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Marius' Villas: the Testimony of the Slave and the Knave

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

E. Badian
E. Badian
Affiliation:
Harvard University
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Extract

Plutarch tells us that the great C. Marius possessed a Campanian villa, which in 88 B.C. could be regarded as more luxuriously appointed than befitted an old soldier; though more than a century later, Seneca, in moralistic mood, could describe it as positively Spartan compared with those of his own day. The villa (we are specifically and credibly informed) was sited in the territory of Misenum; but for rhetorical purposes both Plutarch and Seneca connect it with Baiae—a name that had more powerful associations of luxury and that, even geographically, was not far out.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 63 , November 1973 , pp. 121 - 132
Copyright
Copyright ©E. Badian 1973. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 Plut., Mar. 34, 2 f. (calling the luxurious amenities ‘effeminate’); Sen., ep. 51, 11 (telling us that, like the villas of Pompey and Caesar, it was built on a hilltop and was ‘a camp rather than a villa’). As D'Arms, J. H., Romans on the Bay of Naples (1970), 23Google Scholar, notes, Seneca's comment, in view of its context, ‘is best taken figuratively, not literally’ and does not really contradict Plutarch, whose rhetorical point (we may add) was the opposite of Seneca's.

2 Plutarch, after reporting that Marius' enemies were telling him to ‘go to Baiae’ and attend to his rheumatism, defines the actual location of the villa as ‘around Misenum’. This is confirmed by Pliny, , n.h. xviii, 32.Google Scholar Seneca vaguely speaks of the regio Baiana. Pliny comments on the carefully planned layout, and on the balance between house and farm, which he ascribes to Marius' military experience. If, as the passage suggests, Marius applied techniques modelled on castrametation, this would provide a basis for Seneca's comment.

3 Johnson, J., Excavations at Minturnae ii, 1 (1933), pp. 47, 63.Google Scholar

4 Passerini, A., Athenaeum, n.s. xii, 1934, 372Google Scholar= Studi su Caio Mario (1972), 185; Athenaeum, n.s. xvii, 1939, 68 = Studi (cit.) 214. Endorsement by Münzer had intervened: see his fascinating article on the aristocratic families represented among the slave-owners in these inscriptions, MDAI (R) 1, 1935, 321–30 (at 323).

5 Carney, T. F., ‘The Flight and Exile of Marius’, G & R viii, 1961, 98 ff.Google Scholar, at 105, citing Passerini.

6 J. H. D'Arms, op. cit. (n. 1) 28, n. 31: ‘the slave of a C. Marius, surely the consul’, with a reference to Johnson.

7 D' Arms, op. cit. 26–30 (earlier CQ, n.s. xviii, 1968, 185 ff.). The two villas had been treated as distinct (although only by implication) by Münzer, anticipating D'Arms: see RE, s.v. ‘Cornelius’, no. 412, and s.v. ‘Scribonius’, no. 10, also suggesting purchase in the time of the proscriptions.

8 This is carefully discussed by D'Arms, I.c., though one should add Sulla's failure to insist on payment, which was only remedied nearly a decade later (Sall., hist iv, 1 M; Cic, 2 Verr. iii, 81). However, in view of these circumstances, I do not see how the sale of the villa, somewhat later, at a much higher price can be said to confirm the tradition of Cornelia's avarice (D'Arms 28, n. 33): she presumably sold at market value. If one could take a passage of the elder Pliny literally, it could be held that the elder Curio was not a profiteer of the proscriptions. Pliny contrasts his son with the younger M. Scaurus, stressing the fact that he lacked the resources of the latter: ‘unde enim illi uitricus Sulla et Metella mater proscriptionum sectrix?’ (xxxvi, 116). But since this is clearly an exercise in sarcastic rhetoric, it is perhaps better not to insist on the integrity of C. Curio.

9 D'Arms 28, n. 31. On the supposed Campanian following of Marius, see my comments, Studies in Greek and Roman History (1964) 59–62: there is no evidence for corporate clientelae and very little (no more than elsewhere, and no more than for other eminent Romans) for individuals. The events of Marius' flight show that he could not expect overwhelming support, such as (after his return) he both expected and received in Etruria.

10 See n. 4 above with text.

11 Johnson, op. cit. 123–5. On the. SC of 64, see Linderski, J., Gesellschaft u. Recht im griech.—röm. Altertum (Berlin, 1968), 94 ff.Google Scholar

12 Münzer, op. cit. (n. 4), 321.

13 Johnson (124 f.) thinks that the lettering of his nos. 10 and 17 is noticeably later than that of the rest and speculates as to whether they could date from a resumption of the cult after an intermission! On this kind of argument, see next note with text. I should here add that, like most scholars, I ignore the fantasies of Staedler, E., Hermes lxxvii, 1944, 149 ff.Google Scholar

14 Some of the stones of the magistri Campani and nearly all those of the magistri Minturnenses are reproduced in A. Degrassi, Imagines, nos. 263–8 and 269–91 respectively. Had the Campanian lists not been dated, no one could have put them in anything like the right order on palaeographic criteria. (Cf. also the corresponding urban documents 259–62—quite undatable except within wide common-sense limits.) For the document of 2 B.C. (fortunately dated), see Gordon, A. E. and J. S., Album of Dated Latin Inscriptions i (1958)Google Scholar, no. 33 (contrast faces a and b): but for its date, 33 b might have been assigned to a different century!

15 Cic, Att. ii, 14. 2; 15, 3. See Münzer, op. cit. (n. 4) 324 f. (not known to Shackleton Bailey, ad locc).

16 As Johnson points out, tracing owners' names unfortunately does not help much in dating the documents. Thus we cannot even tell whether 28 is earlier or later than 6. As a curiosity, it might be noted that the only two documents on which Saufeii certainly occur are 22 and 28, and they occur twice on each—these two stones surely belong close together in time. It would help if we could discover an ex-slave as a freedman on another document. Unfortunately there is no really certain case of this, though M. Epidius Antiochus (16; cf. 1: no praenomen survives, but of thirteen slaves and freedmen of Epidii with praenomina only one does not offer ‘M.’) is highly probable, and c. Novius Papia (15; cf. 25) is possible, if the ligature in 15, 11 is intended for ‘M.l.’ rather than ‘M’.1.'. (The latter in Johnson, the former—for what it is worth —in Staedler, op. cit.).

17 Johnson, op. cit. 43. For damnatio memoriae and its consequences (chief of them the loss of right to burial) see, e.g., Mommsen, Röm. Strafr. 66; 591. Cf. Vittinghoff, , Der Staatsfeind in der röm. Kaiserzeit (1936), 43 f.Google Scholar (18 f. on erasure in documents). But Vittinghoff is not well informed on the Republic; cf. 24, n. 41, where he is puzzled at the ‘survival’ of Marius' name in his elogium.

18 Degrassi ad ILLRP 741. Erasures in inscriptions of this type have not (as far as I know) been properly investigated. Complete erasure of a name does not appear at all common. There is no instance in the lists (cited n. 14) printed in ILLRP 717 and 721, where all the names were erased, are (of course) not parallel, though puzzling in themselves. (On 721, a mosaic, see de Franciscis, A., Templum Dianae Tifatinae (1956), 20 f.Google Scholar) In 107c (pointed out to me by Mr. Frederiksen) the personal name of a slave has been erased, but the rest of his name (Orciui M.s.) left intact, in a dedication to Fortuna Primigenia. The partial erasure can hardly be penal. Presumably the wrong name had been carved (or a mistake made in the carving) and the correction was never completed.

19 M.H. Crawford. NC s.7, iv (1964), 144, takes the ploughman and team to indicate colonization. There is no way of deciding with any certainty, but the association with Ceres seems to me to favour the interpretation here given. See, however, n. 22.

20 Vergil, , Georg, ii, 513 f.Google Scholar

21 Sydenham, CRR, no. 717 (dated 86 by Crawford, l.c.).

22 See RE. s.v. ‘Marius’, no. 18; Mattingly-Sydenham, , RIC i, p. 76.Google Scholar This same moneyer's name is also found on an aureus showing a ploughing team in front of a city wall. This is clearly modelled on the coin of C. Marius Capito: Mr. Crawford points out to me that the fact that the team faces the other way strengthens the presumption that this otherwise unique type was copied by a man holding the specimen coin in front of him while he cut the die. Whether the coin is genuine appears to be in doubt. Mattingly-Sydenham, l.c. (cf. Mattingly, , CREBM i, p. 22Google Scholar), regard it as highly suspect, while Bahrfeldt, , Röm. Goldmünzenprägung (1923) 146Google Scholar, no. 185, has no doubts of its genuineness. The city wall suggests colonization. But since this was imported by whoever produced this particular coin, it shows no more than that (if the coin is genuine) the old type could be used in this way.

23 See L. R. Taylor, VDRR 275.

24 CIL × 5614 = i2 1548; Ritschl, tab. lxxiv: Occam's razor should apply to the aristocratic Marii of the first century who are not from Arpinum.

25 As D'Arms correctly points out, a villa at Baiae would technically be in the territorium of Cumae (cf. CIL x 3698). He identifies Curio's Cumanum with Marius' supposed villa at Baiae (p. 195). That a Cumanum was in fact at Baiae is, of course, possible, but—as D'Arms's list makes clear—it is by no means necessary.

26 D'Arms, op. cit. 27. (The scholiast is discussed p. 30, after being quoted n. 29.) It is—contrary to D'Arms's statement—the scholiast's text, and acceptance of it, that is decisive: but for this, Plutarch's statement would easily allow the interpretation here indicated. Indeed, as indicated above, Plutarch's knowledge of but one Baian villa—that at Misenum—is prima facie an argument against there having been two.

27 Clod, et Cur., fr. 20 (Puccioni), with schol. p. 89 St. These must be quoted in full. Cicero: ‘nec enim respexit illum ipsum patronum libidinis suae non modo apud Baias esse, uerum eas ipsas aquas habere, quae <e> gustu tamen Arpinatis fuissent.’ Schol. Bob.: ‘C. Curionem qui de proscribtione Syllana fundum emerat in Campania, qui C. Marii nuper fuerat, et ipsius Arpinatis.’ As the scholiast rightly suggests, the real point (as in Att. i, 16, 10) is not so much an attack on Curio, as the implication that he (Cicero) might be allowed to follow the precedent set by Marius. Appeals to Marius as his great predecessor are, of course, frequent in Cicero when they suit his case.

28 118 St.; see ORF2 p. 121 and, after my discussion of this (Studies in Greek and Roman History 249), ORF 3 p. 121, with no real improvement; and cf. now Pro Munere Grates (Studies Presented to H. L. Gonin, 1971) 1–3, which one may hope will settle the matter.

29 81 St. = ORF 3 pp. 190 f.

30 e.g. 135, 8 f. St., giving the price of wheat under C. Gracchus' law, is (as the scholiast admits) only a recollection of Sest. 55, on which itself his note is nothing but a piece of obvious explication (132, 26 ff. St.). 96, 26 ff. St. (on the Pisones Frugi) is almost certainly picked up in Cicero, who frequently refers to the author of the first lex repetundarum and his enmity towards C. Gracchus. (Perhaps, as Stangl suggests, it comes via Asconius, who was more likely to do the work of collecting the evidence.) On other examples of this, not always creditable, see below.

31 See Stangl, ad locc. The style is at times almost sufficient to prove it, and the kind of fact given (e.g. voting figures on juries) in a fully Asconian manner makes it certain. The value of these passages is, of course, generally high. Cf. n. 48 below.

32 See the passages collected by Mommsen, Staatsr. iii, 393, n. 2.

33 See the survey by T. Rice Holmes, Rom. Rep, i, 391–5, admitting the thinness of the attestation, but in the end accepting the scholiast. Cf. Nicolet, C., L'Ordre équ. i (1966), 598 ff.Google Scholar, for a very thorough discussion of the evidence and of literature (mainly in French). See especially 604 ff. Nicolet finds the figure in the scholiast troublante (608), but is too good a scholar to end otherwise than by rejecting it and accepting Mommsen's view that the census of the tribuni was equal to that of the equits. (I hope this discussion will convince him that there is no particular need to be disturbed by the scholiast's figure.) Suetonius in fact has nothing to say on our question: he merely reports (Aug. 32, 3): ‘ad tres iudicum decurias quartam addidit ex inferiore censu, quae ducenariorum uocaretur.’ The purpose of these men was jurisdiction in minor cases, and Gaius later added a fifth decuria. presumably also of the same rank (Mommsen, , Staatsr. iii, 534 ff.Google Scholar). As Mommsen has made clear (l.c.), the three higher decuriae under the Empire clearly consisted of equites. only: no tribuni aerarii are attested, and it is difficult to see how they were ever—long after Mommsen—spirited into this passage. Augustus' intention was presumably to provide a clear break between the senior and the junior decuriae, appropriate to their diverse functions. In any case, a census of 300,000 HS is neither implied nor conceivable for any of these groups. Earlier, as is known, Caesar had removed the tribuni aerarii from jury duty, to raise the status of the juries; i.e. (since there is no question of his reducing the number of decuriae), he must have instituted another decuria of equits to replace them (see Mommsen, l.c.). What precisely Antony did, to meet the apparent shortage of jurors after this measure, is not clear from Cicero's invective (Phil, i, 19 et al.). In any case, by the time of Augustus' reform as reported by Suetonius, that arrangement seems no longer to have been in force. (Mommsen, l.c., ignores it.) The scholiast's guess as to the property qualification is irrelevant to the problem of the tribuni aerarii.

34 Stangl's habit of putting such guesses in the text is inexcusable. (See Greenidge-Clay-Gray 114, trying to rescue what is actually in the MSS., as far as the uninformative apparatus allows it.) The fact is that the cos. 98, Q. Caecilius Q.f. Q.n. Metellus Nepos, is nowhere referred to as ‘Caecilius Nepos’ (see Degrassi, , Inscr. It. xiii, 1, 478–9Google Scholar)—a fact that will come as no surprise to anyone familiar with noble nomenclature under the Republic. There is no need to father on the scholiast an error he could not easily have made, since no source for it is readily imaginable. The ‘Pompilius’ may possibly hide a ‘Pompeius’: a tribune Q. Pompeius, later to be Sulla's colleague as consul, was active on Metellus Numidicus' behalf (Oros. v, 17; cf. MRR ii, 2 f.). If one had to suggest an emendation of what is obviously a major corruption, possibly read cum Pomp <eio et Met>ello Nepote. (The end seems hopeless.)

35 Cicero here plays this down, by comparison with Gabinius' edict removing L. Aelius from Rome. For his real opinion of such measures see n. 42 below.

36 129 St.

37 e.g. MRR ii, 11 (‘a law to send Italians resident at Rome back to their own towns’); CAH ix, 175 (citing the scholiast). For a more recent work, see A. Lintott, Violence in the Roman Republic (1968) 137 f. (on the trial of Matrinius: ‘…and that he should be expelled from Rome’). Lintott still seems unable to understand argument on that law and its provisions—see CQ xxi, 1971, 453 (against which cf. Historia xviii, 1969, 490, explaining the point that the grant of citizenship did not automatically include amnesty).

38 See last note. A particularly interesting example of the weight of the communis opinio in a case of this kind is provided by Gardner, in his (very good) Loeb edition of the pro Sestio. He gets the fact about the lex Licinia Mucia right, but still feels bound to refer to that law (not mentioned in, or relevant to, the passage in the speech) in his note ad loc.

39 See my discussion in Historia xviii, 1969, 490 f. and Dialoghi di Archeologia iv-v, 1970–71,406 f.

40 See Lewis-Short, s.v. I A.

41 See II. cc. (note 39).

42 Cic., off. iii, 47: ‘male etiam qui peregrinos urbibus uti prohibent eosque exterminant, ut Pennus apud patres nostros, Papius nuper. nam esse pro ciue qui ciuis non sit rectum est non licere; quam legem tulerunt sapientissimi consules Crassus et Scaevola; usu uero urbis prohibere peregrinos sane inhumanum est.’ Those who still interpret the lex Licinia Mucia as an expulsion act should frankly expound the grounds on which they prefer the statement of a late scholiast to that of Cicero himself.

43 Some examples from standard works: RE xii, 2402; MRR ii, 34; CAHix, 195; Mommsen. RG ii14 (1933), 239 (= History of Rome, tr. Dickson, iii (1895), 517); Bloch-Carcopino, , Hist. rom. ii, 386Google Scholar; Cary, , Hist. of Rome 2 (1954), 322Google Scholar; Heuss, , RG 2 (1964), 167Google Scholar; Maschkin, , RG (1953), 282Google Scholar (with further distortion); Pareti, , Storia di Roma iii (1953), 551 f.Google Scholar More recent, and more specialized, works are not exempt, e.g. Lintott, , CQ xxi, 1971, 453Google Scholar; Frassinetti, , Athenaeum n. s. lii, 1972, 98Google Scholar, n. 117, and 112, n. 195. Sherwin-White (RC 132 f.) drew attention to the true meaning of adscriptus in 1939, though his argument concerning the contents of the law was weakened by a misinterpretation. He thought that the professio had to be made before ‘the praetor’ at Rome, which is clearly not so: Cicero's discussion of the subject shows that all praetorian records were in principle admissible as evidence. I accepted his interpretation of the nature of the law PACA i, 1958, 3 (= Stud, in Gr. and Rom. Hist. 75 f); cf. also Historia xi, 1962, 227 f.; also Brunt, , JRS lv, 1965, 95.Google Scholar Cf. n. 45 below.

44 There are indeed problems concerning the lex Papia, on which our evidence appears to conflict, especially regarding both its crimen and its poena. These cannot be discussed here. But the evidence of the scholiast, at any rate, is couched in terms so vague that it would play no real part in such a discussion.

45 For the general position, see n. 43: there is dishearteningly little evidence of progress since 1939. Even where the truth is known, there can be reluctance to embrace it; e.g. Scullard, , From the Gracchi to Nero 3 (1970), 69 f.Google Scholar

46 Cic., Balb. 21.

47 For the circumstances, see App. b.c. i, 49, 211 f. The lex Calpurnia (Sisenna, fr. 17 P; 120 P) is another such law; and there were others of which we do not even know the names (cf. Sisenna fr. 119 P).

48 Note the disquisition on the Curiones: ‘nam tres illis temporibus Curiones inlustri nomine extiterunt.’ (Cf. such passages in Asc. as ‘duo fuerunt eo tempore Cn. Dolabellae’ (74 C).) Also the precise figures on the numbers of jurors voting for conviction and acquittal.

49 Phaedr. ii, 5, 20.

50 Varro, r.r. iii, 17, 9. Tacitus (ann. vi, 50, 2) also mentions Lucullus' ownership, with no word of Marius.

51 op. cit. 184. D'Arms adds Plut., Mar. 34, 2; but from the point of view of this question, that is a petitio principii.

52 I am happy to dedicate this essay to Sir Ronald Syme who, long ago, taught me to suspect fraudulent sources, and has since done much to expose them.