INTRODUCTION

TO THE

ORATION FOR A. LICINIUS ARCHIAS,

THE POET.

A. LICINIUS ARCHIAS was a native of Antiochia in Syria. We know little about him except what Cicero has told us in this oration. He distinguished himself by his talents in his native city (c. 3), which he left when he was a very young man to travel in other parts of Asia and in Greece. Cicero speaks in the most extravagant terms of his reputation. He made what is vulgarly called a sensation, wherever he came, and even before he reached a place. His great talent was to make extempore verses (improvvisare) (c. 8): he was a man for display, a wordy Greek. Quintilian (Inst. x. 7, 19) mentions this talent of Archias, but only on the authority of Cieero. Archias next visited the south of Italy, and received among other distinctions the citizenship in Tarentum, Rhegium, and Neapolis. In B.c. 102, in the consulship of Marius and Catulus, he came to Rome where he got the patronage of the Luculli, and he retained the friendship of this powerful family to the last. Cicero (c. 3) using a Roman expression says that Archias was a very young man (praetextatus) when he came to Rome. He must have been a mere boy, if we give to this word its proper meaning. The Luculli received him well, says Cicero, who means L. Lucullus, the father, and his sons Lucius who afterwards conducted the war against Mithridates, and Marcus. But the sons were still boys. In B.c. 102 L. Lucullus the father had the command of the Roman troops in the Servile war in Sicily.

Drumann maintains that Archias accompanied Lucullus the father to Sicily, and his authority for this assertion is Cicero (c. 4). But this depends on the reading of that passage (cum L. Lucullo), on the interpretation of the words Interim satis longo intervallo,' and on the words cum eodem Lucullo decederet.' There are many objections to Drumann's opinion, and it seems more likely that cum L. Lucullo' should either be 6 cum M. Lucullo' (c. 4, note); or that the son L. Lucullus is meant. If Archias came to Rome in B.C. 102, he could not

have accompanied Lucullus the father to Sicily; for it was some time after his arrival in Rome, says Cicero, that Archias accompanied Lucullus to Sicily. Halm assumes that it was M. Lucullus the son, whom he went with; and he conjectures that this journey was connected with the prosecution which L. and M. Luculli conducted against the augur Servilius (Plutarch, Lucullus, c. 1). L. Lucullus the father had been prosecuted for Peculatus or maladministration during his Sicilian praetorship by Servilius, and had gone into exile.

On leaving Sicily with Lucullus, Archias went to Heraclea in Lucania, where he was admitted a citizen through the influence of Lucullus. It is conjectured that Lucullus the father was living at Heraclea. But it is just as reasonable to conjecture that he was living somewhere else. This visit to Heraclea was before the Marsic war, as the narrative of Cicero shows (c. 4). In B.C. 89 the Lex Plautia et Papiria gave the Roman 'civitas' on certain conditions to all persons whose names were at that time enrolled on the list of citizens in a Civitas Foederata. Heraclea had a Foedus with Rome, and Archias who wished to become a Roman citizen made the necessary declaration at Rome before his friend the praetor Q. Metellus Pius, and was admitted a Roman citizen. After the fashion of Greeks who got the Roman 'civitas' through a Roman patron, he adopted the Gentile name of his patron, and became A. Licinius Archias. The new citizens were not enrolled on the Censors' lists before the Census of B.C. 86, and Archias was then in Asia with L. Lucullus, who was Sulla's quaestor (c. 5). Again in B.C. 70 Archias was not entered on the Censors' lists, for he was in Asia with L. Lucullus who was then conducting the war against Mithridates. In B.C. 65, 64 there was no census.

In B.C. 62 a man named Gratius prosecuted Archias before the praetor, who was, as the Scholiast says, Q. Cicero, Marcus' brother, and under the Lex Papia, which was directed against those who acted as if they had the Civitas without being entitled to it. This fact appears from the Argumentum published by Mai. The motives of the prosecutor are not mentioned by Cicero, but modern acuteness can discover them: "In Archias his prosecutor attacked the protectors of Archias: it can scarcely be doubted that the prosecutor, a man in other respects altogether unknown, acted at the instigation of the Pompeian party, which the year before had sustained a defeat by the triumph of L. Lucullus" (Drumann, Geschichte Roms, iv. 202).

Cicero defended Archias who had begun to write a poem on Cicero's consulship; and this was the reason, says Halm, though he does not say how he knows it, that Cicero undertook the poet's defence, rather than the reason which Cicero gives in the opening of his speech. A year later Cicero says to Atticus (i. 16): Archias has written nothing about

me; and yet he says in this oration that Archias had begun the poem (c. 11). He adds that he is afraid that Archias was employed upon a Caeciliana Fabula, something perhaps that related to the Gens Caecilia. However Cicero made up for Archias' omission by writing the history of his consulship in Greek prose; and he was so vain as to think that nobody could venture to handle the same subject after him (Ad Att. i. 20).

So far as we can judge from what the orator says there was no difficulty in proving Archias' title; and Cicero accordingly devoted the larger part of this short speech to the praise of poetry and of learned men. It seems likely that when he published this oration he left out all the more formal part and elaborated the introduction and the peroration as a kind of rhetorical exercise.

Halm says that the poet gained his cause, but I know no ancient writer who says so. However the cause has preserved Archias' name. His works are lost, but perhaps it is no loss to us. He wrote a poem on the Cimbrian war of C. Marius; and another poem on the Mithridatic war and his patron L. Lucullus. He wrote something, perhaps an Epigram, on the actor Q. Roscius, who, as the story goes, when he was a child and lying in his cradle, was found by his nurse encircled in the folds of a serpent. This memorable incident, which was interpreted as a sign of his future fame, was commemorated by the artist Pasiteles in silver and by Archias in some verses (De Divin. i. c. 36). There are several Epigrams in the Anthology which bear the name of Archias, but none of them is assigned to the poet of Antioch.

Some critics have disputed the genuineness of this speech; but there is no evidence either external or internal against its being the work of Cicero. Tacitus, or the author of the De Oratoribus (c. 37), speaks of an oration for Licinius Archias by Cicero, and he remarks that it is not one of those on which the oratorical reputation of Cicero is founded.

I have used for this oration the notes of Halm in his edition of 1853; and the edition of this oration by Baiter in the second edition of Orelli's Cicero.

The following are the MSS. to which Baiter refers:

=

G Cod. Gemblacensis, nunc Bruxellensis, num. 5352, membr. sec. xii. (collated by Baiter).

E = Cod. Erfurtensis, nunc Berolinensis.

Р

=

Lectiones a P. Pithoeo ad margines exempli editionis Lambinianae a. 1581, quod extat in bibliotheca Heidelbergensi, adscriptae. S = Scholiastes Ambrosianus ap. Aug. Maium Class. Auctt. e Vatic. Codd. edit. t. ii.

B = Cod. Barberinus prior Garatonii.

A

Editio Ascensiana prima a. 1511.

A. Licinius Archias se studiis poeticis dedidit, et adprime, ut videbatur, excelluit in hoc genere litterarum. Amicitia igitur etiam viris inlustribus familiariter copulatus est, ut ipse M. Tullius in orationis hujus narratione confirmat. Interim satis longo intervallo quum esset cum L. Lucullo in Siciliam profectus, et quum ex ea provincia cum eodem L. Lucullo regrederetur, Heracleam venit, quae tunc erat civitas foederata, et ascribtus est in ordinem Heracliensium civis. Tunc Silvanus et Carbo cos. legem tulerunt, ut omnes, qui essent ex foederatis populis, civitatem Romanam consequerentur: si modo illo tempore, quo lex lata esset, domicilium in Italia haberent, et intra diem sexagensimum professi apud praetorem fuissent. Quae quum Licinio Archiae ad obtinendum jus civi. tatis Romanae argumenta deessent, quoniam neque tabulis Heracliensium probare poterat asdcribtum se in ordinem civium; quippe tabularium civitatis illius exarserat bello sociali, nec bona sua in censum detulerat; reus factus est lege Papia, quae lata fuerat ad eos coercendos, qui temere et inlicite civitatem Romanam usurpassent. Fit ergo quasi conjecturalis, an adscribtus sit in ordinem Heracliensium, et an fecerit omnia, quae is facere debuerit, qui esset e numero foederatorum. Et deficitur quidem multis probationibus; testimonio tamen Heracliensium et vel maxime, quibus tota occupatur oratio, poeticae facultatis et doctrinae jucundissimae gratia nititur. Est etiam, omissa conjectura, disceptatio per ipsam qualitatem personae, ut civis Romanus debeat adoptari, etiamsi in praeteritum non sit adscribtus 2.

I. Si quid est in me ingenii, judices, quod sentio quam sit exiguum, aut si qua exercitatio dicendi, in qua me non infitior mediocriter esse versatum, aut si hujusce rei ratio aliqua ab optima

1 This was published by Mai. He supposes it to be by Asconius Pedianus. The parts in italics were supplied by Mai.

2 The MS. has 'adsocius.'

VOL. III.

P

rum artium studiis ac disciplina profecta, a qua ego nullum confiteor aetatis meae tempus abhorruisse, earum rerum omnium vel in primis hic A. Licinius fructum a me repetere prope suo jure debet. Nam quoad longissime potest mens mea respicere spatium praeteriti temporis et pueritiae memoriam recordari ultimam, inde usque repetens hunc video mihi principem et ad suscipiendam et ad ingrediendam rationem horum studiorum exstitisse. Quod si haec vox hujus hortatu praeceptisque conformata nonnullis aliquando saluti fuit, a quo id accepimus quo ceteris opitulari et alios servare possemus, huic profecto ipsi quantum est situm in nobis et opem et salutem ferre debemus. Ac ne quis a nobis hoc ita dici forte miretur, quod alia quaedam in hoc facultas sit ingenii neque haec dicendi ratio aut disciplina, ne nos quidem huic uni studio penitus umquam dediti fuimus. Etenim omnes artes quae ad humanitatem pertinent

in art (ars) or in natural talent (i. 23, &c.). It lies in both, but without nature a man will not get much from art.

hic A. Licinius] He gives him a Roman name. The praenomen Aulus does not belong to any of the Luculli, so far as we know. There are many examples of Greeks adopting the Gentile name of their patrons (Vol. I. Verr. ii. 4. c. 17). prope suo jure] Almost as his own by right.' (Vol. I. Verr. ii. 5. c. 1.) The 'fructus' of Cicero's talent, if he had any, of his practice as a speaker, and of his oratorical principles or art, was his 'oratoria facultas,' his oratorical power; and as Archias had helped to sow the seeds, he had almost a right to claim the fruits.

pueritiae memoriam] Archias came to Rome in B.C. 102, when Cicero was four years old. Cicero came to Rome before B.C. 91. He does not speak of Archias as his master in rhetoric; but he was indebted to him for something, example, exhortation, and advice at least.

ceteris... alios] Help every body else, and rescue some.' For alios' is simply ' others,' not Archias; and 'ceteri' are all not including Archias.'

possemus,] 'possumus,' G. E. and Halm. Either may do, but the meaning is not the same. Baiter has possemus.'

huic uni] Cicero alludes to his own poetical writings. He begun with poetry, as many clever boys do, and ended with prose (Plutarch, Cicero, c. 2.) The MSS. have huic cuncti' or 'cunti,' which has long since been changed to 'huic uni.' 'Puteanus, huicce uni' (Baiter). If 'huic uni' is not the true reading, it makes sense at least; and 'cuncti' does not, for we

humanitatem] Halm quotes another passage of Cicero, in which he expresses the same clear and enlarged view of the connexion, the kinship of all the arts and sciences. It is Plato's saying however, but not the worse for that: "Est etiam illa Platonis vera... vox, Omnem doctrinam harum ingenuarum et humanarum artium uno quodam societatis vinculo contineri." (De Ör. iii. c. 6.) The remark may be useful to those very superficial people, who cannot praise their own pursuits without decrying those of others.

The critics dispute how much is expressed by humanitas' in this passage. Manutius limits it to oratory, poetry, history; or perhaps he names these only as examples. But humanitas' comprises all that characterizes man as a rational animal. Humanitas' came from the Greeks, says Cicero to his brother (Ad Q. Fr. i. 1. c. 9) : it was the fruit of Grecian civility. The arts and philosophy of Greece humanized Rome; and the humanitas' of Greece and Rome rescued modern Europe from its savage state. We still cling to this humanitas as our only hope and our safety against a fresh age of barbarism. We must adopt the word humanity' in this its wide sense, as we have it in a narrower sense. Romans used it both ways, and as our language is now Roman, we must adopt in its enlarged sense the word which shows our obligation to the Romans, and expresses something for which we want an expression.

The