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A lugubrious prospect: Tacitus, Histories 1.40

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

M. Gwyn Morgan
M. Gwyn Morgan
Affiliation:
The University of Texas at Austin
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Extract

Histories 1.40 is designed to set the scene for Galba's assassination. It begins by bringing the emperor into the crowded Forum, but then it switches to Otho and his followers, dwelling on the horror, not of the act they plan (that is reserved for chapter 41), but of their readiness to commit it. The text is not problematical, but since the point behind the first two sentences is not entirely clear, this has prompted occasional emendation, repeated discussion, and continuing perplexity. The difficulty arises, in good measure, from the assumption that Tacitus is saying much the same as Plutarch (Galb. 26.4–6). As has been remarked more than once, the two authors no doubt drew their material from the common source, but they have in mind different time-frames and different viewpoints. Nor does this end the matter. A skewed perspective on these sentences has also led one scholar to dissect the chapter in a manner purporting to show that Galba's fate, not the Othonians' willingness to bring it about, is Tacitus' main concern.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 44 , Issue 1 , May 1994 , pp. 236 - 244
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1994

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References

1 Groag, E., ‘Zur Kritik von Tacitus' Quellen in den Historien’, Jahrbuch für class. Philologie, Supb. 23 (1897), 711–99, at p. 743Google Scholar; Fabia, P., RPh 36 (1912), 106Google Scholar; Ammann, P., Der künstlerische Aujbau von Tacitus, Historien I 12–II 51 (Kaiser Otho) (Diss., Zürich, 1931), p. 41Google Scholar; Waltz, R., ‘Examen d'une phrase de Tacite (Hist., I, 40)’, Mélanges de philologie, de littérature et d'histoire ancienne offerts à Alfred Ernout (Paris, 1940), pp. 377–82.Google Scholar

2 Rademacher, U., Die Bildkunst des Tacitus (Hildesheim and New York, 1975), pp. 128–31Google Scholar, discussed below, pp. 241–4.

3 This is the text printed by Heubner, H. (Teubner, Stuttgart, 1978)Google Scholar. There is no significant difference in the editions of Fisher, C. D. (Oxford, 1911)Google Scholar; Halm, C. and Andresen, G. (Leipzig and Berlin, 1928)Google Scholar; Giarratano, C. (Rome, 1939)Google Scholar; Koestermann, E. (Leipzig, 1961)Google Scholar; or Wuilleumier, P., Bonniec, H. Le and Hellegouarc'h, J., Tacite, Histoires Livre I (Paris, 1987)Google Scholar. For the various emendations which have been proposed, see below, notes 12, 13, and 33.

4 Waltz, op. cit., pp. 377–9.

5 The ablative has been defined as of quality, of accompaniment/attendant circumstances, or—most commonly—absolute. Since the distinctions between them can be subtle (cf. Vallejo, J., Emerita 9 [1941], 158)Google Scholar, Valmaggi, L., Tacito, II libro primo dette Storie (Turin, 1891), p. 66Google Scholar, and Spooner, W. A., Taciti Historiarum Libri (London, 1891), p. 145, try to sit on the fence.Google Scholar

6 This was Ritter's view, according to Davies, G. A., Tacitus, Histories Book I (Cambridge, 1896), p. 114. In general, the commentators take prospectus to mean ‘a view’, the ability to see some distance (cf. 3.20.2; Ann. 2.23.2), rather than a thing seen, a ‘sight’ (cf. Ann. 15.42.1).Google Scholar

7 Cf. Valmaggi, loc. cit.; Davies, loc. cit.; Gerber, A. and Greef, A., Lexicon Taciteum (Leipzig, 1903), p. 1223Google Scholar; Heraeus, W., Taciti Historiarum Libri, Buch I and II6 (Leipzig and Berlin, 1929), p. 64Google Scholar; Heubner, H., P. Cornelius Tacitus, Die Historien, Band 1: Erstes Buch (Heidelberg, 1963), p. 92Google Scholar; Wuilleumier, Le Bonniec and Hellegouarc'h, op. cit., p. 167 n. 3; Longrée, D., ANRW ii.33, 4 (Berlin, 1991), pp. 2550–1.Google Scholar

8 See above all Husband, R. W., CPh 10 (1915), 321–5Google Scholar, industriously collecting all the passages where Tacitus and the other sources advert explicitly to the people's indifference; also Courbaud, E., Les procédés d'art de Tacite dans les ‘Histoires’ (Paris, 1918), pp. 162 and 189Google Scholar; Sage, M. M., ANRW ii.33, 2 (Berlin, 1990), pp. 913–14.Google Scholar

9 Demos. 21.178–9 (compare Plutarch's use of the verb with τπον at Mor. 149 A). Note too the employment of προκαταλαμβνειν by Lucian, Herm. 39, and of προκατληψις by Josephus, A.J. 19.86.

10 See Fuhrmann, F., Les images de Plutarque (Paris, 1964), pp. 48–9, 53 and 241–2 (taking our passage as a reference to the theatre).Google Scholar

11 That the common source took the same line as Plutarch, likely enough anyway, is suggested also by Tacitus' describing Hordeonius Flaccus as spectator flagitii apropos of the mutiny in Germany (1.56.1). An odd expression in context (cf. CQ 43 [1993], 278 n. 23)Google Scholar, this looks like an example of Tacitus' transferring phrasing from one situation to another, a practice discussed by Townend, G. B., AJPh 85 (1964), 350–1Google Scholar. For further examples see below, notes 41 and 45.

12 Elsewhere Tacitus uses ‘lugubris’ only with cultus (Ann. 13.32.3) and bellum (Hist. 2.46.3). The latter example does not explain our passage. The Romans were no more inclined to moralise about what moderns consider the cruelty of the games (cf. below, note 32), than they were to justify it (cf. Ville, G., ‘La guerre et le munus’, in J.-P. Brisson, Problèmes de la guerre à Rome [Paris and the Hague, 1969], pp. 185–95, especially pp. 193–4)Google Scholar. To this extent, Wellesley, K., Taciti Historiae (Leipzig, 1989), p. 188Google Scholar, has reason to object to ‘lugubri’. But his own suggestion, ‘velut ludicri ad prospectum’, cannot stand: cf. Martin, R. H., CR 41 (1991), 75Google Scholar; Hellegouarc'h, J., Gnomon 63 (1991), 273.Google Scholar

13 Since the lack of talk, not its unanimity, is the point at issue, we can reject ‘una vox’, the emendation proposed by Hartman, J. J., Mnemosyne 42 (1914), 419.Google Scholar

14 Courbaud, op. cit., p. 141.

15 For the rest, see 2.29.2; 42.1; 3.13.1; 4.49.3; 72.3.

16 Cf. Spooner, op. cit., p. 12; Courbaud, op. cit., p. 270. Despite the awkwardness that results (conceded by Husband, op. cit., p. 325), modern commentators prefer to take the clause as a gloss on ‘quies’ alone: see Davies, op. cit., p. 115; Heubner, op. cit., p. 92; Chilver, G. E. F., A Historical Commentary on Tacitus' ‘Histories’ I and II (Oxford, 1979), p. 99Google Scholar; Wellesley, K., JRS 71 (1981), 224.Google Scholar

17 Burnouf was credited with the observation by Orelli, who endorsed it (Fletcher, G. B. A., Latomus 30 [1971], 384)Google Scholar. The point was made afresh by Radermacher, L., RhM 58 (1903), 316.Google Scholar

18 See especially Husband, op. cit., p. 322, accepted by Heubner, loc. cit., and by Chilver, loc. cit. The suggestion that Tacitus shows an affinity with Lucan 1.258–61, made by Borgo, A., Vichiana 6 (1977), 126–31Google Scholar, seems to me improbable, unless by affinity aemulatio is meant.

19 Witness the perplexity of Rademacher, op. cit., p. 130 with n. 588, and of Chilver, op. cit., p. 99; the same puzzlement underlies Husband's entire case. None of this, however, is meant to discount Livy's delight in the topos: see Dutoit, E., ‘Silences dans l'oeuvre de Tite-Live’, Mélanges de philologie, de littérature et d'histoire anciennes offerts à J. Marouzeau (Paris, 1948), pp. 141–51.Google Scholar

20 The case was argued eloquently by Gudeman, A., Tacitus, Agricola and Germania (Boston, 1928), pp. 313–22Google Scholar, although he doubted that Tacitus quotes Xenophon in the biography of his father-in-law (ibid., p. 337).

21 At 2.70.2 (‘regium in morem’) the reference may be rather to Alexander the Great than to the Great King (CPh 87 [1992], 19Google Scholar), but for our present purposes this is a distinction without a difference; at 2.73, on the other hand, the purport is clear (‘tum ipse exercitusque…in externos mores proruperant’). Note also 2.89.1 and 90.1. For all that, Tacitus' phrasing probably owes something to Seneca, ad Helv. 10.3.

22 So, in reporting the praetorians' reaction to Galba's speech at 1.18.3, Tacitus refers to their ‘maestitia ac silentium’. This may be hendiadys (Irvine, A. L., Tacitus: Histories Books I & II [London, 1952], p. 119)Google Scholar, but then again it may not.

23 Suet. Cal. 26.4; Tertull. de spec. 16.1; SHA Elagab. 23.2; cf. Sil. Ital. Pun. 16.303–4; Joseph, . A.J. 19.86.Google Scholar

24 Ennius, , Ann. 79–80 SkutschGoogle Scholar; Sil. Ital. Pun. 16.314–16; Tertull. de spec. 16.2; cf. Verg. Aen. 5.137–8 (of the contestants, not the spectators).

25 For the debt of 1.62.3 to Ennius, Ann. 72–84 Skutsch, see ‘Two Omens in Tacitus’ Histories', RhM (forthcoming).

26 For Tacitus' usage (Gerber and Greef, op. cit., p. 1008), all the more noteworthy after ‘rostra occupanda’ at 39.1, Heubner, op. cit., p. 92 compares Seneca, EM 24.5; de ira 3.10.3; Octav. 531. The verb is applied to a footrace by Statius, Theb. 6.617, to a ship by Ovid, Trist. 1.10.6, and to chariot races by Pliny, N.H. 8.160; CIL 6. 10048, line 10 and 10050, line 17.

27 According to Suet. Galb. 19.2, the order to kill the emperor was given specifically to the cavalry (‘equites, quibus mandata caedes erat’); but the biographer has them pause momentarily upon reaching the Forum (‘parumper restiterunt’), a detail Tacitus ignores (see below).

28 We should not separate ‘truces armis’ from ‘rapidi equis’ and take it as a reference to the infantrymen (so Heubner, op. cit., p. 93; cf. Townend, op. cit., p. 359), even though ‘milites Romani … truces armis rapidi equis’ is a variation on the standard collocation of men, arms and horses discussed by Heubner, , Gymnasium 70 (1963), 226–30.Google Scholar

29 Verg. Aen. 5.140–1 and 147–50; Sil. Ital. Pun. 16.317–19; Tertull. de spec. 16.3–4; cf. Plin, . N.H. 8.159.Google Scholar

30 For another string of ablatives see 3.12.1 with the discussion by Sörbom, G., Variatio sermonis Tacitei aliaeque apud eundem quaestiones selectae (‘Diss., Uppsala, 1935), pp. 126–7.Google Scholar

31 See above, note 12; also Wuilleumier, Le Bonniec and Hellegouarc'h, op. cit., p. 167 n. 3.

32 Wistrand, M., ‘Violence and Entertainment in Seneca the Younger’, Eranos 88 (1990), 31–46.Google Scholar

33 Wolff, E., Taciti Historiarum Libri, Buch I und II (Berlin, 1914), p. 107Google Scholar; Goelzer, H., Oeuvres de Tacite, Histoires Livres I–II (Paris, 1920), p. 83Google Scholar; Waltz, op. cit., p. 382, suggesting ‘lugubre prospectu’.

34 Thus Waltz, op. cit., p. 381; Vallejo, op. cit., pp. 155–8.

35 Nutting, H. C., ‘The Ablative as an appositive’, CPh 15 (1920), 389–92Google Scholar; ‘The utor, fruor group (Preliminary Paper)’, U. Cat. Publ. in Class. Philol. 10, 1 (1928), pp. 10–11Google Scholar; ‘The Ablative Absolute and the Stenographic Ablative’, ibid. 10, 8 (1930), pp. 209–11; cf. Hofmann, J. B. and Szantyr, A., Lateinische Syntax und Stilistik (Munich, 1972), p. 429.Google Scholar

36 Rademacher, op. cit., p. 129.

37 Since Tacitus often sets the verb at the head of the sentence (see Courbaud, op. cit., p. 259 and n. 1), it is perilous to claim that this alone marks the start of a tableau (so Rademacher, op. cit., pp. 128–9, perhaps misled by Courbaud, op. cit., p. 273). Here it prepares the transition to a new subject, the crowd: cf. Wolff, E. and Andresen, G., Taciti Historiarum Libri, Buch III, IV und V (Berlin, 1926), p. 88Google Scholar; also Jones, F., PCPhS 37 (1991), 90–3.Google Scholar

38 There is irony here, to the extent that this fulfils Otho's undertaking not to call the praetorians to war and danger (38.2).

39 Once a chariot race was under way, deliberate fouling was permitted: see, e.g., Harris, H. A., Sport in Greece and Rome (London, 1972), pp. 205 and 209.Google Scholar

40 See Durry, M., Les cohortes prétoriennes (Paris, 1938), pp. 99–100.Google Scholar

41 Plut. Galb. 6.4 uses the image of a crash between chariots out of control, the associations of which with war are surely Roman (see, e.g., Verg. Georg. 1.511–14).

42 See above, notes 27–8.

43 Courbaud, op. cit., p. 238.

44 Chilver, op. cit., p. 99.

45 For Turpilianus see Plut. Galb. 15.4: γροντα γυμνν κα ἄνοπλον (but cf. Otho 62). As for Pacorus, he had fought alongside his brother during the wars with Rome in Nero's reign: Debevoise, N. C., A Political History of Parthia (Chicago and London, 1938), pp. 179–96.Google Scholar

46 Frye, R. N., The History of Ancient Iran (Munich, 1984), p. 241.Google Scholar

47 See 1.5.2; 6.1; 7.3; 12.2; 14.1; 16.3 (particularly noteworthy); 18.3; 21.1; 22.2; 35.1.

48 Rademacher, op. cit., p. 131; cf. Etienne, Aubrion, Latomus 48 (1989), 388 n. 23.Google Scholar

49 Compare Galba's treatment of senate and people at 1.17.2.

50 For more recent examples of such thinking see Hayter, Tony (A. J.), The Army and the Crowd in Mid-Georgian England (London and Totowa, N.J., 1978), pp. 151, 168, 171, 173, 175.Google Scholar

51 Spooner, op. cit., pp. 12 and 145.

52 Fabia, P., RPh 36 (1912), 107Google Scholar; Courbaud, op. cit., p. 85 n. 4; Heubner, , Commentary, pp. 102–3Google Scholar; Chilver, op. cit., pp. 99–100. Tacitus' describing Marius Celsus as ‘Galbae usque in extremas res amicum fidumque’ at 45.2 may imply that he was present in the Forum.

53 Hayter, op. cit., pp. 24, 120, and especially 181–2, pointing out that the most effective expedient is a mixture of foot and horse (p. 182), a detail to be borne in mind when assessing Plutarch's narrative.

54 This is one of three cases recorded and discussed by Hayter, op. cit., pp. 174–5 and 180.

55 Cf. Waltz, op. cit., p. 379 n. 1.

56 Thus Spooner, op. cit., p. 145; Davies, op. cit., p. 115; Chilver, op. cit., p. 100.

57 The overstatement lies in ‘tradito’; only Caligula had been assassinated prior to 69 (cf. Heubner, op. cit., p. 93).

58 Cf. Irvine, op. cit., p. 128.

59 Cf. Wolff, , Taciti Historiarum Libri, Buch I und II, p. 108Google Scholar; Goelzer, op. cit., pp. 84–5.

60 I wish to thank Prof. David Armstrong and Dr Jean Alvares for their valuable help during the composition of this paper, the Editors and the anonymous referee for their contributions to its improvement.