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Article

Clodius Turrinus  

John Wight Duff and M. Winterbottom

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature

A well-born Spanish declaimer, close friend of L. *Annaeus Seneca (1) (see esp. Controv. 10 pref. 14–16). His eloquence suffered from his cautious adherence to the doctrines of *Apollodorus (5). His son of the same name was treated by Seneca as one of his own children.

Article

closure  

Deborah Roberts

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
Closure, the sense of finality or conclusiveness at the end of a work or some part of it. In addition to the basic fulfilment of expectations raised by particular texts, some ancient genres show marked closural conventions; examples include the choral coda of Euripidean tragedy, the plaudite of Roman comedy (see comedy, latin), and the rhetorical peroration. We also find a variety of closural modes across genres: authorial self-reference, generalization, prophecy, prayer, motifs such as death, marriage, ritual, and departure. Our understanding of ancient closure is limited by what we have; some endings have been lost, some works were never finished, and some extant endings may be interpolations. Our uncertainties about ancient closural convention in turn lead us to disagree about whether in fact we do possess the actual endings of works such as *Herodotus' Histories, *Euripides' Iphigenia at Aulis, *Lucretius' De Rerum Natura, and *Catullus51.

Article

color  

John Wight Duff and M. Winterbottom

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature

Color (Gk. chrōma), ‘colour’ was used generally of cast or complexion of style. But in *declamation it took on a specialized sense of the ‘gloss’ put on a case argued in a controversia, usually serving to palliate an offence. It is one of the main rubrics of L. *Annaeus Seneca (1)'s collection, which gives many examples. Colours could be far-fetched (Controv. 1. 6. 9) or plain silly (9. 4. 22). In the case of the virgin who survived being thrown for her sins from the Tarpeian rock, *Iunius Otho suggested that ‘she prepared for her punishment and practised falling from the time when she began her offence’ (ibid. 1. 3. 11). The same Otho was author of four books of colours, now lost. In Greek theory, chrōma was equivalent to metathesis aitias, ‘shift of cause’. See rhetoric, latin.

Article

Columella, Lucius Iunius Moderatus  

M. Stephen Spurr

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
  2. Roman Material Culture
Lucius Iunius Moderatus Columella (cf. CIL 9. 235) fl. 50 ce, b. *Gades in Spain (Rust. 8. 16. 9; 10. 185) author of the most systematic extant Roman agricultural manual (written c.60–5 ce) in twelve books. Book 1: introduction, layout of villa, organization of slave workforce; 2: arable cultivation; 3–5: viticulture (mainly) and other arboriculture; 6, 7: animal husbandry; 8, 9: pastio villatica (e.g. specialized breeding of poultry, fish and game, and bees); 10: horticulture (in hexameter verse); 11: duties of vilicus (slave estate-manager), calendar of farm work and horticulture; 12: duties of vilica (female companion of vilicus), wine and oil processing and food conservation. Another surviving book (the so-called Liber de arboribus) probably belonged to a shorter first version of the subject, while his works criticizing astrologers (11. 1. 31) and on religion in agriculture (if ever written, 2. 21. 5) are not extant. Columella defends the intensive slave-staffed villa—characterized by capital investment (1. 1. 18), close supervision by the owner (1. 1. 18–20), and the integration of arable and animal husbandry (6 praefatio 1–2)—against influential contrary views on agricultural management (1 praefatio 1).

Article

comedy, Latin  

Peter G. M. Brown

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
06 July 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
This term has come to be synonymous with fabula*palliata, since the palliatae of *Plautus and *Terence are the only complete Latin comedies to have survived from antiquity. But there were other types of comedy in Latin (see atellana; fabula; mime; togata), and there was clearly some overlap of subject-matter, titles, and style between the various types. Varro praised *Titinius, Terence, and *Quinctius Atta for their character-drawing, combining authors of palliata and togata in the same list, and both types were influenced by *Menander (1). The creative heyday of the palliata is thought to have been from *Livius Andronicus to *Turpilius, that of the togata from Titinius to Atta; most productions cannot be dated, but the two types probably flourished side by side in the mid-2nd cent. bce. This may reflect a development within the palliata; at first happy to allow the inclusion of Roman elements in its Greek setting (as seen most clearly in the plays of Plautus), it came to favour greater consistency (see luscius lanuvinus) and thereby perhaps encouraged the development of a separate type of comedy with an Italian setting.

Article

Cominianus  

R. A. Kaster

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature

Early 4th cent. ce grammarian whose lost handbook (ars), compiled for school use, was excerpted by *Charisius and exploited (directly or indirectly) by other writers on grammar (e.g. *Dositheus (2)).

Article

Commentariolum petitionis  

Jonathan G. F. Powell

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
An essay in epistolary form, c. 5,000 words, on the technique of electioneering, purporting to be addressed by Q. *Tullius Cicero (1) to his brother Marcus*Tullius Cicero (1) on the occasion of the latter's consular candidature in 64 bce; the text is transmitted in the manuscripts of Cicero's letters to Quintus, but is absent from the Mediceus (one of the best MSS). Its authenticity has been repeatedly impugned; the arguments against it are cumulatively rather than individually significant, but have not been generally accepted as conclusive. The level of contemporary reference implies, at all events, a considerable familiarity with the history of the period. The only plausible later context for the production of such a document would be that of a rhetorical exercise or suasoria. The content is divided into three sections: first, the means necessary to overcome the disadvantage of being a *novus homo; second, methods of building up support, (a) through personal connections and (b) through canvassing the popular vote, the latter regarded as less important; third, a short section on how to prevent or counteract bribery.

Article

Commodianus  

J. H. D. Scourfield

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Christianity
  2. Latin Literature

Christian Latin poet, probably from 3rd-cent. Africa, but assigned by some to the 4th or 5th cent. and to other locations; perhaps of Syrian origin. In the Instructiones, 80 short poems mostly in *acrostic form, he attacks paganism and Judaism and admonishes Christians; the Carmen apologeticum or De duobus populis is an exposition of Christian doctrine with didactic intent. His language and versification have been much vilified; in particular, he shows scant regard for classical prosody. The character of his verse, however, is better attributed to a desire to innovate and write poetry with appeal for ordinary uneducated Christians than to incompetence.

Article

communes loci  

M. Winterbottom

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
Communes loci (Gk. koinoi topoi), ‘common places’. Traced back as far as *Gorgias (1) and *Protagoras by *Cicero (Brut.46–7), they were ‘arguments that can be transferred to many cases’ (Cic. Inv. rhet. 2. 48). They were practised at school among the progymnasmata, and theorists laid down headings (e.g. Hermog.Prog. 6); declaimers made them part of their stock-in-trade. They were often directed against generalized targets, vices or the vicious, and they were a means of ‘amplification’ (Rhet. Her. 2. 47); but they could be less polemical, and might be legal (e.g. the credibility of witnesses), moral (e.g. the fickleness of fortune, with scope for historical examples), or philosophical (e.g. the gods). The types are well illustrated in the pages of L. *Annaeus Seneca (1), who often speaks simply of loci, thus approaching modern scholars’ talk of topoi. The danger of commonplaces was that they might be dragged in regardless of strict relevance (see Quint.

Article

Consentius  

R. A. Kaster

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
Consentius (probably 5th cent. ce), grammatical authority of senatorial rank (perhaps from Gaul), whose extant treatises De nomine et verbo (On noun and verb) and De barbarismis et metaplasmis (On barbarisms and ‘metaplasmi’; H. Keil, Gramm. Lat. are excerpted from a larger work. His illustrations, drawn from the speech of his own times, make him valuable for the study of vulgar Latin. See grammar, grammarians, latin.

Article

Consolatio ad Liviam  

J. H. D. Scourfield

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature

Consolatio ad Liviam, a poem of condolence in 474 elegiac lines, addressed to *Livia Drusilla, wife of Augustus, on the death of her son Nero *Claudius Drusus on campaign in Germany in 9 bce. It contains many of the commonplaces of ancient consolation. Date and authorship have been much discussed. The traditional ascription to *Ovid is clearly false, his imitator (as the poet is) not being equipped with his technical skills and imaginative power. Recent attempts at dating have set the piece variously in the principates of *Tiberius, *Claudius, and *Nero; some have seen it as a forgery, composed for propagandist purposes, but it may be simply a literary exercise, without hidden political intent. See consolation.

Article

consolation  

J. H. D. Scourfield

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Greek Literature
  2. Latin Literature
The practice of offering words of consolation to those afflicted by grief is reflected in the earliest Greek poetry (e.g. Hom. Il. 24. 507–51). Later, under the twin influences of rhetoric and philosophy, a specialized consolatory literature began to develop, initiating a tradition which persisted through Graeco-Roman antiquity and into the Middle Ages and beyond. In broad terms, this ‘genre’ can be taken to comprise both situation-specific texts, addressed to individuals who have suffered recent bereavement or some other kind of loss-experience, such as exile or illness, and texts of a more abstract or theoretical (‘metaconsolatory’) kind. The first category includes, centrally, prose letters of consolation, which might be brief or extensive, essentially private or possessing an evident public dimension; poems, often hardly distinguishable from epicedia (see epicedion); and funeral speeches, which in late antiquity in particular might contain a substantial consolatory element. Outside the literary tradition narrowly understood also survive personal letters on papyrus and inscribed decrees from Greek cities consoling the relatives of deceased honorands. To the second category belong philosophical treatises and other writings on death and the alleviation of grief; *Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations 1 and 3 is a good example.

Article

contaminatio  

Peter G. M. Brown

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
22 December 2015
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
  2. Reception
Contaminatio, a word used by modern scholars to express the procedure of *Terence (and perhaps *Plautus) in incorporating material from another Greek play into the primary play which he was adapting. Terence tells us that he had done this in adapting *Menander (1)'s Andria (adding material from Menander's Perinthia), and that his critics had complained that he ought not to contaminare plays in this way (i.e. to ‘spoil’ them by adding alien material: An. prologue 9 ff.; at Haut. 17 he says he has been accused in a general way of ‘contaminating’ many Greek plays while writing few in Latin). Terence claims the precedent of *Naevius, Plautus, and *Ennius, we cannot tell how truthfully (though some have claimed to detect contaminatio in Plautus; the fragments of Naevius and Ennius are too meagre to judge). He followed the same procedure in Eunuchus and Adelphoe but was there accused of ‘theft’ (plagiarism from earlier Latin comedies), not contaminatio.

Article

Cornelius Fronto, Marcus, c. 95–c. 166 CE  

Leofranc Holford-Strevens

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
Marcus Cornelius Fronto, orator, *suffect consul July–August 142; born at *Cirta (Constantine) in *Numidia; completed his education in Rome; a leading advocate under *Hadrian, he was appointed tutor by *Antoninus Pius to Marcus *Aurelius (Caesar) and his adoptive brother Lucius *Verus, remaining on intimate terms with them until his death, probably from the plague of 166/7 (Commodi 159. 12 seems to mean Verus). Marcus proposed a statue to him.Though famous for his oratory (‘not the second but the other glory of Roman eloquence’, XII Panegyrici Latini 8 (5). 14. 2), Fronto is known today almost exclusively through his correspondence, chiefly with Marcus, but also with Pius, Verus, and various friends. The letters expound and illustrate his stylistic theories: the orator must seek out the most expressive word in Early Latin texts, preferring the unusual to the commonplace provided it is not obscure or jarring (but new coinages are discountenanced); he must dispose his words in the best order and cultivate rhetorical figures, the *sententia, and the image-like description (εἰκών).

Article

Cornelius Gallus, Gaius  

Edward Courtney

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
Gaius Cornelius Gallus, said (not altogether reliably; see below) to have been born 70/69 bce at *Forum Iulii, by which modern Fréjus is probably meant. In 43 he appears at Rome as a mutual acquaintance of *Asinius Pollio and Cicero (Fam. 10. 31. 6, 32. 5). In 41 he had some sort of supervision of the confiscations of land, which involved Virgil's family farm, in Transpadane Gaul (Broughton, MRR 2. 377). In 30 as praefectus fabrum (see fabri) he took an active military part in *Octavian's Egyptian campaign after *Actium and laid out a Forum Iulium (this may have caused confusion about his birthplace) either in or near *Alexandria (1); this he recorded in an inscription (AE1964, 255), erased after his downfall, on an obelisk that is now in front of St Peter's at Rome. Octavian made him the first praefectus of the new province of *Egypt.

Article

Cornelius Nepos  

J. C. Rolfe, Gavin B. Townend, and Antony Spawforth

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
Cornelius Nepos, the earliest extant biographer in Latin, lived c.110–24 bce. From Cisalpine Gaul, by 65 bce he was living in Rome and moving in literary circles: he corresponded with *Cicero and considered *Atticus a friend and (so S. Anselm) his ideal reader; Catullus dedicated verses to him. He kept out of politics.(1)De viris illustribus (‘On Famous Men’), at least sixteen books and with perhaps 400 lives, grouped according to categories (those of generals and historians are firmly attested), and including non-Romans. It was first published before the death of Atticus, probably in 34 bce; a second, expanded, edition appeared before 27 bce. Of this we have De excellentibus ducibus exterarum gentium (‘On Eminent Foreign Leaders’) and the lives of M. *Porcius Cato (1) and Atticus from his ‘Roman Historians’.(2) Lost works: Chronica, a universal history in three books (Catull. 1); Exempla.

Article

Cornelius Severus, Augustan epic poet  

Edward Courtney

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature

*Quintilian (Inst. 10. 1. 89) praises the quality of the first book of his poem on the Sicilian War of 38–36 bce. The poem about kings which his friend *Ovid (Pont. 4. 16. 9; cf. 4. 2. 1) ascribes to him may have been the first part of a long verse chronicle called Res Romanae (Probus, ed. H. Keil, Gramm. Lat. 4. 208, cites a half line under this title). The 25 lines on *Cicero's death quoted by the elder Seneca (L. *Annaeus Seneca (1)) (Suas. 6. 26) probably come from a later part of this work.

Article

Cornificius, Quintus  

Theodore John Cadoux and Robin Seager

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
  2. Roman History and Historiography
Quintus Cornificius, of recent senatorial family, was an orator and poet and a friend of *Catullus and *Cicero (cf. Catull. 38. 1, Cic.Fam. 12. 17–30). He wrote a lost *epyllionGlaucus. As quaestor pro praetore in 48 bce he recovered Illyricum for *Caesar and helped to defend it against the Pompeian fleet (see pompey). In 46 he was in charge of Cilicia, perhaps as legatus pro praetore; soon, however, Caesar assigned him to Syria and the war against Q. *Caecilius Bassus; what he did in this command is not known. He was praetor (probably) in 45, and in the summer of 44, probably in accordance with Caesar's appointment, he went as governor to Africa Vetus, and continued to hold it for the senate in disregard of the claims of C. *Calvisius Sabinus. In 43 the triumvirs (*Octavian, M. *Antonius (2) (Mark Antony), and *M.

Article

Cosconius, Quintus  

R. A. Kaster

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature

Quintus Cosconius (early 1st cent. bce), wrote on law, language, and literary history. His works are lost.

Article

Cremutius Cordus, Aulus  

Alexander Hugh McDonald and Barbara Levick

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Latin Literature
  2. Roman History and Historiography

Aulus Cremutius Cordus, the historian, writing under *Augustus (Suet.Tib. 61. 3) and *Tiberius, treated the period from the Civil Wars to at least 18 bce (Suet. Aug. 35. 2). Refusing to glorify Augustus, he celebrated *Cicero, *Brutus, and *Cassius, ‘the last Roman’. Prosecuted at the instigation of *Sejanus (Tac. Ann. 4. 34 f.), he committed suicide (25 ce). His work was burnt, but copies, preserved by his daughter, were published in abridged form under *Gaius (1) (Cass. Dio 57. 24. 4). *Pliny (1) the Elder and Seneca the Younger (L. *Annaeus Seneca (2)) used his work.