Maiestas, morality and humanitas

The earliest case concerns the ill-treatment of prisoners of war. Diodorus writes that in 241 BC Atilius Regulus’ widow, remembering the savage death of her husband at Carthage, seeks revenge against Carthaginian prisoners.

The leading case of the period is that of L.Quinctius Flamininus. As consul in 192 he campaigned against the Ligurians. One day at dinner his mistress complained that she had never seen a man die. Flamininus had a Ligurian—either a condemned criminal or a noble who had deserted and sought asylum—brought in and beheaded by a lictor.⁴ Eight years later Flamininus was expelled from the senate by Cato the Censor for having â€?befouled the maiestas of his high office by so foul a crime’.⁵ The previous censors had not taken any action in 189; but one of them was the culprit’s brother, the well-known T.Quinctius Flamininus. Cato, the conscience of the nation, made it clear in 184 that he was doing what T.Flamininus should have done.⁶

The expulsion of L.Flamininus provoked an immediate public reaction. A public meeting (contio) was held. Cato delivered a speech that would have served as a court indictment for maiestas minuta if it had been delivered before imposing a censor’s nota on Flamininus rather than afterwards.⁷ Flamininus refused Cato’s invitation to vindicate himself through a sponsion but subsequently when he took an isolated seat in the theatre, the people clamoured for him to take his place among the senators (Plut. Flam.

The brutal killing of the Ligurian inspired a torrent of declamations in the schools of rhetoric.¹⁰ The declaimers gave an instructive twist to the concept of maiestas minuta:

[Flamininus] made a game out of the terror inspired by the empire. Remember that the aim of our power is terror, not amusements for women. Decapitation in proper fashion under the law is quite in order, but not when the maiestas of the Roman people, spread through all nations and provinces, lies in the lap of a whore.

(Sen. Rhet. Contr. 9.2.7-11 adapted)

In other words, punishment in order to instil terror into the empire’s subjects is quite proper. But it must be carried out in the manner prescribed by law, which in the standard form for free men was decapitation. Only then does it serve the public interest.