Quintus Remmius Palaemon or Quintus Rhemnius Fannius Palaemon
[.] was a
Roman grammarian
Grammarian may refer to:
* Alexandrine grammarians, philologists and textual scholars in Hellenistic Alexandria in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BCE
* Biblical grammarians, scholars who study the Bible and the Hebrew language
* Grammarian (Greco-Roman ...
and a native of
Vicentia
Vicenza ( , ; ) is a city in northeastern Italy. It is in the Veneto region at the northern base of the ''Monte Berico'', where it straddles the Bacchiglione River. Vicenza is approximately west of Venice and east of Milan.
Vicenza is a thr ...
. He lived during the reigns of
Emperors Tiberius and
Claudius
Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (; 1 August 10 BC – 13 October AD 54) was the fourth Roman emperor, ruling from AD 41 to 54. A member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, Claudius was born to Nero Claudius Drusus, Drusu ...
.
Life
From
Suetonius
Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus (), commonly referred to as Suetonius ( ; c. AD 69 – after AD 122), was a Roman historian who wrote during the early Imperial era of the Roman Empire.
His most important surviving work is a set of biographies ...
, we learn that he was originally a
slave
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
who obtained his freedom and taught grammar at
Rome.
Suetonius preserves several anecdotes of his profligate and arrogant character.
[ He was so steeped in luxury that he bathed several times a day. Tiberius and Claudius both felt he was too dissolute to allow boys and young men to be entrusted to him. He referred to the great grammarian Varro as a "pig." However, he had a remarkable memory and wrote poetry in unusual meters, and he enjoyed a great reputation as a teacher;][ ]Quintilian
Marcus Fabius Quintilianus (; 35 – 100 AD) was a Roman educator and rhetorician from Hispania, widely referred to in medieval schools of rhetoric and in Renaissance writing. In English translation, he is usually referred to as Quintilia ...
and Persius are said to have been his pupils.[
]
Works
His lost ''Ars'', a system of grammar much used in his own time and largely drawn upon by later grammarians, contained rules for correct diction, illustrative quotations and discussed barbarism
Barbarism, barbarity, or barbarous may refer to:
* Barbarism (linguistics), a non-standard word, expression, or pronunciation
** Hybrid words, formerly called "barbarisms"
* Any society construed as barbarian
** Barbarian invasions, a period of m ...
s and solecisms.[ An extant '' Ars grammatica'' (discovered by ]Jovianus Pontanus
Giovanni Pontano (1426–1503), later known as Giovanni Gioviano ( la, Ioannes Iovianus Pontanus), was a humanist and poet from Cerreto di Spoleto, in central Italy. He was the leading figure of the Accademia Pontaniana after the death of Antonio ...
in the 15th century) and other unimportant treatises on similar subjects have been wrongly ascribed to him.[
Among Palaemon's ascribed works is a ''Song on Weights and Measures'' (')][ now dated to between the late 4th and early 6th centuries. In this poem, first edited in 1528, the term ''gramma'' is used for a weight equal to two ]oboli
The obol ( grc-gre, , ''obolos'', also ὀβελός (''obelós''), ὀβελλός (''obellós''), ὀδελός (''odelós''). "nail, metal spit"; la, obolus) was a form of ancient Greek currency and weight.
Currency
Obols were u ...
.[.] (Two oboli—a ''diobol''—corresponds to 1/24th of a Roman ounce or about 1.14 grams.) This eventually led to the adoption of the term '' gram'' as a unit of weight (''poids'', later of mass) by the French National Convention in 1795.
References
Citation
Bibliography
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External links
Bibliography on Palaemon at ''Corpus Grammaticorum Latinorum''
{{Authority control
Imperial Roman slaves and freedmen
Grammarians of Latin
Ancient linguists
1st-century Romans