What's In A Name?: The Significance Of Proper Names In Classical Latin Literature 1905125097, 9781905125098

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WHAT'S IN A NAME? THE SIGNIFICANCE OF PROPER NAMES IN CLASSICAL LATIN LITERATURE

Editors

Joan Booth and

Robert Maltby Contributors

Frederique Biville, Joan Booth, Francis Cairns, Niklas Holzberg, Stratis Kyriakidis, Robert Maltby, Andreas Michalopoulos, Helen Peraki-Kyriakidou, Emma Stafford, Javier Urfa, Daniel Vallat

The ClassicalPressof Wales

First published in 2006 by The Classical Press of Wales 15 Rosehill Terrace, Swansea SAi 6JN Tel: +44 (0)1792 458397 Fax: +44 (0) 1792 464067 www.classicalpressofwales.co.uk Distributor in the United States of America: The David Brown Book Co. PO Box 511, Oakville, CT 06779 Tel: + I (860) 945-9329 Fax:+ I (860) 945-9468

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CONTENTS Introduction

RobertMaltby

vn

1. The qualification of personal names by possessive adjectives in Cicero's letters FrederiqueBiville (Universite Lumiere, Lyon II)

1

2. Personal names and invective in Cicero Javier Uria (UniversityofSaragossa)

13

3. Tibullus' Nemesis: divine retribution and the poet Emma Stafford(University of Leeds)

33

4. Naming names - or not: some significant choices and suppressions in Latin poetry Joan Booth (University of Leiden)

49

5. The nomenclature of the Tiber in Virgil's Aeneid FrancisCairns (The Florida State University)

65

6. Antonomasia and metonymy in the proem to Virgil's Georgics Helen Peraki-Kyriakidou(University ofThessaloniki)

83

7. From the Metamorphosesto the Fasti:Catalogues of proper names

101

StratisKyriakidis(University ofThessaloniki) 8. Bilingual word-play on personal names in Martial Daniel Val/at(Universite Lumiere, Lyon II)

121

9. Onomato-poetics: a linear reading of Martial 7.67-70 Nik/as Holzberg(University of Munich)

145

10. Proper names as a linking device in Martial 5.43-8 RobertMaltby (University of Leeds)

159

11. Naming the characters: the cases of Aristomenes, Socrates and Meroe in Apuleius' Metamorphoses1.2-19 AndreasMichalopoulos(University of Thrace, Komotini)

169

Indexes

189 V

INTRODUCTION Robert Maltby

The aim of the international conference on the significance of proper names in Latin literature held at the University of Wales, Gregynog, Powys, in July 2002 was to bring together scholars who had independently been working in the fast-growing area of Latin etymological play and onomastics in order to share ideas, to investigate the validity of diverse approaches and to draw some conclusions as to the current status of research in the field. The collection of papers presented in the current volume brings together a number of different but interrelated studies on the significant name in Latin. Themes touched upon include not only the significance of 'speaking' names, often involving bilingual Greek/Latin play (MICHALOPOULOS,VALLAT), but also the manner in which persons or objects are named, particularly in contexts of invective or endearment (URfA, BIVILLE).The suppression or changing of names can often be as significant as naming itself (BOOTH, PERAKI-KYRIAKIDIS ). The area of the religious and historical significance of names is developed (CAIRNS, STAFFORD)and their importance as a literary device in catalogues (KYRIAKIDIS)or in giving structure and significance to a group of shorter poems (HOLZBERG,MALTBY)is investigated. The material is arranged in the chronological order of the authors discussed, from Cicero to Apuleius. The collection begins with two papers on Cicero. BIVILLE'sstudy of possessive adjectives attached to proper names in Cicero demonstrates how these can convey a series of varied and complex meanings, moving well beyond the simple expression of familiarity to denote relationships of group-membership, dependence and exchange. In URfAs paper the emphasis shifts from the qualifiers to the names themselves and the varied devices, including etymological play, employed by Cicero to turn names into a carefully crafted tool for invective. The central group of papers deals with naming in Augustan poetry. STAFFORD'sstudy of Nemesis, the mistress' name in Book II of Tibullus, combines literary analysis, based on uses of the name in Hellenistic poetry, with a detailed discussion of the implications of the recent introduction of the cult of the goddess Nemesis to Rome. Both approaches prove fruitful in adding to our understanding of the poet's attention to the detailed associations of the name in the construction of his second book and in its relation to the Delia poems of Book I.

Introduction BooTH's paper on choice and suppression in naming begins with the significance of the use of Quirinus for Romulus in Jupiter's speech at Aen. 1.292 and of the suppression of the name Marpessa under the circumlocution Eveni...filia at Propertius 1.2.18. In both cases the associations of the chosen or suppressed name are shown to have a significant role to play in the literary context. Quirinus, associated by ancient readers with the Sabine curis'spear' and with the root koivrano-'king', has warlike and imperial connotations, which work well in a context looking forward to the historical roles of Caesar and Augustus. The suppression of the name Marpessa at Prop. 1.2.18 paradoxically focuses attention on its associations with 'brightness' - Mount Marpessa in Paros was famous for its bright marble - which is a key motif running through the depiction of the other characters explicitly named in the poem. Finally at Prop. 4.9.51 the name suppressed by the phrase alma sacerdos,describing the 'gracious priestess' who bars Hercules' way to the grove of the Bona Dea, is identified as Parca (Fate) and the metapoetical significance of this identification is analysed. CAIRNSdiscusses the use of the three names Tiberinus, Tiberisand, first in Virgil, Thybris,for the river Tiber in the Aeneid. He rejects the traditional Servian explanation - that Tiberinus is used of the god in sacral contexts, Tiberisis the common prose denomination and Thybrisis used in verse - in favour of an interpretation which links the Trojan river Thybriswith the Latin Tiber and so emphasizes the continuity between Troy and Rome which is central to the Aeneid. In her paper on the proem to GeorgicsI PERAKI-KYRIAKIDOU discusses the names of the gods addressed from the point of view of antonomasia and metonymy. The poet does not invoke the gods in order to ask for their aid in his composition, as is traditional in didactic, but rather the gods' names stand metonymically for the subjects to be treated. Emphasis in this paper is laid on Virgil's combination of diverse sources to endow his deities with multiple functions, literary as well as agricultural, so that their naming adds a metapoetical component to the proem. The use of literary tradition in the use of proper names is also central to KYRIAKIDis' study of catalogues in Ovid's Metamorphosesand Fasti. Literary innovation in Ovid's handling of catalogues of proper names in the Metamorphosesis contrasted with a return to a more traditional, Virgilian, approach in the Fasti. There follow three papers on name-play in Martial. VALLAT'sdiscussion of bilingual Latin/Greek plays on proper names is prefaced by a detailed theoretical discussion of 'significant proper names' and their different uses in poetry. An interesting section on 'transcoding' discusses the application of Latin etymologies to Greek names and vice-versa.The final part of the paper Vlll

Introduction

relates Martial's use of bilingual name-plays to the earlier literary tradition, showing how Martial's approach, in its richness and variety, is much closer to Plautus than to other earlier writers such as Virgil. Both HoLZBERG and MALTBYlook at names in Martial as linking devices between groups of consecutive poems in a book. Holzberg links poem 7.67 with 7.69 through the root phil- 'to love' in the names Philaenis (7.67) and Theophila (7.69) and the root aen- 'to praise' in Philaenis (7.67) and Pantaenis (7.69).Moreover poem 7.68 is linked to the group by lexemes which are related to these two roots: commendare (7.68.1),amat (7.68.2). In the last poem in the group, 7.70, Philaenis appears again with her amica. Reading the four poems in linear succession reveals not only internal thematic links but also throws light on the implicit content of the group as a whole. Similarly Maltby links the group 5.43-8 in two chiastic sequences ABA/CBC through the interplay of common nouns and semantically related proper names: dentes (5.43.1)is picked up by Dento (5.44.2);Bassa (5.45.2) by basia (5.46.1); ames (5.46.4) with Philo (5.47.1) and amor (5.48.1). What is brought out clearly in both these papers is the need to examine each epigram of Martial in relation to its neighbours in the collection and not necessarily to take every poem as a self-contained unit in a random series. Both individual poems and linked groups gain in significance from this interpretative approach. Finally MICHALOPOULOSinvestigates name-plays in the first embedded story of Apuleius Metamorphoses, that of Aristomenes at Met. 1.2-19. This story has no equivalent in the Greek original of the novel and revealsApuleius' own interest in etymology and semantics. The names of Aristomenes, Socrates and Meroe are shown to carry multiple meanings which provide valuable insights into Apuleius' narrative technique and characterization. A theme running through the whole collection is that of the extreme sensitivity of the Romans to names and naming and to the varied opportunities these provide for enriching and enlivening the content of their literary texts.

ix

1

THE QUALIFICATION OF PERSONAL NAMES BY THE POSSESSIVE ADJECTIVE IN THE LETTERS OF CICERO FrederiqueBiville

Meus Alexis, Metellus tuus, Dionysius noster...

I. SCOPE

OF THE PROBLEM: THE PRESUMPTION

OF AFFECTIVITY

As with common nouns, so also proper nouns, and especially personal names, take part in a system of qualification by possessives which involves an opposition between marked and non-marked uses: e.g. Cicero/Ciceromeus, mi Cicero.So in the Letters of Cicero one can find meus, tuus and noster,vester less frequently, and, in exceptional cases, suus1placed before or after personal names. The use of the possessive is generally interpreted as an indication of an affective relationship and translators render them by such phrases as:2 Ciceromeus, 'mon cher Ciceron' ('my dear Cicero', Fam. 14.4.3), 'mon petit Ciceron' ('my little Cicero', QFr. 3.6.2); Metellustuus ('your friend Metellus' Att. 1.20.S). These translations are fully justified in exchanges marked by a certain familiarity, in which the context, by itself, conveys the idea of affectivity: e.g. Tullia mea (Att. 6.4.2 and passim), Tullio/amea (Att. 4.1.4; c£ Tullio/a, deliciolaenostrae,Att. 1.8.3). By contrast, there are more formal contexts where it seems more difficult to admit an affective sense for the possessive, as in this reference to a transaction carried out by Cincius, the business manager (procurator)of Atticus: Cinciusnosteream mihi abs te epistolamreddidit ('our dear Cincius passed on your letter to me') (Att. 1.20.1). It is clear that the possessive can take on a variety of meanings which go well beyond the simple presumption of familiarity. It is above all, in itself, an indication of an interpersonal relationship; but it also takes its sense from the whole system of oppositions and combinations in which it takes part. In the mouth of Cicero himself, Ciceromeus does not so much signify 'my dear Cicero' (Fam. 14.4.3), 'my little Cicero' (QFr. 3.6.2) as 'my Cicero', 'my son' (Marcus), as opposed to Cicerotuus 'your Cicero', that is to say 'your son' (Quintus, the nephew

1

Frederique Biville

of Cicero) and to Cicerones nostri, 'our Ciceros' (the son and the nephew). Cicero can also use two possessives in parallel: Quintus tuus meusque ('your Quintus [= your son], who is also mine') (QFr. 2.5.2) since Cicero sees to his education in the absence of his father, or can deploy them in sets of oppositions with two or three terms: Xenonem tuum vel nostrum potius ('your Xeno, or rather our Xeno') (Att. 5.10.S), Cassius tuus et Dolabella noster, vel potius uterque noster ('your Cassius and our Dolabella, or rather, both of them ours') (Fam. 7.33.2). It can also happen that the possessive is combined with a deictic adjective in order to characterize a personal name in two ways: hie noster Paris, 'our modern Paris' (Att. 1.18.3), with hie actualizing the reference; Tartessium istum tuum, 'your man from Tartessos' (Att. 7.3.11 ), with pejorative iste; ille noster Cato, 'our hero Cato' (Att. 1.17.9) (c£ heros ille noster Cato, Att. 1.17.9), with laudatory ille. The functions fulfilled by a possessive qualifying a personal name are thus varied and cannot all be explained in terms of possession or affectivity. When associated with a personal name which assures the identification of the referent, the possessive serves, above all, as a relational marker. It makes explicit the nature ofthe relationship which joins the speaker with the named individual. It often fulfils an extra-linguistic referential function: it completes the identification of the referent by integrating it into a network of family and social relationships (see examples 1 to 6 below), or it modifies the identification by effecting a metaphorical transfer from individual A to individual B (examples 11 and 12 below). But it can also fulfil a function within the discourse, when it serves to mark out the partners in an exchange, especially when used as an interpellation (examples 7 and 8 below) or when it is deployed in an anaphoric way,to repeat points made in an earlier enunciation (examples 9 and 10 below). It often happens that these different functions multiply and combine so as to endow the possessive with a complex significance.

II. THE POSSESSIVE AS A MARKER OF INTERPERSONAL RELATIONS The possessive is both a marker of belonging to a group (social, familial, political, cultural) and, within this hierarchical group, of a situation of dependence. As an example of familial relations we will take the family of Cicero, as it is organized in the Letters around the speaker/ author Cicero. 1. The Cicero family Excluding examples of interpellation (of the type mi Cicero) which we will study below, the possessive fulfils above all a distinctive designatory function: it serves to differentiate the male members of the family, all of whom have the same name, Cicero. When Cicero speaks of his son,3 he says Cicero meus ('my Cicero, my son') if he is speaking within the framework of a binary 2

1he qualificationofpersonalnames bypossessiveadjectivesin Cicero'sletters The Cicerofamily

Terentia

uxor

+ M(arcus) Tullius Cicero

Q(uintus) Tullius Cicero

+ Pomponia

T(itus) Pomponi us Atticus

frater

I

I

Tullia (-ola) M. Tullius Cicero

ji/ia

Q(uintus) Tullius Cicero

fi/ius

nepos

+ 1. C. Calpurnius Piso Frugi 2. P. Furius Crassipes 3. P.Cornelius Dolabella

/iberti

(M. Tullius) Tiro

f-

M. Pomponius Dionysius

➔

Alexis

father-son relationship, just as he says Cicerotuus ('your Cicero, your son') when he is speaking of the son of his brother, Quintus, and the relations marked by the possessive are reversed when the speaker is Quintus. In this way the possessives become lexicalized and function as substitutes for.filius: e.g. uxor tua et...tui Crassi,'your wife and your Crassuses = your sons' (Fam. 5.8.2). Ciceronoster ('our Cicero') is employed by Cicero for a tertiary relationship including Terentia, the mother ('our son'), or Quintus, the uncle, who is seeing to the education of the young Cicero in the absence of his father, as in June 58 BC, when Cicero, leaving for exile, entrusts his children to his brother: (1) QFr. 1.3.10: filiam meam et tuam, Ciceronem nostrum, quid ego, mi fater, tibi commendem? ... te incolumi orbi non erunt.

Do I need to commend to you, my brother, my daughter, who is also your own, and our Cicero? ... for as long as you are there, they will not be orphans.

But just as it can happen that the young Marcus is under the double 'paternal' authority of his father and his uncle, noster Cicerocan just as well, in the mouth of Cicero, refer to his nephew, Quintus, when Cicero finds himself in charge of him, as in 53 BC, when the boy's father is on campaign in Gaul: (2) QFr. 2.12.2: maxime vero mihi curae erit ut Ciceronem tuum nostrumque videam scilicet cotidie ... etiam magistrum me ei profitebor, cuius rei non nullam consuetudinem nactus sum ... Cicerone nostro minore producendo.

I will do everything possible to see every day your Cicero, who is also mine ... l will even make myself his teacher; it is an activity in which I acquired

3

Frederique Biville a certain experience when I was educating our own young Cicero [= Cicero's son, one year younger than his cousin].

Meus and noster are thus used in an extended sense 4 to mark both the proximity and the hierarchy of family ties, a denotative function which need not exclude, from time to time, the superimposition of affective traits, as in this letter of Quintus addressed from Gaul to Cicero in May 53:

(3) Fam. 16.16.1: mi Maree, ita te, meumque Ciceronem, et meam Tulliolam, tuumque filium videam ... My (dear) Marcus, how I would like to see you all again, you and my Cicero ( = my son), my dear little Tullia (= my niece, your daughter), and your son (my nephew) ...

When Cicero speaks of his sons-in-law, it is not meus that he employs, but noster, which introduces a certain distance: Piso noster (Fam. 14.2.2 ), Dolabella noster (Fam. 16.12.5), genero nostro (Att. 7.14.3), because the relationship he has with them is not so direct and necessarily includes his daughter Tullia, but also at times his wife Terentia. Hence the exclamation 0 miriftcum Dolabellam meum (Att. 14.15.2, c£ ex. 5 below) is all the more significant. Noster is also the word Cicero employs when speaking of his slaves and freedmen, as it lacks the suggestion of familiarity and affectivity which meus could have,5 whereas he uses tuus for the slavesof his interlocutors. Here again noster introduces a distance and confirms Cicero's status as master: Tironem nostrum (Att. 8.6.S, but mi Tiro, as an interpellation, see below). Pamphilus tuus (Att. 7.2.2); Dionysius quidem tuus potius quam noster, 'your Dionysius, rather than ours' (Att. 8.4.1 ), of a slave who belonged to Atticus before being given to Cicero (c£ Att. 4.15.1 ), to whom he was a terrible disappointment.

2. Social groups Outside the private, family sphere, the possessive denotes membership of a social group and adhesion to a common set of values and shared political and cultural convictions. Cicero opposes nostri, the party of political legitimacy, that of the Pompeians, which is his own (Pompeii nostri, Fam. 16.11.13 ), to that of the Clodiani (Fam. 3.5.3) and the Caesariani (Att. 6.8.2). The possessive and the suffix -ianus both mark membership of a group: Catonem nostrum, 'our Cato' (Att. 2.1.8), Catoninos, 'the Catonians' (Fam. 7.25.1). Noster qualifies the members of the group to which one belongs, vester, those of the opposing party. There also exist within the group degrees of intimacy and esteem, which can lead to the substitution of the opposition noster!vester

4

1he qualificationofpersonalnames bypossessiveadjectivesin Cicero'sletters by the individual variant meus/tuus: so Pompeius/Gnaeus noster (,passim), tuum Cn. Pompeium (Fam. 8.15.1), Curio meus (Fam. 16.11.2), Lentulus tuus (Fam. 9.18.2). This partisan dichotomy between noster (meus) and vester(tuus) can easily take on a polemical dimension. Writing to Cicero, the Caesarian M. Caelius Rufus takes pleasure in underlining the weaknesses of Pompey as contrasted with the merits of Caesar:

(4) Fam. 8.15.1: Ecquando tu hominem ineptiorem quam tuum Cn. Pompeium vidisti... ? Ecquem autem Caesarenostro acriorem in rebus gerendis ... ? Have you ever seen a man more incompetent than your Cn. Pompey ... and one more determined in action than our Caesar?

But political engagement and sympathy are not always as clear-cut. Prudence and compromise lead Cicero to say Caesarnoster (Fam. 7.10.1; 8.15.1) and even Caesar,amicus noster(Fam. 16.11.2) and, when speaking of his son-inlaw, the Caesarian Dolabella, who had accomplished an heroic act, he lets himself go with this enthusiastic exclamation: 6 (5)Att. 14.15.2: 0 mirificum Dolabellam meum! lam vero dico 'meum', antea, crede mihi, subdubitabam.

My marvellous Dolabella! I can now say 'my', but before, believe me, I was doubtful about it.

The contrasting pair noster,referring to the sphere of the speaker, and tuus, referring to that of his interlocutor, is also used to characterize the sociocultural milieu, to describe friends and relations who frequent the same places, meet the same people and share the same cultural values: noster Diodotus (Fam. 9.4), says Cicero of his friend the philosopher, who lived for a long time at his house, and nosterHortensius(Att. 5.2.1), of the great orator who came to pay him a visit in his property at Cumae. The possessive tends to become lexicalized as the semantic equivalent of nouns such as amicus, familiaris or necessarius,'friend':

(6) Fam. 7.33.2 (to P. Volumnius Eutrapelus): ... vivamque tecum multum et cum communibus nostris amatoribus. Nam et Cassius tuus et Dolabella noster, vel potius uterque noster, studiis iisdem tenentur. I will give over a large part of my time to you and to those whom we both love. For your friend Cassius and our friend Dolabella, or more exactly our two friends, share the same interests as us.

In this shared cultural universe the possessive does not simply qualify the 5

FrederiqueBiville contemporary members of the community, but it can also extend to cover the founders and representatives of this Graeco-Latin culture, which nourishes their thoughts and discussions, such as the philosopher Plato: Platonem nostrum (Fam.1.9.12), or the actor Aesopus: deliciaeverotuae, nosterAesopus, 'he who is your delight, our dear Aesopus' (Fam. 7.1.2).

Ill.

THE POSSESSIVE AS A DISCURSIVE MARKER

Outside these referential uses, which make plain the identification of an individual, characterizing him by his membership of. and place within, a familial, political or socio-cultural group, there are uses of the possessive which can be qualified as discursive, because they serve to identify the participants in the discourse or to repeat, anaphorically, the points made by the speaker.

1. Identification of participants in the discourse An examination of the syntactical functions of phrases containing personal names where a possessive is present shows that the possessive is used more ofi:en in an address function than in other uses. Cicero frequently writes to his freedman and friend Tiro addressing him as mi Tiro;7 but one does not find Tiro meus,and rarely Tironoster(Att. 8.6.S), when he speaks about him. If mi Cicerois used by Cicero's correspondents when they address him, Cicero meus or meus Cicerois used exclusively in the writing of Cicero to refer to his son (see above). In this address function the use of the possessive meus is a sure indication of familiarity and esteem between the interlocutors. 8 Sometimes, however, a greater subtlety of analysis is required, to justify its use by a greater investment of affective sentiment, or by a particular verbal strategy on the part of the speaker as in the distribution of Terentiaas against mea Terentia,or in the change of relations and tone illustrated by the letters of March 49 addressed to Cicero by L.Cornelius Balbus:

(7) Att. 8.l 5A.l: obsecro te, Cicero('I beg you, Cicero') and 9.7B.l: mehercule, mi Cicero,sentio quod tu ... ('Indeed, I think the same as you, my dear Cicero ...').

The possessive, then, serves a double function: it marks an interlocution, and it integrates into this affirmation the speaker's own perception of the relationship involved. If the possessive meus normally refers to the addressee of the message and in doing so includes within it the impression the speaker has of the addressee, it is more surprising, indeed unusual, to find the second person possessive, tuus, referring to the speaker himsel£ But this is just what Cicero does, by referring to himself as tuus Ciceroin an enthusiastic letter, overflowing with self-satisfaction, which he addresses to Atticus in S 1 BC and

6

Thequalificationofpersonalnames bypossessiveadjectivesin Cicero'sletters in which he airs the merits of his pro-consulship of Cilicia:

(8) Att. S.16.3: Me hercule etiam aduentu nostro reviviscunt iustitia, abstinentia, dementia tui Ciceronis, idque opiniones omnium superavit. Yes,indeed! A veritable resurrection has been provoked by our arrival, thanks to the spirit of justice, disinterest and clemency of your Cicero, a thing which has surpassed everyone's expectations.

Tuus Cicerorefers to the locutor-author, who appears to his correspondent in the double role of object of the discourse and partner in the conversation. Tuus Cicerois 'your Cicero', who speaks to you, who loves you (as you love him), of whom you can be proud (as he is proud of himself). This distancing from himself is characteristic of the familiar language and bears witness to a strong affective sense. 2. Anaphoric repetition In discursive uses, referring to the partners in the discourse, the possessive can also serve to repeat the points of the speaker. Cicero replies to a letter of Paetus, in which the latter had made use of a quotation from the tragedy Oenomaosof Accius, by saying (Fam. 9.16.4): Oenomao tuo nihil utor ('I can't make anything of your Oenomaos'), that is '(of the verses) of Oenomaos which you have cited'. This type of usage, which is both deictic (referring to the speaker) and anaphoric (referring to an earlier letter, that is an earlier enunciation), occurs in a very particular kind of letter, namely letters of reply which, afi:er acknowledging receipt, go through and comment point by point on the contents of the letter received, preserving its overall structure: (9) Att. 1.20.1: Cincius noster earn mihi abs te epistolam reddidit ...Ei nunc epistulae litteris his respondebo. Ac primum ... Qua de re cum ... scripseris ... 2. Quod ad me de rep. scribis ... 3. Earn quam mihi dicis Imiptav ... 4. De Sicyoniis ... S. Metellus tuus est egregius consul... 6. De meis scriptis ... our friend Cincius passed on to me the letter you had given him ... To that letter I shall now reply with this one. First of all...On the point that you wrote about ...As concerns what you write about politics ... That Sparta, as you say... On the subject of the Sicyonians ...Your friend Metellus is an extraordinary consul ...As for what I wrote ...

Here Metellus tuus 'your Metellus' refers to the Metellus of whom Atticus spoke and what he said about him (he is referring to the consul Q Caecilius Metellus Celer). The same epistolary method and procedures can be seen in another letter of reply to Atticus, in which the latter had mentioned

7

Frederique Biville a Tartessian: (10) Att. 7.3.1: tuas litteras legi quas Philotimus mihi reddidit ... Ac primum illud in quo ... 3. De animo autem meo erga rem publicam ...Jlla quam scribis 'Custos Urbis' ( ... ) 6. Nunc venio ad privata ...7. De Philotimo ... 10. Venio ad 'Piraeea' ... ll . .... Tartessium istum tuum ... 12. Quid superest? Etiam. Gener ... I read your letter which Philotimus passed on to me ... And first, about which ... As far as my feelings for the republic are concerned ... This 'guardian of the city', as you write ... I come now to private matters ...As far as Philotimus is concerned ... I now come to the (word) Piraeus ...Your Tartessian ... What else is there? Ah yes, my son-in-law ...

Tartessium istum tuum is not to be understood

as 'your good friend, the man from Tartessos' ('ton bon ami, l'homme de Tartessos' as translated by C.U.F.), but 'the man from Tartessos, as you call him'. Cicero without doubt is repeating the allusive and ironic ethnic designation, used somewhat disparagingly (istum) by Atticus in his letter, to refer to the Caesarian L. Cornelius Balbus, who came originally from Tartessos.

IV. THE

POSSESSIVE

AS A METAPHORICAL

MARKER

As a marker of interpersonal relations the possessive can also, more subtly, indicate a metaphorical name change. By an implicit process of analogical equivalence it can serve to transfer the proper name of individual A to an individual B who shares with him common traits. Meus Alexis (Att. 5.20.9) 'my Alexis', writes Cicero to Atticus, which can only appear paradoxical, since Alexis is not the freedman of Cicero, but rather of Atticus, and since, furthermore, Cicero never uses meus but always noster when referring to his freedmen (see above): ( 11) Att. 5.20.9: Alexis, quod mihi totiens salutem adscribit est gratum. Sed cur non suis litteris idem facit quod meus ad te Alexis facit? I much appreciate the fact that Alexis so ofi:enmakes use of your letters to wish me well; but why does he not do that in his own letters, as my Alexis does? Alexis is to Atticus what Tiro is to Cicero. This - second - name for Tiro rests on the comparison, pushed in this case as far as assimilation, between the two men, both secretaries of great worth and confidants of their masters. Alexis is 'the image of Tiro': Alexim ... imaginem Tironis (Att. 12.10 ). When the metaphorical transfer identifies a legendary or historic character from the past with a contemporary individual, then the use of the possessive, to indicate this transfer, is used together with deictic adjectives, which serve to distinguish the two time-frames, that of the present (hie) and that of

8

Thequalificationofpersonalnames bypossessiveadjectivesin Cicero'sletters the past (ille). In a letter of January 60 addressed to Atticus, Cicero gives a spirited account of one of the latest scandals in Rome, a story of adultery among the great: (12) Att. 1.18.3: M. Luculli uxorem Memmius suis sacris initiavit; Menelaus aegre id passus, divortium fecit. Quamquam illepastorJdaeusMenelaum solum contempserat, hie nosterParistarn Menelaum quam Agamemnonem liberum non putavit.

Memmius initiated into his own mysteriesthe wife of M. Lucullus; Menelaus took it badly and divorced her. But whereas the Idaean shepherd had only harmed Menelaus, our modern Paris no more spared Menelaus than he did Agamemnon. Decoded, the story involves two time-frames and four protagonists. The roles can be assigned as follows: Seducer Modern story: Memmius Myth: hie nosierParis

Wife

Deceived husband

Husband's brother

uxor M Luculli

M.Lucullus

[L.LucullusJ

Menelaus

Agamemnon

illepastorIdaeus [Helen]

This metaphorical system, with its quadruple transfer of personal names (explicit or implicit), is activated by the assimilation of Memmius to Paris and rests on the deictic opposition between hie (nosterParis) and ille (pastor Idaeus), which allows us to distinguish between two frames of reference, that of contemporary events and that of myth. The possessive nosterrefers us back to the sphere of the speaker and reveals the ironic and emphatic metaphorical usage of the mythological proper name, which falls from its mythic status to descend into the sordid banality of an adulterous liaison. When joined with personal names, then, the possessive adjective can convey a series of varied and complex meanings, which reveal a whole range of nuances, both denotative and connotative, inviting us to enter into the inner meanings of the text. Each use must be evaluated in its context, in its relation to each separate enunciation and it is the appreciation of the meanings attached to each use which allows us to propose a more exact translation of the possessive.

Acknowledgement La versionanglaisede cet articlen'auraitpas ete possiblesansl'amicaldevouementde notre collegueRobert Maltby,que nous remercionstresvivement.

9

FrederiqueBiville Notes 1

Except in letter headings, so: Tullius Tironisuo (Fam. 16.1), 'Tullius to his dear Tiro'. Cf. also Cic. Fam. 1.9.19: quoniam illi haberent suum Publium, darent mihi ipsi alium Publium ('since they have their own Publius, let them give me a Publius as well'). 2 The French translations referred to here are those of the Collection des Universites de France. Those that follow are translated from the author's French versions. 3 Nowhere in the Letters does he refer to him by his first name Marcus, although he uses Quintus to refer to his nephew. 4 This can be a source of ambiguity, as when Cicero writes to Atticus: cura, amabo te, Ciceronem nostrum ('please look after our Cicero') (Att. 2.2.l ). The reference here is not to Marcus, Cicero's son, but to Quintus, his nephew, who is also, through his mother, the nephew of Atticus: 'our (nephew) Cicero'. 5 Meus by contrast occurs in expressions where a distinction is being made: Acasto nostro (Att. 7.1.1), 'our Acastus', butAcastoservo meo (Att. 6.9.1) 'my slave Acastus'. For meus Alexis (Att. 5.20.9), cf. example 11. 6 See Biville, F. (forthcoming) 'O mirificum Dolabellam meum! (Cic. Att. 14.15.2). L' apLOtEta de Dolabella. Accusatif exclamatif, possessif, et reference au grec', in C. Cusset (ed.) Hommages aBernard ]acquinad, Memoires du Centre Jean Palerne, Universite de Saint-Etienne. 7 Mi Tiro at Fam. 16.1.2, 3.2, 4.2, 10.1 etc. Cf. also Tiro noster (Fam. 16.7), noster Tiro (Fam. 16.9.4). 8 It is particularly employed of those close to him: Terentia, Quintus, Atticus, Tiro (cf.Adams 1978).

Bibliography Beaujeu, J. (ed.) 1996 Ciceron, Correspondance, vol. 11, Index nominum, C.U.F.,Paris, pp. 271378. Shackleton Bailey, D.R. 1987-8 M. Tulli Ciceronis epistulae, 4 vols.: Epistulae ad Atticum, 2 vols.; Epistulae ad familiares; Epistulae ad Quintum .fratrem; Epistulae ad M. Brutum; Commentariolum petitionis; Fragmenta epistularum, Stuttgart und Leipzig. 1995 Onomasticon to Cicero'sLetters, Stuttgart.

Adams,J.N. 1978 'Conventions of naming in Cicero', Cf 28, (145-166] 162-3. Biville, F. 'Le statut linguistique des noms propres en latin. Approche formelle', in 1998 B. Garcia-Hernandez (ed.) £studios de Linguistica Latina, Actas del IX Coloquio Internacional de Lingiiistica Latina (Madrid, 14-18 de abril 1997), Ediciones Clasicas, 825-39, Madrid. 2001a 'Du particulier au general : Noms propres et derivation en latin', in C. Moussy (ed.) De lingua Latina. Novae quaestiones, Actes du Xe Colloque International de Linguistique Latine (Paris-Sevres, 19-23 avril 1999), Paris, 13-25.

10

Thequalificationofpersonalnames bypossessiveadjectivesin Cicero'sletters 2001b

'Modification et modalisation des noms propres: syntaxe, semantique, pragmatique', communication au 11th International Colloquium on Latin Linguistics, Universiteit van Amsterdam, June 24-9. 2003 'La determination des anthroponymes dans la Correspondancede Ciceron', Paideia57, 77-94. 2004 'Annonce et reprise des noms propres anthroponymiques', in C. Bodelot (ed.) Anaphore,cataphoreet correlationdans la phrasecomplexedu latin, Pressesde l'Universite Blaise Pascal,ERGA 6, Clermont-Ferrand, 115-29. forthcoming 'O mirificum Dolabellam meum! (Cic. Att. 14.15.2). L' cipw'tE(a de Dolabella. Accusatif exclamatif. possessif, et reference au grec', in C. Cusset (ed.) Hommages a Bernard]acquinod, Memoires du Centre Jean Palerne, Universite de Saint-Etienne. Fugier, H. 1983 'Le syntagme nominal en latin classique', in W. de Gruyter, Aufstieg und NiedergangderRomischenWelt II, 29, 1, Berlin and New York, 212-69. Gary-Prieur, M.-N. 1991 'La modalisation du nom propre', Langue Franfaise92, 4-25. 1994 Grammairedu nom propre,Paris. Jonasson, K. 1994 Le nom propre. Constructionset interpretations,Brussels. Kleiber, G. 1981 Problemesde reference:descriptionsdefinieset nomspropres,Paris. Wilmet, M. 1986a La determination nominate, Paris. 1986b 'La determination des "noms propres"', in J. David and G. Kleiber (eds.) Determinants: Syntaxe et semantique,Paris, 317 - 30.

11

2

PERSONAL NAMES AND INVECTIVE IN CICERO Javier Uria

The aim of this paper is to explore, from a linguistic point of view, the literary role of personal names in Cicero's speeches, especially where invective is concerned. Most literary approaches to personal names deal mainly with etymological wordplay, and this will be also considered here; but special attention will be paid to other uses of personal names which are not normally regarded as literary devices. They have the common trait of being - so to speak - 'improper' uses of the proper name. 1 In order to distinguish proper and improper uses, I shall start with some theoretical remarks concerning proper names; then I shall briefly consider the significance of names in Roman culture, and finally I shall attempt both a classification and an explanation of the different uses of personal names in Ciceronian invective.

I. THE

LINGUISTIC

NATURE OF PROPER NAMES

The linguistic status of proper names has been widely disputed by both philosophers and linguists, and this is not the place to set out the history of that debate. For the present purpose it is enough to start from the most accepted opinion, namely that, unlike common nouns, proper names may have referencebut not sense and that they cannot be used predicatively in the sense that common nouns can (Lyons 1977, 219). 2 This means that even when a proper name is syntactically used as a predicate, there is no predication at all; I mean, there is no pointing to any property of the subject (just contrast ThisisJohn andjohn is a postman). The relationship between a proper name and its bearer is clearly different from the relationship between a common noun and its 'denotata' (i.e. the objects to which it can be applied). Proper names 'identify their referents, not by describing them in terms of some relevant property or properties which the name denotes, but by utilizing the unique and arbitrary association which holds between a name and its bearer' (Lyons 1977, 214). According to their nature, proper names have either a referential or a vocative function (Lyons 1977, 216). Two passages in the SecondPhilippic

13

Javier Urfa

may well illustrate those two basic functions: (1) Vocative function: Cic. Phil. 2.1: te miror, Antoni, quorum facta imitere, eorum exitus non perhorrescere. I marvel that you, 0 Antonius, do not fear the end of those men whose conduct you are imitating. 3 (2) Referring function: Cic. Phil 2.2: non video nee in vita nee in gratia nee in rebus gestis nee in hac mea mediocritate ingeni quid despicere possit Antonius. I see nothing either in my life, or in my influence in the city, or in my exploits, or even in the moderate abilities with which I am endowed, which Antonius could despise.

In the first passage, the personal name is used to attract the person's attention; in the second one, Antonius identifies the person about whom some information is reported. To these two basic functions a third can be added: 'appellative utterances', the mere assignment of names to their bearers (Lyons 1977, 217), such as (3) Ibis isJohn. My name is Robert.

It is worth pointing out that the utterances in (3) are 'equative sentences' (Lyons 1977, 185), because both noun phrases are interchangeable. I mean that the sentences in (3) are not an exception to the rule according to which proper names do not normally work as predicates. Referential, vocative and appellative utterances are the so-called prototypical or central uses of the proper name (Jonasson 1994, 64). Because of their specific, referential nature, proper names belong to the so-called singular definite expressions (Lyons 1977, 179), which include also personal pronouns (such as ego, tu) and definite noun phrases such as the one in (4) Cic. P.Red. ad Quir. l 0: ...is inimicus qui ad meam perniciem vocem suam communibus hostibus praebuisset . ... the opponent who to my ruin had lent his voice to the common enemies [sc. of the country] (my translation).

The common trait of those definite expressions is that they all refer to a specific individual. In practice, they are sometimes interchangeable; for example, the complex referential utterance in (4) could be replaced by the personal name Clodius. However, it is important to clarify that, unlike proper names, which are 'context-free' (Orlandini 1995, 154), pronouns and definite noun

14

Personalnames and invectivein Cicero phrases always have a deictic element, without which reference would not be possible: they depend on the context. As for the vocative function (Jonasson 1994, 67), it is interesting to note that the use of a common noun with that function approximates to the use of a proper name or a title (Lyons 1977, 217), that is to say, a common noun in a vocative function is always a definite expression, and, again, interchangeable with the proper name, as we can see in (5) and (6). (5) Cic. Pis. 1: iamne vides, belua, iamne sentis quae sit hominum querela frontis tuae? Do you not see now, do you not feel, 0 you beast, what complaint men make of your impudence? (6) Cic. P.Red. in Sen. 16: Luci Piso, tune ausus es isto oculo, non dicam isto animo, ista fronte, non vita, tanto supercilio, non enim possum dicere tantis rebus gestis, cum A. Gabinio consociare consilia pestis meae? Lucius Piso, did you dare at that time with that eye (I will not say with that mind) with that forehead (I will not say with what character,) and with that arrogance (for I cannot say, after such achievements) to unite with Aulus Gabinius in forming plans for my ruin?

where belua can be replaced with Luci Piso and vice versa. So far I have outlined {following Lyons 1977) the main functions of proper names on the basis of which theories about their nature and usage have conventionally been constructed; I have emphasized the fact that they have reference and are definite referring expressions, but chat they do not have sense. But Lyons himself realizes chat chose are not the only functions of proper names: he states {Lyons 1977, 219), for instance, that proper names can have more or less regular associations in some cultures, in which case they have some sort of meaning {namely the type of meaning usually called 'connotation'). Moreover, this is not the only case in which a proper name seems to carry a degree of meaning. Accordingly, the most recent general studies of the subject 4 have made an effort to produce a theoretical framework which can explain both the basic - referential, vocative, appellative - and the secondary - meaningful - uses of proper names. In so doing, they deal with precisely the utterances that will interest me most in what follows. It may therefore be helpful to present a brief summary of one of those theories. Gary-Prieur (1994, 57) states chat proper names can be interpreted on three different levels: {i) Appellative interpretation {'interpretation denominative'), which is simply and uniquely based on what, since Kleiber (1981), is recognized as

15

Javier Uria the real sense of a proper name, i.e. the 'predicat de denomination'. 5 It is the interpretation to be applied to utterances such as 1here is a William in the school.It does not presuppose any previous knowledge of the real reference of the name William. (ii) Identifying interpretation ('interpretation identifiante'), which is based on both the sense of the proper name and the knowledge of its real reference. It explains the most typical uses of proper names: William lives in London. (iii) Predicative interpretation ('interpretation predicative'), which is based on both the sense of the proper names and the properties of its bearer.6 It explains the so-called metaphorical uses of proper names (see below under Improper uses (ii)). In what conditions do the so-called connotations 7 of proper names arise? How can the speaker or writer manage to show that he wants the hearer or reader to perceive something more than the mere reference of a name? We can distinguish at least two ways: pragmatically and syntactically. The connotations of a name arise 'pragmatically' when only the context or the situation (including the common knowledge of speaker and hearer) lead to the suspicion that a non-literal meaning has to be inferred; 8 for example, if. speaking about a colleague whom I do not appreciate much, I produce the utterance He is not Wilamowitz, you will immediately understand that I am not using Wilamowitz simply as a referring expression, but rather as the model of a great scholar, so that I am using the connotations that the name Wilamowitz has for classical scholars; note that in this case Wilamowitz comes close to a real predicate, a function which can not be fulfilled with proper names in their 'prototypical' functions. The connotations of a name arise 'syntactically' when it is modified with an adjunct; 9 for instance, I can make clearer that I want you to see the connotations (and not the reference) in the name Wilamowitz if I say He will be the Wilamowitz of the next century.

II. NAMES IN ROMAN CULTURE AND SOCIETY Some of the theoretical remarks that I have presented must be qualified before they can properly be applied to Roman literature. To start with, the general statement according to which proper names do not have meaning is not in agreement with what we know about Latin personal names, especially cognomina, which used to arise from simple nicknames (Jones 1996, 39). In fact, cognominawere often ascribed to their bearer later in life, 'so long as they are descriptive and not fossilized', as Jones points out. This special situation of cognomina provides an explanation for the stated contradiction: as long as their meaning remains 'motivated' (that is to say, as long as they fit their 16

Personalnamesand invectivein Cicero bearers), cognominacan not be considered grammatically as proper names: they are just definite referring expressions. Only when they stop fitting their bearers, when there is no reason for their meaning, do they fall properly into the category of proper names; even at this stage, though, they may still be used significantly through etymologizing. 10 Nevertheless, it should remain clear that the meaningful use of proper names is only a possibility 11 and never a constant characteristic, as has been argued by Paschalis ( 1997, 3) who sees 'no distinction between the meaning of a proper name and the meaning of other words'. The use of etymology for ascribing a meaning to personal names is so frequent in Roman literature that it provides most of the literary uses of proper names. Behind that fondness for etymologizing there are a number of beliefs, such as the well-known nomen omen, for which ancient Latin texts provide numerous examples (Jones 1996, 41 ff. and Urfa 1997, 127 ff.,with bibliography). In the sphere of oratory it is clear that a 'significant name' could be a source for mocking; this is the reason why, according to Plutarch ( Cic. 1), Cicero's friends recommended him to lay aside his cognomen (associated with the word for 'chickpea') when he decided to engage in politics. As for the connotations arising from names due to associations with historical individuals, Roman culture provides an extreme case in the socalled damnatio memoriae (Jones 1996, 34-6; Uria 1997, 125-6), which implied, among other things, the removal of the convict's name from public monuments as well as the 'disuse of parts of his name in the family' (Jones 1996, 34). The reverse situation is of course more common; for example we are told (Plutarch Cic. 1) that the cognomen Cicero was never dropped because the first well-known member of the family who bore it was worthy of praise.

Ill.

PERSONAL

NAMES IN CICERONIAN

INVECTIVE

Invective aims at the public denigration of a named individual, 12 so there is no doubt about the prominent role which personal names in their vocative and referential functions play within invective. In what follows, though, I will pay more attention to the 'improper' uses of proper names, which, as I have said, are more interesting from a literary point of view. My account does not purport to be a comprehensive collection of evidence, but rather a rational classification on a linguistic basis, by following this scheme: Proper uses Designative uses Vocative uses Modified proper uses Improper uses of a person's own name

17

Javier Uria modification wordplay of somebody else'sname not modified modified 1. Proper uses (i) Design,ativeuses.The personal name is used to identify the person to which the invective is addressed. (7) Cic. Dom. I 04: Publiusne Clodius, qui ex pontificis maximi domo religionem eripuit, is in meam intulit? has Publius Clodius, who removed religion even out of the house of the Pontifex Maximus, introduced it into mine? (8) Cic. Ven: 1.2: ... reus in iudicium adductus est C. Verres, homo vita atque factis omni um iam opinione damnatus, pecuniae magnitudine sua spe et praedicatione absolutus. Caius Verres is brought to trial as a criminal, a man condemned in the opinion of every one by his life and actions, but acquitted by enormousness of his wealth according to his own hope and boast.

Odd as it may seem, this usage is not very frequent. This is because it is rivalled by other definite expressions which successfully identify, given that in most of Cicero's speeches the victims of his attacks are known by the audience beforehand; and, unlike personal names, these other definite expressions can add a significant amount of meaning in such contexts:

(9) Cic.Dom. 2: nam si ilia labes ac Aamma rei publicae suum ilium pestiferum et funestum tribunatum, quern aequitate humana tueri non potest, divina religione defenderit ... For if that pest and conflagration of the republic succeeds in defending his own mischievous and fatal tribunate by appeals to divine religion, when he cannot maintain it by any considerations of human equity ...

(10) Cic.Dom. 3: sed quoniam ille demens .. . But since that madman ...

Halfway between personal names and meaningful definite expressions are tides, 13 which sometimes provide a mere identification of the person, but usually are complemented with a relative phrase:

18

Personalnamesand invectivein Cicero ( 11) Cic. P.Red. in Sen. 3: postea quam vobis decernendi potestas non est permissa per eum tribunum plebis qui, cum per se rem publicam lacerare non posset, sub alieno scelere delimit. Afi:erthe honour of making a formal decree to that effect was refused to you by the means of that tribune of the people, who as he was unable himself to injure the republic, hid behind the wickedness of another. It may be noted, however, that both these substitutes for personal names with designative function usually depend on deixis (ilia labes,ille demens, eum tribunum qui), either textual (anaphora) or situational. It can be argued that, once the target of the orator's invective is well established, the use of meaningful definite expressions is more economical than the use of the simple proper name. With the definite expression the orator achieves individual reference as well as 'evaluation' of his opponents. Moreover, the avoidance of personal names is sometimes a conscious device to get the complicity of the audience, by transmitting an idea of the type 'you know whom I am talking about'. 14

(ii) Vocativeuses.The personal name is used to attract the attention of the person who is going to be the target of invective. (12) Cic. P.Red. in Sen. 16: Luci Piso, tune ausus es isto oculo ... (passage (6) above) There are a number of variations in address using the vocative of name, and some of them may convey a degree of disdain towards the addressee which is exploited by invective. This has been studied in depth by Adams, and so I shall not deal with it here. Again proper names compete with common nouns: ( 13) Cic. Pis. 1: iamne vides, belua ... (passage (5) above)

(14) Cic.Pis. 8: aude nunc, o furia, de tuo dicere! Dare now, 0 you Fury, to describe yours! and that competition is won by common nouns, which, apart from attracting the attention of the person affected, add a 'predication', an 'evaluation' stemming from their meaning. It is worth noting that in this case there is no need of deictic or anaphoric modification: the mere use of the vocative implies singular definite reference.

19

Javier Uria

(iii)Modifiedproper uses.In each of the main functions of the personal names there is a possibility of a syntactical modification 15 which does not imply a fundamental change. Yet invective is closely related to some of them. I am thinking of utterances such as ( 15) Cic. Phil 11.12 : accedit Saxa nescio quis, quern nobis Caesar ex ultima Celtiberia tribunum plebis dedit ...

There is besides a fellow called Saxa; some man whom Caesar imported from the extremity of Celtiberia and gaveus for a tribune of the people ... (16) Cic. Phil. 13.26: alter designatus lnsteius nescio qui, fortis, ut aiunt, latro.

The other tribune elect is one Insteius, reputedly a bold robber {my translation). in which the use of an indefinite adjunct nescioquis with the personal name results in contempt for the person without altering the referring function of the name. 16 An adjunct can be also found within the address by name as in

(17) Cic.Dom. 47: Sexte noster, bona venia, quoniam iam dialecticus et haec quoque liguris... Pardon me, my good Sextus,sinceyou a dialectician and lick these things as well... (my translation). a passage which is classified by Adams with the praenomina 'used with contemptuous tone'. It seems to me that the 'contemptuous tone' arises here from the inadequacy of the intimate form of address in familiar terms 17 and the social distance which actually exists between Cicero and the scribaSextus Cloelius (Damon 1992 ). This type of 'caustic' address was surely underlined with a special intonation, like the one we can detect in the corresponding uses of English 'my dear'.

2. Improper uses I shall consider as improper uses of personal names any utterance in which those names imply more than the mere identification of a person. For the purpose of clarity, I shall distinguish two main groups: (i) use of a person's name (ii) use of a different name. (i) Useofpersons name. Either through modification or through emphasizing formal relationship with a common name, the name of a person can convey some sort of'meaning'. 20

Personalnames and invectivein Cicero Modification. We can deal here with a 'morphological modification', namely the use of the plural of personal names (Orlandini 1995, 164), because it sometimes results in metaphorical use, as in

(18) Cic.Dom. SO: tamenne arbitraris id quod M. Drusus in legibus suis plerisque, perbonus ille vir, M. Scauro et L. Crasso consiliariis non obtinuerit, id te posse, omnium facinorum et stuprorum hominem, Decumis et Clodiis auctoribus obtinere? 18 Do you still think that what Marcus Drusus, that admirable man, could not obtain in most of his laws - that what Marcus Scaurus and Lucius Crassus, as advisers, could not obtain, you can obtain through the agency of the Decumi [sic] and Clodii, the ministers of all your debaucheries and crimes?

According to Orlandini, this kind of plural proper name does not imply individualizing, but rather presents qualifying properties ('with people like Decumus and Clodius as promotors'). Although this is true of the passage above, as it is of the examples in Orlandini, we cannot generalize from it for all plurals of personal names. If we look at (19) Cic.Dom. 116: lnferiorem aedium partem adsignavit non suae genti Fonteiae, sed Clodiae, quam reliquit, quern in numerum ex multis Clodiis nemo nomen dedit nisi aut egestate aut scelere perditus. The lower part of the house he assigned not to his own Fonteian family, but to the Clodian family which he had quitted; but of all the numerous family of Clodius, no one applied for any share in his liberality except those who were utterly destitute from indigence or wickedness.

we can see that the name Clodiisrefers here to the members of the gens Clodia, i.e. to persons bearing the name Clodius.19 Accordingly, we have to admit that there can be ambiguity in this kind of utterance, an ambiguity which arises from the fact that there are persons with the same name and that the Roman nomen, like our surname, designates families as well as individuals. 20 How can we know when the plural of a nomen refers to the members of a family (e.g. 'the Clodii ') or it is rather used in its qualifying sense ('people like Clodius')? The distinction is only a pragmatic one: the context and the knowledge which is common to speaker and hearer will help the latter to decide. In passage (18) above, even a superficial knowledge of Roman legal procedure will lead us readers to reject the possibility that 'Decumis et Clodiis' refers to the members of a family, because the writing of a law (which is at issue) is entrusted to individuals and not to families.

Wordplay.This is clearly the most interesting device from a literary point of view.21 It consists of formally relating a personal name to a meaningful

21

Javier Uria word, so that the meaning of this word is somehow transferred to the personal name. Because of its variety, it deserves further classification.22 It can be based on 'homonymy' or on 'paronymy', and in both of them there is the possibility of using one or more words. The most valuable type of wordplay (in literary terms) is one-word homonymy (Ballester 2001, 235), as in: (20) Cic. Verr.4.53: Nam nos quidem quid facimus in Verre, quern in luto volutatum totius corporis vestigiis invenimus? For what is it that we are doing in respect ofVerres, who has wallowed in the mud so that we can find him out by the traces of his whole body (play on Verres and verres= 'boar')? (21) Cic. Verr.1.121: ... sed quia stomachabantur ridiculi videbantur esse, cum Sacerdotem exsecrabantur qui verrem tarn nequam reliquisset. but still, because they were angry they seemed ridiculous, while they execrated Sacerdos who had spared so worthless a boar (play also on Lidnius Sacerdos, Verres'predecessor, and sacerdos'priest'). (22) Cic. Har. Resp. 5: ltaque eum numquam a me esse accusandum putavi, non plus quam stipitem ilium qui quorum hominum esset nesciremus, nisi se Ligurem ipse esse diceret. Therefore, I never thought it necessary for me to prosecute him, any more than that blockhead, whose very nation we should be ignorant of if he did not himself say that he was a Ligurian (play on Ligus and Ligus = 'Ligurian'). 23

Instead of adding the related common name (e.g. in Verre,quem in luto quasi verrem volutatum) Cicero prefers the association to arise from the context: in luto volutatum and vestigiisremind us of a pig's behaviour; exsecrabantur, both formally and semantically, points to a priest's activity.24 In the third passage, the ambiguity comes from the possibility of interpreting the essesentence as equative ('had not he said he [his name] was Ligus') or as predicative ('had not he said he was [a] Ligurian'). Examples of a two-word homonymy in which a personal name is involved are far rarer: (23) Cic. Phil 12.20: ... cum Aquilae primi pili nummos daret, de meis bonis se dare dixit: si enim de suis dixisset, ne aquilam quidem ipsam credituram putavit . ...when he was giving some pieces of gold to Aquila the senior centurion, said that he was giving him some of my property. For, if he had said he was giving him some of his own, he thought that the eagle itself would not have believed it (Aquilathe personal name and aquilathe eagle on the coins).

22

Personalnames and invectivein Cicero Paronymic wordplay is necessarily based on the use of a word with a similar sound, as in (24) Cic. Vat.6: Ac tamen hoe, Vatini, memento, paulo post istam defensionem meam, quam tu bonis viris displicuisse dicis ... omniaque ea me pudenter vivendo consecutum esse quae tu impudenter vaticinando sperare te saepe dixisti. However, Vatinius, remember this - that a little afi:erthe time when I defended him in a way which you say gave great offence to all good men ... and that I gained all these honours by living in a modest manner, which you have over and over again said that you hoped to obtain by dealing in the most impudent prophecies ( Vatiniusand vaticinari'to predict').

The personal name can be omitted when it is easily inferred from the context, as in (25) Cic. Ven:2.19: Quo die Siciliam attigit [sc. Verres] - videte satisne paratus ex illo omine urbano ad everrendam provinciam venerit ... On the day on which he reached Sicily (see now whether he came, according to that city-wide omen, quite prepared to sweep the province) ... (Verresand everrere'to sweep' and metaphorically 'to sack').25

A special type of wordplay in Cicero is that involving a Greek word, 26 either a one-word pun as in (26) Cic. Ven: 1.104: Nam ut praetor factus est, qui auspicato a Chelidone surrexisset, sortem nactus est urbanae provinciae magis ex sua Chelidonisque quam ex populi Romani voluntate. For when he was made praetor, leaving the house of Chelidon afi:erhaving taken the auspices, he drew the lot of the city province, more in accordance with his own inclination and that of Chelidon, than with the wish of the Roman people. (The pun arises from the homonymy between the name Chelidonand the Greek word for 'swallow' in a context in which an auspicium, i. e. an augury from the behaviour of birds, is at issue.)

or a more explicit pun as in (27) Cic. Phil 11.14: ... Lysidicum ipsum, quoniam omnia iura dissolvit, nisi forte iure Germanum Cimber occidit ... a Lysidicus himself (i.e. in the Greek meaning of the word) since he has broken all laws, unless perhaps it is lawful for a Cimbrian to slay a German (the name Lysidicum is explained through iura dissolvere,Latin for Greek 11.uEtv 6tica;; see Holst 1925, SO).

23

Javier Uria (ii) Useofanotherpersons name. This is the type which may be classified as 'metaphorical' use of proper names. We find usually historical persons' names, 27 either with bad connotations which Cicero wants to underline in his adversaries or with good connotations that the orator ironically demonstrates in order to emphasize their defects. Formally, there are two possibilities: the mere use of the name (not modified) or the use of a name with an adjunct (modified).

Not modified. The connotative (predicative) use of the proper name is pragmatically inferred from the context: (28) Cic. Phil. 13.22: 'O Spartace! quern enim te potius appellem, cuius propter nefanda scelera tolerabilis videtur fuisse Catilina? 0 you Spartacus! for what name is more fit for you? you whose abominable wickedness is such as to make even Catiline seem tolerable

It is clear that Cicero applies the name Spartacusto Mark Antony with the aim of transferring to him the negative associations which the name of the famous gladiator had. We could even say that Spartacusis a sort of alternative to the common noun gladiator, a frequent insult in Ciceronian invective (Opelt 1965, 136), also applied to Mark Antony: (29) Cic. Phil 13.16: Unus furiosus gladiator cum taeterrimorum latronum manu contra patriam, contra deos penatis, contra aras et focos, contra quattuor consules gerit bellum. One frenzied gladiator, with a band of most infamous robbers, is waging war against his country, against our household gods, against our altars and our hearths, against four consuls.

The pragmatic inference (I mean, in non-technical terms, the contextual interpretation) is more easily taken from the vocative use (as in example 28). There is also the possibility of inferring the metaphoric meaning from an unexpected use of the so-called equative utterance {namely a reversible sum-sentence), as in:

(30) Cic. Div. Caec.57: Est adhuc, id quod vos omnis admirari video, non Verres, sed Q Mucius. He is still, and you may well be amazed at it, not Verres, but Quintus Mucius.

From the absurdity of Verresest Q Mucius it is inferred 28 that Q Mucius is used in a special way, namely conveying connotations of honesty, Q Mucius Scaevola being an example oflawfulness. 29 It is difficult to find an

24

Personalnames and invectivein Cicero unmodified, strictly designative use; but at least we have indirect evidence of the application of the name Gracchusto Numerius Rufus in order to depict him as a revolutionary (Opelt 1965, 145): (31) Cic. Sest. 72: Ex iis princeps emitur ab inimicis meis is quern homines in luctu inridentes Gracchum vocabant, quoniam id etiam fatum civitatis fuit ut ilia ex vepreculis extracta nitedula rem publicam conaretur adrodere. The chief of them is bought over by my enemies, whom men, laughing at him amid their indignation, were used to call Gracchus; since it was the fate of the city, that that weasel pulled out of the brambles should attempt to gnaw a hole in the republic.

However, from this 'metalinguistic' explanation it is impossible to know whether the actual reference was made with or without a modifier, such as

noster.30 Modified. The usual procedure of applying a person's name to another 31 is through a modification showing that the name is not applied to its usual bearer. A very basic modification can be done with a demonstrative adjective, asm (32) Cic. Ven:5.31: lste autem Hannibal, qui in suis castris virtute putaret oportere non genere certari, sic hanc Tertiam dilexit ut earn secum ex provincia deportaret. But that Hannibal, who thought that in his army there ought to be no rivalry of birth, but only of merit, was so much in love with this Tertia, that he carried her with him out of the province.

Here the use of iste, a deictic adjective related to the area of the addressee, makes it clear that Cicero is not referring to the real Hannibal, but actually applying his name to Verres in order to get a comic effect.32 Had Cicero used ille, he would probably have needed further modification, as in (33) Cic. Sest. 82: At vero ipsi illi parricidae, quorum ecfrenatus furor alitur impunitate diuturna, adeo vim facinoris sui perhorruerant ut, si paulo longior opinio mortis Sesti fuisset, Gracchum ilium suum transferendi in nos criminis causa occidere cogitarint. But even those very parricides, whose unbridled frenzy is nourished by long impunity, were thrown into such consternation by the violence of their deed, that if the belief in the death of Sestius had lasted a little longer, they would have done as they were thinking and have slain their own friend Gracchus, for the sake of attributing the crime to us.

25

Javier Urfa Here the possessive suum has the role of removing the ambiguity of ilium Gracchum, which could have been used ofGracchus himself (see above), but is here ironically referred to Numerius Rufus. 33 When historical characters are involved, the use is found of a modifier implying 'new: as if they were brought to life again in the person to whom their name is applied; it is the case in (34) Cic. Phil. 13.25: ...quern ita obsides, nove Hannibal aut si quis acutior imperator fuit ...

...whom you are besiegingin such a manner, 0 you new Hannibal (or if there was ever any abler general than he) ... where the use of the vocative leaves no doubt, in the context of the speech, about the actual reference: Antonius. A similar utterance can be seen in the use of noster with a Greek personal name, as in (35) Cic. Pis. 37: Confer nunc, Epicure noster ex hara producte non ex schola, confer, si audes, absentiam tuam cum mea.

Compare, now, my fine Epicurus, brought forward out of his sty, not out of his school, - compare, if you dare, your absencewith mine. a passage in which I point out chat the vocative is again crucial for identifying the reference and accordingly for interpreting Epicure in its connotative sense, for noster, as I have previously shown, can also be found with proper uses of personal names. Once the audience has noticed chat Epicure refers co Piso, noster conveys the meaning 'Roman Epicurus' (Koster 1980, 243 ), ex hara producte completing the joke. In another comic address to Piso, (36) Cic. Pis. 38: Appellatus est hie volturius illius provinciae [scil. Macedoniae], si dis placet, imperator. Ne tum quidem, Paule noster, tabellas Romam cum laurea mittere audebas?

This vulture of that province - {hear it, 0 ye gods) has been styled Imperator! And did you not even then, my great Paulus, dare to send despatches to Rome crowned with laurel? the vocative Paule noster is hinting at a comparison between Piso and Lucius Aemilius Paulus (Koster 1980, 245), the winner at Pydna in the Third Macedonian War. So Paule noster would convey something like 'you, Paulus of our times'. Again the invective value of the address comes from the obvious contrast between Piso's provincial achievements and chose of the great Aemilius Paulus. 34

26

Personalnamesand invectivein Cicero A qualifying epithet can be used with a personal name which is being applied to a different person, as in (37) Cic. Dom.72: lam neque tu id dicere audes, quern isti satellites tui 'felicem Catilinam' nominant, neque quisquam eorum qui solebant. Even you, whom those henchmen of yours call the fortunate Catiline, do not dare to affirm that, nor do any one of those men who used to say so, venture to say so now.

a very interesting passage in spite of its metalinguistic phrasing. Afelix Catilina ('a lucky Catiline') is a man who, as in the case of Clodius, shares Catiline's traits but has been luckier than he.

It is now time to sum up and conclude. In Latin, as in most languages, personal names have a peculiar linguistic nature. On the one hand, in order to fulfil their main function, identification of an individual, they can have no meaning, for their having meaning would make them applicable to more than one denotatum (as is the case with common nouns). On the other hand, any act of nomination is taken very significantlyby human beings: we give names afi:erfathers, grandfathers or even famous men (actors, singers, football players and so on), either just honouring them or also hoping for their character to be transferred to the newborn from the positive feelings associated with their names. Romans were even fonder of this sort of meaningful nomination, which does not limit itself to newborns, but can continue through their lives, for some adults change their names when they are adopted, generals add new names from the towns or provinces they conquer, and even towns get new names stemming from some good wish or other. It is this 'significant' gap between the human tendency to make proper names become meaningful names and the linguistic system preventing them from doing so that is really exploited by literature.

Notes 1

Linguistic approaches to usages of this kind in Latin are those of Orlandini 1995 and, most recently, Biville 2003 and Vallat 2002. 2 Among classicists, the linguistic nature of proper names has been most recently summarized by Vallat 2003, 151, to whom I owe some recent references on this topic. 3 Unless otherwise stated, translations are from the Loeb edition by C.D. Yonge available from the Perseus Digital Library. 4 Especially Jonasson 1994 and Gary-Prieur 1994. Both of them are indebted to Kleiber 1981. 5 According to this, the sense of a name X is 'to be called X'. For a different view see Jonasson 1991 and 1994.

27

Javier Urfa 6

This is what Gary-Prieur 1994, 46 styles 'contenu' (meaning) of proper names, namely 'un ensemble de proprietes du referent initial associe au nom propre qui interviennent clans !'interpretation de certains enonces contenant ce nom'. 7 I am now using the term 'connotation' in a very general sense. 8 See Gary-Prieur 1994, 80: ' ... la faussete de !'identification conduit a chercher une interpretation metaphorique'. 9 For the role of adjuncts, seeJonasson 1991, 77: 'Les complements font done naitre un contraste a l'interieur du SN hebergeant le Npr metaphorique entre le referent original et sa propriete ou son appartenance ... Ce contraste freine une interpretation "litterale" du Npr'. 10 See Vallat 2003, 151: 'S'il arrive que le sens lexical eventuel du nom propre (comme clans les cognominalatins) soit remotive, alors l'acte referentiel perd sa force et se virtualise pour laisser la preeminence au jeu de mots'. 11 Even Greek personal names, which are mostly 'etymologically transparent', must be seen in this way; otherwise, we would be obliged to admit, inter alia, that the meaning of an adjective derived from a personal name (say Telamonius)is not 'relating or pertaining to Telamon' but rather 'relating or pertaining to a swordbelt', which is absurd. 12 OCD 3 an. 'invective'. 13 Strictly speaking, it is properly 'uniquely referring titles' (Lyons 1977, 181) that come close to being proper names, so that they are usually capitalized in English: the Pope, the Dean, the President, the Queen, the King. 14 This could explain why in some speeches such as the postreditum orationes,persons like Clodius, Piso and Gabinius are hardly named or addressed by their name. This was pointed out by Catherine Steel in a paper given at the Colloquium on Ciceronian Invective which was held in Swansea in May 2001. Asimilar remark is made by Adams 1978, 164: 'Nonaming can also be illustrated from the speeches. Cicero sometimes avoids naming an enemy explicitly,even though he might speak about him at some length. At Sest. 15 ff.,for example, he discusses Clodius, Gabinius, and Piso in succession without naming any of them'. 15 As for 'modification' of proper names, a recent account can be found in Orlandini 1995, 158-65, although she does not deal with modification through the demonstratives or with the type Saxa nesdoquis.See further Biville 2003. 16 I shall not deal here with the type erat Pipa quaedam (for which see Orlandini 1995 and Serbat 1984), because it does not seem to imply contempt. It rather conveys the idea that the speaker knows nothing but the name of the person (see Kleiber 1991, 28). 17 Adams 1978, 165: 'Of the two intimate forms of address, that by praenomenwas used only within closed circles (the family, small cliques of mutual friends)'. 18 See also Cic. Dom. 21 ... quem tuis Sergiis,Lolliis, Titiis ceterisquecaediset incendiorum ducibus obieceras... ('whom you had exposed to your Sergii, and Lollii, and Titii, and your other leaders in massacre and conflagration'); 89 cui populo duces Lentidios, Lollios, Plaguleios,Sergiospraefaceras('a people to whom you gave the Lentidii, and Lollii, and Plaguleii, and Sergii, for leaders'); Phil. 8.9 Omnes Cafanes,omnes Saxae ceteraequepestes ('All the Cafos, all the Saxas, and the other plagues'). 19 A further possibility is the use of the plural to name a father and his son, as in Cic. Att. 11.10.1, where QQ refers to the two Quinti, father and son. 20 In fact, when used as a family name, the linguistic behaviour of a Roman nomen is different from the one described here for proper names; it can be used as a kind of'label' and, accordingly, it acts eventually as a predicate, for example in Cic. Dom. 35 Tu neque

28

Personalnamesand invectivein Cicero Fonteiuses,qui essedebebas,nequepatris heres('You are not Fonteius, as you ought to be, nor the heir of your new father'), and it can even be modified by an adverb (as adjectives can) as in Cic. Sest. 130 vir egregiusac vereMetellus('that illustrious man, - that genuine Metellus'). Again, there could be ambiguity in such uses:Metellusmay be interpreted either as 'a member of the Metellan branch of the gens Caecilia',or as 'a man who shares some of the traits of another man whose name is Metellus';for these ambiguities of interpretation see Gary-Prieur 1994,30. 21 Gary-Prieur 1994,55 states that connotations arising from the homonymy between a proper name and a common noun are the most frequent source for the 'onomastique litteraire'. It is worth noting that in these cases connotations come from the form of the proper name, and not from its referent. The literary value of these utterances comes from their being at the same time 'proper' designative and 'improper' meaningful uses; this results in some sort of pun which is decoded by the audience, thus producing aesthetic pleasure. 22 I have derived much benefit from the detailed classification by Ballester 2001, who pays attention to anthroponyms as well. Most of the examples are taken from Holst 1925, although some of them are also commented on by Opelt 1965 and Koster 1980.A useful collection of examples is also available in Laurand 1928,240-2. See most recently Lopez 2003 with examples from both the speeches and the letters. 23 The homonymy between the family name Ligusand the Latin name for the Ligurians is observed in Cic. Cluent.72. 24 For both passages see Lopez 2003, 585. 25 See asimilar pun with verrit(vertitcodd.) in Cic.Div. Caec.57. 26 On this type of bilingual wordplay see further Vallat (this volume). 27 Usually, but not only; see, for instance, Cic. Att. 5.20.9, where meus Alexis refers to Tiro, Alexis being 'Atticus' Tiro' (the example is taken from Biville's handout for the conference; see further her contribution to this volume). See further Jonasson 1991,73, who distinguishes two types of metaphorical proper names 'dont les uns seraient plus ou moins lexicalises, les autres pas du tout'. 28 See Gary-Prieur 1994, 80: ' ...la faussete de !'identification conduit a chercher une interpretation metaphorique'. 29 So it is actually the historical character Q Mucius, and not the mere name Q Mucius, that is at this point significant, and thus it is 'contenu' (meaning) of proper names which is here at issue, according to Gary-Prieur's terminology (see above my n. 6). 30 Taking a cue from Cic. Sest. 82 Gracchumilium suum ('that Gracchus of theirs', see passage 33), I would suggest that they styled Rufus Gracchusnoster('our Gracchus'). 31 I owe most of the examples to Opelt 1965,145. 32 Further implications of the use of the demonstrative with the proper name have been explored by Kleiber 1991. In the passage at issue, we could see an example of what he calls 'qualification deictique', because it is based on 'un evenement saillant dans la situation implicant le referent' (Kleiber 1991, 95). In other words, iste leads to a particular kind of Hannibal - treated here as the general par excellence,namely the one who in suis castrisvirtuteputaret oporterenon generecertari... Similar remarks would apply, for example, to Cic. Cael. 18 hanc Palatinam Medeam ('this Medea of the Palatine'). 33 Not to Clodius, as Opelt 1965,145supposes. 34 Similar uses of noster are frequent in the Letters: Cic. Att. 2.22.1 Pulchellum nostrum, 15.22nosterCytherius,1.18.3hie nosterParis(see Biville this volume).

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Javier Uria

Bibliography Adams,J.N. 1978 'Conventions of naming in Cicero', CQ71, 145-66. Ballester, X. 'Juegos de palabras en Ruiz de Moros', Myrtia 16, 231- 57. 200 l Biville, F. 'Modification et modalisation des noms propres. Syntaxe et semantique', 2003 Paideia58, 77-94. Damon,C. 1992 'Sex. Cloelius, scriba',HSCPh 94, 227-50. Gary-Prieur, M.-N. Grammairedu nom propre,Paris. 1994 Holst,H. 1925 Die Wortspielein CicerosReden, Oslo. Jonasson, K. 1991 'Les noms propres metaphoriques: construction et interpretation', in M.-N. Gary-Prieur (ed.) Syntaxe et semantique des noms propres {Languefranraise 92), Paris. 1994 Le nom propre. Constructionset interpretations,Louvain. Jones, F. 1996 Nominum ratio. Aspects of the use of personal names in Greek and Latin, Liverpool. Kleiber, G. 1981 Problemesde reference:Descriptionsdef/inieset nomspropres,Paris. 1991 'Du nom propre non modifie au nom propre modifie: le cas de la determination des noms propres par l'adjectif demostratif', in M.-N. Gary-Prieur (ed.) Syntaxe et semantique des nomspropres,Langue fram;aise 92, Paris. Koster, S. 1980 Die /nvektive in der griechischenund romischenLiteratur, Meisenheim am

Gian. Laurand, L. 1928 Etudes sur le style des discoursde Ciceron,3rd edn, Paris. L6pez,M. 2003 'Los nombres propios como factor de comicidad en Cicer6n', in C. Alonso de! coloquiointernadel Real et al. (eds.) Vrbsaeterna. Actasy colaboraciones cional 'Roma entre la literaturay la historia:Homenaje a la profesoraCarmen Castillo,Pamplona. Lyons,J. 1977 Semantics, 2 vols., Cambridge. Opelt, I. 1965 Die lateinischeSchimpfworterund verwandtesprachlicheErscheinungen.Eine Typologie,Heidelberg. Orlandini, A.M. 1995 II riferimento de! nome. Un' analisi semantico-pragmaticade! nome latino, Bologna. Paschalis, M. Vergil'sAeneid. Semantic relationsand propernames, Oxford. 1997

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Personalnames and invectivein Cicero Serbat, G. 1984 'Erat Pipa quaedarn', REL 62, 344-56. Uria,J. Tabuy eufemismoen latin, Amsterdam. 1995 Vallat, D. 2002 'Les noms propres metaphoriques: aspects referentiels et semantiques' in A.M. Bolkenstein (ed.) Theoryand descriptionin Latin linguistics:Selectedpapers from the XIth International Colloquiumon Latin Linguistics,Amsterdam. 2003 'Un cas d'onomastique bilingue: les anthroponymes grecs chez Martial', in R. Oniga (ed.) II plurilinguismonella tradizioneletterarialatina, Rome.

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3

TIBULLUS' NEMESIS: DIVINE RETRIBUTION AND THE POET Emma Stafford

In Book 2 of the ElegiesTibullus presents himself as infatuated with a woman called Nemesis. Not only is nemesis the Greek word for 'retribution' or 'righteous indignation', but Nemesis personified was worshipped as a fullyfledged goddess from as early as the sixth century BC in Attica, and was to become widely recognized throughout the Roman Empire in the second and third centuries AD. While both Propertius' Cynthia and Tibullus' Delia have names which make indirect reference to Artemis-Diana, the naming of Nemesis directly afi:er a goddess is unparalleled amongst the mistresses of elegiac, and the name is difficult to read in the same way as a compliment to the woman's beauty, or a reference to her role as the poet's inspiration, via associations with Apollo. 1 Many attempts have been made to explain the name ofTibullus' Nemesis. Most scholars quite reasonably begin by looking at the character of the goddess Nemesis - Smith's idea that Tibullus is 'getting even' with Delia allows him to point to the goddess's significance as 'retributive justice', while Cairns picks up on her reputation for implacability.2 Some characterizations of the goddess invoked in this context, however, like those of Bright and Lee, seem to depend entirely on the Hesiodic genealogy which makes Nemesis a daughter of Night, and a Jt~µa, a 'bane' to mankind. 3 These descriptions fail to take into account many more positive representations of the goddess which would have been available to Tibullus, including Hesiod' s own account in the Worksand Days ( 197-201) of Nemesis' association with Aidos, the two goddesses leaving the earth at the end of the Age of Iron in disgust at mankind's corruption and arrogant injustice. The more one-sided characterizations of the goddess are of course influenced by readings of the character ofTibullus' durapuella, and occasionally the distinction between the two is lost sight of, as in Elder's wonderful declaration: 'Chains and lashes - these are what Nemesis is.'4 While Tibullus has indeed sometimes been accused of masochism, it seems to me unfair to impute a corresponding sadism to Nemesis the goddess until long afi:er the first century BC. 5 The

33

Emma Stafford most plausible interpretations offered to date point rather to the goddess Nemesis' characterization in Hellenistic poetry, where she is especially associated with erotic themes, and to the thematic significance of retribution in Tibullus' two-book collection as a whole. 6 There are, however, also a number of external factors which may have influenced Tibullus' choice of name, and which I think deserve more consideration than has been devoted to them hitherto. In this paper I shall review the issue in the light of what we know about the goddess Nemesis' cult and her presence in first-century Roman thought. Names real and assumed The first question we should consider, at least briefly, is whether Nemesis was ever used as a real name by a historical woman. I do not mean for a moment to imply a literal existence for Tibullus' Nemesis outside the text of his elegies, but it is important to establish how plausible or otherwise the name is for a character who is at least presented as a real woman. 7 lheophoric names in general are of course very common in the Greek world, though more usually they take either a compound form (Apollodoros, Poseidippos, lhemistokles) or a slightly altered form (Demetrios, Dionysios, Artemisia), rather than repeating the name of the deity exactly. There are a few instances of mortals called Artemis or Hermes, but such literal theonymy is relatively rare, and mostly dates from the first century AD or later.8 The study of such names, with their possible implications for cult practice in particular areas, has been greatly facilitated by the appearance over the last twenty years of the Lexicon of GreekPersonalNames.9 lhe Lexicon has several entries for Nemesis-related names, with a wide geographical spread and dates from the first century BC to the third century AD. 10 'Nemesion', 'Nemesianos' and 'Nemesios' all follow standard conventions for forming men's names, but there are also a number of instances of the straightforward feminine 'Nemesis', most interesting for our purposes being the five Nemeseis attested in imperial-period inscriptions from Italy. While the context does not tell us a great deal about any of the women in question, the epigraphic evidence does at least confirm that the name is not entirely confined to Tibullus' literary imagination. 11 Another possible avenue of enquiry is suggested by the fact that Tibullus' Nemesis is apparently a courtesan. 12 A great number of Greek prostitutes' names are conveniently collected in Lucian's Dialogues and Alkiphron's Letters of Courtesansalong with the thirteenth book of Athenaios' Deipnosophists.Some of the names in Athenaios are explicitly glossed as 'nicknames' ( EJtll Bendidoros/a, Bendiphanes, 78), though he acknowledges some exceptions and problems in positing a direct relationship. 10 LGPNis.v. N{µrnLi;2 entries (Crete 1st cent. BC/AD, Cyrene ?2nd cent. AD); s.v. NEµrn(wv 1 entry (Cyrenaica, C2nd cent. AD). LGPN II s.v. NEµrntavoi; 2 entries 2 entries (Athens 3rd cent. AD). LGPN Illa s.v. (Athens 3rd cent. AD); s.v. NEµfoLOc; N{µrnLc;6 entries (Lakonia 1st cent. AD, Campania 1st cent. BC and 'imperal period', Pompeii 1st cent. BC/ AD, Lucania 'imperial', Volcei 'imperial'). LGPNIIIb s.v. NEµfoLoc; 1 entry (Boiotia, 1st cent. BC/ AD). 11 One example (I/ta! IIl.i.53) is the tombstone of a 10-year-old girl Epictesidis, naming a Nemesis and an Epictetus as her parents; another ( CIL IV 1547 e) is a single word scrawled retrograde on a wall in the Vico degli Scienziati in Pompeii. The others are

44

Tibullus'Nemesis:divine retributionand thepoet CIL 121622,C/L 122752, PdelP33 (1978) p.64no. 8. Still due to come out are volumes of the LGPN on Macedonia, the Balkan area and south Russia (IV), and the coastal regions of Asia Minor (V). 12 Although she seems independent in 2.3-5, the introduction of her lena Phryne at the end of 2.6 confirms her status; cf. 1.5.47-58 for Delia's lena. On prostitutes' legal and economic status, see Flemming 1999, and especially 47-50 on the difficulty of establishing a hierarchy of prostitutes in the Roman world. On the figure of the lena, both historically and as a conventional literary character, see Myers 1996. 13 Athenaios 13.596£ (A~µri) and 587b (npooic~vwv). 14 Athenaios 13.577c (Xopriy(£); Alkiphron, Letters ofCourtesans8, 9, 13 and 14 (TIEta1..ri). nuicEpa: Athen. 13 passim,plus Lucian and Alkiphron. 15 Athenaios 13.577a, 578b-79d, 583e, 587f, 593b. Lucian's prostitutes include the more down-to-earth 'Vine-plant' and 'Goldware' (AµnEAL£,Xpuo(£, Dialoguesofthe LettersofCourtesans14). Courtesans8), Alkiphron's 'Little Coal' (Av0paKLOV, 16 See Stafford 2000, 111-45 on Peitho, and 173-97 on Eirene. 17 e.g. at Athens: LGPN II s.v. 'Eirene' (35 entries), and 'Eirenaios' (109 entries); Stafford 2000, 190. 18 LGPN s.v. '01..uµnt«£.The situation here is complicated by the possible alternative route for the derivation from Zeus Olympios. 19 Athen. 13.587c, citing Hypereides, Against Patroklesfor mention of Nemeas, and Polemon, On the Akropolisfor the prohibition. Parker (2000, 65) describes the law as 'mysterious', pointing out that plenty of slaves had theophoric names of the more usual types. 20 Nemeas is called a n:6pvri here, sentence structure in the Greek offering a nice oxymoronic juxtaposition with the n;uv~yupL£tlvbo1;otatri.Schneider ( 1913, cols. 135871) lists 303 names attributed to hetairai in fifth- and fourth-century literature and epigraphy. More recently, Lewis (2002, 107-9) looks at the problem of distinguishing prostitute-names on Attic vases, and Ogden (1999, 247-52) discusses the names of prostitutes working at the courts of various Hellenistic kings. 21 Smith {1964, 55-6) suggests that Glycera might be the real identity of either Delia or Nemesis. Bright {1978, 106) dismisses the idea as unfounded, suggesting that Horace might even have invented the name purely for the sake of the nice oxymoron inmitis

Glycera. 22

Acron on Sat. 1.2.64: eodemnumerosyllabarumcommutationemnominumfocit. On the problems with this passage, see especially Bright 1978, 108-1 O; see also Wyke 1989, 28-9 and Maltby 2002, 42-3. 24 See Maltby 2004, 114-21. 25 On the aptness of Nemesis' name to the context see also Bright 1978, 202-3 {on 2.3.55), 214-15 {on 2.4.55-60) and 221-4 {on 2.6.21-8). On 2.6 he comments (224) on the goddess' Nemesis association with the dead and suggests that the dead sister appealed to in the following lines (29-40) is meant to be 'the Nemesis of the dead', come to punish the puella Nemesis for her hybris. 26 On Tibullus' general debt to Hellenistic poetry, see Cairns 1979. In addition to the epigrams considered here, Nemesis appears briefly in Callimachus' Hymn (6) to Demeter 1.56, and several times in Menander: Nemesisappears to be the title of a play, the goddess is associated with Adrasteia in a fragment {fr. 266: Abpaotna ical I 0Ea oicu0pwn:ENEµEuµ~pEwi;. Plutarch attributes this story to Varro and Juba, either of whom would make a plausible predecessor to Virgil in his use of 'Jhybris.But Plutarch's manuscripts offer E>uµ~pEwi; without variation, and Juba in another fragment securely attributed to him called the river Tt~Epti;: 'Qot(a, n:611.ti; 'l'ta11.(ai;.'I6~ai; Ev n:pwtcp'Pwµ..rov Ilav al:1to>..oc; E'LTJ ••• ('Then Pan, who reveals all and always moves about, is rightly called goat-herd'). 16 According to Cratylus,therefore, Pan is the bearer of any kind of discourse and since he is ai.Jto>..oc; ('a goat-herd') he n:01..Et ad ('always moves about'). In Phaedrus (263d), too, Pan 17 is also considered to be tEXVLKoc; npoc; 1..oyouc;('proficient in the art of speech') together with the Acheloan Nymphs. This Platonic work is significant to us not only for the references to Pan but more importantly because in it, as scholarship has shown, are found the beginnings of an analogy which converts a herdsman to a poet, 18 according to which 'Socrates likens himself to a sheep or goat, Phaedrus to a shepherd' in Gutzwiller's words. 19 This association of the ai.Jto>..oc; with the poet will see its culmination in the Hellenistic bucolic poetry (Theocritus) and its Latin counterpart, Virgil's Eclogues. The characteristics of Pan that we have just seen form the underlayer of ('goat-herd') and the phrase the Virgilian text. The attribute of the ai.Jto>..oc; aEl noi,,rov('he who always moves about') which the Platonic text assigns to Pan are in a way the presupposition for the linquens...adsisof our proem (lines 16-18) supported by the ovium custos(17) 20 and point to the notion of Nomioswhich in the Hom. Hymn 19.5 is an attribute of this god. 21 Pan is connected in tradition not only to speech 22 in general but also to poetic discourse in particular. This is shown in both Plato's and Theocritus' work. The latter associates the god with poetry and music from his very first

Idyll ( 1.3). abu n TOlj,t81,ptoµpUOlV'diac>Eyap oi Jtap0EVL1] 1 EJtLJtotµatvouoav t1]A.00EvAtµovt11i;, xeovlmi; JtapaKat0Eto vuµ(J)ati;, a'i Atf3u11viviµovto Jtapal Muptwotov a1rcoi;. i!v0a c>'i\.ptotatov otf3qi tEKEV,8v KaA.fouotv .i\ypfo K«lNoµtov JtOA.UA.tjLOL AtµovtfjEi;. t~V µEv yap qJLA.Ott]tL 0Eoi; JtOLtjoato VUµ(J)t]V mhou µai'EVElKEV Vt]JtLUXOV Xdpwvoi; {m' avtpOLOLVKOµEE00at. t0 ml aE1;1]0EVtL 0ml yaµov iµvtjotEUOav

510

Moilom, iiuotopl.11vtE 8t:0JtpoJtl.a; t' il>l.oo~av· 36 rot µtv imv µ~A.WV 8foav ifpavov, 300' ivtµovto aµ JtEC)LOV 0t11i; A0aµo.vnov aµ(J)Lt' ipuµv~v "00puv 1avo'to. v~ooui; ~µoi; c>'ovpav60Ev Mwwlc>ai; E(J)A.EYE l:ELptoi;, ovc>' EJtl c>t]poVEt]VaKOi;EVVUEtUOLV, tfjµoi; t6vy' EKUA.EOoav E(J)t]µoouvmi;'EKO.toLO kotµoil aA.E~tJtilpa. A.LJtEV (), OYEJtatpoi; E(J)Etµfi 0L1]V, EVC)EKEq>KatEVUOOato,A.aovaydpai; Tiappo.mov, tOLJtEPtE Au1 l:ELpLq> avt0 tE Kpovtc>nALL. tOLOb' EK1]tL ya'tav Em'lj,uxoumv Et~Olat EKAtoi; a-Opm ijµata twoapai'i!n vuv LEpfjEi; ClvtOA.EWV JtpoJtapOL0EKuvoi; pi!;,ouot 0u1111.ai;.

(Apoll. Rhod. Arg. 2.500-27) Among men of an earlier age, it is said, a girl called Kyrene grazed her flocks beside the marshes of Peneios. She wished to remain a virgin and to keep her bed undefiled, but once when she had her flocks beside the river Apollo snatched her up and, carrying her far from Haimonia, handed her over to the protection of the nymphs of the land who lived beside the Hill of Myrtles in Libya. There she bore Phoibos a son, Aristaios, whom the inhabitants of Haimonia, rich in grain, call Agreus and Nomios. In his affection for her, the god made her there a long-lived nymph and huntress, but he took her baby son to be brought up in the cave of Cheiron. When the child had grown up, the divine Muses sought out a wife for him, and taught him the arts of healing

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Helen Peraki-Kyriakidou and prophecy; they also made him keeper of their flocks which grazed the Athamantian plain of Phthia, around sheer Othrys and the sacred stream of the river Apidanos. When Sirius was burning the islands of Minos with its fire from heaven and for a long time the inhabitants had found no relief, then the Far-Darter advised them to summon Aristaios to save them from the pestilence. At his father's bidding Aristaios left Phthia and settled in Ceos, having gathered together the Parrhasian people who are descended from the race of Lykaon. He built a large altar to Zeus, god of rain, and in due order performed sacrifices on the mountains to Sirius and to Zeus himself, son of Kronos. For this reason, the Etesian winds which Zeus sends cool the earth for forty days, and to this day on Ceos priests make offerings before the rising of the dog-Star. (tr. Hunter)

In Apollonius, Aristaeus is Apollo's son, a 'Hunter' and 'Shepherd' (i\ypEui; and N6µwi;). In the proem to GeorgicsI not only the name of the island of Ceos,but also the attribute Nomios has its place, as implied by the phrase cui pinguia Ceae Iter centum nivei tondent dumeta iuvenci (translated above, pp. 83-4. N6µwi;, however, is also an attribute of Pan,37 as we have seen, as well as of Apollo. 38 In tradition Aristaeus and Apollo have sometimes been equated: Servius (ad 1.14) gives the information: quem (sc.Aristaeum) Hesiodusdicit Apollinempastoralem ('whom [sc. Aristaeus] Hesiod calls pastoral Apollo'). So, through the text of Apollonius, Aristaeus is not simply recalled but is also given attributes of his father Apollo, who is the god of poetry, and also has some similarities with Pan, a deity ofliterature and poetry too. Furthermore, in the Argonauticathe Muses have taught Aristaeus 39 the art of healing (aKEotoplri)and the art of prophecy (Owrrporda) also connected with the poets. In Georgics4 Proteus teaches Aristaeus to seek and learn the causes of things, the aitia, also a poet's skill.40 Now, there is another source which may lie hidden behind the Virgilian text, namely Pindar's Pythian 9. 59-65. t60t n:a'i6n t£~Etm [sc. Kup~vT]]. 8v KAmo:; 'Epµfr:; l'U0p6voti; "QpmOL KCll ru[i;i (lVEAU>V !;w, and enters into conflict with the verb periclitatur, 'is in danger'. This results in some very pointed contradictions, which in the case of Gaurus approach oxymoron: I, tibi dispereas,Gaure: pusillus homo es.

(5.82.4)

Go to hell, Gaurus, you are a paltry fellow. The adjective yailpot; means 'proud' and, as a name, it contrasts here directly with its Latin antonym pusillus, with its suggestion of 'pusillanimous: Outside jokes, activation by antiphrasis also permits the emphasis of tragic irony in the case of a well-known name that has not lived up to its promise of happiness: Flete nefas uestrum, sed toto flete Lucrino, Naiads, et luctus sentiat ipsa Thetis. Inter Baianas raptus puer occidit undas Eutychos ille, tuum, Castrice, duke latus.

(6.68.1-4)

Weep for your crime, Naiads, and weep for it in the whole of the Lucrine. Let Thetis herself hear your grief. Snatched away in the waters of Baiae, young Eutychos is dead, your sweet companion, Castricus. The Greek Eutychos is the semantic equivalent of the Latin felix, but the referent of this name has met the saddest of destinies, made explicit in the context by terms such as nefasand luctus. If a name with a lexical origin is not in a relationship of analogy or antiphrasis, it is not activated and thus is not significant in situ. But one sometimes sees a double network of activation, both analogical and antiphrastic, the best example of which is without doubt that of Chione: Digna tuo cur sis indignaque nomine, dicam. Frigida es et nigra es: non es et es Chione.

(3.34)

Why you both deserve and do not deserve your name, I will tell you. You are cold and dark: you both are and are not Snow White. By playing here on the resemblance and difference between the referent and her name (which means 'snowy'), the author offers proof of the conscious character of his use of significant names: for one, he himself decodes the

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Daniel "Vallat proper name, explaining to the reader the process to be followed and thus asserting his own onomastic art. c. Complexactivation: compoundproper names Finally, there is a type of activation peculiar to Greek, that based on compound names, which brings with it a greater complexity: with two parts carrying meaning, the semantic potential is increased. It is thus possible that, of the two lexically significant parts, only one is activated, the other remaining semantically inert. Non donem tibi cur meos libellos oranti totiens et exigenti miraris, Theodore? Magna causa est: dones tu mihi ne tuos libellos.

(5.73)

Are you surprised that I do not give you my little books, you who beg and press me so often, Theodorus? There is a good reason: it is so that you won't give me yours.

Here, the second member -dorusis clearly activated by the Latin verb donare. But I do not see how, without becoming involved in wild hermeneutic speculation, one could justify an activation of the first part Theo-:there is no question of gods in this epigram. More frequently Martial likes to play on both members of the compound. Thus, on another occurrence of the name Theodorus: Pierios vatis Theodori flamma penates abstulit. Hoe Musis et tibi, Phoebe, placer? 0 scelus, o magnum facinus crimenque deorum, non arsit pariter quod domus et dominus!

{11.93)

The flames have consumed the poet Theodorus' penates, dedicated to the Muses. Does that please you, Muses, and you, Apollo? What a crime, what a great violation, what an offence by the gods: that the poet did not burn at the same time as his house!

The Theo- element is made significant by the presence of deorum and of Phoebe,while one could deduce in absentia and Kat' avt(cppaoLV the sense of -dorus thanks to the overall point of the epigram: the 'gift of the gods' is nothing but a bad poet who should have burnt with his house. This activation of both members is even clearer at 6.81, where the complexity ofMartial's word-play is evident: lratus tamquam populo, Charideme, lavaris

(6.81.1)

You wash, Charidemeus, as if you were angry with the whole people.

130

Bilingual word-playon personalnames in Martial The second element of the name -demus, derived from bfjµo~, 'people', is activated by the presence of its Latin semantic equivalent populo. As far as the first element Chari- is concerned, this is activated by the antiphrasis with the Latin iratus.Thus, the two elements are semantically activated by the context, in the same verse and in praesentia,but according to two different procedures: the first by antiphrasis and the second by analogy. This illustrates well both the complexity of the technique and the great pleasure taken in it by the author. Finally, compound Greek names ofi:en have as their first element a god's name: this is a third type of figure since the theonym has a specific status of its own. In itself, of course, it is not significant: the name of a god, semantically speaking, means nothing. Nevertheless it is associated with a rich, if somewhat unfocused, fund of associations. The result is a compound in which both parts are activated, but only the second is meaningful: Hermogenes tantus mapparum, Castrice, fur est quantus nummorum uix, puto, Massa fuit;

(12.28.1-2)

Hermogenes is as big a thief of napkins, Castricus, as Massa scarcely was, I believe, of coins.

In epigram 12.28 the name signifies 'born of Hermes'. This is particularly appropriate for a robber, as Hermes was the titular deity of thieves. The whole epigram plays on the half-semantic, half-cultural significance of the name.

d Some remarkson the semanticsofpropernames Significant proper names form a particular semantic category: it seems that we are dealing with a pure signifier, at the phrastic, but not at the syntactic level. The semantic relationship which joins the proper name and its activating term exists outside all logical rules and is related to the stylistic figure of hypallage, as is shown by the example of Hilarus above: this noun is activated by the adjective laeta, the Latin synonym of the Greek t)..apo~, but syntactically and referentially this adjective is connected with iuga. This relationship is thus parasyntactical, since it ignores syntactical and grammatical relations between words and simply imposes a pure significance. It is also preferential, that is to say that it overrides the semantic relations of the phrasal unit: if laeta refers to iuga, it cannot refer to Hilarus. Nevertheless, the process of activating the proper name is content with a simple association of ideas, as ifit existed independently of the syntactical and referential framework of the phrase. Furthermore, the meaning of the proper name does not have a syntactic position within the phrasal unit, since it functions outside this unit, in a second level of meaning. The semantic value of a significant proper name thus diverges considerably from that of a common noun.

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Daniel Vallat

3. Invented personal names Apart from the two main types of activation which govern the relationships between a Greek proper name and its Latin context, bilingual name-plays can equally rely on the proper name itself and its manner of formation. a. Formation by agglutination Rare though it may be, the invention of personal names is not entirely absent from Martial' s corpus. It takes place in different ways, as for example in epigram I.SO by agglutination: Si tibi Mistyllos cocus, Aemiliane, vocatur, dicatur quare non Taratalla mihi?

( 1.50)

If your cook, Aemilianus, is called Mistyllos, why could not mine be called Taratalla?

In this piece Martial finds fault with the arbitrary nature in which slaves are named in Rome. In order to make fun of the master's ignorance, he presents a master who names his cook, by analogy, Mistyllos, from the Homeric verb µto-tu11.11.ov, 'they cut up'. 7 This is an incorrect derivation as the verb twice changes category, becoming first a noun and then a proper name. In order to expose the absurdity of this name, Martial takes up the Homeric verse involved and uses the words following mistyllon to make another name: t' a.pa tctA.A.abecomes Taratalla(Giegengack 1969, 88). It is an agglutinative formation which fixes a string of particles etc. to integrate them into a new category, in this case a proper name. Homeric language thus serves, within this epigram, as an onomastic reserve to be exploited at will, without any regard to the actual sense of the words, especially with Taratalla, which has no real significance. In this unique example, a knowledge not only of Greek, but also of Homeric formulae, is indispensable, since, for a non-Greek speaker Taratalla resembles a foreign name, like, for example, the Numidian name Masinissa, a perfectly acceptable name which would have involved no finesse at all on Martial' s part. That would have been a pity: no other invented name shows such inspiration.

b. Supercode Elsewhere Martial uses the technique of supercodewith the name Calliodorus (5.38. etc.). This technique consists of retaining 'de l'onomastique ses traits formels les plus frequents et les plus characteristiques pour les accentuer, de fa(ion aetre "plus probant que la realite meme"' (Baudelle 1989, 74). Now the name Calliodorusis not found in literature, except in Martial. It is not

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Bilingual word-playonpersonalnamesin Martial found in the Greek world and no onomastic manual indexes it. 8 The fact is that Calliodorus,although it has the structure and every appearance of a Greek proper name, is not one. The truth is that Greek composites derived from KUA.AO£ have forms in either KUA.ALor KUA.o-, but not KUA.A.Lo-. I would not claim that Martial invented the form: tomorrow, perhaps, an inscription from the classical period with this form could appear. But up to the present, none has come to light. The way the name is formed looks exactly like an invention. The expected form would be Ca(l)lidorus, attested in Plautus (Pseudolus), but it cannot be accommodated to dactylic verse. For this reason recourse was had to an analogical form, incorrect in Greek, but acceptable for a philhellenic Latin ear. The fact is that the insertion of a connective element -o-, resulting from the thematic declension, is incorrect in Greek when the first part of the compound ends in -i; but this element was so frequent elsewhere chat it became almost the prototype of Greek nominal composition and so did not shock. One also has to take account of a second analogy, that of forms where the element Callio-can be obtained by a false division of the compound, in forms like Calliope,where the -o belongs to the second element. That is how one obtains, from Martial on, it would appear, a pseudoGreek form created by a speaker of Latin, who was seeking to make up Greek by means of a supercode which fits well into the verse form and, in addition, allows interesting word-plays.

4. Bilingual manipulation Still at the level of the proper name, but without going to the lengths of invention, Martial uses other onomastic plays in which the name's significance is activated by bilingual manipulation and effects of sleight of hand which are based on the types of activation already discussed. a. Bilingual hybrids? One must ask first of all whether activation by hybrid names actually exists. It is attested morphologically for proper names (cf. Sosibi-anusin 1.81 etc., a Greek name with a Latin suffix), but does Greek-Latin hybridization exist at the semantic level in Martial? If so, one would have to distinguish within the name a number of semes belonging to different linguistic codes, and this would no doubt lead us to some rather arbitrary word divisions. So, the name Atestinus is a cogn,omenderived from the name of the town Ateste in Venecia, but this true etymology is not what activates the name in epigram 3.38: Egit Atestinus causas et Ciuis - utrumque noras - sed neutri pensio tota fuit.

133

(3.38.S-6)

Daniel Val/at Atestinus and Civis have pleaded cases - you know them both - but neither had enough to pay his rent. A Latin interpretation of the name, based on the verb attestor, is certainly possible, but the semantic link remains fairly loose. By contrast, a hybrid formation would lend itself much better to interpretation. Since it concerns a penniless lawyer, who is clearly not successful in his profession, why not see in his name a compound made up of the Greek alpha privative and the Latin word testis,'witness'? A-test-inus is a lawyer without a witness, whose pleading remains ineffectual and who fails to make a living. But the area of hybrids in Martial remains full of uncertainty.

b. Transcoding By contrast, transcoding, a procedure by which Martial activates the meaning of a name by a code other than the one to which it belongs, is better attested. First of all, Martial takes pleasure in mixing up meanings by the use of false etymologies. He will activate the meaning of a Greek noun by means of a Latin etymology and vice-versa. He uses the name Aeschylus in this way: Aureolis futui cum possit Galla duobus et plus quam futui, si totidem addideris, aureolos a te cur accipit, Aeschyle,denos? Non fellat tanti Galla. Quid ergo? Tacet.

(9.4)

Although one can fuck Galla for two pieces of gold and do even more if one doubles the sum, why,Aeschylus,does she receiveten from you? Galla does not ask for so much to suck. Why, then? To keep silent. It is not clear what the name of the great Greek tragedian is doing here. Only Killeen ( 1967) thought a false Latin etymology can explain its presence. J.F. an agglutinative formation could be made out here arising from the phrase •es culum (= culum uoras)and relating to the evil habits of the character. I would propose another interpretation: since the question of payment dominates the whole epigram, why not see in Aeschylusa form *aesculum,a diminutive derived from aes and meaning 'small change'? Certainly this form is not attested, but the noun aesculatorfor an agent and the verb aesculariappear in the glossaries.9 Thus under a Greek mask the author would be hiding a Latin explanation, compelling the reader to follow the slippery path of surprise etymologizing. Conversely, it happens that a Latin name can be activated by a Greek homonym. Thus the ancient Latin nomen Horatius finds a Greek etymon: Spectabat modo solus inter omnes nigris munus Horatius lacernis,

134

Bilingual word-playonpersonalnames in Martial cum plebs et minor ordo maximusque sancto cum duce candidus sederet. Toto nix cecidit repente caelo: albis spectat Horatius lacernis

(4.2)

Just recently,alone among everyone,Horatius was watching the games in a black cloak, when the plebs and the second and first order were sitting in white with our sacred chie£ Suddenly the snow started falling from the whole sky: Horace watches the games in a white cloak. The repetition of the verb spectare and its semantic importance in the epigram suggests a link between Horatius and the Greek 6p