Voluntary and Forced Migrants in the Transfer of Greek Language and Literature towards Rome (240 BCE – 27 BCE)

The biographical tradition informs us about the lives of several bilingual ancient writers who were enslaved at some point during their literary careers. This is also the case of individuals credited with the foundation of Latin literary genres which were understood to be cultural translations of Greek equivalents, such as Livius Andronicus or Publilius Syrus. Thus, enslaved and formerly enslaved persons played a crucial role in the emergence of literary culture in Rome. During the late Republic, the enslaved and freed were key agents in the processes of cultural transfer from the Greek-speaking eastern Mediterranean to Latin-speaking Rome.

This arrival of enslaved intellectuals coexisted with the migration of freeborn individuals towards Rome. Among these voluntary migrants, we find Greek scholars who worked in renowned Hellenic cultural centers, distinguished individuals that were sought out by wealthy Romans to increase their cultural capital, and ambassadors on diplomatic missions. How do the biographies of these free migrants differ from those of literate enslaved persons who were taken to Rome against their will? And how did the coexistence of the two simultaneous, but radically different, patterns of mobility affect the development of Latin literature and of Greek literature in Republican Rome?

The narrative that associates the beginning of literature in Rome with the arrival of enslaved Greek-speaking migrants to the city is long-established. The traditional story goes as follows: Livius Andronicus was born in Tarentum towards the end of the first quarter of the 3rd century BCE. He was captured and enslaved in 272 BCE, when his hometown fell to the Romans at the end of the Pyrrhic wars. He was then taken to Rome, where he was eventually manumitted from slavery by M. Livius Salinator, whose nomen he adopted—as was standard practice for freed persons upon manumission. In the year 240 BCE, he wrote and staged the first theatrical performance in Roman history. During the following decades, Livius Andronicus enjoyed a successful career in the capital. He wrote—and likely acted in—at least nine tragedies and three comedies, he translated the Odyssey into Latin in Saturnian verse, and he composed a hymn to Juno Regina for an expiatory rite that took place in 207 BCE. Due to the success of this hymn, a collegium of writers and actors was founded in his honor in the temple of Minerva on the Aventine hill. After his death, his work lived on, as is shown by Horace’s complaints about the use of Livius’ translation of the Odyssey in his schooldays. [1]

But ever since its earliest version, the biography of Livius Andronicus has been subject to controversy. Already Cicero reports two possible dates for Livius’ first performance: a later one given by the poet Accius and an earlier one given by Cicero’s friend and correspondent Atticus—which ultimately derives from Varro. [2] Both Cicero and the bulk of modern scholarship tend to accept the earlier date, as the later one would make Ennius’ plays earlier than Livius’, bereaving him of the title of first poet in Rome. However, there are voices of dissonance. Some scholars have argued in favor of Accius’ chronology, [3] while others reject both dates and propose an alternative one to mark the beginning of Livius’ literary activity. [4] The chronology is not the only part of Livius Andronicus’ biography that is up for debate. The nature of the purported first performance is also unclear, with different sources giving contradictory statements: was it a comedy, as the scholia to Horace’s Epistles 2.1.62–63 affirm? Or did it include both a comedy and a tragedy, as reported in Cassiodorus’ Chronicon? Or even a comedy, a tragedy, and a fabula togata, as Donatus believed? And, in any case, what was new about this performance that gained Livius the title of first poet? Was it that he added a plot to the Roman fabulae that were already circulating—as Livy believes—, or did he translate Greek drama into Latin—as Diomedes Grammaticus suggests? [5]

Even the reasons for which he is included in this paper have been called into question: was he really captured and forcefully taken to Rome as a slave? [6] And if he was, to which member of the Livii Salinatores family did he belong? To M. Livius Salinator, decemvir in the Ludi Saeculares of 236 BCE? Or to his homonymous son, consul in 219 and 207? [7] Moreover, was he originally from the city of Tarentum, or did his patron’s connection to the Ludi Saeculares, which were celebrated in a place called Terentum on the Campus Martius, lead to confusion? [8] Assuming nonetheless that Livius was indeed captured in the city of Tarentum, we still cannot know if he was born there or if he merely happened to be there at the time of the Romans’ arrival. [9] So, was he ever a slave or even a Greek-speaking migrant?

Regardless of the precise historical facts behind it, Livius Andronicus’ biography was molded into a narrative that served multiple purposes. One of them was to draw a line of continuity between Greek and Latin literature. [10] Another was to depict Latin literature as a product of the victory over the Carthaginians—and of the time of peace that followed—by locating its beginning just after the end of the First Punic War. [11] For our present purpose, this biography serves as an example of the issues faced when using ancient biographical texts as a source for historiographical fact. With only a few exceptions, the lives of the people present in this article are attested in scattered testimonia, sometimes mentioned as part of other people’s biographies, or in historiographical or miscellaneous works, or even in court cases. [12] All these texts are imbued with their own agendas and their particular moral outlook, and they often present a significant chronological distance with the actual lives of the individuals they portray. It is beyond the scope of this paper to nitpick through the biographies of enslaved and freeborn migrants from Greek-speaking areas towards Rome in an attempt to establish which parts of these may be more or less rooted in historical fact. Our focus here will be on the broader phenomenon of migration towards Rome in which these biographical details are encased, and on how these biographies contribute to our understanding of this phenomenon by illustrating aspects of the lives of the migrants—free and forced—that carried with them the cultural baggage necessary for the transmission of Greek language and Greek literature to the capital of the expanding Roman Republic.

After this caveat regarding our sources, we may move onto the two methodological frameworks that constitute the base for this paper: slavery studies and migrant literature. Ancient slavery has received considerable scholarly attention lately, resulting in new conceptual frameworks that help understand the phenomenon in its complexity. Recent work eschews essentialist approaches to slavery, and scholars increasingly focus on the enslaved as people with agency and individual identities that were not necessarily related to their enslavement. [13] In consequence, enslaved people are no longer conceptualized exclusively in a legal dimension—as property—, or in an economic dimension—as objects—, or even in a humanitarian dimension—as victims—. Instead, their ability to create networks within their societies and to actively influence their environment is emphasized. The other theoretical pillar of this essay rests on the concept of migrant literature. This term is born from the observations of scholars in postcolonial studies, who have revealed a set of characteristics unique to literary works written by migrants. It has recently been argued that literature from the early Principate written by migrants from the eastern Mediterranean with a Greek cultural background presents characteristics typical of the literature of migrants in the postcolonial world such as ambivalence and in-betweenness. [14] However, there is an important nuance to the idea of Greek literature in Rome as migrant literature, one that makes it quintessentially different from the concept as it is used in postcolonial studies. Many of the migrants who carried Greek language and literature to Rome were taken there forcefully as slaves.

This raises the questions we will attempt to answer in this article: do we observe differences in the lives and works of these two groups of migrants, enslaved and free? How did their identity as migrants interact with other layers of identity such as being a freeborn citizen from a Greek polis or, in the case of former slaves, having gained Roman citizenship by manumission? It will emerge that they sometimes shared common experiences such as the same kind of labor and their dependence on patronage, but that these shared experiences were nuanced by their status. Some literary genres—such as theater— were more accessible to the enslaved, while others—such as philosophy—were claimed by the elite. All migrants accessed the clientela of Roman aristocrats, but freeborn migrants often stemmed from the privileged social strata of their hometowns, which allowed them to make connections that resulted in patronage and sometimes in Roman citizenship. Enslavement and manumission also resulted in patronage and citizenship, but left the lifelong stigma of slavery. And lastly, while freeborn migrants had a claim to political and diplomatic influence since their first arrival, enslaved and freed migrants saw a progressive increase in their involvement in Roman politics.

The first figures of Latin literature were foreigners in Rome. We just saw the case of Livius Andronicus. Together with him, the Oscan poet Ennius, renowned mainly for his Annales, was described as a half-Greek— semigraecus —by Suetonius. [15] Another Oscan migrant completes the triad of the earliest Latin writers, Naevius, who is best known for his adaptations of Greek New Comedy into Latin. Roughly contemporary to these figures we also find Caecilius Statius, who, according to the biographical tradition, was taken to Rome as a slave from the Insubres in Gaul, and who wrote comedies in a style that bridged Plautian and Terentian tradition. [16] In addition, of course, there is the later example of the playwright Terence, who originally hailed from Carthage but arrived at Rome as the slave of a senator. Therefore, since its early days, literature in Rome is indebted not only to Greek literary models, but also to the migrants that inhabited the intercultural spaces of the city at the end of the third and beginning of the second centuries BCE. [17] The foundational narratives for most literary genres in Rome involve Greek-speaking migrants—sometimes enslaved—, and their reception by contemporaries and future generations was rarely straightforward.

Let us take the arrival of philosophy, for instance. A mention in Pliny Natural History 34.26 of the erection of a statue of Pythagoras in the forum during the Samnite War of 298–290 BCE suggests that the Romans had been in contact with Greek philosophy as early as the 3rd century BCE. [18] However, it is only a century later in the works of Ennius that we find the earliest traces of Greek philosophy in Latin literature. [19] The opening chapters of the Annales contain elements of Pythagoreanism, such as dream interpretation, an invocation of the Muses, and the belief in metempsychosis. Ennius also authored two philosophical works, the Epicharmus, a translation of the Syracusan poet Epicharmus’ pseudo-Pythagorean verses, and the Euhemerus, a translation of a treatise on the origin of divinities by Euhemerus of Messene. However, it has been pointed out that Cicero purposefully obscured the significance of Ennius’ works in his account of philosophy’s introduction to Rome. Cicero’s downplaying of the foreigner Ennius’ contribution has been read as an attempt to claim the practice of writing philosophy for the Roman elite. [20] Roughly contemporary to Ennius’ translations of Greek philosophy are Plautus’ representations of Greek philosophers on stage. Plautus shows an awareness of the difference in status between literate migrants. In his plays, the act of philosophizing is a characteristic trait of foreign Greek-speaking slaves. The punchline in Captives 274–275, for instance, implies that enslaved Greek philosophers were available for purchase in the market. [21] The story of philosophy arriving in Rome is driven by the actions of Greek-speaking migrant philosophers, both free and enslaved. For Plautus, a migrant himself, this is no secret: it is just an aspect of everyday life. Over a hundred years later, Cicero’s attempt to downplay foreign intervention reveals a more critical attitude towards this narrative.

This sense of ambiguity surrounding migrants and literature can be further exemplified by a comparison between the attitudes of Cicero and Suetonius towards them. Suetonius does not dwell exceedingly on Livius Andronicus’ and Ennius’ foreignness. [22] Both are defined with the same word, semigraeci, in a matter-of-fact, non-derogative sense. They both performed the exact same tasks: they were bilingual teachers who Graecos interpretabantur: they either provided an explanation of Greek texts or they translated them. In Suetonius’ version, both Livius and Ennius were active at a time where Romans were not yet interested in grammar, and they were predecessors to the actual rise of the discipline in Rome. [23] Cicero offers a stark contrast, using their foreignness to create the two contradicting narratives which we saw above. On the one hand, he stresses the Greek origin of Livius Andronicus to emphasize the continuity between Greek and Latin literature. [24] On the other hand, he downplays Ennius’ role in the introduction of Greek philosophy into Rome because he seeks to present the genre as the exclusive preserve of the Roman elite. [25] Interestingly, neither Cicero nor Suetonius mention the difference in status between them. Rather, contrary to what we might expect, the freeborn peregrinus Ennius is demerited by Cicero in his pursuit of philosophy, but Livius Andronicus, a former slave, is credited with the honor of being the first poet of Rome. [26]

The ambiguity of migrant literary production in Rome does not lie only in the reception of the work of voluntary and forced migrants. Because of their status as migrants, these writers found themselves in an in-between position regarding Rome and their place of origin. One classic example is the quote about Ennius’ three hearts: Greek, Oscan and Latin. [27] Another example is Naevius’ famous epitaph, composed by himself according to Aulus Gellius —and his source Varro—: [28]

The past perfect obliti sunt has an implied subject: the Romans. The lack of an explicit mention contrasts with the explicitness of the deceased poet, whom the epitaph portrays as the custodian of the Latin language. The message is clear: Naevius the Oscan spoke—and wrote—better Latin than any Roman. The fact that Latin was not the playwright’s first language makes the epitaph even more provoking. Naevius uses his own foreignness to criticize the Romans, whom he deems unable to speak or write properly in their own language.

We have seen that foreignness is a characteristic shared by both freeborn and enslaved migrants of this first generation, yet there is one instance where enslavement can be read as the root cause for differences in their literary practice. This is the political content—or lack thereof—in early Latin comedy. The comedies of Naevius and Plautus, freeborn peregrini, contain abundant political allusions. Naevius notoriously slandered important Roman political figures, a risky practice which ultimately led to his imprisonment. [29] Plautus approached politics in a more roundabout way, without explicit references to political figures, but conscious of the political scene of his day. [30] Conversely, political references are almost completely absent from the plays of their successor, the freedman Publius Terentius Afer. This has been interpreted as a consequence not only of his dependence on the circle of the Scipiones, where political allusions by a client could have been perceived as a contradiction of Roman traditions or mos maiorum, but also of his social status as a freed person. [31] The lack of political allusions in Terence is representative of a trend that would gradually change during the late Republic: the relative apoliticism of foreign intellectual freedmen in relation to their freeborn counterparts.

With the Roman campaigns in the East in the second century BCE, contacts between the Roman and the Greek-speaking worlds intensified. Knowledge of the Greek language and literature was quickly becoming essential to thrive in the new cultural milieu, and Roman aristocrats who wished to acquire this knowledge benefited from the arrival of Greek-speaking migrants, both freeborn and enslaved. We have seen that Livius Andronicus and Ennius already worked as teachers. A generation later, Aemilius Paulus also entrusted the education of his children to anonymous Greek teachers shortly before his victory in the Third Macedonian War. [32] But it is just after the end of this war in 167 BCE that Rome witnessed the first arrival of enslaved and free teachers and pedagogues from the East, who took over the education of the elite Roman youth. [33] A contemporary example can be found in the household of Cato the Elder. Cato owned a slave called Chilon, whose name suggests a Greek origin, and who, according to Plutarch, had been a teacher to many children. [34] These early migrants also performed a variety of other intellectual tasks other than teaching. For instance, Gaius Sempronius Gracchus was accused by Gaius Fannius of accepting the help of Menelaus of Marathus—the only mention of this figure—and of other scholars for writing a speech. [35] The other scholars mentioned by Cicero were likely Diophanes of Mytilene, the teacher of Gaius’ brother Tiberius, and Blossius of Cumae, to whom we will soon return. The status of Menelaus is not made explicit, but together with the other two he was probably a freeborn migrant that had come under the patronage of the Gracchi and had been tasked with the education of the brothers by their mother Cornelia. [36]

The arrival of scholars was accelerated by diplomacy too, such as the embassies from Greek poleis that arrived in Rome. These embassies could represent either an individual polis, a state such as the Achaean League, or a kingdom such as Pergamum or Bithynia. Embassies to Rome are attested in the epigraphical record of several Greek cities, for instance Eresos and Epidaurus. Most of these were brief and had more cultural significance for the city that had sent them than for the extensive diplomacy of Rome. [37] But two of them are worth mentioning insofar as they had a certain Hellenizing effect on Roman culture. In 167 BCE, an embassy arrived from Pergamum on behalf of king Eumenes II. [38] Its leader, Crates of Mallos, was the chief grammarian and literary critic of the Pergamene court. In a colorful story, Suetonius explains that an accident in which he broke a leg forced him to prolong his stay in Rome, where he would become the city’s first grammarian. [39] Whereas the embassy is the milestone chosen by Suetonius for this achievement, the teachers of Aemilius Paulus’ children mentioned above may be indicative of a slightly earlier presence of Greek grammarians in the city. Another embassy that left its mark on the Roman cultural environment took place some years later, in 155 BCE. Three philosophers—Carneades of Cyrene, Critolaus of Phaselis, and Diogenes of Babylon—addressed the Senate as ambassadors of the city of Athens. [40] The choice of these philosophers, each representing a different philosophical school—respectively, Academic, Peripatetic, and Stoic—was both a consequence of and a catalyst for Roman interest in Greek philosophy. Each of them gave oratorical performances during their stay, but Carneades seems to have made a particular impression on the young patricians of the city. [41]

The apparition of more and more philosophers from different schools in Rome testifies to this growing interest in philosophy. Two influential figures who arrived around 155 BCE are Diophanes of Mytilene and Blossius of Cumae. As we saw earlier, they were associated with Gaius and Tiberius Gracchus. Diophanes was an exile from Mytilene; there is no mention in the sources of the reason for Diophanes’ banishment from his hometown, although his condition as an exile excludes the possibility of enslavement. On the other hand, Blossius was a Roman citizen from Cumae in Campania who had studied under Antipater of Tarsus, likely in Athens. [42] When Blossius arrived to Rome after his studies in Athens, he was received as hospes by the family of P. Mucius Scaevola. [43] Both, the exile expelled from Mytilene and the Roman citizen from Cumae, performed the same tasks in the household of the Gracchi with no distinction regarding their status. However, after the death of Tiberius Gracchus the difference in the status of these migrants may have played a role in their fate. In the days following Tiberius’ assassination, Blossius was called to trial to defend himself of the accusation of supporting his patron’s plans to set fire to the Capitolium. Blossius claimed in his defense that Tiberius had no such intentions, but that if he had done, Blossius would have supported him. Immediately after the trial, he fled to Pergamum, where he joined Aristonicus in his war against the Romans. [44] Blossius’ trial and acquittance have been interpreted as privileges received due to his status as municeps, since he was a citizen of Cumae, which granted him citizen rights in Rome. The outcome was rather different for his colleague Diophanes of Mytilene, who had no claim to Roman citizenship: after Tiberius Gracchus’ murder, he was summarily executed without a trial. [45]

A notable philosopher and migrant contemporary of Blossius and Diophanes is Panaetius of Rhodes, a descendant of a Rhodian aristocratic family. Between ca. 155 and 147 BCE, he studied in Athens under Diogenes of Seleucia and Antipater of Tarsus. In 146 BCE, he moved to Rome where he would be employed by Scipio Aemilianus until the latter’s death in 129 BCE, when he returned to Athens to assume the leadership of the Stoic school until his death at the turn of the century. [46] During his time in Rome, Panaetius was active both in the literary and in the political fields. While his role in propagating Stoicism in Rome was remarkable, his political influence seems to have been rather small compared to that of his contemporary Blossius. On the basis of a passage in Cicero’s On Duties, it has been argued that there were two different schools among the Stoics, one trending towards the defense of private property and the other towards an equalitarian division of common goods. [47] Panaetius was a supporter of the former idea and Blossius of the latter. [48] This is likely the reason that Blossius is labelled as the mastermind behind Tiberius Gracchus’ reform, possibly in an attempt to put these Stoic ethics in practice. It has been argued that Panaetius never achieved such political influence, nor the chance to apply his views on ethics, precisely because he was a peregrinus who lacked the Roman citizenship his rival possessed. [49]

In addition to receiving embassies and incentivizing the settlement of freeborn Greek scholars with aristocratic families, hostage-taking also contributed to the spread of Greek language and literature in Rome. It was a form of forceful migration that did not, however, imply enslavement. Although one of the objectives of hostage-taking was precisely the indoctrination of the hostages in Roman culture, there is one notable exception who managed to export his own culture to Rome. It is, of course, Polybius. Polybius was born in Megalopolis towards the end of the third century BCE, and was taken to Rome as a political hostage in 168 BCE. There, he entered the circles of the Roman elite; he was particularly close with Scipio Aemilianus and his family. He wrote the Histories, which deal with the history of Rome from the beginning of the Punic Wars in 264 BCE to the destruction of Corinth in 146 BCE. The work is in Greek and presents the typical characteristics of Greek historiography, but it was intended for both Greek and Roman audiences. [50]

We have seen that in the century that passed since Livius Andronicus’ first introduction of Greek literary models in Rome, contacts between the Greek-speaking East and Rome increased not only through military action but also through diplomatic missions. The Greek-speaking intellectuals in Rome who belong to the generations following the destruction of Corinth in 146 BCE demonstrate an increasing consciousness of their position in between the Hellenistic kingdoms of the East, the cities and leagues of Greece, and the expansionist power of Rome. An example of this acquisition of conscience is Antipater of Sidon. Antipater is first mentioned in Cicero’s On the Orator, where L. Licinius Crassus reminds Q. Lutatius Catulus of Antipater’s improvisatory and mnemonic talents. [51] It is precisely from this appearance as a character in Cicero’s work that his presence in Rome can be inferred, although the manner and date of his arrival there are unclear. [52] Antipater’s epigrams interact with Greek culture in Rome in different ways. One especially illustrating poem is Anthologia Palatina 9.151, where the destruction of Corinth is commemorated. [53] While there is no explicit accusation against the Romans who were responsible for the attack, the topic constitutes a veiled critique in itself. Another poem by Antipater that is born from a migrant context is Anthologia Palatina 9.567. [54] This epigram speaks of the migration of Antiodemis, who is described as a lysiodos, an actress who interprets a role in male attire. [55] In these verses, Antiodemis’ arrival in Rome will pacify the Romans’ bellicose habits. The hemistich “τερπνὸν ἄθυρμα Μέθης”, “delightful toy of Methe”, may well be a reference to Antiodemis’ enslaved status, given the parallels that are found in the later tradition. For instance, Autolekythus, a slave of Herodes Atticus, is categorized as a plaything or ἄθυρμα, and the verna and freedman of Catulus, Q. Lutatius Dafnis, was nicknamed “Πανὸς ἀγάπημα”, the “beloved of Pan”. [56] The works of Antipater of Sidon reflect the in-betweenness of his position: while his oratory skills are praised by Roman aristocrats, his epigrams evoke his ambivalence towards Rome. In the poem about the sack of Corinth, we encounter not open critique, but neither silent acceptance. In the poem about Antiodemis, we find the realization that migrants—possibly enslaved—can use their skills to influence Roman culture.

At the very end of the second century CE, in 102 BCE, Archias of Antioch arrived in Rome. Archias was born in an elite family from the Seleucid city, and he travelled extensively through Asia Minor, Greece, and Southern Italy. When he eventually settled in Rome, he wrote in praise of the military successes of Gaius Marius and L. Licinius Lucullus, and the latter became his patron. Some years later, during the proconsulate in Sicily of his patron’s brother Marcus, Archias was granted citizenship of the federate city of Heraclea in Lucania. When the Lex Plautia Papiria was enacted in 89 BCE, Roman citizenship was extended to citizens of federate cities, including Archias. He adopted the name Aulus Licinius Archias, taking the family name or nomen of his patron Lucullus. His citizenship was later questioned by supporters of Pompey as an attack on his patron in 62 BCE, and Cicero successfully defended it in the speech In Defense of Aulus Licinius Archias, where his extraordinary biography is preserved. [57] Archias’ relationship with Lucullus is a vivid example of one of the most important practices for the migration of Greek-speaking intellectuals, patronage. Upon their arrival in Rome, sometimes even earlier, Greek-speaking intellectuals would associate with members of the Roman aristocracy that could vouch for their interests in the city in exchange for the performance of cultural labor, such as composing works in praise of their deeds, teaching the younger members of their families, or providing literary assistance for their own writings. With some differences, patronage represents a point of convergence between free and enslaved migrants. In the Roman manumission system, when an enslaved person was freed, their former master became their patronus and the freed person was introduced into his network or clientela. [58] It has been argued that enslaved intellectuals held an advantage in this respect, since upon their manumission they benefited from the already existing ties with their patron’s familia. [59] It is obvious, however, from cases such as those of Diophanes, Blossius, Panaetius, Antipater, Archias and others that will follow, that freeborn migrants also entered the higher echelons of the patron-client system, and it is doubtful whether enslavement and subsequent manumission reported any networking advantages to Greek-speaking migrants. [60]

The first century BCE was also a turbulent period in the relationship between Rome and the East. The three Mithridatic Wars between 88 and 63 BCE, the conflicts with Parthia in the 50s and 40s BCE and the civil wars between Cesar and Pompey (49–45 BCE) and between Octavian and Mark Antony (32–30 BCE) all took their toll on the inhabitants of the Eastern Mediterranean. Especially during the Mithridatic Wars, there was a large arrival of migrants from Greek-speaking regions, both as enslaved war captives and as free migrants escaping from violence. At the very outbreak of the war in 88 BCE, Philo of Larissa fled the city of Athens where he had been head of the Academy for over twenty years, and arrived at Rome together with other pro-Roman supporters of the tyranny of Medeios. [61] Before his exile, Philo had already taught Roman aristocrats, amongst which were L. Aurelius Cotta and possibly L. Licinius Lucullus too. [62] He continued his lectures in Rome, which were regularly attended by members of the Roman aristocracy, such as Q. Lutatius Catulus, Publius and Gaius Selius, Tetrilius Rogus, and Cicero himself. [63] Like Philo, Greek-speaking intellectuals who played a prominent role in the cultural and political world of the East often came into contact with Roman aristocrats even before they moved to Rome. They would later engage in relationships of patronage with these members of the elite, who would offer them favorable conditions upon arrival to the capital. In other cases, the patronage relationship began after the migrant’s arrival in Rome. This is the case of Philodemus of Gadara, who arrived to Italy ca. 75 BCE, after educational sojourns in Alexandria and Athens. Philodemus was part of the clientela of L. Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus (cos. 58 BCE). He was an all-round intellectual: an Epicurean philosopher, a successful epigrammatist, and a highly influential figure in the cultural circles of Rome. [64] One of Philodemus’ epigrams in the Anthologia Palatina demonstrates an interesting approach to his situation as a migrant. [65] The poem shows the kind of cultural interplay and in-betweenness that characterize migrant literature. Philodemus praises a woman using a typically Hellenizing model of erotic idealization similar to what we saw earlier in Antipater’s Anthologia Palatina 9.567, however, the end of the encomium reveals an unexpected twist: the woman is not Greek but Oscan. [66]

While some migrants, like Philo and Philodemus, were freeborn citizens displaced because of political upheaval and military turmoil, among literate migrants we also find war captives that had been sold into slavery. Alexander Polyhistor is one of the most prolific writers that arrived at Rome as a war captive from the Mithridatic wars. He was enslaved during the First Mithridatic War and taken to Rome, where he was purchased by Cornelius Lentulus to serve as a pedagogue until he was eventually manumitted and acquired his patron’s nomen. [67] Polyhistor wrote many works on a wide range of subjects, from geography and history to philosophical doxography and grammatical commentaries. Other remarkable figures who arrived enslaved to Rome during the Mithridatic Wars are Tyrannio of Amisus and Parthenius of Nicaea.

Tyrannio was taken to Rome by Lucullus after the siege of Amisus in 72 BCE. Plutarch records an episode following Tyrannio’s enslavement that is illustrative of aristocratic views on slavery and intellectual labor in the late Republic. [68] After Amisus fell, Lucullus gave Tyrannio to L. Licinius Murena (cos. 62 BCE), who immediately manumitted him. Lucullus disapproved of this manumission because it gave Tyrannio the irreversible status of a freedman. Modern explanations of Lucullus’ disapproval vary. Some believe the manumission deprived Tyrannio of the possibility of denying his enslavement since he should never have been regarded as a slave in the first place. [69] Others think manumission took away the political power due to Tyrannio as a freeborn citizen. [70] A third opinion is that Lucullus did not disapprove of the manumission at all, since the enslavement of the defeated was unavoidable under the ius gentium, and the negative judgement on his manumission should be attributed to Plutarch. [71] Another possible explanation is that Lucullus expected Murena to grant Tyrannio a kind of benefaction that allowed him to retain his freedom without having to be regarded as a former slave. As a precedent, we could quote the treatment of the citizens of Carthago Nova by Scipio Africanus in 209 BCE. After the capture of the city, despite being nominally and legally enslaved to the Roman victors, all citizens were liberated and not formally manumitted. With this liberation, captive citizens returned not only to their freeborn status—in contrast to becoming freed persons—but also kept the links with their family and community. [72] It seems that, for a learned prisoner such as Tyrannio, Lucullus deemed this form of liberation more appropriate than manumission, which marked him with the lifelong stigma of slavery. In any case, Tyrannio went to Rome as a freedman of L. Licinius Murena, thus entering the gens Licinia, the same that Archias had joined as a freeborn citizen. There, he arranged the library of Apellicon that Sulla had brought to Rome after the conquest of Athens in 86 BCE. [73] He then had a fruitful career as a library curator and teacher for the Cicerones. [74] He also wrote books of his own, on grammar and geography. [75]

Parthenius was born in the city of Nicaea in Bithynia. He was likely captured by the poet C. Helvius Cinna in 73 BCE when Lucullus conquered Nicaea back from Mithridates. Cinna took him to Rome, where he became an influential figure in the transmission of Callimachean poetry into the rapidly growing Roman literary milieu. [76] One of his writings is preserved in full, the Erotika Pathemata, a collection of Greek myths intended for use by C. Cornelius Gallus, as Parthenius informs us in the dedication of the work. It is also reported by Macrobius that Vergil frequented Parthenius as “ grammatico in Graecis ”, but the fact is debated due to chronological and geographical discrepancies. [77]

The convulsed decades of the Mithridatic Wars had far reaching consequences for the movement of people and culture from the Eastern Mediterranean towards Rome that lasted for generations. A grammarian mentioned by Suetonius, L. Ateius Philologus, was probably enslaved after Sulla’s siege of Athens in 86 BCE. [78] There is a chance that L. Ateius Philologus was already enslaved in Athens before Sulla’s siege, since there is no evidence that Sulla enslaved Athenian citizens. [79] During the time of the Second Mithridatic War, between 83 and 81 BCE, the Hasmonean king Alexander Jannaeus attacked the cities of the Decapolis in Syria, resulting in the enslavement of Theodorus of Gadara—or, more likely, his parents—, who would later become a prominent scholar in Rome. [80] Marcus Pompilius Andronicus, a teacher of grammar and Epicurean philosopher from Syria, moved to Rome during the 70s BCE. His legal status is uncertain: while his tria nomina indicate Roman citizenship, it is unknown if he was a freedman that obtained citizenship via manumission, like Tyrannio, or a freeborn peregrinus that became a citizen like Archias. [81] Soon after the defeat of Mithridates in 66 BCE, Cn. Pompeius Lenaeus, a freedman of Pompey, translated into Latin the writings on medicinal plants that his patron had found among Mithridates’ possessions. [82]

A few years before 80 BCE, Publilius Syrus was brought to Rome in the same ship as Manilius and Staberius Eros, and all three were sold together at the catasta, the stage upon which slaves where exhibited for sale. Each of them was to become the founder of a Latin literary genre: Manilius of astrology, Staberius Eros of grammar, and Publilius Syrus of mime. At least this is the story related by Pliny the Elder. [83] Although the details of this episode are highly controversial, there is no reason to doubt its core idea: that these three scholars arrived from the East and left an imprint on Roman culture by introducing new literary genres. [84] Due to obvious chronological reasons, it is impossible to identify Pliny’s Manilius with the M. Manilius, who was author of an Astronomica during the last years of Augustus’ and the first years of Tiberius’ reign. Because of their shared interest in astrology, it has been tentatively suggested that the earlier Manilius may have been the father or grandfather of the later astrologer. [85] A succinct biography of L. Staberius Eros is transmitted by Suetonius in the On Grammarians and Rhetoricians. [86] The biography, despite its briefness, contains several interesting statements. Fist, that Staberius Eros was manumitted propter litterarum studium, “due to his devotion to letters”. This is a recurring motive in the biographies of enslaved intellectuals, from Livius Andronicus and Terence to Cn. Pompeius Lenaeus and M.’ Otacilius Pitholaus / L. Voltacilius Plotus. [87] Second, that he was the teacher of Brutus and Cassius, and that he taught the children of the proscribed free of charge in the times of Sulla. [88]

Of the three, however, Publilius Syrus doubtlessly boasts the most vivid Nachleben. Other than the passage quoted above on his arrival to Rome, the testimonia to his life place him between 46 and 43 BCE. After he had spent several years touring the cities of Italy and making a living by acting in mimes, in late September of the year 46, he arrived at Rome. There, he competed with the eques Decimus Laberius and other anonymous mimographers in the games that Julius Caesar provided in celebration of his four combined triumphs over Gaul, Egypt, Pontus, and Africa. There, Publilius was declared the winner by Caesar. [89] But the reason for Publilius’ literary success lies not so much in his biography as in his work. None of his mimes survive, and only two titles— Putatores and Murmuco —are known, but there is a surviving collection of apothegms known as Sententiae that were compiled from them. While most of them are adaptable and applicable to a variety of circumstances, many of them likely refer to the political context of the years of Publilius’ acme. [90] This marks an inflection point in the way freed intellectuals interacted with Roman society. In the first half of the 2nd century BCE, Terence refrained from exhibiting explicit political invective on stage because of prospective repercussions. But just over a century later, when the boiling pot of politics was overspilling in the high heat that fueled the end of the Republic, the foreign freedman Publilius Syrus was allowed to openly stage political satire, and even more, he was prized for it by Caesar, the leading political figure of the time. But Publilius did not only get away with staging politics. A recent political reading of his work suggests that the Sententiae owe their success to the embodiment of romanitas, the sum of all Roman aristocratic values. However, if we place his Sententiae under the lens of migrant literature, they become more than the work of a migrant who “fully absorbed the values of the society into which he had been forcibly translated, and became in the process an insider”. [91] For instance, mime in itself is a Hellenistic form of literature. The compilation of sententiae (in Greek, χρεία, chreia) from comical performances is a continuation of the Greek gnomological tradition, and it cannot be excluded that Publilius himself had the possibility of a compilation in mind when writing his mimes. [92] It could be argued that Publilius Syrus was more than a forced migrant that became an insider who embraced Roman culture. Both his biography and his work testify to a position in between the hellenophone East and Rome, making him a key figure in the late Republic’s context of cultural interaction.

As we have seen with Blossius and Publilius, towards the end of the Republic Greek-speaking intellectuals—both freeborn and formerly enslaved—found themselves in increasingly influential positions. Because of this, they were able to circulate ideas that were central not only to their own Hellenic identity but also to the identity of Rome itself. Some of the most important issues around which the debate of Roman identity revolves appear in the work of Dionysius of Halicarnassus, a migrant from Asia Minor. Dionysius was writing in the middle of the Augustan era, when Republicanism had become nothing but a political fiction. However, some of his ideas on Roman and Greek identity were already in vogue in the late Republic. Among other issues, there is the matter of Aeolism, a set of different theories that postulated a relationship between Latin and Aeolic Greek. [93] For Dionysius, Aeolism was a way of pushing the agenda that Romans were ethnically Greeks. [94] Ironically, it is in a quote from Cato the Elder that the oldest mention of this trend is attested. [95] Between Cato and Dionysius, it is likely that some form of Aeolism was embraced by one of the scholars named Tyrannio, either the migrant from Amisus whose life we discussed above, or a pupil of his, a younger contemporary from Phoenicia. This Tyrannio, called the Younger to differentiate him from his teacher, was enslaved in the civil war between Antony and Octavian. [96] He was later given to Cicero’s wife Terentia, who manumitted him. [97] Several other Greek scholars wrote on the topic of this connection between Latin and Aeolic Greek, such as Hypsicrates, Aristodemus of Nysa, and Philoxenus of Alexandria. Nothing is known of Hypsicrates’ life, unless we accept he is the same person as the historian from Amisus who lived until he became 92 and whose work was known to Varro. [98] Aristodemus of Nysa was a scholar from Caria who moved to Rhodes. In 62 BCE, Pompey invited him to Rome to teach his children, and he remained there until sometime between 50 and 40 BCE, when he returned to Nysa. [99] He is remembered for trying to prove that Homer was Roman. Philoxenus of Alexandria wrote a work in which he derived the Roman people from the Aeolians, and claimed that Latin was not “born of itself”. [100] All we know about his life is that he was born in Alexandria and taught rhetoric at Rome, likely at the end of the Republic. [101] Despite our current understanding of Aeolism as a loose set of ideas rather than a unitary philosophical movement, the interaction of migrant scholars with it is indicative of a push to create links between Greek and Roman identities.

Not all political matters were as conceptual as the questions of language and identity, and some migrant scholars possessed more tangible forms of political power. Athenodorus of Tarsus, Nicias of Cos, and Theophanes of Mytilene were freeborn migrants involved in politics. Theophanes of Mytilene was an advisor to Pompey in his campaigns in the East, and he eventually received Roman citizenship from his patron. After Pompey died, he lived in Rome until his own death. [102] Nicias of Cos taught in Rome for ten years after an invitation by Pompey in 62 BCE. He then returned to his island where he rose to tyranny. [103] Athenodorus of Cana in Tarsus arrived to Rome close to 44 BCE with Octavian. [104] He became a diplomat for Augustus, likely visiting Sicily and Petra, and eventually took over his hometown during or shortly after the conflict between Octavian and Antony, after deposing the ruler Boethus, a supporter of Antony. [105] Demetrius of Gadara and Timagenes of Alexandria were enslaved migrants who became involved in politics after their respective manumissions. Demetrius of Gadara was a freedman of Pompey. Several anecdotes testify to his influence over his patron, and Pompey even rebuilt the destroyed Gadara on Demetrius’s instance. Later, Demetrius financed the construction of a theatre in Rome in Pompey’s name, and it seems that his lifestyle eventually matched that of his patron’s in luxury. [106] Possibly the most prominent participant in late Republican politics is Timagenes. He was born in Alexandria of Egypt ca. 80 BCE, and was captured by Aulus Gavinius in 55 BCE. Aulus took him to Rome, where he was bought by Faustus Cornelius Sulla, a supporter of Pompey. He was likely manumitted by Faustus, either during his life or ex testamento. After Faustus’ death, he joined Antony’s faction, and then Augustus’ after Antony’s defeat. He fell out with Augustus because of his criticism of Livia, and his historical works have been read as “philobarbarian”, claiming the superiority of Gauls and Greeks over the Romans. There seems to be no doubt of his prominent political role in the early Augustan regime, but what his exact stance was is a matter of debate: was Timagenes a pro-Augustan, a Romanized Alexandrian that supported Augustus but loathed Ptolemy XII, or an anti-Augustan and pro-Alexandrian militant? [107] Many other examples of politically influential migrants from this period could be quoted. While, given the precedents in earlier generations, it does not come as a surprise that freeborn intellectual migrant participated in Roman politics, there is a gradual increase in the political power of formerly enslaved migrants towards the end of the Republic. [108]

To sum up, both freeborn and enslaved migrants played important roles in the transmission of Greek language and literature towards Rome. When examining the lives of freeborn and enslaved migrants who contributed to the transmission of Greek culture to Rome, there are some points of convergence and others of divergence. Freeborn and enslaved necessarily participated in the Roman system of clientela, and their subsistence depended on the patronage of a wealthy Roman citizen. All Greek-speaking intellectuals were expected to perform similar tasks for their patrons. These included teaching children, composing works of praise, and helping with textual composition, as well as providing advice regarding intellectual matters. However, the terminology of patronage varied depending on the status of the dependent. It was framed in terms of kinship for freed persons and in terms of friendship for freeborn migrants. There also is no hard evidence to support the assumption that enslaved migrants had a networking advantage with respect to freeborn migrants because of their immediate introduction to the clientela of their patron and the reception of Roman citizenship upon manumission. On the contrary, Lucullus’ disapproval of Tyrannio of Amisus’ capture and release shows that manumission, even when encased in the narrative of manumission because of learning, left the imprint of the macula servitutis, or stigma of slavery. [109] While several freed persons occupied prominent positions in Republican elite households, it is hard to say if their initial position was privileged, after having been forcefully uprooted from their places of origin and exscinded from their family and community networks. An impression lingers that the few named examples of successful freedmen recorded the literary sources are only the tip of the iceberg, and that many enslaved intellectual migrants continued to endure harsh conditions despite their learning, as Plautus’ philosophers in the slave market. On the contrary, the lives of many freeborn migrants that entered the highest echelons of Roman aristocracy testify to an advantageous position for those that were already members of the local aristocracy in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Regarding the literary production of migrants, there are also some points in common between the works of freeborn and enslaved persons. They were both expected to compose summaries of lengthy works for their patrons, and they contributed to all literary genres. However, certain genres tended to have a certain association with people of enslaved or freeborn status. Theatre, for instance, seems to have been more accessible to the enslaved and formerly enslaved. [110] Freed persons also seem to have a larger representation as grammarians. [111] On the other hand, rhetoric and philosophy were associated with freeborn citizens: rhetoric required more political influence than freed persons had access to, and we saw Cicero’s attempt to claim philosophy as the exclusive preserve of the elite. This may well reflect the reality of his age. According to the Suda, the freedman Alexander Polyhistor, a contemporary of Cicero, produced an uncountable number of books across a wide range of topics, including philosophy. From the fragments quoted in Diogenes Laertius, where he is cited only for his doxographies, it can be gathered that he had a profound knowledge of Pythagoreanism. However, his name is absent from Iamblichus’ catalogue of Pythagoreans. [112]

In the field of political influence, a clear line divides freeborn migrants from their enslaved counterparts. Freeborn migrants were often active in the politics of their places of origin, where they would side with local pro-Roman factions. Their prominent political positions and their pro-Romanism forwarded their connections with members of the Roman elite, who would improve their standings in Rome by becoming their patrons, and in some occasions grant them Roman citizenship. They also occasionally returned to their places of origin as tyrants, or secured benefits for them by interceding with powerful Romans. In the case of enslaved and freed migrants, there is a gradual change from Terence’s avoidance of political topics to Demetrius of Gadara’s influence over Pompey and Timagenes’ outspoken confrontation with Augustus.