|
Back to Archive
Ancient Biography
Tracy Deline
A modern historian would never suggest that there was no history
in a biography. He might even suppose that this view has always been true;
after all, giving factual information about a historical figure could not
be anything other than history. In fact, this is a distinctly modern opinion.
The classical world made a distinction between biography and history. Plutarch
states, somewhat defensively, but very clearly, "I am not writing histories,
but rather lives (B101)."1 While this is a conveniently clear statement
for historians to quote, it is important to recognize that all the ancient
biographers used it as an operating principle. Being distinguished from
the lofty plane of history, biography was naturally regarded as an inferior
type of writing. But to what extent can ancient biography be considered
history? What was their historiographical methodology? For the purpose of
this paper, a biography is simply a systematic written account of a man's
life from birth to death.
The two notions of history and biography are intimately connected
to two different conceptions of history. 'Real' history is understood as
a series of political events alone; biographical history embraces all aspects
of an individual human life, including such details as family life, personal
habits and religious beliefs or superstitions. These kinds of details would
never figure in Thucydides, and so this kind of writing must be inferior
to history. Yet even Thucydides briefly describes some of the virtues of
Pericles' character (II.65). Herodotus also includes several biographical
portraits in his Histories, notably the narrative of Croesus and
his son Atys (I.28-36). Xenophon wrote character sketches of generals in
his Anabasis (I-II)2 , and Tacitus even wrote a biography of his
father-in-law, Agricola. All history must contain, then, some element
of biography. When studying the affairs of men, the men themselves inevitably
become the subject of scrutiny. Yet history and biography did not merge;
clearly there was a difference between the description of an individual
as a part of a larger historical narrative and a narrative solely devoted
to the life of one man.
Thucydides and Tacitus defined history as the exposition and analysis
of political and military affairs. Erudite knowledge of such details as
genealogy, unusual religious ceremonies and so forth was considered inappropriate
for inclusion in a historical narrative. But these details were acceptable
for inclusion in a biography. Other information, such as anecdotes, personal
letters, poetry, epigrams or inscriptions written about an individual, were
also more suited to the genre of biography. Plutarch states that "a
slight thing like a phrase or a jest often makes a greater revelation of
character than battles where thousands fall . . . . [I] devote myself to
the signs of the soul in men, and by means of these [I] portray the life
of each, leaving to others the description of their great contests."3
This statement reveals that the biographer was not a failed historian, but
that he had goals of his own. Even as Thucydides (I.22) had developed the
idea of accurate, contemporary political history, there were those who recognized
that there was still accurate and useful information about important men
which had been bypassed because it did not fit into the genre of history.
Thus the genre of biography was host to various erudite, antiquarian and
documentary types of information. Generally, the biographer was not bound
to imitate Thucydides' or Tacitus' strict standards for accuracy. However,
to suggest that the biographers had less integrity is to misunderstand the
literary tradition to which the genre belonged.4
Another fundamental difference between biography and history is that
biography was not, and is not, strictly confined by chronology. As historians
struggled with theories of time and with the idea of chronology, the biographer
was free to group together events in order to more clearly delineate character
traits without maintaining an accurate chronological order. In extreme cases
the biographer compresses time or treats events out of chronological sequence
and gives no indication of why he/she chose to do so. The difficulties of
chronology are inherent in the genre, but some biographers dealt with the
problem better than others. Polybius (second century BC) proclaims an "old
and honoured distinction"5 between history and biography. But a careful
reading shows that he is not rejecting biographical fact or biography in
general; the encomiastic bias which is proper only in a monograph intended
to extol a man:6 "The historians of Philip's life are thus biased .
. . the result being that their works more closely resemble panegyrics [encomia]
than histories. My own opinion is that we should neither revile nor extol
kings falsely, but always give an account of them . . . in accord with the
character of each."7 Thus, there is a division between encomium and
history more so than between biography and history. However, it would be
premature to suggest that biography has been elevated to the level of 'real'
history. By choosing a single man as a subject, the biographer's task was
limited in scope. Biography was obviously a much less ambitious undertaking
than 'real' history.
Plutarch's Lives and Suetonius' Vita Caesarum (both
first-second century AD) are the most well known, and most complete, collections
of ancient biography. Plutarch of Chaeronea (c.AD 45 - c.120) composed the
most extensive series of biographies in the ancient world. Fifty biographies
are extant, and at least another dozen have been lost. Among the lost works
were biographies of the first several Roman emperors. He arranged the biographies
in pairs with a section drawing comparisons between the two subjects, which
was a common rhetorical strategy. Plutarch's ultimate purpose was not historical
but moral. He was interested in "taking from [the hero's] deeds the
most important and finest [traits] for our understanding. . . . And what
is more effective for correction of character [than] . . . welcoming and
constantly receiving into our souls the memory of the best and most famous
of men?"8 Tacitus and Polybius meant to educate by explaining the true
course of events and the underlying causes; Plutarch's biographies meant
to educate by explaining a human character, and to train the reader to observe
human nature. The goal was to draw inspiration from the observations: "Moral
good is a practical stimulus; it is no sooner seen than it inspires an impulse
to practice, and influences the mind and character not by a mere imitation
which we look at, but creates a moral choice by a reasoned account of the
action."9 In this moral light, Plutarch includes examples of degeneracy,
the Life of Demetrius and the Life of Antony, because "we
shall be more eager observers and imitators of better lives if we are not
completely uninformed on those who are ignoble and subject to criticism."10
Plutarch's Life of Antony, aside from being an exposition
on moral degeneracy, is useful for an examination of Plutarch's style. In
some respects it is quite typical. For example, Plutarch has arranged the
Life in a roughly chronological fashion: 1-3, family and early life;
5-14, role in events leading up to the death of Julius Caesar; 15-21, the
struggle for power, the foundation of the triumvirate; 23-54,the campaigns
in the East and fateful meeting with Cleopatra; 55-77,the war with Octavius
and the downfall of Antony; 78-87, Antony's death, and the capture and suicide
of Cleopatra. On those occasions where he diverges from chronological order,
he notes that fact.11 As he moves through time, he occasionally mentions
the names of consuls (5.3, 10.1 and 11.2) by which a specific date can be
established. For the most part, however, he simply uses temporally relative
phrases such as "at this time," "after these events,"
or "there followed." This type of language allows the order of
events to be clear without addressing any of the historiographical difficulties
of exact dating. This did not concern him since it was not his intention
to write history.
The Life of Antony is also typical in the use of anecdote
to describe the central character. Plutarch used an anecdote to emphasize
the theme that Antony was ruinously free-spending. Antony had ordered his
steward to prepare a gift of a decies (250,000 drachmas) for one of his
friends. When the steward expressed disapproval by laying the money out
in front of Antony, Antony said, "I thought a decies amounted to more
than that. This is just a trifle: you had better double it!" (Antony
4.4) In a more historically significant anecdote, he tells a story in which
Antony, competing as one of the runners on a festival day, twined a wreath
of laurel round a diadem and ran with it to the rostra. There he was lifted
up by his fellow-runners and placed the diadem on [Julius] Caesar's head,
implying that he deserved to be made king. At this, Caesar made a show of
declining the crown, whereupon the people were delighted and clapped their
hands. . . . Perhaps the most curious aspect of this affair was that while
the people were ready to submit to the fact of being ruled by a king, they
still shrank from the title, as though it signified the destruction of their
liberty. (Antony 12)
These two examples illustrate how an anecdote can be used in different
ways. The first shows an aspect of Antony's character: that he was extremely
generous. This is interesting in the study of the man. But historically,
it is a trivial detail. The second anecdote relates a very significant historical
event, and then reveals Plutarch's own insightful analysis.12 This is history,
even by the strictest definition.
The Life of Antony is atypical insofar as the biography does
not end with Antony's death (78), but continues so as to include the death
of Cleopatra (85). Since their lives had become so closely entwined, and
since Cleopatra was presented as a significant factor in Antony's downfall,
Plutarch thought it necessary to conclude her tale as well. This is the
only example in ancient biography of the narration continuing beyond the
death of the central figure named in the title. Antony is also atypical
because the central figure, instead of a noble hero, is a tragic hero in
the best Shakespearean sense. In fact, Shakespeare relied heavily on Plutarch's
Life of Antony in the preparation of his play Antony and Cleopatra.
A key factor in Plutarch's historicity was his extensive research.
Even though he resided in the small town of Chaeronea, Plutarch had traveled
throughout the Empire. He used his travels to collect books and to read
rare copies in libraries. In his Moralia and Lives, Plutarch
cites at least 150 different historians, some of whom are known only from
his citations.13 Endowed with a phenomenal memory, he was able to retain
huge amounts of the information he sought.14 He was able to make use of
archival material such as the archon lists (Life of Aristides, 5).
He also used contemporary documents such as the letters of Alexander, the
poems of Solon, and the speeches of Cicero and Demosthenes.15 In Life
of Antony, he refers to a history written by a certain Olympus, who
was the physician who attended Cleopatra in her final days. (82.3) Plutarch
frequently criticized his sources. For example, he relates a number of accusations
against Antony, then states that "[his source] Calvisius was generally
believed to have invented most of these accusations." (Antony
59.1)
But Plutarch was still not always accurate. Aside from simple memory-related
errors,16 such as interchanging insignificant names, Plutarch seemed to
emphasize different versions of a series of events in different Lives
so as to accentuate the role (or a specific characteristic) of the various
men. C.B.R. Pelling states that "in such cases, he was improving on
the truth, and he knew it."17 At the same time Pelling asserts, and
Stadter and Hamilton concur, that Plutarch did not cross over into outright
fabrication. Still, it would be incautious to take Plutarch's chronology
and depiction of events too literally.
To some degree, Plutarch seems to have been aware of anachronism.
For example, throughout the Life of Antony, he correctly refers to
Antony's co-triumvir as Octavius. In Plutarch's time, Octavius was known
as Augustus or Divus Augustus.18 Yet regarding other Lives, he is accused
of lacking understanding of the more ancient past.19
Plutarch's treatment of Antony's character is interspersed throughout
the chronological framework of the Life. In his youth, he seemed
to have a brilliant future, but then fell in with certain men and became
enslaved to the demands of pleasure (2). This is a central theme in the
depiction of Antony's character (4, 6, 9, 21, 24-30, 36, 37, 58). This passion
manifested itself most disastrously for Cleopatra, which caused his downfall.
The brilliant future which was mentioned at the beginning of the biography
was revealed in his military prowess and his ability to command loyalty
from his troops (3, 5, 7-8, 17-18, 37-50, 55-66). Plutarch, as well as his
contemporaries, believed that character was static; that is, a person's
character was inborn, wholly present at birth and merely revealed by later
events. There was very little room for development. Commenting on the character
of Emperor Tiberius, Tacitus notes that up to a certain time, "he concealed
his real self, cunningly affecting virtuous qualities. . . . Thereafter
he expressed only his own personality by unrestrained crime and infamy."
(Annales VI.50) This conception of character means that ancient biographers
presented a man's character as a vivid portrait, a static representation.
Therefore, there is no analysis of changes within the individual, nor even
the suggestion that such changes would occur.
Suetonius (c.70-c.130) wrote a number of works, including essays
on grammar, games, physical defects, names for clothes, words of insult,
the Roman year, Rome and its customs, and on the institution of offices.20
His curiosity must have been boundless. He also wrote numerous biographies:
Illustrious Men, Lives of Poets, Lives of Courtesans,
Lives of Grammarians and Rhetors.21 Many of these earlier
biographies have been lost. Suetonius is most well known for his last collection
De Vita Caesarum (The Lives of the Caesars).
There is a certain temerity to Suetonius' writing. He was about ten
years younger than Tacitus and was definitely standing in the shadow of
a giant in historiography. The two men were publishing at about the same
time, c. 100-110. This was possibly one of the primary reasons which led
Suetonius to choose the genre of biography rather than history. He was overtly
and deliberately non-Tacitean rather than sycophantically imitative. A.
Wallace-Hadrill suggests that "the Caesares were to be in technique
a mirror-image of history."22 Suetonius was also bold in his decision
to write the biographies of emperors, especially those whom Tacitus had
recently treated in his Annales. He presents information about the
emperors, some of which is laudatory, some deprecatory. Not everyone had
the inclination to tell embarrassing stories about the deified emperors,
especially those writers who had lived through the repression and paranoia
which was rampant during the reign of Domitian (81-96).
A good deal is known about the life of Suetonius which is relevant
to the composition of his biographies of the Caesars. At the peak of his
career, he held the posts of a studiis, and a bibliothecis
most likely under the emperor Trajan. He also held the post of ab epistulis
under the emperor Hadrian.23 These were important imperial secretarial posts,
the last of which involved handling all of the emperor's correspondence.
Suetonius was dismissed from the imperial service in the year 122, at which
time he seemed to have already written Divus Julius [Caesar] and
Divus Augustus.24 The major significance of this information is that
he was involved in the imperial libraries and archives, and was very well
acquainted with the customs of the imperial household. In other words, he
had easy access to all the best primary documents for writing about the
emperors of Rome.
Scholars agree that the first two biographies in the series were
likely composed before his dismissal from the imperial service because they
contain much more of the detailed information which Suetonius could access
in the imperial archives.25 Also attesting to this theory is the lamentable
fact that the quality of the Lives decreases sharply as the work progresses.
The first two (Julius and Augustus) are longer, more closely
focused, and have an abundance of documentation. The following four (Tiberius,
Gaius Caligula, Claudius, and Nero) are still
substantial, but lack the detail and sharpness of the first two. The last
six are quite poor, even the Life of Domitian, during whose reign Suetonius
came to adulthood and about whom there would still have been a great deal
of information within the living memory of many Roman officials.26 Wallace-Hadrill
suggests that part of the reason for the decline in quality was due to Suetonius'
approach, the type of sources which he used, and his being dispirited following
his dismissal from his imperial post.27
In the Life of Augustus, for example, Suetonius makes extensive
use of 'non-historical' evidence. In the first five sections alone, he cites
records from a temple at Velitrae (1), Augustus' own memoirs and letters
written by Antony (2), Cicero's letters (3), more of Antony's letters (4),
references to a shrine honouring Augustus, which likely had a commemorative
inscription, and the Acta Senatus (Senatorial Proceedings) (5). Modern
historians would consider all of this information to be primary source material,
and therefore the most desirable for inclusion. Most ancient historians
would have scorned this type of material as antiquarian. For the most part,
Suetonius preferred to use private, literary sources such as letters, memoirs
and even poetry, rather than relying on standard histories.28 His taste
for the 'juicy details' has given Suetonius a reputation as a gossip (even
since his own time), and is indicative of his rather unhistorical approach
to biography. As a result of his unhistorical approach, it is not surprising
that he did not take great pains to seek out and interview those people
who had information about Domitian, even though he was in need of more material.
His unhistorical approach is also reflected in his use of chronology.
Each life is roughly divided in this way: birth, family and early life,
a brief narration of career, lengthy description of private life with characteristics
roughly grouped together under subheadings, and a description of death and
the surrounding circumstances, which include omens. In his Life of Augustus,
he states: "After this brief outline of Augustus' life, I shall fill
in its various phases; but the story will be more readable and understandable
if, instead of keeping chronological order, I use subject headings."
(9) He then discusses Augustus' role in the civil wars (9-18), suppressing
revolts and conspiracies (19), and foreign wars (20-23), He then discusses
Augustus' military reforms (24), his honors and public offices (25-28),
his building projects (28-29), his civic and moral reforms (30-42), his
public entertainments (43-45), his foundation of veteran's colonies (46),
and his policy regarding provinces and client kingdoms (47-49). Clearly,
Suetonius could not have presented such a great variety of information in
such detail if he had tried to organize his work on a strictly chronological
framework. This treatment is strikingly different from Plutarch's approach
in which the framework is a basic historical narrative arranged chronologically,
and the portrait of character is drawn gradually from events and from Plutarch's
inserted descriptions.
It was in the section dedicated to the description of private life
that Suetonius included the majority of his anecdotes. He usually addressed
such specific topics as appearance, style of living, characteristics and
intellectual pursuits, but he certainly did not limit himself to these categories.29
He recorded important genealogical information regarding the imperial family.
Yet he also preserved for us such silly details as the fact that Augustus
was a poor speller ( Aug. 88), and that he was afraid of thunder
and lightning (Aug. 90). He seems to have taken pains to search out anecdotes
that were amusing. For example, as he is discussing Caesar's restrained
drinking habits, he quotes an epigram written by Cato the Elder that "Caesar
was the only sober man who tried to wreck the constitution."30 Other
anecdotes express his reactions to family scandal: "whenever [their]
names would come up in conversation he would sigh deeply, and sometimes
quote a line from the Iliad: 'Ah, never to have married, and childless to
have died!'" (Aug. 65). Suetonius clearly does not have a reverential
view of the past. He presents his characters in the context of everyday
life from their family squabbles to their sexual proclivities to their eating
and sleeping habits. In an age when emperors were sacred personages whose
word was law, and who could be deified after death, Suetonius presents them
in a refreshingly human fashion.
Suetonius presents all his information in a very matter-of-fact way,
without interpretation, comment or analysis. Objectively and impassively,
he often presents different accounts or both sides of an argument and leaves
judgement up to the reader. It is this attitude as much as his choice of
sources which is responsible for his reputation as an antiquarian. It is
in this sense that Suetonius is farthest away from 'real' history, as defined
by the ancient historians.
Suetonius' objective attitude is his most striking difference from
Plutarch. Plutarch used his writing to convey a moral message, continually
commenting on and evaluating the moral lessons to be drawn from the hero
in each biography. Each Life is carefully crafted to reveal character;
description is used more often than anecdote. Suetonius, however, prefers
not to describe the hero's character, but to let the reader make his own
judgement based on the various information and anecdotes set forth in the
Life. There is no moral commentary, nor any sense that Suetonius
intended his biographies to be educational. Indeed, since 'real history'
ought to be didactic, Suetonius the scholar, the 'not-historian,' probably
rejected this tenet with the others.
As modern historians, we value these ancient biographies for what
they reveal of the methodology of biographical writing during this time.
By the time of Plutarch and Suetonius, the loosely standard formula for
biography had been developed a narrative of the individual's life which
included erudite details, realism, anecdotes (even to the point of gossip)
as well as the basic accurate political framework of the individual's career.
As for style, Suetonius and Plutarch follow two different schools of composition.
Their biographies have worth as works of literature. We also treasure them
for their inherent value as primary sources. For certain periods in the
classical world, the fullest source of information is not a 'real' history,
but rather one of these biographies. The biographers have preserved significant
details of family life, especially regarding the role of women, and of everyday
life such as dress, food, and illness. This information often seemed trivial
and irrelevant to the ancient historians, but are valuable to modern historians
who try to reconstruct social history.
Although the ancients distinguished between history and biography,
modern historians are not so inclined to make an issue of it. Except in
terms of scale, there is not always a great difference in the approach of
ancient biographers and historians. In some respects, ancient biographers
had better historical methodology than the historians. Biographers utilized
antiquarian materials such as monuments, inscriptions, documents and letters
and they were much more likely to cite their sources. Having said this,
biography must be regarded with a note of caution when used as a primary
source, and the sole source of fact. Since the goal of their narrative was
to present a life, often important information on wider political events
is glossed over or lacking entirely. These biographers assumed that if the
reader wished to check a date or read about a military campaign, he would
have the appropriate history on his bookshelf. History and biography are
complements, not rivals.
University of Saskatchewan
History
ENDNOTES
1. Plutarch, Alexander 1.2. The word "biographia" rather
than "bios" does not appear until the fifth century AD. A. Momigliano,
The Development of Greek Biography, (Harvard University Press, 1971), p
12.
2. Momigliano, The Development of Greek Biography, p 102.
3. Plutarch, Alexander 1.3.
4. Patricia Cox, Biography in Late Antiquity. (University of California
Press, 1983), p 5.
5. Polybius, Histories, 10.24.
6. Gentili and Cerri, History and Biography. (J.C. Geiben Publisher,
Amsterdam, 1988), p 65.
7. This refers to Philip II of Macedon, father of Alexander the Great.
Polybus, Histories, 8.8.
8. Plutarch, AEM. 1.1-5. Plutarch wrote in Greek.
9. lutarch, Pericles 2.3-4.
10. Plutarch, Demetrius 1.6.
11. Plutarch, Antony 5.1.
12. This particular incident is also mentioned by Suetonius, Life
of Julius Caesar, 79.2.
13. J.R. Hamilton, Plutarch's Alexander. (Oxford, 1969), p xliii.
14. C.B.R. Pelling, Plutarch's Life of Antony. (Cambridge
University Press, 1988), p 31.
15. Hamilton, Plutarch's Alexander. pp xlvi-xlvii. Modern scholarship
has determined that most of the letters of Alexander which Plutarch used
were forgeries. Plutarch himself makes no comment on this issue.
16. Ibid, p xliv
17. Pelling, Plutarch's Life of Antony, p 36.
18. Octavius was given the title "Agustus" by the Senate in
27 BC, about four years after Antony's death. The title "Divus Agustus"
(Defied Agustus) was given after his death in AD 14.
19. Hamilton, Plutarch's Alexander, p xlv
20. A. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius. (London: Gerald Duckworth and
Co, Ltd., 1983), p 48.
21. Ibid, p 60.
22. Ibid, p 10. He also asserts that "negatively, Suetonius wrote
non-history; positivily he wrote scholarship".
23. Ibid, p 5. Trajan was Emperor 98-117, Hadrian from 117-138.
24. Ibid, pp 6-8.
25. Barry Baldwin, Suetonius. (Amsterdam: Adolf M. Hakkert Publisher,
1983), p 105; Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, p 61.
26. Wallace-Hadrill, Suetonius, pp 61-62.
27. Ibid, p 62.
28. Ibid, p 64, suggests that Suetonius was utterly bored with accounts
of "real" history, and therefore preferred to use obscure, antiquarian
details simply because he enjoyed them.
29. Ibid, p 68.
30. Suetonius, Divus Julius 53. Apparently all others who tried
to wreck the constitution were drunkards. Cato the elder was an ardent supporter
of the Republic and therefore an enemy to everything Caesar did in the political
forum.
|
|
