M. Cornelius Fronto
Other Miscellaneous Remains of Fronto
Ex Dione Cassio, Ixix. 18
Κορνήλιος Φρόντων ὁ τὰ πρῶτα τῶν τότε Ρωμαίων ἐν δίκαις φερόμενος, ἑσπέρας ποτὲ βαθείας ἀπὸ δείπνου οἴκαδε ἐπανιὼν καὶ μαθὼν παρά τινος, ᾧ συνηγορήσειν ὑπέσχητο, δικάζειν αὐτόν, ἔν τε τῇ στολῇ τῇ δειπνíτιδι ὥσπερ εἶχεν, ἐς τὸ δικαστήριον αὐτοῦ εἰσῆλθε καὶ ἠσπάσατο, οὔτι γε τῷ ἑωθινῷ προσρήματι, τῷ “ὑγίαινε” ἀλλὰ τῷ ἑσπερινῷ τῷ “ὑγíaιvε " χρησάμενος.
Ex Eumenii Panegynco Constantii, 14
Fronto, Romanae eloquentiae non secundum sed alterum decus, quom belli in Britannia confecti laudem Antonino principi daret, quamvis ille in ipso Urbis Palatio residens gerendi eius mandasset auspicium, veluti longae navis gubernaculis praesidentem totius velificationis et cursus gloriam meruisse testatus est.
Other Miscellaneous Remans
Other Miscellaneous Remains of Fronto
Fronto’s Salutation to Hadrian1
? About 136 a.d.
Cornelius Fronto, who held the first place at the bar among the Romans of that day, was returning home on one occasion very late in the evening from a banquet, and learning from one for whom he had promised to plead that Hadrian was sitting in court, he went in as he was in his banqueting dress to the court and saluted him, not with the morning salutation χαῖρε but with the evening one ὐγίαινε.
From the Speech on the War in Britain
140–1 a.d.
Fronto, not the second but the alternative glory of Roman eloquence, when he was giving the emperor Antoninus2 praise for the successful completion of the war in Britain,3 declared that although he had committed the conduct of the campaign to others, while sitting at home himself in the Palace at Rome, yet like the helmsman at the tiller of a ship of war, the glory of the whole navigation and voyage belonged to him.
- 1The point in this story, such as it is, seems to be that the court was still sitting in the early morning hours when Fronto came in from his banquet. It was a new day to the court, but the end of Fronto’s day. Hence his use of the evening salutation. For the difference between χαῖρε, “Good cheer” (our “Good morning,” or “How do you do?”), and ὑγίαινε, “Vale” (our “Good night,” or “Good-bye”), see Lucian, Pro Lapsu in Salutando, i., where a mistake in the use of these expressions is illustrated at length.
- 2Pius.
- 3140 a.d.