Cassius Dio

Historiography of Rome and Its Empire

Series Editors

Carsten Hjort Lange (Aalborg, Denmark)Jesper Majbom Madsen (SDU, Denmark)

Editorial Board

Rhiannon Ash (Oxford, UK)Henning Börm (Konstanz, Germany)

Alain Gowing (University of Washington, USA)Adam Kemezis (Alberta, Canada)

Christina S. Kraus (Yale, USA)J.E. Lendon (University of Virginia, USA)

Josiah Osgood (Georgetown, USA)John Rich (Nottingham, UK)

Federico Santangelo (Newcastle, UK)Catherine Steel (Glasgow, UK)

Frederik J. Vervaet (Melbourne, Australia)Johannes Wienand (Düsseldorf, Germany)

Volume 1

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/hre

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Cassius Dio

Greek Intellectual and Roman Politician

Edited by

Carsten Hjort Lange Jesper Majbom Madsen

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Contents

Historiography of Rome and Its Empire Series viiCarsten Hjort Lange and Jesper Majbom Madsen

Notes on Contributors viii

Between History and Politics 1Carsten Hjort Lange and Jesper Majbom Madsen

Part 1Cassius Dio and the Transformation from Republic to Empire

1 Cassius Dio’s Sulla: Exemplum of Cruelty and Republican Dictator 13Gianpaolo Urso

2 Cassius Dio on Pompey’s Extraordinary Commands 33Marianne Coudry

3 The Sources of Cassius Dio for the Roman Civil Wars of 49–30 BC 51Richard Westall

4 Cassius Dio and the Foreigners 76Søren Lund Sørensen

5 Mock the Triumph: Cassius Dio, Triumph and Triumph-Like Celebrations 92

Carsten Hjort Lange

Part 2Imperial History in Cassius Dio

6 Cassius Dio and the City of Rome 117Alain M. Gowing

7 Criticising the Benefactors: The Severans and the Return of Dynastic Rule 136

Jesper Majbom Madsen

vi contents

8 Dio the Dissident: The Portrait of Severus in the Roman History 159Jussi Rantala

9 Cassius Dio’s Secret History of Elagabalus 177Josiah Osgood

Part 3Rhetoric and Speeches in Cassius Dio

10 Fictitious Speeches, Envy, and the Habituation to Authority: Writing the Collapse of the Roman Republic 193

Christopher Burden-Strevens

11 Speeches in Dio Cassius 217Andriy Fomin

12 Dio, Caesar and the Vesontio Mutineers (38.34–47): A Rhetoric of Lies 238

Adam Kemezis

13 Parrhêsia in Cassius Dio 258Christopher Mallan

14 Historiography and Panegyric: The Deconstruction of Imperial Representation in Cassius Dio’s Roman History 276

Verena Schulz

15 Cassius Dio – Pepaideumenos and Politician on Kingship 297Brandon Jones

16 Alexander the Great in Cassius Dio 316Jesper Carlsen

Bibliography 333Index 359

Historiography of Rome and Its Empire Series

Carsten Hjort Lange and Jesper Majbom Madsen

Brill’s Historiography of Rome and Its Empire Series aims to gather innovative and outstanding contributions in order to identity debates and trends, and in order to help provide a better understanding of ancient historiography, as well as how to approach Roman history and historiography. We would particularly welcome proposals that look at both Roman and Greek writers, but are also happy to look at ones which focus on individual writers, or individuals in the same tradition. It is timely and valuable to bring these trends and historical sources together by founding the Series, focusing mainly on the Republican period and the Principate, as well as the Later Roman Empire.

Historical writing about Rome in both Latin and Greek forms an integrated topic. There are two strands in ancient writing about the Romans and their empire: (a) the Romans’ own tradition of histories of the deeds of the Roman people at home and at war, and (b) Greek historical responses, some develop-ing their own models (Polybius, Josephus) and the others building on what both the Roman historians and earlier Greeks had written (Dionysius, Appian, Cassius Dio). Whereas older scholarship tended to privilege a small group of ‘great historians’ (the likes of Sallust, Livy, Tacitus), recent work has rightly brought out the diversity of the traditions and recognized that even ‘minor’ writers are worth exploring not just as sources, but for their own concerns and reinterpretation of their material (such as The Fragments of the Roman Historians (2013), and the collected volumes on Velleius Paterculus (Cowan 2011) and Appian (Welch 2015a)). The study of these historiographical tradi-tions is essential as a counterbalance to the traditional use of ancient authors as a handy resource, with scholars looking at isolated sections of their struc-ture. This fragmentary use of the ancient evidence makes us forget to reflect on their work in its textual and contextual entirety.

Notes on Contributors

Christopher Burden-Strevenscompleted his Ph.D. at the University of Glasgow in 2015, where he first worked as a postdoctoral teaching assistant in Classics and Ancient History and then as a member of the editorial team for the Fragments of the Republican Roman Orators project. He is now Lecturer in Roman History at the University of Durham. He has recently written on the role of Roman imperium and Greek quotation culture within Hellenic élite identity in the Imperial period (in Roselaar, Processes of Cultural Change and Integration in the Roman World, 2015) and on the reception of Cicero and Sallust in Cassius Dio (Steel et al., Reading Republican Oratory: Reconstructions, Contexts, Receptions, forthcom-ing 2017a). He is currently co-editing a volume on the first two decades of Dio’s text, Cassius Dio’s Secret History of Early Rome, as well as working on the monograph issuing from his Ph.D. thesis on the explanatory role of speeches in historiography.

Jesper CarlsenAssociate Professor, University of Southern Denmark. Mostly a scholar of Roman slavery, agriculture and family, he has also written extensively on Roman North Africa, gladiators and Alexander the Great. He is the author of Vilici and Roman Estate Managers until AD 284 (1995), The Rise and Fall of a Roman Noble Family: The Domitii Ahenobarbi 196 BC–AD 68 (2006) and most recently Land and Labour: Studies in Roman Social and Economic History (2013). He has also edited the following volumes: Alexander the Great: Myth and Reality (1993), Landuse in the Roman Empire (1994) and Agricoltura e scambi nell’Italia tardo-repubblicana (2009).

Marianne CoudryProfessor Emeritus of Roman History, Université de Haute-Alsace, is a spe-cialist of the Roman Senate of the Mid- and Late Republic (thesis in 1989 and numerous articles), and more generally of the political culture and society of the Roman Republic. She has recently co-edited a volume on utopia in Greece and Rome with Maria Teresa Schettino (L’utopie politique et la cité idéale, 2015), and the acts of a symposium on Roman sumptuary laws, with Jean Andreau (Le luxe et les lois somptuaires dans la Rome antique, 2010). She has written on several Roman laws for the LEPOR database (http://www.cn-telma.fr/lepor/) and is author, with Guy Lachenaud, of the edition-translation-commentary of Cassius Dio’ Roman History, books 36–37 and books 38–40 (2014 and 2011). She

http://www.cn-telma.fr/lepor/

ixNotes On Contributors

is also involved in the publication of a collective volume of essays edited by Valérie Fromentin, entitled Cassius Dion: nouvelles lectures (2016).

Andriy Fominearned an Ed.M. (Social and Philosophical Foundations of Education) and a Ph.D. (Classics) at Rutgers University. He has held fellowships at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens and at the American Research Center in Sofia, he has been a research fellow at the University of Konstanz, and he has taught Classics at Montclair State University. His doctoral dissertation, How Dio Wrote History: Dio Cassius’ Intellectual, Historical, and Literary Techniques, explores the methodological aspects of Dio Cassius’ intellectual contribution to the development of Greco-Roman historiography. His current research is devoted to the question of how the psychological analysis of individual motives in Dio correlates with the author’s interpretation of history and his conception of historical causation.

Alain M. GowingProfessor of Classics and Adjunct Professor of History at the University of Washington in Seattle. His chief interests lie in the area of Roman historiog-raphy and literature, especially of the imperial period. His most recent book is Empire and Memory: the Representation of the Roman Republic in Imperial Culture (2005), and he is currently working on a book-length study of the role of Rome and urban space in Sallust, Livy and Tacitus.

Brandon F. JonesAssistant Professor, Intercollegiate Center for Classical Studies in Rome, has taught at the University of Puget Sound and the University of Washington, where he received his Ph.D in 2015. His research focuses on literary and social interactions in the Roman Empire. His first monograph is in progress under the working title Greek Education, Roman Status: Studies of Paideia in Latin Prose.

Adam KemezisAssociate Professor, University of Alberta, is the author of Greek Narratives of the Roman Empire under the Severans: Cassius Dio, Philostratus and Herodian (2014) and several articles on Cassius Dio and contemporaries, as well as on the Severan era and Imperial Greek literature in general, including recently “The Fall of Elagabalus as Literary Narrative and Political Reality: A Reconsideration” (Historia 65/3 [2016]). He is the co-editor, with Patrick Hogan, of a recent special issue of Classical World (No. 110/1) on “Writing Imperial Politics in Greek”. His ongoing publication interests include the role of literature in

x notes on contributors

Imperial Roman political culture, with a particular focus on Tacitus and the Historia Augusta.

Carsten Hjort LangeAssistant Professor, Aalborg University, is co-editor of Brill’s Historiography of Rome and Its Empire Series. He is the author of two monographs: Res Publica Constituta: Actium, Apollo and the Accomplishment of the Triumviral Assignment (2009) and Triumphs in the Age of Civil War: The Late Republic and the Adaptability of Triumphal Tradition (2016). He has written articles on politi-cal and military history, including “The Battle of Actium: A Reconsideration” (Classical Quarterly 61/2 [2011]), and has co-edited a volume on the Roman Republican triumph with Frederik Juliaan Vervaet (The Roman Republican Triumph: Beyond the Spectacle, 2014). He is currently working on a mono-graph on civil war and, jointly with Frederik Juliaan Vervaet, a volume on The Historiography of Late Republican Civil War.

Jesper Majbom MadsenAssociate Professor and Director of Teaching, University of Southern Denmark, is co-editor of Brill’s Historiography of Rome and Its Empire Series. He is the author of Eager to be Roman: Greek Response to Roman Rule in Pontus and Bithynia (2009) and is the co-editor of Roman Rule in Greek and Latin Writing: Double Vision (2014). He has published a number of articles on emperor wor-ship, lately “Cassius Dio and the Cult of Iulius and Roma at Ephesus and Nicaea (51.20.6–8)” (Classical Quarterly 66/1 [2016]). His is currently working on a monograph examining the Pompeian city states in Pontos.

Christopher Thomas MallanLecturer in Ancient History, St Benet’s Hall, University of Oxford, is the author of several articles on Cassius Dio and other (predominately) Greek-speaking historians of the Roman Empire. His recent work includes a study of the Parthica of Pseudo-Appian (Historia, forthcoming) and an investigation into the origins of the book indices found in the manuscripts of Cassius Dio (Classical Quarterly, forthcoming). He is currently preparing for publication a commentary on Books 57 and 58 of Dio’s Roman History.

Josiah OsgoodProfessor of Classics at Georgetown University, teaches and studies all areas of Roman history, with a focus on the period usually described as the ‘fall of the Roman Republic.’ He is the author of several books, including Caesar’s Legacy: Civil War and the Emergence of the Roman Empire (2006) and Turia: a Roman

xiNotes On Contributors

Woman’s Civil War (2014). With Susanna Braund, he co-edited A Companion to Persius and Juvenal (2012). He is currently finishing a survey of the impact of Rome’s land and sea empire on its politics, economy, and culture, entitled: Rome: Building the World State (150 BCE–20 CE), and he is interested in further elucidating the Mediterranean setting of Rome’s political history.

Jussi RantalaResearcher, University of Tampere, finished his PhD thesis at the University of Tampere in 2013. He is currently finishing a monograph on Severan imperial ideology. He has written articles on politics, religion, identity and historiogra-phy in ancient Rome, and is presently editing a volume on power relations in the Graeco-Roman world. He is also co-editing, with Jenni Kuuliala, a volume dealing with travelling and pilgrimage in the ancient and medieval world.

Verena SchulzAcademic Coordinator, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, focuses on Imperial Roman Historiography and Ancient Rhetoric. Her dissertation was published as Die Stimme in der antiken Rhetorik (2014). She co-edited an interdisciplinary volume on Nero and Domitian (Nero und Domitian: Mediale Diskurse der Herrscherrepräsentation im Vergleich, 2014) and has written several articles about Tacitus, Suetonius and Cassius Dio. She is currently working on her habilitation project, a book about the deconstruction of eccentric forms of imperial representation in Roman Historiography and Biography.

Søren Lund SørensenResearch Assistant, Freie Universität Berlin, is the author of Between kingdom and koinon: Neoklaudiopolis and the Pontic cities (2016). He has written articles on Graeco-Roman epigraphy and on Jews in the ancient world. Recent arti-cles include: “A re-examination of the imperial oath from Vezirköprü” (Philia 1 [2015]) and “Merging the Jewish Eupolemoi – an onomastic approach” ( Journal of Jewish Studies 66/1 [2015]).

Gianpaolo UrsoPost-Doctoral Fellow, LabEx Sciences Archéologiques, Bordeaux, is author of three monographs: Taranto e gli xenikoi strategoi (1998), Cassio Dione e i magi strati: Le origini della repubblica nei frammenti della “Storia romana” (2005), and Cassio Dione e i sovversivi: La crisi della repubblica nei frammenti della “Storia romana” (2013). He has published articles on Roman Republican history and on the Greek and Latin historiography of Rome. He has edited the proceedings of the international conferences of the Fondazione Niccolo

xii notes on contributors

Canussio (2000–2014, fourteen volumes) and is currently involved in the publication of the collective volume entitled Cassius Dion: nouvelles lectures (forthcoming 2016).

Richard WestallAdjunct Professor, Pontificia Università Gregoriana / Catholic University of America / USAC-Viterbo, is the author of the monograph Caesarian Soundings (forthcoming 2016), which examines Julius Caesar’s De bello civili. He has published various articles dealing with the socio-economic history of Roman imperialism and the historiography of the Roman civil wars of 49–30 BCE. At present he is editing a collective volume on the Roman civil wars (forth-coming 2016) and revising a second monograph reconstructing the history of the creation of the original basilica of St Peter at the Vatican by the emperor Constantius II.

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Between History and Politics

Carsten Hjort Lange and Jesper Majbom Madsen

This collection of essays on Cassius Dio is the first to appear in the new Brill Series Historiography of Rome and its Empire. The Series originated in a Cassius Dio Network (co-founded by Carsten H. Lange and Jesper M. Madsen), which in turn emerged from a Cassius Dio conference entitled Greek Intellectual and Roman Politician, organised in 2014 by Madsen and Lange. Modern scholarship has tended to be somewhat dismissive of Dio. Yet regardless of what we think of Dio as a historian, there is no denying that he occupies a central position in Roman historiography. He is the most detailed extant source for the reign of Augustus and fundamental to the study of the Principate until 229 CE, when he retired from Roman politics. His 80-book Roman History narrates events from the foundation of Rome to circa 229 CE. While much is lost, the surviving text fills nine Loeb volumes (Cary 1914–1927) and four Boissevain volumes, totalling some 2000 pages of Greek text. This is not, however, only a question of quan-tity (see below). Adding to recent work, Dio and his Roman History represent a good opportunity to test the aims and scopes of the Series.

The Cassius Dio Network is a joint venture between SDU, Denmark (Jesper M. Madsen), AAU, Denmark (Carsten H. Lange), and AU, Denmark (George Hinge), in cooperation with the University of Alberta (Adam Kemezis) and Georgetown University (Josiah Osgood). It is, of course, far from certain that Roman history should be entirely rewritten due to a new approach to Dio. But by gathering a number of the world’s Dio specialists, and by emphasising his overall importance, we hope to influence scholars’ understanding of Roman history and historiography in general. Previous work on Dio has focused on providing translations and critical commentaries of the Roman History.1 This groundwork is essential, but it is time to take Dio scholarship further. The main purpose will be to pursue a combined historiographic, literary and rhetorical analysis of Dio’s work and of its political and intellectual agendas. The prin-cipal aim of the Network is to change how Dio – one of the key historians of ancient Rome – is perceived: from a historian sometimes judged as mediocre, to a politician and intellectual steeped in Roman history and historiography. This reassessment will rest on a deeper study of his narrative technique, his

1  Reinhold 1988; Rich 1990; Murison 1999; Freyburger-Galland, Hinard & Cordier 2002; Freyburger-Galland & Roddaz 2002; Swan 2004; Bertrand & Fromentin 2008; 2014; Lachenaud & Coudry 2011; 2014.

Lange and Madsen2

relationship with traditions of both universal and Rome-centric historiogra-phy, and his structural approach to Roman history.

Dio is the only historian who follows the developments of Rome’s political institutions over more than a thousand years.2 This makes him an indispens-able source for Rome’s history, particularly in the Late Republic, the reign of Augustus, and the second and third centuries CE. Traditionally, work on Dio has focused on one or several contiguous books. The aim of this Network, correspondingly, is to take on the whole work and reposition it as a central achievement of Greco-Roman historiography. In his classic and still influential book – A Study of Cassius Dio (1964) – the historian Fergus Millar denies that Dio had a political agenda and at the same time claims that he simply wrote history through the lens of his own contemporary world. This network sets out to challenge this approach. While there is a growing interest in Dio in interna-tional scholarship, focusing on rhetorical and literary aspects, there is still little attention devoted to historiographical questions.3

As already mentioned, Dio is most frequently used as a handy resource, with scholars looking at isolated sections of his annalistic structure. This fragmen-tary use of the Roman History causes us to neglect his work in its textual and contextual entirety. Contrary to this approach, the Network will place empha-sis on Dio and his Roman History in its historiographical setting, thus allowing us to link and understand the different parts of his work. We propose that Dio did have a political agenda: the entire Roman History is centred on his vision of an idealised form of Roman monarchical government. This is already highly perceptible in the books on the Republic, where free political competition is criticised as destabilising the state. In the later, imperial books, Dio focuses on individual emperors and dynasties to develop a theory of the best kind of monarchy and monarchy’s typical problems. One result of this is that his work does not present itself as exclusively annalistic in nature, but also as a series of imperial biographies, beginning with the dynasts of the Republic. This intro-duces a tension into his narrative structure, which creates a unique sense of the past and allows us to see Roman history through a specific lens.

The whole text should accordingly be considered in order to understand Dio’s approaches to and assessments of different time-periods; he is not just simply a writer of narrative history. Of course we also need to reflect on some of the deficiencies of Dio – even what appear to be sloppy errors – but this is only possible if we accept that Dio was a figure in his own right, as a politician,

2  See Urso 2005 and Simons 2009.3  Gleason 2011; Kemezis 2014. Much awaited is the Fromentin volume (forthcoming 2016),

which includes 55 articles on Dio.

Between History And Politics 3

a historian and an intellectual who added philosophical reflection (especially through self-authored speeches assigned to historical protagonists) to create a narrative that suited his overall political objectives and structural understand-ing. Dio sometimes seems to change his attitudes to certain subjects in his nar-rative (political institutions, as well as emperors): this may partly be due to his source material, but also down to his working method. Dio spent ten years in gathering his material, followed by twelve years composing his work (book 73[72].23.5). This long period of research and composition – which witnessed great political turmoil in the Roman Empire – can help to account for some of the shifts in his work. Crucially, it appears that Dio was not simply writing con-temporary history into the past; he also wanted to understand Roman history on its own terms and also lay out examples for future rulers to follow, in the light of long-term experience. He makes it possible for us to view a large part of Roman history through a distinctive interpretation, focusing on the underlying structural elements of imperial society, the individuality of emperors, and the relationship between institutions and individuals.

It seems impractical to get a large group of scholars coming from dif-ferent countries and educational backgrounds – historians and classical philologists – to commit to a single method and theory. However, we take inspiration from a recent restatement of the great value of long-term history, which seeks to understand multiple pasts.4 Dio’s text can be the starting point for a more structural approach to Roman History that spans the usually sharp divide made between “Republic” and “Empire.” As with the Greek historian Thucydides – who famously describes the impact of the internal strife at Corfu in 427 BCE (book 3.81–85) – Dio’s emphasis on civil war provides us with an opportunity to view such conflicts as part of la longue durée, even providing insight into issues relevant for present conflicts, for example the extreme use of violence. Dio wrote in the realist tradition of Thucydides and sought to empiri-cally confirm Thucydides’ analysis of civil war by citing comparable episodes in Roman history. Similarly, Dio’s universal history contains many analyses of “good” and “bad” emperors that take on more meaning when treated structur-ally, as building blocks for his political theory. His approach to the Republican dynasts should be considered much the same way. This partly seems to be the product of his idea that a republican form of government is inadequate. The question that arises is how this fits into his wider political and structural views on Roman history, including his realist view of the world.

The objective of this Network is therefore to understand Dio, but at the same time we will inevitably reshape scholars’ understanding of Roman history in its

4  Guldi & Armitage 2014.

Lange and Madsen4

entirety, with all its structural elements and transformations. Dio is the perfect starting point for a new Roman history that uses developments over hundreds of years to unearth larger patterns of change and continuity.

Cassius Dio – Greek Intellectual and Roman Politician

The bimillennium of Augustus’ death on 19 August 2014 inspired us to revisit and re-evaluate Dio, a key source for the history of Augustus and his successors. The following year was also the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Fergus Millar’s monograph, a book that remains at the centre of Augustan scholar-ship and Roman historiography. The above-mentioned conference aimed to understand Dio, rather than to accept or refute him. Whereas earlier schol-arship focused on Dio’s dependence on his sources, we perceive this volume and the network as being part of a new trend that focuses on Dio’s own con-tributions to his narrative, including his own interpretations and remoulding of the historical material (cf. Rich forthcoming). The conference was funded by The Danish Council for Independent Research (DFF), Humanities (FKK), The Centre for Medieval Literature, SDU & Meloni Press. We are grateful for the fund-ing and support we have received from these institutions. We owe a debt of gratitude to Brill’s Jennifer Pavelko (Acquisitions Editor, Classical Studies) for encouraging us to create this timely and valuable series, and also to assistant editor Tessel Jonquière, and the rest of the team at Brill.

The volume brings together a number of case studies that highlight vari-ous aspects of Dio’s Roman History, focusing on previously ignored or misun-derstood aspects of his narrative. This collection of sixteen papers is divided into three thematic sections, ranging chronologically from the Late Republic to Dio’s own age.

The first section, Cassius Dio and the Transformation from Republic to Empire, begins with Gianpaolo Urso, who focuses on Dio’s use of the image of Sulla as cruel, common in late republican historiography and an integral part of the so-called “myth of Sulla”. Dio utilises this historiographical topos as a means to criticise contemporary civil war and the emperor Septimius Severus, the victor in the civil war against Clodius Albinus in 197 CE. The cruelty of Sulla (and Marius) should be seen as an outright rejection of the cruelty of Severus and his revenge against his enemies in 197 CE. In a speech Severus praises the cruelty of Sulla. In Dio’s narrative the cruelty of Sulla is remembered in a way as to remind the reader of the speech of Severus, as the emperor used Sulla as his exemplum. However, according to Dio, Sulla did not aim for absolute power and his dictatorship did in fact follow Roman traditions. Dio emphasises

Between History And Politics 5

Caesar’s dictatorship as the turning point in the transition from republic to monarchy. The criticism of the cruelty of Sulla thus does not imply a rejection of Sulla per se.

Marianne Coudry examines the vote in 67 BCE of the lex Gabinia, provid-ing Pompeius with an extraordinary imperium in the fight against piracy. She examines the surprisingly detailed narration of the event (about one third of book 36), comparing it to parallel evidence in Dio’s Roman History. She suggests that Dio is focusing on a specific turning-point in Roman history: the transition from one politeia (Republic) to another (Principate). Dio’s description of the voting process itself is clearly intended to stress the discordia during the outgo-ing Republic, and the long speeches of the protagonists are elaborate pieces of rhetoric delivering far reaching messages. Of particular interest is the speech of Pompeius, who, in Dio, falsely pretends to refuse the command proposed by his accomplice, the tribune Gabinius, a tactic later repeated by Augustus in 27 BCE. Rather different is the purpose of Catulus’ speech, which emphasizes the contradiction between such an imperium and the survival of the Republic. According to Coudry: “[Dio] too is convinced that the extraordinary command proposed for Pompey endangers the political system of the Romans” (p. 43), thereby opening the way to dynasteiai, and later monarchia.

Richard Westall’s chapter focuses on the question of which sources Dio used in his extended narrative on the Late Republic in the years 49–30 BCE. Traditionally there has been a tendency to identify Livy as Dio’s main source. Contrary to this view, he emphasises that Dio most likely relied upon a “philo-Republican source” that was consistently critical of the Caesarian leaders. Most likely this source is Cremutius Cordus, an author indeed known for his critical historiographical stance. Dio’s narrative of the battle of Pharsalus accordingly shows sensitivity towards the defeated and is arguably more than merely a rehearsal of Livy’s account. Similarly, Dio’s account of the sacrifice of 300 sena-tors and knights at the close of the siege and capture of Perusia draws upon a historiographical tradition at odds with Augustan ideology. On the other hand, Dio seems to ignore the triumphs of Antonian partisans in the 40s and 30s BCE, and the description of Cassius and Brutus at Philippi is favourable, even if the act of tyrannicide itself is condemned. Last and perhaps most significantly, Dio’s narrative reveals knowledge of Cordus and the fact that his Annales was critical of the dynasts of the Late Republic.

Søren Lund Sørensen’s chapter on emperor worship focuses on a highly problematic and disputed passage in Dio (51.20), set in 29 BCE. This chap-ter lays down the guidelines for the imperial cult in Asia and emphasizes an alleged distinction between “citizens” and “foreigners”, while at the same time highlighting that citizens were not involved in the cult to the living emperor

Lange and Madsen6

during the reign of Augustus. Even though factually wrong, this was necessary in order to distance the reign of Augustus from Dio’s own time. By mention-ing foreigners (“the Hellenes”), Sørensen argues, Dio was in fact referring to the provincial assemblies, or koina. Dio did not use the word koinon in 51.20 because, Sørensen asserts, “Dio lets Augustus himself assign the koina with the title “the Hellenes”, as if hitherto they had not been known by this title” (p. 85). It is argued that Dio distorted historical facts, claiming a division that never existed, at the same time projecting the present into the past, trying to create a plausible historical origin for the imperial cult.

The final chapter in this opening section offers an interpretation of the Roman triumph and triumph-like celebrations in Dio’s narrative. According to Carsten H. Lange, Dio does not remark on many triumphs, but he focuses his attention on divergences from customary procedure, particularly in his exten-sive narrative of the period of staseis and dynasteiai during the Late Republic. This was part of Dio’s general supposition that the dysfunctional demokratia could only be fixed by Augustus, Dio’s model emperor. Throughout his narra-tive Dio’s primary concern “. . . remained a sustained historical narrative, and his discussions of rituals such as the triumph were coloured by the need to support that narrative” (p. 92). The chapter also suggests that the key to under-standing triumphal matters in Dio’s narrative, as well as the actual Roman triumph, is an often neglected and mishandled – but substantial – excursus on triumphal procedure in Zonaras 7.21 (cf. John Tzetzes). This passage is an indispensable description of the customary Roman triumph and trium-phal procedure, as well as a valuable source of information about triumphal requirements.

The second section focuses on Imperial History in Cassius Dio, beginning with Alain Gowing’s chapter on references to monuments and buildings of Rome in the narrative of Dio: as symbols of power, as places where divine dis-pleasure may be manifested, and as a device to establish Dio’s own authority. In doing so Dio draws on the Roman historiographical tradition, but significantly, also departs from it. Rome under Septimius Severus underwent the greatest transformation since the time of Augustus, a transformation that impressed Dio. But what is the role of the city of Rome in the narrative, and what attach-ment did Dio have to it? In Latin authors an emotional attachment to Rome is commonplace, but in Dio no similar sentiment can be found. According to Gowing “this reflects a fundamental lack of interest on Dio’s part in the development and growth of Rome as a city” (p. 122). Dio never refers to the topography of Rome in a way that suggests readers without prior knowledge: buildings are mentioned, not located. Buildings and monuments are chiefly of interest to Dio as symbols of power (and self-promotion) or the abuse of

Between History And Politics 7

power. Thus, according to Dio, buildings tell us much about the men who built them. Having said that, we may even assume that Dio was not especially fond of Rome.

Jesper M. Madsen’s paper focuses on Dio’s criticism of the dynasty in power. The chapter is devoted to Dio’s disapproval of the Severans, arguing that the negative portrayal of the contemporary emperors is closely tied to a deep frus-tration over the fact that a new dynasty had replaced the system of the adop-tive emperors, which, Madsen argues, Dio saw as the ideal form of rule. Even if the notion of how adoptive emperors treated the senators with more respect was an illusion, Dio still portrays the better part of the second century as one of the most stable periods in Roman politics, because the system of adoption meant that the new emperors were chosen from among the most distinguished and experienced senators. In Dio’s thoughts about Roman politics, this meant that the Senate, once again, was back in power.

Jussi Rantala’s chapter focuses on senatorial disapproval of change in impe-rial policy during the reign of Septimius Severus, victor in the first full-blown civil war since after the death of Nero. Whereas the Antonines had maintained a policy of co-operation between the Senate and the emperor, the new emperor Severus had an altogether different approach, purging the Senate in 197 CE. Just like Thucydides, Dio is a cynical observer of human affairs. Dio’s contem-porary narrative is seen as a critique of this purge and in more general terms a critique of the imperial ideology of the new emperor. Even though he accepts that Dio’s portrait of Severus is neither entirely negative nor positive, Rantala argues that it is basically a critique of the regime: Dio’s portrayal of Severus’ handling of the body of his dead enemy Clodius Albinus is one example, and proof that Severus was not a good emperor.

In the last chapter of this section Josiah Osgood focuses on Dio’s account of Elagabalus, a portrait traditionally dismissed as a “rhetorical ste-reotype” of a “bad emperor”. This is indeed not an accurate portrayal of the emperor, as Osgood shows. But he argues that Dio purposefully goes to extremes not seen previously in his massive history to criticize not only Elagabalus but also dynastic monarchy. Dio uses nicknames, images of effeminacy, and claims about the god Elagabalus to show the emperor’s breaches with practices – and the way dynastic monarchy enabled these breaches. If the speech of Maecenas illustrates an ideal Principate for Dio, set out at the start of his history of emper-ors, the narrative of Dio’s contemporary Elagabalus comes as a foil at the end, illustrating all the excesses to which dynastic monarchy can lead. While the account of Elagabalus echoes Dio’s accounts of earlier “bad emperors” such as Nero, his elevated tone and outrage mirror the collapse of social hierarchy and political stability that he sets out to describe.

Lange and Madsen8

The third and final section on Rhetoric and Speeches in Cassius Dio begins with Christopher Burden-Strevens’ chapter on speeches as a medium of his-torical explanation in Dio’s Late Republican narrative. These compositions, he argues, form a part of Dio’s analysis of the causes of constitutional change, and set out those causes in speech, rather than narrative, to lend the historian’s explanation further subtlety and persuasive authority. The chapter focuses on the way in which Dio used speeches to explore two specific issues: the causal relationship between the distribution of power within the empire and the development of individual commanders’ autocratic ambition; and the prolif-eration of envy within political life. Through these compositions, the historian emphasises these issues as driving factors of Republican decline. This consti-tutes a significant change in approach: traditionally Dio’s speeches have been deemed of little historical importance. Contrary to this dismissal, Burden-Strevens suggests that the author used oratory to explain the decline of the outgoing Republic. In the speech of Catulus, for example, Dio emphasises that the lex Gabinia was instrumental in Pompeius’ moral decline, which made it impossible for him to save the Res Publica at Pharsalus. Dio’s solution to this and other problems is to be found in the Agrippa-Maecenas debate, which not only reflects monarchy during the third century, but serves also as a final reca-pitulation on the historical problems of Dio’s Republic, and foreshadows the reforms necessary to secure a smooth transition to the Principate.

Andriy Fomin argues that the orations were part of a rhetorical exercise with scant or no ties to the historical context – within Dio’s overall narrative – in which they appear. He consequently proposes to appreciate the speeches as attempts to demonstrate superior rhetorical skills instead of expressing political views or dramatizing historical events. Attention is drawn to how Dio composed his rhetorical works and how they were particularly inspired by trends during the Second Sophistic: examples include the Agrippa-Maecenas dialogue and Augustus’ speech on the significance of marriage, both of which were inspired by parallel rhetorical texts. Fomin continues to emphasise that speeches were far from always a logical match with their posi-tion within the historical narrative. He offers an alternative approach to the study of Dio speeches, challenging the prevailing scholarly consensus, which suggests that the speeches in the Roman History contained at least a core of historical truth.

Adam Kemezis’ chapter on the Vesontio Mutineers in 58 BCE looks at Caesar’s own account of the matter, Dio’s understanding of Caesar’s account, and Dio’s version of political rhetoric during the declining Republic. Dio charac-terises Late Republican rhetoric, through the speech of Caesar, as effective, but dishonest, with personal ambition as a main motivation. Contrary to this,

Between History And Politics 9

Caesar portrays himself as a gifted military leader “whose men are bound directly to him by the force of their shared virtus” (p. 242). Dio’s version, informed by his reading of Caesar’s account, in effect responds to that account by portraying Caesar as a cynical and self-interested figure. Dio’s construction of Caesar, the speaker, is thus part of Dio’s description of the political dysfunc-tion of the Late Republic. Through rhetoric Caesar and other late republican dynasts “acquire the popular followings required to realize their personal ambi-tion” ( p. 254), with Dio evoking “Thucydidean realist” sentiments. Persuasive rhetoric was, however, an essential part of politics in both Caesar’s and Dio’s own lifetime. In reassessing Caesar’s speech, Dio “proves remarkably sensitive to the role of rhetoric in different political settings” (p. 238).

Christopher Mallan’s chapter focuses on the idea of parrhêsia (“frank speech”) in Dio’s political thought. For Dio, parrhêsia was a defining character-istic of the Republican form of government (dêmokratia). The chapter begins with a discussion of Dio’s portrayals of the Younger Cato and Cicero, and how these men’s displays of parrhêsia represent the positive and negative sides of frank speech, and how these characterizations feed into a broader commen-tary on the state of the Republic at the time of its decline. The advent of the Augustan monarchy saw parrhêsia become an indulgence of emperors rather than an unquestioned right of citizens (and perhaps senators especially). Here, Mallan argues, Dio becomes more focused on how emperors reacted to ‘parrhêsiastic’ displays by senators or would-be advisors, and used these reac-tions as a barometer of an emperor’s quality as a ruler. Finally, Mallan concludes by suggesting that parrhêsia is a central component in Dio’s self-fashioning as a critical (senatorial) historian of his own time, and that the writing of history provided the means and opportunity for Dio to engage in outspoken criticism of the ruling dynasty.

Verena Schulz brings attention to how historiographical discourse reacts to panegyric accounts of imperial representation in Dio. Her focus is on how Dio deconstructs versions promoted by less competent emperors. With a rhetorical device coined “the deconstruction of the imperial representation”, Schulz shows how, by deconstructing emperors’ official self-representation, Dio – turns “bad” emperors into tyrants. The chapter focuses on the rule of Domitian. Schulz moreover demonstrates how the same literary mechanisms are employed in Dio’s account of several of the compromised emperors – with the strategy being adapted to the specific emperor in question. Dio thus sub-verts the official imperial version in forming his own approach to a specific emperor: for example Domitian’s role as a significant military leader is criti-cized and Dio also deconstructs other ‘bad emperors’ by manipulating how they were represented in official versions.

Lange and Madsen10

Brandon Jones’ chapter focuses on Dio as a participant in the literary and social milieu of the second and third centuries CE. Although Dio was not an outright sophist, he reveals a number of sophistic qualities, not least a desire to display literary paideia and to appear among the socio-political elite. Having established himself as such, Dio evaluates emperors on a similar plane. He measures them in terms of paideia, presenting a theory of kingship through-out his narrative in which the princeps embraces sophisticated education and those who have obtained it. Dio emphasises the weaknesses of democracy, but Jones offers yet another explanation for Dio’s monarchism – Dio does not sup-port every monarch, but only those that serve the pepaideumenos.

The final chapter by Jesper Carlsen focuses on the passages referring to Alexander the Great in the surviving narrative of Dio, exploring Dio’s focus on Alexander as part of his own Greek cultural background, as well as offering reflections on the use of Alexander in the context of Roman politics. Dio offers two distinct images of Alexander: on one hand, the young world conqueror (in the narratives of Perseus, Caesar, Augustus, and Trajan), and, on the other hand, the despotic ruler (in the account of Caligula and, in particular, Caracalla). Dio reflects on good Roman rulers and their imitation of/similarities to Alexander, the world conqueror, but also on how a less adequate emperor’s imitation of Alexander is a sign of megalomania and despotism. There is no Greek nostal-gia in Dio’s use of Alexander, who does not appear in a role similar to Plutarch’s philosopher king or Arrian’s Homeric hero. Alexander was instead a successful historical figure analogous only to the best of the Rome’s emperors, if at all.

Part 1

Cassius Dio and the Transformation from Republic to Empire

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CHAPTER 1

Cassius Dio’s Sulla: Exemplum of Cruelty and Republican Dictator

Gianpaolo Urso

1

After his victory over Clodius Albinus, in 197, Septimius Severus convened the senators and delivered a bitter speech, reported by Cassius Dio (76[75].8.1–4), who probably attended the meeting.1 Severus paid homage to the memory of Commodus, whom for some time he had claimed to be his brother:2 then, he demanded his formal deification. In the course of the speech, Severus praised the cruelty of Sulla, Marius, and Augustus against their enemies in the civil wars:

Πρός τε τὴν βουλήν λὸγον ἀναγινώσκων, καὶ τὴν μὲν Σύλλου καὶ Μαρίου καὶ Ἀυγούστον αὐστηρίαν τε καὶ ὠμότητα ὡς ἀσφαλεστέραν ἐπαίνων, τὴν δὲ Πομπηίου καὶ Καίσαρος ἐπιείκειαν ὡς ὀλεθρίαν αὐτοῖς ἐκεῖνοις γεγενημένην κακίζων, ἀπολογίαν τινὰ ὑπὲρ τοῦ Κομμόδου ἐπήγαγε, [2] καθαπτόμενος τῆς βουλῆς ὡς οὐ δικαίως ἐκεῖνον ἀτιμαζούσης, εἴγε καὶ αὐτῆς οἱ πλείους αἴσχιον βιοτεύουσιν . . . [3] ἀναγνοὺς δὲ ταῦτα τριάκοντα μὲν καὶ πέντε ἀπέλυσε τῶν τὰ Ἀλβίνου φρονῆσαι αἰτιαθέντων, [4] καὶ ὡς μηδεμίαν τὸ παράπαν αἰτίαν ἐσχηκόσιν αὐτοῖς προσεφέρετο (ἦσαν δὲ ἐν τοῖς πρώτοις τῆς γερουσίας), ἐννέα δὲ καὶ εἴκοσιν ἀνδρῶν θάνατον κατεψηφίσατο, ἐν οἷς ἄρα καὶ Σουλπικιανὸς ὁ τοῦ Περτίνακος πενθερὸς ἠριθμεῖτο.

While reading to the Senate a speech, in which he praised the severity and cruelty of Sulla, Marius and Augustus as the safer course and deprecated the mildness of Pompey and Caesar as having proved the ruin of those very men, he introduced a sort of defence of Commodus [2] and inveighed against the Senate for dishonouring that emperor unjustly, in view of the fact that the majority of its members lived worse lives . . . [3] After read-ing this address, he released thirty-five prisoners who were charged with having sided with Albinus, [4] and behaved toward them as if they had

1  Millar 1964, 142; Rich 1989, 97.2  Birley 1988, 118, 127.

Urso14

not incurred any charge at all (they were among the foremost members of the Senate), but condemned to death twenty-nine other men, among whom naturally was Sulpicianus, the father-in-law of Pertinax.3

Xiphilinus’ epitome of Dio condenses a speech which had certainly a more extensive content. Severus might have praised, among other things, the great-ness of his own victory, through a comparison with the civil wars of the Late Republic (we have perhaps an echo of this celebration in Hdn. 3.7.7–8).4 This very speech is hinted by the Historia Augusta (Sev. 12.7–9) too: Severus arrived at Rome iratus populo et senatoribus (“filled with wrath at the people and Senate”), delivered a eulogy of Commodus before the Senate and before an assembly of the people, declared him a god, and claimed that he had been unpopular only among the degraded, ut appareret eum apertissime furere (“indeed, it was evident that Severus was openly furious”); “after this” (post hoc) he spoke about his own clementia, whereas – our source adds – he executed a number of senators. The allusion to clementia seems to clash with Dio’s version: it probably indicates that the speech was more articulated than Xiphilinus’ summary.5 But clementia had been (with aequitas) a quality emphasised in the coinage of Clodius Albinus:6 Severus’ praise of the severity and cruelty of Sulla, Marius, and Augustus certainly sounds like a provocative response to Albinus’ propaganda.

The memory of Augustus’ (or rather of young Octavian’s) cruelty had been largely silenced by the historiographical tradition (cf. Vell. Pat. 2.86.2), with the significant exceptions of Suetonius (Aug. 15) and Dio himself (48.14.3–5; 49.12.4–5; 51.2.4–6).7 On the other hand, Sulla’s and Marius’ cruelty was still a paradigmatic exemplum, and Sulla’s cruelty had become an integral part of the so-called “myth of Sulla”, firmly established in the Augustan age and widely accepted by historians of every political orientation, though only after a grad-ual process.8

3  All the translations of Greek and Latin texts are taken from the Loeb Classical Library.4  Zecchini 1993, 93; Schettino 2000, 268–269; Schettino 2001, 545–546.5  This issue was certainly treated in Severus’ autobiography, where he justified his harshest

deeds (SHA Sev. 18.5): “He wrote a trustworthy account of his own life, both before and after he became emperor, in which the only charge that he tried to explain away was that of cru-elty”. Cf. Schettino 2000, 266–267.

6  Birley 1988, 123, 127; Schettino 2000, 269.7  Manuwald 1979, 73; Rich 1989, 97; see also Westall in this volume.8  Laffi 1967, 255–277; Hinard 1984, 81–97 [= 2011, 23–38]; Dowling 2000, 303–340; Zecchini 2002,

45–55; Batstone 2010, 192–193.

Cassius Dio’s Sulla 15

Severus’ choice to flag up Sulla’s “severity and cruelty” as an example worth following is not surprising, if we bear in mind its historical context. Like Sulla, Severus was the victor of a civil war, and had marched on Rome too: the com-parison between Sulla and the emperor was unavoidable. Severus did not reject this comparison, but accepted it and overturned the perspective, so that the ancient monster of cruelty became an exemplum.9 The rehabilitation of Commodus, who had bestowed on himself the name Felix, must have gone in the same direction too. Sulla’s Commentarii, which Plutarch and Gellius could still read,10 were probably a model for those of Severus. According to the Historia Augusta (Pesc. Nig. 6.3–4), the execution of so many senators earned him the nicknames “Punic Sulla” or “Punic Marius”. And Severus’ position towards Sulla was followed by Caracalla too, who displayed his admiration for the dictator on several occasions.11 In the age of the Severans the figure of Sulla had become topical again, which helps to explain, at least in part, Dio’s par-ticular interest in him.

Dio’s account about Marius and Sulla is largely lost: only a few fragments are extant, 9 on Marius and 9 on Sulla, all quoted by the Excerpta Constantiniana.12 But we have also a large number of mentions out of context in books 36–56, preserved through the direct tradition, and a few others in the last decades

9  Here I am following Zecchini 1993, 94.10  Flower 2015, 209.11  Again Zecchini 1993, 94: Caracalla often praised Sulla (and Tiberius), he spoke and

acted as if he wanted to be a “new Sulla”, and tried to treat the soldiers as Sulla had done (SHA M. Ant. 2.2; 4.10; 5.4); he “made search for the tomb of Sulla and repaired it . . . because he was emulating his cruelty (τὴν ὠμότητα αὐτοῦ ἐζήλου)” (Cass. Dio 78[77].13.7); he thought very highly of two generals, Sulla and Hannibal, and commissioned statues and portraits of them (Hdn. 4.8.5).

12  Marius: frg. 89.1 [Excerpta de Legationibus gentium ad Romanos 19]; 89.2 [Excerpta de Virtutibus et vitiis 78: Marius is not explicitly mentioned]; 89.3 [EV 79]; 89.5 [ELg 20]; 89.6 [ELg 21]; 94.1 [EV 86]; 92.2–4 [EV 91]; 98.2 [EV 97]; 102.8–11 [EV 104]; Sulla: frg. 102.1–4 [EV 102]; 104.7 [EV 15]; 106 [EV 117]; 107.1 [EV 118]; 108.1–2 [EV 119]; 109.1–5 [EV 120]; 109.6–10 [EV 121]; 109.11–20 [EV 122]; 109.21 [EV 123: Sulla is not explicitly mentioned]. We might perhaps add, with the editors, three fragments quoted by the lexicon Περὶ συντάξεως (frg. 99.1a [p. 166,18 Bekker = 87,8 Petrova]; 104.8 [p. 165,15 Bekker = 85,13 Petrova]; 107.3 [p. 162,10 Bekker = 80,18 Petrova]), but their reference to Sulla remains hypothetical, because these fragments are very short (a few words each) and Sulla is never mentioned. Four of the fragments on Sulla, concerning the end of the civil war and the proscriptions, are very long: seven pages of Greek text in the Loeb edition (2, 484–497). Cf. Millar 1964, 43: “His account of the proscriptions carried out by Sulla . . . comes near to being a piece of great writing and shows a man who lived through a similar, if much less terrible, period in the civil wars under Severus”; Gowing 1992, 266–267.

Urso16

(quoted by the Excerpta Constantiniana or by Xiphilinus’ epitome). In the extant text Marius is mentioned 33 times, Sulla 62, nearly twice as much. In the “republican” fragments we have 15 and 13 mentions respectively, but this is hardly significant, because this balance depends on the selection of the Byzantine excerptor. More important are the mentions out of context: 18 of Marius (16 in books 36–56) and 49 (46) of Sulla. Marius and Sulla are men-tioned together 14 times: Marius himself does not attract Dio’s attention. For our historian, Sulla’s significance seems to have been far superior.

Sulla is mentioned in most cases, especially in speeches, as the main exemplum of violence and cruelty against political enemies: from this point of view, we shall see, Dio’s opinion is diametrically opposite to that of Severus and may be defined as a totally conventional opinion. But, moral judgement does not necessarily correspond to political judgement: that applies for Sulla as for anybody else. I shall develop this topic in greater detail in sections 3 and 4 of this paper.

2

The affinity with Sulla, claimed by Severus in his speech of 197 but exploited by his political opponents as well, suggests that Cassius Dio may sometimes have used the mention of Sulla out of context to express indirectly his personal judgement on the emperor, and in particular on the emperor’s behaviour after his victory. We can find an example of this re-employment of the Sullan figure in the long speech delivered by Caesar to the Senate in 46 BC after Thapsus (43.15–18). Since this speech is not quoted by any other source, we cannot know if it was actually delivered13 or it is entirely Dio’s invention. At any rate the historian’s mark is undeniable (43.17.5: “In this way you will conduct your-selves toward me as toward a father . . . and I will take thought for you as for my children”; 43.18.1: “Do not fear the soldiers”14). The speech evokes several com-monplaces about the “good emperor”, often recurring in the Roman History: “All that emerges is that the relationship between Caesar and the Senate could be used as a vehicle for laying down those precepts which Emperors were

13  Klotz (1918, 244) took Dio’s account as evidence of what Caesar actually said.14  To be compared to SHA Sev. 7.2–3: “And then throughout the whole city, in temples, in

porticoes, and in the dwellings on the Palatine, the soldiers took up their quarters as though in barracks; and Severus’ entry inspired both hate and fear, for the soldiers seized goods they did not pay for and threatened to lay the city waste”.

Cassius Dio’s Sulla 17

supposed to follow. Dio’s sentiments in the speech were applicable to any age, but perhaps particularly to that of Severus and Caracalla” (Millar 1964, 81).15

According to Dio, after Thapsus the Romans, and especially the senators, were afraid of Caesar’s power and “expected to suffer many terrible evils such as had taken place before”.16 Then Caesar “endeavoured to encourage them and to inspire them with hope” and delivered a speech in the Senate. In particular, the first paragraphs of Caesar’s speech are interesting (43.15.2–6):

Μηδεὶς ὑμῶν, ὦ πατέρες, προσδοκήσῃ μήτε ἐρεῖν με χαλεπὸν μηδὲν μήτε πράξειν, ὅτι καὶ νενίκηκα καὶ δύναμαι πᾶν μὲν ὅ τι ἂν ἐθελήσω ἀνεύθυνος εἰπεῖν, πᾶν δ’ ὅ τι ἂν βουληθῶ μετ’ ἐξουσίας δρᾶσαι. [3] μή μέντοι μηδ’ ὅτι καὶ Μάριος καὶ Κίννας καὶ Σύλλας, οἵ τε ἄλλοι πάντες ὡς εἰπεῖν ὅσοι πώποτε τοὺς ἀντιστασιάσαντάς σφισιν ἐκράτησαν, ἐν μὲν ταῖς ἐπιχειρήσεσι τῶν πραγμάτων πολλὰ καὶ φιλάνθρωπα καὶ εἶπον καὶ ἔπραξαν, [4] ἐξ ὧν οὐχ ἥκιστα προσαγαγόμενοί τινας μάλιστα μὲν συμμάχοις αὐτοῖς, εἰ δὲ μή, οὐκ ἀνταγωνισταῖς γε ἐχρήσαντο, νικήσαντες δὲ καὶ ἐγκρατεῖς ὧν ἐπεθύμουν γενόμενοι πολὺ τἀναντία ἐκείνων καὶ λόγῳ καὶ ἔργῳ ἔπραξαν, καὶ ἐμέ τις ὑπολάβῃ τὸ αὐτὸ τοῦτο ποιήσειν. [5] οὔτε γὰρ ἄλλως πως πεφυκὼς ἔπειτα τὸν μὲν ἔμπροσθε χρόνον προσποιητῶς ὑμῖν ἐνωμίλησα, νῦν δὲ, ὅτι ἔξεστιν, ἀσφαλῶς θρασύνομαι· οὔτ’ αὖ ὑπὸ τῆς πολλῆς εὐπραγίας ἐξῆγμαι καὶ τετύφωμαι ὥστε καὶ τυραννῆσαι ὑμῶν ἐπιθυμῆσαι (ταῦτα γὰρ ἔμοιγε ἀμφότερα ἢ τό γε ἕτερον αὐτῶν ἐκεῖνοι παθεῖν δοκοῦσιν)· [6] ἀλλ’ ἐιμί τε τῇ φύσει τοιοῦτος ὁποίου μου ἀεὶ πεπείρασθε (τί γὰρ δεῖ με καθ’ ἕκαστον ἐπεξιόντα ἐπαχθῆ, ὡς καὶ ἐμαυτὸν ἐπαινοῦντα, γενέσθαι;) καὶ τῆν τύχην οὐκ ἂν προπηλακίσαιμι, ἀλλ’ ὅσῳ μᾶλλον ἀγαθῆς αὐτῆς πεπείραμαι, τόσῳ μᾶλλον πρὸς πάντα μετρίως αὐτῃ χρήσομαι.

Let none of you, Conscript Fathers, suppose that I shall make any harsh proclamation or do any cruel deed merely because I have conquered and am able to say whatever I please without being called to account, and to do with full liberty whatever I choose. [3] It is true that Marius

15  Cf. Béranger 1953, 197: “Un discours de propagande farci de slogans impériaux”; Millar 1961, 13: “The overwhelming impression is that . . . the speech has little to do with Cesar, but . . . relates to Dio’s own times”.

16  Dio’s description of senators’ fear that Caesar might hold a reign of terror is corroborated by Cicero’s Pro Marcello (Lintott 1999a, 205). Nevertheless it is also very similar to the situ-ation of 197, when “the senate awaited Septimius’ return with justifiable anxiety” (Birley 1988, 127). According to Spielvogel (2006, 101–103) Dio and Herodian overstate the senato-rial opposition to Severus; contra, Letta 2013, 131–132.

Urso18

and Cinna and Sulla and practically all the others who ever triumphed over the factions opposed to them said and did many benevolent things in the beginning of their undertakings, [4] largely as the result of which they attracted men to their side, thus securing, if not their active support, at least their abstention from opposition; and then, after conquering and becoming masters of the ends they sought, adopted a course dia-metrically opposed to their former stand both in word and in deed. Let no one, however, assume that I shall act in this same way. [5] For I have not associated with you in former time under a disguise, while possessing in reality some different nature, only to become emboldened in security now that that is possible; nor I have become so elated or puffed up by my great good fortune as to desire also to play the tyrant over you – both of which experiences, or at least one of them, seem to me to have come to those men whom I mentioned. [6] No, I am in nature the same sort of man as you have always found me – but why go into details and become offensive as praising myself? – and I would not think of insulting Fortune, but the more I have enjoyed her favours, the more moderately will I use her in every way.

These first paragraphs include the main topic of the speech: the Romans must not fear Caesar, because victory has not changed him: he is still the same, as the Roman people has always known him, and is not following the infamous example of Marius, Cinna, and Sulla. Character transformation as a conse-quence of a victory is a recurring topic, which Dio adopts also in the account on his own times: we find it in the portraits of Marcus Aurelius and Pertinax, both praised exactly because “they remained unchanged absolutely from first to last” (72[71].34.5; 75[74].5.7). As for Septimius Severus, his first statement after he entered Rome is the promise not to put any senator to death, taking also an oath on this matter; but “he himself was the first to violate this [prom-ise] instead of keeping it, and made away with many senators” (75[74].2.1–2). After his victory over Albinus, in the context of Severus’ speech before the Senate, Dio mentions the condemnation to death of 29 senators (76[75].8.4).

The comparison with Marius, Cinna, and Sulla about the treatment of defeated enemies, whose model he is not going to follow, sounds somewhat strange in Caesar’s mouth. We can easily accept the reference to Sulla, but it seems hardly plausible such an explicit disapproval of Marius, Caesar’s uncle, and Cinna, his father-in-law. The choice of the exempla betrays the interven-tion of the historian. We can wonder if the mention of Marius and Sulla (with the addition of Cinna) is an indirect hint to Severus’ speech of 197, which had

Cassius Dio’s Sulla 19

presented their cruelty against the enemies as an example worth following, opposed to that of Caesar (and Pompey).17

It is worth stressing a detail: Caesar says that he is not imitating Marius, Cinna, Sulla “and practically all the others who ever triumphed over the fac-tions opposed to them”. Caesar is obviously referring to the civil wars (he uses the term ἀντιστασιάσαντας), but this reference to “other victors” of the civil wars would have been anachronistic, in 46 BC. Dio himself is speaking here: “all the others” are the victors of all the (Roman) civil wars, including those of his times.

It is interesting to note that the same three exempla are mentioned by the emperor Otho, in his last address to the soldiers in 69 (63[64].13.2).18 Otho says he is going to commit suicide in order to avoid a civil war, because “it is better that one should perish for all than many for one”:

καὶ γὰρ ἐγὼ Μούκιος καὶ Δέκιος καὶ Κούρτιος καὶ Ῥήγουλος μᾶλλον ἂν ἑλοίμην ἢ Μάριος καὶ Κίννας καὶ Σύλλας, ἵνα μὴ καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους εἴπω, γενέσθαι. [3] μητ’ οὖν βιάσησθέ με ἕνα τούτων ὧν μισῶ γενέσθαι, μήτε φθονήσητέ μοι ἕνα ἐκείνων ὧν ἐπαινῶ μιμήσασθαι.

For I certainly should prefer to be a Mucius, a Decius, a Curtius, a Regulus, rather than a Marius, a Cinna, or a Sulla – not to mention other names. [3] Therefore do not force me to become one of these men that I hate, nor grudge me the privilege of imitating one of those that I commend.

Otho’s address to the soldiers is certainly no fiction: it appears, as a direct speech, already in Tacitus (Hist. 2.47) and Plutarch (Otho 15). Suetonius briefly hints at it (Otho 10), by the direct evidence of his father, who was an eyewit-ness. Now, the exempla mentioned by Otho in Dio’s version are quite absent in the other sources: they are definitely an addition by Dio and it is significant that the mention of Marius, Cinna, and Sulla is followed again, as in Caesar’s speech, by an allusion to the “others” (“not to mention other names”). The fact that Caesar and Otho, in their speeches, employ not only the same exempla but also the same set of words, confirms that these words have no link with the narrative context: in both cases Dio is hinting to the civil war of his times. The evocation, and the condemnation, of Marius and Sulla’s cruelty becomes

17  Giua 1981, 334–335. Cf. Hose 1994, 410.18  Schettino 2000, 271.

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a rejection of Severus’ revenge against his enemies in 197. Caesar’s allocution to the senators is a kind of “ideal speech”, the speech which Dio would have wanted to hear from Septimius Severus after his victory at Lugdunum.

We must now consider a declaration by Antony, Lepidus, and Octavian to the people in 43 BC. It is a short passage, which closes Dio’s account of the triumviral proscriptions (47.13.3–4):

Οὐ γὰρ ὅτι τινὰς ἐφόνευον, αἰτίαν ἔχειν ἠξίουν, ἀλλ’ ὅτι μὴ πλείονας, προσεπαινεῖσθαι ἤθελον. [4] καὶ πρός γε τὸν δῆμον φανερῶς ποτε εἶπον ὅτι οὔτε τὴν τοῦ Μαρίου τοῦ τε Σύλλου ὠμότητα, ὥστε καὶ μισηθῆναι, οὔτ’ αὖ τὴν τοῦ Καίσαρος ἐπιείκειαν, ὥστε καὶ καταφρονηθῆναι καὶ ἀπ’ αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐπιβουλευθῆναι, ἐζηλώκασι.

For these men not only would not allow themselves to be blamed because they were murdering people, but, what is more, wished to be praised because the number of their victims was not greater. [4] And to the popu-lace they once openly stated that they had emulated neither the cruelty of Marius and Sulla, that they should be hated, nor, on the other hand, the mildness of Caesar, that they should be despised and consequently plotted against.

According to Dio, while the massacre of the proscribed men was still in progress, the triumvirs stated they had emulated neither the cruelty (ὡμότης) of Marius and Sulla, nor the mildness (ἐπιείκεια) of Caesar. This piece of information is not entirely groundless: the topic seems to be taken from the triumviral edict on the proscriptions,19 which Appian produces in a Greek translation.20 But in the text of the edict (App. B. civ. 4.10.39)21 only one precedent is recalled,

19  Hinard 1985a, 229; Gowing 1992, 251.20  Gabba 1956, 225; Bengtson 1972a, 124–125; Bengtson 1972b, 9–13; Millar 1973, 59; Canfora

1980, 430–434; Hinard 1985a, 228; Bleicken 1990, 46; Gowing 1992, 250–251; Osgood 2006, 63–64. Contra, among others, Schwartz 1895, 233.

21  “What vast number of citizens have they, on their part, doomed to destruction with us, disregarding the vengeance of the gods and the reprobation of mankind! We shall not deal harshly with any multitude of men, nor shall we count as enemies all who have opposed us or plotted against us, or those distinguished for their riches merely, their abundance, or their high position; nor shall we slay as many as another man who held the supreme power before us, when he, too, was regulating the commonwealth in civil convulsion, and whom you named the Fortunate on account of his success; and yet necessarily three persons will have more enemies than one. We shall take vengeance only on the worst and most guilty”.

Cassius Dio’s Sulla 21

that of Sulla: the triumvirs state that they will not slay so many people as he did, though adding shortly afterwards that three persons have necessarily more enemies than one. The terms used by Dio are different again: he not only adds the exempla of Marius and Caesar to that of Sulla, to whom the edict hints indirectly, but also introduces a contrast between ὡμότης and ἐπιείκεια. This contrast is absent from Appians’ text of the edict, but is indeed one of the topics of Severus’ speech of 197. Concepts and examples employed by the triumvirs are the same as in Severus’ speech, except for the omission (obvious, given the context) of Pompey’ s ἐπιείκεια: this cannot be accidental.

It is not by chance that we find again all five exempla employed by Severus in Tiberius’ epitaph for Augustus. At first Tiberius makes a comparison between the late emperor and Sulla, and shortly afterwards mentions the other three men (56.38.1–5):

Ὁ τοίνυν Αὔγουστος οὗτος, ὃν δι’ αὐτὰ ταῦτα καὶ τῆς ἐπωνυμίας ταύτης ἠξιώσατε, ἐπειδὴ τάχιστα τῶν ἐμφυλίων πολέμων ἀπηλλάγη καὶ πράξας καὶ παθὼν οὐχ ὅσα αὐτὸς ἤθελεν ἀλλ’ ὅσα τῷ δαιμονίῳ ἔδοξεν, πρῶτον μὲν τοὺς πλείους τῶν ἀντιστάντων οἱ καὶ περιγενομένων ἐκ τῶν παρατάξεων ἔσωσεν, ἐν μηδενὶ τὸν Σύλλαν μιμησάμενος τὸν ἐυτυχῆ ονομαζόμενον. [2] . . . ἔπειτα δὲ τοὺς συνεξετασθέντας οἱ πολλαῖς καὶ μεγάλαις δωρεαῖς τιμήσας οὔθ’ ὑπερήφανόν τι πράττειν οὔθ’ ὑβρίζειν εἴασεν . . . [4] τεκμήριον δὲ, Σύλλας μὲν καὶ Μάριος καὶ τοὺς παῖδας τῶν ἀντιπολεμησάντων σφίσιν ἤχθηραν· τί γὰρ δεῖ τῶν ἄλλων ἀνδρῶν τῶν μικροτέρων μνημονεύειν; Πομπηίος δὲ καὶ Καῖσαρ τούτου μὲν ἀπέσχοντο ὥς γε ἐπίπαν εἰπεῖν, τοῖς δὲ δὴ φίλοις οὐκ ὀλίγα παρὰ τὰ ἑαυτῶν ἤθη ποιεῖν ἐφῆκαν. [5] ἀλλ’ οὗτος οὕτως ἑκάτερον αὐτῶν ἔμιξε καὶ ἐκέρασεν ὥστε τοῖς τε ἐναντιωθεῖσίν οἱ νίκην τὴν ἧτταν ἀποφῆναι καὶ τοῖς συναγωνισαμένοις εὐτυχῆ τὴν ἀρετὴν ἀποδεῖξαι.

This Augustus, then, whom you deemed worthy of this title for the very reasons just cited, as soon as he had rid himself of the civil wars, in which his actions and his fortunes were not such as he himself desired but as Heaven decreed, first of all spared the lives of most of his opponents who had survived the various battles, thus in no wise imitating Sulla, who was called the Fortunate. [2] . . . Again, though he honoured his compan-ions in arms with many great gifts, he did not permit them to indulge in any arrogant or wanton behaviour . . . [4] For example, Sulla and Marius cherished hatred toward even the sons of those who had fought against them; and why need I mention the minor instances? Pompey and Caesar refrained in general from such hatred, yet permitted their friends to do not a few things that were contrary to their own principles. [5] But this

Urso22

man so combined and fused the two qualities, that to his adversaries he made defeat seem victory, and to his comrades in arms proved that virtue is blest by fortune.

Sulla and Marius, Pompey and Caesar, and Augustus: the exempla are the same, the indirect hint to Severus’ speech seems undeniable. Tiberius’ epitaph enables Dio to blame once again the cruelty of Marius and Sulla, and to criti-cize the use of Augustus as a “model of cruelty”, as stated by Severus in 197.22 According to Tiberius’ epitaph, Augustus refused to follow the exemplum of Sulla and Marius, choosing a policy of mildness instead. In a context in which Dio celebrates Augustus as the man who granted security and steadiness to the empire, this sounds as an implicit criticism of Severus’ policy against political opponents.23

To sum up: the image of Sulla as a “monster of cruelty”, that was consoli-dated since the Late Republic, is quite endorsed by Dio too. As to this topic Dio has nothing new to offer, but in the speeches by Caesar, the triumvirs, Tiberius, and Otho, Sulla’s cruelty is remembered in terms which remind the reader of the speech of Severus, who, in turn, had praised it as an exemplum.24 Thus a historiographical topos becomes for Dio a means to criticize the emperor, a way to express his judgment on the civil war of his times.

3

In these speeches Sulla emerges as a detestable personality, because of the cru-elty displayed after his victory in the civil war. This judgement is by no means original and can be interesting only in the light of his “contemporary” implica-tions. But, as I said before, moral judgement does not always correspond to political judgement: what was Cassius Dio’s opinion on Sulla’s dictatorship?

In the ancient tradition Sulla’s dictatorship had often been classified as a “tyrannical” power. The expression dominatio Sullae was employed by

22  Giua 1983, 447–449; Reinhold & Swan 1990, 166–167, 170.23  Rohr Vio 1998, 564–565. Dio’s judgement about the new political order established by

Augustus (56.43.4) leaves no doubt: “Augustus has fashioned what Dio would term the ideal state” (Gowing 1992, 58).

24  We must bear in mind that Dio’s readers were perfectly able to detect these and others allusions to contemporary events, even before (or without) reading his “Severan” books.

Cassius Dio’s Sulla 23

authors of different political orientations, like Cicero and Sallust,25 up to Tacitus; Plutarch, though quoting repeatedly Sulla’s Commentarii, eventually called him a τύραννος; and Appian described Sulla as a τύραννος αὐτοκράτωρ (B. Civ. 1.99.461), and his government as a τυραννὶς ἐντελής (1.99.462).26 Now, in two passages of Dio’s Roman History, the power of Sulla is described as a δυναστεία.

The contrast between δημοκρατία and δυναστεία (or better δυναστεῖαι) is the main political topic of the Late Republic, from the tribunate of Tiberius Gracchus (frg. 83.4) to the battle of Actium (52.1.1). Dio “uses the term [δυναστεία] to denote a state of affairs, characterized by violence and illegality, in which one or more faction-leaders held power unconstitutionally” (Millar 1964, 74). Systematic recourse to violence can be of course characteristic of a δυναστεία, but not necessarily (for Dio, Caesar was undoubtedly a δυναστής, but a “mild” one). Δυναστεία in Dio expresses both the opposition to all legal forms of state organisation and a behaviour which not only clashes to the will of the Senate and of the aristocracy, but also endangers the whole community. Its main characteristic is the straining of institutional rules.27

Let us consider the two passages where Dio uses the term δυναστεία in con-nection with Sulla’s power.

(i) The first one concerns L. Domitius Ahenobarbus (41.11.2), who had been a partisan τῶν Συλλείων (clearly a translation of partes Sullanae) and had grown rich “under that régime”, purchasing cheaply many pieces of land:

Καὶ ὅς [scil. ὁ Δομίτιος], εἰ καὶ τὰ μάλιστα ἰσχύν τέ τινα εἶχε καὶ ἐπ’ αὐτῇ ἐπήλπιζε (καὶ γὰρ τοὺς στρατιώτας τά τε ἄλλα ἐτεθεραπεύκει καὶ χώρας ὑποσχέσει ὑπῆκτο· [2] τῶν τε γὰρ Συλλείων ἐγεγόνει καὶ πολλὴν ἐκ τῆς δυναστείας ἐκείνης ἐκέκτητο), ὅμως ἐπειθάρχησε.

And Domitius, in spite of the large force that he had and the hopes he reposed in it, inasmuch as he had courted the favour of the soldiers

25  It is worth stressing that in the mid-first century BC the “myth of Sulla” was not firmly established yet. The complex portrayal of Sulla resulting from Cicero and Sallust (and other contemporary sources) mirrors a debate still open. Cf. n. 8 above.

26  Gowing 1992, 164. Cf. Hinard 2008a, cxcviii: “La dictature de Sylla représentait . . ., pour Appien, une sorte de raté dans un processus historique conduisant inéluctablement à la ‘monarchie’ ”.

27  Cf. Espinosa Ruiz 1982, 63–69; Fechner 1986, 158–159; Freyburger-Galland 1996, 23–27; Sion-Jenkis 2000, 47–50; Kuhn-Chen 2002, 191–195; Cordier 2003, 233.

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in every way and had won them over by promises of land [2] (as one of Sulla’s veterans he had acquired a large amount under that régime), nevertheless obeyed orders.

(ii) The second one is Cicero’s speech on the amnesty, in 44 BC (44.28.1):

Ἴσχυσέ τινα χρόνον ἐν τοῖς στασιωτικοῖς ὁ Μάριος, εἴτ’ ἐκπεσὼν καὶ δύναμιν ἀθροίσας ἴστε οἷα εἰργάσατο. ὁμοίως ὁ Σύλλας, ἵνα μὴ τὸν Κίνναν μηδὲ τὸν Στράβωνα μηδὲ τοὺς ἄλλους τοὺς διὰ μέσου καταλέγω, δυνηθεὶς τὴν πρώτην, εἶτ’ ἐλαττωθείς, ἔπειτα δυναστεύσας οὐδὲν ὅ τι οὐχὶ τῶν δεινοτάτων ἔπραξε.

Marius for a time was strong amid civil strife; then he was driven out, col-lected a force, and accomplished – you know what. Likewise Sulla, – not to speak of Cinna or Strabo or the rest who came between – powerful at first, later defeated, finally making himself master, was guilty of every possible cruelty.

Here Cicero presents a list of historical characters which includes almost all protagonists of the civil wars and political tumults of the first half of the first century BC. There are obviously Marius and Sulla, Pompey and Caesar, but also Cinna, Pompeius Strabo, Marius iunior, Carbo, Lepidus, Sertorius, Catilina, and Clodius (48.28.1–4): it is not a focused judgement and I am not sure that this passage can be used to outline Dio’s own opinion on Sulla. The expression dominatio Sullae (or regnum) had been often employed by Cicero himself:28 this δυναστεύσας could hint to an expression which Cicero actually used, even in his last speeches (Phil. 2.42.108: Cinnam nimis potentem, Sullam postea dominantem, modo Caesarem regnantem; 5.16.44: illius opibus Sulla regnavit). But in the passage on Domitius, Dio himself is speaking, and the meaning is plain.

However, Dio’s judgement on Sulla is perhaps more complex than it seems. In the Agrippa-Maecenas debate, in particular in Agrippa’s speech, the exemplum of Sulla is employed in rather different terms (52.13.2):

Tεκμήριον δέ, Μάριος μὲν καὶ Σύλλας καὶ Μέτελλος, καὶ Πομπήιος τὸ πρῶτον, ἐν κράτει τῶν πραγμάτων γενόμενοι οὔτ’ ἠθέλησαν δυναστεῦσαι οὔτ’ ἔπαθον παρὰ τοῦτο δεινὸν ουδέν.

28  Regnum: Cat. 3.4.9; Har. resp. 27.54; Phil. 5.44; Att. 8.11.2 [= 161.2 Shackleton Bailey]; 9.7.3 [= 174.3 S.B.]. Dominatio: Leg. agr. 1.7.21; 2.29.81; Off. 2.14.51; Phil. 2.108.

Cassius Dio’s Sulla 25

Consider the testimony of history: Marius and Sulla and Metellus, and Pompey at first, when they got control of affairs, not only refused to assume sovereign power but also escaped disaster thereby.

Agrippa’s assertion, that Sulla did not want to δυναστεύειν, could appear bewil-dering, if we bear in mind not only the speeches quoted above but also Dio’s statements on the Romans’ hatred for Sulla’s dictatorship (36.34.3; 40.45.5). To be sure, Agrippa’s reasoning is closely followed by Maecenas’ confuta-tion, which dwells also on the exempla employed by his interlocutor. But the statement, that these personalities (and Sulla among them) did not want to δυναστεύειν, is not refuted by Maecenas.29

4

As we have seen, Cassius Dio’s account on the aftermath of the first civil war is lost, except for a few fragments. This loss is particularly regrettable, if we con-sider the quality of the information usually given by Dio about Roman institu-tions and magistracies.30 We can however detect some passages which seem to confirm Agrippa’s statement about Sulla’s willingness not to δυναστεύειν.

(i) In the fragments on the first civil war, the term δυναστεία is never employed with reference to Sulla.31 No doubt the fragmentary nature of this sec-tion undermines any argumentum ex silentio, but it is significant that in the only occasion where Dio is talking about Sulla’s power, he does not employ δυναστεία, but ἐξουσία (frg. 109.2): “He had doubtless always desired to act thus,

29  As to these exempla, in his reply Maecenas (52.17.3–4) challenges two propositions of Agrippa’s: it is not true that “the majority of Sulla’s ordinances and the more important still remain”, as Agrippa stated (52.13.5); and the choice not to δυναστεῦσαι did not guaran-tee personal security, to Marius and Sulla in particular (52.13.2).

It has been rightly pointed out (Schettino 2001, 549–550) that Maecenas, in his reply, mentions again all the five exempla employed in Severus’s speech of 197: Marius, Sulla, Pompey, Caesar, and Augustus. When he says that renunciation of δυναστεία threatens the ἀσφάλεια of the political leader, Maecenas seems to share Severus’ point of view. But there is a basic difference: the focus of attention in Severus’ speech is ὡμότης as a means of safety, in Agrippa’s speech (and in Maecenas’ reply) is δυναστεία. On this difference, see below.

30  Vrind 1923, 1; Hinard 2005, 261–281 [= 2011, 273–291]; Millar 2005, 17–40; Urso 2005, 163–193.31  It is employed once, in frg. 107.1, with reference to Pompey: it is the δυναστεία ἰδία (“a

sovereignty of his own”) enjoyed by Pompey in Picenum, before joining his forces with Sulla.

Urso26

but revealed himself only in the day of his power (ἐν τῇ ἐξουσίᾳ)”. This term does not imply the negative nuance of δυναστεία: it is no coincidence that this is indeed the term used by Caesar to define his own power, in his “encourag-ing” speech to the senators in 46 BC (43.15.2; 43.16.3–4).32 As for Sulla, the use of ἐξουσία instead of δυναστεία in frg. 109,2 is all the more significant in that Dio is referring to Sulla’s power after his victory.33

(ii) Two passages of Catulus’ speech on the lex Gabinia of 67 BC are interesting too.34 In the first one, Catulus is talking about the magistracies formerly ful-filled by Marius and Sulla (36.31.3–4). Here Catulus says that Sulla was dictator, then consul:

Οὔτε γὰρ τὸν Μάριον ἄλλο τι ὡς εἰπεῖν τοιοῦτον ἐποίησεν ἢ ὅτι τοσούτους τε ἐν ὀλιγίστῳ χρόνῳ πολέμους ἐνεχειρίσθη καὶ ὕπατος ἑξάκις ἐν βραχυτάτῳ ἐγένετο, [4] οὔτε τὸν Σύλλαν ἢ ὅτι τοσούτοις ἐφεξῆς ἔτεσι τὴν ἀρχὴν τῶν στρατοπέδων ἔσχε καὶ μετὰ τοῦτο δικτάτωρ, εἶθ’ ὕπατος ἀπεδείχθη.

What made Marius what he became was practically nothing else than being entrusted with so many wars in the shortest space of time and being made consul six times in the briefest period; [4] and similarly Sulla became what he was because he held command of the armies so many years in succession, and later was appointed dictator, then consul.

The temporal sequence is clear: it implies (against Appian) that Sulla was not dictator when he became consul in 80 BC (δικτάτωρ, εἶθ’ ὕπατος). This pas-sage seems to be another proof that Sulla’s dictatorship ended within 8135 and lasted a shorter time than some scholars still believe.36

32  Cf. Cordier 2003, 234–235.33  Frg. 109.1: νικήσας τοὺς Σαυνίτας; 109.3: ὡς τάχιστα τῶν Σαυνιτῶν ἐκράτησε.34  These two passages of Catulus’ speech have been exploited by Hinard (1999, 427–432

[= 2011, 57–61]), who argued that Sulla gave up the dictatorship after six months, at the normal deadline.

35  According to the chronology proposed by Badian 1970, 9–10; Hinard 1999, 427–432 [= 2011, 57–61]; Hinard 2008b, 56–60; Keaveney 2005b, 423–439 (cf. also Hurlet 1993, 57–69).

36  Cf. Vervaet 2004, 58–77: Sulla abdicated in 79 BC. According to Vervaet (66–67 and n. 121), “rather than merely indicating that, chronologically, Sulla was vested first with a dictator-ship and then with a (second) consulship, Catulus in the first place calls to mind that Sulla undertook an unprecedented cumulation of Rome’s two supreme offices . . . Sulla was the first Roman to hold both for an entire year”. But Dio denies explicitly this hypothesis at 43.21.2: Caesar was the first to be appointed dictator “for an entire year” (cf. n. 41 below).

Cassius Dio’s Sulla 27

(iii) Shortly afterwards (36.34.1–2), in the same speech, Catulus hints to the possibility to appoint a dictator, in order to eradicate piracy:

Καὶ τοῦτον μέντοι τοιοῦτον ὄντα οὔτε ἐπὶ πᾶσί ποτε τοῖς πράγμασιν οἱ πατέρες ἡμῶν οὔτε ἐπὶ πλείω χρόνον ἑξαμήνου κατεστήσαντο. [2] ὥστ’ εἰ μὲν τοιούτου τινὸς δεῖσθε, ἔξεστιν ὑμῖν, μή