BOOK XI

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ARGUMENT.

Schoenbeck supposes this book to have been written in memory of the Iberian war; because it not only touches on military affairs, but contains also some bitter sarcasms on the morals of certain young men who served in that campaign. Petermann coincides in the same opinion. Corpet supposes that the principal object of the book was an elaborate defense of the character of Scipio Africanus; especially with regard to the salutary and strict discipline which he restored to the Roman army during the Numantine war. Gerlach admits the probability of these conjectures, though he scarcely thinks that the Fragments which have come down to us of this book are of sufficient length to enable us to pronounce definitively on the question. It is quite clear that the mention of Opimius the father, or of the elder Lucius Cotta, can bear no relation to the Numantine war, since they both lived before it began; still it is possible that their names might have been introduced, to render the morals of their sons still more conspicuous. How the Fragment (2) respecting the plebeian Caius Cassius Cephalo was connected with the main subject is not clear, unless he was introduced for the purpose of incidentally mentioning the bribery of the unjust judge, Tullius.

The fourth and ninth Fragments may clearly refer to the Numantine war; as may perhaps the seventh; as we learn from Cicero, that while Scipio Africanus was before Numantia, he received some munificent presents, which were sent to him from Asia by King Attalus, and which he accepted in the presence of his army. (Cic. pro Dei., 7.) This happened probably only a few months before the death of Attalus; and Lucilius was most likely an eye-witness of the fact. The thirteenth Fragment also may refer to the same campaign; though Duentzer supposes it to be an allusion to the miserable penuriousness of Ælius Tubero. The fifth and sixth Fragments apparently refer rather to civil than military matters.

1 Quintus Opimius, the famous father of this Jugurthinus, was both a handsome man and an infamous, both in his early youth; latterly he conducted himself more uprightly.[1746]

2 This Caius Cassius, a laborer, whom we call Cefalo--a cut-purse and thief--him, one Tullius, a judge, made his heir; while all the rest were disinherited.[1747]

3 Lucius Cotta the elder, the father of this Crassus, "the all-blazing," was a close-fisted fellow in money-matters; very slow in paying any body--[1748]

4

5 Asellus cast it in the teeth of the great Scipio, that during his censorship, the lustrum had been unfortunate and inauspicious.[1749]

6 ... and now I wished to throw into verse a saying of Granius, the præco.[1750]

7 ... a noble meeting; there glittered the drawers, the cloaks, the twisted chains of the great Datis.[1751]

8 ... and a road must be made, and a rampart thrown up here, and that kind of groundwork--[1752]

9 ... he is a wanderer now these many years; he is now a soldier in winter quarters, serving with us

10 ... thence, while still of tender age and a mere boy, comes to Rome.

11 Nor have I need of him as a lover, nor a mean fellow to bail me--

12 ... he is a jibber, a shuffler, a hard-mouthed, obstinate brute.[1753]

13 When they had taken their seats here, and the skins were extended in due order....[1754]

14 ... who in the wash-house and the pool....

FOOTNOTES:

[1746] _Jugurthinus_ is properly the proud title of Marius. (Ov., Pont., IV., iii., 45, "Ille Jugurthino clarus Cimbroque triumpho.") It is here applied ironically to Lucius Opimius, who so notoriously received bribes from Jugurtha, when he went over, as chief of the ten commissioners, to arrange the division of the kingdom between Jugurtha and Adherbal, B.C. 117. (Sall., Bell. Jug., xvi.) He had been before honorably distinguished by the taking of Fregellæ, when in rebellion against Rome, while he was prætor. The safety of the Roman state had also been committed to him when consul (B.C. 121) during the riots of Caius Gracchus, which by his prompt measures he was the main instrument in quelling. (Hence Cicero styles him "civis præstantissimus." Brut., 34.) For this he was accused by the democratic party, but was acquitted; his defense being conducted by the same Papirius Carbo who had assailed Scipio Africanus after the death of Tiberius Gracchus ("aliâ tum mente Rempublicam capessens." Cic., de Or., ii., 25). The

## partisans of Gracchus, however, afterward crushed him by means of the

Mamilian law, along with many other excellent men. Cic., Brut., _u. s._ Sall., Bell. Jug., 40. He was consul with Q. Fabius Maximus, who that year overthrew the Allobroges and Arverni. His consulship was long remembered as having been a splendid year for wine, hence called Opimianum. Cic., Brut., 83. Of his father Quintus, Cicero speaks in nearly the same terms as Lucilius does here: "Q. Opimius, consularis, qui adolescentulus malè audisset." De Orat., ii., 68.

[1747] _Cephalo_, like Capito, was probably a nickname from the size of his head. _Sector_ is used by Plautus exactly in the sense of the English "cut-purse." Sector Zonarius, i. e., Crumeniseca, βαλαντιοτόμος. Trinum., IV., ii., 20. It is applied by Cicero to a mean fellow, who buys at auction the confiscated goods of proscribed persons to retail again. Cic., Rosc. Am., 29. Ascon. in Verr., II., i., 20. Cf. Nonius, _s. v._ Secare. _Damnare_, i. e., "exhæredare." Non.

[1748] παναίθου (cf. Horn., Il. xiv., 372) is an epithet applied to a helmet. Why it was given to this Cotta is not known. Gerlach supposes him to be the L. Cotta mentioned by Cicero (de Orat., iii., 11) as affecting a coarse and rustic style of speaking, "gaudere videtur gravitate linguæ, sonoque vocis agresti," and that this name was given him by way of irony. He would be most justly entitled to the epithet of Crassus, "the coarse," which was probably given for the same reason. (Crassus not being the regular cognomen of the Aurelian gens, to which Cotta belonged, but of the Licinian.) Valerius Maximus gives a story of the sordid avarice of the father, which illustrates what Lucilius says, that when tribune of the Plebs he took advantage of the "sacrosanct" character of his office to refuse paying his creditors their just claims, but was compelled to do so by his colleagues. (Pighius assigns this event to B.C. 155.) He was afterward accused by P. Corn. Scipio Africanus minor; but being defended by Q. Metellus Macedonicus, was acquitted. Cf. Cic., Brut., 21, where he gives him the epithet "veterator." He was one of the partisans of the Gracchi.

[1749] _Asellus_ is probably the same whom Cicero mentions (de Orat., ii., 64), about whom Scipio made the pun, which is, of course, as Cicero says, untranslatable: "Cum Asellus omnes provincias stipendia merentem se peragrâsse gloriaretur, '_Agas Asellum_,'" etc.

[1750] _Granius_, a præco, though a great favorite with the plebeians, who used to retail his witticisms with great zest, was on terms of intimate friendship with Crassus, Catulus, T. Tinca Placentinus, and other men of high rank, whom he used to criticise with the greatest severity and freedom, and hold, especially with the latter, contests in sharp repartee. (Vid. Cic., Brut., 43, 46: de Orat., ii., 60, 70, where some of his witticisms are quoted.)

[1751] Gerlach refers this Fragment to the presents sent by Attalus. "Datis" he takes to mean any common name, but would suggest "ducis."

[1752] _Rudus_ is applied to a mixture of stones, gravel, and rubble, cemented together with lime, used by the Romans as a substratum for a path or pavement. Cat., R. R., 18. Plin., xxxvi., 25. Cf. Liv., xli., 27, "Vias sternendas silice in Urbe glareâ extra Urbem locaverunt." Tibull., I., viii., 59.

[1753] This Fragment is most probably connected with Fr. 3, as both strigosus and bovinator are applied to beasts who refuse to move; and hence to persons who use all kinds of artifices to avoid the payment of their just debts.

[1754] Cf. vi., 13; x., 4.

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