ACTA ANTIQUA TOMUS 32 (A MTA KLASSZIKA-FILOLÓGIAI KÖZLEMÉNYEI, 1989)

1989 / 1-2. sz. - L. HAVAS: Fable and Historical Concept in Ancient Times

L. HAVAS FABLE AND HISTORICAL CONCEPT IN ANCIENT TIMES* Even nowadays, when information in the possession of the general public on classical times has diminished so greatly compared with the situation a few decades ago, one can find few unschooled people who have never heard of Menenius Agrippa's story. As tradition has it, this politician managed to change the rebels' minds when, in 494 B. C., all the able bodied men of the plebs marched to the mons sneer refusing military service to Rome and deliberated the idea of founding a new city, by telling them the following story. «Long ago when the members of the human body did not, as now they do, agree together, (non . . . omnia in unum consentient in), but had each (singulis membris) its own thoughts and the words to express them in, the other parts (reliquae partes) resented the fact that they should have the worry and trouble of providing everything for the belly (venter), which remained idle, surrounded by its ministers, with nothing to do but enjoy the pleasant things they gave it. So the discontented members plotted together that the hand should carry no food to the mouth, that the mouth should take nothing that was offered it, and that the teeth should accept nothing to chew. But alas ! while they sought in their resentment to subdue the belly by starvation, they themselves and the whole body (membra totumque corpus) wasted away to nothing (in extremam tabem). By this it was apparent that the belly, too, has no mean service to perform: it receives food, indeed; but it also nourishes in its turn the other members, giving back to all parts of the body (in omnes corporis partes), through all its veins, the blood (sanguinem) it has made by the process of digestion; and upon this blood our life and our health depend. From this he drew a parallel between the rebellion inside the human body and the anger of the plebs with their patricians (quam intestina corporis seditio similis esset irae plebis in patres) and succeeded in making them change their minds.» * A good survey of (he classical concept of history is offered by CHR. MEIER in the «Geschichte Grundhegriffe» ed. by О. BRUNNER —W. CONZE —К. KOSELLECK (II, Stuttgart, 1975, 595 foil.). Menenius Agrippa's fable was translated after AUBREY DE SÉLINCOURT: Livy. The Early History of Rome. Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1960, 141 — 42. Acta Antigua Academiae Scientiarum llungaricae 32, 198!) Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest

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