As he draws toward the conclusion of a lengthy string of Roman exempla on the topic of moderatio, a virtue highly regarded by the reigning Emperor Tiberius,Footnote ¹ Valerius introduces a brief discussion on the challenges he faces in producing the kind of account he wants to create. Unfortunately, for a rare passage in which Valerius speaks about his own work, the text is uncertain: various problems have been identified and different solutions have been proposed, but not, I will argue, ones that satisfactorily recognize the prominence of Valerius’ authorial role here or understand his meaning or pay appropriate attention to the immediate context in which he makes his remarks. I propose a new emendation which helps clarify that the primary challenge concerns the scale and the style of coverage of individual exempla required by the Facta et dicta memorabilia. I will show that Valerius deliberately alludes to his own programmatic remarks in the work's preface, which then illuminate his purpose and practice, both broadly in relation to his mission to record and praise outstanding individuals and more narrowly in providing a transition to a specific exemplum.

Before turning to the passage to be examined in detail, it is important to quote from the preface to the work in which Valerius explains to his dedicatee, the Emperor Tiberius, and to the reader what he has set out to do:

In the last section of these opening remarks Valerius highlights two areas in which he has had to make authorial choices: (i) he cannot include everything and so has had to choose what he covers, that is, how many exempla to include, from which periods, what virtues and vices to treat; (ii) he cannot equal his sources in facundia, which, I believe, has two relevant elements. First, the scale of his individual exempla is smaller than that of his sources;Footnote ³ second, he claims that his ‘eloquence’ is inferior, which must include what we could call ‘style’.Footnote ⁴

In the Facta et dicta memorabilia significant reflections by Valerius on his authorial role are relatively few, but 4.1.12 is certainly a key passage. And in this case the reflection is heralded by the appearance of the two key nouns from the title of Valerius’ work, facta and dicta.Footnote ⁵ As a starting point for more detailed discussion I quote the text from Briscoe's relatively conservative Teubner edition, which is now the standard text for Valerius:Footnote ⁶

Briscoe's decision to resort to the obelus on three occasions in such a short passage indicates the substantial problems in reconstructing Valerius’ original text from the evidence of the extant manuscripts.Footnote ⁷ Manuscript A (and manuscript L's) quam ambitu orationis (line 1) attracted adverse comment from Servatus Lupus of Ferrières, but he suggested no correction. breuissimo (line 1) appears in the eleventh-century manuscript G, which does not derive from A and L, showing that the text was problematic at an earlier stage in the transmission. The combination quam breuissimo ambitu orationis is considered ‘grammatically more feasible’ by Westphal,Footnote ⁸ but Shackleton Bailey follows the tradition of many of the later manuscripts, and Kempf, and inserts angusto.Footnote ⁹ A superlative form angustissimo would give an intelligible sense (and echo the explanatory breuissimo), but, although Valerius is excerpting and condensing, his purpose is not to abbreviate as far as possible but rather to the degree appropriate to the scale of his work, so the positive angusto is preferable.Footnote ¹⁰ Westphal suggests that we should read tam angusto, because, ‘framed by the words dicta and angusto, the particle tam could easily have been misread and falsified to quam in the light of the preceding pronouns’.Footnote ¹¹ However, it is far more likely that we have a third interrogative element introduced by quam (or something similar) dealing with the idea ‘on what scale’,Footnote ¹² a question that Valerius then proceeds to clarify in the next sentence.Footnote ¹³

The problems of the next sentence are more complex with three principal loci of disagreement among Valerius’ editors. The starting point, however, for an attempt to unravel some of the difficulties was identified clearly by Gertz, who rightly emphasized that utrumque (line 3) shows that Valerius presented himself as wrestling with two difficulties.Footnote ¹⁴ Therefore, the first part of the sentence must set forth two authorial dilemmas. The different readings of the manuscripts with two substantives, magna and multa (line 2), and one adverb, breuiter, present just one problem, that of scale.Footnote ¹⁵ So scholars have suggested introducing a second adverb to follow magna: Heller conjectured magnifice,Footnote ¹⁶ Gertz abundanter, albeit cautiously,Footnote ¹⁷ and most recently Westphal digne on the grounds that this is a ‘less invasive’ addition. The challenge is to propose an adverb that could easily have been corrupted into atque or atque per. I suggest that apte fits the bill palaeographically and creates perfect sense. Indeed, Valerius uses the adverb on two other occasions both in authorial contexts: hoc loco apte referuntur Polystratus et Hippoclides (1.8.ext.17) and quia appellatione <LATINA> uix apte exprimi possunt, Graeca pronuntiatione dicantur (7.4.prf.). Thus Valerius explains his task as presenting important or weighty material in a manner fitting its nature and presenting a large volume of material, specifically many exempla, in abbreviated form.

Both considerations are reinforced in the sequel: his subjects excel in claritas (line 2) and the author is faced with a range of human and other affairs that are beyond counting (infinitus). Overwhelmed both by the stature and significance of his exemplars and by the sheer number of them, the result was an inability to do justice to both (utrumque praestare). With Kempf (although he did not go so far as to print it), I follow Gertz in emending the potuit of manuscript A (line 3) to potui, a first-person verb that is highly appropriate in this authorial passage. Then itaque (line 3) can stand as first word in the next sentence, its usual position in Valerius.Footnote ¹⁸

What follows, then, is an explanation of what Valerius has been able to do, first through a statement of principle, which returns to what he has set out in the preface, and then through an application of the principle to a specific exemplum. This resolution of his authorial dilemma can be usefully compared with another authorial passage that occurs at the beginning of his treatment of foreign exempla of ira, but which also looks back at the eight cases of Roman anger that he has just presented (9.3.ext.prf.):

Here again there are two competing ideas: in the first eleven chapters of the final book of his work Valerius has determined to present an uninterrupted treatment of vices, which in itself is a stark contrast to eight books of predominantly positive examples of virtue,Footnote ²⁰ and in the middle of his treatment of anger he reflects on what he is doing. In general, for Valerius and other writers of exemplary literature, the more famous the exemplar the more powerful the force of the example. So the vast majority of Valerius’ exemplars are renowned figures. Yet, to treat the vices of the great (uiri maximi), who were in other respects exemplars of virtues (for example, from this chapter, M. Livius Salinator, T. Manlius Imperiosus Torquatus and, most relevantly, Q. Caecilius Metellus Macedonicus), was difficult for an author of inferior status.Footnote ²¹ None the less, Valerius declares that he will not do what is easy, that is, refrain from such criticism, but will pursue the plan for his work that includes vices as a key aspect. The final proviso, whether one accepts the manuscripts’ narrandi or Madvig's emendation narranti, re-presents the issues—Valerius wants to signal his approval for all kinds of positive exempla, but also narrates what he has to, that is, exempla of vice.

To return to 4.1.12: confronted by a double challenge and unable to fulfil both aspects of it, Valerius has prioritized the need to write briefly on many topics over writing with a level of detail or style appropriate to his august exemplars: quis enim omnis aeui gesta modico uoluminum numero conprehenderit? He cannot include everything, but has chosen to include many.Footnote ²² The gerundive recordanda (line 4) picks up firstly the memoratu digna of the opening clause of the work, while non laudanda (line 4) reminds the reader that the exempla he has chosen include things to be imitated and things to be avoided, which is an idea reflected in the praise of Tiberius, cuius caelesti prouidentia uirtutes, de quibus dicturus sum, benignissime fouentur, uitia seuerissime uindicantur. Importantly, this is (again) a programmatic theme outlined in the opening preface. Valerius’ reminder to his reader needs to be issued here because of his concern over the transition to the next exemplum. Although the laudable aspect of the exemplum proper that follows immediately is Metellus Macedonicus’ moderatio after the death of Scipio Aemilianus, categorized expressly by Valerius as praecipua ueneratione prosequenda, it was particularly remarkable precisely because of the preceding enmity (inimicitiae) of the two which arose from the ignoble motive of aemulatio uirtutis and escalated into a kind of civilian warfare (tantum non togata proelia).

In the final sentence of this authorial section Valerius shows us how he has resolved his major dilemma and how he handles this particular instance of two maximi uiri behaving badly. The clear causal link, quapropter (line 4), and the words strictim se narrari (line 5) confirm for the reader that an abbreviated account is what the work requires. In the two other instances in which Valerius uses strictim, it introduces cursory lists of exemplars (6.1.13, 8.13.6), but here the scale is noticeably different: the actual exemplum of Macedonicus’ moderatio is 138-words long, not short in the context of the whole work. None the less, it is a remarkable work of compression, not just of the events of 129 b.c. in the immediate aftermath of Scipio Aemilianus’ death but also of the years of rivalry.Footnote ²³ Valerius has not produced a detailed rehearsal of the enmity or of the key events of 129 b.c. The second idea introduced by bona cum uenia (line 4) and by patientur (line 5) is the uerecundia that Valerius feels at presenting ignoble behaviour by the noble. Those long dead could not prevent Valerius from unveiling their shortcomings, but, by presenting them as consenting to his representation of them, they voluntarily become exemplars. As the anonymous reader has suggested, a useful lesson that might be extracted from the exemplum for Valerius’ readers is that moral improvement is possible: what began ominously with acerrime … dissenserat ends upliftingly with the claim omnia nimirum ista praecipua ueneratione prosequenda deleuit moderatio.

So for 4.1.12 I suggest the following text: