Seneca the Younger

Ancient bust of Seneca, part of a double herm (Antikensammlung Berlin)

Lucius Annaeus Seneca (often known simply as Seneca, or Seneca the Younger) (c. 3 BC – 65 AD) was a Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, dramatist, and in one work humorist, of the Silver Age of Latin literature. He was tutor and later advisor to emperor Nero. He was later forced to commit suicide for complicity in the Pisonian conspiracy to assassinate this last of the Julio-Claudian emperors; however, he may have been innocent.[1][2] His father was Seneca the Elder and his older brother was Gallio.

Contents

Biography

Miriam Griffin says in her standard modern biography of Seneca[3] that "the evidence for Seneca's life before his exile in 41 is so slight, and the potential interest of these years, for social history as well as for biography, is so great that few writers on Seneca have resisted the temptation to eke out knowledge with imagination." It is thus necessary to regard what one reads as alleged fact with extreme skepticism.

Griffin infers from ancient sources that Seneca was born in either 8, 4, or 1 BC. She thinks he was born between <-- 4 & 1, and thus NOT either 8, 4, or 1 --- or between 4 & 1, and either 8, 4, or 1, and thus either 4 or 1 ??--> 4 and 1 BC and was resident in Rome by 5 AD. Seneca says that he was carried to Rome in the arms of his mother's stepsister.[4] Griffin says that, allowing for rhetorical exaggeration, means "it is fair to conclude that Seneca was in Rome as a very small boy."

His family was from Cordoba in Hispania (the Iberian Peninsula), and he may have been born there, although there is no documentary evidence for it. There is no way of knowing when the family came to Spain. According to Griffin, the family probably came from Etruria or the "area further east towards Illyria."

He was the second son of Helvia and Lucius Annaeus Seneca, the wealthy rhetorician known as Seneca the Elder. His older brother, Gallio, became proconsul in the Roman province of Achaea. His younger brother Annaeus Mela's son was Marcus Annaeus Lucanus.

At Rome he was trained in rhetoric and was introduced to Hellenized Stoic philosophy by Attalus and Sotion. Seneca's own writings describe his poor health. At some stage he was nursed by his aunt; as she was in Egypt from 16 to 31 AD, he must have at least visited and perhaps lived for a period in Hellenistic Egypt.

Seneca and his aunt returned to Rome in 31, and she helped him in his campaign for his first magistracy.

Caligula began his first year as emperor in 38, and there was a severe conflict between him and Seneca; the emperor is said to have spared his life only because he expected Seneca's natural life to be near its end.

In 41, Claudius succeeded Caligula, and then, at the behest of his third wife Valeria Messalina, banished Seneca to Corsica on a charge of adultery with Caligula's sister Julia Livilla. Seneca spent his exile in philosophical and natural study (a life counseled by Roman Stoic thought) and wrote the Consolations, fulfilling a request for the text made by his sons for the sake of posterity. In 49, Claudius' fourth wife Agrippina the Younger had Seneca recalled to Rome to tutor her son Nero, then 12 years old; on Claudius' death in 54, she secured Nero's recognition as emperor, rather than Claudius' son Britannicus.

From 54 to 62, Seneca acted as Nero's advisor, together with the praetorian prefect Sextus Afranius Burrus. Seneca's influence was said to be especially strong in the first year.[5] Many historians consider Nero's early rule with Seneca and Burrus to be quite competent. However, over time, Seneca and Burrus lost their influence over Nero. In 59 they had reluctantly agreed to Agrippina's murder, and afterward Seneca wrote a dishonest exculpation of Nero to the Senate.[6] With the death of Burrus in 62 and accusations of embezzlement, Seneca retired and devoted his time again to study and writing.

There is also speculation in Peter Salway's History of Roman Britain that Seneca had been involved in forcing large loans on the indigenous British aristocracy in the aftermath of Claudius's Roman conquest of Britain, and then calling them in suddenly and aggressively. The suggestion is that this contributed to Boudica's rebellion, and so possibly to his own fall.

Luca Giordano, The death of Seneca (1684)

In 65, Seneca was caught up in the aftermath of a plot to kill Nero. Although it is unlikely that he conspired, he was ordered by Nero to kill himself. He followed tradition by severing several veins in order to bleed to death, and his wife Pompeia Paulina attempted to share his fate. Tacitus (writing in Book XV, Chapters 60 through 64 of his Annals, a generation later, after the Julio-Claudian emperors) gives an account of the suicide, perhaps, in light of Tacitus's Republican sympathies, somewhat romanticized. According to it, Nero ordered Seneca's wife to be saved. Her wounds were bound up and she made no further attempt to kill herself. As for Seneca himself, his age and diet were blamed for slow loss of blood, and extended pain rather than a quick death; taking poison was also not fatal. After dictating his last words to a scribe, and with a circle of friends attending him in his home, he immersed himself in a warm bath, which was expected to speed blood flow and ease his pain. Tacitus, however, in his Annals of Imperial Rome says that Seneca suffocated by the water vapor rising from the bath. “He was then carried into a bath, with the steam of which he was suffocated, and he was burnt without any of the usual funeral rites. So he had directed in a codicil of his will, even when in the height of his wealth and power he was thinking of life’s close.”[7]

Legacy

As a humanist saint

Plato, Seneca, and Aristotle in a medieval manuscript illustration (c. 1325–35)

The early Christian Church was very favorably disposed towards Seneca and his writings, and the church leader Tertullian called him "our Seneca".[8]

Medieval writers and works (such as the Golden Legend, which erroneously has Nero as a witness to his suicide) believed Seneca had been converted to the Christian faith by Saint Paul, and early humanists regarded his fatal bath as a kind of disguised baptism. However, this seems unlikely as Seneca always professed to be Stoic.

Dante placed Seneca in the First Circle of Hell, or Limbo, a place of perfect natural happiness where virtuous non-Christians like the ancient philosophers had to stay for eternity, due to their lack of the justifying grace (given only by Christ) required to go to heaven. Seneca makes an appearance as a character in Monteverdi's opera L'incoronazione di Poppea.

An improving reputation

Seneca remains one of the few popular Roman philosophers from the period. He appears not only in Dante, but also in Chaucer and to a large degree in Petrarch, who adopted his style in his own essays and who quotes him more than any other authority except Virgil; in the Renaissance, printed editions and translations of his works become common, including an edition by Erasmus and a commentary by John Calvin.[9] Ralph Waldo Emerson, John of Salisbury, Erasmus and others celebrated his works. French essayist [[Michel de Montaigne|Montaigne], who claimed not to have studied on Seneca and Plutarch,[9] was himself considered by Pasquier a "French Seneca"; similarly, Thomas Fuller praised Joseph Hall as "our English Seneca". Many who have considered his ideas not to be particularly original, still argued he was important in making the Greek philosophers presentable and intelligible.[10]

Even with the admiration of an earlier group of intellectual stalwarts, Seneca is not without his detractors. In his own time, he was widely considered to be a hypocrite or, at least, less than "stoic" in his lifestyle. His tendency to engage in illicit affairs with married women and close ties to Nero's excess test the limits of his teachings on restraint and self-discipline. While banished to Corsica, he wrote pleas for restoration rather incompatible with his advocacy of a simple life and the acceptance of fate. In his Pumpkinification (54) he ridiculed several behaviors and policies of Claudius that every Stoic should have applauded; a reading of the text shows it was also an attempt to gain Nero's favor by flattery—such as proclaiming that Nero would live longer and be wiser than the legendary Nestor. Suilius claims that Seneca acquired some "three hundred million sesterces within the space of four years" through Nero's favor.[11] Robin Campbell, a translator of Seneca's letters, writes that the "stock criticism of Seneca right down the centuries [has been]...the apparent contrast between his philosophical teachings and his practice."[11]

According to Tacitus however, Suilius's accusations did not hold up under scrutiny.[12] It would make sense that Seneca's position of power would make him vulnerable to trumped-up charges, as many public figures were at the time.[13]

In 1966 scholar Anna Lydia Motto also challenged this view of Seneca, arguing that his image has been based almost entirely on Suilius's account, while many others who might have lauded him have been lost.[14]

"We are therefore left with no contemporary record of Seneca's life, save for the desperate opinion of Publius Suilius. Think of the barren image we should have of Socrates, had the works of Plato and Xenophon not come down to us and were we wholly dependent upon Aristophanes' description of this Athenian philosopher. To be sure, we should have a highly distorted, misconstrued view. Such is the view left to us of Seneca, if we were to rely upon Suilius alone."[15]

More recent work is changing the dominant perception of Seneca as a mere conduit for pre-existing ideas showing originality in Seneca's contribution to the history of ideas. Examination of Seneca's life and thought in relation to contemporary education and to the psychology of emotions is revealing a relevance of his thought. For example, Martha Nussbaum in her discussion of desire and emotion includes Seneca among the Stoics who offered important insights and perspectives on emotions and their role in our lives.[16] Specifically devoting a chapter to his treatment of anger and its management she shows Seneca's appreciation of the damaging role of uncontrolled anger, and its pathological connections. Nussbaum later extended her examination to Seneca's contribution to political philosophy[17] showing considerable subtlety and richness in his thoughts about politics, education and notions of global citizenship and finding a basis for reform minded education in Seneca's ideas that allows her to propose a mode of modern education which steers clear of both narrow traditionalism and total rejection of tradition.

Some writers regard Seneca as the first great western thinker on the complex nature and role of gratitude in human relationships [18] There has also been a recent theory presented that there were in fact two Senecas. While the evidence seems marginal at best, a small number of doctorate works have noted stylistic discrepancies across the corpus of Senecan work. The theory, though a published dissertation, has been roundly viewed as incorrect.

Works

Works attributed to Seneca include a dozen philosophical essays, one hundred twenty-four letters dealing with moral issues, nine tragedies, a satire, and a meteorological essay. One of the tragedies attributed to him, Octavia, has been argued as having been written by another. His authorship of another, Hercules on Oeta, has been questioned, though not to the extent of the Octavia.

Seneca generally employed a pointed rhetorical style. His writings contain the traditional themes of Stoic philosophy: the universe is governed for the best by a rational providence; contentedness is achieved by a simple, unperturbed life in accordance with nature and the duty to the state; human suffering should be accepted and has a positive effect on the soul; study and learning is important; et cetera. He emphasized practical steps by which the reader might confront life's problems. In particular, he considered it important to confront the fact of one's own mortality. The discussion of how to approach death dominates many of his letters.

Seneca's Tragedies

Many scholars have thought, following the ideas of the nineteenth century German scholar Leo, that Seneca's tragedies were written for recitation only. Other scholars think that they were written for performance and that it is possible that actual performance had taken place in Seneca's life time (George W.M. Harrison (ed.), Seneca in performance, London: Duckworth, 2000). Ultimately, this issue cannot be resolved on the basis of our existing knowledge.

The tragedies of Seneca have been successfully staged in modern times. The dating of the tragedies is highly problematic in the absence of any ancient references. A relative chronology has been suggested on metrical grounds but scholars remain divided. It is inconceivable that they were written in the same year. They are not all based on Greek tragedies, they have a five act form and differ in many respects from extant Attic drama, and whilst the influence of Euripides on some of these works is considerable, so is the influence of Virgil and Ovid.

Seneca's plays were widely read in medieval and Renaissance European universities and strongly influenced tragic drama in that time, such as Elizabethan England (Shakespeare and other playwrights), France (Corneille and Racine), and the Netherlands (Joost van den Vondel). He is regarded as the source and inspiration for what is known as 'Revenge Tragedy', starting with Thomas Kyd's 'The Spanish Tragedy' and continuing well into the Jacobean Period.

Tragedies:

Dialogues

Other

See also

References

  1. ↑ Bunson, Matthew, A Dictionary of the Roman Empire page 382. Oxford University Press, 1991
  2. ↑ Fitch, John (2008). Seneca. City: Oxford University Press, USA. p. 32. ISBN 9780199282081. 
  3. ↑ Miriam T. Griffin. Seneca: A Philosopher in Politics, Oxford 1976
  4. ↑ Cons Helv. 19.2
  5. ↑ Cassius Dio claims Seneca and Burrus "took the rule entirely into their own hands," but "after the death of Britannicus, Seneca and Burrus no longer gave any careful attention to the public business" in 55 (Cassius Dio, Roman History, LXI.3-7)
  6. ↑ Moses Hadas. The Stoic Philosophy of Seneca, 1958. 7.
  7. ↑ Tacitus, (Translated by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb), The Annals of Imperial Rome Book XV (New York, Barnes and Noble 2007) p 341
  8. ↑ Moses Hadas. The Stoic Philosophy of Seneca, 1958. 1.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Richard Mott Gummere, Seneca the philosopher, and his modern message, p.97.
  10. ↑ Moses Hadas. The Stoic Philosophy of Seneca, 1958. 3.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Campbell, Robin Letters from a Stoic (London 1998) 11.
  12. ↑ Tacitus The Annals (New York 2003) 267.
  13. ↑ Tacitus The Annals (New York 2003) All.
  14. ↑ Lydia Motto,Anna Seneca on Trial: The Case of the Opulent Stoic The Classic Journal, Vol. 61, No. 6 (1966) pp. 254-258
  15. ↑ Lydia Motto,Anna Seneca on Trial: The Case of the Opulent Stoic The Classic Journal, Vol. 61, No. 6 (1966) pp. 257
  16. ↑ Nussbaum, M. (1996), The Therapy of Desire. Princeton University Press
  17. ↑ Nussbaum, M. (1999) Cultivating Humanity: A Classical Defence of Reform in Liberal Education. Harvard University Press
  18. ↑ Harpham, E. (2004) Gratitude in the History of Ideas,19-37 in M. A. Emmons and M. E. McCulloch, editors, The Psychology of Gratitude, Oxford University Press.
  19. ↑ Thelatinlibrary.com
  20. ↑ Earlychristianwritings.com
  21. ↑ Zenit.org

Further reading

External links

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