Table Of ContentSUETONIUS
DXVV§ CLA VDW§
EDITED BY
DONNA W. HURLEY
...0... . .C.. AMBRIDGE
;'.: UNIVERSITY PRESS
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First published 2001
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Suetonius, ea. 69-ca. 122.
Diuus Claudius/ Suetonius ; edited by Donna W. Hurley.
p. cm. - (Cambridge Greek and Latin classics)
Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
ISBN o 521 59325 5 (hardback) ISBN o 521 59676 9 (paperback)
Claudius, Emperor of Rome, Bc-54 2. Roman emperors -
1. 10 AD.
Biography. 1. Title: Divus Claudius. 11. Hurley, Donna W.
111. Title. IV. Series.
PA6700.A35 2001
937'.07'092-dc21
[ B] 00-036299
ISBN o 521 59325 5 hardback
ISBN o 521 59676 9 paperback
CONTENTS
FrontispieceS ilver didrachm struck in celebration of the conquest of
Britain by Claudius in 43. Reproduced by courtesy of the
AD
Barber Institute of Fine Arts, University of Birmingham.
Preface page vii
Introduction
I
Suetoniusa nd his career
1 2
Biographya nd De uita Caesarum
2 4
3 Claudius 10
The man
10
The story 14
4 Structurea nd style 17
5 Text and afterlife 20
Important dates in the life of Claudius
Sigla
C. SVETONI TRANQVILLI DE VITA CAESARVM
LIBER QVINTVS DIVVS CLAVDIVS 29
Commentary 55
Abbreviationsa nd references 245
Bibliography 247
Editions, commentarieasn d translations 247
Worksc ited 247
Indexes 262
1 Latin words 262
V
CONTENTS
VI
General
2
3 Persons
Stemmata
I Claudiusa nd thef amily of Augustus 273
2 Claudiusa nd Messallina 274
PREFACE
The first thing said about Suetonius is that he is not Tacitus. True
enough. But a detour around Tacitean irony has its reward. The
biographer was not without his own opinions, of course, but his
strategies are transparent in comparison with those of the historian
and provide a less obstructed view of what the first century had to
say about its emperors. Suetonius filtered the information that he
inherited through a set of value judgements and entered it into a
template. One size fits all, so to speak, but with varying results. Dif
ferences among the biographies lie not with method but with what
there was for him to work with.
A commentary on a Suetonian Life has a double mandate. Context
must be provided in order to explain the text's glancing references to
historical issues and to restore the missing chronology; I have tried
to offer sufficient for an informed reading without writing the essays
that full explication of the often complex problems would require.
At the same time, the pages are not a random pastiche of informa
tion but a carefully organized marshalling of disparate material
(particularly disparate for Claudius), and so Suetonius' composi
tional strategies need to be identified. If he failed to solve every
organizational problem in the best possible way, it was not for want
of trying. I have come to appreciate the conscientious biographer.
Suetonius knew what he wanted to do and for the most part accom
plished it. Not Tacitean brilliance but an honest job and an immea
surable contribution to our understanding of the early Empire.
Other commentaries on the Claudius Life have preceded this one,
and so I stand on strong shoulders, especially those of Henrik
Smilda, whose 1896 dissertation was the first modern commentary to
identify the text's historical issues in depth. When I have accepted a
suggestion directly from him or from any of the other commentaries,
I acknowledge my indebtedness. Guidance from closer at hand has
J.
come from the series editor, Professor E. Kenney. His comments
have kept me on track, and his amazingly prompt response and close
attention to detail have been beyond what one could hope for. I am
deeply grateful for his painstaking correction. Professors Robert
VII
PREFACE
VIII
Kaster, Edward Champlin and T. Corey Brennan have tolerated my
pestering for help. Professor Elaine Fantham has been unfailingly
encouraging. I also thank Professors Jonathan Roth for his help with
military matters and James Rives with religion questions and Alan
Cameron for extending my library resources. Professor T. P. Wise
man kindly suggested Claudius' escape route from forum to Palatine
(Cl. 18.2). Dr Helen Chang, a neurologist specializing in movement
disorders, helped me write about Claudius' physical problems, and it
was she who suggested the possibility of parental blood incompati
bility as the reason for his congenital disability.
I am especially indebted to Professor Lydia Lenaghan for reading
the manuscript in its final stages and for making many helpful sug
gestions. Pauline Hire has seen the book through Cambridge Press
and I am deeply indebted to the copy-editing of Susan Moore, whose
keen eye has saved me much embarrassment. And special thanks are
due to the students in my undergraduate seminar on Suetonius at
Princeton University in the spring of 1996 for their tolerance when I
tried to teach them Diuus Claudius.T he difficulties that I had are the
inception of this commentary.
New York, New York D.W.H.
INTRODUCTION
Modern scholarship routinely damned the author of De uita Caesarum
as a mechanical collector of gossip1 until the mid-twentieth century,
when rehabilitation began and Suetonius was recognized as an orig
inal artist whose well-crafted biographies could stand as successful
creations on their own. Attempts to define his merits have followed. 2
A literary approach to the Lives, individually or as a whole, is not
without its rewards, but it is for other reasons that Suetonius earns
immeasurable gratitude from those seeking to understand the early
Empire. When he wrote in the first quarter of the second century, the
Principate was fact, the Republic memory, and the line of emperors
long enough for criteria for good and bad ones to have developed.
The Caesarest ake the measure of a princeps against a set of pecu
liarly imperial virtues' and in addition contain an abundance of fac
tual material to be mined by historians and social historians. Sueto
nius could be guilty of common error, and some of his information
is distorted by misleading generalizations and inappropriate segmen
tation, but much is trustworthy and often unique. Anecdotes, true or
not, are embedded in authentic context.• Equally valuable is the
1 He was 'no real writer' ['ein wirklicher Schriftsteller ist er nicht')
(Funaioli (1931) 621).
2 Alcide Mace was the first to identify the major issues relating to author
and work (Essai sur Suitom (1900)). The turning point was Wolf Steidle's Sueton
und die antike Biographie( 1951), in which it was claimed that each emperor was
characterized by a single over-arching theme. But many felt that Steidle
overstated his case: Dihle (1954); Paratore (1959); Bringmann (1971). The Lives
were 'not a happy experiment' ['kein gegli.icktes Experiment') (Flach (1972)
288). Positive assessments from Mouchova (1968) and especially Gugel (1977)
and Lounsbury (1987, 1991). By far the best of the recent scholarship is
Wallace-Hadrill's Suetonius:t he scholar and his Caesars( 1983). Gascou's Suitone
hiswrien (1984) is a valuable resource. There is a collection of surveys in
ANRWu 33.5 (1991).
' The emperor was supposed to exemplify moderatio,c iuilitas, dementia and
liberalitas and many other qualities (Bradley (1976), (1991); Wallace-Hadrill
(1981), (1983) 142-74). The ideal prince was the emperor Trajan as he appears
in Pliny's Pamgyric.
• Saller (1980); Alfoldy (1980-81).
2 INTRODUCTION
window that the Caesareso pen on what was said and then written
about the emperors while they were alive or soon after they died.
Suetonius did not make things up. His catholic reportage did indeed
include gossip - but it was not his own, and his lack of discrimina
tion turns out to be a blessing.
I. SUETONIUS AND HIS CAREER
C. Suetonius Tranquillus was born around 70; according to Sir
AD
Ronald Syme that year following civil war was particularly apt for
the cheerful cognomenb y which antiquity knew him.• His equestrian
family had already made incursions into public life; a grandfather
had access to what was joked about in Gaius' court (Calig. 19.3), and
his father fought as a legionary tribune under Otho in 69 (0th. 10.1).
He himself appears first in the letters of the younger Pliny, who
arranged a military tribunate for him (101-3) which he did not
accept (Ep. 3.8), and later (110-12), when Pliny was Trajan's legate in
Bithynia with Suetonius perhaps on his staff,6 he secured for him the
privilege of the ius trium liberorum( Ep. 10.94, 10.95). In the meantime
(105 or 106), the correspondence reveals him a reluctant author hesi
tant to publish a finished work that Pliny had been advertising in
verse (Ep. 5.10).7 He was a promising young man (Pliny calls him a
scholar, scholasticus,E p. 1.24.4) who had established himself in liter
ary circles and was enjoying the patronage of an imperial official.
Even before an honorific inscription turned up in 1950, it was known
that he was to rise in the emperor's service as far as an equestrian
could. The crown of his career was the post of ah epistulis, chief sec
retary, to Hadrian (SHA, Hadr. 11.3).
The inscription was found in Algeria at the site of Hippo Regius,
• Suetonius refers to himself as adulescensi n 88 or 89 (Ner. 57.2); also at
Dom. 12.2; Gram.4 .6. For Tranquillus as apt, Syme (1977) 44.
• SuetoniumT ranquil/um. . . in contuberniuma dsumpsi,t antoquem agisd iligerec oepi
quanto nuncp ropius inspexi (Ep. 10.94.1). The emendation nunc for hunc and the
inference that Suetonius was in Bithynia (Syme (1958b) 779) are generally
accepted.
7 Perhaps De uiris illustribus (Mace (1900) 66-77; Syme (1981) 115; contra,
Wallace-Hadrill (1983) 59; Lindsay (1994) 459). Suetonius also appears in
Pliny's letters 18 and 9.34.
1.
I. SUETONIUS AND HIS CAREER 3
the African seaport where Augustine would one day preside as
bishop. It lists Suetonius' successes, first a flaminate, then appoint
ment as a juror (this from Trajan), then the pontificate of a temple
of Vulcan. At the end, there is notice of three important posts in the
imperial court; Suetonius was a studiis, a bybliothecis and, by appoint
ment of Hadrian, ab epistulis.6 The inscription's provenance suggests
that Suetonius was Hippo's favourite son, a native product who had
gone to Rome and made good, now honoured by his birthplace at
the height of his career. The family association with Rome does not
preclude an African connection. Alternatively, the tablet commemo
rated a favour that he performed for the city, perhaps something in
conjunction with the visit of Hadrian on his tour of Africa and
Mauretania in 128 (/LS 9133; SHA, Hadr. 13.4, 22.14). If Suetonius
was still with the court at that time, he would have accompanied the
emperor on his circuit. 9
A 'long' or a 'short' chronology 10 of service at court can be con
structed. It may have been Trajan who appointed Suetonius to the
posts of a studiis and a bybliothecis since it was he with whom Pliny
used his influence and who, according to the Hippo inscription, was
responsible for Suetonius' adlection to the jury list and perhaps for
all that followed before the final appointment. 11 If so, Suetonius
joined the court after he returned to Rome (if he was in Bithynia)
when Pliny died (112-13) but before Trajan died in 117. If, on the
other hand, it was Hadrian who appointed him to all three secre-
• L'Annee Epigraphique( 1953) no. 73, pp. 27-8; published by Maree and
Pflaum (1952). The flaminate was a local priesthood (where?); the location of
the priesthood of Vulcan is also unknown. Along with the a libellis and the a
rationibus,t he a studiis and the ab epistulis were the most important imperial
secretaries; they assisted the emperor with correspondence and cultural
affairs. The a bybliothecisp resumably oversaw libraries and archives.
9 Hippo as his birthplace: Pflaum (1960-61) 221; Townend (1961a) 105;
Syme (1980) 116, (1981) 105; Wallace-Hadrill (1983) 5; Bradley (1991) 3705.
Family connections in Italy: Syme (1958b) 780-1; including Ostia where there
was a priesthood of Vulcan: Grosso (1959); Baurain (1976) 142-4; rejected on
chronological grounds: Meiggs (1973) 584. Suetonius in Hippo with Hadrian:
Crook (1956-57) 19; Gascou (1978) 441-3; Lindsay (1994) 464.
10 Bradley (1991) 3710, note 53.
11 For the emperor's name attached to only the first benefaction, Townend
(1961a) 103-5.
4 INTRODUCTION
tarial posts, the first would not have come until after and perhaps
117
not until when Hadrian made C. Septicius Clarus his praetorian
119,
prefect (SHA, Hadr. 9.4-5). Septicius, like Suetonius, had been a
member of Pliny's circle, and they may have entered the imperial
service at the same time. 12 The date of severance is also uncertain.
According to the Historia Augusta, he and Septicius were dismissed
together in because they were 'too familiar' with the emperor's
122
wife (Hadr. 11.3). But the Historia Augusta is unreliable for dates, and
so it is possible that they were both still at their posts in when
128
Hadrian visited Africa. 13 Suetonius' shortest possible tenure is from
to the three secretarial posts overlapping or following in
119 122,
quick succession. 14 At the other extreme, Suetonius enjoyed intimacy
with the court for a considerable time if he became an imperial sec
retary under Trajan and remained one until or later. A compro
128
mise of Trajanic appointment and dismissal in is plausible. 15 No
122
more is known of him after he left the court. He may have lived on
for some time. 16
2. BIOGRAPHY AND DE VITA CAESAR VM
For the ancients, history was narrative, written to persuade and
instruct. It described the sweep of events and ideally offered expla
nations of cause and consequence. Biography, the account of a life
from birth to death, history with a different focus, developed along-
12 Pliny dedicated at least the first book of his letters to Septicius (Ep. 1. 1).
Their simultaneous appointment was first suggested by Mace ((1900) 87-8).
u SepticioC larop raefectop raetoriie t SuetonioT ranquilloe pistularumm agistrom ultis
que aliis, quod apud Sabinam uxoremi n usu eiusf amiliarius se tune egerantq uam reuer
entia domus aulicaep ostulabat,s uccessoredse dit. The passage was interpolated into
the basic account (Crook (1956-57) 21-2; Townend (1961a) 109; Syme (1971)
13).
I
14 The first two could have been held concurrently (Van't Dack (1963)
183-4).
,. Appointment to the first two posts by Trajan: Townend (1961a) 103-5;
Gascou (1978) 439; by Trajan with less certainty: Syme (1958b) 778, (1980) u6,
(1981) 108; Wallace-Hadrill (1983) s; Bradley (1991) 3711. By Hadrian: Maree
and Pflaum (1952) 83-4; Crook (1956-57) 19.
16 Suetonius seems to have written of Domitia Longina as though she had
died, perhaps in the 130s (Tit. 10.2; Syme (1958b) 780, (1980) 120).
