Un provincial dans l’Italie augusteenne : un autre regard sur la « patavinite » de Tite-Live

Briquel, Dominique (2015) Un provincial dans l’Italie augusteenne : un autre regard sur la « patavinite » de Tite-Live. Acta Antiqua Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, 55 (1-4). pp. 255-272. ISSN 0044-5975

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Abstract

Livy was born in Padua, among the Venetes, in a part of Italy which received Roman citizenship only in 49 BC and he was very proud of the origins of his little hometown — that could take pride in being, like Rome, a Trojan foundation. Indeed, before telling Aeneas’ arrival on the shore of Latium, he begins his Roman history telling the story of Antenor, the Trojan hero who founded Padova. Later, he insists on the victory of his fellow-citizens in 302 BC over the Spartan Cleonymos, one of the Greek generals who were appointed by the Tarentines to protect them from their enemies — a victory which appears to be a kind of anticipation of that of Rome against Pyrrhus. But Livy was well conscious that, in present times, the leading center in Italy and elsewhere was only Rome: the last time we hear of his native town in the extant books of his work is 174 BC, when the Romans had to restore order and peace in the Venetian town — an event which was considered so important in local memory that it was considered as the beginnig of a new era. The deep attachment of a provincial Roman like Livy to his little hometown did not prevent from feeling himself a member of the larger Roman comunity and resenting a strong attachment to Rome, head of the whole oikoumene and common patria of all Italians. He gives us a good example of the construction of a Roman Italy under Augustus.

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