Deity of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. His works, which show him to have been learned and laborious but somewhat deficient in critical acumen, include a Spicilegium SS. Patrum et haereticorum
(1698–1699), which was designed to cover the first three centuries of the Christian church, but was not continued beyond the close of the second. A second edition of this work was published in 1714. He brought out an edition of Justin Martyr’s Apologia prima (1700), of Irenaeus, Adversus omnes haereses (1702), of the Septuagint,
and of Bishop Bull’s Latin works (1703). His edition of the Septuagint was based on the Codex Alexandrinus; it appeared in 4 volumes (1707–1720), and was completed by Francis Lee and by George Wigan.
GRACCHUS, in ancient Rome, the name of a plebeian family of the Sempronian gens. Its most distinguished representatives were the famous tribunes of the people, Tiberius and Gaius Sempronius Gracchus, (4) and (5) below, usually called simply “the Gracchi.”
1. Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, consul in 238 B.C., carried on successful operations against the Ligurian mountaineers, and, at the conclusion of the Carthaginian mercenary war, was in command of the fleet which at the invitation of the insurgents took possession of the island of Sardinia.
2. Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus, probably the son of (1), distinguished himself during the second Punic war. Consul in 215, he defeated the Capuans who had entered into an alliance with Hannibal, and in 214 gained a signal success over Hanno near Beneventum, chiefly owing to the volones (slave-volunteers), to whom he had promised freedom in the event of victory. In 213 Gracchus was consul a second time and carried on the war in Lucania; in the following year, while advancing northward to reinforce the consuls in their attack on Capua, he was betrayed into the hands of the Carthaginian Mago by a Lucanian of rank, who had formerly supported the Roman cause and was connected with Gracchus himself by ties of hospitality. Gracchus fell fighting bravely; his body was sent to Hannibal, who accorded him a splendid burial.
3. Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus (c. 210–151 B.C.), father of the tribunes, and husband of Cornelia, the daughter of the elder Scipio Africanus, was possibly the son of a Publius Sempronius Gracchus who was tribune in 189. Although a determined political opponent of the two Scipios (Asiaticus and Africanus), as tribune in 187 he interfered on their behalf when they were accused of having accepted bribes from the king of Syria after the war. In 185 he was a member of the commission sent to Macedonia to investigate the complaints made by Eumenes II. of Pergamum against Philip V. of Macedon. In his curule aedileship (182) he celebrated the games on so magnificent a scale that the burdens imposed upon the Italian and extra-Italian communities led to the official interference of the senate. In 181 he went as praetor to Hither Spain, and, after gaining signal successes in the field, applied himself to the pacification of the country. His strict sense of justice and sympathetic attitude won the respect and affection of the inhabitants; the land had rest for a quarter of a century. When consul in 177, he was occupied in putting down a revolt in Sardinia, and brought back so many prisoners that Sardi venales (Sardinians for sale) became a proverbial expression for a drug in the market. In 169 Gracchus was censor, and both he and his colleague (C. Claudius Pulcher) showed themselves determined opponents of the capitalists. They deeply offended the equestrian order by forbidding any contractor who had obtained contracts under the previous censors to make fresh offers. Gracchus stringently enforced the limitation of the freedmen to the four city tribes, which completely destroyed their influence in the comitia. In 165 and 161 he went as ambassador to several Asiatic princes, with whom he established friendly relations. Amongst the places visited by him was Rhodes, where he delivered a speech in Greek, which he afterwards published. In 163 he was again consul.
4. Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus (163–133 B.C.), son of (3), was the elder of the two great reformers. He and his brother were brought up by their mother Cornelia, assisted by the rhetorician Diophanes of Mytilene and the Stoic Blossius of Cumae. In 147 he served under his brother-in-law the younger Scipio in Africa during the last Punic war, and was the first to mount the walls in the attack on Carthage. When quaestor in 137, he accompanied the consul C. Hostilius Mancinus to Spain. During the Numantine war the Roman army was saved from annihilation only by the efforts of Tiberius, with whom alone the Numantines consented to treat, out of respect for the memory of his father. The senate refused to ratify the agreement; Mancinus was handed over to the enemy as a sign that it was annulled, and only personal popularity saved Tiberius himself from punishment. In 133 he was tribune, and championed the impoverished farmer class and the lower orders. His proposals (see Agrarian Laws) met with violent opposition, and were not carried until he had, illegally and unconstitutionally, secured the deposition of his fellow-tribune, M. Octavius, who had been persuaded by the optimates to veto them. The senate put every obstacle in the way of the three commissioners appointed to carry out the provisions of the law, and Tiberius, in view of the bitter enmity he had aroused, saw that it was necessary to strengthen his hold on the popular favour. The legacy to the Roman people of the kingdom and treasures of Attalus III. of Pergamum gave him an opportunity. He proposed that the money realized by the sale of the treasures should be divided, for the purchase of implements and stock, amongst those to whom assignments of land had been made under the new law. He is also said to have brought forward measures for shortening the period of military service, for extending the right of appeal from the judices to the people, for abolishing the exclusive privilege of the senators to act as jurymen, and even for admitting the Italian allies to citizenship. To strengthen his position further, Tiberius offered himself for re-election as tribune for the following year. The senate declared that it was illegal to hold this office for two consecutive years; but Tiberius treated this objection with contempt. To win the sympathy of the people, he appeared in mourning, and appealed for protection for his wife and children, and whenever he left his house he was accompanied by a bodyguard of 3000 men, chiefly consisting of the city rabble. The meeting of the tribes for the election of tribunes broke up in disorder on two successive days, without any result being attained, although on both occasions the first divisions voted in favour of Tiberius. A rumour reached the senate that he was aiming at supreme power, that he had touched his head with his hand, a sign that he was asking for a crown. An appeal to the consul P. Mucius Scaevola to order him to be put to death at once having failed, P. Scipio Nasica exclaimed that Scaevola was acting treacherously towards the state, and called upon those who agreed with him to take up arms and follow him. During the riot that followed, Tiberius attempted to escape, but stumbled on the slope of the Capitol and was beaten to death with the end of a bench. At night his body, with those of 300 others, was thrown into the Tiber. The aristocracy boldly assumed the responsibility for what had occurred, and set up a commission to inquire into the case of the partisans of Tiberius, many of whom were banished and others put to death. Even the moderate Scaevola subsequently maintained that Nasica was justified in his action; and it was reported that Scipio, when he heard at Numantia of his brother-in-law’s death, repeated the line of Homer—“So perish all who do the like again.”
See Livy, Epit. 58; Appian, Bell. civ. i. 9-17; Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus; Vell. Pat. ii. 2, 3.
5. Gaius Sempronius Gracchus (153–121 B.C.), younger brother of (4), was a man of greater abilities, bolder and more passionate, although possessed of considerable powers of self-control, and a vigorous and impressive orator. When twenty years of age he was appointed one of the commissioners to carry out the distribution of land under the provisions of his brother’s agrarian law. At the time of Tiberius’s death, Gaius was serving under his brother-in-law Scipio in Spain, but probably returned to Rome in the following year (132). In 131 he supported the bill of C. Papirius Carbo, the object of which was to make it legal for a tribune to offer himself as candidate for the office in two consecutive years, and thus to remove
