Tacitus and Bracciolini Part 14

VII. The phrase in the Annals "non modo ... sed," instead of "non modo ... sed etiam" is peculiar, being at variance with the measured style of all the old Roman writers. It occurs several times in the first part, as "_non modo_ portus et proxima maris, _sed_ moenia ac tecta" (III. 1), as well as in the last part, "_non modo_ milites, _sed_ populus" (XVI. 3). In both instances Tacitus would have written "_sed etiam_ moenia--_sed etiam_ populus."

Nor would Tacitus have erred in using the anomalous expressions pointed out by Nicholas Aagard in his treatise about him, ent.i.tled "In C.C. Tacitum Disputatio." Tacitus would never have written, as in the Fourth Book of the Annals (56): "missa navali _copia_, non modo externa ad bella"; he would have used the plural instead of the singular; and, just as he would have used "copiis" instead of "copia", he would have used "ejus" for "sua" in this pa.s.sage in the sixth book (6): "adeo facinora atque flagitia _sua_ ipsi quoque in supplicium verterant":--we know that he would not have constructed an adjective in the positive when it ought to be in the comparative, as: "_quanto_ quis audacia _promtus_" (An. I. 57); for we have almost just seen how in such a phrase he properly constructs _promtus_ in the comparative: "_tanto_ ad discordias _promtior_" (Hist. II. 99).

VIII.--He now and then forgets himself by using words that clearly never could have been known to Tacitus, because they were words that sprang up in an after age. Thus on one occasion he is led into this error from the desire to express a poetical idea by a poetical word: just as Statius writes "distinctus" in the sense that his predecessors of ages before had used "distinctio":

"Viridis quum regula longo Synnada _distinctu_ variat:"

Sylv. I. 5. 41.;

so he falls into the blunder of making Tacitus say;--"ore ac _distinctu_ pennarum a ceteris avibus diversum" (An. VI. 28); at the same time he commits another mistake, of which he is repeatedly guilty, and which a Roman carefully avoided--using the rhythm of the hexameter in prose,--(if the Greek quant.i.ty with "ceterus" be taken:--

"penna/rum a cete/ris avi/bus di/versum."

In both parts of the Annals "codicillus" is used in the plural as signifying "the codicil to a will" (VI. 9): "precatusque per _codicillos_, immiti rescripto, venas absolvit"; and in An.

XV. 64 Seneca is described as "writing in the codicil of his will"

"in _codicillis_ rescripserat." Such Latin not only would not have been written but would not have been even understood by Tacitus; because when he lived his countrymen confined the meaning of "codicillus" to a wooden table for writing on, and thence, figuratively, for "a note" or "letter": it was not till several centuries after,--the first part of the fifth (409-450),--in the reign of the Emperor Theodosius the Younger, that the lawyers used the word to signify "an imperial patent or diploma"; for "codicillariae dignitates" in the Theodosian Codex (VI. 22. 7) means "offices given by the patent of the Emperor." It is also put here and there in the same Codex (VIII. 18. 7 and XVI. 5. 40) for the "codicil to a will"; but it is used in the singular: the meaning so given to it in the plural, (as in both parts of the Annals), did not come into vogue till a century after, in the time of Justinian, as may be seen by consulting the Twenty-ninth Chapter of the Pandects which treats of the Law of Codicils ("De Jure _Codicillorum_"); and Marcian is quoted to this effect: that "a man who can make a will can, certainly, also make a codicil", the language being "_codicillos_ is demum facere potest, qui et testamentum facere potest" (Lib. VI. c. 3. Marcian VII. Inst.i.t.). It looks then tolerably clear that the author of the Annals got his Latin about "codicillus" in the plural signifying the "codicil to a will" either from the Inst.i.tutes of Marcian or the Pandects of Justinian.

IX. Alliterations occur in the Annals at the end of words four times repeated, as "Cui superposit_um_ convivi_um_ navi_um_ aliar_um_ tractu moverentur" (XV. 37), which is in the style not of Tacitus, but Bracciolini, as "ad liberand_os_ praeclarissim_os_ ill_os_ vir_os_ ex ergastulis barbarorum," already quoted from the treatise "De Infelicitate Principum"; or "mul_tis_ cap_tis_, trecen_tis_ occi_sis_," in his History of Florence (Lib. V. See Muratori XX. p.346).

Another very peculiar alliteration of Bracciolini's is with the letter _c_. Sometimes he alternates it after two words, as in a letter to his friend Niccoli, _C_ommisi hoc idem _c_uidam amico meo _c_ivi Senensi" (Ep. II. 3), exactly as we find it towards the beginning of the first book of the Annals (9) _C_uncta inter se _c_onnexa: jus apud _c_ives modestiam"; or at the end of the second book (88): _c_um varia fortuna _c_ertaret, dolo propinquorum _c_ecidit liberator." He repeats, too, this favourite alliteration four times, sometimes after one word, sometimes after two, as in a letter to Cardinal Julian, the Pope's Legate in Germany: "_c_ertissima quadam _c_onjectura, qua praeteritis _c_onnectens praesentia _c_ausasque"

(Op. p. 309). In his History of Florence this quadrupled alliteration of _c_ occurs thus (Lib. II. see Muratori XX. p. 224): "_c_onspiciant; est quippe _c_ommune belluis, quae ratione _c_arent, ut naturali _c_ogente," as we have just seen in a quotation from the fifteenth book of the Annals (31), "gerere _c_othurnos, jacere _c_aput, strepente _c_irc.u.m procaci _c_horo." But these alliterations with _c_ four times repeated, which occur frequently in the Annals generally take place with three or more words intervening between each alliteration, as in this sentence in the first part: "_c_onfertus pedes, dispositae turmae _c_uncta praelio provisa: hostibus _c_ontra, omnium nesciis, non arma, non ordo, non _c_onsilium" (An. IV. 25); or in this sentence in the last part: "_c_ompertum sibi, referens, ex _c_ommentariis patris sui nullam _c_ujusquam accusationem ab eo _c_oactam."

(XIII. 43 _in med_.), which is in the style of one of the numerous beautiful alliterations of his favourite poet, Virgil:

"_C_redunt se vidisse Jovem _c_um saepe nigrantem Aegida _c_oncuteret dextra, nimbosque _c_ieret"

Aen. VIII. 353-4.

But it is not at all in imitation of the manner of Tacitus, who, certainly, sometimes has an alliteration after two words, but it is not with the letter _c_, nor does he alternate it; if an alliteration again occurs immediately afterwards, it is of quite a different character, as in his Agricola (45): "_o_mnia sine dubio, _o_ptime parentum, _a_ssidente _a_mantissima uxore"; and in his History (III. 36) "_p_raeterita, instantia, futura, _p_ari oblivione dimiserat; atque _i_llum _i_n nemore Aricino."

Bracciolini distinctly shows himself to be the author of the Annals by a very peculiar kind of composition to which he is uncommonly partial,--joining together with an enc.l.i.tic polysyllabic words of the same length and the same long ending, as "contempl_ationem_ cogit_ationem_que" in his "De Miseria Humanae Conditionis" (Op. p. 130); in the first part of the Annals, "extoll_ebatur_, argu_ebatur_que"

(I. 9) and in the last part, respec_tantes_, rogi_tantes_que"

(An. XII. 69);--and it is difficult to say whether this is to be found oftener in his acknowledged productions or in his famous forgery.

He is much given to placing together several words ending with i, as in the first part of the Annals: "sed pecorum modo, trah_i_, occid_i_, cap_i_" (IV. 25); and in the last part "ill.u.s.tri memoria Poppae_i_ Sabin_i consular_i" (XIII. 45).

X. He is fond of monotonously repeating the accent on the penultimate syllable of trisyllabic words, as in describing the trial of Jerome of Prague (Ep. I. 11.),--if we are to consider "quae vellet" as equivalent to a trisyllable:--"de_in_de loq_uen_di quae _ve_llet fa_cul_tas da_re_tur"; this most disagreeable monotonous sound, which resembles, more than anything else, the pattering of a horse's feet when the animal is ambling, and which may, therefore, be called the "t.i.t-up-a-t.i.t-up" style, I will be bound to say, is not to be found in anybody else's Latin compositions but Poggio Bracciolini's all the way down from Julius Caesar to Dr. c.u.mming, --(the famous epistle of the reverend gentleman's to the Pope in which he endeavoured to procure an invitation from his Holiness to attend the Oec.u.menical Council of 1870): there is the dreadful sound again,--in the first six books of the Annals (II. 17),--just as it strikes the ear in the Letter describing the trial and death of Jerome of Prague--exactly as many as five times repeated,--when Bracciolini, (for now we know it is he, and n.o.body else but he, who wrote the Annals), is giving an account of the battle between the Cherusei and the Romans: "ple_ros_que tra_na_re Vi_sur_gim con_an_tes, in_jec_ta"; this sound occurs four times consecutively, in the last part of the Annals, when Bracciolini is speaking of Curtius Rufus fulfilling by his death the fatal destiny prognosticated to him by a female apparition of supernatural stature: "def_unc_tus fa_ta_le prae_sa_gium im_ple_vit" (An. XI. 21). Sometimes this very abominable monotony is accompanied by most horrible a.s.sonances, as in one of his letters (Ep. III. 23) "err_o_rum tu_o_rum certi_o_rem"; --we catch it again, or something like it, in the last part of the Annals (XIV. 36) in "im_bel_les in_er_mes ces_su_ros," and in the first part: (I. 41) "_or_ant ob_sis_tunt, re_di_ret, ma_ne_ret."

XI. We find in both part of the Annals a very peculiar use of "properus," with the genitive: in the last part: "Claudium, ut insidiis incautum, ita _irae properum_" (XI. 26): in the first part: "libertis et clientibus _potentiae_ apiscendae _properis_"

(IV. 59). This is not to be met with in the writings of any of the old Romans; it would seem, then, that the Annals was, as is alleged, a spurious composition of the fifteenth century, and that the same hand wrote both parts.

When Bracciolini wants to put into Latin:--"n.o.body will compare my _history_ with the _books_ of those who wrote about the ancient affairs of the Roman people"; he expresses himself:--"Nemo _annales_ nostros c.u.m _scriptura_ eorum contenderit, qui veteres populi Romani res composuere" (An. IV. 32): it is not only a very true observation, but, as far as concerns the use of "annales" and "scriptura," the exact counterpart of what we read in his "Description of the Ruins of the City of Rome", ("Ruinarum Urbis Romae Descriptio"), when he observes: "though you may wade through all the _books_ that are extant and pore over the whole _history_ of human transactions", he writes: "licet ...

omnia _scripturarum_ monumenta pertractes, omnes gestarum rerum _annales_ scruteris" (Pog. Op. p. 132), where it will be observed that in both sentences not only "annales" and "scriptura" occur almost together, but the former has the meaning of "a history" and the latter of "a book," with which significations Tacitus never uses the two words: indeed Tacitus never uses the two words at all.

The use of "totiens," or its equivalent "toties," is peculiar to the author of the Annals: it is never found in Tacitus, but frequently in the writings of Bracciolini, as "tuam _toties_ a me reprehensam credulitatem" (Ep. I. 11):--"_toties_ has fabulas audisti" (ibid):--"toties ... hoc biennio delusus sum in hac re libraria" (Ep. II. 41). So in the Annals: "An Augustum fessa aetate, _toties_ in Germania potuisse" (II. 46):--"anxia sui et infelici fecunditate fortunae _totiens_ obnoxia" (II.75): --"_totiens_ irrisa resolutus" (IV. 9), and in other pa.s.sages.

Bracciolini is so partial to the word that he uses it in its compound as well as simple form, as in one of his letters to Niccoli: "_Multoties_ scripsi tibi" (Ep. I. 17), and at the beginning of the second book of the "Convivales," "addubitari, inquam, _multotiens_" (Op. p. 37).

XII. "Addubitare" is a word which Tacitus never uses, only the author of the Annals, as "paullum _addubitatum_, quod Halicarna.s.sii" (IV. 65). So in the "Ruinarum Urbis Romae Descriptio," when speaking of Marius sitting amid the ruins of Carthage, Bracciolini writes: "admirantem suam et Carthaginis vicem, simulque fortunam utriusque conferentem, _addubitantem_que utriusque fortunae majus spectaculum ext.i.tisset" (Op. p. 132).

"Ext.i.tere" is a word never used by Tacitus;--or, more properly, he so avoids it that he uses it but once. Bracciolini, on the contrary, is very much given to the use of it. In the Annals it is repeatedly met with; in the last part, (take the fifteenth book,) "centurionem _ext.i.tisse_" (XV. 49), "auriga et histrio et incendiarius _ext.i.tisti_"

(ib. 67):--in the first part, "_ext.i.tisse_ tandem viros" (III. 44), "socium delationis _ext.i.tisse_" (IV. 66), and on other occasions.

So it runs throughout the works of Bracciolini, as in his essay on "Avarice": "si amator _ext.i.terit_ sapientiae" (Op. 20); on "The Unhappiness of Princes," "cogitationesque dominantium _ext.i.terunt_,"

(Op. 393); on "n.o.bility," "autorem n.o.bilitatis filiis _ext.i.tisse_ (Op. p. 69); on "The Misery of the Human Condition," splendidissimas in illis civitatibus _ext.i.tisse_ (Op. p. 119); in his Letters, "egenorum praesidium, oppressorem refugium, _ext.i.tisti_" (Ep. III. 17); in his "History of Florence," "quae verba si execranda, et digna odio _ext.i.tissent_" (Muratori XX. p. 235);--in fact, in all his productions, whether forged or unforged.

There are, in fact, a number of words, and also phrases, used by Bracciolini that are no where to be found in any of the works of Tacitus. To ill.u.s.trate this, we will confine ourselves to two examples only of each, and to the first part of the Annals and the History of Florence. To begin with words, and to take "pervastare": in the first part of the Annals: "spatium ferro flammisque _pervastat_"

(I. 51): the History of Florence (Lib. I) "caede, incendio, rapinis _pervastatis_" (Muratori tom. XX. p. 213). "Conficta," in the sense of "fabricated": in the first part of the Annals: "in tempus _conficta_"

(I. 37): in the History of Florence (Lib. III): "_confictis_ mendaciis"

(ib. p. 254). To pa.s.s on to phrases, and to take (a word never used by Tacitus) "impendium" with "posse": in the first part of the Annals: "_impendio_ diligentiaque _poterat_" (IV. 6): in the History of Florence (Lib. V.) "_impendio_ plurimum d.a.m.ni inferre _potuissent_"

(ib. 320). "Bellum" with "flagrare": in the first part of the Annals: "_flagrante_ adhuc Poenorum _bello_" (II. 59): in the History of Florence (Lib. V.): "Gallia omnis _bello flagraret_ Florentinos"

(ib. 320).

XIII. Whenever Tacitus ends a sentence with a polysyllabic word of five syllables he avoids its repet.i.tion at the close of the next sentence. The reverse is the case in the Annals, as, (take the first book of the last part (XI. 22), "rem militarem _comitarentur_, --in the sentence after, "accedentibus provinciarum _vectigalibus_,"

--in the sentence after that, "sententia Dolabellae velut _venundaretur_"; (or take the first book of the first part (I. 21-2), "eo immitior quia _toleraverat_,"--the sentence after, "vagi circ.u.mspecta _populabantur_,"--the sentence after that, "manipularium _parabantur_,"

--where, to be sure, in the last instance a syllable is deficient, but it is made good by the sonorous sesquipedalian penultimate,-- _manipulariam_. So in the works of Bracciolini: "aures tuae _recusabantur_," in the following sentence, "domi forisque _obtemperares_," in the next sentence, "factorum dictorumque _conscientiae_" (Op. 313).

XIV. A peculiarity in composition, if not actually proving, at least raising the suspicion, that the same hand which wrote the last part of the Annals also wrote the first part is observable in the omission of the preposition _in_, when rest at a place is denoted;--the omission, it is to be remarked, is not where there is a single word, but when two words are coupled together, as in the last six books,--in the description of the Romans bearing on their shoulders statues of Octavia, which they decorate with flowers and place both in the forum and in their temples: "Octaviae imagines gestant humeris, spargunt floribus, _foroque ac templis_ statuunt" (XIV. 61); and in the first six books in the description of servile Romans following Seja.n.u.s in crowds to Campania, and there without distinction of cla.s.ses lying day and night in the fields and on the sea sh.o.r.e:--"ibi _campo aut litore_ jacentes, nullo discrimine noctem ac diem" (IV. 74).

Tacitus, in common with all other Roman prose-writers, uses the names of _nations_ (when the verb implies motion) with a preposition, which is not required with the names of _countries_. The Roman poets are not so particular in this respect, Virgil, for instance, writes, after the Homeric fashion, by the omission of the preposition:

"At nos hinc alii sitientis ibimus _Afros_: Ecl. I. 65;

for "ad Afros." So after Virgil, whom he is always quoting and imitating, Bracciolini writes "ipse praecepts _Iberos_, ad patrium regnum pervadit" (An. XII. 51), for "_ad_ Iberos, _in_ patrium."

CHAPTER III.

MISTAKES THAT PROVE FORGERY.

I. The Gift for the recovery of Livia.--II. Julius Caesar and the Pomoerium.--III.--Julia, the wife of Tiberius.--IV. The statement about her proved false by a coin.--V. Value of coins in detecting historical errors.--VI. Another coin shows an error about Cornutus.--VII. Suspicion of spuriousness from mention of the Quinquennale Ludicrum.--VIII. Account of cities destroyed by earthquake contradicted by a monument.--IX. Bracciolini's hand shown by reference to the Plague.--X. Fawning of Roman senators more like conduct of Italians in the fifteenth century.--XI. Same exaggeration with respect to Pomponia Graecina and the Romans.-- XII. Wrong statement of the images borne at the funeral of Drusus.--XIII. Similar kind of error committed by Bracciolini in his "De Varietate Fortunae".--XIV. Errors about the Red Sea.-- XV. About the Caspian Sea.--XVI. Accounted for.--XVII. A pa.s.sage clearly written by Bracciolini.

It is now, however, time to pa.s.s on to other matters more interesting and important, and, it may be, more convincing.

I. Famia.n.u.s Strada is very much surprised in his Prolusions (I. 2 Histor.) that it should be stated in the third book of the Annals (71), that when a gift for the recovery of Livia was to be presented to Fortune the Equestrian, it had to be made at Antium, where, it is stated, there was a temple which had that t.i.tle, there being none in Rome that was so named. Here are the words of Bracciolini, in his own style, too, and his own history, neither of which is, nor could be that of Tacitus: "A debate then came on about a matter of religion, as to the temple in which the offering was to be placed, which the Knights of Rome had promised to present to Fortune the Equestrian for the health of the Imperial Princess" (a phrase which no Roman would have used); "for though there were many shrines of that G.o.ddess in Rome, yet there was none with that name: it was resolved:--'that there be a temple at Antium which has such an appellation, and that all religious rites in towns in Italy, and temples and statues of G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses, be under Roman law and rule': consequently, the offering was set up at Antium": "Incessit dein religio, quonam in templo locandum erat donum, quod pro valetudine Augustae equites Romani voverant Equestri Fortunae: nam etsi delubra ejus deae multa in urbe, nullum tamen tali cognomento erat; repertum est, 'aedem esse apud Antium quae sic nuncuparetur, cunctasque caerimonias Italicis in oppidis, templaque et numinum effigies, juris atque imperii Romani esse': ita donum apud Antium statuitur" (An. III. 71). This, however, was not the case; for Famia.n.u.s Strada says that there was a temple in Rome which had been dedicated to Fortune the Equestrian for more than 200 years by Quintus Fulvius after the war with the Celtiberians, when he was Praetor; and, afterwards when he was Censor, he erected a magnificent edifice in honour of the G.o.ddess: the gift and the temple are both mentioned by Livy (XL. 42), also by Vitruvius, Julius Obsequens, Valerius Maximus, Publius Victor, and other historians and antiquaries. One cannot then well understand how a fact like this could have been unknown to Tacitus, who must have been acquainted with all the public buildings in Rome, especially the Temples; though it is quite easy to conceive how the slip could have been made by a writer of the fifteenth century: indeed, it would be odd if Bracciolini had not, now and then, fallen into such errors, which, though trivial in themselves, become mistakes of mighty magnitude in an inquiry of this description.

II. A writer who could be so ignorant about the temples in Rome is just the sort of writer who would display ignorance about the public works in that city. Cognate then with this blunder in the first part of the Annals is the blunder in the last part about that ancient right, the enlargement of the pomoerium. We are told that those only who had extended the bounds of the Empire by the annexation of countries which they had brought under subjection were ent.i.tled to add also to the City, and that the only two of all the generals who had exercised this privilege before the time of Claudius, were Sylla and Augustus. "Pomoerium urbis auxit Caesar more prisco, quo iis qui protulere imperium, etiam terminos urbis propagare datur. Nec tamen duces Romani, quamquam magnis nationibus subactis, usurpaverant, nisi Lucius Sulla et divus Augustus" (An. XII. 23). Justus Lipsius, at this misstatement, is, strange to say, quite contented by merely remarking in a merry mood: "I am not going to defend you, Cornelius: you are wrong: an enlargement was also made by Julius Caesar, who was 'pitched in'"

("interjectus") "between these two." "Non defendo te, Corneli: erras: etiani C. Caesar auxit interjectus inter eos duos." Any critic ought not to be facetiously playful, but seriously startled and unaccountably puzzled, that Tacitus, or any Roman of his stamp, should have been ignorant of a fact which must have been known to all his well informed countrymen, from its having been borne testimony to by so many eminent writers;--by Cicero in his Letter to Atticus (I. 13), by Ca.s.sius Dio in the 43rd Book of his History, by Aulus Gellius in his "Noctes Atticae" (XIII. 14), and, omitting all the antiquaries such as Fulvius and Onuphrius, Mark Antony in his Funeral Oration over the remains of Caesar, where he bewails the fate of an Emperor, who had been slain in the City, the pomoerium of which he had enlarged: [Greek: en tae polei enedreutheis, ho kai to pomaerion autaes apeuxaesas] (Cas. Dio.

XLIV. 49). This fact seems to have been unknown just as well to Shakespeare as to Bracciolini; or our great national poet would have taken cognizance of it somewhere, perhaps in that part of Mark Antony's speech, where reference is made to what Caesar did for the Romans:

"Moreover, he hath left you all his walks, His private arbours, and new-planted orchards On this side Tiber: he hath left them you, And to your heirs for ever; common pleasures, To walk abroad and recreate yourselves."

(_Jul. Caesar_, Act III. sc. 2)

III. A writer who could entirely overlook such a memorable achievement of Julius Caesar distinctly shows himself in his incorrectness about the career of such a distinguished member of the Augustan family as Julia, the wife of Tiberius: she is spoken of as having died in the first year of the reign of Tiberius, after having been banished by her father for infamous adulteries to the island of Trimetus, where, deserted by her husband, she must have speedily perished, in lieu of languishing in exile for twenty years, had she not been supported by the bounty of "Augusta". "Per idem tempus Julia mortem obiit quam neptem Augustus convictam adulterii d.a.m.natus est, projeceratque haud procul Apulis littoribus. Illic viginti annis exilium toleravit, Augustae ope sustentata" (An. IV. 71).

IV. A very small bra.s.s coin preserved in the National Collection in Paris informs us that Julia was alive at least three years after that date. So far from having been doomed by her husband to perish through want, Tiberius held her in such uncommon esteem that he ordered a coin to be struck in her honour in the fourth year of his reign for the money bears the inscription, in Greek capitals, [Greek: IOULIA], with the initials, [Greek: LD], signifying in the fourth year of Tiberius after the death of Augustus.

V. Now let the reader bear in mind that when we find in the Annals a statement so contrary to what we gather from an old coin, we must set down that statement as a pure figment of history; for nothing can be so valuable for correct and exact information as coins, which were always struck among the ancient Romans by public authority, by the decrees of the Senate or the Comitia Curiata, or by the edicts of the Decuriones (Councils of the Munic.i.p.al towns or Colonies), and of the Propraetors or Proconsuls of the Provinces.

VI. A coin of the latter description lays bare another very gross error committed in the first part of the Annals in making Caius Caecilius Cornutus governor of Paphlagonia in the time of Tiberius (An. IV. 28): Cornutus must have been a Proconsul of that province in the time of either Galba or Otho. The coin, which is a large bra.s.s one, exhibits, on its obverse side, Cornutus with a helmet on his head, and underneath [Greek: AMISOU], meaning that he was the Governor of Paphlagonia, of which "Amisus" was the capital, while on the reverse side are the words [Greek: EPI GAIOU KAIKILIOU KORNOUTOU]; Rome, sitting upon shields, holds the Roman world in her right hand Victory stretches forth hers to place a crown on the head of Cornutus, and beneath is [Greek: ROMAE], which, during the period of the Empire, was inscribed on coins, but only in the time of Galba and Otho, because Amisus, that is Paphlagonia, was then subject to Rome, that is, the Senate, under Caius Caecilius Cornutus, as Africa was under Caius Clodius Mucrinus.