A thought on why things deteriorate

[P.Clodius]

It is with some trepidation I start this thread because I am not trying to inflame, provoke, or insult in any way, shape, or form. My question is simple really, why did the Caesar deserve death, and the Ambitus thread descend into the polarized depths? As PP has often pointed out, we're arguing over 2000+year old dead guys! The problems appear to derive from two distinct areas; inflammatory provocation, and 'sources'. While I will not dwell on or cite specific instances of the inflammatory provocation part of the issue, for I am guilty of such instances, I would like to make a statement at some length, call into question the use/statements concerning some of the sources. Unfortunately to do so I have to call out front and center a long standing and respected member of the community, namely MPC. Also, to illustrate the point I have to scrutinize his historical namesake.

 

Firstly, what constitutes a Primary Source? Seems to me a primary source is someone who writes about an event/persona that they themselves had in their living memory. For events surrounding the late republic examples would be Cicero, Sallust, and yes, Caesar himself. But should Plutarch, Suetonius, or anyone who lived 100+ years post facto be considered primary sources? Is Livy a primary source for the Second Punic War? I know they all would have had access to material now lost but is this enough? Consider this hypothetical analogy, person 1, "Jesus walked on water!" person 2, "Are you retarded, how can anyone walk on water?" person 1, "It must be true because it says so in the bible." The bible (New Testament) being a primary source, yet it was written by a loose collection of individuals who; 1) Never met the guy. 2) Were writing 100+ years postmortem. 3) Never even been to the place where it happened. 4) Heard it from some guy in the pub! It seems to me we should endeavor to treat Primary Sources with a little more skepticism. Just my opinion.

 

Secondary sources are, I think, those individuals who have been schooled in, and thoroughly researched their given subject/thesis. Make sense? We all have our favorites, those on which we tend to rely, mine being Goldsworthy, Meier, Gelzer, Dodge...OK, now this is where I call MPC/Cato front and center, and I do this reluctantly because as I have stated I do not want things to get heated.

 

In previous threads MPC has stated the following concerning Gruen.

"...Not one of major ones I've read--Fergus Millar, Erich Gruen, Nathan Rosenstein, Lily Ross Taylor..."

Here Gruen is "major"!

"it seems to me that E S Gruens....has merit."

Gruen has "merit".

"I really like Morstein-Marx, who is a student of Erich S. Gruen, my top favorite historian of the Roman republic...."

Gruen is "my top favorite".

"I agree with Gruen...."

Agrees with

Yet when Gruen shines the spotlight on Cato Minor's corruption "Cato was not averse to sponsoring grain laws, thereby outbidding his opponents, or to indulging in bribery, if this could bring supporters into power." It is dismissed by a play on words in the Ambitus thread, and possibly a 'mistake' in the Caesar thread.

 

Ronald Syme, a noted yet controversial Oxford professor, authority, was dismissed outright as "mistaken" when he wrote "Cato gathered a great fund to carry by bribery the election of Bibulus...."

 

Lilly Ross Taylor, remember now, she is one of those classed as "major", and "I'll always have a soft spot for Lily Ross Taylor." With regard to Dio's claim that "Cato was a lover of the people as no other." Taylor stated "the public that counted was Cato's own class, the hereditary nobility,"

 

So what do we take from the above points, do we selectively read and use what we want and dismiss what we don't? Do we twist something into what we want it to be? Why do we need citations at all? We never used to! Perhaps as humans it is natural to see what we want to see and believe what we want to believe, everything else is for the birds!

Thoughts?

[M. Porcius Cato]

Why do we need citations at all? We never used to!

 

Of course, you don't NEED citations--you can post whatever you'd like, turning conventional wisdom on Roman history on its head. You can post that Cincinnatus was aiming at regnum, that Scipio was a sleeper agent for Hannibal, that the Gracchi were really Boni, that Sulla was a populare, that Cato was as corrupt as Verres, and that Julius Caesar was a misunderstood defender of the republic. Frankly, I'm very happy to hear bold revisionism that challenges the conventional wisdom because it highlights how many facts we take for granted. BUT if you want to go down this path and you don't want to sound foolish and make yourself a subject of mockery, then your bold claims need to be supported by evidence.

 

What is evidence? Evidence consists of observations that point to a cause. This is the real basis of what is and isn't primary. For example, if Bob is an eyewitness to a crime and Tom merely overheard a conversation from another eyewitness, Bob's testimony is more evidentiary than Tom's because Bob can point to details that led up to and followed from the crime, whereas Tom cannot. In this scenario, Bob is more primary than Tom.

 

Can a modern scholar beat the ancient sources in terms of presenting primary evidence? Sure they can. If an ancient source says that the Etruscans came from Asia Minor in the 10th century BC, but modern scholars find that the DNA of ancient Etruscan remains in the 10th century more closely resembled the DNA of 10th century non-Etruscan Italians than 10th century Pergamenes, the modern source has evidence that more closely points to a cause of Etruscan origins than does the ancient claim. But the key here is that the modern scholars do have to present the DNA observations to support their claim. A general authority on DNA who made no study of ancient Etruscan remains would not be credible on this point, even if he studied the DNA of many other ancient peoples.

 

Now on the issue of Cato's alleged bribery, none of the ancient sources say that Cato engaged in bribery. None. Of the historians writing on Cato, the only contemporaries were Sallust and Cicero, who were positively effusive in praising Cato's incorruptibility, and Caesar, who hated Cato but also never accused him of engaging in bribery.

 

Now what new evidence is offered by my favorite scholars on Cato's alleged bribery? Again, none. And, yes, I'm disappointed that Gruen--in a paragraph praising Cato to the moon--claims that Cato organized a slush fund for Bibulus, but if he had presented evidence (even a footnote of support), I'd have to engage that evidence seriously. Instead, it's clear that Gruen is making an inferential leap, which isn't entirely arbitrary, but it IS conjecture. Note also that Gruen never goes as far as you do in saying that Cato was as corrupt as Clodius and Caesar. That really would be an unreasonable conjecture because it would absolutely fly in the face of the testimony given by Sallust and Cicero.

 

And since you quote me at length, I should point out that this isn't the only howler you've offered about Cato. I have in mind your repeated claim (that you maintained long after having been corrected on the point) that Cato was guilty of extortion when serving in Crete, despite Cato never having even been to Crete and despite the fact that his service in CYPRUS was praised to the moon in all the ancient sources.

 

Now I find it troublesome when people are so lazy that they don't even bother checking basic facts that are easy to look up. And though I understand that not everyone realizes that even a minor falsehood can reverberate throughout a chain of argument and threaten to upset all subsequent inferences, I understand also that many people are happy to dwell in their fantasy of Rome even if threatens to mislead novices who don't know better. But to maintain a falsehood in the teeth of overwhelming evidence to the contrary is raw dishonesty, and to maintain that Cato was as corrupt as Caesar is as good an example of such dishonesty as any I could imagine arising in the study of the Roman republic. And this dishonesty is the reason that things deteriorate.

Edited October 2, 2007 by M. Porcius Cato

[P.Clodius]

TBH our diametrically opposed views have been helpful to me in that they have caused me to research a little harder. Having said that, this is an internet forum and as such I will brain fart into it occasionally. An example of which can be found here. I could have taken the time to correctly research my answer, but I didn't, I relied on memory, and the always dependable PP to confirm. However, a debate in which you're involved often turns provocative, an intended measure from time to time me thinks. For instance, in your last paragraph above you imply that any opinion that isn't your own is dishonest and it is this dishonesty that causes threads to deteriorate. Should anyone disagree with you?

[M. Porcius Cato]

For instance, in your last paragraph above you imply that any opinion that isn't your own is dishonest and it is this dishonesty that causes threads to deteriorate. Should anyone disagree with you?

 

No, I did NOT imply that "any opinion that isn't [my] own is dishonest." The evidence can support more than one reconstruction of events, and I've had lots of disagreements about the best reconstruction where the issue of intellectual honesty was never involved at all (e.g., on the Vettius affair, on whether Caesar was born in 100 or 102, on the best reconstruction of the Catilinarian conspiracy, etc). What I said is that dishonesty is maintaining a falsehood in the teeth of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. As an illustrative contrast, I think Gruen is mistaken about Cato's role in Bibulus' election, but I don't think he was being intellectually dishonest. In contrast, if Gruen had said that Cato was guilty of ripping off the provincials in Crete, then someone had pointed to the source material on Cato's career (which fail to mention that any role for Cato in Crete and report that his performance in Cyprus had been exemplary), and then Gruen had replied "HAHAHAHA, oh to live in an idealistic world...!" THAT would have been dishonest, and it would have led immediately to the deterioration of the discussion. It's one thing to make an error; it's entirely another thing to scoff at the evidence showing that you are in error. The former is inevitable; the latter is dishonesty.

[P.Clodius]

Right, the Crete thing was an honest mistake, haven't we ascertained that already? Does it matter if I said it was Crete, another instance of brain farting? But what about the charges of corruption? Multiple secondary sources, some of which you hold in high regard have said he was as guilty as the rest of em.

[M. Porcius Cato]

Right, the Crete thing was an honest mistake, haven't we ascertained that already? Does it matter if I said it was Crete, another instance of brain farting?

Your "HAHAHAHA, oh to live in an idealistic world...!" wasn't an honest mistake. If you had been honest, you would have checked whether I was right about the ancient sources. Instead, you maintained AGAIN your incorrect view, you repeated it several times in different discussions (I'll link to them if you'd like) even when I provided counter-evidence about where Cato was serving and what the ancient sources said about Cato's conduct in Cyprus. This is what causes a discussion to deteriorate--when one side conscientiously points to sources and the other side flippantly ignores the sources and proceeds as though nothing has happened.

 

But what about the charges of corruption? Multiple secondary sources, some of which you hold in high regard have said he was as guilty as the rest of em.

This is EXACTLY what I'm talking about! None of the secondary sources say that "Cato was as guilty as the rest of em". Why not? It's easy to see why. Let's suppose for the sake of argument that Gruen wasn't mistaken about Cato's involvement in the election of Bibulus. Does that show that Cato was as guilty as the rest of them? No way. You'd have one mark against Cato against mulitple marks against Caesar (for his election to pontifex maximus, for his election to the consulship, for his bribery of Curio, etc etc.) Further, you'd be left scratching your head why Sallust, a partisan of Caesar, was convinced of Cato's incorruptibility; why Cicero thought Cato was lily-white; why the Romans had common sayings like, "I wouldn't believe it even if Cato said it". Etc Etc.

 

Maybe you think that you're entitled to exaggeration and flippant disregard for the facts, but it drives me nuts, and it's NOT honest.

[P.Clodius]

Instead, you maintained AGAIN your incorrect view, you repeated it several times in different discussions (I'll link to them if you'd like)

Please do. Crete, Tahiti, Long Island, is this all you have, this ONE SELF ACKNOWLEDGED MISTAKE AND FREELY ADMITTED ERROR? I talked about 'brain farting' even before you dug up the links, right? Doesn't disguise the fact that 1) Multiple secondary sources say the man was corrupt. and 2) He bent the rules when it suited him. Was he REALLY any different than the others? Are we still cherry picking?

[M. Porcius Cato]

Instead, you maintained AGAIN your incorrect view, you repeated it several times in different discussions (I'll link to them if you'd like)

Please do.

Anon.

 

Doesn't disguise the fact that 1) Multiple secondary sources say the man was corrupt. and 2) He bent the rules when it suited him. Was he REALLY any different than the others?

 

Yes, he was REALLY different from others. And you continue to misrepresent even the secondary sources even while you totally ignore the primary sources. This is what makes conversation with you impossible. NO secondary source says, "Cato was corrupt." That is NOT the historical verdict on Cato, and if you'd bother to quote the whole context in which the Gruen mistake occurs it will be plain that this is the case. I'm just about finished wasting my time with you on this issue, as you repeat yourself endlessly without addressing (1) how to distinguish a mistake in Gruen from a non-mistake, (2) how to conduct a principled (i.e., non-cherry-picking) review of the literature, and (3) what exactly it takes for you to recognize a "brain fart" when you make them given that your approach is to totally ignore the primary source literature.

[P.Clodius]

Yes I agree it is time to exit this thread. However, while we're on the subject of pointing out mistakes, here's one of yours! I guess this makes EVERY post you EVER made about Cicero dishonest and therefore discredits you and EVERY post you EVER made. With regard to Primary Sources I take it it's ok for me to write a biography on George Washington and be considered a primary source.

 

Closing thoughts.

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone." From another Primary Source. From here on in whenever electoral corruption is brought up by you concerning the late republic links to this thread proper, HERE and HERE will be provided.

I guess Mommsen's reference to Cato as "a dogmatic fool." doesn't just apply to the historical Cato! See you in the trenches.

[Primus Pilus]

The problem with the secondary sources is that they interpret the events described by the ancients using conjecture to fill in the blanks, just like the rest of us. Despite their scholarship, their conjecture is no more valid as proof when the source material that does exist either provides little detail or countering evidence. Conjecture is perfectly valid and valuable when used to help understand a broad range of events, the presence of possibilities, human experience, etc., but it provides no more hard facts than what the ancient sources do or don't provide.

 

An excellent example is Professor Stewart Irvin Oost's "Cato Uticensis and the Annexation of Cyprus" available via JSTOR. (The key information begins roughly midway through the 6th page)

 

It is not only a detailed overview of the events, but it provides just enough subtle conjecture to work as a sample of how the secondary sources may or may not be misleading. His conjecture may be correct, but the ancients don't necessarily corroborate it.

 

One excerpt...

He stooped to bribery to

help elect Bibulus, his son-in-law, to

the consulship (Suet. Iul. 19. l),

 

This is a fairly clear condemnation. However, if we read Suetonius, we see that it's not quite so clear.

 

When this became known, the aristocracy authorized Bibulus to promise the same amount, being seized with fear that Caesar would stick at nothing when he became chief magistrate, if he had a colleague who was heart and soul with him. Many of them contributed to the fund, and even Cato did not deny that bribery under such circumstances was for the good of the commonwealth.

 

According to Suetonius, Cato could easily be seen as being guilty of a failure to prosecute here. However, nothing is mentioned about Cato himself actually bribing anyone or personally contributing to a fund, despite acknowledging that it was probably a good thing. Semantics perhaps, but the jump to the conclusion is by the secondary source, not Suetonius.

 

A similar theme can be surmised throughout the publication. Though to be fair, Oost is also quite conscientious in pointing out that extortion can't be proven despite some rather harsh, though entirely legal, methods by Cato in Cyprus.

 

Regardless, an interesting read.

[P.Clodius]

Marcus Porcius Cato (95 BC

[Primus Pilus]

Marcus Porcius Cato (95 BC

[Gaius Octavius]

Just a thought. In a literature class in school, I was once told to 'read between the lines'. I responded (probably sophomorically) that if Shakespeare wanted us to read between the lines, he would have written between the lines. Collected a 'D'. Could something like this be a part of the present situation?

 

I hope that I have chosen my words carefully, so as not to offend. Therefor, if you please, 'read between the lines'.

 

Tom

[P.Clodius]

OK, so I guess we've ascertained;

 

1) Suetonius and Plutarch are secondary sources and therefore could be mistaken about some things.

 

2) Syme is just outright "mistaken".

 

3) Gruen is "mistaken" about one thing but the rest of his work is outstanding.

 

4) The historical Cato is still a gleaming angelic beacon of hope beckoning from history. Clean and free from corruption, though still potentially tarnished a little by Taylor's verdict.

[ASCLEPIADES]

, and even Cato did not deny that bribery under such circumstances was for the good of the commonwealth.

Salve, Amici.

 

The Latin original of this so critical clause (both in Bill Thayer's site and in the Latin Library) is:

 

", ne Catone quidem abnuente eam largitionem e re publica fieri."

 

It's an affirmation of a negative statement; even if it was true, it simply meant Caius Suetonius Tranquillus had no knowledge that Cato Minor ever expressed himself against bribery, specifically referring to Bibulus' election.

 

Gossip in the purest Suetonian way, if you ask me.