Suetonius: DE POETIS

[1] Rhetorica quoque apud nos perinde atque grammatica fere recepta est, paulo etiam difficilius, quippe quam constet nonnunquam etiam prohibitam exerceri. Quod ne cui dubium sit vetus S. C. item censorium edictum subiiciam:C. Fannio Strabone M. Valerio Messala cons. M. Pomponius praetor senatum consuluit.

[1] Rhetoric too among us is almost as accepted as grammar, even a little more difficult, since it is established that sometimes its practice was even prohibited. Lest this be doubtful to anyone, I will subjoin an old senatorial decree and likewise a censorial edict:Gaius Fannius Strabo and Marcus Valerius Messalla being consuls, Marcus Pomponius, praetor, consulted the senate.

Quod verba facta sunt de philosophis et rhetoribus, de ea re ita censuerut, ut N. Pomponius praetor anirndiverteret curaretque, ut si ei e re p. fideque sua videretur, uti Romae ne essent. De eisdem interiecto tempore CN. Domitius Aenobarbus, L. Licinius Crassus censores ita edixerunt: Renuntiatum est nobis, esse homines qui novum genus disciplinae instituerunt, ad quos inventus in ludum conveniat; eos sibi nomen imposuisse Latinos rhetoras; ibi homines adolescenhtuls dies lotos desidere. Maiores nostri, quae liberos suos discere et quos in ludos itare vellent, instituerunt. Haec nova, quae praeter consuetudinern ac morem maiorum fiunt, neque placent neque recta videntur.

As for the fact that speeches were made about philosophers and rhetors, they thus adjudged concerning that matter, that N. Pomponius, the praetor, should take notice and take care that, if it should seem to him to be for the interest of the republic and in keeping with his good faith, they should not be at Rome. About the same persons, after an interval, Cn. Domitius Aenobarbus and L. Licinius Crassus, censors, thus proclaimed by edict: It has been reported to us that there are men who have instituted a new kind of discipline, to whom the youth resorts into a school; that they have imposed upon themselves the name “Latin rhetors”; that there young men sit idle whole days. Our ancestors ordained what they wished their children to learn and to what schools they should go. These novelties, which are done contrary to the custom and the manner of the ancestors, neither please nor seem right.

Quapropter et iis qui eos ludos habent, et iis qui eo venire consuerunt, videtur faciundum ut ostenderemus nostram sententiam, nobis non placere.

Wherefore, both to those who hold those schools and to those who are accustomed to come there, it seems necessary that we should show our opinion, that it does not please us.

Paulatim et ipsa utilis honestaque apparuit, multique earn et praesidii causa et gloriae appetiverunt. Cicero ad praeturam usque etiam Graece declamitavit, Latine vero senior quoque et quidem cum consulibus Hirtio et Pansa, quos discipulos et grandis praetextatos vocabat. CN. Pompeium quidam historici tradiderunt sub ipsum civile bellum, quo facilius C. Curioni promptissimo iuveni, causam Caesaris defendenti, contradiceret, repetisse declamandi consnetudinem; M. Antonium, item Augustum ne Mutinensi quidem bello omisisse.

Gradually it too appeared useful and honorable, and many sought it both for the sake of protection and of glory. Cicero even declaimed in Greek up to his praetorship, while in Latin indeed as an older man as well, and in fact with the consuls Hirtius and Pansa, whom he called disciples and overgrown wearers of the praetexta. CN. Pompeius, some historians have recorded, right at the Civil War itself, in order the more easily to contradict C. Curio, a most prompt young man who was defending Caesar’s cause, resumed the custom of declaiming; M. Antonius, likewise Augustus, did not omit it not even in the war at Mutina.

Nero Caesar primo imperii anno, publice quoque bis antea, declamavit. Plerique autem oratorum etiam declamationes ediderunt. Quare magno studio hominibus iniecto, magna etiam professorum ac doctorum profluxit copia, adeoque floruit, ut nonnulli ex infima fortuna in ordinem senatorium atque ad summos honores processerint.

Nero Caesar, in the first year of his reign, and even twice before, declaimed publicly. Moreover, most of the orators even published their declamations. Wherefore, once great zeal had been infused into people, a great abundance of professors and teachers flowed forth, and it flourished to such a degree that some from the lowest fortune advanced into the senatorial order and to the highest honors.

Sed ratio docendi nec una omnibus, nec singulis eadero semper fuit, quando vario modo quisque discipulos exercuerunt. Nam et dicta praeclare per omnes figuras, per casus et apologos aliter atque aliter exponere, et narrationes cum breviter ac presse tum latius et uberius explicare consuerant; interdum Graecorum scripta convertere, ac illustres laudare vel vituperare; quaedam etiam ad usum communis vitae instituta turn utilia et necessaria, tum perniciosa et supervacanea ostendere; saepe fabulis fidero firmare aut demere, quod genus thesis et anascenas et catascenas Graeci vocant; donec sensim haec exoleverunt, et ad controversiam ventum est.

But the method of teaching was neither one and the same for all, nor always the same for individuals, since each trained pupils in various modes. For they would both set forth sayings splendidly through all the figures, through cases and apologues, now in one way, now in another, and they were accustomed to explain narratives both briefly and compactly and also more broadly and more copiously; sometimes to translate writings of the Greeks, and to praise or to vituperate illustrious men; to show certain institutions established for the use of common life as now useful and necessary, now pernicious and superfluous; often to confirm or to take away by fables, the sort which the Greeks call thesis and anascenas and catascenas; until gradually these things died out, and it came to controversy.

Veteres controversiae aut ex historiis trahebantur, sicut sane nonnullae usque adhuc,.aut ex veritate ac re, si qua forte recens accidisset; itaque locorum etiam appellationibus additis proponi solebant. Sic certe collectae editaeque se habent, ex quibus non alienum fuerit unam et alteram exempli causa ad verbum referre.

Old controversies were drawn either from histories, as indeed some even to this very day, or from truth and fact, if perchance something recent had happened; and so they were wont to be proposed with the appellations of the places added as well. Thus certainly such as have been collected and published stand; from which it would not be out of place to report one or another, word-for-word, for the sake of example.

Aestivo tempore adolescentes urbani cum Ostiam venissent, litus ingressi, piscatores trahentes rete adierunt et pepigerunt, bolum quanti emerent; nummos solverunt; diu expectaverunt, dum retia extraherentur; aliquando extractis, piscis nullus affuit, sed sporta auri obsula. Turn emptores bolum suum aiunt, piscatores suum.

In summertime the urban adolescents, when they had come to Ostia, having entered the shore, they approached fishermen drawing a net and bargained for how much they would buy the haul; they paid the coins; they waited a long time, until the nets were drawn out; when at length they were drawn up, no fish was present, but a basket studded with gold. Then the buyers say the haul is theirs, the fishermen theirs.

Venalici cum Brundusi gregem venalium e navi educerent, formoso et pretioso puero, quod portitores verebantur, bullam et praetextam togam imposuerunt; facile fallaciam celarunt. Romarn venitur, res cognita est, petitur puer, quod domini voluntate fuerit liber, in libertatem. Olim autem eas appellationes Graece synthesis vocabant: mox controversias quidem, sed aut fictas aut iudiciales.

When slave-dealers, at Brundisium, were leading a gang of slaves out of the ship, onto a handsome and precious boy, because the customs officers were suspicious, they put a bulla and a toga praetexta; they easily concealed the deception. Rome is reached, the matter is discovered, the boy is claimed into liberty, on the ground that by his master’s will he had been free. Formerly, however, they called these appellations in Greek “synthesis”; soon, “controversiae” indeed, but either fictitious or judicial.

Illustres professores, et quorum memoria aliqua extet, non temere alii reperientur quam de quibus tradam.

Illustrious professors, and those of whom some memory is extant, no others
will readily be found than those about whom I shall relate.

[2] L. Plotius Gallus. De hoc Cicero in epistola ad M. Titinnium sic refert:Equidem memoria teneo, pueris nobis primum Laline docere coepisse Plotium quendam. Ad quern cum fieret concursus, quod studiosissimus quisque apud eum exerceretur, dolebarn mihi idem non licere.

[2] L. Plotius Gallus. About this man Cicero in an epistle to M. Titinnius reports thus:I indeed retain in memory that, when we were boys, a certain Plotius was the first to begin to teach in Latin. And as there was a rush to him, because every most studious person was exercising with him, I was pained that the same was not permitted to me.

Continebar autem doctissimorum hominum auctoritate, qui existimabant Graecis exercitationibus ali melius ingenia posse. Hunc eundem (nam diutissime vixit) M. Coelius in oratione, quam pro se de vi habuit, significat dictasse Atratino, accusatori suo, actionem; subtractoque nomine, ordearium eum rhetorem appellat, deridens ut inflatum ac levem et sordidum.

I was, however, kept back by the authority of the most learned men, who thought that talents could be better nourished by Greek exercises. This same man (for he lived a very long time), M. Caelius, in the speech which he delivered in his own defense on the charge of violence, indicates that he had dictated to Atratinus, his accuser, the prosecutorial pleading; and, with the name removed, he calls him a barley-bread rhetor, mocking him as puffed-up and frivolous and sordid.

[3] L. Voltacilius Pilutus servisse dicitur atqne etiam ostiarius vetere more in catena fuisse, donec ob ingenium ac studium litterarum manumissus, accusanti patrono subscripsit. Deinde rhetoricam professus, CN. Pompeium Magnum docuit, patrisque eius res gestas, nec minus ipsius, compluribus libris exposuit;primus omnium libertinorum, ut Cornelius Nepos opinatur, scribere historiam orsus, nonnisi ab honestissimo quoque scribi solitam ad id tempus.

[3] L. Voltacilius Pilutus is said to have been a slave and even, as a doorkeeper, according to the old custom, to have been in a chain, until, on account of his talent and zeal for letters, being manumitted, he subscribed on behalf of his patron when he was prosecuting. Then, professing rhetoric, he taught CN. Pompeius Magnus, and in several books he set forth the deeds of that man’s father, and no less of the man himself;the first of all freedmen, as Cornelius Nepos opines, to have set about writing history, which up to that time was accustomed to be written by none except the most honorable.

[4] M. Epidius, calumnia notatus, ludum dicendi aperuit docuitque inter ceteros M. Antonium el Augustum; quibusquondam C. Cannutius, obiicientibus sibi quod in re p. administranda potissimum consularis Isaurici sectam sequeretur,malle respondit Isaurici esse discipulum quam Epidi calumniatoris. Hic Epidius ortum se ab Epidio Nucerino praedicabat, quem ferunt olim praecipitatum in fontem fluminis Sarni, paulo post cum cornibus extitisse, ac statim non comparuisse in numeroque deorum habitum.

[4] M. Epidius, marked by calumny, opened a school of speaking and taught, among others, M. Antony and Augustus; to whom, when they were reproaching C. Cannutius that, in administering the republic, he chiefly followed the faction of the consular Isauricus, he replied that he wouldprefer to be a disciple of Isauricus rather than of Epidius the calumniator. This Epidius proclaimed himself sprung from Epidius of Nuceria, whom they say was once hurled into the spring of the river Sarnus, and a little later emerged with horns, and straightway disappeared, and was reckoned in the number of the gods.

[5] Sextus Clodius, e Sicilia, Latinae simul Graecaeque eloquentiae professor, male oculatus et dicax, par oculorum in amicitia M. Antonii triumviri extrisse se aiebat; eiusdem uxorem Fulviam, cui altera bucca inflatior erat, acumen stili tentare dixit, nec eo minus, immo vel magis ob hoc Antonio gratus. A quo mox consule ingens etiam congiarium accepit, ut ei in Philippicis Cicero obiicit: Adhibes ioci causa magistrum, suffragio tuo et compotorum tuorum rhetorem, cui concessisti ut in te quae vellet diceret, salsum omnino hominem, sed materia facilis in te et in tuos dicta dicere. At quanta merces rhetori est data!

[5] Sextus Clodius, from Sicily, a professor of Latin and likewise Greek eloquence, poor of eyesight and sharp-tongued, used to saythat he had worn out a pair of eyes in the friendship of M. Antony, the triumvir; of the same man’s wife Fulvia, whose one cheek was more puffed, he said she was testing the point of a stylus, and nevertheless, nay rather the more on this account, he was pleasing to Antony. By whom, when soon consul, he also received a huge congiary, as Cicero charges him in the Philippics: You employ for the sake of jest a master, a rhetorician by your suffrage and that of your drinking-companions, to whom you granted that he might say whatever he wished against you, a thoroughly salty fellow, but with easy material in you and yours to say sayings. But how great a fee has been given to the rhetorician!

Audite, audite, P. C. et cognoscite rei p. vulnera. Duo milia iugerum campi Leontini Sex. Clodio rhetori assignasti et quidem immunia, ut tanta mercede nihil sapere disceres.

Hear, hear, Conscript Fathers, and recognize the republic’s wounds. Two thousand iugera of the Leontine plain you assigned to Sextus Clodius, a rhetor, and indeed immune, so that at so great a price you might learn to know nothing.

[6] C. Albucius Silus, Novariensis, cum aedilitate in patria fungeretur, cum forte ius diceret, ab iis contra quos pronuntiabat pedibus e tribunali detractus est. Quod indigne ferens; statim contendit ad portam et inde Romam, receptusque in Planci oratoris contubernium, cui declamaturo mos erat prius aliquem qui ante diceret excitare, suscepit eas partes, atque ita implevit ut Planco silentium imponeret, non audenti in comparationem se demittere. Sed ex eo clarus, propria auditoria instituit, solitus proposita controversia sedens incipere, et calore demum provectus consurgere ac perorare, declamare autem genere vario: modo splendide atque adornate, tum, ne usque quaque scholasticus existimaretur, circumcise ac sordide et tantum non trivialibus verbis.

[6] Gaius Albucius Silus, a man of Novaria, when he was discharging the aedileship in his homeland, as he was by chance pronouncing the law, was dragged down by the feet from the tribunal by those against whom he was giving judgment. Taking this indignantly, he straightway hastened to the gate and from there to Rome, and being received into the quarters of Plancus the orator—whose custom, when about to declaim, was first to rouse someone to speak before him—he undertook that role and so filled it that he imposed silence on Plancus, who did not dare to lower himself into a comparison. But from that point famous, he established his own auditoria, being accustomed, when the controversy had been proposed, to begin sitting, and only when carried forward by heat to rise and perorate; and he declaimed in a varied manner—now splendidly and adorned, then, lest he be thought altogether scholastic, curtly and coarsely, and with all but trivial (street) words.

Egit et causas, verum rarius, dum amplissimam quamque sectatur, nec alium in ulla locum quam perorandi. Postea renuntiavit foro partim pudore, partim metu; nam cum in lite quadam centumvirali, adversario, quem ut impium erga parentes incessebat, ius iurandum quasi per figuram sic optulisset: Iura per patris matrisque cineres, qui inconditi iacent! et alia in hunc modum, arripiente eo conditionem, nec iudicibus aspernantibus, non sine magna sui invidia negotium afflixit. Et rursus in cognitione caedis Mediolani apud L. Pisonem proconsulem defendens reum, cum cohiberent lictores nimias laudantium voces, et ita excauduisset, ut deplorato Italiae statu, quasi iterum in formarn provinciae redigeretur, M. insuper Brutum, cuius statua in conspectu erat, invocaret legum ac libertatis auctorem el vindicern, pene poenas luit.

He also pled causes, but more rarely, since he pursued each most ample case, and took no other place anywhere than that of perorating. Afterwards he renounced the forum partly out of shame, partly out of fear; for when, in a certain centumviral suit, to his adversary—whom he was attacking as impious toward his parents—he had proffered an oath, as it were by a rhetorical figure, thus: Swear by the ashes of your father and mother, who lie unburied! and other things in this vein; with the man seizing on the challenge, and the judges not rejecting it, he crippled the case, not without great ill-will toward himself. And again, in the hearing of a murder case at Milan before Lucius Piso, the proconsul, defending the defendant, when the lictors were restraining the excessive cries of those applauding, he was nevertheless listened to such a point that, after lamenting the condition of Italy, as if it were being reduced again into the form of a province, he furthermore invoked Marcus Brutus, whose statue was in sight, the author and avenger of laws and liberty, and he nearly paid the penalty.

Iam autem senior ob vitium vomicae Novariam rediit, convocataque plebe causis, propter quas mori destinasset, diu ac more concionantis redditis, abstinuit cibo.

But now, an older man, on account of the ailment of an abscess, he returned to Novara; and, the plebs having been convened, after the causes on account of which he had determined to die had been recounted at length and in the manner of one addressing an assembly, he abstained from food.

Reliqua desiderantur. Supersunt tamen in indice praemisso nomina rhetorum undecim, et post stellulam posuimus quae Hieronymus in Chronico hinc decerpsit.

The remainder is missing. However, in the prefixed index there survive the names of eleven rhetors, and after an asterisk we have placed those which Jerome excerpted from here in the Chronicle.

[7] L. Cestius Pius *Cestius Smyrnaeus Latinam Romae rhetoricam docuit (anno ab u. c. 741).

[7] L. Cestius Pius *Cestius the Smyrnaean taught Latin rhetoric at Rome (in the year 741 from the founding of the City).

[8] M. Porcius Latro *M. Porcius Latro, Latinus declamator, taedio duplicis quartanae semet ipsum interfecit (a. 750. 751)

[8] M. Porcius Latro *M. Porcius Latro, a Latin declaimer, killed himself from the tedium of a double quartan fever (a. 750. 751)

[9] Q. Curtius Rufus *

[9] Quintus Curtius Rufus *

[10] L. Valerius Primanus *

[11] Verginius Flavus *

[12] L. Statius Ursulus *Statius Ursulus (al. Sursulus, al. Surculus) Tolosanus celeberrime in Gallia rhetoricam docet (a. 810. 811).

[12] L. Statius Ursulus *Statius Ursulus (elsewhere Sursulus, elsewhere Surculus), a Toulousan, teaches rhetoric most famously in Gaul (in the years 810, 811).

[13] P. Clodius Quirinalis *Clodius (al. Claudius) Quirinalis, rhetor Arelatensis, Romae insignissime docet (a 797. 798).

[13] P. Clodius Quirinalis *Clodius (or Claudius) Quirinalis, a rhetorician of Arles, teaches most eminently at Rome (in 797, 798).

[14] M. Antonius Liberalis *M. Antonius Liberalis, Latinus rhetor, magnas inimicitias cum Palaemone exercet (a. 801. 802).

[14] M. Antonius Liberalis *M. Antonius Liberalis, a Latin rhetor, maintains great enmity with Palaemon (in the years 801, 802).

[15] Sex. Iulius Gabinianus *Gabinianus celeberrimi nominisrhetor in Galliis docuit (a. 829. 830).

[15] Sex. Julius Gabinianus *Gabinianus, a rhetor of most celebrated name, taught in Gaul (a. 829. 830).

[16] M. Fabius Quintilianus *M. Fabius Quintilianus Romam a Galba perducitur (a. 821) ... Quintilianus, ex Hispania Calagurritanus, qui primus Romae publicam scholam et salarium e fisco accepit, claruit (a. 838-842)

[16] M. Fabius Quintilianus *M. Fabius Quintilianus is conducted to Rome by Galba (a. 821) ... Quintilianus, from Hispania, a Calagurritan, who first at Rome received a public school and a salary from the fisc, was renowned (a. 838-842)

[17] Iulius Tiro *

[17] Julius Tiro *

Minus certa fide haec quoque hinc petita existimantur:

These too, derived hence, are reckoned with less certain faith:

Nicetas et Hybreas et Theodorus et Plutio nobilissimi artis rhetoricae Graeci praeceptores habentur. Hieronymus in Chronico ad annum ab u. c. 724.

Nicetas and Hybreas and Theodorus and Plutio are held to be the most noble Greek instructors of the rhetorical art. Jerome in the Chronicle at the year from the founding of the City 724.

Isaeus rhetor fuit ... illius temporis, cuius et Tranquillus meminit. Scholia ad Iuvenal. 3, 74.

Isaeus was a rhetorician ... of that time, of which Tranquillus also makes mention. Scholia on Juvenal 3, 74.