Gellius foregrounds his constant desire to learn about the past. An ancient work stumbled over in the library is, without question, worth reading.12 But when a ques-
tion of the sort discussed above arises, where does he turn? In the previous chapter, I noted Gellius’s penchant for “further reading”, an apparently literal and bibliographical version of the synkritic techniques for resolving uncertainty advocated by Plutarch.13 In the example of the lions in Homer and Herodotus (13.7, above, p 145), his further 8E.g. 18.7.1: “quaeso” [Fauorinus] inquit “te, magister, dicas mihi, num erravi, quod, cum uellem
demegorias Latine dicere, “contiones” dixi?”
9Marcus indicates to Fronto how much Cato he has been reading by mimicking a verbal tic: nam
uni M. Porcio me dedicaui atque despondi atque delegaui. hoc etiam “atque” unde putas? ex ipso furore. (Fronto Ad Marc 2.13) Quintilian praises Catonian style, but notes its hazards for students that cannot appreciate its antiquity (Inst 2.5.21).
10See discussion in previous chapter of reading programmes in Quintilian (p 101) and Plutarch
(p 108). Noctes 6.3, to be discussed below in this chapter, seems to take the form of a traditional educational exegesis of a rhetorical text, as outlined in QuintilianInst 2.5.1-9.
11We might term the latter “historical reality” were it not for the notoriously subjective nature of
the Roman equivalent of this concept. Despite the concern among Gellius et al for how theueteres
actually spoke, Romans engaged in discussion about the past could generally construct a version of events or origins that were “true enough” for the present context. E.g. CiceroDe Rep 1.63, with the rather improbably etymology ofdictator from dicitur. Cf. Morgan 2007: 128 on historical reality in exemplary discourse.
1211.17.1:Edicta ueterum praetorum sedentibus forte nobis in bibliotheca templi Traiani et aliud quid
requirentibus cum in manus incidissent, legere atque cognoscere libitum est..
reading was within the realm of antique authority, but from time to time he specifically narrates his (or his fellow readers’) further reading in the more recent realm of com- mentary and criticism. I will now discuss a few paradigmatic examples in which Gellius narrates the consultation of an interpretive authority.
Although 17.6 hints at a social group of readers, it more closely resembles an essay about a particular interpretive point.
M. Cato Voconiam legem suadens uerbis hisce usus est: “Principio uobis mulier magnam dotem adtulit; tum magnam pecuniam recipit, quam in uiri potestatem non conmittit, eam pecuniam uiro mutuam dat; postea, ubi irata facta est, servum recepticium sectari atque flagitare uirum iubet.” quaerebatur, “seruus recepticius” quid esset. libri statim quaesiti allatique sunt Verrii Flacci de obscuris Catonis. in libro secundo scriptum inuentum est “recepticium seruum” dici nequam et nulli pretii, qui, cum uenum esset datus, redhibitus ob aliquod uitium receptusque sit.
Marcus Cato, arguing for the Voconian law, used these words here: Principio uobis mulier magnam dotem adtulit; tum magnam pecuniam recipit, quam in uiri potestatem non conmittit, eam pecuniam uiro mutuam dat; postea, ubi irata facta est, seruum recepticium sectari atque flagitare uirum iubet. It was asked what a seruus recepticius was. Immediately the books of Verrius Flaccus On the Obscurities of Cato were asked for and brought in. In the second book, it was found written that recepticius is used of a worthless slave of no value who, having been given in sale, is returned because of some defect, and is taken back. (17.6.1-2)14
The article opens with a quotation read, and the presence of a reading group only emerges briefly after the primary quotation in question.15 From there Gellius proceeds to excerpt Verrius’s proposed interpretation. The same form is followed, briefly and apparently in solitude, in 20.2:
“siticines” scriptum est in oratione M. Catonis, quae scribitur ne imperium sit ueteri, ubi novus eunerit. “siticines” inquit “et liticines et tubicines.” sed Caesel- lius Vindex in Commentariis Lectionum Antiquarum scire quidem se ait liticines lituo cantare et tubicines tuba; quid istuc autem sit, quo siticines cantant, homo ingenuae ueritatis scire sese negat.
Siticines is written in a speech of Marcus Cato’s that was composed That the former’s power should end when the new arrives. He says, siticines et liticines et tubicines. But Caesellius Vindex in Notes of Ancient Reading says he indeed 14Note that to ask a question and request a book are the same verb (quaero).
knows that liticines play the lituus, and tubicines the tuba; but, being a man of natural honesty, says he does not know what thesiticines play. (20.2.1-2)
In sed Caesellius. . . , we should see the outline of a decision to consult a secondary authority. Such a reading process underlies the juxtaposition of two texts in this way: thenarrative, modelled elsewhere explicitly, is hereimplied by the presence of the steps that make it up.
Back in 17.6, an unclear word has been read. The readers’ first instinct is to consult a secondary text promising interpretive assistance: a book specifically on unclear words in Cato. Immediately, though, the risks of such assisted reading are made clear, as Gellius warns against trusting Verrius.
cum pace autem cumque uenia istorum, si qui sunt, qui Verrii Flacci auctoritate capiuntur, dictum hoc sit. recepticius enim seruus in ea re, quam dicit Cato, aliud omnino est quam Verrius scripsit.
However, with the pardon and indulgence of those (if they exist) who are taken in by the auctoritas of Verrius Flaccus, let this be said: namely, that seruus recepticius in this case, which Cato was speaking of, is entirely different from what Verrius has written. (17.6.4-5)16
Gellius then provides his own interpretation supported by an example from Plautus and another from elsewhere in Cato (.7-8). He sets this up as a contest between Verrius’s interpretation and his own, in which the reader is to be the judge, and closes with a pun on his rival’s name.
plura dicere, quibus hoc nostrum tuear, supersedeo: ipsa enim sunt per sese eu- identia et quod a Verrio dicitur et quod a nobis; utrum ergo uidebitur cuique uerius, eo utatur.
I refrain from saying more in defense of this, my position: indeed the very words are evident in themselves, both what Verrius has said and what I have said; so you may use whichever one seems better Verified. (17.6.11)
Of the several “scholars” Gellius reads, Verrius is among the most problematic.17
Caesellius Vindex fares worse, while Gellius is slightly happier with Julius Hyginus 16For being capiuntur byauctoritas, cf 16.3.1. 17.7 follows a similar form to 17.6, as does 18.9. 17Holford-Strevens 2003: 162 for the term. Verrius Flaccus is rejected or criticized outright in 4.5
and Gavius Bassus. He cites these latter three grammatici for everything from the validity of spellings to the meanings and origins of words, from the interpretation of political texts to the origins of Roman customs. Tullius Tiro, discussed in detail below, is considered as an authority on every piece of this interpretive spectrum, and seems to come up short almost every time.
Gellius’s engagement with grammatical commentaries and other treatises occupies a unique place in our surviving Latin sources from the time. It is often assumed that the numerous grammatical commentaries written in the triumviral and Imperial period were, first and foremost, teaching aids for grammatici.18 Suetonius, in his biograph-
ical sketches of their authors, focuses primarily on their teaching careers, placing their commentarii in the periphery.19 Meanwhile, Marcus writes to Gellius’s contemporary Fronto that he has read plenty of Cato, but never gives any suggestion he has had any help with his interpretation of it.20 This does not mean that Marcus and Fronto’s read-
ing of Cato was in fact unassisted; instead, it goes to show the variety and significance, discussed in Chapter 3, of different ways of representing one’s reading.
The evidence from Gellius suggests that far from being teaching aids, commentaries were regular aids for readers of all types. He has regular encounters with commentaries that show no signs of being in a classroom, nor do his teachers ever offer commentarii of their own.21 When these interpretive aids are not leaping off the shelves to be of assistance, they are on the lips of learned friends; and though sometimes, as above, they fail or mislead, sometimes too they can come to the rescue, as in 11.17, when a 18Nettleship 1881 surveys the attested commentators on Vergil. Gellius, along with Suetonius’sDe
Grammaticisand later commentaries, is a major source. Kaster 1997: 160-1, 170 discusses grammari- ans commentaries as “manuals” for other grammarians, and as teaching aids. See also Sluiter 2000: 202-3.
19To him they are teachers. E.g. de Gramm 17, on Verrius Flaccus, makes no mention of his
writings, and 24 delays Probus’s to the very end. Cf 2 (Parker 2009: 210n94).
20E.g. Frontoad Marc 2.6, 2.9, 2.13, 4.5. The way reading Cato can relax and uplift (ad Ant 2.1)
suggests a model of reading more focused on immersion and aesthetic appreciation than the learning- oriented Imperial reading models discussed in the previous chapter.
friend’s reading of Bassus (who fares well, for a Gellian grammaticus) helps with an old praetorian edict.22 And sometimes Gellius finds one that is correct and that can be
corroborated by other examples he finds himself (e.g., 4.9).
When a secondary authority fails and is proven to be of little use, the reasons often recall those for which flesh-and-bloodgrammatici fail in Gellius’s social scenes.23
They might be inattentive, failing to notice other, relevant examples of the phenomena they discuss (e.g. 7.6), they might even fail to read the rest of the sentence they are commenting on (e.g., 6.2), or they might just be wrong, offering a flawed or incomplete explanation (e.g., 2.4, 3.19, 16.4).
And like living grammatici, these texts that might first be summoned to assist with reading need to be scrutinised for titles and self-advertisement which they do not deserve.24 It is an unfortunate irony for Verrius Flaccus that his book “on the obscurities of Cato” does not explain the obscurity of Cato at 17.6; likewise Vindex’s “ancient readings” were clearly not wide or ancient enough. Gellius is keenly attuned to the rhetoric of the title, as his playful engagement with his own and his rivals’ titles in the Preface makes clear. But just as he hears agrammaticus advertise his own exclusive authority and wonders whether the man can back it up, so Gellius sees the title of a work of secondary literature as one that can inflate the author’s authority and seduce and mislead its reader:
Aelius Melissus in nostra memoria fuit Romae summi quidem loci inter gram- maticos id temporibus; sed maiore in litteris erat iactantia et σοφιστείᾳquam op-
era. Is praeter alia, quae scripsit compluria, librum composuit, ut tum videbatur, cum est editus, doctrinae inclutae. Ei libro titulus est ingentis cuiusdam inleceb- rae ad legendum; scriptus quippe est de loquendi proprietate. Quis adeo existimet loqui se recte atque proprie posse, nisi illas Melissi proprietates perdidicerit?
In my memory, Aelius Melissus was of the highest rank among grammarians of his times, but with more boasting and sophistry than actual work in literary matters. 2211.17.3-4:“Retanda” igitur quid esset, quaerebatur. dixit ibi quispiam nobiscum sedens amicus
meus in libro se Gaui de origine uocabulorum VII legisse qretas uocari arbores[. . . ]
23E.g. 13.3.1 24Cf 3.10.16.
He composed a book, among many others he wrote, that when it was published, seemed (at the time) to be of renowned learnedness. The title of that book was a certain remarkable enticement to reading; you see, it was writtenOn Precision in Speech. Truly, who could think themselves able to speak correctly and precisely unless they had thoroughly learned the “proprieties” of Melissus? (18.6.1-3) 25
To ask questions of one’s reading, as Gellius urges his readers to do, is only the beginning: next, one must identify the correct source of an answer. The first source consulted might have over-represented its authority, and its answer might hold up to scrutiny. The correct answer might (or perhaps should) already reside in the reader’s mind, or it might be found in a less obvious, derivative, or grammatical source, like the collected writings of a jurist (which, Gellius might be suggesting, one ought to be readinganyway). And the stakes of right or wrong access to the antique are non-trivial: as I will show, Gellius understands how bad interpretations can contaminate intellectual traditions, and mislead future generations. Gellius is not alone in his sensitivity to the nature of commentary and tradition — or in his awareness of the rhetorical potential, for one’s ownauctoritas, of demonstrating a comprehensive command of it.