Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 2.djvu/932

Rh 918 MANILIUS. three the founders of jus civile. Pomponius says that Manilius wrote three treatises, which were extant in his time, and was a consular. Manilius, therefore, appears to be the consul of B. c. 149, with L. Marcius Censorinus. In B.C. 149 the third Punic war commenced, and Manilius and his col- league were appointed to conduct it. They made an attack on Carthage, and burnt the Carthaginian fleet in sight of the city (Liv. Epit. 49 ; Florus, ii. 15). The campaign of Manilius is described at length byAppian {Puniclb — 109). Carthage was taken by P. Scipio Africanus the younger, b. c. 146. During his consulship Manilius wrote to the Achaeans to send Polybius to Lilybaeum, as he wanted his services. But on arriving at Corcyra, Polybius found a letter from the consuls, which informed him that the Carthaginians had given all the hostages, and were ready to obey their orders, and that they considered that the war was ended, and the services of Polybius were not wanted, upon which Polybius returned to the Peloponnesus. (Polyb. lib. xxxvii. ed. Bekker.) The fact of Manilius the jurist having been consul is stated by Pomponius, and he must therefore have been the consul of B. c. 149, for there is no other to whom all the facts will apply. Cicero {Brutus^ 1 6) re- marks that the elder Cato died in the consulship of L. Marcius and M. Manilius, eighty-six years before his own consulship, which was B. c. 63. Cicero, in another passage in the Brutus (c. 2M), speaks of M. Manilius as possessing some oratorical power, and makes him the contemporary of various orators of the period of the Gracchi. The propriety of Manilius and Scipio being introdviced in the De Re Publica appears from the fact that Scipio served under Manilius and his colleague in the campaign of B. c. 149, and Manilius bore testimony to the great services of Scipio (Appian, Punic. 105), who was afterwards appointed to conduct the war. The reputation of Manilius was not founded on his military services. Cicero {de Oral. i. 48) men- tions M. Manilius as a real jurisconsult, in con- nection with Sextus Aeiius and P. Scaevola. L. Crassus (Cic. de Oral. iii. 33) says of M. Manilius, " I have seen him walking backwards and forwards across the forum, which was a token that a man who was doing this was ready to give his advice to all the citizens ; and to such persons in olden time, both when they were walking about, and when seated at home in their chair, it was the practice to go and to consult them, not only about the jus civile, but about marrying a daughter, buying a piece of land, cultivating ground, and in fiiie, on every thing that a man had to do, and on every business transaction." Among the legal writings of Manilius was a treatise on the conditions appli- cable to sales {venalium vendendorum leycs^ Cic. de Oral. i. 58), which was apparently a book of forms. Probably he may have written on other subjects besides law. (Cic. Brut. 28, ed. H. Meyer.) The time of the birth and death of Manilius is not known. He is mentioned by Cicero {de Rep. iii. 10) as having been accustomed to give legal opinions before the Lex Voconia was enacted, which law was enacted B. c. 169. The time which Cicero fixes as the date of the sup- posed dialogue De Re PvLlica (*' Tuditano Cons, et Aquilio," de Rep. i. 9) is b.c. 129, or forty years after the enactment of the Lox Voconia. If Manilius was giving legal opinions before the date of the Lex Voconia, we cannot 6uppo«e that MANILIUS. he was under fifty years of age when he was consul, and seventy at the date given to the supposed dialogue. [G. L.l MANI'LIUS {Marcus or Caius or MA^N- LIUS, or MA'LLIUS, for all of these and many other variations are found in MSS., the weight of evidence being in favour of M. Manilius., is known to us as the author of an astrological poem in five books, entitled Astronomica. The greatest uncer- tainty prevails on every point connected with his personal history. By some critics he is supposed to be the Manilius described by Pliny {H. N. x. 2), as " Senator ille maximis nobjlis doctrinis doctore nullo," who first collected accurate information with regard to the phoenix, and maintained that the period of its life corresponded with the revolution of the Great Year {magni conversionem anni in which the heavenly bodies completed a perfect cycle ; by others to be the Manilius Antiochus styled "astrologiae conditorem," who came to Rome as a slave, along with Publius Syrus the mimographer, and Staberius Eros the grammarian (Plin. H.N. xxxv. 58) ; by others, to be the "Manlius Mathematicus" who, in the time of Augustus, adjusted the obelisk in the Campus Martius, so as to act as a sun-dial (Plin, //. N. xxxvi. 15. § 6) ; by others, to be no other than F'l. Mallius Theodorus, on whose consulship Claudian composed a panegyric, in which he extols his knowledge of the stars. Little proof has been adduced in support of these conjectures, beyond the mere correspondence of name, and the cir- cumstance that each of the individuals, selected is believed to have been more or less addicted to the study of the heavens, while many grave considera- tions forbid us to adopt any one of them. It does not appear that Manlius the senator composed any work at all upon astronomical topics. It is impossible that Manlius Antiochus, to whose claims the expression " founder of astrology" might seem to give some force, can be the person, for we know from Suetonius, that his companion Staberius Eros taught a school during the SuUan troubles, while Manlius, of whom we are in search, cannot, as we shall point out immediately, have flourished earlier than nearly a century after that date. Manlius " the mathematician" exists only in the more cor- rupt copies of the naturalist, the proper name being rejected as an interpolation by all the best editors. Claudian, although he dilates upon the moral per- fections and literary distinction of Mallius, and bestows unmeasured praise on his essay concerning the origin and arrangement of the world, gives no hint that the stoical principles which it advocated were developed in verse, but, on the contrary, de- clares that the honey of its refined eloquence {ser- irionis mella politi) was to be preferred to the en- chanting songs of Orpheus ; while Salmasius {ad Ampelium., p. 91 ) avers that this very treatise in prose by Theodorus, was still to be found in certain libraries, and P. J. Maussaeus proposed to give it to the world. Finally, the arguments advanced by Gevartius and Spanheim, to prove from the language of the Astronomica, that these books must have been composed as late as the reign of Theodosius the Great, have been fully confuted by Salmasius, Huetius, Scaliger, Vossius, and Creech. The fact is, that no ancient writer with whom we are acquainted, either takes any notice of a poet Ma- nilius, or quotes a single line from the poem. He is not mentioned by Ovid in his catalogue of ecu-