'O mi iucundissime Cicero' An analysis of the use of the vocative and its relationship to politeness in Cicero's correspondence

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‘O mi iucundissime Cicero!’

An analysis of the use of the vocative and its relationship to politeness in

Cicero’s correspondence

Dana Roodenburg

University of Amsterdam (UvA) Masterthesis Classics and Ancient Civilizations

December 2017 Student number: 10301313

Under supervision of: mw. dr. R. Risselada Second assessor: mw. dr. L.W. van Gils

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List of Tables

1. Table I: Total number of vocatives per category 14

2. Table II: An example of various vocative forms, addressed to Atticus 15

3. Table III: Classification of letter (2) 15

4. Table IV: The use of names in Cicero’s correspondence 16

5. Table V: The use of mi and noster 19

6. Table VI: Adjectives and nouns in combination with a vocative 22

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Introduction

On October 1st, 47 BC. Cicero, the famous Roman politician and lawyer, wrote the following letter to his wife Terentia (Fam. 14.20):

(1) Scr. in Venusino Kal. Oct. an. 47 TVLLIVS S.D. TERENTIAE SVAE

In Tusculanum nos venturos putamus aut Nonis aut postridie. Ibi ut sint omnia parata. Plures enim fortasse nobiscum erunt et, ut arbitror, diutius ibi commorabimur. Labrum si in balineo non est, ut sit; item cetera quae sunt ad victum et ad valetudinem necessaria.

Vale.

Kal. Oct. de Venusino.

Near Venusia, 1 October 471

From Tullius to his dear Terentia greetings.

I think I shall get to Tusculum either on the Nones or on the following day. Kindly2 see that everything there is ready. I may have a number of people with me, and shall probably make a fairly long stay there. If there is no tub in the bathroom, get one put in; likewise, whatever else is necessary for health and subsistence.

Goodbye.

Kalends of October, from the district of Venusia.

Two things immediately stand out: first of all, certain conventional characteristics of Roman epistolography seem to be lacking. When writing a letter in antiquity, certain conventions were usually followed, such as the division of the text in three parts (‘opening’, ‘body’, ‘closing’), and the use of specific formulaic expressions (e.g. si vales bene est, ego valeo, alternately written as s.v.b.e.e.v. ‘If you are well, I am too’).3 In this quick scribble to his wife, however, Cicero apparently thought them unnecessary. This suggests that whether the writer

1_{The Latin text and its translations are quoted on the basis of the Loeb edition (based on the Cambridge edition),} (both) edited by Shackleton Bailey.

2_{How blunt this request really is, is confirmed by Shackleton Bailey’s choice to add kindly to his translation of} ibi ut sint omnia parata, of which there is no actual equivalent in the Latin.

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strictly followed these conventions or not was dependent on the relationship between himself and the addressee, as well as the circumstances in which the letter was written.

Secondly, the absence of polite language and terms of endearment makes the reader wonder whether Cicero had any affection for his wife at all. Without attempting to conceal the true purpose of his letter or any form of blanditia,4 he asks his wife to ensure that everything is ready for his arrival at Tusculum in a very blunt way. Compare this to the next letter, in which Cicero presents himself as a loving and considerate husband:

(2) Scr. Formiis ix Kal. Febr. an. 49 (Fam. 14.18)

TVLLIVS TERENTIAE SVAE ET PATER SVAVISSIMAE FILIAE <ET> CICERO MATRI ET SORORI S.D.P.

Considerandum vobis etiam atque etiam, animae meae, diligenter puto quid faciatis, Romaene sitis an mecum an aliquo tuto loco. Id non solum meum consilium est sed etiam vestrum. Mihi veniunt in mentem haec: Romae vos esse tuto posse per Dolabellam eamque rem posse nobis adiumento esse si quae vis aut si quae rapinae fieri coeperint; sed rursus illud me movet, quod video omnis bonos abesse Roma et eos mulieres suas secum habere. Haec autem regio in qua ego sum nostrorum est cum oppidorum tum etiam praediorum, ut et multum esse mecum et, cum aberitis, commode et in nostris esse possitis. Mihi plane non satis constat adhuc utrum sit melius. Vos videte quid aliae faciant isto loco feminae et ne, cum velitis, exire non liceat. Id velim diligenter etiam atque etiam vobiscum et cum amicis consideretis. Domus ut propugnacula et praesidium habeat Philotimo dicetis. Et velim tabellarios instituatis certos ut cottidie aliquas a vobis litteras accipiam. Maxime autem date operam ut valeatis, si non vultis valere.

Viiii Kal. Formiis.

CICERO TO TERENTIA AND TULLIA Formiae, 22 January 49

From Tullius to his dear Terentia, and her father to his darling daughter, and Marcus to his mother and sister best greetings.

My dear hearts, I think you should yet again carefully consider what you are to do – whether you should stay in Rome or with me or in some place of safety. The decision is yours as well as mine. The points that occur to me are these: Thanks to Dolabella, you can stay in Rome safely, and your doing so might help us if there is any outbreak of violence or looting. But on the other hand, I am concerned when I observe that all honest men have left Rome and have their womenfolk with them. Moreover, this district where I am, is full of towns friendly to me and also of properties of mine, so that you could be with me a good deal, and when we are separated could live

4_{Blanditia, ae. f. 1. Ingratiating behavior or speech. 2. Blandishment(s), flattery. Oxford Latin Dictionary (2}nd edn, 2012). Cf. Hall (2009).

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comfortably in places of our own. Frankly I have not yet made up my mind which is the better course. You must observe what other ladies of your rank are doing, and take care that when and if you do want to leave you don’t find the way barred. Do please consider the matter again together and with our friends. Tell Philotimus to see that the house is barricaded and guarded and please arrange reliable couriers, so that I get some sort of a letter from you every day. But your chief care must be for your health, if you want us to keep ours.

22nd_{, from Formiae.}

Apart from the size of the letter, the first thing that stands out is its tone. Genuinely concerned about the safety of his family, Cicero asks his wife and daughter to consider their options: either to stay in Rome or to join him at the countryside. The tone of the entire letter seems to be softened by certain words, such as the subjunctive velim used in the request at the end of the letter, and the vocative animae meae.

Considered a Latin equivalent of the English ‘please’, classicists agree upon the use of

velim as a politer way of saying you want something.5 The relationship between the use of the vocative and someone’s desire to convey politeness, however, has not yet received much attention in literature. Intent on making a significant contribution, the focus of this thesis will be on the use of the vocative in written conversation, and more specifically on the possible connection between the vocative and the concept of politeness in the epistolary exchanges of Cicero. For instance, how should we explain the use of the vocative animae meae in the second letter? Is it just Cicero’s way of showing his affection towards his family or is the vocative strategically placed to make up in advance for the imposition he is about to make? Or is it both affectionate and politeness-related? These are the type of questions this thesis will address.

The epistolary genre provides interesting material for this type of research for a number of reasons. First of all, since epistolography is by its very nature less direct than spoken conversation, and often characterized by a different use of language, calling out to someone to get his/her attention - the most common function of the vocative in spoken interaction - does not seem to apply to this specific genre. Even though letters were usually dictated to scribes, Halla-aho (2011) rightly states that ‘it would be an oversimplification to think that when an educated person like Cicero dictated a letter, he would have produced colloquial language simply because he was using his vocal organs rather than his hand (cf.

5_{As Dickey (2012) states, velim can be considered the Latin equivalent of the English I would like or the French} je voudrais. In literature it is often translated as ‘please’, which is also the case in the translation of Fam. 14.19 by Shackleton Bailey.

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Pinkster (2010:192)).’ Therefore, it would be logical to assume that the vocatives employed in the epistolary genre fulfill different functions than the ones used in spoken conversation, functions that perhaps have not even come to light yet.

Secondly, ancient letters - and Cicero’s letters in particular - often show a great variation in register:6 a clear distinction can be made between ‘public’ correspondence, on the one hand, and ‘private’ correspondence, on the other (Trapp 2003:4-5). The first category consists of letters that are of a political nature, and therefore characterized by a more formal register, whereas the letters that belong to the second category are considered more informal due to their subject matter and their type of addressee. Therefore, I would expect the function of the vocative to differ according to the register and overall tone of each letter.

In response to this hypothesis, I looked at all the letters that Cicero’s corpus consists of, and all the vocatives they contained. Analyzing these vocatives on the basis of various parameters, such as the presence of a Face Threatening Act (cf. Chapter 1.2. Politeness

Theory) in the surroundings of the vocative, the place of the vocative itself, and the presence

of other politeness features and/or strategies, I tried to uncover a new, politeness-related use of the vocative.

Before I discuss the nature, aims and outcomes of this research, I will present the reader an overview of the existing communis opinio on both the vocative and politeness theory. Subsequently I will explain my research question in more detail. In the second chapter, I will look at the different vocative forms that occur in Cicero’s letters and in the third, I will discuss the various functions of the vocative that are already agreed upon. Finally, in the last chapter I will try to connect the vocatives to the concept of politeness, in order to properly answer my research question.

6_{Dickey (2002:130): ‘Register can be defined in a number of ways but essentially it refers to the use of different} types of language in different situations.’

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Chapter 1: The vocative and politeness theory

O Syre noster, salve: quid fit? Quid agitur? (Ter. Ad. 883)

O dear Syrus, greetings! What’s up? How are things?7

In this first introductory chapter, I will discuss both the vocative and the concept of politeness theory, and, more specifically, how they have been approached by several different scholars. In the case of the vocative, I have mainly studied the work of Eleanor Dickey on Latin forms of address (2002), as well as an article written by Michael Ctibor on the functions of the vocative case (to appear). For the part on politeness theory in general, I have, of course, made use of the groundbreaking research of Penelope Brown and Stephen Levinson (1987), while I mainly used Jonathan Hall’s (2009) and Sophie Roesch’s (2004) work for information about Latin politeness strategies.

1.1. The vocative: call and address

If two acquainted modern Roman citizens would cross paths on the street, how would they address each other? What would the tone of their conversation be? These are questions to which there is no simple answer, since there are many factors that can be of influence. The relationship between the speaker and the addressee, the social context in which the exchange takes place, even gender and age can determine the entire register of a conversation (Dickey 2002:8). For example, innocent chitchat between friends would allow an informal use of language, whereas the tone of a conversation between a student and his or her professor would be significantly more formal. This was undoubtedly as true of the ancient Roman day-to-day encounters as it is of our contemporary ones. For instance, it would have been unlikely for a slave to address his master by name, just as it would have been equally improbable for an aristocrat to call his servant ‘dear.’8 This is confirmed by the verses of Terence’s

Adelphoe,9 quoted above, in which Demea, an old-fashioned Roman citizen, addresses his

brother’s slave in a gentler way than any Roman would be comfortable with.10_{What Demea’s} intention was when he addressed Syrus this way is debatable. As Ctibor (to appear) states in

7_{As translated by Paolo Poccetti (2010) in his article ‘Greetings and farewell expressions as evidence for} colloquial language: between literary and epigraphical texts.’

8_{An exception is Cicero himself, who always calls Tiro mi Tiro. It is important to keep in mind that their} relationship surpassed that of an ordinary master-slave relationship, and therefore could be called a friendship in its own right.

9_{Comedies often show the opposite of what is considered ‘normal’ in Roman everyday life, such as cunning} slaves, sons that outsmart their fathers, prodigal children or adultery.

10_{Demea has promised himself to shake off the image of a ‘grumpy old man’, and instead be nice to literally} everyone, including the slaves.

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his article on pragmatic functions of the Latin vocative, a division can be made between the vocative function ‘call’, on the one hand, and ‘address’, on the other. The former he explains as the speaker trying ‘to get the attention of the addressee who at the moment of the call was not, for some reason, oriented towards communication with the speaker,’ the latter as ‘a specification or creation of the addressee by which the speaker indicates to whom he/she is speaking without necessarily attracting his/her attention.’11 The first can be particularly useful, according to Ctibor, to indicate the change of addressee in a conversation with more than two interlocutors, or at the beginning of a conversation, which seems to be the case with the conversation between Demea and Syrus in the Adelphoe. I consider Ctibors definitions slightly misplaced in the sense that they are not necessarily mutually exclusive: call and address can most definitely coexist, being part of a spectrum rather than a binary division.

Rather I agree with Dickey (2002), pioneer in the field of Latin forms of address, who did not make this distinction, as she seems to have followed the notion of address by Braun (1988:7), which is ‘a speaker’s linguistic reference to his/her collocutor(s).’12_{This definition} is technically not restricted to nouns only, but also includes pronouns and second-person verb endings. However, Dickey’s study is mostly concentrated around the vocative, which, as it turns out, provided her with more than enough data to make significant observations on the Latin address system. In Cicero’s entire corpus alone (letters, speeches and philosophical treatises) for instance, she found 2531 vocatives, varying from simple cognomina (Cicero) to kinship terms (frater ‘brother’, pater ‘father’) or the use of terms of affection,13 which are all meticulously categorized. Which vocative form is used at which specific moment depends on various factors, of which the relationship between the speaker/writer and addressee, and the social context of the exchange are the most important, since, as Parkinson (1985:225) explains ‘knowledge of the proper use of terms of address is…as important to the overall success of communication as knowledge of the conjugation of verbs would be.’ 14

Thus, every individual situation, - as this quote by Parkinson proves - requires a specific, ‘customized’ register with corresponding addresses, and the language one uses to make a request, express critcism or to tell a good story is affected demonstrably by these factors. This is because they stem from a social standard; a default form which we usually adhere to, but

11_{Ctibor (to appear:5).} 12_{Dickey (2002:5).}

13_{Adjectives in positives (iucunde ‘delightful’, care ‘dear’), comparatives (carior ‘dearer’), and superlatives} (iucundissime ‘very delightful’, carissime ‘very dear’/‘dearest’), nouns (anima ‘soul’, ‘life’, desiderium ‘desire’, lux ‘light’, vita ‘life’) the use of possessive pronouns (mi Cicero, noster Attice), the addition of the particle o (derived from the Greek ω), or combinations (o mi iucundissime Cicero ‘o my dearest Cicero’).

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can also deviate from. In doing so, the speaker/writer should be aware of the possibility of being perceived as rude and insensitive, since what is and isn’t socially acceptable is closely related to the notion of politeness, to which the use of various address forms is strongly connected as well.

1.2. Politeness theory

The question as to how we should define politeness goes back to the ‘70s of the previous century, when Penelope Brown and Stephen Levinson (1987) developed a theory that is still considered the most influential one today. Although a valuable attempt to come up with a satisfying definition had already been made by Robin Lakoff15 (1975:64), Brown and Levinson manage to look beyond assumed cultural differences by giving their research an anthropological basis. Taking over the notion of ‘public self-image’ or ‘face’ from Goffman (1967),16_{which can be explained as ‘the positive social value a person effectively claims for} himself’ they assume that, while the content of ‘face’ can be different in various cultures, ‘the mutual knowledge of members’ public self-image or face, and the social necessity to orient oneself to it in interaction, are universal’ (Brown & Levinson 1987:61-62). This means that both speaker and addressee should be aware of each other’s ‘face needs’, and adjust their speech and tone accordingly. The individual’s concern with face is thus responsible for politeness on a linguistic level and helps determining the register of the conversation.

The concept of face can be further divided into positive face, on the one hand, and negative face, on the other. The first can be defined as the ‘individual’s natural and constant desire that his or her projected self-image be approved of and supported’, while the latter ‘comprises the individual’s desire that his or her rights be not impeded by others’ (Brown & Levinson 1987:61-2). Both should be acknowledged and respected in order to avoid the risk of ‘losing face’, which can lead to feelings of anger and embarrassment. These feelings are usually provoked by what Brown & Levinson call ‘face threatening acts (usually abbreviated as FTA’s, as I will do from now on). An FTA can either violate the ‘positive face’ (e.g. criticism, complaints, refusal) or the ‘negative face’ (e.g. orders, requests, advice) of the addressee, but also both at the same time. This can be done in a blunt, explicit manner (i.e.

15_{Robin Lakoff (1975:5): ‘Polite language aims to reduce friction in personal interaction’ as quoted by Hall} (2009).

16_{Face, as defined by Erving Goffman in the 1960s, originally has a sociological basis and can be explained as} ‘an image of the self which depends on both the rules and values of a particular society and the situation the social interaction is embedded in.’ Or, in other words, a reflection of the way a person wishes to be perceived by others. The three levels which influence the movements of the individual in pursuing his/her face needs are pride (‘the need to fulfil one’s own desires’, dignity ‘one’s emotional and physical attitude in social interaction’) and honour ‘an individual’s duties towards the society’).

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without ‘cushioning the blow’) or very implicitly (i.e. there can be doubt as to whether there is an actual FTA at play). The strategy which the speaker chooses to convey an FTA depends on the relationship between himself and the addressee in terms of ‘hierarchical power’ (are they equals or not?), the social distance (what is their personal relationship?) and the ‘heaviness of the imposition of the content of the FTA (a small favour or a major request?)’17 An FTA can damage the speaker’s and/or writer’s face as well, both in a positive (e.g. an apology) and a negative (e.g. an expression of thanks) way.

Although few have dared to question this apparently flawless definition, Watts (2003) has pointed out some inconsistencies in Brown & Levinson’s model. He states that even though ‘it is relatively easy to see that facework of one kind or another is being carried out, facework is not necessarily coterminous with the attribution of politeness’ and that unless more of the interactional context of the examples of Brown & Levinson is given, ‘it is not possible to know how participants might have evaluated the utterances, nor how we as researchers, might evaluate them.’18_{In other words, it is not always easy to draw a} politeness-related conclusion based on the evidence provided by Brown & Levinson.

Hall (2009), focusing more specifically on Latin politeness strategies, is sceptic about certain points as well. He expresses some doubt as to the relevance of Brown and Levinson’s politeness model when it comes to epistolary correspondence. He criticizes the fact that they only draw data from conversational situations, and therefore neglect what he calls ‘ceremonial politeness.’19 Furthermore, he has his reservations about the use of the terms ‘positive’ and ‘negative’, which seem to ‘encourage a decisively binary view.’ These objections led him to introduce his own slightly modified politeness theory, which is applicable to written as well as oral conversation and specifically fit for Latin epistolary exchanges.

1.3. Three forms of politeness

Hall (2009) distinguishes three separate forms of politeness, which all aim to achieve something different. First of all, there is the ‘politeness of respect’ or verecundia, which, as

17_{Brown & Levinson (1987) provide a useful schematic overview of this triad, which influences the politeness} strategy one chooses:

1 ‘Relationship Speaker  Addressee in terms of hierarchical power (P) and social distance (D).’ 2 ‘Culturally defined ‘rating’ (R) of ‘heaviness’ of the imposition of content of the FTA.’

3 ‘Weightiness of an FTA = P (S over A) + D (between S and A) + R (of content FTA).’ 18_{Watts (2003:89).}

19_{Ceremonial politeness, as Hall explains, is the formulaic way of expressing politeness in (epistolary)} correspondence. A good example is the following formula, which is often used at the beginning or at the very end of a formal letter: s.v.b.e.e.v. or si vales, bene est. ego valeo. ‘If you are healthy, all is well. I am healthy too.’ The same concept is mentioned by Roesch (2004:143), who calls it ‘la politesse routinière.’

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Robert Kaster (2005:15) explains, ‘animates the art of knowing your proper place in every social transaction and basing your behavior on that knowledge.’20_{Its prime aim is thus to} ‘acknowledge a decisive social distance.’ This includes, for instance, the showing of respect towards a superior. Secondly, Hall identifies affiliative politeness which shares strong similarities with Brown & Levinson’s positive politeness. This kind of politeness is used to reduce the sense of distance that verecundia helps to achieve. A good way to do this is for the speaker to adjust his or her register to that of the addressee - called ‘code-switching’21 - to show that both interlocutors are on the same level.

The last form of politeness is called redressive politeness. This equivalent of Brown & Levinson’s negative politeness is ‘primarily concerned with the problems involved in intruding on another person’s time and energy.’ In other words, it offers compensation for upcoming negative FTA’s such as giving advice or making a request, which often occurred in Roman epistolary correspondence.

This last type of politeness had already been thoroughly described by Sophie Roesch (2004) in her article on the use of politeness strategies in Cicero’s letters. While highlighting certain FTA’s (e.g. requests, complaints), she noted the various methods Cicero uses to minimize the damage of an FTA.22 For example, in the case of a request, these strategies can be the ‘introduction of restrictions’,

(3) Et valetudinem istam infirmam, si me amas, noli vexare (Fam. 14.2)

And do not overstrain that frail health of yours, if you love me

the ‘hinting at the desire of a positive outcome’,

(4) Hoc mihi nihil gratius facere potes (Fam. 5.5)

You can do nothing that will oblige me more

the ‘employment of an affectionate term such as a vocative’,

(5) Hunc, mi Caesar, sic velim omnia tu comitate complectare ut omnia quae per me possis adduci ut in meos conferre velis in unum hunc conferas (Fam. 7.5)

20_{Robert Kaster (2005:15) as quoted by Hall (2009:8).}

21_{Code-switching is when someone alternates between more than one language (or register) in the same} conversation. This term from Adams (1978) can be connected to Hall’s affiliative politeness: i.e. when one of the interlocutors switches to the register of the other person in order to close the existing gap between them.

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In embracing his acquaintance with all your usual graciousness, my dear Caesar, I should wish you to confer upon his single person all the kindness which I could induce you to wish to confer upon my friends.

The function which the vocative fulfills in examples such as (5), is one of the subjects of this thesis. But first, let me explain the goal this thesis aims to achieve, as well as the method I employed during the process of research.

1.4. Approach and method

With Dickey’s research exclusively focused on data, on the one hand, and Hall’s main interest in the social aspects of politeness, on the other,23 this thesis aims to combine both studies and tries to support the assumed relationship between the vocative and politeness with concrete data. These data are gathered from the entire epistolary corpus of Cicero (Epistulae ad

Atticum, Epistulae ad Familiares, Epistulae ad Brutum and Epistulae ad Quintum Fratrem),

in order to get as many cases of the vocative as possible, on the one hand, and to ensure a variety of addressees, registers, and FTA’s, on the other. For the Latin text, I have used the Loeb editions (based on the Cambridge editions) edited by Shackleton Bailey, who not only made great observations on the individual letters, but also provided useful information on each of Cicero’s addressees.

In total, I found 215 vocatives in the correspondence to and from Cicero. Choosing to focus on the vocatives with a direct addressee (i.e. the vocatives that are directed towards the addressee of the letter), I left out what I call the ‘third-party vocatives’,24 as these often are of a hypothetical nature and therefore not necessarily representative of the vocative use in Cicero’s epistolary correspondence. Vocatives that do use the name of the addressee but are also strictly hypothetical, I did not include either.25 On the basis of these data, I want to find an answer to the following questions: whether there is a significant relationship between the use of the vocative and the concept of politeness and, if so, what the function of those vocatives could be.

23 _{As Dickey (2012:1) rightly states in her article ‘How to say please in classical Latin’ ‘Hall avoids discussion} of the meaning and usage of particular words in favour of concentration on when, how and why politeness was employed in Roman letters.’

24_{A ‘third party vocative’ is a vocative that is not directed to the addressee of the letter, but to someone else} entirely, who is at that moment not a part of the conversation/correspondence. A good example is Att. 2.16, in which Cicero addressees Pompey (by using the nickname ‘Sampsicerame’ as apostrophe to mock his ‘pretensions as an eastern potentate’), while the letter as a whole is addressed to Atticus.

25_{In Att. 6.11, Cicero discusses a booklet he wrote called ‘O Tite’: librum meum illum ‘o Tite’ tibi prodesse} laetor, ‘I am glad you find that book of mine, ‘O Titus’, helpful.’ The same goes for the ‘O Tite’ in Att. 6.3. Both are vocatives, yet they do not refer to the addressee of the letter.

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A first step involves a classification of the vocatives. Assuming that Cicero would use a different register in the letters to his dearest friends and family members than in the letters to his political partners, a division based on the degree of intimacy - or social distance (Brown & Levinson 1987) - between writer and addressee seems logical. Therefore, I distinguish between intimate addressees, on the one hand, and non-intimate addressees, on the other. Among the intimate addressees are Cicero’s brother Quintus, his wife Terentia (and his children Tullia and Marcus), his best friend Atticus, and personal secretary and houseslave Tiro. The group of non-intimate addressees consists of letters to and from various men, some dearer to Cicero than others, but nonetheless part of the same category due to the subject matter or the type of letter. This is due to the fact that Epistulae ad Familiares consists for the most part of business letters, such as letters of recommendation or letters in which a formal request is made. Since these types of letters demand a formulaic register, it is not always clear whether Cicero had a good relationship with these addressees. In order to find this out, I would have to look at other letters to the same addressee, which unfortunately are not left to us. This leaves us with the division as can be seen in Table I below:

The vocatives of these two categories can be further classified on the basis of addressee and vocative form. This means that I looked at every variation of the vocative that presented itself (i.e. full name, cognomen only, with or without a possessive pronoun, ‘o’, or terms of endearment etc.), and counted the number of times they occurred, in the hope their frequency would shed a light on their relationship to politeness. An example is Table II, which shows the various ways in which Cicero addresses his friend Atticus.

In order to make a first assessment of the relationship between the vocative and politeness I have made a list of all the possible uses of the vocative that are already agreed upon by other scholars (this will be discussed in Chapter 3: The vocative and its functions). Subsequently I have classified all 215 vocative cases, using the following parameters:

Intimate addressees Non-intimate addressees Total Vocatives Cicero  addressee 86 98 184 Vocatives addressee  Cicero - 31 31 Total 86 (40%) 129 (60%) 215 (100%)

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Table II. An example of various vocative forms,

addressed to Atticus 1) The overall purpose of each letter: since this

might have affected its register and therefore the use of the vocative. For instance, the letters that have a clear purpose, as most of the letters to Cicero’s political partners do (e.g. asking for a favour, making a recommendation), are grouped together, as are the letters that have no goal other than providing its addressee with information.

2) The presence of an FTA in the direct context of

the vocative (and if so, which type of FTA I

was dealing with as well as its subject): if this was the case, I also investigated the

sentences around the vocative to see if there were any indications of the upcoming FTA, such as other politeness features or entire politeness strategies.

3) The place of the vocative: is the vocative part of the FTA or the politeness strategy preceding or following it?

On the basis of these parameters, example (2) on page 5, for instance, can be classified in the following way:

Based on the results of this research method I looked into the possible relationship between the vocative and the concept of politeness on a deeper level, which I will discuss in the next two chapters.

Addressee Vocative type Vocative count Titus Pomponius Atticus Mi Attice 17 Mi Pomponi 5 Attice 2 O mi Attice 1 Noster Attice 1 Dulcissime Attice 1 Pomponi 1 T. Pomponi 1 Mi T. Pomponi 1 Mi Tite 1 O noster Tite 1 Total 32

Addressee Letter Type/main purpose of the letter Vocative Preceding context of the main FTA Main FTA Type of FTA Subject of the FTA Place of the vocative Terentia etc. Fam.

14.18 Exchange of information Animae meae - ‘Considerandum vobis…etiam vestram’ Negative: advice/ suggestion

Addressee Within the FTA

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Chapter 2: The vocative and its forms

In this paragraph, the various vocative forms that occur in Cicero’s epistolary correspondence are classified and explained, in order to give an impression of its possible shapes and sizes. The different categories I will discuss in this chapter are provided with various examples; for an overview of the exact numbers per vocative form I refer the reader to Appendix I on pages 59 t/m 61.

2.1. Nomen est omen: the use of names

Of the 15428 addresses that Dickey recovered from letters and speeches from various Roman authors, 5948 addresses consist only of names, ‘and an additional 532 combining names with other words, together representing 42% of the total data.’26_{But while she states that Cicero} ‘used unmodified names 89% of the time when addressing individual humans’,27_{my data} suggest quite the opposite:28 of the 215 vocatives occurring in the letters that are used for this study, 45 consist of name only (34 from Cicero to his addressees, 11 directed to Cicero29) while, in combination with other words, 183 vocatives can be counted. Of course, we should keep in mind that Dickey retrieved her data from various genres and various authors (including numerous speeches), and not just from letters. However, it is still safe to say that address by name is ‘by far the most common type of address in Latin’, as they together represent 85% of my total data (for an overview, see Table IV below).

Intimate-addressees

Non-intimate addressees Total

Name only 3 4% 43 33% 46 21% Name + combinations 54 63% 83 64% 137 64% No name 29 33% 3 3% 32 15% Total 86 100% 129 100% 215 100% tt 26_{Dickey (2002:42).} 27_{Dickey (2002:42).}

28_{We should keep in mind that Dickey retrieved her data from all the Latin forms of address that can be found} throughout Roman literature, including the numerous speeches. These were often professional. Therefore, it is not surprising that there is less need for blanditiae. Furthermore, in spoken conversation the call function of the vocative plays an important role.

29_{Interesting fact is that all 11 vocatives (‘Cicero’) are from the same writer: Marcus Junius Brutus.}

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Whether one chooses to address someone by his/her name only or a modification of that name, depends on the register of the conversation, which can - as it turns out - even influence the name the speaker/writer chooses to address a person with.30 For example, as Table II already showed, Cicero addresses his best friend Atticus by all three of his names (his praenomen Titus, gentilicium Pomponius, and cognomen Atticus), with various frequencies. Adams (1978), who studied Cicero’s use of names at great length, concluded that the formality of the social context is essential for the number of names used: the more formal the context of the conversation, the more names occur. 31

In the case of Cicero’s correspondence to Atticus, however, it is not logical to assume that the degree of formality differs every time, since he was known to be one of Cicero’s closest friends. How then, can the T. Pomponi (Att. 3.19; Att. 4.2) be explained? Or the fact that Cicero alternately uses Atticus’ praenomen, gentilicium and cognomen? As Adams (1978) discovered, when one name is used as an address form it is usually the cognomen. This is, as he suggests, because the cognomen has an aristocratic origin and therefore is the most common way to refer to a man of standing. Both the vocatives used to address intimate addressees and non-intimate addressees support this statement:32 of the 104 times that people with full names are addressed (in other words, who possessed a cognomen), their cognomen is used 85 times in total (almost 82%).33

The gentilicium is normally used to refer to someone of a lower rank, and the praenomen34 is reserved for the speaker’s close relatives and friends or could be used to flatter the addressee (the praenomen occurs only 10 times in the letters to intimate addressees, and 3 times in the letters to non-intimate addressees).35 The use of Tite, Atticus’ praenomen, is therefore easily explained, but what does the alternation between Pomponi and Attice mean? To answer that, Dickey (2002) suggests that we should take a look at the chronology of the letters, which shows us that the letters in which Pomponi is used, are written considerably earlier than the letters in which Cicero uses Atticus’ cognomen. The reason is that, during his

30_{Dickey (2002:49): ‘The complexity of the Roman system of nomenclature made it possible for a Roman to be} addressed by name only in eight different ways, provided he possessed the tria nomina (praenomen, gentilicium, cognomen).’

31_{Adams (1978:145-7:51): ‘Three names are reserved for highly formal settings, two for formal settings, and one} for informal situations, though even in formal speeches a single name is often used of one’s opponent, and a greater number of names can indicate greater respect.’

32_{Cf. appendix I for detail.}

33_{Tiro and Terentia do not possess a full name, and neither do, for instance, Gaius Oppius, Gaius Trebonius,} Publius Sittius, and Marcus Curius.

34_{Dickey (2002:63-64): ‘The rare aristocratic praenomina Appius, Kaeso, and Servius can be used freely by} anyone and appear to function like cognomina.’

35_{As Adams (1978:57) states ‘the use of cognomina to address someone of a lower rank is actually not} uncommon.’ This can be done to express solidarity, cf. Hall’s affiliative politeness and Adams’ code-switching.

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correspondence with Cicero, Atticus rose in rank and therefore could be rightfully addressed by his cognomen after a certain period of time. Although it certainly is a nice suggestion, I am not entirely convinced by Dickey’s statement. After all, when it comes to the relationship between two people, wouldn’t friendship trump adhering to political conventions at any time?36 In total, the gentilicium is used 8 times in correspondence with intimate addressees (in the letters to Atticus only), and 35 times in the correspondence with non-intimate addressees.

As to the use of more than one name, Adams observes that ‘Cicero addresses and refers to contemporary nobles with praenomen + cognomen, but to non-nobles normally with praenomen + gentilicium, even if Cicero respects them enough to use cognomina for informal, single-name reference.’37 This is also the case with T. Pomponi, which is, as Adams suggests, how Cicero would normally address any non-noble.38 However, his friendship with Atticus is intimate enough to address him by either his praenomen or cognomen the rest of the time.

Different rules applied when addressing a Roman woman. Since women did not have the same system of nomenclature as men, - they were usually called after the gens they were born into39 - there was little confusion as to which name had to be used.40 Thus, Cicero calls his wife by her name 7 out 14 times in their correspondence, the rest being nouns as terms of endearment.

2.2. Possessive pronouns: mi and noster

More often than not, a Latin vocative is preceded by mi or noster, possessive pronouns that are used to increase the level of intimacy between writer and addressee. While they occur naturally between friends and family members (of the 86 vocative cases directed to intimate addressees, only 5 are not preceded by a possessive pronoun), they can also be used to ‘give an impression of closeness and affection’ (Dickey 2002:215-216) to people with whom the writer is not on intimate terms: of the 129 vocatives directed to non-intimate addressees, 81 are preceded or followed by a possessive pronoun (The total numbers and percentages can be found in Table IV) For instance, the triumvir Marc Antony disingenuously addresses Cicero with mi Cicero ‘my dear Cicero’ (Att. 10.8) in order to get from him what he wants without appearing too blunt. It should not be taken as proof of an intimate friendship, but is a good

36_{I have to admit that I have failed to come up with an explanation myself.} 37_{Adams (1978) as quoted by Dickey (2002:67).}

38_{An example is Fam. 5.17, in which Cicero calls Publius Sittius P. Sitti.}

39_{Cicero’s daughter, for example, was called Tullia (after the gentilicium Tullius), Caesar’s daughter Julia (after} the gentilicium Julius, and so on.

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example of Hall’s notion of affiliative politeness: closing the existing gap between writer and addressee through the use of specific language.

Even though the correspondence between Cicero and Marc Antony is strictly professional (they actually disliked each other), the possessive mi is used, which is said to be more informal than noster (Adams 1978:162).41 However, the epistolary genre has been ‘a major factor in determining the use of mi: vocatives in letters are likely to have mi attached, while those in other situations use mi much less often.’ (Dickey 2002:218). This is supported by my data: of all my vocatives, 139 cases (roughly 65%) are combined with mi.

Noster, on the other hand, is less likely to occur in letters. According to Dickey, only

2% of the addresses in letters are preceded by this possessive pronoun. Since it expresses a lower level of intimacy between writer/speaker and addressee than mi, she states, it is not equally suitable for lovers and relatives. Therefore, its main purpose would be to address ‘unrelated male friends’ (Dickey 2002:224). Noster occurs only 4 times in my data, indeed directed to two of Cicero’s close friends: Atticus and Tiro (e.g. Noster Attice, Att. 8.11; O

noster Tite, Att. 2.16; Tiro noster, Fam.16.7; and Noster Tiro, Fam. 16.9). Another option -

not mentioned by Dickey - is for noster to be taken literally, which can be said about the way Cicero addresses his slave Tiro: since Tiro belonged to the entire household, it would make sense that Cicero thinks of him as their slave instead of just his own.

Another possibility is the use of a single cognomen (e.g. Attice, Att. 6.2; 12.23), gentilicium (Pomponi, Att. 3.19) or praenomen (e.g. Servi, Fam. 4.1; 4.6), or combinations of the last two (e.g. P. Sitti, Fam. 5.17; T. Pomponi, Att. 3.19), without a possessive pronoun at all. However, this occurs significantly less than a vocative in combination with a pronoun, as

Table V shows:

Intimate addressees Non-intimate addressees Total

Mi + vocative 77 89% 81 63% 158 73%

Noster + vocative 4 5% - 0% 4 2%

No possessive pronoun 5 6% 48 37% 53 25%

Total 86 100% 129 100% 215 100%

2.3. Emotions and Greek impressions: the particle ‘o’

Apart from possessive pronouns, vocatives can also be preceded by the particle ‘o.’ In my data ‘o’ occurs considerably less often than mi or noster. Only 4 of the total of my 215

41_{According to Adams (1978) mi is a remnant of the vocative use in spoken conversation.}

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vocatives are paired with ‘o’ (intimate addressees: Att. 14.12; Att. 8.11; Att. 2.16; non-intimate addressees: Fam. 10.26) which, as Dickey (2002) states, ‘can be attached to vocatives, but is not an address in its own right.’42 Originally derived from the Greek ‘ω’, it is by far less common than its Greek equivalent, which preceded a vocative by default. Even though 52% of Dickey’s cases with ‘o’ are embedded in insults, expressions of pity and terms of affection,43 these emotions are not necessarily a prerogative for the particle to occur. The combination of ‘o’ and the expression of emotions is ‘a strong tendency rather than a firm rule’ (Dickey 2002:225). The particle can have an entirely different function as well: to give an address a Greek touch. Since the use of Greek in Cicero’s time was reserved for the Roman elite, Greek linguistic elements were often employed in order to appear sophisticated and give an aristocratic impression, therefore a way to carry out affiliative politeness (Hall 2009).44

2.4. Kinship terms

As Dickey states, ‘of course the most common use of kinship terms is as addresses to relatives’ (2002:110). This statement is supported by the letters from Cicero addressed to his brother Quintus. Out of the 15 vocatives, only 1 does not emphasize their relationship as brothers (mi Quinte, Q.Fr. 2.14), while the other 14 all contain the word frater. This is not strange, since the ‘addresses using kinship terms are not infrequently attempts to define the nature of a relationship’ (Dickey 2002:110) and therefore ways to express the level of intimacy between writer and addressee.

2.5. Showing affection: adjectives and nouns

All the vocative forms mentioned earlier can occur with an additional term of endearment: a way for the writer to express affection or intimate emotions. These can be conveyed through the use of affectionate adjectives and nouns.45 Adjectives can occur in the positive, comparative, or superlative, of which the last one is by far the most common.46 Carissime ‘dearest’, for instance, the superlative of carus ‘dear’, occurs 122 times in Cicero’s corpus alone (but only 7 times in my epistolary data, of which 5 occur in letters to intimate addressees) and is in itself the most frequently used adjective of all. Also common, though not frequently present in my data, are dulcissime (Att. 6.2; Fam. 16.21) iucundissime (Fam. 9.2)

42_{Dickey (2002:225).}

43_{Dickey (2002:225): ‘This group of emotional addresses accounts for only 4 % of Cicero’s total vocatives.’ ‘O’} is, however, very common in the dramatic genre.

44_{Hall (2009:13-27).}

45_{Cf. Dickey (2002) for a detailed list of all the adjectives and nouns that can be used as an address form.} 46_{According to Dickey (2002), the positive is used in a poetic sense and stronger than the superlative.}

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and suavissime (which occurs 5 out of 6 times in letters to Cicero’s brother Quintus, and once to non-intimate addressee Volumnius), with a meaning similar to carus. The use of these adjectives is not restricted to intimate addressees alone, since these words can be used - according to Dickey (2002) -, to convey respect,47 and therefore are suitable for letters to non-intimate addressees as well (Mi suavissime Volumni, Fam. 7.33; Mi iucundissime Cicero,

Fam. 9.9). Keeping Hall’s politeness-model in mind, this would entail that the adjectives of

both categories should primarily be connected to two different forms of politeness; carissime to affiliative politeness, iucundissime to verecundia.48 A case worth mentioning is Fam. 7.16, addressed to Cicero’s friend and business-partner Trebatius Testa:

(6) In ‘Equo Troiano’ scis esse in extremo ‘sero sapient.’ Tu tamen, mi vetule, non sero, primas illas rabiosulas sat fatuas dedisti. Deinde quod in Britannia non nimis Φιλoθέωρoν te praebuisti, plane non reprendo, nunc vero in hibernis [in]tectus mihi videris; itaque te commovere non curas. ‘Usquequaque sapere oportet; id erit telum acerrimum.’

You remember the words at the end of the Trojan Horse: ‘Their wisdom comes too late.’ But yours, you old fox, does not come too late. First you sent those snappish letters, which were silly enough. Then you showed yourself none too keen a sightseer in the matter of Britain, for which I frankly don’t blame you. Now you seem to be snug in winter quarters, and so you have no mind to stir. ‘Wisdom everywhere befitteth: that shall be thy sharpest arm.

Mi vetule (‘old fox’), from the adjective vetus ‘old’, is - as the context suggests - used in a

teasing way. The relationship between Cicero and Trebatius Testa is obviously intimate enough for innocent banter to occur. The use of this adjective underlines the special relationship of writer and addressee and at the same time increases the likeability of the writer, making it an example of affiliative politeness.

Though less common than adjectives, nouns can be used to the same end. In our corpus, this way of showing affection occurs the most in Cicero’s correspondence to Terentia.49 These terms of endearment all represent elements of the natural world (mea lux ‘my light’), emotions (meum desiderium ‘my desire’) or spiritual entities (mea anima ‘my soul’, mea vita ‘my life’). In the letters from the non-intimate addressees, Cicero is addressed with a noun twice by Marcus Curius (mi amice ‘my friend’, Fam. 7.29; patroni mi ‘patron

47_{Dickey (2002:130).}

48_{This does not mean that an adjective can’t fulfill more than one function at the same time.}

49_{Probably because this type of blanditia is more suitable for lovers and therefore not used in correspondence to} business-partners. Cicero addresses his brother Quintus, for instance, with adjectives only.

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mine’, Fam. 7.29). Finally, there are some combinations that are quite remarkable and therefore deserve attention. The first is Fam. 11.21 (vir optime et mihique carissime Brute ‘excellent and dearest Brutus’), addressed to Decimus Brutus. The second letter is Brut. 1.4, from Marcus Junius Brutus to Cicero himself (Cicero, vir optime ac fortissime mihique merito

et meo nomine et rei publicae carissime ‘my excellent and gallant friend, whom I love so well

and so deservedly both on my account and that of the commonwealth’). While the first is - although longer than the average show of respect - still ‘acceptable’, the second, containing nouns, adjectives and even a name, is so over the top that any reader would immediately question its sincerity.50 Whether this is the case, I will discuss in Chapter 4: Politeness: a new

vocative function.

50_{According to Dickey (2002), the use of the noun vir in correspondence is a sign of utmost respect. The use of} homo on the other hand, is quite the opposite, even though it has the same lexical meaning as vir.

Intimate addressees Non-intimate addressees Total Adjectives 12 14% 3 2% 15 7% Nouns 6 7% 2 2% 8 4% Combination 1 1% 1 1% 2 1%

None of the above 67 78% 123 95% 190 88%

Total 86 100% 129 100% 215 100%

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Chapter 3: The vocative and its functions

Apart from the functions I already discussed in the first chapter (‘call’ and ‘address’), there are certain other ways in which a vocative can be employed.51 As Ctibor (to appear) states, the cases that can’t be categorized according to either of the communicative functions52 can be said to function as either a ‘marker of discourse structure’ or an ‘intensifier.’ Both functions will be explained in detail in the next two paragraphs.

3.1. The vocative as discourse marker

Sometimes a vocative occurs when it looks like there is no direct need for it. In these cases, it is possible that the vocative has the function of ‘discourse marker’, which Ctibor (to appear) explains as the signaling of ‘the beginning of a new section (a new move) in the discourse’53 to the addressee. In other words, there is no direct function other than to provide the text with structure. A good example is the following section from Att. 10.8:

(7) Fefellit ea me res quae fortasse non debuit, sed fefellit: pacem putavi fore. Quae si esset, iratum mihi Caesarem esse, cum idem amicus esset Pompeio, nolui. Senseram enim quam idem essent. Hoc verens in hanc tarditatem incidi, sed adsequar omnia si propero: si cunctor, amitto. Et tamen, mi Attice, auguria quoque me incitant quaedam spe non dubia nec haec college nostri ab Atto sed illa Platonis de tyrannis.

One thing misled me, perhaps it ought not to have done but it did: I thought there would be peace. If that came about I did not want to have Caesar angry with me while on friendly terms with Pompey. I had learned by experience how hand in glove they were. This fear led me into such procrastination. But I shall gain all if I make haste; if I delay, I lose it all. And yet, my dear Atticus, I am also urged in this direction by a sure hope I have in certain auguries, not those of our College inherited from Attus, but Plato’s on the subject of tyrants.

Here, mi Attice might as well have been left out: there is no other function to this vocative than gluing the sentence in which it occurs to its predecessor by highlighting the preceding discourse marker tamen. Thus, I disagree with Ctibor’s (to appear) statement that the vocative

51_{I agree with Ctibor (to appear), who rejects Zwicky’s (1974) and Levinson’s (1983:71) statement that ‘all} vocative utterances are either call or address.’

52_{In the next chapter, I will discuss whether the conveyance of politeness is a vocative function in its own right.} (Cf. Chapter 4: The vocative and politeness).

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is only being employed to introduce an entire new move, and suggest that it instead functions as an intensifier of the preceding discourse marker.

It is also possible that the vocative is part of a formula at the beginning or the closing of a letter. In that case, the vocative is standardized to such an extent, that it in some cases seems to have lost its original sincerity.54 It does, however, bring a certain coherence to the letter. Examples are Q.Fr. 2.5; 3.7; 3.9), in which Cicero bids his brother farewell with the well-known cura ut valeas (‘take care of your health’) formula. In Fam. 14.4, he clearly tries to add something to this formulaic sentence by adding terms of endearment:

(8) Mea Terentia, fidissima atque optima uxor, et mea carissima filiola et spes reliqua nostra, Cicero, valete

My dear Terentia, loyalest and best of wives, my darling little daughter, and Marcus, our one remaining hope, goodbye

The last way in which the vocative can take on the function of a discourse marker, is when the writer wants to shift the focus from himself to the addressee or vice versa, and, by doing so, introduces a whole new move. This is the case in Fam. 12.25:

(9) (…) Liberalibus litteras accepi tuas, quas mihi Cornificius altero vicesimo die, ut dicebat, reddidit. Eo die non fuit senatus neque postero, Quinquatribus frequenti senatu causam tuam egi, non invita Minerva: etenim eo ipso die senatus decrevit ut Minerva nostra, custos Urbis, quam turbo deiecerat, restitueretur, Pansa tuas litteras recitavit, magna senatus approbatio consecuta est cum summo meo gaudio et offensione Minotauri, id est Calvisi et Tauri. Factum de te senatus consulatum honorificum postulabatur ut etiam illi notarentur, sed Pansa clementior.

Ego, mi Cornifici, quo die primum in spem libertatis ingressus sum et cunctantibus ceteris a.d. xiii. Kal. Ian. fundamenta ieci rei publicae, eo ipso die provide multum atque habui rationem dignitatis tuae; mihi enim est adsensus senatus de obtinendis provinciis, nec vero postea destiti labefactare eum qui summa cum tua iniuria contumeliaque rei publicae provinciam absens obtinebat. (…)

(…) I received your letter on Bacchus’ Day. Cornificius handed it to me three weeks after dispatch, so he told me. There was no meeting of the Senate that day or the next. On Minerva’s Day, I pleaded your cause at a well-attended session, not without the Goddess’ good will – my statue of her as Guardian of Rome had been blown down in a gale, and that very day the Senate passed a decree to set it up again. Pansa read your dispatch. The House highly approved of it, to my great delight and the discomfiture of the Minotaur (Calvisius and Taurus). A decree in honorific terms was voted concerning you. There was a demand that they should be censured as well, but Pansa took a more lenient view.

54_{That does not mean that the writer does not experience the emotional intention which lies behind this} standardized vocative.

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For my part, my dear Cornificius, the day I first embarked upon the hope of liberty, that 20th_{of December on which I laid the foundations of the commonwealth} while all the rest hung back, that very day I looked carefully ahead and took account of your personal standing: for the Senate acceded to my proposal about the provincial governorships’ remaining in the present hands (…)

The vocative marks the shift in focus from Quintus Cornificius, the subject of the first paragraph, to Cicero himself by highlighting the pronoun ego at the beginning of the sentence, thereby also marking a large break. This way, the letter is again provided with cohesion.

3.2. The vocative as intensifier

If the vocative can’t be identified as a discourse marker either, then there is - according to Ctibor (to appear) - still the possibility of it being an ‘intensifier’, adding extra weight to the utterances and/or emotions of the writer.

First of all, Ctibor distinguishes what he calls the vocative of ‘sincerity and guarantee’ (2017:8). This type of vocative has nothing to do with attracting the attention of the addressee, but ‘is found in cases when the speaker wants to enhance the credibility of his/her own speech act, although he/she cannot present any supporting evidence (either because this evidence is not conveyable or because the speech act cannot be proved at all, for example in the case of an interpretation, speculation, promise, advice, etc.): instead of providing evidence, the speaker offers himself/herself as the guarantee of truthfulness and/or emphasizes his/her own good, genuine intentions.55 Let’s take a look at Fam. 9.16, addressed to Papirius Paetus, in which the vocative clearly helps strengthening Cicero’s reassurance:

(10) (…) Sed quoniam proximis quoque litteris ostendis quantae tibi curae sit ea res, sic, mi Paete, habeto, quicquid arte fieri potuerit (non eniam iam satis est consilio pugnare, artificium quoddam excogitandum est) – sed tamen, quicquid elaborari aut effici potuerit ad istorum benevolentiam conciliandam et colligendam, summo studio me consecutum esse, nec frustra, ut arbitror; (…)

(…) But since your latest letter also shows how deeply you are taking this matter to heart, let me assure you my dear Paetus, that whatever art could do (we cannot nowadays rely on the weapon of good judgement, a degree of artifice and ingenuity is called for) – anyhow, all that pains could effect towards gaining and garnering the goodwill of these gentry has been achieved by me, no effort spared; and I do not think I have wasted my endeavours. (…)

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Papirius only has Cicero’s word for it: there is - as Ctibor mentions - no proof of him actually doing his best. It is interesting that the vocative occurs in direct combination with what Risselada (1993) calls a ‘metadirective’: a verb that communicates to the addressee the intended effect of a speech act (habeto).56 This ‘metadirective’ makes sure that the communication as well as the relationship between writer and addressee is emphasized. The vocative, used to the same end, underlines this.

Another example of what Ctibor (to appear) calls a vocative of ‘sincerity and guarantee’ can be found in Brut. 1.15, in which Cicero ensures Brutus that he has given Caesar no (nulli is stressed by the vocative) more honours than necessary:

(11) (…) Longa sunt quae restant mihi praetereunda; sunt enim de me. Tantum dico, Caesarem hunc adulescentem, per quem adhuc sumus, si verum fateri volumus, fluxisse ex fonte consiliorum meorum. Huic habiti a me honores nulli quidem, Brute, nisi debiti, nulli nisi necessarii. (…)

(…) The sequel is long and not to be recounted here, since it is about myself. All I will say is that this young man Caesar, thanks to whom (if we choose to admit the truth) we are still alive, drew his inspiration from my counsels. I have given him no honours, Brutus, but what were due, none but what were necessary. (…)

Secondly, Ctibor distinguishes the vocative of ‘discontent’ (to appear:12), with which the speaker/writer, often through multiple use of the name of the addressee, expresses his/her dissatisfaction about a certain outcome (‘Marcus, Marcus, Marcus, what have you done?’). You can almost see Cicero shaking his head while he addresses his brother Quintus in Q.Fr. 1.3:

(12) (…) Mi frater, mi frater, mi frater, tune id veritus es ne ego iracundiam aliqua adductus pueros ad te sine litteris miseram aut etiam ne te videre noluerim? Ego tibi irascerer? Tibi ego possem irasci? Scilicet; tu enim me adflixisti, tui me inimici, tua me invidia, ac non ego te misere perdidi. Meus ille laudatus consulatus mihi te, liberos, patriam, fortunas, tibi velim ne quid eripuerit praeter unum me. (…)

(…) My brother, my brother, my brother! Were you really afraid that I was angry with you for some reason and on that account sent boys to you without a letter, or even did not want to see you? I angry with you? How could I be? As though it was you who struck me down, your enemies, your unpopularity, and not I who have lamentably caused your downfall! (…)

56_{Also common are performatives. These are verbs such as rogo or obsecro and specifically appoint the speech} acts they express.

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The three vocatives directly following each other underline the message these sentences aim to convey: Cicero’s disbelief - not to say indignation - of his brother’s previous letter.

To these functions distinguished by Ctibor (sincerity & guarantee; discontent), I add the vocative which is used only to appeal to the emotions of the writer. This type of vocative has the sole purpose of provoking pathos and is used as a dramatic instrument. A good example is Att. 12.23, in which Cicero obviously dwells in self-pity:

(13) (…) Putaram te aliquid novi, quod eius modi fuerit initium litterarum, quamvis non curarem quid in Hispania fieret, tamen te scripturum; sed videlicet meis litteris respondisti, ut de foro et de curia. Sed domus est, ut ais, forum. Quid ipsa domo mihi opus est carenti foro? Occidimus, occidimus, Attice, iam pridem nos quidem, sed nunc fatemur, postea quam unum quo tenebamur amisimus. (…)

I thought your letter was going to give me some news, since you began by saying that although I was indifferent to events in Spain you would none the less let me know. But I find you have simply answered mine, as with regard to the Forum and the Senate House. But my house, you say, is the Forum. What do I want with a town house at all if I can’t go to the Forum? Atticus, everything is over with me, everything, and has been for long enough, but now I admit it, having lost the one link that held me. (…)

According to this (preliminary) division of vocative functions, I investigated whether they matched the vocatives in Cicero’s letters. Based on this research, I can now state that of all the vocatives that occur in Cicero’s epistolary correspondence 44 (22 vocatives in the letters to intimate addressees, 22 in the letters to non-intimate addressees) can be exclusively linked to one of the functions that I have discussed so far (for the exact numbers see Table VII below), which, after some quick math, leaves us with 171 cases of which the main function is yet to be established. In Chapter 4: politeness: a new vocative function, I will discuss whether this could be the expression of politeness or perhaps a combination of several functions.

Vocative function (exclusive) Frequency %

Call - 0%

Address 1 2%

Discourse marker (also formulaic) 17 39%

Intensifier (sincerity & guarantee + discontent + pathos)

26 59%

Total 44 100%

'O mi iucundissime Cicero' An analysis of the use of the vocative and its relationship to politeness in Cicero's correspondence