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The Triumph of Metellus Scipio and the Dramatic Date of Varro, RR 3*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

J. S. Richardson
J. S. Richardson
Affiliation:
St Salvator's College, St Andrews
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Extract

‘sed ad hunc bolum ut pervenias, opus erit tibi aut epulum aut triumphus alicuius, ut tune fuit Scipionis Metelli, aut collegiorum cenae, quae nunc innumerabiles excandefaciunt annonam macelli.’ Varro, RR 3. 2. 16. (‘But to make such a haul as this, you will need a public banquet, or somebody's triumph, like Metellus Scipio's then, or the dinners of the collegia, which are innumerable just now and send the price of provisions in the market blazing up.’)

Type
Research Articles
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 33 , Issue 2 , December 1983 , pp. 456 - 463
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1983

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References

1 Varro, , RR 3. 2. 1–2Google Scholar.

2 Ibid. 3. 2. 3–18.

3 It is noted by White, K. D., Roman Farming (London, 1970), 400Google Scholar, discussing the economics of different patterns of agriculture. F. Münzer (RE 3 [1899], 1228) takes the passage to refer to Scipio's farming interests.

4 Degrassi lists only two, that of C. Pomptinus in November 54, and that of P. Lentulus Spinther in 51 (Inscr. It. XIII. 1. 566).

5 Although ‘nunc’ is an emendation by Keil for the the ‘tune’ or ‘tunt’ of the MSS, it is surely correct (Keil, H., M. Porci Catonis de agri culture M. Terenti Varronis rerum rusticarum librigtres II. 2 [Leipzig, 1891], 230–1)Google Scholar.

6 Dio 40. 56. 1.

7 Asconius 30–1 C.

8 Degrassi, , Inscr. It. XIII. 1. 84–5Google Scholar, 566.

9 CIL I2. 2663c; cf. Münzer, F., Hermes 71 (1936), 223Google Scholar; Broughton, , MRR II. 229Google Scholar. On the election of the consuls for 53, see Dio 40. 45. 1.

10 Scaurus as praetor: Cic, . Sest. 101 and 116Google Scholar. Governorship and return: Asconius 18C.

11 Dio 42. 57; Plutarch, , Cat. Min. 57Google Scholar; Caes. 52. 4; Suet. Caes. 59.

12 Münzer, F., Hermes 40 (1905), 97Google Scholar, followed by Broughton MRR II. 201 and 207 n. 1. On the interval between aedileship and praetorship, see Mommsen StR I3. 528.

13 Cic, . Sest. 124Google Scholar; Schol. Bob. p. 137 (St.).

14 So Hirzel, R., Der Dialog (Leipzig, 1895), 553 n. 1Google Scholar, reporting Schleicher, A., Meletem. Varron. spec. (Bonn, 1846), 10Google Scholar, who apparently gave the date as a.d.vi or v Id. Quint, in the year 54 B.C. The traditional argument is given by Dahlmann, H., RE suppl. 6 (1935), 1192Google Scholar.

15 RR 3. 2. 3.

16 Cic, . ad Att. 4. 15. 5Google Scholar, cf. id. Scaur. 27.

17 Bailey, D. R. Shackleton, Cicero's Letters to Atticus II (Cambridge, 1965), 208–10Google Scholar; Taylor, L. R., Roman Voting Assemblies (Ann Arbor, 1966), 135 n. 58Google Scholar; Nicolet, C., REA 72 (1970), 113 n. 2 & 116 n. 1CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Heurgon, J., Varron: Économie Rurale I (Paris, 1978), XXGoogle Scholar.

18 Shackleton Bailey, loc. cit.; Taylor, L. R., Voting Districts of the Roman Republic (Rome, 1960), 63 n. 63Google Scholar; cf. Tac, . Ann. 1. 79Google Scholar.

19 Dio 40. 45. 1; Cic, . ad fam. 7. 11. 1Google Scholar; cf. Mommsen, StR I 3. 660–1Google Scholar.

20 Shackleton Bailey, loc. cit.; Mommsen, StR I 3. 580–2Google Scholar.

21 See above n. 17. Nicolet also excludes 59, the year in which Varro was a vigintivir ad agros dividendos Campanos (RR 1. 2. 10; see Cichorius, C., Römische Studien [Bonn, 1922], 198)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Lintott, A. W., Violence in Republican Rome (Oxford, 1968), 71–3Google Scholar, argues for a dramatic date in July 55.

22 Cic, . ad fam. I. 9. 25Google Scholar.

23 Cic, . ad fam. 3. 1Google Scholar. For commentary and date, see Bailey, Shackleton, Cicero: Epistulae ad familiares I (Cambridge, 1977), 359Google Scholar.

24 Cicero left Rome at the end of April or the beginning of May 51 (ad Att. 5. 1) and arrived at Laodicaea on 31 July (ad Att. 5. 15. 1). For the rapid letter, see ad Att. 5. 19. 1 (cf. Hunter, L. W., JRS 3 [1913], 91 n. 4)Google Scholar.

25 Pergamum: B. M. Cat. Mysia, pp. 124–6, nos. 97–107, 109, 111–113, 116–124 (for the prytanis as the eponymous magistrate, see Inschr. von Pergamon no. 5 lines 15–16, and note ad loc.). Tralles: B. M. Cat. Lydia, p. 334, no. 51 (for the stephanephoros as eponymous, Ruge, W., RE VI A [1937], 2111–12)Google Scholar. On the local magistrates on these coins, see Pinder, M., Abh. Kön. Akad. Wiss. Berlin 1855, 543–5Google Scholar. For a survey of proconsular types, Cody, J. M., AJA 77 (1973), 43–50Google Scholar.

26 B. M. Cat. Phrygia, pp. xxxiii and 73. On the magistrates and organisation of Apameia, see Magie, D., Roman Rule in Asia Minor (Princeton, 1950), 126 and 983 n. 19Google Scholar; Ramsay, W. M., Cities and Bishoprics of Phrygia II (Oxford, 1897), 437–45Google Scholar.

27 Cic, . ad Att. 5. 16. 4, 17. 6Google Scholar; ad fam. 3. 6. 6.

28 Above n. 19. For the consul presiding at this election, see RR 3. 5. 18.

29 Cic, . ad fam. 3. 10, 11 and 13Google Scholar.

30 Caesar, , BC 1. 38Google Scholar; Cic, . ad fam. 9. 13. 1Google Scholar; Skydsgaard, J. E., Varro the Scholar (Copenhagen, 1968), 97Google Scholar; Horsfall, N. M., BICS 19 (1972), 120–1Google Scholar.

31 Cic, . de fin. 3 7–9Google Scholar; Cat, . Min. 24 and 54Google Scholar.

32 Plut, . Lucullus 43Google Scholar; Pliny, , NH 25. 25Google Scholar; de vir. ill. 74.

33 Cic, . de prov. cons. 22Google Scholar.

34 Cic, . de fin. 3. 8Google Scholar. On different forms of tutela, see Buckland, W. W., A Textbook of Roman Law (3rd ed., rev. Stein, P., Cambridge, 1975), 142–52Google Scholar.

35 There is no reason to believe that the case was heard at Reate; indeed Cic, . Scaur. 27Google Scholar suggests that it was heard in Rome (so Shackleton Bailey, loc. cit. [n. 17]), in which case Appius and Cicero probably made separate excursions to gather information.

36 Varro, RR 3. 2. 2Google Scholar; see Hirzel, , op. cit. 558–9Google Scholar.

37 So Laughton, E., CQ n.s. 10 (1960), 1–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar, more charitably than most.

38 Cic, . Brut. 205Google Scholar. Other ancient opinions are collected conveniently by Dahlmann, H., RE suppl. 6 (1935), 1178–9Google Scholar.

39 Cic, . ad Att. 6. 1. 17–18Google Scholar, on a statue set up by Scipio in Rome in 51.

40 RR 1 was written in 37, in Varro's eightieth year (1. 1. 1). He was born, according to Jerome, , Chron. 147H, in 116Google Scholar B.C.

41 Mommsen, StR I 3. 580 n. 2Google Scholar: ‘Besonders nach dieser Stelle (Dio 39.7.4) ist nicht zu bezweifeln.dass diese Reihenfolge gesetzlich fest gestellt war’. So also Taylor, L. R., Roman Voting Assemblies, 63 and 141 n. 12Google Scholar.

42 Cic, . ad Att. 4. 3. 3–4Google Scholar; Dio 39. 7. For the date of the election, Cic, . ad QF 2. 2. 2Google Scholar.

43 Dio 39. 7. 4. Cf. Mommsen, loc. cit. (n. 41). On the chronology, and Dio's confusion, see Ed. Meyer, , Caesars Monarchie (3rd ed., Stuttgart, 1922), 109 n. 2Google Scholar.

44 Cic, . ad Att. 4. 16. 5–6. 15. 4Google Scholar; Livy, , ep. 105Google Scholar; Dio 39. 27–31. P. Crassus, who issued coinage in this year, presumably as monetalis, was not present in Rome until January 55 (Dio 39. 31. 2; Cic, . ad QF 2. 7. 2Google Scholar; Crawford, M. H., Roman Republican Coinage I [Cambridge, 1974], 88 and 454, no. 430)Google Scholar.

45 Cic, . ad Att. 4. 15. 7, 17. 2–3Google Scholar.

46 Dio 40. 45. 1–3. See above p. 458 and n. 19.

47 Ascon. 30–31 C; Dio 40. 46. 3, who adds anachronistically that there was no praefectus urbi elected either. The connection between the praetorship and the consular elections is also made by Cicero, , de aere alieno Milonis fr. 16Google Scholar, ap. Schol. Bob. p. 172 (St.).

48 Cic, . ad fam. 8. 4. 3Google Scholar.

49 Mommsen, StR I 3. 99 n. 1, and 581Google Scholar.

50 Cic, ad fam. 7. 30. 1Google Scholar.

51 Mommsen, StR II 3. 80Google Scholar; Rom. Forsch. 1. 157 ff.

52 de vir. ill. 82.

53 Vell. 2. 46. 4; Pult, . Crass. 18Google Scholar; Dio 40. 25. 4; Eutrop. 6. 18; Festus, , brev. 17Google Scholar; cf. Appian, , BC 4. 59Google Scholar. Cicero addresses him as pro quaestore in 51 (ad fam. 15. 14). Sumner, G. V., Phoenix 25 (1971), 365Google Scholar andLinderski, J., CP 70 (1975), 35–7Google Scholar argue for 54 or 55 as the date for Cassius' quaestorship, the latter on the ground that there were no elections for magistrates for 53 before July of that year. Linderski admits, however, that the evidence of the sources is overwhelmingly in favour of a quaestorship in 53.

54 Above n. 43.