Magister Domino: Intellectual and Pedagogical Power in Fronto’s Correspondence 1

This paper examines the epistolarity of Fronto’s correspondence with Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, arguing that, through careful self-fashioning as magister and rhetor, Fronto exploits the epistolary genre to assert his proximity to the imperial court and to promote his status as Rome’s leading intellectual. Fronto’s epistolary strategies reflect a negotiation of the complex power dynamic between letter-writer and recipient, which shifts over time with the political climate. Fronto’s use of the epistolary genre to promote his status, moreover, reflects the competitive milieu of the postclassical context, in which letter-writing constitutes a legitimate venue for the public display of intellectual expertise.