his youth he seems to have given great application to polite literature,
in which he acquired a justness of taste, as well as an elegance of
composition. Early initiated in the gaieties (393) of fashionable life,
he contracted a habit of voluptuousness which rendered him an
accommodating companion to the dissipated and the luxurious. The court
of Claudius, entirely governed for some time by Messalina, was then the
residence of pleasure; and here Petronius failed not of making a
conspicuous appearance. More delicate, however, than sensual, he rather
joined in the dissipation, than indulged in the vices of the palace. To
interrupt a course of life too uniform to afford him perpetual
satisfaction, he accepted of the proconsulship of Bithynia, and went to
that province, where he discharged the duties of his office with great
credit. Upon his return to Rome, Nero, who had succeeded Claudius, made
him consul, in recompense of his services. This new dignity, by giving
him frequent and easy access to the emperor, created an intimacy between
them, which was increased to friendship and esteem on the side of Nero,
by the elegant entertainments often given him by Petronius. In a short
time, this gay voluptuary became so much a favourite at court, that
nothing was agreeable but what was approved by Petronius and the
authority which he acquired, by being umpire in whatever related to the
economy of gay dissipation, procured him the title of Arbiter
elegantiarum. Things continued in this state whilst the emperor kept
within the bounds of moderation; and Petronius acted as intendant of his
pleasures, ordering him shows, games, comedies, music, feats, and all
that could contribute to make the hours of relaxation pass agreeably;
seasoning, at the same time, the innocent delights which he procured for
the emperor with every possible charm, to prevent him from seeking after
such as might prove pernicious both to morals and the republic. Nero,
however, giving way to his own disposition, which was naturally vicious,
at length changed his conduct, not only in regard to the government of
the empire, but of himself and listening to other counsels than those of
Petronius, gave the entire reins to his passions, which afterwards
plunged him in ruin. The emperor's new favourite was Tigellinus, a man
of the most profligate morals, who omitted nothing that could gratify the
inordinate appetites of his prince, at the expense of all decency and
virtue. During this period, Petronius gave vent to his indignation, in
the satire transmitted under his name by the title of Satyricon. But his
total retirement from court did not secure him from the artifices of
Tigellinus, who laboured with all his power to destroy the man whom he
had industriously supplanted in the emperor's favour. With this view he
insinuated to Nero, that Petronius was too intimately connected with
Scevinus not to be engaged in Piso's conspiracy; and, to support his
calumny, caused the emperor to be present at the examination (394) of one
of Petronius's slaves, whom he had secretly suborned to swear against his
master. After this transaction, to deprive Petronius of all means of
justifying himself, they threw into prison the greatest part of his
domestics. Nero embraced with joy the opportunity of removing a man, to
whom he knew the present manners of the court were utterly obnoxious, and
he soon after issued orders for arresting Petronius. As it required,
however, some time to deliberate whether they should put a person of his
consideration to death, without more evident proofs of the charges
preferred against him, such was his disgust at living in the power of so
detestable and capricious a tyrant, that he resolved to die. For this
purpose, making choice of the same expedient which had been adopted by
Seneca, he caused his veins to be opened, but he closed them again, for a
little time, that he might enjoy the conversation of his friends, who
came to see him in his last moments. He desired them, it is said, to
entertain him, not with discourses on the immortality of the soul, or the
consolation of philosophy, but with agreeable tales and poetic
gallantries. Disdaining to imitate the servility of those who, dying by
the orders of Nero, yet made him their heir, and filled their wills with
encomiums on the tyrant and his favourites, he broke to pieces a goblet
of precious stones, out of which he had commonly drank, that Nero, who he
knew would seize upon it after his death, might not have the pleasure of
using it. As the only present suitable to such a prince, he sent him,
under a sealed cover, his Satyricon, written purposely against him; and
then broke his signet, that it might not, after his death, become the
means of accusation against the person in whose custody it should be
found.
The Satyricon of Petronius is one of the most curious productions in the
Latin language. Novel in its nature, and without any parallel in the
works of antiquity, some have imagined it to be a spurious composition,
fabricated about the time of the revival of learning in Europe. This
conjecture, however, is not more destitute of support, than repugnant to
the most circumstantial evidence in favour of its authenticity. Others,
admitting the work to be a production of the age of Nero, have questioned
the design with which it was written, and have consequently imputed to
the author a most immoral intention. Some of the scenes, incidents, and
characters, are of so extraordinary a nature, that the description of
them, without a particular application, must have been regarded as
extremely whimsical, and the work, notwithstanding its ingenuity, has
been doomed to perpetual oblivion: but history justifies the belief, that
in the court of Nero, the extravagancies mentioned by Petronius were
realized (395) to a degree which authenticates the representation given
of them. The inimitable character of Trimalchio, which exhibits a person
sunk in the most debauched effeminacy, was drawn for Nero; and we are
assured, that there were formerly medals of that emperor, with these
words, C. Nero August. Imp., and on the reverse, Trimalchio. The various
characters are well discriminated, and supported with admirable
propriety. Never was such licentiousness of description united to such
delicacy of colouring. The force of the satire consists not in poignancy
of sentiment, but in the ridicule which arises from the whimsical, but
characteristic and faithful exhibition of the objects introduced. That
Nero was struck with the justness of the representation, is evident from
the displeasure which he showed, at finding Petronius so well acquainted
with his infamous excesses. After levelling his suspicion on all who
could possibly have betrayed him, he at last fixed on a senator's wife,
named Silia, who bore a part in his revels, and was an intimate friend of
Petronius upon which she was immediately sent into banishment. Amongst
the miscellaneous materials in this work, are some pieces of poetry,
written in an elegant taste. A poem on the civil war between Caesar and
Pompey, is beautiful and animated.
Though the Muses appear to have been mostly in a quiescent state from the
time of Augustus, we find from Petronius Arbiter, who exhibits the
manners of the capital during the reign of Nero, that poetry still
continued to be a favourite pursuit amongst the Romans, and one to which,
indeed, they seem to have had a national propensity.
--------Ecce inter pocula quaerunt
Romulidae saturi, quid dia poemata narrent.--Persius, Sat. i. 30.
----Nay, more! Our nobles, gorged, and swilled with wine,
Call o'er the banquet for a lay divine!--Gifford.
It was cultivated as a kind of fashionable exercise, in short and
desultory attempts, in which the chief ambition was to produce verses
extempore. They were publicly recited by their authors with great
ostentation; and a favourable verdict from an audience, however partial,
and frequently obtained either by intrigue or bribery, was construed by
those frivolous pretenders into a real adjudication of poetical fame.
The custom of publicly reciting poetical compositions, with the view of
obtaining the opinion of the hearers concerning them, and for which
purpose Augustus had built the Temple of Apollo, was well calculated for
the improvement of taste and judgment, as well as the excitement of
emulation; but, conducted as it now was, it led to a general degradation
of poetry. Barbarism in (396) language, and a corruption of taste, were
the natural consequences of this practice, while the judgment of the
multitude was either blind or venal, and while public approbation
sanctioned the crudities of hasty composition. There arose, however, in
this period, some candidates for the bays, who carried their efforts
beyond the narrow limits which custom and inadequate genius prescribed to
the poetical exertions of their contemporaries. Amongst these were Lucan
and Persius.----
LUCAN was the son of Annaeus Mela, the brother of Seneca, the
philosopher. He was born at Corduba, the original residence of the
family, but came early to Rome, where his promising talents, and the
patronage of his uncle, recommended him to the favour of Nero; by whom he
was raised to the dignity of an augur and quaestor before he had attained
the usual age. Prompted by the desire of displaying his political
abilities, he had the imprudence to engage in a competition with his
imperial patron. The subject chosen by Nero was the tragical fate of
Niobe; and that of Lucan was Orpheus. The ease with which the latter
obtained the victory in the contest, excited the jealousy of the emperor,
who resolved upon depressing his rising genius. With this view, he
exposed him daily to the mortification of fresh insults, until at last
the poet's resentment was so much provoked, that he entered into the
conspiracy of Piso for cutting off the tyrant. The plot being
discovered, there remained for the unfortunate Lucan no hope of pardon:
and choosing the same mode of death which was employed by his uncle, he
had his veins opened, while he sat in a warm bath, and expired in
pronouncing with great emphasis the following lines in his Pharsalia:--
Scinditur avulsus; nec sicut vulnere sanguis
Emicuit lentus: ruptis cadit undique venis;
Discursusque animae diversa in membra meantis
Interceptus aquis, nullius, vita perempti
Est tanta dimissa via.--Lib. iii. 638.
----Asunder flies the man.
No single wound the gaping rupture seems,
Where trickling crimson flows in tender streams;
But from an opening horrible and wide
A thousand vessels pour the bursting tide;
At once the winding channel's course was broke,
Where wandering life her mazy journey took.--Rowe.
Some authors have said that he betrayed pusillanimity at the hour of
death; and that, to save himself from punishment, he (397) accused his
mother of being involved in the conspiracy. This circumstance, however,
is not mentioned by other writers, who relate, on the contrary, that he
died with philosophical fortitude. He was then only in the twenty-sixth
year of his age.
Lucan had scarcely reached the age of puberty when he wrote a poem on the
contest between Hector and Achilles. He also composed in his youth a
poem on the burning of Rome; but his only surviving work is the
Pharsalia, written on the civil war between Caesar and Pompey. This
poem, consisting of ten books, is unfinished, and its character has been
more depreciated than that of any other production of antiquity. In the
plan of the poem, the author prosecutes the different events in the civil
war, beginning his narrative at the passage of the Rubicon by Caesar. He
invokes not the muses, nor engages any gods in the dispute; but
endeavours to support an epic dignity by vigour of sentiment, and
splendour of description. The horrors of civil war, and the importance
of a contest which was to determine the fate of Rome and the empire of
the world, are displayed with variety of colouring, and great energy of
expression. In the description of scenes, and the recital of heroic
actions, the author discovers a strong and lively imagination; while, in
those parts of the work which are addressed either to the understanding
or the passions, he is bold, figurative, and animated. Indulging too
much in amplification, he is apt to tire with prolixity; but in all his
excursions he is ardent, elevated, impressive, and often brilliant. His
versification has not the smoothness which we admire in the compositions
of Virgil, and his language is often involved in the intricacies of
technical construction: but with all his defects, his beauties are
numerous; and he discovers a greater degree of merit than is commonly
found in the productions of a poet of twenty-six years of age, at which
time he died.----
PERSIUS was born at Volaterrae, of an equestrian family, about the
beginning of the Christian aera. His father dying when he was six years
old, he was left to the care of his mother, for whom and for his sisters
he expresses the warmest affection. At the age of twelve he came to
Rome, where, after attending a course of grammar and rhetoric under the
respective masters of those branches of education, he placed himself
under the tuition of Annaeus Cornutus, a celebrated stoic philosopher of
that time. There subsisted between him and this preceptor so great a
friendship, that at his death, which happened in the twenty-ninth year of
his age, he bequeathed to Cornutus a handsome sum of money, and his
library. The latter, however, accepting only the books, left the money
to Persius's sisters.
Priscian, Quintilian, and other ancient writers, spear of Persius's
satires as consisting of a book without any division. They have since,
however, been generally divided into six different satires, but by some
only into five. The subjects of these compositions are, the vanity of
the poets in his time; the backwardness of youth to the cultivation of
moral science; ignorance and temerity in political administration,
chiefly in allusion to the government of Nero: the fifth satire is
employed in evincing that the wise man also is free; in discussing which
point, the author adopts the observations used by Horace on the same
subject. The last satire of Persius is directed against avarice. In the
fifth, we meet with a beautiful address to Cornutus, whom the author
celebrates for his amiable virtues, and peculiar talents for teaching.
The following lines, at the same time that they show how diligently the
preceptor and his pupil were employed through the whole day in the
cultivation of moral science, afford a more agreeable picture of domestic
comfort and philosophical conviviality, than might be expected in the
family of a rigid stoic:
Tecum etenim longos memini consumere soles,
Et tecum primas epulis decerpere noctes.
Unum opus, et requiem pariter disponimus ambo:
Atque verecunda laxamus feria mensa.--Sat. v.
Can I forget how many a summer's day,
Spent in your converse, stole, unmarked, away?
Or how, while listening with increased delight,
I snatched from feasts the earlier hours of night?--Gifford.
The satires of Persius are written in a free, expostulatory, and
argumentative manner; possessing the same justness of sentiment as those
of Horace, but exerted in the way of derision, and not with the admirable
raillery of that facetious author. They are regarded by many as obscure;
but this imputation arises more from unacquaintance with the characters
and manners to which the author alludes, than from any peculiarity either
in his language or composition. His versification is harmonious; and we
have only to remark, in addition to similar examples in other Latin
writers, that, though Persius is acknowledged to have been both virtuous
and modest, there are in the fourth satire a few passages which cannot
decently admit of being translated. Such was the freedom of the Romans,
in the use of some expressions, which just refinement has now exploded.--
Another poet, in this period, was FABRICIUS VEIENTO, who wrote a severe
satire against the priests of his time; as also one (399) against the
senators, for corruption in their judicial capacity. Nothing remains of
either of those productions; but, for the latter, the author was banished
by Nero.
There now likewise flourished a lyric poet, CAESIUS BASSUS, to whom
Persius has addressed his sixth satire. He is said to have been, next to
Horace, the best lyric poet among the Romans; but of his various
compositions, only a few inconsiderable fragments are preserved.
To the two poets now mentioned must be added POMPONIUS SECUNDUS, a man of
distinguished rank in the army, and who obtained the honour of a triumph
for a victory over a tribe of barbarians in Germany. He wrote several
tragedies, which in the judgment of Quintilian, were beautiful
compositions.
FOOTNOTES:
[548] A.U.C. 593, 632, 658, 660, 700, 722, 785.
[549] A.U.C. 632.
[550] A.U.C. 639, 663.
[551] For the distinction between the praenomen and cognomen, see note,
p. 192.
[552] A.U.C. 632.
[553] The Allobroges were a tribe of Gauls, inhabiting Dauphiny and
Savoy; the Arverni have left their name in Auvergne.
[554] A.U.C. 695.
[555] A.U.C. 700.
[556] A.U.C. 711.
[557] A.U.C. 723.
[558] Nais seems to have been a freedwoman, who had been allowed to
adopt the family name of her master.
[559] By one of those fictions of law, which have abounded in all
systems of jurisprudence, a nominal alienation of his property was made
in the testator's life-time.
[560] The suggestion offered (note, p. 123), that the Argentarii, like
the goldsmiths of the middle ages, combined the business of bankers, or
money-changers, with dealings in gold and silver plate, is confirmed by
this passage. It does not, however, appear that they were artificers of
the precious metals, though they dealt in old and current coins,
sculptured vessels, gems, and precious stones.
[561] Pyrgi was a town of the ancient Etruria, near Antium, on the sea-
coast, but it has long been destroyed.
[562] A.U.C. 791; A.D. 39.
[563] The purification, and giving the name, took place, among the
Romans, in the case of boys, on the ninth, and of girls, on the tenth
day. The customs of the Judaical law were similar. See Matt. i. 59-63;
Luke iii. 21. 22.
[564] A.U.C. 806.
[565] Seneca, the celebrated philosophical writer, had been released
from exile in Corsica, shortly before the death of Tiberius. He
afterwards fell a sacrifice to the jealousy and cruelty of his former
pupil, Nero.
[566] Caligula.
[567] A.U.C. 809--A.D. 57.
[568] Antium, the birth-place of Nero, an ancient city of the Volscians,
stood on a rocky promontory of the coast, now called Capo d' Anzo, about
thirty-eight miles from Rome. Though always a place of some naval
importance, it was indebted to Nero for its noble harbour. The ruins of
the moles yet remain; and there are vestiges of the temples and villas of
the town, which was the resort of the wealthy Romans, it being a most
delightful winter residence. The Apollo Belvidere was discovered among
these ruins.
[569] A.U.C. 810.
[570] The Podium was part of the amphitheatre, near the orchestra,
allotted to the senators, and the ambassadors of foreign nations; and
where also was the seat of the emperor, of the person who exhibited the
games, and of the Vestal Virgins. It projected over the wall which
surrounded the area of the amphitheatre, and was raised between twelve
and fifteen feet above it; secured with a breast-work or parapet against
the irruption of wild beasts.
[571] A.U.C. 813.
[572] The baths of Nero stood to the west of the Pantheon. They were,
probably, incorporated with those afterwards constructed by Alexander
Severus; but no vestige of them remains. That the former were
magnificent, we may infer from the verses of Martial:
--------Quid Nerone pejus?
Quid thermis melius Neronianis.--B. vii. ch. 34.
What worse than Nero?
What better than his baths?
[573] Among the Romans, the time at which young men first shaved the
beard was marked with particular ceremony. It was usually in their
twenty-first year, but the period varied. Caligula (c. x.) first shaved
at twenty; Augustus at twenty-five.
[574] A.U.C. 819. See afterwards, c. xxx.
[575] A.U.C. 808, 810, 811, 813.
[576] The Sportulae were small wicker baskets, in which victuals or
money were carried. The word was in consequence applied to the public
entertainments at which food was distributed, or money given in lieu of
it.
[577] "Superstitionis novae et maleficae," are the words of Suetonius;
the latter conveying the idea of witchcraft or enchantment. Suidas
relates that a certain martyr cried out from his dungeon--"Ye have loaded
me with fetters as a sorcerer and profane person." Tacitus calls the
Christian religion "a foreign and deadly [exitiabilis] superstition,"
Annal. xiii. 32; Pliny, in his celebrated letter to Trajan, "a depraved,
wicked (or prava), and outrageous superstition." Epist. x. 97.
Tacitus also describes the excruciating torments inflicted on the Roman
Christians by Nero. He says that they were subjected to the derision of
the people; dressed in the skins of wild beasts, and exposed to be torn
to pieces by dogs in the public games, that they were crucified, or
condemned to be burnt; and at night-fall served in place of lamps to
lighten the darkness, Nero's own gardens being used for the spectacle.
Annal. xv. 44.
Traditions of the church place the martyrdoms of SS. Peter and Paul at
Rome, under the reign of Nero. The legends are given by Ordericus
Vitalis. See vol. i. of the edition in the Antiq. Lib. pp. 206, etc.,
with the notes and reference to the apocryphal works on which they are
founded.
[578] Claudius had received the submission of some of the British
tribes. See c. xvii. of his Life. In the reign of Nero, his general,
Suetonius Paulinus, attacked Mona or Anglesey, the chief seat of the
Druids, and extirpated them with great cruelty. The successes of
Boadicea, queen of the Iceni, who inhabited Derbyshire, were probably the
cause of Nero's wishing to withdraw the legions; she having reduced
London, Colchester, and Verulam, and put to death seventy thousand of the
Romans and their British allies. She was, however, at length defeated by
Suetonius Paulinus, who was recalled for his severities. See Tacit.
Agric. xv. 1, xvi. 1; and Annal. xiv. 29.
[579] The dominions of Cottius embraced the vallies in the chain of the
Alps extending between Piedmont and Dauphiny, called by the Romans the
Cottian Alps. See TIBERIUS, c. xxxvii.
[580] It was a favourite project of the Caesars to make a navigable
canal through the Isthmus of Corinth, to avoid the circumnavigation of
the southern extremity of the Morea, now Cape Matapan, which, even in our
days, has its perils. See JULIUS CAESAR, c. xliv. and CALIGULA, c. xxi.
[581] Caspiae Portae; so called from the difficulties opposed by the
narrow and rocky defile to the passage of the Caucasus from the country
washed by the Euxine, now called Georgia, to that lying between the
Caspian and the sea of Azof. It commences a few miles north of Teflis,
and is frequently the scene of contests between the Russians and the
Circassian tribes.
[582] Citharoedus: the word signifies a vocalist, who with his singing
gave an accompaniment on the harp.
[583] It has been already observed that Naples was a Greek colony, and
consequently Greek appears to have continued the vernacular tongue.
[584] See AUGUSTUS, c. xcviii.
[585] Of the strange names given to the different modes of applauding in
the theatre, the first was derived from the humming of bees; the second
from the rattling of rain or hail on the roofs; and the third from the
tinkling of porcelain vessels when clashed together.
[586] Canace was the daughter of an Etrurian king, whose incestuous
intercourse with her brother having been detected, in consequence of the
cries of the infant of which she was delivered, she killed herself. It
was a joke at Rome, that some one asking, when Nero was performing in
Canace, what the emperor was doing; a wag replied. "He is labouring in
child-birth."
[587] A town in Corcyra, now Corfu. There was a sea-port of the same
name in Epirus.
[588] The Circus Maximus, frequently mentioned by Suetonius, was so
called because it was the largest of all the circuses in and about Rome.
Rudely constructed of timber by Tarquinius Drusus, and enlarged and
improved with the growing fortunes of the republic, under the emperors it
became a most superb building. Julius Caesar (c. xxxix) extended it, and
surrounded it with a canal, ten feet deep and as many broad, to protect
the spectators against danger from the chariots during the races.
Claudius (c. xxi.) rebuilt the carceres with marble, and gilded the
metae. This vast centre of attraction to the Roman people, in the games
of which religion, politics, and amusement, were combined, was, according
to Pliny, three stadia (of 625 feet) long, and one broad, and held
260,000 spectators; so that Juvenal says,
"Totam hodie Romam circus capit."--Sat. xi. 195.
This poetical exaggeration is applied by Addison to the Colosseum.
"That on its public shews unpeopled Rome."--Letter to Lord Halifax.
The area of the Circus Maximus occupied the hollow between the Palatine
and Aventine hills, so that it was overlooked by the imperial palace,
from which the emperors had so full a view of it, that they could from
that height give the signals for commencing the races. Few fragments of
it remain; but from the circus of Caracalla, which is better preserved, a
tolerably good idea of the ancient circus may he formed. For details of
its parts, and the mode in which the sports were conducted, see Burton's
Antiquities, p. 309, etc.
[589] The Velabrum was a street in Rome. See JULIUS CAESAR, c. xxxvii.
[590] Acte was a slave who had been bought in Asia, whose beauty so
captivated Nero that he redeemed her, and became greatly attached to her.
She is supposed to be the concubine of Nero mentioned by St. Chrysostom,
as having been converted by St. Paul during his residence at Rome. The
Apostle speaks of the "Saints in Caesar's household."--Phil. iv. 22.
[591] See Tacitus, Annal. xv. 37.
[592] A much-frequented street in Rome. See CLAUDIUS, c. xvi.
[593] It is said that the advances were made by Agrippina, with flagrant
indecency, to secure her power over him. See Tacitus, Annal. xiv. 2, 3.
[594] Olim etiam, quoties lectica cum matre veheretur, libidinatum
inceste, ac maculis vestis proditum, affirmant.
[595] Tacitus calls him Pythagoras, which was probably the freedman's
proper name; Doryphorus being a name of office somewhat equivalent to
almoner. See Annal. B. xv.
[596] The emperor Caligula, who was the brother of Nero's mother,
Agrippina.