Today | News | Books | Recipes Adventure | Science Fiction | Ghost stories | Poetry | Children | History Bookity of these conjectures, though he
scarcely thinks that the Fragments which have come down to us
of this book are of sufficient length to enable us to pronounce
definitively on the question. It is quite clear that the mention
of Opimius the father, or of the elder Lucius Cotta, can bear
no relation to the Numantine war, since they both lived before
it began; still it is possible that their names might have
been introduced, to render the morals of their sons still more
conspicuous. How the Fragment (2) respecting the plebeian Caius
Cassius Cephalo was connected with the main subject is not
clear, unless he was introduced for the purpose of incidentally
mentioning the bribery of the unjust judge, Tullius.
The fourth and ninth Fragments may clearly refer to the Numantine
war; as may perhaps the seventh; as we learn from Cicero, that
while Scipio Africanus was before Numantia, he received some
munificent presents, which were sent to him from Asia by King
Attalus, and which he accepted in the presence of his army. (Cic.
pro Dei., 7.) This happened probably only a few months before the
death of Attalus; and Lucilius was most likely an eye-witness
of the fact. The thirteenth Fragment also may refer to the same
campaign; though Duentzer supposes it to be an allusion to the
miserable penuriousness of Ælius Tubero. The fifth and sixth
Fragments apparently refer rather to civil than military matters.
1 Quintus Opimius, the famous father of this Jugurthinus, was
both a handsome man and an infamous, both in his early youth;
latterly he conducted himself more uprightly.[1746]
2 This Caius Cassius, a laborer, whom we call Cefalo--a cut-purse
and thief--him, one Tullius, a judge, made his heir; while all
the rest were disinherited.[1747]
3 Lucius Cotta the elder, the father of this Crassus, "the
all-blazing," was a close-fisted fellow in money-matters; very
slow in paying any body--[1748]
4
5 Asellus cast it in the teeth of the great Scipio, that during
his censorship, the lustrum had been unfortunate and
inauspicious.[1749]
6 ... and now I wished to throw into verse a saying of Granius,
the præco.[1750]
7 ... a noble meeting; there glittered the drawers, the cloaks,
the twisted chains of the great Datis.[1751]
8 ... and a road must be made, and a rampart thrown up here, and
that kind of groundwork--[1752]
9 ... he is a wanderer now these many years; he is now a soldier
in winter quarters, serving with us
10 ... thence, while still of tender age and a mere boy, comes to
Rome.
11 Nor have I need of him as a lover, nor a mean fellow to bail
me--
12 ... he is a jibber, a shuffler, a hard-mouthed, obstinate
brute.[1753]
13 When they had taken their seats here, and the skins were
extended in due order....[1754]
14 ... who in the wash-house and the pool....
FOOTNOTES:
[1746] _Jugurthinus_ is properly the proud title of Marius. (Ov.,
Pont., IV., iii., 45, "Ille Jugurthino clarus Cimbroque triumpho.")
It is here applied ironically to Lucius Opimius, who so notoriously
received bribes from Jugurtha, when he went over, as chief of the ten
commissioners, to arrange the division of the kingdom between Jugurtha
and Adherbal, B.C. 117. (Sall., Bell. Jug., xvi.) He had been before
honorably distinguished by the taking of Fregellæ, when in rebellion
against Rome, while he was prætor. The safety of the Roman state had
also been committed to him when consul (B.C. 121) during the riots of
Caius Gracchus, which by his prompt measures he was the main instrument
in quelling. (Hence Cicero styles him "civis præstantissimus."
Brut., 34.) For this he was accused by the democratic party, but was
acquitted; his defense being conducted by the same Papirius Carbo who
had assailed Scipio Africanus after the death of Tiberius Gracchus
("aliâ tum mente Rempublicam capessens." Cic., de Or., ii., 25). The
partisans of Gracchus, however, afterward crushed him by means of the
Mamilian law, along with many other excellent men. Cic., Brut., _u.
s._ Sall., Bell. Jug., 40. He was consul with Q. Fabius Maximus, who
that year overthrew the Allobroges and Arverni. His consulship was
long remembered as having been a splendid year for wine, hence called
Opimianum. Cic., Brut., 83. Of his father Quintus, Cicero speaks in
nearly the same terms as Lucilius does here: "Q. Opimius, consularis,
qui adolescentulus malè audisset." De Orat., ii., 68.
[1747] _Cephalo_, like Capito, was probably a nickname from the
size of his head. _Sector_ is used by Plautus exactly in the sense
of the English "cut-purse." Sector Zonarius, i. e., Crumeniseca,
βαλαντιοτόμος. Trinum., IV., ii., 20. It is applied by Cicero to a mean
fellow, who buys at auction the confiscated goods of proscribed persons
to retail again. Cic., Rosc. Am., 29. Ascon. in Verr., II., i., 20. Cf.
Nonius, _s. v._ Secare. _Damnare_, i. e., "exhæredare." Non.
[1748] παναίθου (cf. Horn., Il. xiv., 372) is an epithet applied to a
helmet. Why it was given to this Cotta is not known. Gerlach supposes
him to be the L. Cotta mentioned by Cicero (de Orat., iii., 11) as
affecting a coarse and rustic style of speaking, "gaudere videtur
gravitate linguæ, sonoque vocis agresti," and that this name was given
him by way of irony. He would be most justly entitled to the epithet of
Crassus, "the coarse," which was probably given for the same reason.
(Crassus not being the regular cognomen of the Aurelian gens, to which
Cotta belonged, but of the Licinian.) Valerius Maximus gives a story of
the sordid avarice of the father, which illustrates what Lucilius says,
that when tribune of the Plebs he took advantage of the "sacrosanct"
character of his office to refuse paying his creditors their just
claims, but was compelled to do so by his colleagues. (Pighius assigns
this event to B.C. 155.) He was afterward accused by P. Corn. Scipio
Africanus minor; but being defended by Q. Metellus Macedonicus,
was acquitted. Cf. Cic., Brut., 21, where he gives him the epithet
"veterator." He was one of the partisans of the Gracchi.
[1749] _Asellus_ is probably the same whom Cicero mentions (de Orat.,
ii., 64), about whom Scipio made the pun, which is, of course, as
Cicero says, untranslatable: "Cum Asellus omnes provincias stipendia
merentem se peragrâsse gloriaretur, '_Agas Asellum_,'" etc.
[1750] _Granius_, a præco, though a great favorite with the plebeians,
who used to retail his witticisms with great zest, was on terms of
intimate friendship with Crassus, Catulus, T. Tinca Placentinus, and
other men of high rank, whom he used to criticise with the greatest
severity and freedom, and hold, especially with the latter, contests in
sharp repartee. (Vid. Cic., Brut., 43, 46: de Orat., ii., 60, 70, where
some of his witticisms are quoted.)
[1751] Gerlach refers this Fragment to the presents sent by Attalus.
"Datis" he takes to mean any common name, but would suggest "ducis."
[1752] _Rudus_ is applied to a mixt |