeol) 3 (1981), pp. 61–96. 159

D. MORELLI

Mele A., “Archita e Gaio Ponzio sannita”, in M. Tortorelli Ghidini, A. Storchi Marino, A. Visconti (eds), Tra Orfeo e Pitagora. Origini e incontri di culture nell’antichità, Atti dei seminari napoletani 1996–1998, Napoli, Bibliopolis, 2000, pp. 433–44. Mele A., “Tra Zaleuco, Caronda e  Parmenide: legislatori e  filosofi in Magna Grecia e  Sicilia”, in Polis e  Politeiai nella Magna Grecia arcaica e classica, Atti del cinquantatreesimo convegno di studi sulla Magna Grecia, Taranto 26–29 settembre 2013, Taranto, Istituto per la storia e  l’archeologia della Magna Grecia, 2016, pp. 235–64. Miano D., “Roma quadrata. Un elemento pitagorico nello spazio romano?”, Storia, antropologia e scienze del linguaggio 24.1–2 (2009), pp. 149–80. Miano D., Monimenta. Aspetti storico-culturali della memoria nella Roma medio-repubblicana, Roma, Bulzoni, 2011. Miano D., Fortuna. Deity and concept in Archaic and Republican Italy, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2018. Morelli D., “The family traditions of  the gens Marcia between the fourth and third centuries bc”, CQ  71 (2021), pp. 189–99. Morelli D., “La battaglia di Pidna. Aspetti topografici e strategici”, Klio 103.1 (2021), pp. 97–132. Ogilvie R. M., A commentary on Livy. Books 1–5, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1965. Pailler J.-M., Bacchanalia. La répression de 186 av. J.-C. à Rome et en Italie: vestiges, images, tradition (Bibliothèque des Écoles françaises d’Athènes et de Rome 257), Rome, École française de Rome, 1988. Panitschek P., “Numa Pompilius als Schuler des Pythagoras”, GB 17 (1990), pp. 49–65. Perrin B., Plutarch’s Lives, VI, Dion and Brutus, Timoleon and Aemi­ lius Paullus, London-Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1970. Pfeilschifter R., Titus Q uinctius Flamininus: Untersuchungen zur römischen Griechenlandpolitik, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2005. Poulle B., “Les réincarnations de Pythagore et de Numa à  Rome”, REL 88 (2010), pp. 92–105. Prowse K.  R., “Numa and the Pythagoreans: a  curious incident”, G&R 11.1 (1964), pp. 36–42. Raffa M., “Acustica e  divulgazione in Archita di Taranto: il fr. 1 160

PYTHAGOREANISM AND ROMAN IDENTITY IN PLUTARCH’S AEMI­LIUS PAULLUS

Huffman come ‘Protrettico alla scienza’ ”, in A. Bellia (ed.), Musica, culti e riti nell’Occidente greco, Pisa, Istituti editoriali e poligrafici internazionali, 2014, pp. 95–101. Reiter W., Aemi­lius Paullus. Conqueror of  Greece, London-New York-Sidney, Croom Helm, 1988. Riedweg C., Pythagoras: His Life, Teaching, and Influence, IthacaLondon, Cornell University Press, 2005 [or. ed. München, C. H. Beck, 2002]. Rocca G., “I libri di Numa Pompilio”, in D.  Maras (ed.), Corollari. Scritti di antichità etrusche e  italiche in omaggio all’opera di Giovanni Colonna (Studia erudita 14), Pisa-Roma, Fabrizio Serra, 2011, pp. 84–86. Rudd N., Cicero. The republic and the laws, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1998. Russo F., “Genealogie numaiche e tradizioni pitagoriche”, RCCM 47 (2005), pp. 265–90. Russo F., “I carmina marciana e  le tradizioni sui Marcii”, PP 60 (2005), pp. 5–32. Schlesinger A., Livy: in fourteen volumes, XIII, Books 43–45, London-Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1961. Schofield M. (ed.), Aristotle, Plato and Pythagoreanism in the first century bc, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2013. Scholz P., “Imitatio patris statt griechischer Pädagogik. Überlegungen zur Sozialisation und Erziehung der republikanischen Senatsaristokratie”, Jahrbuch des historischen Kollegs 6 (2006), pp. 121– 48. Scholz P., Den Vätern folgen. Sozialisation und Erziehung der republikanischen Senatsaristokratie, Berlin, Verlag Antike, 2011. Schwarze W., Q uibus fontibus Plutarchus in Vita L. Aemilii Paulli usus sit, Lipsiae, Typi L. B. Hirschfeldi, 1891. Smith C., “Thinking about Kings”, BICS 54.2 (2011), pp. 21–42. Storchi Marino A., “C. Marcio Censorino, la lotta politica intorno al pontificato e  la formazione della tradizione liviana su Numa”, AION(archeol) 14 (1992), pp. 105–47. Storchi Marino A., Numa e  Pitagora. Sapientia constituendae civitatis, Napoli, Liguori, 1999. Storchi Marino A., “Il pitagorismo romano. Per un bilancio di studi recenti”, in M.  Tortorelli Ghidini, A.  Storchi Marino, A.  Visconti (eds), Tra Orfeo e  Pitagora. Origini e  incontri di culture nell’antichità, Atti dei seminari napoletani 1996–1998, Napoli, Bibliopolis, 2000, pp. 335–66. 161

D. MORELLI

Strasburger H., “Der ‘Scipionenkreis’ ”, Hermes 94.1 (1966), pp. 60–72. Swain S.  C.  R., “Plutarch’s Aemi­lius and Timoleon”, Historia 38.3 (1989), pp. 314–34. Swain S.  C.  R., “Hellenic Culture and the Roman Heroes of  Plutarch”, JHS 110 (1990), pp. 126–45. Tatum W. J., “Another look at Tyche in Plutarch’s Aemi­lius PaullusTimoleon”, Historia 59.4 (2010), pp. 448–61. Taylor M. J., “The Battle Scene on Aemi­lius Paullus’s Pydna Monument: A Reevaluation”, Hesperia 85.3 (2016), pp. 559–76. Timpanaro-Cardini M., “Introduzione”, in G. Reale (ed.), Pitagorici antichi. Testimonianze e frammenti, Milano, Bompiani, 2010, pp. xliii–lxxviii. Torelli M., Typology and structure of  Roman historical reliefs, Ann Arbor, University of  Michigan Press, 1982. Tröster M., “Plutarch and mos maiorum in the Life of  Aemi­lius Paullus”, AncSoc 42 (2012), pp. 219–54. van der Stockt L., “Compositional methods in the Lives”, in M. Beck (ed.), A Companion to Plutarch, Chichester, Wiley Blackwell, 2014, pp. 321–32. Verdière R., “Calpus fils de Numa et la tripartition fonctionnelle dans la société indo-européenne”, AC 34.2 (1965), pp. 425–31. Walbank F. W., “The Scipionic legend”, PCPhS 13 (1967), pp. 54–­ 69 [now in F. W. Walbank, Selected papers. Studies in Greek and Roman history and historiography, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1985, pp. 120–37]. Walsh J. J., “Flamininus and the propaganda of  liberation”, Historia 45.3 (1996), pp. 343–63. Wilson J. P., “Grex Scipionis in De amicitia: a reply to Gary Forsythe”, AJPh 115 (1994), pp. 269–71. Wiseman T. P., “Legendary Genealogies in Late-Republican Rome”, G&R 21.2 (1974), pp. 153–64. Zeller E., Die Philosophie der Griechen in ihrer geschichtlichen Entwicklung, 2 vol., Tübingen, Fues Verlag, 1856–1862.

162

EELCO GLAS University of  Groningen

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS AND THE RHETORIC OF  IDENTITY IN THE BELLUM JUDAICUM

1. Josephus’ Challenge: Roman Perceptions about Judaeans after 70 ce 1 This contribution asks how the historian Flavius Josephus attempts to renegotiate existing boundaries between Judaean and Roman identity in the Bellum Judaicum (BJ). After settling in Rome in 71 ce, Josephus wrote this history of the Judaean-Roman conflict addressing an audience in that city shortly after the events had taken place.2 In the prologue of  his work, he claims to “trans-

1  I thank Cláudia Teixeira and Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta for inviting me to the panel “Roman Identity in Biography: Core Elements and Influences” at the CCC conference in Coimbra (June 26–29, 2019), the editors and reviewers for their guidance and suggestions, and Gemma Hayes for correcting my English. 2  My approach takes the scholarship of  Steve Mason as point of  departure, see S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning: Reading Josephus’s Judean War in the Context of  a Flavian Audience”, in J. Sievers, G. Lembi (eds), Josephus and Jewish History in Flavian History and Beyond, Leiden, Brill, 2005, pp.  71–100. For different approaches to Josephus in his Roman context, see e.g. H. H. Cotton, W.  Eck, “Josephus’ Roman Audience: Josephus and the Roman Elites”, in J. Edmondson, S. Mason, J. Rives (eds), Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 37–52; J. J. Price, “The Provincial Historian in Rome”, in J. Sievers, G. Lembi (eds), Josephus and Jewish History in Flavian History and Beyond, Leiden, Brill, 2005, pp. 101–18; H. H. Chapman, “Josephus”, in A.  Feldherr (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Historians, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009, pp. 319–31; W. den Hollander, Josephus, The Emperor, and the City of  Rome: From Hostage to Historian, Leiden, Brill, 2014; S. Mason, “Josephus as a Roman Historian”, in H. H. Chapman, Z. Rodgers (eds), A Companion to Josephus and His World, Malden, John Wiley, 2016, pp. 89–107. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 163–184 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128695

163

E. GLAS

late” (μεταβάλλω) an account produced previously in his mother tongue, presumably Aramaic,3 and counter rival histories of  the conflict written to flatter the Romans or out of  hatred (μῖσος) of  the Judaeans (1.3; cf. 1.16). He emphasises that historians have bullied (καταβάλλουσιν) the Judaeans and disparaged (ταπεινοῦσιν) their contribution to the conflict on every available occasion to extoll Roman greatness (1.7).4 Obviously, such polemics partially serve to underline the importance of  Josephus’ history in trying to sell his work. Simultaneously, anti-Judaean sentiments in Flavian Rome were real and left their stamp on the structure and themes of  Josephus’ treatment of  the war. Vespasian and his successors had used the Judaean-Roman conflict to enhance their public image and bolster their imperial ideology.5 The Flavian programme of  selfpromotion drastically changed the architectural outlook of  the centre of  Rome, leaving permanent visual reminders of  their victory and Judaean resistance.6 It  should occasion no surprise that Roman authors writing shortly after these events treated Judaeans with more than a little disregard, emphasizing the vast cultural differences between both people.7 For example, Tacitus highlights the tremendous contrast between Judaean and Roman customs and laws when describing the fall of  Jerusalem in 70 ce

3  Which must presumably be understood as an entirely different work, presumably a brief  communication. On the BJ as translation of  an Aramaic original see e.g. T. Rajak, Josephus: The Historian and His Society, revised second edition, London, Duckworth, 2002, pp. 174–84. 4   Thought-provoking historical reconstructions of  the first Judaean-Roman war are offered in M. Goodman, Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of  Ancient Civilizations, London, Allen Lane, 2007; S.  Mason, A  History of  the Jewish War: ad  66–74, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016. The most recent major contribution, which contains a collection of  essays responding to Mason’s monograph, is A. Giambrone (ed.), Rethinking the Jewish War: Archeology, Society, Traditions, Leuven: Peeters, 2021. 5 Cf. Goodman, Rome and Jerusalem, pp. 428–42. 6  For an extensive analysis of  the monuments of  the Judaean-Roman conflict in Rome, see F. Millar, “Last Year in Jerusalem: Monuments of  the Jewish War in Rome”, in J.  Edmondson, S.  Mason, J.  Rives (eds), Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 101–28. 7  For a comprehensive collection of  Greek and Latin literature writing about Judaeans, see M.  Stern, Greek and Latin authors on Jews and Judaism, 3  vols, Jerusalem, Israel Academy of  Sciences and Humanities, 1974–1984.

164

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

(Hist. 5.2–13).8 Suetonius writes how the special tax collectively imposed on the Judaean people (imposita genti) immediately after the Judaean revolt, the Fiscus Iudaicus, was levied with utmost vigour in the days of  Domitian (Dom. 12.2).9 Thus, the social environment of  Flavian Rome in which Josephus produced the BJ was not particularly friendly to Judaeans and their customs.10 In view of  this historical context, the present paper examines Josephus’ narratives as a window to investigate processes of  negotiating identity boundaries between Romans and Judaeans. It may be instructive to ask how Josephus attempts to defend the dignity of  his people in an environment so explicitly hostile to Judaeans. I will argue that he employs a  variety of  rhetorical strategies in shaping Judaean and Roman identities. By means of  such strategies, he attempts to make his BJ intelligible for Roman readers and invoke their pity and compassion for the Judaean case.11 To accomplish this, the contribution will first analyse how Josephus describes Judaean identity in connection to other social groups, specifically the Greeks. I will propose that he shapes Greek   The most comprehensive discussion of  this famous passage is R. S. Bloch, Antike Vorstellungen vom Judentum: der Judenexkurs des Tacitus im Rahmen der griechisch-römischen Ethnographie, Stuttgart, Steiner, 2002. 9 Cf. M. Goodman, “The Fiscus ludaicus and Gentile Attitudes to Judaism in Flavian Rome”, in J. Edmondson, S. Mason, J. Rives (eds), Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, p. 169, in correction to the hypothesis that Suetonius refers to non-Judaeans with Judaizing habits. For a comprehensive analysis of  the Fiscus Iudaicus see M. Heemstra, The Fiscus Judaicus and the Parting of  the Ways, Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2010. 10  E. S. Gruen, Rethinking the Other in Antiquity, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2011 provides an important correction to this focus in difference by showing how ancient authors attempted to overcome perceived difference. 11  Rhetoric is  sometimes explained as something devoid of  any substance, merely introduced for stylistic purposes. This paper rather approaches rhetoric as intrinsically connected to the messages and meaning of  Josephus’ text. As Christina Kraus has noted, “one cannot separate narrative from hard core and retain meaning”. C.  S. Kraus, “Historiography and Biography”, in A.  Barchiesi, W. Schneidel (eds), The Oxford Handbook of  Roman Studies, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2010, pp. 403–19 (quote from p. 416). In other words, it is impossible to recover the meaning of  Josephus’ text without studying its structures, themes, biases, and rhetoric. The role of  rhetoric in Roman processes of  negotiating aspects of  identity is  extensively discussed in e.g. W.  J. Dominik, J.  Hall (eds), A Companion to Roman Rhetoric, Malden, Blackwell, 2007; J. Connolly, The State of  Speech: Rhetoric and Political Thought in Ancient Rome, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2007. 8

165

E. GLAS

identity along the lines of  Roman stereotypes. This strong emphasis on Greek vices is meant to shift Roman attention away from Judaean flaws. This  is a  first indication of  the markedly Roman perspective Josephus tries to set up. Second, it will be examined how he describes the relationship between Romans and Judaeans. My observations indicate how Josephus subtly underlines aspects of  longstanding friendship and alliance between both people. Third, the analysis will then focus on how he uses one of  the major themes of  the BJ, civil war, to connect Judaean and Roman history. I will explain this narrative design intended to renegotiate the appreciation of  Judaean identity in a Flavian Roman environment. Josephus tries to replace anti-Judaean sentiments with pity and compassion. He  emphasises that Romans themselves have lived through civil war and thus know the horrors suffered by the Judaeans from first-hand experience.

2. Greeks and Judaeans A first indication that Josephus tries to overcome Roman stereotypes of  Judaean identity is offered by his presentation of  Greeks in the prologue of the BJ. We have already come across Josephus’ claim of  writing his history in response to rival histories (1.2, 6–8). In  his emphasis on the bias of  these works against Judaeans, he seems to draw on existing Roman stereotypes. We  will see that he attempts to overcome this prejudice by redirecting this bias to another group, namely the Greeks. Josephus explicitly prides himself  in his Judaean background – he calls himself  a native of  Jerusalem of  Hebrew origin (1.3) and a foreigner (1.16) – when revealing his personal identity to his audience. While doing so, he uses Greeks to set up a juxtaposition “them” and “us”, the Judaeans.12 He specifically attacks contemporary Greeks (1.13–16): while they sit in judgement over those who make contemporary history their subject of  in  On Josephus’ portrayal of  Greeks in the BJ, see T. Rajak, “Ethnic Identities in Josephus”, in The Jewish Dialogue with Greece and Rome: Studies in Cultural and Social Interaction, Leiden, Brill, 2001, pp. 137–46. For the complexities involved in understanding “ethnic identity” in the Roman world, see K. Nguyen, “What’s in a Natio?”, this volume. 12

166

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

vestigation, Josephus himself  can justly criticise them (1.13).13 These learned Greeks may have an advantage in style (λόγος), but they lack the proper disposition (προαίρεσις) to write about contemporary affairs. They make the distant past their subject, something already covered by ancient historians far superior to them. These ancient historians wrote contemporary history, their personal honour was at stake. Their task demanded an industrious person (φιλόπονος), willing to include new material and shape an innovative framework. Subsequently, Josephus draws himself  into the comparison (1.16): So too I, at great personal expense and effort, a  foreigner (ἀλλόφυλος), present to Greeks and Romans this memorial of  great achievements. As for the true born (τοῖς … γνησίοις), where it concerns personal gain or lawsuit, they open their mouths wide immediately and they unbind their tongues. Where it concerns history, which requires speaking the truth and the of  facts with much effort, they are muzzled, passing over to the inferior and those without knowledge to write about the deeds of  their rulers. Let historical truth be honoured by us then, since it has been neglected by the Greeks.

Steve Mason has suggested that the views of  these Greeks may not have bothered Josephus. Instead, he used this group of  Greek historians as a straw man to set up a praise of  his own investigation and his own credentials.14 In addition to this, it is striking how strongly Josephus’ description echoes Roman stereotypes of Greek identity, especially in his emphasis on Greek talkativeness, love for style and disregard for truth. He  also distinguishes between contemporary Greeks and their predecessors.15 For example, note how Cicero, using the voice of  Crassus, writes that contemporary Greeks (Graecula) are fonder of  argument than of  truth, adding 13   Cf. Josephus’ emotional transgression of  the “law of  history” in BJ 1.9–12 for which he begs to be excused, keenly aware that some may judge him when doing so (cf. below). 14 S. Mason, Josephus on the Pharisees: A Composition-Critical Study, Leiden, Brill, 1991, pp. 69–75. 15 T. Rajak, “Ethnic Identities”, pp. 142–43. For an overview of  such stereotypes, see esp. A. Wardman, Rome’s Debt to Greece, London, P. Elek, 1976, pp.  1–16; B.  Isaac, The Invention of  Racism in Classical Antiquity, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2004, pp. 381–405.

167

E. GLAS

that the quality of  their arguments have much less weight and eloquence than those of  their predecessors (De  or. 1.47). Elsewhere, he laments that Greeks without any military experience would lecture even a great general such as Hannibal about military matters (De or. 2.76). Strabo calls Greeks the most talkative of  all people (3.4.19). The Elder Pliny proclaims that Greeks are a vain and self-congratulatory people, with a tendency to spread extraordinary falsehoods (NH 2.248; 5.4; 28.112; 37.41). Valerius Maximus (Fact. 4.7.4) and Tacitus (Hist. 2.4) share these sentiments. The poet Juvenal clearly views Greek influence on Rome as undesirable, especially because most Greeks are not from Greece proper but from Syria (Sat. 3.60–65).16 The similarities between Roman stereotypes of  Greeks and Josephus’ presentation of  Greek are obvious and likely not coincidental. Presumably, Josephus fashioned his presentation of  Greeks in such a way that it would be appealing and recognizable to an audience in Rome. His intention might have been to divert attention from Judaeans and to create common ground between Judaeans and Romans, namely, their dislike of  a certain type of  Greeks.

3. Judaeans and Romans While Josephus emphasises differences between Judaeans and Greeks, he simultaneously highlights mutual understanding and similarity between Judaeans and Romans throughout the BJ. For instance, he exculpates the Romans from any responsibility for the outcome of  the Judaean-Roman conflict (1.10).17 He blames Judaean tyrants for waging war among each other and by doing so making Roman intervention and the destruction of  Jerusalem and its temple inevitable (1.10): no foreigner (οὐδεὶς ἀλλόφυλος) is to blame for the disasters that befell Jerusalem (1.12).18 Moreo Cf. B. Isaac, Invention of  Racism, p. 395.   Though on a deeper level Josephus leaves room for irony and veiled criticism, especially on the address of Vespasian. Cf. S. Mason, “Figured Speech and Irony in T.  Flavius Josephus”, in J.  Edmondson, S.  Mason, J.  Rives (eds), Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 243–88; S. Mason, “Rise from Civil War”, pp. 199–226. 18  Note the parallels of  Josephus’ emotional outburst with Polybius, Hist. 38.1–4; Diodorus, Lib. 32.26.1–2; Velleius Paterculus, Hist. Rom. 2.66–67. On this 16 17

168

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

ver, Josephus singles out many famous Romans (Pompey, Sosius, Augustus, Q uintilius Varus, Nero, Cestius Gallus, Vespasian, Titus) and leaves many Judaeans with a  more significant role in the narrative unmentioned (the high priest Ananus, John of  Gischala, Simon son of  Giora, Eleazar son of  Simon, Eleazar son of  Jairus) in the prospectus of  his history (1.17–29).19 All of  this seems to be designed to draw a Roman audience into his presentation of  the Judaean-Roman conflict. Josephus develops this theme in the first volumes by showing the deep ties of  friendship between Judaeans and Romans. It is probably not coincidental that he picks the conflict between the Hasmoneans and the Seleucids in the second century bce as point of  departure for his narrative, stressing that a first alliance between Judaeans and Romans was forged under Judas (1.38; cf.  1 Macc. 8.23–30) and renewed under his brother Jonathan (BJ 1.48). He significantly elaborates this theme in his narrative of  Antipater and Herod the Great, who continuously seek Roman protection. They assist their Roman patrons whenever they can and are greatly rewarded for their services (esp. 1.131, 175–78, 187–200, 277–85, 386–400). Claudius heavily relies on the Judaean Agrippa I as intermediary between him and the senate in his attempt to become emperor. It is only Agrippa’s counsel that prevents civil war in Rome (2.206–17). By means of  this, Josephus highlights Judaean loyalty to and friendship with Rome before the outbreak of  conflict. Josephus also underlines possibilities of  friendship even after conflict has broken out in Judaea, for example, by connecting his own fate with that of  the Flavian house. Thus, he claims that his divine dream at Jotapata forces him to abandon the Judaean cause and surrender himself to the Romans and deliver his prediction to passage and its complex relationship with Graeco-Roman rhetoric and historiography, see J. E. Glas, “Josephus between Jerusalem and Rome: Cultural Brokerage and the Rhetoric of  Emotion in the Bellum Judaicum (1.9–12)”, HISTOS: The On-line Journal of  Ancient Historiography 14 (2020), pp. 275–99. A different reading, emphasizing the biblical background of Josephus’ lamentations, is offered by C. S. Teets, “The Trauma of  Autopsy and the Transgression of  History in Josephus’ Jewish War”, Journal for the Study of  Judaism 51 (2020), pp. 261–84. 19  On the lack of  proportion of  BJ ’s prospectus in comparison to its narrative with as aim to deliberately reach out to a Roman audience, see in more detail S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, pp. 95–96.

169

E. GLAS

Vespasian (3.351–54, 361, 399–408). This prediction eventually results in Josephus’ release.20 Vespasian bestows rights of  Roman citizenship on Josephus for services rendered (4.629: ἐπιτιμία; cf. Vita 423: πολιτείᾳ Ῥωμαίων). Elsewhere he recalls how the Flavians appreciated his efforts and protected him from malicious accusations (BJ 3.410–11; 7.448–50; cf. Vita 414–29). He points out that the Roman tribune Nicanor is “an acquaintance of Josephus and an old friend” (BJ 3.346, γνώριμον τῷ Ἰωσήπῳ καὶ συνήθη πάλαι).21 Vespasian commissions Nicanor to persuade Josephus to surrender to the Romans (3.346–50). In BJ 5 we find Nicanor – this time commissioned by his friend (φίλος) Titus – approaching the walls of  Jerusalem to plead for peace together with Josephus (5.261–62).22 Thus, writing after these events had taken place, Josephus attempts to mend Judaean-Roman relations in the present by pointing to friendships and alliances between both people in the past.23 He describes Romans in mostly friendly terms. He prides himself  in his Judaean background and advertises how well-disposed notable Romans such as Titus had been to the Judaean case. He singles out the strong alliances between Judaeans and Romans before the outbreak of the revolt. In addition to this, Josephus highlights his personal story as a case in point, showing that ties of friendship between Judaean and Roman elites are possible in spite of  ongoing conflict.

  About Josephus’ predictions and their resonance in a Roman context, see J.  E. Glas, “Reading Josephus’ ‘Prophetic’ Inspiration in the Cave of  Jotapata (J.W.  3.351–354) in a  Roman Context”, Journal for the Study of  Judaism 52 (2021), pp. 522–56. 21  Yet the name is  Greek. On Josephus’ friendship with Nicanor, see Den Hollander, From Hostage to Historian, pp. 257–60. 22  Another example is  Josephus’ description of  Herod’s career narrated in BJ 1, which exemplifies a  maintenance of  good political relations with the Romans. Relevant passages are briefly touched upon in the previous section. 23   This corresponds with research on the aims and purposes of  the BJ, see e.g. P. Bilde, Flavius Josephus between Jerusalem and Rome: His Life, his Works, and their Importance, Sheffield, Sheffield Academic Press, 1988, p. 77: “Josephus” intention was to mend the relationship between the Jews and Rome and to restore the Roman policy of tolerance towards the Jewish people’. Following Mason and unlike Bilde, however, I would hesitate to call this the single most important purpose (or “thesis”) of  the BJ. Cf. Mason, A  History of  the Jewish War, pp. 93–101. 20

170

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

4. Josephus on Judaean and Roman Civil War Another way in which Josephus attempts to overcome Roman stereotypes of Judaeans is by showing what Judaeans and Romans have in common. He  accomplishes this by setting up events in Judaea and Rome alongside each other, programmatically connecting Judaean and Roman history, in particular through his use of the theme of civil war. As other scholars have observed, civil war (στάσις οἰκεία) is a major theme in the BJ. Josephus singles it out as the main cause for the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple (BJ 1.10).24 He also makes it the first word of  his actual investigation (1.31).25 In addition, its importance becomes evident by a simple word count. The  word στάσις occurs four times in the prologue (1.10 [2x], 27, 29) and 73 times throughout the BJ. Its semantic cognate πό­ λεμος ἐμφύλιος occurs on 10 occasions. Josephus frequently speaks about insurgents (στασιαστής; prologue: 1.10; 70 occurrences), revolutionaries (νεωτερίζον; prologue 1.4; 30 occurrences), bandits (λῃστρικός; prologue: 1.11; 22 occurrences), and tyrants (τύραν­ νος; prologue: 1.10, 11, 24, 27, 28; 44 occurrences). These are the figures typically described as responsible for the outbreak of  civic unrest and –  if  not restraint in time by moderate statesmen  – civil war.26 Josephus marks the definitive spread of  civil war in Judaea in his obituary of  the Judaean high priests Ananus and Jesus (BJ 4.318–25), among the last moderate statesmen in

24  See e.g. T. Rajak, Historian and His Society, pp. 91–92; P. Bilde, Flavius Josephus between Jerusalem and Rome, pp. 71–73; S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, p.  97; J.  J. Price, “Josephus”, in A.  Feldherr, G.  Hardy (eds), The Oxford History of  Historical Writing: Beginnings to ad 600, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011, pp.  226–27; S.  Mason, A  History of  the Jewish War, pp.  93–101, 208–10. G.  Mader, Josephus and the Politics of  Historiography: Apologetic and Impression Management in the Bellum Judaicum, Leiden, Brill, 2000, pp. 55–103 investigates the extent, complexity, and function of  Josephus’ reception of  Thucydides’ description of  the Corcyran civil war (Thuc. 3.82– 84) in BJ 4.121–282. M. A. Brighton, The Sicarii in Josephus’s Judean War: Rhetorical Analysis and Historical Observations, Atlanta, Society of  Biblical Literature, 2009 traces the motif  in relation to Josephus’ presentation of  the Sicarii. 25  See e.g. S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, p. 97; M. A. Brighton, Sicarii, p. 25. 26 Cf. S. Mason, A History of  the Jewish War, pp. 106–13.

171

E. GLAS

Jerusalem.27 With their death, the last check on tyrannical figures such as John of  Gischala and Simon son of  Giora is  removed. This causes civil war to reach its peak in the second half  of  the fourth and the fifth volume of  the BJ.28 Thus, the destructive consequences of  civil war feature prominently in Josephus’ narrative. Josephus could reasonably assume that this theme had great relevance for a  Roman audience. With the Social War (91– 88  bce), Sulla’s civil wars (88–87, 82–81  bce, 82–72  bce), Caesar’s Civil War (49–45 bce), the post-Caesarian wars (44– 30  bce), and the assassination of  Caligula (41  ce), civil war was among the phenomena that defined Roman history. What is more, when Josephus came to Rome in 71  ce, he found it in ruins: its very centre had been destroyed during the year of  the four emperors (68–69 ce). The impact of  this civil war on the city becomes apparent when looking at Tacitus’ description of  Roman sentiments in response to Otho and Vitellius battling each other for supreme power in 69 ce, singling out the devastating consequences of  civil war on Roman society (Hist. 1.50.2–4). Thus, the phenomenon of  civil war had ingrained itself  in Roman collective memory and had become a  leitmotif  in Flavian and post-Flavian literature.29 27   See also BJ 2.405–07, ending in Agrippa II’s abandonment of  the Judaean cause and the increase of revolutionary activity immediately afterwards; 3.432–42, news of  Josephus’ betrayal reaches Jerusalem and plunges the city into further disaster. Josephus puts an end to trouble in the Galilee (2.647). It only resurfaces after his surrender (3.392 ff.; cf. 3.414, 461, 492). 28  See esp. BJ 4.131–33, 364, 388, 397; 4.406–09; 5.19, 28, 442–45; 6.128– 30, 228. In Book 1 Josephus describes the struggles of  Herod to control his court in stasis language (1.432, 460, 464, 467), and in Book 2 he characterises the problems between the Judaeans and the Greeks in Caesarea as stasis (2.266, 267, 269, 270, 274, 288, 289, 290, 291, 324). Internal conflicts such as these are common and can go back for centuries. This is the case in Alexandria, where Judaeans had been engaged in a stasis with the Greeks from the time of  Alexander the Great (2.487). M. A. Brighton, The Sicarii in Josephus’s Judean War offers an extensive analysis of  stasis language throughout his investigation. 29   See D.  Armitage, Civil War: A  History in Ideas, New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 2017, p. 59: “Even those Romans who tried hardest not to speak of  civil war found themselves reliving it in their writings and speeches. And their contemporaries and successors could hardly avoid addressing it in terms derived from Roman experience itself ”. For the theme’s relevance to Rome’s collective memory in Flavian Rome, see L.  Donovan Ginsberg, D.  A. Krasne (eds), After 69  ce: Writing Civil War in Flavian Rome, Berlin, De  Gruyter, 2019.

172

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

Josephus’ use of the motif of civil war to describe both Judaean and Roman affairs can hardly be a coincidence.30 In the following discussion, I will highlight four ways in which he employs this theme to connect Judaean and Roman history, namely, his application of  1) Roman history as general background to conflict in Judaea; 2) explicit narrative commentary to connect Judaean and Roman civil war; 3) various topoi underlining the similarity of  Judaean and Roman civil war; and 4) the destructive consequences on Judaean and Romans society, particularly illustrated by the destruction of  temples in Jerusalem and Rome.31 By fashioning his narrative along these lines, Josephus invites his Roman readers to discover the parallels between Judaean and Roman problems and replace feelings of  anger or hatred with compassion for their sufferings. First, in the very beginning of  the BJ Josephus speaks of  a time of  great uproar (κίνημα) in the Roman Empire, noting that it is only because “the Romans are diseased from the inside” (Ῥωμαίοις μὲν ἐνόσει τὰ οἰκεῖα) that the Judaean revolutionaries find an opportunity to launch a  revolt against the Romans (BJ 1.4).32 Josephus emphasises that especially after the death of  Nero “everything became a melting-pot of  confusion”, leaving Rome with many pretenders trying to enrich themselves in their quest for glory (1.5). In the prospectus we read that Vespasian waged internal war (στασιάζω) to restore the order of the empire (1.23–24). Thus, in the prologue of  the BJ Josephus thoroughly entrenches events in Judaea in the broader context of instable imperial affairs. J. J. H. Klooster, N. I. Kuin (eds), After the Crisis: Remembrance, Re-anchoring and Recovery in Ancient Greece and Rome, London, Bloomsbury, 2020 investigates the impact of  civil war on Roman society more broadly, both from literary and historical perspectives. For historical overviews of  the Year of  the Four Emperors, leading to Vespasian’s rise to imperial power, see K.  Wellesley, The Year of  the Four Emperors, London, Routledge, 2000; G. Morgan, 69 A.D: The Year of  Four Emperors, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006. Brandão, p. 14 and p. 19, this volume, discusses the impact of  the year of  the four emperors on Roman identity formation from the angle of  Suetonius’ biographies. 30  My analysis builds upon but moves beyond the observations in S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, pp. 97–99. 31  Clearly, these categories overlap partially and should not be perceived as strictly separate from each other. 32  See on the verb νοσέω as marker of  civil strife, S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, p. 97.

173

E. GLAS

He continues to use Roman history as a point of  reference for the Judaean scenery throughout the BJ. In Book 1, which passes through Judaean history from 168 to 4 bce, Josephus describes how Roman strongmen tend to lose themselves in their internal struggles (e.g. 1.183–84, 1.216–18, 242–44, 364, 370, 386).33 These struggles continue in BJ 2 with the assassination of  Caligula by the Praetorian guard (BJ 2.204–14). We find a subtle anticipation to Nero’s death and Vespasian’s rise from the civil war in the opening paragraph of  BJ 3 (1–8). With the outbreak in Jerusalem, civil war becomes the most important theme of  the fourth volume. When this internal Judaean conflict reaches its peak, Josephus repeatedly breaks off  his main storyline to focus on the situation in Rome (esp. BJ 4.440–41, 494–502, 545–49, 585–88, 631–57). Most references are quick and in passing, but they allow him to anchor the chronology of  Judaean events in Roman history, which would be much more familiar to his Roman audience. Josephus does more than set up a simple point of  reference for the sake of  clarity.34 In Josephus’ narrative of  Herod the Great (1.204–664), Roman internal struggles serve as a natural point of  contrast to the exemplary fashion in which Herod manages internal Judaean affairs. Running the risk of  ending up on the wrong side of  an imperial civil war, Romans pose a greater threat to Herod’s rule than his internal enemies. Circumstances, caused by Roman internal struggles, force him to risk his own life on multiple occasions. However, Herod skilfully manages this political minefield and competition, and by doing so, shows his virtues as an exemplary leader and representative of  the Judaean people (1.220–22, 277–85, 288–91, 297–302, 309, 317–22, 358–400).35 33   Honora Chapman has proposed reading Josephus’ description of  the civil wars in the final years of the Roman Republic in BJ 1 in dialogue with the classical sources more commonly used to reconstruct the history and historiography of the civil wars of  the Late Republic. See H.  H. Chapman, “Josephus’s Jewish War and Late Republican Civil War”, in C. Lange, F. J. Vervaet (eds), The Historiography of  Late Republican Civil War, Leiden, Brill, 2019, pp. 92–139. 34  In agreement with S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, p. 99. 35  So, while the Romans wage war among each other with frequency, Herod brings peace and internal stability to Judaea. That is, until he falls in love with Mariamme. See the reversal of  Herod’s fortune at BJ 1.431.

174

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

Second, Josephus emphasises the connection between Roman and Judaean affairs by adding explicit narrative commentary. For example, he writes that “sedition and civil war were not restricted to Judaea, but also present in Italy” (4.545, Οὐ μόνον δὲ κατὰ τὴν Ἰουδαίαν στάσις ἦν καὶ πόλεμος ἐμφύλιος, ἀλλὰ κἀπὶ τῆς Ἰταλίας). Elsewhere he says that “[a]bout this very time, calamities also surrounded Rome”. (4.585, Κατὰ δὲ τὸν αὐτὸν καιρὸν περιέσχε καὶ τὴν Ῥώμην πάθη χαλεπά).36 By inserting such statements, he invites his audience to recognise the similarity between the civil wars in Judaea and Rome. While Josephus writes that he will not offer a detailed treatment of  events in Rome, he employs summary statements to remind Romans of  their recent past in connection to his presentation of  the Judaean-Roman conflict. Note the following example (4.492–95): One could tell how he [Nero] habitually violated his authority by trusting the most worthless individuals – Nymphidius and Tigellinus, the most undeserving of  all freedmen – with his administration; and how he was abandoned by all his guards when they plotted against him, and, together with four loyal freedmen, killed himself  in the suburbs; and how those who had overthrown him (οἱ καταλύσαντες) conceded to justice in not much time; or what happened during the war in Gaul, and how Galba was assigned the imperial office when he returned to Rome from Spain; and how, after the low charges from his soldiers, he was slain in the very centre of  the Roman forum (ἐδολοφονήθη κατὰ μέσην τὴν Ῥωμαίων ἀγορὰν) and the imperial office was assigned to Otho; of  his campaign against the generals of  Vitellius and his overthrow (κατάλυσιν); then the civic unrest under Vitellius and the encounters around the Capitol; the subsequent commotions under Vitellius and the fighting around the Capitol, and how Antonius Primus and Mucianus by destroying Vitellius and his German legions suppressed the war amongst kinsmen (τὸν ἐμφύλιον πόλεμον).

Josephus claims that he will not treat these events in detail because 1) other historians have investigated this already and 2) the story is  common knowledge (BJ 4.496, ἐπειδὴ δι᾿ ὄχλου πᾶσίν ἐστιν).  With S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, p. 98.

36

175

E. GLAS

Although the remark looks casual, Josephus’ choice of  language shows its calculated composition: he uses very similar language when describing affairs in Jerusalem. For instance, in the preceding sections Josephus also uses the verb καταλύω (“to overthrow” or “subvert”) to describe how the Idumaeans, one of  the main factions in the Judaean civil war, are caught up in the murder of  their kinsmen (ἐμφυλίου φόνου). By doing so they overthrow Judaean ancestral order, killing those who had tried to stop them in the process (4.349). Later, Simon is brought in by the Idumaeans to overthrow (καταλύω) another tyrant, John of  Gischala (4.573). In addition to this, note how Josephus describes the death of poor Galba, “murdered in the midst of  the Roman forum” (ἐδολοφο­ νήθη κατὰ μέσην τὴν Ῥωμαίων ἀγορὰν). He  describes the death of  Ananus, one of  Jerusalem’s chief  priests, in strikingly similar terms (4.318): I might not be wrong when saying that the conquest of  the city began with the death of  Ananus. The wall was toppled and Judaean state-affairs ruined on that day, at which high priest, the leader of  their own salvation, was murdered in the very centre of  the city (ἐπὶ μέσης τῆς πόλεως εἶδον ἀπεσφαγμένον).

As Mason demonstrates, this episode functions as the pivotal point of  BJ ’s chiastic composition.37 Thus, that Josephus uses similar language to describe Galba’s death in the centre of  Rome can hardly be coincidental. In  case some of  his readers might have missed this interpretative clue, he employs the same trick again at the end of BJ 4 when describing Vitellus’ “throat was cut in the centre of  Rome” (BJ 4.652, ἐπὶ μέσης τῆς Ῥώμης ἀποσφάττεται). However, rather than explaining the deeper significance of  these parallels explicitly, Josephus leaves it to his audience to discover them. Third, although promising to relate events in Rome in summary only, Josephus narrates the climax of  the year of  the four emperors in rather detailed fashion (4.585–655). He slows down to a day-by-day pace shortly before Antonius Primus and Mucianus and their troops arrive in Rome.38 Josephus describes  S. Mason, A History of  the Jewish War, p. 100.   Noted by S. Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, p. 98.

37 38

176

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

how Vitellius comes out on top after the quick succession of  emperors after the death of  Nero (4.645–55). Readers learn how the eastern legions proclaim Vespasian emperor in response to this (4.588–604). Vespasian secures the East, before sending his trusted general Mucianus to Rome (4.605–32). Antonius Primus, commander of the Moesian legions, swears allegiance to Vespasian and beats the Vitellian legions and travels to Rome to support the Vespasian’s case (4.633–44). Chaos and destruction follow when Vitellius unleashes his forces on the Capitoline hill (4.645–49). Antonius’ army arrives one day later, annihilating Vitellius’ men and butchering Vitellius himself. Josephus emphasises that his troops murder innocent citizens in the process (4.650–54). On the following day, Mucianus arrives and relieves the Romans of  the slaughter by Antonius’ troops (4.654–55). This extended narrative of  Roman civil war enables Josephus to enhance his comparison between Judaea and Rome significantly. For instance, he characterises Vitellius as a “savage tyrant” (4.596, τύραννον ὠμότατον) who in his “natural cruelty thirsts for noble blood” (4.647, διὰ τὴν ἔμφυτον ὠμότητα διψῶν αἵματος εὐγενοῦς). Josephus also ascribes the leaders of  the factions in Jerusalem as tyrants (e.g. 4.166, 179, 258, 564, 566, 574; 5.5, 11). As to Vitellius’ cruelty, the people of  Jerusalem suffer from the cruelty (ὠμότης) of  the Jerusalem tyrants (e.g. 1.27; 4.134, 350, 381, 535, 566; 5.16, 35,  etc.). In  the immediate aftermath of  Ananus’ death Josephus states that the Zealots and the Idumaeans kill 12,000 young Judaeans of  noble blood (4.327–33). They continue their quest for royal blood and the brave general Niger becomes their most prominent victim (4.353–62). The resemblance between phenomena associated with civil war among Judaeans and Roman is unmistakable.39 Fourth, as I have previously noted, Josephus makes the burning of  the temple of  Jerusalem the tragic climax of  the BJ. He anticipates this cataclysmic event twice in the prologue, claiming that “the Judaean tyrants set the temple on fire” (1.10, τὸ πῦρ ἐπὶ τὸν ναὸν εἵλκυσαν οἱ Ἰουδαίων τύραννοι) and that “the temple was set on fire against Caesar’s wish” (BJ 1.28, ὁ ναὸς ἄκοντος ἐνεπρήσθη Καίσαρος). He foregrounds the impact of  the destruction of  the  Ibid.

39

177

E. GLAS

Judaean temple throughout his narrative (e.g. 5.444; 6.97, 165– 67, 216, 249–66, 274, 280, 347). Various statesmen warn the people against the consequences of  conflict with Rome. Josephus (as a character) is among them. In BJ 5 he delivers a long speech before the walls of  Jerusalem in which he reminds the Judaeans that the Assyrians and the Babylonians burned the temple in the past. The same will happen if  they continue in their resistance (5.405, 411).40 Even Titus reprimands the Judaeans for setting their own temple on fire (6.346). To sum up, Josephus makes the burning of  the temple in Jerusalem the hallmark of  Judaean disaster. In consideration of  the strong focus on the burning of  the Jerusalem temple, Josephus reference to the burning of  the temple of  Jupiter Capitolinus as a consequence of  Roman civil war in BJ 4 is likely intentional (4.649). When describing Vitellius’ siege of  the Capitoline hill, Josephus writes that “the soldiers first plundered the offerings of the temple and then set it on fire” (διαρπάσαντές τε οἱ στρατιῶται τὰ ἀναθήματα τὸν ναὸν ἐνέπρησαν). Just like the Judaeans should be held accountable for the burning of  their own temple in 70  ce, Romans had burned their most important temple in the preceding year. This sentence could hardly have escaped the notice of  a Roman reader. Note the outrage expressed by Tacitus, writing c. 30–40 years after the events: “This was the saddest and most shameful crime that the Roman state had ever suffered since its foundation” (Hist. 3.72, trans. LCL). Josephus added the finishing touches to the BJ hardly 10 years after the year of  the four emperors, when memory of  the civil war was an open wound for many in Roman society. Josephus underlines the same point in the beginning of BJ 7, shortly after his narrative of  the destruction of  the temple in Jerusalem at the end of  the preceding volume. He  switches, yet again, from Judaea to Rome, describing vivid memories of  recent civil war as the most important reason why the senate and people readily accept Vespasian as their emperor (7.65–66): the senate has memory (μνήμη) of  the disasters during the year of  the four emperors. The people are exhausted by internal troubles (τῶν 40  Elsewhere in his narrative Josephus also connects these historical events with the burning of  the temple in 70 ce (BJ 6.250, 267–70).

178

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

ἐμφυλίων κακῶν). Josephus draws upon this memory: many of  the Romans addressed by him might have lost relatives or friends on the occasion. His reminder affirms that they had experienced the same sufferings as the Judaeans, extensively narrated in BJ 5 and 6. In subsequent passages, Josephus describes the Roman triumph procession and its aftermath to celebrate the Flavian victory over Judaea (7.123–57).41 His strong emphasis on the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus as the procession’s endpoint might contain some irony. The view cannot have been glorious. The temple must still have been in ruins and thus was a visual reminder of  the war that had been waged in Rome itself. Josephus points out how the festival that follows marked the end of  both a campaign against foreign enemies and internal troubles (τῶν ἐμφυλίων κακῶν), signalling the beginning of  a prosperous future (7.157).42 Strikingly, Josephus puts the story of Roman restoration alongside the story of  continued Judaean suffering. Vespasian decides to build the Temple of  Peace, where he stores the golden artefacts that had formerly inspired awe in the temple of  Jerusalem (7.161). He  orders the confiscation of  land in Judaea (7.216) and founds a  colony three miles away from Jerusalem (7.217). He  imposes the fiscus Iudaicus on Judaeans living everywhere under the empire, forcing them to pay two drachmas to the Capitol annually.43 This is the exact same amount as the contribution previously made by Judaeans to the temple in Jerusalem (7.218). 41  F. Millar, “Last Year in Jerusalem”, p. 101 observes that “this is the fullest description which survives of  any triumph held in the Imperial period”. 42 S.  Mason, “Of  Audience and Meaning”, pp.  98–99. The description of  the Flavian Triumph has received ample attention in recent scholarship. Whereas scholars tended to see it as Flavian propaganda, they now suggest that Josephus’ description might is more sophisticated than than and might contain elements that reflect badly on the Flavian regime. In addition to S. Mason, “Josephus’ Portrait of the Flavian Triumph in Historical and Literary Context”, in F. Goldbeck and J. Wienand (eds), Der römische Triumph in Prinzipat und Spätantike, Berlin, De Gruyter, 2017, pp. 125–76, see, e.g., R. Ash, “Fractured Vision: Flavius Josephus and Tacitus on Triumph and Civil War”, in J. M. Madson and R. Rees (eds), Roman Rule in Greek and Roman Writing, Leiden, Brill, 2014, pp. 144–62; C. A. Frilingos, “More than Meets the Eye: Incongruity and Observation in Josephus’s Account of  the Triumph of  Vespasian and Titus”, History of  Religions 57 (2017), pp. 50–67. 43  According to Cassius Dio a direct tribute to Jupiter Capitolinus, see 66.7.2.

179

E. GLAS

He even orders the destruction of  a second Judaean temple, situated in Heliopolis and founded by Onias, to prevent further spread of  the Judaean revolutionary movement (7.420–36).44 By presenting the continued punishment of  the Judaeans alongside Roman celebrations, Josephus might have tried to invoke questions of  doubt and compassion among his readers. If   the Judaean conflict with Rome was ultimately caused by civil war among Judaeans, would they perhaps not deserve a  new beginning, like the Romans?

5. Conclusions By exploring various themes and narrative structures in the BJ, this paper has argued that Josephus uses a set of  rhetorical strategies to overcome the identity gap between Judaeans and Romans. His narrative subverts Roman ideas about Judaean identity, which in the immediate aftermath of  the Judaean-Roman conflict were not particularly friendly. By doing so, he challenges identity boundaries between two seemingly different people in a way that invites Romans both to assess themselves and to reassess the Judaean case.45 First, in the prologue he introduces Greek intellectuals as “another other” and describes them according to Roman stereotypes with the purpose of  redirecting Roman othering from Judeans to Greeks. Second, he creates a  discourse of  understanding by writing how notable Romans such as Titus pitied the Judaeans. Adding to this point, Josephus highlights ties of  friendship between Judaeans and Romans before and during the outbreak of  the revolt. Third, he counters Roman hatred against Judaeans by highlighting civil war as the main cause of  continued Judaean resistance against the Romans and putting this alongside contemporary events in Rome. By activating particular Roman memories of  their own history of  civil wars, and highlighting that Judaeans went through the same sufferings, 44  Thus, he returns to the story with which he opened the BJ (1.31–33). See S. Mason, A History of  the Jewish War, p. 99. 45  The exemplary functions of  “foreign history” (in the case of  biography) is  also discussed in F.  Ginelli’s discussion of  Nepos’ Punic Lives, which he discusses in terms of  “cultural relativism” (pp. 3, 13, this volume).

180

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

Josephus attempts to show that these two very different people have very similar social identities. He  draws on the empathic capabilities of his Roman readers and invites them to pity a people who, like themselves, had been internally disrupted and brought to the brink of  disaster.46

Bibliography Armitage D., Civil War: A History in Ideas, New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 2017. Ash, R., “Fractured Vision: Flavius Josephus and Tacitus on Triumph and Civil War”, in J. M. Madson and R. Rees (eds), Roman Rule in Greek and Roman Writing: Double Vision, Leiden, Brill, 2014, pp. 144–62. Bilde P., Flavius Josephus between Jerusalem and Rome: His Life, his Works, and their Importance, Sheffield, Sheffield Academic Press, 1988. Bloch R. S., Antike Vorstellungen vom Judentum: der Judenexkurs des Tacitus im Rahmen der griechisch-römischen Ethnographie, Stuttgart, Steiner, 2002. Brighton M.  A., The Sicarii in Josephus’s Judean War: Rhetorical Analysis and Historical Observations, Atlanta, Society of  Biblical Literature, 2009. Chapman H. H., “Josephus”, in A. Feldherr (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Historians, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009, pp. 319–31. Chapman H. H., “Josephus’s Jewish War and Late Republican Civil War”, in C.  Lange, F.  J. Vervaet (eds), The Historiography of  Late Republican Civil War, Leiden, Brill, 2019, pp. 92–139. Cotton H., Eck W., “Josephus’ Roman Audience: Josephus and the Roman Elites”, in J. Edmondson, S. Mason, J. Rives (eds),

46 In his On the Control of  Anger, Plutarch notes that in some cases it might be helpful if a friend holds a mirror to show someone how anger distorts one’s natural features. This effectively discredits the presumed merits of  that anger (456A–B). In  a  like fashion, Josephus overcomes the identity gap between Judaeans and Romans by composing his analysis of  the Judaean revolt against the Romans in such a fashion that Romans could and would see themselves, as in a mirror. F. Lazzarini uses the metaphor of  a mirror in relation to her discussion about the representation of  Roman identity in Varro’s works (p. 17, this volume).

181

E. GLAS

Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 37–52. Den Hollander W., Josephus, The Emperor, and the City of  Rome: From Hostage to Historian, Leiden, Brill, 2014. Dominik W. J., Hall J., “Confronting Roman Rhetoric”, in W. J. Dominik, J. Hall (eds), A Companion to Roman Rhetoric, Malden, Blackwell, 2007, p. 3. Donovan Ginsberg L., Krasne D. A. (eds), After 69 ce: Writing Civil War in Flavian Rome, Berlin, De Gruyter, 2019. Frilingos, C. A., “More than Meets the Eye: Incongruity and Observation in Josephus’s Account of  the Triumph of  Vespasian and Titus”, History of  Religions 57 (2017), pp. 50–67. Giambrone, A. (ed.), Rethinking the Jewish War: Archeology, Society, Traditions, Leuven, Peeters, 2021. Glas, J. E., “Josephus between Jerusalem and Rome: Cultural Brokerage and the Rhetoric of Emotion in the Bellum Judaicum (1.9–12)”, HISTOS: The On-line Journal of Ancient Historiography 14 (2020), pp. 275-99. Glas, J.  E., “Reading Josephus’ ‘Prophetic’ Inspiration in the Cave of  Jotapata (J.W.  3.351–354) in a  Roman Context”, Journal for the Study of  Judaism 52 (2021), pp. 522–56. Goodman M., “The Fiscus ludaicus and Gentile Attitudes to Judaism in Flavian Rome”, in J. Edmondson, S. Mason, J. Rives (eds), Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 167–77. Goodman M., Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of  Ancient Civilizations, London, Allen Lane, 2007. Gruen E. S., Rethinking the Other in Antiquity, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2011. Heemstra M., The Fiscus Judaicus and the Parting of  the Ways, Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2010. Isaac B., The Invention of  Racism in Classical Antiquity, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2004. Klooster J. J. H., Kuin N. I. (eds), After the Crisis: Remembrance, Re-anchoring and Recovery in Ancient Greece and Rome, London, Bloomsbury, 2020. Kraus C.  S., “Historiography and Biography”, in A.  Barchiesi, W.  Schneidel (eds), The Oxford Handbook of  Roman Studies, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2010, pp. 403–19. 182

OVERCOMING OTHERNESS IN FLAVIAN ROME

Mader G., Josephus and the Politics of  Historiography: Apologetic and Impression Management in the Bellum Judaicum, Leiden, Brill, 2000. Mason S., Josephus on the Pharisees: A  Composition-Critical Study, Leiden, Brill, 1991. Mason S., “Of  Audience and Meaning: Reading Josephus’s Judean War in the Context of a Flavian Audience”, in J. Sievers, G. Lembi (eds), Josephus and Jewish History in Flavian History and Beyond, Leiden, Brill, 2005, pp. 71–100. Mason S., “Figured Speech and Irony in T.  Flavius Josephus”, in J. Edmondson, S. Mason, J. Rives (eds), Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 243–88. Mason S., “Josephus as a  Roman Historian”, in H.  H. Chapman, Z.  Rodgers (eds), A  Companion to Josephus and His World, Malden, John Wiley, 2016, p. 89‒107. Mason S., A History of  the Jewish War: ad 66–74, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016. Mason, S., “Josephus’ Portrait of  the Flavian Triumph in Historical and Literary Context”, in F. Goldbeck, J. Wienand (eds), Der römische Triumph in Prinzipat und Spätantike, Berlin, De Gruyter, 2017, pp. 125–76. Millar F., “Last Year in Jerusalem: Monuments of  the Jewish War in Rome”, in J. Edmondson, S. Mason, J. Rives (eds), Flavius Josephus and Flavian Rome, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 101–28. Morgan G., 69 A.D: The Year of  Four Emperors Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006. Price J.  J., “The Provincial Historian in Rome”, in J.  Sievers, G. Lembi (eds), Josephus and Jewish History in Flavian History and Beyond, Leiden, Brill, 2005, pp. 101–18. Price J. J., “Josephus”, in A. Feldherr, G. Hardy (eds), The Oxford History of  Historical Writing: Beginnings to ad 600, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011, pp. 219–43. Rajak T., “Ethnic Identities in Josephus”, in The Jewish Dialogue with Greece and Rome: Studies in Cultural and Social Interaction, Leiden, Brill, 2001, pp. 137–46. Rajak T., Josephus: The Historian and His Society, revised second edition, London, Duckworth, 2002. Schäfer P., Judeophobia: Attitudes toward the Jews in the Ancient World. Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1997. 183

E. GLAS

Stern M., Greek and Latin authors on Jews and Judaism, 3 vols, Jerusalem, Israel Academy of  Sciences and Humanities, 1974–1984. Teets, C. S., “The Trauma of  Autopsy and the Transgression of  History in Josephus’ Jewish War”, Journal for the Study of  Judaism 51 (2020), 261–84. Wardman A., Rome’s Debt to Greece, London, P. Elek, 1976. Wellesley  K. The Year of  the Four Emperors, London, Routledge, 2000.

184

JOSÉ LUÍS BRANDÃO Universidade de Coimbra Centro de Estudos Clássicos e Humanísticos (CECH) ORCID: 0000-0002-3383-2474

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

In writing the Lives of  Caesars, Suetonius focuses on the figure of  the Emperor to identify how he adheres or departs from a certain ethical and political model. We  can catch glimpses of  this model through signs of  both approval and disapproval which he expresses throughout the Lives. As such, Suetonius’ approach is predominantly a  moral one, illustrated by various biographical elements, which he collects and classifies using categories in which chronology generally takes a secondary position.1 While the imperial court helps to modulate transformations serving as an example for society to establish paradigms regarding good and evil, it also reflects the mores of  Roman society.2 However, in so far as behaviours sometimes reflect trends, tastes and fashions, it is not only a matter of  describing public, but also private, mores, as is stated in the famous partitiones that Suetonius operates in the Lives of  Caesar and Augustus.3 Many questions have been raised regarding Suetonius’ intent. For example, there have been scholars who interpreted the Lives 1   I want to express my gratitude to Lautaro Roig Lanzillotta, Cláudia Teixeira, Ália Rodrigues and Emily Bunn for reading the text and making timely suggestions and corrections. Any remaining errors are my responsibility. 2  As points out A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius. The Scholar and his Caesars, New Haven (Conn.), Yale University Press, 1984, pp. 177–80. 3  Jul. 44.4: Talia agentem atque meditantem mors praeuenit. De  qua prius quam dicam, ea quae ad formam et habitum et cultum et mores, nec minus quae ad ciuilia et bellica eius studia pertineant, non alienum erit summatim exponere; Aug. 61.1: Q uoniam qualis in imperis ac magistratibus regendaque per terrarum orbem pace belloque re p. fuerit, exposui, referam nunc interiorem ac familiarem eius uitam quibusque moribus atque fortuna domi et inter suos egerit a iuuenta usque ad supremum uitae diem. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 185–223 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128696

185

J. L. BRANDÃO

as being an expression of  social partisanship; 4 as criticism, advice, or propaganda of  the emperors of  Suetonius’ time; 5 or even a  projection of  Suetonius’ own traits, fears and weaknesses.6 As regards the list of  virtues and vices, we can recognise the influence of  rhetorical and epigraphic tradition,7 or an imperial representation closer to the miscellany and encyclopaedic literature.8 In  any case, the influence of  traditional Roman morality (also present in the rhetorical tradition and coinage) seems undeniable, but rather than there being good or bad emperors, we find good and bad elements within each one, in different proportions and different ways of  processing biographical data.9 Therefore, 4  In favour of  the equites, the order to which the biographer himself  belongs: See F. Della Corte, Svetonio eques Romanus, Firenze, La Nuova Italia, 1967, pp. 165–90. Contra, J. Gascou, “Suétone et l’ordre équestre”, REL 54 (1976), pp. 257–77. 5 T. F. Carney, “How Suetonius’ lives reflect on Hadrian”, PACA 11 (1968), pp.  7–24, states that The Lives of  Caesars contain sly criticism of  Hadrian. E. Cizek, Structure et idéologie dans les Vies des douze Césars de Suétone, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1977, pp. 181–92, is of  the opinion that Suetonius gives discrete advice to Hadrian, but ultimately offends this emperor and therefore falls into disgrace. On the contrary, H.  Bardon, Les empereurs et les lettres latines d’Auguste à Hadrien, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1968, 439–44, thinks that Suetonius does not take sides in favor of  Hadrian or against. K. Bradley, “Imperial virtues in Suetonius’ Caesares”, JIES 4 (1976), pp. 245–53, refutes Carney’s idea that Suetonius criticises this emperor by omitting the captions of  the virtues present in Hadrian’s coinages. J. Gascou, Suétone historien, Paris, de Boccard, 1984, pp. 758–73, refutes Bardon, Carney and Cizek and demonstrates that there are, in the Lives, many more favourable aspects to Hadrian than unfavourable ones. F.  Dupont, T.  Éloi, L’ érotisme masculin dans la Rome antique, Paris, Belin, 2001, p. 293, considers Suetonius a spokesman of  the Antonine propaganda. 6  See R. Newbold, “Suetonius’ boundaries”, Latomus 43, 1984, pp. 118–32. 7  The same applies to the elements which are present in the Pliny’s Panegyric of  Trajan (see F. Della Corte, Svetonio eques, pp. 79–80; A. WallaceHadrill, Suetonius, pp. 154–55; B. Baldwin, Suetonius, Amsterdam, Hakkert, 1983, pp. 269–70); the topoi of  Roman forensic oratory, whether controversial or apologetic (see R. G. Lewis, “Suetonius’ Caesares and their literary antecedents”, ANRW II, 33, 5, 1991, pp. 3623–74); the influence of  Augustus’ Res gestae, or of  the coinage legends, and the result of  reflections on the ethos of  the Principate (see K. Bradley, “The imperial ideal in Suetonius’ Caesares”, ANRW II, 33, 5, 1991, pp. 3701–32). 8 V.  Schulz, Deconstructing Imperial Representation. Tacitus, Cassius Dio and Suetonius on Nero and Domitian, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2019, pp. 269–357. This author argues that, in Suetonius’ text, the “elements of  imperial representation appear in a  depoliticized form, compared to Tacitus and Cassius Dio” (p. 357). 9   See J.  L. Brandão, Máscaras dos Césares. Teatro e  moralidade nas Vidas

186

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

according to the biographical tradition, Suetonius aims to analyse in a systematic way the ethos of  each individual based on their public and private acts.10 As a  central figure in this biography, the emperor is  a  performer. The idea of  the emperor-actor is  clearly expressed by Augustus who, on the brink of  death, requests a mirror and asks if  he represented the mimus of  life well (Suet. Aug. 99), as well as by Nero when he claims that he dies as an artist (Nero 49.1: qualis Artifex pereo!), just to mention two paradigmatic examples. The biographer’s evaluation of  the princeps’ performance rests largely on those aspects which are perceived as characteristics of  a Roman civis; that is, what it means to be a good citizen, a good politician, a good aristocrat, a good patronus. This assessment is largely related to moral, cultural and social aspects of  identity, which we will develop in more detail below. Thus, the purpose of  this chapter is, firstly (§  1), to evaluate how, according to Suetonius, emperors defend traditional customs and how their actions embody (or not) the ethical values associated with the Roman aristocratic tradition. In this way, the character is  defined on the basis of  Roman moral criteria. Secondly, by analysing their performance, this paper will examine the way in which the emperors position themselves vis-à-vis cultural identifiers, such as language, clothing, education, leisure, religion and social organisation. Through these elements we can understand how Suetonius evaluates the emperors’ contribution to the preservation of  Roman identity in terms of  whether they respect tradition or assimilate new elements that do not conflict with the pragmatic Roman spirit; or whether, on the contrary, they promote a  forced and immoderate integration of  exotic elements contrary to traditional Roman values, which not only undermine Roman identity but also the dignity of  the emperor, the citizens and the Roman Empire. suetonianas, Coimbra, Imprensa da UC, 2009, pp. 378–80; V. Schulz, Deconstructing Imperial Representation, pp. 318–27. 10  Thus, while more concerned with ethos, biography gains importance in describing the history of  the empire, to the detriment of  the Annales of  the republican tradition, as Tacitus (Ann. 4.32–33; Hist. 1.1) implies when he suggests that there  is no longer enough material for historiography. Vide M.  A. Giua, “Aspetti della biografia latina del primo impero”, RSI 12 (1990), pp. 544–50.

187

J. L. BRANDÃO

1. Biography and Identity: From Public Customs to Individual Character “Biography is a good source for the mores of  an age”, wrote Wallace-Hadrill.11 When analysing the occurrences of  the concept of  mos (“habits, custom, tradition”) in Suetonius, we can distinguish between the customs of  society and the customs of  the emperor. As  far as society is  concerned, one of  the emperor’s concerns should be the maintenance of  fatherly and civic values. Consequently, what is proper of  a Roman citizen also becomes the criterion for evaluating the emperor’s behaviour during the Principate. For example, in his propaganda against Antony, Augustus accuses him of  diverging from ciuilis mos, that is, of  behaving inappropriately towards a Roman citizen (Suet. Aug. 17. 1).12 As Emma Dench notes, “Roman cultural identity is […] heavily moral in its focus”, supported by the generic formula of  “the ways of  our ancestors” (the mores maiorum).13 Such expression carries an implicit set of  values assumed and defended mainly by the Roman aristocracy, which uses “these ethical categories” to judge others and thus establish the boundaries of  identity within Roman society and in relation to non-Romans, as Roller points out.14 As it  is the aristocrats who write history – and they are Suetonius’ sources – such values are used to judge the emperor: to determine to what extent does he behave like a  true Roman princeps or if  he deviates from the model of  Augustus, thus becoming a dominus. So, one question is to understand to what degree the emperor is  concerned with the maintenance or restoration of  the old  A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, p. 187.   M.  Antoni[i] societatem semper dubiam et incertam reconciliationibusque uariis male focilatam abrupit tandem, et quo magis degenerasse eum a ciuili more approbaret, testamentum, quod is  Romae etiam de Cleopatra liberis inter heredes nuncupatis reliquerat, aperiundum recitandumque pro contione curauit. See D. Wardle, Suetonius. Life of  Augustus. Translated with introduction and historical commentary, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 146–47. 13 E. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum. Roman Identities from the Age of  Alexander to the Age of  Hadrian, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, p. 139. 14  M. B. Roller, Constructing Autocracy. Aristocrats and Emperors in JulioClaudian Rome, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2001, pp.  20–21. Cf. A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, p. 174. 11 12

188

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

customs. Another question is  to ascertain to what extent the emperors’ behaviour conforms to the identity values of  Roman morality or departs from them. Suetonius refers to ancient customs to exemplify both imitation and, at times, rejection. As to the former, he emphasises the efforts made to restore ancient customs. Augustus epitomises a revival of  the ancient mores: in the army (Aug. 24.1),15 in the restoration of  the annual review of  the equites (Aug. 38.3),16 and in the practice of  proposing candidates for elections (Aug. 56.1).17 In the positive part of the biography, Caligula also tries to resume the elections, restoring the custom of  the comitia (Cal. 16.2) 18 which, by Tiberius’ time, had become a mere confirmation of the emperor’s choices ratified by the Senate. Sometimes, however, customs might become inadequate and require change. In  this sense, Augustus changed customs when he deemed it necessary; for example, he introduced at senate meetings a random intervention of speakers in place of the customary order (Aug. 35. 4) in order to control the influence of  authoritative senators on public opinion.19 Such a reform of  senatorial procedure seems to underline a change in aristocratic political system: the horizontal republican articulation evolves into a  pyramidal one, and competition between great families, as well as their influence, are then arbitrated by the princeps. Another related idea is the correction of  mores corrupted by the vicissitudes of  the times, just as Augustus did with regard to the distribution of  spectators in the theatre (Aug. 44.1).20 Domi15   In  re militari et commutauit multa et instituit atque etiam ad antiquum morem nonnulla reuocauit. 16  Equitum turmas frequenter recognouit, post longam intercapedinem reducto more trauectionis. 17  quotiens magistratuum comitiis interesset, tribus cum candidatis suis circuibat supplicabatque more sollemni. 18   Temptauit et comitiorum more reuocato suffragia populo reddere. Cf. D.C. 59.9.6. 19  Sententias de maiore negotio non more atque ordine sed prout libuisset perrogabat, ut perinde quisque animum intenderet ac si censendum magis quam adsentiendum esset. 20  Spectandi confusissimum ac solutissimum morem correxit ordinauitque motus iniuria senatoris, quem Puteolis per celeberrimos ludos consessu frequenti nemo receperat.

189

J. L. BRANDÃO

tian will do something similar, in the context of  the powers of  censor (Dom. 8.3),21 in order to put an end to the disorder which, according to Suetonius’ insinuation, Caligula encouraged (Cal. 26.4). The correction of  corrupted customs is also present in the positive part of  the Life of  Tiberius (Tib. 33.1).22 In  the Life of  Claudius, the correction of  customs is complemented by the restoration of  old religious, civic and military practices (Cl. 22.1).23 Domitian follows the same path with regard to punishing the Vestals who had betrayed the vows of  chastity (Dom. 8. 4).24 However, returning to old customs can be pernicious, if  they concern old-fashioned practices. In  this sense, an old custom can also be used to accentuate cruelty when it comes to rude and primitive practices. Such is the case of  Claudius and Domitian, when they apply punishment according to traditional methods,25 a  practice that even Nero shows no awareness of  (Nero 49.2). In the case of  Tiberius, the correction of  customs is presented as a pretext for the exercise of  his natural cruelty (Tib. 59.1).26 As far as the emperor is concerned, in individual terms, mores are characterisers and, as such, may suggest character similarities between different rulers. Otho is negatively characterised by appearing to share customs with Nero (Otho 2.2).27 In the same way, Vitellius is characterised through his connection to the bad 21  Suscepta correctione morum licentiam theatralem promiscue in equite spectandi inhibuit. 22  Atque etiam, si qua in publicis moribus desidia aut mala consuetudine labarent, corrigenda suscepit. 23  Q uaedam circa caerimonias ciuilemque et militarem morem, item circa omnium ordinum statum domi forisque aut correxit aut exoleta reuocauit aut etiam noua instituit. 24   Incesta Vestalium uirginum, a patre quoque suo et fratre neglecta, uarie ac seuere coercuit, priora capitali supplicio, posteriora more ueteri. 25  Cl. 34.1: cum spectare antiqui moris supplicium Tiburi concupisset et deligatis ad palum noxiis carnifex deesset, accitum ab urbe uesperam usque opperiri perseuerauit. Dom. 11.2: quosdam maiestatis reos in curiam induxerat, et cum prae­ dixisset experturum se illa die quam carus senatui esset, facile perfecerat ut etiam more maiorum puniendi condemnarentur. 26  Multa praeterea specie grauitatis ac morum corrigendorum, sed et magis naturae optemperans, ita saeue et atrociter factitauit, ut nonnulli uersiculis quoque et praesentia exprobrarent et futura denuntiarent mala. Tiberius likes ancestral punishments: cf. Tib. 35.1. 27  Per hanc insinuatus Neroni facile summum inter amicos locum tenuit congruentia morum, ut uero quidam tradunt, et consuetudine mutui stupri.

190

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

practices of  Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero (Vit. 3.2; 4). The Julio-Claudians became a  term of  comparison, and the behaviours of  emperors like Caligula or Nero became stereotypes applied henceforth to tyrants. Let us see how the biographer dissects them from a characterological point of  view. When Suetonius refers to the individual essence, he often uses the word natura to point out that a certain virtue or vice is fixed and genuine, even if  it has been dissimulated.28 As regards intrinsic virtues, which the biographer considers to be true, we have the examples of  Caesar (Jul. 74.1: sed et in ulciscendo natura lenissimus), Augustus (Aug. 77: uini quoque natura parcissimus erat) and Titus (Titus 8.1: natura beniuolentissimus). In general, the word natura appears to underline a vice; indeed, cruel essence (natura saeua) is the most common feature of  the worst emperors.29 Tiberius is characterised by saeua ac lenta natura (“cruel and cold-blooded character”) (Tib. 57.1), which, according to Augustus, is at the root of  his vices.30 From an early age, Caligula reveals a  natura saeua ac probrosa (“natural cruelty and viciousness”); 31 and, like Tiberius, he seems to manifest an awareness of  his nature, but, far from feeling regret, he is proud of  his flaws: Nihil magis in na­tura sua laudare se ac probare dicebat quam, ut ipsius uerbo utar, ἀδιατρεψία, hoc est inuerecundiam (Cal. 29.1) 32 (“He  used to say that there was nothing in his own character which he admired and approved more highly than what he called his adiatrepsia, that is to say, his shameless impudence”). His natura saeua manifests itself  in the “horrendous and sinister” expression of  his face,33 a characteristic that continues in Claudius, of  whom one says: saeuum ac sanguinarium natura fuisse, magnis minimisque apparuit rebus (“That he was of  a  cruel and blood-

  See A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, p. 159 n. 26.   See D. Wardle, Suetonius. Life of  Augustus, p. 467. 30   Tib. 68.3: naturae uitia esse, non animi. 31  Cal. 11: Naturam tamen saeuam atque probrosam ne tunc quidam inhibere poterat. A trend that would be at the basis of  his saeuitia ingenii (Cal. 27.1). 32  See M. Dubuisson, “L’ἀδιατρεψία de Caligula (Suét., Cal. 29.1)”, Latomus 57 (1998), pp. 589–94. 33   Cal. 50.1: Vultum uero natura horridum ac taetrum etiam ex industria efferabat. 28 29

191

J. L. BRANDÃO

thirsty disposition was shown in matters great and small” 34) (Cl. 34.1). This culminates in Nero, in whom the vices of  nature multiply: petulantia, libido, luxuria, auaritia, crudelitas.35 Nero takes on and embodies paternal vices enlarged to the highest degree, which leads him to project multa et inmania non abhorrentia natura sua, “many plans of  monstrous wickedness, but in no way inconsistent with his character” (Nero 43.1).36 We see that having a  “cruel nature” (natura saeua) explains the departure of  a number of  emperors from the constitutional model inaugurated by Augustus, which aimed to moderate the use of  imperial power vis-à-vis a  traditional aristocracy who were not used to being ignored. On the other hand, the “vicious nature” of  Caligula and Nero explains, among other things, the adoption of  exotic dress and practices 37 considered inappropriate and unbecoming of  members of  the aristocracy and, above all, the emperor, as we shall see below. Among the Flavians, Domitian represents a clear case of degeneration as a  result of  his vices, and in the Life of  Vespasian it  is clear from the beginning that he will be punished for his cupiditas and saeuitia (Ves. 1.1). While the greed (cupiditas) of  Vespasian’s natura was controversial among Suetonius’ sources and, according to some of  them, justified by necessitas (Ves. 16.3),38 the propensity for plunder (rapacitas) is, in Domitian’s case, a feature of  nature aggravated by financial constraints (Dom. 3.2).39 Moreo34  Translations of  Suetonius are by J.  C. Rolfe, Suetonius (2  vols), Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1928–1930 [Revised ed]. 35  Nero 26.1:  … sed ut tunc quoque dubium nemini foret naturae illa uitia, non aetatis esse. 36  In Nero, degeneration is linked to the character of  his family: Pluris e familia cognosci referre arbitror, quo facilius appareat ita degenerasse a suorum uirtutibus Nero, ut tamen uitia cuiusque quasi tradita et ingenita rettulerit (Nero 1.2.12). 37  Cal. 11: In the natura probrosa are included the scaenicae saltandi canendi artes dishonourable for a Roman citizen. The same distinction takes place in the Life of  Nero (19.3), between probra (dishonourable acts, at the centre of  which include the scenic activities) and scelera (crimes); cf.  Nero 26.1 (naturae uitia) e 43.1. 38   Q uidam natura cupidissimum tradunt … Sunt contra qui opinentur ad manubias et rapinae necessitate compulsum summa aerarii fiscique inópia. 39 …donec uirtutes in uitia deflexit: quantum coniectare licet, super ingenii naturam inopia rapax, metu saeuus. On the interpretation of  super ingenii naturam, see J. Gascou, “Suétone et l’ordre équestre”, p. 271; A. Wallace-Hadrill,

192

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

ver, Titus’ supposed cruelty and the final revelation of  his very kind nature 40 contrasts with the progressive manifestation of  the younger brother’s natural cruelty, aggravated by fear.41 Suetonius conceives of  the quality of  each government as the result of  a dialectic between the qualities of  the emperor and the political, social and cultural demands in which he moves. The point here is  that the nature of  the emperor has consequences for the empire, as it is suggested in the case of  Vitellius: egregie prorsus atque magnifice et ut summi principis spem ostenderet, nisi cetera magis ex natura et priore uita sua quam ex imperii maiestate gessisset (Vit. 10.1) (“These acts were altogether admirable and noble, and such as to give hope that he would be a great prince, had it not been that the rest of  his conduct was more in harmony with his natural disposition and his former habits of life than with imperial dignity”). From Suetonius’ point of  view, the character (ethos) of  the emperor becomes therefore decisive for the evolution of  the government and the maiestas of  the Empire.42 Depending on the prevalence of  certain virtues or vices, the identity of  a Principate may align more closely to the Roman tradition or to an Orientalizing tyranny.43 There is, therefore, in the Lives of Caesars a set of values which positively characterises the attitude of the princeps towards power (moderatio, ciuilitas or comitas, pietas, abstinentia, liberalitas, diSuetonius, p. 151 and n. 13; B. Jones, Suetonius. Domitian, edited with introduction, commentary and biblography, London, Bristol Classical Press, 1996, p. 34. 40   Tit. 7.1. Praeter saeuitiam suspecta in eo etiam luxuria erat  …; Tit. 8.1: Natura autem beniuolentissimus ... 41  Dom. 3.2 and 10.1. See J. L. Brandão, Máscaras dos Césares, pp. 90–91, 123. 42  On the link between maiestas and identity and the transfer of  maiestas populi romani to the princeps, see in this volume the chapter by A. Rodrigues, “Roman Maiestas”. 43   See J. R. Dunkle, “The rhetorical tyrant in Roman Historiography: Sallust, Livy and Tacitus”, CW 65 (1971), pp.  12–20; A.  Wallace-Hadrill, “Civilis princeps: Between Citizen and king”, JRS 72 (1982), 32–48; J. L. Brandão, “Tirano ao tibre! Estereótipos de tirania nas Vidas dos Césares de Suetónio”, Humanitas 60 (2008), pp.  115–37; J.-M.  Hulls, “The Mirror in the Text: Privacy, Performance and the Power of  Suetonius’ Domitian”, in T.  Power, R.  Gibson (eds), Suetonius the Biographer. Studies in Roman Lives, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 180–84; V. Schulz, Deconstructing Imperial Representation, p. 272.

193

J. L. BRANDÃO

gnitas, castitas) and an opposite set of  vices (arrogantia, superbia, inpotentia and immanitas; inciuilitas; saeuitia, crudelitas, uiolentia and atrocitas; auaritia, cupiditas and rapacitas; impudicitia). These vices characterise tyrants and shape a dominatio, thus calling into question the identity (both constitutional and cultural) of  the Principate.44 The extreme cases are those of  Caligula and Nero. The Life of  Caligula is  divided between the acts of  the princeps and those of  the monstrum,45 and the Life of  Nero between good or neutral acts on the one hand, and infamies and crimes (probra ac scelera) on the other.46 As a consequence, the degree of  presence or absence of  those virtues and vices in each emperor (i.e. his character’s traits) will also determine the way he behaves with regard to identifying elements of  national and foreign culture, such as language, dress, education, leisure, religious practices and social rules, as we shall see below.

2. Elements of  Cultural Identity 47 2.1. Display of  Language and Culture as Elements of  Integration, Interaction and Transformation One way of  integrating elements of  different cultures is by paying attention to other languages, since language represents a way of  organising the world. We can see in the Lives a progressive cultivation of  the Greek language, which moves from a familiar level to the literary plane, as Gascou shows.48 Like his successors, Julius 44  See A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, 145–74; J. L. Brandão, Máscaras dos Césares, pp. 357–80; M. B. Roller, Constructing Autocracy, pp. 253–64. 45   Cal. 22: Hactenus quasi de principe, reliqua ut de monstro narranda sunt. 46  Nero 19.3: Haec partim nulla reprehensione, partim etiam non mediocri laude digna in unum contuli, ut secernerem a probris ac sceleribus eius, de quibus dehinc dicam. 47  See R. Laurence, “Introduction”, in R. Laurence, J. Berry (eds), Cultural Identity in the Roman Empire, London-New York, Routledge, 1998, pp. 1–9; E. M. Bevens, A Sacred people. Roman Identity in the Age of  Augustus. ThesisMaster of  Arts. Georgia State University, 2010, pp.  3–9; E.  Dench, Romulus’ Asylum, p.  139. On the concept of cultural identity, see also in this volume the chapter by C. Teixeira, “When the Emperor is the Other”, especially § 1 (“Cultural Identity: Between Homogenization and Separation”). 48  J. Gascou, Suétone historien, pp. 672–73.

194

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

Caesar expresses himself  in Greek, but his use of  this language seems to be confined to the familial sphere, that of  spontaneity.49 As for Augustus, Suetonius relates that in spite of  to his taste for Greek literature, “he never acquired the ability to speak Greek fluently or to compose anything in it; for if he had occasion to use the language, he wrote what he had to say in Latin and gave it to someone else to translate” 50 (Aug. 89.1). Furthermore, Tiberius wrote in Greek and spoke this language with confidence, but sought to avoid it in Senate sessions and in official documents (Tib. 71), a fact which, in a  distorted way, the biographer interprets as proof  of  the strict character of  the emperor.51 Such scruples are surpassed by Claudius who, in addition to his love of  the Greek literature (Cl. 42.1), never hesitates to respond to the ambassadors in Greek, placing this language on the same plane as Latin (uterque sermo noster). However, according to Cassius Dio (60.17.4), Claudius considered knowledge of  Latin to be a mark of  citizenship, and accordingly removes Roman citizenship from a Lycian who cannot understand this language.52 Titus, educated at the court of  Claudius, reveals great ease in speaking and composing poems 49   An example of  this is the famous exclamation supposedly addresses to Marcus Brutus at the time of  Caesar’s murder: “καὶ σὺ τέκνον” (“You too, my son?!”). Suet. Jul. 82.3. Cf. D.C. 44.19.5. See H. E. Butler, M. Cary, Suetonius. Divus Iulius, edited with commentary, London, Oxford University Press, 1927 (with new introduction, bibliography and additional notes by G. B. Townend, 1982, 1993), pp.  110, 159–60. Plutarch (Caes. 66.8) also refers to words spoken in Greek at that dramatic moment. M. Dubuisson, “Toi aussi, mon fils!”, Latomus 39 (1980), pp. 881–90, considers those words plausible, given the context and the linguistic behaviour of  the Roman aristocrats. 50 …non tamen ut aut loqueretur expedite aut componere aliquid auderet; nam et si quid res exigeret, Latine formabat uertendumque alii dabat. Certainly, for ideological reasons at official situations, in the line of  Cato the Elder: see D. Wardle, Suetonius. Life of  Augustus, p. 495. However, the biographer also mentions both improvised verses (Aug. 98. 4) and the adaptation of  the closure of  comedy, bidding farewell to the “mimus of  life” (Aug. 99.1). 51   Due to his strict character, Tiberius forces the Senate to replace the term emblema with a  periphrasis in a  decree (Tib. 71). Cf.  D.C. 57.15.1. According to M. Dubuisson, “Purisme et politique. Suétone, Tibère et le grec au Sénat”, in F. Decreus, C. Deroux (eds), Hommages à Jozef  Veremans, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1986, pp.  109–20, it  is historical deformation: the episode is  transferred from its historical context to that of  the emperor’s psychological framework, characterised by adfectatio and morositas. 52   See J. Mottershead, Suetonius. Claudius. Edited with introduction and commentary, Bristol, Bristol Classical Press, 1986, p. 137.

195

J. L. BRANDÃO

in both languages (Titus 3.2). Such an evolution demonstrates the proverbial pragmatism of  the Romans and their tendency to assimilate external elements without losing their identity.53 Moreover, the Lives of  Caesars are replete with Greek quotations, largely related to the Homeric culture of  the Caesars.54 This seems to reflect the progressive process of  Hellenization of  the upper classes in Rome, which projects itself  in the imperial court.55 This aspect becomes particularly apparent in Suetonius’ biography, who, unlike historiographers, integrates Greek terms and quotations into his discourse without hesitation, thereby contributing to the usual realism of  his narrative. Linguistic diversity also helps to highlight the ruler’s global power in the spectacles he presents. The biographer explicitly states that Caesar and Augustus gave performances in all languages (Jul. 39. 1, and Aug. 43.1: omnium linguarum histriones). Such hyperbole reminds us of  a statement by Martial (Spec. 3.12) at the inauguration of  the Flavian Amphitheatre in ad 80, when he presented the new building as a space of cosmopolitanism and a visible sign of  Rome’s multicultural and multi-ethnic vocation. Here, the passage from diversity to unity occurs under the aegis of  the emperor: the speakers of the most diverse languages join forces to acclaim, with one voice, Titus as Pater Patriae, thus celebrating the unifying role of  the imperium performed by the princeps and the Latin language. At the end of the Life of Augustus, Suetonius recounts two episodes that highlight the unifying power of the princeps as keeper of  Roman identity and protector of  different identities within the empire: Forte Puteolanum sinum praeteruehenti uectores nautaeque de naui Alexandrina, quae tantum quod appulerat, candidati coronatique et tura libantes fausta omina et eximias laudes congesserant, per illum se uiuere, per illum nauigare, libertate atque fortunis per illum frui (Aug. 98.2) 53   See F. Oliveira, “Consequências da expansão Romana”, in J. L. Bran­ dão, F.  Oliveira (eds), História de Roma Antiga, vol.  I.  Das origens à  morte de César, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade, 2015, pp. 265–72. 54  See J.  F. Berthet, “La culture homérique des Césars d’après Suétone”, REL 56 (1978), pp. 314–34. 55  See A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, pp. 181–85.

196

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

As he sailed by the gulf  of  Puteoli, it happened that from an Alexandrian ship which had just arrived there, the passengers and crew, clad in white, crowned with garlands, and burning incense, lavished upon him good wishes and the highest praise, saying that it was through him that they lived, through him that they sailed the seas, and through him that they enjoyed their liberty and their fortunes.56

It is a performance of acclamation to the emperor that implies the fusion of  complementary elements of  identity (language, in this case Greek, clothing and religion) in a space of  cultural interception and interaction, such as Campania. Dress was also a strong symbol of  cultural identity, as Augustus publicly stressed when he encouraged the wearing of  the traditional garb by quoting a verse of  the Aeneid (1.282), which describes Romans as gens togata (Suet. Aug. 40.5). In  this case, the toga provides a  means of  distinguishing a  Roman citizen in a  crowd and acts as an identifier of  Romanness, although this might have been impracticable in everyday life.57 When identity is  clearly defined, it  is possible to operate a  visible cultural exchange, without affecting Roman values.58 For example, in his retirement to Rhodes, Tiberius wore a Greek cloak (pallium) and slippers (crepidae) (Tib. 13.1).59 In a second episode approaching reports of  Augustus’ decease, Suetonius says that the emperor in Campania distributed togae and pallia, in order to promote an interchange of  dress and language between Greeks and Romans 56   It is a liturgical ceremony, as suggested by the apparatus (clothes, flowers, incense) and rhythm of  the invocation, a possible reflection of  the imperial cult practised in the provinces. Cf. Verg. G. 1.29–30: an deus immensi uenias maris ac tua nautae / numina sola colant. See G. Rocca-Serra, “Une formule cultuelle chez Suétone (Divus Augustus, 98,2)”, in Mélanges de philosophie, de littérature et d’histoire ancienne offerts à P. Boyancé Rome, Palais Farnèse, 1974, pp. 671–80; D. Wardle, Suetonius. Life of  Augustus, pp. 542–43. 57  As says E. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum, pp. 277–78. 58 D. Wardle, Suetonius. Life of  Augustus, p. 544. 59   Claudius adopts the same lifestyle in Neapolis, as Cassius Dio says (60.6.1–2): “… in Neapolis he lived altogether like an ordinary citizen; for both he and his associates adopted the Greek manner of life in all respects, wearing a cloak and high boots, for example, at the musical exhibitions, and a purple mantle and golden crown at the gymnastic contests”. Translations of  Cassius Dio are by E. Cary, Dio’s Roman History (9 vols), London, Heinemann, Cambridge, Mass, Harvard University Press, 1914–1927.

197

J. L. BRANDÃO

(Aug. 98.3).60 It  is  thus a  performance of  Roman identity that combines again two essential marks of  Romanness (language and dress) and makes the awareness of  borders more evident. But here too moderatio is required, which is a trait that confirms the emperor’s ability to keep within what is acceptable. The opposite is the case of  Caesar, Caligula and Nero, whose manner of  dress is described by Suetonius as being consciously transgressive of previous norms. Caesar’s style of clothing is  criticised as effeminate by his contemporaries, such as Sylla and Cicero.61 Suetonius clearly expresses his judgement on Caligula: Vestitu calciatuque et cetero habitu neque patrio neque ciuili, ac ne uirili quidem ac denique humano semper usus est (Cal. 52) (“In his clothing, his shoes, and the rest of  his attire he did not follow the usage of  his country and his fellow-citizens; not always even that of  his sex; or in fact, that of  an ordinary mortal”). By means of  the examples provided,62 which represent a denial of the virtue of ciuilitas (the modesty of  a  citizen), the biographer implicitly criticises foreignness, transvestism and sumptuousness,63 while his use of  divine clothes for the imitation of the gods is the highest degree of  inciuilitas and a sign of tyranny.64 Caligula’s histrionic propensities seem to be reflected, alongside an interference between the theatre and reality, which is also continued by Nero.65 In fact, there is also

60  Sed et ceteros continuos dies inter uaria munuscula togas insuper ac pallia distribuit, lege proposita ut Romani Graeco, Graeci Romano habitu et sermone uterentur. See E. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum, p. 295. 61  Jul. 45.  3. Etiam cultu notabilem ferunt: usum enim lato clauo ad manus fimbriato nec umquam aliter quam ‹ut› super eum cingeretur, et quidem fluxiore cinctura. unde emanasse Sullae dictum optimates saepius admonentis, ut male praecinctum puerum cauerent. Cf. Plu. Caes. 4.4; D.C. 43.43.4; Gell. 7.2.1. See H. E. Butler, M. Cary, Suetonius. Divus Iulius, pp. 107–08. 62   Saepe depictas gemmatasque indutus paenulas, manuleatus et armillatus …; … sericatus et cycladatus; … in crepidis uel coturnis, … in speculatoria caliga, … socco muliebri; … aurea barba, fulmen tenens aut fuscinam aut caduceum deorum insignia, atque etiam Veneris cultu conspectus est. … Magni Alexandri thoracem …. 63  Silk was forbidden and degrading to men; cf. Tac. Ann. 2.33. 64  As remarks D. Wardle, Suetonius’ Life of  Caligula. A commentary, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1994, pp. 336–41. See D. W. Hurley, An historical and historiographical commentary on Suetonius’ Life of  C. Caligula, Atlanta, Scholars Press, 1993, pp. 186–89. 65   Nero 51:  … Circa cultum habitumque adeo pudendus, ut comam semper in gradus formatam peregrinatione Achaica etiam pone uerticem summiserit ac

198

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

a clear moral judgement (adeo pudendus) in describing how this emperor displays himself  in public.66 Closely related to language, Greek culture, in general, is increasingly present. The emperors surround themselves with Greek scholars. Greek studies typically form part of  the curriculum of  the aristocrats. The young Julius Caesar decided to take advantage of  his spare time to go to Rhodes in order to attend Apollonius Molon’s classes (Jul. 4.1), when he was captured by pirates. The dictator himself  was concerned about Octavian’s education and so he sent him to Apollonia to devote himself  to his studies (Aug. 8.2). Tiberius often attended philosophy lessons in Rhodes (Tib. 11.3). A significant example is  the introduction of  music into the educational curriculum.67 In fact, this is about cultivating a group of  disciplines of  which music was an important part, while the goal of  the biographer is  to criticise immoderation. Caligula is devoted to the arts of  the gladiator, charioteer, singer and dancer (Cal. 54.1. Cf. 18.3; 32.2): as an example of  his passion (uoluptas), he is said to imitate the actors singing and making gestures (Cal. 54.1), and he even summons senators in the middle of  the night to watch him dance in stage clothes (Cal. 54.2). Moreover, the biographer had previously framed these excessive performances in the effects of  his natura saeua ac probrosa (Cal. 11),68 thus stressing the link between his behaviour and his ethos, as well as the clash between traditional morals and the adoption of  foreign customs. Among other disciplines, Nero was instructed in music (Nero 20.1). The fact that he instituted a festival, the Neronia, according plerumque synthesinam indutus ligato circum collum sudario prodierit in publicum sine cinctu et discalciatus. 66  See K. Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of  Nero. An historical commentary, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1978, pp. 284–85. 67  As observes A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, pp. 181–82, if  at the time of  Cornelius Nepos (Praef. 1.1; Epam. 1.1–2), singing and dancing were Greek customs that clashed with Roman grauitas, with time and habit these arts were eventually tolerated and even cultivated by the upper classes. Britanicus was talented enough to supposedly provoke Nero’s envy (Nero 33.2), and Titus, who was brought up at Claudius’ court along with Britanicus, is  praised for singing and dancing (Tit. 3.2). 68  Naturam tamen saeuam atque probrosam ne tunc quidem inhibere poterat, quin […] ac scaenicas saltandi canendique artes studiosissime appeteret ….

199

J. L. BRANDÃO

to the Greek tradition (more Graeco: Nero 12.3), including musical, gymnastic and equestrian competitions,69 does not yet seem to represent a serious problem for Suetonius, since it is mentioned in the positive or neutral part of  the biography.70 Further on, however, in a partitio (Nero 19.3) in which the biographer introduces the infamous and perverse actions (probra ac scelera) of  this emperor, he seems to suggest that Nero’s vices derive from his histrionic character. Then, the biographer immediately recounts (and from the beginning: pueritiae tempore) the history of  Nero’s devotion to music (Nero 20.1), implying that this  is the first step in his progression towards the more monstrous behaviour (the scelera) described later on (Nero 26-38).71 Similarly to the cataloguing used for the effects of  Caligula’s natura probrosa, Suetonius includes in Nero’s probra activities related to music (Nero 20.21.2), acting (Nero 21.3–25), and chariot racing (Nero 22.1–3), culminating in Nero’s voyage to Greece, where he freely carries out those kinds of  performances (Nero 22.3–25).72 Nero’s behaviour, therefore, fits better outside the traditional Roman space in the strict sense. Circus racing was a  common practice among aristocrats.73 What most likely scandalised the contemporaries was not the fact that Nero sang and drove chariots, but rather that he acted like a “professional”, as Bradley points out.74 In any case, if  his dedication to singing and his attempts to perform publicly offended the senatorial elite, they nonetheless won the approval of  many members of  the populace 75 and reflected practices that also existed in at least some aristocrats. For example, Vitellius is  accused of  being too conniving with the Julio-Claudians’ vices, before he himself  became emperor. Suetonius not only places him among

  Instituit et quinquennale certamen primus omnium Romae more Graeco triplex, musicum gymnicum equestre, quod appellauit Neronia. 70  But Tacitus (Ann. 14.20) notes the existing fears that it might provoke moral degeneration. 71   See K. Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of  Nero, p. 119. 72  See V. Schulz, Deconstructing Imperial Representation, p. 272; 278–79. 73  See E. Cizek, Néron, Paris, Fayard, 1982, 123–27; A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, p. 180. 74  K. Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of  Nero, p. 121. 75  Cf. Nero 57.1; Vit. 4. 69

200

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

Tiberius’ male prostitutes in Capri,76 but also attests that he had the sympathy of  Gaius due to their common passion for circus racing, Claudius’ favour of  his passion for dice, and Nero’s preference for the same passions. He also mentions that, while presiding over the Neronian games, he added his pleas to those of  the people so that the emperor would take part in cithara contests, which Nero wished but did not dare to do (Vit. 3–4). Later, Cassius Dio (75.8.2–3) says that Septimius Severus excused the dishonourable acts of  Commodus (such as participating in uenationes and gladiatorial arts), claiming that they were customary practice among many of  the senators. It is necessary to discriminate between what is rumour, invective or distortion. The tensions resulting from cultural transformations generate grounds for invective and, in turn, give rise to scandalous and lethal fake news. The rumours of  Tiberius’ debauchery in Capri seem to be based on his philhellenism.77 The reference to Pans and Nymphs (as well as the nickname of  Caprineus) 78 suggest that Tiberius’ sexuality is modelled on that of the Satyrs: thus, Tiberius seems to create around him an erotic and mythological theatre, in keeping with the usage of the time.79 The charge levied against Caligula of  incest with all his sisters, especially with Drusilla (Cal. 24.1), may stem from the emperor’s imitation of  a  Hellenistic theocratic monarchy such as that of  the Ptolemies.80 Furthermore, this emperor’s passion for chariot 76  Vit. 3.2. This information is  suspicious, as are all rumours of  Tiberius’ debauchery in Capri. Vide Ch. L. Murison, “Tiberius, Vitellius and the spintriae”, AHB 1 (1987), pp. 97–99; Ch. L. Murison, Suetonius Galba, Otho, Vitellius, edited with introduction and notes, London, Bristol Classical Press, 1992, pp. 141–42; A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, p. 185. 77   As shows A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, pp. 183–84. 78   Tib. 43. Cf. Tac. Ann. 6.1. 79  As suggested by F. Dupont, T. Éloi, L’ érotisme masculin dans la Rome antique, Paris, Belin, 2001, pp.  293–304. See J.  L. Brandão, “Suetónio e o fascínio do Oriente” in Oliveira, F. (Coord.), Génese e  consolidação da ideia da Europa  III. O  mundo romano, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade, 2005, pp. 92–94. 80  By whom Caligula (according to Philo, Leg. 162) is encouraged in his divine aspirations, and who marry their own sisters. This may explain the relationship with Drusilla and the honours he gives her after death. Vide  R. Martin, Les douze Césars: du mythe à  la réalité, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1991, p.  331; J. Colin, “Les consuls du césar-pharaon Caligula et l’héritage de Germanicus”,

201

J. L. BRANDÃO

racing sparked the unthinkable rumour (advanced by Suetonius in the climax of  emperor’s madness) that he would appoint his horse as consul.81 Part of  Nero’s bad reputation seems to derive from an overly ostentatious affection for Greek culture that is not restricted to private admiration but rather progresses into an intolerable performance of  alienation. As  a  result of  Nero’s dedication to aesthetic arts and singing, he was accused of  setting fire to Rome in order to create a  new city,82 and of  performing his own poem on the destruction of  Troy, inspired by the city’s flames,83 as the climax of  his crimes (scelera). Although Tacitus says they were just versions or rumours,84 Suetonius (and later Cassius Dio) considers such accusations to be based on unquestionable facts.85 The truth is  that such rumours, with the help of  the fine arts, literature and cinema, have set in stone the way that common sense looks at Tiberius, Caligula and Nero (and, in a way, at the Roman emperors in general). Nero’s histrionic character is also manifested in transgressive performances of  a  sexual nature, thus revealing a  character that stands out for its lack of  chastity (pudicitia).86 On the one hand, he produces a parody of  the ritual of  marriage with the eunuch Sporus, with dowry, flammeum and courtship, to the point of  treating him, in public, like a wife.87 On the other hand, he invents Latomus 13 (1954), p. 408; P. Lambrechts, P. “Caligula dictateur littéraire”, BIBR 28 (1953), pp.  226–28 and n.  2; G.  Guastella, Gaio Svetonio Tranquillo, La vita di Caligola, Roma, La Nuova Italia Scientifica, 1992, pp. 171–72; D. Wardle, Suetonius’ Life of  Caligula, pp. 224–26. 81  Cal. 55.3. Cf. D.C. 59.14.7. See J. Gascou, Suétone historien, p. 705. 82  Nero 38: … quasi offensus deformitate ueterum aedificiorum et angustiis fle­ xurisque uicorum. 83  Nero 38.2. 84  Tac. Ann. 15.38.1 and 15.39.3. Cf. D.C. 62.18.1. 85  See P. Holson, “Nero and the fire of  Rome. Fact and fiction”, Pegasus 19 (1976), pp.  37–44; K.  Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of  Nero, p.  231; J.  Gascou, Suétone historien, pp. 442–43. 86  Nero 29: Suam quidem pudicitiam usque adeo prostituit, ut contaminatis paene omnibus membris novissime quase genus lusus excogitaret …. 87   Cassius Dio (63.13.1) speaks of  the similarity between Sporus and Poppea Sabina. The ritual has been interpreted by some authors as an initiation ceremony in a mysterious religion: Spore would have been castrated because he was a ser­ vant of  Cybele. The flammeum is also the veil of  the initiate. See R. Verdière, “À verser au dossier sexuel de Néron”, PP 30 (1975), pp. 21–22; K. Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of  Nero, pp.  161–62; E.  Cizek, Néron, p.  41; R.  Martin,

202

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

a  new game that consists of  disguising himself  as a  wild animal and attacking the private parts of  men and women tied to a pole. Finally, he gives himself  up as a bride to the freedman Doryphorus and even imitates the groans of  virgins’ suffering when they are being forced.88 If   the tension between pro and anti-Hellenism had existed since the Republic, what was at stake now was not culture itself, but rather the mores, the practices classified as sumptuousness (luxuria): passion for chariot races, for Greek fashions, lavish banquets, dice and new sexual practices deemed outrageous for the elite.89 There are signs of  “reaction” in Flavian times, as Wallace-Hadrill shows.90 In fact, in assuming power, Vespasian faced the same problem as Galba: the economic and moral weakness of  the state. Vespasian’s manifest concern with restoring the state is effectively summarised by Suetonius as follows: ac per totum inperii tempus nihil habuit antiquius quam prope afflictam nutantemque rem p. stabilire primo, deinde et ornare (“during the whole period of  his rule he considered nothing more essential than first to strengthen the State, which was tottering and almost overthrown, and then to embellish it as well”).91 Les douze Césars, p. 171; P. Fernández Uriel, “Tácito, Annales XV, 37,8 y Suetonio, Nero XXVIII y XXIX. ¿Interpretación sexual o religiosa?”, in J. Alvar, C.  Blánq  uez, C.  Wagner (eds), Sexo, muerte y religión en el mundo clásico, Madrid, Ediciones Clásicas, 1994, pp. 111–24. 88  It is believed that this Doryphorus and the Pythagoras in the account of  Tacitus (Ann. 15.37.4) and Cassius Dio (63.13.2) are the same person and that it would be, as in the case of  Sporus, a mystical marriage, in which Nero would be the initiated. Doryphorus would not be the first name, but the function of  minister (spear-bearer) of  the cult of  Cíbele or of  the goddess Ma-Belona; vide Verdière, “À verser au dossier …”, pp. 19–20; K. Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of  Nero, pp.  164–65; E.  Cizek, Néron, pp.  41–42; Martin, Les douze Césars, pp.  160 and 169–71; Fernández Uriel, “Tácito, Annales  XV,  37,8  …”, pp.  111–24. On the contrary, Dupont, Éloi, L’ érotisme masculin …, p. 322, criticise these hypotheses and consider that it is more prudent to confine ourselves to texts. 89  See A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, p. 188. 90  There is a retreat in the Hellenising fashion of  singing, dancing and certain sexual practices, as suggested by Vespasian’s correction of  customs (Ves. 11), the marked change in the life of  Titus (Tit. 7), in opposition to his previous lifestyle (regarding eunuchs, banquets and the passion for Berenice), and the moral legislation of  Domitian (Dom. 8.3). A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, pp. 186–89. 91  Vesp. 8.1. According to A. W. Braithwaite, C. Suetoni Tranquilli Divus Vespasianus. With an introduction and commentary, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1927, p. 41, “It would be hard to define Vespasian policy more clearly or more

203

J. L. BRANDÃO

This attitude brings Vespasian closer to Augustus, who is concerned with restoring the beauty and safety of  the city.92 Vespasian’s origins, of  which he was proud,93 seem to explain this change. From the beginning, Suetonius points out Vespasian’s Sabine origins (Ves. 2.1), a traditional symbol of  ancestral virtues that had been assimilated for many centuries in Latin culture.94 These modest origins bring him closer to Augustus (Aug. 5–6), who is also mentioned in this context (to specify that Vespasian was born five years before the death of  the Principate’s founder, thus suggesting a  kind of  rapport of  continuity). The fact that Vespasian did not hide his origins is evident in the claim that, after becoming emperor, he visited and preserved the locus incunabulorum (Ves. 2.1); the way in which he conserves the uilla where he was raised in Etruria and his grandmother’s memory is thus a  display of  pietas.95 His pride in his modest origin is explicitly considered a sign of  ciuilitas 96 – virtue framed (side by side with clementia), as we have seen, in the categories considered by the Roman aristocracy identifiers of  Romanness and which are qualities opposed to those of  tyrannical character.97 Despite presenting a predominantly negative image of  Domitian, the biographer inserts in the positive part of  his Life the expulsion of  a  former quaestor from the Senate, due to his dedi-

succinctly than in this sentence”. See Baldwin, Suetonius, p.  287; L.  Trevor, “Ideology and Humor in Suetonius’ Life of  Vespasian 8”, CW 103 (2010), pp. 511–27. 92  Aug. 28.3. Such an approach would even be reinforced by Flavian propaganda, since it  is said that the construction of  the Flavian Amphitheatre was based on an Augustan project (Ves. 9.1). See M. Cesa, Svetonio. Vita di Vespasiano, Bologna, Cappelli, 2000, p. 78. 93  Ves. 12: … mediocritatem pristinam neque dissimulavit umquam ac frequenter etiam prae se tulit. 94  On the traditional merging of  Sabine and Latin culture and language, see in this volume the chapter 9 on Varro (himself  also a Sabine) by F. Lazzerini, “Rome in the mirror: Varro’s quest for the past, for a present goal”. 95   As proof, Suetonius added a curious detail typical of  this biographer: on festive days he used to drink from the small coup his grandmother had used. See M. Cesa, Svetonio, p. 43. 96  Ves. 12: Ceteris in rebus statim ab initio principatus usque ad exitium ciuilis et clemens, mediocritatem pristinam neque dissimulavit umquam ac frequenter etiam prae se tulit. The examples of clementia appear in the next section, i.e., in Ves. 13. 97 See M. B. Roller, Constructing Autocracy, pp. 20–29, 241–43.

204

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

cation to imitating pantomimes and dancing,98 precisely one of  Caligula’s affections.99 It is also with approval that the biographer recounts Domitian’s severe punishment of  sexual crimes: adultery, pederasty and the incesta of  Vestal virgins (Dom. 8.3–4). However, the condemnation of  adultery, which in Suetonius is subordinate to correctio morum, is later reported by Cassius Dio in a  negative light.100 Among the innovations of  this emperor, Suetonius features the ban on castration and the containment of  the price of  eunuchs (Dom. 7.1.) – measures that Cassius Dio does not see in such a positive light – while omitting Domitian’s passion for Earinus, the eunuch celebrated by Martial and Statius.101 In  this respect, Suetonius therefore differs from Cassius Dio in his aim of  demonstrating a moral concern. For the biographer, Domitian’s vices are essentially others: cupidity and cruelty. Therefore the adoption of  foreign customs and behaviours unworthy of  a Roman citizen also depends on the character, i.e. on ciuilitas, dignitas, pudicitia. Tyrants tend, as we have seen, to show inciuilitas, indignitas and impudicitia. It seems that the crisis of  the years 68–69AD acted as a pivotal period in this transformation: at that time, the attempts by the old aristocracy of the late Republic (represented by Galba) and by the aristocracy that arose during the rule of  Julio-Claudians, and closely linked to them (represented by Otho and Vitellius), were   Dom. 8.3: Q uod gesticulandi saltandique studio teneretur. Caecilius Rufinus, according to Cassius Dio (67.13.1). 99  Pantomime gesturing and dedication to dance are considered by Pliny the Younger to be effeminate and indecorous: on the imitation of  pantomimes, cf. Pan. 46.4; on the custom of  dancing, cf. Pan. 56.1. See B. Jones, Suetonius. Domitian, pp. 74–75. 100  Dom. 8.3: Suscepta correctione morum  … probrosis feminis lecticae usum ademit iusque capiendi legata hereditatesque; equitem R. ob reductam in matrimonium uxorem, cui dimissae adulterii crimen intenderat, erasit iudicum album. This is the restoration of  the lex Iulia de adulteriis celebrated by Martial (6.2; 6.7; 6.22; 6.91). According to Cassius Dio (67.12.1), Domitian condemned many men and women for adultery, but – it is added – the emperor himself  had illicit relations with some of  these women. Vide F. Grelle, “La correctio morum nella legislazione flavia”, ANRW II. 13, 1980, pp. 345–46; B. Jones, Suetonius. Domitian, p. 75; B. Jones, R. Milns, Suetonius: the Flavian emperors, a historical commentary, London, Bristol Classical Press, 2002, p. 141. 101   Cf. D.C. 67.2.3; Mart. 9.11; 9.12; 9.13; 9.16; 9.17; 9.36; Stat. Silv. 3.4. Vide  F. Grelle, “La correctio morum  …”, pp.  340–45; B.  Jones, Suetonius. Domitian, p. 64. 98

205

J. L. BRANDÃO

successively discarded. Vitellius’ death by lynching represents the violent punishment of  the excesses (luxuria) of  the decaying aristocracy to which he belonged.102 2.2. Religion: Display of  pietas, Beliefs and Games of  Fate One of  the most important elements of  Roman identity is religion.103 The pietas traditionally presupposes, among other aspects, reverence for the sacred and is an element of  evaluating the principes. Evil emperors display impietas towards the gods. A contempt of  religion and traditional gods and a  propensity for superstitio tend to be hallmarks of  tyrants.104 The Romans have always been tolerant and even active in the inclusion of  foreign cults, as shown, for example, by the importation of  the Magna Mater cult in the Republican period. But it is also in this area that the moderation of  the ruler is  assessed.105 Suetonius is, above all, committed to defending tradition (mos maiorum), so he praises Augustus and Claudius for restoring ancient religious practices.106 With regard to foreign cults, however, Suetonius presents a model criterion in the Life of  Augustus that consists of  respecting ancient cults consecrated by tradition and despising the others, thus, as Wardle says, “helping to define the boundaries of  Romanness”.107 As examples of  ancient and consecrated cults, Augustus was initiated into the mysteries of  102  Vit. 17.2: … quibusdam stercore et caeno incessentibus, aliis incendiarium et patinarium uociferantibus, parte uulgi etiam corporis uitia exprobrante. Erat enim in eo enormis proceritas, facies rubida plerumque ex uinulentia, uenter obesus, alterum femur subdebile impulsu olim quadrigae, cumauriganti Gaio ministratorem exhiberet. 103  On Roman religious practices and their elitist character in Cicero, see the chapter 10 by Cláudia Beltrão, “Sacra private perpetua manento. A reading of  Cicero’s De Legibus”. 104  Cf.  Jul. 59; Jul 77; Jul. 81.4; Tib. 69.1; Cal. 51.1; Nero 56; Vit. 11.1; Dom. 15.3. See J. L. Brandão, Máscaras dos Césares, pp. 365–67. 105  See S. Benoist, Rome, le prince et la cité: pouvoir impériale et cérémonies publiques (Ier siècle av. - début du IVe siècle apr. J.-C.), Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 2005, p. 340. 106  Aug. 31; Cl. 25.5. 107   Aug. 93: Peregrinarum caerimoniarum sicut ueteres ac praeceptas reuerentissime coluit, ita ceteras contemptui habuit. See D. Wardle, Suetonius. Life of  Augustus, pp. 506–07.

206

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

Eleusis, a cult that Claudius even thought of  transferring to Rome (Cl. 25.5). In what regards other cults, Augustus despised that of  the Apis bull in Egypt and Jewish ritual in the temple of  Jerusalem (Aug. 93). In the same line, the expulsion of  the Jews led by the impulsor Chrestus 108 and the prohibition of  the Druidic religion 109 are measures credited to Claudius and previously framed by the biographer in the correction of  customs (Cl. 22).110 Above all, the city’s religious identity is a clear concern. Domitian is praised in the positive part of  the biography for restoring old customs, repressing the adultery of the Vestals (incesta) 111 and punishing offences against the gods.112 Being a traditionalist, Suetonius dislikes certain new fashions and considers them superstitions. In the positive part of  the Life of  Tiberius, the biographer therefore includes the persecution of  Egyptian (Isis) and Jewish cults as externae caerimoniae (Tib. 36) and condemns Otho for the public cult of  Isis, reported among his corrupt customs and contrasted with his honourable death (Otho 12.1). Besides being foreign and contrary to Roman customs, the ritual of  Isis is  explicitly described as superstitio.113 Accordingly, the biographer classifies Christianity as a new evil superstition (genus homi­ num superstitionis nouae ac maleficae) and inserts the persecution of  Christians into the praised part of  the Life of  Nero, without showing the same compassion as Tacitus for those victims of  the emperor.114 On the contrary, however, he condemns Nero’s con  Cl. 25.4. Some authors identify this Chrestus with Christ, admitting an anachronia (Christ was crucified at the time of  Tiberius), since the first Christians were not distinguished from the Jews in Rome. Others think it would be a Jewish agitator in Rome. See J. Gascou, Suétone historien, p. 731 n. 114. 109  Because of  their dira immanitas (Cl. 25.5). 110  Q uaedam circa caerimonias ciuilemque et militarem morem, item circa omnium ordinum statum domi forisque aut correxit aut exoleta reuocauit aut etiam noua instituit. 111  Dom. 8.3: incesta Vestalium uirginum, a patre quoque suo et fratre neglecta, uarie ac seuere coercit, priora capitali supplicio, posteriora more ueteri. 112   Dom 8.5: Ac ne qua religio deum impune contaminaretur … 113  Tib. 36.1; Dom. 1.2. 114  Nero 16.2. Tacitus (Ann. 15.44.2–5), although hostile to Christians (calling this new religion supertitio exitiabilis), considers them scapegoats presented by Nero when rumours arise of  the emperor’s guilt in the fire. The historian finds the punishment exaggerated and says that the condemned arouse the pity of  the people because they were victims of  the emperor’s cruelty. See B. H. Warming108

207

J. L. BRANDÃO

tempt for religiones to devote himself  to superstition (Nero 56). And, if  he praises Augustus, unlike Caesar, for paying attention to dreams and omens (accepted as traditional signs of  divine communication 115), he also praises Tiberius for the expulsion of  astrologers (Tib. 36).116 Truly conflicting with the Roman mentality was deification in life, a tendency of  Orientalizing type which seemed contrary to the ciuilitas that must guide the princeps.117 The refusal of  divine honours and personal worship is, therefore, a  display of  ciuilitas.118 And, on the contrary, the acceptance of  those is one of  the reasons that transformed Caesar’s rule into a  tyranny (dominatio) that makes him worthy of death (iure caesus).119 Besides being opposed to the deification of  the emperor in life, Suetonius even seems, according to Gascou, to be sceptical regarding the apotheosis of  the emperors,120 eventually expressing the cynicism of  the ton, Suetonius. Nero, text, with introdution & notes, London, Bristol Classical Press, 21999, pp. 43–44; K. Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of  Nero, pp. 103–05. 115  Aug. 91.1: Somnia sua neque aliena de se neglegebat; 92.1: Auspicia et omnia quaedam pro certissimis obseruabat. 116  But the truth is that Tiberius, like Caligula, Titus and Domitian, believes in astrology. Cf. Tib. 69.1; Cal. 57.2; Tit. 9.1–2; Dom. 10.3, 14.1. 117 See J. L. Brandão, Máscaras dos Césares, pp. 358–63. 118   However, the highly publicized denials of  such honours are today considered “performances designed to demonstrate the eminence of  the emperors”, as G. Woolf  points out, “Divinity and Power in Ancient Rome”, in N. Brisch (ed.), Religion and Power. Divine Kingship in the Ancient World and Beyond, Chicago, The Oriental Institute, 2008, p. 237. 119  Jul. 76.1. Praegrauant tamen cetera facta dictaque eius, ut et abusus dominatione et iure caesus existimetur. Non enim honores modo nímios recepit […] sed et ampliora etiam humano fastigio decerni sibi passus est … However, greater honours were decreed to Octavian, including the title Augustus, and such cults are only seen as a way to the legitimation of  the new regime, as Woolf  says: “Divinity and Power in Ancient Rome” (“Divinity and Power”, p. 238). 120  J. Gascou, Suétone historien, p. 732. Suetonius gives a naturalistic explanation of  Caesar’s case: Jul. 88: […] stella crinita per septem continuos dies fulsit exoriens circa undecimam horam, creditumque est animam esse Caesaris in caelum recepti; et hac de causa simulacro eius in uertice additur stella; seems to express subtle irony by referring the alleged witness of  Augustus’ ascension to the heavens. Aug. 100.4: Nec defuit uir praetorius, qui se effigiem cremati euntem in caelum uidisse iuraret. The practice of  confirmation by a juror had become unnecessary and ridiculous in Suetonius’ times (cf. Sen. Apoc. 1.3). He gives credit to the joke, attributed (perhaps falsely) to Vespasian, about his own apotheosis (Ves. 23.4). On the contrary, D. Wardle, Suetonius. Life of  Augustus, p. 558, does not consider Suetonius to be mocking the imperial consecration.

208

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

Roman elite over deification, as L. Revell suggests.121 It seems consistent with the sharp Vespasian, characterised as ciuilis (Ves. 12) and comisimus (Ves. 22), that he also makes fun of  his imminent apotheosis when he feels sick (Ves. 23.4), saying: Vae, puto deus fio (“Woe’s me. Methinks I’m turning into a god”).122 However, this  is an important aspect because of  its implications for the imperial cult in the provinces.123 Despite Suetonius’ defence of  tradition, his descriptions show that the tools employed by emperors and the elite to placate anxiety about the future also seem to denote a change in society. As Wallace-Hadrill notes, pseudosciences, such as astrology, the interpretation of  dreams and the analysis of  physiognomic traits, became more attractive than the ancient rituals linked to anticipating the will of  the gods.124 The importance that the biographer attributes to the omina may be considered with some scepticism today. Dreams, signs and omens were nonetheless an integral part of  the lives of  emperors, especially the most credulous ones, and could decisively condition many events.125 Strange personal beliefs, sceptical reactions to auspices, and contradictory attitudes 126 all make the characters more real and human, more or less dominated by their personal superstitions or conformed to traditional religion. This seems to be the reflex in the court of popular beliefs and heterogenous ways

121 L. Revell, Roman Imperialism and local identities, Cambridge, University Press, 2009, p. 90. 122  The comparison with the words that Seneca puts in Claudius’ mouth (Apoc. 4.3: uae, puto concacaui me) seems to suggest a hostile anecdote to the Flavians seeking to make the association between the two emperors: vide M. Cesa, Svetonio. Vita di Vespasiano, pp. 96–97. 123   According to Benoist, Rome, le prince et la cite, pp. 336–37, it seems that Vespasian’s attitude (who did not try to link himself  more or less artificially to the Julio-Claudian family) did not restrain the imperial cult. Indeed, it achieved new provincial advances under his reign, especially in the West. The cult of  Rome and Augustus was thus an ally of  the new ruling family: the official Flavian titles (Imperator Caesar Vespasianus Augustus) prove the acceptance of  the institutional forms bequeathed by a century of  practice. 124 A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, pp. 196–97. See D. Konstan, “Reading Politics in Suetonius” in W. J. Dominik, J. Garthwaite, P. A. Roche, Writing Politics in Imperial Rome, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2009, pp. 447–62. 125  See several examples in J. L. Brandão, Máscaras dos Césares, pp. 71–72. 126  Cf. Jul. 59 vs 51; Tib. 36 vs 69.1; Nero 16.2 vs 56.

209

J. L. BRANDÃO

of  being Roman, more or less detached from the normative intellectual aristocracy. The high number of  occurrences of  dreams and omens shows that they are an important element in the description of  Roman identity, through which the biographer displays his erudition and religiosity. In fact, Suetonius takes dreams very seriously even in his private life, as his friend Pliny witnesses (Ep. 1.18.1). Furthermore, they have a structural function in the narrative. As signs are related to time, they add a religious dimension to historical evolution. In the text, they help to delineate times, crises and changes. Suetonius expands considerably on the lists of signs that mark the pivotal moments in the lives of  emperors.127 However, the signs also serve to delimit larger cycles. The prosperity and fall of  the Julio-Claudian dynasty are announced by signa euidentissima at the beginning of  the Life of  Galba. The seventh book (containing the Lives of  Galba, Otho and Vitellius) begins with the omen of  the white hen, whose offspring vanishes (thus signalling the end of  the Julio-Claudians), and ends with an explanation of  the meaning of  an omen (Vit. 18): the cock, which had risen to the head of  Vitellius in Vienna, signified that he would fall at the hands of  a Gaul (Antonius Primus). However, if  we cross-check the information from the end of  Vitellius’ Life with the chapter describing this situation (Vit. 9), we find other common elements connected to supreme power: an eagle, statues, and a laurel. As Power notes, this cannot be a mere coincidence.128 In this case, these presages delimit a period of  civil war, a moment of  crisis between the end of  a model and the beginning of  a new syncresis. At the beginning of Vespasian’s Life, Suetonius presents a summary of  the ideas he will develop: the uncertainty caused by the successive coups d’état is finally replaced by the firmitas guaranteed by the Flavian family. Moreover, Vespasian’s struggle for power is  sanctioned by omens (Ves. 5) and by a  thaumaturgical activity (Ves. 7.2–3) that gives him a  messianic aura recalling 127  The lists of  signs are mainly related to two opposing and determining phases: the rise and loss of the empire to government. See A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, pp. 191–92. 128 T. Power, “The Endings of  Suetonius’ Caesars”, in T. Power, R. Gibson (eds), Suetonius the Biographer. Studies in Roman Lives, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014, 61–62.

210

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

Augustus (Aug. 74–76). Furthermore, the Life ends with the role of  fatum in the consolidation of  the dynasty (Ves. 25). This belief  in astrological predictions leads Vespasian to affirm in the Senate that “aut filios sibi successuros aut neminem” 129 (“either his sons would succeed him or he would have no successor”). In this context, the biographer introduces a  dream experienced by the emperor, in which he sees in the atrium a set of  scales: in one of  its pans he observes Claudius and Nero, and in the other he discerns himself  and his children. Finally, this dream is interpreted as an indication of  the time of  the dynasty’s rule.130 Domitian’s optimistic dream at the end of  Lives of  Caesars is, according to Suetonius, fulfilled by the Antonines (Dom. 23.2).131 Nonetheless, this optimism (which suggests flattery) does not detract from a  deterministic concept of  men’s history and life. Fate seems to determine the character of  the emperor with moral consequences. Tiberius is  at once chained to his saeua ac lenta natura (Tib. 57.1), Caligula to his natura saeua atque probrosa (Cal. 11), Nero to infelicitas (Nero 6.2), and Vitellius to bad horoscopes (Vit. 3.2). The emperors ultimately seem to be playthings of  the gods. Although tyrants may ultimately be punished for their vices,132 the idea remains that they could hardly behave otherwise. If   they try to escape their destiny, the natura becomes more pronounced and the initial period of  happiness is replaced by a regime of  terror. The omens of death of Caligula and Nero suggest divine vengeance: in the first case, vengeance from Jupiter, whom Caligula offended (Cal. 57), and in the case of  Nero, persecution by the Furies (Nero 34.  4) and vengeance by the Manes of  his mother and his wife Octavia (Nero 46.1). In  Nero’s life, there seems, therefore, to be interference from the roles he plays on stage, as Orestes the Matricide, Oedipus Blind and Hercules Mad.133   Cf. D.C. 66.12.1. See M. Cesa, Svetonio. Vita di Vespasiano, p. 98.   Nec res fefellit, quando totidem annis parique temporis spatio utrique imperauerunt. Titus also says that the empire is the gift of  the fatum (Tit. 9.1). 131  See T. Power, “The Endings of  Suetonius’ Caesars”, pp. 67, 69–70. 132  J. Gascou, Suétone historien, pp. 797–98. 133  Cf. Nero 21.3. See S. Bartsch, Actors in the audience. Theatricality and doublespeak from Nero to Hadrian, Cambridge, Mass, Harvard University Press, 1994, pp. 61–62. 129 130

211

J. L. BRANDÃO

These two emperors make a  mistake in favourably interpreting encrypted prophecies issued by the lots of  the Fortune of  Antium (Cal. 57.3) and the oracle of  Delphi (Nero 40.3). Other topoi of  the epic and tragic tradition that abound in these Lives are the presage dreams.134 Thus, the identity of  the Roman aristocracy is already modelled on the literary culture, and literary topoi are implicitly or explicitly invoked as models in the evaluation of  the emperors’ performance. At times, the executions themselves turn into rituals of  expiation.135 The two versions of  Caligula’s murder suggest a sacrifice in which the animal is replaced by the emperor and includes the ritual words and a sacrifice to Jupiter (Cal. 58.2). Moreover, Galba’s death follows the same model.136 Therefore, respect for the gods and traditional religion, that is, for Roman religious identifiers, is one of  the elements for evaluating the emperors’ performance. Once again this is dependent on character, in particular, on the preponderance of  pietas in ethos. And they are often punished for their impietas.

3. Social Identity: Display of  dignitas and libertas Another feature of  the emperor’s character is  the attention he pays to social identity. The social hierarchy the emperor represents must be mirrored through his behaviour in both public and private life. In  Della Corte’s view, the attitude towards the equites, the class to which the biographer belonged, is Suetonius’s criterion for evaluating princes. Gascou nonetheless disproves this view.137 In fact, the biographer recounts, among Caligula’s worst   Jul. 81.3; Cal. 50.3; Nero 34.4; Gal. 18.2; Otho 7.2; Dom. 16.1.  Cf. Cal. 27.2; Cal. 32.3; Cal. 35.2; Nero 36.1. See P. Veyne, “Le folklore à Rome et les droits de la conscience publique sur la conduite individuelle”, Latomus 42 (1983), pp. 18–25. 136  See J. L. Brandão, “Suetónio e drama: da tragédia ao mimo”, Humanitas 57 (2005), pp. 175–82; D. W. Hurley, “Rhetorics of  Assassination: Ironic Reversal and the Emperor Gaius”, in T.  Power, R.  Gibson (eds), Suetonius the Biographer. Studies in Roman Lives, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 146–58. 137  F.  Della Corte, Svetonio eques Romanus, pp.  165–90. See G.  Bru­ gnoli, Studi suetoniani, Lecce, Milella, 1968, p.  37; J.  L. Brandão, Máscaras dos Césares, pp. 373–74; J. Gascou, “Suétone et l’ordre équestre”, pp. 257–77. 134 135

212

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

actions, his declaration that he had returned to Rome only for the sake of  the equites and the people, while for the senators he would be neither citizen nor prince anymore (Cal. 49.1).138 Similarly, among Nero’s crimes he lists the intention of  exterminating the senators and handing over senatorial duties to the equites and freedmen (Nero 37.3). In  its relationship with the Roman aristocracy, the emperor is expected to behave like a paterfamilias (as Augustus did), safeguarding the libertas of  the citizens, and not like a dominus (as Caligula and Domitian presented themselves), turning citizens into slaves.139 Suetonius seems to defend a traditional and hierarchical conception of  society and contests the emperors who try to subvert this established order. The best emperors are those who are favourable to all classes: those who achieve the consensus ordinum, verifiable, for example, by reactions to the ruler’s death. But social differentiation also has a moral basis. Since libertas is common to all free citizens, it is dignitas that distinguishes the classes. And the foundations of  dignitas lie not only in the deeds of  the ancestors, but also in the praiseworthy actions of  the citizen.140 In order to preserve the dignity of  the upper classes, Tiberius (still in a positive phase, albeit one in which the despotism of  the princeps is gradually manifesting: Tib. 33) banished matrons who declared themselves prostitutes 141 to circumvent the law (the lex Iulia de adulteriis) and the young men of  senatorial and equestrian orders who voluntarily exposed themselves to an infamous process, so as not to be prevented from taking part in theatre and arena games. Moreover, he withdrew the laticlave from a senator who retired to the countryside before the first of  July (the date when urban lease agreements were made), so that after this date he could rent a  house in the city at a  lower price. Similarly,   See D. Wardle, Suetonius’ Life of  Caligula, p. 320.   As points out M.  B. Roller, Constructing Autocracy, pp.  214–33. According to this author, the emperor’s scope of  action is not confined to the constitutionalist view (i.e. the powers he holds), but goes far beyond this, comprising a broad scope of  “situations in which ethics and power intersect” (pp. 286–87). 140 See Lewis, “Suetonius’ Caesares and their literary antecedents”, p. 3655. 141   Tib. 35.1. The case of Vistillia, according to Tacitus (Ann. 2.85.2–3). More­ over, he provided that, in the absence of a public prosecutor, adulterous matrons should be judged on family council, according to the mos maiorum: the case of  Apuleia Varilla reported in Tacitus (Ann. 2.50). 138 139

213

J. L. BRANDÃO

he removed a senator from the office of praetor for having gotten married on the eve of  the provincial giveaway and divorced the following day (Tib. 35.2).142 This kind of  behaviour did not suit the level of  senatorial dignity. Similarly, Vespasian dismisses senators and equites for being indignissimi, and makes clear that the distinction between the two orders is based on dignitas rather than on libertas, stating that even if  a member of  the equestrian order should not offend a senator, he is nevertheless allowed to respond to an offence (Ves. 9.2). In fact, the equestrian order had been gaining prestige, and there are cases of  men who preferred the equestrian career to the senatorial one, since the former could be more lucrative.143 As stated above, the crisis of  68–69 is a pivotal moment that brought about decisive changes to the identity markers of  the emperor’s character. The former Republican aristocracy, prior to Augustus, represented by Galba and Piso (the chosen heir of  Galba), does not succeed in its intentions: Galba is a man of  the past, by his family (and archaic customs that he cultivates: Gal. 4.4) and by the way in which he intends to apply Roman virtues to his own times. Otho and Vitellius, members of  the aristocracy who affirmed themselves during the rule of  the Julio-Claudians, fare no better: it has become clear that the family tree is no longer the main criterion for creating emperors. In the antipodes of  Galba, who displayed his family tree in the atrium, tracing the family’s origins to Pasiphae,144 Vespasian not only had no illustrious ancestors, but is also proud of  his humble origins and laughs at the noble origin that flatterers want to ascribe to him, certainly   Perhaps because, having won a  rich province, he no longer needed his wife’s money (which made it obvious that he had married her for material and not civic interests), or because he married in order not to break the law according to the lex Pappaea Poppaea, which upheld the marriage. See H.  Lindsay, Suetonius. Tiberius, edited with introduction, commentary and bibliography, London, Bristol Classical Press, 1995, pp. 126–28. 143   Such is the case of  Macrino, who refused to be integrated into the senatorial career (adlectus  … inter praetorios) that Vespasiano had granted him, as says Pliny the Younger (Ep. 1.14). Cf. similar cases in Tacitus: Ann. 16.17, and Hist. 2.86. See A. W. Braithwaite, C. Suetoni Tranquilli Divus Vespasianus, pp. 50–53; L. Mrozewicz, Roman Empire During the Reign of  The Flavians. Principal Trends of  Development and Threats, Warsaw (Akme Studia Historica 7), 2010, pp. 13–16. 144  And it will not be an effabulation of  his own, but information likely taken from documents gathered from Republican-era family archives. 142

214

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

because it would be a means of  emphasising his own merit in the ascension.145 Moreover, being a member of  an equestrian family, Vespasian represents a social revolution in terms of  his access to supreme power, which corresponds to the promotion of  a kind of  bourgeoisie. Suetonius (Ves. 4.3) says that he had to devote himself  to the trafficking of  animals (ad mangonicos quaestus), as the mulio nickname suggests, in order to maintain the amount required for the senatorial census. Such an expedient seems contradictory to the dignitas he intends to maintain, as we saw above.146 In  fact, Suetonius (Ves. 2.2) also says that Vespasian long disdains the office of  senator, while Jones and Milns suggest that Vespasian postpones the request for such status by material interests.147 Tacitus (Ann. 3.55) also analyses the causes of  such a cultural transformation: firstly, the elimination of  the old aristocracy, whose members were accustomed to revelling in sumptuousness, and, in return, the elevation of  a  more austere municipal and colonial nobility; secondly, the Vespasian’s acclaim, since this emperor followed an ancient way of  life.148 And Tacitus points out that Vespasian’s emulation was more effective than prohibitive legislation,149 thus emphasising the influence of  the imperial court in fixing fashions and attitudes. Suetonius emphasises the purge and renewal that Vespasianus himself  operates in the senatorial and equestrian orders, withdrawing the most unworthy and promoting the most distinguished from Italy and from the provinces.150 The reasons given 145   Ves. 12: … Q uin et conantis quosdam originem Flavii generis ad conditores Reatinos comitemque Herculis, cuius monimentum exstat Salaria via, referre irrisit ultro. Cf. 2.1. See G. Morgan, 69 a.d. The year of  Four Emperors, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006, pp. 262–63; O. Hekster, Emperors and Ancestors. Roman Rulers and the Constraints of  Tradition, Oxford studies in ancient culture and representation, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2015, p. 252. 146  This rumour must have therefore been circulated by detractors, although that activity would certainly be profitable. See B.  Levick, Vespasian, LondonNew York, Routledge, 1999, p. 24. 147 B.  Jones, R.  Milns, Suetonius: the Flavian emperors, a  historical commentary, London, Bristol Classical Press, 2002, p. 44. 148  A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, pp. 187–88. 149  Obsequium inde in principem et aemulandi amor validior quam poena ex legibus et metus. 150  L. Mrozewicz, Roman Empire During the Reign of  The Flavians, pp. 13–27.

215

J. L. BRANDÃO

for this rewording are circumstantial and moral: the murders and contamination by long standing neglect.151 Thus, we perceive the appearance of  a new aristocracy that, not being so corrupted by the vices of  the previous elite, has conditions to return to the old customs. The faithful guarantor of  Roman identity begins to lie not so much in the city, but outside it. Moreover, being of  Sabine origin, Vespasian made way for the rise of  emperors from other regions.

Concluding Remarks In conclusion, Augustus reminds us that the emperor is an actor and that his performance is evaluated at the end of  his life. Hence the importance of death reports, in the structure of the biography, as the supreme moment at which a character’s ethos is revealed. As he is not a private citizen, but rather a public actor, whatever he does reflects common values, customs and fashions. Suetonius evaluates the way that each emperor positions himself  in relation to Roman customs and the extent to which his behaviour is determined by nature or by circumstance. The structure used by Suetonius to catalogue behaviours, under keywords constituted by virtues and vices, allows us to have an idea about the author’s point of  view regarding certain cultural elements. The list of  virtues represents a  set of  identity traits of  being Roman, advocated by a traditional aristocracy at the top of  which the emperor stands. The relative weight of  virtues and vices defines the ethos of  each emperor and, consequently, his performance at the political, cultural and social level. Thus in Suetonius’ biography, it is the way the emperor positions himself  vis-à-vis the constitutional, cultural, and social identifiers of  being Roman that defines his character; whether he behaves as a princeps or as a tyrant; whether he promotes Latin or foreign language; whether he wears national or exotic costumes; whether he cultivates traditional or imported arts and sports; whether he encourages traditional religious practices or promotes   Ves. 9.2 Amplissimos ordines et exhaustos caede uaria et contaminatos ueteri neglegentia purgauit suppleuitque recenso senatu et equite, summotis indignissimis et honestissimo quoque Italicorum ac prouincialium Alecto. 151

216

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

new cults and superstitions; and whether he preserves social order and the dignitas of  the upper classes or encourages social subversion. Circumstances, whether favourable or unfavourable, can act as triggers for certain character traits, as happened with Domitian who, due to lack of  funds (necessitas), became rapacious (rapax), and fear (metus) made him cruel (saeuus) (Dom. 3.2), or with Tiberius whose natural cruelty is increased by the death of  his son Drusus (Tib. 62.1). Being at the top of  the social pyramid, the emperor is at the same time the greatest symbol of  Roman identity, the agent of  its definition and the guarantor of  its preservation. The good emperors of  Suetonius are guardians of  Roman identity, especially with regard to traditional customs, and their actions are performances of  Romanness. In this case the model provided tends to be that of  Augustus. There is, however, space for a  moderate introduction of  external Greek elements, in language, literary culture and religion, provided this does not call into question Roman identity and class dignity. In fact, some behaviours, though tolerable for a private citizen, are degrading to an emperor, in accordance with standards designed to protect the dignity of  the aristocratic class. The secret is to keep the right balance so as not to endanger the honour of the imperial office, which must be a clear sign of Roman identity. Nonetheless, the limits depend on each emperor and on the power play between his own virtues and vices. Sometimes, emperors are accused of  foreignness, as V. Schulz points out: Nero is associated with Greekness based on his artistic behaviours, so he lives and dies more like an artist than a Roman emperor.152 This is considered shameful to him and to the Roman state. The same can be said of  Caligula, due to his unreasonable affection for games, dramatic arts and, above all, his way of  dressing. By behaving in this manner, emperors threaten the dignity of  their class and the majesty (maiestas) of  the Roman people as a whole.153 However, in pointing out such transgressions, whether they are facts or rumours, Suetonius also stresses the traditional characteristics of  being Roman.  V. Schulz, Deconstructing Imperial Representation, pp. 288–98.   See in this volume A. Rodrigues, “Roman Maiestas”, pp. 91–120.

152 153

217

J. L. BRANDÃO

Also important are geographic and social elements of  cultural intersection. Augustus presents Campania as a space of  performative exchange of  Greek and Roman cultures. If   wearing a Greek cloak and sandals in Rhodes is  a  demonstration of  ciuilitas by Tiberius, wearing such garments in Rome, as Caligula does, shows a lack of  respect for one’s homeland customs. The adoption of  foreign clothes in Rome and active participation in games, therefore, are behaviours associated with the worst emperors and biographically justified on the basis of  depravity of  character. However, we must also caveat this: the present values are, in any case, those of  the dominant classes. Nero’s extravagances, despite the senatorial class scandal, had long been approved by the populace. The vicissitudes of  the times can also be corrupting, in which case measures must be taken with reference to ancestral customs. On the one hand, the Flavians represent this restoration, which Suetonius seems to stress by highlighting the humble origins of  this family, but also the inclusive expansion of  the imperial aristocracy. Such an enlargement is in line with the inclusive tendency that was in the very nature of  Roman, historical and legendary consciousness. The preservation of  the constitutional, cultural, religious and social identity of  the empire is ultimately dependent on the character of  the emperor. So, the idea of  an inexorable fate, continuously highlighted throughout the Lives, coexists with that of  an immanent justice.154 The deaths of  Caesar, Caligula, Nero and Domitian are portrayed as punishment for the deviation they symbolised from Roman tradition, as well as the liberation of  citizens and the world from the yoke of  tyranny.155 Through the narrative of  these emperors’ deaths, Suetonius therefore operates a kind of  catharsis and restores the balance inherent to justice.

 See J. Gascou, Suétone historien, 797–98.   Jul. 76.1: Praegrauant tamen cetera facta dictaque eius ut et abusus dominatione et iure caesus existimetur. Non enim honores modo nimios recepit; Cal. 56.1: Ita bacchantem atque grassantem non defuit plerisque animus adoriri; Nero 40.1: talem principem paulo minus quattuordecim annos perpessus terrarum orbis tandem destituit; Dom. 14.1: Per haec terribilis cunctis et inuisus, tandem oppressus est. 154 155

218

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

Bibliography Baldwin B., Suetonius, Amsterdam, Hakkert, 1983. Bardon H., Les empereurs et les lettres latines d’Auguste à  Hadrien, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1968. Benoist S., Rome, le prince et la cité: pouvoir impériale et cérémonies publiques (Ier siècle av. - début du IVe siècle apr. J.-C.), Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 2005. Berthet J.  F., “La culture homérique des Césars d’après Suétone”, REL 56 (1978), pp. 314–34. Bevens E. M., A Sacred people. Roman Identity in the Age of  Augustus. Thesis-Master of  Arts. Georgia State University, 2010. Bradley K., “Imperial virtues in Suetonius’ Caesares”, JIES 4 (1976), pp. 245–53. Bradley K., Suetonius’ Life of  Nero. An historical commentary, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1978. Bradley K., “The imperial ideal in Suetonius’ Caesares”, ANRW II, 33, 5, 1991, pp. 3701–32. Braithwaite A. W., C. Suetoni Tranquilli Divus Vespasianus, with an introduction and commentary, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1927. Brandão J. L., “Suetónio e drama: da tragédia ao mimo”, Humanitas 57 (2005), 159–93. Brandão J. L., “Suetónio e o fascínio do Oriente” in F. Oliveira (ed), Génese e consolidação da ideia da Europa III. O mundo romano, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade, 2005, 81–102. Brandão J. L., “Tirano ao tibre! Estereótipos de tirania nas Vidas dos Césares de Suetónio”, Humanitas 60 (2008), pp. 115–37. Brandão J. L., Máscaras dos Césares. Teatro e moralidade nas Vidas suetonianas, Coimbra, Imprensa da UC, 2009, 378–80. Brugnoli G., Studi suetoniani, Lecce, Milella, 1968. Butler H.  E., Cary M., Suetonius. Divus Iulius, edited with commentary, London, Oxford University Press, 1927 (with new introduction, bibliography and additional notes by G.  B. Townend, 1982, 1993). Carney T. F., “How Suetonius’ lives reflect on Hadrian”, PACA 11 (1968) pp. 7–24. Cary E., Dio’s Roman History (9 vols), London, Heinemann, Cambridge, Mass, Harvard University Press, 1914–1927. Cesa M., Svetonio. Vita di Vespasiano, Bologna, Cappelli, 2000. 219

J. L. BRANDÃO

Cizek E., Structure et idéologie dans les Vies des douze Césars de Suétone, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1977. Cizek E., Néron, Paris, Fayard, 1982. Colin J., “Les consuls du césar-pharaon Caligula et l’héritage de Germanicus”, Latomus 13 (1954), pp. 394–416. Della Corte F., Svetonio eques Romanus, Firenze, La Nuova Italia, 1967. Dench E., Romulus’ Asylum. Roman Identities from the Age of  Alexander to the Age of  Hadrian, Oxford, University Press, 2005. Dubuisson M., “Toi aussi, mon fils!”, Latomus 39 (1980), pp. 881– 90. Dubuisson M., “Purisme et politique. Suétone, Tibère et le grec au Sénat”, in F. Decreus, C. Deroux (eds), Hommages à Jozef  Veremans, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1986, pp. 109–20. Dubuisson M., “L’ ἀδιατρεψία de Caligula (Suét., Cal. 29.1)”, Latomus 57 (1998), pp. 589–94. Dunkle J. R., “The rhetorical tyrant in Roman Historiography: Sallust, Livy and Tacitus”, CW 65 (1971), pp. 12–20. Dupont F., Éloi T., L’érotisme masculin dans la Rome antique, Paris, Belin, 2001. Fernández Uriel P., “Tácito, Annales  XV,  37,8 y Suetonio, Nero  XXVIII y XXIX. ¿Interpretación sexual o  religiosa?”, in J.  Alvar, C.  Blánq  uez, C.  Wagner (eds), Sexo, muerte y religión en el mundo clásico, Madrid, Ediciones Clásicas, 1994, pp. 111–24. Gascou J., “Suétone et l’ordre équestre”, REL 54 (1976), pp. 257–77. Gascou J., Suétone historien, Paris, de Boccard, 1984. Giua M. A., “Aspetti della biografia latina del primo impero”, RSI 12 (1990), pp. 535–59. Grelle F., “La correctio morum nella legislazione flavia”, ANRW II. 13, 1980, pp. 340–65. Guastella G., Gaio Svetonio Tranquillo, La vita di Caligola, Roma, La Nuova Italia Scientifica, 1992. Hekster O., “Imagining Power. Reality Gaps in the Romam Empire”, Babesch 86 (2011), pp. 111–24. Hekster, O., Emperors and Ancestors. Roman Rulers and the Constraints of  Tradition, Oxford studies in ancient culture and representation, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2015. 220

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

Holson P., “Nero and the fire of  Rome. Fact and fiction”, Pegasus 19 (1976), pp. 37–44. Hurley D.  W., An historical and historiographical commentary on Suetonius’ Life of  C. Caligula, Atlanta, Scholars Press, 1993. Hurley D. W., “Rhetorics of  Assassination: Ironic Reversal and the Emperor Gaius”, in T.  Power, R.  Gibson (eds), Suetonius the Biographer. Studies in Roman Lives, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 146–58. Hulls J.-M., “The Mirror in the Text: Privacy, Performance and the Power of  Suetonius’ Domitian”, in T. Power, R. Gibson (eds), Suetonius the Biographer. Studies in Roman Lives, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 178–96. Jones B., Milns R., Suetonius: the Flavian emperors, a historical commentary, London, Bristol Classical Press, 2002. Jones B., Suetonius. Domitian, edited with introduction, commentary and bibliography, London, Bristol Classical Press, 1996. Konstan D., “Reading Politics in Suetonius” in W. J. Dominik, J. Garthwaite, P. A. Roche, Writing Politics in Imperial Rome, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2009, pp. 447–62. Lambrechts P., “Caligula dictateur littéraire”, BIBR 28 (1953), pp. 219–32. Laurence R., “Introduction”, in R. Laurence, J. Berry (eds), Cultural Identity in the Roman Empire, London-New York, Routledge, 1998, pp. 1–9. Levick B., Vespasian, London-New York, Routledge, 1999. Lewis R.  G., “Suetonius’ Caesares and their literary antecedents”, ANRW II, 33,5, 1991, pp. 3623–74. Lindsay H., Suetonius. Tiberius, edited with introduction, commentary and bibliography, London, Bristol Classical Press, 1995. Martin R., Les douze Césars: du mythe à la réalité, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1991. Morgan G., 69 a.d. The year of  Four Emperors, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006. Mottershead J., Suetonius. Claudius, edited with introduction and commentary, Bristol, Bristol Classical Press, 1986. Mrozewicz L., Roman Empire During the Reign of  The Flavians. Principal Trends of  Development and Threats, Warsaw (Akme Studia Historica 7), 2010. Murison Ch.  L. “Tiberius, Vitellius and the spintriae”, AHB 1 (1987), pp. 97–99. 221

J. L. BRANDÃO

Murison Ch. L., Suetonius. Galba, Otho, Vitellius, edited with introduction and notes, London, Bristol Classical Press, 1992. Newbold R., “Suetonius’ boundaries”, Latomus 43, 1984, pp. 118– 32. Oliveira F., “Consequências da expansão Romana”, in J.  L. Brandão, F.  Oliveira (eds), História de Roma Antiga, vol.  I. Das origens à morte de César, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade, 2015, pp. 233–311. Power T., “The Endings of  Suetonius’ Caesars”, in T.  Power, R. Gibson (eds), Suetonius the Biographer. Studies in Roman Lives, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 58–77. Revell L., Roman Imperialism and local identities, Cambridge, University Press, 2009. Rocca-Serra G., “Une formule cultuelle chez Suétone (Divus Augustus, 98,2)”, in Mélanges de philosophie, de littérature et d’histoire ancienne offerts à  P.  Boyancé, Rome, Palais Farnèse, 1974, pp. 671–80. Rolfe J. C., Suetonius (2 vols), Cambridge, Mass, Harvard University Press, 1928–1930 [Revised ed]. Roller M.  B., Constructing Autocracy. Aristocrats and Emperors in Julio-Claudian Rome, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2001. Schulz V., Deconstructing Imperial Representation. Tacitus, Cassius Dio and Suetonius on Nero and Domitian, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2019. Trevor L. “Ideology and Humor in Suetonius’ Life of  Vespasian 8”, CW 103 (2010), pp. 511–27. Verdière R., “À verser au dossier sexuel de Néron”, PP 30 (1975), pp. 5–22. Veyne P., “Le folklore à Rome et les droits de la conscience publique sur la conduite individuelle”, Latomus 42 (1983), pp. 3–30. Wallace-Hadrill A., “Civilis princeps: Between Citizen and king”, JRS 72 (1982), pp. 32–48. Wallace-Hadrill A., Suetonius. The scholar and his Caesars, New Haven (Conn.), Yale University Press, 1984. Wardle D., Suetonius’ Life of  Caligula. A  commentary, Bruxelles, Latomus, 1994. Wardle D., Suetonius. Life of Augustus, translated with introduction and historical commentary, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014. 222

PERFORMING ROMAN IDENTITY IN SUETONIUS’ CAESARS

Warmington B. H., Suetonius. Nero, text, with introdution & notes, London, Bristol Classical Press, 21999. Woolf  G., “Divinity and Power in Ancient Rome”, in N.  Brisch (ed.), Religion and Power. Divine Kingship in the Ancient World and Beyond, Chicago, The Oriental Institute, 2008, pp. 235–51.

223

CLÁUDIA TEIXEIRA University of  Évora Centre for Classical and Humanistic Studies (U. Coimbra) ORCID: 0000-0002-1282-2568

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER PERCEPTIONS OF  IDENTITY IN THE HISTORIA AUGUSTA’S LIFE OF  MAXIMINUS The biography of Maximinus Thrax in the Historia Augusta – a late Roman collection of  imperial biographies of  Roman Emperors, Caesars and usurpers, spanning from 117 ce to 285 ce1 –, evokes a  period in which significant changes occurred in the structure of  imperial power. His accession to power in 235 ce marked the end of  trends that, during the first and second centuries, defined the emperors’ profile. In these centuries, emperorship was mainly assigned to individuals “from the Italic peninsula, or originating from the Latin-speaking aristocracy of  the Western provinces”,2 holding senatorial ranks. Exceptions to these trends are scarce and all set at the end of  the second century: Septimius Severus and Clodius Albinus broke the tradition of  emperors coming from the Italian Peninsula; Pertinax, Pescennius Niger and Septimus Severus were born outside of  senatorial families, but reached senatorial rank before becoming emperors. In the III century, instability along the borders, consequent militarisation of  conflict zones 1  The work presents a gap that includes the Vitae of  Philip the Arab, Decius, Trebonianus Gallus, Volusianus and Emilianus; the Life of  Valerian only begins after its capture by the Persians. 2  I. Mennen, Power and status in the Roman Empire, ad 193–284, Leiden, Boston, Brill, 2011, p.  22. See also note 6: “The Iulio-Claudian emperors stem from ancient patrician gentes bound to Rome; the Flavians belonged to the Italic municipal aristocracy; Traianus” family came from Italica, in Hispania Baetica, which was also the hometown of  Hadrianus’ family. It remains unclear, however, whether Traianus and Hadrianus were born in Italica. […] Antoninus Pius was from Lanuvium, Italy; Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus were born in Rome; and Commodus in Lanuvium. This development coincided with a more general gradual shift of  power from the Empire’s geographical center: in the second century, men from the East entered the Senate in Rome’. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 225–252 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128697

225

C. TEIXEIRA

and deterioration of  imperial authority 3 create ripe conditions for the mode of  accession to power to change. Contrary to what had happened in the past,4 acclamation by the troops becomes the most common way of  promoting someone to emperorship, while usurpation was now the standard model by which power was passed on.5 The rise of  equestrians 6 became common, occurring alongside another trend: the diversification of the geographic origins of  the emperors, who started to come from provinces such as Moesia, Thracia and Pannonia. The accession of  Maximinus Thrax in 235 ce exemplifies all aspects of  these trends: he was a professional soldier who had risen to the equestrian order, although not to its highest rank, becoming “the first emperor with a  pre-imperial career as professional military 7”; he was also the first emperor to come from the Illyria, the birthplace of  several forthcoming emperors, including Claudius, Aurelian, Probus and Diocletian. The success of  men from non-traditional regional or social back­grounds may be considered a consequence of  the historical and political circumstances of  the time 8 and an indication that 3  On this subject, see A. Ziolkowski, “The Background to the Third-Century Crisis of  the Roman Empire”, in J.  P. Arnason, K.  A. Raaflaub (eds), The Roman Empire in Context: historical and comparative perspectives, Malden – Oxford, Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, pp. 113–33. 4  O. Hekster, Rome and its Empire, ad 193–284, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2008, p.  58: “But becoming emperor through military acclamation was nothing new. Amongst emperors who gained power in this way are well-established ‘good’ emperors such as Vespasian and Septimius Severus”. 5  See M. Hammond, “The Transmission of  the Powers of  the Roman Emperor from the Death of Nero in ad 68 to that of Alexander Severus in ad 235”, MAAR 24 (1956), pp. 61–133. 6  From 268 to 284 this trend became hegemonic. Before 268, only Macrinus, Phillip the Arab and Maximinus were equestrians when acceded to em­per­orship. 7  I. Mennen, Power, p. 23: “Whereas Macrinus’ proclamation constituted merely an interlude within the senatorial Severan dynasty, the accession of Maximus Thrax in made clear that an eques acting as emperor had been no aberration. Unlike Macrinus, Maximinus had not been praetorian prefect and therefore was not the highest-ranking eques at the time of  his acclamation. Maximinus was a professional soldier who had worked his way up to the equestrian position of  praefectus tironibus, recruiting and training new soldiers in the Rhine area”. 8   On the third century crisis, see X.  Loriot, “Les premières années de la grande crise du IIIe siècle: De l’avènement de Maximin le Thrace (235) à la mort de Gordien III (244)”, ANRW II.2 (1975), pp. 657–787; D. S. Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay, ad 180–395, London – New York, Routledge, 2004; L. de Blois,

226

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

the globalization of  Roman culture, through which a considerable number of  peoples with different ethnicities and cultures were brought together under a  common culture, was an integrative process that created socio-political opportunities to individuals from the Empire’s peripheries. Maximinus’ biography in the Historia Augusta deals with complex elements of  this process, giving us an insight into the relationship between ethnicity and cultural identity.

1. Cultural Identity: Between Homogenization and Separation The issue of  Roman cultural identity has been the subject of  intense scrutiny in recent decades.9 Despite questions around the “The Military Factor in the Onset of  Crises in the Roman Empire in the Third Century ad” in L. de Blois, E. Lo Cascio (eds), The Impact of the Roman Army (200  bc–ad  476): Economic, Social, Political, Religious and Cultural Aspects, Leiden – Boston, Brill, 2007, pp. 495–508; W.  Liebeschuetz, “Was there a crisis of  the third century?”, in O.  Hekster, G.  Kleijn, D.  Slootjes (eds), Crises and the Roman Empire: proceedings of the Seventh Workshop of the international Network Impact of Empire, Nijmegen, June 20–24, Leiden – Boston, Brill, 2007, pp. 11–20; E. Lo Cascio, “The Emperor and his administration. The government and administration of the empire in the central decades of the third century”, in A. Bowman, P. Garnsey, A. Cameron (eds), The Cambridge Ancient History vol. XII: The Crises of Empire a.d. 193–337, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008, pp. 156–69; O. Hekster, Rome and its Empire, ad 193–284, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2008; J.  F. Drinkwater, “Maximinus to Diocletian and the ‘crisis’ ”, in A. Bowman, P. Garnsey, A. Cameron (eds), The Cambridge Ancient History vol.  XII: The Crises of  Empire a.d.  193–337, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008, pp.  28–66; A.  Ziolkowski, “The  Background to the Third-Century Crisis of  the Roman Empire”, in J.  P. Arnason, K. A. Raaflaub (eds), The Roman Empire in Context: historical and comparative perspectives, Malden – Oxford, Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, pp. 113–33; M.  Hebblewhite, The Emperor and the Army in the Later Roman Empire, ad 235–395, London – New York, Routledge, 2016; M. Kulikowski, The Triumph of  Empire: The Roman World from Hadrian to Constantine, Cambridge Mass., Harvard University Press, 2016. 9  K.  Galinsky, Augustan culture: an interpretive introduction, Princeton, Prince­ton University Press, 1998; R.  Lawrence and J.  Berry, Cultural Identity in the Roman Empire, London, Routledge, 1998; G. Woolf, Becoming Roman: The Origins of  Provincial Civilization in Gaul, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2000; E. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum. Roman Identities from the Age of  Alexander to the Age of  Hadrian, Oxford, University Press, 2005; R. Hingley, Globalizing Roman culture: unity, diversity and empire, London and New York, Routledge, 2005; A. Wallace-Hadrill, Augustan Cultural Revolution, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008; L. Revell, Roman Imperialism and

227

C. TEIXEIRA

definition of  the concept of  cultural identity and the elements that, in each period and space, defined the basis of  Roman-ness, there are nonetheless some commonly recognised assumptions: firstly, that the concept of  Roman identity is the result of  multiple influences, namely from Greek and Italian cultures, which dynamically guided the construction of  Roman cultural identity over the centuries; secondly, that by the time of  the transition from the Republic to the Empire, cultural identity performed a key role in the process of  integrating a  vast group of  peoples who had become part of  the empire due to the territorial expansion; thirdly, that globalisation of  Roman culture was activated through the instantiation of  cultural (language, dress, religion, lifestyle and also material culture 10) and legal elements (namely, the policy of  citizenship) that were subject to intense negotiations and renegotiations, within the vast network of  local and regional cultures that existed throughout the empire; finally, that this process assimilated the Roman territories under a common culture, turning the Empire into a more unified entity than the mere sum of  Rome, the Italian Peninsula and a vast collection of  Provinces. However, despite the valuable interpretative acquisitions that studies on Roman cultural identity have recently brought to the debate, it remains difficult to find a comprehensive definition of  this concept. This difficulty results, firstly, from an a priori element that consists in the fact that “cultural identity” does not actually have an objective existence. In its broad definition, cultural identity may correspond to the system of  cultural representations and symbolic patrimonies, by which individuals and groups historically construct and share perceptions of  the reality, i.e., a “belief  system” that emphasises the feeling of belonging to an ethnic, linguistic, religious, regional and/or national community and culture. This difficulty, in turn, grows exponentially in the case of complex societies. Subject to high levels of  social heterogeneity, cultural diversity and ethnic interpenetration, complex societies tend to Local Identities, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009; S. T. Roselaar, Processes of  Cultural Change and Integration in the Roman World, Leiden – Boston, 2015; L. Revell, Ways of  Being Roman: Discourses of  Identity in the Roman West, Oxford and Philadelphia, PA, Oxbow Books, 2016; E.  Dench, Empire and political cultures in the Roman world, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2018. 10 See Wallace-Hadrill, Augustan, 2008.

228

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

show that the definition of  cultural identity based on the principles of  “inner homogenization and outer separation” 11 (both involved in the “feeling of  belonging”) does not have an empirical counterpart, since individuals and communities are mutually subject to external influences and continually transformed by the challenges posed by other cultural groups performing in the same space and time.12 The premise of this assumption can be applied to the process by which Roman culture became a globalised culture 13 in the imperial era. In fact, the intense and numerous relationships between the centre and peripheries necessarily implied multilateral processes in which diverse experiences of  cultural negotiation took place, according to the competing interests of  the distinct groups that existed in the vast network of  provinces and regions.14 This does not mean, however, that a wide range of elements assimilating the concept of  “identity” and “cultural identity” were not performed as powerful political instruments in order to structure perceptions, behaviours, and interactions as a means of  reinforcing imperial unity. In addition, to recognise the countless variants relating to the adoption of  Roman culture at provincial, regional and local levels does not mean failing to recognise that the pro11   W. Welsch, “Transculturality – the Puzzling Form of  Cultures Today”, in M.  Featherstone, L.  Scott (eds), Spaces of  culture: city, nation, world, London, Sage, 1999, p. 195. 12  See, in this volume, K. Nguyen, “What’s in a Natio?”. 13  On the difference between globalization system in pre-modern and contemporary worlds, see J.  Tomlinson, Globalisation and Culture, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1999, pp. 36–37. 14   P. Southern, The Roman Empire from Severus to Constantine, London – New York, Routledge, 2001, p.  6: “The Empire was never an entirely uniform, homogeneous entity. In the east, Romanisation did not penetrate right down to the grass-roots level of  society, which had a much longer history behind it than Rome herself. The Syrian and Egyptian peasants, for instance, continued to use their own local dialects, though the language of  the administration was Greek or Latin. Romanisation of  the west was more intensive and widespread, but even in Spain and Gaul the local languages and customs were not totally absorbed to the point of  obliteration. Provincial and regional differences across the Empire were often tolerated and even encouraged. Indigenous social and religious customs, artistic traditions and local languages were not deliberately effaced, unless some of  those customs were in direct confrontation with Rome. The Empire was a conglomeration of territories, peoples, and military forces, corporately administered from regional centres under the aegis of the Emperor”. For a summary of the multiple aspects involved in the processes of  cultural change, see Roselaar, Processes, spec. pp. 1–18.

229

C. TEIXEIRA

cess of  supra-unification of  Roman culture depended, to a large extent, on the “capacity to attract others without strength”.15 And the attraction of  others without strength, i.e., the exercise of  “soft power”, has its most important asset precisely in culture: “A major part of  the producing factors or strengthening factors of  soft power in a political unit is related to culture area and the system of  values and cultural norms such as language and literature, ideological and religious status, excellent and humanistic values, moralities, power of  influencing of  beliefs and attitudes and generally national manner and nature, national spirit, national beliefs and values”.16 With regard to Roman culture, all of  these elements –  language, religion, ways of  living, morals, social behaviour, values, etc.  – were performed as mechanisms of  supra-unification and actively used to structure the networks of inter-relationships generated within the framework of  interactions established between the dominant culture and regional and local cultures, leading to the creation of  a  common perception of  what it means “to be Roman”, even though “being Roman” may have signified different things, depending on time, place and individual or community interests.17 In other words, during the imperial era, Roman culture, in provincial and regional contexts, was performed mainly as an “accumulable culture”, a concept of  culture defined by Park and Moon as “more universalistic” and “[…] broader in terms of  consumption because it is disseminated to various territories” 18 (and, in this sense, representing the type of  culture

15   On the concept of  soft-power, see J. S. Nye, Soft Power. The Means to Success in World Politics, New York, Public Affairs, 2004. 16  G.  Mortazavi, J.  Rezakhani, H.  Mohagheghnia, “The Role of  Cultural Power and Its Influence on Global Developments”, Journal of  History Culture and Art Research 7 (2018), p. 249. 17  E. Dench, Empire, pp. 157–58, states that “Recognizing that, even at the height of  empire, Roman power was thinly stretched, coexisted with competing systems of  power and authority, and fostered opportunism on the part of  local states and groups, should encourage us to reintegrate within the appraisal of  empire as a system the conditions most clearly visible in the making of  empire, at its edges and in times of  crisis. Such conditions become less exceptional and more diagnostic of  the way empire worked even at less fraught times”. 18  J. Parc, H.-C. Moon, “Accumulated and accumulable cultures”, Kritika Kultura 32 (2019), p. 438.

230

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

connected with the exercise of  soft power). However, viewing Roman culture as strictly “accumulable” poses a problem. In fact, despite the flexibility by which it spread across various geographical and cultural spaces, Roman culture, from an internal perspective, continued to function as “accumulated culture”, that is, the type of  culture “[…] formed over a long period of  time with the accumulation of related cultural practices”, “shared within an enclosed space, […]  derived from society’s values, and  […] well established in society”.19 Mores and behaviours, although being elements than can be performed as “accumulable”, were also conveyed by literature as non-negotiable features of  identity. In this sense, the flexibility of practices carried out to encourage the popu­ lation of the provinces to embrace Romanitas coexisted with messages that continue to define Roman-ness as being deeply associated with the values of  an “accumulated culture”. And this raises issues related to the Roman perception of  the Other. One of  the elements that has always characterised Roman culture as an accumulable culture is its openness to different ethnicities. Besides that, the fact that citizenship was developed as a primary element of  its identity system made the separation between being inside and outside of  the Romanitas more dependent on political and legal status than on ethnic element. The relationship with different ethnic groups, which emerges in the imperial era as an experience shaped over a considerable period of  time, was channeled to co-opt individuals and peoples into the hierarchical social fabric of  Roman society. In literature, ethnicity appears both as a  separating and integrating concept regarding identity. If   Caesar describes the Gauls (e.g. Gal. 3.8, 4.5, 7.42), evidencing features that attest to cultural separation, Virgil, despite conceptualising the Roman genealogy in a  deeply traditionalist way, anchors Silvius,20 son of  Aeneas and Lavinia and, therefore,   J. Parc, H.-C. Moon, “Accumulated”, p. 436.   The passage is problematic, especially considering that it explicitly contradicts another version of  the legend, used by Virgil in 1.167–271, in which Iulus was given as the first king of  Alba Longa. Scholars have seen this discrepancy either as an inconsistency or as a Virgilian commitment to the two versions of the legend. E. Norden, “Virgil’s Aeneid in the Light of  Its Own Time”, in P. Hardie (ed.), Virgil: Critical Assessments of  Classical Authors, London – New York, Routledge, 1999, pp. 138–39, states: “We know from numerous analogies what 19 20

231

C. TEIXEIRA

an Italo commixtus sanguine (6. 762), at the root of  the Roman historical process. On the cusp of  an era in which Roman cultural globalisation will be consolidated, this last example expresses a  conviction that Roman identity was born conceptually from an experience that illustrates integration and incorporation.21 This did not, however, prevent the emergence of  a vivid and centralizing representation of  what it is to be Roman emerged from the Aeneid. In book VI, the catalogue of  the glorious heroes conveys a  kind of  Roman hyperidentity in which nation, gender 22 and moral values 23 are highlighted in order to celebrate origins, tradition and continuity. Or, in other words, despite the Aeneid ’s clear message about the importance of different ethnicities in the formation of Roman history, the Roman identity system was nevertheless conceived in a  deeply ontological, organic, and unitary way. This is possible because, according to the Aeneid ’s account of  Roman history in book VI, ethnicity and ethos seem to be conceived as separate categories, meaning that ethnicity is conceived

the scholarly poets of  Rome did, following the example of  their Hellenistic predecessors, when faced with such variations in a legend: instead of  choosing one version or another they preferred to use each (or several) at different places in their own works. […] And Virgil, too, in the Aeneid, allows himself  the same liberty, or rather tries to give the same appearance of  erudition. […] Virgil makes the Alban kings belong partly to the Trojan and partly to the Italian ancestry of  Aeneas, just as he gives Aeneas one Trojan son (Ascanius) and one Italian (Silvius)”. See also, A. Rogerson, Virgil’s Ascanius: Imagining the Future in the Aeneid, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2017, spec. pp. 31–36. 21  E. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum, p. 366, observes: “Q uestions of  perception and self-perception in the Roman imperial world are frequently somewhat different from those raised in relation to other societies in the ancient world, such as classical Athens, given the tendency towards incorporation and integration”. E. Dench, Empire, p. 7: “Roman identity meant something quite specific in the early Empire. Roman citizenship had long been extended to the freed slaves of  Roman citizens, remarkably to Greek eyes, and, from the middle Republic, to the inhabitants of  certain communities in Italy, including some of  Rome’s former enemies. The traditional assumption was that Roman citizenship would entail direct participation in the obligations and privileges of  the Roman state, including the political institutions of  the city of  Rome”. 22  See Nuno  S. Rodrigues’ chapter in this volume: “Lucrecia, Tullia and Tanaquil: shaping the identity of  Rome’s women in the Augustan period”. 23  E. Dench, Romulus’ Asylum, p. 139: “Roman cultural identity is […] heavily moral in its focus: that is to say that our own categories of  culture and morality blur nicely within the Roman formula of  ‘the ways of  our ancestors’, the mores maiorum”.

232

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

as a category whose cultural content is permeable to assimilation and incorporation of new cultural contents. Yet, here we encounter a  problem: what happens when this new cultural content, in this case, Romanitas, is  not fully assimilated and does not fully replace the original content? If   the death of  Turnus in the Aeneid shows us one of  the possible outcomes that occur in a  framework where assimilation and articulation of  difference is  not possible, Maximinus’ biography in the Historia Augusta allows us to explore the problem from another point of view, that is, from the point of  view of  the problems that arise in a framework where such assimilation and articulation are taking place.

2. Maximinus’ Biography in the Historia Augusta: Ethnicity and Cultural Content The Historia Augusta poses several challenges, namely regarding authorship,24 date of  composition,25 reliability 26 and pur24   Since Hermann Dessau rejected the traditional authorship of  the work by Aelius Spartianus, Julius Capitolinus, Vulcacius Gallicanus, Aelius Lampridius, Trebellius Pollio, and Flavius Vopiscus, the single authorship theory was accepted widely. See H. Dessau, “Über Zeit und Persönlichkeit der Scriptores Historiae Augustae”, Hermes 24 (1889), pp.  337–92; R.  Syme, Emperors and Biography: Studies in the Historia Augusta, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1971; J. N. Adams, “On the authorship of the Historia Augusta”, CQ  22 (1972), pp. 186–94; F. Paschoud, “L’Histoire Auguste et Dexippe” HAC (1991), pp.  217–70; D.  W.  P. Burgersdijk, Style and structure of  the Historia Augusta, Diss. Amsterdam Univ., 2010; D.  Rohrbacher, The Play of  Allusion in the Historia Augusta, Madison, WI – London, University of  Wisconsin Press, 2016. On multiple authorship, see T.  Mommsen, “Die Scriptores Historiae Augustae”, Hermes, vol. 25 (1890) pp. 228–92; A. Momigliano, “An unsolved problem of historical forgery: the Scriptores Historiae Augustae”, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 17 (1954), pp.  22–46; R.  Baker, A  study of  a  late antique corpus of  biographies, Diss., Oxford Univ. 2014. See also, D. Hengst, Emperors and Historiography: Collected Essays on the Literature of  the Roman Empire by Danièel Den Hengst, Leiden – Boston, Brill, 2010, spec. 177–85. 25 Since  H. Dessau, “Über Zeit”, who contested the traditional dating of  the work (late third century-early fourth century), the date of  HA composition has been attributed to different periods, coinciding with the late fourth centuryearly fifth century. For a summary of  these positions (mainly by Dessau, Hartke, Alföldi, Shwartz, Chastagnol, Cameron, Syme, Baynes), see T. Honoré, “Scriptor Historiae Augustae”, JRS (77), pp. 156–76. 26  Rohrbacher, The Play, 134, states that “The opinions expressed in the Historia Augusta are bland because the work is  fundamentally concerned with

233

C. TEIXEIRA

pose,27 this is, a set of “comorbidities” that make the text a fragile document for any sort of  analysis dealing with historical issues. However, despite not being a reliable source and failing a possible programmatic intention that could give us information about the political and cultural circumstances of  the time in which the author was writing, the work offers elements related to cultural identity,28 although in a  different way from other texts. For instance, contrary to what happens in Livy, in which paradigmatic individuals are constructed in order to exemplify roles and values positively or negatively,29 the author of  the Historia Augusta, albeit also centred on the mores, does not seem to construct historical agents in terms of  sctrict paradigmatisation and exemplarity. In  other words, the figures constructed in these biographies are not perceived as models that actively transmit core Roman values, in order to regulate the behaviours of  individuals and communities; on the contrary, they are figures whose construction, through a stereotyped set of  vices and virtues, dem­ on­strates whether a  particular ruler displayed, in respect to his mores and political acts, conformity and compliance with the ideal values and models of  behaviour that framed Roman cultural identity. In turn, conformity and non-conformity to this model constitute a basic explanation for the historical process, as the following excerpt from Carus’ biography eloquently expresses (3.1): He [Augustus] then restored it once more, if  indeed we may say that it was restored when it gave up its freedom. 2 Nevliterature, not life. Although scholars have often sought to understand the author’s views on events of  his own day through his portrayal of  the second and third centuries, these attempts have been less than successful because when the author is freely inventing, his attention most often turns to other texts, not to contemporary events”. 27   Rohrbacher, The Play, p. 175: “His failure to promote a political or religious agenda is not a flaw, because it was not his goal. […] Instead of  filling gaps in sources, however, the HA-author boldly fabricates an alternative reality built from a range of  literary and historiographical texts. We lack many of  the details that we need to be full participants in his game, but accident has preserved for us a work that is valuable not only for the historical information it reproduces, however dimly, but also for its record of  scholars at play in the early fifth century”. 28   Cf., in this volume, J. Brandão, “Performing Roman identity in Suetonius’ Caesars”; and also F. Ginelli, “Similarities and dissimilarities”. 29  On this subject, see, in this volume N. S. Rodrigues, “Lucretia, Tullia and Tanaquil”.

234

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

ertheless, in some way or other, though mourning at home, it enjoyed great fame among nations abroad. Next, after enduring so many of  the house of  Nero, it reared its head again under Vespasian, 3 and though having no joy from all the good fortune of  Titus and bleeding from Domitian’s brutality, it was happier than had been its wont under Nerva and Trajan and his successors as far as Marcus, but was sorely stricken by the madness and cruelty of  Commodus. 4 Thereafter, save for the diligent care of  Severus, it knew naught that was good until Alexander, the son of  Mamaea. 5 All that ensued thereafter is too long to relate; for it was not permitted to enjoy the rule of  Valerian and it endured Gallienus for fifteen years. 6  Then Claudius was begrudged a  long-lasting rule by Fortune, which loves a  change and is  almost always a  foe to justice. 7  For in such wise was Aurelian slain and Tacitus carried off  by disease and Probus put to death, that it became clear that Fortune takes pleasure in nothing so much as in changing, by means of  a  varied succession of  events, all that pertains to the public business. 8 To what end, however, do we dwell on such lamentations and the misfortunes of  the times? 30

Subsuming the historical process on the level of  individuality means not only failing to understand its complexity, but also relegating history to the scope of  a personalistic conception. In fact, History is conceived of  as a vacuum that obtains its qualitative definition from the quality of  the rulers. As these qualities emanate from a  cultural matrix and are relatively homogeneous in their effects (traditional vices explain the Empire’s decadence and traditional virtues its empowerment and consolidation), non-traditional elements, such as those relating to ethnic, social and geographical origins, have to be embedded in the narrative and articulated by the same discursive device. This allows us not only to perceive in which frame of  reference (negative or positive) these elements are grouped by the biographer, but also to analyse how they are performed in order to (re)create the biographee’s vita.  The Historia Augusta’s translations are by D. Magie, The Scriptores Historiae Augustae, 3 volumes (139, 140, 263), Cambridge, Massachusetts – London, Loeb Classical Library, 1953–54 (first edition: 1921–1932). 30

235

C. TEIXEIRA

In the case of  Maximinus, an assessment of  the importance of  “origin” in his biographical construction could be made in comparison with the way in which this element is performed in the biographies of  emperors who share a  similar background. Concerning this matter, the biographies tend to confirm that this element is  not determinant for biographical construction, since it does not prevent, for instance, Aurelianus or Probus, who came from similar regional backgrounds,31 from being placed by the biographer on the same qualitative level as emperors like Trajan, Antoninus or Marcus Aurelius.32 Besides that, the author makes a  clear statement on the importance of  origin at the beginning of  Aurelianus’ vita (3.1.5): So then – lest I become tiresome by weaving too many trifles into my preface – the Deified Aurelian was born of  a humble family, at Sirmium according to most writers, but in Dacia Ripensis according to some. 2 I remember, moreover, having read one author who declared that he was born in Moesia; and, indeed, it often comes to pass that we are ignorant of  the birthplaces of  those who, born in a humble position, frequently invent a birthplace for themselves, that they may give their descendants a  glamour derived from the lustre of  the locality. However, in writing of  the deeds of  a great emperor, the chief  thing to be known is not in what place he was born, 31 SHA, Aur., 3.1–2: “So then – lest I become tiresome by weaving too many trifles into my preface – the Deified Aurelian was born of  a  humble family, at Sirmium according to most writers, but in Dacia Ripensis according to some. 2 I remember, moreover, having read one author who declared that he was born in Moesia”; SHA, Prob., 3.1: “Probus was a  native of  Pannonia, of  the city of  Sirmium, his mother was of  nobler birth than his father, his private fortune was modest, and his kindred unimportant”. 32 SHA, Aurel. 42.3: “The valour of  Trajan, the righteousness of  Antoninus, the self-restraint of  Augustus, and the good qualities of  all the great emperors, all these were his to such a degree that he did not merely take others as examples, but, even if  these others had never existed, he himself  would have left an example to all who came after”; Claud. 2.3: “The valour of  Trajan, the righteousness of  Antoninus, the self-restraint of  Augustus, and the good qualities of  all the great emperors, all these were his to such a degree that he did not merely take others as examples, but, even if  these others had never existed, he himself  would have left an example to all who came after”; SHA, Tac. 16. 6 [on Probus]: “Now we must take up Probus, a man of  note both at home and abroad, and one to be preferred to Aurelian, to Trajan, to Hadrian, to the Antonines, to Alexander, and to Claudius, for the reason that, while they had various virtues, he had all combined and to a surpassing degree”.

236

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

but how great he was in the State. 4 Do we value Plato more highly because he was born at Athens than because he stands out illumined as the peerless gift of  philosophy? 5 Or do we hold Aristotle of  Stagira or Zeno of  Elea or Anacharsis of  Scythia in less esteem because they were born in the tiniest villages, when the virtue of  philosophy has exalted them all to the skies?

Addressing this topic in terms of  “irrelevance”, a verdict deftly reinforced by the rhetorical comparison made between two examples of  authority (Plato and Aristotle), represents, to some extent, a novelty. Emperors, both in real life and in biography, do not tend to appear decontextualised from their ancestry, or, at least until the III century, to arise by a kind of  historical fiatcircumstances. That ancestry is  an important rubric 33 in the emperors’ biography is  shown by the considerable number of  fictional lineages, sometimes traced to a  divine ancestor, fabricated in order to bestow them a lineage. For instance, the fabrication both of  an ancestry and a progeny for Claudius Gothicus, making him a member of  the gens Flavia and a  Constantinus’ ancestor,34 illustrates the importance of  lineage in narratives about origin. The importance of  this topic does not lie so much in transposition of  intergenerational value, since, in the majority of  cases, it is not possible to establish any infallible correlation between emperors worth and that of  their ancestors, but in the fact that lineage provides authority and the identity substance that makes them recognisable within the cultural framework. It  is  not surprising, therefore, that when writing the biographies of  emperors born in border zones and without illustrious ancestors, the author grasps the absence of  that identity source and tries to explain  it, obliterating its importance. The biographer also deploys a  strategy which, although common to the biographical genre, is  performed in a  very emphatic way in these Vitae, namely by associating his subjects with former 33  On the topic, see J. L. Brandão, “A púrpura aviltada: honra e desonra nas Vidas dos Césares de Suetónio”, Humanitas 63 (2011), esp. pp. 322–24. 34  The name Flavius that is given to Claudius (SHA, Claud. 7.8) is commonly accepted as a result of  fabrication, in order to give an ancestry to Flavius Valerius Constantius Chlorus. On this matter, see H.  W. Bird, “The Historia Augusta on Constantine’s Lineage”, Arctos 31 (1997), pp. 9–17.

237

C. TEIXEIRA

emperors 35 or portraying them as restorers 36 of  “golden eras” of  peace and prosperity. The association with these golden eras and former emperors, who represent valorising models, places the biographees in a “value segment” of  the cultural community, which also ends up compensating for the absence of  an aforementioned identity substance. However, conversely to what happens in the lives of  Claudius, Aurelianus and Probus, in Maximinus’ biography, origin is neither represented as a neutral category, nor compensated with any sort of  element that brings him closer to the core of  Romanitas. On the contrary, the biographer intensively explores foreignness to reinforce his belonging to a cultural exogroup. This is done through different discursive strategies. Jason Moralee addressed Maximinus’ life in the Historia Augu­ sta, arguing that the “[…] profile of the emperor as a boorish tyrant is based on the alleged fact of  his half-barbarian origins. To make his case, the biographer manufactures a pair of  barbarian parents for Maximinus”.37 Origin is, indeed, adduced in the opening of the Vitae, in the following terms (1. 5–6): He was born in a village in Thrace bordering on the barbarians, indeed of  a barbarian father and mother, the one, men say, being of  the Goths, the other of  the Alani. 6 At any rate, they say that his father’s name was Micca, his mother’s Ababa.

Contrary to what typically happens with the emperors who do not have a traditional lineage, the author conveys brief  but very accurate information regarding the context of  both geographic 38 and social origin. In this brief  description, there are references to   See note 29.  e.g., SHA, Claud. 1.6; Aurel. 1.6, 41.7; Prob. 6.1. 37  J. Moralee, “Maximinus Thrax and the politics of  race in late antiquity”, G&R 55 (2008) pp. 60–61. 38   M.  A. Speidel, “Maximinus and the Thracians. Herodian on the coup of  235, and ethnic networks in the Roman Army of  the Third Century ce”, in V.  Cojocaru, A.  Rube (eds), Mobility in Research on the Black Sea Region, 2016, p.  341: “Thrace, a  province with a  very small Roman garrison, had become one of  the most important sources of  recruits for the entire Roman army. Numerous young Thracians were now sent abroad to join units at distant bases, no doubt because of  their fame as soldiers, but at least initially also to prevent local uprisings”. 35 36

238

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

two barbarian peoples and the word barbarus appears twice; his parents’ name,39 alien to Roman sensibility, denotes the typical exoticism associated with individuals who come from exogroups. From that point on, the information provided is  driven in two directions: firstly, the biographer describes Maximinus’ entry into Romanness and his rise from a humble “herdsman and the leader of  a band of  young men in a Thracian village” to the command of  the Empire; 40 then, the vita moves from an ascendant path to a descendant one, describing the figure, during the exercise of  imperial power. Maximinus’ entry into the Roman army is  narrated as follows: Severus, on Geta’s birthday, was running military games and Maximinus asked for permission to participate; the emperor, struck by his physical size, granted it. The young man, described as “[…] half  barbarian and scarcely yet master of  the Latin tongue, speaking almost pure Thracian”, won the prize. A couple of  days later, the emperor saw him again “rioting in his barbarian way among the crowd and immediately ordered the tribune to take him in hand and school him in Roman discipline”. Maximinus, aware that the Emperor was talking about him, approached Severus and, after once again beating the bravest soldiers, was rewarded with a  post in the Emperor’s personal guard. He  becomes a  soldier, respected by his peers, but leaves 39  These names were considered by Hohl a fabrication from Herodianus’ term (Herod. 6.8.1) mixobarbaroi [mixo/Micca and barbaroi/Abbaba]. See E. Hohl, Maximini duo Iuli Capitolini. Aus dem Corpus der sog. Historia Augusta herausgegeben und erläutert, Berlin, 1949, p. 30. 40  Speidel, “Maximinus”, p.  343, states: “For Herodian, our only surviving contemporary narrative of  the mutiny on the eve of  the military expedition into Germany in 235 ce relates that ‘Pannonians and barbarian Thracians’ were responsible for elevating the Thracian officer to the throne. Herodian apparently evoked common ethnicity as the most important bond between Maximinus and his supporters in the army. Moreover, Herodian’s remark reeks of  disapproval. For notwithstanding the fact that all free-born inhabitants of  the Empire were Roman citizens since 212, he counted the inhabitants of  distant provinces among the ‘barbarians’. He particularly despised the Thracians, and even held that being Thracian meant ‘possessing the bloodthirsty temperament derived from  […] ancestors and the country’. We must therefore ask: is Herodian’s account simply distorted by his personal hatred of  Maximinus and the Thracians? Or is there more evidence to support the view that Maximinus’ elevation to the throne was, to a certain extent, a Thraco-Illyrian conspiracy, perhaps brewed up in the Thracian ‘clubs’ of  Severus Alexander’s expeditionary army?”.

239

C. TEIXEIRA

the army when Macrinus, a  man he hated for having killed the son of  Severus, becomes emperor; he returns to the service under Elagabalus, but, disregarded by the emperor, leaves again. Elagabalus’ friends retained him, in order to prevent another bad act from being added to “Elagabalus’ ill-fame”. Maximinus, described as the “bravest man of  his time – whom some called Hercules, others Achilles, and others Ajax”, is said to have “held only the honour of  a tribuneship; but never did he come to take the Emperor’s hand and never did he greet him”. Under Alexander, Maximinus returned to the army and was assigned to the post of  tribune of  the Fourth Legion. Although considered fictional,41 this account would not stray too far from the general experience of  a barbarian brought into Romanitas through the army. The way in which his integration into military routine and discipline is described, along with his friendship with barbarian peoples, points to a reality plausibly experienced by soldiers of different ethnicities and who developed their activity in a mixed cultural context, outside the central framework of  Roman culture (4.4-5): He was singularly beloved by the Getae, moreover, as if  he were one of  themselves. 5 And the Alani, or at least those of  them who came to the river-bank, continually exchanged gifts with him and hailed him as friend.

In the biographer’s perception, livingness at the intersection of  different cultures does not appear to have hindered his proximity to Romanitas. His successive withdrawals from the army due to Macrinus and Elagabalus’ behaviour present him as an individual with an acute moral awareness  –  whether natural, cultural or both  –  that attests an adjustment to the core values of  Roman culture. Thus, the biographer says that when Alexandre put him in charge of  the entire army,42 “everyone, everywhere, 41 See T. Mommsen, “Die Scriptores”, p. 259; Syme, Emperors, p. 184. Speidel, “Maximinus”, pp. 345–46, based on the discovery in 2008 of the battlefield of  Harzhorn, considers “[…] that the author of  the Historia Augusta drew reliable information for Maximinus’ biography not only from Herodian but also from other independent sources”. 42  The information is incorrect, since he has only commanded the recruits on the Rhine. Cf. SHA, Alex. 59.7: “Many, indeed, relate that he was slain by some

240

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

was pleased  –  tribunes, generals, and men”, suggesting his total acceptance by the system of  imperial authority. Although he is  portrayed as a  good soldier, his characterisation after ascending to purple undergoes a  profound change. From this point on, the most part of  references to Maximinus, either in his biography or in the biographies of  the following emperors, point out to “The characterization of  Maximinus as a bandit or public enemy  […]. He  is  ‘latro improbus’ (Max. et Balb. 17.1), ‘nefarius latro’ (Max. et Balb. 17.2), ‘sceleratus latro’ (Max. et Balb. 17.6), and ‘hostis publicus’ (Maximin. 15.9, 16.5, 18.2, 20.8, 26.2; Gord. 11.7, 11.9, 11.10; Max. et Balb. 1.4, 2.11). This kind of  language is applied elsewhere in the Historia Augusta only to usurpers, not legitimate emperors”.43 Although the author again praises him for his cleverness and good qualities as a  military man,44 the biography becomes highly unfavourable and condemnatory. Unfavourable Vitae are common in the biographical tradition and also in the Historia Augusta. In Roman biography, vices and disruptive political performance are the basis for creating negative characters. In Maximinus’ vita this negative characterization is  largely achieved at the expense of  elements that reinforce the separate 45 nature of  his identity. In order to accomplish this, two main discursive strategies are employed: hyperpolarization of  the concepts of  culture and nature and ideological decontextualization of  crudelitas. Closeness to nature, as Hingley points out, was an aspect of  Roman imagery that was deeply associated with “non-civilized” behaviour: “Barbarians were perceived as being closer to nature, warlike and irrational. They were marked out from the civilized by recruits despatched by Maximinus (to whom they had been assigned for their training), and many others give different accounts”. Cf. also Herod. 6.8.2. 43  Rohrbacher, The Play, p. 167. 44 SHA, Maximin. 8.2–4: “Now Maximinus was always clever enough not to rule the soldiers by force alone; on the contrary, he made them devoted to him by rewards and riches. 3 He never took away any man’s rations; 4 he never let any man in his army work as a smith or artisan, which most of  them are, but kept the legions busy only with frequent hunting”. 45   According to W. Welsch, “Transculturality”, p. 195, separateness is one of  the features of  the traditional concept of  “single culture”: “Every culture is, as the culture of  one folk, to be distinguished and to remain separated from other folks’ cultures. The concept is separatory”.

241

C. TEIXEIRA

strange clothing, different ways of  living and aberrant (although also, sometimes, admirable) behaviour. In general, however, from the Roman viewpoint, they lacked both the moral quality of  civilized people and also the culture that defined the Roman elite”. These features – irrationality, war-likeness and proximity to nature – are all addressed by the biographer and activated throughout the narrative by a set of topics that cover food (4.1, 4.2), drink (4.1), physique (2.6, 6.8), bloodthirstiness 46 and an inability to exercise control over emotions,47 sometimes reinforced by comparisons and metaphors alluding to wildlife.48 Besides that, direct references to his barbarian origin, as a means of emphasising the sense of belonging to an exogroup, is constant throughout Maximinus’ biography. These references, frequently used to conclude an earlier assessment regarding the emperor’s mores and behaviors’, articulate different types and levels of  prejudice. For instance, in 9.5, his incapacity to understand Greek is highlighted: “But when he asked his friends what the clown on the stage had said, they told him that he was simply singing some old verses written against violent men, and he, being a Thracian and a  barbarian, believed them”; in 12.7, after transcribing the 46  SHA, Maximin., 12.6: “We cannot, Conscript Fathers, tell you all that we have done. Throughout an area of  forty or fifty miles we have burned the villages of  the Germans, driven off  their flocks, carried away captives, killed men in arms, and fought a battle in a swamp. And we should have pushed on to the forests, had not the depth of  the swamps prevented our crossing”. 47 SHA, Maximin., 17.1–3: “When this decree of  the senate reached Maximinus, being by nature passionate, he so flamed with fury that you would have thought him not a  man but a  wild beast. He  dashed himself  against the walls, sometimes he threw himself  upon the ground, he screamed incoherently aloud, he snatched at his sword as though he could slaughter the senate then and there, he rent his royal robes, he beat the palace-attendants, and, had not the youth retreated, certain authorities affirm, he would have torn out his young son’s eyes”. The passage slightly recalls the text by Seneca’s De ira, 1.1.3–5. W. Harris, Restraining Rage: The Ideology of  Anger Control in Classical Antiquity, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 2001, pp. 248–49, observes: “From Augustus’ time onwards, the positive or negative character of  a Roman ruler – and of  a potential ruler – could be signaled by his control over his anger, or the lack of  it”. 48  SHA, Maximin., 10.1: “And now when he had already taken on the life and character of  a wild beast, he was made still harsher and more savage by a revolt which Magnus, a certain man of  consular rank, plotted against him”; SHA, Maximin., 17.1–3: “When this decree of the senate reached Maximinus, being by nature passionate, he so flamed with fury that you would have thought him not a man but a wild beast”.

242

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

letter that he had sent to the Senate, boasting sanguinary deeds in the war, the biographer concludes that “Aelius Cordus says that this oration was entirely his own; 8 and it is easily believed. For what is  there in  it of  which a  barbarian soldier were not capable?”; in 29.1, a possible marriage between Maximinus’s son and a girl from the imperial family is considered in the following terms: Aurelius Alexander wished to give him his sister Theoclia in marriage and wrote to his mother Mamaea these words concerning the youth: 2 “Mother, were there not an element of  the barbarian in the character of  the elder Maximinus – he who is  out general, and a  very good one, too – I had already married your Theoclia to Maximinus the younger. 3 But I am afraid that such a product of Greek culture as my sister could not endure a  barbarian father-in-law, however much the young man himself  seems handsome and learned and polished in Greek elegance”.

These excerpts illustrate the casting of Maximinus as non-Roman, combining various perceptions related to his origin. These perceptions give us an idea of  the mechanisms used to operate cultural and social categories, since origin is defined by the lack of sophisticated cultural content (9.5), by behaviour separateness (12.7) and also by challenges to established social relations. The biographer’s account of  Emperor Severus Alexander’s letter (29.1) clearly expresses that culture, even when fully assimilated, as is the case of  Maximinus’ son, is  not sufficient to transcend family origin. Origin is thus perceived as a conflictive element to the established social relations, since it disrupts rules, expectations and group interests. In  this sense, the biographer perceives origin as a boundary-­category that separates cultures and classes, and, ultimately, identities, considered as synthesis of  status, roles, expectations and interests. Origin also played an important role in the biographies of  Macrinus, Elagabalus and Alexander in the Historia Augusta. In Macrinus’ uita, the emperor’s humble origin is counted against him; 49 49 SHA, Macr. 5.5: “Macrinus moreover, feared also his colleague, lest he too might desire to rule; for all hoped that he would, and, had he received the support of  a single company of  soldiers, he himself  would not have been unwilling. All, indeed, would most gladly have had him because of  their hatred for Macrinus

243

C. TEIXEIRA

in Severus Alexander’s uita, the emperor is  described as being ashamed of his origins, a self-perception that fits suspiciously with the biographer’s intention to portray him as a good ruler; 50 and the biography of  Elagabalus constitutes a narrative built generically upon stereotypes and prejudices that in the Roman popular imaginary were associated with the Orient (religion, clothes, rites, festivities, etc.) and the Orientals (luxury, exuberance, lassitude, sexual behaviour,  etc.). However, despite his foreignness, Elagabalus social status and family background were important factors in the biographer’s assessment of his character. Although generally portrayed as a bad ruler, the biographer, at least, situates him within the same conceptual framework as Nero, Caligula, Otho and Vitellius to whom he is compared. On the contrary, in Maximinus’ vita, foreignness is constantly highlighted by references to his lack of  refinement, deviant behaviour and barbarian origin. Nor is he given the benefit of  being compared to any previous ruler, either in the positive or negative sense, thus pushing him further to the margins of  Roman society. This perception is  reinforced by the way crudelitas 51 is  performed in Maximinus’ vita. Cruelty, a common and conventional species in Biography, appears frequently as a  feature of  nature. In Maximinus, however, the topic is moved from the context of  natura to the political field, being used primarily to demonstrate his inadequacy to rule the Empire (8.7–8): […] and all this for no desire for personal authority but because he seemed to wish military discipline to be supreme, and wished to amend civil affairs on that pattern  […] As a matter of  fact, he was convinced that the throne could not be held except by cruelty.

Underlying this statement, there  is a  clear attempt to diminish his ability to rule, distancing him from the great princes, who recon account of  his evil life or his humble origin, for all former emperors had been noble in birth”. However, the notion of exclusion in his biography is not so closely related to origin as it is in Maximinus’ vita. 50 SHA, Alex. 65.1. 51  On the topic of  cruelty in biography, specially in Suetonius, see J. L. Bran­ dão, Máscaras dos Césares: teatro e moralidade nas vidas suetonianas, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2009.

244

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

ognise that political and military spheres imply different means of  management and that the use of  “good qualities” (Claud. 2.3) is the best way to acquire both reputation and the loyalty of  the subjects. However, from the biographer’s perspective, cruelty and martialisation of  the political sphere do not appear merely as a  result of  a  lack of  vision regarding the elements traditionally related to the ars governandi. As  clearly stated in 8.9–9.1, this topic is also used to demonstrate that this model of  political action is largely motivated by Maximinus’ self-perception and by the high degree of  self-prejudice regarding his own background (Max. 8.9–11): He likewise feared that the nobility, because of  his low barbarian birth, would scorn him remembering in this connection how he had been scorned at Rome by the very slaves of  the nobles, so that not even their stewards would admit him to their presence; and as is always the way with fatuous beliefs, he expected them to be the same toward him now that he was emperor. So powerful is the mere consciousness of  a low-born spirit. For to hide the lowness of  his birth he put to death all who had knowledge of  it, some of  whom, indeed, were friends who had often pitied him for his poverty and made him many presents.

Moralee very accurately argued that “Like his source Herodian, the biographer contrasts Maximinus’ barbarian blood with the noble blood of  his rivals. To find the root of  Maximinus’ cruelty, the author attributed to the emperor paranoid thoughts of  racial inferiority”.52 The rhetorical construction by which this theme is developed clearly deals with social dynamics, since the author makes the social reaction to “humble barbarian origins” dependent on social status. And, in this sense, the message that the biographer conveys is that, despite being a humble barbarian, his social rise to the Empire’s highest rank annuls the prejudice towards his origin inside the ingroup he entered; however, by creating the idea that Maximinus continues to self-perceive himself  as a member of  an exogroup, the biographer reverses the previous statement. And this means that, although he has entered Romanitas,   Moralee, “Maximinus”, p. 61.

52

245

C. TEIXEIRA

his identity is  not very distinct from the identity (frequently, a  mixed identity) acquired by newly incorporated individuals, this is, a  type of  identity that does not yet allow individuals to fully understand both the specificities of  Roman social behaviour as well as the complexity of  the political sphere. In this sense, Maximinus’ Romanness seems to correspond to the delimitation that Hingley speaks about when stating that “military identity may be identified as another form of  non-elite Roman culture, or ‘subordinate” culture, one shared, at least to an extent, by serving soldiers and retired veterans’.53 Maximinus’ inability to overcome self-prejudice is restated in Maxim. 9.6.: He suffered no nobleman at all to be near his person, ruling in this respect precisely like Spartacus or Athenio.

Self-prejudice is  now embroiled in a  complex inner/outer conceptual game. On the one hand, he is a barbarian who has entered Romanitas; however, within this ingroup, in which social stratification is strongly hierarchised, and despite occupying the highest position in it, he continues to manifest discomfort with the high social strata of  society. Evidently, what the biographer describes as discomfort is most probably a representation of  the historical tensions that, with greater or lesser assiduity over time, marked the relationships between the Emperor and the Senate. These tensions grew exponentially during the third century: “[…] the rise of the militarily-skilled equites […], many of whom had risen from soldier ranks, will have been a source of  concern for members of  the traditional aristocracy. They must have regarded such men, who in their eyes lacked the appropriate paideia, the distinguishing ‘cultural capital’ of  the senatorial elite, as socially inferior”.54 These issues are, once more, transferred by the biographer to the identity system, as suggested by the connection that the author makes between Maximinus, Spartacus and Athenio. In fact, despite being the emperor, the biographer places him, by association, on the same plane of  internal exogroups as, in this case, an exogroup   Hingley, Globalizing, p. 94.   Mennen, Power, p. 252.

53 54

246

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

of  revolted slaves, who, at a certain moment in History, acted in a disruptive way, threatening the established social model of  the ingroup. In the context of  the relatively extensive biography of  Maximinus, the biographer gives him the floor only once. After discovering that the Senate has recognised the emperor Gor­di­ anus I, Maximinus makes the following harangue to the soldiers (29.2): Fellow soldiers, we are revealing something you already know. The Africans have broken faith. When did they ever keep it? Gordian, a feeble old man on the brink of  death, has assumed the imperial office. 2 Those most sacred Conscript Fathers, who murdered Romulus and Caesar, have pronounced me a public enemy, me, who fought for them and conquered for them too; and not only me but you also, and all who stand with me. The Gordians, both father and son, they have called Augusti. 3 If   you are men, then, if  there is any might in you, let us march now against the senate and the Africans, and you shall have the goods of  them all.

This harangue clearly gives us an idea of  the structural change that was taking place in Roman culture, with regard to identities. If, throughout the biography, Maximinus is seen as a new-comer poorly integrated into the cultural framework of  Romanitas, this does not prevent him from seeing himself  as a  fully integrated subject, albeit with an awareness that he is not seen as integrated. In  fact, he sees himself  not only as someone adjusted to that world, who actively participates in its construction and defence, but also as someone who identifies himself  with the symbols that mediate the values of  the cultural world he has entered. Although the biographer summons the names of  Spartacus and Athenio to imply that the emperor’s identity as Roman has not overcome the lowest level, Maximinus summons Caesar and Romulus, two symbols respectively linked to the foundation of  the Empire and the city of  Rome, to whom he attaches his self-­ perception. After narrating his death, the biographer writes, in an epigraphical way, the following words (24.1.): “Among the provincials there was tremendous rejoicing at their death, but among the barbarians the most grievous sorrow”. This statement seals 247

C. TEIXEIRA

his impressions about Maximinus, according to the narrative pattern he has developed, portraying the Emperor as someone whose identity aligns more closely to exogroups than to Romanitas. The rise of  Maximinus, a barbarian, to the political summit of  the Empire, proves, on the one hand, that Roman culture functioned as an accumulable culture, capable of  bringing to its core a  set of  culturally different peoples and individuals and giving them opportunities to “realize their full potential”; 55 on the other hand, however, it challenges this same nature, with regard to its status as an accumulated culture. In the context of  this accumulated culture, Maximinus’ life shows that the concept of  Roman identity remains traditional and that the Other, even when it ascends to the highest form of  power, may continue to be perceived as an outsider.56 The lives of  Aurelianus, Claudius and Probus demonstrate that this perception might not be related specifically to origin stricto sensu, but rather to the fact that origin may represent something that does not allow the individual to fully adapt and function according to the model established by the cultural system. Nonetheless, this also means that, in Roman accumulated culture, difficulties in dealing with contradictory or different identities remain. In  this sense, Maximinus’ life demonstrates that an identity culture is  also a  discourse and a  continuous dialogue between hetero-perception and self-perception, interiority and exteriority, stability and fragmentation.   Hingley, Globalizing, p. 63.   Moralee, “Maximinus”, p. 72, connects the prejudices expressed throughout Maximinus’ vita to the fourth century historical environment: “The author of  the Historia Augusta and his contemporaries were probably even more selfconsciously aware of  barbarians, barbarism, and the passage of  barbarians into the empire than Victor. In flight from the Huns and allowed to settle in Thrace, the Goths revolted against the empire, killed Valens on the field in 378, and in short order marched against both Constantinople and Rome. The concern, particularly in a post–378 world, was not the passage of  effeminate non-Roman or barbarian culture into Roman territory, but the passage of  flesh-and-blood barbarians into Roman society. Like the Gothic settlers in Thrace who shamed the empire and continued to pose a threat, Maximinus, the semibarbarus from Thrace, had set upon Rome and unleashed his terror. He was, in this sense, symptomatic of  a disease that nearly put the empire in mortal danger a century and a half  later. Although this thought cannot be attributed to the author of the Historia Augusta with certainty, it is difficult to imagine the peculiarities of  the biography without the recent transgressions of  the Gothic nation in mind”. 55 56

248

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

Bibliography Adams J.  N., “On the authorship of  the Historia Augusta”, CQ  22 (1972), pp. 186–94. Ando C., Imperial Rome ad  193 to 284: the critical century, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2012. Baker R., A study of  a late antique corpus of  biographies, Diss., Oxford Univ. 2014. Bird H. W., “The Historia Augusta on Constantine’s lineage”, Arctos 31 (1997), pp. 9–17. Birley A. R., “Further echoes of Ammianus in the Historia Augusta”, HAC (1991), pp. 53–58. Birley A.  R., “The Historia Augusta and pagan historiography”, in G.  Marasco (ed.), Greek and Roman Historiography in Late Antiquity, Leiden, Brill, 2003, pp. 127–50. Brandão J. L., Máscaras dos Césares: teatro e moralidade nas vidas suetonianas, Coimbra, Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra, 2009. Brandão J. L., “A púrpura aviltada: honra e desonra nas Vidas dos Césares de Suetónio”, Humanitas 63 (2011), pp. 321–35. Braund S. M., Understanding Latin literature, London – New York, Routledge, 2002. Burgersdijk D. W. P., Style and structure of  the Historia Augusta, Diss. Amsterdam Univ., 2010. De blois L., “The military factor in the onset of crises in the Roman empire in the third century ad”, in L. de blois, E. lo cascio (eds), The impact of  the Roman army (200 bc - ad 476): economic, social, political, religious and cultural aspects, Leiden – Boston, Brill, 2007, pp. 495–508. Dench E., Romulus’ asylum. Roman identities from the Age of  Alexander to the Age of  Hadrian, Oxford, University Press, 2005. Dench E., Empire and political cultures in the Roman world, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2018. Dessau H., “Über Zeit und Persönlichkeït der Scriptores Historiae Augustae”, Hermes 24 (1889), pp. 337–92. Drinkwater J.  F., “Maximinus to Diocletian and the ‘crisis’ ”, in A. Bowman, P. Garnsey, A. Cameron (eds), The Cambridge Ancient History vol. XII: The Crises of  Empire a.d.193–337, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008, pp. 28–66. Galinsky K., Augustan culture: an interpretive introduction, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1998. 249

C. TEIXEIRA

Gruen E., Rethinking the Other in Antiquity, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2011. Gruen E., Ethnicity in the ancient world – Did it matter?, Berlin  – Boston, de Gruyter, 2020. Haegemans K., Imperial authority and dissent: the Roman empire in ad 235–38, Leuven, Peeters, 2010. Hammond M., “The transmission of  the powers of  the Roman emperor from the death of Nero in ad 68 to that of Alexander Severus in ad 235”, MAAR 24 (1956), pp. 61–133. Harris W., Restraining rage: the ideology of  anger control in Classical Antiquity, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 2001. Hebblewhite M., The emperor and the army in the later Roman empire, ad 235–395. London – New York, Routledge, 2016. Hekster O., Rome and its empire, ad  193–284. Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2008. Hengst D. Den, Emperors and historiography: collected essays on the literature of the Roman empire by Daniel Den Hengst, Leiden  – Boston, Brill, 2010. Hingley R., Globalizing Roman culture: unity, diversity and empire, London – New York, Routledge, 2005. Hohl E., Maximini duo Iuli Capitolini. Aus dem Corpus der sog. Historia Augusta herausgegeben und erläutert, Berlin, 1949. Honoré T., “Scriptor Historiae Augustae”, JRS (77), pp. 156–76. Huskinson J. (ed.), Experiencing Rome: culture, identity and power in the Roman empire, London – New-York, Routledge, 2013. Isaac B., Empire and ideology in the Graeco-Roman world: selected papers, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2017. Kulikowski M., The triumph of empire: the Roman world from Hadrian to Constantine. Cambridge Mass., Harvard University Press, 2016. Lawrence R., Berry J., Cultural identity in the Roman empire, London, Routledge, 1998. Liebeschuetz W., “Was there a  crisis of  the third century?”, in O. Hekster, G. de Kleijn, D. Slootjes (eds), Crises and the Roman Empire: proceedings of  the seventh workshop of  the international network Impact of  Empire, Nijmegen, June 20–24, Leiden – Boston, Brill, 2007, pp. 11–20. Lo Cascio E., “The Emperor and his administration. The government and administration of  the empire in the central decades of  the third century”, in A. Bowman, P. Garnsey, A. Cameron 250

WHEN THE EMPEROR IS THE OTHER

(eds), The Cambridge Ancient History vol. XII: The Crises of  Empire a.d. 193–337, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008, pp. 156–69. Loriot X., “Les premières années de la grande crise du IIIe siècle: De  l’avènement de Maximin le Thrace (235) à  la mort de Gordien III (244)”, ANRW II.2 (1975), pp. 657–787. Magie D., The Scriptores Historiae Augustae, vol. 3, Cambridge, Massachusetts – London, The Loeb Classical Library, 1953/54. Mennen I., Power and status in the Roman empire, ad 193–284, Leiden – Boston, Brill, 2011. Momigliano A., “An unsolved problem of  historical forgery: the Scriptores Historiae Augustae”, Journal of  the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 17 (1954), pp. 22–46. Mommsen T., “Die Scriptores Historiae Augustae”, Hermes 25 (1890), pp. 228–92. Moralee J., “Maximinus Thrax and the politics of race in Late Antiquity”, G&R 55 (2008), pp. 55–58. Mortazavi G., Rezakhani J., Mohagheghnia H., “The role of cultural power and its influence on global developments”, Journal of  History Culture and Art Research 7 (2018), pp. 242–60. Nye J. S., Soft Power. The means to success in world politics, New York, Public Affairs, 2004. Norden E., “Virgil’s Aeneid in the light of its own time”, in P. Hardie (ed.), Virgil: Critical assessments of classical authors, London – New York, Routledge, 1999, pp. 114–72. Parc J., Moon, H.-C., “Accumulated and accumulable cultures”, Kritika Kultura 32 (2019), pp. 429–52. Paschoud F., “L’Histoire Auguste et Dexippe”, HAC (1991), pp. 217– 70. Potter D. S., The Roman empire at bay, ad 180–395, London – New York, Routledge, 2004. Revell L., Roman imperialism and local identities, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2009. Revell L., Ways of  being Roman: discourse of identity in the Roman West, Oxford – Philadelphia, PA, Oxbow Books, 2016. Rogerson A., Virgil’s Ascanius: Imagining the future in the Aeneid, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2017. Rohrbacher D., The play of allusion in the Historia Augusta, Madison, WI – London, University of  Wisconsin Press, 2016. 251

C. TEIXEIRA

Roselaar S. T. (ed.), Processes of cultural change and integration in the Roman world, Leiden – Boston, Brill, 2015. Southern P., The Roman empire from Severus to Constantine, London – New York, Routledge, 2001. Speidel M. A., “Maximinus and the Thracians. Herodian on the coup of  235, and ethnic networks in the Roman Army of  the third century ce”, in V. Cojocaru, A. Rube (eds), Mobility in research on the Black Sea Region, 2016, pp. 339–65. Syme R., Emperors and Biography: studies in the Historia Augusta, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1971. Tomlinson J., Cultural globalization and cultural imperialism, London – New York, Continuum, 1991. Tomlinson J., Globalisation and culture, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1999. Wallace-Hadrill A., Augustan cultural revolution, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008. Welsch W., “Transculturality – the puzzling form of cultures today”, in M.  Featherstone, L.  Scott (eds) Spaces of  culture: city, nation, world, London, Sage, 1999, pp. 194–213. Woolf  G., “Becoming Roman, staying Greek: culture, identity and the civilizing process in the Roman East”, Proceedings of  the Cambridge Philological Society 40 (1994), pp. 116–43. Woolf  G., Becoming Roman: the origins of provincial civilization in Gaul, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2000. Ziolkowski A., “The background to the third-century crisis of the Roman empire” in J.  P. Arnason, K.  A. Raaflaub (eds), The Roman empire in context: historical and comparative perspectives, Malden – Oxford, Wiley-Blackwell, 2011, pp. 113–33.

252

II.

ROMAN IDENTITY IN POLITICAL AND LEGAL DISCOURSES

CARLO PELLOSO University of  Verona

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS NEW IDENTITIES AND OLD FIGURES IN ΑRCHAIC LEGAL FORMULAS

1. Introduction Over the last few decades, an abundance of  studies has attempted to decode the Latin expression “quirites”, examining it from various perspectives. Linguistic, historical and legal approaches have all been championed – either together or individually – in search of  a more precise meaning for such a mysterious terminus technicus.1 Before considering the role played by quirites (i.e. a noun used by Latin sources almost exclusively in the plural 2 in order to emphasise the multiple elements composing the Roman people as acting mainly in its “political” capacities 3) within the framwork 1   See, for the status quaestionis, C. Pelloso, Ricerche sulle assemblee quiritarie, Naples, Jovene, 2018, pp. vii–406. In particular, on the use of  the noun quirites in non-Roman contexts, see P. Schubert, “Q uirites, mais non Romains?”, in “Nomen Latinum”: Mélanges de langue, de littérature et de civilisation latines offerts au professeur A.  Schneider à  l’occasion de son départ à  la retraite, Gèneve, Droz, 1997, pp. 121–24; for the Roman context, see J. Perret, “Cives ou Q uirites”, in Hommage à la mémoire de P. Wuilleumier, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1980, pp. 269–75. 2  For some exceptions, see Festus, s.v. “Fossae Q uiritium” (Lindsay 304); cf., also, Varro, l.  L. VII,  42 and Horatius, carm. II,  7.3; Horatius, epist. I,  6.7; Ovidius, am. I,  7.29; Ovidius, metamorph. XIV,  823; Persius, V,  75; Lucanus, II, 86; Iuvenal, VIII, 47. See P. Kretschmer, “Lat. Q uirites und quiritare”, Glotta 10 (1920), pp.  147–57, esp. p.  152; D.  Porte, “Un  … mais toujours tous  …”, Vita Latina 138 (1995), pp. 2–6, esp. p. 5. 3 See R. E. A. Palmer, The Archaic Community of  the Romans, Cambridge, CUP, 1970, p. 158: “The salient difference between the Roman populus and the Q uirites is  that the former is  a  collective body and the latter are individuals”; “in political assemblies … speakers and president always addressed the citizens as This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 255–278 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128698

255

C. PELLOSO

represented by the most ancient legal institutions of  Rome, it is necessary to answer a  series of  preliminary questions. Who are the quirites? What lies behind this rather enigmatic entity often connected to the Roman populus? What legal and social realities are suggested by the so-called “ius of  the quirites”? If   one takes into account the Latin writers whose works first display some historical and linguistic ambitions, the overlap between Romans and quirites turns out to be an undisputed idea. Yet, the so-called ethnonymic thesis – which was so common among ancient authors, but appears to have been almost completely abandoned by present-day scholars – looks like it is based on rather divergent arguments and it is articulated in not a few internal branches.

2. Q uirites, that is hastati? Our term was at times associated with the divinity of  Q uirinus and with the Collis, i.e. the Q uirinal Hill; at other times, it was linked to the Sabine city of  Cures, or to the Sabine term “curis”, meaning spear,4 which could even be traced in the festuca or vindicta, i.e. a ceremonial and symbolic “weapon” used by the plaintiff  and defendant within the procedural context of the legis actio sacramento, as well as in some applications related to the legal act of  mancipatio.5 ‘Q uirites’ (never by Romani)”; Contra, cf. E. Dickey, Latin forms of address. From Plautus to Apuleius, Oxford-New York, OUP, 2002, p. 206: “Notable is the relative scarcity of  examples of  Romani, which is normally replaced by Q uirites”. 4 Paulus-Festus, s.v. “Curis” (Lindsay 43): Curis est Sabine hasta. Unde Romulus Q uirinus, quia eam ferebat, est dictus; et Romani a Q uirino Q uirites dicuntur. Q uidam eum dictum putant a Curibus, quae fuit urbs opulentissima Sabinorum. Curitim Iunonem appellabant, quia eandem ferre hastam putabant; Paulus-Festus, s.v. “Caelibaris hasta” (Lindsay 55): … vel quia matronae Iunonis Curitis in tutela sint, quae ita appellabatur a  ferenda hasta, quae lingua Sabinorum curis dicitur; cf. Varro, l. L. V, 51, V, 71; Festus, s.v. “Fossae Q uiritium” (Lindsay 304); Isidorus, origines IX, 1.84; Ovidius, Fasti II, 477–78; Servius, ad Aeneida I, 292; Macrobius, Sat. I, 9.16; Plutarchus, quaest. Rom. 87; Dionysius Halicarnassensis, II, 48.4. 5  Gaius, inst. IV,  16: Si in rem agebatur, mobilia quidem et mouentia, quae modo in ius adferri adduciue possent, in iure uindicabantur ad hunc modum: qui uindicabat, festucam tenebat; deinde ipsam rem adprehendebat, uelut hominem, et ita dicebat: HVNC EGO HOMINEM EX IVRE Q VIRITIVM MEVM ESSE AIO SECVNDVM SVAM CAVSAM; SICVT DIXI, ECCE TIBI, VINDICTAM INPOSVI, et simul homini festucam inponebat. aduersarius eadem similiter dicebat et faciebat; see Gaius, inst. I, 32 (... mancipat pater filium alicui: is eum vindicta

256

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

Such suggestions are indeed shared by some – admittedly not many – contemporary scholars, who have developed complex theories, all aimed at giving credit to the following primeval equation: quirites / Sabini.6 This is an equation that reveals a firm belief  in the fundamental contribution made by the Sabine people to primitive Rome: the ius quiritium, the ancestral “rights” (or “law”) of  the Romans would, therefore, be strongly influenced, if  not even determined, by one of  the ethnic components of  the archaic city. Accordingly, the foundation of  Rome itself  would be the result of  a Roman-Sabine interpenetration, which archaic formulas – such as populus Romanus quirites, populus Romanus quiritesque, and populus Romanus Q uiritium – should mirror. Other scholars, who do not share the idea of  an originary synoecism and remain sceptical on the supposed connection between the city of  Cures and the Roman quirites, however end up siding with a  different version of  the so-called ethnonymic interpretamanumittit ...) with Gaius, inst. I,  119: Est autem mancipatio, ut supra quoque diximus, imaginaria quaedam venditio: Q uod et ipsum ius proprium civium Romanorum est; eaque res ita agitur: Adhibitis non minus quam quinque testibus civibus Romanis puberibus et praeterea alio eiusdem condicionis, qui libram aeneam teneat, qui appellatur libripens, is, qui mancipio accipit, rem tenens ita dicit: HUNC EGO HOMINEM EX IURE Q UIRITIUM MEUM ESSE AIO ISQ UE MIHI EMPTUS ESTO HOC AERE AENEAQ UE LIBRA; deinde aere percutit libram idque aes dat ei, a quo mancipio accipit, quasi pretii loco. On the significance of  the hasta see V. Scarano Ussani, “Il significato simbolico dell’hasta nel III periodo della cultura laziale”, Ostraka 5 (1996), pp. 321–32. Cf., moreover, the persuasive remarks put forward by A. L. Prosdocimi, Forme di lingua e contenuti istituzionali nella Roma delle origini, I, Naples, Jovene, 2016, p. 273: “la hasta è l’arma esclusiva e specifica del civis = quiris, e ciò indipendentemente dal fatto di essere o non in armi: è una possibilità da non escludere, ma ciò importerebbe che la curis ‘hasta’ fosse arma unica e insegna del fatto di essere quiris: malgrado alcuni usi rituali della hasta e la identificazione del ‘senso’ della hasta nella festuca, pare una ipotesi troppo forte”. 6   E. Pais, Storia dei Romani, II, Rome, Clausen, 1913, p. 49; F. Ribezzo, “Roma delle origini. Sabini e Sabelli”, Rivista indo-greco-italica 14 (1930), pp. 59– 99, esp. p. 62; A. Monier, s.v. “Q uirites”, in Vocabulaire de droit romain, Paris, Domat-Montchrestien, 1948, p. 233; G. Devoto, Storia della lingua di Roma, Bologna, Cappelli, 1991, p. 81; this view is shared by: A. Ernout, A. Meillet, s.v. “Q uiris”, in Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue latine. Histoire des mots4, Paris, Klincksieck,  1959; A.  Ernout, “Sur quelques noms de dieux sabins”, in Studies Presented to J. Whatmough, Gravenhage, Mouton & Co., 1957, pp. 35– 38, esp. p. 35, nt. 2; contra, cf. Prosdocimi, Forme di lingua, pp. 256–96; A. L. Prosdocimi, “Populus Q uiritium Q uirites  I”, Eutopia 4.1 (1995), pp.  15–71; A. L. Prosdocimi, “Curia, Q uirites e il ‘sistema di Q uirino’ [‘Populus Q uiritium Q uirites’ II]”, Ostraka 5 (1996), pp. 243–319, esp. p. 298.

257

C. PELLOSO

tion: the quirites became the Romans, symbolically identified in the citizens “armed with spears”, or the Latins who not only took the Roman name from their city, that is Rome, but also acquired the name of  a  given “tribe” regardless of  any local designation.7 From a legal point of  view, one must admit that adhering to this view means believing that only those who were citizens and, at the same time, soldiers would have the power to declare that their ownership came from the law and the right of  the conquerors: the quirites would be those to whom land (taken, above all, from the enemy) was assigned by means of  centuriatio.8 Much criticism has been directed at such trend of thought and, as a result, the main basis of  the above-mentioned interpretation of  the phrase ius quiritium has begun to waver.9 Firstly, eminent scholars have ruled out the existence of  any historical or linguistic correlation between the origins of  the terms Cures, curis and quirites.10 Accordingly, the ius of  the quirites could no longer be understood as representing the status enjoyed either by the “Sabines” or by the citizens optimo iure, i.e. those Romans who, being males and soldiers, took part in the army as well as in the political assemblies, and also enjoyed property rights. In turn, from a religious perspective, Q uirinus would not be a “Sabine” duplication of the god Mars, but rather a Latin god: at times mono-functional and related to “the third function” (like the Etruscan Fufluns and the iguvinian Vofiono), while, at other times, multifunctional and thereby both a  warrior god and a  peaceful one.11 Thirdly, from 7  G. De Sanctis, Storia dei Romani, I, Turin, Bocca, 1907, p. 212; F. Bozza, “Ius Q uiritium”, Studi Senesi 44 (1952), pp. 1–34. 8   Bozza, “Ius Q uiritium”, pp. 24–34. 9  On the status quaestionis, cf.  A.  Nocentini, “Miti etimologici antichi e moderni intorno a Q uirites”, Archivio glottologico italiano 55 (1970), pp. 128–48; G. Prugni, “Q uirites”, Athenaeum 65 (1987), pp. 121–61. 10 See Prosdocimi, Forme di lingua, p. 272: “l’etimologia con curis ‘hasta’ è già di per sé esclusa per Q uirinus e Q uirites perché cur- non può diventare quir-; in più cur-, se va con Iuno curitis, ha quantità breve …, per cui non può andare nemmeno con cūria”; cf., moreover, Nocentini, Miti etimologici, pp. 130, 132, 133; Devoto, Storia della lingua di Roma, p. 81. 11  See  G. Dumézil, Jupiter, Mars, Q uirinus. Essai sur la conception indo-­ européenne de la société et sur les origines de Rome, Paris, Gallimard, 1941, passim; Prosdocimi, Forme di lingua, pp.  112–17, 155–61, 460–69; cf.  A.  Magdelain, “Q uirinus et le droit (spolia opima, ius fetiale, ius Q uiritium)”, in “Jus”, “imperium”, “auctoritas”. Études de droit romain, Rome, École française de Rome, 1990, pp. 229–69.

258

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

a legal point of view, it must be emphasised that the thesis at issue does not explain how the vindicatory and ritual assumption “esse ex iure quiritium”, deemed as initially limited to the ownership of  fundi, was then extended to the res nec mancipi and to movable property. Moreover, if  the citizen-soldier is the only person who can claim the ownership of  real estates and chattels, then it is necessary to assume that, at the beginning, the filii familias (if  males and adults), in their quality of  hastati, should have also been considered “owners”, at least of  real estate. However, if  their legal capacity was excluded in historical times, the clause meum esse aio ex iure quiritium would turn out to be entirely unfounded, unless one can demonstrate a  deep shift in the meaning of  the word quirites.12

3. Q uirites, that is cives Romani? According to the current prevailing opinion, quirites represents a common term connected to the political and legal institution of  the curia.13 Yet, adopting this view does not exclude the possibility of  simultaneously believing in the presence of  certain Italic elements penetrating the cultural substratum of  early Rome. In  fact, the “non-ethnic” reconstruction understands the noun curia as co-wir-ia, that is as a compound of  vir. The linguistic sign quirites should consequently be interpreted as co-wir-ites, that is, in other words, as a noun denoting the members of  the curia. From the historical and institutional point of  view, both historiographical and biographical works show quirites as an ancient synonym of  cives,14 signifying the components of  the commu12  Gaius, inst. I, 17, 35, 54, 119, II, 24, 40, 41, 82, 88, 194, 196, 222, 267, III, 56, 80, 167, IV, 16, 34, 36, 41, 45, 86, 193; Tituli ex corpore Ulpiani, I, 16, 23, III,  4, XI,  19, XIX,  20, XXIV,  7, 11a; Cicero, Mur. XII,  26; Cicero, Verr. II,  2.12.31; Probus, VI,  31–32; Fronto, contr. agr. XLIV,  8; Fragmentum de iudiciis I, 1. 13 Cf.  Kretschmer, “Lat.  Q uirites und quiritare”, pp.  147–57; Prosdocimi, “Curia, Q uirites e il ‘sistema di Q uirino’”, pp. 297, 299; A. Carandini, Remo e  Romolo. Dai rioni dei Q uiriti alla città dei Romani [775/50– 700/675 a.C.], Turin, Einaudi, 2006, p. 144. See, however, C. Koch, “Religio”. Studien zu Kult und Glauben der Römer, Nürnberg, Hans Carl, 1960, p.  26, supporting an agnostic “non liquet”. 14  Cf. Livius, V, 41.3, XXVI, 2.11, XLIII, 37.9; Tacitus, ann. I, 42; Svetonius, Caes. LXX, 2; Plutarchus, Caes. 51; Appianus, bell. civ. II, 13.

259

C. PELLOSO

nity of  Rome, rather than the belonging of  an individual to the community. Accordingly, Mommsen – highlightening the formulaic contrast between populus and quirites – assumed the existence of  an antithesis between “die Gemeinde” and “die einzelnen Bürger”.15 The Roman civitas, considered as a whole, both would be juxtaposed with the individuals living inside the centralised organisation of  the primitive curiae, and would further represent a new reality, likely to be opposed to the Latins.16 In other words, the ius quiritium would be nothing more than the right to Roman citizenship (civitas) that foreigners could acquire.

4. Q uirites, that is omnes? In the twentieth century, many Roman law scholars developed Mommsen’s theory and merged in the word quirites institutional meanings with various ethnonymic shades. However, its Sabine origins were definitively excluded,17 since this –  as has been 15 T.  Mommsen, Römisches Staatsrecht, III.13, Leipzig, Hirzel, 1887, p.  4. F.  De Visscher, “Autour du ius Q uiritium”, in Festschrift für F.  Schulz, II, Weimar,  Böhlaus, 1951, pp.  71–78, and “Ius Q uiritium, civitas Romana et nationalité moderne”, in Studi in onore di U.E. Paoli, Florence, Le Monnier, 1955, pp. 239–52; see also F. De Visscher, “Ex iure Q uiritium”, in Mélanges H. LévyBruhl, Paris, Sirey, 1959, pp. 317–23, where it is emphasised – with respect to the problem of  the ius quiritium as opposed to the law of  the Latins – that ius qui­ ri­tium, unlike civitas Romana, could denote, as a subjective status of  citizenship, a  quid minoris. See, along the same lines of  thought, G.  Valditara, Studi sul “magister populi”. Dagli ausiliari militari del “rex” ai primi magistrati repubblicani, Milan, Giuffrè, 1989, p. 154; cf., contra, M. Kaser, Das altrömische “ius”. Studien zur Rechtsvorstellung und Rechtsgeschichte der Römer, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1949, p. 77, who considers the phrases ius quiritium consequi and ius quiritium adipisci to be only recent archaicising formulas (yet, it is noteworthy that such an archaism appears only in the legislative terminology concerning the acquisition of  citizenship on the behalf  the only Latins). 16  Cf., for instance, Gaius, inst. I, 32a: Praeterea ex lege Visellia tam maiores quam minores XXX annorum manumissi et Latini facti ius Q uiritium adipiscuntur, id est fiunt cives Romani, si Romae inter vigiles sex annis militaverint. See, moreover, Gaius, inst. I, 35, III, 72–73; Tituli ex corpore Ulpiani, III, 1–5; Pauli Sententiae, IV, 9.8. 17   G. Grosso, Lezioni di storia del diritto romano, Turin, Giappichelli, 1965, p. 46; P. Bonfante, Storia del diritto romano, Rome, Istituto di diritto romano, 1934, pp.  63–64; E.  Volterra, Istituzioni di diritto romano, Rome, Edizioni Ricerca, 1961, p.  29; P.  Catalano, Linee del sistema sovrannazionale romano, Turin, Giappichelli, 1965, p. 89–96, 146–51; H. Lévy-Bruhl, Recherches sur les actions de la loi, Paris, Sirey, 1960, pp. 39–41; A. Guarino, Le origini quiritarie,

260

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

argued – would imply an inadequate evaluation of  the political, religious and legal background underlying the “quiritarian system” (i.e. a system that amounted, in turn, to an artificial organisation, rather than to a natural expression of  an ethnic identity). For instance, Mommsen’s idea was ingeniously re-elaborated by those who – within the framework of  a particular interpretation of  ius quiritium and Q uirinus – understood the quirites as the “corps civique”.18 Under the protection of  the civic body, and by means of  the vindicatory rituals, any owner could bring to justice his own “ex iure quiritium rights”, that is to say absolute rights to be respected by – and protected thanks to the testimony of   – all members of  the community. If   ownership is an erga omnes entitlement, and thereby enforceable against anybody who infringes  it,19 then it must be labelled as ex iure quiritium. Yet, even if  it  is plausible that any claim grounded ex iure quiritium could imply omnes as possible defendants, this still reveals nothing about the overlap between omnes and quirites; in other words, this says nothing about the traits of  the term at stake or, therefore, about the possibility that the quirites identify with the civic body. Moreover, through a range of  convincing arguments, the quirites have been limited to a group not exactly matching all Roman citizens. They have been considered as members of  the assemblies of  the viri, gatherings not quite overlapping the “centuriate army”, as well as the elders of  the noble groups, and on

Naples, Jovene, 1973, passim; M.  Bretone, Storia del diritto romano10, RomaBari, Laterza, 2004, p. 86. 18  A.  Magdelain, De la royauté et du droit de Romulus à  Sabinus, Rome, L’Erma di Bretschneider, 1995, p.  83; Magdelain, “Q uirinus et le droit”, pp.  229–69, on the grounds of  L.  Mitteis, Römisches Privatrecht bis auf  die Zeit Diokletian, I, Leipzig, Duncker & Humblot, 1908, p.  67 and Kaser, Das altrömische “ius”, pp. 77–78. See, moreover, C. Gioffredi, Diritto e processo nelle antiche forme giuridiche romane, Rome, Apollinaris, 1955, pp. 284–91. 19 Gaius, inst. I, 54: Ceterum cum apud cives Romanos duplex sit dominium (nam vel in bonis vel ex iure Q uiritium vel ex utroque iure cuiusque servus esse intellegitur), ita demum servum in potestate domini esse dicemus, si in bonis eius sit, etiamsi simul ex iure Q uiritum eiusdem non sit: Nam qui nudum ius Q uiritium in servo habet, is potestatem habere non intellegitur; Gaius, inst. IV, 2–3: In personam actio est, qua agimus, quotiens litigamus cum aliquo, qui nobis uel ex contractu uel ex delicto obligatus est, id est, cum intendimus DARE FACERE PRAESTARE OPORTERE. 3. In  rem actio est, cum aut corporalem rem intendimus nostram esse aut ius aliquod nobis conpetere.

261

C. PELLOSO

occasion as the Roman citizens themselves, albeit viewed in light of  certain functions and tasks.20

5. Q uirites and the Pre-Roman curia Recently, the idea of  a correlation between quirites and curia has undergone careful and innovative scrutiny. According to Prosdocimi, for instance, the thesis maintaining the existence of  a single pre-Roman curia should be favoured over the view that quirites would be members of  pre-civic and pre-urban organisms called *co-wiriae. Unlike the term civitas, which comes from the noun civis, curia would not be a “set of  quirites”, i.e. a “set of  men or warriors”. The quirites, acting almost as an authentic people, albeit without recognising themselves in a single “ethnos”, would be those who took part in a  (pre-Roman) system conceived of  as a  monistic organisation. If   the quirites corresponded, at first, to all members of  the curia, and if  Rome therefore originated either by absorbing the whole of  this former system or by duplicating it, then it follows that many of  the interpretations that give quirites a “partial” connotation should be abandoned, at least as far as the new Roman community is concerned.21 This reconstruction implies a strong divide between the primitive curia, embedded in the Romulean and Numan age, and the more recent system founded on the thirty curiae. Moreover, it denies the political and legal existence of  Rome until at least the sixth century bc, that is  to say when the populus Romanus was finally given a “totalising” value, as an army and as a people, whereas, on the contrary, the noun quirites remained a formulaic “fossil” of  the pre-existing institutional structure. In my opinion, some doubts, above all regarding these secondary aspects, cannot but arise. First of  all, it is unlikely that the lex curiata de imperio dates back to the royal age, at least according to its peculiar traits emerging during the Republican period. Notwithstanding that, if  one gives credit to Cicero and Dionysius, the people, already divided  See Pelloso, Ricerche sulle assemblee quiritarie, pp. 7–77.  See Prosdocimi, Forme di lingua, pp. 256–85.

20 21

262

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

curiatim, expressed its own suffragium.22 Did they vote? To say yes would be too risky an assumption. However, as far as the primitive regnum is concerned, one cannot rule out the possibility of  some cases where the quirites were summoned and gathered, divided into super-individual units: first, on the occasion of  the creatio through a preliminary popular iussus (which cannot be identified in the lex curiata de imperio, but amounts to a prerequisite of  such enactment); subsequently, during the inauguratio (when the people played the role of  formal witness); and, lastly, for the final iussus-suffragium, which  is –  etymologically  – the ultimate approval by acclamation of  the new rex.23 Secondly, Ulpian and Tacitus 24 have been questioned for their comments on the power ascribed to the Roman people – set as  Cicero, rep. II,  13.25: Numam qui quamquam populus curiatis eum comitiis regem esse jusserat, tamen ipse de suo imperio legem curiatam tulit; Cicero, rep. II, 17.31: Tullum Hostilium populus regem, interrege rogante, comitiis curiatis creavit, isque de imperio suo populum consuluit curiatim; cf. Cicero, rep. II, 18.33, 20.35, 21.38; Dionysius Halicarnassensis, II 5.1–2, II, 6.1–4. 23 Cf. R. Develin, “Lex Curiata and the Competence of  Magistrates”, Mnemosyne 30 (1977), pp. 49–65, esp. p. 50: “the double vote by the same assembly has seemed doubtful, as being unnecessary, but Cicero does say that Numa held the second vote despite the fact that the assembly had already chosen him king and elsewhere he remarks that this procedure was designed precisely to give the voters a chance to change their minds if  they regretted their decision”. Contra, see B. Stasse, “La loi curiate des magistrats”, RIDA 52 (2005), pp. 375–400. 24 Tacitus, ann. XI, 22: sed quaestores regibus etiam tum imperantibus instituti sunt, quod lex curiata ostendit ab L. Bruto repetita; Ulp. l.s. off. procons. Dig. 1.13.1 pr.: origo quaetoribus creandis antiquissima est et paene ante omnes magistratus. Gracchanus denique Iunius libro septimo de potestatibus etiam ipsum Romulum et Numan Pompilium binos quaestores habuisse. Q uos ipsi non sua voce, sed populi suffragio crearent, refert. Sed sicuti dubium est, an Romulo et Numa regnantibus quaestor fuerit, ita Tullo Hostilio rege quaestores fuisse certum est: et sane crebior apud veteres opinio est Tullum Hostilium primum in rem publicam induxisse quaes­ tores. See Zonaras, VII,  13, Varro, l.  L. V,  81; Paulus-Festus, s.v. “Parrici‹di› quaes­tores” (Lindsay 247). As far as the primitive regnum is concerned, the quaes­ tores were established to inquire into killings (above all on the mens rea of  the killer) and, probably, to give a final judgement on the behalf  of  the king (contra, see Plutarchus, Publ. XII, 3 and Dig. 1.2.2.22–23, where the quaes­tores seem to be considered only a magistracy of  the republican age); on a possible harmonisation of  these two views, see L. Garofalo, Appunti sul diritto criminale nella Roma monarchica e repubblicana3, Padova, Cedam, 1997, pp. 71–86. For the status quaes­ tionis, cf. V. Dementyeva, “The Functions of the Q uaestors of Archaic Rome in Criminal Justice”, Diritto@Storia, 8 (2009), passim; P. Kołodko, “The Genesis of  the Q uaestorship in the Ancient Rome. Some Remarks”, Legal Roots, 3 (2014), pp. 269–80; M. Falcon, “Funzioni e poteri dei quaestores nel V e IV secolo a.C.”, 22

263

C. PELLOSO

an assembly and organised in thirty curiae – to create, through its final iussus, the royal officials called quaestores. If  one reads Tacitus in the sense that, at the beginning of  the republic, the first consul, Brutus, was entitled to diligere the quaestores due to the lex curiata related to his imperium, and not in the sense that the quaestores were created through a lex curiata, it follows that such kind of  lex was explicitly considered a “replication”, that is a republican feature imitating its monarchic precedent.25 Thirdly, true is that populus was already structured and acting as a real army before Servius Tullius’s regnum, and ancient sources strongly attest to a  military configuration linked to the thirty curiae (three thousand infantrymen and three hundred knights). In the light of all this, only three rather unconvincing options remain, beside the one supported here as opposed to the theory at hand. According to the first, one has to consider the history of  the earliest pre-Servian army as totally ungrounded; if  one adheres to the second, the pre-civic curia would call an army only irregularly; purusant to the last, the ancient “curiate” system of Rome should be post-dated to the sixth century, i.e. within a  period between the reign of  Tullus Hostilius and that of  Servius Tullius.26 In other words, maintaining that the archaic cowiria consisted of an “autonomous” and “pre-Roman” monistic entity means in­ad­ e­quately assessing the tradition concerning the monarchic age, with its political, religious and legal institutions. The quirites existed in a  multi-structured pre-civic system that pre-dated both the Servian reforms and the foundation of  Rome. in E. Bianchi, C. Pelloso (eds), Roma e l’Italia tirrenica. Magistrature e ordinamenti istituzionali nei secoli V e IV a.C., Alessandria, Edizioni dell’Orso, 2020, pp. 71–102. 25 The dilectio-designation of  the quaestors (first a royal act and then a consular one until 447 bce) could be supplemented by an informal suffragium of  the people ordered in curiae (cf., as dating the “popular” act of  quaestores constituere to the Republican age, Pomponius l.s. ench. Dig. 1.2.2.23 [et quia, ut diximus, de capite civis Romani iniussu populi non erat lege permissum consulibus ius dicere, propterea quaestores constituebantur a  populo, qui capitalibus rebus praeessent]): this does not go against the reconstructions supported by Ulpian and Tacitus (the former concerning the creation of  the quaestors by the kings, but integrated suffragio populi; the latter dating the institution of  the quaestors to the regnum, and giving the people the power of  election by lex, only due to a  superficial reading). 26 See, amplius, Pelloso, Ricerche sulle assemblee quiritarie, pp. 23–42.

264

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

The quirites survived along with the new populus Romanus. Does this imply an exact overlap between the latter and the former?

6. Q uirites, that is Romani? It seems quite implausible that the word “quirites” could work as a  substitution for “Romans”. Firstly, because the system of  the curiae precedes Rome, and is included in Rome as a political and administrative organisation that disregards national and ethnic connotations. Secondly, because some testimonia challenge the assumption at stake. Livy,27 dealing at length with three famous episodes (the devotio of  Decius Mus, the accusation against Cneus Fulvius, and the speech given by M. Servilius before the Roman people), does not seem to use “Romans” and “quirites” as exactly equivalent terms. In  non-formulaic contexts, quirites do not map onto Romans, far from including omnes cives. On the one hand, quirites are those Romani cives entitled to participate in the assemblies and, likewise, in the army. On the other hand, they amount to a figure opposed to slavery. In a famous passage of  the tabulae censoriae, Varro 28 recounts that the praeco is ordered by the censor himself  to call all the viri: i.e. all those who, at the end of  the procedure directed to the cen27 Livius, V, 41.3: sunt qui M. Folio pontifice maximo praefante carmen devovisse eos se pro patria quiritibusque Romanis tradant; Livius, XXVI, 2.9–11: quid interfuisse inter Ti. Sempronium et Cn. Fulvium? … Cn. Fulvium Q uiritium Romanorum exercitum, honeste genitos, liberaliter educatos servilibus vitiis imbuisse; Livius, XLV,  37.8: duas mihi aliquis contiones parumper faciat, unam militum Macedonicorum, puram alteram et integrioris iudicii a favore et odio, universi populi Romani. apud contionem togatam et urbanam prius reus agatur. quid apud quirites Romanos, Ser. Galba, diceres? 28 Varro, l.  L. VI,  86:  … “fidei magistratuique nostro omnes quirites, pedites armatos privatosque, curatores omnium tribuum, si quis pro se sive pro altero rationem dari volet, voca[t] inlicium huc ad me”; Varro, l. L. VI, 88: in commentariis consularibus scriptum sic inveni: qui exercitum imperaturus erit, accenso dicit hoc: “Calpurni, voca inlicium omnes quirites huc ad me”. accensus dicit sic: “omnes quirites, inlicium visite huc ad iudices”. “C. Calpurni”, cos. dicit, “voca ad conventionem omnes quirites huc ad me”. accensus dicit sic: “omnes quirites, ite ad conventionem huc ad iudices”. dein consul eloquitur ad exercitum: “impero qua convenit ad comitia centuriata”. See, amplius, Pelloso, Ricerche sulle assemblee quiritarie, pp. 241– 346 (with bibliography and commentary).

265

C. PELLOSO

sus, and in view of  a purifying ritual called lustratio, are invoked as quirites omnes and referred to specifically as pedites armati privatique. It is a formula that, in a solemn and institutionalised context, alludes to a community which both ignores women and non-adult males, and includes liberi homines in the etymological sense of  the phrase, i.e. patres and filii belonging, either directly or indirectly, to the populus Romanus, due to their status of  cives. The noun quirites is then found twice in the consulares commentarii in connection with the description of  how the people is summoned by the herald, before the centuriate assembly – i.e. the exercitus urbanus – meets for the carrying out of  either electoral, or legislative, or judicial functions. The primary and primeval meaning of  the term at issue is etymologically distorted, for the Roman cives are summoned according to the centuriate (that is Servian) order of  the vote, even if  the word quirites still keeps bearing all the weight of  the curiate system. However, the absence of  women and non-adults within the group of  the quirites vocati still remains a clear factor. Finally, the phrase omnes quirites is  found in relation to the content of  the lex Publilia Philonis (339 bc) and the lex Hortensia (286 bc).29 It points to the addressees of the measures enacted by the popular assemblies and plebeian councils, namely to the universus populus. Here the semantic nuance is  quite different from the previous contexts, given that the word quirites seems to embrace even those who are not granted the ius suffragii, and to include both patres and plebeii. Aside from these differences, the “non-military” trait of  the quirites turns out to be prevailing, if  not totalising. This noun is regularly used in formalised frameworks, relating to the purely “civic” functions carried out by the populus, as well as to contexts that are “formally military” (since the Roman people is gathered as an army), but “substantially civic” (since the Roman 29  Laelius Felix, 1 ad Q .  Muc. (Gellius, XV,  27.4: O.  Lenel, “Palingenesia iuris civilis”, I, Lipsiae, B. Tauchnitz, 1889, p. 557): Ita ne leges quidem proprie, sed plebisscita appellantur quae tribunis plebis ferentibus accepta sunt, quibus rogationibus ante patricii non tenebantur, donec Q . Hortensius dictator legem tulit, ut eo iure quod plebs statuisset omnes Q uirites tenerentur. See Livius, VIII, 12.14; Gaius, inst. I,  3; Plinius, nat. hist. XVI,  15.37; Laelius Felix, 1 ad Q .  Muc. 2 (Gell. XV,  27.4: P.  E. Huschke, “Iurisprudentiae anteiustinianae quae supersunt”, Lipsiae, Teubner, 1867, p. 79); Pomponius, l.s. ench. Dig. 1.2.2.8.

266

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

people is  set as an assembly). For instance, by means of  rogationes aiming at a popular general iussus, the magistrate addresses the people organised either according to the order of  the curiae (as,  e.g., in the comitial adoption) or divided into centuriae (as,  e.g., in the law-making procedure).30 Likewise, the quirites are invited, calatis comitiis, to testify to the comitial wills.31 If   the foundation by Romulus unifies the previous, politically disjointed “quiritary realities” both as an army and as a  people (this amounting to the pivotal element of  novelty with respect to the past), and accordingly the Roman kingdom embraces the previous system based on the curiae, it  is clear that, within the new (political, religious, legal and administrative) system of  reference, the quirites seem to be neither the cives of  the republican age, nor the “freemen” of  the archaic reigns (as the liberi homines mentioned in the law of  Numa on homicide correspond to “men belonging to the people”, according to the most likely etymological meaning of  such phrase).32 30  Cf.  Livius, XXI,  17.4, XXII,  10.2, XXVI,  33.13–14, XXX,  43.2, XXXVIII, 54.3; Cicero, dom. XVII, 44; Cicero, Pis. XXIX, 72. Cf. Mommsen, Römisches Staatsrecht, III.1, p. 312 f. and G. Rotondi, “Leges publicae populi Romani”: elenco cronologico con una introduzione sull’attività legislativa dei comizi romani, Milan, Giuffrè, 1912, p. 140. 31 Cf.  Gaius, inst. II,  104; Tituli ex corpore Ulpiani  XX,  9. According to Magdelain, “Q uirinus et le droit”, pp. 255, 257–58, “à une époque où l’écrit est rare, où il n’y a pas de cadastre et pas de registres d’état civil, les droits absolus, qu’il s’agisse aussi bien de l’état civil que du patrimoine, reposent sur l’assistance du corps civique, c’est ce qu’il faut entendre par ius Q uiritium  … la formule vos Q uirites testimonium mihi perhibetote … du testament libral, ridicule devant cinq témoins” dates back to the testamentum calatis comitiis where “le testateur place ses dernières volontés sous la protection de tous ses concitoyens” (cf., moreover, F. Terranova, Ricerche sul “testamentum per aes et libram”, I, Il ruolo del “familiae emptor” [con particolare riguardo al formulario del testamento librale], Turin, Giappichelli, 2011, pp. 354–55e nt. 761). 32  Paulus-Festus s.v. “Parrici‹di› quaestores” (Lindsay 247): […] ita fuisse indicat lex Numae Pompili regis his composita verbis: Si qui hominem liberum dolo sciens morti duit, paricidas esto. Cf.  L. Garofalo, “Homo liber et homo sacer: deux archétypes de l’appartenance”, Revue historique de droit français et étranger 87 (2009), pp.  317–37; M.  Falcon, “Paricidas esto. Alle origini della persecuzione dell’omicidio”, in L. Garofalo (ed.), Sacertà e repressione criminale in Roma arcaica, Naples, Jovene, 2013, pp. 191–274; C. Pelloso, “Sew It up in the Sack and Merge It into Running Waters! Parricidium and Monstrosity in Roman Law”, in D. Carpi (ed.), Monsters and Monstrosity. From the Canon to the AntiCanon: Literary and Juridical Subversions, Berlin-New York, De Gruyter, 2019, pp. 45–76.

267

C. PELLOSO

In short, the term “quirites” originally designated neither the “Sabini”, nor the “members of  a unitary pre-Servian system”, nor the “Roman citizens” (whether “warriors” or “patricians”), nor the “Romans” ethnically connoted as such. More precisely, the analysis of  the extra-formulam uses of  the noun at issue, both in civic contexts and, albeit secondarily, in military contexts, shows its non-ethnic meaning in the sense of  “male puberes” actively taking part in the populus Romanus (in other words, endowed with the “capacity to act under public law”). It remains only to explore the formulas that link populus Romanus and quirites.

7. Populus Romanus Q uiritium The formulaic phrase populus Romanus quiritium is  used in the censorian tables, where the para-militarised context would lead the reader to favour the sense of  “populus as army”.33 Similarly, as for the ritual of  devotio, the carmen quoted by Livy does not seem to have been reworked and interpolated.34 The phrase popu33 Cf.  Varro, l.  L. VI,  86: nunc primum ponam ‹de› censoriis tabulis: ubi noctu in templum censor[a] auspicaverit atque de caelo nuntium erit, praeconi[s] sic imperato ut viros vocet: “quod bonum fortunatum felix salutareque sie[ri]t Populo Romano Q uiritium reique publicae Populi Romani Q uiritium mihique collegaeque meo, fidei magistratuique nostro omnes quirites, pedites armatos privatosque, curatores omnium tribuum, si quis pro se sive pro altero rationem dari volet, voca[t] inlicium huc ad me” (cf., for the reading “Populo Romano Q uiritium”, E. Riganti, Varrone. “De lingua latina”. Libro VI, testo critico, traduzione e commento, Bologna, Patron, 1978, a.l.; L. Spengel, A. Spengel, “M. Terentii Varronis de lingua Latina quae supersunt”, Berlin, Duncker & Humblot, 1885, a.l.; see Prosdocimi, Forme di lingua, p. 21: “PRQ -ium è stato corretto dal Brissonius – e, di qui, accolto nella vulgata – in PRQ -ibus: senza alcuna ragione testuale in quanto basato su un solo manoscritto contro tutti gli altri; senza ragione di lectio difficilior, anzi, eventualmente, per presunta lectio facilior testuale sulla base di Gellio (cit.) o  di lectio facilior sostanziale: un populus Romanus Q uiritium è lectio difficilior sostanziale: sopra e appresso. Nel testo di Varrone l’occorrenza seguente, al genitivo, non forniva ragione di uniformare qui -ium (allora facilior) in tutta la tradizione, quindi -ium – in questa citazione – e dell’antigrafo perduto; se e dell’antigrafo e dell’archetipo e cioè della formula originale” (contra, i.e. for the reading “Populo Romano Q uiritibus” see G. Goetz, F. Schoell, “M.Terenti Varronis de lingua latina quae supersunt”, Leipzig, Teubner, 1910, a.l.; P. Flobert, Varron. La langue latine. Livre VI, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1985, a.l.). 34  Livius, VIII, 9.4–8: in hac trepidatione Decius consul M. Valerium magna uoce inclamat. “Deorum” inquit “ope, M. Valeri, opus est; agedum, pontifex publi-

268

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

lus Romanus quiritium would stand for the legions pro quibus the consul Decius devovet both himself  and the enemies, and would designate the Roman army consisting of  quirites, rather than the populus universus (even though this alternative cannot be totally discarded). If   populus reflects the “people in army”,35 then the associated genitive quiritium can likely be used to designate the singulae partes of  the populus considered as a totum. Secondly, populus Romanus quiritium is found in the indictio belli, fragment of  the ancient ceremony for the initiation of  the accomplishments directed to start a bellum iustum.36 If   it is true cus populi Romani, praei uerba quibus me pro legionibus devoveam”. Pontifex eum togam praetextam sumere iussit et velato capite, manu subter togam ad mentum exserta, super telum subiectum pedibus stantem sic dicere: “Iane, Iuppiter, Mars pater, Q uirine, Bellona, Lares, Divi Novensiles, Di Indigetes, divi, quorum est potestas nostrorum hostiumque, dique Manes, vos precor veneror, veniam peto feroque, uti Populo Romano Q uiritium uim uictoriam prosperetis hostesque Populi Romani Q uiritium terrore formidine morteque adficiatis. Sicut uerbis nuncupaui, ita pro re publica [Q uiritium], exercitu, legionibus, auxiliis Populi Romani Q uiritium, legiones auxiliaque hostium mecum deis Manibus Tellurique deuoueo”. Varro, l. L. VI, 86 and Livius, VIII, 9.4–8 are cases where populus Romanus is found in the genitive case. Obviously, it would seem difficult to decide which of  the two for­ mulas (the first with quirites in the same case of populus; the second with quirites in genitive) has been concretely used. Such difficulty is lessened if, from the con­ text (where the formula is used with populus in a case different from the genitive), one can hypothetically infer the same, moving from the notum to the ignotum. See, for example, Livius, VIII, 9.7, X, 28.14, XXII, 10.2; Acta Fratrum Arvalium, CXIV.41–42 (Henzen); see, for the use of  the formula with populus in the genitive case, Livius I, 32.11, 32.13, IX, 10.9. 35  For this primitive meaning of  populus, see L. Peppe, “La nozione di populus e le sue valenze. Con un’indagine sulla terminologia pubblicistica nelle formule della evocatio e  della devotio”, in W.  Eder (ed.), Staat und Staatlichkeit in der frühen römischen Republik, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner, 1990, pp. 312–43; L. Peppe, “Civis Romana”. Forme giuridiche e modelli sociali dell’appartenenza e dell’identità femminile in Roma antica, Lecce, Libellula, 2016, pp. 89–93; L. Peppe, “Women and Civic Identity in Roman Antiquity”, Austrian Law Journal 1 (2017), pp. 23– 38, esp. p.  33: “for many centuries, the only true Roman was a  man who bore arms: in archaic language the Q uiris, not the civis. Civis was only the individual belonging to the same group, representing a kind of  a relationship: cives Romani were men, women and children. Only after the relationship between the people and the army had disintegrated did it become unequivocally clear that the people consisted of  all cives”. See, moreover, A. L. Prosdocimi, “La Roma “tarquinia” nella lingua: forme e contenuti tra il prima e il dopo”, in G. M. Della Fina (ed.), La grande Roma dei Tarquini. Atti del Convegno (Orvieto, 18–20 dicembre 2009), Rome, Q uasar, 2010, pp. 367–489. 36  Livius, I, 32.11: quod populi Priscorum Latinorum homines[ve]‹que› Prisci Latini adversus Populum Romanum Q uiritium fecerunt, deliquerunt, quod Populus Romanus Q uiritium bellum cum Priscis Latinis iussit esse senatusve Populi

269

C. PELLOSO

that the ritual is archaic, it is also true that the formalities have been subject to changes and additions (from at least as early as the fifth century bc), when the noun populus was no longer used to mean exercitus. Populus Romanus can therefore be understood in  its post-Servian meaning: the “deliberative people” gathered according to a military system and in view of  carrying out nonmilitary tasks. Likewise, on the occasion of  the ver sacrum of  the year 217 bc, the formula of  votum publicum confirms the use of  the term populus in  its secondary and non-military meaning.37 Indeed, it  is Lentulus himself, together with the pontiffs, who sponsors the principle “iniussu populi voveri non posse” and elaborates the formula to be presented to the people. Once the meaning has shifted from “army” to “people”, it is reasonable to suggest that the genitive (quiritium) has changed its primitive and pre-­civic semantic sphere. It  does not seem to designate a  super-­category (the totum) of  which the people is a part; rather, it specifies the elements constituting the popular assembly and corresponding only to a part of  whole “Roman community”, since a variety of  factors related to gender, age and wealth affects the status of  qui­ rites. To say it differently, this formula mirrors “the Roman people (relative totum) made up of quirites (partes)”, and not “the Roman people (pars) belonging to quirites (absolute totum)”. Romani Q uiritium censuit, consensit, conscivit ut bellum cum Priscis Latinis fieret, ob eam rem ego Populusque Romanus ‹Q uiritium› populis Priscorum Latinorum hominbusque Priscis Latinis bellum indico facioque; for this reading, see B. Albanese, “Res repetere e bellum indicere nel rito feziale (Liv. 1,  32,  5–14)”, AUPA 46 (2000), pp. 7–47, esp. p. 44, nt. 68. Cf., on the symbolism emerging from this ritual, F. Blaive, “Indictio belli. Recherches sur l’origine du droit fécial romain ”, RIDA 40 (1993), pp. 185–207. 37  Livius, XXII, 10.1–6: L. Cornelius Lentulus pontifex maximus consulente collegium praetore omnium primum populum consulendum de vere sacro censet: iniussu populi voveri non posse. Rogatus in haec verba populus: “velitis iubeatisne haec sic fieri? Si res publica Populi Romani Q uiritium ad quinquennium proximum, sicut velim (vov)eamque, salva servata erit hisce duellis, quod duellum populo Romano cum Carthaginiensi est quaeque duella cum Gallis sunt qui cis Alpes sunt, tum donum duit Populus Romanus Q uiritium quod ver attulerit ex suillo ovillo caprino bovillo grege quaeque profana erunt Iovi fieri, ex qua die senatus populusque iusserit. Q ui faciet, quando volet quaque lege volet facito; quo modo faxit probe factum esto. Si id moritur quod fieri oportebit, profanum esto, neque scelus esto. Si quis rumpet occidetve insciens, ne fraus esto. Si quis clepsit, ne populo scelus esto neve cui cleptum erit. Si atro die faxit insciens, probe factum esto. Si nocte sive luce, si servus sive liber faxit, probe factum esto. Si antidea quam senatus populusque iusserit fieri faxitur, eo populus solutus liber esto”.

270

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

8. Populus Romanus Q uirites As far as the formula populus Romanus quirites is  concerned,38 there  is a  scanty number of  attestations: the pronunciation of  the maximus pontifex regarding the cap(t)io vestalis sacerdotis, the Acta fratrum Arvalium, and the calling of  the feast of  Compitalia proclaimed by the praetor.39 Different interpretations of  the two terms connected by asyndeton have been put forward. Populus could be the totality of  the Roman citizens in line with the centuriate system, and quirites could represent the previous order based on the curiae.40 Alternatively, some have understood this formula as mirroring an opposition, either between the community and its individuals,41 or between the military and the civic popular functions.42 Others, lastly, have seen in  it an antithesis between 38  Prosdocimi, “Populus Q uiritium Q uirites”, 28, remarks that “populus Romanus quiritesque è sempre fuori formula, cioè inserita nel modulo narrativo di Livio”, and that “se Livio innova è logico e prevedibile che lo faccia fuori formula e  che, di contro, sia rigorosamente conservativo quando cita espressamente la formula in modo diretto”. 39  Fabius Pictor, 1 iur. pont. fr. 4 (Gellius I, 12.14: Huschke, “Iurisprudentiae anteiustinianae quae supersunt”, p. 4): [“capi” autem virgo propterea dici videtur, quia pontificis maximis manu prensa ab eo parente, in cuius potestate est, veluti bello capta abducitur.] In libro primo Fabii Pictoris quae verba pontificem maximum dicere oporteat, cum virginem capiat, scriptum est. Ea verba haec sunt: “sacerdotem Vestalem, quae sacra faciat, quae ius siet sacerdotem Vestalem facere pro populo Romano Q uiritibus, uti quae optima lege fuit, ita te, Amata, capio”; Acta Fratrum Arvalium CXIV.41–42 (Henzen): Augustus … si imp(erator) Caesar … Domitianus … iuvet domusque eius incolumis erit a(nte) d(iem) XI K(alendas) Februar(ias), quae proximae populo Romano Q uiritibus, rei publicae Populi Romani Q uiritium erunt; Gellius, X, 24.3: ea verba haec sunt: die noni populo Romano Q uiritibusque Compitalia erunt. 40  Prugni, “Q uirites”, p. 141. 41  Magdelain, “Q uirinus et le droit”, p. 253: “les Q uirites sont les individualités qui forment le populus Romanus, de même que populus et homines se complètent dans l’expression: populi Priscorum Latinorum hominesque Prisci Latini (Liv. 1 32, 13). Q uirinus préside la somme des Q uirites et, à ce titre, il a comme parèdre la divinité qui se manifeste sous le pluriel Virites (Gell. 13.23.2: Virites Q uirini; cf. viritim), qui désigne les parties de ce tout”; see also Palmer, The Archaic Community of  the Romans, p. 154; P. Catalano, “Populus Romanus Q uirites”, Turin, Giappichelli, 1974, pp. 97–105. 42  U. von Lübtow, Das römische Volk: sein Staat und sein Recht, Frankfurt am Main, Klostermann, 1955, p. 32; J.-P. Neraudau, La jeunesse dans la litté­ rature et les institutions de la Rome républicaine, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1979, p.  333; J.-C.  Richard, Les origines de la plèbe romaine. Essai sur la formation du dualisme patricio-plébéeien, Rome, Ecole française de Rome, 1978, pp. 130–31, and nt. 173.

271

C. PELLOSO

divergent ethnic or topographical entities, or between different classes or groups.43 All these views share the idea that the formula at issue was elaborated when the military and timocratical reforms, whose authorship is  attributed to Servius Tullius, took place and the centuriate army replaced the quiritarian system. In other words, the cross between the pre-Roman and quiritarian reality, on the one hand, and the centuriate Roman system, on the other hand, would give rise to the two formulas at issue. However, earlier than Servius’s reign, there was in fact already a Roman people and a Roman army: thus, it is quite unlikely to assume that the community could be called Roman solely on the condition that the populus was given a centuriate structure. Indeed, these views fail to take into account many of  the remarkable recent discoveries in the field of  archaeology, the interpretation of  which has led quite a few scholars both to consider the fundamental elements of  the city-state of  Rome as already emerging since the second half  of  the eighth century bc, and to infer that the early monarchic age cannot precede the urban age. The flourishing of  a urban reality cannot be dissociated from the contextual foundation of  a  city as a political and legal reality, i.e. a new reality having first of  all (but not exclusively) its own army, that is  – with regard to Rome – the “populus of  the curiae”.44 It is clear that, if  one totally identified Rome with the previous quiritarian system, the foundation would only be vain rhetoric: on the contrary, Rome emerges as a new regnum, and the quirites, formerly included in their own curiae, are now part of  the new populus, which is in potestate regis. The formula populus Romanus 43  The following authors share the former view: F. Reiche, “Q uirites”, Klio 21 (1927), pp. 74–78; R. Paribeni, Le origini e il periodo regio. La repubblica fino alla conquista del primato in Italia, Bologna, Cappelli, 1954, p. 47; G. Devoto, Il linguaggio d’Italia. Storia e strutture linguistiche italiane dalla preistoria ai nostri giorni, Milan, Rizzoli, 1977, p. 74; S. Tondo, Profilo di storia costituzionale romana, I, Milan, Giuffrè, 1981, p.  31; L.  Labruna, s.v. “Q uirites”, in Noviss. dig. it., XIV, Turin, 1967, pp. 340–48, esp. p. 348; Nocentini, “Miti etimologici”, p. 147. For the latter, see Guarino, Le origini quiritarie, pp. 16 and nt. 28, 59, 158, 176; Kaser, Das altrömische “ius”, pp. 76–77; see, moreover, L. R. Menager, “Nature et mobiles de l’opposition entre la plèbe et le patriciat”, RIDA 19 (1972), pp. 367–97, esp. p. 389. 44 See, amplius, Pelloso, Ricerche sulle assemblee quiritarie, pp. 66–77.

272

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

quirites implies a small community, where the pre-existing civic system is transformed into a unitary structure, the populus, conceived “primarily” in a military sense. The term quirites remains in the formula as an image of  the constitutive structure and of  the origins of  the Romulean people, and, as confirmed by the sources, its main connotation (on the historical and functional level) remains a civic one. This formula presents neither two complementary parts of  a totum, nor an element that is part of  the totum, with the other being the totum itself. The same new reality is depicted in both a  unitary and pluralistic sense, since the people is, first of  all – but not restricted to – , the Roman army, whereas the quirites are members of  pre-civic entities participating in the army and in the assemblies of  the new reign.

9. Conclusions Firstly, this contribution has attempted to show that, from a diachronic perspective, quirites seem to be the only part of  “Roman citizens” whom kings, republican magistrates and priests officially and formally approach in institutional and solemn frame­ works. Q uirites, in short, cannot be reduced to the homines liberi of  the origins. Indeed, the latter include those who belong to the people, as well as those who do not actively participate in the popular assemblies (such as, for instance, a  pater familias before his puberty). The former do not overlap with Romani cives because, albeit citizens, those Romans who are excluded from the popular comitia and the army cannot be addressed as quirites. Secondly, as for the archaic formula populus Romanus qui­ri­ tium, if  the earliest meaning of  populus is army, the genitive qui­ ritium plausibly concerns the subjects that take part in the new Roman army itself, rather than a  super-category including the populus. By contrast, the different, and perhaps contemporary, formula populus Romanus quirites has been read as a totalising one: the Roman populus appears both as exercitus (in its primary meaning) and as people considered in a non-military sense (its derived, yet coessential, sense). The Romulean foundation imprints a centralisation under the banner of unity; still, the two formulas make it clear that the pre-existing pluralistic system of  the curiae (and, therefore, the pre-Roman system of  the quirites) is transplanted, 273

C. PELLOSO

albeit renewed and transformed, into the regnum, without dissolving in the abstract entity of  the “people”. If  it is true that military connotations prevail in the term populus, whereas non-military traits occur more dominantly in quirites, then the formulaic juxtaposition of  these two terms allows the first pole to be reoriented in a civic sense and the second in a military sense. On the one side, the pre-civic quirites lacked institutions such as army and assembly, while, on the other side, the civic quirites started to exercise both functions of  the Roman populus. To conclude, Rome is  a  new reality that incorporates and develops the earlier pre-civic and quiritarian system. Yet, at the same time, an original and arguably more striking element of  novelty emerges: i.e. the Roman people and its army. Against the backdrop of  the structural and functional duality of  the “new” populus, to which two overlapping figures correspond, the “ancient” status enjoyed by the quirites materialises, rewritten and recontextualised, as the foundation of  a new identity whose legal, political and religious significance overshadows any ethnic connotations and enhances its sense of  belonging. In archaic legal formulas, where the terms quirites and populus Romanus appear together, past and present coexist: new identities do not replace old figures, while a firm belief  in such harmonisation safeguards and enriches the future.

Bibliography Blaive F., “Indictio belli. Recherches sur l’origine du droit fécial romain”, RIDA 40 (1993), pp. 185–207. Bonfante P., Storia del diritto romano, Rome, Istituto di diritto romano, 1934. Bozza F., “Ius Q uiritium”, Studi Senesi 44 (1952), pp. 1–34. Bretone M., Storia del diritto romano10, Roma-Bari, Laterza, 2004. Carandini A., Remo e  Romolo. Dai rioni dei Q uiriti alla città dei Romani [775/50–700/675 a.C.], Turin, Einaudi, 2006. Catalano P., Linee del sistema sovrannazionale romano, Turin, Giap­ pichelli, 1965. Catalano P., “Populus Romanus Q uirites”, Turin, Giappichelli, 1974. De Sanctis G., Storia dei Romani, I, Turin, Bocca, 1907. 274

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

De Visscher F., “Autour du ius Q uiritium”, in Festschrift für F. Schulz, II, Weimar, Böhlaus, 1951, pp. 71–78. De Visscher F., “Ius Q uiritium, civitas Romana et nationalité moderne”, in Studi in onore di U. E.  Paoli, Florence, Le Monnier, 1955, pp. 239–52. De Visscher F., “Ex iure Q uiritium”, in Mélanges  H. Lévy-Bruhl, Paris, Sirey, 1959, pp. 317–23. Develin R., “Lex Curiata and the Competence of  Magistrates”, Mnemosyne 30 (1977), pp. 49–65. Devoto G., Storia della lingua di Roma, Bologna, Cappelli, 1991 (first ed. Bologna, 1940). Devoto G., Il  linguaggio d’Italia. Storia e  strutture linguistiche ita­ liane dalla preistoria ai nostri giorni, Milan, Rizzoli, 1977. Dickey E., Latin forms of address. From Plautus to Apuleius, OxfordNew York, OUP, 2002. Dumézil G., Jupiter, Mars, Q uirinus. Essai sur la conception indoeuropéenne de la société et sur les origines de Rome, Paris, Gallimard, 1941. Ernout A., “Sur quelques noms de dieux sabins”, in Studies Presented to J. Whatmough, Gravenhage, Mouton & Co., 1957, pp. 35–38. Ernout A., Meillet A., s.v. “Q uiris”, in Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue latine. Histoire des mots4, Paris, Klincksieck, 1959. Falcon M., “Paricidas esto. Alle origini della persecuzione del­l’o­mi­ cidio”, in L.  Garofalo (ed.), Sacertà e  repressione criminale in Roma arcaica, Naples, Jovene, 2013, pp. 191–274. Falcon M., “Funzioni e poteri dei quaestores nel V e IV secolo a.C.”, in E. Bianchi, C. Pelloso (ed.), Roma e l’Italia tirrenica. Magi­ strature e ordinamenti istituzionali nei secoli V e IV a.C., Ales­san­ dria, Edizioni dell’Orso, 2020, pp. 71–102. Flobert P., Varron. La langue latine. Livre VI, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1985. Garofalo L., Appunti sul diritto criminale nella Roma monarchica e repubblicana3, Padova, Cedam, 1997. Garofalo L., “Homo liber et homo sacer: deux archétypes de l’appartenance”, Revue historique de droit français et étranger 87 (2009), pp. 317–37. Gioffredi C., Diritto e processo nelle antiche forme giuridiche romane, Rome, Apollinaris, 1955. Goetz G., Schoell F., “M. Terenti Varronis de lingua latina quae supersunt”, Leipzig, Teubner, 1910. 275

C. PELLOSO

Grosso G., Lezioni di storia del diritto romano, Turin, Giappichelli, 1965. Guarino A., Le origini quiritarie, Naples, Jovene, 1973. Huschke P. E., “Iurisprudentiae anteiustinianae quae supersunt”, Lipsiae, Teubner, 1867. Kaser M., Das altrömische “ius”. Studien zur Rechtsvorstellung und Rechtsgeschichte der Römer, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1949. Koch C., “Religio”. Studien zu Kult und Glauben der Römer, Nürnberg, Hans Carl, 1960. Kołodko P., “The Genesis of  the Q uaestorship in the Ancient Rome. Some Remarks”, Legal Roots, 3 (2014), pp. 269–80. Kretschmer P., “Lat.  Q uirites und quiritare”, Glotta 10 (1920), pp. 147–57. Labruna L., s.v. “Q uirites”, in Noviss. dig. it., XIV, Turin, 1967, pp. 340–48. Lenel O., “Palingenesia iuris civilis”, I, Lipsiae, B. Tauchnitz, 1889. Magdelain A., “Q uirinus et le droit (spolia opima, ius fetiale, ius Q uiritium)”, in “Jus”, “imperium”, “auctoritas”. Études de droit romain, Rome, École française de Rome,1990, pp. 229–69. Magdelain A., De la royauté et du droit de Romulus à  Sabinus, Rome, L’Erma di Bretschneider, 1995. Menager L. R., “Nature et mobiles de l’opposition entre la plèbe et le patriciat”, RIDA 19 (1972), pp. 367–97. Mitteis L., Römisches Privatrecht bis auf  die Zeit Diokletian, I, Leipzig, Duncker & Humblot, 1908. Mommsen T., Römisches Staatsrecht, III.13, Leipzig, Hirzel, 1887. Monier A., s.v. “Q uirites”, in Vocabulaire de droit romain, Paris, Domat-Montchrestien, 1948, p. 233. Neraudau J.-P., La jeunesse dans la littérature et les institutions de la Rome républicaine, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1979. Nocentini A., “Miti etimologici antichi e moderni intorno a Q uirites”, in Archivio glottologico italiano 55 (1970), pp. 128–48. Pais E., Storia dei Romani, II, Rome, Clausen, 1913. Palmer R. E. A., The Archaic Community of  the Romans, Cambridge, CUP, 1970. Paribeni R., Le origini e il periodo regio. La repubblica fino alla conquista del primato in Italia, Bologna, Cappelli, 1954. Pelloso C., Ricerche sulle assemblee quiritarie, Naples, Jovene, 2018. 276

Q UIRITES AND POPULUS ROMANUS

Pelloso C., “Sew It up in the Sack and Merge It into Running Waters! Parricidium and Monstrosity in Roman Law”, in D. Carpi (ed.), Monsters and Monstrosity. From the Canon to the Anti-Canon: Literary and Juridical Subversions, Berlin-New York, De  Gruyter, 2019, pp. 45–76. Peppe L., “La nozione di populus e  le sue valenze. Con un’indagine sulla terminologia pubblicistica nelle formule della evocatio e della devotio”, in W.  Eder (ed.), Staat und Staatlichkeit in der frühen römischen Republik, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner, 1990, pp. 312–43. Peppe L., “Civis Romana”. Forme giuridiche e  modelli sociali del­l’ap­ partenenza e dell’identità femminile in Roma antica, Lecce, Libellula, 2016. Peppe L., “Women and Civic Identity in Roman Antiquity”, Austrian Law Journal 1 (2017), pp. 23–38. Perret J., “Cives ou Q uirites”, in Hommage à la mémoire de P. Wuilleumier, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1980, pp. 269–75. Porte D., “Un  … mais toujours tous  …”, Vita Latina 138 (1995), pp. 2–6. Prosdocimi A. L., “Populus Q uiritium Q uirites I ”, Eutopia 4.1 (1995), pp. 15–71. Prosdocimi A. L., “Curia, Q uirites e il ‘sistema di Q uirino’ [‘Populus Q uiritium Q uirites’ II]”, Ostraka 5 (1996), pp. 243–319. Prosdocimi A. L., “La Roma ‘tarquinia’ nella lingua: forme e contenuti tra il prima e il dopo”, in G. M. Della Fina (ed.), La grande Roma dei Tarquini. Atti del Convegno (Orvieto, 18–20 dicembre 200), Rome, Q uasar, 2010, pp. 367–489. Prosdocimi A. L., Forme di lingua e contenuti istituzionali nella Roma delle origini, I, Naples, Jovene, 2016. Prugni G., “Q uirites”, Athenaeum 65 (1987), pp. 121–61. Reiche F., “Q uirites”, Klio 21 (1927), pp. 74–78. Ribezzo F., “Roma delle origini. Sabini e Sabelli”, Rivista indo-grecoitalica 14 (1930), pp. 59–99. Richard J.-C., Les origines de la plèbe romaine. Essai sur la formation du dualisme patricio-plébéeien, Rome, Ecole française de Rome, 1978. Riganti E., Varrone. “De  lingua latina”. Libro  VI, testo critico, traduzione e commento, Bologna, Patron, 1978. Rotondi G., “Leges publicae populi Romani”: elenco cronologico con una introduzione sull’attività legislativa dei comizi romani, Milan, Giuffrè, 1912. 277

C. PELLOSO

Scarano Ussani V., “Il significato simbolico dell’hasta nel III pe­ riodo della cultura laziale”, Ostraka 5 (1996), pp. 321–32. Schubert P., “Q uirites, mais non Romains?”, in “Nomen Latinum”: Mélanges de langue, de littérature et de civilisation latines offerts au professeur A.  Schneider à  l’occasion de son départ à  la retraite, Gèneve, Droz, 1997, pp. 121–24. Spengel L., Spengel A., “M. Terentii Varronis de lingua Latina quae supersunt”, Berlin, Duncker & Humblot, 1885. Stasse B., “La loi curiate des magistrats”, RIDA 52 (2005), pp. 375– 400. Terranova F., Ricerche sul “testamentum per aes et libram”, I, Il ruolo del “familiae emptor” (con particolare riguardo al formulario del testamento librale), Turin, Giappichelli, 2011. Tondo S., Profilo di storia costituzionale romana, I, Milan, Giuffrè, 1981. Valditara G., Studi sul “magister populi”. Dagli ausiliari militari del “rex” ai primi magistrati repubblicani, Milan, Giuffrè, 1989. Volterra E., Istituzioni di diritto romano, Rome, Edizioni Ricerca, 1961. von Lübtow U., Das römische Volk: sein Staat und sein Recht, Frankfurt am Main, Klostermann, 1955.

278

FEDERICA LAZZERINI University of  Oxford ORCiD: 0000-0002-4796-315X

ROME IN THE MIRROR VARRO’S Q UEST FOR THE PAST, FOR A PRESENT GOAL 1

Marcus Terentius Varro lived a long life. Born in 116 bce, he died in 27, thus living through one of the most culturally rich moments of  the Roman Republic, its decline and end, and the advent of  the Empire. He devoted a substantial part of his life to scholarly activity, which resulted in an astonishing number of works: our sources credit him with hundreds of  volumes and account for dozens of  titles of  writings, in both poetry and prose, ranging from satires to language and linguistics, literary criticism, history and antiquarianism, and technical literature on various subjects (on agriculture, geography, law, philosophy, and the seven Greek liberal arts plus medicine and architecture).2 Such prolificity later made Varro the go-to source for a variety of  imperial and late-antique authors (Gellius, Plutarch, Charisius, Augustine, Nonius, Servius, and many others). Despite this fact, most of  Varro’s production has not survived to the present day in a  complete state; 3 however, of some of these works we have a good number of fragments and 1   I would like to thank the editors of  this volume and the reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions on earlier drafts of  this paper. I am also grateful to all the convenors of  the panel, from whose insight I have learnt a lot, both in the discussions at the 2019 conference and in the papers edited in this volume. 2  For an abridged overview of  Varro’s writings, see Werner et  al., s.v. “Varro”, in Brills Neue Pauly, 2006. For a complete review, see H. Dahlmann, s.v. “M. Terentius Varro”, RE, Suppl. VI, 1935, cols 1981–83, and B. Cardauns, Marcus Terentius Varro: Einführung in sein Werk, Heidelberg, C. Winter, 2001. 3  The books on agriculture (Rerum rusticarum libri) are the only ones to have survived in their entirety. Of  De lingua Latina, only six books (V–X) have been preserved out of  twenty-five (see further below). Many of  the other works survive in fragments; of  some, only the title is preserved. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 279–312 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128699

279

F. LAZZERINI

the date of  composition can be reconstructed to a good degree of  plausibility. This enables us to see the link between certain historical and political situations and the composition of  some of  these works, and to speculate on how their content was influenced by the circumstances of  the time. This paper aims to explore how questions of  “national” identity are faced and dealt with in Varro’s historical-antiquarian and linguistic production. By framing these writings in a  distinctive historical and ideological context, I will argue that their composition was compelled by Varro’s urge to engage in a wider ongoing discussion on the identity of  the Roman people.

1. Varro’s Writings on Roman Antiquities and Language: An Overview Before we dive into Varro’s writings which are commonly classified as “historical-antiquarian”, a word is due about the viability of  this label. Scholarship has come some way since Arnaldo Mo­mi­ gliano’s 1950 essay established an interpretative model which cast historiography and antiquarianism as contrasting (and competing) genres based on a clear-cut separation of  objects, structure, methods, selection, and use of  sources, and purposes of  the two disciplines.4 Recent studies have emphasised that, for all these aspects, the boundaries were more blurred than Mo­mi­gliano made them to be and that the works of  ancient authors such as Thucydides, Diogenes of  Halicarnassus, Cato, and indeed Varro resist being categorically labelled as either “historical” or “antiquarian”.5 4  A. Mo­mi­gliano, “Ancient History and the Antiquarian”, JWI 13 (1950), pp. 285–315. 5 E.g. I. Herklotz, “Arnaldo Mo­mi­gliano’s ‘Ancient History and the Antiquarian’: A Critical Review”, in P. N. Miller (ed.), Mo­mi­gliano and Antiquarianism: Foundations of  the Modern Cultural Sciences, Toronto, University Press, 2007, pp. 127–53. These questions were recently addressed in some of  the papers included in K.  Sandberg, C.  Smith (eds), Omnium Annalium Monumenta: Historical Writing and Historical Evidence in Republican Rome, Leiden - Boston, Brill, 2018: among these, MacRae, taking a  radical stance, argued that to classify ancient works as antiquarian is to anachronistically project a modern invention onto a literary culture which did not know such a distinction (D. MacRae, “Diligentissimus investigator antiquitatis? ‘Antiquarianism’ and Historical Evidence between Republican Rome and the Early Modern Republic of  Letters”,

280

ROME IN THE MIRROR

Nevertheless, it remains by and large accepted that, for some works and to a certain extent, we can recognise, if not an exclusive interest (as Mo­mi­gliano would have it), at least a prevalent focus either on relating and interpreting past events or on investigating religious and civic institutions, customs, and ways of  everyday life.6 As a working definition, I will refer to Varro’s writings concerned with the latter as “antiquarian”. Varro’s studies of Roman antiquities were clearly extensive and wide-ranging. The monumental Antiquitates rerum humanarum et divinarum reconstructed the origins and progressive developments of  various aspects of  the Roman state and civilisation: the res humanae (henceforth ARH) 7 recreated the history of  Rome’s topography, political system, state organisation, notable buildings and objects, etc.; the res divinae (ARD) 8 studied the Roman religious apparatus, places of  worship, priesthoods, rites,  etc. The ARD can be dated to 47–46  bce,9 and while the date of  the ARH is  more difficult to pin down, it  is unlikely that these two works, which had been conceived as complementary parts

pp. 137–15). A thorough overview of  antiquarianism and Varro which engages with this scholarly debate is  provided by Arena and Piras in the introduction to V.  Arena, G.  Piras (eds), Reconstructing the Republic: Varro and Impedial Authors, Rome, Salerno Editrice, 2018. 6  See e.g. Wiseman, seeking to mitigate MacRae’s thesis: “whether we call them antiquarians or just historians of  a particular kind, the fact is that authors like L. Cincius were not doing the same sort of  thing as authors like Livy and Dionysius” (T. P. Wiseman, “Writing Rome’s Past”, Histos 12 (2018), pp. 1–23). 7   Edited by P. Mirsch (ed.), “De M. Terenti Varronis Antiquitatum rerum humanarum libris XXV”, Leipziger Studien zur classischer Philologie 6  (1882), pp. 1–144. 8  Edited by B. Cardauns (ed.), Marcus Terentius Varro: Antiquitates rerum divinarum, Mainz, Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Literatur, 1976. 9  See the thorough reconstruction by N. Horsfall, “Varro and Caesar: Three Chronological Problems”, Bulletin of  the University of  London Institute of  Classical Studies 19 (1972), pp. 120–22. We know that the ARD were inscribed to Julius Caesar as pontifex maximus; Caesar had held this title since 63 bce, but it is not likely that Varro would have dedicated such an important piece of  writing to him before Pompey (to whom he was loyal until the very end) was defeated in Pharsalus; 48 will thus be a terminus post quem. Furthermore, as Horsfall points out (p. 121), “Varro was not likely to have addressed the r.d. to Caesar at a time when the pontifex maximus was absent from Italy”, therefore, this must have happened before the dictator left for Spain in November 46. It is also plausible that Varro’s appointment as head of  the first public library, in the Summer of  46, was Caesar’s way of  rewarding the scholar for the dedication.

281

F. LAZZERINI

of  a  whole,10 were separated by a  substantial chronological gap. Other antiquarian books include De vita populi Romani,11 which dealt with the historical background of  various aspects of  Roman culture; scholars dispute whether it was published before or after De gente populi Romani,12 which instead discussed the ethnicity and genealogy of  the Roman people. The undisputable termini post and ante quem for De vita are, respectively, 49 and 32 bce,13 and various considerations point to 43 as the most likely date of  publication of  De gente.14 Finally, although little is known of  the Aetia, the title and the six surviving fragments 15 show that it illustrated the “causes” which had brought about some typical Roman traditions. If   the critical reappraisal of  Mo­mi­gliano’s model has sought to soften the opposition of  antiquarianism and historiography, on the other hand, the intrinsic partnership between antiquarianism and philology has been underscored. The ways in which the study of  language was an asset to research into antiquities were summarised by Arena and Piras as follows: 10  Firstly, the internal arrangement of  the two works is symmetrical; furthermore, in his praise of  Varro at the beginning of  the Academica (see below, section 4 in this paper), Cicero brings the two works together. On the other hand, it is true that they were dedicated separately, and ARD, fr. 5 (ap. Aug., civ. VI, 4) has often been taken as confirming that the res humanae were written before the res divinae. The evidence, however, is not conclusive; see, again, Horsfall, Varro and Caesar. 11  The reference edition is now A. Pittà, M. Terenzio Varrone, de vita populi Romani. Introduzione e commento, Pisa, University Press, 2015. 12   Edited by P. Fraccaro (ed.), Studi Varroniani: De gente populi romani, libri IV, Padova, Angelo Draghi, 1907. 13  The work was dedicated to Atticus, who died in 32; and frr. 118 (ap. Non., pp. 245, 17 Lindsay) and 119 (ap. Non., pp. 398, 13) mention events which took place during the Civil War. Pittà, de vita, p. 8 further narrows the date down to 43–42. 14  This is suggested, firstly, by the fact that Varro purports to produce a chronology from the mythical age to the consulate of  Hirtius and Pansa, which dates to 43 and was therefore the time of  his writing (fr. 20 ap. Arnob., nat., V,  8). Furthermore, De gente deals extensively with the deification of  kings, a crucial topic in the city’s political discussion since Caesar’s assassination and Octavian’s ensuing endeavours to obtain his deification (something which Antony strongly opposed). See L.  Ross Taylor, “Varro’s De  gente populi Romani”, CPh 29/3 (1934), pp. 221–29; Horsfall, Varro and Caesar, pp. 124–25; T. Baier, “Myth and Politics in Varro’s Historical Writings”, EMC 43/3 (1999), pp. 351–67. 15   Edited by L. Mercklin, “Aetia des Varro”, Philologus 3 (1848), pp. 267–77.

282

ROME IN THE MIRROR

Not only did textual exegesis combine philology with an understanding of  the history of  religion, legal practices, and literary works, but also classical lexicography took precisely the form of  the study of  etymology. Whether investigating Roman history, language, family genealogy, jurisprudence, religious lore, or political procedure, antiquarian tools were historical research and etymology, a genealogical-reconstructive method which was substantially inductive and aimed to work back from the present to the past.16

In light of  this, whereas our modern perspective would induce us to consider Varro’s linguistic production as a  separated and self-contained section of his corpus, in Varronian scholarship the awareness has been taking hold that those writings and the historical-antiquarian ones were inspired by the same theme and complemented each other. In fact, although Varro’s advanced perceptiveness of  linguistic phenomena and profound erudition enabled him to acquire the level of  linguistic knowledge that one would credit to a specialist, casting him straightforwardly as a “grammarian” – as is sometimes done – risks hindering our recognition that his interest was not in studying language per se, but the language of  the Roman people: one of  the many aspects of  that specific cultural heritage. The linguistic writings, too, have suffered great losses in the course of  their transmission. Only De  lingua Latina accounts for at least a few books (V–X) that have survived (although with some lacunae); 17 the treatise was published some time between the Summer of  45 and December of  43 18 and was intended to 16   Arena, Piras, Reconstructing the Republic, p. 95. On this subject, see further Herklotz, A  Critical Review, pp.  131–36 and, specifically in relation to Varro, G. Piras, “Dicam dumtaxtat quod est historicon: Varro and/on the past”, in V.  Arena, F.  M. Góráin (eds), Varronian Moments, BICS 60/2 (2017), pp. 8–20. 17  The most recent complete edition is  W.  D.  C.  de Melo (ed.), Varro: De  lingua Latina: Introduction, text, translation, and commentary, New York, Oxford University Press, 2019. 18  Varro’s treatise had not yet been published by the time the Cicero’s Academica (whose second edition was completed in late August 45) appeared, nor, surely, by the time the letter fam. IX,  8.1 was written (11–12 July 45), where Cicero complains about Varro’s delay in delivering the promised dedicated work. And, since the entire work was ultimately dedicated to Cicero, it must have been issued before his death.

283

F. LAZZERINI

provide a systematisation of  all that had been accomplished thus far in the field of  language, from lexicon (etymology) to morphology (a study of  analogy in inflection and derivation) to syntax and semantics,19 specifically applied to Latin. The other works survive in fragments.20 De antiquitate litterarum, written before 86,21 related the history of  the Latin alphabet and writing conventions. The content of  De  origine linguae Latinae is  difficult to glean from the one fragment certainly belonging to this work, but it has been argued that it dates to much later than De anti­ qui­tate litterarum, probably to Varro’s old age.22 Of  De sermone Latino, dated to after 46,23 many fragments have survived which deal with a wide range of topics from orthography, prosody, metre, and inflection. The dates of  De  similitudine verborum (which discusses words of  dubious inflection), Περὶ χαρακτήρων (which probably dealt with inflectional prototypes),24 and De  utilitate ser­monis (whose extant fragments are not revealing of  the work’s content) are not known. The specific interest in the Latin language emerges from the titles and the content of  the extant fragments of  these books. As such, it is clear that Varro’s linguistic and historical-antiquarian works were linked by a common thread: the interest in building up a picture of  how various features of  what made up Roman

  The plan of  the work is illustrated in ling. VIII, 1.   The two main editions of  the fragments are included in G.  Funaioli (ed.), Grammaticae Romanae fragmenta, Leipzig, Teubner, 1907, and G. Goetz, F. Schoell (eds), M. Terenti Varronis de lingua Latina quae supersunt, Leipzig, Teubner, 1910. In what follows, I will be citing the fragments with reference to Goetz and Schoell’s edition. 21   The work was dedicated to Accius, who died in 86. 22  In fr. 46 (ap. Prisc. gramm., GL, II, p. 30), Varro discusses an orthographical problem and reports Accius’ opinion without endorsing it: therefore, Della Corte assumes that the work must have been written later in Varro’s life, after Accius’ influence on him had subsided. (F. Della Corte, La filologia Latina dalle origini a Varrone, 2nd edition [1937], Firenze, La Nuova Italia, 1981, pp. 155– 56). Goetz and Schoell attributed two other fragments to this work (45 and 47), but this attribution has been questioned: see below, n. 81. 23  The fragments report Varro’s theory of  Latin prosody, which shows a clear debt to Tyrannio’s treatise on accent; as the latter had appeared before 46, when Cicero wrote to Atticus seeking to procure it (Cic., Att. XII, 6.2), this is taken as a terminus post quem for Varro’s book. 24  See Funaioli, GRF, pp. 206–07. 19 20

284

ROME IN THE MIRROR

identity had come to be. We might speak of  a broad research project aimed at investigating the history of  Roman culture. Now, it is interesting to notice that, while Varro’s written production extends over his entire life (the earliest works being the Saturae Menippeae, the latest the Res rusticae),25 most of the works outlined above seem to have been written, or at least published, in a relatively short time span, in the course of  the 40s (with the exception of  De antiquitate litterarum, which was certainly precedent, and the four works whose dates are not known); as far as we can tell, the works produced outside of  this period belonged to different genres. Some of those writings bear traces of an awareness of and interest in the events that defined the period in which they were composed: this  is not only true for the Menippeae, which often address contemporary issues,26 but elements of political satire have also been recognised as central to the Res rusticae, in which one can read a reflection on the Roman exploitation of  the Italian territory in the early stages of the Empire.27 Therefore, since other writings show that Varro was invested in the current affairs and engaged with them, expressing his opinions through his writings, it seems legitimate to ask what prompted him to address questions about Roman culture in the central decade of  the century. To an extent, this fact is explained by some simple historical considerations. Since 78 bce, Varro had been involved in a series of  military missions at Pompey’s side: first as proquaestor against Sertorius in Spain, then as naval commander against Mithridates 25   Scholars have long debated the date of composition of the Menippeae, which Cichorius and Cèbe date between 80 and 67 (C. Cichorius, Römische Studien: Historisches, epigraphisches, literargeschichtliches aus vier Jahrhunderten Roms, Leipzig, Teubner, 1922, pp.  207–26; J.-P.  Cèbe (ed.), Varron: Satires ménippées, Rome, École française de Rome, 1972–1979, vol. 1, pp. xv–xviii). According to Salanitro, some satires were added later, up until 55 (M.  Salanitro, Le menippee di Varrone: Contributi esegetici e linguistici, Roma, Edizioni dell’Ateneo, 1990, p. 11); some scholars suggest that the writing of  the Menippeae continued for Varro’s entire life. The Res rusticae date to 37. 26 See B.  Mosca, “Satira filosofica e  politica nelle Menippee di Varrone”, ASNP 2 (1937), and A. Rolle, Dall’Oriente a Roma. Cibele, Iside e Serapide nel­ l’o­pera di Varrone, Pisa, Edizioni ETS, 2017. 27 See  G.  A. Nelsestuen, Varro the agronomist: political philosophy, satire, and agriculture in the late Republic, Columbus, Ohio, The Ohio State University, 2015.

285

F. LAZZERINI

in 67–66; he came back to Rome with Pompey in 63, but then followed him again in the last stages of  the war against Caesar. Even a devoted scholar such as Varro could hardly be expected to write so many books on Roman antiquities and language – a task which, moreover, would have required extensive research – in the middle of  a military expedition. Although, even in such circumstances, he (literally) would not put the pen down, his production during those thirty years mainly consisted of  the satires and technical handbooks that either originated from, or were useful for, the activities that he or others were undertaking.28 Conversely, once he had returned to Rome (this time, for good) in 48, he would have had the necessary time to dedicate himself  to his literary leanings. But while this change of  circumstances suggests that, after 48, it was easier for Varro to devote himself  to his research project on the history of  Roman culture, it is not convincing as the sole explanation. For one, Varro could not retire to a  tranquil life without troubles immediately after Pharsalus, as he nearly fell victim to Antony’s ambition to acquire his estate as Casinum 29 and, later, to the proscriptions after the Ides of  March. Furthermore, Varro, as any wealthy and well-connected aristocrat, would have had the means to access the private libraries available at the villas of  Cicero, Lucullus, and others throughout all his adult life: Cicero’s letters attest to the fact that he was very much included in the network through which the cultivated elite circulated books among themselves. Arguably, the technical treatises required research work not too dissimilar from the one behind the historical-antiquarian and linguistic writings; for instance, there are grounds to assume that Varro studied Posidonius’ theory of  tides to write his own De aestuariis.30 28   For instance, De ora maritima and De litoralibus were presumably written at the time when he was naval commander; and the Ephemeris navalis ad Pompeium must have been given to Pompey when he was about to leave for Spain in 77. 29  On that occasion, Caesar intervened to make Antony desist from his aims (Cic., Phil. II, 103) and Varro was safe. 30  Varro alludes to this work in ling. IX,  26, where he gives a  description of  the tidal phenomenon which bears close resemblance to Posidonius’ (fr. 217 Edelstein-Kidd). Posidonius’ theory of  tides is  considered “astonishingly complete” and unprecedented for his time (L. Edelstein, I. Kidd (eds), Posidonius,

286

ROME IN THE MIRROR

The practical circumstances may have played a part, but they alone cannot account for Varro’s choice to write so much on Roman antiquities and language in that particular time frame. The impetus and devotion with which he applied himself  to such an immense project in that period, and the abundance – even repetitiveness – of  the fruits of  his research suggest that some other factors might have guided his interest in this particular direction.

2. The Background: Loss, Confusion, and Q uestions about Romanness That the Romans attached great significance to the concept of mos maiorum is well known, as is the fact that they frequently turned to the ideal of  a glorious and uncorrupted past to seek refuge from a disconcerting present or to find a moral compass in it. WallaceHadrill distinguished three different ways of  appealing to the ancestral mores between the late Republic and the early Empire: one which served personal competition (drawing attention to the accomplishments of  one’s own ancestors), one charged with rhetorical power (often to urge the audience or readership to take example from the collective ancestors), and one which denounced a “betrayal” of  the ancestors, in the face of  a present crippled by corruption and decadence.31 The latter underscores an irreconcilable gap between the past and the present and is seen to emerge especially in times of  profound crisis. The first century bce, approaching the sunset of  the Republic, was notoriously an age of  distress, and such lamentations about the loss of  the ancestral glory and decorum abound in Cicero’s writings. But a  similar kind of  malaise was also expressed by Varro (who had been personally involved in some of  the most recent developments, as outlined above). In fact, this consideration offers a key to read one of  Varro’s satires, entitled Sexagessis Cambridge, University Press, 1972, vol. 3, p. 13): therefore, the similarity between his description of  tides and Varro’s strikes as non-coincidental. 31 A. Wallace-Hadrill, Rome’s Cultural Revolution, Cambridge, University Press, 2008, pp. 215–31.

287

F. LAZZERINI

(“The sixty-year-old”). The plot, as we can tell from the transmitted fragments, revolved around a man who, having fallen asleep at the age of  ten, woke up fifty years later, now unrecognisable to himself. The story is reminiscent of  the legend in which a similar thing had happened to Epimenides, the sixth-century Cretan prophet and poet, and Varro seems to have been fond of  this tale, which he also evokes in ling. VII,  3 (see below, section 3). The sexagessis is understandably upset by how his physical appearance has changed while he was asleep; but he appears even more shocked by how much Rome, the city that used to be his home, has transformed: Men. fr. 491 Ast.32 (ap. Non., pp. 570, 19): Romam regressus ibi nihil offendi, quod ante annos quinquaginta, cum primum dormire coepi, reliqui. When I returned to Rome, I  found nothing there of  what I had left fifty years before, when I first began to sleep.

After this declaration (which probably belongs at the beginning of  the story) follow a number of  fragments which tell us that the changes that the sixty-year-old remarks and laments are, above all, in Rome’s morality; for instance: fr. 488 Ast. (ap. Non., pp. 245, 7): ergo tum Romae parce pureque pudentis vixere, en patriam, nunc sumus in rutuba. Back then, in Rome, they used to live a  sober, chaste, and uncorrupted life. Look at our homeland! Now we are in disarray.

Several scholars have suggested dating the Sexagessis to 55 on account of  the compelling idea that Varro wrote this satire when he himself  was sixty years old,33 as a  way to exorcise a  sense of  alienation that he was experiencing. 32 R.  Astbury (ed.), M.  Terentius Varro. Saturarum Menippearum fragmenta, Munich-Leipzig, K. G. Saur, 2002. 33  I.  Mikołajczyk, “Les fragments de la satire ménippée ‘Sexagessis’ de Varron”, in Z. Abramowicz (ed.), Études de philologie classique à la mémoire de Stefan Srebrny, Toruń, Université Nicolaus Copernicus, p. 147; A. Riese, M. Te­ renti Varronis Saturarum Menippearum reliquiae, recens., prolegomena scripsit

288

ROME IN THE MIRROR

If  we seek to pinpoint the cause behind this sense of  disorientation and inability to recognise one’s own home which would have affected authors of  Varro and Cicero’s generation, we are spoilt for choice. That generation had lived through the civil war between Marius and Sulla, Sulla’s dictatorship, Catiline’s conspiracy, the shift of  powers in the wake of  Triumvirate (which Varro himself  defined a “three-headed (monster)”),34 and the war between Caesar and Pompey. The institutions which had held the Urbs since its beginning had progressively weakened: politicians served multiple consecutive terms and time and time again the rule of law was challenged (and sometimes thwarted) by “populist” waves (such as the one ridden by Clodius). However, I want to highlight one particular aspect which, alongside rampant internal strife and the evidence that the structures of  the state could no longer provide stability in the face of  unscrupulous personal competition, may have contributed to the growth of  such a  feeling of  estrangement: the traumatic encounters with “others”. Centuries of  war had brought Rome in contact with various civilisations – within and without the borders of Italia 35 – which were now politically and economically tied to the Urbs, but at least two major developments, which occurred in the years before Varro began his antiquarian and linguistic research, brought about a radical rethinking of  the very notion of  “the Roman people”. The first one was the Social War (91–89 bce), which represented a dramatic turning point in the long and troubled history of  Rome’s relationship with her neighbouring Italian peoples: A. Riese. Lipsiae, Teubner, 1865, p. 215; Mosca, Satira filosofica e politica nelle Menippee, p. 75; F. Della Corte, “La poesia di Varrone Reatino ricostruita”, MAT 69/2 (1937), p. 44; L. Robinson, “Marcus Terentius Varro, ‘Sexagesis’ or born sixty years too late”, in Atti del congresso internazionale di studi varroniani, Rieti 1974, Rieti: Centro di studi varroniani, 1976, p.  482. Against dating the satire to 55, see E. Bolisani, Varrone Menippeo, Padua, F. Vallardi, 1936, p. 266; Cèbe, Varron: Satires ménippées, vol. 12, pp. 1906–07. 34  Of  Varro’s political pamphlet Trikaranos (Τρικάρανος) little is known beyond the title. See B.  Zucchelli, “L’enigma del ΤΡΙΚΑΡΑΝΟΣ: Varrone di fronte ai triumviri”, in Atti del congresso internazionale di studi varorniani, Rieti 1974, Rieti, Centro di studi varroniani, 1976, pp. 609–25. 35  It should be kept in mind that the ancient designation of  Italia did not coincide with the entire Italian peninsula, but with the area west of  the Apennines (excluding Etruria), as defined by Appian (Hann. 34). See S. Mazzarino, Il pensiero storico classico, Bari, Laterza, 1966, vol. 2, pp. 212–13.

289

F. LAZZERINI

after the umpteenth attempt to extend citizenship rights to them was shut down by the Senate, the Marsians, the Samnites, and other Italici rose once again against their oppressive neighbour. They eventually capitulated, but the conflict – which, although short-lasting, brought about bloodshed and devastation of  proportions unseen since the Hannibalic war – left an open wound in both parties: the reluctance with which people who had taken part in those events revisited them in later years speaks to the trauma that they must have caused.36 Aside from the lived experience of  the conflict, the Social War was an exceptional event for what it represented. Whereas Florus, in the second century ce, was comfortable asserting that this was a war between members of  the same people, who shared the same blood,37 at the time when Varro wrote, not all Roman citizens would have held this opinion just as easily. In fact, the repeated clashes with peoples from central and southern Italy, who took arms against Rome (in different coalitions from time to time) ever since a time lost in a blur of  history and myth, had led some citizens of  the Urbs to progressively develop a sentiment of  distrust towards communities who were perceived as treacherous allies at best, and barbarians at worst.38 And yet, precisely because the relationship between Rome and the Italian peoples went such a long way back, because the Italians were (for better or worse) embedded in the stories that made up Rome’s mythological history ever

36   See Mouritsen’s case study of  Cicero and the anecdote concerning the encounter between Cato and the Marsic leader Poppaedius in 91 (H. Mouritsen, “From hostes acerrimi to homines nobilissimi. Two Studies in the Ancient Reception of  the Social War”, Historia 68/3 (2019), pp. 302–26). 37 Flor., II, 6.1: Sociale bellum vocetur licet, ut extenuemus invidiam; si verum tamen volumus, illud civile bellum fuit. Q uippe cum populus Romanus Etruscos, Latinos Sabinosque sibi miscuerit et unum ex omnibus sanguinem ducat, corpus fecit ex membris et ex omnibus unus est; nec minore flagitio socii intra Italiam quam intra urbem cives rebellabant. (“Let us call this war ‘social’, to soften its hatefulness; but to tell the truth, that was a civil war. For, because the Roman people mixed with Etruscans, Latins, and Sabines, and held that one and the same blood came from all of  these, from these parts they made one body and from all of  them they became one people. Yet the various allies took arms against another one in Italy no less shamefully than citizens in a city”). 38  See e.g. D. S., XVI, 15 on the Bruttians; Cic., Agr. 2.81–97 and Liv., VII, 31.5–6 on the Campanians; Cato ap. Serv., Aen. XI, 700 on the Ligurians; Lucil. ap. Non., p. 201 on the Marsians.

290

ROME IN THE MIRROR

since its very origins (the same stories that Romans evoked and celebrated as an heirloom and repository of  their sense of  community), the Italians were difficult to cast as conventional enemies. The Social War was unlike any other war that Rome had fought before because it demanded redefining that tradition which was so central to Roman identity. From that standpoint, the aftermath of  the Social War was as consequential as the conflict itself: for, although the Italians were eventually defeated militarily, they gained an exceptional political victory – obtaining the citizenship.39 From that moment on, the path for Italians to flow into the city and into various fringes of the Roman society was more open than ever; and, what is most important, municipal elites now had access to the cursus honorum.40 As competition among aristocratic families grew more and more ferocious, the ethnic origin became an important validating or disqualifying factor in a political candidate (at least at the level of  political campaigns and advertisement).41 The progressive diversification of  the Roman citizen body also had important repercussions on the sense of  Roman identity, which, as hinted at above, was already being tested by other traumatic events within the city itself. In short of  three years, the Italians, who had transitioned from being long-standing (if  incon39   This process unfolded through a series of  steps, in which Rome wielded her citizenship rights first as an incentive (with the lex Iulia de civitate, of  90, which offered the citizenship to all the Latin communities who had not taken up arms or would commit to laying them down promptly), then as a concession (with the lex Plautia Papiria de civitate, of  89, which allowed all the socii Italici to request and obtain it), finally as a reward (to the provinces of  Cis- and Transpadania, for not joining the rebellion against Rome, with the lex Pompeia de Transpadaniis, of  the same year). 40  C.  Teixeira, in this volume, also looks into how globalisation and the extended access to political careers to groups who had previously been excluded from them factored into an identity crisis, in the third century ce. 41   The subject has been thoroughly studied by G. D. Farney, Ethnic identity and aristocratic competition in Republican Rome, Cambridge, University Press, 2007). On the strained coexistence of  different ethnicities in the Roman social strata and on the Roman “idea of  Italy”, see also two works of  E. Dench: From barbarians to new men: Greek, Roman, and modern perceptions of  peoples from the central Apennines, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1995, and Romulus’ asylum: Roman identities from the age of  Alexander to the age of  Hadrian, Oxford, University Press, 2005, esp. chapt. 3. For a contrasting view, see E. Gruen, “Did Romans have an ethnic identity?”, Antichthon 47 (2013), pp. 1–17.

291

F. LAZZERINI

stant) allies to being enemies, had to be repositioned once again, this time into the role of  fellow-citizens: it  is hard to conceive that this upheaval would not have affected the significance that Romans attached to the concept of  citizenship, which had been, again, a  crucial component of  Roman identity. In  fact, there  is indication that, in the decades following the Social War, members of  the Roman nobilitas became increasingly invested in a discussion on what it actually meant to be Roman. Where should the line between “us” and “them” be drawn? Citizens of  Latin origin naturally tended to hold ethnicity as the most important requirement for one to be considered a  true Roman,42 whereas other Italians who could not boast an aboriginal status would rather emphasise historical or cultural factors as more determinant. We can imagine that the seething tension in such an environment, around who could legitimately be included into the notion of  “Romanness” and who could not, would have been exacerbated by the fact that, during the 50s (hardly a  full generation after the Social War, and at the same time as the consequences of  the Italian integration were becoming more manifest), Caesar was carrying forward his agenda of  expansion in Transalpine Gaul. The reasons why I would highlight the Gallic campaigns as the second major event concerning Rome’s relationship with “others” during Varro’s life are different from those discussed for the Social War. The Gauls too had clashed with the Romans before, but, unlike the Italian peoples, their status as aliens had never been called into question: virtually all their encounters with Rome had been very traumatic and hardly any aspect of  their civilisation was really known beside their military brutality. Not for nothing did Caesar endeavour to provide a comprehensive description of  the Gallic tribes, their society, customs, and culture in his Commentarii de bello Gallico; but Caesar was doing   Even among Latins, some aimed to establish a hierarchy based on autochthony. Cicero himself  – being from Arpinum, a city in the part of  Latium known as adiectum which had been annexed later – was occasionally the target of  slurs from citizens of  Latium vetus: Catiline referred to him as an inquilinus civis urbis Romae (Sall., Catil. 31.7); L. Torquatus called him a peregrinus (Cic., Sull. 22–25: the passage is enlightening in that it shows how Cicero wavered, not without some inconsistency, between claiming pride of  his origin, in a demand of  respect for municipia which had proven their worth to Rome, and somehow implying superiority compared to other municipia which were more “foreign” than his own). 42

292

ROME IN THE MIRROR

more than that, going to great lengths to promote a narrative that stretched the Roman notion of  “otherness” in order to make the Gauls seem less alien and fearsom to his fellow citizens.43 By all accounts, Caesar’s policy aimed to integrate the Gauls (or at least their elite) to a  considerable extent.44 Presumably this fact, in that already troubled period, put further strain on the Romans’ ability or willingness to overcome their resistance to what they perceived as barbarous. These considerations suggest correlating Varro’s works on Rome’s cultural history with this ongoing preoccupation with how to define “the Roman people”. One could argue that Varro personally had higher stakes in this conversation, being a Sabine from Reate (present-day Rieti). Admittedly, of  all the Italici who had come in contact with the Latins over the centuries, the Sabines were hardly a discriminated minority: they had been incorporated into the Roman citizenry very early, also thanks to a mythological tradition which placed them, with the Latins, at the very roots of  the Roman civilisation. A  Sabine background was therefore possibly the least likely to represent a disadvantage for non-Latin Roman citizens.45 Nevertheless, a  sense of  being different from the Latins (albeit on equal footing) was vividly felt by some Sabines – and certainly by Varro, as will be illustrated below. It is plausible that, as a prominent scholar, well known to the intellectual elite of  the time, Varro actively took part in a conversation in which he was invested himself  and begun to look for an answer to the question of  what defined the Roman identity.

43  See A.  C. Johnston, “Nostri and ‘The Other(s)’ ”, in L.  Grillo, C.  B. Krebs (eds), The Cambridge companion to the writings of  Julius Caesar, Cambridge, University Press, 2017, pp. 81–94. 44  This  is even indicated by Caesar’s linguistic politics, which aimed at the rationalisation of  the Latin language in view of  making its learning more accessible: see A. Garcea (ed.), Caesar’s De analogia, Oxford, University Press, 2012, especially pp. 7–10. 45  If   anything, a  positive stereotype was attached to the Sabines, especially since the age of  Cato the Elder, who significantly contributed to (and may even have created, as Farney suggested) the portrayal of  the Sabines as a pious, austere, and virtuous people: see Farney, Ethnic identity, especially chapt. 3.

293

F. LAZZERINI

3. Digging into the Roman Past That Varro himself  framed his “quest for the past” as something similar to archaeological excavations is made explicit by the passages in De  lingua Latina in which he discusses the difficulties that a  scholar has to face when attempting to reconstruct the etymology of  words.46 It is in this context that Varro evokes the tale of  Epimenides, alongside that of  Teucer (a character from a lost book of  Livius Andronicus), similar in content: 47 vetustas, the passage of  time, is the chief  obstacle to a researcher because it obscures and alters people, things, and ideas to the point of  making them unrecognisable.48 However, Varro draws an important distinction between vetustas and oblivio: while the latter brings about an irreparable effacement (for what has been wiped out from our memory cannot in any way be restored, see ling. V,  5), the effects of  vetustas can be overcome (with great effort).49 The archaeological comparison is suggested by the very words that the ancient authors use to describe the task of  restor  Ling. V, 3–6; VII, 2–3.   Ling. VII,  3: Nec mirum, cum non modo Epimenides sopore post annos L experrectus a  multis non cognoscatur, sed etiam Teucer Livii post XV annos ab suis qui sit ignoretur. (“And no wonder [scil. that this task is so difficult], when not only Epimenides, having woken up from his slumber after fifty years, is not recognised by many, but even the family of  Livius’ Teucer, after fifteen years, do not know who he is”). 48   On the multi-layered role of vetustas in De lingua Latina, see R. Schröter, “Die varronische Etymologie”, in B.  Cardauns (ed.), Varron: Six exposés et discussions. Entretiens du 3–8 septembre 1962, Vandœuvres-Genève, Fondation Hardt, 1963, pp. 85–86. 49  This distinction has a parallel in Cic., Deiot. 37. See the instructive discussions of this topic by C. Moatti, La raison de Rome: Naissance de l’esprit critique à la fin de la République (IIe-Ier siècle avant Jésus-Christ), Paris, Seuil, 1997, p. 14 and E. Romano, “Il concetto di antico in Varrone”, in M. Citroni (ed.), Memoria e identità. La cultura romana costruisce la sua immagine, Florence, Università degli Studi, 2003, p. 106. Vetustas plays a different (but related) role in Varro’s satires, where it reflects the longing for a lost, more virtuous past: see two contributions of  I.  Leonardis, “Vetustas, oblivio e  crisi d’identità nelle Saturae Me­ nippeae. Il risveglio di Varrone in un’altra Roma”, Ἐπέκεινα 4 (2014), pp. 19–58, and “Risvegliarsi in un’altra Roma. Crisi del presente e nostalgia del passato nelle Saturae Menippeae di Varrone”, in R. Angiolillo, E. Elia, E. Nuti (eds), Crisi. Immagini, interpretazioni e reazioni nel mondo greco, latino e bizantino. Atti del Convegno Internazionale Dottorandi e Giovani Ricercatori. Torino, 21–23, Alessandria, Edizioni dell’Orso, 2015, pp. 223–36. 46 47

294

ROME IN THE MIRROR

ing – literally, unearthing – what lies hidden and covered by the dust of  time.50 But anyone who sets out to dig into the depths of  the most distant past will soon find themselves having to untangle an intricated bundle of historical and mythological accounts, sometimes incompatible with one another. Varro probably had to face the same problem when he resolved to investigate the origins of  his own people; and, in various instances, his findings suggested that many of  the features which were considered distinctively Roman had in fact been derived from other peoples. In the second book of  the ARH, Varro traced the roots of  the Romans back to the Pelasgians, who came to Latium on the instruction of  the oracle of  Dodona; 51 but elsewhere he also endorsed the descent from Aeneas,52 so that the original Roman stock emerged from a mix of  different peoples. And then, ARH III (de ceteris Italiae gentibus), fr. 4 (ap. Non., 90, 16): Postea cum his una rem publicam coniuncti congermanitate tenuere. After, they [scil. our ancestors] kept the State united in a brotherly kinship with these peoples.

Continuing with the next historical developments, Varro acknowl­ edged that several Italian and non-Italian nations contributed to setting the foundations of  the Roman civilisation; however, he granted special prominence to the Sabines. Again in the ARH, he contended that the very few remaining cities that had been inhabited by the Aborigines were located in the territory of Reate, 50   E.g. words like eruere and operire. See ling. VI, 2: obruta vetustate ut potero eruere conabor; Cic., Mur. 16: Itaque non ex sermone hominum recenti sed ex annalium vetustate eruenda memoria est nobilitatis tuae; Enn., Ann. VIII, 282: multa tenens antiqua, sepulta vetustas / quae facit; Liv., IV, 23.3: sit inter cetera vetustate cooperta hoc quoque in incerto positum. 51  ARH II (de Aboriginibus et Latinis), fr. 2 (ap. Macr., Sat. I, 7.28–30). 52  According to a reading of  D. H., I, 67–69 by Wissowa, followed by Perret and Collart, Varro identified the Penates of  the Roman people with those of  Lavinium (G.  Wissowa, “Die Überlieferung über die römischen Penaten”, Hermes 22/1 (1887), p. 42; J. Perret, Les origines de la légende troyenne de Rome (281–31), Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1942, pp.  340–44, 351–54; J.  Collart, Varron, grammairien latin, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1954, p. 212).

295

F. LAZZERINI

his home town; 53 and that words used in everyday life, such as multa (“pecuniary fine”), came from the Sabine language 54 (see further below). Other passages bear evidence of  instances where Varro, facing more than one possible account, chose to validate the version that confirmed the Sabines’ involvement. For example, the origin of  the name of  the Aventine hill was given different explanations in antiquity; while it seems that, at the time of  Servius, there was a consensus that the name came from “the birds [aves] which would soar up from the Tiber and go rest there”, previously, others had postulated a  derivation from the name of  the king of  the Aborigines or of  the Albans (Aventinus).55 In  De  lingua Latina, Varro cautiously reported various possible etymologies (he also suggested one from adventus and one from advectus); 56 conversely, in De gente populi Romani he confidently asserted that the Sabines had named the hill after the river Avens, which flowed in their territory.57 In sum, among the Italian peoples whom Varro credited with having played a part in building the Roman civilisation, the Sabines clearly got the lion’s share. It does not appear, however, that such a  display of  patriotism (if  not, as Collart put it, a  proper case of  chauvinism) 58 was intended to place the Sabines in a position of  superiority over the remaining foreign communities, but rather to separate them from such category and to show that they were not foreign at all. In fact, while some strands of  genealogical traditions traced the Sabines back to non-Italian ancestries,59 Varro seems to have endorsed the theory of  their autochthony: according to the story (first established, as far as we know, by

  ARH X (de Italiae regionibus), fr. 4 (ap. D. H., I, 14).   ARH XXI (de magistratuum imperio et potestate), fr. 1 (ap. Gell., XI, 1.5). 55 Serv., Aen. VII, 657. The derivation from aves was also accepted by Augustine (civ. XVIII,  21); the one from king Aventinus is  also found in Ov., Fast. IV, 51, Liv., I, 3.9, and others. 56   Ling. V, 43. See de Melo, Varro, pp. 686–87. 57  De gente IV, fr. 35 (ap. Serv., Aen. VII, 657). 58  Collart, Varron, p. 228. 59   One notable example is their descent from the Spartans, asserted in Ov., Fast. I, 260; Pomp. Trog. ap. Iust., XX, 1.14–15; Plu., Rom. 16.1, Num. 1. Farney, Ethnic identity, chapt. 3, persuasively argues that this genealogy provided a convenient way to justify the stereotype of  the Sabina prisca virtus. 53

54

296

ROME IN THE MIRROR

Cato the Elder),60 they descended from the local god Sabus and had occupied the Reatine territory, previously inhabited jointly by the Aborigines and the Pelasgians. As such, on the one hand, Varro claimed that the Italian roots of  his people ran just as deep as those of  the Latins (and he aimed to bolster this claim through his historical reconstructions); on the other hand, his emphasis on the “Sabinity” of  certain elements of  Rome’s history and culture does the opposite of  merging the two groups together. Latins and Sabines were distinctly different, but contributed in equal measure to the creation of  Rome. Beyond this twofold ethnical core, Varro credits other, properly “foreign” communities with having enriched the Roman cul­ture with their own involvement. A passage from De gente is enlightening in this respect: De gente IV, fr. 37 (ap. Serv., Aen. VII, 176): Maiores enim nostri sedentes epulabantur. Q uem morem a Laconibus habuerunt et Cretensibus, ut Varro docet in libris de gente populi Romani, in quibus dicit quid a quaque traxerint gente per imitationem. Our ancestors used to dine sitting: they took this tradition from the Laconians and the Cretans, as Varro illustrates in his books “On the genealogy of  the Roman people”, where he tells what they took from each race by reproducing it.

The fact that De gente – a treatise on “the geneaology” or “the race of  the Roman people” – is  glossed by Servius as the work in which Varro illustrates what the Romans took from other ethnic groups is perhaps the most revealing indication of  where Varro stood in the discussion on Roman identity. The phrase per imi­ ta­tio­nem also bears significance, since, in ancient literature, the process of  imitatio was not intended as slavish replication of  a model (aemulatio), but always required its absorbance and some personal contribution. This fact suggests that Varro’s recognition of  various components did not result in the portrait of  the Roman civilisation as a  patchwork of  juxtaposed parts, but as a harmonious mixture. A fragment from De vita seems to point to the same conclusion:  Ap. D. H., II, 49.2.

60

297

F. LAZZERINI

De vita I, fr. 2 (ap. Non., 490, 25): †  Sed quod ea et propter talem mixturam inmoderatam exaquiscunt, itaque quod temperatura moderatur in Romuli vita triplicis civitatis. †  But  … because of  such an uncontrolled mixture, that becomes spoiled … thus, what is subject to reasonable control in Romulus’ time … of  a threefold people.

Although the text is obviously corrupt and it is difficult to make sense of  the syntax, it  is at least clear that Varro was making a comparison between mixing things in an uncontrolled way (which results in spoilage) and using moderation, as was done in Romuli vita. The phrase triplicis civitatis is  commonly understood as alluding to the three tribes (Ramnes Titienses Luceres): while there  is no scholarly consensus on who was historically part of  each tribe, and whether they distinguished three ethnic groups or not, what is  clear is  Varro’s implication that (demographic) mixture done sensibly produces good results. The same idea is found in some of  the linguistic books. Varro’s study of  language – which, as argued above, stemmed from the same commitment to “unearthing” the true origin of  the Roman culture which had inspired the antiquarian writings – produced conclusions in line with what we have seen in the passages above: that “not all words in our language come from the vernacular substrate” (ling. V, 3). In fact, some are foreign and some are “hybrid, coined here from a  foreign model” (ling. X,  69). In  a  fragment, the character of  these peregrina verba is  made more specific: Fr. 47 (ap. Lyd., Mag. II, 13): ὅτι δὲ οὐ Ῥωμαϊκὸν τουτὶ τὸ ῥημάτιον, μάρτυς ὁ Ῥωμαῖος Βάρρων ἐν βιβλίῳ πέμπτῳ περὶ Ῥωμαϊκῆς διαλέκτου, ἐν ᾧ διαρθροῦται ποία μέν τις λέξις ἐστὶν Αἰολική, ποία δὲ Γαλλική· καὶ ὅτι ἑτέρα μὲν ἡ Θούσκων, ἄλλη δὲ Ἐτρούσκων, ὧν συγχυθεισῶν ἡ νῦν κρατοῦσα τῶν Ῥωμαίων ἀπετελέσθη φωνή. That this word [scil. καρταμέρα, cartamera (“girdle”)] is  not Latin is attested by Varro the Roman in his fifth book On the Latin language, in which he distinguishes which expressions are Aeolian, which are Gallic, which come from the language of  the Tusci and which from that of  the Etrusci. From a blend of  these idioms originated what is now the Romans’ prevailing language. 298

ROME IN THE MIRROR

The passage raises a  few exegetical problems. First of  all, it  is unclear what work it belongs to.61 Another conundrum is what appears to be a double mention of the language of the Etruscans (Θούσκων  / Ἐτρούσκων), which has been explained in different ways.62 But perhaps what has puzzled scholars the most is the lack of  a  mention of  Sabine in this overview of  the various components of  the Latin language. In  light of  what discussed above, I would endorse Russo’s thesis 63 that such absence reveals a precise intent on the part of  Varro: Sabine does not belong in this catalogue of  foreign components of  Latin because it  is not a foreign language; it enjoys the same privilege of  autochthony as the idiom of  the Latins. In fact, in the books of  De lingua Latina   Goetz and Schoell include this fragment among those attributed to De ori­ gine linguae Latinae. By contrast, Collart, Varron, p. 25 observes that a number of  elements point to De lingua Latina: (a) περὶ Ῥωμαϊκῆς διαλέκτου looks like the literal translation of  said treatise’s title; (b) the reference to a “fifth book” rules out De origine linguae Latinae, De similitudine verborum, De utilitate sermonis, and Περὶ χαρακτήρων, all of  which reportedly had less than five books; (c) book V of  De  lingua Latina contains the etymologies of  vocabula locorum et quae in his sunt (ling. V, 10), which include clothing items (especially §§ 130–33), and there is a lacuna after § 162 where, possibly, this passage could fit. I would demur at the latter point, because a generic discussion on the distinction between Aeolic, Gallic, and Etruscan words seems oddly placed in book V. It is possible, of course, that such a discussion was in the lacuna, but overall, this book is organised differently, moving from one semantic area to the other and reconstructing the etymologies of  different words, which sometimes are said to be of  foreign origin: it would therefore be strange of  Lydus to summarise the book like that. 62  Most notably, Pascucci speculated that Θούσκων derived from a  corruption of  Ὀπικῶν or Ὄσκων, and that the ethnonym “Oscan” was meant to include the Sabines as well (G. Pascucci, “Le componenti linguistiche del latino secondo la dottrina varroniana”, in Studi su Varrone, sulla retorica, storiografia e poesia latina: Scritti in onore di Benedetto Riposati, Rieti, Centro di studi varroniani, 1979, p.  340 n.  4); see the convincing objection to this hypothesis by of  F. Russo, “Greco, Gallico ed Etrusco: Varrone e le componenti del Latino”, AC 80/1 (2011), p. 168. According to Briquel, the text is correct and the double mention reflects the intent to separate the most recent Etruscan loanwords (which seeped into Latin through contact with the Tusci) from the most ancient ones (through the Etrusci) (J. Briq  uel, “La conception du latin comme langue mixte chez Varron”, in C.  Moussy, J.  Dangel (eds), De  lingua Latina novae quaestiones: Actes du Xe colloque international de linguistique latine, Paris, Sèvres, 19–23 avril 1999, Louvain, Peeters, 2001, pp. 1033–43). The additional suggestion of  Russo, Greco, Gallico ed Etrusco, p. 177 n. 58, that the inconsistent toponyms and ethnonyms in Latin for Etruria and its inhabitants may have simply confused Lydus, also seems sensible. 63   Russo, Greco, Gallico ed Etrusco. 61

299

F. LAZZERINI

on etymology (V–VII), Varro pointed to numerous Latin words of  Sabine origin: words related to rural life (e.g. haedus (“kid”), hircus (“buck”),64 crepusculum (“dusk”),65 and various produce of  the fields), to religion (especially theonyms: Feronia, Minerva, Novensides, Pales, Vesta, Salus, Fortuna, Fons, Fides,66 and others), and to everyday life (supparus (“feminine garment”); 67 lixula (“pancake”); 68 and other words of  domestic utility). As for foreign words proper, to start with, Varro traced several Latin words back to the Greek world. The idea that Latin had derived from Greek (and specifically the Aeolian dialect) was fairly popular in Varro’s time 69 and Varro appears to have mildly endorsed it insofar as he recognised a conspicuous Greek layer in the make-up of  the Latin of  his day. In  his etymological reconstructions, sometimes he drew attention to the similarity between a  Latin word and its Greek equivalent (e.g. ager (“field”) ~ ἀγρός; 70 malum (“apple”) ~ μᾶλον),71 other times he straightforwardly postulated a derivation of  one from the other (e.g. puteus (“well”) < πύταμον, Aeolian for ποταμός).72 Beside Greek, Varro’s recognition of  foreign words remarkably stretched out to encompass the languages of  peoples whom many hard-core elitist Latin citizens tended to look at with much more suspicion

64  Ling. V, 43. Varro perceptively noticed the phonological correspondence: Lat. /h/ ~ Sab. /f/. He remarked the same phenomenon in harena “sand” ~ Sab. fasena (ap. Serv., Aen. I, 172). 65  Ling. VI, 5; VII, 77. 66  All of  these names are given in ling. V, 74. 67  Ling. V, 131. 68  Ling. V, 107. 69  This idea was entertained by a  number of  Greek and Roman authors between the second century bce and the sixth century ce: some of  these, like Philoxenus and Hypsicrates, probably were known to and influenced Varro. On this much-studied topic, see recently P. De Paolis, “La parentela linguistica fra greco e latino nella tradizione grammaticale latina”, in Latin Linguistics in the Early 21st Century. Acts of  the 16 th International Colloquium on Latin Linguistics, Uppsala, June 6 th–11th, 2011, Uppsala, Uppsala Universitet, 2016, pp.  610–24 and, specifically on Varro, A.  Gitner, “Varro Aeolicus: Latin’s affiliation with Greek”, in D. J. Butterfield (ed.), Varrio Varius: The polymath of  the Roman world, Cambridge, Philological Society, 2015, pp. 33–50. 70  Ling. V, 34. 71  Ling. V, 102. 72  Ling. V, 25.

300

ROME IN THE MIRROR

than the Sabines and the Greeks. Rome’s relationship with the Etruscans, for instance, had been notoriously complicated since the dawn of  the Republic and the community suffered from the entrenched stigma of  being a  barbarous nation (only redeemed by their being versed in the noble practice of  haruspicina); 73 therefore, it is significant that (as is also confirmed by Lydus’ passage above) Varro reminded his readers that some of  the words connected to the deepest roots of  the Roman civilisation had come from the Etruscan language, such as miles (“soldier”),74 Tiberis (“Tiber”),75 idus (“Ides”),76 and names related to religion (Vertumnus).77 The reference to loanwords from Gallic is  also noteworthy: these are to be found in names of  clothing items (sagum (“coarse woollen mantle”), reno (“reindeer-skin”)) 78 and some animals (alauda (“lark”)).79 Of  course, the methods of  etymology in the first century bce still needed to be honed and not all of  Varro’s reconstructions pass the test of  modern philology; nevertheless, they are of  great interest to us in that they served the purpose of  showing that Latin resulted from a blend of  different idioms. Such a conception of  language is very sensible from a modern perspective, but not one that was shared or endorsed by all authors who stated their opinion on the characters and definition of  the Latin language in this period (Cicero, for one, famously strived to preserve the “purity” of  Latin against foreign influences).80 This makes Varro quite special in this regard. 73  See Farney, Ethnic identity, chapt. 4, for a  breakdown of  the negative stereotype of  the Etruscans and the consequences that this narrative had on social and political competition among the elites. 74  Ling. V, 89. 75   Ling. V, 29–30. 76   Ling. VI, 28. 77  Ling. V, 46. 78  Ling. V, 167. 79   Ling. VIII, 65. 80 Cicero’s endeavour to avoid resorting to loanwords where possible is spelled out in fin. III,  2.5; ac. I,  24–25 (in both passages he clarifies that he will make an exception for words that are now so rooted in Latin literature that it would be absurd to translate them, like philosophia, rhetorica, dialectica, physica,  etc.). In  Brut. 169–72 he elevates urbanitas (or, to be precise, a  color urbanitatis) to one of  the highest virtues of  the oratory style. Dench, Romu-

301

F. LAZZERINI

Furthermore, Varro presents the compound nature of  Latin as the result of  a stratification that did not originate only recently, as a  result of  the Roman expansion in the Mediterranean, but which stretches back to the earliest stages of  the Roman civilisation. This can not only be inferred indirectly, from the fact that the words which Varro traces back to a  foreign origin include “Tiber”, objects of  everyday life, the names of  the Roman gods, and other object or figures central to the ancient mores; but it is also articulated explicitly in a fragment where the Greek language is  said to have been absorbed already by Romulus and the first generation of  Romans: Fr. 45 (ap. Lyd., Mag. I, 5): 81 οὐδὲ ἀγνοήσας ὁ Ῥωμύλος, ἢ οἱ κατ’αὐτόν, δείκνυται κατ’ ἐκεῖνο καιροῦ τὴν Ἐλλάδα φωνήν, τὴν Αἰολίδα λέγω, ὥς φασιν ὅ τε Κάτων ἐν τῷ Περὶ Ῥωμαϊκῆς ἀρχαιότητος, Βάρρων τε ὁ πολυμαθέστατος ἐν προοιμίοις τῶν πρὸς Πομπήϊον αὐτῷ γεγραμμένων, Εὐάνδρου καὶ τῶν ἄλλων Ἀρκάδων εἰς Ἰταλίαν ἐλθόντων ποτὲ καὶ τὴν Αἰολίδα τοῖς βαρβάροις ἐνσπειράντων φωνήν. Clearly neither Romulus not his contemporaries, at his time, were ignorant of  the Greek (I mean Aeolian) dialect, as is reported by Cato in his On Roman antiquities and Varro the outstanding polymath in the preface of  his books dedicated to Pompey. For Evander and the other Arcadians came to Italy then and passed the Aeolian language on to the barbarians.

In contrast to the picture presented by some of  Varro’s coeval authors, in this text it  is stated that language mixture already characterised the time when Roman culture was beginning to be lus’ asylum, p. 300, rightly observes that, in this passage, Cicero “dodges precise criteria” to clarify what urbanitas means: “he eliminates vocabulary that can be learned and resorts to the language of  visual metaphor – ‘a certain urbane colouring’ – and vague comments on the sound of  urban speech”. I  agree with the scholar’s suggestion that this attitude feeds into a barrier which was meant to keep non-Roman Latin speakers at a  distance. Contrast this with Caesar’s attitude (see above, n. 44). 81  Fr. 45 is also attributed to De origine linguae Latinae in Goetz and Schoell’s edition, but if  that work indeed dates to Varro’s old age, it cannot be the one that Lydus refers to here, which was dedicated to Pompey and therefore must predate Pharsalus (Della Corte, Filologia, pp. 155–56).

302

ROME IN THE MIRROR

forged.82 In theory, this idea ought not to have been controversial: after all, the myth had it that Romulus attracted populace to his newly founded city by opening up a sanctuary on the Capitoline hill, to which fled beseechers from all surrounding territories with no distinction of  class or social status (nobles alongside shepherds, freemen alongside slaves).83 If  such a variety of  people (coming from different places) merged and formed the first core of  Rome’s citizen body, it should stand to reason that many of  them brought their own cultures and idioms: therefore, claims that various civilisations had contributed to the making of  the Latin language – and, indeed, Roman culture – need not have raised any eyebrows. But in fact, it appears that not everyone in Rome at that time was particularly fond of  this chapter from their mythologised history. It is not hard to imagine that citizens who leaned towards the elitist conception of  “true Romanness” – especially those of  Latin ancestry, who prided themselves upon their aboriginal status – would have been somewhat embarrassed by an episode which implied that the most ancient, most “autochthonous” cluster of  Romans essentially resulted from a  mix of  migrants and refugees.84 By contrast, although there  is no unambiguous mention of  Romulus’ asylum in Varro’s surviving writings, it is plausible that he would have viewed this episode in a positive light, which tallied perfectly with the narrative of  the history of  Roman culture which he pieced together in his writings. In fact, one could suggest that an allusion to Romulus’ asylum is  embedded in a  passage from De lingua Latina where Varro introduces etymology: 82   It is interesting that Lydus reports that Cato shared the same idea, despite his often-reiterated aversion to Hellenic influence. 83  D.  H. II,  15.3–4; Liv. I,  8.4–7; Plu.  Rom., 9.3; Flor. I,  9; Vell. I,  8.5–6. The historical details of  this foundation and its important and complex implications for Rome’s idea of  identity are thoroughly treated in Dench, Romulus’ asylum. 84  For his part, Cicero (whose relationship with other Latins with respect to his ethnic identity was complicated in its own way, as mentioned above, n. 42) put the snarky comment, en passant, in Scaevola’s mouth in de orat. I,  37 that Romulus would have “gathered together shepherds and tramps”. In  a  letter to Atticus, he was even more explicit (II,  1.8): [scil. Cato] dicit enim tamquam in Platonis πολιτείᾳ, non tamquam in Romuli faece, sententiam. (“Cato speaks as if  we were in Plato’s ideal state, not in Romulus’ crap”).

303

F. LAZZERINI

he distinguishes four levels (gradus) of  progressive depth and difficulties of  the analysis,85 from the solution of  simple compounds (such as argentifodinae (“silver mines”) < argentum + fodina) to obscure poetic words (such as incurvicervicum (“bowed-necked”), scil. “herd”, said of  a  pack of  dolphins) 86 to words in common usage (such as oppidum (“citadel”)). Exactly what kind of  words are subject to the fourth level of  analysis, and what analytical approach corresponds to that level, is not clear from the transmitted text, which is almost certainly corrupted: Q uartus ubi est aditus et initia regis (“the fourth [scil. level is] where lies the entrance and the origins of  the king”). This passage has been discussed many times and has prompted numerous and diverse suggestions of  textual emendation as well as interpretations, which cannot be discussed here.87 Probably the most straightforward solution (proposed by various scholars) is to correct et to ad and read the fourth level as the one which provides aditus ad initia (“an access to the origins”), which would fit well with the idea – under­pin­ ning antiquarianism as characterised above in section 2 – that the study of  old words is a tool for the study of  the past. But it might also be that the text originally read asylum et initia regis and alluded, precisely, to the time when Romulus founded his sanctuary.88 If   so, then this event, when a multitude of  identities merged together, would come to represent not only the origin of  the Roman citizenry, but also the founding act of  the Latin language.

  Ling. V, 7–8.   The word is found in Pacuv. fr. 238 Schierl. 87  The script of  the round-table discussion following the contribution of  Schröter, Die varronische Etymologie, gives an insight into the debate. For a  more recent review of  all the scholarship on this passage, see F.  Lazzerini, “Romulus’ adytum or asylum? A New Exegetical proposal for De lingua Latina 5, 8”, Ciceroniana On Line – Nouvelle Série 1/1 (2017), pp. 97–128. 88   This hypothesis is  put forth in Lazzerini, Romulus’ adytum or asylum and, in a more mitigated version, in Lazzerini, “The status of  ars etymologica in Varro and its Ciceronian origins”, RhM (forthcoming), where I analyse another segment of  the same passage and propose an interpretation of  how Varro characterised the function and limits of  the art of  etymology. 85 86

304

ROME IN THE MIRROR

4. Conclusion The sense of  loss and estrangement, following the traumatic events of  the first half  of  the first century, had led many of  those who considered themselves Romans to feel much like the sexagessis of  Varro’s satire: unrecognisable to themselves and unable to recognise their home. If, indeed, Varro wrote this satire when he himself  was sixty, then it was the year 55 when he had the titular character cry in despair, “When I returned to Rome, I  found nothing there of  what I had left”. About a  year later, Cicero started working on his De  re publica, where he had the character Scipio recount a  history of  Rome’s past which reaffirmed the value of  the ancestral mores and the role of  the Roman nobilitas as their guardians and living embodiment: a story which provided comfort from the disconcerting threats to the known world of  Romans and showed the way to a better present. It was perhaps a  similar sentiment which led Varro to “dig” into the past with so much scholarly devotion and, by all accounts, within just a few years, in that central decade of  the first century when it seemed like the order of  things was coming apart. However, as V. Binder argued compellingly, whereas Cicero sought to recover and celebrate the mores of  the noble ancestors, Varro put the Roman people in the broader sense at the centre of  his work: as Binder put it, “the people as bearers of  mos rather than the class that can boast maiores”.89 The very titles of  his antiquarian writings confirm this: he wrote “On the life” and “On the geneaology” or “race of  the Roman people”. This people – their history, their ways, their culture, their language – he studied in a  similar way to how biographers would  V. Binder, “Inspired Leaders versus Emerging Nations: Varro’s and Cicero’s Views on Early Rome”, in Sandberg, Smith, Monumenta, pp. 157–81. Binder’s analysis builds up on Blösel’s distinction between mos vetus / antiquus, a definition which actually bears on the “habits” or “ways” of  the past, and mos maiorum, where the key-element are the maiores: the latter concept “leitet seinen Anspruch auf  Befolgung aus dem Hinweis ab, daß schon die Vorfahren in der betreffenden Art und Weise zu handeln gewohnt waren” (W.  Blösel, “Die Geschichte des Begriffes mos maiorum von den Anfängen bis zu Cicero”, in B. Linke, M. Stemmler (eds), Mos maiorum. Untersuchungen zu den Formen der Identitätstiftung und Stabilisierung in der römischen Republik, Stuttgart, F. Steiner, 2000, p. 26). 89

305

F. LAZZERINI

study a person’s life: by going back to their birth and upbringing and retracing all the developments which built up, shaped, and transformed the identity of  their present self. And, just as one does when writing a biography, it is the selection of  and emphasis on different elements which determines what kind of  story will be told.90 If, as I argued, the feeling of  estrangement that seems to have been pervasive in that period partly stemmed from the debate around the inclusion of  different communities into the Roman people, then it is remarkable that Varro’s studies, coming full circle, led him to acknowledge the great extent to which those different communities were involved in the building of  that very people. Whether this confirmed a  belief  that he already had, or the outcome of  his research surprised him, is probably impossible to ascertain. What is significant is that, instead of downplaying the contributions of  the Italian peoples to various aspects of  the Roman culture, he highlighted them (especially of  the Sabines, whose aboriginal status he confirmed), occasionally actively choosing one account or explanation which bolstered those claims over an alternative one. In this sense, the task of  antiquarianism truly reveals the potential it shares with historiography: Precisely because of  their detachment from and elevation above the landscape of  the past, historians are able to manipulate time and space in ways they could never manage as normal people. They can compress these dimensions, expand them, compare them, measure them, even transcend them, almost as poets, playwrights, novelists, and film-makers do.91

In the same way, by selecting, expanding, or collapsing different elements of  the puzzle of  Rome’s past, Varro created a  narrative designed to convey a  specific message to his readership, i.e. the intellectual elite of  his time who were exchanging views on what Romanness had become or ever had been. Mo­mi­gliano had claimed that antiquarians were guided in their task by the fact 90  F. Ginelli, in this volume, underscores this very aspect in relation to Cornelius Nepos’ biographies of  Hamilcar and Hannibal. 91  J.  L. Gaddis, The Landscape of  History: How Historians Map the Past, Oxford, University Press, 2002.

306

ROME IN THE MIRROR

that they “took pleasure in erudition as such”,92 but Varro’s en­deav­ours speak to the intention of  fulfilling a  purpose which served his own present: indeed, as an act of  civic duty.93 Varro spelled out in the ARD that this was the intention guiding him: ARD fr. 2a (ap. Aug. civ. VI, 2): Se timere ne pereant [scil. dei] non incursu hostili, sed civium neglegentia, de qua illos velut ruina liberari a se [dicit] et in memoria bonorum per eius modi libros recondi atque servari. [scil. Varro says] that he is afraid that [scil. the gods] will perish, not because of  an incursion of  enemies, but because the citizens neglect them; [he says] that he is rescuing them from this neglect as if  from a collapsing building and giving them shelter in his books so that they may be kept in the memory of  good people.94

The famous praise that Cicero addressed him, as a character, at the beginning of  his Academica is perhaps the most eloquent confirmation that Varro succeeded in his intent: Cic., ac. I, 9: Tum ego “Sunt” inquam “ista Varro. Nam nos in nostra urbe peregrinantis errantisque tamquam hospites tui libri quasi domum deduxerunt, ut possemus aliquando qui et ubi essemus agnoscere. Tu aetatem patriae tu descriptiones temporum, tu sacrorum iura tu sacerdotum, tu domesticam tu bellicam disciplinam, tu sedum regionum locorum tu omnium divinarum humanarumque rerum nomina genera officia causas aperuisti; plurimum quidem poetis nostris omninoque Latinis et litteris luminis et verbis attulisti atque ipse varium et elegans omni fere numero poema fecisti, philosophiamque multis locis inchoasti, ad impellendum satis, ad edocendum parum”.

  Mo­mi­gliano, Ancient History, p. 288.   In a similar vein, MacRae illustrates how Varro’s research on Roman religion had a concrete impact on the laws of  the priestly colleges written at that time (D. MacRae, “ ‘The laws of  the rites and of  the priests’: Varro and late Republican Roman sacral jurisprudence”, in Arena, Góráin, Varronian Moments, pp. 34–48). 94  Transl. after Binder, Inspired leaders, p. 172. 92 93

307

F. LAZZERINI

Then I said, “That is true, Varro. For, as we were wandering and roaming like foreigners in our own city, your books, so to speak, led us home, so that we could at last be able to recognise who and where we were. You have revealed the age of  our homeland, the various stages of  its history, the laws of  its religious practices and of  the priesthood, its civic and military institutions, the names, kinds and functions of  the districts, regions and places, and of  all the things related to religious and human affairs. You have also shed a lot of  light upon our poets, and in general on the Latin literature and language, and you have yourself  composed elegant poetry in different genres and almost every metre, and have drafted some principles of  philosophy on many occasions, that was enough to stimulate one’s curiosity, but not enough to exhaust all one’s instruction”.

By setting out on his quest for Rome’s past, Varro had embarked on the mission to present his fellow citizens with a mirror of a sort: a story of  where their culture came from which would allow them to know who they were, as a people and as a nation.

Bibliography Arena V., Góráin F.  M. (eds), Varronian Moments, BICS 60/2 (2017). Arena V., Piras, G. (eds), Reconstructing the Republic: Varro and Imperial Authors, Rome, Salerno Editrice, 2018. Astbury R. (ed.), M. Terentius Varro. Saturarum Menippearum fragmenta, Munich-Leipzig, K. G. Saur, 2002. Baier T., “Myth and Politics in Varro’s Historical Writings”, EMC 43/3 (1999), pp. 351–67. Binder V., “Inspired Leaders versus Emerging Nations: Varro’s and Cicero’s Views on Early Rome”, in Sandberg, Smith, Omnium Annalium Monumenta, pp. 157–81. Blösel W., “Die Geschichte des Begriffes mos maiorum von den Anfängen bis zu Cicero”, in B. Linke, M. Stemmler (eds), Mos maiorum. Untersuchungen zu den Formen der Identitätstiftung und Stabilisierung in der römischen Republik, Stuttgart, F. Steiner, 2000, pp. 25–97. Bolisani E., Varrone Menippeo, Padua, F. Vallardi, 1936. 308

ROME IN THE MIRROR

Briq uel J., “La conception du latin comme langue mixte chez Varron”, in C.  Moussy, J.  Dangel (ed.), De  lingua Latina novae quaestiones: Actes du X e colloque international de linguistique latine, Paris, Sèvres, 19–23 avril 1999, Louvain, Peeters, 2001, pp. 1033– 43. Cardauns B. (ed.), Varron: Six exposés et discussions. Entretiens du 3–8 septembre 1962, Vandœuvres-Genève, Fondation Hardt, 1963. Cardauns B. (ed.), Marcus Terentius Varro: Antiquitates rerum divinarum, Mainz, Akademie der Wissenschaften und der Literatur, 1976. Cardauns, B., Marcus Terentius Varro: Einführung in sein Werk, Heidelberg, C. Winter, 2001. Cèbe J.-P. (ed.), Varron: Satires ménippées, Rome, École française de Rome, 1972–1979. Cichorius C., Römische Studien: Historisches, epigraphisches, literargeschichtliches aus vier Jahrhunderten Roms, Leipzig, Teubner, 1922. Collart J., Varron, grammairien latin, Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1954. Dahlmann H., s.v. “M.  Terentius Varro”, RE, Suppl. VI, 1935, cols 1172–227. de Melo W. D. C. (ed.), Varro: De lingua Latina: Introduction, text, translation, and commentary, New York, Oxford University Press, 2019. De Paolis P., “La parentela linguistica fra greco e latino nella tradizione grammaticale latina”, in Latin Linguistics in the Early 21st Century. Acts of  the 16 th International Colloquium on Latin Linguistics, Uppsala, June 6 th–11th, 2011, Uppsala, Uppsala Universitet, 2016, pp. 610–24. Della Corte F., “La poesia di Varrone Reatino ricostruita”, MAT 69/2 (1937), pp. 1–102. Della Corte F., La filologia Latina dalle origini a Varrone, 2nd edition [1937], Firenze, La Nuova Italia, 1981. Dench E., From barbarians to new men: Greek, Roman, and modern perceptions of peoples from the central Apennines, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1995. Dench E., Romulus’ asylum: Roman identities from the age of  Alexander to the age of  Hadrian, Oxford, University Press, 2005. Edelstein L., Kidd I. (eds), Posidonius, Cambridge, University Press, 1972. Farney G. D., Ethnic identity and aristocratic competition in Republican Rome, Cambridge, University Press, 2007. 309

F. LAZZERINI

Fraccaro P. (ed.), Studi Varroniani: De gente populi romani, libri IV, Padova, Angelo Draghi, 1907. Funaioli G. (ed.), Grammaticae Romanae fragmenta, Leipzig, Teubner, 1907. Gaddis, J. L., The Landscape of  History: How Historians Map the Past, Oxford, University Press, 2002. Garcea A. (ed.), Caesar’s De  analogia, Oxford, University Press, 2012. Gitner A., “Varro Aeolicus: Latin’s affiliation with Greek”, in D.  J. Butterfield (ed.), Varrio Varius: The polymath of  the Roman world, Cambridge, Philological Society, 2015, pp. 33–50. Goetz G., Schoell F. (eds), M. Terenti Varronis de lingua Latina quae supersunt, Leipzig, Teubner, 1910. Gruen E., “Did Romans have an ethnic identity?”, Antichthon 47 (2013), pp. 1–17. Herklotz I., “Arnaldo Mo­mi­gliano’s ‘Ancient History and the Antiquarian’: A Critical Review”, in P. N. Miller (ed.), Mo­mi­ gliano and Antiquarianism: Foundations of  the Modern Cultural Sciences, Toronto, University Press, 2007, pp. 127–53. Horsfall N., “Varro and Caesar: Three Chronological Problems”, BICS 19 (1972), pp. 120–28. Johnston A. C., (2017). “Nostri and ‘The Other(s)’ ”, in L. Grillo, C.  B. Krebs (eds), The Cambridge companion to the writings of  Julius Caesar, Cambridge, University Press, 2017, pp. 81–94. Lazzerini F., “Romulus’ adytum or asylum? A New Exegetical proposal for De lingua Latina 5, 8”, Ciceroniana On Line – Nouvelle Série 1/1 (2017), pp. 97–128. Lazzerini F., “The status of  ars etymologica in Varro and its Ciceronian origins”, RhM (forthcoming). Leonardis I., “Vetustas, oblivio e crisi d’identità nelle Saturae Menippeae. Il risveglio di Varrone in un’altra Roma”, Ἐπέκεινα 4 (2014), pp. 19–58. Leonardis I., “Risvegliarsi in un’altra Roma. Crisi del presente e nostalgia del passato nelle Saturae Menippeae di Varrone”, in R. Angiolillo, E. Elia, E. Nuti (eds), Crisi. Immagini, interpretazioni e  reazioni nel mondo greco, latino e  bizantino. Atti del Convegno Internazionale Dottorandi e  Giovani Ricercatori. Torino, 21–23, Alessandria, Edizioni dell’Orso, 2015, pp. 223–36. MacRae D., “Diligentissimus investigator antiquitatis? ‘Antiquarianism’ and Historical Evidence between Republican Rome and 310

ROME IN THE MIRROR

the Early Modern Republic of  Letters”, in Sandberg, Smith, Omnium Annalius Monumenta, pp. 137–56. MacRae D., “‘The laws of  the rites and of  the priests’: Varro and late Republican Roman sacral jurisprudence”, in Arena, Góráin, Varronian Moments, pp. 34–48. Mazzarino S., Il pensiero storico classico, Bari, Laterza, 1966. Mercklin L., “Aetia des Varro”, Philologus 3 (1848), pp. 267–77. Mikołajczyk I., “Les fragments de la satire ménippée ‘Sexagessis’ de Varron”, in Z. Abramowicz (ed.), Études de philologie classique à la mémoire de Stefan Srebrny, Toruń, Université Nicolaus Copernicus, pp. 103–96. Mirsch P., “De  M. Terenti Varronis Antiquitatum rerum humanarum libris XXV”, Leipziger Studien zur classischer Philologie 6 (1882), pp. 1–144. Moatti C., La raison de Rome: Naissance de l’esprit critique à  la fin de la République (IIe–Ier siècle avant Jésus-Christ), Paris, Seuil, 1997. Mo­mi­gliano A., “Ancient History and the Antiquarian”, JWI 13 (1950), pp. 285–315. Mosca B., “Satira filosofica e  politica nelle Menippee di Varrone”, ASNP 2 (1937), pp. 41–77. Mouritsen H., “From hostes acerrimi to homines nobilissimi. Two Studies in the Ancient Reception of  the Social War”, Historia 68/3 (2019), pp. 302–26. Nelsestuen G. A., Varro the agronomist: political philosophy, satire, and agriculture in the late Republic, Columbus, Ohio, The Ohio State University, 2015. Pascucci G., “Le componenti linguistiche del latino secondo la dottrina varroniana”, in Studi su Varrone, sulla retorica, storiografia e poesia latina: Scritti in onore di Benedetto Riposati, Rieti, Centro di studi varroniani, 1979, pp. 339–63. Perret J., Les origines de la légende troyenne de Rome (281–31), Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 1942. Piras G., “Dicam dumtaxtat quod est historicon: Varro and/on the past”, in Arena, Góráin, Varronian Moments, pp. 8–20. Pittà A., M. Terenzio Varrone, de vita populi Romani. Introduzione e commento, Pisa, University Press, 2015. Riese A. (ed.), M.  Terenti Varronis Saturarum Menippearum reliquiae. Lipsiae, Teubner, 1865. 311

F. LAZZERINI

Robinson L., “Marcus Terentius Varro, ‘Sexagesis’ or born sixty years too late”, in Atti del congresso internazionale di studi varroniani, Rieti 1974, Rieti: Centro di studi varroniani, 1976, pp. 477–83. Rolle A., Dall’Oriente a Roma. Cibele, Iside e Serapide nell’opera di Varrone, Pisa, Edizioni ETS, 2017. Romano E., “Il concetto di antico in Varrone”, in M. Citroni (ed.), Memoria e identità. La cultura romana costruisce la sua immagine, Florence, Università degli Studi, 2003, pp. 99–117. Ross Taylor L., “Varro’s De gente populi Romani”, CPh 29/3 (1934), pp. 221–29. Russo F., “Greco, Gallico ed Etrusco: Varrone e  le componenti del Latino”, AC 80/1 (2011), pp. 167–78. Salanitro M., Le menippee di Varrone: Contributi esegetici e linguistici, Roma, Edizioni dell’Ateneo, 1990. Sandberg. K., Smith, C. (eds), Omnium Annalium Monumenta: Historical Writing and Historical Evidence in Republican Rome, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2018. Schröter R., “Die varronische Etymologie”, in B. Cardauns (ed.), Varron: Six exposés et discussions. Entretiens du 3–8 septembre 1962, Vandœuvres-Genève, Fondation Hardt, 1963, pp. 79–116. Wallace-Hadrill A., Rome’s Cultural Revolution, Cambridge, University Press, 2008. Werner E., Sallmann K. G., Schmidt P. L., “Varro”, Brills Neue Pauly, 2006. Wiseman T. P., “Writing Rome’s Past”, review-discussion of  Sandberg, Smith, 2018, Histos 12 (2018), pp. 1–23. Wissowa G., “Die Überlieferung über die römischen Penaten”, Hermes 22/1 (1887), pp. 29–57. Zucchelli B., “L’enigma del TPIKAPANOΣ: Varrone di fronte ai triumviri”, in Atti del congresso internazionale di studi varroniani, Rieti 1974, Rieti, Centro di studi varroniani, 1976, pp. 609–25.

312

CLAUDIA BELTRÃO Federal University of the State of  Rio de Janeiro (UNIRIO)

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO A READING OF  CICERO’S DE LEGIBUS

… civitas communis deorum atque hominum (Leg. 1.23)

In De  domo sua, shortly after his return from exile, Cicero addresses the Pontifical College asking for the restoration of  his house on the Palatine.1 In this speech from 57 bce, he emphasises the centrality of  the domus to the religious life of  all Roman citizens: [Q ]uid est sanctius, quid omni religione munitius quam domus unius cuiusque civium? Hic arae sunt, hic foci, hic di penates, hic sacra, religiones, caerimoniae continentur; hoc perfugium est ita sanctum omnibus ut inde abripi neminem fas sit (Dom. 108–09).2 What is  more sacred, what more inviolably hedged about by every kind of  sanctity, than the home of  every individual citizen? Within its circle are his altars, his hearths, his household gods, his religion, his observances, his ritual; it is a sanctuary so holy in the eyes of  all, that it was sacrilege to tear an owner therefrom.

Cicero thereby declares the importance of  the sacra privata to Rome. Later, in De legibus 2, he argues that these rites should be preserved from generation to generation. The relevance of  fam1   The central theme of  De domo sua deals with the houses destroyed or plundered by P. Clodius Pulcher during Cicero’s exile: The Palatine’s domus and the villae in Tusculum and Formiae. Cicero had other properties through which to transfer his inheritance to his children (Dom. 62), in which his descendants could keep the rites next to their ancestors’ graves, for the sake of  family continuity. The orator presents the affront to his properties as an affront to his dignitas and his auctoritas, as well as an assault on Rome itself, despite also declaring that he had other means by which to perpetuate his memory and that of  his ancestors. 2  English text by N. H. Watts, Cicero XI. Pro Archia, Post reditum in senatu, post reditum ad quirites, De domo sua, De haruspicum responsis, Pro Plancio, Cambridge Mass., London, Harvard University Press, 1923. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 313–334 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128700

313

C. BELTRÃO

ily rites is  made clear when he states that sacra privata perpetua manento (Leg. 2.9). This  is a  recurring theme in Cicero’s work, affirming the role of  the Roman family’s religious identity to the cohesion of  the res publica, with its family rites, sacred sites and graves.3 While the sacra privata were restricted to the Roman family and individual groups, they were also a matter of  public interest. Indeed, the preservation of  ancestral rites is  a  crucial point in De  legibus, a  dialogue written at a  time when Roman institutions, practices and beliefs were subject to intense intellectual scrutiny, in which the notion of  Roman society is based on the common law and shared reason (Leg. 1.42). The gods are declared integrant parts of societas (Leg. 1.23–25) and Cicero promotes a politico-philosophical programme capable to give sense to Roman religious practices. Among these practices, the ancestral family rites are related to the Roman identity, in Cicero’s refined elitist view of  Romanness.4 Cicero had actively participated in a creative intellectual milieu in the late Republican Rome, which gave rise to a remarkable literary production in lively dialogue with contemporary Hellenistic philosophy.5 In fact, Cicero devoted a great deal of  time and attention to intellectual issues, developing a  vast and consistent theoretical work.6 His impressive corpus, a full discussion of which   See, e.g., Cicero, De Officiis 1.55.   On the debate about Ancient and Roman Identity(ies), see L. R. Lanzi­ lotta, “Introduction” in this volume. 5   On the prolific intellectual milieu in the first century Rome, see C. Moatti, La raison de Rome. Naissance de l’esprit critique à  la fin de la république, Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1997; D. Feeney, Literature and Religion in Rome. Cultures, Contexts and Beliefs, Cambridge University Press, 1999, J. Rüpke, Religion in Republican Rome: Rationalization and Ritual Change, Philadelphia, University of  Pennsylvania Press, 2012, and K. Volk, The Roman Republic of  Letters. Scholarship, Philosophy, and Politics in the Age of  Cicero and Caesar, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2021. 6  Key references for Cicero’s philosophical reappraisal are J. Glucker, “Cicero’s Philosophical Affiliations”, in J. M. Dillon, A. A. Long (eds), The Q uestion of  “Eclecticism”. Studies in Late Greek Philosophy, Berkeley, University of  California Press, 1988, pp. 34–69; C. Lévy, Cicero Academicus. Recherches sur les “Academiques” et sur la philosophie cicéronienne, Rome, École française de Rome, 1992, and J. G. F. Powell (ed.), Cicero the Philosopher. Twelve Papers, Oxford University Press, 1995. On the reassessment of Cicero’s philosophica, see W. Görler, “Silencing the Troublemaker: De Legibus 1.39 and the Continuity of  Cicero’s Scepticism”, in J. G. F. Powell (ed.), Cicero the Philosopher, pp. 85–113; 3 4

314

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

goes beyond the scope of  this paper, is the most complete work known to us and one of  the most authoritative in the Western tradition. In his philosophical dialogues, Cicero repeatedly states that he intends to provide his contemporaries with a sophisticated and well-developed philosophical language and training.7 Even in his public speeches, philosophical issues are abundant, and Cicero champions philosophy as an appropriate activity for his Romans peers. However, his work displays a real tension between philosophy and the expected behaviour of  a  Roman nobleman.8 From this tension, he seems to derive his effort to “naturalise” Greek thought in Rome by writing dialogues in which prominent public figures, debating in their villae, overshadow any objections to philosophical thinking, for their behaviour and ambitions differ from the life and behaviour of  Greek thinkers of  their times. His characters are senators, magistrates, public priests; that is, people highly regarded in the élite context of  the Roman Republic. They are amici and figures of  authority, linking their philosophical conversations to a moment of  otium when they are detached – voluntarily or not – from the urbs, even though political matters are never forgotten.9 They are a  select group of  individuals

R. Woolf, Cicero, the Philosophy of  a Roman Sceptic, London, Routledge, 2015; S. Maso, Grasp and Dissent, Cicero and Epicurean Philosophy, Turnhout, Brepols, 2015; J. Annas, “Introduction”, in J. Annas, G. Betegh (eds), Cicero’s De Finibus. Philosophical Approaches, Cambridge University Press, 2016, pp. 1–11, and C. Brittain, “Cicero’s sceptical methods: the example of  De Finibus”, in J. Annas, G. Betegh (eds), Cicero’s De Finibus, pp. 12–40. For a consistent criticism of  the current idea of  a sceptical Cicero, see C. Lévy, “Cicéron était-il un ‘Roman sceptic’?”, Ciceroniana online 1 (2017), pp. 9–24. 7  See, e.g., Cicero, Academica 1.11, De finibus 1.10, Tusculanae 1.3. 8  See especially I.  Gildenhard, Paideia romana. Cicero’s “Tusculans Disputations”, Cambridge, The Cambridge Philological Society, 2007. On Cicero’s philosophical project, see Y.  Baraz, A  Written Republic. Cicero’s Philosophical Politics, Princeton University Press, 2012, and C. Bishop, Cicero, Greek Learning, and the Making of  a Roman Classic, Oxford University Press, 2019. 9   None of  Cicero’s characters are “defeated” in the debate since their differences of  opinion are reconciled or left open for future conversations in the epilogues, even when Cicero clarifies his own ideas and positions. See I. Gildenhard, Paideia romana; M. Schofield, “Writing Philosophy”, in C. Steel (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Cicero, Cambridge University Press, 2013, pp.  187–205, and J.  E. Zetzel, “Philosophy is  in the Streets”, in G.  D. Williams, K.  Volk (eds), Roman Reflections. Studies in Latin Philosophy, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 50–82, on that.

315

C. BELTRÃO

serving as a moral and intellectual guide to proper conduct and thinking.10 In these dialogues, Cicero declares to follow – and he often does so – the methods of  the New Academy, that is, the disputationes in contrariam partem and in utramque partem, without explicitly committing himself  to any of  the theoretical positions under discussion. These methods allow for a consideration of  the merits and inconsistencies of any doctrine, as well as an evaluation of  different opinions while guaranteeing a certain distance from all of  them, even those that may be temporarily endorsed as plausible.11 De  legibus, however, presents a  dogmatic and normative discourse on the laws proposed and commented on by Marcus, the main character, which seems rather strange when compared to the Academic and non-dogmatic framework of  Cicero’s other works, particularly the dialogues of the forties. This peculiarity has been – and still remains – the subject of  fierce debate, sparking differing scholarly interpretations over the past few decades, usually about Cicero’s alleged departure from the New Academy. The subject is  controversial, and here I follow W.  Görler, who in 1995 drew attention to the caveat in Leg. 1.38–39 by arguing that Marcus, in requesting that Atticus, the Epicurean, and himself, the Academic, keep quiet in face of  the laws he proposed, ultimately stayed in line with the requirements of  the Academy: tradition could and should be required when the perturbatrix Academia proved to be dangerous and destructive to the “beautiful theoretical constructs” (Leg. 1.39). This paper intends, then, to analyse Marcus’ normative narrative in De legibus 2, with the aim of  contributing to our understanding of  his proposal of  religious laws for the res publica. My interpretive hypothesis is that Marcus’ dogmatic constitutio 10  See especially I. Gildenhard, Paideia romana, who, arguing for Cicero’s commitment and real interest in philosophical issues since his youth, suggests that his philosophical dialogues were a  substitute for his frustrated political action during and after Caesar’s dictatorship, proposing an ideal res publica, characterised by libertas and auctoritas. However, one can consistently disagree with the point of  philosophical writing as a substitute for political action, understanding Cicero’s philosophical practice as a form of  political action. 11  For an outline of  the Academic methods, see C. Brittain, “Middle Platonists on Academic Scepticism”, in R. W. Sharpies, R. Sorabji (eds), Greek and Roman Philosophy. 100 bc – 200 ad, London, BICS, Suppl. 94, 2007, pp. 297–315.

316

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

religionum is a central element in understanding Cicero’s political and intellectual project. For the sake of  conciseness, after observing the general lines of  the dialogue, only offerings on sacra privata will be considered here. “Beautiful theoretical constructs” aside, if  we consider Cicero’s insistence on social cohesion in favour of  what he defended as the interests of  the res publica, it can be said that Marcus presents the ideal laws of an ideal state; that is, Rome itself. At  this point, the philosopher falls silent, and the voice of  the legislator takes the lead.

1. An Overview of   De legibus De legibus is usually dated from 51 bce and seems to have never been completed. This work is dedicated to T. Pomponius Atticus, its dramatic date is contemporary to its composition, and Cicero sets the dialogue in his ancestral villa in Arpinum. Cicero establishes a  conversation between the characters Marcus, Q uintus Cicero and Atticus about law and justice in general (Book 1), followed by religious law and priesthoods (Book 2), before ending on the codes of  law and the magistracies (Book 3). The dialogue begins with an ex abrupto: the interlocutors are in the woods talking about an oak, the oak of  Marius. Unlike other Ciceronian dialogues, there  is no authorial preface, and Cicero does not provide the reader with an explicit interpretative key.12 Each literary genre is a distinct and particular mode of  communication in itself, with its own vocabulary and conventions, and the author needs to point them out to his audience in order to provide interpretative keys for their understanding. Therefore, the topic of  the quercus Mariana could be a clue to reading this 12 This ex abrupto can certainly be read in association with Platonic dialogues in which the contemplation of  a landscape or an object leads to a debate about its meaning, in the sense of  the dichotomy between ficta and vera, and between past and memory. The quercus Mariana can then be read as an echo of  Plato’s Phaedrus, when the eponymous character asks if  a specific tree on the bank of  the river Ilissus was where Boreas kidnapped Orithia, daughter of  Erechtheus (Phaedrus 229). Socrates replies by disapproving of  folk tales, establishing that he prefers to devote his time to “knowing himself ”, rather than thinking about irrelevances. Like Socrates, the protagonist of  the Ciceronian dialogue, Marcus, does not seem interested in discussing the historicity of  the oak tree, which belongs to popular memory. However, in De legibus the passage is not irrelevant to the development of  the dialogue.

317

C. BELTRÃO

work. There is  an explicit reference to Cicero’s poem about Marius, for it would have been under the treetops that the general received an omen, a  divine sign foretelling his return from the exile. In the poem, this case is presented as a prophetic dream about Cicero and his fellow countryman Marius, foretelling a triumphant return from exile of  Cicero himself.13 The theme in the prologue (Leg. 1.1–37) is thus instrumental to this work, acting as a trigger for Marcus’ statement of  intent which will define the scope of  the whole dialogue. Marcus then considers the similarities and differences between poetry, history, jurisprudence, and philosophy, before identifying the main themes of  the dialogue. It is, therefore, a lengthy prologue in which Cicero builds an elaborate discussion to explain why he will not write a  historiographical work or a  treatise on jurisprudence.14 Likewise, he explains why he will not be bound by any philosophical doctrine in this conversation. If   the form of  De  legibus is  inspired by Greek literary models, its concerns are specifically Roman. Cicero’s lifetime was characterised by significant political and religious upheaval. The historical scene of  the mid-first century bce is  that of  military confrontation and institutional crisis, while religion appears in De Legibus 2 as the answer to a period of  great transformation in Rome and its empire. Cicero’s use of  Greek models to analyse Roman institutions can be seen as innovative, connecting him with the mores and grounding his auctoritas. Governing Rome involved preserving good relations with the gods and, in my view, any reading of  De legibus demands an observation of  the legitimising effect of  religion on the processes of  political and governmental decision-making and action in Rome, as well as a sharp consideration of  the power of  religious practices and beliefs on the creation of  shared identities. In fact, any literary work of  a senator, orator and public priest like Cicero necessarily had political ramifications. Cicero declares the sovereignty  Cf. De divinatione 1.59–63, 2.140, and Leg. 2.6.   Expertise in jurisprudence already existed at the time of  Cicero – the most famous jurist of  his time was Sulpicius Rufus, a  real legend in legal authority, to whom the writing of  180 books is attributed. But De legibus’ bias is not the jurisprudence itself, but rather political philosophy, which provides him with the theoretical framework of  his dialogue about the laws. 13 14

318

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

of  the gods as the undisputed foundation of  religion, as well as of  Roman society and its power relations. In this way, divine power over the world is accepted as a matter of  fact.15 Marcus will not talk about legal consultants (ad ius respondendum: Leg.  1.12), nor about the ius civile (Leg. 1.14), clearly defining his goal: he is proposing a theoretical discussion of  the laws. He recognises the practical importance of  jurists, albeit he minimises their cognitive value (id autem in cognitione tenue est, in usu necessarium: Leg. 1.14). In Leg. 1.15, Atticus presents his expectations on the subject, asking Marcus to follow in Plato’s footsteps and, having already spoken about the ideal state, to focus on the laws. Marcus consents to do so but asserts that his exposition will be independent of  Plato, in order to discuss the fons legum et iuris (Leg. 1.16). In Leg. 1.17, Marcus states that he will focus on the nature of  universal law and justice, of  which the ius civile is  just a  derivative. However, even though philosophy is his point of  entry, Marcus makes it clear that it is not his end goal (Leg. 1.39). The key terms here are libertas disserendi and auctoritas. Marcus’ argument is  based on Roman tradition, taken as being consensual, and not on philosophy. The main concern of  De legibus 2 is Roman religious tradition. Marcus’ statements of  intellectual independence seem to be a way of  establishing Cicero’s own political and religious authority. Moreover, Marcus uses deliberately popular and accessible language: populariter interdum loqui necesse erit (Leg.  1.19).16 The character then asserts that he will use critical thinking to make both law and justice comprehensible and accessible to all (Leg. 1.33). He states his intention to help the Roman people reach their potential: to act in an ideal state with an ideal legal system (Leg. 1. 58–65). In this way, De legibus 1 presents the philosophical framework for Cicero’s ideal constitution, assuming that this legal system has the potential and optimal condi15  Just as for Varro (cf. Antiquitates, fr. 5 Cardauns), for Cicero religious practices and rules were not revealed by the gods, but they are human creations, and can be understood by scrutinising their history and development. See G. Bogdan, “La discusión sobre la forma de los dioses a fines de la República”, in C. Beltrão, F. Santangelo (eds), Estátuas na religião romana, Coimbra, Coimbra University Press, 2020, pp. 47–63, on the relations of  both Varro and Cicero’s discourses in shaping Roman religious identity, and F. Lazzerini (“Rome in the Mirror”) in this volume, a study on Varro’s linguistic writings shaping Roman identity. 16 Cf. also Leg. 1.57.

319

C. BELTRÃO

tions to achieve his ideal, as the traditional legal system is the very foundation of  Marcus’ proposals. This leads Q uintus to say, after Marcus has presented his religious laws, that his constitutio religionum little differs from Numa’s laws and Roman customs (Leg. 2.23). It is on this basis that Cicero presents and discusses legal and institutional elements that are explicitly Roman-based, as well as proposing some reforms, ultimately placing himself  at the centre of  his ideal construction of  the Roman legal system: intercessor rei malae salutaris civis est (Leg. 3.11).17 Book 2 and the first cast of  positive norms of  Book 3 are dedicated to religion, rituals, and priesthoods, while throughout Leg. 3, Marcus deals with matters related to power, legitimate sovereignty, legal procedures, and legislation. His point of  view is quite pragmatic: he proposes positive norms for the collective conduct of  the lives of  Roman citizens. Marcus leaves no room for theological discussions, and a proposal for the “reconstruction” of  religion on a new (Ciceronian) basis is presented as the foundation of  Cicero’s desired “reconstruction” of  the urbs.

2. Normalising the sacra privata Cicero’s comments on his Arpinum ancestral home and family rites are extensively articulated in De legibus 2, and it may help us to explore some aspects of  the actions that aimed at perpetuating ancestral memoria through these family rites. At  the beginning, Marcus states that in the villa of  Arpinum “are our sacred rites, our lineage, here are many traces of  our ancestors” (… hic sacra, hic genus, hic maiorum fine vestigia: Leg. 2.3).18 Although it has already been convincingly demonstrated that Arpinum’s landscape in De legibus contains many elements based on the topos of  17  Cicero (like Varro) stresses the need to determine the boundaries of  Roman tradition, as well as to safeguard its future. He does not present Roman tradition as static, highlighting his political motivations and interest in a programme of  institutional reform. This relation with tradition is critically viewed by him in a creative dialogue with Greek thought – allowing us to understand the supposed Ciceronian “eclecticism” as an intellectual strategy in which religion is formulated as knowledge. 18  See S. Treggiari, “The Upper-Class House as Symbol and Focus of  Emotion in Cicero”, JRA 12 (1999), pp. 36–56, on Cicero’s issues regarding family emotions and feelings and the Platonic topos.

320

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

the countryside idyll and on Plato’s works, Cicero’s dialogue also has much to tell us about the ancestral rites of  the Roman élite.19 Cicero contrasts the fame that can be obtained in the urbs with the perpetuation of memory, which he has cultivated in his ancestral house, especially in Leg. 2.3. Atticus then declares that human beings are “mysteriously affected by places in which vestiges of  those we love and admire are located”, referring to his fascination with Athens, which for him marks a  place to remember the famous men who had their tombs there (Leg. 2.4). However, if  for the Epicurean Atticus this special place of  memory was Athens, for Cicero it was Arpinum.20 Cicero explicitly associates the family rites, along with the remains of  the maiores, to his family home, which appears as the very stage of  his ancestral rites. The normative character of  Marcus’ laws, explicit in his religious laws in Leg. 2. 19–22, is recurrent throughout several passages of  his commentary on these laws, for example: [C]aste iubet lex adire ad deos, animo videlicet in quo sunt omnia; nec tollit castimoniam corporis, sed hoc oportet intellegi, quom multum animus corpori praestet, observeturque ut casta corpora adhibeantur, multo esse in animis id servandum magis. Nam illud vel aspersione aquae vel dierum numero tollitur; animi labes nec diuturnitate evanescere, nec amnibus ullis elui potest. quod autem “pietatem adhiberi, opes amoveri” iubet, significat probitatem gratam esse deo, 19  The topic of  the simplicity of  the countryside and the ancestral home has become a topos among Roman writers. For example, a passage quite similar to Cicero’s one is written by Pliny the Younger (Epistulae 2.15.2), in which he speaks of  his maternal property, saying that while as a residence it was not convenient for his needs, it was pleasing to him simply because it belonged to his mother. Another example is Plutarch (Cato Maior 1) presenting Cato linked to his paternal home in the Sabine region, guiding his life by frugality. See F. Fontanella, “Ius pontificum, ius ciuile e  ius naturae in De  legibus II,  45–53”, Athenaeum 84 (1996), pp. 254–60; A. R. Dyck, A Commentary on Cicero. De legibus, Ann Arbor, The University of  Michigan Press, 2003, p. 246. 20  Cicero’s strong connection with Arpinum is also visible in his lengthy remarks about Tullia’s fanum in letters to Atticus. Cicero considered building the fanum in Arpinum but changed his mind because of  the difficulty of  maintaining a regular cult for his deceased daughter there. Compared with Leg. 2, these letters show the differences between the ideal and the real contexts of  the performance of  family rites: esp. Ad Atticum 12.12. See C.  Beltrão, “Monimenta mortuorum: memória e religião em dois monumentos ciceronianos”, in L. M. Omena, P. P. A. Funari (eds), Práticas funerárias no Mediterrâneo romano, Jundiaí, Paco Editorial, 2016, pp. 47–68.

321

C. BELTRÃO

sumptum esse removendum. quid enim? paupertatem cum divitiis etiam inter homines esse aequalem velimus, cur eam sumptu ad sacra addito deorum aditu arceamus, praesertim cum ipsi deo nihil minus gratum futurum sit, quam non omnibus patere ad se placandum et colendum viam? quod autem non iudex, sed deus ipse vindex constituitur, praesentis poenae metu religio confirmari videtur. suosque deos aut novos aut alienigenas coli confusionem habet religionum, et ignotas caerimonias nostris sacerdotibus. nam a patribus acceptos deos ita placet coli, si huic legi paruerint ipsi patres (Leg. 2.24–26).21 The law commands us to approach the gods in purity – that is, purity in mind, for everything is included in that. This does not remove the requirement of  bodily purity: but it ought to be understood that, since the mind is  much superior to the body, and the requirement of  bodily purity is observed, we ought to be more careful about the mind. For in the former case impurity is  removed by the sprinkling of  water or the passage of  a  certain number of  days, but a  mental stain can neither be blotted out by the passage of  time nor washed away by any stream. The rule that piety shall be brought, but riches left behind, means that uprightness is pleasing to god, but that great expenditure is to be avoided. For indeed, since we desire that poverty shall be equal to riches even among men, why should we exclude it from the presence of  the gods by adding costliness to our rites, especially since nothing would be less pleasing to god himself  than the pathway to his favour and his worship should not be open to all alike? The provision that no human judge, but god himself, is to punish disobedience would seem to strengthen the power of  religion through the fear of  immediate punishment. The worship of  private gods, whether new or alien, bring confusion into religion and introduces ceremonies unknown to our priests. For the gods handed down to our fathers should be worshipped only in case our fathers themselves obeyed this law.

Marcus argues that “confusion” in religion should be avoided. In fact, De legibus 2 does not consider the existence of  Egyptian, Syrian, or other deities and cults in Rome, except the Greek ones, 21  English text by C. W. Keyes, Cicero, On the Republic, On the Laws, LCL 213, Cambridge Mass., London, Harvard University Press, 1928.

322

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

whose religious practices could be considered legitimate.22 It  is a presentation of  religion according to the model of  the Roman administrative hierarchy: an abstract and strictly functional definition, disregarding the actual religious pluralism of  the citizens and other inhabitants of  Rome, in a society in which there is supposed to have been great capacity for coexistence, or even for interaction between different religions.23 It  should be noted that the “private gods” (separatim deos: Leg. 2.19), whether new or foreign deities, are both opposed to the traditional gods of  public worship and those of Roman family cults. Therefore, Marcus proposes religious norms based on the Roman institutional model, hence the inclusion of  Greek deities and cults already incorporated into Rome’s religious tradition. He  also argues for attributing a  preponderant role to the priesthoods, of  which he claims to provide a complete list (Leg. 2.36). In Marcus’ terms, Roman priests had to have a sound knowledge of  religion, avoiding the kind of  ignorance that leads to error.24 This requirement is  not attested to in any other known textual evidence concerning Roman priesthoods.25 Cicero makes it an essential requirement at the beginning of  his list of  priesthoods (Leg. 2.20), in which his extensive commentary defines what priests should know about public or private worship. This   Cf., e.g. Leg. 2.6; 2.28–29; 2.56; 2.59; 2.62–67; 2.69.  On the topic, see especially S.  Estienne, V.  Gasparini, A.-F.  Jaccottet, J.  Rüpke, “La religion romaine: une fabrique de la norme?”, in T.  Itgenshorst, P.  Le Doze (ed.), La norme sous la République et le Haut-­ Empire romains. Élaboration, diffusion et contournements, Bourdeaux, Ausonius, 2017, pp. 201–16. 24  See V. Arena, “Cicero, the Augures, and the Commonwealth in De legibus”, in C. Beltrão, F. Santangelo (eds), Cicero and Roman Religion, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner, 2020, pp. 23–43, on the innovative laws set out by Cicero in Leg. 2. 25  C. Moatti, La raison de Rome, argues that rational expertise was a feature of  the second and first centuries bce, a moment of  significant upheaval in Roman society, which would have induced a need for clarification and “recreation” expressed in the intellectual domain. There was a double movement around the specialisation and organisation of  knowledge, which allowed for the emergence of  the relatively autonomous figure of  the expert (in religious, legal, antiquarian, and other realms). Sacred law, for example, underwent specialisation, and Roman priests became religious experts, in addition to being generally competent as aristocrats, performing rites privately and publicly, debating the religious aspects of  the city’s business in the Senate, practising sacred law, acting on matters of  justice, or advising amici and clientes. 22

23

323

C. BELTRÃO

institutional foundation and knowledge aim to ensure the best conditions to ritual performance, as underlined in Leg.  2.22: ex patriis vitibus optuma colunto. The institutional control is implicitly expressed in the following sentence, which indicates rules concerning the establishment of  private places of  worship, whether in the countryside or the city, precisely: quod sequitur vero, non solum ad religionem pertinet sed etiam ad ciuitatis statum ut sine iis qui sacris publice praesint, religioni privatae satis facere non possint. continet enim hoc rem publicam, consilio et auctoritate optimatium semper populum indigere (De Leg. 2.30). The provision which follows really has to do with the condition of  the State as well as with religion, its object being that private worship may not be satisfactorily performed without the assistance of  those in charge of  the public rites; for the people’s constant need for the advice and authority of  the aristocracy helps to hold the State together.

According to Marcus, the Romans need the consilio et auctoritate optimatium in the conduct of  their private rites, and notably the Ciceronian model of  private rites relates to the traditional rites of  the great Roman families. The ancestral house, therefore, was not just a literary topos, which is also evidenced by the heirs’ inalienable right to the ancestral home, along with other bona paterna in Roman heirdom (the sui heredes, those under the control of the patria potesta). The ancestral house is presented in the De legibus as the first place of  the sacra privata: de sacris autem, qui locus patet latius, haec sit una sententia, ut conserventur sempre et deinceps familiis prodantur et, ut in lege posui, perpetua sint sacra? Exposite haec iura pontificum auctoritate consecuta sunt, ut, ne morte patris familias sacrorum memoria occideret, iis essent ea adiuncta, ad quos eiusdem morte pecunia venerit. hoc uno posito, quod est ad cognitionem disciplinae satis, innumerabilia nascuntur, quibus implentur iuris consultorum libri (Leg. 2.47–48). Indeed, even this subject, which is of  somewhat wider importance, can be reduced to one basic principle: namely, that these rites shall ever be preserved and continuously handed down in families, and, as I said in my law, that they must be continued for ever. Clearly our present laws on the subject 324

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

have been laid down by the authority of  the pontiffs, in order that the performance of  the rites may be imposed upon those to whom the property passes, so that the memory of  them may not die out at the death of  the father of  the family. After this single rule was laid down – a  rule which is  quite sufficient for the understanding of  the proper procedure – innumerable others have come into existence and filled the books of  the consultants.

The family rites and the commemoration of  the ancestors are upheld as essential to the stability and permanence of  the res publica, creating and recreating individual and social religious identities.26 This point becomes explicit when Marcus invests against the pontiffs P. and Q .  Scaevola, for having confused their legal expertise with their pontifical responsibilities, creating devices that allowed wills and transfers of  properties without the obligation to maintain and perform the ancestral rites (Leg. 2.50–52). To the pontifical law, the Scaevolae would have added such technical provisions: if  an heir or heiress to an estate on which graves were located could receive less in currency than the other heirs, he or she would have been exempt from the cultic obligation. Marcus states that this pontifical rule, linking the responsibility of  performing the sacra to the cash amount of  the inheritance, is inappropriate (Leg. 2.52). One can imagine that, in most cases, the heres in charge of the family rites were members of  the testator’s kinship and, in general, that the responsibility for the sacra in the hereditas was a vector of  law, since the heres

 Cf. Att. 12.36.1, in which Cicero reveals to Atticus his concern with the location of  Tullia’s funerary monument, especially concerning eventual changes of  ownership, in order to guarantee the religio of  the monument. For funeral rites and festivals, see J.  Scheid, “Contraria facere: renversements et déplacements dans les rites funéraires”, AION (archeol) 6 (1984), pp. 117–39; N. Belayche, “La neuvaine funéraire ou la morte impossible à Rome”, in F. Hinard (ed.), La  mort au quotidien dans le monde romain, Paris, De  Boccard, 1995, pp. 155–69; B. Duffalo, The Ghosts of  the Past: Latin Literature, the Dead, and Rome’s Transition to a  Principate, Columbus, The Ohio State University Press, 2007, and J. Scheid (ed.), Pour une archéologie du rituel? Nouvelles perspectives de l’archéologie funéraire, Rome, École française de Rome, 2008. For an overview of  the legal aspects of  the Roman funeral domain, see J. R. Rodriguez, “Aspectos legais do mundo funerário romano”, in L. M. Omena, P. P. A. Funari (eds), Práticas funerárias no Mediterrâneo romano, pp. 25–46. 26

325

C. BELTRÃO

succeed the testator in locum et ius.27 In  short, for Cicero, family worship should be ensured as much as possible by the paterfamilias and their successors, who had a (public) duty to take care of  the proper fulfilment of  the family’s sacra, which comprised the ancestors’ rites, a  central component of  the sacra privata.28 On the family graves, Marcus states: [I]am tanta religio est sepulcrorum, ut extra sacra et gentem inferri fas negent esse  […] Totaque huius iuris conpositio pontificalis magnam religionem caerimoniamque declarat, neque necesse est edisseri a nobis, quae finis funestae familiae, quod genus sacrificii Lari ueruecibus fiat, quem ad modum os resectum terra obtegatur, quaeque in porca contracta iura sint, quo tempore incipiat sepulcrum esse et religione teneatur (Leg. 2. 55). Now graves are the objects of  so much religious veneration that it  is considered sinful to bury in them corpses not belonging to the gens or participating in its rites […] This whole body of  pontifical law shows deep religious feeling and a respect for the solemnity of  religious ceremony. It is unnecessary for me to explain when the period of  family mourning is ended, what sort of  a sacrifice of  whether is offered to the 27  On this topic, G.  Gandolfi, “Sulla evoluzione della hereditas alla luce del regime dei sacra (Cic.  De  Legibus 2.19–20, 47–49)”, SDHI 21 (1955), pp. 223–48. 28  Excellent studies have already showed the relationship between Roman funerary habits and beliefs and the social and legal system, as well as with the creation, expression and negotiation of  individual, family and social hierarchies and identities, including E. D’Ambra, “Acquiring and ancestor. The importance of  funerary statuary among the non-elite orders of  Rome”, in J.  M. Hojte (ed.), Images of  Ancestors, Aarhus, Aarhus University Press, 2002, pp. 223–46; V. M. Hope, “Contempt and Respect. The Treatment of the Corpse in Ancient Rome”, in V. M. Hope, E. Marshall (eds), Death and Disease in the Ancient City, London, New York, Routledge, 2002, pp.  104–27; M.  George, “Family Imagery and Family Values in Roman Italy”, in M. George (ed.), The Roman Family in the Empire: Rome, Italy and Beyond, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 37–66; K.  Mustakallio, “Roman Funerals: Identity, Gender, and Participation”, in K.  Mustakallio, J.  Hanska, H.  L. Sainio, V.  Vuolanto (eds), Hoping for Continuity. Childhood, Education, and Death in Antiquity and Middle Ages. Rome, Institutum Romanum Finlandiae, 2005, pp. 179–90; M. Carroll, Spirits of  the Dead. Roman Funerary Commemoration in Western Europe, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006, and E.-J. Graham, “Memory and Materiality. Re-embodying the Roman Funeral”, in V. M. Hope, J. Huskinson (eds), Memory and Mourning. Studies on Roman Death, Oxford, Oxbow Books, 2011, pp. 21–39.

326

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

Lar, in what manner are the rules in regard to the obligation to sacrifice a sow, or when the grave first takes on the character of  a grave and comes under the protection of  religion.

Nine days after the burial (the feriae denicales), the heir(s) performed the cena novemdiales. A  holocaust was offered to the Manes, the divine collective of  which the deceased was now part, while a sacrifice was made to the Lar and a banquet was held at the burial site, another public place, or even at the family’s own house. From then on, the deceased was the object of  religious attention on specific dates: in the Kalends, the Nonae and the Ides, the Rosalia, the Violaria, the dies natalis of  the deceased itself  and, above all, in the Parentalia and the Caristia.29 Beyond the cena novemdiales, the guests performed on those dates their family duties of  memoria, demonstrating their pietas by perpetuating, through these rites, the memory of  the dead. The memory of  the ancestors thus depended on the existence of descendants or other people – for example, the owner of  the land on which the tomb was located or the members of  a funerary collegium – to perform the rites. The consequences of  not observing these religious duties could be disastrous for the family or even for the Roman pietas as a whole, what can be seen, for example, in a narrative by Ovid: The Romans once went to war and failed to perform the Parentalia, resulting in the invasion of  Rome’s streets by terrible ghosts (Fast. 2.547–56). Moreover, in De natura deorum, Cicero makes this point by associating the absence of  pietas with the disappearance of  fides, iustitia and human society itself  (Nat. D. 1.4). Admittedly, there were financial concerns linked to properties and other bona paterna, but the implications of  such wills were much broader, threatening the family’s memory and identity, for the house was the place of  their ancestors’ commemoration, a place of  deep religious and cultural significance. In Roman law, some norms and rules dictated that the ancestral house was transferred from father to son or, in the absence of  male children,  Cf. J. Scheid, Pour une archéologie du ritual? pp. 117–82. Add to these rites the festival of  Lemuria, whose rites aimed at appeasing the ill-made dead, especially those who did not receive the due honours, keeping them far from the living. On this topic, see R. M. C. Bustamante, “Lemuria: apaziguando os mortos malfazejos na Roma antiga”, Phoînix 20.2, (2014), pp. 109–28. 29

327

C. BELTRÃO

to the immediate heirs (sui heredes). It  is  well known, however, that property transfers did not always occur this way, so the continuity of  the family rites and the ancestral home was not guaranteed in practice.30 Marcus’ statements allow us to reflect on the importance of  the ancestral house, linked to the spread of  the gens, the familia and the worship of  the maiores. For him, it  is a  duty that should be transmitted, almost without exception, with the right to property. Cicero’s De legibus presents us with an image of  the ancestral house as the place of  eternal commemoration, from generation to generation, of  the sacra privata.31 Roman family rites are thereby understood from a collective and public perspective, linked both to the identity and stability of  Rome itself  and to the parameters of  religion and law. This idea is  strongly supported by Marcus, who in De  legibus condemns the burial extra sacra et gentem (Leg. 2.55). As the sacra privata were pillars of  the cohesion and posterity of  the family group, they extend far beyond the funeral and provision of a decent grave for the dead. Their demands take the form of  precise, periodically renewed rituals involving all heirs, whether natural or testa­ mentary.32 30  See the transmission of  paternal inheritance to daughters, for example, among other situations analysed by J.  Bodel, “Monumental Villas and Villa Monuments”, JRA 10 (1997), and, especially, by R. P. Saller, Patriarchy, Property, and Death in the Roman Family, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994. 31  Plautus, in turn, had satirised the obligation of  ancestral rites by describing the ideal inheritance as that which occurred sine sacris hereditas (Trinummus, 484), which would be a  great economic advantage. Cicero insists on the traditional principle: that the rites must be fulfilled by the heirs, so that the memory of  the ancestors does not disappear with the death of  paterfamilias. 32 Cf. Ulpian, Digesta 11.7.2.6. The transfer of  a property to legitimate children did not appear to require a testamentum. On the law of  succession there is an abundant bibliography: see the dossier in R. Sotty, “Droits de l’Antiquité: Droit Romain II”, RD 78.2 (2000), pp. 381–84. A will ignoring a suus heres was, in principle, invalidated, even if  the testator was unaware of  the heir’s existence: E. Champlin, Final Judgements: Duty and Emotion in Roman Wills, 200 bc– ad 250, Berkeley, University of  California Press, 1991. For the privileged heirs, see Dig. 28.2.11. In the case of  property sales or inheritance outside the restricted family circle, from the point of  view of  Roman law, there were provisions that created a right of  access to the tomb, especially if  it was in loco alieno, for example, a property in which the house and land changed ownership without the graves being part of  the sale. After the sale, the access to the tomb was ensured by the right of  iter ad sepulchrum granted to the holder of  the tomb, cf. F. De Visscher, Le droit des tombeaux romains, Milan, Giuffrè, 1963, pp. 83–92.

328

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

As well as the juridical regime of  the res religiosae, Roman law of  succession is particularly complex because of  the vast freedom allowed to individuals in their testamentary dispositions, for their limits were set more by respect for tradition and pietas than by positive norms.33 Perhaps this context explains the emphasis on inheritance and its associated rites in Cicero’s De legibus. There was, for example, the possibility of  a here extraneus being charged with the performance of  the sacra, and this charge could have been a  significant financial expense for this kind of  heir. Thus, the maintenance of  the family rites defended by Marcus (cf.  Leg.  2.47) might not in practice be so straightforward. The institution of  the principle of  sacra cum pecunia proposed by Cicero (Leg. 2.50) could help the heir to bear these cultic expenses, but one can imagine that impoverishment, property transfers or even the extinction of  the heirs, especially in troubled times like the fifties and forties bce, made it difficult or even unfeasible to maintain and perform the sacra.34 In short, the law is the conceptual form that, in De legibus, Cicero utilises to achieve his goal of “reconstructing” the res publica. These sacra, recognised by all and supervised by public priests who are sufficiently wise and educated in religion and law, as Marcus proposes, seem to be an effort to strengthen Roman identities, but were also a form of  enacting social control over private matters. Here one can identify the pragmatic character of  Cicero’s proposal. His constitutio religionum provides a  consistent basis for the political constitution of  the De re publica and the recreation of  his ideal optimus civis.

3. Closing Remarks The religious practices Cicero deals with in De legibus 2 are exclusively Roman, and Marcus does not take into account any other human groups in the Roman Empire. It is a highly selective cod  See, especially, A.  Watson, The Law of  Succession in the Later Roman Republic, Oxford University Press, 1971. 34   The heir could also evade this responsibility through certain legal subterfuges. Two scenic examples have emerged in Plautus: Captivi 1.4, Trinummus 2.4. See O. Sacchi, “Il passaggio dal sepolcro gentilizio al sepolcro familiare e la successiva distinzione”, in G. Franciosi (ed.), Ricerche sulla organizzazione gentilizia romana, vol. 3, Napoli, Eugenio Jovene, 1995, esp. pp. 216–19. 33

329

C. BELTRÃO

ing in both form and content. It is, therefore, a contingent proposal of  a normative religious code, at a time when Rome was the caput mundi of  a huge empire with a significant cultural and religious diversity. If  in De Legibus 1 Marcus stated that “this whole world is to be regarded as a city common to gods and men” (universus hic mundus una civitas communis deorum atque hominum existimanda: Leg. 1. 23), his “whole world” is, after all, a generalisation of  the religious universe of  the very Roman élite. Cicero presents his religious laws from the point of  view of  public and institutional control, and his proposal is undeniably conservative. At the same time, however, it is innovative, as it argues for the universalisation of  religious customs hitherto attached to the great Roman families. With his laws, Marcus demands a standardised (and expensive) conduct of  life to whomever upholds Roman citizenship, regardless of  his or her lineage. Thus, his leges can be described as innovative, for they refer not only to the public norm, as was typical of  Roman law, but also to the private sphere, disseminating practices, behaviours and religious beliefs stretching from the Roman élite to all Roman citizens in the imperium. De legibus’ religious laws are highly elitist and, far from being “strange” in Cicero’s theoretical corpus, they can be seen as the political and institutional foundations of  a philosophical project, expressed for example in the prologues of  De natura deorum and the Tusculanae disputationes, with the aim of  creating a new élite to reconstruct the libera res publica. Such a project was not only theoretical, but it was based on very practical questions aimed at establishing “Roman” identities and attitudes compatible with religious and political Republican tradition. Hence his insistence on the sacra privata, which regulated and disciplined the funeral customs and family cults of  all citizens, overseen by public priests of  high expertise. To reach his goal of  social cohesion in the Roman Empire, Cicero proposed an extension of  the traditional élite’s way of  life, attitudes, and religious beliefs to all Roman citizens, ultimately under the aegis of  a new élite of  philosophically educated optimates.

330

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

Bibliography Annas J., “Introduction”, in J.  Annas, G.  Betegh (eds), Cicero’s De Finibus. Philosophical Approaches, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016, pp. 1–11. Arena, V., “Cicero, the Augures, and the Commonwealth in De legibus”, in C. Beltrão, F. Santangelo (eds), Cicero and Roman Religion, Stuttgart, Franz Steiner, 2020, pp. 23–43. Baraz Y., A Written Republic. Cicero’s Philosophical Politics, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2012. Belayche N., “La neuvaine funéraire ou la morte impossible à Rome”, in F. Hinard (ed.), La mort au quotidien dans le monde romain, Paris, De Boccard, 1995, pp. 155–69. Beltrão C., “Monimenta mortuorum: memória e  religião em dois monumentos ciceronianos”, in L.  M. Omena, P.  P.  A. Funari (eds), Práticas funerárias no Mediterrâneo romano, Jundiaí, Paco Editorial, 2016, pp. 47–68. Bishop C., Cicero, Greek Learning, and the Making of  a Roman Classic, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2019. Bodel J., “Monumental Villas and Villa Monuments”, JRA 10 (1997), pp. 5–35. Bogdan, G. “La discusión sobre la forma de los dioses a  fines de la República”, in C. Beltrão, F. Santangelo (eds), Estátuas na religião romana, Coimbra, Coimbra University Press, 2020, pp. 47– 63. Brittain C., “Middle Platonists on Academic Scepticism”, in R. W. Sharpies, R. Sorabji (eds), Greek and Roman Philosophy. 100 bc – 200 ad, London, BICS, Suppl. 94, 2007, pp. 297–315. Brittain C., “Cicero’s sceptical methods: the example of De Finibus”, in J.  Annas, G.  Betegh (eds), Cicero’s De  Finibus, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2016, pp. 12–40. Bustamante R. M. C., “Lemuria: apaziguando os mortos malfazejos na Roma antiga”, Phoînix 20.2, (2014), pp. 109–28. Carroll M., Spirits of  the Dead. Roman Funerary Commemoration in Western Europe, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006. Champlin E., Final Judgements: Duty and Emotion in Roman Wills, 200 bc – ad 250, Berkeley, University of  California Press, 1991. D’Ambra E., “Acquiring and ancestor. The importance of  funerary statuary among the non-elite orders of  Rome”, in J.  M. Hojte (ed.), Images of  Ancestors, Aarhus, Aarhus University Press, 2002, pp. 223–46. 331

C. BELTRÃO

De Visscher F., Le droit des tombeaux romains, Milan, Giuffrè, 1963. Duffalo B., The Ghosts of  the Past: Latin Literature, the Dead, and Rome’s Transition to a Principate, Columbus, The Ohio State University Press, 2007. Dyck A.  R., A  Commentary on Cicero. De  legibus, Ann Arbor, The University of  Michigan Press, 2003. Estienne S., Gasparini, V., Jaccottet, A.-F., Rüpke J., “La religion romaine: une fabrique de la norme?”, in T.  Itgenshorst, P. Le Doze (ed.), La norme sous la République et le Haut-Empire romains. Élaboration, diffusion et contournements, Bourdeaux, Ausonius, 2017, pp. 201–16. Feeney D., Literature and Religion in Rome. Cultures, Contexts and Beliefs, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1999. Fontanella F., “Ius pontificum, ius ciuile e ius naturae in De legibus II, 45–53”, Athenaeum 84 (1996), pp. 254–60. Gandolfi G., “Sulla evoluzione della hereditas alla luce del regime dei sacra (Cic.  De  Legibus 2.19–20, 47–49)”, SDHI 21 (1955), pp. 223–48. George M., “Family Imagery and Family Values in Roman Italy”, in M. George (ed.), The Roman Family in the Empire: Rome, Italy and Beyond, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2005, pp. 37–66. Gildenhard I., Paideia romana. Cicero’s “Tusculans Disputations”, Cambridge, The Cambridge Philological Society, 2007. Glucker J., “Cicero’s Philosophical Affiliations”, in J. M. Dillon, A.  A. Long (eds), The Q uestion of  “Eclecticism”. Studies in Late Greek Philosophy, Berkeley, University of  California Press, 1988, pp. 34–69. Görler W., “Silencing the Troublemaker: De Legibus 1.39 and the Continuity of  Cicero’s Scepticism”, in J.  G.  F. Powell (ed.), Cicero the Philosopher. Twelve Papers, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1995, pp. 85–113. Graham E.-J., “Memory and Materiality. Re-embodying the Roman Funeral”, in V.  M. Hope, J.  Huskinson (eds), Memory and Mourning. Studies on Roman Death, Oxford, Oxbow Books, 2011, pp. 21–39. Hope V. M., “Contempt and Respect. The Treatment of  the Corpse in Ancient Rome”, in V. M. Hope, E. Marshall (eds), Death and Disease in the Ancient City, London, New York, Routledge, 2002, pp. 104–27. Keyes, C. W., Cicero, On the Republic, On the Laws, LCL 213, Cambridge Mass., London, Harvard University Press, 1928. 332

SACRA PRIVATA PERPETUA MANENTO

Lévy C., Cicero Academicus. Recherches sur les “Academiques” et sur la philosophie cicéronienne, Rome, École française de Rome, 1992. Lévy C., “Cicéron était-il un  ‘Roman sceptic’?”, Ciceroniana online 1 (2017), pp. 9–24. Maso S., Grasp and Dissent, Cicero and Epicurean Philosophy, Turnhout, Brepols, 2015. Moatti C., La raison de Rome. Naissance de l’esprit critique à la fin de la république, Paris, Éditions du Seuil, 1997. Mustakallio K., “Roman Funerals: Identity, Gender, and Participation”, in K. Mustakallio, J. Hanska, H. L. Sainio, V. Vuolanto (eds), Hoping for Continuity. Childhood, Education, and Death in Antiquity and Middle Ages. Rome, Institutum Romanum Finlandiae, 2005, pp. 179–90. Powell J. G. F. (ed.), Cicero the Philosopher. Twelve Papers, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1995. Rodriguez J. R., “Aspectos legais do mundo funerário romano”, in L. M. Omena, P. P. A. Funari (eds), Práticas funerárias no Mediterrâneo romano, Jundiaí, Paco Editorial, 2016, pp. 25–46. Rüpke J., Religion in Republican Rome: Rationalization and Ritual Change, Philadelphia, University of  Pennsylvania Press, 2012. Sacchi O., “Il passaggio dal sepolcro gentilizio al sepolcro familiare e la successiva distinzione”, in G. Franciosi (ed.), Ricerche sulla organizzazione gentilizia romana, vol. 3, Napoli, Eugenio Jovene, 1995, pp. 171–218. Saller R. P., Patriarchy, Property, and Death in the Roman Family, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994. Scheid J., “Contraria facere: renversements et déplacements dans les rites funéraires”, AION (archeol) 6 (1984), pp. 117–39. Scheid J. (ed.), Pour une archéologie du rituel? Nouvelles perspectives de l’archéologie funéraire, Rome, École française de Rome, 2008. Schofield M., “Writing Philosophy”, in C. Steel (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Cicero, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2013, pp. 187–205. Sotty R., “Droits de l’Antiquité: Droit Romain II”, RD 78.2 (2000), pp. 321–94. Treggiari S., “The Upper-Class House as Symbol and Focus of Emotion in Cicero”, JRA 12 (1999), pp. 36–56. Volk K., The Roman Republic of  Letters. Scholarship, Philosophy, and Politics in the Age of  Cicero and Caesar, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2021. 333

C. BELTRÃO

Watson A., The Law of  Succession in the Later Roman Republic, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1971. Watts, N. H., Cicero XI. Pro Archia, Post reditum in senatu, post reditum ad quirites, De domo sua, De haruspicum responsis, Pro Plancio, Cambridge Mass., London, Harvard University Press, 1923. Woolf  R., Cicero, the Philosophy of  a Roman Sceptic, London, Routledge, 2015. Zetzel J.  E., “Philosophy is  in the Streets”, in G.  D. Williams, K.  Volk (eds), Roman Reflections. Studies in Latin Philosophy, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 50–82.

334

ÁLIA RODRIGUES University of  Coimbra Centre for Classical and Humanistic Studies (CECH) https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9787-4331

ROMAN MAIESTAS

BECOMING IMPERIAL, STAYING REPUBLICAN 1

The concept of  Maiestas is  frequently mentioned as a  specific feature of  Roman institutional, political and state identity.2 Traditionally ascribed to the gods,3 and later also the Christian God,4 the Roman Emperor adopted it as a central facet of his political identity.5 The use of  the language of  greatness and preeminence, which had traditionally been restricted to gods, to politics and law contributed to the construction of  a myth of  Roman exceptionality and a self-representation based on the idea of  maiestas. The reception of  this concept in European political 1  Earlier versions of  this paper were presented at the Celtic Conference at the University of  Coimbra in June 2019 and at Durham University in September 2019. For observations, comments and corrections, I would like to thank Carlo Pelloso, Greg Woolf, João Lanna, Fábio Faversani, Lautaro Lanzillotta, Georgy Kantor, and Chris Pelling. I would also like to thank Salam Rassi for improvements to the English. 2  On the association between maiestas and Roman political institutions and magistrates, such as the Senate, Consuls and Dictator, see note 79 for references, and the tribunes, see Cicero (De inventione 2.17.52–54) which will be explored above p. 354. The attribution of  maiestas to a person solely based on his/her individual merits is rare, as mentioned in the note 64. 3   See H. Drexler, “Maiestas”, Aevum 30, no. 3 (1956), pp. 195–212, p. 196; G. Dumézil, “Maiestas et Gravitas”, in Idées Romaines, Paris, Gallimard, 1969, pp. 125–52, and R. Bauman, The Crimen maiestatis in the Roman Republic and Augustan Principate, Witwatersrand University Press, Johannesburg, 1967, pp. 4–6. 4   e.g. CIL X 7112 apud D.  Salvo, “Maiestas”, in R.  S. Bagnal, K.  Bro­ der­sen, C. B. Champion, A. Erskine, S. R. Huebner (eds), The Encyclopedia of  Ancient History, s.l., Wiley-Blackwell, 2013, pp. 4236–38. See also note 85. 5  On the construction of  the emperor’s identity, see J. L. Brandão, “Performing Roman Identity” in this volume. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 335–369 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128701

335

Á. RODRIGUES

thought is immense, having influenced discourses on sovereignty 6 and the doctrine of  laesio maiestatis in European legal codes.7 The intellectual history of  this concept both as a  political concept and a  legal tool is expansive, but I will focus on a  specific stage of  this concept’s development that occurred during the Late Republic and the Principate. In  doing so, my aim in this study is to re-center the maiestas debate in the context of  the construction of  the (Roman) identity.8 The shift from the maiestas of  the Roman people to the maiestas of  the Princeps illustrates how maiestas was not only a site of  memory and political identity construction; it also provided a language that reflected Republican expectations and concerns about a  new political reality. In  particular, I  wish to discuss how the mediation of  maiestas (populi romani) through political and legal discourse helped shape a specific version of  Roman self-representation, a unified and imperial version of  Roman identity.9

  For instance, the well-known political thinker Jean Boudin interpreted maiestas (and summum imperium) as an expression of  sovereignty in his Methodus ad facilem historiarum cognitionem [Method for the easy knowledge of  history] (1566) and Les Six livres de la République (1576). In the latter, he states: “La souveraineté est la puissance absolute et perpétuel d’une République, que les Latins appellent maiestatem  […]”. J.  Boudin, Les six livres de la Republique. A  Lyon, Pour Barthelemy Vincent, 1593, p.  122. See also B.  Straumann, Crisis and Constitutionalism: Roman Political Thought from the Fall of  the Republic to the Age of  Revolution. New York, NY, Oxford University Press, 2016, in particular the chapter “Jean Bodin and the Fall the of  the Roman Republic”, pp. 278–302, especially pp. 228, 300. 7   For instance, F. S. Lear, Treason in Roman and Germanic Law: Collected Papers. Austin, University of Texas Press, 1965, and W. W. P. Damen, “Maiestas in the Dutch Republic”, RM - Early Modern Intellectual History, 2017. http://hdl. handle.net/2105/40565 (site accessed April 2020). 8  The idea that tracing the intellectual history of  concepts is a useful guide for understanding long-term political changes has been argued by Skinner and, more recently, by Straussman. Q .  Skinner, “The State”, in T.  Ball, J.  Farr, R.  L. Hanson (eds), Political innovation and conceptual change, Ideas in context. University Press, Cambridge, 1989, pp. 90–131 and B. Straussman, “The Energy of  Concepts: The Role of  Concepts in Long-Term Intellectual History and Social Reality”, Journal of  the Philosophy of  History 13 (2019), pp. 1–36. 9  On the parallel with Arena’s study on libertas, see p.  12 and note 106: V. Arena, Libertas and the practice of  politics in the late Roman Republic, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2012. Macagno and Walton have shown that these meanings must be understood as part of  a tradition of  legal rhetorical speculation, otherwise they would not have been efficient from a technical point 6

336

ROMAN MAIESTAS

The link between the legal maiestas and Roman identity was already acknowledged by Callie Williamson,10 who pointed out the importance of  making sense of  the crime of  maiestas beyond its legal context: “That maiestas remained for so long one of  the most significant criminal-law constructs of  ancient Rome underscores its value as a  window, as yet not fully opened, onto the Romans’ changing perception of  their world from earliest times”. In an insightful study on the law of  maiestas as a tool to control elites, Harries 11 observed that legal debates surrounding maiestas influenced the construction of  shared political understandings that shaped “the discourse in public offenses”. Moreover, Arena has identified “an intellectual tradition or set of  concepts” that was consolidated and transmitted by Roman politicians in the Late Republic, which also included the maiestas law.12 In a 1970 review of  Bauman’s study on crimen maiestas,13 Ramsey MacMullen makes a similar point in his critique of  the author’s failure to circumscribe maiestas beyond its legal context, remarking that Bauman’s “concern is  less with the history of  ideas than of  law and politics”.14 From an etymological point of  view, the concept maiestas is usually understood to derive from maior/maius, the comparative of  magnus, thus expressing an unequal relationship and preeminence often translated as “majesty” or “superiority”. By the first of  view. F. Macagno, D. Walton, Emotive language in argumentation, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2014, pp. 246–47. For evidence, see note 30. 10 C.  Williamson, “Crimes against the State”, in P.  Plessis, C.  Ando, K. Tuori (eds), The Oxford Handbook of  Roman Law and Society, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 333–44, p. 342. 11 J. Harries, “Controlling elites II: Maiestas” in Law and crime in the Roman world, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2007, pp. 72–85, p. 75. 12  Arena, Libertas and the practice of  politics, p. 133. 13   For two important works on crimen maiestatis, see R. Bauman, The Crimen maiestatis in the Roman Republic and Augustan Principate, and Impietas in principem: a study of  treason against the Roman emperor with special reference to the first century a.d., Beck, München, 1974. 14 R.  Macmullen, “The Crimen Maiestatis in the Roman Republic and Augustan Principate by Richard A. Bauman”, AJPh 91 (1970), pp. 117–18, p. 117. Seager makes a similar point in R. Seager, “Maiestas in the Late Republic: Some observations”, in J. Cairns, O. Robinson (eds), Critical Studies in Ancient Law, Comparative Law & Legal History: Essays in Honour of  Alan Watson, Oxford (England); Portland, Ore: Hart Publishing, 2001, pp. 143–53, p. 143.

337

Á. RODRIGUES

century ce, this understanding would develop into an absolute quality, thereby losing its original comparative dimension.15 Although the expression maiestas populi Romani was probably familiar to the Romans before Saturninus’ law in 103–00  bce, the lack of  sources attesting to this term makes it difficult for us to reconstruct its pre-legal meaning.16 Even Cicero himself, who 15 As Ferrary explains: “Dès les années 80 et sans aucun doute dès les années 100, semblent avoir presque totalement perdu conscience de la valeur propre de cette suffixation, et de ce fait n’établissent plus de rapport privilégié entre maiestas et maior”. For this reason, Ferrary rejects Sherwin-White’s interpretation of  maiestas as a derivation from the stem mag-, similar to “egestas, potestas”, since maiestas also included the suffix *-yes-, which is  absent from egestas and potestas. J.-L. Ferrary, “Les origines de la loi de majesté à Rome”, Comptes rendus des séances de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres 127 (1983), pp.  556– 72, p.  571, n.  7. Sherwin-White’s review mentioned by Ferrary here: A.  N. Sherwin-­White, “The Crimen Maiestatis in the Roman Republic and Augustan Principate”, Gnomon 41 (1969), pp.  288–93, p.  289. For maiestas as a  derivation from the goddess Maia, see Macrobius 1.12.16–18. Bauman (The Crimen maiestatis, pp. 1–2) does not acknowledge maiestas as an “absolute attribute” but rather as an unequal relationship. No Greek equivalent for maiestas is  known and authors who wrote in Greek used terms such as σεμνότης “solemnity, dignity”, δυναστεία “power, domination”, ἐξουσία “power”, μεγαλειότης, “majesty, magnificence”, ἀξίωμα, “honour, reputation” (LSJ). Welch also includes μέγεθός ἀρχῆς and μέγεθός ἡγεμονίας “largeness of  empire” as equivalents to maiestas. (K. Welch, “ ‘Maiestas regia’ and the donations of  Alexandria”, MedArch 19/20 (2006), pp.  181–92, p.  181). For instance, Dio when referring to the crimen maiestas, translates it as ἀσέβεια (68.2, two occurrences), which refers, for instance, to the crime of  impiety, one of  the crimes of  which Socrates was accused. 16 As Ferrary (“Les origines de la loi”, p. 556) observed: “La première célébra­ tion publique des jeux séculaires remonte au moins à 249 et c’est du milieu du IIIe siècle que, pour d’autres raisons, M. Gundel date l’apparition de la maiestas populi Romani [CIL VI, 32323, 11.93–94 and 126–27]; nous inclinerions plutôt à ne voir en cette date qu’un terminus ante quem”. The Secular Games inscription dates from 17  bce (Tac., Ann., 9.11), when August reinstated its celebration, which is first attested in 249 bce. The expression “maiestatemque p(opuli) R(omani)” appears twice in this prayer. However, it might not be an Augustan innovation, since ceremonial language tends to be archaizing. See also H. G. Gundel, “Der  Begriff  Maiestas im politischen Denken der römischen Republick”, Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte 12 (1963), pp. 283–85. From a legal point of  view, Ferrary (“Les origines de la loi”, pp.  556–57) lists a  few cases mentioned by first-century sources (Cicero, Diodorus Siculus, Suetonius, Seneca) that might attest maiestas’ cases prior to the passing of  Saturninus’ law (see note 26). However, as Sherwin-White (“The Crimen Maiestatis in the”, p.  289) also noticed, the fact that these sources mention maiestas’ cases does not necessarily mean that the concept of  minuere maiestatem populi Romani preceded that of  lex Appuleia, since they can often provide anachronistic explanations. Both Gau­demet and Seager have pointed out that the maiestas law sparked little interest among jurists partly because of  its lack of  technical definition, and be-

338

ROMAN MAIESTAS

provides the earliest source for Saturninus’ law,17 extensively discussed the ways in which a legal meaning could be attributed to maiestas populi Romani within the framework of  Saturninus’ law, as we will do below. In the following two sections, I will first explore aspects of  the Republican narrative of  maiestas, and then move to an account of  the legal changes that shaped the political-legal content of  maiestas until Caesar’s death. Each part will be examined separately for the sake of  clarity, although the legal meaning of  maiestas cannot be separated from the “sociology of  power” 18 from which the legal sense emerges.

1. Constructing Roman Exceptionality The Second Punic War and the consequent unification of  Italy under Roman hegemony had a  long-lasting impact on Rome’s self-representation and state identity.19 The idea that the Roman people were a historical entity that superseded the deeds of  their Greek predecessors is  a  major theme of  the first historical narrative in Cato’s Origines, which he wrote roughly ten years later after the Second Punic War.20 The idea of  a  Roman Republic cause once the imperial adjudication became more frequent in maiestas cases, there was little room for intellectual speculation. See J. Gaudemet, “Maiestas populi Romani”, in A. Guarino, L. Labruna (eds), Synteleia Vincenzo ArangioRuiz, vol. II, Naples, Biblioteca di Labeo 2, 1964, pp. 699–709 and R. Seager, “Maiestas in the Late Republic: Some observations”, p. 143 and p. 153. Recently, João Freitas also provided a  survey of  all occurrences of  the element maiestin Latin Literature between the middle of  the first century bc to the end of  the Julio-Claudian dynasty (ad 68), year of  emperor Nero’s death. (J. V. L. de Freitas, “Maiestas: apontamentos entre a  República Tardia e  o Principado”, Roda da Fortuna. Revista Eletrônica sobre Antiguidade e Medievo 2018, vol. 7.2, pp. 60–93). 17   See pp. 357–358 below. 18 T. Lanfranchi, “La majesté: l’autre nom de la souveraineté?”, Lectures 2 (28 March 2013) and 3 (6 April 2013). Seminaires des membres de l’école française de Rome, 2013. https://semefr.hypotheses.org/886 (site accessed May 2019). 19  Gundel, “Der Begriff  Maiestas”, pp. 283–320, especially pp. 318–19. 20  The notion of  “Roman people” has two semantic modalities in Cato: the Roman people as a whole as opposed to “individual gentes” (i.e. other Italic peoples) and the Roman people as a  political community that existed by virtue of  its elements. The idea of  the Roman people as a collective entity in Cato aimed

339

Á. RODRIGUES

(or Roman version of  mixed constitution) as an explanation for the success of  Roman expansion was expressed by Polybius (6.18.1–8; 56.1–15), a  contemporary of  Cato. The correlation between the agency of  the Roman People and the Republic forms part of  an emotional collective memory of  the Republican past as well as being a literary commonplace. Sallust, for instance, writing in 41–40  bce, reinterpreted the earlier plebian struggles as a  means of  achieving maiestas. This could also reflect another understanding of  maiestas insofar as populus romanus could be considered an element of  the Roman state but not the whole of  it:  21 Your ancestors twice seceded, took up arms, occupied the Aventine in order to get justice and establish their sovereignty (maiestas). Will you not struggle with every resource for the liberty that you received from them? And all the more passionately because it is a greater disgrace to lose what was once won than not to have won it at all. (Sall., Iug. 31.17) 22

The emotional resonance of  the phrase maiestas populi Romani played an important role when Saturninus’ Law was passed in 100–03 bce.23 The tribune Appuleius Saturninus introduced the to show that Rome was the ethnic center of  the Italic peoples, as Gotter puts it: “the systematically ethnicized origin of  Rome and the Republic”. The fragment of  the anonymous tribune (Q uintus Caedicius) transmitted by Aulus Gellius is  particularly meaningful (Orig. f.  83 HRR  = Gell.3.7.1–19) as it explores the idea of  the anonymous Roman magistrate that performed heroic deeds that became closely associated with the Roman people as a whole. See also another fragment of  Cato, Frg. 1.1 Chassignet. See also Nepos, Cato 3.3. Gotter also points out that Cato’s homo novus background in his historical narrative might also have played a role in the construction of  Roman people as character. For an extensive analysis of  these topoi in Cato, see U. Gotter, “Cato’s Origines: The historian and his enemies”, in A. Feldherr (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Historians. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp. 108–22. Gundel (“Der Begriff  Maiestas”, pp. 318–19) also identifies the unification of  Italy after the first Punic war as having created the ideal conditions for these ideas to flourish. 21  I owe this point to Greg Woolf. 22   Translated by W.  W. Batstone, Sallust. Catiline’s conspiracy, The Jugurthine War, Histories. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016. 23  The Lex Appuleia was first transmitted by Cicero (Inv.  Rhet., 2.52–53; De or., 2.25.107, 49.201 and by the anonymous treaty Rhetorica ad Herennium (1.21) which used to be attributed to Cicero. The full extent of  this law is not known. The bibliography on maiestas law is  understandably vast. For a  general guide to the development of  the Roman maiestas and its emergence, see Gundel (“Der Begriff  Maiestas”), Ferrary (“Les origines de la loi”); for a political and

340

ROMAN MAIESTAS

first quaestio perpetua (“permanent jury court”) for treason, which pertained to the maiestas populi Romani diminuta (often refereed simply as maiestas) and condemned any conduct that caused damage to the majesty of  the Roman people.24 This permanent court (quaestio perpetua) was introduced after an intense sequence of  military failures and cases of provincial corruption created a sense of  mistrust towards the elites.25 The new law introduced by Saturninus reinforced two elements which were already present in previous related cases.26 The former is the relation between Per­ duel­lio (hostility towards the state) 27 and the safety of  the Roman people, while the latter placed a “new emphasis on the sovereign ‘greatness” of  the people’.28 Both written in the 80s bce, Cicero (De  Inventione), the anonymous Rhetorica Ad Herennium, and Cicero’s De  Oratore dated 55 bce (on the case of  91 bce) are our main sources for legal perspective between the Late Republic and the Principate, see Gaudemet (“Maiestas populi Romani”, pp. 699–709), R. Seager (“Maiestas in the Late Republic”), J. Harries (“Controlling elites II: Maiestas”), M. Peachin (“Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers, the ‘Crimen Maiestatis’, and the Second Cyrene Edict” in J.-L.  Ferrary, J.  Scheid (eds), Il  princeps romano: autocrate o  magistrato? Fattori giuridici e fattori sociali del potere imperiale da Augusto a Commodo, Pavia IUSS Press, 2015, pp. 497–553), Williamson (“Crimes against the State”) and Bauman (The Crimen maiestatis, Impietas in principem) as mentioned previously in the notes 13 and 14. For relevant bibliography on specific aspects of  the maiestas narrative, see in loco. 24  Maiestatem is minuit qui amplitudinem civitatis detrimento adficit (Rhet. Her. 2.12.17, 4.25.35; also Cic., De  or., 2.39.164). On the possibility of  a  legal meaning of  maiestas before the lex Appuleia, see note 26. 25  For an extensive Saturninus’ law as a legal means of  controlling elites, see Harries (“Controlling elites II”, p. 72). 26  For instance, in 107 bce, Gaius Popillius was accused of  maiestas for negotiating with the enemy in order to save his men (Cic., Inv. Rhet., 2.72–73; Leg. 3.36; Rhet. Her. 1.25; 4.34). On this case, see also further p. 344. Cicero (Inv. Rhet., 2,52) comments on a case of  maiestas in which the tribune of  the plebs Flaminius is prevented by his father from passing an agrarian law in the Assembly. On this case, see further p. 6. Ferrary (“Les origines de la loi”, pp. 556–57) lists other cases mentioned in first-century sources (Cicero, Diodorus Siculus, Suetonius, Seneca) that attest to maiestas’ cases before Saturninus’ law was passed. See also Harries, “Controlling elites II”, pp. 72–73. 27  Perduellio also included proditio which consists in colluding with the enemy against the state. On the nature and scope of  perduellio, see C.  Pelloso, “Dalla ‘pro Rabirio perduellionis reo’ alla causa Horatiana: riflessioni su attesta­ zioni storiche e storiografiche del giudizio duumvirale”, in L. Garofalo (ed.), Giornata di studio in ricordo di Carlo Venturini, Napoli, 2021 (forthcoming). 28   These two points were made by Harries, “Controlling elites II”, p. 73.

341

Á. RODRIGUES

the reconstruction of  legal arguments in Republican maiestas cases and focus mainly on trials that took place little after Saturninus’ law was passed. Despite the different aims of these works, they all appear to agree on one point regarding the maiestas charge: a  good advocate must define maiestas in line with the case in question. In other words, the content of  the word maiestas must be taken according to what best serves the defendant.29 For instance, in the famous case of  the trial of  Caepio and Norbanus (95  bce), Caepio 30 accused Norbanus of  maiestas for causing a riot which prevented the tribunician veto from being effective. Antonius, a  well-known orator and Norbanus’ advocate, confirmed that Norbanus did indeed cause the seditio but showed that this did not cause damage per se because other seditions in the past had actually benefited the Roman people (De or., 2.125.1; Part. Or. 105).31 Furthermore, the political role of  the tribune of  the plebs was to obey the people whose will was most fully expressed in the popular assembly (De  or. 2.167).32 In  De  Oratore  II (25.105–08), Cicero lets Antonius explain his defense strategy: 29   Instances in which this point is made include the case of  Gaius Flaminius and his father (232 bce): De inventione 2.17.53. For a discussion on the maiestas’ arguments in this case, see Seager, “Maiestas in the Late Republic”, p. 6. Other cases are: Case of  Servilius Caepio and Saturninus (100  bce): Ad Herennium 1.12.21; 2.12.17. Caepio and Norbanus’ case (95 bce): Cic., De Or., 25.107–09. 30  Cf. the case of  the tribune Gaius Flaminius (Cic., Inv. Rhet., 2.17.52). See p. 343. 31  However, as Seager (“Maiestas in the Late Republic”, p. 147) has noted, this argument would fail at a later stage, since Ulpian defines seditio as a maiestas offence (see full quotation in note 45). 32   “If  the magistracies ought to be under the control of the Roman People, why impeach Norbanus, whose conduct as tribune was subservient to the will of the community?” (si magistratus in populi Romani potestate esse debent, quid Norbanum accusas, cuius tribunatus voluntati paruit civitatis?). The Latin text and English translation were taken from: H. Rackham, E. W. Sutton, Cicero. De  Oratore. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. On the consuls’ submission to the plebs, see Livy 2.7.7 (see full quotation in note 82) and 2.55.3 (see p. 355). For an analysis of  this passage, see Arena (Libertas and the practice of  politics, pp.  131–34), who connects it to Tiberius Gracchus’ definition and meaning of  the office of  tribune of  plebs office. Later, Cicero would also use Tiberius Gracchus’ interpretation of  the tribune of  plebs office as an argument in Cornelius’ defense when he was being accused of  maiestas. Arena (Libertas and the practice of  politics, p. 133) and Straumann (Crisis and constitutionalism, p. 108).

342

ROMAN MAIESTAS

I still maintained that the defendant was not guilty of  “treason” [maiestas minuta] since the whole case depended on the construction of  this word, by virtue of  the Statute of  Appuleius. […]  But in that case of  ours Sulpicius did no such thing nor did I attempt it, since we both, to our power, enlarged with all our fluency upon the meaning of  “treason” [maiestatem minuere]. (De or. 2.107–09) […] So, Sulpicius, it was rather by working upon, than by informing [ita magis affectis animis iudicum quam doctis], the minds of  the tribunal, that I beat the prosecution on that occasion.33 (De or., 2.201)

Antonius, therefore, expands on the subjectivity of  the maiestas concept and explores its emotional effects (especially in De  or., 2.200–01). While Antonius refers to a specific case, this legal reasoning could also be applied to other maiestas cases since these discussions are set in the rhetorical treatises aimed at training future advocates or politicians. A similar case took place in 232 bce when the tribune Gaius Flaminius was prevented by his own father from proposing a controversial agrarian law which caused his father to be accused of  maiestas. The two sides of  the argument are explored by Cicero (De inventione 2.17.52–54): can a father invoke this authority to prevent his son from exercising his duty as a tribune? (2.17.52). In this case, maiestas minuta is identified with “lessening of  the dignity (dignitas) of  high state (amplitudo) or power (potestas) of  the people or of  those to whom the people have given authority”.34 33  Translated by H. Rackham, E. W. Sutton, Cicero. De Oratore. Q uintilian (Institutes 3.6.86–87), in the final book of  his Institutes, also describes this forensic technique: “In the case of one law we rely on the letter, in others on the spirit. Some laws we force to serve us when we can find no other to support us, others we compare with one another, and others we put some novel interpretation”. More on this passage, see Humphress, “Telling Stories”, p. 102. I quoted the translation from H. E. Butler, Q uintilian. The institutio Oratoria. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press. London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1920. 34  See also Ad Herennium 2.12.17. Hilder explores the use of  the “ciuitatis amplitudo”. J. Hilder, “Jurors, Jurists and Advocates: Law in the Rhetorica Ad Herennium and De Inventione”, in P. Plessis (ed.), Cicero’s Law: Rethinking Roman Law of  the Late Republic. Edinburgh, University Press, 2016, pp. 177–78. The Latin text and English translation were taken from: H. M. Hubbell, Cicero. De inventione; De optimo genere oratorum. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. I have slightly modified the translation, reading “power” for potestas instead of  “authority”.

343

Á. RODRIGUES

Another case which is  discussed at length by Cicero took place in 107  bce and concerns the general Gaius Popillius, who was accused of  maiestas for making an agreement with the enemy for saving his men, as Cicero explains: Granted that all the soldiers were going to perish unless they had come to this agreement, was it better to lose the soldiers to come to these terms? One should treat this kind of  case by topics peculiar to itself  and also adapt the principles and rules which apply in other issues 35 (Cic., Inv. rhet., 2.72–73; also Rhet. Her., 1.15.25).

The anonymous author of  Rhetoric ad Herennium comments on another famous trial that took place in 100  bce (1.12.21; 2.12.17–18), in which Q . Servilius Caepio 36 prevented Saturninus, the author of  the Lex Appuleia de maiestate, from passing a  grain law by “demolishing of  the bridges of  the Comitium” (2.12.17) and therefore preventing the people from exercising their political rights. The author then goes on to provide two contrasting interpretations of  maiestas: on the one hand, in Saturninus’ defense: “He impairs the sovereign majesty of  the state who destroys the elements constituting its dignity”, i.e. the right to vote (suffragium, 2.12, 17) and the political magistrates (magis­tratum consilium, 2.12, 17); on the other hand, in Caepio’s defense: “He impairs the sovereign majesty of  the state who inflicts damage upon its dignity”,37 i.e. to protect the sustainability of  the treasury (“[I] kept the majesty of  the state from perishing utterly” 38).  “cum omnes perituri milites essent, nisi ad hanc pactionem venissent, utrum satius fuerit amittere milites, an ad hanc condicionem venire? Hoc causae genus ex suis locis tractari oportebit et adhibere ceterarum quoque constitutionum rationem atque praecepta”. 36  The former is the son of  Q . Servilius Caepio, the general who caused Arausio’s extraordinary defeat in 105 bce. See Ad Herennium 1.14.24. Both Q . Servi­ lius Caepio and his colleague C. Mallius Maximus (Ad Her. 1.14.24) were exiled after being prosecuted for perduellio by Saturninus and Norbanus. 37  Saturninus’s defense: “Maiestatem is  minuit qui ea tollit ex quibus rebus civitatis amplitude constat”; Caepio’s defense: “Maiestatem is minuit qui amplitudinem civitatis detriment adficit”. Latin text and English translation were taken from: H. Caplan, [Cicero]. Rhetorica ad Herennium, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. For a  detailed analysis of  the construction of  the legal argument in this case, see Hilder, Jurors, Jurists and Advocates, pp. 175–76. 38  “[Ego] maiestatem omnem interire non passus sum”. 35

344

ROMAN MAIESTAS

These semantic exercises were also limited by the context of  interpretation. The content of  what maiestas populi Romani diminuta meant was being formulated at the end of the Republic and Cicero, one of  our main sources, was invariably aligned with the Senate. However, despite these limitations, such examples are exercises of  an articulation between legal reasoning and political (Republican) emotion, demonstrating how the construction of  maiestas populi romani – or what ought to be protected for the Romans – was being reified and mediated by legal language. Thus, these legal arguments also produced a homogenous political and public discourse on the concept maiestas that contributed to the emergence of  the Roman civitas as a coherent entity.39 The Lex Appuleia de maiestate (103–00 bce) 40 was followed twenty years later by the Lex Cornelia de maiestate (81  bc) of  Sulla. In  55  bce, Cicero (Pis. 50) delivered before the Senate a speech against Lucius Calpurnius Piso which included a catalogue of  offenses said to have been committed by Aulus Gabinius while he was governor in Syria (57–54 bce). These offenses included leaving his province, withdrawing his army and declaring or persisting in wars that were unauthorized by the people or Senate. Cicero adds that these offenses were forbidden by several laws, including the Cornelian law concerning treason and the Julian law concerning extortion.41 Although Sulla does not clarify the con­cept of  maiestas,42 he nevertheless managed, as 39   For Roman people as a  historical commonplace in Cato’s Origines, see note 20. 40 The Lex Varia de Maiestate issued in 90 bce was not a permanent quaestio or a general law, but a temporary legal measure aimed at dealing with the Italian insurgents during the outbreak of the Social War. See Seager (“Maiestas in the Late Republic”, p. 144) and Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, p. 514. 41  This corresponds to Julius Caesar’ extortion law of  59 bce. See discussion in Seager, “Maiestas in the Late Republic”, pp. 144, 148). 42  Cic., Fam., 3.11.2: “Still there  is something indeterminate about a  lèsemajesté charge, in spite of Sulla’s ordinance penalizing random declamation against individuals, whereas corruption is clearly defined” (verum tamen est maiestas, etsi Sulla voluit ne in quemvis impune declamari liceret, ‹ambigua›). Latin text and English translation were taken from: D. R. Shackleton Bailey, Cicero. Letters to Friends, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. This might be why the maiestas crime was never abolished after Saturninus’ death. As Seager (“Maiestas in the Late Republic”, p.  148) pointed out: “The champions of  the authority of  the Senate had realized that its very vagueness would allow them to stand it on its head and use it was a weapon against tribunician reform”.

345

Á. RODRIGUES

Harries 43 points out, to ensure the “permanent replacement of  perduellio with maiestas, which now became ‘treason’ in every sense”. Sulla’s reform of  the maiestas law is followed by the Lex Iulia de maies­tate (46 bce) passed by Caesar.44 Cicero mentions it in his first Philipic (1.9.23) in 44 bce and Ulpian (D.48.4.1), also seems to be relying on the Lex Iulia Maiestatis.45 In neither of  these two legal updates of  the maiestas law is death mentioned as a penalty with the interdiction from fire and water and confiscation of  property being the main penalties.46

  Harries, “Controlling elites II”, p. 75.   There is some speculation regarding how many leges Iulia on maiestas were passed. For a detailed reconstruction of  this law (or laws), see Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, pp. 516–18). 45  Ulpian, Duties of  Proconsul, book 7: “Closest to sacrilege is  the crime of  treason. 1. The charge of  maiestas refers to an action which is committed against the Roman people. He is liable by whose agency with deliberate malicious intent a plot is entered into to kill hostages without the order of  the emperor; or that men should be within or assemble within the bounds of  the city armed with weapons or stones against the interests of  the res publica, or that they should seize control of  sites or temples, or that there should be a ganging-up or assembly, or that men should be brought together for seditious ends; or by whose agency and deliberate bad intent a conspiracy should be entered into to kill any magistrate of  the Roman People, or anyone holding imperium, or other form of  official power (potestas); or that anyone should bear arms against the res publica; or that anyone should send a messenger or letters to an enemy of  the Roman People, or give them a password or should so act with deliberate bad intent that enemies of  the Roman People receive assistance from his advice against the res publica; or who persuades or incites soldiers in such a way as to give rise to sedition or revolts against the res publica”. Translated by A. Watson, The Digest of  Justinian. Vol. IV. Philadelphia, University of  Pennsylvania Press, 2009. Ulpianus libro septimo de officio proc‹ons›ulis. Proximum sacrilegio crimen est, quod maiestatis dicitur. Maiestatis autem crimen illud est, quod aduersus populum Romanum uel aduersus securitatem eius committitur. quo tenetur is, cuius opera dolo malo consilium initum erit, quo obsides iniussu principis interciderent: quo armati homines cum telis lapidibusue in urbe sint conueniantue aduersus rem publicam, locaue occupentur uel templa, quoue coetus conuentusue fiat hominesue ad seditionem conuocentur: cuiusue opera consilio malo consilium initum erit, quo quis magistratus populi Romani quiue imperium potestatemue habet occidatur: quoue quis contra rem publicam arma ferat: quiue hostibus populi Romani nuntium litterasue miserit signumue dederit feceritue dolo malo, quo hostes populi Romani consilio iuuentur aduersus rem publicam: quiue milites sollicitauerit concitaueritue, quo seditio tumultusue aduersus rem publicam fiat […]. T. Mommsen, P. Krueger, A. Watson, Digesta Iustiniani 1–50 (The Digest of  Justinian vols 1–4), Philadelphia, University of  Pennsylvania Press, 1985. 46 A. Lintott, “Maiestas”, in J. Percy, V. D. Balsdon, B. Levick (eds), Oxford Research Encyclopedia of  Classics, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016. 43 44

346

ROMAN MAIESTAS

While the content of  maiestas (populi Romani) was being debated in trials and discussed in rhetorical treatises, the so-called maiestas (populi Romani) clause was also included in Roman diplomatic treaties. The earliest known evidence for the use of  the maiestas clause in a diplomatic context is the Aetolian treaty of  189 bce, which is also the earliest occurrence of  a treaty between Rome and a  Greek state.47 This reference was first transmitted by Polybius (dunasteia, 21.32.2) who later became Livy’s source (38.11.2).48 The next evidence is the treaty of  Gades in 78 bce, which is transmitted by Cicero in his speech in defense of  Lucius Cornelius Balbus delivered in 56 bce, in which he states maies­ tatem populi Romani comiter conversanto (“Let them uphold the greatness of  the Roman people in a friendly way”) (v. 34–35).49 See also notes 91, 103. Cf. B. Santalucia, Diritto e processo penale nell’antica Roma (2ª ed.), Milano, Giuffrè, 19982, p. 182. 47  There is  no precedent in Greek treaties. See E.  S. Gruen (The Hellenistic World and the Coming of  Rome. Berkeley, London, University of  California Press, 1984, p. 29), and G. Kantor, “Roman Treaties”, in R. S. Bagnall, K. Brodersen, C. B. Champion, A. Erskine, S. R. Huebner (eds), The Encyclopedia of  Ancient History, s.l., Wiley-Blackwell, 2013, pp. 6842–46). See also Gruen, The Hellenistic World, pp. 14–15. 48   The discovery of  the Treaty Between Rome and Lycia of  46 bce in 2001 shed new light on the possibility the the Aetolian treaty might have included an actual maiestas clause. E.  S. Gruen (The Hellenistic World) has dismissed the Aetolian treaty as having been the earliest evidence of  the maiestas clause, since there was no precedent or later example in any treaty between Rome and a Greek state. On Polybius’ passage, see also: F. W. Walbank (A Historical Commentary on Polybius. 2. Commentary on Books Vii–Xviii. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1999) and D.  W. Baronowski, “Sub Umbra Foederis Aequi”, Phoenix 44.4 (1990) pp.  345–69. The discovery of  the Lycian Treaty of  46  bce, however, changed this as S. Mitchell (The Treaty Between Rome and Lycia of  46 bc (MS 2070) [Offprint from Papyri Graecae Schøyen (PSchøyen I)]. Papyrologica Florentina; v. 35 [Offprint], 2005, p. 189) pointed out: “[…] in the case of  Lycia, the maiestas clause is placed at the head of  the treaty, as it was in the treaty with the Aetolians of  189 bce”. See also Welch, “Maiestas regia”, p. 182 n. 7. 49  Translated by R. Gardner, Cicero, Pro Caelio. De Provinciis Consularibus. Pro Balbo. Vol. XIII, Cambridge, Mass., 1958. Cicero’s arguments about the content and the meaning of  this clause seems to have later influenced Proculus’ (Dig. 49.15.7.1) definition of  the maiestas clause, which reads: “[…] Note moreover that the one people is understood to be superior; the other is not to be understood as not free. So, just as we understand our clients to be free, even if  they do not excel us in authority or dignity, so those who are bound to respect our maiestas with good will should be understood to be free”. Sempronius Proculus, Proculus Letters (bk. 8 fr. 30 Lenel = Dig. 49.15.7.1; trans. after O. Robinson) apud C. Ando, Law, language, and empire in the Roman tradition, Philadelphia, University of  Pennsylvania Press, 2011, p. 73. The maiestas clause as defined by

347

Á. RODRIGUES

In this passage, while examining the content and meaning of  this clause, Cicero also points out that it did not reflect a  common practice in Roman treaties by his time (Balb. 35–36). Roughly ten years after Cicero delivered this speech, Julius Caesar, during his third dictatorship, includes the maiestas clause in three treaties: the treaty with the Lycian league of 46 bce,50 which provides the first fully preserved version of  the maiestas clause; the Mytilene treaty of 46 bce (IG XII.2 35); and the fragmentary Latin version of  the treaty with Cnidus in 45 bce (I. Knidos I 33, ll. 11–13).51 The restoration of  the latter two were based on the Lycian treaty, since they appear to follow a similar structure.52 The sparse use of the maiestas clause between the beginning of  the second century and the Augustan era, however, suggests that its inclusion was not a common practice in Roman non-domestic politics but rather was an ad hoc feature. In fact, in the first century centuries ce, references to the maiestas clause appear in the context of  Caesar’s personal agenda during the civil war rather than in relation to the maiestas of  the Roman people.53 Thus, outside the legal context, there does not appear to be a correlation between maiestas and the construction of  the Roman imperium and its allies.54 Proculus seems to have inspired the distinction between “equal treaty” (foedus aequum) and an “unequal treaty” (foedus iniquum). However, as Mitchell (The Treaty Between Rome, p. 188; also Kantor, “Roman Treaties”) has pointed out, this distinction “had no technical relevance” though reinforced by modern scholarship. Cf. Livy (34.57.7–9; 38.2.2). On the implications of  the inclusion of  the maiestas’ clause a non-Roman party, see Mitchell, The Treaty Between Rome, pp. 188–89. 50  “Let the Lycians observe the power (ἐξουσία) and pre-eminence (ὑπεροχή) of  the Romans [firmly] (10) as it proper in all circumstances in a manner worthy of  themselves and of  the Roman people” (lines 8–10). S. Mitchell, The Treaty Between Rome and Lycia of  46 bce (MS 2070), pp. 165–258. 51 See Gruen, The Hellenistic World, p. 29 n. 87 and Mitchell, The Treaty Between Rome, pp. 189, 233–34. 52  On the restorations of  the treaties of  Mytilene and Cnidos, see Mitchell, The Treaty Between Rome, p. 188. I owe this reference to Georgy Kantor. 53  This diplomatic practice also reflects a  constitutional change in course which is mentioned by Cassius Dio (42.20.1: “They appointed him [Julius Caesar] arbiter of  war and peace with all mankind – using the conspirators in Africa as a  pretext – without the obligation even of  making any communication on the subject to the people or the senate”). See Mitchell, The Treaty Between Rome, pp. 237–41 on this discussion. 54   This point is made by Mitchell, The Treaty Between Rome, p. 188. Welch

348

ROMAN MAIESTAS

However, the use of  maiestas populi Romani by Caesar in the context of  civil war was both skillful and timely. As Stephen Mitchell, the author of  the editio princeps of  the Lycian treaty, explains: “By using the form of  a treaty Caesar appeared to stand for the Roman people as a whole, although he did so in the context of a civil war. His new allies thus recognized him as constituting the legal sovereign power of  Rome …”. This diplomatic juxtaposition of  identities produced objective political consequences for Caesar and also for his partisans, since, as Mitchell also points out, these cities remained loyal to Caesar and later, after his death, to the Caesarian-Octavian party.55 Caesar’s alignment with the populus Romanus – or the “Ego et Populus Romanus” theme 56 – is also found elsewhere in Caesar’s work, in statements such as: “He treated with Caesar as follows: If   the Roman people would make peace with the Helvetii  […]” (Is ita cum Caesare egit: Si pacem populus Romanus cum Helvetiis faceret, BGall. 1.13.1) 57 or “Nevertheless, I  accepted the loss of  prestige with equanimity for the sake of the republic” (tamen hanc iacturam honoris sui rei publicae causa aequo animo tulisse, BCiv. 1.9.3.1.) 58 However, as Bauman 59 demonstrated, despite Caesar’s obsession with his own “dignitas” (p. 120), no semantic or technical change in Roman maiestas occurs from the time of  Caesar’s first consulate to the date of  his death.60 (“Maiestas regia”, p. 182), who argues that treaties are not the best places to look for Roman maiestas, since Roman continuous expansion and military power was considered enough to inspire compliance in other parties. 55  Mitchell, The Treaty Between Rome, p.  235. Apart from the treaties, Caesar mentions it twice in his works: one occurrence can be found in the Gallic Wars in relation to Rome, where we find “maiestas populi romani” (7.17.4.1); while the other, “maiestas regia”, is  in Commentaries of  the civil war, where he applies it to Alexandria. On this passage, see the interesting discussion by Welch (“Maiestas regia”). 56  Bauman, The Crimen maiestatis, p. 123. 57  Latin text and English text were taken from: A. G. Way, Julius Caesar. Alexandrian War; African War; Spanish War. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. 58  C. Damon, Julius Caesar. Civil War. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2016. Also “to prove his loyalty to the Roman people and to Caesar” (fidem populo Romano sibique praestaret, Bell. Alex. 24.2). 59  Bauman, The Crimen maiestatis, p. 136. 60  See Bauman, The Crimen maiestatis, p. 136. As R. W. Westhall (Caesar’s Civil War: Historical Reality and Fabrication, Leiden, Brill, 2018, p.  276)

349

Á. RODRIGUES

Caesar’s assassins and others who conspired to murder him were punished by the Lex Pedia de interfectoribus Caesaris, which was carried by Q uintus Pedius,61 co-consul of Octavian in 43 bce. Although sources do not connect the Pedian law to the law of  maiestas,62 the fact that Ulpian’s version of  lex maiestatis includes intention to kill a Roman magistrate 63 as a specific maiestas offense helps us to understand how Caesar could have been perceived.64 For Peachin,65 this legal event represents a  crucial shift in the understanding of  the role of  the magistrate in the emergent new reality, stating that “there is the question as to why any offense […] perpetrated against Augustus could or would be interpreted as treason. Moving out of  the republican and into the imperial era, this was precisely the direction in which the lex Pedia (n. 1) took things”. Regardless of  the events that triggered the shift in scope of  maiestas, the political reality that emerged after Caesar’s assassination accelerated the process of  the concept’s move away from the Roman people to Augustus and the members of  his house. As  mentioned previously, the fact that Gaius Flaminius was prevented by his father (232  bce) from exercising his political

commented on Caesar’s display of  his consul’s fasces on his arrival in Alexandria: “Notwithstanding the revolutionary nature if  his behavior, Caesar manifestly still thought in terms of  Republican institutions”. For Caesar’s Republican self-fashioning, see Westhall, Caesar’s Civil War. 61  According to Appian (B Civ. 4.9), he was in charge of  carrying out the proscriptions and he did publish the list of  seventeen people as the sole authors of  Caesar’s murder, but he died of  “fatigue” in that night. On this law, see also Vell. Pat. 2.6.9.5, Suet., Galb. 3.2; Ner. 3.1. 62   To my knowledge, virtually no bibliography on the legal narrative of  maiestas includes the Pedian law. Some exceptions include Bauman (The Crimen maiestatis, pp. 171–77), Lintott (“Maiestas”), and Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, pp. 516–17, 533). 63  See note 45 for full quotation. 64  For parallels between the Pedian law, the praetor Q uintus Gallius’ case in 43 bce and the maiestas law, see the discussion in Bauman, The Crimen maiestatis, pp. 173–77. Pelloso also interpreted the killing of  Caesar in the context of  the Roman Ius Sacrum in which Caesar’s assassins could be qualified as “purgers” and his killing would not be considered an actus reus, i.e. not a criminal act. C. Pelloso, “Are the conspirators purgers or murderes? Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar and Roman Ius Sacrum”, in D. Carpi, F. Ost (eds), As You Law It - Negotiating Shakespeare Berlin; Boston: De Gruyter, 2018, pp. 203–24. 65   Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, p. 533.

350

ROMAN MAIESTAS

duties as a tribune of plebs resulted in a maiestas charge. The same rationale applies to Caesar and to the Princeps, since the role of the magistrates corresponded to the formal and ethical extensions of  a larger civitas. As Cicero pointed out, “it is the particular duty of  a  magistrate (magistratus) to understand that he is  the personification of  a  political community (se gerere personam civitatis)” (De off. 1.124.5).66 Thus, the legal-political framework remained Republican.

2. Managing Republican Expectations The emergence of  imperial adjudication and jurisdiction during the last years of  Augustus’s reign would have an enduring impact on narratives surrounding Roman maiestas.67 Augustus’ role as judge 68 at maiestas trials had consequences on the development and outcome of  cases involving maiestas and on the perception of  this crime.69 This political shift therefore had obvious implications 66  Translated by B.  P. Newton, Cicero, On Duties. Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 2016. D. Hammer makes an interesting point about maiestas populi Romani as a “fictive identity” which can be transferred to any agent thereby making it “continuous and uninjured” (p.  35) regardless of  political changes. (D. Hammer, “Between Sovereignty and Non-Sovereignty: Maiestas and Foundational Authority in the Roman Republic” (2017) https://doi.org/10.13140/ RG.2.2.31780.48005). Sherwin-White has also made a  similar point regarding the context of Caracalla’s edict. A. N. Sherwin-White, The Roman Citizenship (2nd ed.), Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1973, p.  283. In  April 50, Cato refers to Cicero’s maiestas in a letter (Fam. 15.5.3 SB 111). This is an unusual occurrence in Republican sources because maiestas was an attribution derived from belonging to specific political institution rather than a personal quality. See N. Mackie, “Ovid and the Birth of  Maiestas”, in A. Powell (ed.), Roman Poetry & Propaganda: In the Age of  Augustus, Bloomsbury Academic, London, 1994, pp. 83–97, pp. 89–90 and especially K. Morrell (Pompey, Cato, and the Governance of  the Roman Empire, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2017, esp. 252) who discuss this passage at length. 67  For a detailed approach to the idea of  emperor as a judge, see the Tuori (The Emperor of  Law), which traces it back to Cicero’s pro Ligario (in whose trial Caesar acted as judge), until Caracalla. 68   According to Tuori (The Emperor of Law: The Emergence of Roman Imperial Adjudication. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 299–416), Augustus acted as a judge in twenty-four trials. Tuori also lists 774 cases of  imperial adjudication from the time of  Julius Caesar to Severus Alexander, while the majority of  imperial adjudication cases took place after Septimius Severus onwards. 69   Seager, “Maiestas in the Late Republic”, p. 153. See also note 16.

351

Á. RODRIGUES

for the future conceptualization of  legal maiestas.70 Delatores or informants actively extended the semantic scope of  maiestas, not only for personal gain 71 but also to get the Emperor’s attention. The Second Cyrene Edict (6 bce), an inscription (SEG IX 8) containing Augustus’ response to a petition from Cyrenaean ambassadors, is  a  good example of  how an instrumental use of  imperial adjudication added new legal content to the maiestas law.72 The circumstances of  this event and the motivations of  both parties are not easy to identify and the only evidence is this inscription.73 I  will outline it briefly by following Peachin’s 74 reconstruction of  the sequence of  events that may explain Augustus’ answer. After three Roman men fell foul of  the law in Cyrene, they attempted to flee to back to Rome, claiming they held information concerning the safety of  the Emperor and the Republic. However, as they had nothing to declare, the Emperor released them. Shortly afterwards, Cyrene envoys went to Rome to make a case against Stlaccius Maximus, who had allegedly removed statues erected by the community with the name of  Augustus inscribed on them. In  Peachin’s (“Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”) interpretation, these two events are connected and might have been part of  a  premeditated defense strategy from both parties which led to the broadening of  the scope of  maiestas. From that point onwards, the removal of the statues was included on the list of  offenses covered by maiestas law.75 70   This point is made by S. H. Rutledge, Imperial Inquisitions: Prosecutors and Informants from Tiberius to Domitian. London, Routledge, 2001, p. 4) who traces the development of  the delatores culture in the Early Principate from the reigns of  Tiberius to Domitian. 71  On the practice of  delation as an opportunity for social advancement and financial reward, see Rutledge, Imperial Inquisitions, pp. 20–53. 72  This is Peachin’s interpretation: Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, p. 545, esp. pp. 550, 552. 73   For more details about this event, see Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, pp. 549–52 and Tuori, The Emperor of  Law, pp. 82–84. 74  Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, p. 542. 75 As Peachin (“Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, p.  550) explains, “the central government, i.e., Augustus, was then effectively induced to consider these new aspects of  the law of  treason precisely because these litigants had forced the issues”. The Digest includes explicit references to statues of  the emperor: Scaevola (Dig. 48.4.4) and the entirety of  Marcian’s text (Dig. 48.4.5) concerns only statues. Cf.  cases in which issues related with statues were dis-

352

ROMAN MAIESTAS

In addition to the increase of the practice of delation, a further political process contributed to the change of  the scope of  maiestas: the transfer of  the maiestas populi romani to Augustus and members of  his house. The first sequence of  legal events to signal this change dates from 2 bce when Julia, Augustus’ daughter, and others that committed adultery with her were prosecuted under maiestas, according to Tacitus (Ann. 3.24.2), on the following grounds: For, in applying the severe terms “sacrilege” and “treason” to such widespread misconduct amongst men and women, he [Augustus] exceeded the humane penalties sanctioned by our ancestors and his own legislation.76

They were all condemned to exile, except Antonius who, having been condemned to execution, opted instead to commit suicide.77 Almost a decade later (8 ce), a case of  defamation was prosecuted under the maiestas law for the first time. As Tacitus (Ann. 1.72.16) explains: Actions were prosecuted; words were not punishable. It was Augustus who, angered by Cassius Severus’ immoderate slander of  distinguished men and women with his scandalous compositions, initiated judicial proceedings against defamatory writings under the specious cover of  this law [maiestas minuta populi Romani].78

Cassius Severus’ property was confiscated, and he was “forbidden fire and water” (Ann. 1.4.21). He went into exile first to Crete missed as maiestas’ offenses: Ennius’ case during Tiberius’ reign (see further p. 361), Trajan’s letter to Pliny (see note 98), and the Digest also included Scaevola (Dig. 48.4.4). 76  Translated by J.  C. Yardley, A.  Barrett, Tacitus. Annals, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016). Nam culpam inter viros ac feminas vulgatam gravi nomine laesarum religionum ac violatae maiestatis appellando clementiam maiorum suasque ipse leges egrediebatur. C. D. Fisher, C. Tacitus. Annales (Cornelii Taciti Annalium Ab Excessu Divi Augusti Libri, Oxonii, e typographeo Claren­ doniano, 1906. 77 See Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, p. 524. 78  “facta arguebantur, dicta inpune erant. Primus Augustus cognitionem de famosis libellis specie legis eius tractavit, commotus Cassii Severi libidine, qua viros feminasque inlustris procacibus scriptis diffamaverat”.

353

Á. RODRIGUES

and, after reoffending, he was then sent to Seriphos where he eventually died around 35 ce.79 Apart from these legal sources, other contemporary sources reflect the conceptual shift that maiestas underwent in this period, namely, the frequency of  its association with the Senate’s institutional identity as opposed to “maiestas populi romani”. This reflects the tension between senate and populus romanus in the context of  shifty Republican power dynamics.80 For instance, the majority of  Livy’s references to maiestas in his account are consistently associated with the Senate or the Roman offices, the consul and to the dictator.81 Livy follows an institutional version of  maiestas, similar to the Ciceronian Late Republican ideal of  concordia ordinum. As in the latter, the institutional balance depends on the institution’s ability to keep the power of  the tribune of  the plebs under control: The tribunes should not so extend their control to every aspect of  government that no deliberation on public policy was permitted. The state would finally be free, the laws equal, if  each other of  the state retained its own rights and dignity [maiestas] 82 (3.63.11) 79   For more details about Cassius Severus’ exile, see A. Hautcourt, “L’exil de Cassius Severus: hypothèse nouvelle”, Latomus 54, no. 2 (1995), pp. 315–18. 80 As Freitas (“Maiestas: apontamentos”, p.  73) noticed: “There are no direct connections of  maiestas with the Senate in written Latin bibliographical sources from 31 bc.” (translated from Portuguese). 81  Examples of  references in Livy: Senate: Livy 2.61.4; 3.65.5; 3.69.3; 3.69.4; 4.2.4; 4.2.10; 6.40.3; 8.34.1; Consuls:  2.57.3; 3.6.9;  3.10.3;  8.7.15; 9.34.23; 39.37.18; Dictator: 4.14.2; 6.6.7; 7.14.2; 8.34.5; 8.35.4. 82   Translated by T.  J. Luce, Livy. The rise of  Rome. Books 1–5. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016. The English translation was slightly modified in order to render the word maiestas differently: ne ita omnia tribuni potestatis suae implerent, ut nullum publicum consilium sinerent esse ita demum liberam ciuitatem fore, ita aequatas leges, si sua quisque iura ordo, suam maiestatem teneat. R. S. Conway, C. F. Walters (eds), T. Livius. Ab Urbe Condita (Bks. 1–5): Vol. 1, Oxonii: e typographeo Clarendoniano, 1955. However, this perception of  institutional maiestas contrasts with an account from the Early Republic about events following Brutus’ death: “The crowd was pleased at the sight of  the symbols of  office being made subordinate to themselves, for it was an admission that the people’s was superior to that of the consuls”. (gratum multitudini spectaculum fuit, submissa sibi esse imperii insignia confessionemque factam populi quam consulis maiestatem uimque maiorem esse, 2.7.7). R. M. Ogilvie (A Commentary on Livy. Books 1–5, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016, p. 375), however, sees this reference as an invented tradition for a constitutional practice, since there is no other evidence for it.

354

ROMAN MAIESTAS

An interesting use of  the concept of  maiestas is found in Livy’s second book (55.9). During a  conflict between the Senate and the tribunes of  the plebs in 473  bce, the plebeian Volero Publilius, as a  former company commander, refused to follow the consuls’ orders to be conscripted as a soldier. Since the tribunes of  the plebs would not defend him, he began to appeal for the people’s support. In this context, Livy comments on the consuls’ fragile position: “the consuls, who were exposed to this mighty storm, quickly learned how unsafe high station is without power (maiestatem sine uiribus)”. In other words, the consuls’ “maiestas” was preserved by force, here represented by twenty-four lictors who were also plebeians (2.55.3). Thus, maiestas is not sustainable without the power of  enforcement. Ovid, another contemporary of  Augustus, offers a rather unusual account of  Maiestas. His reference to the goddess Maiestas in his Fasti (5.25–52) is  unprecedented, as she is  not found in any Roman tradition. Nor did this myth have a sequel,83 nor was she ever received into the official cult in Rome.84 In the fifth book of  the Fasti (8 ce), the Muse Polyhymnia narrates an unknown theogonic myth to explain the etymology of  the month of  May (5.25–52): the birth of  the “goddess” Maiestas.85 This goddess is  described as “great” (magna, v. 26; “[she who became] great [on the very day she was born], 5.26 86), ‘golden, conspicuous in

83   As noticed by E. Fantham “Ovid, Germanicus and the Composition of  the Fasti” in P. E. Knox (ed.), Oxford Readings in Ovid, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006, pp. 373–414 (reprinted; original publication 1986), p. 375. 84  There is some speculation whether Ovid might have been accused of  maiestas himself. According to Tuori (The Emperor of Law, pp. 74–75), Ovid (Tr. 2.121– 40) provided the first contemporary narrative of  Augustus acting as judge, demonstrating that imperial adjudication was particular common in maiestas’ cases (pp. 5, 299–416). However, it is not clear whether Ovid had also been tried under the maiestas law. For more details on this trial Tuori (The Emperor of  Law, pp. 74–80) and Peachin, “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers”, p. 528. 85  v. 25–28: hinc sata Maiestas, hos est dea censa parentes, / quaque die partu est edita, magna fuit. / nec mora, consedit medio sublimis Olympo / aurea, purpureo conspicienda sinu; […]. The Latin Text is  taken from: H.  Alton, D.  E.  W. Wormell, E. Courtney (eds), P. Ovidius Naso. Fasti, Leipzig, Teubner, 1978. 86   Although I follow A. Wiseman and T. P. Wiseman’s translation (Ovid. Fasti, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2015), for this particular passage, however, I  am quoting J.  G. Frazer and G.  P. Goold’s (Ovid. Fasti, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014) translation.

355

Á. RODRIGUES

her purple robe” (v. 29) 87 and morally impeccable since birth. She  is  further described as being “legitimate” because she was born from a union that was “sanction[ed] by law” (v. 24). After introducing this new goddess, Polyhymnia recalls a  time when the “house of  Jupiter” was attacked by Earth monsters, she was “well defended by these weapons of  the gods” (v. 43) – an event that marks a shift in this account of  the goddess Maiestas. From that moment onwards, she became Jupiter’s guardian, guaranteeing the maintenance of  his authority (“[she] provides Jupiter with a scepter to be feared without violence” (et praestat sine vi sceptra timenda Iovi, v. 46). This incident thus re-centers and redefines the role of  Maiestas within the Olympian network of  power relations: while at first Maiestas’ role and presence were purely moral, she later becomes the guardian of  those who protected her dignity. The majority of  the verbs 88 attributed to Maiestas express the static nature of  her role which seems to aim solely at the preservation and quiet maintenance of  an order already established: “[no delay; she] took her seat” (nec mora consedit, v. 25), “endures” (manet, v. 44), “sits [by Jupiter]” (assidet, v. 45), “provides [Jupiter] with a sceptre” (praestat, v. 46), “keeps [fathers and mothers in dutiful respect]” (tueor v. 49), “entrusts [the granted fasces and the ivory chair of  the office]” (commendo v. 54). 87  The fact that this adjective is mentioned in the beginning of  the verse (29) clearly adds more emphasis to this specific quality. Pasco-Pranger (Founding the Year: Ovid’s Fasti and the Poetics of  the Roman Calendar, Leiden, Brill, 2006, p. 230) also notes an interesting nuance about this Ovidian feature: “She is not wearing a gold crown; she is golden”. Mackie (“Ovid and the Birth”, pp. 83–84) finds a parallel between this description (v. 26–27) and the “virtual arts” such as “painting or sculpture”. Interestingly, this composition of  central figure seated in a  frontal position became part of  the imperial imagery seems to have influenced the emergence of  theme Maiestas Domini in early and Christian art during the fourth century. T. Devonshire Jones, L. Murray, P. Murray (eds), “Majestas Domini”, in The Oxford Dictionary of  Christian Art & Architecture (2nd ed.), Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013 [electronic resource]. 88  The two exceptions are the verbs “[She] has come [to the earth]” and “comes to accompany boys and maidens” (v. 50), since both indicate movement. However, even in these cases, these actions correspond to unilateral movement from the goddess. Mackie (“Ovid and the Birth”, p. 89) notes one instance in which the goddess seems to have performed an actual action “the liveliest thing she does is to make sure that Jupiter can hold on to his scepter”. Again, I believe that this action falls in the same motionless semantic sphere in the sense that her action does not add anything new but aims to preserve and maintain a pre-existing order.

356

ROMAN MAIESTAS

Throughout the description, the nature of  her role seems to be closer to a non-interventionist goddess that is expected to be protected (“well defended by these weapons of  the gods”, v. 43), worshipped (v. 45) while she remains indifferent and unchanged (“You could see that all the divinities had shaped their expressions on her”, v. 3389). Morality, passivity, omnipresence,90 and lack of  agency are thus key traces in Ovid’s portrayal of  Maiestas. Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of  the goddess Maiestas is  the fact that she was new and not only from a  chronological point of  view, as mentioned below.91 As Mackie (“Ovid and the Birth”, p. 93) noticed, she was also new from a theogonical point of  view, in that she was a retroactive addition to the pantheon as she only guarantees and maintains a specific form of power already in place.92 Ovid’s etymological derivation of  the month of  May is, therefore, usually explained as reflecting the importance given to the term maiestas and the crimen maiestatis and the debates and semantic shift that marked the intellectual history of  maiestas between the Late Republic and the Principate. Pasco-Pranger went even further by interpreting this passage in Ovid not only as an allegory of the transition between Julius Caesar and Augustus but as part of a general process of “negotiation” between the imperial ideology and the Republican past.93 However, despite the fact that Ovid’s portrayal of  the goddess is focused more on the con “omne videres numen ad hanc voltus composuisse suos”.  M. Pfaff-Reydellet (“Naissance de ‘maiestas’ dans les ‘Fastes’ d’Ovide (F.V, 9–54)”, REL 81 (2003), pp.  157–71, pp.  164–65) explores the apparent contradiction between these two features in the characterisation of  Maiestas. 91  See below, p. 356. 92  See also M. Pasco-Pranger, Founding the Year, p. 227. 93   While some scholars (G.  Dumézil, “Maiestas et Gravitas”, in Idées Romaines, Paris, Gallimard, 1969, pp. 135–41; Mackie, “Ovid and the Birth”, and Pfaff-Reydellet, “Naissance de ‘maiestas’ ”) have seen this coincidence as an exercise of  poetic freedom which absorbed all the semantic nuances of  maiestas, Pasco-Pranger (Founding the Year), on the other hand, identified deeper political meanings in the reference to the goddess Maiestas, arguing that it was an allusion to Julius Caesar and Augustus, as she puts it: “I am, of  course, suggesting that this shift is  a  means of  exploring how Caesar’s quasi-regal position relates to Augustus’ statio, his careful positioning of  himself  in relation to the political order of  the Republic”. Pasco-Pranger, Founding the Year, p. 238. For a reconstruction of  Ovid’s political motivation for celebrating maiestas in the Fasti, see Fantham (“Ovid, Germanicus”, pp. 412–13). See also M. Pfaff-Reydellet, “Naissance de ‘maiestas’ dans les ‘Fastes’”, pp. 161–62. 89 90

357

Á. RODRIGUES

cept of  maiestas than the emerging Roman autocracy, the features which he ascribes to her nevertheless reflect the semantic map of  maiestas during this transitional period.94 The majority of our sources on maiestas in the Principate comes from Tacitus’ account of  Tiberius’ reign, according to which this emperor played a  crucial role in the development of  the law.95 As Tuori 96 has pointed out, “Tiberius had criminal jurisdiction at least in cases of  maiestas”.97 This change in the crime’s scope and   Mackie (“Ovid and the Birth”, p. 92) identified two features in Ovid’s characterisation of  maiestas which are absent in previous accounts: “First, she is very interested in upholding sexual morality: she is born out of  a legitimate marriage, and she keeps an eye on the purity of  young people […] Secondly, Polyhymnia’s Maiestas is un upholder of  social hierarchies”. 95  Several scholars have discussed Tacitus’ account in relation to Tiberius’ development of  maiestas. Detailed data of  criminal trials under Tiberius were collected by R. S. Rogers (Criminal Trials and Criminal Legislation under Tiberius. American Philological Association, Middletown, Connecticut, 1935), while Rutledge (Imperial Inquisitions) provided a comprehensive list of delatores and prosecutions of defendants charged with maiestas. Rogers (Criminal Trials and) lists fifty-one people tried for maiestas under Tiberius, of  which eighteen were executed, twenty-one were punished under other laws, and twelve were acquitted. The best-known maiestas cases during Tiberius’ reign were those of  Libo Drusus (16  ce, suicide), Piso (20  ce, murdered, died during trial), Silius (24  ce) and Aelius Sejanus (31 ce, suicide). As we have seen, the legal versatility of  the crimen maiestatis itself  was well-known before Tiberius. On Jesus’ trial see note 97. 96   Tuori, The Emperor of  Law, p. 143. 97   A considerable amount of  research has been done in the recent decades on the possibility that Jesus might have accused of  maiestas which would have resulted in his death sentence. It is well known, as Tacitus made clear, that Tiberius played a crucial role in the development of  the maiestas law. Tacitus does mention Jesus’ execution (15.44) but no reference to a maiestas charge is made. One of  the main arguments against this possibility is  the fact that the maiestas law only applied to Roman citizens, in which case Jesus would have been an exception. See J. G. Cook (“Crucifixion and Burial”, NTS 57.2 (2011) pp. 193–213, p. 197). Cf. B. Wassell (“ ‘Doing Evil’ as Maiestas in John 18.301”, Journal for the Study of  the New Testament 42, no. 3 (2020), pp. 325–49, p. 340). However, D. W. Chapman, E. Schnablel (The Trial and Crucifixion of  Jesus: Texts and Commentary. Tübingen, Germany, Mohr Siebeck, 2015), Wassel (“ ‘Doing Evil’ as Maiestas”) and, very recently, Garofalo (Gesù. Il processo. Milano, Solferino, 2020) provided detailed and persuasive legal reconstructions of  Jesus’ trial as a  maiestas case. Rogers (Criminal Trials, pp.  150, 193, 208), who provides an exhaustive list of  criminal trials under Tiberius, mentioned Jesus Christ’s trial as one of  the eighty-two that appear “with more or less certainty” (p.  193) to correspond to a perduellio. Rutledge (Imperial Inquisitions, pp. 3, 73–75) does not explore the nature of  Jesus’ trial itself, but concluded that the Gospels’ narrative of  Judas’ actions matches the behaviour of  a standard delator of  this time (Matthew 27.2–5): “Read between the lines, we actually see in the trial of  Jesus 94

358

ROMAN MAIESTAS

perception between the late Republic and the Principate is clear when we compare two temporally distant narratives regarding maiestas trials. Whereas Cicero refers to the crime of  maiestas as a useful and creative legal tool (e.g. Fam. 3.11.2), in Tacitus the frequency of  maiestas trials during Tiberius’ reign is described as a tyrannical and a “trace of  insanity” 98 (e.g. Tac., Ann., 4.32–33). The first time that the “majesty of  the house of  Augustus” becomes an object of  protection under maiestas was the condemnation of  Gnaeus Piso, the second great trial to take place during Tiberius reign in 20 ce. Gnaeus Calpurnius Piso is accused of  seditious actions in the East while also allegedly seeming rather too “pleased” about Germanicus’ death (Tac. 3.12.4). He  committed suicide before the end of  the trial. The details of  this trial are transmitted by Tacitus (3.12.4) and by the document Senatus consultum de Cn.  Pisone patre.99 The latter clearly places the an example of  how delatores (Mark 15.3 and Luke 23.1 use the verb kategorein) could act in imperial interest, and at the same time serve the interest of  their own community”. (p. 74). F. Millar (“Reflections on the Trial of  Jesus”, in The Greek World, the Jews and the East, Chapel Hill, University of  North Carolina Press, 2006, pp. 139–63) also offered valuable insights on the circumstances of  the trial itself. See also G. Agamben’ interesting approach to Jesus’ trial in which he also refers it as a maiestas’ case. (G. Agamben, Pilate and Jesus, California, Stanford University Press, 2015). 98  Tuori, The Emperor of  Law, p.  227. See also Seneca (Ben. 3.26), who writes that the informant culture in Tiberius’ reign became such a  widespread and common practice (frequens et paene publica rabies) that it caused more damage and ruin than the civil war. Moreover, in a letter exchange between Pliny and Trajan regarding an inquiry about the displacement of  one Trajan’s statues in Prusa, Trajan makes clear that he does not wish to be seen as an emperor that resorts to maiestas’ accusations in order to instigate fear: “you were fully aware of  my decision not to gain respect for my name through men’s apprehension or terror, or through charges of  treason (non  ex  metu  nec  terrore  hominum  aut  criminibus  maiestatis  reuerentiam  nomini  meo  adquiri). So, the inquiry is  to be abandoned, for I would not allow it even if  it were supported by precedents”. (10.82, 1–2) Translated by P. G. Walsh, Pliny the Younger. Complete Lettters, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2009. The Latin text was taken from: R. A. B. Mynors (ed.), C. Plini Caecili Secundi Epistularum Libri Decem, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1966. For a different view of  maiestas’ trials under Tiberius, see I. J. Colunga, “Untangling a historian’s misinterpretation of  ancient Rome’s treason laws”, Eutopia - nuova serie, 3.2003, 1–2, 75–107. Abolitions of  the maiestas charge are documented in the chapter 8 of  R. Bauman, Impietas in Principem. Cf. P. A. Brunt, “Did emperors ever suspend the law of  ‘maiestas’?”, Sodalitas. Scritti in Onore de Antonio Guarino, Naples, 1984, pp. 469–80. 99  On the narrative differences between both this document and Tacitus’ version of it, see M. Griffin, “The Senate’s Story (W. Eck, A. Caballos and F. Fernán-

359

Á. RODRIGUES

“majesty of  the house of  Augustus” at the same level of  importance as the maiestas populi romani. For it states: “this man (Piso) – […] without regard of  the majesty of  the house of  Augustus, without regard even for public law, etc.” (necleta maiestate domus Aug(ustae), necleto etiam iure publico, 32–33).100 In  Tacitus’ account, however, Tiberius delivered a speech before Piso’s trial in which he distinguishes between personal injury to the Princeps and public offense.101 In  the Senatus Consultum, however, as Yakobson 102 has noted, “this distinction is  blurred, but not wholly abandoned”.103 Several passages in Tacitus also attest to this anxiety in Tiberius; 104 for instance, in 14 ce, when the German legions threatened mutiny, the local community at Illyricum is said to have demanded the intervention of  the Emperor himself  (“set his majesty as an emperor”, opponere maiestatem imperatoriam) instead of  his young son Germanicus. However, Tiberius did not wish to “leave the hub of  the Empire and to put himself  and the state at risk” (non omittere caput rerum neque se remque publicam in casum dare, 1.46–47). Shotter’s examination of maiestas cases of  21  ce also demonstrates that Tiberius had a  clear

dez, ‘Das Senatus Consultum de Cn. Pisone Patre’ ”, JRS 87 (1997), pp. 249–63, pp. 258–63. 100  The Latin text was taken from W. Eck, A. Caballos, F. Fernandez, Das senatus consultum de Cn. Pisone patre, Vestigia 48, C. H. Beck Munich, 1996, p. 40 and the translation is by M. Griffin, “The Senate’s Story”. 101   “If   as a legate he overstepped his authority, and cast aside his obedience to his commanding officer, and was then pleased with the man’s death, and my grief, then I shall hate him and bar him from my house, satisfying personal grudges without the use of the imperial power. If, however, a crime is revealed that should be punished, a crime that has taken the life of  any human being whatsoever, then it is for you [Senate] to bring due solace both to the children of  Germanicus and to us, his parents” (“Nam si legatus officii terminos, obsequium erga imperatorem exuit eiusdemque morte et luctu meo laetatus est, odero seponamque a domo mea et privatas inimicitias non vi principis ulciscar: sin facinus in cuiuscumque mortalium nece vindicandum detegitur, vos vero et liberos Germanici et nos parentes iustis solaciis adficite”, 3.12.7–10). 102 A. Yakobson, “Maiestas, the imperial ideology and the imperial family. The evidence of the senatus consultum de Cn. Pisone patre”, Eutopia 3.2003, pp. 75– 107, p. 106. 103  For a different reading, see also Tuori (The Emperor of  Law, p. 145). For a very detailed analysis of  the jurisdiction matters related to maiestas and others raised in this document, see Griffin, “The Senate’s Story”, pp. 257–58. 104  Tac., Ann., 1.47.2; 3.3.1; 3.53.3, 3.64.2–4, 3.66.1.

360

ROMAN MAIESTAS

“problem with his public image” and the way his actions could be perceived.105 Ennius’ case in 22 ce is not only a good example of the expression of  Tiberius’ anxiety regarding his own maiestas, but it also illustrates the constitutional dissonances generated by the coexistence of  two sources of  Roman maiestas: the Emperor and the Res Publica. Tacitus (3.70.8) reports that Lucius Ennius was charged of  maiestas for having melted a silver effigy of the emperor in order to transform it into a  plate for everyday use. Tiberius, however, did not allow this case to go to trial. Ateius Capito, characterised as an “expert in secular and religious law” by Tacitus, reacted to Tiberius interference by saying: The Senate should not be stripped of  its power to decide cases, he said, and a crime of  such magnitude should not go unpunished – by all means let the emperor be slow to anger when personally hurt, but he should not condone injury done to the state (res publica)! (3.70).106

Tiberius’ veto, however, remained unchanged. Tiberius judgement that only his maiestas was impugned and not the state’s illustrates the same tension between these two modes of authority as those found in narratives of  Piso’s trial in Tacitus and in the SC previously mentioned.107 These two cases also show how the co-existence of both the Emperor and the state as objects of maiestas could lead to inevitable juxtapositions of  political and public identities, which also led to legal inconsistencies. Tiberius’ anxiety was therefore a consequence of  the Princeps’ vaguely defined constitutional position vis-à-vis the Republican perception of the Roman civitas. 105  D. Shotter, “A Group of Maiestas Cases in a.d. 21”, Hermes 108 (1980), pp. 230–33, p. 232. Several passages in Tacitus attest to this anxiety in Tiberius (1.47.2; 3.3.1; 3.53.3, 3.64.2–4, 3.66.1). For instance, in 14  ce, when the German legions threatened mutiny, the local community at Illyricum demanded the intervention of  the Emperor himself  (“set his majesty as an emperor”, opponere maiestatem imperatoriam) instead of  his young son Germanicus, but Tiberius did not want to “leave the hub of  the Empire and to put himself  and the state at risk” (non omittere caput rerum neque se remque publicam in casum dare, 1.46–47). 106 “non enim debere eripi patribus vim statuendi neque tantum maleficium impune habendum. sane lentus in suo dolore esset: rei publicae iniurias ne largiretur”. 107  For a detailed analysis of  this trial, see Tuori, The Emperor of  Law, p. 181.

361

Á. RODRIGUES

3. Concluding Remarks In the foregoing I explored the shift that the conceptualization of  maiestas went through in the late Republic and Principate and the ways in which it reflected changing modes of  Roman public self-representation during this period. We  have also examined the ways in which diplomatic events and literary sources such as Ovid and Livy were closely bound up with the dynamic nature of  Roman maiestas. As mentioned in the first section of  this study, the link between maiestas and political power became increasingly more formalized after Saturninus’ law. The legal reification of  the concept of  maiestas (populi Romani) was a crucial point in its intellectual history. The first stage of  its legal narrative created a stable framework which enabled different appropriations of  maiestas by future dominant political forces. Although these cases did not establish formal precedents, the arguments debated in trials, and later canonized through a rhetorical and legal tradition, provided a space in which to define and reify maiestas offenses as punishable crimes. Therefore, in addition to identifying and categorising potential treats, this rhetorical and legal tradition also shaped a specific discourse on maiestas, namely the political identity of  the state – or what ought to be protected by the law. A similar process also explains the transfer of  maiestas populi Romani to the Princeps, which provided a political language and conceptual framework to a  newly emerging political reality that lacked a  clearly defined identity and constitutional shape.108 Emotional memory also played a crucial role in more than one instance. Given maiestas’ deeply Republican, and even religious resonance, it  is hard to conceive that any citizen would voluntarily oppose it or be at odds with it as an idea. Indeed, maiestas’ exceptional legal framework is  comparable to that which heresy would later: unlike other crimes, the defendant could be 108  Arena’s (Libertas and the practice of  politics) study on libertas demonstrates how the changes underwent by the idea by the end of  the Republic slowly enabled the legitimatisation of  a new political reality. A similar point is made by Bauman in his study of  crimen maiestatis, in which concluded that this crime was instrumental in the construction of  a “a new corporate identity” for the Principate.

362

ROMAN MAIESTAS

prosecuted posthumously, his property confiscated, and his will invalidated.109 This is an important Republican legacy regarding the narrative of  maiestas and Roman self-representation: the consolidation of  a structure and language through which to express an enduring feature of  Roman political identity.110 The continuity of  the Republican past into the period of  the Principate through language and state self-representation created an optical illusion of  an unchanging Roman political identity.111 This is where the power of  the maiestas narrative lies.

109  This procedure only applied to these two criminal categories. On more comparisons between maiestas and sacrilegium (“violation of  profanation of  sacred things”), see Tacitus (Ann. 3.24.2, see p. 13) and also Ulpian’s opening line in the “Lex Iulia on treason” in the Digest (48.4.1) quoted in the note 45. For more parallels between maiestas and heresy in terms of  procedure and punishment, see L. Barnard, “The criminalisation of  heresy in the later Roman empire: a sociopolitical device?”, Journal of  Legal History 16 (1995), pp. 121–46, pp. 134–40. The legal and religious implications of  maiestas and the figure of  the Emperor go beyond the scope of  this paper. On this issue, see Bauman, Impietas in Principem. See also Harries (“Controlling elites II”) and Williamson (“Crimes against the State”) for surveys of  the maiestas law after Tiberius, and Tuori (The Emperor of  Law) for maiestas’ cases until Caracalla. 110   By the beginning of  the third century, Caracalla’s edict included the whole population of  the empire as a  single entity. The P.Giss. 40, which contains three edicts related to Caracalla in a very fragmentary state, mentions the so-called Constitutio Antoniniana and the term μεγαλειότης, one the Greek terms for maiestas, appears twice (col. 1, line 5: τῇ μεγαλει[ό]τητι; col. 1, lines 11–12 “[τήν]  μεγαλειότητα [το]ῦ Ῥωμα[ί]ων δήμου]”. Sherwin-White who commented on the significance of  maiestas populi romani both in this document and in Caracalla’s historical time also pointed out: “The importance of  Caracallus is that, by completing the processes of  a century, he set the maiestas populi Romani upon the widest possible basis. […]. Caracallus’ edict identified the whole population of  the empire with Rome, thus providing the juridical foundation for the development of  the later idea of  Romania”. A. N. Sherwin-White, The Roman Citizenship, p. 283. For the Constitutio Antoniniana’s quotation, I followed F. M. Heichelheim’s restoration as presented in F. M. Heichelheim, “The Text of  the Constitutio Antoniniana and the Three Other Decrees of  the Emperor Caracalla Contained in Papyrus Gissensis 40”, JEA 26 (1941), pp.  10–22, esp. pp. 10–11. I also consulted A. Blanco Pérez, “P.Giss. 40 and the Constitutio Antoniniana”, in http://www.judaism-and-rome.org/pgiss-40-and-constitutio-­ antoniniana, 2018 (site accessed February 2020). 111   On the coexistence of  the social and legal entities quirites and populus Romanus and the idea that new identities did not replace old figures, see Pelloso’s contribution to this volume, “Q uirites and Populus Romanus”.

363

Á. RODRIGUES

Bibliography Agamben G., Pilate and Jesus, California, Stanford University Press, 2015. Alton H., Wormell D. E. W., Courtney E. (eds), P. Ovidius Naso. Fasti, Leipzig, Teubner, 1978. Ando C., Law, language, and empire in the Roman tradition, Philadelphia, University of  Pennsylvania Press, 2011. Arena V., Libertas and the practice of  politics in the late Roman Republic, Cambridge, New York, Cambridge University Press, 2012. Barnard L., “The criminalisation of  heresy in the later Roman empire: a sociopolitical device?”, Journal of  Legal History 16 (1995), pp. 121–46. Baronowski D.  W., “Sub Umbra Foederis Aequi ”, Phoenix 44.4 (1990), pp. 345–69. Batstone W. W., Sallust. Catiline’s conspiracy, The Jugurthine War, Histories. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016. Bauman R., The Crimen maiestatis in the Roman Republic and Augustan Principate, Johannesburg, Witwatersrand University Press, 1967. Bauman R., Impietas in principem: a  study of  treason against the Roman emperor with special reference to the first century a.d., München, Beck, 1974. Benjamin P. N., Cicero. On Duties, Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 2016. Blanco Pérez A., “P.Giss. 40 and the Constitutio Antoniniana”, in http://www.judaism-and-rome.org/pgiss-40-and-constitutio-anto niniana, 2018 (site accessed February 2020). Bodin J., Les six livres de la Republique. A Lyon, Pour Barthelemy Vincent, 1593. Brunt P. A., “Did emperors ever suspend the law of ‘maiestas’?”, Sodalitas. Scritti in Onore de Antonio Guarino, Naples, 1984, pp. 469–80. Butler H. E., Q uintilian. The Institutio Oratoria, Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press. London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1920. Conway R.  S., Walters C.  F. (eds), T.  Livius. Ab Urbe Condita (Bks. 1–5), vol. 1, Oxonii, e typographeo Clarendoniano, 1955. Chapman D. W., Schnablel E., The Trial and Crucifixion of  Jesus: Texts and Commentary, Tübingen, Germany, Mohr Siebeck, 2015. Colunga I.  J., “Untangling a  historian’s misinterpretation of  ancient Rome’s treason laws”, Eutopia - nuova serie 3  (2003) 1–2, pp. 75–107. 364

ROMAN MAIESTAS

Cook J. G., “Crucifixion and Burial”, NTS 57.2 (2011), pp. 193– 213. Damen W. W. P., “Maiestas in the Dutch Republic”, RM - Early Modern Intellectual History, 2017. http://hdl.handle.net/2105/40565 (site accessed April 2020). Damon C., Julius Caesar. Civil War, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2016. Dench E., Empire and Political Cultures in the Roman World, New York, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2018. Devonshire Jones L., Murray P. (eds), “Majestas Domini”, in The Oxford Dictionary of  Christian Art & Architecture (2nd ed.), Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013 [electronic resource]. Drexler H., “Maiestas”, Aevum 30, no. 3 (1956), pp. 195–212. Dumézil G., “Maiestas et Gravitas”, in Idées Romaines, Paris, Gallimard, 1969, pp. 128–52. Eck W., Caballos A., Fernandez F., Das senatus consultum de Cn. Pisone patre, Vestigia 48, C. H. Beck Munich, 1996. Edwards H. J., Julius Caesar. The Gallic War, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. Fantham E., “Ovid, Germanicus and the Composition of  the Fasti” in P. E. Knox (ed.), Oxford Readings in Ovid, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2006, pp.  373–414 (reprinted; original publication 1986). Ferrary J.-L., “Les origines de la loi de majesté à  Rome”, Comptes rendus des séances de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres 127 (1983), pp. 556–72. Fisher C.  D.  C., Tacitus. Annales (Cornelii Taciti Annalium Ab Excessu Divi Augusti Libri, Oxonii, e typographeo Clarendoniano, 1906. Frazer G., Goold G.  P., Ovid. Fasti, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. Freitas J. V. L. de, “Maiestas: apontamentos entre a República Tar­ dia e  o Principado”, Roda da Fortuna. Revista Eletrônica sobre Antiguidade e Medievo 2018, vol. 7.2, pp. 60–93. Gardner R., Cicero, Pro Caelio. De Provinciis Consularibus. Pro Balbo. Vol. XIII, Cambridge, Mass., 1958. Garofalo L., Gesù. Il processo, Milano, Solferino, 2020. Gaudemet J., “Maiestas populi Romani”, in A.  Guarino, L.  La­ bruna (eds), Synteleia Vincenzo Arangio-Ruiz vol.  II, Naples, Biblioteca di Labeo 2, 1964, pp. 699–709. 365

Á. RODRIGUES

Gotter U., “Cato’s Origines: The historian and his enemies”, in A. Feldherr (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Historians, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp. 108–22. Griffin M., “The Senate’s Story (W. Eck, A. Caballos and F. Fernández, ‘Das Senatus Consultum de Cn.  Pisone Patre)’ ”, JRS 87 (1997), pp. 249–63. Gruen E. S., The Hellenistic World and the Coming of  Rome, Berkeley, London, University of  California Press, 1984. Gundel H.  G., “Der Begriff  Maiestas im politischen Denken der römischen Republick”, Historia 12 (1963), pp. 283–85. Hammer D., “Between Sovereignty and Non-Sovereignty: Maiestas and Foundational Authority in the Roman Republic” (2017) https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.31780.48005. Hautcourt A., “L’exil de Cassius Severus: hypothèse nouvelle”, Latomus 54, no. 2 (1995), pp. 315–18. Heichelheim F. M., “The Text of  the Constitutio Antoniniana and the Three Other Decrees of  the Emperor Caracalla Contained in Papyrus Gissensis 40”, JEA 26 (1941), pp. 10–22. Hilder J., “Jurors, Jurists and Advocates: Law in the Rhetorica Ad Herennium and De Inventione”, in P. Plessis (ed.), Cicero’s Law: Rethinking Roman Law of  the Late Republic, Edinburgh, University Press, 2016, pp. 177–78. Hubbell H. M., Cicero. De inventione; De optimo genere oratorum, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. Humfress C., “Telling Stories About (Roman) Law: Rules and Concepts in Legal Discourse”, in P. Dresch, J. Scheele (eds), Legalism: Rules and Categories, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2015, pp. 79–104. Kantor G., “Roman Treaties”, in R. S. Bagnall, K. Brodersen, C. B. Champion, A. Erskine, S. R. Huebner (eds), The Encyclopedia of  Ancient History, s.l., Wiley-Blackwell, 2013, pp. 6842–46. Lanfranchi T., “La majesté: l’autre nom de la souveraineté?”, Lectures 2 (28 March 2013) and 3 (6 April 2013). Seminaires des membres de l’école française de Rome, 2013. https://semefr.hypotheses. org/886 (site accessed May 2019). Lear F. S., Treason in Roman and Germanic Law: Collected Papers, Austin, Published for Rice University, Houston by University of  Texas Press, 1965. Levick B., Tiberius the Politician, London, Routledge, 1999. 366

ROMAN MAIESTAS

Lintott A., “Maiestas”, in J.  Percy, V.  D. Balsdon, B.  Levick (eds), Oxford Research Encyclopedia of  Classics, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016. Luce T. J., Livy. The rise of  Rome. Books 1–5, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016. Macagno F., Walton D., Emotive language in argumentation, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2014. Mackie N., “Ovid and the Birth of  Maiestas”, in A. Powell (ed.), Roman Poetry & Propaganda: In  the Age of  Augustus, London, Bloomsbury Academic, 1994. Macmullen R., “The Crimen Maiestatis in the Roman Republic and Augustan Principate by Richard A. Bauman”, AJPh 91 (1970), pp. 117–18. Millar F., “Reflections on the Trial of  Jesus”, in The Greek World, the Jews and the East, Chapel Hill, University of  North Carolina Press, 2006. Mitchell S., The Treaty Between Rome and Lycia of 46 bc (MS 2070) [Offprint from Papyri Graecae Schøyen (PSchøyen I)]. Papyrologica Florentina; v. 35 [Offprint], 2005. Mommsen T., Krueger P., Watson A., Digesta Iustiniani 1–50 (The Digest of  Justinian vols  1–4), Philadelphia, University of  Pennsylvania Press, 1985. Morrell K., Pompey, Cato, and the Governance of the Roman Empire, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2017. Newton B.  P., Cicero, On Duties, Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 2016. Pasco-Pranger M., Founding the Year: Ovid’s Fasti and the Poetics of  the Roman Calendar, Leiden, Brill, 2006. Pelloso C., “Are the conspirators purgers or murders? Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar and Roman Ius Sacrum”, in D. Carpi, F. Ost (eds), As You Law It - Negotiating Shakespeare, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2018, pp. 203–24. Pelloso C., “Dalla ‘pro Rabirio perduellionis reo’ alla causa Horatiana: riflessioni su attestazioni storiche e storiografiche del giudizio duumvirale”, in L. Garofalo (ed.) Giornata di studio in ricordo di Carlo Venturini, Napoli, 2021 (forthcoming). Peachin M., “Augustus’ Emergent Judicial Powers, the ‘Crimen Maies­tatis’ ”, and the Second Cyrene Edict’, in J.-L.  Ferrary, J. Scheid (eds), Il princeps romano: autocrate o magistrato? Fattori giuridici e fattori sociali del potere imperiale da Augusto a Commodo, Pavia IUSS Press, 2015, pp. 497–553. 367

Á. RODRIGUES

Pfaff-Reydellet M., “Naissance de ‘maiestas’ dans les ‘Fastes’ d’Ovide (F.V, 9–54)”, REL 81 (2003), pp. 157–71. Rackham H., Sutton E. W., Cicero. De Oratore, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. Rogers R. S., Criminal Trials and Criminal Legislation under Tiberius, American Philological Association, Middletown, Connecticut, 1935. Rutledge S.  H., Imperial Inquisitions: Prosecutors and Informants from Tiberius to Domitian, London, Routledge, 2001. Salvo D., “Maiestas”, in R. S. Bagnal, K. Brodersen, C. B. Champion, A.  Erskine, S.  R. Huebner (eds), The Encyclopedia of  Ancient History, s.l., Wiley-Blackwell, 2013, pp. 4236–38. Santalucia B., Diritto e  processo penale nell’antica Roma (2a ed.), Milano, Giuffrè, 1998. Seager R., “Maiestas in the Late Republic: Some observations”, in J. Cairns, O. Robinson (eds), Critical Studies in Ancient Law, Comparative Law & Legal History: Essays in Honour of  Alan Watson, Oxford (England); Portland, Ore: Hart Publishing, 2001, pp. 143–53. Shackleton Bailey D. R., Cicero. Letters to Friends, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. Sherwin-White A.  N., “The Crimen Maiestatis in the Roman Republic and Augustan Principate”, Gnomon 41 (1969), pp. 288–93. Sherwin-White A. N., The Roman Citizenship (2nd ed.), Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1973. Shotter D., “A Group of  Maiestas Cases in a.d. 21”, Hermes 108 (1980), pp. 230–33. Skinner Q ., “The State” in T. Ball, J. Farr, R. L. Hanson (eds), Political innovation and conceptual change, Ideas in context, Cambridge, University Press, 1989, pp. 90–131. Straumann B., Crisis and Constitutionalism: Roman Political Thought from the Fall of the Republic to the Age of Revolution, New York, NY, Oxford University Press, 2016. Straussman B., “The Energy of  Concepts: The Role of  Concepts in Long-Term Intellectual History and Social Reality”, Journal of  the Philosophy of  History 13 (2019), 1–36. Tuori K., The Emperor of  Law: The Emergence of  Roman Imperial Adjudication, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016. Walbank F. W., A Historical Commentary on Polybius. 2. Commentary on Books VII–XVIII, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1999. 368

ROMAN MAIESTAS

Walsh P. G., Pliny the Younger. Complete Letters, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2009. Wassell B., “ ‘Doing Evil’ as Maiestas in John 18.301”, Journal for the Study of  the New Testament 42, no. 3 (2020), pp. 325–49. Watson A. The Digest of  Justinian. Vol. IV. Philadelphia, University of  Pennsylvania Press, 2009. Way A.  G., Julius Caesar. Alexandrian War; African War; Spanish War, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2014. Welch K., “ ‘Maiestas regia’ and the donations of  Alexandria”, MedArch 19/20 (2006), pp. 181–92. Williamson C., “Crimes against the State”, in P. Plessis, C. Ando, K. Tuori (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Roman Law and Society, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 333–44. Wiseman A., Wiseman, T. P., Ovid. Fasti, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2015. Yakobson A., “Maiestas, the imperial ideology and the imperial family. The evidence of  the senatus consultum de Cn.  Pisone patre”, Eutopia 3 (2003), pp. 75–107. Yardley J. C., Barrett, A., Tacitus. The Annals, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2016.

369

KELLY NGUYEN Stanford University

WHAT’S IN A NATIO NEGOTIATING ETHNIC IDENTITY IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE C(aio) Caesare dict(atore) iter(um) / M(arco) Antonio mag(istro) eq(uitum). / Sepulcri loc[us] empt[us] / de Q (uinto) Modio L(uci) f(ilio) Q ui(rina). In / fronte pedes XXIIII, in agrum pedes XXIIII. / C(aius) Numitorius C(ai) l(ibertus) Nicanor, / natione T‹h›ebaeus, medicus / ocularius, Numitoria C(ai) l(iberta) / Philumina, natione P‹h›rugia, / C(aius) Numitorius C(ai) l(ibertus) Stabilio, / natione verna. / P(ublius) Opitreius C(ai) l(ibertus) Butas, / natione Smurnaeus, / fundamentum / posuerunt. In suo / sepulcro sepelita / est Numitoria C(ai) l(iberta) / Erotis, natio(ne) Punica / Q (uintus) Numitorius C(ai) l(ibertus) Isio / [- c. 6 -] / Ib{e}i sepultus/ est.1 With Gaius Caesar as dictator again, Marcus Antonius as master of  horse. The burial place was bought from Q uintus Modius, son of  Lucius, of  the Q uirine tribe. Twenty-four feet across, twenty-four feet deep. Gaius Numitorius Nicanor, freedman of  Gaius, Theban by natio, an eye doctor, Numitoria Philumina, freedwoman of  Gaius, Phrygian by natio, Gaius Numitorius Stabilio, freedman of  Gaius, a home-born slave by natio, Publius Opitreius Butas, freedman of  Gaius, Smyrnan by natio, set up the foundation. Buried in their tomb is Numitoria Erotis, freedwoman of  Gaius, Punic by natio. Q uintus Numitorius Isio, freedman of  Gaius, … is buried there.2

In this funerary inscription from Rome, four freedmen – a Theban, a  Phrygian, a  Smyrnan, and a  home-born slave – are commemorated as the ones who set up the burial place for a  Punic freedwoman and another freedman of  unknown origin.3 As the commemorators, they were most likely alive when the inscription was made, which suggests that they presumably chose how they themselves should be memorialized. Other than Gaius Numitorius Nicanor who included his profession as an eye doctor, all the commemorators chose their nationes as their only descriptor. 1  CIL, I, 2965a = AE, 1972, 14. That five of  the six freed people share the same nomen, Numitorius, and all six the same pseudo-filiation suggest that they were owned by the same master. 2   All translations are my own unless otherwise noted. 3  I. Di Stefano Manzella, Epigraphica 34, (1972), pp. 105–30. This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Roman Identity, ed. by L. Roig Lanzillotta, J. L. Brandão, C. Teixeira, and Á. Rodrigues, Turnhout, 2022 (ASH, 8), pp. 371–393 ©  DOI 10.1484/M.ASH-EB.5.128702

371

K. NGUYEN

In the translation above, I have specifically left natio untranslated to highlight the difficulty of  understanding its range of  meaning. While the commemorators all used Latin or Latinized ethnic terms to describe their nationes, these terms do not correspond to Roman administrative units. Instead, they refer to cities, a region, a group of  people, and even a specific servile categorization (verna). The inscription above is a famous example that has been often used to demonstrate the diversity of  the Roman world. After all, it showcases freed people who, despite hailing from different ethnic backgrounds, developed close enough bonds to be commemorated together. While much attention around this inscription has been paid to the honorees’ diverse ethnic backgrounds, their ethnic markers have been taken for granted. Epigraphically, there are set formulae to indicate a  foreign origin: the use of  natus/natione/ex/domo followed by the name of  the birthplace, the birthplace itself  given in the ablative case, or simply the use of  an “ethnic” such as Graeca. However, the exact meaning of  such designations is not always clear and non-Romans’ own designation of  a province or an area from which they came did not necessarily coincide with the official Roman designation, as we see in the example above.4 The specific inclusion of  the word natio itself  implies a certain significance placed on the term and its role within (self-) representation. Why did these freedmen decide to highlight their ethnic differences and why did they do so through the signifier natio? Why did their usage of  natio differ from each other? What is  the symbolic value behind memorializing your identity with this very Roman term? Natio as a concept has been profoundly understudied. Previous scholarship has tended to gloss over the various nuances of  natio and relegate the concept to the realm of  either “nationality” or “ethnicity” without a deeper discussion on the intersections of  the Roman concept with these modern ones.5 Conversely, in recent 4  For example, C. Ricci, “Balcanici e Danubiani a Roma. Attestazioni epigraphiche di abitanti delle Province Rezia, Norico, Pannonia, Dacia, Dalmazia, Mesia, Macedonia, Tracia (I–III sec.)”, in Prosopographica, Poznań, 1993, p. 143, shows that Dardanus might be used for someone who considered himself  to be Dardanian even if  he did not come from the area that Romans officially labeled as Dardania. 5 M.  Gordon, “The nationality of  slaves under the early Roman empire”, JRS 14 (1924), pp. 93–111; G. Zernatto, “Nation: the history of a word”, The Re-

372

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

scholarship on ethnicity and identity, natio is  either mentioned in passing or completely neglected.6 Often translated as “ethnic group”, natio has also been deemed interchangeable with gens and populus.7 However, as Benjamin Isaac has noted, natio could denote a Roman province, as well as refer to heredity.8 As such, it serves both as a Roman administrative term and as an aspect of  identity that is defined and redefined as Roman rule reshapes the geopolitical landscape of  the provinces. The only recent full treatment of  natio is Kočovska-Stevović’s 2016 article, which examines the differences between the Roman concept of  natio and the modern concept of nation.9 In the article, Kočovska-Stevović traces the development of  natio by surveying its uses throughout Latin literature. Such an investigation thus only takes into consideration the uses of  natio by a  certain category of  people, that of  the elite, educated, Roman male. Moreover, Kočovska-Stevović sidesteps ethnicity and identity, even though natio has been shown to be entangled with them. In fact, the words “ethnicity” and “identity” do not even appear throughout the entire paper. It is not enough to survey the literary corpus to track the shifting meaning of  natio, especially since this method privileges the perspectives of  elite, Roman men. The question driving this paper view of  Politics 6 (1944), pp. 351–66; S. Kočovska-Stevoviç, “On the Roman concept of  natio”, Colloquia Humanistica 5 (2016), pp. 3–18; T. Grüll, “Origo as identity factor in Roman epitaphs”, in G. Cupcea, R. Varga (eds), Social interactions and status markers in the Roman world, Oxford, 2018, pp. 141–52. 6   For example, see B.  Isaac, “Attitudes towards provincial intellectuals in the Roman Empire”, in E. Gruen (ed.), Cultural identity in the ancient Mediterranean. Los Angeles, 2010, pp. 495–96; E. Dench, Romulus’ asylum: Roman identities from the age of  Alexander to the age of  Hadrian, New York,  Oxford University Press, 2005, p. 73; B. Shaw, “Who are you? Africa and Africans”, in J. McInerney (ed.), A companion to ethnicity in the ancient Mediterranean, Cambridge, 2014, p. 536. Surprisingly, there is no mention of  natio in R. Laurence, J.  Berry (ed.), Cultural identity in the Roman Empire, New York, Routledge, 2001 or L. Revell, Ways of  being Roman: discourses of  identity in the Roman west, Oxford, Oxbow, 2016. 7 F. Walbank, “Nationality as a factor in Roman history”, Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 76 (1972), p. 149; E. Gruen, “Did ancient identity depend on ethnicity? A preliminary probe”, Phoenix 67 (2013), p. 1; Shaw, “Who are you? Africa and Africans”, p. 536. 8  Isaac, “Attitudes towards provincial Intellectuals in the Roman Empire”, pp. 495–96. 9  Kočovska-Stevoviç, “On the Roman concept of  natio”, pp. 3–18.

373

K. NGUYEN

is therefore not what is the meaning of natio, but rather how was it used on the ground, in the lived experiences of those in the provinces. It is crucial to contextualize the usages of the term itself and to analyze its adaptation across space and time. As a case study, I focus specifically on the treatment of  natio within the funerary epitaphs of  those whose origins are described as from the region of  Pannonia. Funerary monuments are one of  the most powerful settings for the negotiation of identity as they provide insight into which aspects of  the deceased’s identity are commemorated and how these attributes are working in tandem or in tension with each other. Obviously, there are biases inherent in the extant data and in the nature of  epitaphs, but these biases actually contribute to our investigation: of  those who could afford to have a funerary monument and did commission or receive one, why did they specifically include the word natio? Why use such an etic word, a  Roman construct, a  category imbued with political and ideological connotations to describe one’s ethnic identity? Ethnicity itself is a deeply debated term that is generally viewed as a modern construct from the mid-twentieth century, one that is the product of  social discourse rather than historical reality.10 Erich Gruen employs ethnicity to mean shared lineage, but calls into question the assumption that “the construct of  ethnicity is  tied to the framing of  collective identity”.11 Descent and genealogy were important in antiquity, Gruen asserts, but they did not in and of  themselves form a basis for singular group self-­ consciousness. Instead of  employing ethnic characterization to differentiate themselves from others, Gruen proposes that they 10 F. Barth, Ethnic groups and boundaries: the social organization of  culture difference, Long Grove, IL, Waveland Press, 1998; A. Smith, The ethnic origins of  nations, Malden, MA, Blackwell, 1986; A. Smith, Nationalism and modernism, New York, Routledge, 1998; A.  Smith, The antiquity of  nations, Cambridge, Polity Press, 2004; A. Smith, Nationalism: theory, ideology, history, 2 nd ed., Cambridge, Polity Press, 2010; J. Hall, Ethnic identity in Greek antiquity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1997; J.  Hall, Hellenicity: between ethnicity and culture, Chicago, University of  Chicago Press, 2002, pp. 9–19; I. Malkin (ed.), Ancient perceptions of  Greek ethnicity, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2001; E. Gruen, “Did ancient identity depend on ethnicity? A pre­limi­nary probe”, Phoenix 67 (2013), pp. 1–22. 11  Gruen, “Did ancient identity depend on ethnicity? A preliminary probe”, p. 20.

374

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

cultivated a self-perception with plural identities.12 The key aspect here for our purposes is that ethnic identity is a dynamic process and not a  homogenous entity. The assumed unity of  ethnicity is itself  an ideological construct. The aim of  the following case study is not to reconstruct the overall sentiment regarding “becoming Roman”, but to examine how an exogenous element, the Roman construct natio, has been appropriated by people whose origin is that of  a conquered land. By focusing the case study on “Pannonians”, we can investigate the diverse ways people from a specific region are describing their ethnic identities and how these negotiations in turn transform the word natio itself. Overall, this paper aims to demonstrate that natio was not a one-dimensional static identity, but one that oscillated between etic and emic perceptions, between socio-cultural and geo-political definitions, and between local and global identities. Turning to my dataset, I  have compiled 89 epitaphs from across the empire that include the word natio along with either the provincial designation of  Pannonia or local ethnonyms, such as Breucus and Eraviscus (fig. 1). Interestingly, an overwhelming majority of  the epitaphs (94%) use natio to describe the province of  Pannonia (fig. 3). All of  these epitaphs, along with the more local ones, date from the first–third centuries ce (fig. 2). The terminus post quem makes sense since the province of  Pannonia was only created sometime after the indigenous uprising known as the Bellum Batonianum which raged in Ilyrricum from 6–9 ce. The date of  the division of  Illyricum into two distinct provinces, Dalmatia and Pannonia, is disputed between either the late Augustan or early Tiberian times as a part of a larger process of reshaping the empire.13 But the fact still remains that the time of  Augustus 12  E. Gruen, Rethinking the other in antiquity; Gruen, “Did Ancient Identity Depend on Ethnicity? A Prelimary Probe”. Cf. N. Roymans, Ethnic identity and imperial power: the Batavians in the early Roman Empire, Amsterdam, Amsterdam University Press, 2004, p. 2, where ethnicity is defined as “the temporary resultant of  a process of  developing collective self-images, attitudes and conduct that takes place in a context of  interaction between those directly involved and outsiders”, and Revell,  Ways of  being Roman, which suggests that within the Roman world, local identities were multi-layered rather than a binary combination of  Roman and indigenous. 13 E. Tóth, “Die Entstehung der Gemeinsamen Grenzen Zwischen Pannonien und Noricum”, ArhVest 31 (1980), pp. 80–88; M. Šašel Kos, “Pannonia

375

K. NGUYEN

and Tiberius witnessed the reorganization of subjugated lands and the creation of new imperial administrative units. Illyricum itself  was already an artificial product of Roman imperial power: the area did not constitute a distinct geographical entity nor were its inhabitants culturally or ethnically connected.14 It was an outcome of Roman conquests that ultimately reshaped those territories, as well as the people who inhabited them and their societies. Danijel Dzino has demonstrated that after the Bellum Batonianum, the indigenous groups in Illyricum that had challenged Roman domination were divided not only into two provinces, but also into new peregrinae civitates that altered indigenous polities and transformed their local power networks.15 He notes for example that the two tribes that led the revolt, the Breuci and the Daesites, were split up with the former placed in Pannonia and the latter in Dalmatia.16 According to Dzino, the peregrinae civitates created in southern Pannonia not only managed to dismantle the powerful Breucian alliance into smaller communities, but they were created for that very destabilizing purpose.17 Throughout the Roman Empire, the restructuring of  existing communities to fit imperial infrastructures often did not take into account ethnic differences or previous political boundaries. But in the case of  Pannonia, the division of  powerful tribes was the point – this is what makes the Pannonian natio a particularly illuminating case. The province of  Pannonia was named after the or Lower Illyricum?”, Tyche 25 (2010), pp. 123–30; M. Šašel Kos, “The Roman conquest of  Dalmatia and Pannonia under Augustus: some of  the latest research results”, in G Moosbauer, R.  Wiegels (eds), Fines Imperii-Imperium Sine Fine? Römische Okkupations- und Grenzpolitik im Frühen Principat. Osnabrücker Forschungen zu Altertum und Antike-Rezeption 14, Rahden, 2011, pp. 107–17; P. Kovács, “Some notes on the division of  Illyricum”, in I. Piso (ed.), Die Römischen Provinzen. Begriff und Gründung, Cluj-Napoca, 2008, pp. 237–48; D. Dzino, Illyricum in Roman politics 229 bc–ad 68, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2010. 14  For “Illyricum” as the later Roman administrative term versus “Illyria” or “Illyrians”, see Dzino, “Illyrians’ in Ancient Ethnographic Discourse”, pp. 45–65. 15  Dzino, “The division of  Illyricum in Tiberan era: long term significance”; D. Dzino, Illyricum in Roman politics 229 bc–ad 68. 16  Dzino, “The division of  Illyricum in Tiberan era: long term significance”, p.  46. Dzino also notes that the division made followed the geographical line where Pannonian plains and mountainous inner Dinaric geological zone meet. 17   Dzino, “The division of  Illyricum in Tiberan era: long term significance”, pp. 46–47; D. Dzino, Illyricum in Roman politics 229 bc–ad 68, pp. 164–67.

376

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

Location

Military

Civilian

Total

Rome

52

2

54

Pannonia

1

3

4

Germania Superior

2

1

3

Galatia

1

0

1

Syria

2

0

2

Cilicia

3

0

3

Dalmatia

3

0

3

Latium and Campania

7

0

7

Aemilia

7

0

7

Britannia

1

0

1

Gallia Narbonensis

1

0

1

Lugdunensis

1

0

1

Caesariensis

1

0

1

Numidia

1

0

1

Total

83

6

89

Fig. 1. Provenance of  the epitaphs. Century (ce)

Military

Civilian

1

1

3

2nd

36

1

3

35

1

Unknown

11

1

st

rd

Fig. 2. Dates of  the military and civilian epitaphs by century.

Pannonii, a  community of  indigenous groups from central and northern Dalmatia and southern Pannonia that were vaguely connected culturally. Despite hosting one of  the largest rebellions of  local auxiliary troops the Empire ever faced, this region also served as one of  the richest sources of  recruits for the Roman army.18 After Rome re-imposed control in the area, the Pannonian 18 I. Acrudoae, “Militaries from Pannonia in the Imperial fleet at Misenum and Ravenna (first-third centuries ad), prosopographical aspects”, Studia Antiqua et Archaeologica XVIII, (2012), pp. 130–31. Epitaphs and diplomas record

377

K. NGUYEN

Fig. 3. Breakdown of  the uses of  natio by ethnonym.

recruits were deployed elsewhere. No regiment appeared in its area of  origin again and the responsibility for defending this stretch of  Danubian frontier fell to regiments from all over the empire.19 Interestingly, 93% of  the epitaphs in my database commemorate soldiers or veterans (figs 4 and 5).20 Such epitaphs come from all over the empire, from Mainz to Ankara, Britannia to Maumen enlisting from Pannonian civitates of  the Drave and Save, the Breuci, Colapiani, Coranacates, and Sisiciani. See, for example, CIL 3.4372, 4373, 4376, 4377 and CIL 16.2 and 4. Tacitus also records the recruitment of  Pannonians for the Pannonian garrison in his account of  50 ce (Tac. Ann 12.29). With the consolidation of  the Danube frontier in the late first and early second centuries ce, recruitments also drew from the Iasi and north Pannonians, as well as Azali and Eravisci. Mócsy, A. Pannonia and Upper Moesia. A history of  the middle Danube provinces of  the Roman Empire, Boston, Routledge, 1974, pp. 51–52, cites CIL 16.20 and 31 for this trend with the Iasi and north Pannonians. 19 I.  Haynes, Blood of  the provinces: the Roman auxilia and the making of  provincial society from Augustus to the Severans, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013, p. 110. 20  This preponderance of  military epitaphs over civilian ones that record the deceased’s origins mirrors the figures in D. Noy, Foreigners at Rome: citizens and strangers, London, Gerald Duckworth & Co. Ltd, 2000, p. 59. Noy records 109 soldiers from Pannonia and only 23 civilians. from Pannonia. This connection between the use of  natio and military background is a promising avenue to investigate.

378

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

Fig. 4. Military and civilian uses of  natio.

Fig. 5. Breakdown of  natio referring to either the province of  Pannonia or a local ethnonym within the military and civilian subsets.

379

K. NGUYEN

ritania, but the majority (62%) come from Rome.21 This skew towards Rome may be due to the recruiting policy discussed above coupled with the general upward trend of  military recruits from the provinces to Rome in the first–third centuries.22 The figures in my dataset also parallels this recruitment pattern, with one of  the military inscriptions dating from the first century, thirty-six from the second century, and thirty-five from the third century (fig. 2). That these military epitaphs record the origins of soldiers is not surprising, especially since military epitaphs are typically formulaic. One can expect details such as military offices and posts, years of  service, and years of  life, in addition to the name of  the commemorator and their relationship to the deceased. That they used the term natio to describe their origin, rather than origo is interesting because the term has legal connotations and is typically used on military diplomas.23 Of  the military epitaphs, 95% use natio to specifically refer to their province of  origin. The usage of  natio to refer to provinces may have been a convenient tool of  communication among military recruits, especially since cohorts comprised of  people from different provinces. In  this way, though, the inclusion of  natio (a Roman category) to specifically describe their province (a Roman geopolitical construct) appears at first sight to be an example of  the supposed Romanization of  provin21   Only 1 military inscription comes from Pannonia (CIL 3.03849). This is perhaps unsurprising due to the recruiting policy discussed early. 22  Noy, Foreigners at Rome, pp. 20–21. In the first–third centuries ce, the majority of  the Praetorian Guard, which comprised the largest military presence in Rome, were from Italy, but by the third century, due to a change in policy by Septimius Severus, recruitment shifted to outside Italy. Citing Dobo’s 1975 study, Noy records that of  the 37% of  inscriptions from which we can determine the deceased soldier’s place of  origin, 45.5% came from Italy, 15% Pannonia, 7.7% Thrace, 6% Noricum, 3.8% Moesia, 3.8% Hispania, 3.3% Dacia, 2.7% Macedonia, 2.2% Africa, 1.7% Gallia Narbonensis, 1.7% Germany. He notes that these numbers do not reflect the change over time, as most of  the Italians belong to the second century and most of  the others to the third. For example, according to the epitaphs from the SS. Pietro e  Marcellino catacomb, the ethnic composition of  the equites singulares shifted from 56% with German/Britain/Gaul/ Raetia/Norcium origin before 193, to 70% from Pannonia/Dacia/Moesia/Thrace/ Macedonia after 193. 23  Origo is yet another term whose nuanced meanings have been overlooked. It would be interesting to compare the uses of  origo and natio within military epitaphs to compare and contrast their changing meanings.

380

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

cial soldiers. Not only were these soldiers uprooted from their native land to serve in the Roman army, but their hybrid identities now in turn advertise the ongoing conquest of  Rome. Stemming from this notion, scholarship on the ancient Roman army has focused on the army’s role as an imperial enforcer and cultural broker, consequently reducing the army to a homogenous, collective unit.24 However, such a reductionist view assumes a unidirectional influence, one that empowers the army as an institution while neglecting the individual agency of the soldiers themselves.25 To be sure, the experiences of  auxiliary soldiers in the Roman army, an official organization of  the state, must have necessitated the employment of  the dominant discourse. However, as Ralph Haeussler has noted, “Individual soldiers made personal choices, taking up new languages, media and symbols acquired in the army-context, and combined them with personal cognitions and experiences”.26 While auxiliary soldiers had to adapt to life in the army, they did not just simply adopt a homogenous army culture. Instead, these auxiliary soldiers existed in what Homi Bhabha has termed “the Third Space”, a  contradictory and ambivalent space where social identities and ideologies are negotiated.27 According to Bhabha, the Third Space “constitutes the discursive conditions of  enunciation that ensure that the meaning and symbols of  culture have no primordial unity or fixity; that even the same signs can be appropriated, translated, rehistoricized and read anew”.28 In other words, the Third Space debunks the homogeneity of  cultures and rejects cultural hybridity as a simple fusion of  old and new elements.29 Rather than an enclosed space, the Third 24 M. Speidel, Roman army studies, Vol. 1 and 2, Amsterdam, J. C. Gieben, 1984; L. Keppie, The making of  the Roman army: from Republic to Empire, London, Routledge, 2002. 25  For a comprehensive study of  the largest part of  the Roman army, the auxilia, that focuses on the diversity and agency of  its soldiers, see Haynes, Blood of  the provinces. 26   R. Haeussler, Becoming Roman?: diverging identities and experiences in ancient northwest Italy, Walnut Creek, CA, Left Coast Press, 2013. 27  H. K. Bhabha, The location of  culture, London, Routledge, 1994. 28  H. K. Bhabha, The location of  culture, 37. 29   For a  history of  the concept “hybridity”, see R.  Young, Colonial desire: hybridity in theory, culture, and race, Psychology Press, 1995. For discussions of  hybridity in the ancient Mediterranean, see A. Jimenez, “Pure hybridism. Late Iron Age sculpture in southern Iberia”, World Archaeology 43 (2011), pp. 102–23;

381

K. NGUYEN

Space is a fluid one that is in constant flux, a space where elements that are themselves constantly changing interact with each other in relation to larger contexts. In the case of auxiliary soldiers, although they served as both the instruments and the products of  Roman imperialism, they nevertheless also constituted living, evolving communities in their own right. According to Third Space theory, the use of  Roman traits cannot simply be equated with mere emulation since the supposed fixedness of culture, even if it is of the dominant culture, does not exist. Contrary to Gayatri Spivak who argues that the subaltern cannot speak since any representation of  and by the subaltern would still necessarily remain within the dominant discourse, Homi Bhabha finds the subaltern’s voice through the process of  cultural hybridity, and more specifically, through mimicry.30 Describing mimicry as “one of the most elusive and effective strategies of colonial power and knowledge”, Bhabha explains that it is the sign of a double articulation: a complex strategy of reform, regulation and discipline, which “appropriates” the Other as it visualizes power. Mimicry is also the sign of  the inappropriate, however, a  difference or recalcitrance which coheres the dominant strategic function of  colonial power, intensifies surveillance, and poses an immanent threat to both “normalized” knowledges and disciplinary powers.31

In other words, mimicry produces something that is  “the same, but not quite”.32 Mimicry is crucially more about difference than sameness – both for the colonizer and the colonized. For while C. Tronchetti, P. Van Dommelen, “Entangled objects and hybrid practices: colonial contacts and connections at Monte Prama, Sardinia”, Journal of  Mediterranean Archaeology 18 (2005), pp.  183–208; J.  Webster, “Necessary comparisons: a  post‐colonial approach to religious syncretism in the Roman provinces”, World archaeology 28 (1997), pp. 324–38; J. Webster, “Creolizing the Roman provinces”,  American Journal of  Archaeology 105 (2001), pp.  209–25; J. Webster, “Art as resistance and negotiation”, in S. Scott, J. Webster (ed.), Roman and provincial art, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp. 24– 51; N. Terrenato, “The Romanization of  Italy: global acculturation or cultural bricolage”, Theoretical Roman Archaeology Journal, (1997), pp. 20–27. 30 G.  C. Spivak, A  critique of  postcolonial reason. Towards a  history of  the vanishing present, Cambridge, 1999, p. 310; Bhabha, The location of culture, 1994, pp. 85–92. 31  Bhabha, The location of  culture, 1994, pp. 85–86. 32  Bhabha, The location of  culture, 1994, p. 86.

382

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

the colonizer curbs the possibility of  the colonized to assimilate and become equal to them, thus disrupting the colonial hierarchy, the colonized’s partial imitation mocks and challenges the supposed superiority and universality of  the colonizing culture. The concept of  colonial mimicry thus reveals that the process of  acculturation is purposefully limited in order to maintain asymmetrical power relations. However, while Bhabha’s notion of  mimicry is useful to understand the intersection of  culture and power, he does not develop it beyond an expression of  the subaltern’s pathology. Indeed, throughout his discussion, the abstract concept of  mimicry seems to have more agency than the agents involved in  it. And yet, by taking into consideration the subaltern’s knowledgeability, we can investigate mimicry as an intentional strategy of  subversion. This more dynamic understanding of  mimicry and Third Space theory thus suggests that in terms of the auxiliary soldiers’ epitaphs, what is important are not the examples that follow the standardized formulae, but those that deviate from them. For example, 17% of  the epitaphs in the dataset include more specific geographic locations to supplement their nationes, such as home villages and sometimes even the nearest cities. The soldier’s role as the servant of Rome did not constitute his only identity, nor was it antithetical to his local ones. It is necessary therefore to consider the relationships and interactions between the soldiers and their local communities (both where they were born and where they were stationed), as well as within the regiments themselves. In the following example, Aurelius Verus is  commemorated with several levels of  his origin: D(is) M(anibus) s(acrum). / Aur(elio) Vero mil(iti) c(o)hor­ (tis)  / VI pr(a)et(oriae) (centuria) Blicisi, stup(endiorum) XIIII, nat(ione)  / Pannon(io), pede Sirmese, pago Ma/rtio, vico Budalia, qui vixit an(nis) / XL, m(enses) III, d(ies) XV, mil(i)t(avit) in l(egione) I  Atiut/rice stup(endiorum) III. Aur(elius) Marcellus  / et Aur(elius) Florinus, Val(erius)  / Avitianus et omnes com‹m›anipuli sui / de re ipsius b(ene) m(erenti) f(ecerunt) ex / XL milibus.33   CIL 6.37213 = ILS 2044 = EDR 107030.

33

383

K. NGUYEN

Sacred to the divine shades. To Aurelius Verus Blicisius, soldier in the 6th praetorian cohort, centurion for 14 years, from the natio of  Pannonia, on the outskirts of  Sirmium, in the pagus of  Mars, in the vicus of  Budalia, who lived for 40 years, 3 months, and 15 days, who served in the Legio I Adiutrix for 3 years. Aurelius Marcellus and Aurelius Florinus, Valerius Avitianus and all of  his fellow soldiers made [this] to the well deserving from 40,000 of  his own funds.

In addition to natione Pannonio, Aurelius Verus is  described as from pede Sirmese, pago Martio, and vico Budalia. This inscription follows what David Noy concluded in his study of  epitaphs of  foreigners in Rome: “Pannonia” was an important self-designation, but there was also a large number of  references to home villages that were specifically placed after the province and even the nearest city.34 However, the question still remains as to why and how this epitaph from Rome, where most of  the viewers would not have been familiar with the successive details concerning location, was so specific. How did his fellow soldiers (commanipuli) possess such a comprehensive knowledge of  the deceased soldier’s origin? Did the deceased share his desires for the details of  his epitaph to the commemorators before his death? Did he discuss his origin so frequently and in so much depth that the commemorators felt it necessary to include all these details? Whatever the reasons, these details appear to be so crucial to the deceased’s identity that they were inscribed and immortalized. This epitaph is  particularly revealing since it is an example where the soldier is not only commemorated with several layers of  his ethnic identity, but he was also remembered as such in a foreign city (Rome) and by fellow soldiers who were not necessarily from the same background. Natio in this case did not aptly describe the deceased’s origins or his ethnic identity, though it  is still included first in the list as it narrows from the provincial identity to a regional one to a local one. For Flavius Aurelianus, his “natio Pannonia” was so important that in his epitaph to his wife Julia, he explicitly states his own natio, but not hers: 34  Noy, Foreigners at Rome, p. 218. See table 18 for the breakdown of  the designations of  people from Pannonia.

384

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

D(is) [M(anibus)] s(acrum). / Iuliae B[-c. 3-] / coniugi ben[e] / merent[i] qu‹a›e / vixit mecum / annos XXII et / tulit aetatis s/uae annos XL. / Fl(avius) Aurelianus, / dec(urio) coh(ortis) I Belg/arum posui/t, natione Pan/nonia.35 Sacred to the divine shades. To Julia B[-c. 3-], well deserving wife, who lived with me 22 years and bore 40 years of her life. Flavius Aurelianus, decurion of  the first Belgium cohort, from the natio of  Pannonia, set [this] up.

This inscription from Dalmatia is especially informative because it is an example where the soldier is the one commissioning the epitaph and thus is the one who, at the very least, gave the final approval of  how he himself  should be described. Accordingly, the two descriptors that he chooses to immortalize himself  with indicate which aspects of his identity lie at the forefront: his military background (as a decurion in the first Belgium cohort) and his natio (Pannonia). Paškvalin has proposed that Julia’s cognomen should be reconstructed to the indigenous name Benna, which suggests that she could also be from the Pannonian area.36 If  this is the case, it is even more telling that on an epitaph to his wife, Flavius Aurelianus commemorated her ethnic background in relation to his rather than vice versa. Moreover, Flavius Aurelianus’ decision to include his natio runs counter to the funerary tradition in the Pannonian region: Pannonian men did not tend to emphasize their local roots through their own self-representation, but rather, through that of  their wives. As Ursula Rothe has demonstrated, the majority of  women on the gravestones of  northern Pannonia are depicted with local dress styles – a practice that continued well into the third century ce.37 For example, Boii women are depicted with   AE 1913, 00139.  V.  Paškvalin, Antički Sepulkralni Spomenici Spodručja Bosne i  Hercegovine, ANUBiH Djela LXXXIII, CBI 9, Sarajevo, 2012. He also suggests this conclusion based on 1) Julia is described as a coniunx, which is a term that denotes a spouse from a legal marriage, but also one that that is from a community not regulated by Roman legal norms; 2) the name Julia suggests that the family received Roman citizenship in the period between Augustus and Caligula; 3) based on the length of  marriage and Julia’s age, their marriage probably began before or shortly after the start of  Flavius Aurelianus’ military service. 37 U. Rothe, “Dress in the middle Danube provinces: the garments, their origins and their distribution”, Jahreshefte des Österreichischen Archäologischen 35 36

385

K. NGUYEN

“a special kind of  boat-shaped fur hat”, while the Azali women further east don a different type of  hat “consisting of  a large arc of  fabric” and the Eravisci further west women wear “a tighter, double-layered cloth bonnet”.38 Rothe has also documented a similar regional and tribal distribution for different types of  overtunic.39 On the other hand, northern Pannonian gravestones tend to depict men wearing either Roman dress or generic garments common to both Pannonia and Rome. These patterns also pertain to gravestones where men and women are depicted together, with husbands and sons usually depicted in togas while the wives, mothers, and daughters are in traditional clothing. Through such visual connections, Pannonian men were able to embed their priv­ i­leged social status within the Roman Empire (e.g.  Roman citi­ zen­ship, represented by their togas), while simultaneously linking themselves back to their local community (e.g.  ethnic member­ ship, represented by their wives in traditional garments). Although Flavius Aurelianus’s epitaph defied this pattern, it nevertheless visually immortalized his Third Space in a  similar way by in­di­ cating a hybridized identity that was simultaneously traditional and new, local and foreign. Rather than conflicting with each other, various Roman and local customs intermingled to create an alternative discourse. For others, the term natio itself  referred to local communities rather than to the province. In the following example from Germania Superior, Breucus Blaedari, a soldier from the first Pannonian cohort, was commemorated by his heir as from the natio of  Breucus, a local tribe: [B]reucus Blaedar[i], / miles ex coh(orte) I Panno(niorum), / natione Breucus, / an(norum) XXXVI, stip(endiorum) XVI, / h(ic) s(itus) e(st). H(eres) p(osuit).40 Instituts 81, 2012, pp.  137–231. Also see U.  Rothe, “Whose fashion? Men, women and Roman culture as reflected in dress in the cities of  the Roman NorthWest”, in E. Hemelrijk, G. Woolf  (ed), Gender and the Roman city, Leiden, 2013, pp. 243–68. 38 U. Rothe, “Ethnicity in the Roman Northwest”, in J. McInerney (ed.), A  com­panion to ethnicity in the Ancient Mediterranean, Cambridge, 2014, pp. 509–10. 39 U. Rothe, “Dress in the middle Danube provinces: the garments, their origins and their distribution”, pp. 137–231. 40   CIL 13.07510.

386

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

Breucus Blaedari, soldier from the first Pannonian cohort, Breucan by natio, [who lived] 36 years [and served] 16 years, lies here. [His] heir set [this] up.

As mentioned earlier, the Breuci comprised one of  the main tribes that rebelled against the Romans in the Bellum Batonianum and was consequently moved into the province of  Pannonia after the war. The date of  the inscription is uncertain, but due to the fact that Breucus Blaedari was in the Pannonian cohort and that this inscription was found in Germania Superior, it must be sometime after the revolt when Pannonian troops were no longer stationed locally for security reasons. If  this is the case, then it is telling that this soldier was commemorated not by the Roman designation of  Pannonian, but by his local tribe. What’s more, he uses the Roman term natio to describe his tribe, thus subtly defying the Roman reorganization of  his homeland. Other such examples include natione Boius and natione Varcianus from across the empire, all referring to tribes within Pannonia.41 Notably there are extant examples of  civilian epitaphs with natione Eraviscus, all of  which were found in Pannonia and range in date from the first to the third centuries ce.42 In the following epitaph, Senius is com­mem­ o­rated by his mother Comatuia as not only natione Eraviscus, but also from the civitas Eraviscorum in Aquincum: Senio, Comatonis f(ilius), nat(ione) / Era(viscus), h(ic), XXX. In c(ivitate) Er(aviscorum), in Aq(uinco) / d(efunctus). Comatuia, mater eius, / sibi et f(ilio) viva t(itulum) p(osuit). Senius, son of Comato, Eraviscan by natio, [lies] here. 30 years of  age. He died in the community of  the Eraviscans in Aquincum. Comatuia, his mother, set up this epitaph for her son and for herself  while she was alive.

This epitaph specifically declares the location where he died, which given his natio, was also his homeland. According to Rothe, tribal affiliations played a significant role in the construction of  ethnic identities in northern Pannonia until as late as the mid-third century ce.43 Rothe specifically notes the frequent occurrence of    e.g. CIL 6.03308; AE 1992, 01879; CIL 6.03257.   AE 1910, 00139; AE 1939, 00260. 43 U. Rothe, “Ethnicity in the Roman Northwest”, p. 509. 41 42

387

K. NGUYEN

“civitas Eraviscorum” on gravestones and altars in the mid-late third century ce despite the fact that this particular region had already been under the control of  the municipium at Aquincum since the Severan period.44 Such a  phenomenon, she remarks, contrasts with Cologne where the local population abandoned the tribal names and instead identified strongly with the new city.45 The retention of  the tribal names as a  marker of  ethnic identity over the span of  about three centuries thus underscores the power of  local identity to adapt to the dominant discourse, embedding itself  within a wider power network while also maintaining its own sense of  autonomy. I have focused specifically on natio within the context of funerary epitaphs in order to assess the uses of the word in different contexts and by different agents. In these funerary inscriptions from across the Roman Empire, from the first to third centuries ce, natio essentially served as a tool of  empire, a word to designate the territorial units that were formed as artefacts of  power. As such, it described the new provinces that divided existing polities and restructured power relations, as well as cultural ones. In addition, there is crucially no evidence that natio was ever used to refer to one’s identity as a Roman (e.g. natio Romanus). By assessing the interplay between ethnic identity and power, we gain further insight into how people from the provinces, from lands that were being repartitioned and renamed, attempted to reconcile these changes in their identity. This paper thus moves beyond defining natio to exploring the extent of  its limits and influence among subaltern populations. From this microstudy of  Pannonian epitaphs, this paper demonstrates how subaltern groups can engage in the dominant discourse by subtly appropriating its tools and reinserting their local identities.46 In this way, natio emerges as a  Ibid.  U.  Rothe, “Ethnicity in the Roman Northwest”, p.  504, notes that “no inscriptions include the phrase natione Ubius or the like after the end of  the first century ad … while Agrippinenses becomes the standard ethnonym for people from Cologne and perhaps also the Ubian area in general, from the mid-first century onward”. 46  It would be interesting for future studies to compare the epigraphic habit of  the Pannonians with those from Germany and Noricum. According to Noy,  Foreigners at Rome, pp. 216–17, the people from these regions, like the Pannonians, 44 45

388

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

versatile and multi-layered term that should not be limited to one catch-all definition, but rather should be contextualized in its use. Returning to the epitaph of  the freedmen of  various nationes, we can now see the tension in its use as a marker unifying these diverse freedmen in a  powerful fictive kinship, but also as one that signified their perpetual, controlled foreignness. As freedmen, they had all gained Roman citizenship and yet they still chose to include their ethnic markers. The repetition of  natio throughout the epitaph connects their ethnic diversity as it commemorates the strong bond they developed in slavery despite their different backgrounds. On the other hand, we do not know whether or not these freedmen included their nationes simply because it was recorded on their bill of  sale. Roman law required sellers to disclose the nationes of  every slave sold and to record them on the bill of  sale.47 Within the sphere of  slavery, natio served as a quick reference point through which buyers could assess the quality of  their merchandises since “it  is assumed that some slaves are good, because they come from a natio which does not have a bad reputation, and others are thought to be bad because they come from a natio which has a rather bad name”.48 The fact that Gaius Numitorius Stabilio recorded his natio as verna, “homeborn slave”, suggests that his ethnic marker, at least, was tied to his servile identity. That the other freedmen, besides the Punic freedwomen, were commemorated with nationes from the Eastern Mediterranean raises the possibility that these freedmen wanted to convey that they were not just any slaves, but highly valued ones, since slaves from Greece and Asia Minor were associated with positive servile stereotypes (e.g. educated) and were typically more expensive. If   this is the case, the usage of  natio on this epitaph serves as a reproduction of  Roman dominance – of  the Roman Empire’s tended to record more specific details of  their origins, like tribal and civil affiliations. They also encompassed peoples that led big revolts against Roman power (e.g. the Batavians). 47  Digest 21.1.31.21, 21.1.1.1; Seneca, Controversiae 7.6.22. 48  Digest 21.1.31.21. As another example, in his manual on agriculture written in the first century bce, Varro includes advice on which slaves are fit for which tasks on a farm and suggests standards to be applied in slave markets. Martial also portrays a  speaker who prefers a  slave specifically from “the Mytilenean slavedealer”, which is presumably from Asia Minor (Martial 7.80).

389

K. NGUYEN

attempts to control foreign people through artificial categorizations and enduring ethnic myths and stereotypes. Ultimately, this paper aims to demonstrate that work on ethnic identity would profit from analyzing the words used in the ancient evidence to categorize people in antiquity themselves. Our understanding of  words such as “race”, “ethnicity”, and “gender” have changed dramatically just over the past couple of  decades. In terms of  these modern constructs, we have come to realize that before we can begin to understand their subcategorizations, we need to understand the framework within which they exist. Likewise in studies of  antiquity, there  is a  need to better understand words used by ancient writers and people, words such as natio, gens, and origo and the significance, the connotations, and the people behind their usage.

Bibliography Acrudoae I., “Militaries from Pannonia in the Imperial Fleet at Misenum and Ravenna (first-third centuries ad), Prosopographical Aspects”, Studia Antiqua et Archaeologica XVIII (2012), pp. 127– 60. Barth F., Ethnic groups and boundaries: the social organization of  culture difference, Long Grove, IL, Waveland Press, 1998. Bhabha H. K., The location of  culture, New York, Routledge, 1994. Dench E., Romulus’ asylum: Roman identities from the age of  Alexander to the age of  Hadrian, New York, Oxford University Press, 2005. Di Stefano Manzella, I, Epigraphica 34, (1972), pp. 105–30. Dzino D., Illyricum in Roman politics 229  bc–ad  68, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2010. Dzino D, “Illyrians’ in ancient ethnographic discourse”, Dialogues D’Histoire Ancienne 40.2, (2014), pp. 45–65. Dzino D, “The division of  Illyricum in Tiberan era: long term significance”, in P.  Kovács (ed.), Contributions to the history of  the Danubian provinces under Tiberius’ reign (14–37 ad), Budapest & Debrecen, 2017, pp. 41–54. Gordon M., “The nationality of  slaves under the early Roman empire”, JRS 14 (1924), pp. 93–111. Gruen E., Culture and national identity in Republican Rome, Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1992. 390

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

Gruen E. (ed.), Cultural identity in the Ancient Mediterranean, Los Angeles, Getty Publications, 2010a. Gruen E., Rethinking the other in antiquity, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2010b. Gruen E, “Did ancient identity depend on ethnicity? A preliminary probe”, Phoenix 67 (2013), pp. 1–22. Grüll T., “Origo as identity factor in Roman epitaphs”, in G. Cupcea, R. Varga (eds), Social interactions and status markers in the Roman world, Oxford, 2018, pp. 141–52. Hall J., Ethnic identity in Greek antiquity, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1997. Hall J., Hellenicity: between ethnicity and culture, Chicago, University of  Chicago Press, 2002. Haynes I., Blood of  the provinces: the Roman auxilia and the making of  provincial society from Augustus to the Severans, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013. Isaac B., “Attitudes towards provincial intellectuals in the Roman Empire”, in E. Gruen (ed.), Cultural identity in the ancient Mediterranean. Los Angeles, 2010, pp. 491–518. Jimenez A., “Pure hybridism. Late Iron Age sculpture in southern Iberia”, World Archaeology 43 (2011), pp. 102–23. Keppie L., The making of  the Roman army: from Republic to Empire, London, Routledge, 2002. Kočovska-Stevoviç S., “On the Roman concept of  natio”, Colloquia Humanistica 5 (2016), pp. 3–18. Kovács P., “Some notes on the division of Illyricum”, in I. Piso (ed.), Die Römischen Provinzen. Begriff  und Gründung, Cluj-Napoca, 2008, pp. 237–48. Kovács P., A history of  Pannonia during the Principate, Bonn, Antiquitas Reihe I/65, 2014. Laurence R., Berry J. (ed.), Cultural identity in the Roman Empire, New York, Routledge, 2001. Malkin I. (ed.), Ancient perceptions of  Greek ethnicity, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2001. Mócsy A. Pannonia and Upper Moesia. A History of the Middle Danube Provinces of  the Roman Empire, Boston, Routledge, 1974. Noy D.,  Foreigners at Rome: citizens and strangers, London, Gerald Duckworth & Co. Ltd, 2000. Paškvalin V., Antički sepulkralni spomenici spodručja bosne i hercegovine, ANUBiH Djela LXXXIII, CBI 9, Sarajevo, 2012. 391

K. NGUYEN

Revell L., Ways of  being Roman: discourses of  identity in the Roman west, Oxford, Oxbow, 2016. Ricci C., “Balcanici e Danubiani a Roma. Attestazioni epigraphiche di abitanti delle province Rezia, Norico, Pannonia, Dacia, Dalmazia, Mesia, Macedonia, Tracia (I–III sec.)”, in Prosopographica, Poznań, 1993, pp. 141–208. Rothe U., “Dress in the middle Danube provinces: the garments, their origins and their distribution”, Jahreshefte des Österreichischen Archäologischen Instituts 81, 2012, pp. 137–231. Rothe U., “Whose fashion? Men, women and Roman culture as reflected in dress in the cities of  the Roman North-West”, in E. Hemelrijk, G. Woolf  (ed), Gender and the Roman city, Leiden, 2013, pp. 243–68. Rothe U., “Ethnicity in the Roman Northwest”, in J. McInerney (ed.), A companion to ethnicity in the Ancient Mediterranean, Cambridge, 2014, pp. 497–513. Roymans N., Ethnic identity and imperial power: the Batavians in the early Roman Empire, Amsterdam, Amsterdam University Press, 2004. Said E., Culture and imperialism, New York, Alfed A. Knopf, 1993. Šašel Kos M., “Pannonia or Lower Illyricum?”, Tyche 25 (2010), pp. 123–30. Šašel Kos M., “The Roman conquest of Dalmatia and Pannonia under Augustus: some of  the latest research results”, in G. Moosbauer, R.  Wiegels (ed.), Fines Imperii-Imperium Sine Fine? Römische Okkupations- und Grenzpolitik im Frühen Principat. Osnabrücker Forschungen zu Altertum und Antike-Rezeption 14, Rahden, 2011, pp. 107–17. Shaw B., “Who are you? Africa and Africans”, in J. McInerney (ed.), A companion to ethnicity in the ancient Mediterranean, Cambridge, 2014, pp. 527–41. Smith A., The ethnic origins of  nations, Malden, MA, Blackwell, 1986. Smith A., Nationalism and modernism, New York, Routledge, 1998. Smith A., The antiquity of  nations, Cambridge, Polity Press, 2004. Smith A., Nationalism: theory, ideology, history, 2nd ed., Cambridge, Polity Press, 2010. Speidel M., Roman army studies, Vol. 1 and 2, Amsterdam, J. C. Gieben, 1984. Spivak G. C., A critique of postcolonial reason. Towards a history of the vanishing present. Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1999. 392

WHAT’S IN A NATIO

Terranato N., “The Romanization of  Italy: Global acculturation or cultural bricolage”, Theoretical Roman Archaeology Journal, (1997), pp. 20–27. Tóth E., “Die Entstehung der Gemeinsamen Grenzen Zwischen Pannonien und Noricum”, ArhVest 31 (1980), pp. 80–88. Tronchetti C., Van Dommelen P., “Entangled objects and hybrid practices: colonial contacts and connections at Monte Prama, Sardinia”, Journal of  Mediterranean Archaeology 18 (2005), pp. 183– 208. Walbank F., “Nationality as a  factor in Roman history”,  Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 76 (1972), pp. 145–68. Webster J., “Necessary comparisons: a post‐colonial approach to religious syncretism in the Roman provinces”, World Archaeology 28 (1997), pp. 324–38. Webster J., “Creolizing the Roman provinces”, American Journal of  Archaeology 105 (2001), pp. 209–25. Webster J., “Art as resistance and negotiation”, in S. Scott, J. Webster (ed.), Roman and provincial art, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2004, pp. 24–51. Zernatto G., “Nation: the history of  a word”, The Review of  Politics 6 (1944), pp. 351–66.

393

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

Adkins, A. H.  17 (n. 43) Aemilius Buca, L.  150 Aemilius Lepidus, M. (triumvir) 122, 150 (n. 105, fig. 6) Aemilius Lepidus Paullus, L. (consul 50 bce)  136, 137 (n.  50, figg. 1–2), 149 Aemilius Paullus, L. (c. 229–160 bce) 20–21, 60 (n. 59), 121–155 Aemilius Scaurus, M.  122, 150 (fig. 7), 151 Africa  44, 50, 56, 75, 247, 348 (n. 53), 373 (nn. 6–7), 380 (n. 22) Antiochus  54–58 Antiquarianism  279–282, 304–306 Appuleius Saturninus (tribune)  78, 338–345, 362 Aretas (king of Nabataea)  150 Aristides  40, 52, 60 Army  27, 46–56, 138–140, 177, 189, 227, 238–241, 258–274, 345, 377, 381 Arpinum  292 (n. 42), 317–321 Arvales  269–271 Assemblies  255–274, 341–346 Assmann, Jan  18, 26 Asylum (Romulus’)  27 (n. 73), 121 (n.  2), 145 (nn.  90–91), 188 (n.  13), 194 (n.  47), 197–198, 227–232, 291 (n. 41), 302–304, 373 (n. 6) Athens  92 (n. 3), 232 (n. 21), 237, 321

Atticus, T. Pomponius  39–45, 59 (n.  56), 282–284, 303 (n.  84), 316–325 Audience  42–45, 50, 92–94, 109– 114, 163–179, 287, 317 Augustine of Hippo  14–17, 279, 296 (n. 55) Augustus, emperor  60 (n.  61), 72, 93–96, 101, 109, 115, 169, 185– 197, 204–218, 234–236, 242 (n. 47), 271 (n. 39), 341 (n. 23), 345 (n.  40), 346 (n.  44), 350– 378, 385 (n. 36) Ausonius  72–86 Bazas  76, 83, 85 Bellum Batonianum  375–376, 387 Bhabha, Homi  381–382 Biography  28–30, 39–62, 71–89, 155, 180 (n. 45), 187–189, 196, 200, 207, 216, 225–227, 233– 248, 306 Boius/Boii  385–387 Breucus/Breuci  375–378, 386–387 Caesar, Julius  60 (n. 61), 101 (n. 34), 138, 150, 172, 191, 195–199, 208, 218, 231, 247, 281 (n.  9), 282 (n. 14), 286, 289–293, 302 (n.  80), 316 (n.  10), 339, 345 (n. 41), 346–351, 357 Caligula, emperor  172–174, 189– 218, 244, 385 (n. 36)

395

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

Calpurnius Piso, Cn.  149, 345, 359 Calpus  127 Campania  76, 81, 84, 133, 197, 218, 377 Capitoline Hill (and/or Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus)  177–179, 303 Career  29, 72–88, 138 (n. 57), 141, 146 (n.  93), 170 (n.  22), 214, 226, 291 (n. 40) Carthage  44–57, 84 Cassius Dio  116, 140, 179 (n. 43), 186 (n. 8), 195–197, 201–205 Cassius Severus  353–354 Cato the Elder  41–42, 59 (n. 56), 195 (n.  50), 280, 290 (n.  36), 293 (n. 45), 297, 302–303, 321 (n. 19), 339–340, 345 (n. 39) Cicero, M. Tullius  24, 42, 51, 59, 92, 115, 124, 129, 134 (n.  41), 137–139, 143 (n. 82), 147 (n. 97), 152 (n.  111), 167, 198, 206 (n.  103), 259 (n.  12), 262–263, 267 (n.  30), 282 (n.  10), 283 (n.  18), 284 (n.  23), 286–307, 313–330, 335 (n. 2), 338 (n. 16), 340 (n. 23), 341–351, 354, 359 De domo sua  267 (n. 30), 313 De finibus  301 (n.  80), 315 (n. 6) De legibus  24, 143 (n. 82), 313– 330, 341 (n. 26) De officiis  93 (n. 6), 100 (n. 32), 314 (n. 3), 351 De re publica  59 (n.  57), 138, 263 (n. 22), 305, 329 Tusculanae disputationes  24, 102, 134 (n. 41), 147 (n. 97), 315 (n. 7), 330 Cimon  40, 52, 56 (n. 48), 60 (n. 58) Citizens/Cives  23–27, 40, 52, 81, 93, 98–99, 170, 177, 187–188, 192 (n. 37), 195, 197–198, 205, 213, 216–218, 228–232, 239 (n.  40), 255 (n.  3), 258–273, 290–293, 300, 303–308, 313, 320, 323, 330, 351 (n.  66), 358

(n.  97), 362, 363 (n.  110), 378 (n. 20), 385 (n. 36), 386, 389 Civil War (or stasis)  30, 41 (n. 8), 166–181, 210, 282 (n.  13), 289, 290 (n. 37), 348–349, 359 (n. 98) Claudius Caecus, Ap.  131, 134, 144 (n. 83), 147, 152 Claudius, emperor  116 (n. 81), 169, 190–211, 226, 235–238, 248 Clothing (toga, pallium/pallia)  187, 197–199, 218, 242, 244, 269, 299, 301, 386 Concordia – ὁμόνοια  101, 108, 136– 138, 152 Cornelius Nepos  26, 39–62, 180 (n. 45), 199 (n. 67), 306 (n. 90), 340 (n. 20) Cornelius Scipio Aemilianus, P.  131, 138–141 Cosmology and astronomy  134, 138–140, 152 Crimen maiestatis  335 (n. 3), 337, 338 (nn.  15–16), 341 (n.  23), 349–350, 357, 358 (n. 95), 362 (n. 108) Cultural hybridity  381–382 memory  18, 26 relativism  43, 61–62, 180 (n. 45) Cures  256–258 Curiae  260–273 Dalmatia  375–377, 385 Descartes, René  12, 14 Domitian, emperor  165, 186 (n. 8), 190–193, 203–218, 235, 271 (n. 39), 352 (n. 70) Epictetus  16–17 Equites/knights  189, 212–214, 246, 264, 380 (n. 22) Eraviscus/Eravisci  275, 278 (n. 18), 386–388 Ethical/Pedagogic use of biography 39, 42–43, 61, 93, 185–188 Ethnic identity  11–12, 21, 26, 166– 167, 261, 291–293, 296 (n. 59),

396

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

301 (n.  73), 303 (n.  84), 371– 375, 384–390 Ethnicity  11–12, 19–21, 26, 121 (n. 2), 227–239, 282, 292, 372– 375, 386–390 boundaries between  21, 30, 113, 163–165, 180, 186–188, 206, 320 (n. 17), 374–376 stereotypes of  57, 166–171, 180, 191, 234, 244, 293 (n.  45), 296 (n. 59), 301 (n. 73), 389– 390 Ethos (cf. Natura)  58 (n. 52), 186– 187, 193, 199, 212, 216, 232 Etruscan  95–97, 109–113, 123 (n. 7), 258, 290, 298–301 Etymology  107, 129, 257 (n.  6), 263–267, 283–284, 294–304, 337, 355, 357 Exceptionality  124, 129, 230 (n. 17), 290–291, 335, 339, 362 Exemplarity  40, 52 (n. 36), 60–62, 93–116, 154, 174, 180 (n.  45), 234 Exogroup  238, 242, 245–246 Fabius Maximus Aemilianus, Q. 131–132 Family  24, 29, 44, 72–88, 95– 110, 124, 128–129, 142, 148, 151, 192 (n. 36), 209–218, 225 (n.  2), 236, 243–244, 283, 294 (n. 47), 313–314, 320–330, 360 (n. 102), 385 (n. 36) Felix  76–88 Fiscus Iudaicus  165, 179 Flavius Josephus  30, 61 (n.  62), 163–171, 179 (n. 42) Fortuna (Τύχη)  73, 127 (n.  15), 134 (n. 42), 141–142, 146, 152, 185 (n. 3), 300 Foucault, Michel  15–17, 29 Funerary rites  21, 113, 325–327, 371, 374, 385, 388 Gaius Licinius Mucianus  175–177 Gaius Lutatius Catulus  48–50

Galba, emperor  175–176, 203, 205, 210–214, 265 (n. 27) Gallic Wars  292, 298–301, 349 (n. 55) Gaul/Gauls  22, 75–76, 83–87, 175, 210, 227 (n. 9), 229 (n. 14), 231, 292–293, 380 (n. 22) Gens  54, 83, 122–124, 127–131, 145–152, 197, 225 (n.  2), 237, 326, 328, 339 (n. 20), 373, 390 Gill, Christopher  15–18, 29 Greece  15, 122, 130, 133 (n.  35), 136, 144, 146–147, 154 (n. 116), 167–173, 200, 389 Greeks  45 (n. 16), 91, 130 (n. 27), 135, 154–155, 165–168, 172 (n. 28), 180, 197, 301 Hamilcar  26, 43–61, 306 (n. 90) Hannibal  26, 42 (n.  11), 44–62, 153, 168, 290, 306 (n. 90) Hasdrubal  43–45, 51–53 Hellenism/philhellenism  16, 23, 28, 52–53, 91, 111 (n. 67), 132 (n.  33), 134, 201, 232 (n.  20), 314, 347–348 Historiography  19–20, 28 (n. 76), 42 (n.  12), 91–94, 104, 113– 116, 147, 169 (n. 18), 171, 174, 187 (n.  10), 193 (n.  43), 233 (n. 24), 280, 282, 306 History  12, 14, 20, 25, 40, 42, 45, 53, 59, 71, 92–104, 113–116, 146, 151–153, 163–180, 187 (n.  10), 188, 200, 211, 229 (n. 14), 232, 235, 247, 264, 279, 281–308, 318, 319 (n. 15), 336– 337, 357, 362 Horace  72–86 Identification  12–13, 19–20, 25, 61 Identity  “troubled idiom”  12 and self  62 and the Other  26 cultural  11, 26–27, 61–62, 188, 194–197, 227–234

397

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

Italic  22, 27, 49, 126 (n.  14), 133 (n. 36), 147 (n. 97), 152, 225, 259, 293, 339 (n. 20) literary  22, 24, 28, 30, 42, 71, 77, 82–83, 86, 92, 144–146, 173 (n. 29), 186 (n. 7), 194, 212–217, 234 (n. 27), 279– 280, 314, 317–318, 362, 373 political  11, 27–28, 39–40, 52 (nn.  34, 36), 53 (n.  39), 56 (n.  48), 58 (n.  54), 83, 92 (n. 3), 93, 99–113, 130–138, 145, 151, 185, 189, 193, 216, 226–234, 241–248, 255– 267, 272, 274, 280–285, 289–301, 315–320, 330, 335–363, 373–380 religious  11, 22–28, 59 (n. 56), 83, 87–88, 107, 143, 144 (n.  83), 153, 155, 187, 190, 194, 197, 206–212, 216– 218, 228–230, 244, 258, 261, 264, 274, 281, 283, 308, 313– 330, 361–363, 382 (n. 29) rhetorical shaping of  26, 30, 61 (n.  62), 74, 91, 163–181, 186, 245, 287, 343, 347, 362 social  11–21, 24–27, 30, 42– 43, 73, 79, 110, 165–166, 181, 186–194, 212–218, 226–238, 243–248, 256, 303, 317, 325– 330, 374, 381, 386 multiple  27, 50, 61, 132, 228– 233, 255, 289 Illyricum  360–361, 375–376 Ingroup  245–247 Integration  187, 194, 232, 240, 247, 292 Italia/Italy  46, 55, 57, 131, 145, 151, 175, 215, 225, 228, 232, 285, 289–297, 302, 306, 339– 340, 380 (n. 22) Ius Quiritium  257–261 Jerusalem, Temple of  164–180, 207 Jesus  171, 358 (nn. 95, 97) Judaea  169–179

Judaeans (or Jews)  163–181 Juvenal  168 Kahn, Charles  17, 29, 134 (n. 39) Language  22–26, 45 (n.  16), 71, 87, 136, 144, 172, 176, 187, 194–199, 204 (n. 94), 216–217, 228–230, 241, 269 (n. 35), 279– 308, 315, 319, 335–338, 345, 362–363 Latins/Latini  109, 258, 260, 269 (n.  36), 271 (n.  41), 290–303, 307, 372 Laws of succession  328–329 Legis actio  256 Lex Appuleia de maiestate  338, 340 (n. 23), 341 (n. 24), 344–345 Lex Cornelia de maiestate  345 Lex curiata  262–264 Lex Iulia Maiestatis  346 Lineage  237–238, 320, 330 Livy (Titus Livius)  20, 23, 29, 49 (n.  26), 51 (n.  33), 52 (n.  34), 57 (n.  50), 91–116, 128–144, 152 (n.  111), 234, 265, 268, 281 (n. 6), 342 (n. 32), 347, 348 (n. 49), 354–355, 362 Location  29, 71, 78, 83–88, 325 (n. 26), 377, 381–387 Long, A. A.  17, 29, 314 (n. 6) Lucretia  20, 91–117 Ludi (theatre, circus, …)  189, 198– 201, 213 Lysander  40, 57 (n. 50) Maiestas  23–24, 193, 217, 335– 363 Maiores (Roman ancestors)  297, 305, 321, 328 Maleševic, S.  12 (n. 8) Mamercus  124–130 Marcius Censorinus, L. & C.  148 Marcus Antonius Primus  175–177, 210 Marcus Brutus  98–99, 128 (n. 18), 195 (n. 49)

398

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

Marius, G.  41–42, 289, 317–318 Marseille  85 Marsyas  121 (n. 1), 148–149 Martial, poet  72, 196, 205, 389 (n. 48) Matron  96–113, 213, 256 (n. 4) Mediterranean  84–85, 302, 373 (n. 6), 381 (n. 29), 389 Memory  18, 26, 45, 122, 145, 151 (n.  109), 155, 172, 178–179, 204, 294, 307, 313 (n.  1), 317 (n.  12), 321, 325, 327, 328 (n. 31), 336, 340, 362 Miltiades  40, 52, 56 (n.  48), 60 (n. 58) Mimicry  382–383 Models of behaviour  20, 26–27, 38–62, 75, 94–95, 100, 104–117, 140 (n.  65), 154, 185, 188, 212, 217, 234, 238, 247–248, 324 Momigliano, Arnaldo  41 (n. 8), 44 (n.  15), 233 (n.  24), 280–282, 306–307 Monarchy  95, 135, 201 Mores/Customs  22, 24, 53, 60 (n. 61), 126, 164–165, 185–190, 199 (n. 67), 201–207, 214–218, 229 (n. 14), 231–234, 242, 281, 287, 292, 302, 305, 318, 320, 330 Mos maiorum  93, 100, 107–108, 144–147, 155, 206, 213 (n. 141), 287, 305 (n. 89) Music  197–200 Natio  21, 371–390 Natura  191–193, 199–200, 211, 244 Nero, emperor  116 (n.  81), 169, 173–177, 187–218, 235, 244 Nola  72–87 Numa Pompilius, Roman king  123– 129, 147 (n. 97), 149–154, 263 (nn. 23–24), 267 Origin/Origo  21, 73–85, 109 (n. 61), 116, 128, 130, 132 (n.  33),

145–147, 166, 204, 214, 216, 236–248, 291–304, 340 (n. 20), 371–384 Otho, emperor  172, 175, 190, 205– 214, 244 Ovid  72–88, 95–96, 327, 355– 358, 362 Polybius  47–49, 135–142, 168 (n. 18), 340, 347 Pannonia  226, 236 (n.  31), 372– 390 Paulinus of  Nola  v. ‘Nola’ Paulinus of  Pella  v. ‘Pella’ Pausanias  40, 59 (n. 57) Pella  72, 76–88 Perduellio  341, 344, 346, 358 (n. 97) Perfidia Punica  57 (n. 50), 58 Philip V of Macedonia  54–55 Philosophical and active life (βίος θεωρητικός – βίος πρακτικός)  131– 152 Pietas  98, 107–108, 193, 204, 206, 212, 327, 329 Pinus  127 Plato  14–16, 132–134, 237, 303 (n. 84), 317–321 Pliny the Elder  168 Pliny the Younger  41, 186 (n.  7), 205 (n.  99), 210, 214 (n.  143), 321 (n.  19), 353 (n.  75), 359 (n. 98) Plutarch  16, 20–21, 44 (n.  15), 102, 112, 115, 121–155, 181 (n.  46), 195 (n.  49), 256 (n.  4), 259 (n.  14), 263 (n.  24), 279, 321 (n. 19) Political use of biography  28–30, 40–62, 121–155, 187–189, 196, 216, 225–248, 306 Polymathy/πολυμαθία   142–144, 152, 302 Pomponius Molo, L.  149 Pompus  127 Populus  27–28, 54, 255–274, 290 (n.  37), 340, 349, 354, 363 (n. 111), 373

399

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

Princeps  53, 114, 122, 187–196, 208, 213, 216, 336, 351, 360– 362 Principate (princeps, imperator)  93, 96, 186–188, 194, 204, 336– 341, 352 (n. 70), 357–363 Process of comparison  42, 61, 62 (n.  64), 78–88, 136, 167, 177, 191, 209 (n. 122), 236–237, 242, 294, 298, 363 (n. 109) Propaganda (and coins)  39 (n.  1), 138, 146, 149, 151, 179 (n. 42), 186, 188, 204 (n. 92) Propertius  72, 74, 80–81 Province  21, 197 (n.  56), 209, 214–215, 225–231, 238 (n. 38), 239 (n.  40), 291 (n.  39), 345, 372–388 Prudentius  72–86 Prusias  55, 57 Pudicitia  97, 202, 205 Punic wars  45–56, 339–340 Pythagoreanism  20–21, 121–155 Q uestors  75, 81, 205, 263–267 Q uirites  27–28, 255–274 Religion  22–29, 72, 88, 128, 143– 144, 153, 155, 187, 197, 202– 212, 217, 228–230, 244, 283, 300–301, 307 (n. 93), 313–329 Republic/Res publica  21–29, 56 (n.  48), 59 (n.  56), 61, 92–103, 121–137, 142–152, 174 (n. 33), 187–206, 214, 228, 232 (n. 21), 262–273, 279–287, 301, 314– 315, 330, 336–363 Roman army  227, 238–239, 269, 272–273, 377, 381 Roman gods  302 Roman People  27, 54, 99, 112, 115, 217, 255, 263–265, 270, 272, 274, 280–283, 289–297, 305–306, 319, 336, 339–350 Roman priesthoods  323 Roman religion  128, 155 (n. 117), 307 (n. 93), v. ‘Religion’

Romanitas  121–122, 231, 233, 238, 240, 245–248 Romanness  17, 21–23, 30, 58, 122, 197–198, 204, 206, 217, 239, 246, 287, 292, 303, 306, 314 Romulus  51 (n. 32), 130, 247, 256 (n. 4), 267, 298, 302–304 Sabines/Sabini  126, 259, 290 (n. 37), 293–301, 306 Scaevola, P. & Q. Mucius  303 (n. 84), 325, 352 (n. 75) Selection/Selectiveness  39, 44 (n. 15), 60, 62, 280, 306 Self-perception  25, 62, 145 (n. 90), 155, 232 (n. 21), 244–248, 374 Senate (senators)  169, 178, 189, 195, 204, 211, 225 (n.  2), 242–247, 290, 323 (n. 25), 335 (n. 2), 345, 348 (n. 53), 354–355, 359–361 Sepulchrum/Roman graves  313– 314, 325–328 (n. 32), 385–386, 388 Servius Tullius  104–116, 264, 272 Sex  51, 201–205, 244, 358 (n. 94) Sextus Tarquinius  97–98, 103 Sicily  44–49 Sidonius Apollinaris  72, 77–78, 82, 86 Snell, Bruno  17 Social War  172, 289–292, 345 (n. 40) Soft power  230 Sorabji, Richard  12 (n. 10), 15–16, 316 (n. 11) Spain  46 (n.  19), 76, 81, 84, 139, 140 (n. 66), 175, 229 (n. 14), 281 (n. 9), 285, 286 (n. 28) Spivak, Gayatri  382 Subaltern  382–383, 388 Suetonius  22, 40 (n. 3), 60 (n. 61), 93, 114–115, 165, 173 (n.  29), 185–218, 234 (n.  28), 244 (n. 51), 338 (n. 16), 341 (n. 26) Sulla  172, 198 (n.  61), 289, 345– 346 Sallust  93, 115, 340

400

INDEX RERUM AC NOMINUM

Sulmo  74, 83 Sulpicius Galus, P.  138–141 Tacitus  51 (n.  32), 93, 114–116, 164–165, 168, 172, 178, 179 (n.  42), 186 (n.  8), 187 (n.  10), 200 (n.  70), 202, 203 (n.  88), 207, 213–215, 235, 259 (n. 14), 263–264, 353–363, 378 (n. 18) Tanaquil  20, 94, 104–105, 109– 116 Tarquinius Priscus  104, 106, 109– 110, 112 Taylor, Charles  14 Temple of Peace  179 Themistocles  40, 50 (n. 31), 52, 56 (n. 48), 59 (n. 56), 60 (n. 58) Third Space  381–386 Tiberius, emperor  115–116, 189– 202, 207–214, 217–218, 352 (n. 70), 358–363, 376 Titus, emperor  102, 169–170, 178, 180, 191, 193, 195–196, 199 (n.  67), 203 (n.  90), 208 (n. 116), 211 (n. 130), 235 Treason  341–353, 359 (n.  98), 363 (n. 109) Tullia Minor  104–115 Tyranny (Tyrant[s], dominatio)  40 (n. 3), 101, 193, 198, 208, 218 Ulpian  263–267, 328 (n. 32), 342 (n. 31), 346, 350, 363 (n. 109) Valerius Maximus  95–97, 115, 168 Vespasian, emperor  164, 168–170, 173–174, 177–179, 192, 203– 204, 208 (n.  120), 209–211, 214–216

Vetustas  294–295 Vices immanitas  194, 207 (n. 109) inciuilitas  194, 198, 205 saeuitia  191 (n. 31), 192, 194 crudelitas  192, 194, 241, 244 auaritia  192, 194 cupiditas  46, 55, 192, 194 rapacitas  192, 194 impudicitia  194, 205 uiolentia  194 Virgil  74, 231–232 Virtus/Virtues and values moderatio  99, 102, 193, 198, 206 ciuilitas  193–194, 198, 204– 205, 208, 218 pietas  81, 98, 107–108, 193, 204, 206, 212, 327, 329 comitas  193 abstinentia  193 liberalitas  193 dignitas  205, 212–217, 313, 343, 349 castitas/pudicitia  97, 194, 202, 205 libertas  101, 108, 136, 212– 214, 316 (n.  10), 319, 336 (n. 9), 362 (n. 108) Vitellius Germanicus  172–178, 190, 193, 200–201, 205–206, 210– 211, 214, 244 Volcatius Sedigitus  40 Whitmarsh, Tim  17–18, 22 (nn.  60–61), 28 (nn. 75–76) Women  20, 91–116, 203, 205 (n.  100), 266, 269 (n.  35), 353, 385–386

401