1

CLIENT RELATIONSHIPS AND THE DIFFUSION OF ROMAN NAMES IN

HISPANIA.

A CRITICAL REVIEW

Estela García Fernández

In 1958 E. Badian published Foreign Clientelae: (264-70 B.C.), a study that

would have a profound impact on the field of Roman provincial studies. He asserted

that the basis for stability and control of the assorted territories dominated by Rome was

a dense network of personal client relationships between the Roman aristocracy and the

local populations. This conclusion was reached after a study of provincial onomastic

practices, which showed a direct connection between client relationship and the

spreading of Roman names.1 Italo-Roman names in the provinces associated with the

different generals involved in their conquest were the result of the establishment of

client relationships, names that would then be passed on through the generations. In the

provinces of Hispania, on which this study will focus, this clientele disseminated the

Fabii, Sempronii, Pompeii, Aemilii and Iunii, the nomina of the generals who

contributed to the conquest.2

Regarding onomastic creation and the diffusion of naming practices, Badian’s

thesis concerned two different legal situations: on the one hand, Roman names legally

acquired through individual enfranchisement, whereby one usually adopted the nomen

of the general-turned-patron;3 and on the other, Roman names adopted through

imitation. This latter situation, also discussed by Badian and widely accepted, was the

result of the patrons’ habit during the Republic of allowing and encouraging their

provincial clients to adopt Roman names––within a Roman naming structure––as an

expression of loyalty and submission in exchange for legal support, while not entailing

any concession of Roman citizenship.4 According to this view the nomina attested in

*This article is the result of the Nuevas bases documentales para el estudio histórico de la Hispania

romana de época republicana (Ref. no. HUM 2011-26561) research project, funded by the Ministerio de Economía and Competitividad (Spanish Government). 1 Badian 1958a 256-258 and 309-321. Badian’s thesis has been reviewed by Pina Polo 2012: 55-79 and

his paper in this volume. 2 Knapp 1978: 187-222; Dyson 1980-1981: 259-294 with distribution maps. 3 Pina Polo 2011a, and his chapter in this book. 4 Badian 1958a: 256-258; accepted by Brunt 1971: 206-207; also Knapp 1978; Dyson 1980-81. For the

Hispanic provinces, Marin 1986-87; González Roman 1986-87 and 2010a; Amela 2001; Padilla 2006 and

2010 among others. Also Knapp 1978: 190 considers that the phenomenon of the taking of Roman names

by natives can be used as a measurement of the progress of Romanisation.

2

Republican times in Hispania: Aemilius, Cornelius, Fabius, Pompeius, Acilius, Aelius

and Baebius, among others, when inserted into Roman name structures –duo nomina or

tria nomina– do not indicate a privileged legal status, but rather peregrine locals who

voluntarily took Roman names.

Badian’s thesis has garnered much respect and support,5 but little attention has

been paid to the legal procedures involved in the transmission of Roman citizenship and

the adoption of its naming structure. Some methodological objections to the author’s

position must be put forth.

It is far from empirically evident that clientship could have acted as a channel for

both the diffusion of Roman citizenship––and therefore of Roman names legally

acquired––, and nomina that were voluntarily and spontaneously imitated. In fact, no

researcher has, to date, explained how clientship operates as a vehicle for onomastic

transmission, much less so of Roman citizenship. Its existence is a given effect of

provincial societies, but no document exists that proves the dissemination of names

through client relationships, beyond drawing a connection between Republican and

Early Empire names.

During the Republic, a client could obtain Roman citizenship––and its associated

nomina––when a patron with imperium bestowed upon him the civitas Romana in virtue

of the dispositions of a de civitate law. During the Empire this happened, however,

when a wilful patron such as Pliny the Younger interceded before the emperor on behalf

of his clients.6 In both cases, once citizenship was granted, clients would usually receive

the same nomen as their patron, but not always, for example in the case of Cornelius

Balbus.7 Little attention has been paid, however, to the fact that, once citizenship was

conferred, clientship could no longer be involved in its transmission, since it was an

independent process that followed its own legal rules. Roman citizenship, when

acquired virtutis causa or through manumission, as can be seen in Carthago Nova where

individuals inherited the nomina of the Roman negotiators,8 could only be transmitted

through filiation when it was the fruit of a marriage that was iustum, in accordance with

5 For Hispania Knapp 1978; Dyson 1980-1981; Amela 2002, González Román 2010a and 2010b among

others. 6 Plin. Ep. 10.5.2; 11.1-2; 11.2 7 Pina Polo 2011a: 340-344 and his paper in this volume. 8 The transmission of family names (Aquinus, Atellius, Laetilius, Popilius, etc.) through the freedmen of

the Italo-Roman negotiatores and the duunviri quinquennales of the city could only have happened under

very particular legal conditions, with which a peregrine city did not comply. Domergue 1990: 321-326.

Also Abascal 2002: 21-44.

3

Roman law. A common understanding is that legal marriages, ––the only ones that

enabled the transmission of Roman citizenship, and the associated onomastics––were

those that took place between Roman citizens or between a Roman citizen and a free

Latin (non-Junian) citizen. However, a union between a Roman and a peregrine woman

could only transmit Roman citizenship and Roman names when ius conubii had been

granted, as seen in diplomata militaria for example.9 Given these conditions, which

were inherent to Roman citizenship, one would expect that in the peregrine context of

Republican Hispania there would be a high degree of failure in transmitting it from

generation to generation, unless a family took special care to carry out a strategy

conducive to perpetuating citizenship––including its inherent prestige––through legal

marriages. There is no reason to expect that the members of the Turma Salluitana would

be particularly successful in spreading locally the nomen Pompeius or whichever name

they received, because the names they bore indicated the peregrine status of their

community of origin. The only exception is the possible Latin status that Ilerda may

have possessed by then, as indicated by the duo nomina exhibited by three of its citizens

in the bronze inscription.10

If that were the case, the status of Ilerda would have allowed

the transmission of both the civitas Romana and the corresponding nomina.11

Roman

citizenship displayed similar behaviour in the documents at Claros where individuals

with Greek names are listed, and whose patronyms contain duo or tria nomina. This

occurred when these individuals were the offspring of non-legal unions between Roman

citizens and Greek women, making them peregrines, and thus lacking the right to bear

the tria nomina.12

Regarding the second––and most important––form of onomastic transmission

established by modern historiography, nomen imitation, we must understand it as an

instrumental idea. It served as a plausible explanation for a reality attested in some of

the provincial documentation, as in the case of Hispania. Two apparently contradictory

characteristics occur here: on the one hand, the proliferation of Roman names during the

Republican and Early Empire (a significant number, which cannot be explained through

the bestowing of viritim citizenship); and, on the other hand, the explosion of Roman

9 Valvo 2010: 292-296. Regarding conubium, Humbert 1981: 212-215. The conubium links a child with

his father, so that in a mixed marriage it is the Roman citizenship which is inherited (Gai Inst. I.67). 10 Turma Salluitana: CIL I2 709 = CIL VI 37045 = ILLRP 515 = ILS 8888; for the names of the Ilerdan

knights, see below n.24. 11 Galsterer 1971: 11; Roldán 1989: 165; García Fernández 2011: 51-52 12 Ferrary 2008: 259 and 263.

4

names in a mainly peregrine provincial territory in the Republican period. One can

object that the total number of direct testimonies of Roman names mentioned in texts,

coins or inscriptions is not large. It is generally acknowledged that during the Early

Empire these nomina of Republican origin were borne by direct descendants from that

period.13

If testimonies from the Early Empire are included, the number is far greater.

If we accept this idea, then a large proportion of the population of Republican

Hispania was using Roman nomina and name structures to which it was not legally

entitled. Knapp admits that the few known Republican nomina would hardly have led to

the far greater number of Imperial nomina, so he proposes that during the Republic

there were a large number of people using Roman names, enough to ensure their

survival.14

This points to the more problematic aspect of this interpretation. It is hard to

explain how a peregrine territory in which citizenship concessions were few until

Caesar began granting citizenship to communities, could have generated such a large

number of Roman names. In a world where one could only be either Roman or

peregrine,15

the only coherent historical explanation for the abundance of Roman names

is through hypothetical widespread onomastic imitation. This necessitates the

acceptance of peregrines using Roman names in the more Romanised areas, and passing

them down from generation to generation. When their descendants became Roman

citizens––or Latin citizens, we might add–– through the promotion of their community,

they already had Roman names.16

This hypothesis creates immediate difficulties. We ignore the mechanisms used in

the indigenous world for transmitting names, although the existence of a patronym

presupposes that it is filiation, not clientship, that determines onomastic transmission,

despite the specific conditions being unknown. If a peregrine adopted his patron’s

13 Knapp 1978: 190-191 and 198, where he refers to Brunt’s objections (not convinced that Imperial

names were descendants from Republican magistrates), that the absence of names in the Fasti referring to

Cornelii, Iunii or Sempronii, so common in Early Empire Hispania, confirms the Republican origin of these names, and explains the low percentage of Imperial names in the more Romanised areas of

Hispania. 14 Knapp 1978: 189 n.11, The possibility that one Fabius at Saguntum set the trend for the Fabii in the

Empire exists, but it seems to me likely that a fair number or Fabii existed during the Republic (enough to

keep the name alive later…) especially when Roman names were being taken by non-Romans during this

same time elsewhere. 15 This same limitation is frequently applied, contra all evidence, to all provincial populations throughout

the Empire García Fernández 2012: 423-429 16 Knapp 1978: 190-191 and 198.

5

Roman name because of clientship,17

one could expect that this would be reflected in

whichever official document certified this relation. This name change would also be

applied in local official documentation, to be used for marriage reasons or for

administrative/military demands. What would be the name of a Hispanic auxiliarius in

the Roman army, a legal indigenous name or a usurped Roman one? In practice,

accepting this would mean that there was an almost official concession of Roman names

to the peregrine population, which would reveal a curious phenomenon of generalised

and authorised usurpation of Roman names, a fraudulent act persecuted and punished in

other contexts.18

Also, this use would devalue the worth and prestige that Roman

citizenship conferred upon an individual within his indigenous community, its value as

a praemium, and would unnecessarily yield an instrument which was useful for Rome in

dissuading and controlling provincial elites.19

Finally, we must consider whether, and if

so, how, these freely-acquired nomina changed along with client relations. Clientship is

not an institution with a fixed legal character, nor is it exclusive, allowing for the

existence of several patrons at once, and permitting a client to fail in his obligations in

favour of more immediate interests or circumstances. Clear examples of this variability

are provided by the well-known precautions adopted by both Pompey and Caesar to

ensure the frail loyalty of communities of which they were patrons, and the fact that

their clients were often lost because of pressing circumstances and varying political

interests.20

If loyalty was sufficient reason to accept the assumption of a Roman name

by an indigenous individual, then one may suppose that breaking that allegiance was

enough to change it, given that these were voluntary and not legal procedures.

The notion of name imitation can be acceptable in different onomastic contexts

such as peregrine-type structures (single name and filiation) incorporating an idionym

17 Knapp 1978: 188 suggests that, in exchange for legal protection guaranteed by the patron, the client

(who would remain peregrine) adopted his Roman name. He acknowledges that there is no direct

testimony of this. 18 There is no need to recall the zeal of Emperor Claudius in matters of usurpation of citizenship and

nomina (Edict de civitate Anaunorum CIL V 5050 ll. 33-34; Suet, Claud. 25). In 65 B.C. the lex Papia de

peregrinis had already instituted an extraordinary quaestio aimed at expelling from Rome those who had

passed themselves off as Romans (Cic. Off. 3. 11. 47: pro cive se gerere; Cic. leg. agr. 1, 13), being one

of the deceits involved the use of Roman nomina, see the edict on the citizenship of the Anauni:

nominaque ea/ quae habuerunt antea tanquam cives Romani, ita habere is permitam (ll. 33-34). 19 One may add the observations of Dondin-Payre and Raepsaet-Charlier 2001: II, in which the idea of a

generalised usurpation of Roman onomastics ignores the social control that the population groups

enjoying different legal status within the same community exercised over each other. 20 For a seminal work on Roman clientship see Brunt 1988a: 382-442; for the subject at hand 398-399; a

similar critical review in Pina Polo 2009: 229-234 and his paper in this volume.

6

stemming from a Roman name, whether it be a praenomen, nomen or cognomen. This

use also occurs in a Greek context, where the use of any of these naming elements as an

idionym, followed by a patronym, is common. This practice reveals the Greek taste

during the Hellenistic period for foreign names, in this case Roman, though no Roman

citizenship is involved.21

In the provinces loyalty, political relations with this or that

governor, or merely the advance of the acculturation process could have had an impact

on the use of Italo-Roman nomina as idionyms in several inscriptions.22

But in none of

these cases is there any possible confusion regarding the legal status of the people

involved: the onomastic structures clearly indicate a peregrine individual. When these

names appear in duo or tria nomina, it is difficult to allow that Roman authorities

consented––much less encouraged––the lax use of Roman nomina in Roman name

structures that may have created confusion about the legal status of the bearer.23

This

use was easy to control, because it was reflected in public and official documents under

the oversight of Roman authorities.

Assumption of the existence of widespread imitatio to explain the Roman names

used by magistrates performing official roles on Hispanic coins, or the Latin

denomination of the equites at the Ascoli Bronze, causes several problems. This

hypothesis disregards the official and public nature of these documents, and also creates

new methodological problems by dissociating name structures and legal status, which

would introduce insecurity into the onomastic analysis. It is hard to accept that in a

public document created by the Roman state in Italy, and with the presence of a

consilium whose members appeared solemnly cited with full nomenclature including

tribe, some Hispanic equites would be allowed the whim of listing themselves with full

Roman names when they were not Roman citizens.24

This act would have debased

21 Hatzfeld 1919: 11. Also the use of nuda nomina on behalf of peregrini, generally of lower classes but

aware of the prestige of Roman-ness, Rizakis 1996: 21-22; Ferrary 2008: 253-257 provides an extensive

dossier of Roman naming elements used by Greeks as given names, including nomina. 22 Some cases of the use of Pompeius/a as given names within peregrine onomastic structures, see Amela

2002: 308-314. 23 Ferrary 2008: 253-257 and 262 has defended the need to not confuse, in the Greek context, the use of duo or tria nomina with the use of a Latin name as idionym within a peregrine onomastic structure, Greek

in this case. This can be the result of mere fashion or imitation, or even the result of Roman ancestry, but

never suggesting any usurpation of citizenship. 24 This document (ILS 8888) mentions three members from the Turma Salluitana, whose origo is Ilerda

and who, contrary to the rest of the knights, bear Roman names usually attributed to onomastic imitation:

[Q?] Otacilius Suisertarten f.; Cn. Cornelius Nesille f.; P. [F]abius Enasagin f. Criniti 1970: 189-190

provided a possible explanation through the previous concession of ius Latii. Also Knapp 1978: 192

echoes, and rejects, the latinisation proposal of Galsterer (1971: 11); likewise Richardson 2001, 247-249.

Regarding the Turma, Amela 2002: 87-92 who follows Badian’s interpretation.

7

Roman citizenship granted ob virtutem, the importance of the act of concession and its

nature as a reward (one of the most valuable praemia granted by the Roman state),25

because imitation would enable the feigning of citizenship. The Roman names of the

three Ilerdans in an official document describing the concession of civitas virtutis causa

can only mean, if we are to offer a legal explanation given the document’s

characteristics, that their city of origin was a Latin colony. It must be kept in mind that

Latin status could not be granted to individuals, only to communities. This legal status

was the only alternative to Roman citizenship that allowed the use of tria nomina, a

situation that Ilerda would also share with at least three other cities that provide

evidence of such a condition: Carteia, Saguntum and Carthago Nova.26

Personal names and legal status have also tended to be dissociated when analysing

the personal status of Hispanic mint magistrates. No difference can be detected a priori,

either in name structures or in the origin of the nomina, between the Roman names of

magistrates from communities whose Latin status is proven and the use of those Roman

names by magistrates from communities of unknown legal status. The interpretation of

their personal status varies greatly depending on the information available for the city in

which they held office. As an example, the magistrates from Saguntum M. Fabi(us) and

M. Aemili(us) aed(iles) or Carteia, Cn. Am(m)i(us) and L. Arg(entarius) aed(iles), are

considered to be individuals who made legal use of Roman names, given that both cities

are known to have been Latin colonies. Other individuals, who also present Roman

name structures and Italo-Roman names, are classified as peregrine onomastic imitators,

simply because the administrative status of their city is unknown: for example L.

Aimil(ius) and M. Iuni(us) aid(iles) from Obulco.27

Hispanic documents during the

Republic pose many challenges, and their analysis must not discount many other

25 The most honourable way to attain Roman citizenship was through virtutis causa. Cicero clearly

differentiates this path from that which entails an accusation, Off. 2.49-50 and Balb. 54. On the

importance of praemia and their gradation, David, 1979: 139-140. 26 Carteia, Liv. 43.3.1-4; for Saguntum Ripolles - Velaza 2002 proposes Latin Colony status for the city

after studying the coinage; Carthago Nova, Abascal 2002: 21-44, considering the duunviri quinquennales

attested, the promotion date is 54 B.C. or earlier. The use of the tria nomina by Latin citizens, Garcia

Fernández 2012: 423-429. 27 Regarding the names of mint magistrates and their chronology see Pérez Zurita 2011: 535 nos. 243-244

(Saguntum 44-4/3 B.C.); 532, nos. 221-222 (Carteia circa 90 B.C.); and 533, no. 223 and 224 (Obulco

120-100). On the peregrine status of the Saguntine magistrates before the city was known as Latin,

Ripollés-Velaza 2002: 287-288; regarding the weakness of the federal status for Saguntum in 56 B.C.,

García Fernández 2013. Neither Plin. HN 3.10 nor Ptol Geog.2.4.11 clearly attribute stipendiary status to

Obulco, regardless of how common it was in Hispania.

8

factors.28

Nevertheless it must be stressed that dissociating names and legal status

entails the undermining of all internal criteria (different nomina, onomastic structure

changes, etc.) for assessing the legal status of cities or individuals. Determining their

status would come to depend on external and circumstantial criteria, such as the

availability of documentary evidence––extremely rare for the Republican period––that

would show explicitly the legal status of the community. This methodological criterion,

which is weak and problematic, reduces onomastics to historically irrelevant

information.

Brunt’s reasoning, which prompted Knapp to assert that “nomenclature is no

certain guide to status”, is far from conclusive.29

Informal manumission appears to have

been common because Roman negotiatores abroad probably had little time or desire to

undergo formal procedures, which compelled them to present themselves before a

Roman magistrate in order to free a slave. This problem was not exclusive to the

provinces: it also happened in Rome itself. The consequence was that these improperly

manumitted freedmen were still slaves, and they had no ownership rights, so all their

possessions––constituting their peculium––would ultimately belong to their patron.30

Likewise, they were not allowed to use the Roman tria nomina, much less to pass it on

to their children. Fraudulent use of names, as suggested by Brunt, is difficult to identify,

due to the lack of testimonies known to date.31

Nonetheless, a spurious practice, even if

it were generalised––which seems improbable––, cannot be held as proof of onomastic

arrogation in Hispania, since most of the cases belong to magistrates holding office,

whose names are displayed in official public documents.

There is also uncertainty around the so-called hybridae individuals, both those

mentioned in the texts and those ascribed to this category in the historiography, as

examples of peregrines using Roman names. Pliny is the only author who defines this

condition, and he does so using zoological terminology: a domestic breed crossed with

28 I am aware of the complexity of the documentation, and the difficulties involved in analysing it. See

Melchor Gil 2011: 151-167. 29 Brunt 1971: 206-207; Knapp 1978: 192, the main reasoning being the following: the illegal use of

Roman names is to be expected on behalf of slaves and freedmen improperly manumitted, though no

testimony is provided, when one could be expected; and the names of the so-called hybridae, individuals

of mixed origin but who were peregrine, and who usurped Roman names. 30 These freedmen manumitted improperly obtained praetorian protection at some point at the end of the

Republic, López Barja de Quiroga 2007: 72-73. 31 On the contrary, the Roman state is very interested in regulating and controlling the situation of the

improperly manumitted freedmen, see López Barja de Quiroga 2007: 37-40 and 71-75. Also Wilson,

1966: 142.

9

wild animal; Cicero’s colleague C. Antonius was called hybrida for his fierceness and

cruelty. It is not a legal category, but the use of the term in Roman literature leads to the

belief that it was used for Roman citizens born of legal marriages among people of

different legal status.32

The citizenship of Q. Varius Severus Hybrida ––tribune in 90

B.C.–– is as clear as that of C. Antonius Hybrida, regardless of the obscurity of their

origins from a Roman standpoint.33

Similarly, the fact that the Hispanic C. Marcius34

was not Roman does not mean that he was simply peregrine. There exists the possibility

–though no formal proof– that Marcius was a Latin citizen because of his origo

Italicensis, which would give him the legal right to use the Roman tria nomina, without

a tribus.35

However, the cases of Apuleius and Curius, who are dealt with as natives by

Appian, may be good examples of onomastic imitation.36

They were peregrine

individuals who adopted Roman names but as idionyms, which is perhaps the very

practice legislated against by Claudius.37

Another case of supposed onomastic

usurpation is that of Q. Fabius and the other Fabii from Saguntum, who already bore

32 Brunt 1971: 207-8; Knapp 1978: 192, it is a modern interpretation which considers hybridae the

children born of marriages between Italic citizens and indigenous women. No source supports this, and

from a Roman standpoint they were just peregrines. Apart from alluding to fierce and savage-like

behaviour, this term also is used for a new type of Roman citizen generated by Roman expansion. They

are mentioned in Plin. HN 7.213; Hor. Sat. 1. 7. 1-5, 28 and 32 (on the Roman status of Persius, Wilson,

1966: 142); Suet. Aug. 19; Caes. B.Afr. 19.2: ex hibridis libertinis servisque conscripserat, a text which

suggests a gradation; Mart. Epigr. 8.22, for a contemptuous use. I am unaware of any passage that indicates that the term hybridae could be used for the offspring of free person and a slave. 33 This individual who came from Hispania may have descended from a marriage between a Roman and

either a Latin or a peregrine woman with whom there was a ius conubii, reason enough to provide him

with an obscure origin (Val. Max. 3.7.8; 8.6.4; App. B.Civ. 1.37; De vir.ill. 72.11; Cic. Brut. 221 and 305;

Nat. D. 3. 81; De or. 1.117). There is no further reason to reject his Hispanic origin. Regarding C.

Antonius Hybrida, Plin. HN 7.213, vid. Caballos, 1989: 244-245. 34 App. Iber. 66 35 The Hispanus, though not Hispaniensis, nature of Marcius is indicated by the expression used by

Appian (andra ibera) and his Italica origo (ek poleos Italikes). His legal status is harder to determine, but

it seems more reasonable to suppose he was a Latin citizen before he was Roman, given the impossibility

of accepting both Roman citizenship and an Italica origin in 143 B.C. See Garcia Fernández, 2009a: 380

on the legal grounding for such an impossibility. Regarding Marcius and his troops Cadiou, 2008: 639,

no. 121 believes they may have auxiliary units at the command of a Romanised Iberian. These could also have been the regular units provided by a Latin colony turmae or cohorts, such as the cohortes colonicae

mentioned at Corduba (Caes. B.Civ. 2.19.3). Finally, also about C. Marcius, Caballos, 1989, 263-2.

Regarding the probable Latin status of Italica, though the issue is much disputed due to the lack of formal

proof to date, see Canto, 1999: 145-182. Likewise Caballos, 2010: 2-3 guardedly considers the possibility

that Pompey may have established a Latin settlement at Italica. 36 App. Iber.68 37 Knapp 1978: 192 n. 23 considers the hypothesis that they may have been Roman citizens who were

deprived of their citizenship or defectors from the army, though he acknowledges that Appian treats them

as natives. Regarding Claudian prohibition (Suet. Claud. 25), Ferrary 2008: 262-263 does not believe the

ban could affect the use of a nomen as idionym, for it was the use of Roman name structure that was

important.

10

these names when citizenship was bestowed upon them;38

this may have a legal

explanation, thanks to a new interpretation of the city’s coinage (see below). Finally, the

qualification as homo barbarus that the author of the Bellum Hispaniense39

bestows

upon one Caecilius Niger, from the Lusitanian oppidum of Lennium, does not

necessarily imply an illegal use of a Roman name. The supposed proof of his peregrine

nature lies in assumptions about the adjective barbarus. This, like peregrinus, is a term

that at the time —after the Social War, in the midst of the struggle between optimates

and populares—had acquired precise ideological connotations, in part due to the new

type of Roman citizen who now had access to the forum.40

Even if naming irregularities were frequent, fraudulent or otherwise inadequate

onomastic practices cannot constitute a methodological criterion for judging the naming

behaviour of the population at large.41

This is especially the case when considering that

most testimonies —through inscriptions or literature— were created by local elites who

were closely controlled by Roman authorities. Dondin-Payre and Raepsaet-Charliet

have demonstrated that the examples of citizenship fraud on behalf of peregrines were

irrelevant during the Empire —presumably even more so in a Republican context—, and

should not be used to support a supposed dissociation of naming practices and legal

status in general.42

If clientship is not the vehicle for onomastic dissemination — in the cases of both

legal acquisition and imitation— there are still two documented facts that need to be

explained: the existence of Roman names in Hispania during the Republic and their

continuity from the Republic to the Early Empire.

38 Cic. Balb. 50 and 51; Knapp 1978: 192-193. 39 BHisp. 35.3.4 40 González Román 2005: 282 includes him among the Roman citizens, though with some doubts because

of the barbarian denomination. Richardson, 2001: 248-249 believes he is a peregrine who usurps a Roman

name. It may also have been an individual who was Latin, given that there were in numero peregrinorum:

Gai Inst. 1,79 and Liv. 43.13.61 for Fregellae. The adjective barbarus bears a distinct ideological-cultural

baggage which is not incompatible with having the civitas; rather, it had more to do with an the absence of certain education and rootedness in Roman citizenship that was characteristic of optimates (Cic. De or.

1.118, 3. 43; Orat. 159, Arch. 25). Regarding Roman citizens of municipal origin who were treated as

peregrines Cic. Sull. 7.23; for this see David 1979: 150-172. 41 Judging by the sources available, the real problem was not in naming practices, but rather in legal

status, Gai Inst. lib. 1. 65-94.The cases collected by Gaius regarding the legal condition of individuals

highlight the frecuent confusion. The documentation analysed by Gardner, 1989:1-14 is revealing. 42 Dondin-Payre and Raepsaet-Charlier 2001: II; Rizakis 1996: 26-27 notwithstanding the possible cases

of illegal use of Roman names by peregrines, defends that in a Greek context there is a close relation

between the use of names and citizenship diffusion.

11

The data from Carteia would add a third factor: the possibility of Latin status,

which is not contemplated by Badian or Brunt, which would enable the historical and

legal coherence of the existing documentation. This third legal status, neither peregrine

nor Roman, would end the need to resort to the explanation of naming usurpation, or the

impossible use of client relations as a form of Roman citizenship and onomastic

transmission. This is the case of the mint magistrates from Carteia: C. Curmanus

(quaestor in 105 B.C.), L. Marcius (magistrate in 104 B.C.) or Q. Curv(ius) q(uaestor)

from 120 B.C.43

All these magistrates from the Republican period, cited in the

documents available from the Latin colony of Carteia44

which used their legal names

would have been Latin citizens, not Roman. They could not have been Roman citizens

by virtue of having held magistratures45

because this right only appeared at a fairly late

date—124 B.C. for Tibiletti—, and in any case not until 89 B.C. was it granted to a

provincial territory, Gallia Cisalpina, closely related to Italy.46

There is no proof that

this was granted to the ancient Latin communities in Hispania, which would become in

time an old and residual group, until their municipal or colonial promotion in Caesar’s

time, as suggested by the use of the Sergia tribe in Carteia or Corduba, for example.47

The other Roman foundations in Hispania, Italica, Palma, Pollentia or Valentia, all of

Latin status, lacked the possibility of their magistrates being made Roman citizens, due

to the antiquity of those foundations.48

To date, there is no reason to believe that the ius

Latii was introduced at an intermediate stage to any of the cities founded by Rome

throughout the second century B.C. in Hispania.

The documented existence of Latin communities in Hispania, which granted their

citizens with the legal right to use Roman names, brings a new factor into the analysis

that has rarely been addressed. The diffusion of the Italo-Roman names in Hispania was

43 Hernández 1994: 88 44 Liv. 43.3.1-4 45 Asc. Pis. 3C 46 Tibiletti 1953a: 46-63; cf. Brunt 1988b: 97-98 and 511-512; Crawford 1996: 111 47 Regarding ius Latii, García Fernández 2001: 150-154. Hispania does not appear to have been affected at all by any of the de civitate laws that came about right after the Social War. The references by Cicero

to the lex Iulia ascribe it to the member states of the Nomen Latinum and the socii. That is, the member

states of the formula togatorum, which did not include the colonies in the provinces (Cic. Balb. 21; Fam.

13.30; more generally, Gell. NA. 4.4.3). The Plautia Papiria law required Italian residence for acquiring a

Roman citizenship (Cic. Arch. 8). Brunt 1971: 169 also limits the benefits of this legislation to the

members of the formula togatorum. A different issue, the later conflict regarding the inclusion of these

novi cives Romani in a small number of new tribes (App. B.Civ. 1.49) affected only people from Italy and

those communities of Cisalpine Gaul affected by the lex Iulia. 48 A recent review of these in Beltrán 2010b: 131-144.

12

not the result of clientship relations, but rather of the selective concession of the Latin

status to some cities in the east and south of the peninsula. The existence of

communities with Latin status during the Republic would explain onomastic diffusion

without infringing Roman law. The following sets out the argumentation in favour of

this hypothesis:

- The existence of cities that under Augustus enjoyed the condition of

optimo iure, and which during the Republic were Latin colonies: Carteia,

Corduba, Saguntum, Valentia or Carthago Nova, among others.

- Pliny lists forty-eight ancient Latium oppida, referring to cities that had

this legal status during the Republican period.49

The Augustan origin and the

official character of the information provided by Pliny in books III and IV would

enable us to infer that the adjectives referring to the antiquity associated with

this status (Latium vetus o antiquitus) were not added by the author, but were

copied directly from his sources. It is thus the Augustan, and not the Flavian,

period from which the antiquity of this status is measured.50

- Added proof of the existence of Latin colonies during the Republic is the

recruitment mentioned in the Caesarean corpus ex colonis from Hispania

Ulterior, where there were no Roman colonies. In the Bellum Hispaniense a

description of the troops available to Pompey the Younger in 46 B.C. describes

the best of them: the legio Vernacula and legio II, as well as a third ‘constituted

of colonists living in the region’ (facta ex colonis qui fuerunt in his

regionibus)51

. There is also a mention of the cohortes quae colonicae

appellabantur present at Corduba52

, and the recruitment of Roman equites

‘enlisted in all the conventus and colonies’ (ex omnibus conventibus coloniisque

conscriptos)53

which Cassius Longinus intended to carry out. This last passage is

particularly important due to the use of the noun colonia, which clears up any

existing doubts about the references to colonists (ex colonis) in the Bellum

49 Plin HN 3. 7; 3, 24; 3, 25; 4, 117 50 García Fernández 2009b: 219-225, with extensive argumentation. The number of Latin status

communities mentioned by Pliny is apparently high because it includes the foundations created under the

Transpadane procedure, García Fernandez 2009a on the different types of Latin status. This thesis is

developed further by D. Espinosa Espinosa, Plinio y los “oppida de antiguo Lacio”. El proceso de

difusión del Latium en Hispania Citerior, Madrid 2013. PhD thesis, forthcoming. 51 BHisp. 7.4 52 Caes. B.Civ. 2.19.3 53 B. Alex. 56.4

13

Hispaniense.54

These coloni were not possessores occupying the land, but rather

members of a colonia in a technical and administrative sense. The coloniae were

not Roman but Latin, for no Roman colony existed at that time in those

territories, as the conventus civium Romanorum in some cities clearly

demonstrates.55

This recruitment process was not exclusive to Hispania. Caesar carried out a

similar procedure in the Latin colonies of Transpadane Gaul.56

From 58 B.C. onwards,

Caesar enrolled Transpadanes and Cispadanes not in the auxiliary units, but in the

legions themselves. As Laffi clearly indicates, there are similarities between

Transpadane and Hispanic recruitment procedures; in both cases soldiers would become

Roman citizens upon recruitment.57

All these factors indicate that there was a programme of the concession of Latin

status carried out in Hispania in different circumstances and during various periods.58

This programme would allow for an alternative explanation of the onomastic diffusion

phenomenon, one that is more coherent with Roman law and current evidence than the

clientship hypothesis. The existence of Latin cities would provide the legal

infrastructure necessary to explain the use of Roman names without contravening

Roman law. There are two circumstances: on the one hand, the transmission of Roman

citizenship and name structure, which would be possible because (non-Junian) Latini

had conubium with the Romans; on the other, cities with Latin status would serve to

explain the proliferation of Roman names without resorting to widespread imitation by

the provincial population. This legal use of Roman names by Latin citizens is attested in

the extensive use of tria nomina in Baetican epigraphy, where only the presence of

tribus or magistratures enables us to differentiate Latins from Romans, and in the

onomastics of public freedmen of Latin communities.59

This use of Roman names might explain the case from Saguntum of the Fabii,

who were granted Roman citizenship by Metellus Pius and Pompeius Magnus during

54 BHisp. 7.4 55 B. Alex. 56.4; Caes. B.Civ. 2. 19. 3 (Cordubae conuentus); García Fernández 2009b: 225-226 56 Caes. B.Civ. 3. 87. 4: et plerique sunt ex coloniis Transpadanis 57 Laffi 2000: 144. 58 García Fernández 2009b 228-230 and 2009a: 377-390. 59 Stylow 1986: 299 nn. 27 and 30. On the names of public freedmen, Dardaine 1999: 213-214; the

onomastics of the Latin population and the consequences thereof, including the debate concerning Latin

status name structures, García Fernández 2012: 419-426.

14

the Sertorian wars.60

In both cases the concessions were given to individuals who

already bore Roman names. This fact, already noticed by Badian, was explained, once

again, as onomastic imitation.61

If this were the case, it would be expected that they

would have adopted the nomina of the benefactors, Metellus or Pompeius. The only

plausible explanation is that the name Fabius was for these Saguntines legal and

official, and was thus included in the local census due to the status as a Latin colony

enjoyed by Saguntum since an indeterminate date before 56 B.C. Once the civitas

Romana was obtained, all they needed was a tribus to include in their tria nomina. In

the same way, Marcus Aelius M(arci) fil(ius) Niger, after completing his term as aedile

at Igabrum and becoming Roman, simply added the tribus Quirina to the tria nomina

that he bore as a civis Latinus.62

Interpreting Hispanic documentation becomes more historically intelligible, and

has more legal coherence, if we overcome the rigid Roman-peregrine polarity as the

only possible legal status available to the Hispani during the Republic. The possession

of Latin citizenship by a group of cities would explain, without illegality, the extended

use of Roman names and the transmission of Roman citizenship, obtained virtutis causa

or through manumission. This hypothesis would explain the onomastic continuity from

the Republic to the Early Empire documented in Hispania, without resorting to an

explanation of widespread imitation. Clientship per se cannot, in any case, be the

vehicle for the transmission of Roman citizenship and its associated naming structure.

60 Cic. Balb. 50 and 51 61 Badian 1958a: 257. Cf. Pina Polo, his paper in this volume. 62 CIL II 1610 = CIL II2/5, 308; Stylow 1986: 299 no. 27. On the Latin status of Saguntum Ripollés-

Velaza 2002: 285-294. The use of Cicero (Balb. 23) to establish the date after 56 B.C. is questionable

García Fernández 2013.