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The Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto with Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Lucius Verus, Antoninus Pius, and Various Friends in Two Volumes Volume One 1 I
The Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto with Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Lucius Verus, Antoninus Pius, and Various Friends in Two Volumes Volume One 1 I (Loeb Classical Library)
374 pages, Hardcover
Published January 1, 1955
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About the author
Marcus Cornelius Fronto
94 books4 followersFronto was born a Roman citizen in about AD 100 in the Numidian capital Cirta. Educated at Rome,he soon gained such renown as an advocate and orator as to be reckoned inferior only to Cicero. He amassed a large fortune, erected magnificent buildings and purchased the famous gardens of Maecenas. Antoninus Pius, hearing of his fame, appointed him tutor to his adopted sons Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus.
In 142 he was consul for two months (August and September), but declined the proconsulship of Asia on the grounds of ill-health.
His latter years were embittered by the loss of all his children except one daughter.
His talents as an orator and rhetorician were greatly admired by his contemporaries, a number of whom were later regarded as forming a school called after him Frontoniani; his object in his teaching was to inculcate the exact use of the Latin language in place of the artificialities of such 1st-century authors as Seneca the Younger, and encourage the use of "unlooked-for and unexpected words", to be found by diligent reading of pre-Ciceronian authors.
He found fault with Cicero for inattention to that refinement, though admiring his letters without reserve.
He may well have died in the late 160s, as a result of the Antonine Plague that followed the Parthian War, though conclusive proof is lacking.
In 142 he was consul for two months (August and September), but declined the proconsulship of Asia on the grounds of ill-health.
His latter years were embittered by the loss of all his children except one daughter.
His talents as an orator and rhetorician were greatly admired by his contemporaries, a number of whom were later regarded as forming a school called after him Frontoniani; his object in his teaching was to inculcate the exact use of the Latin language in place of the artificialities of such 1st-century authors as Seneca the Younger, and encourage the use of "unlooked-for and unexpected words", to be found by diligent reading of pre-Ciceronian authors.
He found fault with Cicero for inattention to that refinement, though admiring his letters without reserve.
He may well have died in the late 160s, as a result of the Antonine Plague that followed the Parthian War, though conclusive proof is lacking.
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March 26, 2018The correspondence between Marcus Aurelius and his Rhetoric teacher is at times highly informative, at time boring (how many sick notes do you want to read) and sometimes very strange, especially when they spend several pages discussing how a specific Latin word is unacceptable because an author 250 years earlier did not use it...still there is no denying it, it is one of the few insights into training a Roman emperor and how the Roman elite of the second century communicated at court.
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