For other forms of mental relaxation are in no way suited to every time, age, and place. He uses dramatic rhetoric to discredit the case of his opponent, Grattius,[3] whom he here names. He reveals this thesis in lines 2022: He continues with this approach in the final lines of this section where he proposes that even if Archias were not enrolled as a citizen, his virtuous qualities should compel us to enroll him. We know that Archias wrote, in Greek, a historical poem in several books on the Mithridatic War ( 21). It will also give him a much larger pool of examples on which to draw, including the actor Q. Roscius Gallus ( 17), the rhetorician L. Plotius Gallus ( 20), and the historian Theophanes of Mytilene ( 24), none of whom would otherwise be relevant to his argument. The comparison with Ennius is a useful one for Cicero, since Ennius was Romes great national poet and would have been fully acceptable to the jury. He continues ( 14): Sed pleni omnes sunt libri, plenae sapientium voces, plena exemplorum vetustas; quae iacerent in tenebris omnia, nisi litterarum lumen accederet. Plut. If Cicero had wished to be less ambiguous he could have said:When I was a child, Archias was my tutor in Greek poetry, and I benefited from his teaching. The ArT of CiTizenship - ejournals.bc.edu But even if he has, the jury may still feel reluctant to acquit Archias, because they are prejudiced against him. (Cic. 32), I hope that my departure from the practice and the conventions of the courts, and my digression upon the subject of my clients genius, and, in general terms, upon the art which he follows, has been welcomed by you in as generous a spirit as I am assured it has been welcomed by him who presides over this tribunal. It was here that he earned a living as a poet and gained the patronage of the Roman general and politician L. Lucullus. 4. Mr. Whelan, a former U.S. Marine, was detained minutes after he was handed a USB stick by a Russian acquaintance that Russia maintains contained a classified list of its security agents. At Rome, Archias was accepted into the household of the Luculli. The speech is rounded off with a brief conclusio ( 312). Cicero emphasizes the stature of those who gave patronage to Archias by altering the usual word order. Scholars all give the date as 62, citing our passage; but our passage is not so specific. PDF SPEECH IN DEFENCE OF AULUS LICINIUS ARCHIAS - PinkMonkey.com In the Fourth Verrine, for example, when he is dealing with Verres theft of art treasures, he affects to be unable to recall the name of the famous sculptor Polyclitus (Verr. Go fishing with the idea that Cicero (and classical authors tout court) keenly considered and combined form and content in a manner that was meaningful and not simply mechanical, and at least some students will bite.2 C. astutely notes how Cicero, while describing Archias attempts to obtain citizenship (section 7), imitates the language of the law he has just cited in order to suggest Archias compliance with it. Copy this link, or click below to email it to a friend. This argument, understood literally, does in fact have some validity. For centuries it has been seen as a charming encomium of literature, and it would be wrong to deny that it is that. The first point to bear in mind, then, is that this passage is, formally at least, the second stage of Ciceros argument as announced at 4a. Aulus Licinius Archias, (born c. 120 bc, Antioch, Syria [now Antakya, Turkey]), ancient Greek poet who came to Rome, where he was charged in 62 bc with having illegally assumed the rights of a Roman citizen. It is only in Pro Archia, however, that the style is made to play an active part in the process ( 3): quaeso a vobis ut in hac causa mihi detis hanc veniam accommodatam huic reo, vobis, quem ad modum spero, non molestam, ut me pro summo poeta atque eruditissimo homine dicentem hoc concursu hominum litteratissimorum, hac vestra humanitate, hoc denique praetore exercente iudicium, patiamini de studiis humanitatis ac litterarum paulo loqui liberius, et in eius modi persona quae propter otium ac studium minime in iudiciis periculisque tractata est uti prope novo quodam et inusitato genere dicendi. Quint. Lord Broughams often-quoted pronouncement: Ciceros speech for Archias, which is exquisitely composed, but of which not more than one-sixth is to the purpose, could not have been delivered in a British court of Justice, On the nature of Archias relationship with these men see. Literature and Persuasion in Cicero's Pro Archia The digressio concludes ( 2830) with Ciceros admission that he too wishes to be immortalized in verse; as he has demonstrated, there are many honourable precedents for this. Cicero begins his account of Archias' life and travels through Asia and Greece during the poet's early career before his first arrival in Rome. Cicero now moves on to the confirmatio, which, because of the simplicity of the case, is almost as brief as the narratio. 28), The measures which I, jointly with you, undertook in my consulship for the safety of the empire, the lives of our citizens, and the common weal of the state, have been taken by my client as the subject of a poem which he has begun; he read this to me, and the work struck me as at once so forcible and so interesting, that I encouraged him to complete it. Gotoff, H. C. Ciceros Elegant Style: An Analysis of the Pro Archia, Urbana, Illinois (1979). Literary commemoration, he says, incites men to undertake dangerous and heroic deeds. If I have any natural talent, members of the juryand I am aware how limited it is; or if I have any experience in public speakingin which I do not deny that I am moderately well practised; or if there is any technical skill in my oratory which has been derived from application and training in the liberal artsand I admit that I have never at any period of my life been averse to such training: if I do have any of these capabilities, then A. Licinius here is entitled almost as of right to be among the very first to claim from me the benefits which they may bring. The legal argument now being triumphantly concluded, it might be assumed that Ciceros defence is over. Or perhaps Archias had simply grown tired of praising the Romans, and felt confident that Cicero would forgive him if he failed to oblige. Expand or collapse the "in this article" section, Expand or collapse the "related articles" section, Expand or collapse the "forthcoming articles" section, Art and Archaeology, Research Resources for Classical, Bilingualism and Multilingualism in the Roman World, Bronze Age Aegean, Death and Burial in the. Cicero was always aware of the importance of entertaining and amusing his audiences, and he won them over partly by providing them with passages they would derive pleasure from listening to. Rome should therefore be grateful that Archias already belongs to her (the argument concludes in the same way as the argument from Homer at 19). How many finely executed portraits of the most valiant men have the Greek and Latin writers left us, and not only for our contemplation but for our emulation! Persuasion of a different kind occurs in the next section ( 6): Erat temporibus illis iucundus Q. Metello illi Numidico et eius Pio filio, audiebatur a M. Aemilio, vivebat cum Q. Catulo et patre et filio, a L. Crasso colebatur, Lucullos vero et Drusum et Octavios et Catonem et totam Hortensiorum domum devinctam consuetudine cum teneret, adficiebatur summo honore , Back in those days Archias was regarded with affection by the famous Q. Metellus Numidicus and his son Pius; his recitations were attended by M. Aemilius; he was constantly in the company of Q. Catulus and his son; his friendship was cultivated by L. Crassus; and as for the Luculli, Drusus, the Octavii, Cato, and the entire family of the Hortensii, he was on the closest terms with all of them and was treated by them with the greatest respect . The digressio begins as if in anticipation of a question from the prosecutor ( 12):You will no doubt ask me, Grattius, why I am so delighted with this man (Quaeres a nobis, Gratti, cur tanto opere hoc homine delectemur). Thus in the last (hopelessly corrupt) sentence of section 5, C. informs us of a textual crux but maintains focus upon the meaning of the sentence as printed. In 62 Archias was prosecuted under this law. W. M. Porter divides it into three parts, 1216 covering the benefits afforded by the study of poetry, 1719 covering the intrinsic virtues of poets, and 2030 covering the relationship of the poet and his poetry to the state. Obviously, it will take . Key facts about Americans and guns | Pew Research Center At the risk of waxing biographical, as a Biology major at UC Berkeley I switched camps to Classics/CompLit largely because of Brian Krostenkos intermediate Latin course on Vergil: by drawing students attention to the Aeneids interconnection of language and theme, he gave life to the focus on Latin grammar and Vergilian hexameter. Again, Lucullus had helped Cicero during the Catilinarian conspiracy (ibid. It would appear in fact that this argument has been introduced primarily in order to provide a context for the famous names, since it is the names that carry the main persuasive force.26. Cicero immediately takes us into a world of intelligent culture in which he and Archias play a part, and in which the jury are flattered into fancying that they also belong. For the argument to be effective, Cicero has to imply that it was Archias who made him the great orator he has become; this then demands an element of vagueness as to precisely what Archias contribution was. 12). With typical rhetorical flourishes, Cicero asks the "cultivated audience and enlightened jury" 50 to allow this defense speech. See also C. Murgias detailed review of Gotoffs book: Murgia, C. Review Article: Analyzing Ciceros Style, CP 76 (1981): 301-313. Archias wrote poems of the general's military exploits, and in 93 BC, Lucullus helped him gain citizenship of the municipium of Heraclea. 54). Cicero's famous defense of the poet Aulus Licinius Archias in Pro Archia Poeta Oratio remains one of the most eloquent and important works of Latin literature to date. The reason for this, Cicero continues, is that there is no one who is unwilling to have his own deeds immortalized in verse (this was indeed true in his own case, as he will later reveal). Abstract. He does not have documentary proof that Archias is a citizen of Heraclea, he says, because the public record office at Heraclea was burnt down in the Social War and all the records destroyed;19 but he can nevertheless produce M. Lucullus as a witness to Archias enrolment, and an official deputation has been sent from Heraclea with a written statement confirming Archias claim. In the second part, 1830, he turns from literature to poetry and brings Archias into the discussion (Archias is not referred to at all in 1317), arguing that poetry, and a fortiori Archias, is useful to society. Ciceros reasons for undertaking the defence are apparent from the speech. 4.5);25 Ciceros claim here is that works of literature, whether Greek or Latin, have the same salutary effect. The next example, however, is that of Pompey giving Roman citizenship to Theophanes of Mytilene.31 This parallel is less valid since Theophanes was not a poet but a prose historian (scriptorem,writer, is the ambiguous word Cicero uses). Gotoff (cited n. 1) 81; Porter (cited n. 14) 144 f. This seems to have been the usual number: see, On the hostility of the late-Republican Roman ruling class to Greek philosophy (and to the Greek language) see. Life of Archias. Inst. If this argument too is put another way, its weakness will be apparent:You may be surprised to hear me attributing my success in the courts to a poet rather than a rhetorician, but rhetoric is not the only subject I have studied, and in any case rhetoric and poetry are really the same sort of thing. The main value of this argument, however, is that it introduces the idea of thecommon bond (commune vinclum) by which Cicero claims all branches of culture are linked. The high stylistic level, secondly, serves to establish an atmosphere of culture and sophistication, and this too is something that was best done right from the start. The important point is then made that Archias poetry celebrates the military glory of the Roman people: his poem on the war against the Cimbri actually won the approval of Marius. Saxa atque solitudines voci respondent, bestiae saepe immanes cantu flectuntur atque consistunt; nos instituti rebus optimis non poetarum voce moveamur? Cicero's client is not, as so often, a prominent Roman aristocrat accused of violence, bribery, or extortion, but a Syrian poet whose claim to Roman citizenship was disputed. Gotoff (cited n. 1) 211, 21213 (cf. The conclusio ( 312) recapitulates the main points of the case, and contains no emotional appeal. OLD locus 17 and TLL VII, 1588, 38 ff. 31.7). Cicero states that poets have a natural gift and that Ennius called poets holy. He does, it is true, make an exception for the Greeks of Achaea, who could point to a more distinguished, if remote, past, and lived closer to Rome. He reinforces that proposition through the alliteration of Mars, manubiae, and the Muses: the language demonstrates the idea. After the Social War, citizenship was granted to the allies by the lex Iulia in 90, and this was followed in 89 by a further measure, the lex Plautia Papiria, which among other provisions extended the citizenship to honorary citizens of federate states not resident in those states but nevertheless resident in Italy, provided that they reported to one of the praetors at Rome within sixty days.10 As an honorary citizen of Heraclea, which had been allied to Rome since 278, and being long resident in Rome, Archias duly reported to the praetor Metellus Pius within the specified period. This paper examines Cicero's Pro Archia Poeta Oratio and the author's implicit and explicit views on how Roman cultural identity is constructed. The tone of the passage is philosophical; but it is popular philosophy of a straightforward nature, designed to reassure rather than intimidate the jury. The extent of upper-class Roman prejudice regarding a mans place of origin is revealed by the fact that, in the year before Archias trial, Cicero himself had been described in the Senate by one patrician as animmigrant citizen (inquilinus civis, Sal. 9.2.612). 5.7 (April 62 bc) shows him seeking to form closer ties with Pompey. Archias had become eligible for Roman citizenship under the Lex Iulia de Civitate Latinis Danda, passed in 90 BC, and the Lex Plautia Papiria de Civitate Sociis Danda, passed in 89 BC. It is this potential prejudice that Cicero has to overcome in the remainder of the speech. Archias must indeed be a teacher of genius, the jury will conclude, if he taught Cicero to speak like this. Then ( 5): Statim Luculli, cum praetextatus etiam tum Archias esset, eum domum suam receperunt. It ends with a curious reference to the praetor in charge of the court ( 32): quae a foro aliena iudicialique consuetudine et de hominis ingenio et communiter de ipso studio locutus sum, ea, iudices, a vobis spero esse in bonam partem accepta, ab eo qui iudicium exercet certo scio. Manil. Name: Reading guide for Cicero's Speech in Defense of the Poet Archias (on Blackboard) Note: The defendant's birth name is Archias (a Greek name), Cicero refers to him as Aulus Licinius, the name he took once he moved to Italy and attained Roman citizenship. The technique is similar to that employed the previous year in Pro Murena (Mur. Archias's Roman citizenship has been called into question, and through an artful display of oratory and rhetoric, Cicero reconstructs the reality of Archias's life and contributions to provide proof of his worth as a citizen. This plea for Archias may man of Rome, a man of high birth, a sol- be divided thus: dier of no mean capacity, and an orator of mi I. Cicero's reasons for undertaking the unusual success. Some features of this site may not work without it. It furthers the University's objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide, This PDF is available to Subscribers Only. In the first, 1217 (Porter and MacKendrick also agree on a break at around 17), Cicero discusses literature in general rather than specifically poetry (here I do disagree with Porter), and provides a series of arguments to show that literature is useful, or at least not harmful. 4). While the speech itself is the legal defense of the poet Archias' claim to Roman citizenship, it also situates the debate of legal citizenship within a broader context of Roman cultural . At the same time he is also alluding to the uniquely Roman custom whereby nobles kept wax masks (imagines) of their ancestors who had held curule office within the atria of their houses. Russia's Top Diplomat Hints at a Prisoner Swap for Detained Reporter JavaScript is disabled for your browser. After a brief hit at philosophers for their hypocrisy in writing their names on the books they have written, we are back with Roman generals once again: D. Junius Brutus Callaicus inscribed his monuments with poems by Accius, and M. Fulvius Nobilior dedicated his spoils of war to the Muses ( 26b27). The comparison with Ennius at last brings Cicero to answer the objection that Archias writes in Greek ( 23). Inst. If Archias was Ciceros grammatikos, he would have taught him to recite Homer and other Greek poets, and the vocal training that this involved may genuinely have helped him on his way to becoming a great orator. First, whatever the jurors private views on poetry and culture, it is nevertheless flattering for them to be treated as intellectuals, as a select group of people who are well educated and superior to the common herd (cf. In reality Archias, if he ever wore a toga at all, which is doubtful, would not have done so until 89, by which time he had been settled in Rome for thirteen years. If Archias had not already possessed Roman citizenship, Cicero says, he could easily have obtained it as a favour from some general such as Sulla, or from his friend Metellus Pius ( 2526a). Ciceros defense of his teacher, the Pro Archia, is far from the expert orators most well-known work, yet it presents fascinating questions for analysis. In 65 BC, the Roman Senate passed the Lex Papia de Peregrinis, which challenged false claims of citizenship and expelled foreigners from Rome. Consequently this passage, though it might formally be termed digressio, is, like other digressions in Ciceros speeches, central to the case. 12.73); Cic. The Luculli straight away received Archias into their house, although even at this time he was still of the age when the toga of boyhood is worn. One quibble: it seems odd that C. defines civitas only as citizenship in the vocabularies, although Cicero also employs civitas in the more familiar meaning city (C. gives this sense, however, in the note cum translation at the end of section 6). It is most likely under this law that Archias was prosecuted. II 4.5; cf. It could even be read as a sort of laudatio funebris for Archias, Cicero, and liberal learning. This is understandable in view of the higher social status of the Metelli. The two examples he mentions here are Alexander the Great and Pompey the Great ( 24); the comparison is highly complimentary to the latter. He asks the court to indulge him with a novum genus dicendi "new manner of speaking", similar to the style of a poet. First some nuts and bolts. In his speech defending Archias-the Pro Archia-Cicero argues that Archias was a Roman citizen. 309; Luc. Examples of hendiadys abound, and C. carefully explains and smoothly translates these tricky bits of Ciceronian fullness, as in section 3, where tanto conventu hominum ac frequentia is both translated literally and then rendered as with so numerous a throng of men. Students are taught to distinguish the literal meaning from Ciceros meaning. I am grateful to Professor A. J. Woodman for drawing my attention to the Sallust passage. Pro Archia - Everything2.com 6.53.910; Cic. He'll need an impressive summer to enter the defensive end . Pro Archia, then, is genuinely, all of it, an exercise in persuasion. After the rebuttal Cicero presents his case for Archias citizenship. He applied the three techniques that were expected of ancient oratory: pathos (emotional persuasion), ethos (credibility persuasion), and logos (logical persuasion). There are two pieces of misrepresentation in this sentence. In this part he turns his attention specifically to poetry and to Archias, and argues that both are useful to society. Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. The greater part of the speech contains finely crafted rhetoric and an increased frequency of such poetical devices as hendiadys, chiasmus, and the golden line. It is for that reason that many noble Romans had a poet to write for them. C. helps us to see the force of the parallel that Cicero does create: equating patriotic Romanness with the acceptance and fostering of poets (the kind of oratorical strategy that could, for the sake of engaging classroom discussion, be compared to some American politicians rhetorical equation of support for the war in Iraq with support for America). [3] Due to political unrest, Archias, while yet a mere youth, left Antioch and travelled around the major cities of Asia Minor, Greece, and Italy, in each of . Now that I have become a famous advocate, I feel that I have a duty to defend him. But this would of course be much less neat rhetorically, and would also make Ciceros obligation appear much less pressing. Being Economical with the Truth: What Really Happened at Lampsacus? Treating the jury as intellectuals also serves to reduce the apparent cultural distance separating them and Archias: during the trial, Cicero, Archias, and the jury will all be literary men together. (Cic. Volume Information - JSTOR Such a characterization could not have been employed by Cicero unless the jury already held, or at least were disposed to hold, a similar view themselves. But the argument is nevertheless misleading because it leaves the impression, for example by the reference totechnical skill in oratory (huiusce rei (referring to exercitatio dicendi) ratio), that Archias actually taught Cicero rhetoric. Pro Archia Poeta - Wikipedia Ciceros defense of Archias follows a two-pronged argument. Mur. Cicero cannot conceal or explain away Archias occupation, and so he has no choice but to make a virtue of it. There was no official enrollment record for Archias in Heraclea because the records office had notoriously been destroyed during the, He also appeared in the records of the praetor. The prosecutor, Grattius, is not otherwise known, but in view of the hostility between Lucullus and Pompey he is usually assumed to have been one of Pompeys supporters, and the prosecution is therefore interpreted as an attack by a supporter of Pompey on the protg of Pompeys enemy Lucullus.12 This seems plausible: it is difficult to see why anyone should otherwise have wished to call into question Archias citizenship, which had gone unchallenged for twenty-seven years. It was in Rome where Archias became a mentor and teacher of Cicero in his early education in rhetoric. Porter (cited n. 14) 140 f.; MacKendrick (cited n. 16) 110 f. Cf. Abstract. After this, 16 closes with the argument that literature is inherently pleasant. The third reason for the high stylistic level may be stated more briefly. A large part of Archias output, and his entire output before he attracted Roman patronage, would doubtless have consisted of poems on typical Hellenistic themes (the epigrams in the Greek Anthology which may be his include erotic poems, dedications to a god, epitaphs, and poems on a work of art). Even if we had not been informed by the scholia (175 Stangl), we would, I think, have been able to tell that the praetor in question is Ciceros brother Quintus. as for the part of my speech which was out of keeping with the Forum and the tradition of the courtswhen I discussed my clients talents and literary studies in generalI hope that this has been received in good part by you, gentlemen, as I know it has been by the man who is presiding over this court. 41.36). First, Archias was a literary man, a poet, and this is a factor which was potentially prejudicial to the defence. A distinction is then made between those like Cicero who study literature and apply it to a useful end, such as defending people in court, and those who study it but make no practical use of it; the latter category, Cicero says, should be ashamed of themselves. Several more arguments follow, but they are of little practical value since Cicero has already proved his case. It was in 62 that Cicero sought to improve his social position (Att. C. accompanies that choice with a keen understanding of vocabulary acquisition: The second time a word occurs, it is marked with an asterisk; the third time two asterisks; the fourth time, three asterisks, and thereafter it is dropped from the listit is likely that the studentwill, on the fifth encounter with the word, be able to recognize it and, in context, recall its meaning (p. xi). 5.11.25, 8.3.75, 9.4.44, 11.1.34, 11.3.84, 11.3.167). Archias was acquitted, as he surely deserved to be: of Ciceros clients, Archias is one of those of whom we can say with most certainty that he was innocent of the crime with which he was charged.15 We hear of him again in 61, presumably still living in Rome, and contemplating writing a poem for the Metelli (Att. Just as in the exordium he makes clear that this was an unusual speech compared to the tradition of trials. 2. Chief among his enemies, and one who would stand to gain much by disgracing Lucullus was Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, better known as Pompey the Great. Themistocles is cited as an example, but then we have the surprising sentence ( 20):It was for the same reason that Marius was so fond of L. Plotius: he thought that his achievements could be made famous by Plotius talent (Itaque ille Marius item eximie L. Plotium dilexit, cuius ingenio putabat ea quae gesserat posse celebrari).
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