Tacitus, Annals, 15.20­-23, 33­-45. Latin Text, Study Aids with Vocabulary, and Commentary, 2013a

Rather, he has designed his tricolon climactically with respect to the
offending group: we move from public speakers (oratores), to candidates
for public office (candidati), to office holders (magistratus). Thrasea
chooses his examples carefully. All three pieces of legislation turn out to
be relevant to the issue at hand.
The lex Cincia de donis et muneribus (‘Cincian law on
gifts and fees’) was a plebiscite of 204 BC that, among other stipulations,
prohibited gifts or payments of any kind to advocates. Tacitus already
had occasion to mention the law at Annals 11.5–7 and 13.42.1 – indicating
that financial compensation for acting as orator in court remained a hotbutton
issue under the principate.
The leges Iuliae de ambitu (‘Julian laws on bribery’) were
passed by Augustus in 18 BC and 8 BC. Cassius Dio 54.16.1: ‘Among the
laws that Augustus enacted was one which provided that those who had
bribed anyone in order to gain office should be debarred from office for
five years. He laid heavier assessments upon the unmarried men and upon
the women without husbands, and on the other hand offered prizes for
marriage and the begetting of children.’ See also Suetonius, Augustus 34.1:
Leges retractavit et quasdam ex integro sanxit, ut sumptuariam et de adulteriis
et de pudicitia, de ambitu, de maritandis ordinibus (‘He revised existing laws
and enacted some new ones, for example, on extravagance, on adultery
and chastity, on bribery, and on the encouragement of marriage among
the various classes of citizens’). Put differently, by invoking this particular
piece of Augustan legislation, Thrasea harks back to a previous item on
the agenda of this particular senate-meeting, i.e. the tricksing of childless
senators to reap the benefits Augustus accorded to procreating members
of the ruling élite.
magistratuum avaritia: The phrase recalls Sallust, Bellum Iugurthinum 43.5,
especially since Thrasea’s speech will shortly rework another formulation
from the same passage (see below 21.3: invictus adversum gratiam animus): 78
Itaque ex sententia omnibus rebus paratis conpositisque in Numidiam
proficiscitur, magna spe civium cum propter artis bonas tum maxime quod
adversum divitias invictum animum gerebat et avaritia magistratuum ante
id tempus in Numidia nostrae opes contusae hostiumque auctae erant.
78 Translations of Sallust here and elsewhere are taken from the Loeb Classical Library
edition by J. C. Rolfe (Cambridge, Mass. and London, 1921).