Some Uses of Gratus and Gratia in Plautus: Evidence for Indo-European?

Gordon Williams

doi:10.1017/S0009838800041434

Some Uses of Gratus and Gratia in Plautus: Evidence for Indo-European?

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 February 2009

Gordon Williams

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Gordon Williams: Affiliation:
Balliol College, Oxford

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The form of this paper, which has more than one purpose, needs a word of explanation and perhaps of excuse. I had had it in mind to bring together and discuss a number of passages of Plautus in which gratus or gratia occurred. Then I came across an interesting paper by Professor L. R. Palmer in Hommages à Max Miedermann (Collection Latomus vol. xxiii), Bruxelles, 1956, pp. 258–69, entitled ‘The Concept of Social Obligation in Indo-European: A Study in Structural Semantics’. There Palmer dealt, among other things, with gratus and related words; he seemed to me, however, to treat the Latin evidence, the greater part of it from Plautus, in a way which I felt to be mistaken. In addition it seemed that a preconceived theory, derived from a special interpretation of the Mycenean tablets, was being read into Roman thought and institutions against the evidence. I have therefore taken the opportunity to discuss the passages of Plautus in which I was first interested within a general examination of Palmer's treatment of the Latin evidence for his theory.

Type: Research Article
Information: The Classical Quarterly , Volume 9 , Issue 3-4 , November 1959 , pp. 155 - 163

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0009838800041434 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © The Classical Association 1959

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References

¹ Amph. 39 ff.; Most. 220 f.; and Pseud. 709 ff.

² On this see the remarks of Finley, M.I. in Economic History Review, 2nd ser. x. i (1957). 140.Google Scholar

³ Transactions of the Philological Society, 1954, P.39.Google Scholar

⁴ Op. cit., p. 40 and esp. n. 2.Google Scholar

⁵ Hommages Niedermann, p. 261.Google Scholar References to this article will hereafter by given just by page-number.

⁶ It may be remarked in passing that the present writer, far from seeing this as firmly established, can only regard it as an hypothesis on which, in the absence of more direct evidence, the only possible judgement is: ‘Not proven’. There is a dangerous circularity in the argument, which is not unduly exaggerated by saying that the Hittite evidence (itself very uncertain and obscure) is used to interpret the tablet and then the similarity of the two is claimed as a reason for finding a common Indo-European institution as ancestor.

⁷ Palmer (p. 262) claims that fungor should be connected with the root of Iranian baog (‘loosen’) rather than Vedic bhuṅkte, and that its basic meaning therefore is ‘to loose one self from’. He says (p. 263): It remains to add that this hypothesis illuminates the syntax of the verb: munere fungor may be interpreted quite literally “I release myself from the obligation”.’ But one would think that the basic meaning and consequently this syntax of the verb would be clearer the earlier one could trace it. The simple fact is that fungi is invariably constructed with the accusative in early Latin. For an account of the verb see Wackernagel, , Vorles. ü. Syntax, i. 68Google Scholar; Schmalz-Hofmann, , p. 435.Google Scholar

¹ Little can be made of the use by Cicero of such an obvious metaphor (examples are fairly common, though Palmer quotes only two: one of these as cum aratori munus aliquod, ius aliquod onus aliquod imponitur, Cic. Verr. 3. 199; but one manuscript reads just cum aratori aliquid imponitur, another just cum aratori ius aliquod imponitur, the others just cum aratori onus aliquod imponitur, while cum aratori munus aliquod imponitur is due to a conjecture by Klotz, R.. More strange is Palmer's next statement (p. 263)Google Scholar: ‘Most striking is Plautus’ combination of moenia with tolerate (Trin. 687) for tolero is a denominative formed from *tolas, the Latin equivalent of the Greek , which provided the starting point for this investigation. This observation may encourage us to look more closely into the contexts of munus and munis.’ The etymology of tolerare could be significant only if the phrase moenia tolerare was extremely frequent and could be shown to be a technical, institutional phrase. As it is, Palmer does not give a single further instance of its occurrence.

² The usual etymology connects grates with Sanskrit gir (‘songs of praise’): on this see further, p. 162 below.

³ i.e., presumably, things which constitute a weight or burden on the recipient.

⁴ Leumann, M., Glotta, xxxvi (1957), 147, says of this etymological connexion: ‘was angesichts der verbalen Bedeutung der Wurzel ‘preisen’ eine ziemlich gezwun-gene Kombination darstellt’.Google Scholar

¹ There are two ideas here which have become confused. The passages quoted by Palmer illustrate two things: (1) That words meaning ‘heavy’ are used with gratia by Plautus. This is largely due to Plautine wordplay—grave et gratum, gratia gravida, levior pluma est gratia … plumbeas iras gerunt, solidam et grandem gratiam. This point is clinched when it is noticed that other writers scarcely ever use these words with gratia. So these passages tell us nothing in particular about ‘Roman Sprachgefühl’. (2) That Romans, like Greeks (and presumably many other peoples), sometimes think of important people as ‘weighty’ and unimportant as ‘lightweights’ (e.g. Trin. 1170). Now in gift-exchange, on Palmer's theory, the person who receives a gift becomes ‘burdened’ (gratus), not the person who confers the favour and who thereby becomes influential with the other. So the second set of ideas (which is of importance for ‘Roman Sprachgefühl’, e.g. in the concept of gravitas) has nothing to do with Palmer's point. It might be answered that the greater one's obligations, the greater one‘s importance; but this lacks evidence in Roman thought and affairs. A man is weighty because he exerts influence, not because he contracts obligations.

¹ Palmer makes much of the word merito in religious contexts. He says (p. 265): ‘If the god fulfils his part, he acquires a credit balance (mereor, meritum) which had to be faithfully and accurately discharged or paid off (e.g. CIL I² 632: perficias decumam ut faciat verae rationis).’ But the matter has only to be so expressed to reveal itself as an inadequate account of this aspect of Roman religious feeling (that there was such a crude element in Roman, as in other religions, at low levels is undeniable but here irrelevant), merito is no more than another expression of the worshipper's gratitude and joy: it stands beside words like laetus, lubens, lubenter etc., and explicit enumeration of a god's services (frequent in Greek and Roman prayers). One must not assume that the word was borrowed from book-keeping and inserted in prayers. Palmer illustrates the ‘accurate payment of the god’ concept by quoting only a fraction of an extraordinary dedication in which (if the whole is read) a merchant, in rudimentary hexameters, offers Hercules a tithe (as was usual widi Hercules), claims that it is truly reckoned (always a special point with tithe-offerings), and asks Hercules to help him collect his debts. This should not be taken to reveal the inner content of Roman religion (the publicity value of such a dedication should not be ignored). In general Palmer makes too much of commercial ideas and language in Roman religion; most of the evidence comes from the comic writer Plautus, who is not above a joke (cf., e.g., Most. 241 ff.). Of other evidence who can say that certain terms were first developed in commerce and then were transferred to religion? A specially unfortunate result of this treatment is that a distorted and in exaggerated picture is given of one ofthe most interesting characteristics of Roman religion. It is hard to believe that any religion, positing active divine control of the world, did not conceive of man's relationship with the gods as being in the nature of a contract (so there is nothing surprising in the use of a word like merito). What is peculiar in Roman religion is that the cast of mind which produced Roman law (no soulless system) also took a special interest in religious forms and ritual. The result was that, presumably over a long development, a much greater precision of definition was attained as to the conditions of relationship between human and divine in all its aspects than we find in other religions.

² The very existence as well as the nature of these two constructions is by itself sufficient to rule out the possibility of Palmer's equation of *gratus with *gravis. For in the relationship of giver and receiver, the latter's pleasure is obvious, while the giver may take pleasure in the other's gratitude whether expressed in deeds or in words. The gift brings pleasure to the recipient, and to the giver also when return, of whatever sort, is made. The point of view is clear in Accius trag.; 114 R. alui educavi: idfatite gratum ut sit seni; Cepheus has spent much trouble: if the girl goes off, he will lose the return he might expect for his kindness. Palmer's equation can give no plausible account of these two constructions. These constructions of gratus are not discussed in the most recent treatments of die word: Leumann, M. in Gnomon, xiii (1937), 36Google Scholar; Frisk, H., Eranos, xxxviii (1940), 26–30Google Scholar; Wistrand, E., Eranos, xxxix (1941), 17–26.Google Scholar

¹ These passages are collected by Thes.l. L. 6. 2. 2261. 9 ff.

² As it is also taken by Lodge, Lexicon Plautinum, i. 8, sectio A. 1.3.

³ Plautus, Aulularia, Menaechmi, Mostellaria, ed. Max. Niedermann (Editiones Helveticae, ser. Lat. 14), Frauenfeldae, 1955.

⁴ I have examined this hypothesis in detail and tried to support it with further arguments in J.R.S. xlviii (1958), 22 ff.Google Scholar

⁵ I find noted in the margin of the copy used by Paul Jacobsthal at Leo's seminar in 1900–1 on Most, the suggestion optatum, which was presumably made viva voce by Leo at the time.

¹ Leo reads , hesitantly; but it seems unlikely that Plautus made the magnificent and condescending Pseudolus leave the dismissal of Charinus to Calidorus, rather than, as in 713, discharge the matter himself. Leo says in his critical note: ‘quod posui non satis facit, placuerit ’ and Ussing had suggested . Either of these would be unexceptionable on grounds of sense and meaning; but the manuscripts seem to give, with an unusual degree of agreement, and some form of . An editor's first obligation lies here.