Populares in Livy and the Livian tradition

Author: Seager, Robin
Title: Populares in Livy and the Livian tradition
Review/Collection: "Classical Quarterly", XXVII
Year edition: 1977
Pages: 377-390
Keywords: Histoire - Storia - History, Politique - Politica - Politics
Description: This paper essays a reconstruction of Livy's attitude to and treatment of the major ‘popularis’ figures of the late republic, from Ti. Gracchus to Cinna and Carbo. The opening section examines four situations involving ‘popularis’ prototypes: the careers of Sp. Cassius, Sp. Maelius, and Manlius Capitolinus and the fall of Ap. Claudius the decemvir. It first considers Livy's use of what by his time had become standard themes in writing about ‘populares’, then attempts to establish the possible antiquity of these modes of expression. In passing it should perhaps be stressed that the attention directed in this section to terminology is not intended to imply that Livy's attitudes (or those of any other author) can be determined simply from the mere occurrence in his work of certain slogans or catchwords. That is one reason why there is little profit in asking how a ‘popularis’ historian might have handled the same or similar events [Author].
Author initials: Seager 1977