Rhetoric and Truth: Tacitus's Percennius and Democratic Historiography. (2024)

The democratic man is a being who speaks, which is also to say a poeticbeing, a being capable of embracing the distance between words andthings... which is not deception, not trickery, but humanity; a beingcapable of embracing the unreality of representation. Jacques RanciAaAaAeA?re, On the Shores of PolitiDemocracy is not the parliamentary system or the legitimate State. Itis not a state of the social either, the reign of individualism or themasses... Democracy is the name of a singular interruption of thisorder of the distribution of bodies in a community that I havesuggested should be conceptualised as police. It is the name of thatwhich interrupts the smooth functioning of this order through asingular process of subjectivization. Jacques RanciAaAaAeA?re, Disagreeme

In the political thought of Jacques RanciAaAaAeA?re, the termdemocracy used to denote a type of activity that challenges theorganization of role and place within a given hierarchy. ForRanciAaAaAeA?re such hierarchi are governed by the police, a term usedto refer to "all the activities which create order by distributingplaces, names and functions" (RanciAaAaAeA?r cited in Nash 1996,173). Rather than being a constitutional mechanism, RanciAaAaAeA?riandemocracy is an act of political "subjectivization," a proceof declassification and equality that challenges the way in whichregimes organize their citizens. (1)

RanciAaAaAeA?re argues that political cultures operate so as toenforce system of social division that defines those who are politicalsubjects, that is, those who are enabled to take political action, suchas speaking within political contexts. This regime is, inRanciAaAaAeA?re's terms, a poli order. That order not only governsour social reality but also prescribes our perception of that realitythrough the distribution of ways of seeing, hearing, and thinking. Inthis way, the police order determines how seditious acts are to beperceived, whose words should be heard as legitimate"discourse" and whose as illegitimate "noise"(RanciAaAaAeA? 1999, 30-33). For RanciAaAaAeA?re, our perception ofreality is tied to t realm of aesthetics, the name he gives to ahistorically-determined regime for artistic representation; this regimedetermines what should be made visible, audible, and, most importantly,meaningful. (2)

In this paper, I apply RanciAaAaAeA?re's concepts of democracyand aestheti to Tacitus's writing of history in order to test thetraditional perception of the exclusive (elitist) nature ofTacitus's political thought. I see in Tacitus a form of democratichistoriography, which, following RanciAaAaAeA?re's formulation ofdemocracy, may be understood as historic writing that breaks withestablished modes of representation and by doing so allows previouslyinvisible or inaudible actors to be seen or heard. (3) The ways in whichTacitean historiography does or does not account for those normativelymarginalized have attracted considerable attention, notably from EricAuerbach and RanciAaAaAeA?re himself. (4) their analyses of the speechTacitus gives to Percennius, the rebellious soldier who provoked thePannonian mutiny in 14 CE (Ann. 1.16.3-1.17.6), Auerbach andRanciAaAaAeA?re raise issues of who speaks, how, and why, a address therole of rhetoric in making the past speak and the relationship betweenrhetoric, historiography, and truth. (3)

In the first half of the paper, I reconsider Auerbach'streatment of Percennius's speech to argue that the ambiguity ofspeaker and perspective in this speech provides a notable instance ofdemocratic representation. While Tacitus employs tropes associated withmadness and disease, which imply that there were no 'valid'motives behind the soldiers' mutiny, I argue, contra Auerbach, thatthe soldiers are also presented as aggrieved, reasoned, and fullyconscious political agents. The social distinction between soldiers andsenators is not employed to suggest that only the senators possessedpolitical significance and legitimacy.

In the second half, I consider RanciAaAaAeA?re's treatment ofthe episo by paying particular attention to his analysis ofTacitus's blurring of legitimate and illegitimate speakers. I arguethat this blurring can also be read in Tacitus's writing ofmisrecognition. For RanciAaAaAeA?r democratic writing works from anassumption of equality whereby all individuals, irrespective of socialstanding, are fully equal in their capacity to recognize the meaning oftheir actions. This assumption is presumed by RanciAaAaAeA?re to bedecisively modern, since authors writi before the "Modern Age"(that is, before the nineteenth century) attributed the capacity to knowto the ruling classes alone, and not to those "destined to beruled." (6) Yet in my view, Tacitus problematizes such a readingsince his writing of history shows that senators and emperors are assusceptible to misrecognize as soldiers and barbarians. This embedswithin Tacitus's narrative a different kind of democraticpotential: by equalizing ignorance across social groups and thereforepresupposing a democratic incapacity to recognize the meaning ofactions, Tacitus undermines the pedagogical power of the elite, a powerthat ordinarily privileges the intellect of the Roman aristocratic maleabove that of Rome's socially marginalized.

Auerbach's Mimesis, though published over sixty years ago,remains a work of seminal importance in the field of modern literarycriticism. The philosophy of Jacques RanciAaAaAeA?re has also receivedincreasing critic attention over the past two decades, generating debatein a diverse range of disciplines such as social history, pedagogicaltheory, and political philosophy. Yet Auerbach's andRanciAaAaAeA?re's readings of Tacitu which play crucial roles intheir respective works, deserve re-assessment. Tacitean historiographyis not as straightforwardly ethical and conservative as Auerbach deemedand nor does it necessarily deny the legitimacy of the'Other,' as RanciAaAaAeA?re presumes. This raises implicationsconcerni the two scholars' understanding of the'antique,' the distinction between ancient and modernliterature, and their historicist conceptions of politics andaesthetics.

Tacitus is a paradigmatic example of an 'elite'individual, living in a society that illustrates the'normalizing' and 'distributing' activities of apolice regime. Nevertheless, his narrative does not always reveal norsupport a poetics that reflect elitist ethics. Rather, his writing ofthe past, as well as the roles played by the marginal in that past,displays an ambiguity of representation and supplies a multiplicity ofvoices that mirror the complexity of social experience under empire. (7)While this ambiguity cannot be extended to argue that Tacitus'spolitical thought is liberal or organized according to a principle ofequality, it does suggest an inclusive dimension to his thought that, asI shall argue, renders democratic representation latent within hishistories.

In section one I start by analyzing Percennius's speech beforeturning directly to the commentaries of Auerbach and RanciAaAaAeA?re,which will fo the basis of the discussions in sections two and three. Inthe final section, I return to the Tacitean passage in order to locatethe democratic features of his political thought.

I. Writing Insurgency

Two mutinies occurred in 14 CE. Once the news of Augustus'sdeath was communicated and an official period of mourning declared, thesoldiers on the Danube and Rhine rebelled against their commanders forthe purpose of service reform. The mutinies are given due attention byTacitus: after the account of Tiberius's accession, Tacitusimmediately moves on to a description of events in Pannonia (1.16-30)and next to a longer description of events in Germany (1.31-49).

Tacitus's initial description of the outbreak in Pannonia,which involved three legions under command of Q. Iunius Blaesus, tellsthat there existed no new causes of the soldiers' discordantbehavior except that the change of emperor created the opportunity toriot and collect the profits of war (1.16.1). After Tacitus relatesBlaesus's declaration of the iustitium and the suspension of normalduties, he introduces Percennius. Formerly the leader of a theatricalclaque, Percennius had "bold speech" (procax lingua), an"actorish enthusiasm" (histrionale stadium), and was practicedin stirring up crowds (1.16.3). His speech to the troops is reported byTacitus as follows (1.16.3-1.17.6):

postremo promptis iam et aliis seditionis ministris velutcontionabundus interrogabat, cur paucis centurionibus, paucioribustribunis in modum servorum oboedirent. quando ausuros exposcereremedia, nisi novum et nutantem adhuc principem precibus vel armisadirent? satis per tot annos ignavia peccatum, quod tricena autquadragena stipendia senes et plerique truncato ex vulneribus corporetolerent. ne dimissis quidem finem esse militiae, sed apud vexillumtendentes alio vocabulo eosdem labores perferre. ac si quis tot casusvita superaverit, trahi adhuc diversas in terras, ubi per nomen agrorumuligines paludum vel inculta montium accipiant. enimvero militiam ipsamgravem, infructuosam: denis in diem assibus animam et corpus aestimari:hinc vestem arma tentoria, hinc saevitiam centurionum et vacationesmunerum redimi. at hercule verbera et vulnera, duram hiemem, exercitasaestates, bellum atrox aut sterilem pacem sempiterna. nec aliudlevamentum, quam si certis sub legibus militia iniretur: ut singulosdenarios mererent, sextus decumus stipendii annus finem adferret, neultra sub vexillis tenerentur, sed isdem in castris praemium pecuniasolveretur. an praetorias cohortes, quae binos denarios acceperint,quae post sedecim annos penatibus suis reddantur, plus periculorumsuscipere? (8)With others ready to serve the rebellion his questions took on the formof a public meeting--why like slaves were they obedient to a fewcenturions and fewer tribunes? When would they ever be bold enough toask for remedies, if they were not even going with arms or pleas to anew and still apprehensive princeps? Enough wrong had been done throughthe cowardice of so many years. Old men with bodies crippled by woundswere enduring thirty to forty years of service. Even dismissal did notsee the end of their soldiering, but, pitched by a legion's standard,they suffered the same hardships under another title. And any soldierswho may have survived so many risks would still be dragged off toremote and other regions only to be given soaked swamps or neglectedmountain. Indeed, military service itself was oppressive andunprofitable; soul and body to be valued at ten asses a day; out ofthis, clothing, arms, tents, as well as the savagery of centurions andexemptions from duty have to be purchased. But indeed of floggings andwounds, hard winters, wearisome summers, terrible war, or barren peace,there was no end. Relief could only come if military life was enteredon under fixed conditions: they should earn each the pay of a denariusa day and the sixteenth year terminating their service. They should beretained no longer under a standard, but in the same camp a reward incash must be paid to them. Did the praetorian cohorts, who received twodenarii each per day, and who after sixteen years are returned to theirhomes, really take on more dangers?

Tacitus's remark about Percennius's theatrical past and"actorish" zeal signal unreality and unreliability that would,one imagines, suggest to the elite reader the disreputable nature ofwhat will follow. The other markers of the speech, however, question anyimmediate condemnatory response. For example, Tacitus describesPercennius's style of speaking with the adjective contionabundus,compounded from the term used for an official public speech or meeting(contio). Though the parallel is drawn contemptuously (velutcontionabundus), the mutiny is set within a political discursive frame:Percennius attempts to constitute himself as a political speaker and thespeech itself is equally well-composed and persuasive. (9) It is alsonotable that Percennius's views are represented indirectly, viaoratio obliqua, which blurs Tacitus's and Percennius's voices.While Tacitus does insert a critical, top-down view, the inclusion ofspeech enables Tacitus to implicate the reader in the perspective of therebellious soldiers through a presentation that has a reliable factualcontent (as the narrative account confirms) and a reasonable (just)argumentation. This rationality becomes more obvious when we compare theTacitean version with Velleius's parallel condemnatory account,which emphasizes the extremity, madness, and revolutionary ardor of thesoldiers (2.125.1-3):

quippe exercitus, qui in Germania militabat praesentisque Germaniciimperio regebatur, simulque legiones, quae in Illyrico erant, rabiequadam et profunda confudendi omnia cupiditate novum ducem, novumstatum, novam quaerebant rem publicam; quin etiam ausi sunt minaridaturos se senatui, daturos principi leges; modum stipendii, finemmilitiae sibi ipsi constituere conati sunt, processum etiam in armaferrumque strictum est et paene in ultima gladiorum erupit impunitas,defuitque, qui contra rem publicam duceret, non qui sequerentur.The army that was on campaign in Germany under the command ofGermanicus, who was present there, and along with it the legions inIllyricum fell prey to some kind of madness and a profound desire tocreate general chaos. They were demanding a new commander, a new orderof things, a new state. They even had the audacity to threaten to laydown the law to the senate and to the emperor as well, and they triedto establish their own level of pay and length of service. They went asfar as taking up arms and sword and their impunity almost erupted intoevery extreme of murder. What was missing was someone to lead the menagainst the state, not those who would follow him.

Velleius describes both the mutiny in Pannonia and in Germany inthe same chapter. There is an emphasis on the soldiers' madness andchaos. His outline of their motives includes a desire for a new leader,government, and state, as well as new terms of pay and service. There isstress on the extremity of the soldiers' acts: they went as far astaking up arms and they were bold enough to threaten the senate andemperor--the same acts that Tacitus's Percennius had incited themto commit. But Velleius's description of the events is critical intone because it is expressed purely from his perspective. Velleius makesno reference to the soldiers' hardships, and as a result theinsurgency emerges as unjustified. Velleius not only excludes thereasons for the soldiers' sedition, (10) but refers to madness(rabies) and confusion (confusio). This suggests no thoughtful incentivebehind the soldiers' acts but rather violence for the sake ofviolence, again erasing any sense of aggrievement and reason. (11)

The soldiers' reasonableness is a central issue in thecommentaries of Auerbach and RanciAaAaAeA?re. As we turn our attentionto their reading I should begin with a few prefatory remarks regardingthe wider aims of their works. In Mimesis: The Representation of Realityin Western Literature, Auerbach argues that literature written fromantiquity through to the twentieth century progressively reveals morenaturalistic forms of representation. Auerbach uses mimesis as a term todescribe a practice of representation that imitates something"realistically." Writing within a Marxist tradition, Auerbachoffers a realism that is an artistic form taking the life of the commonpeople with absolute seriousness and furthermore one that accounts forthe social forces that underlie historical movement. It is, then,"seriousness" (as a mode of representation) and"everydayness" (as the subject of representation) whichconstitute the two primary features of what Auerbach terms realism. (12)

The Percennius passage was a key and difficult case study inAuerbach's work since the passage appeared to be an obvious momentin which historiography precisely captured that everydayness and enableda realistic imaginative reconstruction of the lives of the lowerclasses. Yet, for Auerbach, Tacitus's writing of the passagerendered that moment unreal due to an "excess of rhetoricaldevices" that present Percennius and his fellow insurgent Vibulenusas "mere scoundrels and swindlers" (Auerbach 2003, 39). (13)Auerbach extends this to argue that ancient historiography serves toperpetuate elite ideologies, thereby preventing any true or seriousrepresentation of the thoughts, actions, and tragedies of the commonperson:

If the literature of antiquity was unable to represent everyday lifeseriously, that is, in full appreciation of its problems and with aneye for its historical background; if it could represent it only inthe low style, comically or at best idyllically, statically andahistorically, the implication is that these things mark the limitsnot only of the realism of antiquity but of its historicalconsciousness as well. (2003, 39)

Since elite writers could not imagine the lives of the lowerclasses realistically, they could not critique the social bases of theirsociety, a democratic function of literature that would inAuerbach's analysis appear to be decisively modern. Accordingly,those less worthy were relegated to satire and comedy, representedthrough a "low" or "comic" style, as appropriate totheir social status. In his commentary on Tacitus's writing of thePannonian mutiny, Auerbach is disposed to conclude that Percennius isnot represented realistically or through recognition of the everydaystruggle of his position, but through tropes and rhetoric that renderPercennius silent, or rather force him to speak Tacitean.

RanciAaAaAeA?re owes much to Auerbach's understanding, yet hisreading focus not on the "effect of exclusion," as stressed byAuerbach, but rather on the "power of inclusion" (1994, 28)since, though Percennius is not among those whose speech counts, Tacitusmakes him speak and in the same mode as his counterparts--thecenturions, Germanicus, and Tacitus himself. RanciAaAaAeA?re (1994, 29)argues that the Tacitean narrati attests the inclusivity of literature,which "is always susceptible of allowing entry into its communityof those excluded when its circle is drawn."

RanciAaAaAeA?re's wider aim in The Names of History: On thePoetics of Knowled is to trace the ways in which historians employliterary techniques to construct knowledge that appears truthful. ForRanciAaAaAeA?re it is on through literary means that history (facts,statistics, material), as well as the methods of historical analysis(measuring, classifying, objectifying), are rendered as a discourse oftruth (1994, 51). RanciAaAaAeA? argues that the speech given toPercennius constitutes part of the "literary pre-history" ofmodern social-scientific historiography, since Tacitus not only givesPercennius an historical identity but provides a "model ofsubversive eloquence" for later orators, soldiers, historians, andstudents to imitate (1994, 29).

Auerbach and RanciAaAaAeA?re take opposing positions in relation tothe natu of the relationship between rhetoric and truth. As a result,their readings of Tacitus constitute the two extreme poles on thespectrum of democratic representation. For Auerbach, Tacitus'snarrative is exclusive because it is elitist, conservative, andnormative. RanciAaAaAeA? views the narrative as inclusive because byallowing a member of the poor access to the words of the elite throughthe indirect style, Tacitus breaks the hierarchical distinction betweenthe Roman elite male and the common soldier. (14)

In the following two sections, I analyze both commentaries infurther detail, starting with Auerbach. I follow RanciAaAaAeA?re inarguing for t inclusivity of Tacitus's narrative, but while thenarrative of the mutinies attests the violence and immoderation of thesoldiers, these acts are juxtaposed in Tacitus with other voices (notjust Tacitus's), which struggle for a place to speak but find thatspace and speak with reason. The result is not mimesis but polyphony, a"multi-voicedness," which counters the Romano-centricdiscourse that Auerbach criticizes and RanciAaAaAeA?re presupposes. (15)The issue in reading Tacitus is n so much to find the voice that speakstruth, but to hear the various voices that speak various truths.

II. Auerbach on the Limitations of Speaking Tacitean

I now turn to Auerbach's commentary on the Tacitean passage.Key to Auerbach's reading of Percennius's speech isTacitus's introduction in which he tells us that there existed"no new motives" for the soldiers' discordant behavior(1.16.1). Auerbach (2003, 37) argues that Tacitus invalidatesPercennius's speech "in purely ethical terms" before itis actually made since the phrase nullis novis causis strips therebellion of any real cause and a priori such condemnation reflectsTacitus's lack of understanding and interest in the soldiers'plight.

From this initial observation, Auerbach offers a more generalcritique of ancient historiography which "does not see forces"but merely "vices and virtues, successes and mistakes" andfails to escape a fixed system of categorization. (16) The result isthat ancient historiography offers a static and ahistoricalunderstanding of a society whose values are "of an absolutevalidity in themselves" rather than historically determined (2003,39). The Tacitean narrative, however, is not so simple or"absolute."

Tacitus's introductory phrase (nullis novis causis) influencesour reading of the subsequent narrative, but it does not nullifyPercennius's long list of grievances nor does it erase, as Auerbachclaims, any sense of grief or tragedy behind the soldiers' revolt.In fact, one could read the events of the mutinies in general as auniversal tragedy, concomitant upon the continuation of the imperialregime, thus associating the elite perspective and the soldiers'perspective. Moreover, in this precise instance, the speech may beviewed as generating ambivalence with regard to the authorial, eliteintervention with which the mutiny is introduced. The absence of newcauses points to 'old' causes, embedded in the Augustan regimeand its repressive frameworks from which the soldiers were seekingliberty. (17) Such liberty would enable the soldiers to profit and wouldintroduce disorder and indiscipline. These would appear to be a'cost' of a democratic revival. Making that cost obviousproblematizes an episode in which, lest we forget, the Tiberian regime(despised on most readings of the Annales) is seemingly threatened bymilitary mutiny. Further, the 'old' causes that Percenniusrelates can be read as providing commentary on the prefatory remarks:despite the status of the speaker, the grievances concerning a corruptand brutal regime are justified. (18) Commentary and passage do not denyeach other, but establish ambivalence, one that perhaps is alsoreflected in the blurred voice (Tacitus/Percennius) in which the demandsare made.

Such ambivalence sits uncomfortably with the absolute (timeless)moral-political conceptions that Auerbach identifies as characteristicof ancient historiography. Such normative conceptions are certainly afeature of ancient thought. (19) Nevertheless, Tacitus appears to testthe validity of absolute concepts. In the mutiny episode, Percenniusdescribes the discipline of military life as oppressive (gravis) andunprofitable (infructuosa), whereas in Roman social and politicalthought discipline (disciplina) and associated concepts such asmoderation (moderatio) are fundamental to moral propriety and alsointegral to the stability of the state. (20) The characterization ofGermanicus, who is initially presented as the embodiment of"absolute" virtue (Ann. 1.33), also calls into questiontimeless moral concepts like pietas. When Germanicus is first confrontedby the seditious soldiers in Germany, he attempts to restore orderthrough a moralizing speech that evokes the qualities that preventdisorder in the camp (fides, modestia), and the dignity of old-fashioneddiscAaAaAeA plina (1.34-35). Germanicus's speech represents thetradition (ethical) Roman voice and Germanicus himself is presented,initially, in an exemplary light. Yet such words ultimately fail to calmthe troops, and in the end Germanicus has no choice but to resort todeception, forging a letter in Tiberius's name that promisesdemobilization after twenty years, immediate discharge to soldiers whohave served sixteen years, and double payment of requested legacies(1.36.3). Although Tacitus employs ethical/normative models in givingcharacters moral words, such ethics are not stable and by so doingTacitus draws our attention to the frailty of virtue. (21)

Despite such ambivalence, Auerbach concludes that Tacitus'swriting of Percennius's speech is purely aesthetic. By this hemeans that although Tacitus's speeches capture the character andsituation of the person who was supposed to have delivered them, theyremain primarily rhetoric: "Percennius does not speak his ownlanguage; he speaks Tacitean" (2003, 39). Auerbach's critiqueof Tacitus's narrative in terms of its mimetic limit recognizesthat written representations of the 'everyday' where they havesurvived, are naturally created from an elite consciousness and thusinevitably embedded in a certain degree of falsity, that is, inrepresented form. This reveals an obvious problem of Taciteanhistoriography (Tacitus is not Percennius and subsequently cannotpresent Percennius realistically) and historiography/ethnography ingeneral (can the plebeian or 'Other' speak?). Yet Tacitus doesoffer a narrative that escapes his own class-located discourse, and thePercennius passage (though an invention), along with other narrations ofenemy speech (also inventions), are specific examples of moments inTacitean historiography which oppose a specifically Roman or imperialideology. Though Percennius is inevitably speaking Tacitean, the way hespeaks and what he says is not necessarily 'elitist.' Suchrepresentations, though fictitious, nonetheless adhere to the spirit ofthe truth, especially because both senators and soldiers shared theexperience of subjection under the empire.

III. RanciAaAaAeA?re and the Poetic Detours of Histo

In order to locate the democratic aspects of Tacitus'swriting, let us now examine closely RanciAaAaAeA?re's analysis inThe Names of Histor On the Poetics of Knowledge. RanciAaAaAeA?reundertakes to trace the poet structures that have governed the writingof the past from antiquity to the present. Taking short excerpts fromhistorians such as Tacitus, Fernand Braudel, E. P. Thompson, and JulesMichelet, RanciAaAaAeA?re unpac the way in which the study of historyhas been constructed as a discipline. The book is, as Hayden Whitesummarizes in the preface, a collection of reflections on historicaldiscourse, on the ways in which we speak about the past, and on"the ways in which it speaks, fails to speak, or is prohibited fromspeaking to us" (1994, vii).

As discussed above, Auerbach's reading of Tacitus underlinesthe ways in which ancient rhetoric prohibits the past from speaking. Thecommon person, in Auerbach's framework of mimetic realism, isentangled in a paradox: they are silenced either because they are notrepresented at all or because when they are represented it is throughthe rhetorical and elitist voice of the historian. The Other is thusdoubly doomed--they are either excluded or included only in'mute' form. RanciAaAaAeA?re offe a way out of this paradox byreading rhetoric not as antithetical to realism but rather as a literarypractice that makes history possible as a discourse of truth.

RanciAaAaAeA?re's analysis of Percennius's speech formspart of the seco chapter of The Names of Histoty. RanciAaAaAeA?rebegins, consciously followi Auerbach, by noting that the revolt isexplained twice--"in its absence of reason and in the reasons thatit gives itself"--but only Tacitus's words have"explanatory value":

[It is] not that Percennius's reasons are declared false; thehistorian doesn't comment on them, doesn't refute them. They are notsaid to be either true or false. They have, more fundamentally, norelation to the truth. Their illegitimacy is not due to their contentbut to the simple fact that Percennius is not in the position oflegitimate speaker. A man of his rank has no business thinking andexpressing his thought. And his speech is ordinarily reproduced onlyin the "base" genres of satire and comedy. (1994, 26)

RanciAaAaAeA?re, like Auerbach, presupposes that Tacitus would notconsid the words and thoughts of a rebellious soldier such as Percenniusas legitimate or meaningful: "The speech of the man of the commonpeople is by definition without depth" (1994, 26). ButRanciAaAaAeA?re then exten his analysis, somewhat subvertingAuerbach's argument, by pointing to the significance of Tacituslending Percennius a tongue. This poetic practice enables Tacitus, asthe narrator, to create a relationship with Percennius whereby hisinherent illegitimacy as both a speaker within the text and as a memberof society not normally considered legitimate, intelligent, or seriousis validated even as it appears suspicious.

RanciAaAaAeA?re (1994, 28) supports this claim with reference toTacitus use of indirect discourse (the narrator's 'they'replacing the speaker's 'you') to presentPercennius's speech, which is "the specific modality accordingto which [Tacitus] effects the equilibrium of narrative anddiscourse," (22) that is, the relationship between the story beingnarrated and the manner in which that story is explained by thehistorian:

Percennius speaks without speaking, in the infinitive mode, which isthe zero-degree of the verb, expressing the value of information,without deciding on the value of this information, without situatingit on the scale of the present and the past, of the objective and thesubjective. The indirect style, in practice disjoining meaning andtruth, in effect cancels the opposition between legitimate andillegitimate speakers. The latter are just as much validated assuspected. (1994, 28)

RanciAaAaAeA?re's discussion here moves beyond the categoriesof ancient poeti that concern Auerbach. RanciAaAaAeA?re deals with, notmimesis (the way which Tacitus represents or 'repeats'Percennius, which RanciAaAaAeA?re not from the start is invention notdocumentation), but lexis: "The way in which the poet as subjectrelates to the subject of the poem, identifies with it, differentiateshimself from it or hides himself behind it" (2004b, 11). In thisperspective, RanciAaAaAeA?re offers a framework th is especially usefulfor the analysis of ancient historiography. He sees the disciplines ofhistory and literature as closely related, but does not reduce historyto literature, nor does he try to assert the literary or fictitiousnature of history. Rather, RanciAaAaAeA?re attemp to foreground acodependency, namely, that history (as a discourse of truth) isdependent on a particular use of literary devices, in this case indirectdiscourse.

The significance of indirect discourse, as RanciAaAaAeA?reconceives of i is that it establishes a level of equality betweenTacitus's and Percennius's voices: "The hom*ogeneity ofthe narrative-discourse" constituted by the indirect style comes to"contradict the heterogeneity of the subjects it represents"(1994, 28). (23) To underline the heterogeneity of the subjects, Tacituswould require the use of distinctions, such as those of mood, tense, andperson, which would serve to differentiate between past and present, theobjective and the subjective, the legitimate and the illegitimatespeaker. Alternatively, Tacitus could directly cite Percennius, makingthe latter's voice more prominent than his own but in so doingincrease the suspicious nature of those words. But the indirect,specifically the infinitive mode of expression that counters the"narrative prestige" (24) of the preterit, prevents any suchdistinctions, rendering indistinct the voice of the one who authorizessocial divisions and the voice of the one made subject to thosedivisions.

What matters to RanciAaAaAeA?re, then, is the manner in whichhistory is tol that is, how a narrative of events is framed by thediscourse that comments on and explains it, and, furthermore, how thatdiscourse privileges, among other things, the intellectual capacity ofcertain individuals over others. For RanciAaAaAeA?re, thehistorian's discourse is intricate tied to politics and aesthetics,which are governed by the "distribution of the sensible,"which is a set of a priori laws that define what is possible to see,hear, say, think, and more importantly who counts as reasoned. (25)These various distributions in the social realm result in an emergenceof a category of people who count as legitimate (those who have a part)and another, excluded, and illegitimate category ("the part thathas no part"), which guarantees the status of the legitimatecategory by their exclusion (RanciAaAaAeA?re 1999, 1-14). The sans-partnot a legitimate, political subject until the democratic politicalmoment, the moment when their voice is included and becomes perceptibleon the same level as those who have a part.

The distinction between those who count and those who do not formsthe theoretical basis of RanciAaAaAeA?re's reading of thePercennius passag history and historiography work to make some wordslegitimate and others illegitimate. When RanciAaAaAeA?re refers to an"effect of exclusion" he not referring to a physical exclusionor abandonment, but to an exclusion from the (aesthetic) sensory ordersince Percennius's discontent cannot be perceived as meaningful.Rather, as a member of "the poor" Percennius has "anessential relation to nontruth" (1994, 28) and his voice is and canonly be heard as unreasoned, un-meaningful "noise." (26)

RanciAaAaAeA?re also seems to be suggesting, on the other hand,that Tacit shifts this sensory configuration through the use of theindirect style, which serves to erase the boundary between the narratorand character. This would create a democratic possibility for all tospeak, in their own terms, as opposed to one whose terms and context aredefined for or dictated to them. Direct speech, in opposition, couldamount to "noise" since it would make obvious the distinctionbetween the historian's discourse and the person that discoursedescribes, creating a distinct disassociation between author andcharacter, the legitimate and the illegitimate, emphasizing thesuspicious nature of the Other's speech as opposed to regulatingits validity.

RanciAaAaAeA?re extends the conflation of legitimate andillegitimate speake to argue for the inclusivity of Tacitus'slanguage:

Although Percennius may well be the radical other, the one excludedfrom legitimate speech, his discourse is included, in a specificsuspension of the relations between meaning and truth... Whatnonetheless remains is the gathering power of language and of the playthat it authorises, the power of a discourse that is alwayssusceptible of allowing entry into its community of those excludedwhen its circle is drawn. (1994, 28-29)

RanciAaAaAeA?re's particular interpretation of the indirectstyle as wh suspends the relations between meaning and truth helps toelucidate further the ambivalence of Tacitus's/Percennius'sspeech. By making Percennius perceptible in a way that is not personalto Tacitus, nor emblematic of a Roman point of view, this in turn offersa more inclusive and democratic narrative.

We may, nonetheless, want to modify some of RanciAaAaAeA?re'sconclusion First, the extent to which the use of oratio obliqua can beused to infer a blurring of legitimate and illegitimate speech is amatter of debate. It is possible, as Ronald Martin (1981, 233) hasnoted, that Tacitus reserved reported speech for "characters oflesser importance--to avoid giving them more prominence than theydeserve." (27) From this perspective, indirect speech is merelyanother way of presenting "noise" and emphasizing"illegitimacy." (28) Second, by focusing on Tacitus's useof the indirect, RanciAaAaAeA?re's argument implies that inpassages whe Tacitus employs direct speech, thereby stressing certaindistinctions of tense and person, the suspicious nature of the speechincreases. Calgacus's speech (Agr. 30-32), for example, is moresuspect than Percennius's since the former, presented in directform, reinforces the distinction between historian and subject,discourse and narrative, rather than neutralize it.

It is difficult to reconcile the logic (if any) that underpinsTacitus's varying use of indirect speech and, given the extent towhich Tacitus employs this particular mode of speechifying (indirectspeech takes up almost twice as much space as does direct speech), itseems unlikely that such choices relate to imbuing certain characterswith more or less prominence than others, or that Tacitus used directspeech for creating effects of presence and indirect speech for curbingsuch effects. We may suppose, instead, that where Tacitus employsindirect discourse, the effect is neutrality and ambivalence (asRanciAaAaAeA?re argues) but al interference with the speaker'swords and, by extension, a level of control over the wider meaning ofthe episode. If so, the indirect is not a mode of democraticrepresentation but, on the contrary, its very opposite.

IV. Inventing the Rebel: Tacitus on the Part That Has No Part

Auerbach, with his focus on mimesis, and RanciAaAaAeA?re, with hisfocus the stylistic, read Tacitus in a way to render the meaning of thetext dependent on issues of realism and form. Both commentators,however, fail to address the specificity of Tacitus's writing ofsedition in terms of its democratic effects. In what follows, I arguethat Tacitus's language not only includes and attributes agency, asRanciAaAaAeA?re assert but also imbues the soldiers with reason.

As explained above, a revolt stemming from a real sense ofgrievance felt by the sans-part produces RanciAaAaAeA?re'sdemocracy. Yet the polici agent (in this case the historian) enacts aform of hermeneutic oppression to turn that reason--the logical wordsand thought of the poor--into madness, silence, and forms of'nonthought.' (29) The revolutionary moments are trivializedthrough the deployment of language associated with greed (avaritia) andmadness (furor) in narrations of insurgency. (30) As a result, anarrative conforming to the representational trope of protest as 'asign of disease' (as opposed to reason) emerges, subvertingpossible acts of democracy into senseless crime.

Tacitus, however, presents a nuanced picture. To be sure, furorassumes a prominent role in the mutinies, particularly the Germanmutiny. (31) As A. J. Woodman (2006, 329) has argued, Tacitus'sdescriptions of the mutinies are presented through a sustained metaphorof madness: "[T]he very legions upon whom the imperial securitydepended... are shown to be vulnerable to collective madness." Atthe same time, though, Percennius's speech makes visible injusticesimposed onto the soldiers (their low pay, terrible living conditions,and physical abuse), which provide justifications for the revolt.Further, the "madness" that Woodman's reading disclosesis counteracted with Tacitus's references to the soldiers'aequalitas (32) (levelness, equality) and constantia (agreement,constancy: 1.32.3). In the same chapter (1.32), Tacitus also tells usthat the soldiers acted as though they were under command (regi), whichsuggests that the mutiny, though chaotic and violent, was also organizedand measured (and recognizable as such by the elite).

Tacitus does not construct a form of Roman furor that trivializesseditious voices. Although the soldiers are violent, Tacitus does notsuggest that their actions were "thoughtless." (33)Furthermore, the furor of the mutinies is not linked with a lack ofpolitical consciousness. Contrary to RanciAaAaAeA?re's commentary,the soldiers are deemed by Tacit significant and certainly capable ofunderstanding the meaning of their actions. For example, Tacitus imbuesthe soldiers in Germany with a political purpose: the soldiers'hope was that Germanicus, unable to tolerate Tiberius as emperor, wouldsurrender himself to the legions (1.31.1). The situation is not just amatter of insurgency, but a threat of usurpation. Tacitus does not,therefore, describe the soldiers as "blind" or"unthinking," and the military as a collective entity is notdeemed "the part that has no part." Instead, Tacitusemphasizes what appears to be the proper and accurate awareness of thesoldiers--that they held the fate of Rome in their hands (1.31.5).Although the soldiers remained inferior in the normal distribution ofrole and place in Roman society, the political power underpinning thatorganization ultimately belonged to them.

From this perspective, the nature of the relationship betweenrhetoric and truth, specifically the ways in which Tacitus's use ofrhetorical devices enables the past to speak, seems complex andambiguous. On the one hand, the invented lower-class speech isfictitious, an aesthetic/rhetorical representation of the experience ofthe marginalized which is produced from the confines of an eliteimagination. On the other, the dialogue created by the invented speechbetween various voices of different status and opinion embeds apolyphonic aspect within the narrative. This serves to counter thehom*ogeneity (and thus falsity or 'nontruth') that Auerbach andRanciAaAaAeA?re associate with representations of the margin in ancienthistoriography.

The polyphonic narration foregrounds the democratic effects ofTacitean rhetoric since the many voices of the soldiers, juxtaposed withthose of Germanicus and the other commanders, undermine the orderingactivities of a police regime, which strive to define one value systemfor all. The values to which the soldiers adhere, however, appear todiverge from those of the centurions. For example, while we can tracethe voice of the senator and the centurion in the valorization ofdisciplina and obsequium, the voice of the soldier represents the samequalities as violent and oppressive. The power to define the wrong orthe right meaning of words does not appear to belong exclusively to theelite speaker, nor is the non-elite speaker relegated to the realm ofillegitimacy. (34)

Tacitus's own structuring of the chapters also prevents anyconsistent or 'static' explanation from emerging: the furorthat introduces the German revolt is countered with references to thesoldiers' order and their political (thoughtful) motivations.Similarly, in his explanation of the cause of the Pannonian mutiny,Tacitus's references to praemia, luxus, and otium (terms that implygreed) are undermined by the subsequent speech, which by contrast is anemphatic demonstration of grievance. In this way, Tacitus invites and,more importantly, enables the reader to understand diversely. (33) InRanciAaAaAeA?re's framework, such a meth of narrating history wouldcertainly exemplify "democratic" representation.

For RanciAaAaAeA?re and Auerbach, the truth and reality of historydepen on the manner in which it is told. As I have argued,Tacitus's narration of the mutinies, particularly the speech givento Percennius, makes obvious the power and ability to voice complaintsof certain persons normally not allowed to speak. In such a context,rhetoric and mimesis/realism cannot necessarily be read in opposition toone another. Rather, Tacitus's deployment of rhetoricaldevices--the mixing of voices and the testing of absolute moralconcepts, which work against the well-ordered discourse ofelite-didactic historiography--invites us to consider the democraticnature of his rhetoric. If democratic writing shifts a body from theplace and voice normally assigned to it and makes legitimate thosenormally considered illegitimate, then Tacitean rhetoric is certainlyemployed to this effect. Tacitus foregrounds the conflict over the realmeaning of words and in doing so points to the possibility of differentrealities for those of different status. The ambiguity and polyphonythereby produced undermine the elitism or "nontruth" thatAuerbach and RanciAaAaAeA?re associate with his writing of histor

Conclusion: Misrecognition and the Equivalence of Ignorance

I have argued that democracy can be traced in Tacitus'srepresentations of the soldiers as aggrieved, reasoned, and consciouspolitical agents. Yet this may be an aspect of Tacitus's polyphonicrhetorical-historiographical practice and not necessarily a feature ofhis political thought--that is, a literary device, not a politicalstance. A question thus remains as to how and whether we cansubstantiate Tacitean polyphony, as well as his inclusive writing of themarginal, beyond the matter of style.

The poetics of knowledge RanciAaAaAeA?re puts in place aims tolocate momen when historians and philosophers erect boundaries betweentheir understanding and the misunderstanding that they attribute toothers. RanciAaAaAeA?re trac the attribution of such boundariesthroughout his work, starting with Plato and then moving onto leftistcritics such as Marx, Sartre, Althusser, Bourdieu, and Badiou. (36) ForRanciAaAaAeA?re, these authors underestima the capacity of those theyspeak for to understand for themselves. In the attribution of ignorance,each emerges as a thinker of inequality and pedagogical privilege,assuming that the marginal need someone to think and speak for them. The"traditional way of embodying inequality" that from Platoonwards allocated different "sensory equipment" to those ofdiffering social status is for RanciAaAaAeA?re deeply entrench inWestern political philosophy (RanciAaAaAeA?re 2006

In Tacitus the significance of the sensory can be traced in hiswriting of misrecognition; however, Tacitus's analysis ofmisrecognition is not in accord with "the traditionaldistribution," according to social status. What seems to me adefining feature of Tacitean historiography and one that may help tolocate the underlying democratic aspect of his political thought, is thenotion that everyone has the capacity to not know, regardless of socialstatus. As Tacitus writes history, even those destined to rule cansuffer defects in the eyes, ears, and intellect. A failing capacity todiscern afflicts both the poor and the elite. (37)

Tacitus does at times adhere to the traditional distribution; forexample, the Britons misrecognize their enslavement (Agr. 21), which isobvious to those who know the truth (such as Agricola and Tacitushimself). Yet in the Annales the 'knowing' elite are aware oftheir own servitude and furthermore 'rush' into it (at Romaemere in servitium consules, patres, eques, Ann. 1.7). The most obviousdiscussion of political sensibilities comes during the digression atAnnales 4.33 in which Tacitus tells us that under the principate few hadthe knowledge (prudentia) to discern the honorable from the worse(honesta ab detorioribus... discemunt) and the useful from the harmful(utilia ab noxiis discemunt), or alternatively, that few could wiselydiscern between use and harm, the honorable and the worse (4.33.2). Wecan read this statement in terms of a growing moral deficiency, that is,an individual inability to act according to Roman moral standards, butwe are obliged to understand the problem as a deficiency in discernmentthat makes moral judgments impossible. Given the context of elitepolitical decision-making, Tacitus refuses an association of discernmentwith normative elite behavior, but equalizes ignorance across socialgroups. The radical departure within this perspective can be seen bycomparison with a traditional association of the patres of Rome withpolitical wisdom. Further, whereas in the Agricola (1.2, 1.3) thesenators were unable to act (unable to do good) and forced to maintainsilence (unable to speak truth), in the Annales the elite are unableeven to comprehend the good.

The above allows us to question RanciAaAaAeA?re's (andAuerbach's) historici positions. (38) Undeniably a social hierarchydetermines a poetics of knowledge in Tacitus and elsewhere within Romanliterature, and any dehierarchization of society can only be understoodas belonging to a fictional realm, as both Auerbach and RanciAaAaAeA?reargue. Yet, discussed above, in certain chapters Tacitean historiographyreconfigures the normative alignment between social positions,capacities, and knowledge: in the mutiny chapters, Tacitus offers arepresentation of a lower-class revolt produced from reason as opposedto madness alone; at Ann. 4.33, misrecognition is equalized acrosssocial groups, generating a shared social experience of ignorance thatcuts across conventional hierarchical distinctions.

We cannot conclude, therefore, that Tacitus was a thinker ofpedagogical privilege, one who gave only the elite the power to know.While Tacitus certainly permits far more members of the elite to speakin his works than others, he equally does not give us a history in whichthe elite are presented as having a complete monopoly on knowledge.Tacitus's writing of history thus challenges the traditionaldistribution and to that extent his political thought can be seen asdemocratic. The democratic undercurrent to his political thought may beunderstood as that which gives rise to those moments of democratichistoriography, such as the Percennius episode, which imports alegitimate and meaningful discourse to the soldiers.

Auerbach and RanciAaAaAeA?re, then, both exercise their own formsof 'policin to partition the ancient historical and literaryrecords from the modern age. As a result each author fails to recognizethe fundamental similarity between ancient and modern historiography.RanciAaAaAeA?re's wider aim to trace the literary pre-history ofscientific history to discover the ways in which the modern disciplineof history has escaped its literary nature and has asserted instead its"scientific dignity" (1994, 6). RanciAaAaAeA?re's notionof modern scientific history is distinctiv he does not necessarily labelhistory 'scientific' because it is concerned with the factualbut because scientific means are those through which knowledge is madeplausible and dignified. But if modern history is a discipline thatworks not just as a process of collecting and measuring facts but as adiscipline that is substantiated through 'dignity' andplausibility, then rhetoric and ancient historiography cannot wholly beread in opposition to this. The reason is that rhetoric, though closelycomparable to fiction and storytelling to the modern eye, did notundermine the dignity or plausibility of an ancient historian'scraft. Furthermore, the practice of rhetoric as an ars of persuasion wasinvested with "real, tangible social value" (Sinclair 1995,190) since it could increase a writer's social importance. Suchsocial importance or status must in turn be read as that which enabledone to assert or decide truth (even if that decided truth was inherentlyfalse). The use of rhetoric, in other words, did not prevent an authorfrom asserting any claim to dignity, plausibility, or truth. Rather,rhetoric remains a fundamental part of the argumentation within therepresentation of ancient historians.

As much as RanciAaAaAeA?re appears to account for the conditions ofpossibili for truth (that is, what can count as true rather than what isobjectively true or real), by aligning rhetoric strictly with fictionand the literary he fails to see the way in which the practice of therhetorical tradition worked as part of the ancient regime of truth (thediscourse of plausibility and dignity). For example, RanciAaAaAeA?reopposes the "rigors" of scien with the "charms" ofliterature (1994, 7), but ancient rhetorical practice cannot be whollyaligned with the latter (the charms and seductions of storytelling).Rhetorical training was a rigorous process and it was a dignified,plausible process. Therefore, while RanciAaAaAeA?re wor within themodern dichotomy of scientific history and literary history, even as hetries to diffuse it, the place of rhetoric in ancient historicalnarrative lies somewhere in between the literary and the scientific. Asan artistic practice, rhetoric did not prevent the historian fromasserting any claim to truth. It simply cannot be reduced to"charm" and "seduction." Only if we honor thedifferences between ancient and modern forms of history-writing can we,paradoxically, see that both ancient and modern historical discoursesembed their claims to truth in the language of plausibility and dignity.If we conceive, as RanciAaAaAeA? does, of scientific history as adiscourse of plausibility and dignity, then this pushes us to questionwhether history, through the practice of rhetoric, had already been'scientized' in antiquity. (39)

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Notes

(1.) For a full description of RanciAaAaAeA?re's conception ofdemocracy s RanciAaAaAeA?re 200

(2.) For RanciAaAaAeA?re 2003, 6, politics is "an aestheticaffair" becau it is not concerned with the exercise of or strugglefor power but rather "the configuration of a specific world."

(3.) Throughout this paper I use the terms democracy and democraticin accordance with RanciAaAaAeA?re's formulation of the term

(4.) See also, e.g., O'Gorman 1993; Adler 201 1, 119-40; Gruen201 1, 159-96; and Shumate 2012, 476-503.

(5.) On this relationship see, among others, Wiseman 1979, 27-40;Fornara 1983, 142-68; Woodman 1988; Moles 1993; Laird 1999, 116-52;Lendon 2009; Damon 2010; Alston 2010, 143-46; Whately 2015, 13-20; and,in the context of Tacitean historiography specifically, Haynes 2012,282-9 and Levick 2012. See also McCloskey and Megill 1987 who argue thatthe deployment of rhetorical devices in history-writing (both ancientand modern) is part of "the art and science of argument" (222)and thus cannot be confined to falsehood. For an analysis ofAuerbach's and RanciAaAaAeA?re's commentaries on the Taciteanpassage see Parker 20 who covers much of the same ground as I do insection three below. See also Alston 2016.

(6.) RanciAaAaAeA?re 2006: "[The] traditional distributionadds that peop have different senses according to their position insociety. Those who were destined to rule and those who were destined tobe ruled didn't have the same sensory equipment, not the same eyesand ears, not the same intelligence."

(7.) On the ambiguous nature of Tacitean ethnography see, e.g.,Whitmarsh 2006; Gruen 2011, 159-78; and Alston and Spentzou 2011,206-24. On the ambiguous nature of Tacitus's political thought seeKapust 2012. On the plurality at the heart of Roman culture anddiscourses of unity see Moatti 2015, 271-319.

(8.) The edition of Tacitus's Annales used here is Borzsak1992. All translations are my own unless otherwise stated.

(9.) Cf. Livy 3.47.3 where contionabundus is used to describe themanner in which the plebeian Verginius speaks to the people in an effortto save his daughter from the decemvir Appius Claudius. See also Livy5.29.10 and 21.53.6 (for different applications). Tacitus uses theadjective only here.

(10.) Of the four extant accounts of the mutinies in 14 CE(Velleius Paterculus 2.125.1-2; Dio Cassius 57.4-6; Suetonius, Tib. 25;and Tacitus, Ann. 1.16.44-49), Tacitus is the only author who includesgrievances (hardships, labores, wounds, bad weather).

(11.) This is not to say that Tacitus does not employ languageassociated with madness; indeed he does (on which see Woodman's[2006] unrivalled analysis) but it is balanced with a sense of reason,orderliness, and grievance (discussed further below).

(12.) See further Gebauer and Wulf 1995, 9-15.

(13.) On classical historiography as primarily a rhetorical genresee Wiseman 1979 and Woodman 1988.

(14.) It should be noted that when RanciAaAaAeA?re employs the termthe po he is not referring to an economically disadvantaged group but toanyone who is not deemed as an equal (in terms of their sensory capacityand intellect, as well as their social status) in a given hierarchy. Theterm evokes Plato's description in the Republic of the threeclasses that make up the ideal city (workers, soldier-guardians, andphilosopher-kings) and their according thinking/doing capacities, aswell his discussion in Book 3 of Laws which outlines a number ofqualifications for ruling. See further RanciAaAaAeA?re 200

(15.) Polyphony is of particular significance in the context ofancient historiography, given the importance of impartiality forpresenting a 'true' account of the past. As Marincola (1997,159-60) has crucially argued, ancient historians saw impartiality as a"fundamental component of historical truth" and opposed"true" not to "false" but to "biased."Polyphony by generating multiple perspectives (such as those of thehistorian, of his characters, and of the nameless agents of rumor)prevents a biased ("false") account of the past. This isespecially the case in Tacitus's narration of the mutinies, sinceit is not always easy to ascertain whose words hold authoritative weight(cf. Feldherr's [2009] reading of rumor in Tacitus's accountof Drusus's death [Ann. 4.10-11] as a competing alternativehistoriography).

(16.) Cf. Williams 1968, 628-29: "It was because they saw theultimate explanation of historical events in moral terms that ancienthistorians came to view the state, or a politically identifiable sectionof the state, as if it were an individual... Consequently, in ancienthistoriography there is little sense of the people as a political forceor of popular movements and there is no conception of the importance ofsocial mobility." On the importance of historical cause for ancienthistoriographers see Tsitsiou-Chelidoni 2009, 533 note 27 and referencesthere cited.

(17.) Cf. Goodyear 1972, 198, who notes that the hardships ofmilitary service had been on the increase since 6 CE and Tacitus, Ami.1.2.1 on Augustus's seductive measures of pacification after thecivil wars (cunctos dulcedine otii pellexit).

(18.) Compare Tacitus, Hist. 1.40-46, chapters that underline theviolence of military sedition as well as the systemic nature of militaryand political corruption.

(19.) On which see Bettini 2011, 104-6 on the normative function ofthe mos maiorum.

(20.) On the role of moderatio in republican politics see Cicero,Leg. 3.5, 3.12, 3.40. See also Tacitus, Hist. 2.69 on the luxus of thesoldiers as contra veterem disciplinam et instituta maiorum. On thepertinence of disciplina in a military context see esp. Phang 2008.

(21.) The crucial example is at Agr. 21.2; one would assume thathumanitas, whether translated as "culture" or more widely"civilization," "humaneness," or "ethos,"is a term of absolute validity (at least for a Roman); nonetheless it iscompared to enslavement. See also Ann. 3.55.5, where Tacitus suggeststhat the institutions and customs of the past were not always better. AsGinsburg (1993, 87-8) notes, "Of particular interest to thehistorian seems to have been the question of whether the institutionsand decisions handed down by the maiores possess a timeless value orwhether there are circ*mstances that necessitate amending or changingthem altogether." Cf. Marincola 2010, 287. Bettini (2011, 101-2),noting the distinction Tacitus places between the mos of obsequium andthe fas of disciplina at Ann. 1.19.3, interprets fas as more absolute interms of its validity and acceptability than mos. Yet, givenTacitus's use of fas elsewhere (e.g., Ann. 1.77) the question ofwhether Tacitus deemed fas or any other term signifying rightfulness asabsolutely/eternally valid remains difficult to answer.

(22.) RanciAaAaAeA?re is using the terms narrative and discourse ina specif sense, following Emile Beneviste's framework, according towhich narrative and discourse can be distinguished linguisticallyaccording to the uses of tense and person. Cf. RanciAaAaAeA?re 1994, 1

(23.) On the Latin use of the indirect, see Utard 2004. On directand indirect discourse and its relationship to narrativeauthority/veracity, see Laird 1999, 131-52. For further bibliography ondirect and indirect discourse see Foster 2012. See also Parker's(2009) discussion of RanciAaAaAeA?re use of the indirect in his ownworks.

(24.) For RanciAaAaAeA?re 1994, 48-49, by abandoning the use of thepast tens the author is able to assert the timelessness of the event andits meaning. On the other hand, by employing the past tense, meaning iscontrolled by the author and his associated prestige/credibility.

(25.) In aesthetics, RanciAaAaAeA?re has analyzed three differentpartage (I) the ethical regime of images; (2) the representative regimeof art; and (3) the aesthetic regime of art (on which see furtherRanciAaAaAeA? 1999, 57-60 and 2004a, 12-13). In politics, there are twopartages: "politics" and "the police."

(26.) Cf. RanciAaAaAeA?re 2009, 24: "For all time, the refusalto consid certain categories of people as political beings has proceededby means of a refusal to hear the words exiting their mouths asdiscourse."

(27.) Cf. Haynes's (2003, 15-19) discussion of the speechesmade by Segestes and Arminius at Ann. 1.58-9: the latter's speechis reported bv Tacitus indirectly, "to highlight the fact that heis foreign, unlike the direct, and therefore Roman, perspective wereceive from Segestes" (17).

(28.) Notably though, Tiberius's speeches (and letters) areoften reported indirectly by Tacitus (see, e.g., Ann. 1.11.1, 3.69.2-3).

(29.) As an example, and in the context of workers' movementsin contemporary France, RanciAaAaAeA?re (2006) claims that there exists"a trend in Fran to consider any kind of workers' protest as asign of disease. Workers are seen as an outmoded part of the populationwho cannot grapple with modernity." Cf. Trouillot 1995 on thedismissal of the slave revolts of 1791-1804 in Haitian historiographyand Guha's analysis of the representation of peasant revolts in theelite historiography of colonial India. For Guha (1994, 337), thesewritings erase the will and reason of the rebel through the use ofmetaphors that compare their actions to natural phenomena: "Theybreak out like thunderstorms, heave like earthquakes, spread likewildfires, infect like epidemics."

(30.) On greed as a motivating factor in military mutiny, see,e.g., Livy 22.9, 22.42.7, 29.8; Sallust, Cat. 11.6-7. On imageryassociated with madness and disease in Tacitus and Livy see Woodman2006. For further references see Phang 2008, 46-48.

(31.) Furor as a kind of senseless and unreasoned rage is onlymentioned once in the Pannonian mutiny (1.18.2). In his writing of theGerman mutiny furor and associated terms of madness appear morefrequently (in rabiem prolapsus, 31.1; plurium vecordia, 32.1; repentelymphati, 32.1; etiam furentibus, 35.5; conscienta vecordes, 39.2;fatalem... rabiem, 39.6; inter furentes, 40.2; procul a furentibus,42.1; piaculum furoris, 49.3). The contexts in which these terms areused, however, prevent any overall conclusion that the soldiers'frenzied acts are senseless and/or irrational. Also notable here are thedistinctions between furor as insania, furor as immanitas, and furor asira.

(32.) A term Tacitus associates with the political situation beforethe foundation of the principate (Ann. 1.4.1) and earlier (Ann.3.26.2).

(33.) Cf. Low 2011, 14.

(34.) Cf. Konstan's (1993, 11-30) discussion of the"strategies of ideological stabilization" in Cicero'sCatilinarian orations.

(35.) Cf. Bartsch 2012 on doublespeak in Tacitus's Dialogus.

(36.) See further the summary in Davis 2010, 15-24.

(37.) For example, during the accession debates following the deathof Augustus, Tiberius does not appear to recognize the importance ofmaintaining the system of one-man rule (as Sallustius Crispusemphasizes: Ann. 1.6.3). Similarly, he fails to recognize thesignificance of sovereign exceptionality for the maintenance of pax.Whereas Augustus absorbed the functions of the law (Ann. 1.2.1) for thepurposes of security, Tiberius believes that the laws must be enforced(1.72.3-4). Corruption, in the form of legal exceptions and luxury,continue to be underlined by Tacitus as crucial to the stability of thestate, yet not all are able to recognize this connection betweencorruption and peace and corruption and virtue (cf. the opposing viewsof Quintus Haterius, Octavius Fronto, and Asinius Gallus at Ann. 2.33during the debate about the country's current luxury andPiso's speech against corrupta iudicia in the following chapter).

(38.) For RanciAaAaAeA?re, the breakdown of the poetic rules thatfixed f each type of subject an appropriate mode of representationoccurred at the beginning of the nineteenth century, after which newpoetic forms came into play and when new subjects, words, and phrasesbegan to challenge the classical order of representation. See furtherRanciAaAaAeA? 2011.

(39.) My thanks to Richard Alston