Marcus Cornelius Fronto

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Marcus Cornelius Fronto (c. AD 100-170), Roman grammarian, rhetorician and advocate, was born of an Italian family at Cirta in Numidia.

He came to Rome in the reign of Hadrian, and 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, but declined the proconsulship of Asia on the ground 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 first-century authors as Seneca, and encourage the use of unlooked-for and unexpected words 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.

Until 1815, the only extant works ascribed (erroneously) to Fronto were two grammatical treatises, De nominum verborumque differentiis and Exempla elocutionum (the last being really by Arusianus Messius). In that year, however, Angelo Mai discovered in the Ambrosian library at Milan a palimpsest manuscript (and, later, some additional sheets of it in the Vatican), on which had been originally written some of Fronto's letters to his imperial pupils and their replies. These palimpsests had originally belonged to the famous convent of St Columbanus at Bobbio, and had been written over by the monks with the acts of the First Council of Chalcedon.

The letters, together with the other fragments in the palimpsest, were published at Rome, so far as available in the Ambrosian palimpsest, in 1815; the Vatican texts were added in 1823. Their contents disappointed Romantic scholars as not matching the writer's great reputation, but are nowadays viewed with greater sympathy. The letters consist of correspondence with Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, in which the character of Fronto's pupils appears in a very favourable light, especially in the affection they both seem to have retained for their old master; and letters to friends, chiefly letters of recommendation. The collection also contains treatises on eloquence, some historical fragments, and literary trifles on such subjects as the praise of smoke and dust, of negligence, and a dissertation on Arion.

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