Another rhetor from Calagurris

Faventia 912 (1987), 79-84 I ANOTHER RHETOR FROM CALAGURRIS J. Gómez-Pantoja Fulvius Sparsus was a rhetorici a n who took part in some of the declamations Seneca the Elder attended. In fact, the Controuersiae are our only extant source for this minor speaker: they contain about twenty five samples of Sparsus' declamation and some scanty references of biographical interestl. According with Seneca. c<Sparsus autem dicebat uiolenter sed dure. and tho&h the length of the surviving dicta -with exclusion of Contr. 4.8-10is not enough for us to get an accurate picture of Sparsus' style, it seems that he was fond of antitheses and oppositions resulting in affected -and sometimes unsavorydeclamations2. Two instances may illustrate the point. When discussing the *case of the unfaithful vestal who survived her being thrown down from the rock, Sparsus' ingenuity summarized up <ca superis deiecta, ab inferis non recepta, in cuius poenam saxum extruendum est,> Quintilian mentioned (Inst. 6.3.100) one tulvius, who had been held by several scholars as being Fulvius Sparsus. But since Radeimacher emended the passage, such a possibility is untenable, cf. K. M~NSCHER, RE VI], S.V. Fulvius, cols. 279-80, n. 109. * Contr. 10. praef. 11.3, but see now J. FAIRWEATHER, Seneca the Elder, Cambridge 1981, p. 10, who would like to emend uiolenter -the lecrio difficilior preferred by many Seneca's editorsfor ualenter, arguing that it seems hard to accept Seneca's using two expressions of oprobium linked by sed. A compbrative discussion on the style of the various speakers recorded in the Controversiae, in H. BORNECQUE, Les déclamations et les déclamateurs d'apres Séntque le Ptre, Lille 1902 (on Sparsus, cf. p. 167) and MUNSCHER, loc. cit., p. 280. (Contr. 1.3.3); and the lack of taste is nowhere better displayed than in the description of Flamininus' drunken orgy and its sequels3. Still Sparsus was not an odd character. Seneca recalled him as being a man of good sense and as a skillful speaker -but not especially gifted (Contr. 1.7.15). We also know that Sparsus profited from the teachings of M. Porcius Latro4, and how he appropriated the latter's ideas and colores and used them with a different wording, a practice Seneca certainly frowned at (Contr. 10. praef. 11). Notwithstanding this lack of inventiveness and innovation, Sparsus' declamation seems to have had strong appeal for his contemporaries as the number of his dicta quoted in Seneca's Excerpta seem to point to. There is little evidence about Sparsus' life. Along with another colleague, he conducted a school of rhetorics (Contr. 10. praef. 11) but an accurate dating for his activities seems to be out of our reach, since the Controuersiae renders little help and modern scholarship inclines to place him sometime during the Augustan period5. Seneca's noticing that Sparsus often contended with one Iulius Bassus -a declaimer that Seneca's children were still able to hear performing6probably means that both speakers were active about a.D. 15. Furthermore, Quintilian records one Iunius Bassus whose personality is so similar to that of Seneca's Bassus that scholars have been inclined to identify the same man under both names7. If that possibility is accepted, a more Compare Contr. 9.2.5, with QUINT. Inst. 8.3.66, describing this very occasion according with Cicero. But a fair comparison of Fulvius Sparsus' style should be made among his peers: take for instance, Contr. 9.2.4. On M. Porcius Latro, see L. RADERMACHER, RE XXII, s.v. Porcius, cols. 223-40, n. 49. This declaimer was closely tied to Seneca. Both were from Baetica and attended the same school, either somewhere in Spain (J. FAIRWEATHER, OP. cit., p. S), or at Rome (cf. M. GRIFFIN, aThe Elder Seneca and Spainr, JRS, 62 (1972), p. 6; L. SUSSMAN, The Elder Seneca, Leiden 1978 pp. 20 ff. Porcius Latro was probably born about 55 B.C. and according to Jerome (cf. Chron. 168 and R. HELM, Philologus, Suppl. 21-2 [1929], p. 69) he died in 4 B.C. Those datings have certain importance for Sparsus' own chronology for he was presumably among Porcius' students, cf. MUNSCHER, [OC, cit., p. 280. S As BORNECQUE, [oc. cit., p. 25 has stressed, the attempts at dating any discussion of the Confroversiae on the grounds of the combined chronology of its participants are doomed by the anachronistic character of Seneca's work. The same could be said regarding the site or sites on which the declamations took place, although it is generally held taht the discussions occurred in Rome. See MUNSCHER, loc. cit., p. 579 for Sparsus' chronology. Contr. 1.2.21 and 10.1.13, and the references cited below in note 14. See also K. GERTH, RE, x S.V. Iulius, cols. 178-180. n. 121 and L. PETERSEN, PIR2, IV 152, n. 204. ' QUINT., Inst. 6.3.27, 6.3.57, and 6.3.74. The identification was suggested by STEIN, RE x. S.V. lunius, col. 966, n. 38, but not accepted by L. PETERSEN, PIR2 IV. 330, n. 735. convenient dating for Sparsus would be sometime during Augustus' late days or during Tiberius' reig(. Equally obscure is the question of Sparsus' origo. Seneca said nothing and modern scholars have paid little attention to such a point. It should be noted, however, what Syme has recently pointed out: the cognomen Sparsus, being crpreternaturally rare,,, occurs severa1 times in Tarraconensis, and it would see very plausible to hold the bearers P of the name as people born in or coming from Spain8. Griffin has accepted that, and -in the wake of Syme's suggestionmade of Fulvius Sparsus a Spaniard though she is quite aware of the weakness of an identification grounded on the likeness of the name aloneg. The name of Calagurris in HiSpania Citerior is quite familiar to scholars as Quintilian's birthplace.Many also will remember the Calagurritani7s strong devotion toward Sertorius during his short-lived domination in Spain. Less known is the fact that during the Early Empire Calagurris was an important administrative center whose mint produced one of the most extensive series of local coinage of Spainlo. I Bassus was a cognomen more popular among the Iulii than with the Iunii; a quick survey in the indexes of CIL vr. provides eight instances of Iulii Bassi against only one of Iunii. S R. SYME, ((Pliny the Procuratora, HSCP, 73 (1969), p. 232, n. 116 = Roman Papers, Oxford 1979, p. 769. SYME noticed three instances of Sparsus in CIL. One occurs in a inscription from Nemausus (CIL xlr, 3558). Thp others are from Tarraconensis: CIL 11, 2648, Asturica Augusta, which records a Licinia Sparsi f. Procilla, married to a L. Lusius; and CIL, rr. 4198, Tarraco (= G. ALFOLDY, Die romischen Znschriften von Tarraco, Berlin 1975, n. 320): [L.] L[i]cinius [Spar]sus, a provincial priest. Both people are probably related and they are commonly held as the ancestors of L. Lusius Sparsus, cos. suff. a.D. 1561 57 (cf. L. PETERSEN, PIR2, V. 115 n. 443). Other recorded occurrences of Sparsus are: the owner of the domus Petiliana (cf. MART. 12'.57), who could be identified either with Sex. Iulius Sparsus, cos. suff. 88 (AE. 119491 23~; L. PETERSEN, PIR2, IV. 281 n. 586) or with Iulius Sparsus, Pliny's friend (Epist. 5.5 and 8.3; see also R. SYME, aPeople in Pliny~, JRS, 58 (19681, p. 149). Syme cited a coin from Osca on which one of the moneyers appears as Sparsus. The coin could be roughly dated between 2 b.C. and a.D. 14 (cf. A. Vrv~s, La Moneda Hispánica, rv, Madrid 1924, p. 51, n. 7 and pl. cxxxvr). Curiously enough, Syme overlooked the evidence I am presenting in this paper. M. GRIFFIN, [OC. cit., p. 42. In favor of such a hypothesis, she could press the fact that several of the people named in the ~ontrodersiae would seem to be of Spanish origin, as it was shown by the authoritative article of H. DE LA VILLE DE MIRMONT, %Les déclamateurs Espagnols au temps d'Auguste et Tibkre., Bull.Hisp., 12 (1910), pp. 1-22; 14 (1912), pp. 11-29, pp. 229-43, pp. 341-52; 15 (1913), pp. 154-69, pp. 237-67, pp. 384-40 (especially relevant are pp. 237-69). 'O On Quintilian's birthplace, vid. AUSON, Prof. Burd. 1.7 (ed. Prete), and HIER., Chron. 211 (ed. Helm 186). On early Calagurris' history, cf. LIV., Frag. 91; VAL. MAX would like to draw some attention toward one of these coins: an as" on which Tiberius' laureate head to the right was engraved along with the inscription Ti. Avgvs. Divi Avgvsti F. Imp. Caesar surrounding it. On the obverse, the motive is a bull to the right, with IIVir in front of it, L. Satvrnino below, M.C.I. behind, and L. Fvl. Sparso above. The abbreviation M. C. I. on the reverse stands for M(unicipium) C(a1agurris). I(ulia), the regular designation of the city during the Early Empire. Except for Tiberius' odd titles, the remaining features of the coin conform to the standards of the mint12. The inscription on the obverse goes counterclockwise, occupying the whole perimeter of the coin, and the abbreviation TI, was placed just at the tip of the neck of Tiberiu's bust. Since such a position often marks the beginning of the inscription in several other coins struck in Calagurris, Vives opted to read Tiberius' titles as above indicated. Since it surely results in a strange combination of titles, other s~holars'~ have preferred to read Imp. Caesar Ti. Augus. Divi Augusti F., for which parallel titles may be found elsewhere. Some time ago, Mommsen called attention to certain milestones from Africa Proconsularis, dated in a. D. 14, on which Tiberius is designated as Imp. Caesar Augusti. F. Augustus, i.e. in the same fashion as Augustus (cf. CIL, VIII 10018 and 10023). A unique dupondius from Italica and severa1 inscriptions from Africa14 provide a most common title, closer to that of Calagurris: Imp. Ti. Caesar Augustus. Lamentably none of those instances have an explicit dating, although it was Mommsen's contention that such titles remained in use unti1 it was widely known that Tiberius had relected the use 7.7. ext. 3; FLOR. 2.10; and OROS. 5.23. Also see E. HOBNER, RE 111, cols. 1327-8. CIL 11. 2959, v. 6987 and XII. 3167 point toward Calagurris as being the seat of the Legati iuridici of Tarraconensis, as R. KNOX MCELDERRY, JRS, 9 (1919), p. 89 suggested some time ago. For a catalogue of the coins struck in Calagurris, see M. R. RUIZ-TRAPERO Las acunaciones hispano-romanas de Calahorra, Madrid 1968, pp. 105-113. " VIVES, loc. cit., p. 99, n. 25 and pl. CLIX n. 5; RUIZ-TRAPERO, IOC. cit., p. 112, n. 24. l2 M. GRANT, From lmperium to Auctoritas, Cambridge 1946, p. 165, and RUIZ-TRAPERO, loc. cit., p. 112, n. 24. " So A. BANTI-L. SIMONELLI, Corpus Numorum Romanorum, x, Florentia 1976, p. 44 n. 514, following Cohen's suggestions. VIVES, loc. cii., p. 127, n. 9 and pl. CLXVIII 8, and F. CHAVES, Las monedas de Italica, Sevilla 1973, n. 144. In this particular case, there is no doubt that Imperator Caesar was intended to be the first part of the name. The inscriptions are CIL VIII, 10492 (with Mornrnsen's supplements, cf. 11052), from Tacapa, Africa Proconsularis; 685 (with add. 1 l912), from Mograwa, Africa Byzacena; and 26518, frorn Thugga, Africa Proconsularis. of Imperator Caesar as a part of his personal name15. In any case, whether Vives' reading should be preferred, the coin from Calagurris may confidently be dated to the first year of Tiberius' rule. The name of one of the moneyers of the coin immediately recalls that of the declaimer Fulvius Spa sus. The coincidence is even more striking bearing in mind how infre 6 uent that cognomen is, and the dating of the coin gives further confirmation. The identification of Seneca's rehtorician with Calagurris officer cannot be pressed further, for we neither know the declaimer's praenomen nor his precise chronology, but it is very reasonable to hpld them as somehow related. The surviving information about Calagurris is painfully scarce. Only two inscriptions are recorded as found in the whereabouts of Calagurris -and both concern two non-Spanish soldiers who presumably died while billeted there during one of Augustus' campaigns in Northwestern Spain (CIL 11 2983-4). knother inscription from Tarraco honors a Calagurritanus who had served his term of office in a distinguished manner (CIL 11 4245). The most valuable information about the city comes from her coins. They give us the names of 34 moneyers, their offices, and sometimes a datpg for the collegium. Even so, the standing roster only covers the Augustan and Tiberian period. Considering the available evidence, little could be said about the moneyer Sparsus, his family and station. There was a C. Fulvius Rutilus who also served as a moneyer sometime during the Augustan period16, and most likely, he was a relative of L. Fulvius Sparsus. If this is accepted, it points toward the Fulvii as being one of the leading families in town and it surely helps to explain the presence of the declaimer in Rome among the exclusive circle of people for whom declamation was a fashionable act'vity The fact that an important 1.. number of Spaniards were in Rome at that time needs no further comment. People like Seneca the Elder and Porcius Latro, Martial and Quintilian found their way from Hispania to Rome. Fulvius Sparsus, a lesser declaimer from Tarraconensis, should be included among the l5 T. MOMMSEN, Staatrecht, 11-2 p. 769, n. 2. M. GRANT, Aspects of the Principate of Tiberius, New York 1950, p. 24, cites among other instances, this very coin from Calagurris. For the fanciful titles used by some of the I@ conspicuous characters of the Late Republic and Early Empire, see R. SYME, Historia 7 (1957), pp. 172-88. l6 VIVES, op. cit., p. 99, n. 21 and pl. CLIX, 1. I am dating the officer on the grounds of Augustus' titles, which allow a dating between 2 b.C. and a.D. 14. Spaniards living or working at Rome dhring the early years of the Empire. Being from a sufficiently well-to-do family as to afford the local cursus honorum, he rather attempted to pursue a rhetorician career in Rome. Ultimately, that was what his more famous countrymen, L. Valerius Martialis and Q. Fabius Quintilianus, did a generation later.