The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Complete
[Footnote 843: Suetonius’s account of the rude and unlettered state of
society in the early times of Rome, is consistent with what we might
infer, and with the accounts which have come down to us, of a community
composed of the most daring and adventurous spirits thrown off by the
neighbouring tribes, and whose sole occupations were rapine and war. But
Cicero discovers the germs of mental cultivation among the Romans long
before the period assigned to it by Suetonius, tracing them to the
teaching of Pythagoras, who visited the Greek cities on the coast of Italy
in the reign of Tarquinius Superbus.--Tusc. Quaest. iv. 1.]
[Footnote 844: Livius, whose cognomen Andronicus, intimates his
extraction, was born of Greek parents. He began to teach at Rome in the
consulship of Claudius Cento, the son of Appius Caecus, and Sempronius
Tuditanus, A.U.C. 514. He must not be confounded with Titus Livius, the
historian, who flourished in the Augustan age.]
[Footnote 845: Ennius was a native of Calabria. He was born the year
after the consulship mentioned in the preceding note, and lived to see at
least his seventy-sixth year, for Gellius informs us that at that age he
wrote the twelfth book of his Annals.]
[Footnote 846: Porcius Cato found Ennius in Sardinia, when he conquered
that island during his praetorship. He learnt Greek from Ennius there,
and brought him to Rome on his return. Ennius taught Greek at Rome for a
long course of years, having M. Cato among his pupils.]
[Footnote 847: Mallos was near Tarsus, in Cilicia. Crates was the son of
Timocrates, a Stoic philosopher, who for his critical skill had the
surname of Homericus.]
[Footnote 848: Aristarchus flourished at Alexandria, in the reign of
Ptolemy Philometer, whose son he educated.]
[Footnote 849: A.U.C. 535-602 or 605.]
[Footnote 850: Cicero (De Clar. Orat. c. xx., De Senect. c. v. 1)
places the death of Ennius A.U.C. 584, for which there are other
authorities; but this differs from the account given in a former note.]
[Footnote 851: The History of the first Punic War by Naevius is mentioned
by Cicero, De Senect, c. 14.]
[Footnote 852: Lucilius, the poet, was born about A.U.C. 605.]
[Footnote 853: Q. Metellus obtained the surname of Numidicus, on his
triumph over Jugurtha, A.U.C. 644. Aelius, who was Varro’s tutor,
accompanied him to Rhodes or Smyrna, when he was unjustly banished, A.U.C.
653.]
[Footnote 854: Servius Claudius (also called Clodius) is commended by
Cicero, Fam. Epist. ix. 16, and his singular death mentioned by Pliny,
xxv. 4.]
[Footnote 855: Daphnis, a shepherd, the son of Mercury, was said to have
been brought up by Pan. The humorous turn given by Lenaeus to Lutatius’s
cognomen is not very clear. Daphnides is the plural of Daphnis; therefore
the herd or company, agaema; and Pan was the god of rustics, and the
inventor of the rude music of the reed.]
[Footnote 856: Oppius Cares is said by Macrobius to have written a book
on Forest Trees.]
[Footnote 857: Quintilian enumerates Bibaculus among the Roman poets in
the same line with Catullus and Horace, Institut. x. 1. Of Sigida we know
nothing; even the name is supposed to be incorrectly given. Apuleius
mentions a Ticida, who is also noticed by Suetonius hereafter in c. xi.,
where likewise he gives an account of Valerius Cato.]
[Footnote 858: Probably Suevius, of whom Macrobius informs us that he was
the learned author of an Idyll, which had the title of the Mulberry Grove;
observing, that “the peach which Suevius reckons as a species of the nuts,
rather belongs to the tribe of apples.”]
[Footnote 859: Aurelius Opilius is mentioned by Symmachus and Gellius.
His cotemporary and friend, Rutilius Rufus, having been a military tribune
under Scipio in the Numantine war, wrote a history of it. He was consul
A.U.C. 648, and unjustly banished, to the general grief of the people,
A.U.C. 659.]
[Footnote 860: Quintilian mentions Gnipho, Instit. i. 6. We find that
Cicero was among his pupils. The date of his praetorship, given below,
fixes the time when Gnipho flourished.]
[Footnote 861: This strange cognomen is supposed to have been derived
from a cork arm, which supplied the place of one Dionysius had lost. He
was a poet of Mitylene.]
[Footnote 862: See before, JULIUS, c. xlvi.]
[Footnote 863: A.U.C. 687.]
[Footnote 864: Suetonius gives his life in c. x.]
[Footnote 865: A grade of inferior officers in the Roman armies, of which
we have no very exact idea.]
[Footnote 866: Horace speaks feelingly on the subject:
Memini quae plagosum mihi parvo
Orbilium tractare. Epist. xi. i. 70.
I remember well when I was young,
How old Orbilius thwacked me at my tasks.]
[Footnote 867: Domitius Marsus wrote epigrams. He is mentioned by Ovid
and Martial.]
[Footnote 868: This is not the only instance mentioned by Suetonius of
statues erected to learned men in the place of their birth or celebrity.
Orbilius, as a schoolmaster, was represented in a sitting posture, and
with the gown of the Greek philosophers.]
[Footnote 869: Tacitus (Annal. cxi. 75) gives the character of
Atteius Capito. He was consul A.U.C. 758.]
[Footnote 870: Asinius Pollio; see JULIUS, c. xxx.]
[Footnote 871: Whether Hermas was the son or scholar of Gnipho, does not
appear,]
[Footnote 872: Eratosthenes, an Athenian philosopher, flourished in
Egypt, under three of the Ptolemies successively. Strabo often mentions
him. See xvii. p. 576.]
[Footnote 873: Cornelius Helvius Cinna was an epigrammatic poet, of the
same age as Catullus. Ovid mentions him, Tristia, xi. 435.]
[Footnote 874: Priapus was worshipped as the protector of gardens.]
[Footnote 875: Zenodotus, the grammarian, was librarian to the first
Ptolemy at Alexandria, and tutor to his sons.]
[Footnote 876: For Crates, see before, p. 507.]
[Footnote 877: We find from Plutarch that Sylla was employed two days
before his death, in completing the twenty-second book of his
Commentaries; and, foreseeing his fate, entrusted them to the care of
Lucullus, who, with the assistance of Epicadius, corrected and arranged
them. Epicadius also wrote on Heroic verse, and Cognomina.]
[Footnote 878: Plutarch, in his Life of Caesar, speaks of the loose
conduct of Mucia, Pompey’s wife, during her husband’s absence.]
[Footnote 879: Fam. Epist. 9.]
[Footnote 880: Cicero ad Att. xii. 36.]
[Footnote 881: See before, AUGUSTUS, c. v.]
[Footnote 882: Lenaeus was not singular in his censure of Sallust.
Lactantius, 11. 12, gives him an infamous character; and Horace says of
him,
Libertinarum dico;
Sallustius in quas
Non minus insanit; quam qui moechatur.--Sat. i. 2. 48.]
[Footnote 883: The name of the well known Roman knight, to whom Cicero
addressed his Epistles, was Titus Pomponius Atticus. Although Satrius was
the name of a family at Rome, no connection between it and Atticus can be
found, so that the text is supposed to be corrupt. Quintus Caecilius was
an uncle of Atticus, and adopted him. The freedman mentioned in this
chapter probably assumed his name, he having been the property of
Caecilius; as it was the custom for freedmen to adopt the names of their
patrons.]
[Footnote 884: Suetonius, TIBERIUS, c. viii. Her name was Pomponia.]
[Footnote 885: See AUGUSTUS, c. lxvi.]
[Footnote 886: He is mentioned before, c. ix.]
[Footnote 887: Verrius Flaccus is mentioned by St. Jerome, in conjunction
with Athenodorus of Tarsus, a Stoic philosopher, to have flourished A.M.C.
2024, which is A.U.C. 759; A.D. 9. He is also praised by Gellius,
Macrobius, Pliny, and Priscian.]
[Footnote 888: Cinna wrote a poem, which he called “Smyrna,” and was nine
years in composing, as Catullus informs us, 93. 1.]
[Footnote 889: See AUGUSTUS, cc. lxii. lxix.]
[Footnote 890: Cornelius Alexander, who had also the name of Polyhistor,
was born at Miletus, and being taken prisoner, and bought by Cornelius,
was brought to Rome, and becoming his teacher, had his freedom given him,
with the name of his patron. He flourished in the time of Sylla, and
composed a great number of works; amongst which were five books on Rome.
Suetonius has already told us (AUGUSTUS, xxix.) that he had the
care of the Palatine Library.]
[Footnote 891: No such consul as Caius Licinius appears in the Fasti; and
it is supposed to be a mistake for C. Atinius, who was the colleague of
Cn. Domitius Calvinus, A.U.C. 713, and wrote a book on the Civil War.]
[Footnote 892: Julius Modestus, in whom the name of the Julian family was
still preserved, is mentioned with approbation by Gellius, Martial,
Quintilian, and others.]
[Footnote 893: Melissus is mentioned by Ovid, De Pontif. iv 16-30.]
[Footnote 894: See AUGUSTUS, c. xxix. p. 93, and note.]
[Footnote 895: The trabea was a white robe, with a purple border, of a
different fashion from the toga.]
[Footnote 896: See before, c. x.]
[Footnote 897: See CLAUDIUS, c. x1i. and note.]
[Footnote 898: Remmius Palaemon appears to have been cotemporary with
Pliny and Quintilian, who speak highly of him.]
[Footnote 899: Now Vicenza.]
[Footnote 900: “Audiat haec tantum vel qui venit, ecce, Palaemon.”--Eccl.
iii. 50.]
[Footnote 901: All the editions have the word vitem; but we might
conjecture, from the large produce, that it is a mistake for vineam, a
vineyard: in which case the word vasa might be rendered, not bottles, but
casks. The amphora held about nine gallons. Pliny mentions that Remmius
bought a farm near the turning on the Nomentan road, at the tenth
mile-stone from Rome.]
[Footnote 902: “Usque ad infamiam oris.”--See TIBERIUS, p. 220, and the
notes.]
[Footnote 903: Now Beyrout, on the coast of Syria. It was one of the
colonies founded by Julius Caesar when he transported 80,000 Roman
citizens to foreign parts.--JULIUS, xlii.]
[Footnote 904: This senatus consultum was made A.U.C. 592.]
[Footnote 905: Hirtius and Pansa were consuls A.U.C. 710.]
[Footnote 906: See NERO, c. x.]
[Footnote 907: As to the Bullum, see before, JULIUS, c. lxxxiv.]
[Footnote 908: This extract given by Suetonius is all we know of any
epistle addressed by Cicero to Marcus Titinnius.]
[Footnote 909: See Cicero’s Oration, pro Caelio, where Atracinus is
frequently mentioned, especially cc. i. and iii.]
[Footnote 910: “Hordearium rhetorem.”]
[Footnote 911: From the manner in which Suetonius speaks of the old
custom of chaining one of the lowest slaves to the outer gate, to supply
the place of a watch-dog, it would appear to have been disused in his
time.]
[Footnote 912: The work in which Cornelius Nepos made this statement is
lost.]
[Footnote 913: Pliny mentions with approbation C. Epidius, who wrote some
treatises in which trees are represented as speaking; and the period in
which he flourished, agrees with that assigned to the rhetorician here
named by Suetonius. Plin. xvii. 25.]
[Footnote 914: Isauricus was consul with Julius Caesar II., A.U.C. 705,
and again with L. Antony, A.U.C. 712.]
[Footnote 915: A river in the ancient Campania, now called the Sarno,
which discharges itself into the bay of Naples.]
[Footnote 916: Epidius attributes the injury received by his eyes to the
corrupt habits he contracted in the society of M. Antony.]
[Footnote 917: The direct allusion is to the “style” or probe used by
surgeons in opening tumours.]
[Footnote 918: Mark Antony was consul with Julius Caesar, A.U.C. 709.
See before, JULIUS, c. lxxix.]
[Footnote 919: Philipp. xi. 17.]
[Footnote 920: Leontium, now called Lentini, was a town in Sicily, the
foundation of which is related by Thucydides, vi. p. 412. Polybius