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Some Puns on Roman Cognomina

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2009

Victor J. Matthews
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Extract

Since so many Roman cognomina are derived from physical peculiarities and personal idiosyncrasies, it is not surprising that the unfortunate bearers were often the butt of laughter. As Cicero says (de Or. ii. 236), ‘Locus autem, et regio quasi ridiculi (nam id proxime quaeritur) turpitudine et deformitate quadam continetur: haec enim ridentur vel sola, vel maxime, quae notant et designant turpitudinem aliquam non turpiter.’ Cicero remarks that there is need for restraint and good taste in such jokes, and he adds (247) that it is not enough just to get a laugh, a man must also derive some benefit from the remark. Cicero's qualifying comments are in reference to an occasion when a man called Vargula was embraced by A. Sempronius, a candidate for office, and the latter's brother Marcus, whereupon he shouted to his slave ‘Puer, abige muscas’ (‘Boy, chase away the flies’), Musca being a cognomen of the Sempronii.

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Type
Research Article
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Greece & Rome , Volume 20 , Issue 1 , April 1973, pp. 20 - 24
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1973

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References

page 20 note 1 Cf. ii. 239; Quint, vi. 3. 8, v. 10. 31; Cic. de Inv. ii. 9. 28.

page 20 note 2 For Musca as a cognomen of the Sempronii, see Kajanto, I., The Latin Cognomina (Helsinki, 1965), 333Google Scholar; RE iiA. 1435, nos. 71–2.

page 20 note 3 It is of Etruscan origin. See RE s.v. ‘C. Verres’, 1562.

page 21 note 1 Kajanto, remarks (op. cit. 67–8)Google Scholar that Frugi was one of the very few laudatory names among the family cognomina of the republican nobility. This is another indication of the meritorious character of the consul of 133.

page 21 note 2 Wilkins, A. S., Ciceronis De Oratore Libri Tres (Oxford, 1892, repr. 1962), 357–8.Google Scholar

page 22 note 1 Cic., de Or. ii. 268Google Scholar; Gell. ii. 20. 5–6Google Scholar; iii. 4. 1; iv. 17. i; vi. 11. 9; Val. Max. iv. 1. 10Google Scholar. Asellus' tribunate was in 140, not 139 as Wilkins dates it. See Livy, , Oxy. Per. 54Google Scholar, ‘Q. Caepione C. Laelio Sapiente coss.’; MRR i. 480.Google Scholar

page 22 note 2 See Wiseman, T. P., HSCP lxxiv (1970), 213 n. 33.Google Scholar

page 22 note 3 Bailey, D. R. Shackleton, Cicero's Letters to Atticus, i. (Cambridge, 1965), 379.Google Scholar

page 22 note 4 See MRR ii. 184.

page 23 note 1 Shackleton Bailey, loc. cit.

page 23 note 2 Appian, , BC ii. 108Google Scholar: εὐμηχ⋯νως εὐπε τοῖς ⋯σπασαμ⋯νοις “οὐκ εἰμ⋯ Βασιλε⋯ς, ⋯λλ⋯ Καῖσαρ”, ὡς δ⋯ περ⋯ τ⋯ ⋯νομα ⋯σφαλμ⋯νοις; Dio, xliv. 10. 1Google Scholar: οὐκ ἔφη Βασιλε⋯ς ⋯λλ⋯ Καῖσαρ καλεῖσθαι. See Fraenkel, E., Horace (Oxford, 1957), 120 n. 1.Google Scholar

page 23 note 3 Fraenkel, loc. cit.

page 23 note 4 MRR ii. 339.

page 23 note 5 Vers. Anon. 4, in Poetarum Romanorum Veterum Reliquiae, sel. Diehl, E. (repr. Berlin, 1967), 164.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 24 note 1 Plutarch, , Crass, iv. 1Google Scholar; Appian, , BC i. 72, 75.Google Scholar

page 24 note 2 It is a strange coincidence that the names of another Crassus and Carbo occur together in 130, when C. Papirius Carbo (cos. 120) succeeded P. Licinius Crassus Dives Mucianus (cos. 131) as a member of the Gracchan land commission. However it is difficult to see how this would have benefited Carbo to any material extent, and I am sure that the Marian context is the right one. [Victor], Vir. Ill. lxv. 4Google Scholar, confuses the names of Carbo and Crassus (see Greenidge, and Clay, , Sources for Roman History 133–70Google Scholar [2nd edn. Oxford, 1960, repr. 1961], 34; MRR i. 503)Google Scholar. Could the author have been influenced by this verse?