Abstract
Nazarius’ dictum, cum dico proelia, significo uictorias, may be applied to all the speeches of the Panegyrici Latini but not all battles are easily rewritten as victories. Menander Rhetor, ignoring the possibility of military defeat, advises the speaker of an imperial oration to find material for the emperor’s battles in the ancient historians and to invest the emperor with the aura of Achilles, Hector and Ajax. In following these guidelines, the orators of the Panegyrici Latini give their sources far more intertextual weight than Menander suggests and use their models to magnify success and reinterpret setbacks. This chapter examines the narration of war in the Panegyrici Latini, and in particular, the models employed for particular campaigns. Vergilian allusion, for example, makes the battle of the Milvian Bridge a triumph for Constantine and Romanitas (PL XII(9), while the recollection of Caesar’s successful siege of Massilia glosses over Constantine’s failure and allows the orator to interpret Constantine’s delay in taking the city as Caesarean clementia.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Visualising War across the Ancient Mediterranean |
| Subtitle of host publication | Interplay between Conflict Narratives in different Media and Genres |
| Publisher | Taylor and Francis |
| Pages | 217-230 |
| Number of pages | 14 |
| ISBN (Electronic) | 9781040340080 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9781032977980 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Jan 2025 |