Many Latin terms related to the exercise of power (dignitas, potestas, imperium, libertas, maiestas, mos …) have, even recently, been the subject of important research. But a systematic and exhaustive study of auctoritas had never before been conducted. The 444 titles mentioned under the heading auctoritas in O. Hiltbrunner's Bibliographie zur lateinischen Wortforschung (1988) should not mislead: the only study of some depth on the meaning of auctoritas in the political sphere was the comprehensive but dated one by J. Hellegouarc'h (Le vocabulaire latin [1963], pp. 295–320). The gap has been filled by an international conference held in September 2018 at the University of Nanterre, the presentations from which are published in this valuable volume.
L’auctoritas à Rome includes a broad introduction (‘Quand la vertu s'incarne’), eighteen chapters split into five sections (‘Terminologie, définitions et contexte’; ‘Les instances religieuses et politiques de l’auctoritas’; ‘L’auctoritas dans l'action’; ‘L’auctoritas dans le droit’; ‘Vers l’auctoritas impériale’) and a brief conclusion (‘Nature, fonctions et effets de l’auctoritas dans la culture civique romaine à la fin de la République et au début de l'Empire’). It is not intended as another addition to the studies on Begriffsgeschichte, but has a much more ambitious goal, already alluded to in its subtitle. On the one hand, the mention of the concept of ‘political culture’ reveals the intention to include this volume in the rich line of investigations that in the last 20 years (cf. K.-J. Hölkeskamp, Rekonstruktionen einer Republik [2004]) have expanded the field of studies on Roman politics, ‘en y intégrant les rituels, les images et l'ensemble des actes performatifs à travers lesquels des négociations étaient menées’ (editors’ introduction, p. 8). On the other hand, auctoritas is considered a constitutive notion, ‘l’élément central de la culture politique romaine, celui qui était au cœur des interactions sociales essentielles à l'exercice du pouvoir et à sa representation’ (p. 9); furthermore, ‘comme l'air qu'on respire, l’auctoritas était pour les Romains une réalité si évidente qu'ils ne se donnaient pas la peine de la définir’ (ibid.).
Indeed, a quick look at the auctoritas lemma in the TLL confirms this ‘universal’ use of the concept, which is reflected in the various chapters of this volume. In addition to the strictly political sphere, auctoritas comes into play in the activities of jurists (D. Mantovani; A. Schiavone), of erudites (P. Le Doze), of priests (Y. Berthelet; F. Van Haeperen) – and in every age since the early republic (T. Lanfranchi, on the XII Tables; K.-J. Hölkeskamp, on the laws Publilia and Maenia de patrum auctoritate).
This wide diffusion of the concept explains why the Romans (even speakers of the Greek language: see É. Famerie) ‘did not concern themselves with defining it’. The theme emerges above all in the study by F. Pina Polo on the use of auctoritas in Livy, Books 31–45. Pina Polo notes that auctoritas is a polysemic term, which can mean ‘influence’, but also ‘credibility’, ‘prestige’ and ‘authority’ as well as ‘authorisation’ and ‘approval’. This polysemy has a specific reason, namely that auctoritas applies to both groups and individuals, and it is used by Livy in three different contexts: he speaks of auctoritas patrum or senatus in relation to the senate; he applies the term to foreign individuals and peoples; and much more rarely he refers auctoritas to Roman individuals (Scipio Africanus, Cato, Aemilius Paulus). Perhaps, I would say, for Livy the ‘precursors’ of the auctoritas Augusti had to be few and carefully chosen (starting with Evander, who auctoritate magis quam imperio regebat loca, Liv. 1.7.8: see now E. Bianchi, JUS 3 [2018]).
If this widespread diffusion of the term and its polyvalent application justify the comparison with ‘the air we breathe’, they could also lead to an excessive fragmentation of the material in the volume presented here. The risk is averted thanks above all to the excellent introduction (which is not a mere framing of the topic, but an original synthesis) and to the contribution of M. Jehne, who opens the fifth section (‘Vers l’auctoritas impériale’) and best clarifies the complexity of auctoritas. Jehne rightly points out that auctoritas ‘vor allem eine Zuschreibung ist’ (p. 326): an ascription by those who accept that the advice or orders of certain individuals and groups are substantial, and as a consequence, they are often willing to follow. It is an essential point that auctoritas always depends on an external recognition to whoever holds it (as Pina Polo also writes, p. 155: ‘auctoritas parece haber sido en Roma ante todo un concepto mental y un término social’), it is not acquired forever (at least until Augustus), and it can increase or decrease. Moreover, auctoritas may be ‘individual’ (e.g. an experienced senator) or ‘collective’ (the senate as a council): individual auctoritas is subdivided into an institutional branch (a consul's authority) and a personal one (perceptible in the difference in auctoritas between colleagues); collective auctoritas may be cumulative (the authority of the group is understood as the summation of the individual authority of the members: e.g. the senate) or integral (e.g. the populus Romanus).
As is to be expected, most of the chapters deal with the multiple aspects of individual auctoritas (on which the definition proposed by David, p. 189, is based). Collective auctoritas is the subject of two particularly interesting chapters. The chapter by Hölkeskamp on the laws de patrum auctoritate is very useful as it clarifies the importance of auctoritas in the context of concrete political practice. According to Hölkeskamp the laws Publilia and Maenia, which regulated the auctoritas patrum by integrating it into the decision-making processes in the senate, contributed to the consolidation of the senate as a stable institution. This in turn was an essential prerequisite of the formalisation of decision-making processes in the senate in the shape of auctoritas senatus.
The chapter by G. Zecchini investigates the meaning of auctoritas populi in Cicero (Manil. 63–4) and of auctoritas Italiae in Cicero (Sest. 35) and Caesar (B civ. 1.35.1): both these formulas are alternative and polemic in relation to the auctoritas senatus and the potestas of the consuls and praetors, which Sulla had enhanced (here Zecchini convincingly illustrates the relationship of ‘inverse proportionality’ between auctoritas and potestas: for a different approach to the problem see David, p. 190). Italy (i.e. Roman citizens having the right to vote) becomes a politically active subject, whose auctoritas can legitimate Caesar's acts and deeds. Zecchini concludes with a fascinating hypothesis on the real intentions of Caesar before the Ides of March. The recent publication of the Fasti Privernates (F. Zevi, ZPE 197 [2016]) has suggested that Caesar's perpetual dictatorship has to be understood not as ‘everlasting’, but as ‘undetermined’. According to Zecchini Caesar probably purposed to give it up after his return from the Parthian campaign and to replace it with his own auctoritas: the auctoritas senatus would have been replaced by the auctoritas Italiae and the auctoritas Caesaris.
This conclusion refers us back to the well-known passage of the Res Gestae, which emphasises the superiority of Augustus’ auctoritas (34.3: a]uctoritate [omnibus praestiti, potest]atis au[tem n]ihilo ampliu[s habu]i quam cet[eri qui m]ihi quoque in ma[gis]tra[t]u conlegae f[uerunt]). This passage is the most quoted in the volume – which is not surprising. Since taking the name (etymologically connected to auctor/augeo), Augustus’ was the first (successful) attempt to ‘absolutize’ the concept of auctoritas, by binding it to himself in all circumstances and in front of anyone. It is precisely from the Res Gestae that the final chapter by Hurlet takes its cue. This chapter looks at the transition from auctoritas senatus to auctoritas principis, the foundation of imperial power, which is part of a debate recently renewed by the contrasting contributions of G. Rowe (JRS 103 [2013]) and K. Galinsky (Hermes 143 [2015]). It aims to describe how the auctoritas of Augustus emerged and overshadowed that of the senate, by analysing not only the aforementioned passage, but also the other three epigraphic documents from the Augustan period that contain the formula auctoritate / ex auctoritate Augusti. For Hurlet the auctoritas principis, far from being an established institution from the beginning, gradually developed through interactions with the senate: the auctoritas Augusti needed the recognition of the senators to produce its effects. Only from Claudius onwards the formula ex auctoritate senatus disappeared almost completely, while ex auctoritate Augusti was generalised. This opens a research path (the evolution of the concept of auctoritas in the post-Augustan age), which the volume approaches only in the fourth section (‘L’auctoritas dans le droit’) and which would be worthy of further study.
If RGDA 34.3 is the most cited passage in the volume, the most cited author by far is Cicero. Again, this is not surprising, given that ‘auctoritas was … one of Cicero's favourite concepts’ (J.P.V.D. Balsdon, CQ 10 [1960]). Cicero is almost omnipresent: an entire section of the volume is dedicated to him (‘L’auctoritas dans l'action’); the chapter by C. Bur on auctoritas and mos maiorum and the chapter by Berthelet are largely based on him. This observation is not meant to be a criticism: it cannot be denied that the Ciceronian corpus constitutes a precious and often irreplaceable source for the definition of the concept of auctoritas (and we must work with the sources we have at our disposal). But if Cicero's preponderance appears inevitable, it can be partly misleading: we risk attributing to the Romans the point of view of Cicero, a politician and master of the forum who is not known for his objectivity or his coherence (it is enough to recall the way in which he first values, then sets aside the notion of auctoritas populi and the one that he had ‘invented’, auctoritas Italiae). This is all the more true when Cicero himself becomes the object of research, as in the interesting chapter by É. Deniaux on Cicero's auctoritas. The idea that during the first months of 43 ‘son expérience et son auctoritas lui [avaient] donné une supériorité évidente devant le Sénat et devant le peuple’, that he ‘avait pris la charge entière de l’État à Rome’ (p. 247), has perhaps more to do with Cicero's self-representation (Fam. 12.24.2, quoted ibid.) or with the flattery of some of his interlocutors (such as Brutus: cf. Cic. Brut. 1.4a.2) than with the reality of the facts.
L’auctoritas à Rome is an excellent volume, which considerably adds to our knowledge of a fundamental aspect or rather a ‘constitutive notion’ of Roman political culture.
