This dissertation consists of four chapters in which I consider the question of
what the emperors can control, in Suetonius’ Caesares. The first chapter sets up the
question of the emperors’ control with an examination of the genealogies with which
Suetonius typically begins each Life. Previous interpretations of these sections have
tended either to advance or to deny Suetonius’ belief in determinism. I suggest that
Suetonius’ approach is more nuanced—the biographer’s Tiberius, for example, may be
as arrogant as his Claudian and Livian ancestors, but Domitian is clearly neither his
father Vespasian nor his brother Titus—and that Suetonius presents the genealogies in
order to separate the emperor from his gens. Suetonius’ purpose in these sections is to
demonstrate that the emperor is responsible for his actions regardless of what his
family history or ancestry might lead one to expect.
In the second chapter, I continue with the question of responsibility, but this
time from the perspective of the ‘portraits’ or physical descriptions that Suetonius
provides for each emperor. In place of the long-standing interpretation of
physiognomy—the belief that certain physical features are signs of specific character
traits (e.g., a pale complexion is a sign of effeminacy and cowardice)—I argue that
Suetonius’ purpose is to examine the emperor’s behavior in relation to his body. The
question, for example, is not what Caligula’s thinning hair as such tells us about the
emperor, but rather what Caligula’s management of his hair tells us about him (Caligula makes looking at his hair a capital offense). Caligula cannot, in other words be held
responsible for his thinning hair, but how he manages it is up to him.
The third chapter considers the emperor’s control or agency from the
perspective of Suetonius’ much-neglected divisiones, or leading statements that
introduce and guide the rubrics which tend to be thought of as Suetonius’ trademark
and which have consequently received much more scholarly attention. I argue that the
judgments or opinions these leading statements frequently contain are crucial to
understanding the rubrics that follow them and that they are the primary means
through which Suetonius demonstrates the emperors’ responsibility for their actions.
The final chapter is a demonstration of the ideas laid out in chapter 3. I use the
divisiones that introduce the emperors’ deaths to ask how his subjects’ response to his
behavior either does or does not condition future events. In the Galba, for instance,
Suetonius notes on more than one occasion the elderly emperor’s refusal to pay his
soldiers a donative. This obstinacy, Suetonius points out, made it easier for Galba’s
successor Otho to achieve his disloyal goal with the help of those same disaffected
soldiers. Again, the point is that the payment of the donative was entirely under
Galba’s control and that, as Suetonius presents things, the people who kill Galba are the
very ones whom he annoys. / text
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UTEXAS/oai:repositories.lib.utexas.edu:2152/7522 |
| Date | 27 May 2010 |
| Creators | Kim, Raymond John |
| Source Sets | University of Texas |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Format | electronic |
| Rights | Copyright is held by the author. Presentation of this material on the Libraries' web site by University Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin was made possible under a limited license grant from the author who has retained all copyrights in the works. |
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