Tacitus and Bracciolini | Page 6

a conjecture when he flourished by comparing his
age with that of his friend, Pliny the Younger. Pliny died in the year 13
of the second century at the age of 52, so that Pliny was born A.D. 61.
Tacitus was by several years his senior. Otherwise Pliny would not
have spoken of himself as a disciple looking up to him with reverence
as to "a master"; "the duty of submitting to his influence," and "a desire
to obey his advice":--"tu magister, ego contra"--(Ep. viii. 7): "cedere
auctoritati tuae debeam" (Ep. i. 20): "cupio praeceptis tuis parere" (Ep.
ix. 10); nor would he describe himself as "a mere stripling when his
friend was at the height of fame and in a proud position": "equidem
adolescentulus, quum jam tu fama gloriaque floreres" (Ep. vii. 20); nor
of their being, "all but contemporaries in age": "duos homines, aetate
propemodum aequales" (Ep. vii. 20). From these remarks chiefly and a
few other circumstances, the modern biographers of Tacitus suppose
there was a difference of ten or eleven years between that ancient
historian and Pliny, and fix the date of his birth about A.D. 52.
This is reconcilable with the belief of Tacitus being the author of the
Annals; for when the boundaries of Rome are spoken of in that work as
being extended to the Red Sea in terms as if it were a recent
extension--"claustra ... Romani imperii, quod nunc Rubrum ad mare
patescit" (ii. 61),--he would be 63, the extension having been effected
as we learn from Xiphilinus, by Trajan A.D. 115. It is also reconcilable
with Agricola when Consul offering to him his daughter in marriage, he
being then "a young man": "Consul egregiae tum spei filiam juveni
mihi despondit" (Agr. 9); for, according as Agricola was Consul A.D.
76 or 77, he would be 24 or 25. But it is by no means reconcilable with
the time when he administered the several offices in the State. He tells
us himself that he "began holding office under Vespasian, was
promoted by Titus, and still further advanced by Domitian":
"dignitatem nostram a Vespasiano inchoatam, a Tito auctam, a
Domitiano longius provectam" (Hist. i. 1). To have "held office" under
Vespasian he must have been quaestor; to have been "promoted" by
Titus he must have been aedile; and as for his further advancement we
know that he was praetor under Domitian. By the Lex Villia Annalis,
passed by the Tribune Lucius Villius during the time of the Republic in
573 after the Building of the City, the years were fixed wherein the

different offices were to be entered on--in the language of Livy; "eo
anno rogatio primum lata est ab Lucio Villio tribuno plebis, quot annos
nati quemque magistratum peterent caperentque" (xl. 44); and the
custom was never departed from, in conformity with Ovid's statement
in his Fasti with respect to the mature years of those who legislated for
his countrymen, and the special enactment which strictly prescribed the
age when Romans could be candidates for public offices:
"Jura dabat populo senior, finitaque certis Legibus est aetas, unde
petatur honos." Fast. v. 65-6.
After the promulgation of his famous plebiscitum by the old Tribune of
the People in the year 179 A.C., a Roman could not fill the office of
quaestor till he was 31, nor aedile till he was 37,--as, guided by the
antiquaries, Sigonius and Pighius, Doujat, the Delphin editor of Livy,
states: "quaestores ante annum aetatis trigesimum primum non
crearentur, nec aediles curules ante septimum ac trigesimum";--and the
ages for the two offices were usually 32 and 38.
From Vespasian's rule extending to ten years we cannot arrive at the
date when Tacitus was quaestor; but we can guess when he was aedile,
as Titus was emperor only from the spring of 79 to the autumn of 81.
Had his appointment to the aedileship taken place on the last day of the
reign of Titus, he would then be but 29 years old; and though in the
time of the Emperors, after the year 9 of our aera, there might be a
remission of one or more years by the Lex Julia or the Lex Pappia
Poppaea, those laws enacted rewards and privileges to encourage
marriage and the begetting of children; the remission could, therefore,
be in favour only of married men, especially those who had children; so
that any such indulgence in the competition for the place of honours
could not have been granted to Tacitus, he not being, as will be
immediately seen, yet married. In order, then, that he should have been
aedile under Titus,--even admitting that he could boast, like Cicero, of
having obtained all his honours in the prescribed years--"omnes
honores anno suo"--and been aedile the moment he was qualified by
age for the office,--he