Noctes Atticae

Marcus Varro's opinion of the just and proper number of banqueters; his views about the dessert and about sweetmeats.

THAT is a very charming book of Marcus Varro's, one of his Menippean Satires, entitled You know not what the Late Evening may Bring, [*](Apparently a proverbial expression; cf. Virg. Georg. i. 461, Denique, quid vesper serus vehat . .. sol tibi signa dabit.) in which he descants upon the proper number of guests at a dinner, and about the order and arrangement of the entertainment itself. Now he says [*](Fr. 333, Bücheler.) that the number of the guests ought to begin with that of the Graces and end with that of the Muses; that is,

it should begin with three and stop at nine, so that when the guests are fewest, they should not be less than three, when they are most numerous, not more than nine.

For it is disagreeable to have a great number, since a crowd is generally disorderly, [*](There is a word-play on turba and turbulenta, which it seems difficult to reproduce. Cf. Ausonius, p. 12, 146, Peiper; i., p. 22, L. C. L.: Quinque advocavi; sex enim conviviumCum rege iustum; si super, convicium est.) and at Rome it stands, [*](Referring to turba as the throng of citizens in public assembly.) at Athens it sits, but nowhere does it recline. Now, the banquet itself,

he continues,

has four features, and then only is it complete in all its parts: if a nice little group has been got together, if the place is well chosen, the time fit, and due preparation not neglected. Moreover, one should not,

he says,

invite either too talkative or too silent guests, since eloquence is appropriate to the Forum and the courts, but silence to the bed-chamber and not to a dinner.

He thinks, then, that the conversation at such a time ought not to be about anxious and perplexing affairs, but diverting and cheerful, combining profit with a certain interest and pleasure, such conversation as tends to make our character more refined and agreeable.

This will surely follow,

he says,

if we talk about matters which relate to the common experience of life, which we have no leisure to discuss in the Forum and amid the press of business. Furthermore, the host,

he says,

ought rather to be free from meanness than over-elegant,

and, he adds:

At a banquet not everything should be read, [*](Readings or music were common forms of entertainment at a Roman dinner (cf. e.g. Pliny, Epist. iii. 1. 9). Legi, however, may have the meaning of legere in § 3 (end), in which case the reference would be to the viands and biwfelh= would mean wholesome.) but such things as are at once edifying and enjoyable.

And he does not omit to tell what the nature of the dessert ought to be. For he uses these words:

Those sweetmeats (bellaria) are sweetest which are not sweet; [*](An example of Varro's fondness for word-plays; sweetest is used in the double sense of sweetest to the taste and pleasantest in their after-effects.) for harmony between delicacies and digestion is not to be counted upon.

That no one may be puzzled by the word bellaria which Varro uses in this passage, let me say that it means all kinds of dessert. For what the Greeks called pe/mmata or tragh/mata, our forefathers called bellaria. [*](mensa secunda bellariorum occurs in the Transactions of the Arval Brethren for May 27, A.D. 218.) In the earlier comedies [*](p. 144, 65, Ribbeck 3.) one may find this term applied also to the sweeter wines, which are called Liberi bellaria, or

sweetmeats of Bacchus.

That the tribunes of the commons have the right to arrest, but not to summon.

IN one of the letters of Ateius Capito we read [*](Fr. 19, Huschke: ii. p. 287, Bremer.) that Antistius Labeo was exceedingly learned in the laws and customs of the Roman people and in the civil law.

But,

he adds,

an excessive and mad love of freedom possessed the man, to such a degree that, although the deified Augustus was then emperor and was ruling the State, Labeo looked upon nothing as lawful and accepted nothing, unless he had found it ordered and sanctioned by the old Roman law.

He then goes on to relate the reply of this same Labeo, when he was summoned by the messenger of a tribune of the commons. He says:

When the tribunes of the commons had been appealed to by a woman against Labeo and had sent to him at

v2.p.443

the Gallianum [*](Probably Labeo's country place. He spent half the year in retirement (Dig. i. 2. 2.47), and praedia Galliana are mentioned in C.I.L. iii. 536, and ix. 1455, col. iii, lines 62—64.) bidding him come and answer the woman's charge, he ordered the messenger to return and say to the tribunes that they had the right to summon neither him nor anyone else, since according to the usage of our forefathers the tribunes of the commons had the power of arrest, but not of summons; that they might therefore come and order his arrest, but they did not have the right to summon him when absent.

Having read this in that letter of Capito's, I later found the same statement made more fully in the twenty-first book of Varro's Human Antiquities, and I have added Varro's own words on the subject: [*](Fr. 2, Mirsch.)

In a magistracy

says he,

some have the power of summons, others of arrest, others neither; summoning, for example, belongs to the consuls and others possessing the imperium [*](The right of commanding an army conferred by the Lex Curiata de imperio on the dictator, consuls, magister equitum and praetors.) ; arrest, to the tribunes of the commons and the rest who are attended by a messenger; neither summoning nor arrest to the quaestors and others who have neither a lictor nor a messenger. Those who have the power of summons may also arrest, detail, and lead off to prison, all this whether those whom they summon are present or are sent for by their order. The tribunes of the commons have no power of summons, nevertheless many of them in ignorance have used that power, as if they were entitled to it; for some of them have ordered, not only private persons, but even a consul to be summoned before the rostra. I myself, when a triumvir, [*](That is, one of the triumviri capitales, a minor office.) on being summoned by Porcius, tribune of the commons, did not appear, following the authority of our leading men, but I held to the old law. Similarly, when I was a tribune, I ordered

v2.p.445

no one to be summoned, and required no one who was summoned by one of my colleagues to obey, unless he wished.

I think that Labeo, being a private citizen at the time, [*](That is, he had not yet held a magisterial office.) showed unjustified confidence in that law of which Marcus Varro has written, in not appearing when summoned by the tribunes. For how the mischief was it reasonable to refuse to obey those whom you admit to have the power of arrest? For one who can lawfully be arrested may also be taken to prison. But since we are inquiring why the tribunes, who had full power of coercion, did not have the right to summon ... [*](There seems to be a lacuna in the text. Supply we may assume that it was, or something similar.) because the tribunes of the commons seem to have been elected in early times, not for administering justice, nor for taking cognizance of suits and complaints when the parties were absent, but for using their veto-power when there was immediate need, in order to prevent injustice from being done before their eyes; and for that reason the right of leaving the city at night was denied them, since their constant presence and personal oversight were needed to prevent acts of violence.

That it is stated in Marcus Varro's books on Human Antiquities that the aediles and quaestors of the Roman people might be cited before a praetor by a private citizen.

WHEN from the secluded retreat of books and masters I had come forth among men and into the light of the forum, I remember that it was the

subject of inquiry in many of the quarters frequented by those who gave public instruction in law, or offered counsel, whether a quaestor of the Roman people could be cited by a praetor. Moreover, this was not discussed merely as an academic question, but an actual instance of the kind had chanced to arise, in which a quaestor was to be called into court. Now, not a few men thought that the praetor did not have the right to summon him, since he was beyond question a magistrate of the Roman people and could neither be summoned, nor if he refused to appear could he be taken and arrested without impairing the dignity of the office itself which he held. But since at that time I was immersed in the books of Marcus Varro, as soon as I found that this matter was the subject of doubt and inquiry, I took down [*](From his bookcase.) the twenty-first book of his Human Antiquities, in which the following is written: [*](Fr. 3, Mirsch.)

It is lawful for those magistrates who have the power neither of summoning the people as individuals nor of arrest, even to be called into court by a private citizen. Marcus Laevinus, a curule aedile, was cited before a praetor by a private citizen; to-day, surrounded as they are by public servants, aediles not only may not be arrested, but even presume to disperse the people.

This is what Varro says in the part of his work which concerns the aediles, but in an earlier part of the same book he says [*](See xiii. 12. 6, above.) that quaestors have the right neither to summon nor to arrest. Accordingly, when both parts of the book had been read, all came over to Varro's opinion, and the quaestor was summoned before the praetor.

The meaning of pomerium.

THE augurs of the Roman people who wrote books On the Auspices have defined the meaning of pomerium in the following terms:

The pomerium is the space within the rural district designated by the augurs along the whole circuit of the city without the walls, marked off by fixed bounds and forming the limit of the city auspices.

[*](That is to say, the pomerium separated the ager Romanus, or country district, from the city. The auspices could be taken only within the pomerium. When a furrow was drawn and the earth turned inward to mark the line of the city walls, the furrow represented the pomerium. On the derivation of the word see T.A.P.A. xliv. 19 ff.) Now, the most ancient pomerium, which was established by Romulus, was bounded by the foot of the Palatine hill. But that pomerium, as the republic grew, was extended several times and included many lofty hills. Moreover, whoever had increased the domain of the Roman people by land taken from an enemy had the right to enlarge the pomerium.

Therefore it has been, and even now continues to be, inquired why it is that when the other six of the seven hills of the city are within the pomerium, the Aventine alone, which is neither a remote nor an unfrequented district, should be outside the pomerium; and why neither king Servius Tullius nor Sulla, who demanded the honour of extending the pomerium, nor later the deified Julius, when he enlarged the pomerium, included this within the designated limits of the city.

Messala wrote [*](Fr. 3, Huschke; id., Bremer (ii, p. 265).) that there seemed to be several reasons for this, but above them all he himself approved one, namely, because on that hill Remus took the auspices with regard to founding the city, but found the birds unpropitious and was less

successful in his augury than Romulus.

Therefore,

says he,

all those who extended the pomerium excluded that hill, on the ground that it was made ill-omened by inauspicious birds.

But speaking of the Aventine hill, I thought I ought not to omit something which I ran across recently in the Commentary of Elys, [*](The name is obviously corrupt; see critical note.) an early grammarian. In this it was written that in earlier times the Aventine was, as we have said, excluded from the pomerium, but afterwards by the authority of the deified Claudius it was admitted and honoured with a place within the limits of the pomerium.