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Seneca and the Temple of Divus Claudius

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 November 2011

Duncan Fishwick
Duncan Fishwick
Affiliation:
Department of Classics, University of Alberta
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Extract

In his fair and constructive review of The Imperial Cult in the Latin West, Vol. i (1987), S.R.F. Price is in general agreement with the proposed development of provincial cults in the Latin West – with one exception. He has misgivings about the thesis that the temple at Colchester was only to Divus Claudius and at no stage to Claudius in his lifetime. Two points are raised. The first concerns the text of Seneca, Apocolocyntosis vm. 3: ‘deus fieri vult: parum est quod templum in Britannia habet, quod <hunc> nunc barbari colunt et utdeum orant Price writes, The dramatic context of this remark, by Jupiter, is before the debate in the Olympian senate about the admission of the late Claudius. As the Olympian debate is a parody of the debate in the Roman senate, it is implausible to argue that the Apocolocyntosis passage could refer to a temple authorized by the senate after Claudius' death.'

Type
Articles
Information
Britannia , Volume 22 , November 1991 , pp. 137 - 141
Copyright
Copyright © Duncan Fishwick 1991. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 Phoenix xlii (1988). 371–4Google Scholar.

2 Printed in some editions as a question: ‘He wants to become a god?’ Cf.. for example. P.T. Eden. Seneca Apocolocxniosis (1984), 42 f.. 105. For the reading <hunc> mine see Eden, op. cit, 44. 105. His translation of the text is followed below passim.

3 ‘He wants to become a god[?] Is it not enough that he has a temple in Britain, that savages now worship him and. as if he were a god. pray “to happen on the fool when well-disposed”?’.

4 CR xxxix (1989), 322Google Scholar.

5 For the competence of the Senate in such matters see Fishwick, D.. The Imperial Cult in the Lenin West. Vol. 1. 2 (1987), 212 f.; cf. Vol. 1. 1. 150 f. On the relationship between the Senate and the emperor see F. Millar. The Emperor in the Roman World (31 B.c.-A.I) 337) (19771). 341-55Google Scholar.

6 Smallwood, E.M.. Documents Illustrating the Principates of Gains, Claudius and Nero (1967). no. 370. 11. 48 ff.: no. 369. 11. 39 1Google Scholar.

7 Fish wick, op. cit. (note 5). 1. 2. 201 f.

8 For a careful analysis of the sources sec Timpc, D.. Untersuchungen zur Kontinuilat des friilien Prinzipats, Historica Einzelschrifien 5 (1962), 102–5Google Scholar.

9 cf. Eden, op. cit. (note 2). 98 I.ad VIII [: … ‘modo die nobis qualem deum islum fieri velis’. ‘Only tell us what kind of god you want your protege to be.’ The speaker can hardly he Jupiter as he says at VIII. 2: ‘ilium deum <induci> ab love, quern, quantum qudien in illo fuil, damnavil in.cestil’ ‘Is he to be introduced as a god by Jupiter- whom, as far as he could, he convicted of incest]

10 What opinion has this man formed of us. whatever his status?

11 ‘Since the deified Claudius is connected by blood with both the deified Augustus and no less with the deified Augusta his grandmother. … I move that from this day the deified Claudius be a god just like anyone before him who became one with the best justification, and that this event be appended to Ovid's Metamorphoses.’

12 So rightly Eden. op. cit. (note 2). 113 ad. ix. 5, noting that Divus Claudius' is Claudius' official title after deification by decree of the Senate. He suggests that the Senate of the gods implicitly rescinds it; cf. idem. 110 on ‘factus dictus pictusve’ (ix. 3) ‘made, mentioned or portrayed’, stressing that the celestial Senate was (as with Claudius) not obliged to grant de facto recognition to someone made a god by decree of the Roman Senate.

13 ‘I have you. honourable members, as witnesses.’ he said, that from the time I became a god I have not uttered a word’.

14 Apoc. X. 4: ‘die mihi, dive Claudi: quare quemquam ex his, quos quasque occidisti, antequam de causa cognosceres. antequam audires, damnasti? ‘Tell me. deified Claudius, why did you convict any of these men and women, whom you killed, before you could examine the case, before you could hear the evidence?’ Note that Seneca refers consistently to Claudius as ‘Claudius’ and that the divus title is given him only in the two proposals (one positive, one negative) regarding his admission as a god among the Olympians. For the distinction between deus and divus (— a man made god by senatorial decree) see S. Weinstock, Divus Julius (1971), 391 f., citing Serv., Aen. v. 45: ‘… “divum” et “deorum” indifferenter plerumque ponit poeta. quamquum sit diseretio. ut deos perpetuos dicamus, divos ex hominibus factos, quasi qui diem obierint: unde divos etiam imperatores vocamus.’ ‘… the poet uses “divum” and “deorum” without difference for the most part, although there should be a distinction in that we call the immortals “deos”. but gods made out of men we term “divos” inasmuch as they have ended their days; whence emperors too we call “divos”.’

15 ‘Whereas the deified Claudius killed his father-in-law. Appius Silanus … my proposal is that he be severely punished and not given exemption from due process of law, and that he be deported as soon as possible and leave heaven within thirty days and Olympus within three.’ Cf. Bowersock, G.W.. ‘Greek Intellectuals and the Imperial Cult in the Second Century AD.’, in Boer, W. den (ed.). Le Culte des Souverains dans L' Empire remain, Entretiens Eondation Hardl 19 (1972). 179–206 at 198 fGoogle Scholar.

16 Suetonius seems to put the deification after Claudius' burial in Claud, XLV: ‘funeratusque est solemni principum pompa et in numerum deorum retains; quem honorem a Nerone destitution abolitumque recepit mox per Vespasianum.’ ‘He was buried with regal pomp and enrolled among the gods, an honour neglected and finally annulled by Nero, but later restored to him by Vespasian’; cf. Nero ix: … ‘Cluudium appuralissimo funere elatum laudavit et conseeravit.’ ‘… he gave Claudius a magnificent funeral, spoke his eulogy, and deified him.’ The evidential value of this is dubious as the deification was not annulled by Nero, though he did pull down the temple of Divus Claudius on the Mons Caelius. Strictly speaking, moreover, it was the Senate that deified Claudius, not Nero; cf. Fishwick, op. cit. (note 5). 1.1. 158; 1.2. 296 f. with refs.

17 ‘Divine honours were voted to Claudius, and his funeral solemnities were celebrated precisely as those of the deified Augustus. Agrippina emulating the magnificence of her great-grandmother. Livia.’

18 ‘The Senate, too. decreed her two lictors and the priesthood of Claudius, to whom was voted at the same session a public funeral …’

19 For mox in the sense of ‘next’ see Oxford Latin Dictionary 1139. 3b s.v.

20 The Annals of Tacitus. Vol. II (1907). 155 f. ad. XII. 2. 6Google Scholar; Koestermann, E.. Cornelius Tacitus Annalen. Band III (1967), 237 fGoogle Scholar. puts the decree of deification later (mox). but not explicitly after the funeral. The procedure in the case of Augustus is hardly an apposite model as divine honours were decreed on 17 September, that is a month after his funeral: Degrassi, , Inscript XIII. 2. p. 510Google Scholar with sources: Fishwick. op. cit. (note 5), 1. 1. 159-63. Seneca's sneer at Claudius' funeral - that you'd know beyond doubt it was a god being buried (XII. 1) - also seems to place his deification beforehand.

21 Weinstock. op. cit. (note 14), 390 ff. points out that the consecration of a divus will have included the creation of the statutes of his cult: the lex templi providing for the name of the new god, his priest and his temple; all belong together. For flamen as the technical term appropriate to the priest of a divus see Fishwick, op. cit. (note 5). 1. 1.

22 ibid. 1. 2. 202.

23 cf. Eden. op. cit. (note 3). 45: ‘… and, as if he were' a god, pray “to happen on the fool when well-disposed”?’

24 cf. Apoc. xi. 3-4: ‘hunc nunc deum facere vullis? … hunc deum quis colet? quis credet?’ ‘Is this the man you now want to make a god? … Who will worship this man as a god? Who will believe in him?’ For the suggestion that ut deum in VIII. 3 is an intrusive gloss also see Eden. op. cit. (note 3) 105.

25 Fishwick, D.. ‘Votive Offerings to the Emperor?’ ZPE lxxx (1990). 121–30: idem. ‘Prayer and the Living Emperor’, in Mélanges in Honor of Alexander G. McKay (1991). 104-17Google Scholar.

26 See in particular Livy 1. 16. 3 (Romulus); Suet., lul. LXXXV (Caesar); Virgil, . Eel. ix. 46–9 (Caesar); Val. Max. 1. 6. 13 (Caesar)Google Scholar: Virgil, , Georg. 1. 24–42 (Octavian post mortem); Aen. 1. 286-90 (Caesar or Augustus post mortem)Google Scholar; Ovid, . Ex. Ponto iv. 9. 127–34; iv. 13. 24 (Divus Augustus); cf. Met. xv. 869 f. (Augustus post mortem); Prudentius. Contra. Oral. Sym., I. 245-8 (Divus Augustus): SHA Mark. Anton, XVIII. 3-7 (Marcus Aurelius)Google Scholar: Libanius, . Or. XVIII. 304; cf. Or. xv. 36; Or. xxiv. 40 (Julian)Google Scholar. For discussion of these passages see Fishwick, D.. ‘Ovid and Divus Augustus.’ CPh lxxxvi (1991). 36–41Google Scholar; idem. ‘Prudentius and the Cult of Divus Augustus.’ Historia xxxix (1990). 475-86 at 483-5. Such an outlook is radically different from the rationalist view of deification as simply a posthumous reward for meritorious conduct during life; cf. Nock, A.D., ‘Deification and Julian’. JRS xlvii (1957). 115–23Google Scholar at 121 with n.47 (= A.D. Nock [ed. Z. Stewart]. Essays on Religion and the Ancient World (1972). 884 with n.47. citing Minuc. Fel., Oct. XXI. 9: ‘qui consecrantur non ad fidem numinis sed ad honorem emerilae polestatis;’ ‘who are consecrated not because of belief in their deity but in honour of their past power.’ But clearly in the vast Roman empire one should expect differing perceptions of the emperor's deification and what it implied. Not everyone was a rationalist theologian.

27 For a similar substitution see Apoc. VII. 3. with Eden. op. cit. (note 2). 95. 105 f.

28 RE XXIII. 1 (1957), 822–826 s.v. (Weinstock), citing Livy xxix. 14. 13Google Scholar; Macrob, ., Sal. III. 9. 8Google Scholar.

29 ‘Finally, before his funeral was held, so many say. the Senate and people, not in separate places but sitting together, as was never done before or after, hailed him as a gracious god.’ Weinstock. ibid., 824 takes the passage to mean the unusual feature was that in the case of Marcus Aurelius the rite took place before the funeral. As the deification of Claudius had evidently already taken place before the funeral, the quod-clause may rather apply to the following point - that the Senate and the people not in separate places but in one place acclaimed him a ‘propitious god’. So rightly the Loeb translation (Magie). In practice the consent of the comitia to the consecration of an emperor, though apparently required by the Lex Papiria. seems not to have been sought (Caesar's case is an exception). As a rule, the Senate alone decided and the decree of the Senate was sufficient, without confirmation by the assembly. See Weinstock. op. cit. (note 14). 390 with refs.

30 RE xxiii, 1 (1957), 824 f.; Weinstock, op. cit. (note 14), 390 fGoogle Scholar.

31 For the interpretation of habet in the sense that a decision had been taken authorizing the construction of a temple in Britain see Fishwick. op. cit. (note 5), I. 2. 202.

32 For analysis of the phrase ‘templum divo Claudio constitutum’ see Fishwick. ibid., 203 ff.

33 See Fishwick, ibid., 199: ‘The possibility that Claudius himself sanctioned a temple to the living emperor at Camulodunum can be dismissed out of hand. For that would not only have contradicted his stated policy, but would run counter to the whole theory of the ruler cult as laid down by Augustus and followed by Tiberius.’

34 ‘Although well aware that it was usual to vote temples even to proconsuls, he would not accept one even in a province save jointly in his own name and that of Rome.’

35 Fishwick. op. cit. (note 5), 200 f. with n. 32, 218.