Having now finished the proposed explanation, relative
to the celebrity of the Augustan age, we shall conclude
with recapitulating in a few words the causes of this
extraordinary occurrence.
The models, then, which the Romans derived from Grecian
poetry, were the finest productions of human genius;
their incentives to emulation were the strongest that
could actuate the heart. With ardour, therefore,
and industry in composing, and with unwearied patience
in polishing their compositions, they attained to
that glorious distinction in literature, which no
succeeding age has ever rivalled.
(192)
I. The patrician family of the Claudii (for there
was a plebeian family of the same name, no way inferior
to the other either in power or dignity) came originally
from Regilli, a town of the Sabines. They removed
thence to Rome soon after the building of the city,
with a great body of their dependants, under Titus
Tatius, who reigned jointly with Romulus in the kingdom;
or, perhaps, what is related upon better authority,
under Atta Claudius, the head of the family, who was
admitted by the senate into the patrician order six
years after the expulsion of the Tarquins. They
likewise received from the state, lands beyond the
Anio for their followers, and a burying-place for themselves
near the capitol [284]. After this period, in
process of time, the family had the honour of twenty-eight
consulships, five dictatorships, seven censorships,
seven triumphs, and two ovations. Their descendants
were distinguished by various praenomina and cognomina
[285], but rejected by common consent the praenomen
of (193) Lucius, when, of the two races who bore it,
one individual had been convicted of robbery, and another
of murder. Amongst other cognomina, they assumed
that of Nero, which in the Sabine language signifies
strong and valiant.
II. It appears from record, that many of the
Claudii have performed signal services to the state,
as well as committed acts of delinquency. To
mention the most remarkable only, Appius Caecus dissuaded
the senate from agreeing to an alliance with Pyrrhus,
as prejudicial to the republic [286]. Claudius
Candex first passed the straits of Sicily with a fleet,
and drove the Carthaginians out of the island [287].
Claudius Nero cut off Hasdrubal with a vast army
upon his arrival in Italy from Spain, before he could
form a junction with his brother Hannibal [288].
On the other hand, Claudius Appius Regillanus, one
of the Decemvirs, made a violent attempt to have a
free virgin, of whom he was enamoured, adjudged a
slave; which caused the people to secede a second time
from the senate [289]. Claudius Drusus erected
a statue of himself wearing a crown at Appii Forum
[290], and endeavoured, by means of his dependants,
to make himself master of Italy. Claudius Pulcher,
when, off the coast of Sicily [291], the pullets used
for taking augury would not eat, in contempt of the
omen threw them overboard, as if they should drink
at least, if they would not eat; and then engaging
the enemy, was routed. After his defeat, when
he (194) was ordered by the senate to name a dictator,
making a sort of jest of the public disaster, he named
Glycias, his apparitor.
