Pegasus
Author(s): Edward Champlin
Source: Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, Bd. 32 (1978), pp. 269-278
Published by: Dr. Rudolf Habelt GmbH, Bonn (Germany)
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20185579
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269
PEGASUS
is one of the enigmas
The Roman Jurist Pegasus
and a consul,
senator
but prefect
and as such a counsellor
of the city of Rome,
yet we know him by his bare and exotic
Domitian,
He was not only a
of the principate.
cognomen
alone.
of the emperor
He was one of the
leading jurisconsultsof the classical age of Roman law, head of the Proculian school and so
learned
that his contemporaries
knew him as
'the Book',
yet not a single word of his writings
survives. Indeed, but for notices in the Digest and in Juvenal and his scholiast, he would have
been quite forgotten. Fortunately, an inscription turnedup a decade ago, naming Pegasus
as governor of the province of Dalmatia underVespasian, and the fragmented stone yielded
the last half of the man's
nomen gentilicium:
he is now on record as '...tius
.
Pegasus'
That is just enough to begin the reco7nstructionof his biography.
the publisher of the inscription, observed that themissing portion of
ProfessorWilkes,
the stone could hardly have accomodqtedmore than three additional letters in the gov'ernor's
name, and the reader can confirm his observation by inspection of the photograph.2) That
considerably narrows the range of possibilities, and in fact there is one combination of three
letters precisely which is clearly correct: the juristwas a Plotius Pegasus.
Pegasus,
the winged
recalling
horse of mythology,
is an unusually
rare name under any
circumstances, most of all in the senatorial class of Rome, where it is unique to the jurist.
The Juvenal scholiast, here a reliable and essentially near-contemporary witness, felt
obliged to commentupon it when the juristappeared in the famousconsilium of the fourth
satire:
consul
'filius
trierarchi,
parasemo
nomen accepit'
of Rome had been named after his father's
and prefect
are not normally
ex cuius Liburnae
to be looked
1) The meagre evidence
romischen Juristen2 (1967),
for in the consular
.3) That
ship. Winged
is, a future
beasts
of myth
fasti Qf Rome at any time. Besides
Pegasus
is gathered by W. Kunkel, Herkunft und soziale Stellung der
to the legal
PW ' Pegasus' . References
cf. A.Berger,
133-134;
writings are collected at Lenel, Palingenesia 11.9-12. The only recent contribution is the
highly fanciful essay by E.Marmorale, GIF 18 (1965), 97-106, which is especially vitiated
by the author's
belief
that the Pegasus Augus[talis?]
sodalis Augustalis; see nowG.Paci,
of an inscription
at Aletrium
was a
Epigraphica 38 (1976), 74-79.
2) Epigraphische Studien 4 (1967), 119-21, with Tafel 7, = AE 1967.355 (Zadar).
3) Schol. ad IV.77. G.B.Townend has successfully resurrected a scholiast contemporary
with
the poet whose
hand may be discerned
in the scholicon
I through VI (including
passage): CQ 22 (1972), 376-387. Theman's forte was prosopography.
this
E .C ham p
270
in
there is only one other example to be found, in the equally extraordinary name of an
equestrian partisan of Vespasian who rose to the consulship in 88, D.Plotius Grypus, the
griffin.4) Thuswe are faced with the coincidence of two contemporarygentlemen of
the Flavian era, both of non-senatorial birth and both consuls; one a Plotius and the other
a ...tius; one named after the fabulouswinged horse, the other after an equally fabulous
beast, part eagle, part lion. Winged beasts, swift and powerful, are apt symbolsof the
of the Roman navy.
might
it happens,
Pegasus would
no such vessel
be one obvious
stands on record
choice
in the imperial
for the name of a ship. As
but there
fleet,
is no reason
to
doubt the scholiast, and the name does turnup (suggestively perhaps) as that of a warship
in an epic
on the PunicWars
there was a vessel
Grypus,
by a consular
composed
of that name
in the classis
Syriaca.
of Pegasus named not one son but two after his commands.
attested
well
in naval
circles,
Paulus qui et Zosimus,
in or dying
at'Rome.
5)
Surely
the trierarch
The nomen Plotius
father
is certainly
a trierarch by the name of M.Plotius
and we can even produce
resident
of the jurist. As for
contemporary
as the Grypus
6) Also,
to the
was attached
Syrian fleet, we should note the trierarchAntonius Plotianus who set up a funerarydedication
at Seleucia
the base of that fleet,
Pieria,
of the Misenine
navarch
Plotia C.l.
Thalassa.8)
Various
considerations
fleet. 7) And
support
it would
First,
used as a Roman cognomen
attested
with
it can be quickly
patrician
both
gentes
less common
Septimius
imperial
examined.
names,
of the republic.
thanthe
Severus
other
three: a soldier
bears the unique
the name
to omit
is exceptionally
representing
common,
at Rome,
of the gens
that is,
lulius
the largest by far of the great
of the fifth cohort of vigiles
Pegasus.
and it is incomparably
at Rome under
10) It would
be difficult
4) Below, n.31.
The Grypus: CIL 111.434. Pegasi and
5) The Pegasus: Silius Italicus, Pun. 14.576.
form a natural pair, cf. Pliny NH 10.136:
'Pegasos equino capite volucres et
Grypi
reor. . .
rostri
ac
dira
aduncitate
fabulosos
gryphos -auritos
6) CILVI.3621.
7) IGLS 1155.
8) ILS8422.
9) CIL V1I1.128 (lulius); 111.4150, cf. V1.10889 (Aelius); Xll.1297
10) CIL VI. 1057.3.44
(A.D. 205?).
late
rare, and the gentilicia
is only one other on record,
name of A. Plautius
Herculanus,
the freedwoman
as a member
of Pegasus
Three are exceedingly
and Cornelius,
) There
the Italian Annius
be criminal
the identification
Plotia.
and Aelius,
to his friend,
(Cornelius).
to
271
Pegasus
argue coincidence: the man should be the descendant of a client of the great jurist, possibly
even a descendant of the jurist himself. The spelling of the name offers no problem, for
Plautius and Plotius are as interchangeable as Claudius and Clodius. There isgood evidence
that the name of a single person could be spelled indifferently in either fashion, and (most
relevantly) there are two senators of the second century, a Plotius lulianus and a D.Plautius
Felix lulianus, who are clearly connected not only to each other but to the brothers Pegasus
and Grypus aswell.11) As it happens, themore vulgar formhad good authority in the
Flavian
age,
Next,
for Vespasian
himself was
inclined
to use
'plostra'
for 'plaustra'
. 12)
the proconsul of Cyprus in the year 81/82 is recorded by an inscription (now lost)
as L.Plotius P....
13) He is usually, if hesitantly, identified as an unknown son of the
Claudian praetor P. Plautius Pulcher, a scion of the noble family of the Plautii Silvani. This
ismost unlikely.
'Lucius' is a praenomenquite unknown to the Plautii Silvani, or to the
republicanClaudii Pulchri fromwhom P. Pulcher clearly derived his name. Much more
likely,
then,
a Plotius ..:.
P
just then at the height
-should be the homonymous
of his power.
In that case,
son of Ptotius
Pegasus,
who was
the full name of the jurist might
be
restored as L. (?) Plotius Pegasus.
Finally, there is a Roman jurisconsultof the same era known simply as Plautius, who
is demonstrably 'fere aequalis Pegasi' . 14) The coincidence of a Flavian juristPlautius and
a Flavian juristPlotius Pegasus is highly suggestive. Jurisprudence tends to run in families,
the grand example being the IAcii Scaevolae of the republic, who produced no fewer than
six jurisconsults:the high incidence of relationship by blood andmarriage among the
members of a small profession remains to be investigated in detail.15) With reference
particularly to Pegasus, it is interesting that he was preceded in his school by the Coccei
Nervae, pater and filius, and succeeded immediately by the luventii Celsi, pater and
11) Plautius/Plotius:
PW 'Plautius'
(F.MUnzer).
luliani:
see below.
12) Suetonius, DV 22.
' Lucius' does appear in the Plautii Silvani,
13) CIL 111.6732 (cf. AE 1953.179).
but
only at a late date and through the connection with the Aelii Lamiae: L.Aelius
Plautius
LamiaAelianus, cos.80. Plautius Pulcher (ILS964) had no Aelian connection.
14) Kunkel, 134. Fragmentsat Lenel, Palingenesia 11.13-14.
15) Note
the recurrence of names among the jurists collected
by Kunkel,
to w*ich one
should add connections
by marriage,
e.g. Antistius Labeo married to a Neratia.
For the
republic, see especially F.Wieacker, "Die romische Juristen in der politischen Gesellschaft
des zweiten vorchristlichen Jahrhunderts", Sein undWerden imRecht (FestschriftU.v.Lubtow,
1970), 183-214.
E. Champi
272
in
filius. The surviving fragmentsof Plautius certainly do betray some interests similar to those
reported of Pegasus,
in the matter
particularly
He should be a close
of fideicommissa.
relative, perhaps a brother. 16)
It is very difficult
other members
to say just where
of his family.
as a partisan
first appears
year he was
In the following
he turnsup as suffect
launched
in the great
of Vespasian
in 88.17)
consul
on his senatorial
career
indiction
year 69, when
lie in the
may
D. Plotius Grypus,
he was appointed
and adlected
(probably VII Claudia)
to praetorian
raised
from. Some
is the brother,
important of these
to the command of a legion
regularly
until
Most
came
Pegasus
rank, but thereafter
the record
is silent
well
in one of the more
is honoured
who
ir
to the senate.
His son should be the Plotius Grypus,
by the mid-90's,
who
jocular of Statius' Silvae. 18) The praenomen of the consul of 88 is now known from the
to the subsequent
history of the family,
is extremely
Plautius/Plotius
D. Plautius Valens
Felix
lulianus,
take into account
and the excessive
with Grypus.
This
related
lulianus,
age.21)
One
is an obscure
century,
D.Plautius
in time to the
we should presume
attested
a relationship
as proconsul
of
And he in turn should be closely
lulianus attested
Plotius
to Professor A. M. Honors
the nomen
his proximity
is abundantly
Elpis,
clue
with
of Decimus
two other examples.
his high rank,
or Severan
the senator
this is a vital
is a senator of the second
father of a Plautia
if not the same as,
16) 1am indebted
in only
rarity of his nomenclature,
in the Antonine
at some date
to,
The other
at Corinth.20)
and if we
for the combination
rare, offered
consul of 88,
Cyprus
) If we can trust these fasti,
to have been Decimus.
Fasti Potentini
for his advice
as legate
of V Macedonica
on the jurist Plautius,
is
who
probably not to be identified with Pegasus nor with a possible son (there are problems of
nomenclature and chronology).
17) Below, n.31
18. Silvae IV. pr.21, IV.9.
19) Athenaeum
26 (1948),
110ff. What
follows
in this and
the next
two paragraphs
is
highly tentative, presumingon the accuracy of the FP. But ProfessorC.P.Jones rightly
remindsme of the problems of the FP, cf. most recently F.Zevi, Akt. VI Epigr. Kongress
(1973), 438.And'against theFPstands BCAR 15 (1887), 188, naming the consular pair
L. Plotius and L. Minucius
to give this priority over
(presumably Rufus, cos. ord. 88): but there is no good reason
from that of his
the FP, and the praenomen might be attracted
colleague.
20) CIL 111.541; cf.
SEG XI.219
for a Plotius
at Corinth.
21) IGRR111.954-956, AE 1961 .8, 1.Kourion90. For grave reservations on the pos
sibility of dating, see R.Bagnall and T.Drew-Bear, Phoenix 27 (1973), 227-28.
Pegasus
273
in Mbesia Inferior in 134. 22)
The unknown
father of the consuls
Pegasus
and Grypus
was a trierarch
in the Roman navy,
a rankand profession indicative of humble, if not servile, birth and strongly suggesting
Easternextraction. 23) And finally, the L. PlotiusP....,
of Domitian,
has a good
claim
to being
proconsul of Cyprus in the first year
the son of the jurist.
Taken together and with great caution, these fragile itemspoint strongly to the Eastern
half of the empire. Where
they are at all distinctive
the names are clearly
Greek:
not just
Pegasus andGrypus, which are certainly exotic, however they be explained: but Elpis
especially, and perhaps the trierarchZosimus, known to Romansas M. Plotius Paulus, who
certainly has the best claim to being the consuls' father. And whoever their fathermay have
been, his service in the fleet importsa probability of Eastern origins. It is also highly sug
gestive that, with the exception of Pegasus himself, the known provincial employments of
the family all lie in the East: Plotius Grypus and Plotius lulianus commandedMoesian legions,
Plautius lulianus and Plotius P....
were both governors of Cyprus. Itmight be conjectured
from the latter instance that the proconsulshipwent tomen with local ties, that the Plotii
were perhaps themselves native, seafaring Cypriots who received the franchise from the
Augustan proconsul of the island, A. Plautius - note the later vigilis, A. Plautius Pegasus and that one of their number with
a naval bent was attracted
to the Roman service
at the
nearby base of the classis Syriaca at Seleucia Pieria. However thatmay be, Eastern ancestry
(but not necessarily upbringing) is not historically implausible in the ruling classes of the
Flavian era, and the brothers Plotii can be assigned to the noteworthy contingent of Eastern
knights and senators adlected into or promotedwithin the senatorial order of Rome after the
revolution of 69.24)
The history of Pegasus is succinctly recorded by the Juvenal scholiast:
Filius trierarchi, ex cuius Liburnae parasemo nomen accepit, iuris studio gloriam memoriae
meruit, ut ' liber' vulgo, non homodoceretur. Hic functus omni honore cum provinciis
22) CIL 111.6178.
23) The senior Plotius was certainly trierarchunder Tiberius, possibly underAugustus
as well.
In that period officers
of the fleet were
almost
invariably
freedmen
(or even
im
perial slaves), though free provincials are not to be discounted: considerable modern debate
has not substantially supersededMommsen, Gesammelte Schriften V (1908), 407-41. Ihave
opted
for a free provincial
because
of the nomen,
but one should note
the still unexplained
C.Plotius Aug. lib. Gemellus (CILVI.24316), on whom see P.R.C.Weaver, Familia
Caesaris (1972), 36f.
24) Cf. most recently G.Houston, AJP 98 (1977), 53f.; conjecture might add more.
E .C h a m p I in
274
plurimis praefuisset, urbis curam administravit. Hinc est 'Pegasianum' scilicet ius,
quod iurisperitus fuerat.25)
Before his consulship the career of Pegasus is otherwise a blank. His father was of humble
station and his brotherwas certainly an equestrian officer in 69, nevertheless it should be
th'at he himself
accepted
a senatorial
followed
.26) As a new
'functus omni honore'
career,
man, and thereforemost unlikely to have been consul before the age of forty-two, he was
born not much after
probably
and perhaps
the year 30,
7) Whatever
earlier.
considerably
offices he may have held, his extraordinary rise was clearly due to his legal learning. Not
a walking
only was he a iuris peritus of glorious memory,
of one of the two schools
Proculus
of law at Rome,
who had succeeded
himself,
the Proculian.
Nerva
he was head
encyclopaedia,28)
His own master was
the jurisconsult
as long ago as 33,
pater as head of the school
and whom Pegasus succeeded directly at an unknowndate, possibly in the later years of
Nero.29) The relationshipmay have been a close one, not merely because Pegasus suc
ceeded
his master
of so many years,
but also because
law, and because
of reform in at least one branch of the civil
nomen gentilicium
in an affectionate
might
lead us to a wider
Conjecture
'Seneca's
was
Nero's
rein.
manner,
stage,
continued
he probably
as the name for a character
for if, as Professor Honore
then his best pupil will
lawyer',
he seems to have
also have moved
his work
used Proculus'
in a law-case.
has argued,
in the highest
Proculus
circles
of
30)
25) For the reliability
of this source,
see the article
cited
in n.3
above.
like his brother and adlected
by Vespasian
that he was an equestrian
26) The alternative,
of the 14 subsequent consuls
On the latest calculation,
in or after 69, is on balance unlikely.
into the senate, 2 may have reached the consulship under
by Vespasian
who were adlected
and one as late as Traian: Houston, 41ff.
his rule, 2 under Titus, at least 9 under Domitian,
27) For the calculation
see R.Syme,
Tacitus
(1958),
652-653,
and for the date of
Pegasus' consulship see below, n.35. Moreover, the proconsul of Cyprus of 81/82 must
long before),
and therefore was
have been praetor no later than the year 80 (and possibly
If he was Pegasus' son, the jurist's own birth should be pushed
born by 50 at the latest.
back into the 20's.
28) The popular comment might
play on the meanings of liber.
29) Pomponiusapud Dig.
Vespasiani
praefectus
472-509,
is essential.
suggest malice
1.2.2.53:
urbi fuit.'
toward the parvenu,
with
a deliberate
'Proculo Pegasus (sc. successit), qui temporibus
On Proculus,
the article
by A.M.
Honor6,
TvR 30 (1962),
he argues that
with 476. At 490-491
30) On all of this, see Honor6, esp. 490-493,
of 56 was influenced-by
Proculus; it was of course followed by the
the s.c. Trebellianum
of
Ibelieve)
that the gentilicium
He further argues (persuasively,
s.c. Pegasianum.
Pegasus
With
of Vespasian,
the advent
Pegasus
but his brother Plotius Grypus
unknown,
clearly
275
prospered.
His position
in 69 is quite
in that year as a commander
first appears
in the
armyof Antonius Primusand Arrius Varus, sweeping through Italy after the Flavian victory
at Cremona. The mysterious Grypus is an importantfigure, apparently the chief Flavian
agent among the forces led by Danubian generals of dubious loyalty. Vespasian had recently
adlected him into the senatorial order and placed him in commandof a legion, and the
sinisterMucianus correspondedwith him privately during the descent on Rome. His swift
rewardwas praetorian rank, assigned to him in the following year.31) PlotiusGrypus clearly
stood high in the confidence of Vespasian, and it might furtherbe conjectured that he had
previously served with the new emperorandMucianus in the East, being among the first
agents despatched by his party to join the campaign in Italy. Thus Pegasuswas assured of
access to the regime, if it were needed, and the smooth continuation of his career. But there
should be another
link binding
him (and his brother)
even
closer
to the dynasty.
The new
Dalmatian inscription'recording his tenure of the province commemorateshis choice of C.
32)
Petillius Firmus, tribune of legio IVFlavia felix, as iudex in a boundary dispute.
Petil
lius is a name
rare in the ruling classes
of the principate,
and its occurrence
precisely
in
the reign of Vesposian inevitably recalls the emperor's energetic general and son-in-law,
Petillius
Cerialis,
twice
close
relative
guess
that the military
(and probably
of this man,
three times) consul.
.33)
Firmus should be a
Petillius
perhaps even a son by an earlier marriage.
tribunate was
in the gift of the legate
Pegasus
It would
be a good
(the practice
is well
a name first reportedly used by Pegasus (Dig. 28.5.19).
Proculus was Sempronius,
Imight
note here that the connection
between Proculus and the sisters Metilia
Rufina and Metilia
Marcia
(suggested at 476) can be strengthened.
Among the relations of these ladies was
a line of later consuls headed by P.Metilius
Sabinus Nepos,
cos. 91 (on whom see, sum
marily, R.Syme, JRS58 (1968), 138); there exist three fragments from the Epistulae of
Proculus addressed
'Nepoti suo', surely a connection.
As for Pegasus under Nero,
I am
inclined to see a reference - could contemporaries
have missed it? - to the lawyer at
in the cena Trimalchionis:
Petronius, Satyricon 36.2,
'Quo facto videmus infra altilia
'Was the jurist a
et sumina leporemque in medio pinnis subornatum, ut Pegasus videretur.
timid and retiring scholar?
31) Tacitus, Hist. 3.52,
4.39,
40. For speculation
intrigue over the award to him of an actual praetorship,
as to Grypus'
role
and its subsequent
in 69 and the
revocation,
see recently J.K.Evans, Historia 27 (1978), 121-122.
32) AE 1967.355.
33) On
the career
of Cerialis
Britannia 4 (1973), 179-190.
and on the imperial Petillii
in general,
see A.R.Birley,
276
in
E .ChampI
attested), and that his choice reflects some intimacywith Vespasian's son-in-law.34)
did not harm and must have helped
of regime certainly
The change
career.
Pegasus'
A good sign was the first private consul ordinarius of the reign, M.Cocceius Nerva (71),
the son and grandson
of
lights of the Proculian
leading
ship soon followed
at an uncertain
and an appropriate
opportunity
consulta
bearing
Juvenal
scholiast,
to put some of his ideas into practice:
the consulship
is not as unusual
as it may appear.
its army reduced
to a single
It is certainly
in the reign of Titus),
Priscus,
who was
and its commanders
legion,
a military
the legate
tribune as judge. And
Pegasus was no vir militaris
command
in military
outside
and his consulship
important
item which
held no promise of martial
some
(or just possibly
jurist,
head of the Sabinian
himself
men.
of Rome the great Flavian
is a further
there
felix was another
of IV Flavia
importance,
hardly have been military
at some time in the later years of Vespasian
or was soon to become,
then,
is now on record
The Dalmatian
declined
need
that in his sole appearance
in coincidence:
strains belief
had certainly
to the
According
one of which
in the later 70's.
The province
two known senatus
reforms.35)
provinces,
several
and probably
to observe
piquant
jurist is found appointing
what
just a hint of his legal
the jurist also governed
own consul
a triumph for the son of a trierarch,
in the early 70's,
date
his name are perhaps
after
as Dalmatia,
school of law. Pegasus'
lavolenus
school
glory.
of law. 36)
The sparse
evidence shows a suspiciously legal bias.
34) The
link with
Petillius
Cerialis
be familial'.
might
The name Plotius
is rare in the
upper classes of the empire, Petillius rarerstill. An elusive figure of the year 68/69 is
a certain Plotius Firmus, successively praefectus vigilum underGalba and praefectus
praetorio under Otho: cf. Plotius Pegasus
Plotius Firmus disappears
from the record,
and Petillius Firmus. With the death of Otho
but not into disgrace,
for a near connection,
C.Tullius Capito PomponianusPlotius Firmus, flourished under the Flavians as legate in
Numidia
and consul
in 83.
For the granting
of tribunates
by consular
legates,
see e.g.
Pliny, Epp. 2.13, 3.8, 4.4, 7.22.
35) We
know of two senatusconsulta
passed
with fideicommissum(Gaius 2.254, etc.),
' Pegaso et Pusione
consulibus',
one dealing
the other with anniculi probatio (Gaius 1.31),
which might have been a subject of special
interest to a jurist of dubious origins. Two items
in the cursus of L.Cornelius
Pusio Annius Messalla
(gathered at PIR2 C 1425), and the
appearance
of his apparent son, L.Cornelius
Pusio, as consul as early as 90 (FP, and now
named as a legatee on the new fragment of the testament of Dasumius in 108, cf. ZPE 30
(1978), 286), combine
to the very early 70's:
36)
ILS 1015,
noted
discussed by G.Alfoldy,
to suggest that the consulship
it is commonly dated
'c. 73'
by R.Syme,
Danubian
Papers
of Pegasus
.
(1971),
and Pusio should be assigned
203; career
and origins
are
ES 5 (1968), 108ff. Note that Petillius Cerialis was legate of
and then of Britain from 70 to 74. Had Petillius Firmus been military
Germany
those years it might be presumed that he would have served with his relative;
command in Dalmatia will lie in the years 74/79.
tribune in
if so, Pegasus'
277
Pegasus
both Juvenal
which
of Domitian
that Pegasus
of this office
was savagely
satirized
by
of the city of Rome recorded
the prefecture
in the consilium
of his peers
takes precedenc'e
It is
upon a senator.
honours bestowed
one of the highest
and Pomponius,
by virtue
doubtless
to his career was
climax
The surprising
by Juvenal:
primusclamante Liburno
'currite, iam sedit' rapta properabat abolla
Pegasus, attonitae positus modo vilicus urbi.
quorum optimus atque
tum praefecti?
anne aliud
interpres legum sanctissimusomnia, quamquam
temporibusdiris, tractanda putabat inermi
(IV.75-81)
iustitia.
The dramatic date of the fourth satire of Juvenal lies somewherebetween mid-September
to his office
Pegasus was appointed
him under Vespasian,
forced by attonitae
appointed
perhaps
because
Precisely
urbi,
of Pomponius
is to be preferred,
as he generally
Juvenal
it certain
should make
soon after
Domitian,
how terrible
that Pegasus was
in 81. Why was
of Titus
the death
who was clearly
the times might
from Pomponius
or rather the epitome
the best and most upright
as his prefect
no matter
reliable.
) but just when
the Chatti),
The extract
remains unclear.
but Pomponius,
is not always
Digest,
and spring 83 (the war with
of Domitian)
81 (the accession
such a monster
interpreter
be,
in hindsight
in the
presented
rein
is. Modo,
the choice
the city
places
of Domitian,
thunderstruck)
at least,
appointed
of the laws, a man who believed
all of his duties
should be carried
that,
out with
un
armed justice, inermi iustitia. 38) The last phrase is ambiguous, often taken (by translators
especially)
to imply a weak
full justice
to offenders
surely preferable.
recourse
without
Domitian's
dignified
simply
office
interpres
lust for blood,
being
the prefect
The point
him at a moment's
reduced
to that of mere
legum sanctissimus,
bravely
diris),
insisted on seeing
as if he were
vilicus
and praise
and even
a slave,
of the city.
from Juvenal
his integrity,
is
in the face
justice done
despite
and despite
For Juvenal
out
to mete
interpretation
the alternative
is that the man retained
notice
not daring
master,
the horrors of the times (temporibus
to violence.
summoning
in to his tyrannical
in a reign of terror. However,
Despite
notorious
of Domitian's
man giving
his
he was
is rare.
of which
37) The war with the Chatti was the subject of Statius' De Bello Germanico,
this poem is a parody: the setting is before Domitian's
departure for the front. B.W.Jones,
for spring 82 as the opening campaign,
Historia 22 (1973), 79-90,
argued vigourously
but
the traditional date is defended by J. K.Evans, ib. 24 (1975), 121-124.
38) Another indication, perhaps, that Pegasus' prefecture began with the new reign
in 81,
a sign of its good
intentions.
278
E. Champi
- After
the meeting
of Domitian's
he retired
view. When
in
in the early 80's,
consilium
from the urban prefecture
Pegasus disappears
is quite uncertain.
Between
from
81 and 91 we
must find room in that office for him, forT.Aurelius Fulvus, forRutilius Gallicus (whodied
c.91), and probably forM.Arrecinus Clemens. 39) Fulvus, Gallicus and Clemens were all
bis in 85,
three consuls
and it has been
that the urban prefecture
observed
is normally
held
in
proximity to the second consulship.40) It is thus highly unlikely that Pegasus' prefecture
for more
lasted
and his demise
is due simply
him - Juvenal's
discussed
more
than two or three years,
than once
to the loss of our sources.
in the lost books of the Histories.
familiar with
all of the leading
after
office
leaving
self. 41)
Thereafter
but he was
appropriately:
forgotten
85.
The mystery
(or even
Juvenal
Martial,
and the younger-Pliny
jurists of the day) suggests
in office),
remembered
by the world
and probably
and praised
at large. Only
'iuris studio gloriam memoriae
his absence
him
from the
(who was certainly
that he may have died not
before
the death of Domitian
him, and so did Juvenal's
in the law schools
meruit'
certainly
must have mentioned
the other hand,
On
of his departure
De Bello Germanico
Statius'
satire was a parody of it - and Tacitus
extant works of Statius,
voluminous
surely not beyond
long
him
scholiast,
did his memory
flourish,
.
Princeton
EdwardChamplin
39) R.Syme, Tacitus, 644. ForClemens: B.W.Jones and R.Develin, Antichthon 10
(1976), 79-83.
40) Pegasus' appointment should not be considered unusual for that reason. The common
association
of the urban prefecture
with
an iterated
consulship
seems actually
to have
originated with the Flavians. Of Pegasus' twelve known predecessors in the office, only
three won a second consulship, viz., Statilius Taurus, SanquiniusMaximus, and Plautius
Si vanus Aelianus.
41)
It is worth
remarking
that all of the major
jurists contemporary
with
the correspondence
do turnup in Pliny's letters: lavolenus Priscus, Neratius Priscus, luventiusCelsus, and Titius
Aristo.