Philip II and Alexander the Great: Father and Son ... - Historia Antigua

190 RECEPTION OF FATHER AND SON
Ceterum etsi Romanae seueritatis exemplis totus terrarum orbis
instrui potest, tamen externa summatim cognosse fastidio non
sit. (6.3 ext. 1)
Although the whole world is able to be thoroughly kitted out
with examples of Roman severity, still one should not disdain to
investigate external ones in brief.
Masinissa was both barbarian and Roman amicus: simultaneously
outside and within the Roman oikoumenē (known world). Here
Valerius makes the whole world susceptible to reinvention in Roman
terms, but proposes that external examples can still be considered.
Roman political hegemony does not make for a Roman monopoly on
Roman virtues; “barbarians” sometimes turn out to be the noblest
“Romans” of them all. But how far must one go to fi nd such a “foreign”
paragon? The ambiguity of alienus (“other” or “external” to
what?) leaves the problem hanging.
Valerius continues to worry away at this in my next extract:
Tempus defi ciet domestica narrantem, quoniam imperium nostrum
non tam robore corporum quam animorum uigore incrementum
ac tutelam sui comprehendit. Maiore itaque ex parte
Romana prudentia in admiratione tacita reponator, alienigenisque
huius generis exemplis detur aditus. (7.2 ext. 1a)
Time will run short in the telling of domestic examples, since
our empire, not so much from strength of body as from liveliness
of mind, encompasses both expansion and security. So let
Roman prudence mostly be put away in silent admiration, and
let the fl oor be opened to foreign-born examples of this kind.
The most important quality of Valerius’ Roman imperialism is not
brute strength but good sense: expansionism is always tempered by an
understanding of the need to keep the empire secure. Valerius’ defi nition
of Roman imperialism is thus diametrically opposed to A lexander’s
legendary fi xation on expansion. In characterizing Roman power
explicitly in this way, Valerius draws Alexander allusively into the
frame as the antithesis of the paradigmatic well-functioning empire. 36
Three fi nal snippets offer a useful closing set:
Graeca quoque industria, quoniam nostrae multum profuit,
quem meretur fructum Latina lingua recipiat. (8.7 ext.1)
Neque ab ignotis exempla petere iuuat et maximis uiris
exprobrare uitia sua uerecundiae est. ceterum cum propositi
fi des excellentissima quaeque complecti moneat, uoluntas