Poseidonios on Problems of the Roman EmpireAuthor(s): Hermann StrasburgerSource: The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 55, No. 1/2, Parts 1 and 2 (1965), pp. 40-53Published by: Society for the Promotion of Roman StudiesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/297429Accessed: 05/01/2010 17:49

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POSEIDONIOS ON PROBLEMS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE *

By HERMANN STRASBURGER

On the life of Poseidonios there is but little reliable information elucidating the theme of this paper.1 The probable years of his birth and death are i35 and 51 B.C. About his background nothing is known except that Apameia in Syria was his place of origin. In view of the mixed population of that country 2 one might surmise the presence of non-Hellenic ethnical components in his ancestry, but nothing is known about this. He was a disciple of the stoic philosopher Panaitios of Rhodes,3 probably at Athens; 4 afterwards he became himself the head of the stoic school in Rhodes, where he must have acquired the citizenship,5 for he acted as a magistrate (' prytanis ') 6 and as an ambassador of the city. Strabo's praise of the exemplary social-welfare work at Rhodes (I4, 653) seems to be derived from Poseido- nios; in any case it is characteristic of Poseidonios' interest in social problems (see below p. 48).

A great exploring expedition to the West led him to Massilia and the southern part of Gaul, to Spain and its Atlantic coast, to some islands in the western Mediterranean, to the north coast of Africa and to Sicily. During the winter of 87 to 86 he went as a political ambassador to Rome and paid a visit to Marius who was then laid up with his fatal illness. Among his acquaintances with high-ranking Romans those with Pompey and Cicero are especially beyond doubt.7 A personal connection with the family of the Marcelli has been conjectured from some striking features of his historical work.8 The link might be a certain M. Marcellus, who studied in Athens about the year i Io, and so perhaps at the same time as Poseidonios.9 Furthermore we might give credit to an obscure testimony of his connection with Q. Aelius Tubero, grandson of the great Aemilius Paullus and nephew of Scipio Aemilianus, as this Tubero was closely connected with Panaitios and passionately devoted to stoic philosophy.l? Yet, among his relationships with Roman statesmen which have been traced out, probably the most important is his acquaintance with P. Rutilius Rufus, who was his fellow-student under Panaitios.11 The opinion of Rutilius on Roman affairs and on the problems of Roman rule might have reached and influenced Poseidonios through Rutilius' historical work, written in Greek,12 as well as by way of friendly conversations. There might have been occasions for these not only in the time of their studies but also in later years, when Rutilius was living as an exile in Smyrna. We must also take into con- sideration the possibility of an acquaintance with Q. Caecilius Metellus Numidicus, of whose philosophical studies during his exile in Rhodes in the years o100-99 Plutarch 13 had something to say in his biography of Numidicus; an important piece of Roman educational history lost to us.

Even Polybios in his statements on Rome betrays the outsider and was evidently influenced by the views of Scipio Aemilianus; 14 Poseidonios, no doubt, in spite of his travels in the West, had still less inside knowledge of Roman life than his predecessor. He was to a great extent dependent on the judgement of his Roman friends on Roman affairs.15

* An earlier and somewhat shorter version of this paper was read to the Annual Meeting of the Roman Society in London on i6th June, I964. I am very grateful to Mrs. A. Schweitzer and Dr. M. Merten, who helped me to translate text and notes into English.

1 FGrHist II A, no. 87, T i-8, with Jacoby's com- mentary, ib. II C (references to F(ragments), T(esti- monia) and Comm(entary) below are to this work). See also K. Reinhardt, P-W s.v. Poseidonios, 563 ff. and M. Pohlenz, Die Stoa i (1948), 208 ff.; 2 (I955), 103 f.

2 See E. Honigmann, P-W s.v. Syria, 1565 ff. 3 Cicero, de div. i, 6 ; de off. 3, 8. 4 cf. Pohlenz, P-W s.v. Panaitios, 424 f. 5 cf. Hiller v. Gaertringen, P-W s.v. Rhodos

(Suppl. v), 80oi. 6 Hiller, I.c. 767. 7 Cicero, fin. i, 6; Tusc. 2, 6I ; nat. deor. i, 6;

123; de div. I, 6 ; de fato 5. Plut., Cic. 4, 5; Pomp. 42, 10. Strabo II, 491. 8 FF 41-44. cf. T i. Plut., Marcell. 13 f.; 17; I9-21 ; 23. M. Muihl, Poseidonios und der plutarch. Marcellus, 1925. F. Miinzer, Gnomon I (1925), 96 ff. 9 Cicero, de orat. I, 57. cf. 45: see Miunzer, L.c. 98.

10 Ps. Plut., pro nobil. I8, 3. cf. Pos., F 59, p. 260, line 35 and Klebs, P-W s.v. Aelius, no. I55. 11 Cicero, Brut. II114 ; de off. 3, 10.

12 F 27, cf. F 59. Appian, lb. 382. cf. H. Simon, Roms Kriege in Spanien (Diss. Frankfurt, I96I), I75, 83. 13 Mar. 29, I2. cf. Livy, Per. 69.

14 Particularly obvious in his description of political dynamics in book vi. On his oral sources for Roman history, Gelzer, Kl. Schr. III, I69 ff., 175 f., I89 f. is very instructive.

15 MiAnzer, P-W s.v. Livius Drusus, 859. cf. Gelzer, o.c. II, 48.

POSEIDONIOS ON PROBLEMS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

Accordingly his historical work shows clearly that he was following optimate authorities; for instance, he was evidently unappreciative of the reforms of the Gracchi,16 of the eques- trian class in general 17 and, at least to some extent, of the personality of Marius.18 The Roman friends of Poseidonios, such as we can name, have in common moderate optimate views and openmindedness towards the problems of imperial administration and responsi- bility for the subject peoples. Yet it is not advisable to picture this group as forming a priori an intellectual unity, in a context, perhaps, of certain Roman ideals embodied in the great personality of Scipio Aemilianus-at this very point more precision is needed. Modern conceptions of this type are determined far less by real historical evidence than by the vague and romantic, almost fictitious picture of the so-called Scipionic Circle given by Cicero in his De re publica and in the ' Laelius ' (but only in these two works, and obviously Cicero himself was always conscious of its unhistoricity).19 It is only the wishful thinking of modern scholars which has made this a hallowed region of Roman history. So one cannot at pleasure infer from the opinions of any given member of the ' Scipionic Circle ' the opinions of another. To pick but one instance out of this complex, which has some relevance for our subject: we might take it for granted that in Smyrna in 78 old Rutilius Rufus communicated to the young Cicero vivid oral memoirs on the great Scipio Aemilianus, under whom he had served as a military tribune at Numantia, and that he talked about him with the utmost respect-indeed, critical remarks by Rutilius about Scipio can hardly be imagined, Cicero being separated from Rutilius by such a difference of age and rank. But this does not allow us to conclude that the political maxims of Rutilius were identical with those of Scipio throughout the whole of his life. Not only had the young Rutilius, as Cicero himself tells us (Brut. 85 ff., de off. 2, 47), got his education in the circle of the enemies of Scipio Aemilianus,20 but above all it must be seriously doubted that this Roman stoic, whose later life at least showed active devotion to the idea of supra-national humanity, could permanently subscribe to the hard moral code of old-time Rome which characterized the destroyer of Carthage and Numantia. The final judgement on the conqueror of Numantia in Appian's book on Spain (Ib. 425 f.) is formulated not uncritically in just this sense and makes Scipio appear perhaps by a few degrees better than, but not fundamentally different from, his brutal predecessors in the government of Spain. This verdict is most probably derived from Poseidonios,21 who, for his part, is likely to have drawn on the history of Rutilius Rufus.22 We have still more evidence in the controversy on the expediency of destroying Carthage, where Poseidonios, based, as scholars agree, on Rutilius, favours the view of Scipio Nasica; the latter prophesied that political decay at home and a hateful despotism by the Romans

16 The few meagre excerpts from Diodoros (FF I io and I i i) do not make clear Poseidonios' view on the agrarian reforms, but in any case his general judgement on both the Gracchi was unjustly sharp. It shows the influence of optimate polemics: Poseidonios' authorities were convinced that both the brothers strove for tyranny (cf. F I 12, 7) and were to be held responsible for an anarchical situation. This was also the view of Scipio Aemilianus on Ti. Gracchus (F I Io f.), but I do not think that Poseido- nios would have made it his only guide (see further below). Nothing is preserved of Rutilius' account of the Gracchi, but there can hardly have been a differ- ence between his views and those of his teacher P. Mucius Scaevola, cos. I 33 (see on this my forthcoming paper 'Der Scipionenkreis' in Hermes 94, I966), to whom he was closely attached and who had furthered the agrarian reform, like his brother Crassus Mucianus, but then, obviously, when he saw the order of the state endangered, abandoned Ti. Gracchus and later on even condemned him severely. Likewise Q. Aelius Tubero (see above p. 40) had turned from a friend to an enemy of the Gracchi (Cic. Lael. 37., cf. Malcovati, ORF2 17I). Poseidonios is likely to have followed the opinion of the stoics Rutilius and Tubero, with both of whom he was acquainted.

17 F 108 d (p. 287, line 40). F ixx b (p. 296, line 5).

Diod. 36, 3, I ; 37, 5. This view too, surely, was. inspired by Rutilius and particularly by the indigna- tion Poseidonios felt over Rutilius' trial.

18 F 37, cf. the passages in Diodoros noted in Jacoby's commentary and Diod. 38, 4. Elsewhere in Diodoros Marius is painted not unfavourably (34, 38f., 36, i, i and 3, I ; 37, 2, I2 and I4; 15). In the mixture of sources used by Plutarch for his biography of Marius, too complicated to be analysed here, two threads of tradition are conspicuous: the somewhat dull praise of Marius by an unknown biographer and the hostile but well-informed and pointed treatment of an admirer of Metellus Numidicus (see esp. ch. 4 f., 8, IO, 28-3 ), who cannot be other than Rutilius Rufus, the notorious enemy of Marius (28, 8, cf. io, i and Dio fragm. 98, 3). For distinguishing between his hand and that of Poseidonios, Plutarch's biography offers no clue to me (cf. W. Steidle, ' Sallusts histor. Monographien ', Historia, Einzelschrift 3 (I958), 78 f.).

19 See my paper ' Der Scipionenkreis ', Hermes 94, 1966.

20 ibid. 21 Miinzer, P-W s.v. Cornelius, 1454. cf. E.

Norden, German. Urgeschichte in Tacitus' Germaniac I63 f. and H. Simon, Roms Kriege in Spanien I88, 125.

22 Norden, o.c. 436 f.; Simon, o.c. 175, 83.

41

over their provinces would be the inevitable consequences of this measure.23 There could be no weightier criticism of the imperial policy of Aemilianus.24

The iT-ropilc of Poseidonios, a universal history, which continued that of Polybios, beginning, that is to say, with the year 145, contained fifty-two books according to Suidas (T i). This figure cannot err much on the high side, for the quotations in Athenaios reach as far as Book 49 (F 27). Even supposing-as cannot be ascertained-that a book in Poseidonios was somewhat shorter than one in Polybios or Diodoros (whose works with forty books each were of remarkable size), the work of Poseidonios was an unusually voluminous one. The mere fact that a philosopher, working in so many fields of science, devoted so much time to this, sv irappycp so to speak, is unique in ancient historiography 25

and should therefore be noted with interest in considering our political theme. The final point reached by his historical narrative is controversial. The datable

fragments go down as far as 86 B.C. (F 38). If the number of books (attested only in Suidas) were certain, the work could hardly have gone beyond 85 B.C., judging by the scale it can be seen to have observed till then.26 But the traces in the secondary tradition lead further down, most clearly in Diodoros, who based his universal history on Poseidonios continuously from Book 32, i.e. from where his former source Polybios left off, to the end.27 As this is a certain and never seriously questioned result of source-criticism,28 Diodoros is, next to the frag- ments proper, our most valuable source for discovering what is characteristic of Poseidonios and thus identifying further fragments elsewhere in the secondary tradition.29

Before treating briefly the question of the supposed end of the work, I must first, I think, give some account of the remaining secondary sources for anonymous Poseidonian material.30 In this category the relatively richest mines are the Geography of Strabo and some of Plutarch's biographies. Both authors acknowledge, by a number of citations, that they have read Poseidonios in the original.31 Doubtless they contain much more Poseidonian material, particularly Strabo, but the delimitation of these passages is an operation conducted on slippery ground and only in a few fortunate cases satisfactory. Still more unmanageable is the analysis of other secondary literature, where Poseidonios' history might have been used through intermediary sources. Scholars who have some familiarity with Poseidonios' stylistic peculiarities and his favourite ideas on history 32 will spot them frequently in the secondary historical tradition (apart from Strabo and Plutarch), particu- larly in Appian, and even sporadically in the debris of the Latin tradition down to Florus (2, 7). But an exhaustive exploitation of this material, without recourse to arbitrary dogma, is prevented by the hopelessly complicated stratification of the sources, which is charac- teristic of the whole narrative tradition on the history of the later Roman republic.33 One must be content with occasional finds, such as seem to be certain enough.

In this paper I shall make use of one such find, an observation not yet recorded in print, at least to my knowledge, which may perhaps be helpful in clarifying some points in Poseidonios' historical work. I am convinced that some of the most substantial references

23 F I2, cf. Gelzer, o.c. It, 47 f. and the literature quoted there. cf. also W. Steidle, o.c. I8 and H. Fuchs, 'Der Friede als Gefahr,' Harv. Stud. Cl. Phil. 63 (1958), 367; 379 ff.

24 For which policy cf. esp. Gelzer, o.c. ii, 63; K. Bilz, Die Politik des P. Corn. Scipio Aem. (1936), 33 f., 65; H. H. Scullard, JRS 50 (I960), 59 ff.

25 A. D. Nock, ' Posidonius,' JRS 49 (I959), 4. 26 See Jacoby, Comm. p. i56. 27 As he did some earlier geographical and ethno-

logical passages; for instance, those on Gaul and Spain in book 5.

28 G. Busolt, Jahrb.fiur cl. Philol. 36 (i890), 321 ff., 405 ff. E. Schwartz, P-W s.v. Diodoros, 690. A. Rosenberg, Einleitung u. Quellenkunde zur r6m. Gesch. I99 f. Jacoby, Comm., p. 157; 2o6 ff. K. Reinhardt, P-W s.v. Poseidonios, 630 ff.

29 cp. Jacoby, Comm. p. I59. 30 cp. Jacoby, Comm. pp. 157 f. Athenaios, our

richest source of original fragments, seems to confine himself to the passages he quotes.

31 cp. FF 30-34, 37, 40-47, 49-58, 6o, 62-67, 70 f., 73.

32 The most revealing characteristics are given by K. Reinhardt: Poseidonios (i921), I9 ff.; '* Posei- donios fiber Ursprung und Entartung,' Orient und Antike 6 (1928); P-W s.v. Poseidonios, 63I ff., 822 ff. ' Philosophy and History among the Greeks,' Greece and Rome 2nd Ser. i, 2 (1954), 87 ff. cp. Jacoby, Comm. p. I59 ff. and see further A. Schulten, Hermes 46 (1911), 592 f., with the justified criticism of E. Norden, Germ. Urgesch. I63, 4. cf. also H. Simon, Roms Kriege in Spanien 95, 20; 137; 164 f.; I88; and my paper: 'Komik und Satire in der griech. Geschichtsschreibung,' Festgabe f. Paul Kirn (1961), 38 ff.

8a By underrating this complication Busolt often went astray. The right views, at least in principle, are set out by E. Schwartz, P-W s.v. Appianos, 222, 224; s.v. Cassius Dio, i698, 1705.

42 HERMANN STRASBURGER

POSEIDONIOS ON PROBLEMS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

we have to the origins and spread of piracy and to its successful final suppression by Pompey are derived from no other than Poseidonios. It seems to me that this was a subject Poseidonios treated extensively and with particular interest, a complex of which the frag- ments are now so scattered in the secondary sources and so mixed up with the Roman tradition as to evade precise and detailed delimitation. But I am pretty sure that not only does Strabo's most interesting account of the development of piracy and its involvement with the problems of the Roman empire depend on Poseidonios,34 but the corresponding accounts in Plutarch's Pompey and in Appian's Mithridatike 35 are-directly or indirectly-of the same extraction. For instance, what Plutarch has to say in ch. 24 on the luxurious life of the pirates corresponds, in a series of characteristic features, to established fragments of Poseidonios.36 In particular the reports of both authors on the increasing power of the pirates show in the whole trend of their narrative a most striking resemblance to Poseidonios' great description of the first Sicilian slave-revolt (F i o8), the layout of which is still easily recognizable in the Byzantine excerpts from Diodoros.37 These passages on the increase of piracy are so typically Poseidonian that the potential authorship of Theophanes of Mytilene, which, since his history was the most important source for Pompey's campaigns in the East, could obviously be conjectured, can be excluded-for these limited passages at least-in all certainty; for the fragments of Theophanes' work for their part do not show any feature of a similar kind.38

34 The central passage in Strabo is that on the foundation of the league of Cilician pirates (14, 688 f.), a passage which W. Capelle (Klio 25 (1932), 103 note) has already assigned to Poseidonios, though for insufficient reasons. Also closely related, in my view, are several minor passages which explain the geo- graphical, economic and political causes of the thriving of piracy, illuminate the attitude of some important cities in favour of or against piracy (further- more their close connection with the international slave-trade), and, finally, discuss the social solution of the problem by Pompey (IO, 486; 14, 644; 652 ; 664 f.; 671; i6, 752; 754). This means: an account, probably connected in Poseidonios, was cut into pieces by Strabo to fit in with his own periegetic survey and-as is obvious in Plutarch and Appian- much abridged.

The main peculiarity pointing to Poseidonios as being the source of Strabo, Plutarch and Appian, as the case may be, is a preoccupation with circumstantial and complicated aetiological considerations, an out- look which claims intense interaction between the problems of political history on the one hand and social and economic, ethical and psychological problems on the other, which traces the dynamic of a development from casual local origins to world- wide danger-with evident predilection for the paradoxes of the subject. The most representative survival of this is F I08 on the first Sicilian slave-war, the close thematic affinity of which to piracy should be noticed particularly. Likewise we may call to mind the exposition of the second slave-war (Diod. 36, 2 ff.), the connection between the destruction of Carthage and the Roman decline (F I I2) and portraits like that of Viriathus (Simon, o.c. 135, 69), Marius (Diodoros 37, 29) or Athenion (F 36) (further see esp. Reinhardt's descriptions of Poseidonios' peculi- arity cited above, n. 32). In Strabo 14, 668 we may find Poseidonian origin indicated also by the appearance of Diodotos-Tryphon, whose activity was treated with special interest in the histories (see Jacoby on Poseidonios FF 2-3 and 29).

Whether the somewhat stilted and lifeless parallel record of Cassius Dio (36, 20 f.) shows traces of the Poseidonian conception or is based on Roman accounts, I do not dare to decide. The Thucydidean flourish at the beginning, exempting Dio from a serious aetiology, is certainly his own product. But I am sure that the problem of piracy had already been portrayed by the Roman Annalists, like the slave- revolts in Sicily, as something which had suddenly

fallen from heaven. It is only against the back- ground of such run-of-the-mill treatments that the inconvertible features of the great Poseidonian aetio- logies become obvious.

35 See esp. Plut., Pomp. 24 and 28, App., Mithr. 92, 4I6-96, 445.

36 FF I, 2, 7, 9, I0, 14, 20, 2x; *28, 12; *36, 49. In Greek historiography the richly coloured descrip- tion of the Tpuvqp since Theopompos has a long tradition. But for the first half of the first century- here only in question-it is to be found only in Poseidonios, as far as I know.

37 Social and economic causes of the phenomenon: App., Mithr. 417; Pos., F io8 b-d. Motive of greed of gain: App., 417 and 419; Strabo 14, 668 ; Pos., F io8d; ii6, 26, 3; I17, 36, 3 and 38, 2. Small local beginnings and gradual rising of brigan- dage: App. 4i6 ff.; Plut., Pomp. 24, 2; Pos., F I08 a 2 and d. The trade of piracy becomes socially acceptable: App. 4I8, Plut. 24, 3. Armament, technical resources: App. 419 f.; Plut. 24, 4; Pos., F xo8 d and a i6. Stop to all traffic because of common insecurity: App. 423; Plut. 25, I ; Pos., F Io8 d. Collision with the Roman power and initial helpless- ness of it: App. 423 ff.; Plut. 24, 8 ff. ; Pos., F io8 a 3 and d ; a I8. Derision of a Roman citizen: Plut. 24, i -13. Here characterizing a situation by generalizing an anecdotal feature (as e.g. F Io8 f ; g; i; r) is typical of Poseidonios, likewise the implied hint at the blindness of the mocker, who later on will be the helpless victim himself: F o8 a 8; g; f; cf. F 7 (on the peculiarity of the scene of derision, which has been compared to the derision of Christ, see St. Weinstock, ' Saturnalien und Neu- jahrsfest in den Martyrerakten,' in ' Mullus ', Festschrift fur Th. Klauser, Jahrb. f. Antike u. Christentum, Ergdnzungsband i (I964), 393). In Plut. Pomp. 28, 4 the philosophical argument for Pompey's clemency points to Poseidonios' optimistic anti- Thucydidean view of human nature (cf. F Io8 a I3, c and k; Diod. 38-39, 2I. See also below pp. 47 and 50 f.).

38 FGrHist I88. The fragments, of course, are too few to permit a real comparison, but in any case they all refer to the Mithridatic War, and as there is no other testimony on the extent of the whole of the work, it remains dubious whether Theophanes had included the war against the pirates at all (cf. Jacoby ii D, Comm. on FGrHist i88, p. 614. For a different view see Laqueur, P-W s.v. Theophanes, 2 25 f., but, as it seems to me, his arguments are merely hypothetical).

43

The historical contents of the Poseidonian passages which have thus been detected will be treated later (see below pp. 49-50). But, to return to the extent of Poseidonios' work, it follows from this that it included the extinction of piracy by Pompey, and seemingly not as an excursus but in the context of the history of Pompey.39 This gives strong support to the suggestion of Karl Reinhardt,40 that Poseidonios' account of the Jews, preserved by Strabo (F 70), was connected with Pompey's conquest of Jerusalem (63 B.C.). Thus only two possibilities remain: either to take for granted the special history of Pompey which Strabo seems to ascribe to Poseidonios (T II),41 or to assume that the main work, the icT-opiai, went down to about 63 B.C.42 The latter seems to me not at all impossible. The number of books given in Suidas is by no means reliable,43 and I really do not understand why the prevailing opinion need be right that Poseidonian traces in the secondary tradition are vanishing in the eighties, and that the dictatorship of Sulla must accordingly be considered the terminal point of the Histories.44

It is true that the meagreness of the Byzantine excerpts from Diodoros' books 38 to 40 gives us but little to go on, but this cannot be accepted as proving the assumption that at this point the main source of Diodoros (i.e. Poseidonios) dried up. For it was not Diodoros but his excerptors who from this point hurried carelessly to the end of their work; Diodoros himself treated the three decades from the death of Marius to the British expedition of Caesar in no less than three books,45 which corresponds exactly to the scale used through- out the whole of his work. I think that, even in what remains of Book 38, the unfavourable treatment of Fimbria (8) points to Poseidonios, and even more so the most favourable treatment of the young Pompey (9-10), whose way of life is described in striking harmony with the theories of Poseidonios on old-time Roman conduct.46 Furthermore the sentence on Spartacus (38-39, 2I) corresponds to a most characteristic one of Poseidonios on the first slave-war (F io8 k Exc. de sent. 399). It would be hazardous to infer from this one small fragment of Diodoros that Poseidonios' narrative included the Spartacus war, but more may be said. A chapter of Plutarch on Spartacus (Crass. 8) sounds Poseidonian. Moreover, it is possible that Strabo in mentioning a history of Pompey 47 is not referring to a monograph but to a continuation of the main work of the histories, which was only catalogued under this title because Pompey was its central figure.48 However, I do not think it necessary to decide this formal question. It is sufficient to notice that Pompey was the Roman who not only had the most conspicuous personal relationship with Poseidonios, but was also historically appreciated by him in a particular manner.

The most penetrating treatment of our particular subject that I have seen-and I hope not to have overlooked any paper of importance-I found in an article by Wilhelm Capelle, ' Griechische Ethik und r6mischer Imperialismus', Klio 25 (I932), 86 ff.49 He examines the reflections of Poseidonios on Roman imperialism in close connection with those of Polybios and Panaitios and on this basis deduces the central thought of the Middle Stoa on this theme. Poseidonios must indeed be considered in relation to just these two men, one of whom was his teacher in philosophy, the other his immediate predecessor in historio- graphy, whose work he continued (T i ; I2a). Nevertheless, one could urge as an objection to this synthesis that it seems advisable to consider the opinions of these three personalities separately. To begin with, the assumption that Panaitios' comment on Roman rule is preserved at all is based on the unproved, and unprovable, supposition, that it is his view

39 I think it probable (along the lines followed by Germ. Urgesch. 78, 2; 103, 3. Jacoby, Comm. pp. the reflections of Reinhardt, Poseidonios iiber Ur- I56 f. sprung (above, n. 32), 30 f.), that Poseidonios post- 45 i.e. about 400 pages of a modern printed edition. poned his account of the whole of the development 46 F 59, cf. the characterization of Viriathus recon- of piracy, from the middle of the second century till structed by Simon, o.c. (above, n. 32), 136 f. the year 67, to this context (cf. the reconstruction 47 II, 492 = Pos., T i. The wording does not sketched below pp. 50-5i), but I cannot prove it. compel us to assume a separate monograph. 40 Poseidonios iiber Ursprung 25 if. 48 cf. P. Treves, Oxf. Cl. Dict. s.v. Posidonius.

41 Reinhardt, P-W s.v. Poseidonios, 638 f., cf. Parallels are the history of Dionysios I in Philistos M. Gelzer, P-W s.v. Tullius Cicero, 902; Pompeius2 (FGrHist 556, TT ; I I; I2) or those of Agathokles (I959), I09. and Pyrrhos in Timaios (FGrHist 566, TT 8 and 9).

42 This is the view of Ed. Meyer, Caesars Monar- 49 The Bryn Mawr Dissertation of Margaret E. chie und d. Principat des Pompeius3, 29, 4; 6i8 f. Reeser, The political theory of the old and middle Stoa

43 See Jacoby, Comm. p. I56. (1951), seems to be unacquainted with Capelle's 44 cf. Busolt, o.c. (above, n. 28), 436; Norden, article and is inferior to it on the essential points.

44 HERMANN STRASBURGER

POSEIDONIOS ON PROBLEMS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

Cicero is reproducing in De re publica 3, 36, when he defines the rule of the best over the inferior as a natural relationship which is also advantageous for the people so governed, the rule of the best over them being justified ' quod talibus hominibus sit utilis servitus '.50 As this is an opinion indubitably compatible with those of Plato or Aristotle, but sharply repudiated by the stoics, who before and after Panaitios were teaching the equality of men, it was not a good idea, as a mere hypothesis, to impute to Panaitios this strange conces- sion to Roman imperialism. We must leave Panaitios out of it. All we are in a position to say is that the conception of Roman rule advanced here by Cicero probably represents the basic idea for its justification most familiar to the Romans themselves ;50a for this aristocratic but at the same time somewhat naive and unreflecting pretension can be found not only in the famous verses of Vergil: 'tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento, . . . parcere subiectis et debellare superbos,'51 but also, only slightly modified, in a more circumstantial statement by Cicero in the De officiis (2, 26): 'Verum tamen quam diu imperium populi Romani beneficiis tenebatur, non iniuriis, bella aut pro sociis aut de imperio gerebantur, exitus erant bellorum aut mites aut necessarii, regum, populorum, nationum portus erat et refugium senatus, nostri autem magistratus imperatoresque ex hac una re maximam laudem capere studebant, si provincias, si socios aequitate et fide defendissent. Itaque illud patro- cinium orbis terrae verius quam imperium poterat nominari.' 52

Turning from Panaitios to Polybios, Roman influence on him, especially the personal influence of Scipio Aemilianus, is more certain by far than stoic influence. The supposition

50 Capelle (p. 95) refers to A. Schmekel (Die Philosophie der mittleren Stoa (1892), 6I ff., 228), considering him to have proved this. M. Pohlenz, who by his authority supports this opinion, which has been accepted by many other scholars without any further examination, contents himself with insufficient arguments (e.g. Antikes Fiihrertum (I934), 33 ; GGA 200 (1938), i35 f.; Die Stoa i, 206; 22, Io2). His statement that Panaitios is a fundamental source of Cicero in the De re publica has been doubted in the case of the first book especially (cp. F. Solmsen, Philol. 88 (I933), 33I ; 338 ; V. P6schl, R6m. Staat undgriech. Staatsdenken bei Cicero (1936), 23, note 27; K. Biichner, Stud. Ital. Fil. Class. 26 (1952), 97; id., Latomus 70 (1964), 149, which I have not time to deal with here). But the arguments adduced by Schmekel and Pohlenz, in favour of the thesis that Cicero uses the famous disputation of Karneades of 155 B.C. in a polemic reproduction of Panaitios, seem to me very airy. Each attempt to prove this must fail, a priori, because there is preserved not the tiniest scrap of the content of Panaitios' political doctrine (cp. De legibus 3, I4 f.; De re p. I, 34), and therefore the question remains, to what extent, if at all, he engaged in problems of practical politics. A study of all genuine fragments (cp. M. van Straaten, Panaetii Rhodii Fragmenta3, I962) and especially the excellent analysis of the De officiis by Georg Picht (Die Grund- lagen der Ethik des Panaitios, unprinted dissertation, Freiburg, 1943, obtainable at the Universitats-Biblio- thek, Freiburg im Breisgau) made it seem very doubt- ful to me that he did so at all (see also the objections of K. Biichner, Latomus l.c.). If the doctrine of the minor peoples which need tutelage (De re publica 3, 36 f.) were Panaitios' justification of Roman rule, it should occur in the De officiis.; but there we look for it in vain. This conception would also be a major break with the old stoic view of the equality of all men (Zeno (SVF I), fragm. 262 in Plut. De Al.fort. I, 6; Chrysippos (SVF iii), fragm. 334-366 ; Eratos- thenes in Strabo I, 66 f.; Seneca, ep. 47 ; Epictet., Diatr. I, 13, 3 f.). Nay more, it is originally, as Capelle (I.c. 95, Io6 ff.) and Pohlenz (Die Stoa, 206) are fully aware, a Platonic and Aristotelian concep- tion (cf. especially Aristotle's counsel to Alexander, Fragm. 658 Rose = Ross p. 63. On this E. Buchner, Hermes 82 ( 954), 378 ff.). And it was precisely Plato and Aristotle whose ideas of justice Karneades took strong exception to, as Cicero himself seems to have

testified in De re publica iii (see ch. 3, 9- I). Another mediator of the Karneades-speeches suggests himself far more than Panaitios: Karneades' disciple Kleitomachos, from whom Cicero derived a great deal of information about him on other matters (Orelli-Baiter, Onom. Tull. 2, I31 f.; I60) and whom he once cites explicitly for the embassy of philosophers (Acad. 2, I37). The logical threads of the two original speeches of Karneades have been obscured in Cicero not only by the fragmentary state of the De re publica but above all because Cicero has inverted the order of the speeches for and against (see on this excellently H. von Arnim, P-W s.v. Karneades, 1978 ff.). But I think there is no reason why he should have needed stoic help against Karneades to return to the Platonic- Aristotelian doctrine. At any rate, the attitude of Panaitios towards the legitimation of Roman rule remains unknown.

50a cf. the evidence from the early second century B.C. discussed by H. Volkmann, Hermes 82 (I954), 474-

51 See on this H. Haffter, ' Politisches Denken im alten Rom,' Stud. Ital. Fil. Class. N.S. 17 (I940), III ff.

52 The Roman examples in the De officiis, which (as in this case) do not always fit with their context, show the hand of Cicero rather than that of Panaitios. The logical inconsistency in the morals of this (probably unfinished) passage do not suggest an earlier version by the philosopher (cp. n. 50 above and M. Gelzer, Kl. Schr. II, 60 f.; II, 6 ff.). On the whole, no correspondence can be securely proved between concrete issues of Roman policy and ascer- tained' stoic' doctrines; in the case of Ti. Gracchus, for instance, his attempted reforms seem to have been disapproved of by Scipio Aemilianus and Polybios as well as by Poseidonios, but he had at his disposal a stoic philosopher, Blossios of Kymai, as an ideological counsellor (adequately on this D. R. Dudley, 'Blossius of Cumae,' JRS 31 (I941), 92-9). When it came to the point, Roman statesmen did not follow the prescriptions of the Greek philosophers in their households and the latter were certainly careful not to give too decided ones. The effect of the Stoa on Roman behaviour, as far as there was any, arose from its general educational influence, which led the Romans to interpret their own task subjectively and differently in each case.

45

that this man, otherwise not very philosophically-minded, was influenced by the Stoa is based mainly on the assumption of his friendship with Panaitios, which is recorded only in the fiction of Cicero's De re publica (I, 34), and, in addition, on his theory of the superiority of the mixed constitution in book VI, which happens to be a stoic theory, but is attested, to my knowledge, only for the older Stoa (Diog. Laert. 7, I3I). With regard to the matter in hand such a basis is too small to support a convincing thesis of a close ideological relationship between Polybios and Panaitios.53 We should rather rely solely on the explicit general remarks on Roman rule which can be found in the surviving parts of Polybios' work. These are less comprehensive and penetrating than one would expect. For, as is well known, Polybios declared it his main task to describe and explain the phenomenon of Rome's rise to world-supremacy,54 and so repeatedly expatiated, in general or specific terms, on the origins of Roman superiority, the political and military as well as moral factors which produced it; 55 and at the beginning of the third book (ch. 4)56 he gave advance notice of some general reflections on the nature and meaning of Roman rule and its advantages and disadvantages for its subjects. This is just what should arouse our most lively interest, but a development of this theme is not to be found anywhere in the surviving parts of the work. It is likely, indeed, that he never fulfilled this promise, for the scattered remarks which are preserved 57 show almost no trend towards a more penetrating reflec- tion. Only the general line of thought becomes clear, namely, that Polybios accepted the Roman conquest of the world much as did Scipio Aemilianus. He pleaded for relative humanity in warfare and for the observance of law as far as possible in any given case. But, however much concerned he was with deducing from history political lessons for the future, about the principles and tasks of maintaining rule and governing an empire he says nothing which would take us beyond the well-known lines of Vergil or Cicero's comment in the De officiis. It is probable that on these questions neither Scipio nor Polybios himself had worked out a line of his own, in any case not one in which humanity would have been anything more than an instrument of an unmitigated policy of power.58

In my opinion Poseidonios went far beyond Polybios in the treatment of this subject. In this direction Capelle has done valuable preparatory work, but he has not paid enough attention to the realistic historical material in Poseidonios' kirTopial. This defect produces the wrong, or at least one-sided, impression that Poseidonios is philosophically idealizing the role of Rome. Yet Capelle has the merit of having discovered some additional passages of Poseidonian origin in Strabo's chapter on Spain and of having recognized, in connection with them, the authorship of Poseidonios in Strabo's account of the Cilician pirates in book I4.59 All these passages develop one theme in common: in barbarian regions, where the inhabitants were damaging their own economic prosperity by constant robbery and warfare, 'the Romans appear as the bringers of peace and order.'60 This idea, which Capelle rightly recognized as being Poseidonian, he regards as the core of what Poseidonios thought of Roman rule. And he relates this to a philosophical fragment of Poseidonios, of which Seneca preserves a version in his ninetieth letter. There the natural foundations of govern- ment are under discussion: in the animal-kingdom the greater and stronger beasts rule over the weaker ones ; to this corresponds the rule of the better men in the human sphere; and from this it should be inferred that in the Golden Age the rulers were the wise men, who governed for the benefit of all and protected the weaker ones from the stronger.61

The kinship of this conception with Cicero's ethical justification of Roman imperialism in De re publica 3, 36 (the very passage which has been wrongly, as I believe, ascribed to

53 cp. Ziegler, P-W s.v. Polybios, 1470 f. and N.S. 4 (I954), 102 ff. cf. M. Gelzer, Kl. Schr. ii, 63 f., 1498 f. 7I and K. Ziegler, P-W s.v. Polybios, 1552 ff. 54 I, I, 5; I, 3, 9 f.; 3, I, 4; 6, 2, 3; 39, 8, 7. 58 See esp. the reflections in Diod. 32, 2 and 4, 55 i, 63, 9 ff. ; 3, 2, 6; ii8, 9; 6, 8 ; 52-56; rightly traced back to Polybios (H. H. Scullard, RS 52-56; i8, 28, 4 if. 50 (i960), 73, 57).

56 See on this F. W. Walbank, Hist. Comm. on Pol. 59 Strabo 3, I44, I54, 156, I63; 14, 665, 688 f. i (1957), 301. Capelle, I.c. ioi f. and above pp. 42-3. 57 See for the following passage the penetrating 60 Capelle, l.c. p. 103. discussion by C. 0. Brink and F. W. Walbank, CQ 61 Capelle, I.c. p. 99.

46 HERMANN STRASBURGER

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Panaitios) is quite evident. However, it seems to me erroneous to regard this as the quintes- sence of Poseidonios' reflections on the Roman position 62 and at the same time to think it possible that the Stoa should have placed itself at the disposal of the Government by such a hollow formula of compromise. I think Poseidonios is much more of a realist than is supposed. At all events I would hesitate to say, with Capelle (p. 104), that Poseidonios, like Polybios and Panaitios, was convinced ' of the inner vocation of the Roman nation for world-supremacy '. Doubts must be raised by the mere fact that in his letter Seneca is presenting the ideal reconstruction which Poseidonios gave of the Golden Age. Poseidonios was certainly very far from believing in the possibility of recreating this ideal state in his own age. In several sections of his historical work he himself has propounded the theory that the moral qualities of the Romans, formerly outstanding, had been deteriorating since the destruction of Carthage 63 in a process of constant decay.64 He ascribed the most critical and dangerous political situations explicitly to this very cause, as for instance the Social War (Diod. 37, 2, i ff.) and the civil war under Marius and Sulla (Diod. 37, 2, 12 ff.). Such indeed is the moral which pervades the whole period dealt with by Poseidonios (from I45 B.C.): beginning with the Spanish wars in the middle of the second century B.C., serious crises for the Roman government, in foreign as well as in home politics, are an almost incessantly recurring theme. This outlook in itself debarred him from any philosophically idealizing simplification of the problem. Accordingly he very strongly emphasized Roman cruelty and perfidy in foreign wars and the horrible self-destruction of the civil wars and he detected alarming symptoms of degeneration (influenced in this by the judgement of Roman optimates) even in an episode where we see a noble endeavour to bring about reasonable reforms : the episode of the Gracchi. In his account of economic conditions in Gaul and Spain, Roman and Italian merchants appear as avaricious and brutal exploiters,65 and, unfairly generalizing, he charges C. Gracchus with having delivered up the provinces to the ruthless greed of the Roman tax-farmers.66 It must be said at once, however, that such statements were never left one-sided and without compensation. What he says, for instance, about Roman merchants exploiting Spanish mineral wealth, he lays likewise to the charge of the Phoenicians and Carthaginians,67 who preceded the Romans in Spain. Similarly, he gives copious illustrations both of terrible abuses of power by oriental despots and of the decadence of other nations.68 He describes brutality or immorality everywhere in the world, impartially, but he does not make it the general rule. Even barbarian peoples, to whose customs and national character he devoted careful study, are described fairly, without either idealization or disparagement. An obvious and well-preserved example is his descrip- tion of the Gauls.69 There all characteristic features of this nation are put together with scientific thoroughness: he describes them as open-hearted, good-natured, valiant, chivalrous, religious, reckless, boastful, intelligent and eager to learn; but he also alludes to the crudity of their eating-manners, their addiction to drink and to a variety of primitive features, especially their repulsive custom of sacrificing human victims to their gods and their habit of preserving the heads of distinguished enemies and of nailing them above their front- doors. Poseidonios tells us how hard he found it to get accustomed to that spectacle, but how in conversations with the Gauls he became more and more aware of the moral and serious conceptions underlying these outlandish customs.

Well differentiated too was his description of the Celtiberians, though not quite so well preserved; he calls them cruel to criminals and enemies, but kind and humanitarian 70

in their attitude towards foreigners. When he praises these qualities and also the extra- ordinary hospitality of the Celtiberians, we must not miss, any more than in the description of the Gaulish Celts, the note of complaint and admonition intended for the Romans, who maltreated these predominantly amiable nations terribly. Not so much by loud declamation

62 Poseidonios' F 8 (on the Heracleots and Mari- 64 FF 59; xiI2 == Diod. 34/5, 33; Diod. 37, 3-5. andynians) (cf. Reeser, I.c. p. 54, who seems even to 65 F i 6 = Diod. 5, 26, 3; F 117 == Diod. 5, 36 f. trace back Cicero, De re publica 3, 37- I, 5I to 66 F iii b = Diod. 34/5, 25. Poseidonios !) also should not be generalized in this 67 F II7 = Diod. 5, 35, 4 and 38, 2. sense (cp. Reinhardt, P-W s.v. Poseidonios, 632 f.). 68 FF 2, 5, 6, io; Diod. 33, 4; 5 ; 6; I2; 14;

63 W. Steidle (Sallusts histor. Monographien I6 ff.) 15, etc. rightly points out that in Poseidonios' view Roman 69 F II6 = Diod. 5,25-32. FF 55-58, from Strabo's moral decay hardly began abruptly in I46 B.C., but book 4. FF I5-18 = Athen. 4, 15I-4 and 4, 246. the events of this year at most initiated a stage of 70 -taiKETs Kad piAavOpdbrot-two favourite terms of crisis in a development which had begun long before. Poseidonios, F I7 = Diod. 5, 34, I.

47

as by the fairness of his reporting, Poseidonios shows that he has completely absorbed the stoic doctrine of the parity of all men. He is absolutely free from the disagreeable arrogance underlying the phrase ' quod talibus hominibus utilis sit servitus '. I do not believe that in every given case he identified the pax Romana with the happiness of the subjugated. His precisely shaded and highly appreciative portrait of Viriathus,71 which has some important features in common with that of Pompey (Diod. 38/9, 9) and even alludes to the Thucydidean Pericles, shows a barbarian ruler capable of developing the best energies of his nation and thus representing at least one case in which Roman tutelage appears unnecessary, or even positively destructive.72 There is also a fragment in Diodoros, certainly with reference to the conquest of Numantia,73 which shows the moving attachment of savage barbarians to their liberty and native soil: a picture doubtless intended to proclaim the right of these peoples not to be deprived of these assets. Everywhere Poseidonios likes to point out that even barbarians and slaves might be endowed by nature with the highest qualities of human dignity, that normally they become brutal only as a result of brutal treatment.74

The practical consequences of this conception are obvious, and even the very fragmen- tary tradition provides plenty of evidence for the vigour with which Poseidonios insisted on them. In so far as subordinate states exist anywhere in the world-and Poseidonios accepts them as political and historical realities-the crucial problem is the right treatment (which means for Poseidonios the humanitarian treatment) of the subjects. This remains equally valid for him whether he is thinking of political relations between peoples or of the status of slaves in private law. Both aspects of this field of enquiry are absolutely identical for him : social questions at every level and their adequate solution according to the principles of humanity are the central issue for that political instruction which the all-round historical stock-taking of the philosopher is meant to provide.75 The often recurrent keywords here are ?EtEiKEcia (clementia) and piAcxvepcowtia (humanitas).76

A fundamental statement in this sense-unfortunately preserved only in the doubly simplified form of a Byzantine excerpt (de sent.) from Diodoros-was made by Poseidonios in his introduction to the first Sicilian slave-war (F io8 c). There he gave a prefatory summary on the terrible disaster which the thoughtless mismanagement of the Sicilian slave-holders had inflicted on their whole country, and he added the following moral (I translate from the excerpt de sententiis): ' Therefrom it is to be learnt that not only should the officials of the state behave mildly to those of lower station, but that likewise in private life reasonable persons should treat their servants kindly. For haughtiness and harshness produce in political life rebellions of the free and in private households plots by the slaves against their masters and revolts which might endanger whole cities. As, step by step, absolute power degenerates into brutality and illegality, so the characters of the subjects become increasingly brutish and unreasonable. For everyone to whom his fate has assigned a humble place will willingly concede to the mightier pre-eminence in nobility and prestige; but, when he begins to miss his due share of philanthropy, then he will become the enemy of brutal despots.'

This is a political doctrine in the spirit and tone of Aristotle, whose Politics, in the sections on the origins of revolts and how to prevent them, contain parallel trains of thought (Book 5). But in this political context Aristotle, although mentioning elsewhere the frequent revolts of Helots and Penestae (2, 9, p. 1269 a-b), does not discuss the treatment of slaves; this for him is only a problem of private life. A literature specifically ' On slavery' seems not to have existed in antiquity. Extensive discussions occur as late as Seneca (De beneficiis, Book 3), although there must have existed theories on how to treat slaves, as is proved by a casual remark in Cicero's De officiis (i, 4I).77 Into historiography social problems seem to have been introduced intentionally for the first time by Agatharchides of Knidos, a contemporary of Polybios, yet confined to non-political spheres.78 It seems to have been he

71 Diod. 33, i ; 2I a; App., Ib. 3I8 f.; Dio Cass., on his source see also Hiller von Gaertringen, P-W fr. 73. For a reconstruction see H. Simon, o.c. s.v. Rhodos (suppl. v), 766. (above, n. 32), 134 and I35, n. 69. 76 For these qualities in the Celtiberians : F iI7 =

72 For other examples see above, n. 68. Diod. 5, 34, I. 73 Diod. 34/5, 4, -z2; cf. Simon, l.c. I64, 52. 77 cf. W. Richter, ' Seneca und die Sklaven,' 74 For relevant passages see above n. 37, ad fin. Gymn. 65 (1958), I98, cf. 204 f. 75 Diod. 33, 14 f. ; 18 ; 34/5, 3 ; 12 ; 20-23. 78 See the excerpts of his treatise ' On the Red

Pos., F io8. On Eunomia at Rhodes, Strabo 652 f.; Sea ' in Diod. 3, I2-48 and Phot., Bibl. 250 passim.

48 HERMANN STRASBURGER

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who stimulated Poseidonios; the latter, in describing human misery in the Spanish silver- and gold-mines, was evidently inspired by Agartharchides' similar account of the terrible conditions in the Egyptian gold-mines.79 But it might well be Poseidonios who started the important innovation of introducing the social question into high-styled historiography, considering it to be the central problem of all historical movements and thus also of Roman world-supremacy. It does not detract from his merit that this conception was probably stimulated by like-minded personalities, who should be looked for not only among stoic philosophers but also among noble Romans, who had become familiar with stoic thought. In his history Poseidonios repeatedly praised those statesmen who had obtained a philo- sophical education; even our defective evidence enables us to cite-apart from the Numidian Micipsa (Diod. 34/35, 35)-the following Roman names: P. Cornelius Scipio Nasica Serapio, cos. III (Diod. 34/35, 33, 8); L. Sempronius Asellio (Diod. 37, 8),80 who when praetor in Sicily at about 96 B.C. had been the benefactor of his province; a Mucius Scaevola,-either the augur,81 who is said to have been a stoic and a follower of Panaitios, or his like-minded younger relative, the pontifex, who in 94 B.C. governed the province of Asia in association with Rutilius Rufus (Diod. 37, 5); 82 an Aelius Tubero-certainly the zealous disciple of Panaitios ; 83 and finally P. Rutilius Rufus himself (F 59, ? io8).

It is significant not only for the views of Poseidonios, but also for those of the men whom he admired, that he mentions, in praise of their old-style Roman frugality and patriarchal humanity, that Tubero and Rutilius used to pay their own slaves scrupulously for minor extra services received.84 This inconspicuous gesture implied a fundamental acknowledgement that (the law notwithstanding) a slave should not be considered as an object but as a man. Similarly, it was in all probability Rutilius Rufus who conveyed to Poseidonios, either verbally or via his history, the wording of the prophecy of Scipio Nasica Corculum, ' that, if Carthage was preserved, the fear of that city would constrain the Romans to inner concord and to a kind and dignified rule over their subjects, which would be the unsurpassable device for perpetuating and increasing their empire; but, if Carthage were to be destroyed, the consequences, clearly to be foreseen, would be, in home-affairs, civil war and, on the part of the so-called allies, hatred of Roman rule, caused by the avarice and arbitrariness of their governors.' 85

With our theme in mind we should note particularly the attention paid in this sentence to the adequate treatment of Rome's subjects, which is recognized here too to be at once a moral and a political problem. Taking both passages together we see how concerned Rutilius was with this problem, in his private life as well as in his most far-ranging political thought. Whether he also developed such ideas extensively in his Greek historical work, is hard to guess; with Roman brevity he might equally well have confined himself to a few short remarks. In any case, this conception implies a serious criticism of the imperial policy of the destroyer of Carthage and Numantia. As it is always characteristic of Poseidonios to illuminate opposite facets of historical problems and personalities-a good example of the latter is his treatment of Marius-our assertion of this criticism is not at all contradicted by the account of Scipio's famous embassy to the East (FF 6, 30, 59; Diod. 33, 28, a), where Poseidonios has outlined an imposing picture of his commanding and honest personality. The emphasis on the great impression which this embassy made upon the peoples visited should not be taken as a simple panegyric, but as a hint of the great chance Roman imperial policy had at that time. Whether Scipio Aemilianus recognized and used this chance is there left as an open question, which afterwards, in the disappointment over the treatment of Numantia, which we detected in the judgements of Rutilius and Poseidonios quoted above, seems to be answered implicitly in the negative. This, I think, is precisely the point of view which engaged Poseidonios' interest so strongly in favour of Pompey.

The passages on piracy, which I believe to be derived from Poseidonios' history, help us to recognize this train of thought and confirm the picture I have outlined so far (see

79 F 117 == Diod. 5, 38, i - Agatharchides in 82 On him cf. Cicero, de off. 3, 62. Diod. 3, 12. 83 Klebs, P-W s.v. Aelius, no. 155, 536.

80 Miinzer, P-W s.v. Sempronius, no. i8, cf. 84 cf. Cicero, de off. I, 41. Broughton MRR under the year 96 B.C. 85 See above, n. 23.

81 cf. Miinzer, P-W s.v. Mucius, 43I and Titius, 1556.

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HERMANN STRASBURGER

above, pp. 42-3). They show impressively at the same time that his historical understanding is not confined to ethical questions, but is also able to grasp the nexusses of power-politics in a manner Thucydides or Polybios would not have been ashamed of. Leaving aside the uncertain minor splinters scattered in the secondary tradition, particularly in Strabo, I shall keep to such fragments as are-for me at least-beyond doubt, and summarize only the main views. The account of the developments leading up to the Mithridatic war has to be gathered mainly from Strabo; what comes later, from Appian's Mithridatike and Plutarch's Pompey.

Poseidonios began with the statement that in earlier times it was the Thalassokratia of the Rhodians which prevented piracy from arising in the eastern Aegean. He seems not to have mentioned-at least it is not in Strabo (14, 652; 668 f.)-the reasons for the decline of the Rhodian sea-power; these were the punitive measures which Rome inflicted on Rhodes after I68 B.c. and the establishment of the free port of Delos, which ruined the Rhodian commerce. But this was explained by his predecessor Polybios (30, 31) ; so he might have taken for granted that it was well known. Then the league of the Cilician pirates came about, according to Poseidonios, under the patronage of the Syrian usurper Diodotos- Tryphon, which means after 145 B.C. Poseidonios gave several reasons for its thriving. He claimed that the main reason was the prosperity of the slave-trade, conditioned by the enormous capacity of the slave-market at Delos. This in turn was caused by the increase in wealth the Romans obtained by destroying Carthage and Corinth, whereby they became wholesale buyers on the slave-market: and here we are expected to recall the Sicilian slave-economy, in connection with which Poseidonios had given a more detailed discussion of the problem of slavery. Further factors favouring the pirates, according to Poseidonios, were, firstly, the active support the Ptolemies gave them in order to damage the Seleucids; secondly, the connivance of the Rhodians, which stemmed from their aversion to the Seleucids; and, lastly, the laissez-faire attitude of the Romans. The Romans, who from the time of the embassy of Scipio Aemilianus were informed about the complaints being made, laid the blame for them on the incapacity of the Seleucids, but shrank from deposing the dynasty they had themselves acknowledged. But the weakness of Syria, so Poseidonios stated, caused the Parthians and the Armenians to push forward, the latter annexing Syria (in 83 B.C.) and abandoning the sea to the Cilician pirates : and thus among the consequences of Roman inactivity on the Syrian question was the war which the Romans had to wage later against Armenia (under Lucullus and Pompey).

The absolute hey-day of piracy, according to Poseidonios, was brought about by Mithridates vi of Pontos, who made systematic use of the sea-power of the pirates in his war against the Romans.86 The picturesque description of the spreading of piracy all over the Mediterranean Sea, perhaps the best known part of the story, I may pass over here and confine myself to emphasizing the Poseidonian statements on the social background of the phenomenon. It was, he says, mostly those uprooted politically and economically by the Mithridatic war who joined the league of the pirates, among them some rich and well-born people, the trade of piracy having become socially acceptable because of the widespread power of the pirates. But in addition large numbers of craftsmen qualified in shipbuilding and the manufacture of arms were forced into their service.

I pass over the campaign of Pompey, as the share of Poseidonios in that portion of the story is not separable from the Roman accounts. In any case, these events by their nature held no significance for his main thesis. But the end is again important: Pompey's humane solution after his victory, which was naturally emphasized in other sources too. Here Poseidonios' account shines through chapter 28, 4 ff. of Plutarch's Pompey (I quote the characteristic section in the translation of Langhorne-Dryden): '(Pompey) took above twenty thousand prisoners, whom he was unwilling to put to death, though he thought it dangerous to suffer them to disperse, lest they might reunite and make head again, as they were numerous, poor and warlike. Therefore, considering that man by nature is not a wild savage creature, but becomes such only by an unnatural and vicious habit, and that he is reclaimed and civilized by a change of place, conversation and manner of life, as beasts that are wild by nature become tame and tractable by being kept and fed in a mild domestic

86 In 88 B.C. and the following years, App., Mithr. 262, 416, 586; Plut., Pomp. 24, I.

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POSEIDONIOS ON PROBLEMS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 5I

manner, he determined to remove these pirates from the sea to the land, and to give them a taste of an innocent and humane course of life, by settling them in cities, and accustoming them to agriculture.'

This measure of Pompey's broke with a long tradition of Roman behaviour towards enemies considered as criminals. The importance which this new attitude must have had in Poseidonios' view will certainly have emerged much more clearly in the complete original text of his histories, where it will have provided a contrast with the long series of unfavour- able portraits which preceded it, particularly those of the commanders in the Spanish wars. The last instance of these was that of T. Didius (in 97 B.C.), who practised that mixture of perfidy and brutality which had already become traditional on the Roman side in this theatre of war: Didius, who missed a comparable chance of a humane and thus durable social solution when it was offered to him (as it was later to Pompey) by the situation. Only four years after his cruel act of annihilation the Romans had to suffocate the next revolt of the Celtiberians in streams of blood.87

It would be tempting to imagine that an exchange of ideas with the philosopher of Rhodes had its share in Pompey's decision on the lot of the pirates, which was humane and at the same time politically far-sighted, and was followed by his large-scale and lasting organization of the eastern world in the same spirit (cf. Strabo I I, 492). Unfortunately the sources say nothing about this. But in any case the demonstration of friendship between the philosopher and the statesman casts retrospective light on the whole of Poseidonios' history, which repeatedly praised those Roman politicians who, thanks to the lessons they drew from their philosophical education, approached the task of governing their provinces in the right spirit, to the benefit of their subjects and thus also of the Roman Empire (see above p. 49).

In Poseidonios' view this was the spirit in which the problems of mankind had to be solved in the future; with his cosmopolitan sentiments and convictions, he steps consciously beyond Polybios, who, although universal in his historical view, still thought in national categories. Perhaps his pleading for a community of all men having equal rights was, as the disproportionate emphasis given to their respective views in Cicero's De officiis suggests, somewhat more determined and active than that of his teacher Panaitios, to whom, however, as I said before (see above p. 45), we must not impute an opportunist betrayal of this ideal.88 Poseidonios' thoughts are idealistic but not unrealistic; such notions of the moral

87 App., lb. 100, 433 ff., Miinzer, P-W s.v. Didius, 409. On the sources see E. Norden, Germ. Urgeschichte in Tac. Germania, I64.

88 The way the idea of the societas hominum is treated in De officiis I, i.e. where Panaitios is Cicero's source, seems to me very different from precisely that part of book in which Cicero is particularly likely to have based on Poseidonios. As Cicero says himself (3, 7-9), Panaitios, his source until then, did not supply any more material for book III. It is certain that in what followed he now had recourse to a treatise of Poseidonios, the brevity of which he complained of (De officiis 3, 8 ; Att. i6, II, 4), and besides that used a OTr6pivTPa of the stoic Atheno- dorus Calvus (Att. I.c. and i6, 14, 4), which he had procured from the author for this purpose. The respective contributions of these two sources cannot be determined exactly, but perhaps this is unnecessary because Athenodoros was probably a pupil of Posei- donios (von Arnim, P-W s.v. Athenodoros, n. I9), and so might well have reproduced Poseidonian doctrine. Cicero's use of this source, as he himself says, extends to ch. 32 inclusively; the rest he com- posed ' nullis adminiculis ', pursuing his own ideas (33 f.).

One can most clearly distinguish two different treatments of societas hominum corresponding to these two different sections. In the first book the term often occurs (15, I7, 20 f., 50-60, 153-160 : on the most complicated relationship between Panaitios and Cicero in the passage 50 ff., see Picht I.c. (above, n. 50), 175 ff.). But here the themes are, in a general philo- sophical sense, the liability of individuals to have regard for the generality of men and the relative

precedence of obligations towards those natural for- mations of society to which every man belongs (the gradation of which Picht, I.c., traces to Cicero). The greatest and highest of these for Cicero is the nation, which is for him the fatherland. He deliberately omits the most comprehensive conception, viz. the infinita societas hominum (53, 57, i6o), and consequently does not handle at all the relations between Romans or Greeks and barbarian peoples. This is significant for Cicero at least, but one may doubt whether Panaitios' argumentation was of similar political concreteness (cf. above, n. 50o). But it may perhaps be said, with all due caution, that Cicero did not find in Panaitios any definite postulates here which would have made it difficult for him to exclude supra-national ideas.

In contrast to this, the passage which is probably based on Poseidonios (3, 21-32) suddenly teems with cosmopolitan demands, which differ markedly from the tenour of the first book and are also out of harmony with Cicero's theory in De re publica 3, 36 f. on the necessity for the rule of the better and conversely for the servitude of the worse. A few sentences may prove this:

' Si enim sic erimus adfecti, ut propter suum quisque emolumentum spoliet aut violet alterum, disrumpi necesse est eam, quae maxime est secundum naturam, humani generis societatem (21). ... Neque verum hoc solum natura, id est iure gentium, sed etiam legibus populorum, quibus in singulis civitati- bus res publica continetur, eodem modo constitutum est, ut non liceat sui commodi causa nocere alteri . . . Atque hoc multo magis efficit ipsa naturae ratio, quae est lex divina et humana; cui parere qui velit- omnes autem parebunt, qui secundum naturam

responsibility of the Romans for their subjects, entertained only by a small and uninfluential minority in his own time, were realized to a remarkable degree in the administration of the empire in imperial times. Seen in this light, the endeavour of Pompey in the period of his glory seems more modern and promising than Caesar's.89 One would like to know what Poseidonios thought about the conquest and treatment of Gaul by Caesar, which he had unwittingly furthered by the information he had supplied,90 and what he thought about the mind of the conqueror, to whom the Gallic national character presented such very different features (cp. Caesar, BG 6, I i-2o and above p. 47).

Scholars who like to lay stress on Caesar's fine education should not fail to observe that no connection between him and any philosopher or his doctrine is attested.91 The spiritual and moral virtues which entitled the Romans to world-supremacy are far more evident in the course of education pursued by Cicero and his friends, and possibly still more in the atmosphere surrounding Cicero's venerated teachers. Perhaps nothing reconciles us to the Romans of Republican times so much as the humanity which radiates from Cicero's rhetorical and philosophical works as a reflex of this educational experience. I mean by this-if I may draw one more distinction-the actual educational experience which stamped his spiritual development in the years when he was a disciple of the orator Crassus and of the Mucii Scaevolae, and of which he himself became the greatest embodiment in his own generation; not the retrospective wish-dream which identified this spirit with that of the old Roman aristocrats and warriors of the glorious past, symbolized by the type of Scipio Aemilianus, a wish-dream which clouded Cicero's own understanding of Roman realities, and much more that of modern scholars.92 Cicero's naive praise of a states- manship for which the destructions of Carthage and of Numantia were acts of justice and wisdom,93 his appreciation, at times partly clear-sighted but on the whole defective, of the causes of the crisis and the requirements of imperial government, which prevented him from developing any programme for the latter in his own political doctrine 94-all this is conditioned by his fixation on an ideal which had its justification and its greatness only in the past. It is significant that from the store of historical exempla which Cicero scatters through- out his works the opposition of Scipio Nasica to the destruction of Carthage is missing. By the same token he does not recognize the fundamental difference between the traditional imperialistic policy and the line of constructive imperialism, based on ethical reflections, which leads down from Nasica through men like Rutilius Rufus and the Scaevolae into the future (see above p. 49). Nor does Cicero perceive the latter's intellectual superiority: and this is the more astonishing as not only his personal connection with this circle but the whole tenor of his own sentiments, education and gifts destined him, one would think, to a career along that path (cf. Q.fr. i, I, 27 f.). Perhaps it was only natural that he, the novus homo, could not free himself from the spell of conservative-optimate ideology. Yet, seen

volent vivere-, numquam committet, ut alienum appetat et id, quod alteri detraxerit, sibi adsumat (23). ... Itemque magis est secundum naturam, pro omnibus gentibus, si fieri possit, conservandis aut iuvandis, maximos labores molestiasque suscipere . . . quam vivere in solitudine non modo sine ullis molestiis ... Ex quo efficitur, hominem naturae oboedientem homini nocere non posse (25).. . Atque etiam si hoc natura praescribit, ut homo homini, quicumque sit, . . . consultum velit, necesse est secundum eandem naturam omnium utilitatem esse communem (27). .. . Qui autem civium rationem dicunt habendam, externorum negant, ii dirimunt communem humani generis societatem (28).'

From 3, 35 on to the end Cicero does not speak of the humana societas apart from a few passages (and they are remarkably few) which lack profundity of thought (52 f., 69, ii8) : for Cicero this idea remains always a philosophical topic in the sphere of private life; he does not recognize it, or at least does not acknowledge it, to be a problem affecting Roman imperial policy. But there can hardly be any doubt that the purpose of Poseidonios, to whose authority in 3, 21-32 he conceded more than was appropriate

to his own convictions, had been to create not just a beautiful academic theory, but a constructive contri- bution to the solution of the world's political prob- lems, just as in his time Karneades had set out to do.

89 cf. F. Hampl, Hist. Zeitschr. i88 (1959), 525. 90 On Caesar's knowledge of the 'Histories' see,

e.g., E. Norden, Germ. Urgesch. in Tac. Germ. 99 f. 91 For relevant references, see Klotz, P-W s.v.

Julius, 259 ff. 92 cf. above pp. 41-2. The two papers of F. Hampl,

which set out to shatter these illusions (' " Stoische Staatsethik " und fruihes Rom ', Hist. Zeitschr. 184 (I957), 249 ff. and ' R6m. Politik in republ. Zeit und das Problem des Sittenverfalls,' I.c. I88 (1959), 497 ff.), in spite of some exaggerations seem to me to demand serious consideration.

93 Both in Lael. iI and De off. i, 34 f. 94 De re p. 3, 36 f.; 41; cf. Gelzer, P-W s.v.

Tullius, 975 f.; Cic. De off. i, 34-41 ; 2, 26-28; 75. In particular, the remarks on empire-government in De leg. 3, 9, with I8 and frg, 3, are poor. Obviously he had not planned any more, to judge by the short survey of what followed. cf. also H. D. Meyer, Cicero und das Reich, Diss. Koln (I957), 240 ff.

52 HERMANN STRASBURGER

POSEIDONIOS ON PROBLEMS OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE

from our distance, it is most strange to read, in his letters from Cilicia, how he felt happy, and justly so, about fulfilling his task as a governor with the integrity of a Scaevola and at the same time strongly disgusted by the actual business before him; to notice his genuinely felt humanity towards the oppressed provincials and, side by side with this, his total indiffer- ence to the fate of that wretched mountain tribe which brought a gay auction of human prey to his soldiers and to himself the hope of a triumph. Surely this odd mixture 95 does not indicate a lack of personal reflection but is representative of the immature stage of Roman imperial ideology. It is also characteristic-of both the men concerned-that the only evidence for Poseidonios' historical work having any impact on Cicero's mind 96 is his wish to see his suppression of the Catilinarian conspiracy, which he thought equal to Pompey's deeds in the East, glorified in the same style by the same author; and that Poseidonios in most polite, even flattering, terms refused this request (Att. 2, I, 2). If I am not mistaken, the wording of the most relevant passage of Poseidonios' answer is preserved in a hidden place; for Cicero has quoted it, bashfully veiled, in the De officiis (3, Io).97 Poseidonios compared the Trd6pvroca which Cicero had placed at his disposal for embellishment by his pen, with the posthumous Coan Aphrodite of Apelles, whose singular beauty had it made hopeless for any painter to complete the unfinished work adequately. The grace of this compliment, evoking vividly the brilliancy of the masterpiece among Poseidonios' historical fragments, the Athenion-episode (F 36), surely earns it a place here at the end as a little additional testimony to Poseidonios' sovereign personality.

University of Freiburg im Breisgau.

95 See e.g., Att. 5, 10, 2 ; 20, 5 f. with fam. 15, 4, Io and Chr. M. Wieland, Ciceros Briefe (1809), 3,

0S ff.; 2i, 7-12. 6, i, 15. cf. Gelzer, P-W s.v. Tullius, 971 ; 983 f.; H. D. Meyer, I.c. (n. 94), I70 ff. and J. Graff, Ciceros Selbstauffassung (I963), 37ff.

96 But it must be noticed at least, that perhaps the strongest and most decided words Cicero ever found on the Roman duty of responsibility for the welfare of the barbarians (Q. fr. I, I, 27), were written very close to this time (about the turn of 60-59 B.C.).

97 De off. 3, 0o: 'Accedit eodem testis locuples Posidonius, qui etiam scribit in quadam epistola, P. Rutilium Rufum dicere solere, qui Panaetium audierat, ut nemo pictor esset inventus, qui in Coa Venere eam partem, quam Apelles inchoatam reli- quisset, absolveret-oris enim pulchritudo reliqui corporis imitandi spem auferebat-, sic ea, quae Panaetius praetermisisset et non perfecisset, propter eorum, quae perfecisset, praestantiam neminem per- secutum.' This passage was taken as evidence for a published collection of letters of Poseidonios: "'EmTaToXai' (cf. A. Schmekel, Philosophie der mitt- leren Stoa (1892), I4), or alternatively ' Briefe ethische Fragen behandelnd' (Reinhardt, P-W s.v.

Poseidonios, 569). But for this there is no other testimony except the private letter to Cicero of the year 60 B.C., where the double comparison with the unfinished masterpieces of the philosopher Panaitios and the painter Apelles (for which see E. Pfuhl, Malerei und Zeichnung der Griechen (1923), 74I), which were continued by nobody, fits in surprisingly well as a flourish of polite refusal. The Coan Aphro- dite of Apelles was an example Cicero liked to quote. It occurs for the first time in 59 B.C. (Att. 2, 2I, 4;

fam. I, 9, I5 ; Orat. 5 ; nat. deor. I, 75 ; de div. I, 23), so perhaps he had become fond of it as a result of the compliment of Poseidonios. If anyone is offended by the present tense ' Rutilium . . . dicere solere ' and concludes therefrom that the letter of Poseidonios must have been written in Rutilius' life- time, i.e. long before 60 B.C., he may accept the reading of the Palatinus 1531 : 'solitum.' More serious considerations to my mind are whether ' Posidonius . . . qui .. . scribit ' points to a published letter and whether 'scripsit (ad me)' would be essential to prove an unpublished one; but I do not think that the unpolished text of the De officiis can be pressed so much.

53