15-28
Historiographers martyrs
Began
Augusto with Titus Labienus
nicknamed, called, Rabienus (full of rabies, angry against the regime). This
author of Historiae killed himself
because he did not want to survive his work (burnt in 12 a. C.) in which he had
praised freedom.
The second
historiographer martyr was Cremuzio
Cordo.
Cornelio Cosso Asinio Agrippa consulibus Cremutius Cordus
postulatur novo ac tunc primum audito crimine, quod editis annalibus laudatoque
M. Bruto C. Cassium Romanorum ultimum dixisset", Tacito, Annales,
IV, 34,
under the
consuls Cornelio Cosso and Asinio
Agrippa (25 a. C.) is called, convened before a court, Cremuzio Cordo
for a new and never before heard crime: he had published Annales where he had praised M. Bruto and he had called C. Cassio
the last of Romans. The order came by Seiano the notorious, ill famed, prefect
of praetorian guard of Tiberio, and Cremuzio defended his work exalting
freedom. Then he left himself to die for hunger.
Cremuzio
defended himself saying that Tito Livio had celebrated Pompeo, Catullo had
shamed Caesar, Asinio Pollione praised Bruto, while Greeks leave unpunished not
only freedom but also liberty, licence. For example see the first comedies by
Aristophanes (Acarnesi, Cavaleri-Riders, 424-425).
In Giulio Cesare by Shakespeare Bruto says
to Cassius dead suicide: “The last of all
the Romans, fare the well! (V, 3, 99).
The History as palimpsest
But the history
is a palimpsest (a codex where you can write a second time after a scraping of
preceding, prior writing) as notices G. Orwell
in 1984:
"All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean
and re-inscribed exactly as often as was necessary”[1].
In fact Caligola (37-41) rehabilitated Cremuzio
Cordo and placed in favourable light his Annales.
Seneca (4 b. C.-65 a. C.) testifies it in Consolatio ad Marciam, a daughter of Cremuzio Cordo: magna illorum pars arserat (I, 3) a great part of those books had
been burnt. But now (37 a. C.) legitur,
floret; in manus hominum, in pectora receptus, vetustatem nullam timet” (I,
4), he, Cremutius, is read and blooms, the book is in the hands of men, is
received in the breasts, does not fear any ageing.
Caligola
(37-41) said: is in my interest ut facta
quaeque posteris tradantur : Svetonio-70-140 a. C.- Life of Caligola 16, 1)
that all the deeds are hand down to the posterity. In his first time as emperor
he was looking for popularity inside a trend anti Tiberian.
But later, under Nerone (54-68) Trasea Peto accused of lese majesty
killed himself. He had written a monography about Cato Uticense. Tacito
santifies him writing: “Nero virtutem ipsam excindere concupivit interfecto
Thrasea Paeto" (Annales, XVI, 21) Nero wanted to kill the
personification of virtue killing Trasea Peto,
His work debated, questioned, the autocratical
government.
Let us read
the comment of Tacito: “Scilicet illo
igne vocem populi Romani et libertatem senatus et conscientiam generis humani
aboleri arbitrabatur, expulsis insuper sapientiae professoribus atque omni bona
arte in exilium acta, ne quid usquam honestum occurreret” (Agricola, 2), evidently with that fire
they think to cancel, suppress, the freedom of senate and the conscience of
human kind, expelled what’s more the teachers of philosophy and exiled every
good culture, in order that nothing of beautiful or moral could be met in any
place. The extreme of slavery is when become impossible to speak and to listen:
“adempto per inquisitiones etiam loquendi audiendique commercio" (Agricola,
2), through spies was taken off the right to listen and to speak.
Euripide in
the tragedy Ione[2] writes that without parrhsiva , freedom in speaking, the man has
the mouth slave (tov ge stovma-dou'lon vv. 674-675).
In another
tragedy, Fenicie[3], Polinice speaks with his mother
Giocasta about the most hateful condition for the men in exile:" e{n me;n
mevgiston, oujk e[cei parrhsivan" (v. 391), one, over all, he has not freedom of speech.
But the
tyrant is not able to abolish, cut out, also the memory: “Memoriam quoque ipsam cum voce perdidissemus, si tam in nostra
potestate esset oblivisci quam tacere” (Agricola,
2), we could have lost also the memory with the voice, if we might as forget as
to be silent.
P. P.
Pasolini in his Scritti corsari
(Pirate writings, 1975) wrote that the power has excluded the free
intellectuals (p. 113)
Bad and good emperors
Tacito in
the third chapter of Agricola (98 a.
C) writes “nunc demum redit animus”,
now at last comes back the heart, the soul. He says that the emperor Nerva
began (96-98) and Traiano continues (98-117) res olim dissociabilis miscere: principatum ac libertatem, to link
things one time dissociated, empire and freedom. Traiano auget cotidie felicitatem temporum (Agricola, 3) increase every day the happiness of this new time.
But the Historiae
that narrate past time (years 69-96) is presented as “opus opimum casibus, atrox
proeliis, discors seditionibus, ipsa etiam pace saevom, quattuor principes
ferro interempi, trina bella civilia” (Historiae I, 2) a work rich of
collapses, misfortunes, terrible for battles, torn by seditions, even in peace
cruel, four emperors killed with iron (Galba, Otone, Vitellio 69, Domiziano 96)
trhee civil wars (Galba-Otone; Otone-Vitellio; Vitellio-Vespasiano)
On the
whole: “Pollutae caerimoniae, magna
adulteria, plenum exiliis mare, infecti caedibus scopuli(…)nobilitas pro crimine(…) et ob virtutes
certissimum exitium" (Historiae,
2), ceremonies polluted, profaned, great adulteries, the sea full of exiles,
the rocks spotted, stained, with măssăcres, nobility taken for crime, and for
virtues absolutely sure the death
What must do a free man under the tyrant?
Tacito
disapproves the suicide and the sterīle opposition. He finds noble the attitude
of his father in law, Agricola who: "non contumacia neque inani
iactatione libertatis, famam fatumque provocabat"(Agricola, 42) did not provoke repute and fate with obstinacy in
opposition, nor with empty, vain ostentation of freedom.
Therefore
the man must know: posse etiam sub malis
principibus magnos viros esse, that also under bad emperors can be, can
live, great man and that obedience and moderation (obsequium ac modestiam) if there are also industry and energy (si industria ac vigor adsint) can
surpass in the glory the men who inclaruerunt
ambitiosa morte became famous with a spectacular death, got trhough ruins
and precĭpĭces, per abrupta, sed in nullum rei publica usum, without
any profit, advantage for the State (Agricola,
42).
The honest
and clever man must follow a middle way between ruinous opposition and
degrading servility, a way lacking in flattery and risks, inter abruptam contumaciam et deforme obsequium pergere iter ambitione
ac periculis vacuum (Annales, IV, 20).
Seneca supported a kind of diarchy of emperor and
Senate: Nero wen became emperor in 54 a. C was 16 years and ten months old and
had Seneca as teacher in whom this teen ager believed, and in his first speech
from the throne, said: teneret antiqua munia senatus (Tacito, Annales, XIII, 4), the senate must keep his ancient, traditional prerogatives.
Seneca did
not made abruptam contumaciam, ruinous
opposition to the emperor his pupil. Only at the point of death (65), taking
leave of his friends, urged them non to cry and not to be amazed by the cruelty
of Nero: “neque aliud superesse post
matrem fratremque interfectos quam ut educatoris praeceptorisque necem adiceret”
(Annales XV, 62), nothing was missing
after the murders of mother (59) and brother (55) but to add the murder of his
educator and teacher.
The teacher
educator tried to teach the imperial pupil the mercy (see De Clementia, 55) and urged him to manage the power in favour of
subjects because to reign is an honourable service, e[ndoxo" douleiva, as said Antigono Gonata king of
Macedonia (276-239) educated by stoic teachers.
Seneca,
after repudation by Nerone (in 62) remebers that along the Golden age: “officium erat imperare, non regnum” (Ep. 90, 5), to command was a duty, not a
kingdom.
On the
other hand, neither saint Paul proclaimed the revolt against the emperor: in 57
or 58 ( therefore under Nero) in Epistula
ad Romanos, Epistle To Romans, the Apostle writes : “οὐ γὰρ ἔστιν
ἐξουσία εἰ μὴ ὑπὸ Θεοῦ”
(non est enim potestas nisi a deo, 13, 1), every power comes from God, is no
power but of God.
So: “quae
autem sunt, a Deo ordinatae sunt (13, 1).
Itaque, qui resistit potestati, Dei ordinationi resistit; qui autem resistunt
ipsi, sibi damnationem acquirent” (!3, 2), the powers currents are ordained
by God. Whoever therefore sets himself against the power, sets himself against
ordinance of God ; and they who set themselves against, shall receive
damnation.
The Apostle,
in the same Epistula ad Romanos, prescribes
also to pay taxes: “reddite omnibus
debita: cui tributum tributum, cui vectigal vectigal, cui timorem timorem, cui
honorem honorem” (13, 7) give back to everybody what you must: to whom tributum
tributum ( tributum is the direct tax
, in greek fovro"-ou, oJ);
to whom vectigal vectigal ( vectīgal
is the indirect tax, in greek tevlo"- ou". tov);;; to whom the fear, the fear; to whom the honour, the honour. Saint Paul
wanted to avoid that the christian preaching might give push to those uproars
that led the emperor Claudio to expel from Rome the rising jewish-christian
community: Roma expulit Iudaeos impulsore
Chresto tumultuantes (Svetonio, Claudii
Vita, 25, 4), expelled from Rome the Jewishes who were riotting in the spur
of “Chresto”. There is confusion between Jewishes and Christians, that Romans
mixed up.
Also Tacito
after all approves the imperial government if the emperor is not an extremist,
or mad, or criminal as Caligola (37-41), Nerone (54-68), Domiziano (81-96), nor
false as Tiberio (14-37), nor weak and stupid as Claudio (41-54).
Claudio
dead was ridiculed by Seneca in Apocolokyntōsis
(54 a. C.) an apotheosis upset: instead of transformatin in God, as for other
imperators, trasformation in pumpkin (kolovkunqa).
Anyway
Tacito refuses res novas and molitores rerum novarum, revolutions and
makers of revolutions. Is necessary to remember here that the impartiality of
greek and latin historiographer is applied when the enemy is stranger (as
Mitridate and Calgaco), but is forgotten with the inner enemy (the emperors
hostiles to senatorial class whence Tacito comes).
In addition there is a prejudice against every
movement coming from low, and even from high, if is in favour of poors : for
example Tiberio and Caio Gracco who, aristocratic and yet tribunes of people,
try to make an agricultural reform and were killed by senators large landowner
(133-121 b. C.).
In Dialogus de oratoribus (Dialogue about eloquence, about 100 a. C.) Tacito reminds that the great
eloquence was flourishing, prospering, with freedom and even licence: magna illa et notabilis eloquentia alumna
licentiae, quam stulti libertatem vocabant (40) the great and famous
eloquence, pupil of licence that stupid persons called freedom. Many, a lot of
orators there were in Athen where omnia
populus, omnia imperiti, omnia, ut sic dixerim, omnes poterant”, all the
power was of the people, of ignorants, everything was of everybody. Also in
Rome eloquence bloomed in disorder “sicut
indomitus ager habet quasdam herbas laetiores”, such as a field uncultivated
has some grasses more blooming.
“Sed nec tanti rei publicae Gracchorum
eloquentia fuit ut pateretur et leges” (40), but the eloquence of Gracchi
was not so precious for the State that could be tolerated their laws.
These
brothers are remembered with a mixture of praise and blame.
They were
killed by the violent reaction of the senators larg landowner. Their mother
Cornelia, daughter of Scipio Africanus: “numquam,
inquit non felicem me dicam, quae Gracchos peperi” (Seneca, Ad Marciam de consolatione, 16, 3),
never she said I shall call not happy myself, a woman who gave birth to
Gracchi.
CONTINUA
Giovanna Tocco
RispondiElimina