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NERO'S EXPERIMENTS WITH THE WATER-ORGAN

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 November 2022

Harry Morgan*
Affiliation:
Harvard University

Abstract

This article examines a pair of anecdotes in the works of Suetonius and Cassius Dio, describing Nero's passionate late-career interest in the instrument known as the hydraulis or water-organ. The first half of the article contextualizes the water-organ episode in light of both the history of the instrument's reputation and the wider characterization of Nero in the literary sources. The rest of the article uses the episode to shed light on Nero's self-representation as princeps, focussing on the significance of the water-organ as both a musical instrument and a technological marvel. On the one hand, the organ's popularity with Roman audiences of the Early Imperial period made it a politically strategic choice for a music-loving emperor with strong populist leanings. On the other hand, the association of the organ with the intellectual world of Hellenistic Alexandria appealed to a certain group of Roman elites (including Nero himself), who shared a keen interest in technological innovation and technical knowledge more broadly. In the end, however, Nero's experiments with the water-organ were cleverly trivialized by hostile writers and redeployed as an illustration of the emperor's most appalling vices.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association

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Footnotes

*

I would like to thank Kathleen Coleman, Nicholas Purcell and the anonymous reader for their invaluable comments and suggestions on this paper. I am also grateful to Melissa Bedard for her assistance with the figure.

References

1 The following narrative is based on Suet. Ner. 40.4–41.2.

2 Suet. Ner. 41.1; cf. Philostr. V A 5.10.2.

3 K. Bradley, Suetonius’ Life of Nero: An Historical Commentary (Brussels, 1978), 253: ‘The last few days in March appear to be the most reasonable time for the date of this event.’

4 Cf. OLD s.v. circumdūcō, 3a; TLL 3.1135.27–8 (Probst) takes circumduxit with diei partem (circumducere = consumere).

5 See Mallan, C., ‘The style, method, and programme of XiphilinusEpitome of Cassius Dio's Roman History’, GRBS 53 (2013), 610–44Google Scholar.

6 Suet. Calig. 54; Cass. Dio 59.5.5; J. Perrot, The Organ from its Invention in the Hellenistic Period to the end of the Thirteenth Century (London, 1971), 49; E. Champlin, Nero (London and Cambridge, Mass., 2003), 292 n. 101. Cf. also Dio's account of Domitian's nocturnal banquet: Cass. Dio 67.9.

7 Bradley (n. 3), 254.

8 See e.g. M.T. Griffin, Nero. The End of a Dynasty (London, 1984), 164; Champlin (n. 6), 2 and 80; E. Fantham, ‘The performing prince’, in E. Buckley and M.T. Dinter (edd.), A Companion to the Neronian Age (Chichester, 2013), 17–28, at 20; M. Leigh, ‘Nero the performer’, in S. Bartsch, K. Freudenburg and C. Littlewood (edd.), The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Nero (Cambridge, 2017), 21–33, at 26; J.F. Drinkwater, Nero: Emperor and Court (Cambridge, 2019), 123; V. Schulz, Deconstructing Imperial Representation: Tacitus, Cassius Dio, and Suetonius on Nero and Domitian (Leiden and Boston, 2019), 197, 227, 234.

9 For the date of this oration, see C.P. Jones, The Roman World of Dio Chrysostom (Cambridge, Mass. and London, 1978), 133. For Nero's interest in painting and sculpting, cf. Tac. Ann. 13.3; Suet. Ner. 52.

10 Vitr. De arch. 9.8.2; Ath. Deipn. 4.174b. For a summary of the main arguments surrounding Ctesibius’ date, see A.G. Drachmann, Ktesibios, Philon and Heron: A Study in Ancient Pneumatics (Copenhagen, 1948), 1–3. Comprehensive studies of the hydraulis have been undertaken by Perrot (n. 6) and M. Markovits, Die Orgel im Altertum (Leiden and Boston, 2003); see further M.L. West, Ancient Greek Music (Oxford, 1992), 114–18; L. Beschi, ‘L'organo idraulico (hydraulis): una invenzione ellenistica dal grande futuro’, in M.C. Martinelli, F. Pelosi and C. Pernigotti (edd.), La Musa dimenticata: Aspetti dell'esperienza musicale greca in età ellenistica (Pisa, 2009), 247–66; Creese, D., ‘Erogenous organs: the metamorphosis of PolyphemusSyrinx in Ovid, Metamorphoses 13.784’, CQ 59 (2009), 562–77CrossRefGoogle Scholar, especially 569–71.

11 Vitr. De arch. 9.8.4; Plin. HN 7.125.

12 See P. Williams, A New History of the Organ from the Greeks to the Present Day (Bloomington, 1980); P. Williams, The Organ in Western Culture, 750–1250 (Cambridge, 1993); P. Dessì, L'organo tardoantico: storie di sovranità e diplomazia (Padua, 2008).

13 Our knowledge of the technical workings of the hydraulis derives mainly from the writings of Hero (Pneum. 1.42) and Vitruvius (10.8.3–6), as well as from the remains of two water-organs excavated during the twentieth century, the first from Aquincum (modern Budapest) and the second from Dion in northern Greece. On the Aquincum organ, see Hyde, W., ‘The recent discovery of an inscribed water-organ at Budapest’, TAPhA 69 (1938), 392411Google Scholar; M. Kaba, Die römische Orgel von Aquincum (3. Jahrhundert) (Budapest, 1976). On the Dion organ, see Markovits (n. 10), 97–8; Beschi (n. 10), 256–7; C. Stroux, ‘Appendice: caratteristische musicali dell’hydraulis di Dion’, in M.C. Martinelli, F. Pelosi and C. Pernigotti (edd.), La Musa dimenticata: Aspetti dell'esperienza musicale greca in età ellenistica (Pisa, 2009), 267–9. Fragments belonging to a third water-organ, unearthed at Aventicum (modern Avenches), are discussed by F. Jakob, M. Leuthard, A.C. Voute and A. Hochuli-Gysel, Die römische Orgel aus Avenches/Aventicum (Avenches, 2000).

14 Syll. 3 737 = Choix Delphes 192. There is an erasure in lines 8–9 of the text; Dittenberger, ad loc., restores the name of the games (i.e. Pythian) and the total prize money: τῶι ἀγῶν[ι τῶν Πυθίων δραχμαῖς χιλίαις καὶ πεντακοσίαις καὶ] εἰκόνι χαλκέαι. The inscription states that additional honours were conferred on a certain Cryton, the brother of Antipatros (lines 13–14), as well as on a group of attendants (line 20), who may have assisted Antipatros in the operation of the instrument: see A. Chaniotis, ‘A few things Hellenistic audiences appreciated in musical performances’, in M.C. Martinelli, F. Pelosi and C. Pernigotti (edd.), La Musa dimenticata: Aspetti dell'esperienza musicale greca in età ellenistica (Pisa, 2009), 75–97, at 88.

15 Cic. Tusc. 3.43. Perrot (n. 6), 45–6 speculates that Cicero might have encountered the hydraulis at some point during his travels in Greece between 79 and 77 b.c., but there is no direct evidence to support this claim.

16 Petron. Sat. 36; Aetna vv. 296–7. On the date of the Aetna, see Goodyear, F.R.D., ‘The Aetna: thoughts, antecedents, and style’, ANRW 2.32.1 (1984), 344–63Google Scholar, at 353.

17 Unfortunately, none of the extant iconography can be securely dated to the period before or during Nero's reign. A tiny engraved gem from the British Museum shows an organ-player accompanied by two assistants who operate the pistons (GR 1859.3–1.112; BM Cat Gems 1051). Markovits (n. 10), 39 dates it to the first century b.c., but does not say on what grounds, while Perrot dates it to the third century a.d. on the opinion of ‘experts at the British Museum’ (Perrot [n. 6], 84–5 with Plate VIII, no. 2). The hydraulis is also represented in two terracotta figurines from Tarsus and Alexandria, variously dated between the first centuries b.c. and a.d. (Perrot [n. 6], 77–8 with Plate V; 99–100 with Plate XVI, no. 1; Markovits [n. 10], 739, Taf. 5 and 6). Also noteworthy is a small graffito of an organ from a taberna in Pozzuoli, found alongside a larger graffito of a gladiator's trident; it is usually dated to the mid first century a.d. (M. Guarducci, ‘Iscrizioni greche e latine in una taberna a Pozzuoli’, in Acta of the Fifth International Congress of Greek and Latin Epigraphy, Cambridge, 1967 [Oxford, 1971], 219–23, with Plate 23a; M. Langner, Antike Graffitizeichnungen: Motive, Gestaltung und Bedeutung [Weisbaden, 2001], Taf. 153, nos. 952, 2362–3; not mentioned by Perrot [n. 6] or Markovits [n. 10]); this dating is disputed by Creese (n. 10), 571 n. 41.

18 Champlin (n. 6), 79–80.

19 A survey of the prosopographical entries in I.E. Stephanis, ΔΙΟΝΥΣΙΑΚΟΙ ΤΕΧΝΙΤΑΙ (Heraklion, 1988) and P. LeVen, The Many-Headed Muse: Tradition and Innovation in Late Classical Greek Lyric Poetry (Cambridge, 2014), 22–32 yields only a couple of possible exceptions. A fascinating inscription from Aquincum commemorates a female musician who apparently was proficient at both the cithara and the hydraulis (CIL 3.10501). However, the inscription suggests that the woman played the lyre in private for her husband's benefit (uox ei grata fuit pulsabat pollice cordas, line 3), in contrast with the organ, which she performed while being ‘watched by the people’ (spectata in populo, line 7). The depiction of women as skilful lyre-players is a common literary trope denoting education and domestic virtue: see E. Hemelrijk, Matrona Docta: Educated Women in the Roman Elite from Cornelia to Julia Domna (London and New York, 1999), 79–80.

20 Aulodes were singers who accompanied aulos-players.

21 It could be argued, perhaps, that Nero adopted the pipes in an attempt to assimilate himself more closely with his patron god Apollo, with whom he positively compared himself as a singer (Suet. Ner. 53). A poem by Alcman (PMG fr. 51) represents Apollo as being proficient at both the lyre and the pipes, implying that mortal musicians ordinarily lacked such proficiency.

22 Mart. 10.3.8. Canus specialized as a choraules and rose to fame under Nero: cf. Suet. Galb. 12.3. On the bagpipes, see A. Baines, Bagpipes (Oxford, 1960), 64–6; West (n. 10), 107–9; Calvo-Sotelo, J.C., ‘Around the origins of bagpipes: relevant hypotheses and evidences’, Greek and Roman Musical Studies 3 (2015), 1852CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

23 On Nero's musical education, cf. Tac. Ann. 13.3; Suet. Ner. 20, 52.

24 Cass. Dio 63.26.4. For the use of (suppressed) catalogues as a feature of Dio's characterization of Nero, see Schulz (n. 8), 227–8.

25 See E. Gowers, ‘Persius and the decoction of Nero’, in J. Elsner and J. Masters (edd.), Reflections of Nero: Culture, History and Representation (London, 1994), 131–50, at 136. Cf. Epictetus, Encheiridion 29.3, criticizing those who throw themselves ‘like children’ (ὡς τὰ παιδία) from one activity to the next: ‘they [i.e. children] play wrestlers, again gladiators, again they blow trumpets, and then act a play’.

26 Caligula: Philo, Leg. 44, 79, 96; Suet. Calig. 11, 54.1; Cass. Dio 59.29; Aur. Vict. Caes. 3.12; cf. Philo, Leg. 42, describing his ‘boyish’ (μειρακιωδέστερον) enthusiasm for dancers and mimes. Commodus: HA, Comm. 1.8. Elagabalus: HA, Heliogab. 32.8. Severus Alexander: HA, Alex. Sev. 27.5, 27.9. Titus, too, is said to have acquired an aptitude for singing and playing the lyre as a boy (in puero), although he was apparently careful to adhere to proper standards of decorum once he reached maturity: Suet. Tit. 3.

27 On the importance of speeches in Dio's history, see J. Rich, ‘Speech in Cassius Dio's Roman History, Books 1–35’, in C. Burden-Strevens and M. Lindholmer (edd.), Cassius Dio's Forgotten History of Early Rome (Leiden, 2018), 217–84, especially 224.

28 J. König, ‘Introduction: self-assertion and its alternatives in ancient scientific and technical writing’, in J. König and G. Woolf (edd.), Authority and Expertise in Ancient Scientific Culture (Cambridge, 2017), 1–26, especially 1–2.

29 For the ‘eureka’ story, cf. Vitr. De arch. 9.praef.10; M. Jaeger, Archimedes in the Roman Imagination (Ann Arbor, 2008), 17–31. The Archimedean resonance becomes stronger if we imagine that Nero was actually speaking in Greek, the standard language of technical discourse in antiquity: see C. Roby, Technical Ekphrasis in Greek and Roman Science and Literature: The Written Machine between Alexandria and Rome (Cambridge, 2016), 80–2. Interestingly, Tertullian (De anim. 14.4) claims that the hydraulis was the invention of Archimedes and not of Ctesibius.

30 Plut. Dem. 20.1–2; cf. Plut. Dion 9.2; Diod. Sic. 20.92.1–5; S. Cuomo, Technology and Culture in Greek and Roman Antiquity (Cambridge, 2007), 73.

31 Polyb. 26.1.

32 Sen. Ep. 90.10–11.

33 Plut. Marc. 17.3–4.

34 Similarly, Philostratus (V A 4.42.1) conjures an image of a scantily clad Nero singing in a tavern and compares him to ‘the most shameless of shop-keepers’ (τῶν καπήλων οἱ ἀσελγέστατοι).

35 The impact of the ‘performative turn’ on Neronian scholarship is discussed by M.T. Griffin, ‘Nachwort: Nero from zero to hero’, in E. Buckley and M.T. Dinter (edd.), A Companion to the Neronian Age (Chichester, 2013), 467–80, at 469–71; see also S. Bartsch, K. Freudenburg and C. Littlewood, ‘Introduction: angles on an emperor’, in eid. (edd.), The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Nero (Cambridge, 2017), 1–18, at 2–3.

36 C. Edwards, ‘Beware of imitations: theatre and the subversion of imperial identity’, in J. Elsner and J. Masters (edd.), Reflections of Nero: Culture, History and Representation (London, 1994), 83–97.

37 Champlin (n. 6), 82.

38 T.C. Power, The Culture of Kitharôidia (Washington, DC, 2010), 101.

39 Tac. Hist. 1.4.3.

40 For the popularity of Nero's songs, cf. Suet. Vit. 11.2; Philostr. V A 4.39.1, 5.9.1. On the infamous ‘false Neros’, cf. Tac. Hist. 2.8; Cass. Dio 66.19.3; Suet. Ner. 57.2; also Dio Chrys. Or. 21.10; C.J. Tuplin, ‘“The False Neros” of the first century a.d.’, in C. Deroux (ed.), Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History 5 (Brussels, 1989), 364–404; Champlin (n. 6), 1–35; C.W. Hedrick, ‘Qualis artifex pereo: the generation of Roman memories of Nero’, in K. Galinksy (ed.), Memory in Ancient Rome and Early Christianity (Oxford, 2015), 145–66.

41 Columella, Rust. 1.praef.3.

42 Laus Pisonis 32, 166–72; cf. Tac. Ann. 15.65, on Piso's tragic acting.

43 Cass. Dio 62.17.3.

44 Champlin (n. 6), 70.

45 Suet. Ner. 53.1 (maxime autem popularitate efferebatur).

46 Cic. Tusc. 3.43.

47 The appearance of a hydraulis on the reverse of a fourth-century contorniate medallion, coupled with an image of Nero on the obverse, may suggest that Nero was remembered for playing the hydraulis in later times. However, this idea could be challenged on the grounds that the hydraulis also features on other contorniates of the period alongside portraits of Trajan and Caracalla on the obverse: see Perrot (n. 6), 90–1 with plate IX, nos. 1–2; Markovits (n. 10), Taf. 26a; A. Alföldi and E. Alföldi, Die Kontorniat-Medaillons (Berlin and New York, 1990), 2.223–4 with additional tables.

48 Vitr. De arch. 1.praef.1–3; Frontin. Aq. 1.1; Aelian, Tactica praef.1–7 (C.A. Matthew, The Tactics of Aelian [Barnsley, 2012], 2–3); Apollodorus, Poliorketica 137.1–138.17 (D. Whitehead, Apollodorus Mechanicus: Siege-Matters (Πολιορκητικά) [Stuttgart, 2010]); Arr. Tact. 32.3, 44.2–3 (E.L. Wheeler, ‘The occasion of Arrian's Tactica’, GRBS 19 [1978], 351–65); De rebus bellicis, preface (R.I. Ireland, Anonymi auctoris De rebus bellicis [Leipzig, 1984]); cf. Cass. Dio 69.4.1–5 for Hadrian's interest in innovative architectural designs.

49 Plin. Ep. 10.24, 10.40, 10.42, 10.62, 10.91, 10.99.

50 Suet. Vesp. 18. The meaning of Vespasian's statement is not entirely clear, but it probably relates to the idea that casual labourers should continue to receive wages for public works: see Brunt, P.A., ‘Free labour and public works at Rome’, JRS 70 (1980), 81100Google Scholar, at 81–3.

51 Petron. Sat. 51; Plin. HN 36.195; Cass. Dio 57.21.6. Revealingly, Pliny concludes his account by mentioning a new type of glass that was ‘discovered’ (reperta) during Nero's reign. Rather than prohibiting its circulation as Tiberius had done with the ‘unbreakable’ glass, he permitted it to be sold on the market but for an exorbitantly high price.

52 Finley, M.I., ‘Technical innovation and economic progress in the ancient world’, The Economic History Review 18 (1965), 2945CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 40–3.

53 Greene, K., ‘Technological innovation and economic progress in the ancient world: M.I. Finley re-considered’, The Economic History Review 53 (2000), 2959CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 46–50.

54 Hine, H.M., ‘Rome, the cosmos, and the emperor in Seneca's Natural Questions’, JRS 96 (2006), 4272Google Scholar, at 66 cites the water-organ episode as evidence that ‘the emperor [Nero] was a serious sponsor of technological progress’. Similarly, Drinkwater (n. 8), 123 infers from the episode that Nero possessed a ‘liking for gadgets’, but does not pursue this idea further.

55 Plin. HN 37.64; see Woods, D., ‘Pliny, Nero, and the “emerald” (NH 37,64)’, Arctos 40 (2006), 189–96Google Scholar.

56 Sen. QNat. 6.8.3; Plin. HN 6.181; Cass. Dio 63.8.1–2.

57 Paus. 2.37.5.

58 Suet. Ner. 19.2; Cass. Dio 62.16; Philostr. V A 4.24.

59 Plin. HN 31.40; Mart. 2.85.1, 14.116, 14.117; Juv. 5.50; Suet. Ner. 27.2, 48.3; Cass. Dio 63.28.5. One might add to this list of examples the massive lake which Nero constructed in the Domus Aurea (Suet. Ner. 31.1); his vast pool extending from Misenum to Lake Avernus (Tac. Ann. 15.42; Suet. Ner. 31.3; cf. Stat. Silu. 4.3.7–8); and the collapsible boat which he used to drown Agrippina, supposedly inspired by a mechanical stage prop exhibited in the theatre (Tac. Ann. 14.3; Suet. Ner. 34.2; Cass. Dio 61.12.2).

60 Sen. QNat. 2.6.5. The loudness of the hydraulis is also suggested by an inscription from Rhodes, dating from the third century a.d., which refers to an organ-player belonging to the cult of Dionysus whose role was to ‘wake up the god’ (τῷ ὑδραύλῃ τῷ ἐπεγείροντι [τὸ]ν θεὸν): REG 17 (1904), 203 no. 1b, lines 23–4; I.Ephesos 1601a provides further evidence of the use of organs in noisy Dionysiac ritual.

61 Cf. Suet. Ner. 20.1; Plin. HN 19.108, 34.166.

62 See Wilson, A., ‘Machines, power and the ancient economy’, JRS 92 (2002), 132Google Scholar, especially 4–5. For the concept of conflicting ethical discourses in Julio-Claudian Rome, see M.B. Roller, Constructing Autocracy: Aristocrats and Emperors in Julio-Claudian Rome (Princeton and Oxford, 2001).

63 Plin. HN 7.125.

64 Vitr. De arch. 10.8.3–6.

65 Hero, Pneum. 1.42; cf. Pneum. 1.proem.15–20. For Hero's date, see O. Neugebauer, Über eine Methode zur Distanzbestimmung Alexandria-Rom bei Heron (Copenhagen, 1938), 22; Drachmann (n. 10), 74–7; Sidoli, N., ‘Heron of Alexandria's date’, Centaurus 53 (2011), 5561CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On the significance of ‘wonder-making’ in Hero, see Tybjerg, K., ‘Wonder-making and philosophical wonder in Hero of Alexandria’, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 34 (2003), 443–66CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

66 Keyser, P., ‘Suetonius Nero 41.2 and the date of Heron mechanicus of Alexandria’, CPh 83 (1988), 218–20Google Scholar.

67 May, J.M., ‘Seneca's neighbour, the organ tuner’, CQ 37 (1988), 240–3CrossRefGoogle Scholar interprets a phrase in Sen. Ep. 56.4 (qui ad Metam Sudantem tabulas experitur et tibias) as an oblique reference to ‘a tuner, builder, or repairer of the hydraulus’ [sic], rejecting the conventional reading tubulas [i.e. small pipes] in favour of the variant tabulas (which, in his view, represent ‘the boards of hydrauli’; cf. Vitr. De arch. 10.8.3). May proceeds to speculate further that ‘Seneca had, in fact, been one of the primores uiri who accompanied Nero on guided tours of his favourite water organs’. Such speculation is unhelpful: Seneca retired from the political scene in 62 and was put to death in 65, whereas Nero's association with the instrument is not mentioned until 68.

68 See J.-L. Voisin, ‘Exoriente sole. À propos de la Domus Aurea’, in L'Urbs: Espace urbain et histoire (Ier siècle av. J.C.–IIIe ap. J.C.) (Rome, 1985), 509–43; D. Hemsoll, ‘The architecture of Nero's Golden House’, in M. Henig (ed.), Architecture and Architectural Sculpture in the Roman Empire (Oxford, 1990), 10–36; Y. Perrin, ‘D'Alexandre à Néron: le motif de la tente d'apparat – La salle 29 de la Domus Aurea’, in J.M. Croisille (ed.), Neronia IV: Alejandro Magno, modelo de los emperadores romanos: actes du IVe Colloque international de la SIEN (Brussels, 1990), 211–29. On Nero's Egyptomania generally, see M. Cesaretti, Nerone e l'Egitto: messaggio politico e continuità culturale (Bologna, 1989), 53–65; S. Mratschek, ‘Nero the imperial misfit: philhellenism in a rich man's world’, in E. Buckley and M.T. Dinter (edd.), A Companion to the Neronian Age (Chichester, 2013), 45–62, especially 46–7.

69 See P.M. Fraser, Ptolemaic Alexandria (Oxford, 1972), 1.305–35; A. Erskine, ‘Culture and power in Ptolemaic Egypt: the Museum and Library of Alexandria’, G&R 42 (1995), 38–48; M.J.T. Lewis, ‘The Hellenistic period’, in Ö. Wikander (ed.), Handbook of Ancient Water Technology (Leiden, 2000), 631–48; M. Berrey, Hellenistic Science at Court (Berlin, 2017); R. Strootman, The Birdcage of the Muses: Patronage of the Arts and Sciences at the Ptolemaic Imperial Court, 305–222 b.c.e. (Leuven, 2017); F. Schironi, ‘Enlightened kings or pragmatic rulers? Ptolemaic patronage of scholarship and sciences in context’, in P.R. Bosman (ed.), Intellectual and Empire in Greco-Roman Antiquity (New York and London, 2019), 1–29. For scientists and other intellectuals in the court of Nero, see Drinkwater (n. 8), 119–27.

70 Ph. Bel. 50.3.

71 Ath. Deipn. 4.184c.

72 Pl. Leg. 811a–b (κίνδυνόν φημι εἶναι φέρουσαν τοῖς παισὶν τὴν πολυμαθίαν); cf. Pl. Phdr. 275a2–b1; Heraclitus, DK 22 B 40; Xen. Cyr. 8.2.5; Y.L. Too, The Idea of Ancient Literary Criticism (Oxford, 1998), 123–4.

73 Cass. Dio 61[60].32.3; on this theme, see B. Jones, ‘Cassius Dio – pepaideumenos and politician on kingship’, in C.H. Lange and J.M. Madsen (edd.), Cassius Dio: Greek Intellectual and Roman Politician (Leiden and Boston, 2016), 297–315, at 310.

74 Cuomo (n. 30), 1; König (n. 28), 3–4.

75 Cf. TLL 2.696.65–77 (Klotz).