Returning to Spain in 1679, Antonio died at Madrid in the spring of 1684. His Bibliotheca Hispana nova, dealing with the works of Spanish authors who flourished after 1500, appeared at Rome in 1672; the Bibliotheca Hispana vetus, a literary history of Spain from the time of Augustus to the end of the 15th century, was revised by Manuel Martí, and published by Antonio’s friend, Cardinal José Saenz de Aguirre at Rome in 1696. A fine edition of both parts, with additional matter found in Antonio’s manuscripts, and with supplementary notes by Francisco Perez Bayer, was issued at Madrid in 1787–1788. This great work, incomparably superior to any previous bibliography, is still unsuperseded and indispensable.
Of Antonio’s miscellaneous writings the most important is the posthumous Censura de historias fabulosas (Valencia, 1742), in which erudition is combined with critical insight. His Bibliotheca Hispana rabinica has not been printed; the manuscript is in the national library at Madrid.
ANTONIO DE LEBRIJA [Antonius Nebrissensis], (1444–1522), Spanish scholar, was born at Lebrija in the province of Andalusia. After studying at Salamanca he resided for ten years in Italy, and completed his education at Bologna University. On his return to Spain (1473), he devoted himself to the advancement of classical learning amongst his countrymen. After holding the professorship of poetry and grammar at Salamanca, he was transferred to the university of Alcalá de Henares, where he lectured until his death in 1522, at the age of seventy-eight. His services to the cause of classical literature in Spain have been compared with those rendered by Valla, Erasmus and Budaeus to Italy, Holland and France. He produced a large number of works on a variety of subjects, including a Latin and Spanish dictionary, commentaries on Sedulius and Persius, and a Compendium of Rhetoric, based on Aristotle, Cicero and Quintilian. His most ambitious work was his chronicle entitled Rerum in Hispania Gestarum Decades (published in 1545 by his son as an original work by his father), which twenty years later was found to be merely a Latin translation of the Spanish chronicle of Pulgar, which was published at Saragossa in 1567. De Lebrija also took part in the production of the Complutense polyglot Bible published under the patronage of Cardinal Jimenes.
Antonio, Bibliotheca Hispana Nova, i. 132 (1888); Prescott, History of Ferdinand and Isabella, i. 410 (note); MacCrie, The Reformation in Spain in the Sixteenth Century (1829).
ANTONIUS, the name of a large number of prominent citizens of ancient Rome, of the gens Antonia. Antonius the triumvir claimed that his family was descended from Anton, son of Heracles. Of the Antonii the following are important.
1. Marcus Antonius (143–87 B.C.), one of the most distinguished Roman orators of his time, was quaestor in 113, and praetor in 102 with proconsular powers, the province of Cilicia being assigned to him. Here he was so successful against the pirates that a naval triumph was awarded him. He was consul in 99, censor 97, and held a command in the Marsic War in 90. An adherent of Sulla, he was put to death by Marius and Cinna when they obtained possession of Rome (87). Antonius’s reputation for eloquence rests on the authority of Cicero, none of his orations being extant. He is one of the chief speakers in Cicero’s De Oratore.
Velleius Paterculus ii. 22; Appian, Bell. Civ. i. 72; Dio Cassius xlv. 47; Plutarch, Marius, 44; Cicero, Orator, 5, Brutus, 37; Quintilian, Instit. iii. 1, 19; O. Enderlein, De M. Antonio oratore (Leipzig, 1882).
2. Marcus Antonius, nicknamed Creticus in derision, elder son of Marcus Antonius, the “orator,” and father of the triumvir. He was praetor in 74 B.C., and received an extraordinary command (similar to that bestowed upon Pompey by the Gabinian law) to clear the sea of pirates, and thereby assist the operations against Mithradates VI. He failed in the task, and made himself unpopular by plundering the provinces (Sallust, Hist. iii., fragments ed. B. Maurenbrecher, p. 108; Velleius Paterculus ii. 31; Cicero, In Verrem, iii. 91). He attacked the Cretans, who had made an alliance with the pirates, but was totally defeated, most of his ships being sunk. Diodorus Siculus (xl. 1) states that he only saved himself by a disgraceful treaty. He died soon afterwards (72–71) in Crete. All authorities are agreed as to his avarice and incompetence.
3. Gaius Antonius, nicknamed Hybrida from his half-savage disposition (Pliny, Nat. Hist. viii. 213), second son of Marcus Antonius, the “orator,” and uncle of the triumvir. He was one of Sulla’s lieutenants in the Mithradatic War, and, after Sulla’s return, remained in Greece to plunder with a force of cavalry. In 76 he was tried for his malpractices, but escaped punishment; six years later he was removed from the senate by the censors, but soon afterwards reinstated. In spite of his bad reputation, he was elected tribune in 71, praetor in 66, and consul with Cicero in 63. He secretly supported Catiline, but Cicero won him over by promising him the rich province of Macedonia. On the outbreak of the Catilinarian conspiracy, Antonius was obliged to lead an army into Etruria, but handed over the command on the day of battle to Marcus Petreius on the ground of ill-health. He then went to Macedonia, where he made himself so detested by his oppression and extortions that he left the province, and was accused in Rome (59) both of having taken part in the conspiracy and of extortion in his province. It was said that Cicero had agreed with Antonius to share his plunder. Cicero’s defence of Antonius two years before in view of a proposal for his recall, and also on the occasion of his trial, increased the suspicion. In spite of Cicero’s eloquence, Antonius was condemned, and went into exile at Cephallenia. He seems to have been recalled by Caesar, since he was present at a meeting of the senate in 44, and was censor in 42.
Cicero, In Cat. iii. 6, pro Flacco, 38; Plutarch, Cicero, 12; Dio Cassius xxxvii. 39, 40; xxxviii. 10. On his trial see article in Pauly-Wissowa’s Realencyclopädie.
4. Marcus Antonius, commonly called Mark Antony, the Triumvir, grandson of Antonius the “orator” and son of Antonius Creticus, related on his mother’s side to Julius Caesar, was born about 83 B.C. Under the influence of his stepfather, Cornelius Lentulus Sura, he spent a profligate youth. For a time he co-operated with P. Clodius Pulcher, probably out of hostility to Cicero, who had caused Lentulus Sura to be put to death as a Catilinarian; the connexion was severed by a disagreement arising from his relations with Clodius’s wife, Fulvia. In 58 he fled to Greece to escape his creditors. After a short time spent in attendance on the philosophers at Athens, he was summoned by Aulus Gabinius, governor of Syria, to take part in the campaigns against Aristobulus in Palestine, and in support of Ptolemy Auletes in Egypt. In 54 he was with Caesar in Gaul. Raised by Caesar’s influence to the offices of quaestor, augur, and tribune of the plebs, he supported the cause of his patron with great energy, and was expelled from the senate-house when the Civil War broke out. Deputy-governor of Italy during Caesar’s absence in Spain (49), second in command in the decisive battle of Pharsalus (48), and again deputy-governor of Italy while Caesar was in Africa (47), Antony was second only to the dictator, and seized the opportunity of indulging in the most extravagant excesses, depicted by Cicero in the Philippics. In 46 he seems to have taken offence because Caesar insisted on payment for the property of Pompey which Antony professedly had purchased, but had in fact simply appropriated. The estrangement was not of long continuance; for we find Antony meeting the dictator at Narbo the following year, and rejecting the suggestion of Trebonius that he should join in the conspiracy that was already on foot. In 44 he was consul with Caesar, and seconded his ambition by the famous offer of the crown at the festival of Lupercalia (February 15). After the murder of Caesar on the 15th of March, Antony conceived the idea of making himself sole ruler. At first he seemed disposed to treat the conspirators leniently, but at the same time he so roused the people against them by the publication of Caesar’s will and by his eloquent funeral oration, that they were obliged to leave the city. He surrounded himself with a bodyguard of Caesar’s veterans, and forced the senate to transfer to him the province of Cisalpine Gaul, which was then administered by Decimus Junius Brutus, one of the conspirators. Brutus refused to surrender the province, and Antony set out to attack him in October 44,
