Tacitus: Annals Book IV

288 Pages·1990·9.92 MB·English

by  Tacitus

CAMBRIDGE GREEK AND LATIN CLASSICS
GENERAL EDITORS
J.
PROFESSOR E. KENNEY
Peterlwuse, Cambridge
AND
PROFESSOR P. E. EASTERLING
Universit;· Collq;e London
TACITUS
ANNALS\
BOOK IV
EDITED BY
R. H. MARTIN
Emeritus Prqfessor rif Classics,
University rif Leeds
AND
A. J. WOODMAN
Professor of Latin,
(/nil'frsity q/ Durham
Th{' right of the
Uni~ersiry of Cambridge
to print and ull
off manna of books
\\"OJ granted by
J/enry VIII in 1534.
The University has printed
und publishe-d continuowly
since 1584.
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
CAMBRIDGE
NEW YORK PORT CHESTER MELBOURNE SYDNEY
Published by the Press Syndicate of the C niw·rsity of Cambridge
The Pitt Building, Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB2 IRP
40 \Vest 2oth Street, New York, NY IOOI I, USA
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©Cambridge Cniversity Press I989
First published I 989
Printed in Great Britain at The Bath Press, Avon
British Libra~Y cataloguing in publiwtion data
Tacitus, Cornelius
Tacitus Annals book IV. - (Cambridge Greek
and Latin Classics)
I. Roman Empire. Historiography. Tacitus, Cornelius
I. Title II. Martin, Ronald
Ill. Woodman, A. J. (Anthony John)
93 7' .0072024
LibraiJ of Congress cataloguing in publication data
Tacitus, Cornelius.
[Annalcs. Liber 4]
Annals. Book IV J Tacitus: edited by R. H. Martin and A. J. Woodman
p. em. (Cambridge Greek and Latin classics)
Text in Latin: commentary in English.
Bibliography.
Includes indexes.
ISBN 0 52 I 30504 7 ISBN 0 52 I 3I543 3 (pbk.)
r. Rome- History-Tiberius, L}-37· I. Martin, Ronald H., t9l5-
II. Woodman, A. J. (Anthony John), I945·- III. Title.
IV. Title: Annals. Book 4· V. Series.
PA6705.A6B4 I989
937'.07 ·de 19 89-545 CIP
ISBN o 521 30504 7 hard covers
ISBN o 521 31543 3 paperback
ETA
CONTENTS
Preface VII
Introduction
Latin historiograftkY to Tacitus
2 Tacitus' career 10
3 The Annals 12
Annals Book 4
4
Structure and narrative
Language and expression
Sources
Tacitus and Tiberius
Text
CORNEL II TACIT! AB EXCESSV DIVI A VGVSTI
LIBER QVARTVS 35
Commentary 77
References and Abbreviations 264
Indexes 268
General 268
Latin words 274
.Names 278
Stemm a 282
v
PREFACE
'Book iv of the Annales, it may be asserted, is the best that Tacitus ever
wrote.' Such is the judgement of this century's leading Tacitcan
scholar, Sir Ronald Syme (Roman pajJers ( 1984) Ill t 031 ); yet no
commentary on the Latin text has been published in English since the
time of the First World War. In the seventy-five years which have
elapsed between then and now, our knowledge of classical literature
has greatly increased, there have been several revolutions in the way
literary texts may be read, and readers have become accustomed to
rxpect more from classical commentaries than the elucidation of points
of grammar and syntax.
\Vc have devoted our Introduction to explaining both the nature of
Latin historical writing and Tacitus' place within the historiographical
tradition. By analysing the structure and various other aspects of the
composition and style of Book 4, we have tried to show how Tacitus
capitalised on that tradition to produce a dramatic work of literature
which would be found compelling by his readers in the second century
A.D.
In the Commentary we have had two principal aims: first, to help
the modern reader understand Tacitus' Latin and, second, to illustrate
the intrinsic fascination of his writing. On the relatively few occasions
when we have been unable to put forward an agreed interpretation,
our separate views arc identified by our initials-· a practice which we
hope may stimulate further discussion amongst readers. \Vc have not
attempted to give an account of the broader historical background,
which is available in two reliable and relatively recent biographies of
Tiberius by R. Seager and B. Levick. Though we hope that the
Commentary will make a contribution to Tacitean scholarship and be
useful to professional classicists, we also hope that it will be found 'user
fi·iendly' by the sixth-formers and university students for whom it is
primarily intended. We have tried to avoid much of the conventional
panoply of scholarship, preferring instead to refer to such works as
E. C. Woodcock's JVew Latin 5]/ltax or the Oxford Latin dictiona~y, to
which our readers may reasonably be expected to have access.
\Ye are jointly indebted to the generosity of Dr D. C. Braund and Mr
K. \Vcllcsley, who supplied us with valuable information on buffer
vii
nu PREFACE
states and Tacitean emendations respectively, and of Prokssor W. S.
\Vatt, who volunteered a series of textual notes on Book 4· In addition
AJ\V is grateful to a number of fl·iends and colleagues in the North
East, who have cheerfully tried to answer the questions with which
they have been pestered and amongst whom Dr E. D. Hunt dcsnves a
special mention. He also wishes to express his appreciation to the
Univnsity of Durham for allowing him an extended period of research
leave, during which the bulk of the book was written, and f()r a
research grant to help with the purchase of a book by the Durham
University Library.
September 1988 R.H.M.
A .. J. W.
INTRODUCTION
I. LATIN HISTORIOGRAPHY TO TACITUS
·It is f{Jreign locations, the suspense of battles, and heroic deaths which
keep the readers' attention and whet their appetites for more.' This
statement fl·om Book 4 of Tacitus' Annals ( 33·3) indicates a basic truth
about the works of ancient historians: they were not written to be read
as text-books or as source-material for a modern disciplinr called
'history'; they were written to be enjoyed as works of literature in their
own right, containing the same kinds of compulsin~ topic which today
,,T
associate more readily with historical novels or war films. Of course
that is not the whole story, as we shall sec below; but unless we arc
aware of the spirit in which works of ancient historiography were
written, we have no chance of appreciating them properly.
In his dialogue De Oratore, the dramatic date of which is 91 B.C.,
Cicero makes one of the speakers, l'vf. Antonius, express disappoint
ment that hitherto Latin historiography had cntirdy f~1ilcd to match
the standards set by the Greek masters Herodotus and Thucydides.
Maintaining that earlier historians had done little more than transmit
in continuous prose the kind of year-by-year record (annates) kept by
the j;ontifex maximus at Rome (2.52j,1 Antonius complained that as a
result earlier historiography comprised 'only plain notices of dates,
persons, places and events' (2.53). Similar complaints had already
been made by two of the early historians themselves, Cato the Elder
(234 149 B.C.) and Sempronius Ascllio (flor. 133 B.c.)," the latter
adding that jejune annals 'cannot in any way make people more
enthusiastic to defend their country or more reluctant to do wrong' (fi·.
2). This statement reveals two other important characteristics of Latin
historiography: its political and its moral dimensions. On the one hand
For an explanation of our system of references and abbreviations see below, pp.
264-7·
' Almost everything connected with these records is problematic and
controversial: see B. \V. Frier, Libri annates fJontijicum maximorum ( 1979).
' Cato, fi·. 77, Sempr. fr. 2. These and other fragments of the earlier Roman
historians are in H. Peter, Hisloricorum Romanorum reliquiae I (2nd edn, 1914).
For discussion sec E. Badian, 'The early historians', Latin historians (eel.
T. A. Dorey, 1966), 1-38; Wiseman 9-26.
2 INTRODUCTION
historians were expected to treat Roman history with a patriotic bias
and to demonstrate that Rome's greatness was something admirable
and worthwhile. On the other hand they were expected to usc their
works as a medium for reinforcing the moral code of the upper sections
of society to which they and their readers largely bclonged.3
Slightly later in Cicero's dialogue Antonius suggests how Roman
historiography can be brought up to Greek standards. He argues that
earlier historians had failed to exploit the rhetorical potential of the
genre: that is, they had not approached their task as if they were
writing a speech (2.62), the aim of which was to move and persuade an
audience. If historiography is to be raised above the level of a merely
perfunctory record, Antonius says that it requires a 'superstructure'
(exaedificatio) which 'consists of content (res) and style (uerba)':
It is in the nature of content, on the one hand, that you require a
chronological order of events and topographical descriptions; and
also that you need - since in the treatment of important and
memorable achievements the reader expects (i) intentions, (ii) the
events themselves, and (iii) consequences in the case of (i) to
indicate whether you approve of the intentions, of (ii) to reveal not
only what was said or done but also in what manner, and of (iii) to
explain all the reasons, whether they be of chance or intelligence or
impetuousness, and also to give not only the achievements of any
famous protagonist but also his life and character. The nature of
style and type of discourse, on the other hand, require amplitude
and mobility, with a slow and regular fluency and without any of
the roughness and prickliness associated with the law-courts. (2.63-
4)
This is the most important substantial text for our understanding of
how Latin historiography worked.•
3 See D. Earl, The moral and political tradition af Rome ( 1967); T. P. Wiseman
(ed.), Roman political life go B.C.-A.D. 69 ( 1985).
4 See RICH 78-95, of which the following is a summary. Readers should be
warned at this point that the view of Roman historiography offered here differs
substantially from that found in other books both on the ancient historians in
general (e.g. S. Usher, The histon·ans af Greece and Rome ( 1969), M. Grant, The
ancient historians (I 970), C. W. Fornara, The nature rif history in ancient Greece and
Rome (1983); but not Wiseman) and on Tacitus in particular (e.g. those listed
by Martin (2) 271-2).
F
l. LATIN HISTORIOGRAPHY TO TACITCS 3
Antonius' distinction between content and style confirms that he
approaches historiography as he would a speech. For example
Quintilian, a professor of rhetoric and older contemporary of Tacitus,
was only expounding conventional doctrine when he said (8 pre[ 6)
that 'every speech consists of content and style (rebus et uerbis)'. But the
implications of this approach become clear when Quintilian adds:
'with reference to content (in rebus) we must study inuentio'. For inuentio,
one of the five techniques in which orators were supposed to be expert,
is defined as 'the "discovery" of what requires to be said in a given
situation, the implied theory being that this is somehow already
"there" though latent' .5 This means that when an orator was
confronted by a particular situation or case which demanded his
attention, he would draw on his rhetorical training, as well as on his
knowledge of literature and experience of life, to provide his audience
with a convincing and persuasive presentation. In the context of
historiography, it means that when a historian was provided by his
sources with an item of information, however small, he would
immediately be aware of the various ways in which he could 'build up'
its presentation into an episode which his readers would enjoy.6 This
parallelism between oratory and historiography is confirmed by the
fact that each of the elements listed by Antonius under 'content' (for
example, topographical descriptions, the revelation of how a person
spoke, or the attribution of reasons based on chance or character) is
drawn from the theoretical instructions which were provided in
rhetorical handbooks for inuentio. It follows, and is implicit in the term
inuentio itself, that any element so 'discovered' need only be plausible:
as Cicero himself said, inuentio is 'the devising of matter true or plausible
which will make a case appear convincing' (lnu. 1.9). Since it was
axiomatic that rhetoric should be persuasive, the minimal criterion for
an ancient historian was, therefore, that his work should be realistic.'
Since there is a rapid increase in the numbers of volumes written by
5 D. A. Russell, 'Rhetoric and criticism', G. & R. 14 (1967) 135.
6 See RICH 88-93. Of course the amount of source material available to a
historian can vary greatly depending on circumstances: for Tacitus see below,
pp. 26-7.
7 This criterion forms the basis for Tacitus' excursus on the death of Drusus
(see below, p. 123 and I 1.3n.). He also introduces realistic elements into
Tiberius' speeches (8.2n.).