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This textbook covers admirably the wide range of concepts and issues
and accurately reflects the fast-moving pace of marketing in the modern Mairead
world, examining traditional aspects of marketing and blending them with
modern and future concepts.
A key text for both undergraduate and postgraduate marketing programmes. Malcolm
www.pearson-books.com
Torben
Marketing
Management 4th European Edition
Harlow, England • London • New York • Boston • San Francisco • Toronto • Sydney • Dubai • Singapore • Hong Kong
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Authorised adaptation from the United States edition, entitled MARKETING MANAGEMENT, 15th Edition, ISBN
0133856461 by KOTLER, PHILIP; KELLER, KEVIN, published by Pearson Education, Inc, Copyright © 2016.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage retrieval system,
without permission from Pearson Education Inc.
Fourth European Edition published by Pearson Education Ltd, Copyright © 2019
First published 2009 (print)
Second edition 2012 (print and electronic)
Third edition published 2016 (print and electronic)
Fourth edition published 2019 (print and electronic)
© Pearson Education Limited 2009 (print)
© Pearson Education Limited 2012, 2016, 2019 (print and electronic)
The rights of Philip Kotler, Kevin Lane Keller, Mairead Brady, Malcolm Goodman and Torben Hansen to be
identified as authors of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988.
The print publication is protected by copyright. Prior to any prohibited reproduction, storage in a retrieval sys-
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the publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
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This book is dedicated to my wife, Punam, and my two daughters, Carolyn and Allison,
with much love and thanks – KLK
This book is dedicated to Martin and three great girls, Aine, Leah and Isabel,
with all my love – MB
Philip Kotler is one of the world’s leading authorities on marketing. He is the S. C. Johnson & Son
Distinguished Professor of International Marketing at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern
University. He received his master’s degree at the University of Chicago and his Ph.D. at MIT, both in
economics. He did postdoctoral work in mathematics at Harvard University and in behavioural science
at the University of Chicago.
Dr Kotler is the coauthor of Principles of Marketing and Marketing: An Introduction.
Dr Kotler’s other books include Marketing Models; The New Competition; Marketing
Professional Services; Strategic Marketing for Educational Institutions; Marketing for Health
Care Organizations; Marketing Congregations; High Visibility; Social Marketing; Marketing
Places; The Marketing of Nations; Marketing for Hospitality and Tourism; Standing Room Only –
Strategies for Marketing the Performing Arts; Museum Strategy and Marketing; Marketing
Moves; Kotler on Marketing; Lateral Marketing; Winning at Innovation; Ten Deadly Market-
ing Sins; Chaotics; Marketing Your Way to Growth; Winning Global Markets and Corporate
Social Responsibility.
In addition, he has published more than 150 articles in leading journals, including the
Harvard Business Review, Sloan Management Review, Business Horizons, California Manage-
ment Review, the Journal of Marketing, the Journal of Marketing Research, Management
Science, the Journal of Business Strategy and Futurist. He is the only three-time winner of
the coveted Alpha Kappa Psi award for the best annual article published in the Journal
of Marketing. Professor Kotler was the first recipient of the American Marketing Association’s (AMA)
Distinguished Marketing Educator Award (1985). The European Association of Marketing Consultants
and Sales Trainers awarded him their Prize for Marketing Excellence. He was chosen as the Leader in
Marketing Thought by the Academic Members of the AMA in a 1975 survey. He also received the 1978
Paul Converse Award of the AMA, honouring his original contribution to marketing. In 1995, the Sales
and Marketing Executives International (SMEI) named him Marketer of the Year. In 2002, Professor
Kotler received the Distinguished Educator Award from the Academy of Marketing Science. In 2013, he
received the William L. Wilkie ‘Marketing for a Better World’ Award and subsequently received the Sheth
Foundation Medal for Exceptional Contribution to Marketing Scholarship and Practice. In 2014, he was
inducted into the Marketing Hall of Fame.
He has received honorary doctoral degrees from Stockholm University, the University of Zurich,
Athens University of Economics and Business, DePaul University, the Cracow School of Business and
Economics, Groupe H.E.C. in Paris, the Budapest School of Economic Science and Public Administration,
the University of Economics and Business Administration in Vienna, and Plekhanov Russian Academy
of Economics. Professor Kotler has been a consultant to many major US and foreign companies, includ-
ing IBM, General Electric, AT&T, Honeywell, Bank of America, Merck, SAS Airlines, Michelin and others
in the areas of marketing strategy and planning, marketing organisation and international marketing.
He has been Chairman of the College of Marketing of the Institute of Management Sciences, a Direc-
tor of the American Marketing Association, a Trustee of the Marketing Science Institute, a Director of the
MAC Group, a member of the Yankelovich Advisory Board and a member of the Copernicus Advisory
Board. He was a member of the Board of Governors of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and
a member of the Advisory Board of the Drucker Foundation. He has travelled extensively throughout
Europe, Asia and South America, advising and lecturing to many companies about global marketing
opportunities.
Kevin Lane Keller is the E. B. Osborn Professor of Marketing at the Tuck School of Business at
Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, USA. Professor Keller has degrees from Cornell, Carnegie-Mellon
and Duke universities. At Dartmouth, he teaches MBA courses on marketing management and strategic
brand management and lectures in executive programmes on those topics. Previously, Professor Keller
was on the faculty at Stanford University, where he also served as the head of the marketing
group. Additionally, he has been on the faculty at the University of California at Berkeley and
the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has been a visiting professor at Duke Uni-
versity and the Australian Graduate School of Management, and has two years of industry
experience as Marketing Consultant for Bank of America.
Professor Keller’s general area of expertise lies in marketing strategy and planning and
branding. His specific research interest is in how understanding theories and concepts
related to consumer behaviour can improve marketing and branding strategies. His research
has been published in three of the major marketing journals: the Journal of Marketing, the
Journal of Marketing Research and the Journal of Consumer Research. He also has served on
the Editorial Review Boards of those journals. With over 120 published papers, his research
has been widely cited and has received numerous awards.
He has served as a consultant and advisor to marketers for some of the world’s most
successful brands, including Accenture, American Express, Disney, Ford, Intel, Levi Strauss,
L. L. Bean, Nike, Procter & Gamble, and Samsung. Additional brand-consulting activities
have been with other top companies such as Allstate, Beiersdorf (Nivea), BJs, BlueCross
BlueShield, Campbell, Capital One, Caterpillar, Colgate, Combe, Eli Lilly, ExxonMobil, General Mills, GfK,
Goodyear, Hasbro, Heineken, Intuit, Irving Oil, Johnson & Johnson, Kodak, Mayo Clinic, MTV, Nordstrom,
Ocean Spray, Red Hat, SAB Miller, Serta, Shell Oil, Starbucks, Time Warner Cable, Uni-lever, and Young &
Rubicam. He has served as an expert witness for a wide variety of firms. He has also served as an academic
trustee for the Marketing Science Institute and as their executive director from 2013 to 2015.
A popular and highly sought-after speaker, he has made keynote speeches and conducted marketing
seminars to top executives in a variety of forums. Some of his senior management and marketing training
clients have included such diverse business organisations as AT&T, Cisco, Coca-Cola, Deutsche Telekom,
ExxonMobil, Fidelity, GE, Google, Hershey, Hyundai, IBM, Macy’s, Microsoft, Nestle, Novartis, Pepsico,
S. C. Johnson & Son and Wyeth. He has lectured all over the world, from Seoul to Johannesburg, from
Sydney to Stockholm, and from Sao Paulo to Mumbai.
Professor Keller is currently conducting a variety of studies that address strategies to build, measure
and manage brand equity. His textbook on those subjects, Strategic Brand Management, in its fourth
edition, has been adopted at top business schools and leading firms around the world and has been
heralded as the ‘bible of branding’.
An avid sports, music and film enthusiast, in his so-called spare time he has helped to manage and
market, as well as serve as executive producer for, one of Australia’s great rock-and-roll treasures, The
Church, as well as American power-pop legends Tommy Keene and Dwight Twilley. He also serves on
the Board of Directors for The Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism, the Lebanon Opera House and
the Montshire Museum of Science. Professor Keller lives in Etna, NH, with his wife, Punam (also a Tuck
marketing professor), and his two daughters, Carolyn and Allison.
Mairead Brady is an assistant Professor of Marketing at the Trinity School of Business, Trinity College
Dublin. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Strathclyde in Scotland, which she completed under the
supervision of Professors Michael Saren and Nikolaos Tzokas.
Dr Brady lectures at undergraduate and Master levels and supervises Ph.D. students. She is also the
director of the BA Mod in Computer Science and Business. She provides executive education to man-
agers and directors and also provides consulting and marketing advice to multinational companies as
well as start-ups and Irish government agencies. She was a recent winner of the Provost
Teaching Award at Trinity College Dublin as a recognition of her commitment to her
teaching and teaching innovations.
Dr Brady’s research focuses on the assimilation and management of digital technolo-
gies in marketing. She concentrates on analysing the challenges of contemporary mar-
keting practice with papers and research work in the area of digital challenges, social
networking realities and myths, and how real-time data affects business. She is also the
academic lead on the Pearson MyMarketingExperience game-based learning, which is
an online simulation designed to engage students in the writing of a marketing plan. This
aligns with her research interest in academic adoption of technology within third level
education, in the digitalised student and the role of technology, and particularly games
and simulations, in the development of higher-order cognitive skills. She is a core member
of a network of academics, including educationalists and computer scientists, who are
evaluating the growing assimilation of technology into the university setting.
With more than 90 publications, including journal articles and international confer-
ence papers and presentations, Dr Brady is a prolific author. She has published in many
journals, including British Journal of Educational Technology, Psychology and Marketing, Journal of Mar-
keting Management, Journal of Business and Industrial Marketing, International Journal of Technology
Marketing, International Journal of Applied Logistics, Irish Marketing Review, Irish Journal of Management
and Management Decision. She has been guest editor of the Irish Journal of Management and Journal of
Business and Industrial Marketing, which she jointly edited with Professor Rod Brodie of the University of
Auckland. She was also guest editor of the Service Industries Journal, (2015) with Mark Durkin, and Aod-
heen, McCartan from the University of Ulster on exploring social media impact within service contexts.
Dr Brady was co-chair of the Irish Game-Based Learning Conference, held in Trinity College in 2016.
She was also chair of the Irish Academy of Management Conference and she was on the organising
committee of the 11th International Product Development Management Conference held at Trinity
College. She was/is a reviewer and/or track chair for the following conferences: European Marketing
Academy Conference (EMAC), International Conference on Service Operations, Logistics and Informat-
ics (IEEE/INFORMS), Academy of Marketing, American Marketing Association and American Academy
of Management.
She was also a editor on the book - Social Media & Interactive Communication: A service sector
reflective on the challenges for practice and theory, 1st Edition, Oxfordshire, Routledge (2016), with
Mark Durkin, and Aodeen McCarten. Additionally, Dr Brady has contributed chapters to a selection of
books, including two to Marketing Graffiti edited by Professor Michael Saren and one to the Handbook
of Teaching with Technology in Management, Leadership, and Business with a chapter title of: ‘The chal-
lenges of adopting technology for assessment in higher education: Implications for assessment design
and technology deployment’.
Her many conference publications include the European Academy of Marketing (EMAC), European
Academy of Management (EURAM), American Academy of Management (AOM), British Academy of
Management (BAM), Irish Academy of Management, Academy of Marketing (UK and Ireland), Australian
and New Zealand Marketing Academy (ANZMAC), IEEE/INFORMS, European Group for Organizational
Studies (EGOS) and Academy of International Business. She was the communications director for the
technology and innovation special interest group of the American Marketing Association and is currently
the secretary of the Management Education Division of the Academy of Management (American).
With a busy work and home life, Dr Brady still makes the time to enjoy travel. She particularly
likes socialising with friends, though time with her family – Martin and Aine, Leah and Isabel – is her
greatest joy.
Malcolm Robert Victor Goodman has retired from full-time teaching and is actively engaged in
AJM Management Development, a partnership specialising in the practical application of marketing,
creativity, change management and strategic innovation initiatives. He is also Visiting Associate of
Sheffield Business School, Sheffield Hallam University. He has co-authored Creativity and Strategic
Innovation Management (2nd edition) with Professor Dingli of the Edward de Bono Institute for
the Design and Development of Thinking at the University of Malta. During his twenty-plus years
at Durham Business School he taught both undergraduates and postgraduates at the
University of Durham in the UK. His specialist subjects are business creativity, organisational
change and marketing.
He graduated in economics after submitting a practical marketing study on the cricket
bat and ball industries of Britain, designed to explore the gap between theoretical knowl-
edge and its application to the real world. This became the springboard for a lifetime inter-
est in the practical application of marketing concepts and techniques. Professor Goodman
also holds the Diploma from the UK’s Chartered Institute of Marketing.
The paradigm change in many markets, both in Europe and further afield, from sellers’
to buyers’ markets, sparked his fascination with the problems that many organisations face
as they seek to come to terms with the challenges presented by mounting global competi-
tion. This has led to him developing a keen interest in business creativity and organisational
change. The pursuit of business success now requires a holistic integration of creative man-
agement and marketing management skills, and this challenges organisations to pursue
and adopt new attitudes and skills.
Publications include original texts on The Cricket Bat and Ball Industries of Britain and Creative Man-
agement. He also contributed a chapter entitled ‘Managing in times of change: avoiding management
myopia’ in Strategy and Performance: Achieving Competitive Advantage in the Global Market edited by
Abby Ghobadian, Nicholas O’Regan, David Gallear and Howard Viney, which has been translated into
Chinese. Professor Goodman has produced several papers for academic, trade and industry publica-
tions. He has also authored and contributed to distance learning courses in marketing for Durham
University Business School and tutored on the UK’s Open University Creative Management course.
Before entering the academic profession, Professor Goodman gained experience in the practi-
cal application of creative management and marketing skills in executive posts at British Leyland
(where he was market planner for British Leyland France), General Motors, Lucas Industries and the
Tube Investments Group. He also served as Marketing Director for Lindley Lodge, a charity charged
with the provision of development training programmes for young people, which provided useful
experience in getting results with a very small budget. Training courses run for the coal and steel
industries were balanced by the pioneering of programmes for national retailers such as Boots and
Marks & Spencer.
During his career, management briefs have covered both consumer and business-to-business
assignments. These have included product and market planning posts that have provided a wealth
of experience in working with outside professional agencies. Professor Goodman has worked on
several international assignments and has conducted on-the-spot marketing surveys and manage-
ment briefs in Europe (particularly France and Germany) and in the Far East (especially Indonesia,
Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand).
He has been a consultant to and been involved in creative management and marketing training
with many organisations including ICI, Lucas, Marks & Spencer, Price Waterhouse, the Royal Navy,
Sunderland Association Football Club and Uniroyal. He has also contributed to the UK government-
inspired gifted and talented youth programme (NAGTY) by running two-week summer school pro-
grammes in practical business skills at the University of Durham.
In his youth, Professor Goodman played football and roamed the pitch for the London-based
Crystal Palace FC. A lifetime interest in sport – mainly football and cricket – has convinced him of
the importance of taking a holistic and team-based approach to management tasks. His academic
career began with an appointment to teach marketing and management skills on the Royal Navy
Resettlement Programme and to run UK government-sponsored practical business courses for small
businesses (SMEs) at the Portsmouth Management Centre (now Portsmouth University). He also
brought and further developed retail-orientated training programmes for Boots and Marks & Spen-
cers. His current activity is characterised by a strong desire to assist clients and students to apply
creative management and marketing skills practically, to enable them to make a difference in highly
competitive global markets.
Outside of work he cites his main interests – other than sport – to be camping, creative thinking,
current affairs and classical music. He is happily married to Jill and has an adult daughter and son.
Torben Hansen is a Professor at the Department of Marketing, Copenhagen Business School (CBS).
He received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Southern Denmark and his Ph.D.
from Copenhagen Business School. His main fields of research are consumer behaviour and market-
ing research methods, and his papers have appeared in various academic journals, including Journal of
Service Research, Psychology & Marketing, Food Policy, International Journal of Consumer Studies, Euro-
pean Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Behaviour, Journal of Foodservice Business
Research, Journal of Product & Brand Management, Journal of International Consumer Mar-
keting, International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, International Review of
Retail Distribution and Consumer Research, Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services and
others, and he has contributed a number of chapters in scholarly books. He has authored or
co-authored several books, including New Perspectives in Retailing: A Study of the Interface
between Consumers and Retailers. He is a frequent speaker at national and international
conferences and community forums.
Professor Hansen is editor in chief of the Consumer Behaviour Newsletter at Copenhagen
Business School. He has served as a member of the Danish Food Think Tank and a member
of the Danish Marketing Practices Act Committee. Professor Hansen has also served as
chairman of the Danish Money and Pension Panel, a board established by the Danish par-
liament with the purpose of improving consumers’ knowledge of and interest in financial
matters. Apart from the chairman, the panel comprises eight Danish consumer-orientated
and financial organisations. In 2011 Professor Hansen was appointed member of the BEUC
(the European Consumer Organisation) Consumer Strategy Council. He has received several
awards for his research, including the Marketing Trends Award, the International Academy
of Business & Public Administration Research Award, the ICEBMM (International Conference on Eco-
nomics, Business and Marketing Management) Best Presentation Award, and the Copenhagen Business
School Gold Medal.
Professor Hansen has worked as a consultant for various companies and collaborates with several
private organisations and public authorities, including the Danish Chamber of Commerce, the Ministry
of Science, Technology and Innovation, the Confederation of Danish Industry and the Danish Consumer
Council. He is a VIP member of the Danish Shareholders’ Association. As a consumer behaviour expert,
he is often called upon by the press, which relies on him for assessments of market trends and comments
on consumer behaviour issues.
Professor Hansen has served as a reviewer for several leading marketing journals, including Journal
of Service Research, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, International Review of Retail, Distribution
and Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Psychology, Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services,
International Journal of Retail and Distribution Management, British Food Journal and Journal of Marketing
Management. In 2010 he was appointed chairman of the Northern European scientific committee for the
ESCP-EAP International Marketing Trends Congress. Professor Hansen has chaired, or been a member of,
several assessment committees for various academic positions. He is the director of the M.Sc. programme
in Economics and Marketing (EMF) at Copenhagen Business School and has wide teaching experience,
which also includes Master’s and Ph.D. supervision activities.
Professor Hansen has a passion for food and wine, and often experiments with exotic spices and new
recipes, which with various success he serves for people who visit him and his wife in their home. He
has appeared on Danish television as a guest chef in a popular comedy cookery and talk show. In his
spare time he often goes boating in his small but fast boat, which he also uses for fishing expeditions.
He enjoys do-it-yourself work on his old country house.
Preface xxv
Acknowledgements xxix
Publisher’s acknowledgements xxx
Glossary 758
Index 773
Preface xxv
Acknowledgements xxix
Publisher’s acknowledgements xxx
R OMAN literature may be said to date from about 250 b.c., or, to
take an event which marked an important era in the life of the
Republic, from the close of the first Punic War, 241 b.c.
With the Romans, literature was not of spontaneous growth, but
was chiefly the result of the influence exerted by the Etruscans, who
were their first teachers in everything mental and spiritual.
The earliest literary efforts of the Greeks, or at least the earliest
which are known to us, were, as we have seen, epic poems, setting
forth the deeds of the gods, demi-gods, and heroes. The earliest
literary productions of the Romans were historical narratives, bald
records of events real or imaginary.
Simcox refers to the curious feature of Latin literature, that “It is in
its best days a Roman literature without being the work of
Romans.”[139] The great writers of Athens were Athenians, but from
Ennius to Martial, a succession of writers who were not natives of
Rome lived and worked in the metropolis and owed their fame to the
Roman public.
Authors came to Rome from all parts of the civilized world, there to
make their literary fortunes. They needed, in order to secure a
standing in the world of literature, the approval of the critics of the
capital, and in the latter period, they required also, for the
multiplying and distributing of their books, the service of the Roman
publishers.
Géraud points out that the Romans came very near to the
acquisition of the art of printing. It was the aim of Trajan, in his
Asiatic expeditions, to surpass Alexander in the extent of his
conquests and journeyings eastward. “If I were but younger!”
murmured Trajan, as he stood on the shores of the mysterious
Erythrean Sea (the Indian Ocean). And there was in fact probably
little but lack of time to prevent him from passing Alexander’s limit of
the Indus, and, marching across the Indian peninsula, from arriving
within the borders of the “everlasting empire” of the Chinese. In the
time of Trajan, however (100 a.d.), the Chinese had already
mastered the art of xylographic printing, or printing from blocks. If,
therefore, Trajan had arrived at the imperial power say ten years
earlier, literary property might have saved thirteen centuries in
securing the most essential condition of substantial existence.
There are, however, compensations for all losses. If printing had
come into Europe in the first century, the world might to-day be
buried under the accumulated mass of its literature, and my subject,
already sufficiently complex, would have assumed unmanageable
proportions.
With the knowledge of the language and literature of Greece, which
came to the Romans partly through the commerce of the Greek
traders of the Mediterranean, partly through the Greek colonies in
Italy, and partly, probably, through the intercourse brought about by
war, a new literary standard was given to Rome. The dry annals of
events, and the crude and barely metrical hymns or chants, which
had hitherto comprised the entire body of national literature, were
now to be brought into contrast with the great productions of the
highest development of Greek poetry, drama, and philosophy. As a
result the literary thought and the literary ideals of Rome were, for a
time, centred in Athens.
It would not be quite correct to say that from the outset Athenian
literature served as a model for Roman writers. This was true only at
a later stage in the development of literary Rome. The first step was
simply the acceptance of the works of Greek writers as constituting
for the time being all the higher literature that existed. Greek
became and for a number of years remained the literary language of
Rome. Such libraries as came into existence were at first made up
exclusively, and for centuries to come very largely, of works written
in Greek. The instructors, at least of literature, philosophy, and
science, taught in Greek and were in large part themselves Greeks.
In fact the Greek language must have occupied in Italy, during the
two centuries before Christ, about the place which, centuries later,
was held throughout Europe by Latin, as the recognized medium for
scholarly expression.
There is, however, this difference to note. The Latin of mediæval
Europe, though the language of scholars, was for all writers an
acquired language, and its use for the literature of the middle ages
gave to that literature an inevitable formality and artificiality of style.
The Greek used in early Rome was the natural literary language,
because it was the language of all the cultivated literature that was
known, and it was learned by the Romans of the educated classes in
their earliest years, becoming to them if not a mother tongue, at
least a step-mother tongue. In the face of this all-powerful
competition of the works of some of the greatest writers of antiquity,
works which were the result of centuries of intellectual cultivation,
the literary efforts of the earlier Roman authors seemed crude
enough, and the development of a national literature, expressed in
the national language, progressed but slowly.
With the capture of Corinth in 146 b.c., the last fragment of Greek
independence came to an end, and the absorption of Greece into the
Roman empire was completed. But while the arms of Rome had
prevailed, the intellect of Greece remained supreme, and, in fact, its
range of influence was enormously extended through the very
conquests which gave to the Romans the mastery, not only of the
little Grecian peninsula, but of the whole civilized world.
The second stage in the development of Roman literature was the
wholesale adaptation by the Roman writers of such Greek originals
as served their purpose. It was principally the dramatic authors
whose productions were thus utilized, but the appropriations
extended to almost every branch of literature. In a few cases the
plays and poems were published simply as translations, due credit
being given to the original works, but in the larger number of
instances in which the adaptation from the Greek into the Latin was
made with considerable freedom and with such modifications as
might help to give a local or a popular character to the piece, the
Roman playwright would make no reference to the Attic author, but
would quietly appropriate for himself the prestige and the profits
accruing from his literary ingenuity and industry. It is proper to
remember, however, that in few cases could living Greek authors
have had any cause for complaint. It was the writings of the dead
masters, and particularly, of course, of those whose work, while
distinctive and available, was less likely to be familiar to a Roman
literary public, which furnished an almost inexhaustible quarry for
the rapacity of the plagiarists of the early Republic.
The bearing of this state of things upon the development of real
Roman literature and upon any possibility of compensation for the
writers of such literature, is obvious. Why should a Roman publisher
or theatrical manager pay for the right to publish or to perform a
drama by a native writer, when he could secure, for the small cost of
a translation or adaptation, a more spirited and satisfactory piece of
work from the Attic quarry?
What encouragement could be given, in the face of competition of
this kind, to the young Latin poet, striving to secure even a hearing
from the public? The practice of utilizing foreign dramatic material by
adapting it for home requirements, has, as we know, been very
generally followed in later times, the most noteworthy example
being the wholesale appropriations made by English dramatists from
the dramatic literature of France, prior to the establishment between
the two countries of international copyright.
There must also have been a further difficulty on the part of the
earlier Roman publishers in the way of finding funds for the
encouragement of native talent. Their own work was for many years
being carried on at a special disadvantage in connection with the
previously referred to competition of Alexandria. As late as the
middle of the first century a.d., a large portion, and probably the
larger portion, of the work of the copyists in preparing editions had
to be done in Alexandria, as there alone could be found an adequate
force of trained and competent scribes, the swiftness and accuracy
of whose work could be depended upon. Alexandria was also not
simply the chief, but practically the sole market in the world for
papyrus. The earlier Roman publisher found it, therefore, usually to
his advantage to send to Alexandria his original text, and to contract
with some Alexandrian correspondent, who controlled a book-
manufacturing establishment, for the production of the editions
required, while to this manufacturing outlay the Roman dealer had
further to add the cost of his freight. There is record of certain
copying done for Roman orders during the first and second centuries
b.c. in Athens, but this seems in the main to have been restricted to
commissions from individual collectors, like Lucullus (b.c. 115-57).
The mass of the book-making orders certainly went to Alexandria,
which bore a relation to the book-trade of Rome similar in certain
respects to that borne to the London publishers in the first half of
the present century by the literary circle and by the printers of
Edinburgh. The earlier Roman publishers, therefore, in losing the
advantage of the manufacturing of books issued by them, found
their margin of possible profit seriously curtailed, and the chances of
securing for the authors any remuneration from the sales of their
books must for many years have been very slight. It seems, in fact,
probable that compensation for Roman authors began only when,
through the development of publishing machinery, it became
possible for the making of books to be done advantageously in
Rome. This period corresponds also with the time when a real
national literature began to shape itself, and when the development
of a popular interest in this literature called for the production of
books in the Latin language, which could be prepared by Latin
scribes.
The two sets of influences, the one mercantile, the other
intellectual and patriotic, worked together, and were somewhat
intermingled as cause and effect. The peculiar relation borne to the
earlier intellectual development of Rome by the literature of a
foreign people has never been fully paralleled in later history. The
use of Greek in Italy as the language of learning and of literature,
was, as said, very similar to the general acceptance of Latin by the
scholars of mediæval Europe as the only tongue worthy of
employment for literary purposes. But I can find no other instance in
which the literature of one people ever became so completely and so
exclusively the authority for and the inspiration of the first literary
life of another. During the eighteenth century, North Germany had,
under the direction of its Court circles accepted French as the
language of refined society, and German literature was to some
extent fashioned after French models; but important as this
influence appeared to be, at the time, say, of Frederick the Great, it
does not seem as if it could have had any large part in shaping the
work of the German writers of the following half century.
The literary life of the American Republic has, of course, during a
large portion of its independent existence, as in the old colonial
days, drawn its inspiration from the literature of its parent state,
Great Britain. There has been, in this instance, as in the relation
between Rome and Greece, on the part of the younger community,
first, an entire acceptance of and dependence upon the literary
productions of the older state; later, a very general appropriation
and adaptation of such productions; still later (and in part pari passu
with such appropriation), a large use of the older literature as the
model and standard for the literary compositions of the writers of
the younger people; while, finally, there has come in the latter half
of the nineteenth century for America, as in the second half of the
first century for Rome, the development, in the face of these special
difficulties, of a truly national literature. For America, as for Rome,
this development was in certain ways furthered by the knowledge
and the influence of the great literary works of an older civilization,
while for America, as for Rome, the overshadowing literary prestige
of these older works, and the commercial difficulties in the way of
securing public attention and a remunerative sale for books by native
authors in competition with the easily “appropriated” volumes of
older writers of recognized authority, may possibly have fully offset
the advantage of the inspiration.
In certain important respects the comparison fails to hold good. For
America the literary connection with and inspiration from Great
Britain was in every way a natural one. In changing their skies, the
Americans could not change their mother-tongue, and in the
literature of England, prior to 1776, they continued to claim full
ownership and inheritance. The peculiar condition for Rome was its
acceptance, as the foundations of its intellectual life, of the literature
of a conquered people, with which people its own kinship was
remote, and whose language was entirely distinct.
The estimate in which the Greeks were held by their conquerors is
indicated in the fact that, while the Greeks held all but themselves to
be barbarians, by the Romans the term was applied to all but
themselves and the Greeks.
While a republican form of government has not usually been
considered as unfavorable for intellectual activity, history certainly
presents not a few instances in which an absolute monarch has had
it in his power, through the direct use of the public resources, to
further the literary production of the State in a way which would
hardly have been practicable for a republic. It is not to be doubted,
for instance, that a ruler in Rome, with the largeness of mind and
persistency of will of Ptolemy Philadelphus, could by some such
simple measures as those which proved so effective in Alexandria,
have hastened by half a century or more the development of a
national literature in Italy. But, until the establishment of the Empire,
the rulers of the Republic had their hands too full with the work of
defending the State and of extending its sway, to be able to give
thought to, or to find funds for any schemes for, “Museums,”
Academies, or Libraries, planned to supply instruction for the
community, and to secure employment and incomes for literary men,
under whose direction literary undertakings could be carried on at
the expense of the public treasury.
No institution of learning received any endowment from the
treasury of the Roman Republic, and the scholars who undertook
literary work received no aid or encouragement from the
government. Under the limitations and conditions controlling the
literary life of the time, it is not to be wondered at that the many
attractions held out by the Ptolemies should have caused Alexandria
rather than Rome to become the literary centre of the world, a
distinction which it seems hardly to have lost until, half a century
after, through the conquest of Egypt by Octavius (b.c. 30), it had
fallen to the position of a capital of a Roman province.
A still further consideration to be borne in mind in connection with
the slow development of Roman literature, is the attitude of Roman
writers to their work. Many of those whose names are best known to
us would have felt themselves lowered to be classed as authors.
They were statesmen, advocates, men about town, or, if you will,
simple citizens, who gave some of their leisure hours to literary
pursuits. To the Greek author, whether poet, philosopher, or
historian, literature was an avocation, an honored and honorable
profession. The Roman writer preferred as a rule to consider his
writing as a pastime. Cicero says: Ut si occupati profuimus aliquid
civibus nostris, prosimus etiam, si possumus, otiosi.[140]
Cornelius Nepos, in writing the life of Atticus, omits the smallest
reference to the connection of Atticus with literature, as if any
association with authorship or with publishing was either of no
importance, or might even have impaired the reputation of an
honored Roman.
It was this feeling that authorship was not in itself an avocation
worthy of a Roman citizen, which unquestionably stood very much in
the way of any arrangements under which authors could secure
compensation for their productions, and doubtless postponed for a
considerable period the recognition by the publishers and the
reading public of any property rights in literature. The evidences, or,
as it would be more exact to say, the indications, concerning such
compensation for Roman writers are but fragmentary and at best
but inconclusive. They will be referred to later in this chapter.
The first Latin playwright whose name has been preserved, was
Titus Livius Andronicus of Tarentum. Andronicus added to his labors
as a dramatist the work of an instructor of Greek literature, and he
prepared for school use (about 250 b.c.) an abridgment of the
Odyssey. A volume of this kind, written for use as a text-book, could
hardly have been undertaken for the sake of the literary prestige,
but must have been published for the purpose of securing profit
from the sale of copies. If this inference is a just one, the book will
stand as the earliest known instance in Latin literature of property in
the work of an author, and the example is peculiarly characteristic,
because the work of Andronicus, like the literature of his country,
rested upon a Greek foundation.
A large proportion of the works of the early Roman dramatists have
been identified as being versions, more or less exact, of known
Greek originals, and in a number of cases the substance of Greek
productions of which the titles and perhaps some descriptive
references have come into record but the original texts of which
have disappeared, have been preserved only by means of these
Latin versions. The presumption is strong that very few of the
dramatic writings which appeared in Rome during the century
following the date of Andronicus, say 280 b.c. to 180 b.c., even of
those whose Greek connection has not been traced, were not in
great part based upon Greek originals.[141] It would not be easy to
decide whether this exceptional relation between the two literatures,
and this enormous indebtedness of the younger to the older,
furthered or hindered the wholesome development of the literary
productiveness of Italy. It seems probable that the gain in
refinement, and in the cultivation of literary form, was largely offset
by the check to the work of the creative faculty and the lessening of
sturdiness and individuality. Emerson’s saying that “every man is as
lazy as he dares to be,” was probably as true of the writers of Rome
as it would have been of any other group of writers placed in a
similar position. It is much easier to build one’s house from the
finished blocks of the neighboring ruin, than to do the original
hewing of new stones out of the side of the mountain.
The next name of importance among the writers of the period of
the Punic Wars was Ennius, often spoken of as “the father of Latin
literature.” Of his dramatic work Simcox remarks: “A play of Ennius
was generally a play of Euripides simplified and amplified.”[142] It is
in order to remember that Ennius, though doing all his literary work
in Latin, was himself not a Latin, but a Calabrian—that is, at least
half Greek in his ancestry and early environment. The work by which
he is best known is the Annals, a historical or rather legendary
poem, giving evidence of the Greek bias of the author in undertaking
to present history (from Romulus to Scipio) as a poem rather than as
a chronicle of facts in sober prose. Ennius translated a Sicilian
Cookery-book (issued about 175 b.c.), a piece of work which, as the
translator was poor, earning a modest livelihood by teaching, could
only have been undertaken as a business commission. Whether it
was paid for by a bookseller or by a patron is not recorded, but the
probability is in favor of the latter, as Ennius, while frequently
mentioning his patrons, makes no reference to any booksellers. An
early instance of the possibility of making money by writing is
afforded by Plautus, whose comedies date between 202 and 184 b.c.
He is reported to have written plays with such success as to have
been able with the proceeds to set himself up as a miller, and when
his business failed, he returned to play-writing until he had again
secured a competence.[143] His success was the more noteworthy,
as it was difficult to understand how there could have been much
demand for comedies in Rome during the anxious years when
Hannibal was encamped at Capua. Cæcilius, who was a late
contemporary of Plautus, is for us little more than a name, as of his
comedies, commended by others as great, but fragments have been
preserved. Terence was one of the writers possessing a large
appreciation of Greek literature. He translated a hundred plays,
chiefly from Menander, but there is nothing to tell us how far his
literary undertakings proved commercially successful.[144] A
historical work of substantial importance was the Origines of Cato
the Censor, completed about 149 b.c. (three years before the fall of
Carthage and of Corinth), which dealt with the institutions of Rome
and with the origin of the allied Italian States. This was followed by
the Annales Maximi of Mucius Scævola (issued in 133 in no less than
eighty books), by further Annals by Calpurnius Piso, and by the
Histories of Hostius (125) and of Antipater (123). I have, of course,
no intention of presenting in a sketch like this, a summary of early
Roman literature, or a schedule of Latin writers. I only desire to
point out that during the century preceding the birth of Cicero (106),
while there is no definite information concerning the existence in
Rome of any organized book trade, or of publishing machinery, by
means of which books could be manufactured and sold, and
business relations be established between the authors and their
public, a number of important literary enterprises, involving no little
labor and expense, were undertaken. I think there are fair grounds
for the inference that the continued production of books addressed
to the general public implied the existence of a distribution
machinery for reaching such public, and that there were, therefore,
publishers in Rome who found it to their advantage to pay authors
for literary labor many years before the founding of the firm of that
prince of publishers, Atticus, whose business methods are described
by Cicero.
In Rome, as in Athens, the men who first interested themselves in
publishing undertakings, or at least in the publishing of higher class
literature, were men who combined with literary tastes the control of
sufficient means to pay the preparation of the editions. Their aim
was the service of literature and of the State, and not the securing
of profits, and, as a fact, these earlier publishing enterprises must
usually have resulted in a deficiency. As the size of the editions could
easily be limited to the probable demand, and further copies could
always be supplied as called for, it seems at first thought as if the
expense need not have been considerable. The high prices which,
under the competition of a literary fashion, it became necessary to
pay for educated slaves trained as scribes, constituted the most
serious item of outlay. Horace speaks of slaves competent to write
Greek as costing 8000 sesterces, about $400.[145] Calvisius, a rich
dilettante, paid as much as 10,000 sesterces, $500, for each of his
servi literati.[146] In one of the laws of Justinian, in which the
relative price of slaves is fixed for estates to be divided, notarii, or
scribes, are rated fifty per cent. higher than artisans.[147]
Certain proprietors found it to their advantage, partly for their own
service and partly for the sake of making a profit later through their
sale, to give to intelligent young slaves a careful education. Such a
training, in order to produce a really valuable scribe, had to include a
good deal beside reading and penmanship. A servus literatus, to be
competent to prepare trustworthy copies, needed to have a good
knowledge of Greek, and such acquaintance with the works of the
leading authors, Greek and Latin, as would enable him to decipher
with some critical judgment doubtful passages in difficult
manuscripts. It is probable that better work, that is more accurate
work, was done by these selected scribes of the household than by
the copyists employed by the book-dealers. Strabo tells us that as
the making of books became a common undertaking, there was
constant complaint at the inaccuracies and deficiencies of the copies
offered for sale, which had in many cases been prepared by ignorant
scribes writing hastily and carelessly, and which had not afterwards
been collated with the original text.[148] Strabo refers to book-
making establishments in Rome as early as 80 b.c., which was before
the founding of the concern of Atticus, but he does not give us the
names of their managers.
Marcus Crassus, whose staff of skilled slaves included readers,
copyists, and architects, took upon himself the general supervision
of their education, and presided over their classes of instruction.[149]
As is shown by the correspondence of Cicero, Atticus, Pliny, and
others, these educated slaves frequently came into very close
personal relations with their masters, and were cherished as valued
friends. The writers who were employed in the duplicating of books
were called librarii, correspondence clerks, amanuenses, and the
official clerks of public functionaries, scribæ. An inscription quoted
by Gruter indicates that the work of book-copying was sometimes
confided to women—Sextia Xanta scriba Libraria. Copyists who
devoted themselves to deciphering and transcribing old manuscripts,
were known as antiquarii. The term notarii was applied to those who
wrote at dictation, taking reports of speeches and of public
meetings, testimony of witnesses, notes of judicial proceedings, etc.
They were called notarii because they took notes, often in a kind of
shorthand. Such a man was Tiro, a freedman of Cicero.
The man whose name is most intimately connected with the work
of publishing in the time of Cicero was Titus Pomponius Atticus, who
is perhaps best known to us through his correspondence with Cicero.
Atticus organized (about 65 b.c.) a great book-manufacturing
establishment in Rome, with connections in Athens and Alexandria.
He was himself a thorough scholar, and it was because he was so
well versed in the Greek language and literature that the name
Atticus had been given to him. It is probable that his earliest
publishing ventures were editions of the Greek classics, and it is
certain that these always formed a very important proportion of his
undertakings. He had himself brought from Greece an extensive and
valuable collection of manuscripts, which he placed at the service of
Cicero and of other of his literary friends, and the development of
the work of his scribes from the transcription of a few copies for
their friends to the publication of editions for the reading public was
a very natural one.
The editions issued by Atticus, which came to be known as
“Attikians,” Ἀττικίανά, secured wide repute for their accuracy, and
came to be referred to as the authoritative texts. The term
“Attikians” appears to have been used as we might to-day, in
referring to Teubner’s Greek classics, say “the Teubners.” Haenny
speaks[150] of the “Attikians” as welcomed by scholars for their
accuracy and completeness. H. Sauppe tells us that the text of the
oration of Demosthenes against Androtion is based upon the issue of
Atticus.[151] Harpocration refers to the “Atticus texts” of this oration,
and also of Æschines.[152] Galen makes mention of the Atticus
edition of Plato’s Timæus.[153] Haenny points out that some
question has been raised as to whether the term “Attikiana” always
referred to the editions of Titus Pomponius Atticus.[154] He
concludes, with Birt, that this term may, later, having come to stand
for accurate texts and carefully prepared editions, have occasionally
been applied to issues of a later period which could properly be so
described or as a term of compliment. When, however, it was used
in connection with works presumably issued between 65 and 35 b.c.,
it must be understood as referring to the publications of Titus
Pomponius. Fronto always spoke of him simply as Atticus, and he is
so referred to several times by Plutarch. Hemsterhuis[155] quotes a
reference by Lucian. “You appear to think,” says Lucian to the “book-
fools,” bibliomaniacs, “that it is essential for scholarship to possess
many books. Therein, however, you show your ignorance.”
Atticus brought to Rome skilled librarii from Athens, and gave
personal attention to the training of young slaves for his staff of
copyists. He seems also to have sent manuscripts for copying to
both Athens and Alexandria, probably while he was still completing
the organization of his own staff. Such commissions may also have
been due to the fact previously referred to, that of many works the
well authenticated texts could be found only in those two cities, and
after the time of Philadelphus, more particularly in Alexandria.
Atticus was a large collector of books, and won also some
reputation as an author, although his principal work, a series of
chronological tables, belonged perhaps rather to records than to
literature proper. Cicero speaks warmly both of the excellent literary
judgment and of the warm liberality of his publishing friend, and it
seems certain that Atticus took an important part in furthering the
development of Latin literature, and in organizing the publishing
machinery which was thereafter to make it possible for Latin writers
to secure some remuneration for their labors. He seems, in fact, in
every way to have been a model publisher, and to have well
deserved the honor of being the first of his guild whose name has
been preserved in the history of Latin literature. While giving due
credit to his wide-minded liberality in his dealings with authors, and
to his public-spirited expenditure in behalf of literature, it is in order
to bear in mind that with Atticus publishing, while probably carried
on with good business methods, was rather a high-minded diversion
than a money-making occupation. His chief business was that of
banking, in which he became very wealthy. It is not so difficult to be
a Mæcenas among publishers if one is only a Mæcenas to begin
with. It is probable from the little that can be learned concerning the
expenses of book-making and the possibilities of book-selling, that
the publishing interests of Atticus brought him (as far at least as
money is concerned) deficiencies instead of profits, but he doubtless
considered that he was, nevertheless, a gainer by literature when he
had taken into account at its full value the friendship of Cicero.
Among the earlier writings of Cicero certainly published by Atticus
were the Letters, the De Oratore, the Academic Discourses, and the
Oration for Ligarius.[156]
Cicero seems to have been especially well satisfied with the
account of sales rendered for this last, for he writes: “You have done
so well with my Discourse for Ligarius, that I propose hereafter to
place in your hands the sale of all my writings”—Ligarianam
præclare vendidisti; posthac, quidquid scripsero, tibi præconium
deferam.[157]
Several pieces of information are given by this letter. It appears
that Cicero was in the habit of securing remuneration from the sale
of his published works, and that this remuneration was proportioned
to the extent of the sales, and must therefore have been in the
shape either of a royalty or of a share of the net profits. It is further
clear from the emphasis given to his decision that Atticus should
publish his future works, that some other publishing arrangements
were within his reach, and therefore that there were already other
publishers whose facilities were worth consideration in comparison
with those of Atticus.
In this same letter Cicero tells his publishers that he has discovered
an error in this Ligarian Oration (he had spoken of a certain Corfidius
who had been dead for some years as if he were still living), and
that before any more copies were sold, at least three of the librarii
must be put to work to make the necessary correction, from which it
appears that the “remainder” of the edition comprised a good many
copies.
A passage in another letter shows that the ancient, like the
modern, publisher had to keep a record of complimentary copies
given away under instructions of the author, so as to avoid the risk
of including these among the copies accounted for as sold. “I am
obliged to you,” writes Cicero, “for sending me the work by Serapion.
I have given orders that the price of this should be paid to you at
once, so that you should not have it entered on your register of
complimentary copies.”[158]
While the De Oratore was in course of publication, Cicero
discovered that a quotation had been ascribed to Aristophanes which
should properly have been credited to Eupolis. Some copies had
already been sold, but Cicero begs Atticus to have the correction
made in all the copies remaining in the shop, and, as far as possible,
to have the buyers looked up so that their copies might also be
corrected.
Simcox says that “Cicero’s smaller treatises, the Lælius and the
Cato, were probably, like the De Officiis, based upon Greek works,
which he adapted with a well founded confidence that as a great
writer he could improve the style, and that a Roman of rank ought to
be able to improve the substance.”[159] The suggestion is interesting
as indicating a change in the mental attitude of a Roman writer
towards Greek literature.
Cicero used Atticus not only as a publisher but as a literary
counsellor and critic, and evidently placed great confidence in his
friend’s critical judgment. He speaks of waiting in apprehension for
the “crayon strokes” (across the papyrus sheets)—Cerulas enim tuas
miniatas illas extimescebam.[160] Atticus criticises freely, indicates
misused words and erroneous historic references, and suggests
emendations.[161]
It seems evident, from the wording of certain references, that the
copies prepared for sale were usually at least themselves the
property of the bibliophile. Cicero speaks of libri tui,[162] and says
also, illa quæ habes de Academicis.[163] On the other hand, the
author and publisher, occasionally, at least, assumed equal shares of
the cost of the paper (papyrus). Cicero writes to Atticus, quoniam
impensam fecimus in macrocolla, facile patior teneri.[164] This share
taken by the author in the outlay in addition to his investment of
literary labor, may very properly have been taken into account in
arriving at a division of the profits, but we have no figures to show
on what basis such division was made. While the Discourse on
Ligarius produced, as we have seen, a profit, the publication of the
first series of Academic Discourses (Academica Priora) resulted in
loss, and the full amount of this loss appears to have been borne by
the publisher. Cicero, referring to the large portion of the edition
remaining unsold, writes, tu illam jacturam feres æquo animo, quod
illa, quæ habes de Academicis, frustra descripta sunt; multo tamen
hæc (i. e., academica posteriora, the later or the revised series)
erunt splendidiora, breviora, meliora.[165] “You will bear the loss with
equanimity, since the copies that you have left on your hands of the
Academic Discourses comprise in fact but a portion of the venture.
The revised editions of these will be more brilliant, more compact,
and in every way better.” Cicero wishes to show that this revision
should certainly prove popular and salable, and should more than
make up the loss incurred on the first edition.
Birt points out[166] the difference in the publishing arrangements
entered into by Cicero from those referred to by Martial. Cicero has
apparently a direct business interest in the continued sale of his
books, an interest, therefore, probably based upon a percentage.
Martial, on the other hand, appears to have accepted from the
publishers some round sum, a præmium libellorum, for each of his
several works, a sum which is evidently too small to make him
happy. On this ground he says it is, from a pecuniary point of view, a
matter of indifference to him whether his writings find few readers
or many—Quid prodest? nescit sacculus ista meus.[167]
Unfortunately no catalogue or even partial list of the publishing
ventures of Atticus has been preserved, and the references in the
letters of Cicero are almost the sole source of information in regard
to them. Cicero speaks of the treatise of Aulus Hirtius upon Cato as
one of the publications of Atticus.[168] Birt finds record of the issue
by him of a series of carefully edited Greek classics (published in the
original), for the texts of which the trustworthy manuscripts of the
Athenian “calligrapher,” or copyist, Callinus were followed.[169] Birt is
also my authority for the conclusion that Atticus did not confine his
book business to his publishing house, but that he established retail
shops, tabernarii, in different quarters of Rome, and possibly also in
one or two of the great provincial capitals.[170]
While no publisher of the time occupied any such prominent
position in the world of letters as Atticus, it seems evident from the
references made by Roman authors to the arrangements for the sale
of their books, that other publishing concerns already existed in
Rome, although no other names have been preserved. It is probable
that no one of his contemporaries possessed the exceptional
advantages afforded by the wealth of Atticus in carrying on literary
undertakings of uncertain business value, and it is probable also that
the competition of a publisher to whom the financial result of his
venture was a matter of small importance, must frequently have
been perplexing to the dealers whose capital was limited and whose
income was dependent upon their publishing business. In fact, the
exceptional business methods of Atticus may easily for a time have
discouraged or rendered difficult the development on sound business
foundations of publishing in Rome.
Important as the undertakings of Atticus unquestionably were for
the furthering of the production and the distribution of literature, in
Rome, we should have known practically nothing concerning his
work as a publisher if it were not for the fortunate preservation of
the series of letters written to him by Cicero. If these letters had
been destroyed, the name of Atticus would have come into the
history of his time only as that of a rich banker and a public-spirited
citizen. The honorable friendship between this old-time publisher
and his most important author was of service to literature in more
ways than one. Other Roman publishers of greater importance must
have taken up the work of Atticus, but no similar series of letters has
been preserved to commemorate their virtues and their services.
Boissier[171] is of opinion that Tiro acted as publisher for certain of
Cicero’s writings; he uses the phrase Tiron et Atticus, les deux
éditeurs de Cicéron. The evidences, however, concerning Tiro’s
career as a publisher do not appear to be conclusive. Tiro was a
favorite slave of Cicero, a Greek by birth, and evidently a man of
education. He served as Cicero’s secretary, and, as the
correspondence shows, was regarded by his master as a valued
friend. As secretary, he unquestionably had during Cicero’s lifetime a
full share of responsibility in preparing Cicero’s writings for
publication, and after the death of his master he appears to have
acted as a kind of literary executor.
It is probably to this class of service that Quintilian referred when
he spoke of him as the compiler and publisher of the writings of
Marcus Tullius.[172] Gellius, in quoting the fifth oration against
Verres, speaks of the edition or the “book” as one of accepted
authority, prepared under the supervision and personal knowledge of
Tiro.[173]
Haenny is of opinion that Tiro never had any publishing business,
but that his services were simply those first of a secretary and later
of an editor and literary executor. Seneca is authority for the
statement that after the death of Cicero his works and the right to
their continued publication were bought from Atticus by the
bookseller Dorus;[174] see also Birt.[175] This same Dorus was, says
Seneca, the publisher of the history of Livy: Sic potest T. Livius a
Doro accipere aut emere libros suos.
The writings of Catullus and the famous treatise on the Nature of
Things of Lucretius were the most important of the works published
between 75 and 50 b.c. during the time of Cicero’s correspondence
with Atticus. Lucretius appears to have had little personal vanity
concerning his work, which did not appear until after his death. It is
probable, but not certain, that the former was issued by Atticus.
Géraud says that there were at this time in Rome a large number of
public writers, or professional copyists (librarii), who devoted
themselves to transcribing for sale the older classics, and who also
took commissions from authors for the production of small editions
of volumes prepared for private circulation.[176] Their work might in
fact be compared to that of the typewriters of to-day, whose signs
are multiplying in all our large cities. These “writers” were principally
Greeks, and it was probably for this cause that their Latin work not
infrequently evoked criticism. Cicero, writing to his brother Quintus,
concerning some Latin books which Quintus had asked him to
purchase, says it was difficult to know where to go for these,
because most of the texts offered for sale were so bad—ita mendose
et scribuntur et veneunt.[177]
These librarii took upon themselves the work not only of
transcribing but of binding and decorating the covers of the books
sold by them. The contrast between a scribe of this kind, working at
bookmaking in his stall like a cobbler making shoes, and the great
establishment of the banker-publisher Atticus, must have been
marked enough.
Horace writes:[184]