CORNUTUS

Form: Lucius Annoeus.

A native of Leptis, in Africa. A professor of the Stoic philosophy, who lived in Rome in the middle of the lat century A.D. He was a friend of the poets Lucan and Persius, especially of the latter, whose posthumous satires he prepared for publication. He was banished by Nero, in A.D. 68, for his uprightness and courage. He was the author of works on rhetoric, grammar and philosophy. Of his philosophical works one remains, an essay on the Nature of the Gods, written in Greek. This is perhaps only an extract from a larger work. Cassiodorus (q.v.) has pre served part of a grammatical treatise by Cornutus, entitled De Orthographia ("On Orthography").