Innovation and Invective in Cicero’s Violent Metaphors By Anne Meredith Rabe B.A., University of Kansas, 2002 M.A., University of Kansas, 2007 Dissertation Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Classics at Brown University PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND MAY 2015 © 2015 by Anne M. Rabe This dissertation by Anne M. Rabe is accepted in its present form by the Department of Classics as satisfying the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Date _________________ __________________________________________ (John Bodel), Advisor Recommended to the Graduate Council Date _________________ __________________________________________ (Lisa Mignone), Reader Date _________________ __________________________________________ (Adele Scafuro), Reader Date _________________ __________________________________________ (Anthony Corbeill), Reader Approved by the Graduate Council Date _________________ __________________________________________ (Peter M. Weber), Dean of the Graduate School iii CURRICULUM VITAE Anne M. Rabe was born in St. Louis, MO on December 30, 1979. At the age of two she moved with her parents to Lawrence, Kansas, and there she benefitted from the superb education afforded by the city at the elementary, secondary, and collegiate levels. After graduating from Lawrence High School in 1998, Anne entered into study at The University of Kansas where she completed her B.A. first in Anthropology (2002) and then in Classical Languages (2004), graduating with Highest Distinction and receiving induction into Phi Beta Kappa. She then earned a M.A. in Classics at the University of Kansas (2007), receiving along the way the university-wide Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant Award (2006) and the Classics Department’s Albert O. Greef Outstanding Essay Award (2007). Upon completion of her master’s degree, Anne served as Adjunct Instructor of Classics at William Jewell College (2008). In 2008 she undertook a Ph.D. at Brown University, and over the course of her studies there, she delivered a paper at the annual meeting of the Classical Association of the Middle West and South (2012) and attended courses in Roman epigraphy at the British School at Rome (2012) and in Greek paleography at the Lincoln College Summer School of Greek Paleography, Oxford (2012). Following completion of her Ph.D., Anne plans to devote herself to Latin teaching in the greater Kansas City area. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Among the many debts of gratitude I owe for the fruition and completion of this project, first mention must go to my advisor John Bodel, who, having patiently read Cicero’s speeches with me in the course of my special author study, indulged me as I chose to embark on a dissertation-length study of two verbs in Cicero’s usage (frango and lacero), and throughout the project helped shape my fledgling ideas into a cohesive argument. The way ahead was not always clear nor smooth, and he bore graciously several unexpected (and for my part, life-altering) announcements, rejoicing with me in the birth of our son Jacob and in good humor continuing to meet with me via Skype as I took up residence in Kansas the final year. As many faults as this work still may bear (which are entirely my own), without his guidance there would be no dissertation, and to him I give my sincere and everlasting thanks. Much gratitude is owed too to Tony Corbeill. It was with Tony at the University of Kansas that I first became a serious student of Cicero and entered into the rigors of prose philological work, and when the request came years later to be a part of this dissertation committee, Tony accepted with humility and eagerness, offering insightful comments and feedback at various stages of the project. Additional thanks are due to the faculty and graduate students of the Brown University Department of Classics. It has been a privilege and an honor to be a part of this department in every respect, from the vigorous seminars to the annual Latin Carol Celebration, which I am sure must be one of the most uniquely joyful holiday events held anywhere. I came to Brown an enthusiastic, awestruck, and slightly overconfident girl v from Kansas, and I was met by nothing but encouragement and a warmhearted challenge to excellence, from my teachers first and foremost but from my fellow graduate students as well. I cannot imagine a more congenial atmosphere for graduate study than this department has afforded, and to the cohort of my year especially (Annie and Joe McDonald, Barbara Blythe, Mitchell Parks) I offer the final cry of ‘wanquish’. Upon moving back to Kansas, our families were crucial to finishing this project. They housed us, fed us, and cared for our son as I frantically worked day and night to turn thoughts scribbled on paper and echoing in my head into a cogent piece of writing. Their love and support proved a stay amidst the maelstrom the final year brought, and I am eternally grateful. I thank too Tara Welch and the Classics Department of The University of Kansas for providing me with an office as well as academic fellowship this past year. The smiles and warm hellos from all were glimmers of sunlight during my darkest days of writing. My utmost thanks, however, goes to my husband Kyle, who has borne with me every step of the way, enduring two rounds of graduate school and all the stress, elation, and occasional despair there entailed. Night after night, year after year, through countless hours of feverish work he loved, encouraged, and sacrificed, listening patiently as I practicing for upcoming presentations and recounted the various woes of grad school life according to the day. He walked and talked with me as I bounced dissertation ideas off of him in the early stages, and through the end he read and offered apt stylistic feedback on numerous pieces of the dissertation itself, including sections of detailed philological analysis. I cannot express my gratitude and love in writing here and hope instead that in the future I may return the loving service he has given so selflessly. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Curriculum Vitae iv Acknowledgements v Table of Contents vii List of Tables ix Abbreviations x Introduction 1 Chapter 1 Invective Reference Before Cicero 15 I. The Greek Divide 17 I.a. The Iambic Testimonia 21 I.b. The Attic Orators 26 I.c. Aristophanes 32 I.d. Plato 38 II. The Roman Contribution 40 II.a. Plautus and Terence 43 II.b. Pre-Ciceronian Oratory 54 II.c. Lucilius 60 Chapter 2 Cicero’s Pre-Consular Language 65 I. Documentation 71 I.a. Verb Entries 73 I.b. Initial Comments 87 II. Categories by Meaning and Sphere 89 II.a. Categories by Meaning 89 II.b. Categories by Sphere 92 III. Application 98 III.a. Specificity of Imagery 99 III.b. Tendency to Cluster 101 III.c. Verb Forms and Application 105 IV. Conclusion 111 vii Chapter 3 Post-Consular Cicero: An Innovative Posture 113 I. 63-58 BCE (The Consular Years and Exile) 115 II. 57-55 BCE (The Post Reditum Years) 127 III. 54-45 BCE (The Years of Remove) 141 IV. 46-43 BCE (The Final Years) 145 V. Conclusion 152 Chapter 4 Novus Homo Self-Fashioning and an Imperial Legacy 158 I. Post-Consular Self-Fashioning 159 II. A Novus Homo Perspective 171 III. Imperial Afterlife 178 Conclusion 191 Works Cited 200 viii LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Verb Frequency in the Attic Orators 26 Table 2: ‘Affliction’ Verbs in Cicero’s Pre-Consular Works 93 Table 3: Agents and Objects in Parallel Instances from Plautus and Terence 172 ix ABBREVIATIONS Latin texts are cited throughout this dissertation according to the conventions of the Oxford Latin Dictionary, and those in Greek likewise follow the abbreviations listed in Liddell and Scott’s Greek-English Lexicon with the exceptions of Aeschines and Demosthenes, abbreviated here “Aesch.” and “Dem.”. LSJ H.G. Liddell and R. Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, revised and augmented by H.S. Jones, with revised supplement. (Oxford, 1996). OCT Oxford Classical Texts, series published by Oxford University Press. (Clarendon Press). OED The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., prepared by J.A. Simpson and E.S.C. Weiner. (Oxford, 1989). OLD P.G.W. Glare, Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed. (Oxford, 2012). ORF E. Malcovati, Oratorum Romanorum Fragmenta Liberae Rei Publicae, 3rd ed. Vol. 1: Textus. (Turin, 1967). RE Real-Encyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft. (Stuttgart, 1893–1980). SB D.R. Shackleton Bailey, Cicero: Letters to Atticus; Letters to Friends; Epistulae ad Quintum Fratrem et M. Brutum. Cambridge Classical Texts and Commentaries. (Cambridge). TLL Thesaurus Linguae Latinae (Leipzig, 1900- ). x INTRODUCTION This dissertation presents a detailed and focused examination of the language used in reference to invective attacks and verbal abuse in Greek and Roman literature up through Cicero. Its focus is metaphors, specifically those whose meaning can roughly be conceived of as ‘violent’ and take the form of a verb. Its ultimate goal is to argue 1) that from the year of his consulship on, Cicero, in depicting invective attacks, employed three specific semantic strands of violent metaphors heretofore unattested in prose, and, moreover, deployed them in a phrasing and syntax atypical of earlier prose, including his own; and 2) that his usage represents an innovative ad hominem posture of self- fashioning, serving to bolster his image and auctoritas in the post-consular years and paralleling a psychology of violent self-elevation over a social superior that is characteristic of Plautus’ slaves in particular. Its investigations are inspired by a simple statement in the sixteenth epistle of the ad Atticum collection (Att. 1.16, 61 BCE), the letter in which Cicero famously recounts to Atticus his altercatio with P. Clodius Pulcher during Clodius’ trial for violation of the Bona Dea rites.1 Having described several debates in which he battled Clodius, Cicero boasts to Atticus, “I broke Clodius in person in the senate” – Clodium praesentem fregi in senatu (Att.