1 Renewed Interest in the scholia Ciceroniana
As Paolo de Paolis has stated, âogni discorso sulla fortuna di Cicerone in epoca antica non può non partire dalla filologia ciceronianaâ.1 This volume on the Ciceronian scholia originates from exactly this observation: its aim is to understand more fully what interests commentators of Ciceroâs speeches between (roughly) the first and the seventh century had; how they reacted to, but also actively participated in, the debate about Ciceroâs legacy in Imperial and late antique Roman culture; and whether these interestsânotwithstanding the obvious changes of focus and knowledge between the Neronian period and the transition from ancient to medieval Europeâshow certain elements of continuity with regard to how Cicero was perceived and taught.
The anonymous ancient scholia to Ciceroâs speeches (if we exclude for the moment Asconius, as in his case we know the authorâs name) are transmitted in versions that can be dated between the fourth and the late seventh centuries ce, and exhibit a long and complicated history during which the different corpora were assembled, abbreviated, combined, and reworked in the course of several centuries. The following brief characterizations are based on James Zetzelâs excellent overview.2
Q. Asconius Pedianus: fragmentarily transmitted mid-first-century âcommentaryâ3 on six Ciceronian speeches; after the rediscovery of the manuscript by Poggio Bracciolini, the text quickly spread throughout Italy, which is why it is transmitted by an impressive number of humanistic manuscripts.4
Scholia Bobiensia: a palimpsest, now partly in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan (Ambros. EÂ 147 sup.) and partly in the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana (BAV Lat. 5750).5 The scholia on Ciceroâs speeches were written shortly before 500 (âscholia ipsa saeculo V scripta suntâ, as Hildebrandt says)6 and were erased around the year 700. Their content, however, is older: the scholia in the transmitted form have been dated to the fourth century (the possible ascription to the commentary by Volcacius, which Jerome knew,7 has been suggested, among others, by Peter Lebrecht Schmidt, but Zetzelârightly in our viewâis more careful).8 What seems beyond doubt is that the commentator of the fourth century, when assembling the commentary notes, based himself on a large (possibly complete and possibly chronological)9 commentary on Ciceroâs speeches.
Scholia by Ps.-Asconius (sometimes also labelled Scholia Sangallensia): a set of fifth-century, mostly rhetorical commentaries on the Verrines; transmitted in the same humanistic manuscripts from which we know the authentic Asconius, their much later authorship has been proven by Madvig.10
Scholia Cluniacensia et recentiora Ambrosiana and Scholia Vaticana: a brief set of marginal notes in manuscripts kept today in the British Library in London (BL Add. 47678), the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan (Ambros. C. 29), and the Biblioteca Vaticana (BAV Reg. 2077). The manuscripts partly show textual variations (in Zetzelâs words, they testify how regularly commentaries âchange in accordance with the needs or interests of the scribes and users of the manuscriptsâ),11 but seem to go back to one single commentary of the sixth century.
Scholia Gronoviana: a complex ensemble of three or probably four different sets of commentaries on the Verrines (Schol. Gron. AâC) and a selection of other speeches (D),12 transmitted in a ninth-century manuscript kept in the University Library in Leiden (Voss. Lat. Q. 130) and stemming from material to be dated between the late fourth/early fifth and late seventh centuries. The oldest part (A), a commentary on Ver. 2.1.45â62, might be related to the Scholia Bobiensia;13 the youngest (D) was probably compiled in a monastery in the transitional phase between Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages.
These Ciceronian scholia have long been neglected in modern scholarship.14 If scholars used them, it was mostly to extract selective information from them, for example about lost speeches of Cicero, specific realia, or bits and pieces of historical information. Two major reasons might have been behind this very selective scholarly interest: on the one hand, there are the philological difficulties, which make exact dating for most of the scholia very problematic, resulting in the problem of several layers of commentators that can often hardly be separated from each other; on the other handâironicallyâthe critical editor of the scholia, Thomas Stangl, who considered most of them of inferior quality, has for a long time influenced scholarly opinion.15 Only the Scholia Bobiensia, preserved for us in a version of the fourth century, but containing much material from the second century, have always been considered of better qualityâalthough even this commendation is often accompanied by patronizing remarks of surprise.16 The reason for this disdain is probably that most nineteenth and early twentieth-century critics only looked for the scholarly value of the scholia and were not at all interested in their didactic context and/or usefulness.17 As a consequence, with few exceptions (among whom James Zetzelâs important work since the 1970s takes pride of place),18 scholars have only recently begun to study the Ciceronian scholia for their own sake and to take them seriously as coherent corpora.19 In particular, they have found their way into the study of the reception of Ciceroâs works in Antiquity.20 Most prominently, the monographs by Thomas Keeline and Giuseppe La Bua have used them to reconstruct the daily practice of teaching Ciceronian speeches in Imperial schools of rhetoric.21 Caroline Bishop in 2015 has suggested another approach, namely that the scholia are an important piece of evidence for what she calls the âbifurcationâ of Ciceroâs reception in Imperial times, when readers increasingly tended to separate his rhetorical legacy from the philosophical one due to the influence of the Greek commentaries on Demosthenes and Plato.22 These recent studies have convincingly shown the importance of the scholia for a better understanding of Ciceroâs reception in Late Antiquity.
In the light of this renewed interest, it seems timely to dedicate a volume to the scholia, in which some of the opportunities and challenges regarding their study are dealt with: how does the Ciceronian exegetical material relate to the Graeco-Roman tradition of commentaries (especially the grammatical ones on Vergil and the rhetorical ones on Demosthenes); how do they fit into the broader context of teaching rhetoric (and grammar) in Antiquity and Late Antiquity; how do they contribute to our understanding of the negotiation of Ciceroâs legacy in Antiquity and of Republican oratory more generally; and can they also be inspiring for current research on Ciceroâs speeches themselves?
2 The Genre of (Ancient) Commentaries
Studies on ancient, medieval, and Renaissance commentaries of the last decades have shown how useful it is to approach these works not only to learn more about the texts on which they comment. Instead, by taking commentaries seriously as a genre, questions have been raised that go beyond philological or historical interests, like those of authority and legitimation, cultural canonization and negotiation of the memory of the past.23 This is also true for corpora of scholia, even though in their case certain parameters are more complex: as they are normally anonymous and often consist of material that goes back to different streams of the commentary tradition, it is more challenging to assign to them (authorial) intentions.24 On the other hand, as Pieper argues, exactly because of their anonymity âthey represent not one individual authorâs view of Cicero, but more collective testimonies of the process of Ciceroâs ancient and late antique Nachleben. Layers from different centuries overlap in most of them and suggest the longevity of the negotiation of Ciceroâs legacyâ.25 Yet the variability of the commentary through the ages does not mean that there is no authorial agency at stake: even if no individual commentator can be assigned to the scholia, the versions as transmitted to us represent the (in some way or other conscious) choice of a certain compiler or a group of compilers, according to whom the specific form of the commentary as we have it must have felt useful or appropriate to the needs and interests of the alleged users of that time.26
This brings us to another important parameter of any commentary: its users. According to Christina Kraus and Christopher Stray, few other genres know a similar array of possible approaches to a source text, and in consequence a similarly broad spectrum of possible readers (ranging from students to teachers, to literary connoisseurs, to fellow-intellectuals).27 This diversity is also visible in the Ciceronian material studied in this volume: whereas for Asconius we may assume an informed reader who has passed the stadium of rhetorical exercises,28 the notes in the ps.-Asconian or Gronovian scholia are clearly intended for didactic aims29âwhether the compiler was actually a teacher or not.30 The attitude expected by all ancient commentaries on Cicero from their ideal readers is that of an (inter)active partner of the commentator, as La Bua in this volume argues: the commentaries aim to trigger an active engagement with Ciceroâs texts and the rhetorical and cultural baggage they are transporting. This will not always have been the reality, of courseâwe can imagine that the commentaries were often not read from beginning to end, but instead were consulted for a specific passage or problem, or used as quarries for rhetorical theory or Ciceronian vocabulary. This becomes visible in the case of the Scholia Gronoviana: another Leiden manuscript, VLOÂ 88, contains a glossarium of words used by Cicero in his speeches; the explanations of these words are taken from the Gronovian scholia.31 This example shows that even if commentators construct a kind of idealized recipient of their commentaries, they cannot prescribe the actual way in which they will be used.32
While commentators cannot influence the readerâs reception, they can try to shape their own authority.33 In fact, authorial self-fashioning is an important element of every commentary, and it is especially important to mention this because, at a first and superficial view, commentaries could be understood as purely subservient texts without much authorial interest (âthey want to elucidate the source textâ). Research of the last decades, however, has made sufficiently clear that this is not the only truth. Commentators negotiate the authority of their voice, often in direct opposition to what previous exegetes have maintained.34 We find numerous examples of this in the scholia as well, as several chapters of this volume show: Asconius has a special relation to the historian Fenestella with whom he loves to disagree, while other scholiasts often refer to the previous tradition.35 It is worth noting that the scholiasts (as in this case the Gronovian one) often do not speak in the first person in such cases, but formulate their interpretation more generally, thereby suggesting that their explanation is not their private opinion, but truth.36
Closely connected to this question of authority is that of the relation between commentators and their source authors. With regard to this, Ineke Sluiter has identified two tensions that inform most commentaries. The first is the status of the source text: is it fully authoritative, or does it need further explanation in order to develop its full potential? The second is how commentators should approach the authors they are commenting upon: with âcharityâ, i.e. an apologetic attitude, or with severity in order to show their own critical merit?37 A possible solution for the first tension might lie in the self-fashioning of the commentator as equal to the author38âor even as superior in the sense identified by Schwameis in this volume: by making the hidden qualities of Ciceroâs speeches more visible than Cicero himself, Ps.-Asconius shows his highly developed exegetical and rhetorical acumen. An additionally useful tactic to show oneâs wit is to identify (and solve!) interesting problems in the textâas Asconius enthusiastically does all the time, or as Ps.-Asconius does with the question of the fictionality of the actio secunda of the Verrines, or as the Scholia Gronoviana do when discussing issues of Ciceroâs rhetorical disguise.39 As Christina Kraus suggests, the readersâ opinion as to whether commentaries explain âproblems inherent in the textâ or rather identify (or even create) these problems in order to solve them, has repercussions for how they perceive the role of the commentator, either as a âpassive recipientâ or as an active author.40 The tendency of many scholia (and surely of Asconiusâ commentary) to go beyond a mere explanation of Ciceroâs speeches and to offer the reader insights into late Republican oratory and politics might be the result of attempts to make the commentaries more than simply a subservient text to the speeches, and consequently to give the commentator/scholiast authorial authority.41
A possible solution for Sluiterâs second tension is offered by herself: be mild with the source author and restrict your philological austerity to previous interpreters.42 We have mentioned the importance of criticizing predecessors among the Ciceronian scholiasts above, whereas an apologetic tendency towards Cicero (one could also say, a huge reverence towards him) is omnipresent, as Keeline, Pieper, Schwameis, and Margiotta in this volume especially demonstrate. In addition, this in the end helps the authority of the commentator, as he can present himself as a kind of advocate of the author who finds himself under attack from previous critics. If we take this image of the commentator as the authorâs patronus a step further, we might even say that in return for his service a commentator could expect a favour, which could perhaps be that his name be commemorated together with that of the author: as Homer and Aristarchus belong together, so do Cicero and Asconius.43 And even if the twists of fate have doomed the names of the scholia Ciceroniana to oblivion, at least parts of their texts survive and can be lifted up on the ever-growing interest in the Ciceronian tradition.
One final remark on the genre of ancient commentaries and scholia: if we approach the Ciceronian scholia from a generic angle, this means that a typically generic issue such as intertextuality can also be applied to them. It can have to do with explicit references to previous commentaries, as mentioned above, or with silent adaptations or borrowings (both from previous Ciceronian and from other, e.g. Vergilian, material, which we regularly find in the scholia).44 Generic intertextuality, however, can also go beyond the confines of Latin oratory, as several chapters in this volume argue. Bishop shows how processes of canonization via commentaries on Greek models have influenced the Roman practice of commentaries, while Farrell unveils the relevance of Vergilian commentaries for the development of the Ciceronian ones. Riesenweber argues for the interdependence of the Ciceronian scholia and Latin rhetorical handbooks, which in their turn were often adaptations of Greek treatises (a process during which examples from Demosthenes or other Attic orators were replaced with Ciceronian material), whereas Maffei reminds us that Ciceroâs speeches were also studied (albeit on a more basic level) in the Eastern part of the Empire.
3 The Ciceronian Commentaries and Scholia as Part of Cultural Discourses of Their Times
As Christina S. Kraus and Christopher Stray have stated, â[n]o commentator operates in a vacuum. ⦠there were always already previous comments, interpretations, versions, and theories to negotiate.â45 Generic intertextuality as mentioned above is one aspect of how the Ciceronian material is embedded in learned discourses of its time. Another important point of contact are debates about Ciceroâs linguistic and moral excellence. One of the merits of Giuseppe La Buaâs monograph of 2019 is his emphatic argument for the close connection between the scholia to Ciceroâs speeches and intellectual debates in Imperial and late antique Roman culture about Ciceroâs legacy and iconicity. In fact, Ciceroâs speeches were a constant source of intellectual debate in Antiquity. There were numerous intellectuals and/or teachers of grammar and rhetoric who fiercely debated the meaning of certain words or the grammatical structure of certain sentences, but also the historical circumstances and the people involved. The mostly anonymous and fragmentary ancient commentaries that we possess, which modern editors have labelled the scholia Ciceroniana, are embedded in this intellectual culture and participate in such debates.
Let us elaborate on one example here. The second-century polymath Aulus Gellius in his Noctes Atticae 1.7 discusses the question of whether one finds cases of solecisms in Ciceroâs speeches. A passage from Ciceroâs Verrines is at the core of such a linguistic debate.46 Is the neutral form futurum in the accusative-with-infinitive construction hanc sibi rem praesidio sperant futurum (Ver. 2.5.167) correct, or should Cicero have written futuram?47 After excluding the possibility that the debated form is a mere error of transmission (Gellius stresses the good quality of the copy he has, which allegedly goes back directly to Tiroâs careful editorial interventions),48 Gellius reports that âmanyâ (complures, Gel. 1.7.3) have accused Cicero of solecism in the sentence. An anonymous âfriendâ of Gellius, however, who is introduced as an experienced reader and well versed in the writing style of the past (cui pleraque omnia veterum litterarum quaesita meditata evigilataque erant, âwho had researched, thought through and studied intensely almost all works of old literatureâ, 1.7.4), comes up with parallels from Gaius Gracchus, Claudius Quadrigarius (twice), Valerius Antias, Plautus, and Decimus Laberius to show that Ciceroâs formulation had been perfectly acceptable in the old times of the Republic.49 Ciceroâs many critics are blamed for ignorance both with regard to the grammatical terms and, more importantly, their ability to understand Cicero not from their contemporary perspective, but as a vetus auctor.
The passage is instructive for our understanding of the fragmentary commentaries to Ciceroâs speeches that form the theme of this volume. Gellius gives us an impression of the intensity and love for linguistic detail with which critics scrutinized Ciceroâs speeches in search of linguistic ineptitudes.50 The impression we have is that of two schools: one of critics who try to reduce Ciceroâs status as exemplary linguistic model (and which might be connected to the so-called âCiceromastigesâ, a tradition of heavily criticizing Cicero that according to ZieliÅksi goes back to Asinius Pollio),51 and another that defends exactly this status with utmost philological vigour. It is worth mentioning that the argumentative frame set up by the two schools, which we find in Gel. 1.7, seems to be opposed: Ciceroâs critics argue from their contemporary understanding of Latin and thereby judge Cicero against criteria of their own times. The defenders, however, apply a historical perspective and explain Cicero with the help of Republican authors from the second and first centuries bce, thereby including Cicero among those old authors whose texts were especially valuable sources for the archaist movement of the second century ce which looked for forgotten strands of Latin from the past.52 That this tradition of using Cicero as source for acceptable archaic formulations was long-standing is proven by Macrobius, who applies a similar strategy in the Saturnalia, where the construction of mille followed by a partitive genitive and a verb in the singular is said to have an archaic flavour (redolent vetustatem, 1.5.4). It is sanctioned, however, by references to Cicero, Varro, Quadrigarius, and Lucilius (1.5.5â7).
These debates also found their way into annotations and commentaries that were written, reworked, and summarized since the mid-first century ce and which today form the corpus of the scholia Ciceroniana.53 They regularly apply Gelliusâ apologetical position and show a keen interest in Cicero as a source for valuable linguistic curiosities of the past.54 The commentary by Ps.-Asconius on the Verrines in particular seems interested in discussing possible solecisms in Ciceroâs work.55 As La Bua writes, âthe scholiographic corpora on the speeches offer quite a few examples of this academic confrontation between detractors and defenders of Ciceroâ.56 In doing so, however, they are not only concerned with questions of linguistic correctness or style, but also include factual errors or moral shortcomings of Cicero. Also in those cases they normally follow the Gellian tradition of defending Cicero.57
Generally, especially the earlier commentaries and scholia to Ciceroâs speeches (Asconius and the Scholia Bobiensia) are not only presenting Cicero as linguistic model, but also as a historical figure. Interest in Ciceroâs biography and character are traceable in many of the corpora. This also seems to be an interest which the commentaries share with other Imperial readers of Cicero. It is again Gellius who in 15.28 offers a good example of this more historical attitude: he mentions the question of how old Cicero was when defending Sextus Roscius from Ameria58 and corrects Cornelius Neposâ erroneous opinion that Cicero was 23 at the time of the trial (fr. 12 FRHist = 37 Marshall)59âeven though his own calculation that Cicero was 27 also misses the point. Furthermore, he refers to the historian Fenestella, who had (according to our modern knowledge correctly) suggested that Cicero was 26 years when he defended Roscius, for which he was obviously criticized by Asconius Pedianus in his (now lost) commentary on the speech. We mention the passage, interesting for many reasons, here because it tells us something about the authority of Asconiusâ commentaries on Ciceroâs speeches, which (at least for Gellius) seem to have an equal value as Neposâ vita for solving difficult Ciceronian philologica.60
4 Continuity or Change?
What we have said above leaves us with an important question that concerns not only the Ciceronian scholia, but most ancient commentaries as well: how much continuity or discontinuity do they reveal with respect to the interests in Ciceroâs speeches between the first and the late sixth or early seventh century ce? Closely related to this question is the problem of whether we should attribute any kind of individuality to the corpora of scholia (or, to put it differently, a specific character to their alleged authors), or whether we should see them rather as results of a collective cultural effort of several centuries. In order to approach the question, it is important to realize that throughout this whole period there seems to have been great continuity in the didactic curriculum of schools in the Western part of the Roman Empire. This includes the way rhetoric was taught, which continued to be seen as a core competence for young members of the upper class and anyone who aimed at a public career.61 Together with the rest of the curriculum, the teaching of rhetoric thus fulfilled a similar function to the one ascribed to the task of the grammaticus by Robert Kaster. According to him, it âstood for the tenacious maintenance of one kind of order. ⦠the profession contributed to an idea of permanence that sought to control the instabilities of idiosyncratic achievement and historical changeâ.62 Therefore, what was taught often remained unchanged for hundreds of years and frequently found its foundation in the times that had first canonized this kind of knowledge and teaching: the late Republic and the early Principate. Matthias Gerth interprets this great stability as an expression of trust in the consolidating potential of the tradition and as a sign that the present and the past can merge in a meaningful and constructive way.63 The famous simile of the bee that Macrobius in the preface to his Saturnalia borrows from Senecaâs 84th letter is a very fitting metaphor for this, as well: apes enim quodammodo debemus imitari, quae vagantur et flores carpunt, deinde quicquid attulere disponunt ac per favos dividunt et sucum varium in unum saporem mixtura quadam et proprietate spiritus mutant (âin a certain way, we have to imitate bees, who go from place to place and pick flowers; then they order what they have collected and distribute it in their combs, and with a certain mixture and the quality of the breath they transform the different nectars into one flavourâ, Sat. 1.pr.5).64 The simile not only instructs writers in good imitation, i.e. to engage with all available models in order to make something new out of the mixture, but the passage can also be understood as a reflection on cultural stability (and as such perfectly fits the attitude we find in the Ciceronian scholia): the material the bees bring together (the writers from the past) is appropriated to the needs of the present time (the new flavour) without the different nectars being lost altogether. In other words, the process of transformation that is part of the emulative process does not annihilate the past, but renders it even more relevant for the present.
In such a conservative cultural climate, it is not surprising that Cicero was seen as one of the intellectual champions of the past. In a certain sense, this position, achieved by the end of the first century ce (not least through the works of authors like Asconius and Quintilian, whose reverence for the nomen eloquentiae is notorious), never seems to have been seriously contested. On the other hand, as Riesenweber in this volume argues, the intensity with which Ciceroâs speeches were read as examples of all kinds of rhetorical means changed with time: judging from the quotations in the Imperial and late antique rhetorical handbooks there seems to have been a dip in engagement in the third and early fourth centuries. The interest was renewed after the publication of Marius Victorinusâ influential commentary on Ciceroâs De inventione, which seems to have consolidated the workâs importance for rhetorical teaching and, as a consequence, to have fostered interest in Ciceroâs speeches as practical examples of the teaching offered in De inventione.65
It is from this moment onwards that not only the rhetorical handbooks ârediscoveredâ Ciceroâs speeches as major source, but also (as far as we can judge from what has been transmitted for us) that commentaries on the speeches gained a new momentum. All anonymous scholia as we have them are posterior to Victorinusâ commentary, and in all of them we can observe that the focus on the biography of Cicero, which was still prominent in the first and second centuries ce, is diminished at the cost of rhetorical explanations. This is especially visible in the ps.-Asconian and Gronovian scholia, but also partly applies to the Scholia Bobiensia which, despite their interest in Ciceroâs personality and the historical circumstances in which he delivered his speeches, no longer arrange the speeches in chronological order as the second-century predecessor probably still did.66 If one looks another few centuries ahead, rhetorical teachers of the Middle Ages had lost almost all interest in Ciceroâs personalityâeven to the extent that magister Tullius and the historical agent Cicero were considered two distinct persons.67 The scholia never go as far. In the argumenta, even the late Gronovian scholiast still preserves some basic knowledge of the historical circumstances and climate of Ciceroâs time, but these are no longer in the foreground, only serving to elucidate more fully the rhetorical choices made by Cicero.
We hope that this volume will inspire scholars to consider the Ciceronian scholia as an important corpus. As research on the cultural and literary potential of the Ciceronian scholia has only recently begun to develop, our volume will certainly not provide any final answers, but we hope that it will stimulate moreâand more profoundâfuture research.
Summary of the Chapters of This Volume
The first two chapters are meant to pave the way in that they are conceived as general introductions to the scholia Ciceroniana and Asconius Pedianus respectively.
The first chapter by Giuseppe La Bua discusses the didactic function of the ancient commentaries and scholia on Ciceroâs speeches, intended as auxiliary texts supporting teachers and students in the interpretation and clarification of rhetorical, linguistic, and textual issues arising during the reading and learning process. The chapter starts with Jeromeâs discussion of the art of commentary in his reply to Rufinusâ indictment for plagiarism (Against Rufinus 1.16) and re-examines the modalities by which an oration was being read and commented upon in the classrooms. Subsequently, it sheds further light on the figure of the scholiast as schoolteacher, engaged in assisting his students on their path towards intellectual maturation. In addition to providing a telling test-case for illustrating the impact exercised by the persona of Cicero on the moral and cultural growth of would-be âCicerosâ, the scholia illuminate the complexity of the relationship between teacher and student and emphasize the readerâs active role in interpreting the text of the master-author.
The second chapter by Thomas Keeline deals with the only commentary to Ciceroâs works that can be safely attributed to a certain author: Q. Asconius Pedianus, who at some point in the first century ce wrote âcommentariesâ on an indeterminate number of Ciceroâs speeches. The chapter first challenges certain orthodox scholarly opinions about Asconius, showing how little we really know about the man. It then turns to our only secure source of information, Asconiusâ surviving works, and creates a typology for his comments on Ciceroâs In Pisonem and Pro Milone. Using these comments, it tries to extract some of Asconiusâ methods and working principles. He emerges as a curious âgentlemanâ scholar with a particular interest in names, places, and dates, concerned above all to solve mysteries and problems found in Ciceroâs speeches. In conclusion, the chapter suggests that Asconius was not writing with pedagogical purposes in mind, still less for his sons, but was instead a scriptor historicus who wrote about whatever piqued his curiosity.
Chapters 3 and 4 broaden the perspective by showing the importance of Ciceroâs speeches for didactic aims both in the teaching of the Greek-speaking East (Egypt) and in the rhetorical treatises and handbooks known as the Rhetores Latini minores.
Chapter 3 by Fernanda Maffei discusses those transmitted papyri with fragments of Ciceroâs speeches that can be assigned to a didactic context. After an overview of all extant Egyptian papyri with passages from Cicero (stemming from the first to fifth century ce) it analyzes six of these: the first-century P. Iand. V. 90, one of the oldest Latin literary papyri we have containing a part of the Actio secunda in Verrem; P. Ryl. III 477 (the only Ciceronian papyrus also containing annotations, which show that the speeches were used at a more basic level of language acquisition in Egypt); the bilingual glossaries we find in P. Vindob. G 30885 a+e + P. Vindob. L17; P. Vindob. L127; PSI Congr. 21.2; and P. Ryl. I 61, containing extracts of the Catilinarians; the miscellaneous P. Monts. Roca inv. 129â149 + P. Duke inv 798, on which parts of Ciceroâs Catilinarians are combined with different pagan and Christian texts (the papyrus suggests that Cicero was also read in Christian, perhaps monastic, contexts); and the codex P. Oxy. VIII 1097 + P. Oxy. X 1251 + P. Köln. I 49, in which several speeches are transmitted (showing that the order of the speeches was flexible in Egypt, too). The Ciceronian papyri attest to the popularity and didactic usefulness of Ciceroâs speeches also for Greek-speaking inhabitants of the Roman Empire who wanted to learn Latin.
Chapter 4 by Thomas Riesenweber reviews all instances of quotations or references to Ciceroâs speeches in the Rhetores Latini minores. After briefly characterizing all of the treatises gathered under this name, the chapter looks at each one according to its generic affiliation. By applying a roughly chronological approach in this analysis, it shows that in the earliest handbooks Ciceroâs presence is still relatively moderate, as they are mostly interested in Greek stasis theory and do not need Cicero to explain that. The intensity of his presence increases conspicuously after the mid-fourth century. The chapter connects this to the huge success of Marius Victorinusâ De inventione-commentary, through which Ciceroâs status as a major teacher of rhetoric was reaffirmed. As a consequence, his speeches were also scrutinized more thoroughly as the handbooks aimed to show that the orator Cicero followed his own precepts when speaking. The chapter thus offers contextualization for the fact that most corpora of scholia Ciceroniana as we know them also date to the fourth century or later.
Chapters 5 and 6 are concerned with the models on which the Ciceronian scholia could rely.
In chapter 5, Joseph Farrell compares the canonization of Cicero with that of Vergil. He argues that Ciceroâs own self-fashioning, which he used to turn himself into a classical author, was influential on the way in which Vergil one generation later was turned into the model poet in Rome. Conversely, Vergilâs early reception, especially in commentaries, established a pattern that would only later be followed in the case of Cicero. Starting from a humoristic remark in Ciceroâs correspondence with Atticus that the latter could serve as Ciceroâs Aristarchus, the chapter asks who, then, would be Ciceroâs Aristarchus, that is a commentator who seals his canonical status. After sketching the fluid nature of ancient canon formation and briefly reviewing early Imperial stages of Ciceroâs reception, the chapter turns to what we know about early commentaries and other scholarly work on Vergil and argues that this grammatical exegesis was necessary for Asconius to build his own Ciceronian commentaries upon.
Chapter 6 by Caroline Bishop explores the influence of the Greek scholia to Demosthenes on the Bobbio scholia to Cicero. It proceeds on the principle, well-attested in ancient Vergilian scholarship, that Roman scholars were motivated to produce works that resembled the exegetical traditions on their authorâs Greek model. While there are no close correspondences between Ciceroâs and Demosthenesâ scholia, they do evince a similar methodological approach. Both scholiasts cross-reference other classical authors to demonstrate lexical and contextual similarities, reinforcing a broader culture of classicism, and both discuss their respective oratorâs skill in admiring terms, even when that skill involved elements of deception. But unlike Demosthenesâ scholiast, that of Cicero performs these tasks with an eye towards both Roman and Greek culture, referring to Roman and Greek classical authors alike, and using a wide array of Greek rhetorical terminology to describe Ciceroâs abilities. This suggests that the Ciceronian scholiast did indeed consider how Ciceroâs closest Greek counterpart had been studied, and then applied those methods in Latin.
Chapters 7 to 10 offer four case studies in which the potential of the Ciceronian scholia for research on Cicero and Roman Republican oratory is sketched.
Chapter 7 by Gesine Manuwald reviews the role of the Ciceronian scholia and Asconius in our knowledge of non-Ciceronian speeches in the Republic. It therefore lists all fragments of Roman Republican orators transmitted in the speeches and analyzes selected items from these. The aim of the article is to show that the commentators and scholiasts were not only academically interested in the oratorical material of Ciceroâs role models and contemporaries, but they also expected their readers to acknowledge that Ciceroâs speeches were full of intertextual references to previous speeches, and that it was the task of the commentaries to elucidate these. Thus, although the most telling pieces of information in the scholia are (due to their perspective) centred on Cicero and relate to Cicero in comparison to other orators, they contribute to going beyond looking at Cicero in isolation and lead to a more nuanced portrait of Ciceroâs working practices and his context.
Chapter 8 by Christoph Pieper interprets the two earliest corpora of Ciceronian commentaries, Asconius and the Scholia Bobiensia. It suggests that they were written for idealized (implied) readers who were interested not only in Ciceroâs speeches as oratorical models, but also in the history of the late Republic. When reading the commentaries, not in a fragmented way as merely secondary literature but as one coherent corpus, the originally chronological arrangement of Ciceroâs speeches in these commentaries turns out to be a kind of history book, offering late Republican history to the reader through the lens of Ciceroâs speeches. The second part of the chapter argues that this historical attitude results in an interest in Cicero that goes far beyond his rhetorical excellence. The commentaries participate in the Imperial debate about Ciceroâs political and moral legacy by turning him into an exemplary personality and by exculpating all his possible errors.
Chapter 9 by Christoph Schwameis deals with the ancient scholia by Ps.-Asconius as the most important source on the fictionality of Ciceroâs Actio secunda in Verrem. Although most modern scholars working on the Verrines still quote Ps.-Asconius when dealing with this subject, usually only those who query the fictionality of the actio secunda dig any deeper into these ancient scholia. This chapter does not intend to solve the riddle of the true nature of Ciceroâs speeches, but rather to take a closer look at Ps.-Asconiusâ comments themselves on this subject and on their scholarly reception. First, the chapter treats the other sources on the fictionality of Ciceroâs speech and the ways modern research has assessed Ps.-Asconius. Next, it discusses the relevant text in a close reading, while embedding it in its context. Lastly, it outlines the ways in which Ps.-Asconiusâ observations on the fictionality of Ciceroâs Verrines have influenced early modern commentaries.
Chapter 10 by Giovanni Margiotta addresses the question of veiled speech in Ciceroâs Caesarian Orations and how it is treated in the Scholia Gronoviana. Starting from a remark in the argumentum that others have interpreted the Pro Marcello as oratio figurata, Margiotta first sketches Quintilianâs theory of the term and his influence on later rhetorical handbooks before interpreting and contextualizing the scholiastâs remark. In a following step, the chapter addresses the remaining two Caesarian Orations and how they deal with Ciceroâs rhetorical dissimulatio. In the case of Pro Ligario, the scholiastâs treatment of its irony is compared to Quintilianâs and Grilliusâ assessment of the same issue. For the Pro rege Deiotaro the chapter discusses how the scholia deal with Ciceroâs insinuatio with a reference to Vergilâs notorious liar Sinon. The chapter shows how the scholia, by labelling these strategies of dissimulatio, fulfil âa didactic purpose, providing students with illustrious models of manipulatory eloquenceâ (p. 259).
De Paolis 2018, 32, paraphrasing La Bua 2015, 54.âAll translations in this chapter are our own, unless specified differently.
Zetzel 2018, 143â148 and 257â259.
On the generic question of the text and on Asconiusâ working methods, see Keeline in this volume.
On the manuscript history see Welch 2017 and Welch forthcoming.
A small portion probably belonging to the same set of commentary is preserved in the Scholia Gronoviana, see below.
Cf. Hildebrandt 1907, XVIIâXVIII.
Cf. Hier. Ruf. 1.16, where he obviously lists the commentaries most commonly used for teaching: puto quod puer legeris, Aspri in Vergilium ac Sallustium commentarios, Vulcatii in orationes Ciceronis, Victorini in dialogos eius, et in Terentii comoedias praeceptoris mei Donati, aeque in Vergilium, et aliorum in alios, Plautum videlicet, Lucretium, Flaccum, Persium atque Lucanum. See on this passage also La Bua, p. 24 in this volume.
Cf. Schmidt 1989; Zetzel 2018, 258 (âquite uncertainâ); La Bua 2019, 79â80.
Thus Zetzel 2018, 143. See also Pieper in this volume.
Madvig 1828, 84â142, who classifies its author as ânon historicus, sed rhetoricus et grammaticus, in vocum sententiarumque facillimarum, rerum notissimarum enarratione positus, saepe puerilis, errorum et ineptiarum plenusâ (90). See for the longevity of this judgment n. 15.
Zetzel 2018, 145.
Thus one generally assumes since Stangl 1884.
Thus Hildebrandt 1907, 1â6, who prints it as part of his edition of the Scholia Bobiensia; cf. Zetzel 2018, 147.
E.g., they are absent from the study on ancient Roman education by Bonner 1977, or the one on literary education by Morgan 1998, or the edited volume on Graeco-Roman education by Too 2001.
Most notorious are his judgments on the Scholia Gronoviana in Stangl 1884: of the four layers of scholia that have been identified, only the oldest one (A = commentary on Ver. 2.1.45â62, fourth or beginning of the fifth centuryâHildebrandt 1907, 1â6 regarded them as stemming from the Scholia Bobiensia), is âtolerableâ (âerträglichâ) compared to Asconius (13), whereas BâD (end of fifth until seventh century) are so bad that their authors deserve to be doomed to anonymity forever: âDass die Namen von B, C, D nicht erhalten sind, bedaure ich wirklich nicht; sie sind
Cf., e.g., the almost surprised litotes in the entry on Volcacius (the alleged author of the original second-century version) by P.L. Schmidt in Herzog and Schmidt 1989, 141: the scholia show the ânicht unbeträchtliche Niveau der historisch-rhetorischen Exegese unserer Epocheâ (my emphasis). Schanz and Hosius 1927, vol. 1, 449 criticize the scholiastâs tendency to sell tradition as his own insights (â⦠gibt das fremde Gut lieber als eigene Weisheitâ), but at least acknowledge that âwir ihm Dank schuldig [sind]â for the fact that the scholia preserve fragments of otherwise lost Ciceronian material and historiographical works.
For the contrast between the two see Kraus and Stray 2016, 11.
Cf., e.g., Zetzel 1973, 1974, 1981, and 2018.
Sluiter provocatively labels ancient commentaries as âsecondary literatureâ; she argues, however, that this a category that ancient literary critics did not find very interesting (Sluiter 2000, 199 and 202).
In Tadeusz ZieliÅskiâs standard work about Ciceroâs afterlife (ZieliÅski 1929), they are still conspicuously absent.
Keeline 2018, esp. ch. 1; La Bua 2019.
Bishop 2015.
Cf. the important volumes by Most 1999; Gibson and Kraus 2002; Kraus and Stray 2016; and especially the excellent article by Sluiter 2000. For Renaissance commentaries see especially the groundbreaking article by Grafton 1985 and the rich introduction by Enenkel and Nellen 2013 to their edited volume.
Cf., however, Sluiter 2000, 187 on the âimprovised ⦠and fluid natureâ of any ancient commentary, which means that scholia are not ontologically different from non-anonymous commentaries in this respect.
Pieper in this volume, p. 191.
Cf. Most 1999, XIII on commentaries which do not solve problems automatically inherent to the text; instead âthe kinds of problems a commentator will discover in his text are at least in part the result of the approach he takes on itâ and thus of the questions that interest him and his time. Cf. also Kraus 2002, 11. We recall the famous beginning of Stephen Greenblattâs Shakespearean Negotiations (Greenblatt 1988, 1) where he speaks of any interpreterâs shaman-like wish to speak with the dead (i.e., the authors of the texts); but instead of their voices one always hears oneâs own voice in the texts.
Cf. Kraus and Stray 2016, 10.
Cf. Steel 2022, 239.
On the scholia as didactic texts, see La Bua in this volume. This is visible, for example, from the emphasis on rhetorical terminology (that is always retraceable in the rhetorical handbooks of the same period as well) and in their interest in stasis theory, which is always included in the argumenta. Cf. the first lemmata of the Scholia Gronoviana on Cic. S. Rosc. (301.14â302.23 St.), which all are rather basic and directed towards a learner of rhetorical principles: the argumentum explains the historical setting and then focuses on Ciceroâs defence tactic, a dispositio naturalis in a case of double coniectura (thereby the status is also defined as coniecturalis). The scholiast adds that the speech is written in the genus admirabile. The following first eight lemmata on the speech proper contain: three Greek technical terms (pleonasmos, antiptosis, and anadiplosis); two explanations on Ciceroâs tactic of presenting himself as brave without blaming the other orators who did not defend Roscius; one definition of an oratorâs tasks, namely to possess auctoritas and eloquium; and two lexical explanations (on officiosior and ignoscere). All rhetorical terms used in Schol. Gron. S. Rosc. can also be found in Martianus Capellaâs De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii (apart from the three mentioned above, these are prosapodosis [304.7 St.]âStanglâs conjecture, as the transmitted proantidosis does not exist as a rhetorical or grammatical term); anticategoria (304.27); and ironia (313.27). This fits the general impression: as Manuwald in this volume, p. 183 asserts, âthe rhetorical terminology used by the Ciceronian scholiasts is standard and their rhetorical explanations are often less advanced compared to contemporary rhetoriciansâ.
We will never know this in the case of all Ciceronian commentaries and scholia (only for Asconius it seems safe to exclude this possibility because of his non-rhetorical focus). Cf. Sluiter 2000, 191, who reminds us that âthe writer of a commentary need not be identical with the exegeteâ, but can simply be compiling material used by other teachers.
Cf. Zetzel 2018, 145 for some brief remarks on the Leiden glossary.
On readings of commentaries being âunpredictableâ, see also Kraus and Stray 2016, 12.
The intellectual authority of commentators is a major criterion in Glenn Mostâs succinct seven âreflections on commentariesâ (Most 1999, XIIâXIV).
Kraus 2002, 17 calls this attitude âa powerful engine of aemulatio and anxiety of influenceâ.
Margiotta in this volume discusses this with regard to the Scholia Gronoviana and the question of oratio figurata in the Pro Marcello, where the scholiast refers to the opinion of the plerique only to distance himself from those unnamed predecessors. Cf. Schol. Gron. Marc. 295.32â33 St.: plerique putant figuratam esse istam orationem ⦠hoc nec temporibus convenit nec Caesari (âmost people think that this speech is figured ⦠This does not fit the time and the person of Caesarâ).
Examples of the same strategy from the Scholia Bobiensia include Schol. Bob. Mil. 125.26â31 St. (the opinion of plerique stands against that of the scholiast, formulated as factual truth) or Schol. Bob. Vat. 144.24â26 St. (the reader is addressed directly as (s)he could accuse Cicero [possis ⦠reprehendere]âthe scholiastâs answer is formulated impersonally); on the latter example see Pieper in this volume, p. 208.
Cf. Sluiter 2000, 188â190. With regard to the first tension, Kraus and Stray 2016, 8 speak of âfetishizing of the source text and direct[ing] attention away from itâ. Closely connected are the different goals of commentaries identified by Most 1999, XIV: not only explaining the text, but also helping the career and renown of the commentator.
For this see esp. Farrell, Bishop, and Schwameis in this volume.
On these aspects see Keeline, Schwameis, and Margiotta in this volume.
Kraus 2002, 11.
On the historical dimension, see Keeline, Manuwald, and Pieper in this volume.
Sluiter 2000, 189.
For a possible link between Aristarchus and Asconius see Farrell in this volume. See also above n. 7 for Jeromeâs list of authors and commentators as irresolvable entities.
Cf. Bishop in this volume, p. 156, who stresses that the scholia share this tendency with authors like Servius, Victorinus, and Grillius (on the latter two, see also Riesenweber in this volume).
Kraus and Stray 2016, 9. In the case of Cicero, his own attempts to control his commemoration through interpreting and commenting upon his life and works have been identified as the starting point of his later reception; cf. La Bua 2019, 16â54, and especially Bishop 2019.
For Gelliusâ admiration for Cicero see Santini 2006, esp. 35â38 on this passage.
Despite Gelliusâ defence of futurum and his reference to the Tironian edition to which he had access, modern editions prefer the reading futuram; cf. Zetzel 1973, 231 with reference to Zumptâs 1831 edition of the Verrines, 983.
Gel. 1.7.1: in libro spectatae fidei Tironiana cura atque disciplina facto (âin a book that has been produced with care and orderly method of Tiro, whose trustworthiness is well knownâ). On Tiro in this chapter of the Noctes Atticae see Howley 2018, 175â177. Cf. also the remarks of La Bua 2019, 62, who includes the passages in his discussion of second-century interest in Tiroâs âoriginalâ edition. Cf. Zetzel 1973, 241, who suggests that Gelliusâ alleged Tironian original was a forgery of the Antonine era, and Holford-Strevens 2003, 190: âcrass errors in the âlibro spectatae fideiâ destroy the credit of its provenanceâ.
In the rest of the chapter, Gellius treats two passages from De imperio Cn. Pompei, in which critics have also found errors, more brieflyâwith the same result: the critics are wrong, not Cicero.
Cf. Holford-Strevens 2003, 206 on Ciceroâs âcheapjack criticsâ in Gelliusâ time; Santini 2006, 37 (not quite convincingly in my view) asserts that Gelliusâ main aim is not to defend Cicero, but to sanction an archaism through Ciceroâs usage of it.
Cf. ZieliÅski 1929, 353; Gabba 1957, 324â325; Massa 2006, 451â458.
Cf. La Bua 2019, 133 and Holford-Strevens 2003, 195â197 on the comparison of Cato, Gracchus, and Cicero as three model authors for oratory.
Cf. Zetzel 1974 for the second-century interest in obscure or rare formulations in Cicero, as witnessed by the word list of Statilius Maximus and the Scholia Bobiensia.
Cf. La Bua 2019, 144â146.
Cf. on these La Bua 2019, 160â161. Cf. Bishop in this volume, pp. 160â163 on the interest of the Scholia Bobiensia in Ciceroâs lexicon.
La Bua 2019, 177.
Cf. Manuwald and Schwameis in this volume.
That this was a question that interested readers in Antiquity greatly is still visible in Jeromeâs Chronicle, in which the speech is mentioned (Corbeill 2020, 23 n. 17).
Gellius excuses Nepos by adding the speculation that he might have been studio amoris et amicitiae adductus when making Cicero even younger: the speech would then be even more impressive (Gel. 15.28.5); cf. La Bua 2019, 57â58, and Cornell 2013, vol. 3, ad loc.
Keeline in this volume argues that Asconius was not a typical commentator as we would imagine one, but was probably read as a scriptor historicus, similar to the target of much of his criticism, Fenestella. Still, in Gellius at least we do not find what Sluiter 2000, 190, and following her Kraus and Stray 2016, 9 have labelled âthe originary tension between the teacher/grammarian and the professional scholarâ, and we feel that it is not very prominent in the scholia Ciceroniana either.
Cf. Gerth 2013, 225, who links the conservative teaching programme to the fact that teachers were paid by parents and therefore had to adapt their curriculum to their wishes.
Kaster 1988, 95.
Gerth 2013, 230; he contrasts his view with a more traditional interpretation of the fifth century as a time of a perceptible (and perceived) cultural decline. He speaks instead of the timeâs âgesundes Traditionsbewusstseinâ.
See for this passage Goldlust 2009; Gerth 2013, 14 interprets the simile as stressing unity of disparately collected knowledge.
Riesenweber in this volume speaks of the ââ¯âWiederentdeckungâ Ciceros durch die De inventione-Kommentatorenâ (p. 115). More than 100 years after Victorinus, in Martianus Capellaâs De nuptiis Philologiae et Mercurii, Cicero appears as companion of Lady Rhetoric herself in book 5: his role as the representative of Latin eloquence is undisputed.
So far no compelling solution for the changed arrangement has been found: has the compiler of the fourth century thought of a didactic arrangement (from easier to more difficult)? This seems hardly plausible given the speeches involved. Equally implausible is the suggestion by Zetzel 2018, 144 that the scholiast wanted to concentrate on the less well-known speeches (at least if Hildebrandtâs suggestion is true that a part of the commentary on the Verrines of the Scholia Gronoviana belongs to the Bobbio material). Cf. La Bua 2019, 80â84 about the uncertainties of the organizational principle.
For Ciceroâs reputation in the Middle Ages see Schmidt 2000, Cizek 2009, and Mabboux 2022.
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