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Sura and Senecio

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

C. P. Jones
C. P. Jones
Affiliation:
University College, Toronto
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Extract

At first glance, L. Licinius Sura and Q. Sosius Senecio have many points of resemblance. Both were men of erudition and culture, like their mutual friend the younger Pliny. Both stood close to Trajan and participated in the two Dacian wars. Both received the rare honour of a public statue from the emperor. Together they gave their names to the year 107, sharing the fasces as consules ordinarii.

So many are the similarities, in fact, that the two are difficult to think of as separate and defined characters. There is another and graver reason for juxtaposing their careers. Sura's is often assumed to be largely known from an acephalous inscription found in Rome in the sixteenth century: that view goes back to Lipsius, but was first forcefully argued by Borghesi. In recent years doubts have been voiced, in the first place by Professor Syme: not Sura, but possibly Sosius Senecio. It is time to argue that the ignotus is indeed Sosius, and to draw the consequences for the early years of Trajan's reign.

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Articles
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 60 , Issue 1 , November 1970 , pp. 98 - 104
Copyright
Copyright ©C. P. Jones 1970. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 CIL VI, 1444 = ILS 1022. B. Borghesi, Œuvres complètes 5 (1869), 32 ff., followed by Groag, E., RE 13 (1926), 472 ff.Google Scholar, and now Alföldy, G., Die Legionslegaten der römischen Rheinarmeen = Epigraphische Studien 3 (1967), 16 ff.Google Scholar

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5 Groag, , RE 13 (1926), 472Google Scholar, remarks on this passage (my italics): ‘um das J. 85/86 war er … zwar offensichtlich noch ein jüngerer Mann, erfreute aber doch schon eines gewissen Namens’.

6 Friedländer, op. cit. 57–58.

7 Syme, , JRS XLIII (1953), 161.Google ScholarIuvenis admodum in the last years of Nero, but quaestorius in 70 (Tac, Hist. 4, 42, 1, 5), and so consul probably in the early or mid 80's. Pliny, , Epp. 2, 11Google Scholar, 22, shows Regulus in 100 influencing (Sex.) Pompeius Collega, cos. ord. 93, to propose a motion in the senate and then failing to support it at the vote. Sherwin-White, A. N., The Letters of Pliny (1966) 94Google Scholar, cf. 171, infers that Regulus was only a praetorian, if that, and hence had to work through others. But Pliny does not indicate that Regulus was unable to present the motion, only that he preferred to let another do so. If Regulus had the auctoritas to ‘dictate’ to an ordinarius of 93, he should have been one of the senior consulars.

8 Friedländer, op. cit. 58–59.

9 Note Pliny on Verginius Rufus after 69, his fifty-fifth year: ‘posteritati suae interfuit’, Epp. 2, 1, 2.

10 Arr., Diss. Epict. 3, 17, 4. Thus Groag, , RE 13 (1926), 484.Google Scholar Secundus; CIL n, 4536–48, 6148–49; Eph. Epigr. IX, no. 395; AE 1957, 26. On Epictetus' reminiscences of his life in Rome, Millar, F. G. B., JRS LV (1965), 141 ff.Google Scholar

11 On this see Groag, art. cit. (n. 5) 476; Degrassi, A., I fasti consolari (1952), 29Google Scholar; Syme, , JRS XLIII (1953), 150–51Google Scholar; Tac. 641.

12 cf. the references given in n. 11 above. Groag argued for 97 from CIL VI, 32445, which he held to show that Sura became a pontifex after Q. Pomponius Rufus, suff. 95, and before A. Cornelius Palma, ord. 99; Wiener Studien 40 (1918), 16–17, and Ritterling, E., Fasti des römischen Deutschlands unter dem Prinzipat (1932), 60–61.Google Scholar But the evidence does not support the supposition that the order of entry into a priestly college corresponded with the order of consular seniority; cf. M. W. Lewis, Hoffman, The Official Priests of Rome under the Julio-Claudians (1955), 24–25, 87–88.Google Scholar

13 Epit. de Caes. 13, 6.

14 Thus he is the only author to preserve Narnia as the origo of the Cocceii (Epit. 12, 1), Tuder of the Ulpii (Epit. 13, 1, cf. Syme, Tac. 786). And note Epit. 12, 5, showing knowledge of Pliny, , Epp. 4, 22, 4–6.Google Scholar This can be added to the number of allusions to Pliny's letters in the late fourth century; Cameron, Alan, CQ 15 (1965), 292–98Google Scholar; 17 (1967), 421–22; Jones, C. P., Phoenix 21 (1967), 301.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15 Thus Groag, op. cit. (n. 5) 475 and sources quoted there.

16 Observe the uses in the Epitome 8, 3; 26, 1; 47, 7; and those in the HA listed by C. Lessing, Scriptorum Historiae Augustae Lexicon, s.v. arripere; also TLL 2, 642, 38 ff.

17 Epit. 12, 9 ‘hic Traianum in liberi locum inque partem imperil cooptavit’.

18 AE 1923, 33 = Smallwood, Documents of Nerva, Trajan and Hadrian, no. 158.

19 Singulares; Syme, , JRS XLIX (1959), 27.Google Scholar Sura's legateship: Syme, Tac. 647, no. 23, Alföldy, op. cit. (n. 1) 19.

20 A. Lappius Maximus is now attested in Syria in 91, AE 1961, 319. The tenure of Vestricius Spurinna (Pliny, , Epp. 2, 7Google Scholar, 2) appears to belong in the early years of Domitian: Syme, , JRS XVIII (1928), 43Google Scholar, n. 1; Tac. 634–35.

21 Syme, Tac. 647, no. 31.

22 Decebalus: Dio Cass., 68, 9, 2. Ornaments: CIL 11, 4508.

23 As Groag does, art. cit., 476–78.

24 Pliny, Epp. 4, 30; 7, 27.

25 Julian, Caes. 327 B; HA Hadr. 3, 11.

26 Dio Cass., 68, 15, 32–16, 1a.

27 Aur. Vict., Caes. 13, 8; Epit. de Caes. 13, 6. Cf. Platner-Ashby, Topographical Dictionary 532–33; Lugli, G., I monumenti antichi di Roma e suburbio 3 (1938), 561–63Google Scholar; Carettoni, G. et al., La Pianta marmorea di Roma antica: Forma Urbis Romae (1960), 1, 79.Google Scholar

28 Dio Cass., 68, 15, 32.

29 Syme, Tac. 232, 233, n. 8.

30 cf. Arr., Diss. Epict. 3, 17, 4, and the hint in Martial, 7, 47, lines 11–12. His enemies; Dio Cass., 68, 15, 4–16, 1a. The Lic(i)nius Sura Isspan(us) named in a defixio from Siscia in Pannonia Superior (V. Hoffiller—Saria, B., Antike Inschriften aus Jugoslavien 1 (1938)Google Scholar, no. 557) is evidently a person of low degree.

31 CIL VI, 1444 = ILS 1022.

32 Birley, E., Proceedings of the British Academy 39 (1953), 202–3Google Scholar; McAlindon, D., JRS XLVII (1957), 195.Google Scholar

33 On Agricola's career see Syme, Tac. 19 ff.; R. M. Ogilvie and I. A. Richmond, edition of Tac, Agr. (1967), 317 ff.

34 ILS 1021; Syme, op. cit., 641.

35 Dio Cass., 68, 16, 2.

36 Metellus, cited on CIL VI, 1444.

37 Thus Groag, RE art. cit. 482; Platner-Ashby, Topographical Dictionary 184; Lugli, , Fontes 3 (1955), 107–8Google Scholar, no. 24.

38 On the family, Groag, , JOAI 18 (1915)Google Scholar, Beih. 265–74. Observe ILS 1105 = ILAlg 11, 652, in which the consul of 149, the son of this pair, is referred to both as ‘Q. Pompeius Sosius Priscus’ and ‘Sosius Priscus’.

39 CIL VI, 31752–53.

40 On CIL VI, 31752–53 (my italics). Accepted by Groag, art. cit., 271; Lugli, , Fontes 4 (1957), 103–4, nos. 49–51.Google Scholar

41 Syme, Tac. 655–6.

42 Syme, op. cit. 214. For the relation between the two, cf. ILS 1105, 8820.

43 Quaest. Conviv. 612 F, 673 C (Athens), 629 F (Patras), 666 D, with Hubert's emendation (Chaeronea).

44 SEG XI, 544, 579, 620. Cf. Box, H., JRS XXII (1932), 171.Google Scholar

45 Thus Ogilvie, R. M., Phoenix 21 (1967), 114CrossRefGoogle Scholar, n. 21.

46 Sosius; RE 3A (1927), 1181, Die römischen Reichsbeamten von Achaia bis auf Diokletian (1939), 44–45. Sura; RE 13 (1926), 483; Reichsbeamten 116.

47 Tac, Hist. 2, 8, 1, Suet., Nero 57, 2; Tac, Agr. 42, 1, Suet., Dom. 10, 2, ILS 1374.

48 See below, p. 103.

49 Pliny, , Epp., 1, 13.Google Scholar On the date, Sherwin-White, A. N., The Letters of Pliny (1966), 27–28, 115.Google Scholar

50 See above, p. 99.

51 Above, p. 101.

52 Pliny, , Epp. 4, 4.Google Scholar

53 Syme, , JRS XLIX (1959), 28–29Google Scholar, cf. Tac. 648, no. 35. Sherwin-White, op. cit. 268, holds that the date of the letter is not determinable, though his ‘Chronological Analysis’, 32–34, would permit a date between 103 and 105. Cf. Phoenix 22 (1968), 128–129.

54 JRS XXXV (1945), 112. For Quadratus Bassus: PIR2 I/J 508; Habicht, Chr., Altertümer von Pergamon VIII, 3: Die Inschriften des Asklepieions (1969), 43–53Google Scholar, no. 21.

55 Dio Cass., 68, 16, 2.

56 HA Hadr. 4, 2. On the reading, Groag, RE 3A (1927), 1187Google Scholar, Pflaum, H.-G., Klio 46 (1965), 331–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

57 Tac, Agr. 44, 1.

58 Thus Groag, , RE 3A (1927), 1181Google Scholar, while conceding that his ultimate origin might be Eastern. That was because Borghesi had called Sosius, ‘un Greco’ (Œuvres complètes 8 (1872), 367)Google Scholar, but solely on the basis of the false reading in Plut., Quaest. Conviv. 666 D.

59 Fluss, , RE 15 (1931), 1292–94Google Scholar; Ziegler, , RE 21 (1951), 687–88.Google Scholar

60 ILS 1035–36, cf. PIR 2 I/J 302. On Sosius and and Sparta, cf. p. 102.

61 Falco: Birley, A. R., Epigraphische Studien 4 (1967), 69.Google Scholar Sosius; Syme, , Historia 17 (1968), 101Google Scholar, n. 127.

62 IGRR IV, 779, cf. OGIS 490 = ILS 8820 = IGRR IV, 780 = MAMA VI, 182.

63 Hierapolis: Ann. Scuol. Arch. di Atene 41/42, n.s. 25/26 (1963–64, published 1965), 409–10 (J., and Robert, L., Bull. Épigr. 1967, 581Google Scholar). Laodicea: MAMA VI, 2.

64 One item might lead by a long way round back to Laodicea. The apocryphal Acts of Paulus and Thecla produce a Queen Tryphaena with a daughter Falconilla, the name borne by Sosius' greatgranddaughter, the granddaughter of Falco and Polla: Acta Pauli et Theclae 27 ff. = Lipsius, R. A., Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha I (1891), 255 ff.Google Scholar (I owe this reference to Professor Syme). The true Queen Tryphaena (PIR 2 A 900) was the granddaughter of the dynast Zeno of Laodicea (Bowersock, G. W., Augustus and the Greek World (1965), 8, 51–53Google Scholar).

65 Syme, Tac. 510.

66 PIR2 I/J 507.

67 PIR2 I/J 508.

68 For this restoration, see Groag, op. cit. 478.