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Boni Atque Improbi1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2009

W. K. Lacey
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Extract

Boni and improbi are political words. Political words change their meanings—as we all very well know today—but they also have histories, which suggest basic, fundamental value-judgements, and whose use reveals as much about the user as about the object to which he refers.

Type
Research Article
Information
Greece & Rome , Volume 17 , Issue 1 , April 1970 , pp. 3 - 16
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1970

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References

page 3 note 2 Ps.-Xen., Constitution of Athens 1, 2, 4, 6, 9, etc.Google Scholar Cf. Aristoph, . Knights 192.Google Scholar

page 3 note 3 Dinarchus, ii. 8Google Scholar, for example; cf. Demosth, . lviii. 66–9Google Scholar; Lysias, xxvi. 21–2, xviii. 2–10, etc.Google Scholar

page 3 note 4 Ps.-Xen. op. cit. 1, 4, 6, 9, etc.; Isoc. xv. (Antidosis) 100, 316; Aristoph, . Knights 181, 186Google Scholar; cf. Plato, , Republic vi. 519A.Google Scholar

page 3 note 5 In the strictest sense there are no democratic writers, but orators in court, Thucydides in his speeches, documents on stone, etc., use these phrases.

page 3 note 6 Arist, ., Ath. Pol. 2. 2Google Scholar, uses this phrase of Solon, but almost certainly anachronistically. Thuc. iii. 75, 82; iv. 66, show that it was familiar by his day. See Ath. Pol. 25. 1, for Ephialtes.Google Scholar

page 4 note 1 See Earl, D. C., The Moral and Political Tradition of Rome (London, 1967).Google Scholar

page 4 note 2 Cf. Brunt, P. A., JRS lii (1962), 84.Google Scholar

page 5 note 1 See the interesting letter, ad fam. v. 2, esp. 5 ff.Google Scholar, in reply to a letter from Metellus Celer, brother of Metellus Nepos, ad fam. v. 1.Google Scholar

page 5 note 2 Probably in Pompey's (his old commander's) interest; but he was also working to save his relative, P. Clodius, from being condemned, by securing his election as aedile for 56, Att. iv. 3. 3–4.Google Scholar

page 5 note 3 Att. iii. 12. 2Google Scholar; cf. ibid. i. 14. 5.

page 5 note 4 Att. ii. 18. 1.Google Scholar

page 5 note 5 Badian, E., Foreign Clientelae (Oxford, 1957), 267–8Google Scholar, q.v. for refs.

page 6 note 1 de leg. agr. ii. 7–10, 102.Google Scholar

page 6 note 2 pro Rabirio 11–13Google Scholar; Hardy, E. G., Problems in Roman History (Oxford, 1926), 99 ff.Google Scholar, for the background to this speech.

page 6 note 3 in toga Candida, frag. 25.

page 6 note 4 I assume that, as is generally agreed, the Rhetorica ad Herennium is not by Cicero; optimates is used in iv. 34. 45.

page 7 note 1 For the opponents of the Gracchi, Livy, , Per. 58Google Scholar; Vell. Pat. ii. 3. 2; Quintilian, , Inst. Or. i. 10. 28.Google Scholar For opponents of Marius and Cinna, Livy, , Per. 59, 60Google Scholar; Vell. Pat. ii. 20. 3; Asconius; Suet. Divus Julius 1. 3.Google Scholar

page 7 note 2 Clear from many passages in Cicero, pro Roscio Amerino 136–9, 149, etc.Google Scholar Cf. Asconius' commentary on the lost speeches pro Cornelio pp. 79–80Google Scholar (Clark); Cic. pro Cluentio 151Google Scholar; as a standard word for opponents of Marius, cf. Sallust, , Jugurtha, passim.Google Scholar See Badian, E., JRS lii (1962), 47 ff.Google Scholar, for the partiality of the surviving accounts.

page 7 note 3 Twice, that is, if my study of Curio's tribunate in Historia x (1961), 318 ff.Google Scholar, is correct. No one has yet controverted it.

page 7 note 4 Catiline 11, 21, 4 f., 37 f.

page 8 note 1 pro Rosc. Am. 3, 11, 13, 154 (the end of the peroration).Google Scholar

page 8 note 2 On 27 February (Att. viii. 11. 2Google Scholar) Pompey is seeking a reproduction of Sulla's oppression: many of his henchmen are seeking it too.

On 13 March (Att. ix. 7. 3Google Scholar) mirandum in modum Gnaeus noster Sullani regni similitudinem concupivit.

On 22 April (Att. x. 7. 1Google Scholar) sin autem vincit Pompeius, Sullano more exemploque vincet.

page 9 note 1 With the list of the fundamental otiosae dignitatis, cf. pro Cluentio 154Google Scholar (spoken in 66): a senator's ornamenta are locus, auctoritas, domi splendor, apud extents nationes nomen et gratia, toga praetexta, sella curulis, insignia, fasces, exercitus, imperia, provinciae.

page 13 note 1 Cf. in the same letter (Att. i. 14Google Scholar) how miseri (poor) and improbi (rascals) are compared with beati (rich) and boni (sound men) in the similarity of their reactions to Pompey's first speech.

page 15 note 1 Augustus, res gestae, passim, but esp. in 1–2, 34.