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Language and Style in Tacitus' Agricola

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 September 2009

Janet P. Bews
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Abstract

In the Agricola … Tacitus amalgamates biography and historical monograph. But the success of the combination is questionable. He gives roughly two thirds of the work to Agricola's governorship of Britain, and treats the climax of Agricola's campaigns at length, providing direct speeches for the two leaders, almost as if he were experimenting with full-scale history. Such extensive development of a part, albeit an important part, unbalances the whole. Again, most of what he tells us about Agricola's personality is conventional and unrevealing.… Some contend that Tacitus exaggerated Agricola's achievements and wilfully misconstrued his relations with Domitian. We cannot be sure, but certainly many matters in the Agricola are unclear or, like the insinuation of poisoning against Domitian, ill substantiated. There is, however, a case for the defence. Tacitus probably found little else worth relating about Agricola except the governorship, and hence made the most of it. In thus concentrating on military and administrative achievements, he followed a hallowed Republican tradition.… A Roman aristocrat should possess and display virtus, above all in warfare: to this pattern Agricola conformed. Thus one old-fashioned attitude underlies a work somewhat novel in conception.

Type
Research Article
Information
Greece & Rome , Volume 34 , Issue 2 , October 1987 , pp. 201 - 211
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1987

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References

Notes

1. Kenney, E. J. and Clausen, W. V. (eds.) The Cambridge History of Classical Literature, Vol. II, Latin Literature (Cambridge, 1982) p. 643CrossRefGoogle Scholar. In the same context he refers to Agricola as ‘a colourless individual’. What Goodyear terms ‘infelicities and obscurities’ lead him to conclude that ‘in style, as in structure, this first essay is imperfect’, p. 644.

2. Syme, Ronald, Tacitus I (Oxford, 1958) p. 125Google Scholar.

3. Ogilvie, R. M. and Richmond, Ian, Cornellii Taciti De Vita Agricolae (Oxford, 1967) pp. 22ff.Google Scholar

4. The word is unusual in itself. It is used once by Horace with an active meaning (Od. 1.3.22), but is not attested before Tacitus in a passive sense.

5. Ogilvie, p. 6.

6. Ogilvie, pp. 21ff.

7. Ogilvie, p. 28.

8. Syme, pp. 714f.

9. Asiaticus… cum se honestius calliditate Tiberii… periturum dixisset quam quod fraude muliebri et impudico Vitellii ore caderet, venas exolvit.

10. The word intolerantia is relatively uncommon but it appears at Cicero, , Clu. 112Google Scholar and Suetonius, , Tib. 51Google Scholar.

11. Elsewhere the use of the word is primarily poetic, e.g., Ovid, Met, 8.396; Martial 2.43.2; Statius, Theb. 3.192.

12. Used in this sense, the word goes back to Roman drama, e.g., Plaut. Trin. 2.1.23.

13. Ogilvie notes (p. 285) that the word is first attested in Phaedr. 1.11.2. It appears to be an intensified form of Livy's risus.

14. The translation of Hutton in the Loeb edition succeeds in maintaining Tacitus' metaphor. In Handford's revision of Mattingly's Penguin translation the metaphor is lost: ‘The next day revealed the effects of our victory more fully.’

15. This passage is also one of the few instances in which Tacitus uses the Greek term philosophia rather than sapientia. The term is in keeping with the Greek refinement and culture which he ascribes to Massilia along with provincial thrift (4.2). At the same time there is the negative suggestion that the Greeks carry their studies to excess, ultra quam concessum Romano ac senatori (4.3).

16. Ogilvie, p. 299.