Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/709

Rh SALLUSTIUS. to chronology. There is an oration in the Jugur- thine war (c. 30) of C. Memmius, tribunus plebis, against L. Calpurnius Bestia, which Sallustius declares to be the genuine speech of Memmius ; and it is, in fact, very different from those which he composed himself. Sallustius, also, is said to have written Histo- riarum Libri Quinque, which were dedicated to Lucullus, a son of L. Licinius Lucullus. The work is supposed to have comprised the period from the consulship of M. Aemilius Lepidus and Q. Lutatius Catulus, B. c. 78, the year of Sulla's death, to the consulship of L. Vulcatius Tullus and M- Ae- milius Lepidus, B. c. 66, the year in which Cicero was praetor. If this is so, Sallust began his history where that of Sisenna on the Civil Wars of Sidla ended. This work is lost,*with the excep- tion of fragments which have been collected and arranged. The fragments contain, among other things, several orations and letters. Some frag- ments belonging to the third book, and relating to the war with Spartacus, have been published from a Vatican MS. in the present century. (C. Sal- lustii Cr. Histor. lib. iii. Fragmenta e Cod. Vat. ed. ah Angela Maio ; edit, aticttor et emendatior, curante J. Th. Kreysig, Misen. 1830, 8vo.) The ground for stating that the history of Sal- lustius began with b. c. 78, is the authority of the fragment in Donatus. ( lies Populi Romania ^c). But Ausonins (Id. iv. ad Nepotem)^ seems to speak of some historical work which, as Le Clerc sup- poses, comprised a period of twelve years before the Tumultus Lepidi in B. c. 78. The commence- ment of such a work would coincide with b. c. 90, or the outbreak of the Social War, but the twelve years may be referred with equal probability to the period from b. c. 78 to b. c. QQ. However, Sallust seems to have treated of the period of Sulla (Plutarch, Comparison of Sulla and Ly- sander, c. 3) ; though it is possible that this was done only by way of introduction to his historical work. The opusculum of Julius Exsuperantius may, with great probability, be assumed to be an epitome from the Avorks of Sallustius. It commences with speaking of Me- tellus, the proconsul, taking C. Marius with him to the Jugurthine war ; and it terminates with the capture of Calagurris in Spain (Calahorra) by Pompeius, the erection of his trophies on the Pyrenees, and his return to Rome from Spain, b. c. 72. It does not, therefore, comprise the whole of the period comprehended in the historical works of Sallustius ; but Exsuperantius certainly followed some work which treated of the wars of Marj[us and Sulla. It is, then, a probable conjecture that Sallustius treated the following subjects in their chronological order, which may not have been the order in which they were written : — the war of Jugurtha ; the period from the commencement of the Marsic war, B. c. 90, to the death of Sulla, b. c. 78 ; the tumults caused by the consul M. Aemilius Le- pidus upon the death of Sulla ; the war of Ser- torius, which ended B. c. 72 ; the Mithridatic war, which ended r c. 63 ; and the conspiracy of Catiline. It was the fashion of Sallust to choose striking periods and events, and to write in piece- meal. Some grammarian probably arranged into the form of a history the works which com- prised the period from B. c. 90 to b. c. 66, and this arrangement may have been made at a very SALLUSTIUS. 697 early period. Plutarch {Lucullus., 10, 33) twice refers to Sallustius in his history of the campaigns of Lucullus in Asia. A passage in the Pompeius of Plutarch (c. 2) is apparently founded on a fragment, which is arranged in the third book. The fragments themselves are too meagre to allow the plan of the supposed history of Sallust to be reconstructed, though this has been attempted several times. But the more probable conclusion is that he did not write one history, but wrote several histories, all of which, except 'the Catilina and .Jugurtha., were arranged either by himself or others, under the title of Histories. Gellius fre- quently quotes the Histories of Sallustius. Duae Epistolae de Re Publica ordinanda., which appear to be addressed to Caesar at the time when he was engaged in his Spanish campaign (b. c. 49) against Petreius and Afranius, and are attributed to Sallustius ; but the opinions of critics on their authenticity are divided. The rhetorical character of them is in itself no ground for supposing that they are not by Sallustius. The Declamutio in Sallustium, which is attri- buted to Cicero, is generally admitted to be the work of some rhetorician, the matter of which is the well-known hostility between the orator and the historian. The same opinion is generally maintained as to the Declamatio in Ciceronem^ which is attributed to Sallustius ; but Quinti- lianus {Inst. Or. iv. 1. 68) quotes the very words of the commencement of this declamatio ; and (ix. 3, 89) the words " Romule Arpinas." {De- clam, in Cic. c. 4.) Some of the Roman writers considered that Sal- lustius imitated the style of Thucydides. (Veil. Pat. ii. 36.) His language is generally concise and perspi- cuous : perhaps his love of brevity may have caused the ambiguity that is sometimes found in his sen- tences. He also affected archaic words. Though he has considerable merit as a writer, his art is always apparent. The terms in which some critics speak of him as a writer seem to be very extra- vagant. Sallustius had no pretensions to great research or precision about facts ; and probably the grammarian Atteius Philologus (Sueton. de Illust. Gram. 10) may have helped his indolence by collecting materials for him. His reflections have often something of the same artificial and constrained character as his expressions. One may- judge that his object was to obtain distinction as a writer ; that style was what he thought of more than matter. We have no means of judging how far Sallustius was superior as a writer to Sulla, L. Lucullus, and Sisenna ; but he has probably the merit of being the first Roman who wrote what is usually called history. He was not above his contemporaries as a politician : he was a party man, and there are no indications of any comprehensive views, which had a whole nation for their object. He hated the nobility, as a man may do, without loving the people. The editions of Sallustius are very numerous. The Editio Princeps was that of Rome, 1470, fol. The edition of G. Corte, Leipzig, 1724, 4to ; of Haverkamp, Haag, 1742, 4to, and of F. D. Ger- lach, Basel, 1823—1831, 3 vols. 4to.; and of Kritz, Leipzig, 1828 — 1834, 2 vols. 8vo., are the principaL An edition of the text was published by Orelli, Zurich, 1840. The translations are very nume- rous. The Italian version of Alfieri is as close and compact as the original. There are vasmy