Scaptius oder der kleine Mann in der großen Politik. Zur kommunikativen Struktur der contiones in der römischen Republik
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Keywords
- At the very end of book 3 of his Roman history
- Livy tells us the strange story of P. Scaptius
- a contionalis senex de plebe. According to this story
- Scaptius did not only succeed to get to the platform and address the people
- but
- against the massive resistance of the consuls and the senators
- he won the day with his suggestion that the people
- arbiter in a territorial struggle between Ardea and Ariccia
- should vote the contested area to themselves. While this episode is certainly not historical
- it is highly interesting for the comprehension of communicative structures in contiones which are analyzed in the paper. Some aspects are the roles of speakers and listeners in the assemblies
- justification of supremacy by emphasising peritia vs. imperitia
- the attractiveness of assemblies for the people
- pudor as an upper-class virtue
- the peopleâ€
- ™
- s greed as a risk for Roman policy
- individual and collective auctoritas
