The sources analysed above have created an image of social expectations for father and son relationships; these showed that interactions were based upon traditional values such as pietas and reputation rather than legal powers. This section will continue that discussion by looking in-depth at a speech which provides a further insight into those issues already considered.
The Pro Sex. Roscio Amerino, delivered in 80 BC, is Cicero’s defence of a man charged with the murder of his father.69 It appears from Cicero’s account that the Elder Sex. Roscius was both relatively influential and wealthy. Though he lived in Ameria, he had connections with some of the most prominent families of Rome; the Metelli, Servilii, and the Scipiones are all mentioned in the text (15). In 81 BC, he was murdered on his return from Rome to Ameria. Cicero’s defence of his son argues that this death was a result of a plot between two relations, and Chrysogonus, a freedman with connections to the dictator Sulla. The defence claimed that these men arranged to have the Elder Sex. Roscius’ name added to the list of those proscribed and the son charged with the murder of his father in order that they might receive the property that would otherwise go to the Younger Sex. Roscius.
There are a number of scholarly works which discuss whether the younger Roscius was guilty of the murder or not.70 It seems that he was acquitted by the jury in this trial, made up of senators, but his guilt or innocence is largely irrelevant for the
69 The trial took place in the quaestio di sicariis and was the first to be held in 80 BC after the turmoil of the civil war and proscriptions (Gell. 15.28.3). Because of the severity of charges of parricidium, the case took precedence over other trials. For more information on this, see Dyck (2010), 2. For a discussion of possible revisions made after the death of Sulla in 78 BC, see Berry (2004).
70 See Dyck (2003), 235-246 and Seager (2007), 896-910 on the case against the younger Roscius, and Vasaly (1985), 1-20 on the methods of persuasion within the speech. Lintott (2008), 425-427 also includes an appendix on the case and Seager (1982) discusses the political context of the trial.
[144]
purposes of this discussion.71 It is more significant for a study of social expectations that a large section of Cicero’s defence focuses upon interactions between fathers and their sons. The picture he presents of these relationships must, if he had any hope of succeeding, have been designed to appeal to the aristocratic traditional values of the elite. In fact, the verdict of the jury implies that the expectations of father and son relationships employed by Cicero were effective in striking a chord with this audience.
Duty and the Family
In order to defend the younger Roscius, Cicero presents his audience with a set of parallels designed to cast the defendant in a good light, while associating his accusers with the corruption of late republican society. One of the most significant of these contrasts is the disparity between rural and city life. Although his father had close connections with individuals at Rome, the younger Roscius rarely went into the city and had to rely upon his father’s associates for support after he had been evicted from his land (18). From the arguments established by Cicero, it seems that the prosecution depicted him as a figure worthy of suspicion and as a son who had been sent to work on his father’s farms as a punishment for past misbehaviour.72 Here, Cicero questions Erucius on Roscius’ rural background:
hoc patres familiae qui liberos habent, praesertim homines illius ordinis ex municipiis rusticanis, nonne optatissimum sibi putant esse filios suos rei familiari maxime seruire et in praediis colendis operae plurimum studique consumere? an amandarat hunc sic ut esset in agro ac tantummodo aleretur ad uillam, ut commodis omnibus careret?
71 See Gruen (1968) 257-8 on the composition of the jury: ‘Control of the courts had been, for at least a century prior to this time, subject to political pressures, and Sulla's reorganization of them and return to exclusively senatorial jurors was a major element in his political program.’ Cicero twice mentions the favourable attention that his speech on behalf of Sex. Roscius had brought: Brut. 90.312; Off.
2.14.51. Plutarch categorically states that Sex. Roscius was acquitted in the trial (Cic. 3.2-4).
72 Compare the example of T. Manlius Imperiosus Torquatus who, because he had sent his son away from Rome to work on the family farm, was charged with mistreatment by L. Manlius: Val. Max.
5.4.3; Livy, 7.3.4; Cic. Off. 3.112.7.
[145]
quid? si constat hunc non modo colendis praediis praefuisse sed certis fundis patre uiuo frui solitum esse, tamenne haec a te uita eius rusticana relegatio atque amandatio appellabitur?
Surely the heads of households who have children, especially those of Roscius’ class from the country towns, think it most desirable for themselves that their sons should devote themselves as much as possible to the management of the estate and spend a large part of their labour and pains on cultivating the farms? Or did he send him away with the intent that he might remain on the estate and merely have his food given him at the country house while at the same time he was deprived of all advantages? What? If it is established that Roscius not only superintended the cultivation of the farms, but, even during his father’s lifetime, was allowed to have usufruct of certain estates, will you, in spite of this, continue to call his life a banishment to the country to get him out of the way? (43-44)
In the defence speech, Cicero attacks those arguments constructed by Erucius in his accusations against the younger Roscius. In particular, it appears that the young man had been depicted as an outcast from Roman society, one who had been consigned to a hard life on the farm by his own father. In response, Cicero claims that Sextus Roscius favoured the younger Roscius by entrusting him with such a responsibility, and there is the implication that the son was acting as a true heir to the property.
Moreover, Cicero’s argument presents the life of Roscius on the farm as more akin to that of the early Romans, than that of someone banished from the society of the city:73
Ne tu, Eruci, accusator esses ridiculus, si illis temporibus natus esses cum ab aratro arcessebantur qui consules fierent. etenim qui praeesse agro colendo flagitium putes, profecto illum Atilium quem sua manu spargentem senem qui missi errant conuenerunt hominem turpissimum atque inhonestissimum iudicares. at hercule maiores nostri longe aliter et de illo et de ceteris talibus uiris existimabant
73 See, however, the commentary by Dyck (2010), 114 in which he states that for all of Cicero’s representation of Roscio’s country life, the running of the property would usually be the responsibility of a slave by this period.
[146]
itaque ex minima tenuissimaque re publica maximam et florentissimam nobis reliquerunt.
In truth, O Erucius, you would have made an absurd accuser, if you had been born in those times when men were summoned from the plough to be made consuls. For, seeing that you think it a crime to superintend the cultivation of the land, you would assuredly have considered the well-known Atilius, whom the deputation found sowing his field with his own hand, a most base and dishonourable man. But, by heaven, our ancestors had a very different opinion of Atilius and others like him. And it was by acting on such principles that, in place of a very small and poor State, they have left us one that is very great and prosperous. (50)74
In truth, there is a problem with this argument of Cicero’s, in that Roscius was the son of an equestrian and so it is highly unlikely that he laboured on the farm himself, like the early Romans he is being compared with.75 Yet, neither does this fact strengthen the case of the prosecution, as Roscius would have overseen the extensive property owned by his father and it is thus unlikely that his rural life was entirely lacking in comforts, as Erucius implies (43-44).76
However, the traditional rural life versus the corrupt city life is an important contrast throughout the speech. Cicero’s allusion to the rustic citizen-farmers ties into a value system which would have appealed strongly to the traditional, aristocratic jury.
Moreover, this furthers the view of society in the city of Rome as having degenerated, a view discussed in the first section of this chapter. It should also be noted that the proscriptions had recently torn Roman society apart and violence had
74 Dyck (2010), 118 argues that the reference to the maiores is designed to show that Cicero, although a novus homo, has adopted the ideals of the Roman elite, unlike Erucius. He also makes Atilius a model of the senatorial elite. It is not known which of the Atilii who had held the consulship is meant here, but it is a similar anecdote to the one of L. Quinctius Cincinnatus. See Dyck (2010), 119.
75 L. Quinctius Cincinnatus was not only an ideal of Roman virtue because of his conduct of the war against the Latins. When a case was brought against his son, he supported the young man to the point that he was forced to withdraw from Rome and work on a farm in the countryside (Livy, 3.11-14).
Livy writes that he was farming his land when the deputation came to recognise him as dictator (3.26), and described his sons waiting to greet him after he had heard the news. For discussion of the case against his son, see Ch. V, section 2.
76 Also refer back to Dyck’s comments in n.73 of this chapter.
[147]
become a part of daily life in the city. The idea of the loss of Roman morality and the mos maiorum must have been felt keenly in the light of the recent turmoil.77 The association of Roscius with those early Romans whose traditional virtues had ensured the success of the state was an effective defence, even if the reality was not so straightforward.
However, as a result of the association between Roscius and the country life, his accusers were placed in the contrasting position.78 The relations of Sextus Roscius involved in the attack were from Ameria also, but they are characterised in a way more befitting the corrupt man of the city prepared to take advantage of the country man.79 The motives put forward by Erucius for Roscius’ murder of his father are those which cannot be related to life in the country, and must instead be understood with reference to the corrupt city life:
luxuries igitur hominem nimirum et aeris alieni magnitudo et indomitae animi cupiditates ad hoc scelus impulerunt? de luxuria purgauit Erucius cum dixit hunc ne in conuiuio quidem ullo fere interfuisse. nihil autem umquam debuit. cupiditates porro quae possunt esse in eo qui, ut ipse accusator obiecit, ruri semper habitarit et in agro colendo uixerit? quae uita maxime disiuncta a cupiditate et cum officio coniuncta est.
No doubt, then, it was riotous living, enormous debts, and his unbridled desires that drove him to commit this crime? As for the charge of riotous living, Erucius himself has cleared him from that by saying that he hardly ever took part in any festive gathering; as for debts, he never had any; further, as for greed, how could it exist in one who has always lived in the country and occupied himself with the cultivation of his land, with which the accuser himself has reproached
77 For an interesting discussion of the ‘language of morals’ in Latin historiography in particular, see Levick (1982), 53-62.
78 On this manipulation of the facts of a case, see Lintott (2008), 3: ‘In the courts of the Roman Republic, an orator’s duty was to his client, not the court, and Cicero stressed the importance of adapting the narration, the account of the ‘facts of the case’, to the later argument. The same is true of the historical exempla he introduces’.
79 These characterisations have their roots in Roman drama, especially comedy. See Vasaly (1985) for a more in-depth discussion of the dramatic personae used by Cicero in the Pro Roscio Amerino.
[148]
him—a kind of life which is entirely removed from the passion of avarice, but inseparable from duty? (39)
Forensic speeches would often consider the past of the accused in order to explore whether the crime reflected previous immoral behaviour.80 Luxury, debts, and evil desires were all things that did not fit with a rural lifestyle, yet they could be associated with those individuals accusing the younger Roscius. Moreover, the son is presented in the speech as fulfilling the expectations of father and son relationships discussed above in the very fact that he is described as diligently overseeing his father’s property. Duty towards the family has been discussed at length in various sources, and it comes up again in Cicero’s defence:
nam cum hic Sex. Roscius esset Ameriae, T. autem iste Roscius Romae, cum hic filius assiduus in praediis esset cumque se uolantate patris rei familiari uitaeque rusticae dedisset, iste autem frequens Romae esset, occiditur ad balneas Pallacinas rediens a cena Sex.
Roscius.
Now, while my client was at Ameria, and that Titus Roscius Magnus at Rome; while the son was always engaged upon his farms, and, in accordance with his father’s wish, devoted himself to the management of the estate and a country life, whereas Magnus was constantly at Rome, the father, while returning one evening from supper, was killed near the baths of Pallacina. (18)81
Although the prosecution and defence have debated the father’s decision to leave his son in the country to take charge of the family property, it is important for Cicero’s case that the younger Roscius is never presented as questioning that decision. He is dutiful towards his father and family, and presented as content in the simple country life. This makes it all the more shocking that he should be forced off of this property
80 Dyck (2010), 111: ‘This chapter accordingly raises and dismisses three theories by which Roscius’
character could have led to parricide: a misdirected youth, a propensity to violence, or the need to support a luxurious lifestyle.’
81 Dyck (2010), 84: ‘C. later seeks to refute the prosecution’s argument that the son’s relegation to the country proves the father’s dislike by claiming that it is characteristic of an entire class of young men acting partum uoluntate (42-8)’
[149]
by T. Roscius, and so rendered unable to perform all of the ceremonies for his father’s funeral:
interea iste T. Roscius, uir optimus, procurator Chrysogoni, Ameriam uenit, in praedia huius inuadit, hunc miserum, luctu perditum, qui nondum etiam omnia paterno funeri iusta soluisset, nudum eicit domo atque focis patriis disque penatibus praecipitem, iudices, exturbat, ipse amplissimae pecuniae fit dominus.
Meanwhile, the excellent Titus Roscius, the agent of Chrysogonus, comes to Ameria; he seizes my client’s farms, and before the unhappy man, overwhelmed with grief, had rendered all the last tokens of respect to his father, strips and throws him out of his house, and drives him headlong from the hearth and home of his fathers and his household gods, while he himself becomes the owner of an ample property. (23)82
Important for Cicero’s characterisation of the younger Roscius is his loyalty towards his father. However, in those days when he should have been in the midst of the feriae denicales and preparing for the funeral of his father, he is forced, grief- stricken, from the land that he has overseen for all of those years. Unable to complete the funeral rites, separated from his home and his household gods, he is described as naked while he is made to leave what had been his home.83 His vulnerability is emphasised; this fits into his characterisation as a simple farmer and would have encouraged sympathy.84 He does not have the connections that his accusers can call upon, either in terms of the people he knows at Rome, or in the capacity for manipulation which becomes an important characteristic of Chrysogonus and the
82 The son would have been in the midst of the feriae denicales, the nine days during which those affected by the death did not attend work or other engagements. See Dyck (2010), 91; Toynbee (1971), 50; Maurin (1984), 205; Belayche (1995), 167-8. Dyck (2010), 91: ‘domus is amplified by the reference to the foci patria and di penates with their sacred associations; cf. Dom. 109 quid omni religion munitis quam domus unius cuiusque ciuium? hic area sunt, hic foci, hic di penates, hic sacra, religions, caerimoniae continetur’.
83 See Bodel (1999), 259-281 on Roman funerals; Lindsay (1998), 67-80 on the Roman funerary banquet, and Rawson (2003), 336-363.
84 The importance of the corona of spectators in Roman trials should be emphasised here. The crowd would shout their approval or sympathy and must have had a powerful influence on the outcome of cases. See Millar (2002), 41.
[150]
Roscii within the speech.85 As a conclusion to the depiction of Roscius’ character and behaviour towards his father, no matter how much is rhetorical show, it is a moving scene.86 It was carefully designed to persuade the jurors by using pre- existing social expectations of father and son relationships. The final element in convincing Cicero’s audience of the genuine nature of Roscius’ characterisation is his statement that the son does not ask for his property to be returned; he asks only that he be acquitted of the murder of his father and the taint of such an accusation (143).
Natural Feeling
Another theme which comes up in this speech is the idea that a type of natural feeling exists between fathers and sons which, Cicero concludes, means that any disruption to the relationship must have had strong motives behind it:
si tibi fortuna non dedit ut patre certo nascerere ex quo intellegere posses qui animus patrius in liberos esset, at natura certe dedit ut humanitatis non parum haberes; eo accessit studium doctrinae ut ne a litteris quidem alienus esses. ecquid tandem tibi uidetur, ut ad fabulas ueniamus, senex ille Caecilianus minoris facere Eutychum filium rusticum quam illum alterum, Chaerestratum - nam, ut opinor, hoc nomine est - alterum in urbe secum honoris causa habere, alterum rus supplici causa relegasse?
If it has not been your lot to be born of a father about whom there is no mistake, one from whom you could have learnt what was the feeling of a father towards his children, at least nature has given you
85 In Cicero’s depiction of the episode, Sex. Roscius is denied help because many individuals fear the consequences of siding against Chrysogonus (Rosc. Am. 1); he is only able to act as the defence because he is relatively unknown at this stage in his career. Cicero describes how Caecilia, the daughter of Nepos, helped Sex. Roscius (27) and relates that the notoreity of the alleged crime, it being the first in the re-opened courts, and the involvement of Chrysogonus had led many to think that no one would defend him (29). This is, of course, the way in which Cicero’s wants his audience to interpret events; it is possible to argue that few people helped the son because they were unsure of his innocence of the murder.
86 On pathos and ethos in Roman rhetoric, see Wisse (1989), May (1988), and Paterson and Powell (2004), 1-57.