The Oxford Handbook of the Second Sophistic

by Daniel S. Richter

  The confrontation between Fronto and Favorinus, which takes place in the first chapter where Fronto is mentioned, is very instructive. As highlighted by Baldwin (1973), the important characters in the Attic Nights have rare interactions. Aulus Gellius seems to build impervious parallel worlds that rotate around one character and do not replicate the sociability and rivalry set forth by Philostratus in his presentation of the Second Sophistic. The biographer speaks of encounters or relations, inter alia, between Favorinus, Herodes Atticus, and Polemon. According to Fronto’s Correspondence, the Latin orator knew Polemon and was engaged in a lawsuit against Herodes Atticus.12 These relationships are not mentioned by Aulus Gellius. In the Attic Nights, Fronto is the only character of importance who meets other sophistic personalities. Fronto is not the main hero of the Attic Nights, the part played by Favorinus (see Holford-Strevens 2003, 98–130). Yet, the positive features attributed to him by Aulus Gellius make Fronto seem an authority in grammatical matters and an expert in the Latin language. The anecdotes show Fronto as a respected model, but a model that is a little old-fashioned, representative of a conservative Roman fundus, a complement to the originality introduced by the Gallic sophist Favorinus. The victory that is conceded by Favorinus to Fronto on the number of words to say the colors red and green in Greek and in Latin seems to reveal Aulus Gellius’s desire to show Latinity as the foundation of culture.

  The narrative of the last chapter where Fronto intervenes as a character is interesting in many respects. It is the only chapter among the five where Fronto intervenes in a public setting, the hall of the Palatine palace, where many learned men are mentioned by name and where the orator does not lead the discussion. These features could indicate that Aulus Gellius builds, by means of the anecdotes concerning Fronto, some character progression, from an academic authority in an intimate setting to a more humble purveyor of culture. The situation at the end of the miscellany confirms in sum the minor part played by Fronto in Aulus Gellius’s intellectual construction.

  Aulus Gellius’s testimony is essential, because it sheds light on the impact that the imperial tutor could have on the Roman cultural circle. This testimony should, however, be considered with caution, since Aulus Gellius’s construction of the narrative and of the character serve primarily the purposes of the author of the Attic Nights and cannot be considered as an exact reflection of reality. Modern commentators, on the basis of Aulus Gellius’s and Sidonius Apollinaris’s testimonies (Epist. 1.1, 2), which mention a rhetorical school claiming Fronto as their master, have quickly concluded that the orator had an immense influence on later literature (cf. in particular Marache 1952: 206–207; 335–338). Even if Fronto’s renown in the following centuries is revealed by the mention of his name in Macrobius’s (Sat. 5.1.7) and Mamertus Claudianus’s (Ad Sapaudum, p. 206 Englebrecht) canons of style, the absence in the Latin corpus of real imitators should urge caution. We follow on that point the prudence wished for by Holford-Strevens, who shows that Fronto is not the originator of the archaic movement of the second century and that his younger contemporaries, Aulus Gellius and Apuleius, even if they also value archaisms and pre-Ciceronian authors, do not necessarily make the same choices as Fronto (Holford-Strevens 2003, 354–358). The writers of the period do not all conceive this return to the lexical past in the same way. The practices are not identical in the Greek and the Roman worlds, even though they both seem to feel a general need to curb the evolution of language by anchoring it in a sure and revivifying lexical past (Holford-Strevens 2003, 362–363). Nevertheless, it is obvious that Fronto’s portrayal in Aulus Gellius enhances the importance of Latinity and its relationship with Hellenism (Keulen 2009, 5–6), themes that are also observable in his correspondence, but that are not, as we have said, discernible in the real practice of the Latin orator.

  16.3 FRONTO’S CIRCLE IN THE CORRESPONDENCE

  If the Correspondence were not accessible, Fronto’s portrayal would be one of a picky man with a narrow outlook on literature. Aulus Gellius has no concern for Fronto’s oratory, the activity on which his ancient renown was based (Cass. Dio, 69.18.3). The Correspondence gives a more nuanced picture of his vision of the belles-lettres, but also a diversified portrait of his entourage. This reality can largely be explained by the way that the letters were published. It seems likely that the epistolary corpus was put together not by the author, but by one of his descendants, who would have tried to emphasize and give concrete examples of the relations between his ancestry and that of Antonines and other important persons of the time.13 It is then normal to find as correspondents, besides the emperor and the Caesars, a variety of important persons, especially in the political and forensic spheres.14 A detailed account of the constitution of Fronto’s circle is beyond the limits set here, and in any case the detailed treatment in Champlin (1980) and elsewhere makes it unnecessary. But we can recall some remarks about the orator’s relations on prosopographical grounds.

  Modern prosopographical studies have yielded multiple readings of Fronto’s circle in the correspondence, in accordance with the particular angle pursued.15 It is, however, obvious that the correspondents and the people mentioned in the two books Ad amicos distinguish themselves by their proximity to imperial power. Moreover, Champlin has clearly shown how much this cultural circle is varied. Fronto’s entourage is primarily bound by culture and literature, with no real barrier between the Greek and the Roman worlds, nor sharp distinctions between various disciplines (rhetoric, poetry, philosophy). Champlin (1980, 29–44) also points out the connections, not always tight, but existing, between the Latin orator and some Greek sophists.

  16.4 A DISCOURSE ON CULTURAL IDENTITY

  It is not possible in the assigned limits of this contribution to address all the topics in the letters that establish parallels between the Frontonian approach and the sophistic movement.16 Therefore, in order to give a picture of the way Fronto builds his cultural identity, two specific points will be discussed: his discourse on Greek and his idea of political power.

  In a letter in Greek addressed to Marcus Aurelius’s mother, Domitia Lucilla, Fronto asks his correspondent to forgive the poor quality of his Greek and he likens himself to Anacharsis; he then affirms his African origin:

  After all, [Anacharsis] was a Scythian of the nomad Scythians, I am a Libyan of the Libyan nomads. So it’s common to both of us, Anacharsis and me, to be driven to pasture; and it will be our common deed to baa when we are grazing as best anyone can baa. Well, now I’ve made a simile between talking like a barbarian and baaing. (Ad Marcum 2.3.5, Richlin 2006, 91–92)17

  Fronto’s posture is to exclude himself from the two cultural spheres, Greek and Latin, so as to excuse his barbarisms, even though these, as Norden and others (Brock 1911, 41; Norden 1915, 364) have shown, are extremely rare in his very classical and Platonician Greek. The same attitude can be seen in the exordium of the eroticos, a letter also written in Greek, which takes Plato’s Phaedrus as model to talk about amatory and pedagogical relations:

  This is the third letter, beloved Boy, that I am sending you on the same theme, the first by the hand of Lysias, the son of Kephalus, the second of Plato, the philosopher, and the third by the hand of a barbarian, but as regards judgement, as I think, not wholly wanting in sagacity. (Additamentum epistularum 8.1; Haines 1919–1920, 1:21)

  Furthermore, Marcus Aurelius, in a letter to his teacher, recalls that Fronto had scolded his student for writing in Greek, while the teacher himself was guilty of the same offense. The Princeps also says that he never learned the Greek language (Ad Marcum 3.9.2). It is difficult to say if Fronto’s remonstrances were motivated by the impropriety of the language in some circumstances, or by an absolute rejection of Greek for writing. The prohibition against the use of Greek does not seem unilateral in the orator’s mind. The composition of several letters in Greek and the quite common use of that language in the Correspondence seem to show that Fronto was more flexible than he says.18

  To this example,
we can add another of Marcus Aurelius’s observations, which is a compliment to his teacher: “nam de elegentia quid dicam? nisi te latine loqui, nos ceteros neque graece neque latine” (“for as to its style what can I say? except that you talk Latin while the rest of us talk neither Latin nor Greek”; Ad Antoninum 1.4.2; Haines 1919–1920, 2:123). The emphatic expression puts Fronto in a category apart where he is alone, where his Latin surpasses the language of all the inhabitants of the empire. This construction, made by Fronto and adopted by Marcus Aurelius, enables the orator to go beyond cultural limitations and to place himself above all the intellectuals, Greek or Roman, of his day. The way Fronto considers the values that should be at the basis of the hierarchy of power follow an analogous strategy.19

  This transformation can be seen in Fronto’s political ideas, although the Correspondence is not very eloquent on the topic (André 1982, 29–55; Portalupi 1995). This is in part due to the epistolary form of the corpus, in part due to the professorial function of the letters and in part due to Fronto’s social status. Nevertheless, the hierarchies built, especially in the letter to Antoninus Pius (Ad Pium 3.5; Fleury 2006b, 148–151), in the letters on the Princeps’s eloquence (Ad Marcum 4.3.6; Ad Verum 2.3 and 25; Fleury 2001) and in the letters on the consulate (Fleury 2009; Martin 2003), show that Fronto changes the center of authority from a political to a cultural entity. For Fronto, indeed, the foundation of society is friendship, or more exactly what he calls philostorgia (Aubert 2011; Lana 1966; Steinmayer 1961–1962), a specific kind of natural love, that he also puts in evidence in the letters of recommendation (Béranger-Badel 2000; L’Huillier 2002; Plantera 1977–1978); however, this love cannot be without culture and especially without rhetoric. It is speech capacity, given to man by the gods, that makes the social link possible (Ad Marcum 1.3). Friendship is a value that transcends human and imperial laws. Nobody can coerce the Princeps to surrender to the law of culture (Ad Marcum 4.3.6), but it is laudable, indeed necessary, for the men in power to take into account the opinions of the learned. In this perspective, the power of culture surpasses political power. Fronto, because he is a man of unsurpassable culture, rebalances the relations with the men in power by portraying himself as the judge of what is and what is not culture (Fleury 2001; Pennacini 1983). These devices are sometimes used, of course, to serve some individual and particular goal. That is to say, the direct relationship of Fronto with the imperial family requires some concrete strategies. Nevertheless, these kinds of constructions can also be seen in the way that the Greek contemporary authors negotiate with political authorities, even though the definition of culture, of paideia, is not the same (see, inter alia, Whitmarsh 2005, 41–56).

  There is, therefore, from Fronto a sharp difference between the way he talks about Greek culture and the way he lives it, which is much more nuanced. In the Correspondence, speech is used to delimit categories and exclude some type of intellectuals; the same process can be seen in the Fronto anecdotes of the Attic Nights. Nonetheless, the social relations of the orator, according to what we can deduce from the prosopographical analysis, do not show the same dichotomy. Fronto, while building his position on the Greek language, presents himself as a barbarian, opening thus a third category, which is specific to him. Actually, Fronto is not a Libyan, nor a barbarian.20 These strategies of humility and exclusion can also be observed in the literary criticism of Polemon and in the self-construction of the censorial character, able to judge all men on oratorical et cultural matters (Graverini and Keulen 2009, 197–217). The virulent metaphors against philosophy seem part of the same strategy. The exclusionary discourse, however, is never applied in the way Fronto conceives and practices literary genres and models, in his cultural conceptions and in his social relations.

  The teacher had obviously a global conception of rhetoric, but also of the relationship that eloquence should have with civic life, that is to say the relationship between eloquence and power. This type of reflection on the rhetorical and the political can also be seen in the writings of the Greek sophists of the first and second centuries of our era. In this, Fronto seems to take part in this intellectual movement. In speech, Fronto is anything but a philhellene. Drawing parallels between the Greek language and the philosophical lifestyle, he builds multiple associations that segregate the Greek and Latin languages into philosophy and rhetoric, idle and civic life. The teacher lives, however, in a Mediterranean world, where the elites are more and more homogeneous, where sophists think of speech as a triumphant, unifying, founding, civilizing force (Fleury 2011; Pernot 1993, 621–635). Therefore, Fronto’s writing gives a specific example of how a Roman teacher of rhetoric can negotiate his place in the geography between the two cultural spheres.

  FURTHER READING

  Fronto’s Correspondence has not frequently been translated in English. Haines’s (1919–1920) translation is a little archaistic and not always easy to follow, but it is complete. Richlin (2006) has translated a selection of letters, in a gender studies approach. My translation in French (Fleury 2003) only has the letters of Fronto and not those of Marcus Aurelius. The 1999 linear commentary of Van den Hout is helpful, but dense. For the English-speaking world, the reference is still Champlin’s (1980) historical study of the man and the period. In recent studies, we should note the original literary approaches of Keulen (2009) and Johnson (2012).

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

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  Anderson, G. 1993. The Second Sophistic: A Cultural Phenomenon in the Roman Empire. London and New York.

  Aubert, S. 2011. “La φιλοστοργία chez Fronton, une vertu sans équivalent latin?” Aitia 1. http://aitia.revues.org/179.

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  Fleury, P. 2001. “La flûte, le général et l’esclave: Analyse de certaines métaphores rhétoriques chez Fronton.” Phœnix 55: 108–123.

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  Fleury, P. 2006a. “L’argument de la nature: Définitions et rôles de la fable dans le corpus frontonien.” LEC 74: 115–141.

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  Fleury, P. 2009. “L’orateur et le consul: Fronton conseiller du Prince.” Cahiers des Études Anciennes 47: 457–475.