Tarpeian Rock Its precise location is still hotly debated, but we do know that it was quite visible from the lower Forum Romanum, as people being thrown off it could be seen from the rostra. Presumably it was an overhang at the top of the Capitoline cliffs, but since the drop was not much more than eighty feet, the Tarpeian Rock must have been located directly over some sort of jagged outcrop–we have no evidence that anyone ever survived the fall. It was the traditional place of execution for Roman citizen traitors and murderers, who were either thrown from it or forced to jump from it. The tribunes of the plebs were particularly fond of threatening to throw obstructive senators from the Tarpeian Rock. I have located it on a line from the temple of Ops.
tata The Latin diminutive for "father"-akin to our "daddy." I have, by the way, elected to use the almost universal "mama" as the diminutive for "mother," but the actual Latin was "mamma."
Tellus The Roman earth goddess, of undeniably Italian origin. After the navel stone of Magna Mater was imported from Pessinus in 205 b.c., worship of Tellus was neglected. Tellus had a big temple on the Carinae, in earlier days imposing; by the last century b.c. it was dilapidated. tergiversator Thank you, Professor Erich Gruen! You have given me much valued information and much food for thought–but "tergiversator" I especially prize, even if it is a small point. "Tergiversator" is a very imposing word for a political turncoat.
tetrarch The chief of a fourth section of any state or territory. The three tribes of Galatia-Tolistobogii, Trocmi, and Volcae Tectosages-were each divided into four parts, and each of the four parts was headed by a tetrarch.
Teutones See the entry entitled Cimbri.
theaters Republican Rome owned no permanent structures devoted to the staging of plays. Whenever the games included theatricals, temporary wooden structures had to be built for the occasion, and dismantled after the games were over. The old conviction that theater was morally degrading, a corrupting force, never quite died. A reflection of this can be seen in the fact that women were not allowed to sit with men, and were relegated to the very back rows of the audience. Only public pressure had obliged the magistrates to include plays in the public entertainments put on during games; the Roman people adored comedy, farces and mimes. The wooden theaters were built like permanent stone ones-amphitheatrical in shape, with a raised stage, wings, flies, and concealed entrances and exits for the actors. The scenae (backdrops) were as high as the top tier of the cavea (auditorium). The cavea was a semicircle of stepped tiers, which left a semicircular vacant space called the orchestra between the front row of the audience and the stage.
Thrace Loosely, that part of Balkan Europe between the Hellespont and a line just east of Philippi; it had coasts on both the Aegean and the Euxine Seas, and extended north as far as the mouth of the Danubius (the Danube). The Romans considered that its western boundary was the river Nestus. Thrace never_ really got itself organized, and remained until Roman occupation a place of partially allied Germano-Illyrian-Celtic tribes long enough settled in the area to warrant the name Thracian. Both the Greeks and the Romans considered the Thracians utterly barbaric. After 129 b.c. the strip of Thrace along the Aegean seaboard was governed by Rome as a part of Macedonia. For Rome had built the Via Egnatia, the great highway between the Adriatic and the Hellespont, and needed to protect this quickest way to move her soldiers between west and east. Thrace's largest city by far was the old Greek colony of Byzantium, on the Thracian Bosporus, but it of course was not inhabited by Thracians; nor was any other seaport. The Bessi constituted the most warlike and Roman-hating tribal confraternity, but the Odrysiae were slightly more Hellenized, and had a king who strove to placate Rome.
Tingitanian ape The Barbary ape, a macaque, terrestrial and tailless. Monkeys and primates were not common around the Mediterranean, but the macaque still found on Gibraltar was always present in North Africa.
toga The garment only a full citizen of Rome was entitled to wear. Made of lightweight wool, it had a peculiar shape (which is why the togate "Romans" in Hollywood movies never look right). After exhaustive and brilliant experimentation, Dr. Lillian Wilson of Johns Hopkins worked out a size and shape which produced a perfect-looking toga. To fit a man 5 feet 9 inches (175cm) tall having a waist of 36 inches (89.5cm), the toga was about 15 feet (4.6m) wide, and 7 feet
6 inches (2.25m) long. The length measurement is draped on the man's height axis and the much bigger width measurement is wrapped around him. However, the shape was far from being a simple rectangle! It looked like this:
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Unless the toga is cut as illustrated, it will absolutely refuse to drape the way it does on the togate men of the ancient statues. The Republican toga of the last century b.c. was very large (the size varied considerably during the thousand years it was the customary garb of the Roman). And a man draped in his toga could not have worn a loincloth or other undergarment!
toga Candida The specially whitened toga worn by those seeking office as an elected magistrate. Its stark whiteness was achieved by bleaching the garment in the sun for many days, then working finely powdered chalk through it.
toga praetexta The purple-bordered toga of the curule magistrate. It continued to be worn by these men after their term in office was over. It was also the toga worn by children of both sexes. toga trabea Cicero's "particolored toga." It was the striped toga of the augur, and very likely of the pontifex also. Like the toga praetexta, it had a purple border all the way around it, but it was also striped in broad bands of alternating red and purple down its length.
toga virilis The plain white toga of a Roman male. It was also called the toga alba, or the toga pura.
togate The correct English-language term to describe a man clad in his toga.
torc A thick round necklace or collar, usually of gold. It didn't quite form a full circle, as it had a gap about an inch wide interrupting it; this was worn at the front. The torc was the mark of a Gaul or Celt, though some Germans wore it also. The ends of the torc at the gap were normally finished in some decorative way, with knobs, animal heads, twists, swirls. Smaller versions of the torc were awarded as Roman military decorations and worn on the shoulders of the shirt or cuirass.
transvectio The parade of the Public Horse held on the Ides of Quinctilis (July). Abandoned as part of the aftermath of Gaius Gracchus, it was revived in 70 b.c. by Pompey, who wanted to make it clear that he was a knight.
tribe Tribus. By the beginning of the Republic, tribus to a Roman was not an ethnic grouping of his people, but a political grouping of service only to the State. There were thirty-five tribes altogether; thirty-one were rural, only four urban. The sixteen really old tribes bore the names of the various original patrician gentes, indicating that the citizens who belonged to these tribes were either members of the patrician families, or had once lived on land owned by the patrician families. When Roman-owned territory in the peninsula began to expand during the early and middle Republic, tribes were added to accommodate the new citizens within the Roman body politic. Full Roman citizen colonies also became the nuclei of fresh tribes. The four urban tribes were supposed to have been founded by King Servius Tullius, though they probably originated somewhat later. The last tribe of the thirty-five was created in 241 b.c. Every member of a tribe was entitled to register one vote in a tribal Assembly, but his vote counted only in helping to determine which way the tribe as a whole voted, for a tribe delivered just one vote, the majority of its members. This meant that in no tribal Assembly could the huge number of citizens enrolled in the four urban tribes sway the vote, as the urban tribes delivered only four of the thirty-five ultimate votes. Members of rural tribes were not disbarred from living in Rome, nor were their progeny obliged to be enrolled in an urban tribe. Most senators and knights of the First Class belonged to rural tribes. It was a mark of distinction.
tribune, military Those on the general's staff who were not elected tribunes of the soldiers but who ranked above cadets and below legates were called milit
ary tribunes. If the general was not a consul in office, military tribunes might command legions. Otherwise they did staff duties for the general. Military tribunes also served as cavalry commanders.
tribune of the plebs These magistrates came into being early in the history of the Republic, when the Plebs was at complete loggerheads with the Patriciate. Elected by the tribal body of plebeians formed as the concilium plebis or comitia plebis tributa (the Plebeian Assembly), they took an oath to defend the lives and property of members of the Plebs, and to rescue a member of the Plebs from the clutches of a (patrician in those days) magistrate. By 450 b.c. there were ten tribunes of the plebs. A lex Atinia de tribunis plebis in senatum legendis in 149 b.c. provided that a man elected to the tribunate of the plebs automatically entered the Senate. Because they were not elected by the People (that is, by the patricians as well as by the plebeians), they had no power under Rome's unwritten constitution and were not magistrates in the same way as tribunes of the soldiers, quaestors, curule aediles, praetors, consuls, and censors; their magistracies were of the Plebs and their power in office resided in the oath the whole Plebs took to defend the sacrosanctity-the inviolability-of its elected tribunes. The power of the office also lay in the right of its officers to interpose a veto (intercessio) against almost any aspect of government: a tribune of the plebs could veto the actions or laws of his nine fellow tribunes, or any-or all!-other magistrates, including consuls and censors; he could veto the holding of an election; he could veto the passing of any law; and he could veto any decrees of the Senate, even those dealing with war and foreign affairs. Only a dictator (and perhaps an interrex) was not subject to the tribunician veto. Within his own Plebeian Assembly, the tribune of the plebs could even
exercise the death penalty if his right to proceed about his duties was denied him.
The tribune of the plebs had no imperium, and the authority vested in the office did not extend beyond the first milestone outside the city of Rome. Custom dictated that a man should serve only one term as a tribune of the plebs, but Gaius Gracchus put an end to that; even so, it was not usual for a man to stand more than once. As the real power of the office was vested in negative action–the veto–tribunician contribution to government tended to be more obstructive than constructive. The conservative elements in the Senate loathed the tribunate of the plebs.
The College of Tribunes of the Plebs entered office on the tenth day of December each year, and had its headquarters in the Basilica Porcia. Sulla as dictator in 81 b.c. stripped the tribunate of the plebs of all its powers save the right to rescue a member of the Plebs from the clutches of a magistrate, but the consuls Pompey and Crassus restored all the powers of the office in 70 b.c. It was too important to do without. See also the entry under ims auxilii ferendi. And Plebs, of course.
tribune of the soldiers Two dozen young men aged between twenty-five and twenty-nine years of age were elected each year by the Assembly of the People to serve as the tribuni militum, or tribunes of the soldiers. They were true magistrates, the only ones too young to belong to the Senate, and were the governmental representatives of the consuls' legions (the four legions which belonged to the consuls in office). Six tribunes of the soldiers were allocated to each of the four legions, and normally commanded them. The command was shared in such a way that there was always a tribune of the soldiers on duty as commander, but apparently one of the six (probably by lot or by his number of votes) was senior to the others.
tribuni aerarii These were men of knight's status whose census at 300,000 sesterces made them junior to the knights of a 400,000 sesterces census. See the entry on knights for further information.
triclinium The dining room of a Roman house or apartment. By preference it was square in shape, and possessed three couches arranged to form a U. Standing in the doorway one looked into the hollow of the U; the couch on the left was called the lectus summus, the couch forming the middle or bottom of the U was the lectus medius, and the couch on the right was the lectus imus. Each couch was very broad, perhaps 4 or 5 feet, and at least twice that long. One end of the couch had a raised arm forming a head, the other end did not. In front of the couches (that is, inside the hollow of the U) was a narrow table also forming a U. The male diners reclined on their left elbows, supported by bolsters; they were not shod, and could call for their feet to be washed. The host of the dinner reclined at the left end of the lectus medius, which was the end having no arm; the guest of honor reclined at the other end of the same couch, in the spot called the locus consularis. At the time of these books it was rare for women to recline alongside the men unless the dinner party was a men's affair and the female guests were of low virtue. Respectable women sat on upright chairs inside the double U of couches and tables; they entered the room with the first course and left as soon as the last course was cleared away. Normally they drank only water, as women drinking wine were thought of low moral virtue. See the illustration.
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trireme With the bireme, the commonest and most favored of all the ancient war galleys. By definition a trireme had three banks of oars, and with the advent of the trireme about 600 b.c came the invention of the projecting box above the gunwale called an outrigger (later galleys, even biremes, often were fitted with outriggers). In a trireme every oar was much the same length at about 15 feet (5m), this being relatively short; only one rower manned an oar. The average trireme was about 130 feet long, and the beam was no wider than 13 feet (excluding the outrigger): the ratio was therefore about 10:1. The rower in the lowest bank the Greeks called a thalamite; he worked his oar through a port in the hull so close to the water line that it was fitted with a leather cuff to keep the sea out. There were about 27 thalamites per side, giving a total of 54 thalamite oars. The rower in the middle bank was called a zygite; he worked his oar through a port just below the gunwale. Zygites equaled thalamites in number. The outrigger rower was a thranite; he sat above and outboard of the zygite on a special bench within the outrigger housing. His oar projected from a gap in the bottom of the outrigger perhaps two feet beyond the ship's side. Because trh outrigger could maintain its projection width when the hull narrowed aft, there were 31 thranite rowers to 27 thalamites and 27 zygites per side. A trireme was therefore powered by about 170 oars; the thranites in the outriggers had to work the hardest due to the fact that their oars hit the water at a sharper angle.
With the invention of the trireme there had arrived a vessel absolutely suited for ramming, and rams now became two-pronged, bigger, heavier, and better armored. By 100 b.c. the genuine ship of the line in a war-going fleet was the trireme, as it combined speed, power, and maneuverability. Most triremes were decked, and could carry a complement of up to perhaps 50 marines. The trireme, mainly built from some kind of pine, was still light enough to be dragged out of the water at night; it could also be portaged quite long distances on rollers by its crew. In order to prevent waterlogging adding to its weight, the trireme was routinely beached overnight. If a ship of the line was well looked after, its warfaring life was a minimum of twenty years in length; a city or community (Rhodes, for example) maintaining a standing navy always provided shipsheds for out-of-the-water storage of the fleet. It is the dimensions of these shipsheds as investigated by archaeologists which has confirmed that, no matter how many the oars, the average war galley never grew to be much larger than 180 feet in length and 20 feet in the beam.
troglodytes In ancient times, people who lived not so much in caves as in dwellings they carved out of soft rocks. The Egyptian side of the Sinus Arabicus (now the Red Sea) was reputed to have troglodytes, and the soft tufa stone of the Cappadocian gorges provided homes for the local peoples from times before recorded history.
trophy Captured enemy gear of sufficiently imposing appearance or repute. It was the custom of the Roman general to set up trophies (usually suits of armor, standards) if he won a significant victory. He might choose to do so on the actual field of battle as a memorial, or as Pompey di
d on the crest of a mountain pass, or else inside a temple he vowed and built in Rome.
tunic The ubiquitous article of clothing for all the ancient Mediterranean peoples, including the Greeks and the Romans. A Roman tunic tended to be rather loose and shapeless, made without darts to give it a waisted look; it covered the body from the shoulders and upper arms to the knees. Sleeves were probably set in (the ancients knew how to sew, cut cloth, and make clothing comfortable), and sometimes long. The tunic was usually belted with a cord or with buckled leather, and the Romans wore theirs longer at the front than at the back by about three inches. Upper-class Roman men were probably togate if outside the doors of their own homes, but there is little doubt that men of lower classes only wore their togas on special occasions, such as the games or elections. If the weather was wet, a cloak of some kind was preferred to a toga. The knight wore a narrow purple stripe down the right (bared to show the tunic) shoulder called the angustus clavus; the senator's purple stripe, the latus clavus, was wider. Anyone on a census lower than 300,000 sesterces could not wear a stripe at all. The customary material for a tunic was wool.
Twelve Tables A bit like the Ten Commandments. These twelve tablets (the originals were perhaps made of wood, but the later version was certainly of bronze) were a codified system of laws drawn up about 450 b.c. during the early Republic by a committee called the decemviri legibus scribundis; from them all Roman law descended. They covered most aspects of law, civil as well as criminal, but in a rather small-town way, and must often have amused the schoolboys of the last century b.c. as they learned their XII Tables off by heart. Law by then had become far more sophisticated.
Venus Erucina That aspect of Venus which ruled the act of love, particularly in its freest and least moral sense. On the feast of Venus Erucina prostitutes offered to her, and the temple of Venus Erucina outside the Colline Gate of Rome was accustomed to receive gifts of money from successful prostitutes.