Hilder, Jennifer Claire (2015) Recontextualising the Rhetorica Ad Herennium
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Hilder, Jennifer Claire (2015) Recontextualising the Rhetorica ad Herennium. PhD thesis http://theses.gla.ac.uk/6968/ Copyright and moral rights for this thesis are retained by the author A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Glasgow Theses Service http://theses.gla.ac.uk/ [email protected] Recontextualising the Rhetorica ad Herennium Jennifer Claire Hilder BA (Hons), MPhil Submitting in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of PhD School of Humanities College of Arts University of Glasgow September 2015 © Jennifer Hilder Abstract This thesis will provide a sustained analysis of the relationship between the Rhetorica ad Herennium and its context in early first century BCE Rome. Over 250 examples in the Rhetorica ad Herennium illustrate the text’s rhetorical theory, but in so doing they also provide a significant insight into the history, law, and politics of this period. As I demonstrate, these examples show the preoccupations and perspectives of orators who were not necessarily from the political elite. They illustrate what could and could not be discussed in speech, and the modes of oratory that were encouraged by the author – popularis or not. The author’s focus on forensic oratory also has important implications for understanding the use of the law and legal knowledge. An important strand of this thesis is to compare the examples in the Rhetorica ad Herennium to those of Cicero’s contemporary De Inventione. Although the two texts have often been treated as a pair, there are differences between the two. The contrasts are noteworthy in themselves, but they also emphasise the independence of the author of the Rhetorica ad Herennium and the potential to adapt theories and approaches as necessary. This is also an educational text, and the way it is constructed relates closely to its audience. I argue that the post-Social War context of the Rhetorica ad Herennium is key to understanding this audience, who may include newly enfranchised Italians using the Roman legal system for the first time. By recontextualising the Rhetorica ad Herennium, it becomes clear that it is a very different text to the De Inventione in many ways. By highlighting these differences, I show that the work can stand alone as an object of enquiry and serve as a rich source for Roman Republican historians. Table of Contents Acknowledgements 7 Author’s Declaration 9 Abbreviations 11 Introduction 13 Chapter 1: Contextualising pre-Sullan Rome 39 Chapter 2: A rhetorical handbook 63 Chapter 3: Exempla and political history 85 Chapter 4: Popularis oratory, invective and licentia 117 Chapter 5: Pathos and maiestas in criminal trials 140 Chapter 6: Civil law and the jurists 165 Chapter 7: Educating the reader 191 Conclusion 207 Bibliography 213 Acknowledgements I am very grateful to all those who have helped me throughout my thesis, including my supervisors Catherine Steel and Henriette van der Blom first and foremost, whose advice has been invaluable for developing my ideas and arguments. The Classics department in Glasgow and the advisory board of the Fragments of the Republican Roman Orators project have been two other sources of much welcome guidance and friendship. I would also like to thank the Classics postgraduates, especially Sarah and Christopher, as well as Christa Gray and Fraser Rowan for moral support and endless cups of tea. I am also grateful to have had the opportunity to present my research in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Warsaw and Turin, and I thank the organisers and audiences for their comments. For financial support I am indebted to the European Research Council and the University of Glasgow’s College of Arts Graduate School, without whom I could not have undertaken this thesis. I also had the great pleasure of staying at the Fondation Hardt in the latter stages of my thesis with funding from the Roman Society. Finally, to friends and family, and to Galen, thank you for the wonderful evenings, weekends, and holidays that have made these three years more than a thesis. Needless to say, any mistakes that remain here are my own. Author’s Declaration I declare that this thesis is the result of my own work and that I have referenced sources in cases where ideas are not my own: any omission of an accurate reference is an oversight on my part and will be corrected. This dissertation is the result of my own work and has not been submitted for any other degree at the University of Glasgow or any other institution. Signature _______________________________ Printed name _______________________________ Abbreviations References to ancient authors and texts follow the conventions of the Oxford Classical Dictionary. CAH IX2 J. W. Crook, A. L. Lintott, E. Rawson (eds.) (1994) The Cambridge Ancient History, vol. IX. Cambridge. CCSL Corpus Christianorum, series Latina (1953– ). CIL Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. FRHist T. J. Cornell (ed.) (2013) The Fragments of the Roman Historians, 3 vols. Oxford. Gramm. Lat. [Hertzius] M. Hertzius (ed.) (1961) Grammatici Latini, vols. 2-3. Hildesheim. Lewis and Short C. T. Lewis and C. Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary. Oxford. MRR T. R. S. Broughton (1951-2) The Magistrates of the Roman Republic, vols. 1-2. New York. MRR Suppl. T. R. S. Broughton (1986) The Magistrates of the Roman Republic, vol. III: Supplement. Atlanta. Müller K. O. Müller (1880)2 Sexti Pompei Festi De verborum significatione quae supersunt cum Pauli Epitome. Leipzig. OCD3 S. Hornblower and A. Spawforth (eds.) (1996) The Oxford Classical Dictionary. Oxford. OLD2 P. G. W. Glare (ed.) (2012) Oxford Latin Dictionary. Oxford. ORF4 H. Malcovati (1976) Oratorum Romanorum Fragmenta Liberae Rei Publicae. Turin. RE A. Pauly, G. Wissowa and W. Kroll (eds.) (1893– ) Real- Encyclopädie der klassichen Altertumswissenschaft. Stuttgart. Rhet. Lat. Min. K. Halm (1863) Rhetores Latini Minores. Leipzig. RhG H. Rabe (ed.) (1931) Rhetores Graeci, vol. XIV: Prolegomenon Sylloge. Leipzig. RRC M. H. Crawford (1974) Roman Republican Coinage, 2 vols. Cambridge. TLRR M. C. Alexander (1990) Trials in the Late Roman Republic, 149 B.C. to 50 B.C. Toronto. Introduction The Rhetorica ad Herennium is a rhetorical handbook that contains over 250 vivid and informative examples about gruesome deaths, the passing of laws, personal insults, and much more. These examples provide an alternative look at the history of the early first century BCE, recording events and voices from a perspective that has not often survived elsewhere. But the potential of the text as a significant source for this period has not been fully appreciated, as other questions have drawn discussions about the text away from its content. For over a century, three issues about the context and circumstances of the work have dominated the debate around the Rhetorica ad Herennium.1 The first is that the text is anonymous. As the author is unknown, it is not immediately possible to discover their perspective and approach to the text. A second problem is that the dating of the work is not secure, which makes it more difficult to locate the text in its political, social and cultural context. A third problem has also hindered a full analysis of the text: there are significant parallels, from general structure to detailed word order, between the Rhetorica ad Herennium and Cicero’s early rhetorical work, De Inventione. In trying to understand how and why these similarities exist, the two texts have become almost synonymous and are often treated together, which elides their important differences. There are not simple answers to these questions, but scholars have made reasonable hypotheses. As I will discuss in this Introduction, the identity of the author may never be certain, but there are many suggestions within the work itself about the type of person he was. The date of the work cannot be narrowed down to a year or month, but the traditional dating of 86-82 BCE fits well with the evidence at hand. And by looking carefully at the Rhetorica ad Herennium and the De Inventione, the two texts do appear to have had a common source but who or what this is still speculative. 1 Important discussions of the Rhetorica ad Herennium are: Marx (1894); Herbolzheimer (1926); Golla (1935); Caplan (1954); Adamietz (1960); Douglas (1960); Barwick (1961); Gelzer (1962); Bione (1965); Calboli (1965), (1969), (1972); Gotoff (1973); Ungern-Sternberg (1973); Achard (1989); Sinclair (1993); Müller (1994), (1996); Deneire (2004); Krostenko (2004); Masiello (2006). 14 Introduction As I will show, these debates about the context of the Rhetorica ad Herennium have reached workable conclusions, but these conclusions have not been put to use. By placing the examples and other content into this contextual framework, they begin to take on a greater meaning. In fact, there are many different lines of enquiry about the text that remain to be explored. As I will argue in the remainder of the thesis, the range of examples and subjects discussed within the text means that the Rhetorica ad Herennium can lead to a greater understanding of first century BCE Rome across the fields of history, politics, law and rhetorical education. The author The anonymity of the Rhetorica ad Herennium has long been a barrier to better understanding the text. Understandably, an author and their authority are often seen as an essential starting point for analysing a work, for relating to it, for finding out the who, why, and what.