K.P.S. Janssen, Leiden University/University of Edinburgh
In the third book of his Annals, Tacitus interrupts his account of emperor Tiberius’ handling of Augustan legislation to instead turn his audience’s attention towards the role that laws in general play in Roman society. He points out the plethora of existing laws, and argues that a fuller understanding of the origins of law (de principiis iuris) is required to understand the present situation. In the digression that follows, he then provides a fascinating summary of Roman legal history, starting with the earliest humans, and ending in the early Principate.
The passage is indicative of Tacitus’ profound interest in the law and legal themes, the presence of which throughout his works has been commented upon (Bablitz 2015; Ducos 1991 and 2007; Petersen 2019, contra Syme 1958), but nevertheless remains notably understudied. Law was deeply intertwined with Roman civic identity and cultural memory (Cicero, Rep 1.39; Gaius, Inst.1.1; Dig.1.2.2; Cf. Milnor 2007), and its origins and development therefore frequently play a subordinate but significant role in the writings of Roman authors about the formation of the Roman state – including those of Livy and Sallust, with whom Tacitus has been shown to have been familiar (Livy, AUC 1-4, Sallust, Cat. 6-13; cf. Ginsburg 1993; Petersen 2019).
The framework of Tacitus’ digression is in many ways highly similar to these earlier accounts, but rather than foregrounding the development of the Roman state, the author has refocussed the narrative to concentrate on the law instead. In his digression, then, Tacitus presents his own take on a well-established subject, and frequent attempts have been made to determine exactly which sources he used, and which narratives he may have followed. (e.g. Ducos 2007; Hahn 1933; Sage 1991; Syme 1954; Woodman and Martin 1996). Notably, however, the exact ways in which he used and reshaped pre-existing traditions to articulate his own legal thinking has received little systematic attention by comparison. In particular, the first stage in Rome’s legal development, for which Tacitus builds on earlier descriptions of the so-called ‘Golden Age’ by authors like Ovid, Vergil and Seneca (Zanker 2017), widely plays only a subordinate part as an idealised starting point for the rest of the narrative (Flach 1973; Heilmann 2000; Petersen 2019; exc. Wallace-Hadrill 1982), with most scholars framing the rest of Tacitus’ analysis as a fairly straightforward narrative of decline (Ducos 2007; Hahn 1933; Milnor 2007; Sage 1991; Woodman and Martin 1996).
In this paper, I will argue that, far from being straightforward, Tacitus’ digression significantly complicates the role of the law in Roman society by using intertextual references to rework and reframe shared traditions and memories about the Roman past, including the Golden Age, the kings, and the Law of the XII Tables. In doing so, I will suggest, the author draws attention not simply to law as a civilizing force, but to legal measures as a potential tool of oppression – not just during the Principate, but throughout Roman history.