FOOTNOTES:
[1] That Cicero up to the time of his consulship had been connected rather with the populares is illustrated by Quintus (de Petit. i.) urging him to make it clear that he had never been a demagogue, but that if he had ever spoken "in the spirit of the popular party, he had done so with the view of attracting Pompey."
[2] De Orat. ii. §§ 1, 2.
[3] "The city, the city, my dear Rufus—stick to that, and live in its full light. Residence elsewhere—as I made up my mind early in life—is mere eclipse and obscurity to those whose energy is capable of shining at Rome."—Fam. ii. 12 (vol. ii., p. 166).
[4] Even at these he found troublesome people to interrupt him. See vol. i., pp. [102], [104].
[5] Yet the announcement of the birth of his son (p. [16]) and of the dangerous confinement of Tullia (vol. ii., p. 403) are almost equally brief.
[6] See [Att. ii. 1], vol. i., p. [62]; Plut. Cic. 13; Cic. in Pis. § 4.
[7] Die Entstchungsgeschichte der catilinarischen Verschwörung, by Dr. Constantin John, 1876. I am still of opinion that Plutarch's statement can be strongly supported.
[8] Cæsar said, οὺ μὴν καὶ προσήκειν ἐπὶ τοῐς παρεληλυθόσι τοιοῠτόν τινα νόμον συγγράφεσθαι (Dio, xxxviii. 17).
[9] "The man who did not so much as raise me up, when I threw myself at his feet."—Att. x. 4 (vol. ii., p. 362). Similar allusions to Pompey's conduct to him on the occasion often occur.
[11] See vol. i., pp. [129], [138]; cp. pro Planc. §§ 95-96.
[12] [Fam. i. 9, 15] (vol. i., p. [316]).
[13] Letter [CVII], vol. i., pp. [219], [220].
[14] Ever since its capture in the second Punic War, Capua had ceased to have any corporate existence, and its territory had been ager publicus, let out to tenants (aratores). Cæsar had restored its corporate existence by making it a colonia, and much of the land had been allotted to veterans of his own and Pompey's armies. The state thus lost the rent of the land, one of the few sources of revenue from Italy now drawn by the exchequer of Rome.
[15] Letter [CLII], vol. i., pp. [310-324].
[16] Quoted by Flavius Charisius, Ars Gramm. i., p. 126 (ed. Kiel).
[17] Vol. ii., p. 204.
[19] [CLXXVIII]-[CLXXXI]. The date of the letter to P. Sittius ([CLXXVIII]) is not certain.
[21] Letter DXXXIII (Fam. iv. 14), about October, B.C. 46.
[22] Vol. i., p. [226]; Pliny, Ep., vii. 33.
[23] Pomponia, married to Cicero's younger brother Quintus. We shall frequently hear of this unfortunate marriage. Quintus was four years younger than his brother, who had apparently arranged the match, and felt therefore perhaps somewhat responsible for the result (Nep. Att. 5).
[24] Atticus had estates and a villa near Buthrotum in Epirus,—Butrinto in Albania, opposite Corfu.
[25] This is probably Sext. Peducæus the younger, an intimate friend of Atticus (Nep. Att. 21); his father had been prætor in Sicily when Cicero was quæstor (B.C. 76-75), the son was afterwards a partisan of Cæsar in the Civil War, governor of Sardinia, B.C. 48, and proprætor in Spain, B.C. 39.
[26] The person alluded to is L. Lucceius, of whom we shall hear again. See Letters [V], [VII], [VIII], [CVIII]. What his quarrel with Atticus was about, we do not know.
[27] Prescriptive right to property was acquired by possession (usus) of two years. But no such right could be acquired to the property of a girl under guardianship (pro Flacco, § 84).
[28] C. Rabirius, whom Cicero defended in B.C. 63, when prosecuted by Cæsar for his share in the murder of Saturninus (B.C. 100). He lived, we know, in Campania, for his neighbours came to give evidence in his favour at the trial.
[29] M. Fonteius made a fortune in the province of Gaul beyond the Alps, of which he was proprætor, B.C. 77-74. In B.C. 69 he had been accused of malversation, and defended by Cicero. After his acquittal he seems to be buying a seaside residence in Campania, as so many of the men of fashion did.
[30] Cicero's "gymnasium" was some arrangement of buildings and plantations more or less on the model of the Greek gymnasia, at his Tusculan villa.
[31] The mother of Atticus lived to be ninety, dying in B.C. 33, not long before Atticus himself, who at her funeral declared that "he had never been reconciled to her, for he had never had a word of dispute with her" (Nep. Att. 17).
[32] This sum (about £163) is for the works of art purchased for the writer by Atticus.
[33] Thyillus (sometimes written Chilius), a Greek poet living at Rome. See Letters [XVI] and [XXI]. The Eumolpidæ were a family of priests at Athens who had charge of the temple of Demeter at Eleusis. The πάτρια Εὐμολπιδῶν (the phrase used by Cicero here) may be either books of ritual or records such as priests usually kept: πάτρια is an appropriate word for such rituals or records handed down by priests of one race or family.
[34] Lucceius, as in the first letter and the next.
[35] The comitia were twice postponed this year. Apparently the voting for Cicero had in each case been completed, so that he is able to say that he was "thrice returned at the head of the poll by an unanimous vote" (de Imp. Pomp. § 2). The postponement of the elections was probably connected with the struggles of the senate to hinder the legislation (as to bribery) of the Tribune, Gaius Cornelius (Dio, 36, 38-39).
[36] The first allusion in these letters to the disturbed position of public affairs. See the passage of Dio quoted in the previous note. There were so many riots in the interval between the proclamation and the holding of the elections, not without bloodshed, that the senate voted the consuls a guard.
[37] The point of this frigid joke is not clear. Was the grandmother really dead? What was she to do with the Latin feriæ? Mr. Strachan Davidson's explanation is perhaps the best, that Cicero means that the old lady was thinking of the Social War in B.C. 89, when the loyalty of the Latin towns must have been a subject of anxiety. She is in her dotage and only remembers old scares. This is understanding civitates with Latinæ. Others understand feriæ or mulieres. Saufeius, a Roman eques, was an Epicurean, who would hold death to be no evil. He was a close friend of Atticus, who afterwards saved his property from confiscation by the Triumvirs (Nep. Att. 12).
[38] Cneius Sallustius, a learned friend of Cicero's, of whom we shall often hear again.
[39] C. Calpurnius Piso, quæstor B.C. 58, died in B.C. 57. The marriage took place in B.C. 63.
[40] The annalist C. Licinius Macer was impeached de repetundis (he was prætor about B.C. 70 or 69, and afterwards had a province), and finding that he was going to be condemned, committed suicide. He was never therefore condemned regularly (Val. Max. ix. 127; Plut. Cic. 9). Cicero presided at the court as prætor.
[41] The books must have been a very valuable collection, or Cicero would hardly have made so much of being able to buy them, considering his lavish orders for statues or antiques.
[42] One of the judices rejected by Verres on his trial, a pontifex and augur.
[43] Agent of Atticus.
[44] C. Antonius (uncle of M. Antonius) was elected with Cicero. Q. Cornificius had been tr. pl. in B.C. 69. See Letter [XVIII].
[45] M. Cæsonius, Cicero's colleague in the ædileship. He had lost credit as one of the Iunianum concilium in the trial of Oppianicus.
[46] Aufidius Lurco, tr. pl. B.C. 61. M. Lollius Palicanus, tr. pl. some years previously.
[47] L. Iulius Cæsar, actually consul in B.C. 64, brother-in-law of Lentulus the Catilinarian conspirator, was afterwards legatus to his distant kinsman, Iulius Cæsar, in Gaul. A. Minucius Thermus, defended by Cicero in B.C. 59, but the identification is not certain. D. Iunius Silanus got the consulship in the year after Cicero (B.C. 62), and as consul-designate spoke in favour of executing the Catilinarian conspirators.
[48] The text is corrupt in all MSS. I have assumed a reading, something of this sort, quæ cum erit absoluta, sane facile ac libenter eum nunc fieri consulem viderim. This at any rate gives nearly the required sense, which is that Cicero regards the influence which Thermus will gain by managing the repair of the Flaminia as likely to make him a formidable candidate, and therefore he would be glad to see him elected in the present year 65 (nunc) rather than wait for the next, his own year.
[49] C. Calpurnis Piso, consul in B.C. 67, then proconsul of Gallia Transalpina (Narbonensis). He was charged with embezzlement in his province and defended by Cicero in B.C. 63. There were no votes in Transalpine Gaul, but Cicero means in going and coming to canvass the Cispadane cities.
[50] Pompey was this year on his way to take over the Mithridatic War. But Cicero may have thought it likely that he or some of his staff would pass through Athens and meet Atticus.
[51] L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, prætor in B.C. 58, and consul B.C. 54, fell at Pharsalia, fighting against Cæsar.
[52] Q. Cæcilius, a rich uncle of Atticus, so cross-grained that no one but Atticus could get on with him, to whom he accordingly left his large fortune (Nep. Att. 5).
[53] Hom. Il. xxii. 159, Achilles pursuing Hector:
"Since not for sacred beast or oxhide shield
They strove,—man's guerdon for the fleet of foot:
Their stake was Hector's soul, the swift steed's lord."
[54] Reading eius ἀνάθημα, and taking the latter word in the common sense of "ornament": the Hermathena is so placed that the whole gymnasium is as it were an ornament to it, designed to set it off, instead of its being a mere ornament to the gymnasium. Professor Tyrrell, however, will not admit that the words can have this or any meaning, and reads, ἡλίου ἄναμμα, "sun light"—"the whole gymnasium seems as bright as the sun"—a curious effect, after all, for one statue to have.
[55] Asconius assigns this to the accusation of embezzlement in Africa. But that seems to have been tried in the previous year, or earlier in this year. The new impeachment threatened seems to have been connected with his crimes in the proscriptions of Sulla (Dio, xxxvii, 10). Cicero may have thought of defending him on a charge relating to so distant a period, just as he did Rabirius on the charge of murdering Saturninus (B.C. 100), though he had regarded his guilt in the case of extortion in Africa as glaring.
[56] The essay on the duties of a candidate attributed to Quintus is hardly a letter, and there is some doubt as to its authenticity. I have therefore relegated it to an appendix.
[57] Q. Metellus Celer had been prætor in B.C. 63 and was now (B.C. 62), as proconsul in Gallia Cisalpina, engaged against the remains of the Catilinarian conspiracy. Meanwhile his brother (or cousin) Q. Cæcilius Metellus Nepos, a tribune, after trying in vain to bring Cicero to trial for the execution of the conspirators, at last proposed to summon Pompey to Rome to prevent danger to the lives of citizens. This attempt led to riots and contests with Cato, and Nepos finally fled from Rome to Pompey. By leaving Rome he broke the law as to the tribunes, and the senate declared his office vacant, and this letter would even seem to shew that the senate declared him a public enemy. This letter of remonstrance is peremptory, if not insolent, in tone, and the reader will observe that the formal sentences, dropped in more familiar letters, are carefully used.
[58] Metellus had been employed with Antonius against the camp at Fæsulæ, but was now engaged against some Alpine tribes.
[59] When Metellus was commanding against Catiline, it is suggested that he marched towards Rome to support his brother, but this is conjecture.
[60] Sister of P. Clodius. Of this famous woman we shall hear often again. She is believed to be the Lesbia of Catullus, and she is the "Palatine Medea" of the speech pro Cælio. Yet, in spite of Cicero's denunciations of her, he seems at one time to have been so fond of her society as to rouse Terentia's jealousy.
[61] Wife of Pompey—divorced by him on his return from the East.
[62] On the next meeting of the senate. The second was a dies comitialis on which the senate usually did not meet (Cæs. B. Civ. i. I).
[63] For the riots caused by his contests with Cato (on which the senate seems to have passed the senatus consultum ultimum), and for his having left Rome while tribune.
[64] P. Sestius was serving as proquæstor in Macedonia under Gaius Antonius. As tribune in B.C. 57 he worked for Cicero's recall, but was afterwards prosecuted de vi, and defended by Cicero.
[65] Gaius Antonius, Cicero's colleague in the consulship. He had the province of Macedonia after the consulship, Cicero having voluntarily withdrawn in his favour to secure his support against Catiline. Scandal said that he had bargained to pay Cicero large sums from the profits of the province. He governed so corruptly and unsuccessfully that he was on his return condemned of maiestas.
[66] From expressions in the following letters it seems certain that this refers to money expected from Gaius Antonius; but we have no means of deciding whether or no Teucris is a pseudonym for some agent. Cicero had undertaken to be the advocate and supporter of Antonius, and though as an actual patronus in court he could not take money, he may have felt justified in receiving supplies from him. Still, he knew the character of Antonius, and how such wealth was likely to be got, and it is not a pleasant affair.
[67] Money-lenders.
[68] The rich and cross-grained uncle of Atticus. See Letter [X].
[69] Cicero quotes half a Greek verse of Menander's, ταὐτόματον ἡμῶν, leaving Atticus to fill up the other two words, καλλίω βουλεύεται, "Chance designs better than we ourselves."
[70] Mucia was suspected of intriguing with Iulius Cæsar.
[71] The chief festival of the Bona Dea (Tellus) was in May. The celebration referred to here took place on the night between the 3rd and 4th of December. It was a state function (pro populo), and was celebrated in the presence of the Vestals and the wife of the consul or prætor urbanus, in ea domo quæ est in imperio. As Cæsar was Pontifex Maximus, as well as prætor urbanus, it took place in the Regia, the Pontiff's official house (Plutarch, Cic. 19; Dio, xxxvii. 35).
[72] The word (comperisse) used by Cicero in regard to the Catilinarian conspiracy; it had apparently become a subject of rather malignant chaff.
[73] Cicero is hinting at the danger of prosecution hanging over the head of Antonius.
[74] Reading tibi ipsi (not ipse), with Tyrrell.
[75] Ora soluta. Or, if ancora sublata be read, "when the anchor was already weighed." In either case it means "just as you were starting." Atticus wrote on board, and gave the letter to a carrier to take on shore.
[76] A word lost in the text.
[77] See end of Letter [XXI]. Cicero playfully supposes that Atticus only stayed in his villa in Epirus to offer sacrifices to the nymph in his gymnasium, and then hurried off to Sicyon, where people owed him money which he wanted to get. He goes to Antonius first to get his authority for putting pressure on Sicyon, and perhaps even some military force.
[78] C. Calpurnius Piso (consul B.C. 67), brother of the consul of the year, had been governor of Gallia Narbonensis (B.C. 66-65), and had suppressed a rising of the Allobroges, the most troublesome tribe in the province, who were, in fact, again in rebellion.
[79] M. Pupius Piso.
[80] "By the expression of his face rather than the force of his expressions" (Tyrrell).
[82] Pompey.
[83] Or, "inclose with my speech"; in both cases the dative orationi meæ is peculiar. No speech exists containing such a description, but we have only two of the previous year extant (pro Flacco and pro Archia Poeta). Cicero was probably sending it, whichever it was, to Atticus to be copied by his librarii, and published. Atticus had apparently some other works of Cicero's in hand, for which he had sent him some "queries."
[84] Apparently the speech in the senate referred to in Letter [XIV], p. [23], spoken on 1st January, B.C. 62. Metellus had prevented his contio the day before.
[85] The letter giving this description is lost. I think frigebat is epistolary imperfect—"he is in the cold shade," not, "it fell flat."
[86] πανήγυρις. Cicero uses the word (an honourable one in Greek) contemptuously of the rabble brought together at a market.
[87] Pompey's general commendation of the decrees of the senate would include those regarding the Catiline conspirators, and he therefore claimed to have satisfied Cicero.
[88] Meis omnibus litteris, the MS. reading. Prof. Tyrrell's emendation, orationibus meis, omnibus litteris, "in my speeches, every letter of them," seems to me even harsher than the MS., a gross exaggeration, and doubtful Latin. Meis litteris is well supported by literæ forenses et senatoriæ of de Off. 2, § 3, and though it is an unusual mode of referring to speeches, we must remember that they were now published and were "literature." The particular reference is to the speech pro Imperio Pompeii, in which, among other things, the whole credit of the reduction of Spartacus's gladiators is given to Pompey, whereas the brunt of the war had been borne by Crassus.
[89] Fufius, though Cicero does not say so, must have vetoed the decree, but in the face of such a majority withdrew his veto. The practice seems to have been, in case of tribunician veto, to take the vote, which remained as an auctoritas senatus, but was not a senatus consultum unless the tribune was induced to withdraw.
[90] Comperisse. See Letter [XVII], [note 1], p. [28].
[91] See Letters [XVI] and [XVIII], pp. [26], [32].
[92] παντοίης ἀρέτης μιμνήσκεο (Hom. Il. xxii. 8)
[93] The allotment of provinces had been put off (see [last letter]) till the affair of Clodius's trial was settled; consequently Quintus would not have much time for preparation, and would soon set out. He would cross to Dyrrachium, and proceed along the via Egnatia to Thessalonica. He might meet Atticus at Dyrrachium, or go out of his way to call on him at Buthrotum.
[94] ὕστερον πρότερον Ὁμηρικῶς.
[95] That is, the resolution of the senate, that the consuls should endeavour to get the bill passed.
[96] Cicero deposed to having seen Clodius in Rome three hours after he swore that he was at Interamna (ninety miles off), thus spoiling his alibi.
[97] The difficulty of this sentence is well known. The juries were now made up of three decuriæ—senators, equites, and tribuni ærarii. But the exact meaning of tribuni ærarii is not known, beyond the fact that they formed an ordo, coming immediately below the equites. Possibly they were old tribal officers who had the duty of distributing pay or collecting taxes (to which the translation supposes a punning reference), and as such were required to be of a census immediately below that of the equites. I do not profess to be satisfied, but I cannot think that Professor Tyrrell's proposal makes matters much easier—tribuni non tam ærarii, ut appellantur, quam ærati; for his translation of ærati as "bribed" is not better supported, and is a less natural deduction than "moneyed."
[98] I.e., the Athenians. Xenocrates of Calchedon (B.C. 396-314), residing at Athens, is said to have been so trusted that his word was taken as a witness without an oath (Diog. Laert. IV. ii. 4).
[99] Q. Cæcilius Numidicus, consul B.C. 109, commanded against Iugurtha. The event referred to in the text is said to have occurred on his trial de repetundis, after his return from a province which he had held as proprætor (Val. Max. II. x. 1).
[100] Hom. Il. xvi. 112:
ἕσπετε νῦν μοι, Μοῦσαι, Ὀλύμπια δώματ' ἔχουσαι
ὅππως δὴ πρῶτον πῦρ ἔμπεσε νηυσὶν Ἀχαίων.
[101] The reference is to Crassus. But the rest is very dark. The old commentators say that he is here called ex Nanneianis because he made a large sum of money by the property of one Nanneius, who was among those proscribed by Sulla. His calling Crassus his "panegyrist" is explained by Letter [XIX], pp. [33-34].
[102] C. Curio, the elder, defended Clodius. He had bought the villa of Marius (a native of Arpinum) at Baiæ.
[103] Q. Marcius Rex married a sister of Clodius, and dying, left him no legacy.
[104] L. Afranius.
[105] Reading deterioris histrionis similis, "like an inferior actor."
[106] Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, married to Cato's sister. Consul B.C. 54. A strong aristocrat and vehement opponent of Cæsar.
[107] Aufidius Lurco had apparently proposed his law on bribery between the time of the notice of the elections (indictio) and the elections themselves, which was against a provision of the leges Ælia et Fufia. What his breach of the law was in entering on his office originally we do not know: perhaps some neglect of auspices, or his personal deformity.
[108] I.e. to Quintus Cicero, now proprætor in Asia, who apparently wished his brother-in-law to come to Asia in some official capacity.
[109] Some epigrams or inscriptions under a portrait bust of Cicero in the gymnasium of Atticus's villa at Buthrotum. Atticus had a taste for such compositions. See Nepos, Att. 18; Pliny, N. H. 35, § 11.
[110] Cicero had defended Archias, and Thyillus seems also to have been intimate with him: but he says Archias, after complimenting the Luculli by a poem, is now doing the same to the Cæcilii Metelli. The "Cæcilian drama" is a reference to the old dramatist, Cæcilius Statius (ob. B.C. 168).
[111] Of Amaltheia, nurse of Zeus in Crete, there were plenty of legends. Atticus is making in his house something like what Cicero had made in his, and called his academia or gymnasium. That of Atticus was probably also a summer house or study, with garden, fountains, etc., and a shrine or statue of Amaltheia.
[112] Cicero is evidently very anxious as to the misunderstanding between Quintus and his brother-in-law Atticus, caused, as he hints, or at any rate not allayed, by Pomponia. The letter is very carefully written, without the familiar tone and mixture of jest and earnest common to most of the letters to Atticus.
[113] At the end of the via Egnatia, which started from Dyrrachium.
[114] The election in question is that to be held in B.C. 60 for the consulship of B.C. 59. Cæsar and Bibulus were elected, and apparently were the only two candidates declared as yet. They were, of course, extremists, and Lucceius seems to reckon on getting in by forming a coalition with either one or the other, and so getting the support of one of the extreme parties, with the moderates, for himself. The bargain eventually made was between Lucceius and Cæsar, the former finding the money. But the Optimates found more, and carried Bibulus. Arrius is Q. Arrius the orator (see Index). C. Piso is the consul of B.C. 67.
[115] Reading (mainly with Schutz) animus præsens et voluntas, tamen etiam atque etiam ipsa medicinam refugit. The verb refugit is very doubtful, but it gives nearly the sense required. Cicero is ready to be as brave and active as before, but the state will not do its part. It has, for instance, blundered in the matter of the law against judicial corruption. The senate offended the equites by proposing it, and yet did not carry the law. I think animus and voluntas must refer to Cicero, not the state, to which in his present humour he would not attribute them.
[116] The temple of Iuventas was vowed by M. Livius after the battle of the Metaurus (B.C. 207), and dedicated in B.C. 191 by C. Licinius Lucullus, games being established on the anniversary of its dedication (Livy, xxi. 62; xxxvi. 36). It is suggested, therefore, that some of the Luculli usually presided at these games, but on this occasion refused, because of the injury done by C. Memmius, who was curule ædile.
[117] By Agamemnon and Menelaus Cicero means Lucius and Marcus Lucullus; the former Memmius had, as tribune in B.C. 66-65, opposed in his demand for a triumph, the latter he has now injured in the person of his wife.
[118] A man who was sui iuris was properly adopted before the commitia curiata, now represented by thirty lictors. What Herennius proposed was that it should take place by a regular lex, passed by the comitia tributa. The object apparently was to avoid the necessity of the presence of a pontifex and augur, which was required at the comitia curiata. The concurrent law by the consul would come before the comitia centuriata. The adopter was P. Fonteius, a very young man.
[119] L. Afranius, the other consul.
[120] M. Lollius Palicanus, "a mere mob orator" (Brutus, §223).
[121] The toga picta of a triumphator, which Pompey, by special law, was authorized to wear at the games. Cicero uses the contemptuous diminutive, togula.
[122] To be absent from the census without excuse rendered a man liable to penalties. Cicero will therefore put up notices in Atticus's various places of business or residence of his intention to appear in due course. To appear just at the end of the period was, it seems, in the case of a man of business, advisable, that he might be rated at the actual amount of his property, no more or less.
[123] A special title given to the Ædui on their application for alliance. Cæsar, B. G. i. 33.
[124] The migration of the Helvetii did not actually begin till B.C. 58. Cæsar tells us in the first book of his Commentaries how he stopped it.
[125] Consul B.C. 69, superseded in Crete by Pompey B.C. 65. Triumphed B.C. 62.
[126] Prætor B.C. 63, defended by Cicero in an extant oration.
[127] Cn. Cornelius Lentulus Clodianus, consul in B.C. 72. Cicero puns on the name Lentulus from lens (pulse, φακή), and quotes a Greek proverb for things incongruous. See Athenæus, 160 (from the Necuia of Sopater):
Ἴθακος Ὀδυσσεὺς, τὸ ἐκὶ τῇ φακῇ μύρον
πάρεστι· θάρσει, θυμέ.
[128] B.C. 133, the year before the agrarian law of Tiberius Gracchus. The law of Gracchus had not touched the public land in Campania (the old territory of Capua). The object of this clause (which appears repeatedly in those of B.C. 120 and 111, see Bruns, Fontes Iuris, p. 72) is to confine the allotment of ager publicus to such land as had become so subsequently, i.e., to land made "public" principally by the confiscations of Sulla.
[129] That is, he proposed to hypothecate the vectigalia from the new provinces formed by Pompey in the East for five years.
[130] The consulship. The bribery at Afranius's election is asserted in Letter [XXI].
[131] The day of the execution of the Catilinarian conspirators.
[132] Epicharmus, twice quoted by Polybius, xviii. 40; xxxi. 21. νᾶφε καὶ μέμνας' ἀπιστεῖν, ἄρθρα ταῦτα τῶν φρενῶν.
[133] Pedarii were probably those senators who had not held curule office. They were not different from the other senators in point of legal rights, but as ex-magistrates were asked for their sententia first, they seldom had time to do anything but signify by word their assent to one or other motion, or to cross over to the person whom they intended to support.
[134] P. Servilius Vatia Isauricus, son of the conqueror of the Isaurians. As he had not yet been a prætor, he would be called on after the consulares and prætorii. He then moved a new clause to the decree, and carried it.
[135] The decree apparently prevented the recovery of debts from a libera civitas in the Roman courts. Atticus would therefore have to trust to the regard of the Sicyonians for their credit.
[136] A son must be hard up for something to say for himself if he is always harping on his father's reputation; and so must I, if I have nothing but my consulship. That seems the only point in the quotation. I do not feel that there is any reference to praise of his father in Cicero's own poem. There are two versions of the proverb:
τίς πατέρ' αἰνήσει εἰ μὴ κακοδαίμονες υἱοί
and
τίς πατέρ' αἰνήσει εἰ μὴ εὐδαίμονες υἱοί.
[137] Contained in Letter [XXII], pp. [46-47].
[138] Reading tibi for mihi, as Prof. Tyrrell suggests.
[139] Σπάρτην ἔλαχες κείνην κοσμεῖ. "Sparta is your lot, do it credit," a line of Euripides which had become proverbial.
[140] οἱ μὲν παρ' οὐδέν εἰσι, τοῖς δ' οὐδεν μέλει. Rhinton, a dramatist, circa B.C. 320-280 (of Tarentum or Syracuse).
[141] See pp. [52], [56], [65].
[143] The lex Cincia (B.C. 204) forbade the taking of presents for acting as advocate in law courts.
[144] Nep. Att. c. 18.
[145] Atticus seems to have seen a copy belonging to some one else at Corfu. Cicero explains that he had kept back Atticus's copy for revision.
[146] Cicero evidently intends Atticus to act as a publisher. His librarii will make copies. See p. 32, [note 1].
[147] The passage in brackets is believed by some, not on very good grounds, to be spurious. Otho is L. Roscius Otho, the author of the law as to the seats in the theatre of the equites. The "proscribed" are those proscribed by Sulla, their sons being forbidden to hold office, a disability which Cicero maintained for fear of civil disturbances. See in Pis. §§ 4-5.
[148] Pulchellus, i.e., P. Clodius Pulcher, the diminutive of contempt.
[149] Where he had been as quæstor. Hera is said to be another name for Hybla. Some read heri, "only yesterday."
[150] Clodius is shewing off his modesty. It was usual for persons returning from a province to send messengers in front, and to travel deliberately, that their friends might pay them the compliment of going out to meet them. Entering the city after nightfall was another method of avoiding a public reception. See Suet. Aug. 53.
[152] Clodia, wife of the consul Metellus. See p. 22, [note].
[153] We don't know who this is; probably a cavaliere servente of Clodia's.
[154] I.e., in the business of her brother Clodius's attempt to get the tribuneship.
[155] Though Cæsar has been mentioned before in regard to his candidature for the consulship, and in connexion with the Clodius case, this is the first reference to him as a statesman. He is on the eve of his return from Spain, and already is giving indication of his coalition with Pompey. His military success in Spain first clearly demonstrated his importance.
[156] During the meeting of the senate at the time of the Catilinarian conspiracy (2 Phil. § 16).
[157] The consul Cæcilius Metellus was imprisoned by the tribune Flavius for resisting his land law (Dio, xxxvii. 50).
[158] M. Favonius, an extreme Optimate. Ille Catonis æmulus (Suet. Aug. 13). He had a bitter tongue, but a faithful heart (Plut. Pomp. 60, 73; Vell. ii 73). He did not get the prætorship (which he was now seeking) till B.C. 49. He was executed after Philippi (Dio. 47, 49).
[159] P. Scipio Nasica Metellus Pius, the future father-in-law of Pompey, who got the prætorship, was indicted for ambitus by Favonius.
[160] Ἀπολλόνιος Μόλων of Alabanda taught rhetoric at Rhodes. Cicero had himself attended his lectures. He puns on the name Molon and molæ, "mill at which slaves worked."
[162] Reading discessionibus, "divisions in the senate," with Manutius and Tyrrell, not dissentionibus; and deinde ne, but not st for si.
[163] His study, which he playfully calls by this name, in imitation of that of Atticus. See p. [30].
[164] See Letter [XV], p. [25].
[165] His translation of the Prognostics of Aratus.
[166] Gaius Octavius, father of Augustus, governor of Macedonia.
[167] The roll being unwound as he read and piled on the ground. Dicæarchus of Messene, a contemporary of Aristotle, wrote on "Constitutions" among other things. Procilius seems also to have written on polities.
[168] Herodes, a teacher at Athens, afterwards tutor to young Cicero. He seems to have written on Cicero's consulship.
[169] These remarks refer to something in Atticus's letter.
[170] Gaius Antonius, about to be prosecuted for maiestas on his return from Macedonia.
[171] P. Nigidius Figulus, a tribune (which dates the letter after the 10th of December). The tribunes had no right of summons (vocatio), they must personally enforce their commands.
[172] "The Conqueror," i.e., Pompey. Aulus's son is L. Afranius.
[173] I.e., his military get-up.
[174] Cyrus was Cicero's architect; his argument or theory he calls Cyropædeia, after Xenophon's book.
[175] He supposes himself to be making a mathematical figure in optics:
[176] The theory of sight held by Democritus, denounced as unphilosophical by Plutarch (Timoleon, Introd.).
[177] Apparently a villa in the Solonius ager, near Lanuvium.
[178] The Cornelius Balbus of Gades, whose citizenship Cicero defended B.C. 56 (consul B.C. 40). He was Cæsar's close friend and agent.
[179] Cicero was apparently not behind the scenes. The coalition with Pompey certainly, and with Crassus probably, had been already made and the terms agreed upon soon after the elections. If Cicero afterwards discovered this it must have shewn him how little he could trust Pompey's show of friendship and Cæsar's candour. Cæsar desired Cicero's private friendship and public acquiescence, but was prepared to do without them.
[180] From Cicero's Latin poem on his consulship.
[181] εἶς οἰωνός ἄριστος ἀμύνεσθαι περὶ πάτρης (Hom. Il. xii. 243).
[182] A country festival and general holiday. It was a feriæ conceptivæ, and therefore the exact day varied. But it was about the end of the year or beginning of the new year (in Pis. § 4; Aul. Gell. x. 24; Macrob. Sat. i. 4; ad Att. vii. 5; vii. 7, § 2).
[183] Of the persons mentioned, L. Ælius Tubero is elsewhere praised as a man of learning (pro Lig. § 10); A. Allienus (prætor B.C. 49) was a friend and correspondent; M. Gratidius is mentioned in pro Flacco, § 49, as acting in a judicial capacity, and was perhaps a cousin of Cicero's.
[184] The class of Romans who have practically become provincials.
[185] Rome and its society and interests.
[186] Father of Augustus, governor of Macedonia, B.C. 60-59. But he seems to refer to his prætorship (B.C. 61) at Rome; at any rate, as well as to his conduct in Macedonia.
[187] Reading primum; others primus, "his head lictor."
[188] That is, if it ends in his death, for Meliodorus of Skepsis was sent by Mithridates to Tigranes to urge him to go to war with Rome, but privately advised him not to do so, and, in consequence, was put to death by Mithridates (Plut. Luc. 22). The word Scepsii (Σκηψίου) was introduced by Gronovius for the unintelligible word Syrpie found in the MSS., which so often blunder in Greek names.
[189] Clodius, alluding to his intrusion into the mysteries.
[190] Atticus has asked Cicero for a Latin treatise on geography—probably as a publisher, Cicero being the prince of book-makers—and to that end has sent him the Greek geography of Serapio.
[191] In his Formianum or Pompeianum, his villas at Formiæ and Pompeii.
[192] An architect, a freedman of Cyrus, of whom we have heard before.
[193] The triumvirs. The mission to Egypt was in the affairs of Ptolemy Auletes (father of Cleopatra), who was this year declared a "friend and ally." He soon got expelled by his subjects.
[194] Il. vi. 442; xxii. 100. Cicero's frequent expression for popular opinion, or the opinion of those he respects—his Mrs. Grundy.
[195] Theophanes, a philosopher of Mitylene, a close friend of Pompey's, in whose house he frequently resided. He took charge of Pompey's wife and children in B.C. 48-47.
[196] Q. Arrius, an orator and friend of Cæsar's, by whose help he had hoped for the consulship. See p. [49].
[197] Q. Cæcilius Metellus Nepos (consul B.C. 57). His brother, the consul of B.C. 60, had just died and made a vacancy in the college of augurs.
[198] A captive brought by Lucullus, who became a friend of Cicero and tutor to his son and nephew.
[199] One of the two yearly officers of a colony—they answer to the consuls at Rome. Therefore Cicero means, "I wish I had been a consul in a small colony rather than a consul at Rome."
[200] For distribution of land under Cæsar's law. P. Vatinius was a tribune this year, and worked in Cæsar's interests.
[201] Theopompus of Chios, the historian (Att. vi. 1, § 12). Born about B.C. 378. His bitterness censured by Polybius, viii. 11-13.
[202] The money due from the treasury to Q. Cicero in Asia. He wants it to be paid in Roman currency (denarii), not in Asiatic coins (cistophori), a vast amount of which Pompey had brought home and deposited in the treasury. So an Indian official might like sovereigns instead of rupees if he could get them.
[203] As he was a man sui iuris, Clodius's adoption into a new gens (adrogatio) would have to take place before the comitia curiata (now represented by thirty lictors), which still retained this formal business. The ceremony required the presence of an augur and a pontifex to hold it. Cicero supposes Pompey and Cæsar as intending to act in that capacity. Pompey, it seems, did eventually attend.
[204] One of the twenty commissioners under Cæsar's agrarian law. Cicero was offered and declined a place among them. The "only man," of course, refers to the intrusion on the mysteries.
[205] To Egypt.
[206] This seems also to refer to the twenty agrarian commissioners, who, according to Mommsen, were divided into committees of five, and were, therefore, spoken of indifferently as quinqueviri and vigintiviri. But it is somewhat uncertain.
[207] κατὰ τὸ πρακτικόν.
[208] Castricius seems to have been a negotiator or banker in Asia. We don't know what mistake is referred to; probably as to some money transmitted to Pomponia.
[209] It is suggested that Aristodemus is some teacher of the two young Ciceros, to whom the young Marcus wishes to apologize for his absence or to promise some study.
[210] Perhaps some inscription or other ornament for Atticus's gymnasium in his villa at Buthrotum.
[211] A verse from Lucilius. "Young Curio" is the future tribune of B.C. 50, who was bribed by Cæsar, joined him at Ravenna at the end of that year, was sent by him in B.C. 49 to Sicily and Africa, and fell in battle with the Pompeians and King Iuba.
[212] L. Saufeius, the Epicurean friend of Atticus (see Letter [II]). He seems to mean, "as indefatigable as Saufeius." But Prof. Tyrrell points out that it might mean, "at the risk of your thinking me as Epicurean and self-indulgent as Saufeius, I say," etc.
[213] The bay of Misenum, near which was Cicero's Pompeianum.
[214] Q. Cæcilius Bassus, probably quæstor at Ostia. Antium would be in his district.
[215] βοῶπις, sc. Clodia. She is to talk to her brother about Cicero. She is "Iuno" perhaps as an enemy—as Bacon called the Duchess of Burgundy Henry VII.'s Iuno—or perhaps for a less decent reason, as coniux sororque of Publius.
[216] Pompey, who was proud of having taken Jerusalem. Traductor ad plebem, said of the magistrate presiding at the comitia for adoption.
[217] Cicero himself. Clodius may have called him this from his biting repartees. Prof. Tyrrell, "Tear 'em."
[218] The nobility, whom Cicero has before attacked as idle and caring for nothing but their fish-ponds (piscinarii, cp. p. 59).
[219] The lex Ælia (about B.C. 150) was a law regulating the powers of magistrates to dissolve comitia on religious grounds, such as bad omens, servata de cœlo, etc. Cicero (who could have had very little belief in the augural science) regards them as safeguards of the state, because as the Optimates generally secured the places in the augural college, it gave them a hold on elections and legislation. Bibulus tried in vain to use these powers to thwart Cæsar this year. The lex Cæcilia Didia (.B.C. 98) enforced the trinundinatio, or three weeks' notice of elections and laws, and forbade the proposal of a lex satura, i.e., a law containing a number of miscellaneous enactments. Perhaps its violation refers to the acta of Pompey in the East, which he wanted to have confirmed en bloc. The senate had made difficulties: but one of the fruits of the triumvirate was a measure for doing it. The lex Iunia et Licinia (B.C. 62) confirmed the Cæcilia Didia, and secured that the people knew what the proposed laws were.
[220] As Pompey did in Asia, e.g., to Deiotarus of Galatia, and about ten others. It is curious that Cicero speaks of the pauci just as his opponent Cæsar and Augustus after him. Each side looks on the other as a coterie (Cæsar, B. C. i. 22; Monum. Ancyr. i. § 1)
[221] Theophrastus, successor of Aristotle at the Lyceum, Athens (p. [70]).
[222] The purple-bordered toga of the augur. Vatinius did not get the augurship. He had some disfiguring swelling or wen.
[223] Himself.
[224] ἄνδρ' ἀπαμύνεσθαι, ὅτε τις πρότερος χαλεπήνῃ (Hom. Il. xxiv. 369).
[225] Written in Greek, perhaps by the boy himself.
[226] Where the road from Antium joins the Appia. Cicero seems to be on his way to Formiæ, where he had intended to arrive on the 21st. He must be going very leisurely.
[227] Δικαίαρχος and ἀδικαίαρχοι, a pun on a name not reproducible in English: "just-rulers" and "unjust-rulers."
[228] On the via Appia. Cicero halts at Appii Forum and at once despatches a short note, probably by some one he finds there going to Rome, to announce a change of plan. He had meant to get back to Antium on 6th May, because Tullia wanted to see the games. See Letter [XXXIV], p. [96].
[229] Homer, Odyss. ix. 27.
[230] τηλέπυλον Λαιστρυγονίην, whose king Lamus (Odyss. x. 81) was supposed to have founded Formiæ (Horace, Od. iii. 17).
[231] A despatch from senate or consuls. See Letter [XXIV], p. [60].
[232] At comparem for at quam partem. At has its usual force of introducing a supposed objection. I can't, say you, compare the Æmilian tribe, the Formiani, to a crowd in a court-house! They are not so bad as that, not so wasteful of time! I take basilica to mean the saunterers in a basilica, as we might say "the park" for the company in it, "the exchange" for the brokers in it. I feel certain that Prof. Tyrrell is wrong in ascribing the words sed—sunt to a quotation from Atticus's letter. What is wanted is to remove the full stop after sunt. The contrast Cicero is drawing is between the interruption to literary work of a crowd of visitors and of one or two individuals always turning up. The second is the worse—and here I think all workers will agree with him: the crowd of visitors (vulgus) go at the regular hour, but individuals come in at all hours.
[233] Because he would be inclined to sell it cheap in his disgust.
[234] The spectacle Cicero hopes for is Clodius's contests with the triumvirs.
[235] To Arpinum (see [last letter]). The verse is not known, and may be a quotation from his own poem on Marius. He often quotes himself.
[236] This is not mentioned elsewhere. The explanation seems to be that for the ager publicus allotted under the Sempronian laws a small rent had been exacted, which was abolished by a law of B.C. 111 (the name of the law being uncertain). But some ager publicus still paid rent, and the publicanus Mulvius seems to have claimed it from some land held by Terentia, perhaps on the ground that it was land (such as the ager Campanus) not affected by the law of Gracchus, and therefore not by the subsequent law abolishing rent.
[237] Cæsar.
[238] The old territory of Capua and the Stellatian Plain had been specially reserved from distribution under the laws of the Gracchi, and this reservation had not been repealed in subsequent laws: ad subsidia reipublicæ vectigalem relictum (Suet. Cæs. 20; cp. Cic. 2 Phil. § 101).
[239] According to Suetonius 20,000 citizens had allotments on the ager publicus in Campania. But Dio says (xxxviii. 1) that the Campanian land was exempted by the lex Iulia also. Its settlement was probably later, by colonies of Cæsar's veterans. A iugerum is five-eighths of an acre.
[240] See Letter [XXIX], p. [82]. They were abolished B.C. 60.
[241] This and the mention of Cæsar's "army" (a bodyguard) is explained by Suet. Cæs. 20: "Having promulgated his agrarian law, Cæsar expelled his colleague, Bibulus, by force of arms from the Forum when trying to stop proceedings by announcing bad omens ... and finally reduced him to such despair that for the rest of his year of office he confined himself to his house and only announced his bad omens by means of edicts." Bibulus appears to have been hustled by the mob also.
[242] πρόσθε λέων ὄπιθεν δὲ ——. Cicero leaves Atticus, as he often does, to fill up the rest of the line, δράκων, μέσση δὲ χίμαιρα (Hom. Il. vi. 181). He means, of course, that Quintus is inconsistent.
[243] The question seems to be as to goods brought to a port and paying duty, and then, not finding a sale, being transferred to another port in the same province. The publicani at the second port demanded the payment of a duty again, which Cicero decides against them.
[244] Schutz takes this to mean, "Are the quæstors now doubting as to paying even cistophori?" i.e., are they, so far from paying in Roman denarii, even hesitating to pay in Asiatic? But if so, what is the extremum which Cicero advises Quintus to accept? Prof. Tyrrell, besides, points out that the quæstors could hardly refuse to pay anything for provincial expenses. It is a question between cistophori and denarii. See p. [92].
[245] The marriage of Pompey with Cæsar's daughter Iulia.
[246] ἀδιαφορία, a word taken from the Stoies, huic [Zenoni] summum bonum est in his rebus neutram in partem moveri, quæ ἀδιαφορία ab ipso dicitur (Acad. ii. § 130).
[247] C. Curius, one of the Catiline set, who had been ignominiously expelled from the senate.
[248] Another nickname of Pompey, from the title of the head of the Thebais in Egypt. Like Sampsiceramus and the others, it is meant as a scornful allusion to Pompey's achievements in the East, and perhaps his known wish to have the direction of affairs in Egypt.
[249] See Letter [XIX], p. [35].
[250] I.e., Cæsar's agrarian law, by which some of the Campanian ager publicus was to be divided.
[251] M. Iuventius Laterensis. See Letter [L], p. [123].
[252] Pulchellus, i.e., P. Clodius Pulcher. The diminutive is used to express contempt. Cicero, since his return to Rome, is beginning to realize his danger.
[253] A libera legatio was really a colourable method of a senator travelling with the right of exacting certain payments for his expenses from the Italian or provincial towns. Sometimes it was simply a legatio libera, a sinecure without any pretence of purpose, sometimes it was voti causa, enabling a man to fulfil some vow he was supposed to have made. It was naturally open to much abuse, and Cicero as consul had passed a law for limiting it in time. Clodius would become tribune on 10 December, and this libera legatio would protect Cicero as long as it lasted, but it would not, he thinks, last long enough to outstay the tribuneship: if he went as legatus to Cæsar in Gaul, he would be safe, and might choose his own time for resigning and returning to Rome.
[254] Statius, a slave of Quintus, was unpopular in the province. See p. [125].
[255] Terence, Phorm. 232.
[256] ἅλις δρυός, i.e., feeding on acorns is a thing of the past, it is out of date, like the golden age when they fed on wild fruit et quæ deciderant patula Iovis arbore glandes (Ovid, Met. i. 106); and so is dignity, it is a question of safety now.
[257] Ennius on Q. Fabius Maximus Cunctator.
[258] Pompey was in Campania acting as one of the twenty land commissioners.
[259] The lex Roscia theatralis (B.C. 67), which gave fourteen rows of seats to the equites.
[260] That is, the law for distribution of corn among poorer citizens. There were many such. Perhaps the most recent was the lex Cassia Terentia (B.C. 73). Cæsar, who, when in later years he became supreme, restricted this privilege, may have threatened to do so now.
[261] I.e., as one of the twenty land commissioners. The next clause seems to refer to some proverbial expression, "to be invited to a place at Pluto's table," or some such sentence. Cicero means that his acceptance would be equivalent to political extinction, either from the obscurity of Cosconius or the inconsistency of the proceeding.
[262] The uncle of Atticus. See p. [15].
[263] After the scene of violence in which Bibulus, on attempting to prevent the agrarian law being passed, was driven from the rostra, with his lictors' fasces broken, he shut himself up in his house and published edicts declaring Cæsar's acts invalid, and denouncing the conduct of Pompey (Suet. Cæs. 20; Dio, xxxviii. 6).
[264] M. Terentius Varro, "the most learned of the Romans," and author of very large numbers of books. He was afterwards one of Pompey's legati in Spain. He survived most of the men of the revolutionary era.
[265] See Letter [XXIV], p. [56].
[266] I.e., in biting language. Archilochum proprio rabies armavit iambo (Hor. A. P. 79).
[267] The Cosmographia of Alexander of Ephesus. See Letter [XLVIII], p. [120].
[268] Appius Claudius Pulcher, elder brother of P. Clodius.
[269] The speeches known to us of this year are those for his colleague, C. Antonius, A. Thermus, and L. Flaccus. The two former are lost, but we know from his own account that he had not avoided touching on politics in the speech for Antonius, but had so offended Pompey and Cæsar that they at once carried out the adoption of Clodius (de Domo, § 41).
[270] Βοῶπις, i.e., Clodia. See Letters [XXXV], [XL]. Crasso urgente is difficult. Cicero must mean that while Crassus (whom he always regards as hostile to himself) is influencing Pompey, he cannot trust what Pompey says, and must look for real information elsewhere.
[271] Alexander of Ephesus. See Letter [XLVI], p. [115].
[272] I.e., between the time of his election and of his entering on his office. The tribunes entered on their office on the 10th of December; the elections usually took place in July, but were postponed till October this year by Bibulus. See Letter [XLVI], p. [115].
[273] Reclamatum est. The MSS. have haud reclamatum est, "it was not refused."
[274] Marcus Iunius Brutus, the future assassin of Cæsar, adopted by his uncle, Q. Servilius Cæpio. The father of Lentulus was flamen Martialis (L. Lentulus), in Vat. § 25. Paullus is L. Æmilius Paullus, consul B.C. 50.
[275] Cum gladiatoribus. Others omit cum, in which case the meaning will be "at the gladiatorial shows of Gabinius." As some date is wanted, this is probably right.
[276] Under the lex de sicariis of Sulla carrying a weapon with felonious intent was a capital crime, for which a man was tried inter sicarios. See 2 Phil. §§ 8, 74.
[277] Q. Lutatius Catulus, who died in the previous year, B.C. 60, had been a keen opponent of Cæsar, who tried to deprive him of the honour of dedicating the restored Capitoline temple, and beat him in the election of Pontifex Maximus.
[278] Servilia, mother of Brutus, was reported to be Cæsar's mistress. As Cicero is insinuating that the whole affair was got up by Cæsar to irritate Pompey with the boni, this allusion will be understood.
[279] If Vettius did say this, he at any rate successfully imitated Cicero's manner. These names are always in his mouth. See 2 Phil. §§ 26, 87; pro Mil.. §§ 8, 82, etc. For a farther discussion of Vettius, see [Appendix B].
[280] Probably a prætor, not the triumvir.
[281] Q. Considius Gallus, who, according to Plutarch (Cæs. 13), said in the senate that the attendance of senators was small because they feared a massacre. "What made you come, then?" said Cæsar. "My age," he replied; "I have little left to lose."
ἑλικτὰ κοὐδὲν ὑγιὲς ἀλλὰ πᾶν πέριξ φρονοῦντες.
Eur. Androm. 448.
"With tortuous thoughts, naught honest, winding all."
τὰς τῶν κρατούντων ἀμαθίας φέρειν χρεών.
Eur. Phœn. 393.
"Follies of those in power we needs must bear."
[284] L. Valerius Flaccus, as prætor in B.C. 63, had assisted Cicero in the Catiline conspiracy. He was now being tried for embezzlement in Asia, and was defended by the famous Q. Hortensius (Hortalus) and Cicero—the only extant speech of this year.
[285] ἀλλ' αἰεί τινα φῶτα μέγαν καὶ καλὸν ἐδέγμην, "but I ever expected some big and handsome man" (Hom. Odyss. ix. 513). Statius had been manumitted by Quintus Cicero, and there had been much talk about it, as we have already heard. See [XLIV], p. [109], and [XLV], p. [111].
[286] Reading quam pro civitate sua for prope quam civitatem suam. I think prope and pro (pr) might easily have been mistaken for each other, and if the order of quam and pro (mistaken for prope) were once changed, the case of civitate would follow. Prof. Tyrrell, who writes the town Blandus, would read molliorem for nobiliorem, and imagines a pun on the meaning of Blandus. But the name of the town seems certainly Blaundus, Βλαῦνδος, or Μλαῦνδος (Stephanus, Βλαῦδος); see Head, Hist. Num. p. 559: and Cicero, though generally punning on names, would hardly do so here, where he is making a grave excuse.
[287] Whom he called (Letter [XXIX]) "a madman and a knave."
[288] C. Vergilius Balbus, proprætor in Sicily (pro Planc. § 95; Letter [XXIX]). C. Octavius (father of Augustus), in Macedonia (see p. [78]). L. Marcius Philippus was proprætor of Syria B.C. 61-59. The governor of Cilicia in the same period is not known; probably some one left in charge by Pompey.
[289] I have endeavoured to leave the English as ambiguous as the Latin. Cicero may mean that he has done some good, for at the end of Letter [XXIX] he says that Quintus has improved in these points, and had been better in his second than in his first year. On the other hand, the context here seems rather to point to the meaning "how little good I have done!"—impatiently dismissing the subject of temper.
[290] These "requisitionary letters" were granted by a provincial governor to certain persons requiring supplies, payment of debts, or legal decisions in their favour in the provinces, or other privileges, and, if carelessly granted, were open to much abuse. Cicero, in his own government of Cilicia, boasted that he had signed none such in six months. The ill-wishers of Quintus had apparently got hold of a number of these letters signed by him (having been first written out by the suitors themselves and scarcely glanced at by him), and a selection of them published to prove his injustice or carelessness.
[291] The governor of a province would stand in such a matter in the place of the prætor in Rome, i.e., he would decide on questions of law, not of fact, as, whether a debt was due or not. However, Quintus perhaps only erred in the form of his injunction. He might forbid the deceased's estate being touched till the question of Fundanius's debt was decided; but in his letter he assumed (as he had no right to do) that the claim was good. Substantially it seems to me that Quintus was right, and certainly in his appeal to him Cicero does not follow his own injunction to disregard personal feelings.
[292] ὀρθὰν τὰν ναῦν. Quintus had written, it seems, defiantly about the slanders afloat against him, and had quoted two Greek proverbial sayings. The first is found in Stobæus, 108 (extract from Teles): "It was a fine saying of the pilot, 'At least, Poseidon, a ship well trimmed,'" i.e., if you sink my ship, she shall at least go down with honour. Quintus means, "Whatever my enemies may do afterwards, I will keep my province in a sound state as long as I am here."
[293] ἅπαξ θανεῖν, perhaps "Better to die once for all than give in to every unjust demand." The editors quote Æschylus, Pr. V. 769:
κρεῖσσον γὰρ εἰσάπαξ θανεῖν
ἢ θὰς ἁπάσας ἡμέρας πάσχειν κακῶς.
But I don't feel sure that this is the passage alluded to.
[294] Reading queruntur for quæ sunt.
[295] Gaius Cato, tribune B.C. 56.
[296] L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, who as prætor threatened Cæsar with impeachment, and as consul (B.C. 54) tried to get him recalled. He was, in 50-49, appointed Cæsar's successor in Gaul, defended Marseilles against him, and eventually fell in the battle of Pharsalia. P. Nigidius Figulus supported Cicero during the Catiline conspiracy. Gaius Memmius, ædile B.C. 60 (see p. [51]). Lucretius dedicated his poem to him. L. Cornelius Lentulus Crus, consul B.C. 49, accused Clodius in B.C. 61, murdered in Africa after Pompey, B.C. 48.
[297] There is no direct means of dating these letters, as we have no other information as to the proconsulship of Culleolus. Illyricum was not always a separate government, but was sometimes under the governor of Macedonia, sometimes under the governor of Gaul. The indications of date are (1) Pompey is at home and often seen by Cicero, therefore it is not between the spring of B.C. 67 and the end of 62; (2) it is not later than March, B.C. 58, because from that time for ten years Cæsar was governor of Illyricum, and before he ceased to be so Pompey had left Italy, never to return. Even if Culleolus was not governor of Illyricum, but of Macedonia, the same argument holds good, for C. Antonius was in Macedonia B.C. 63-60, and Octavius from B.C. 60 to March, B.C. 59. That is, Culleolus could not have been in Macedonia while Pompey was in Italy till after March, B.C. 59.
[298] L. Lucceius, whom we have heard of before as a candidate for the consulship with Cæsar, and whom we shall hear of again as the author of a history of the social and civil wars (Sulla and Marius), and as being asked to write on Cicero's consulship. He was a close friend of Pompey, and took his side in B.C. 49 (Cæs. B. C. iii. 18). The people of Bullis owed Lucceius money, and Cicero asks for "mandatory letters" from Culleolus to get it.
[299] Mod. Monte Leone, on the road to Rhegium, from which at this time Cicero meant to cross to Sicily, and thence to Malta.
[300] Nares Lucanæ (Monte Nero), near the River Silarus, and on the via Popilia (south-western branch of the Appia). Cicero has therefore come north again from Vibo, having given up the idea of Rhegium and Sicily, and making for Beneventum, and so by the via Appia for Brundisium.
[301] A friend of Cicero's, of whose death at Brundisium we afterwards hear (Fam. xiv. 4, § 6).
[302] The bill originally named 500 miles as the distance from Italy. Before passing it had to be put up in public three weeks (trinundinæ), and meanwhile might be amended, and was amended to 400.
[303] P. Autronius Pætus, one of Catiline's confederates, who would injure Cicero if he could. Cicero would not be able to reach Epirus without coming within his reach; for he had been condemned for ambitus, and was in exile there or in Achaia. Illas partes=Epirus.
[304] To Malta. The proprætor of Sicily, C. Vergilius, opposed his going to Malta, which was in the province of Sicily, though it had a primus of its own (Planc. 40; Plut. Cic. 32).
[305] Because of entertaining the condemned man, a special proviso in this law (Dio, xxxviii. 17).
[306] In Epirus, believing that Atticus will understand that his going to Brundisium means that he will go to Epirus: and as Atticus lives there, he naturally asks him to come to meet him. Epirus was, for certain purposes at least, in the province of Macedonia, and it depended on the governor, L. Appuleius Saturninus, what reception he would meet. His friend Plancius was quæstor.
[307] One of Clodius's concessions to the consuls, to keep them quiet, was to get Macedonia assigned by a lex to L. Calpurnius Piso. As Atticus lived in what was practically part of the province, and had much business there, it was important to him to be on the spot, and try to influence the choice of a governor. That being over, he would not have so much to detain him in Rome.
[308] We suppose that Cicero has heard from Atticus that he is not going to be at Tarentum or Brundisium, for he writes before arriving at either.
[309] Reading prid. Kal. instead of a. d. II. Kal., which Tyrrell calls audacius in Schutz. But absolute nonsense is not to be kept even for a MS.
(1) Cicero says that he has been thirteen days at Brundisium. In the next letter he tells Atticus he arrived on the 17th. That, in the Roman way of counting, brings it to prid. (29th).
(2) Either the date at the end of the letter is wrong, or prid. must be used here
(3) There is no such date properly as a. d. II. Kal. The day before prid. is a. d. III.
In regard to dates we must remember that Cicero is using the præ-Julian calendar, in which all months, except February, March, May, July, and October, had twenty-nine days. These last four had thirty-one and February twenty-eight.
[310] Cicero does not mean that young Marcus is to come to him at once, but that, when Tullia's marriage portion is settled, Terentia is to bring him with her if she comes. Really he didn't mean any of them to come, at any rate for a long while. Piso is Tullia's husband.
[311] If Cicero's property was confiscated, it might be held that the slaves went with it, and would be sold with it, and that his manumission of them was an evasion, which could not hold good at law. If his property was not confiscated, they were to remain in their status as slaves. See Letter CXCII.
[312] He means that had it not been for enemies in Greece and Epirus, he should not only have gone as far south as Epirus, but farther—to Athens. There is a good deal to be said for Schutz's reading, Achaiam for Athenas, but as the MS. reading can be explained, it is safer to keep it.
[313] The Clodian party at Rome. "That town" is Athens.
[314] "I have lost my chance of dying with honour; henceforth death may end my grief, but cannot heal my damaged reputation." Reliqua tempora, i.e., other opportunities of suicide.
[315] A mountain range in Illyria, over which the via Egnatia passes (mod. Elbassán).
[316] Reading ab Ilio with Madvig for ab illo.
[317] Tigranes, a son of the king of Armenia, was brought to Rome by Pompey to adorn his triumph, and put under the care of Lucius Flavius. This prince was, for a bribe, released by Clodius by a trick, and the attempt to get him away led to a scuffle in which lives were lost. Pompey regarded this as a slight upon himself, and his partisan, the consul Gabinius, attempted to prevent it. But both were hustled in the forum and treated with insults. The hope of a breach in the triumvirate arose from the supposition that Clodius had the support of Cæsar in his high-handed proceeding (Dio, xxxviii. 30; Plut. Pomp. 48; Ascon. 47).
[318] P. Plautius Hypsæus, who had been Pompey's quæstor and on intimate terms with him. He had been, it seems, interesting himself on Cicero's behalf.
[319] The gazette of public transactions and measures passed in the senate, which was sent round to the provinces. We shall hear of it again.
[320] The next letter shews that he means Hortensius. The blunder which he complains of having committed, by the advice of Hortensius, is that of having left Rome, rather than stay and brave the impeachment.
[321] Because, though a provincial governor retained his lictors till he reached Rome, he was bound to go straight home or dismiss them.
[322] I.e., suicide.
[324] Quintus was a candidate in B.C. 66 for the ædileship of the following year. The lex Aurelia, which divided the juries between the senators, equites, and tribuni ærarii, was passed in Pompey's first consulship, B.C. 70. As this was the compromise in the matter of the iudicia favoured by Pompey, Hortensius, and the like, an attack on it would be likely to give offence.
[325] I.e., to the house of Atticus at Buthrotum.
[326] Clodius was not re-elected, and Q. Cæcilius Metellus Nepos, who had as tribune (B.C. 63-62) been hostile to Cicero, now as consul supported Pompey in befriending Cicero.
[327] The speech in the senate in Curionem et Clodium, i.e., against the elder C. Curio, who had been Clodius's advocate in B.C. 61 on the charge de incesto. Fragments only of it are preserved. They are sufficiently violent. Cicero suggests repudiating the authorship, because the speech had never been delivered, and therefore was not necessarily intended for publication. There is no special reason for abusing Cicero's character on this account. If some enemy had got hold of the MS. and published it without his consent, it was not really the expression of his deliberate sentiments.
[328] Reading nunc tamen intellego for si donatam ut intellego, which is meaningless. There may be latent in si donatam some proper name, as Dodonam or Macedoniam, but it is not possible to extract it now. Istic, as usual, means "where you are," i.e., at Rome.
[329] The via Egnatia, the road across Macedonia, which was one of the great channels of communication between Rome and the East, and which terminated at Thessalonica.
[330] The probable split among the triumvirs, alluded to in Letter [LXIII].
[331] Reading defuit for fuit.
[332] Or, as Prof. Tyrrell suggests, "does not quote Curio to that effect." I think, however, that Cicero does not use laudo in this sense except in connexion with auctorem, auctores, and even then generally with a subsense, at least, of commendation. The speech was composed to be delivered against the elder Curio and Clodius (see p. [155]), but was never delivered. Its personal tone made it dangerous now.
[333] Cicero means that Atticus acted with the emotion spontaneously arising from his affection, but not with the caution which he would have shewn in doing a thing which he was under some obligation to do.
[334] The ancient "colleges" or "clubs" had been gradually increasing, and a decree of the senate in B.C. 64 had declared certain of them unlawful. But Clodius had overridden this decree by a lex early in B.C. 58, and many new ones were formed, which he used for his political purposes (pro Sest. § 55; Dio, xxxviii. 13).
[335] That he could do nothing against the wishes of Cæsar (Att. x. 4, § 3; cp. in Pis. § 77). According to Plutarch, Pompey avoided a personal interview (Cic. 31).
[336] The kindness has been all on the side of Atticus, who will therefore be attached to the object of it—for the benefactor loves more than the benefited.
[337] A privilegium was a law referring to a particular person, which was forbidden by the twelve tables, and if it was shewn to be unconstitutional a decree of the senate could declare it void. But Cicero seems to think that such a proceeding of the senate would give a possibility of raising the question afresh.
[338] The first bill named no one, but enacted that "anyone who had put a citizen to death uncondemned should be forbidden fire and water." The second, "that M. Tullius be forbidden fire and water." Cicero says that the former did not touch him, I suppose, because it could not be retrospective. This is in accordance with the view of Cæsar, who approved of the law, but said that old sores ought not to be ripped up—οὐ μὴν καὶ προσήκειν ἐπὶ παρεληλυθόσι τοιοῦτόν τινα νόμον συγγράφεσθει (Dio, xxxviii. 17).
[339] Because it shewed that he considered himself as coming under the new law.
[340] Letter [LXVIII], p. [154].
[341] L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, who was a prætor this year.
[342] Though Cicero uses tantum ... quantum here, he does not mean that Atticus failed to love him enough—that would have been too unreasonable. In a certain way he means that he loved him too much. He allowed his spontaneous feelings full vent, without acting with the cool wisdom which he would have shewn in fulfilling a duty or moral obligation. It is more fully expressed above. Still, it was a difficult thing to say, and he doesn't succeed in making it very clear.
[343] Reading lætæ for lectæ.
[344] L. Livineius Regulus, whom Cicero (F. xiii. 60) calls a very intimate friend, and says that his freedman Trypho stood his friend in the hour of need. He seems to have been condemned (in B.C. 56?) for something, but he afterwards served under Iulius Cæsar (B. Afr. § 9). The freedman's full name was L. Livineius Trypho.
[345] About Appius acting as prosecutor of Quintus. He was a nephew of P. Clodius. See Letter CCXXII.
[346] Appius Claudius Pulcher, brother of P. Clodius, was prætor-designate for B.C. 57, and had allotted to him the quæstio de rebus repetundis (pro Sest. § 78). He was consul B.C. 54.
[347] Cicero gives Atticus his full name, rather playfully, as it was a new acquisition. His uncle, Q. Cæcilius, dying this year, left him heir to a large fortune, and adopted him in his will (Nep. Att. 5). He therefore, according to custom, took his uncle's prænomen and nomen, Q. Cæcilius, retaining his own nomen in an adjectival form (Pomponianus) as a cognomen, just as C. Octavius became, by his uncle's will, C. Iulius Cæsar Octavianus. His additional name of Atticus remained as before, and in ordinary life was his usual designation. See p. [15].
[348] Sestius, tribune-elect for B.C. 57, would come into office 10th December, B.C. 58. He means to bring a bill before the people for Cicero's recall, and a draft of it has been sent to Cicero, who criticises it as not entering sufficiently into details, though he had before said that a general restitutio in integrum covered everything; but perhaps this bill only repealed the Clodian law as a privilegium, without mentioning anything else.
[349] Terentia, whose half-sister was a Vestal, seems to have taken sanctuary with the Vestals, as did the mother and sister of Augustus in B.C. 43. The special indignity of which Cicero complains is that she had been forced to leave the sanctuary and appear at the bank of Valerius, but for what purpose we cannot now tell. It is suggested that it was to make some solemn declaration as to her husband's property, some of which she may be supposed to have tried to conceal. The term ducta esses is that applied to prisoners led through the streets, but we may regard it as used ad invidiam.
[350] In securing her husband's advocacy.
[351] Mention is made of Terentia's separate estate in Letters [XXX] and [LXXXI].
[352] Cn. Plancius, quæstor in Macedonia, whose kindness Cicero lauds highly when defending him in B.C. 54.
[353] The forces of the new governor, L. Calpurnius Piso, who was to have Macedonia after his consulship, and would be sending his troops on before him.
[354] P. Cornelius Lentulus, consul-designate for B.C. 57.
[355] Q. Cæcilius Metellus Nepos, consul-designate for B.C. 57. See pp. [22-23].
[356] The party of the triumvirs.
[357] See Letter [LXI], p. [142].
[358] A centurion or other officer in the army of Piso crossing to Macedonia. But the name is otherwise unknown, and some have thought that it is an intentional disguise for the name of Piso himself.
[359] Cicero's son-in-law.
[360] The greater part of this letter was evidently written at Thessalonica. Cicero appears to have put the date and place of departure to it after arriving at Dyrrachium, and then added a postscript to explain why he had come there.
[361] As a libera civitas Dyrrachium had the ius exilii, and would not be filled with Roman officials. The crowded state of the town—by which Cicero means crowded with Romans—would arise from its being the usual place of disembarkation from Rome across the north of the Greek peninsula to the East. There was doubtless always a large traffic between it and Brundisium, but at this time of year, when sailing would be, if possible, avoided, he might hope to find it somewhat less crowded.
[362] This bill for Cicero's recall would, of course, be vetoed by Clodius, and could not therefore be passed, but it would probably influence the action of the new tribunes for B.C. 57.
[363] I.e., the tribunes of B.C. 58.
[364] I.e., securing indemnity to the proposers if there is a technical breach of existing laws, something like the common clause—"all statutes to the contrary notwithstanding."
[365] The Clodian law.
[366] Because they would not be protected as the previous tribunes were by the fact of the Clodian law (which alone was contravened) having emanated from their own collegium.
[367] L. Quadratus Ninnius, tribune-elect. On the 1st of June next he brought forward the question of Cicero's restoration in the senate.
[368] Cicero's cousin, C. Visellius Varro, a learned jurisconsult (Brut. § 264; 1 Verr. § 71).
[369] The tribunes came into office on the 10th of December, nearly three weeks before the consuls, prætors, etc., who entered office on the 1st of January.
[370] Either the libera legatio or the acting legatio in Gaul, both of which Cæsar offered him.
[371] The phrase ornare provincias, ornare consules, etc., means the vote in the senate deciding the number of troops, amount of money, and other outfit that the magistrates going to their provinces were to have. The provinces to be taken by outgoing consuls were decided before the elections—in this case they were Cilicia and Spain. But the ornatio usually took place after the consuls had entered on their office, i.e., after the 1st of January. For this year, however—we don't know why—it had taken place before the 1st of December, B.C. 58. The result of this would be that the new tribunes for B.C. 57—entering on their office 10th December, B.C. 58—would have no voice in the matter, and would thus lose a great hold on the consuls. Most of these tribunes were supporters of Cicero, while he was doubtful as to one of the consuls—Q. Cæcilius Metellus Nepos. He thinks, therefore, that his cause has lost by this measure, for the tribunes will have less power of putting force on the consuls to do anything for him, and yet the same power of stopping them should they wish to do anything of their own accord. Besides, the new tribunes may be alienated by what they may think a measure derogatory to their position. These fears came to nothing; the tribunes were loyal to Cicero, and the consul Piso forwarded his recall.
[372] Because the tribunes could have vetoed any measure brought before the people, and so could have forced the consuls to come to terms.
[373] I.e., that the senate would pass no decree prior to one recalling Cicero.
[374] There is no indication in the letter as to where Atticus is. He left Rome late in B.C. 58, and apparently did not return till after Cicero's recall. The most natural explanation is that he was in Epirus, or somewhere in Greece, and that he had visited Cicero at Dyrrachium on his way. I do not quite see how this should be thought impossible in view of the last sentence of [LXXXV] or the [next letter]. Cicero asks Atticus to join him, but he might do so whether Atticus were at Buthrotum, or Rome, or anywhere else.
[375] On 1st January, B.C. 57, P. Lentulus brought the case of Cicero before the senate. The prevailing opinion was that his interdictio having been illegal, the senate could quash it. But Pompey, for the sake of security, recommended a lex. One of the tribunes, without actually vetoing the senatus consultum, demanded a night for consideration. The question was again debated in succeeding meetings of the senate, but on the 25th was not decided. Technically an auctoritas was a decree that had been vetoed by a tribune, and Cicero (pro Sest. § 74) implies that such a veto had been put in, and at any rate the noctis postulatio was equivalent to a veto.
[376] Perhaps he has just heard that the sitting of the senate on the 25th of January had been interrupted by Clodius's roughs. But other similar events happened, and there is no certain means of dating this note. The difficulty, as it stands, is that it implies Atticus's temporary return to Rome.
[377] This intentionally enigmatical sentence is meant to contain a menace against Clodius, who is hinted at in the word omnium, just as he is earlier in the letter in the word tuorum. Clodius was a connexion by marriage of Metellus (through his late brother, the husband of Clodia), and Cicero assumes that Metellus is restrained from helping him by regard for Clodius. He knows, however, by this time, that one of the new tribunes, Milo, is prepared to repel force by force, and he hints to Metellus that if he countenances Clodius's violence he may some day find that there is no Clodius to save—if that's his object. In Letter [LXXXIX] he shews how early he had contemplated Clodius being killed by Milo (occisum iri ab ipso Milone video).
[378] Reading ab infimo.
[379] As backing the decree. The phrase was aderat scribendo M. Tullius Cicero, etc.
[380] Dederunt, i.e., contionem; lit. gave me a meeting, i.e., the right of addressing the meeting, which only magistrates or those introduced by magistrates could do.
[381] C. Messius, a tribune of the year.
[382] Clodius had consecrated the site of Cicero's house for a temple of Liberty. The pontifices had to decide whether that consecration held good, or whether the site might be restored to Cicero. Hence his speech de Domo sua ad Pontifices.
[383] The origin of the Latin line is not known. The English is Milton's, P. L. ii. 224.
[384] The speech de Domo sua ad Pontifices. The genuineness of the existing speech has been doubted. But it may very well be said that no one but Cicero could have written it. It is not certainly one of his happiest efforts, in spite of what he says here; but he is not unaccustomed to estimate his speeches somewhat highly, and to mistake violence for vigour.
[385] He will send it to Atticus to get copied by his librarii, and published.
[386] Appius Claudius Pulcher, brother of P. Clodius, was a prætor this year.
[387] It is not clear that Clodius was wrong; the pontifices decided that for a valid consecration an order of the people was requisite, and, of course, Clodius could allege such an order. Cicero devoted the greater part of his speech, therefore, to shewing (1) that Clodius's adoption was invalid, and that he was therefore no tribune, and incapable of taking an order of the people; (2) that the law was a privilegium, and therefore invalid. The pontifices did not consider either of these points, which were not properly before them, or within their competence; they merely decided the religious question—that unless there had been a iussus populi or plebis scitus there was no valid consecration.
[388] Or perhaps only "statue of Liberty," as the temple was not yet completed.
[389] A portico or colonnade, built by Q. Catulus, the conqueror of the Cimbri, on the site of the house of M. Flaccus, who was killed with Saturninus in B.C. 100. It was close to Cicero's house, and what Clodius appears to have done was to pull down the portico, and build another, extending over part of Cicero's site, on which was to be a temple for his statue of Liberty.
[390] Cn. Cornelius Lentulus Marcellinus was called on first as consul designate for B.C. 56.
[391] Sext. Attilius Serranus, a tribune. He had been a quæstor in Cicero's consulship, but had opposed his recall.
[392] Cn. Oppius Cornicinus, the father-in-law of Serranus, is said in p. red. at Quir. § 13 to have done the same in the senate on the 1st of January, when Serranus also went through the same form of "demanding a night" for consideration.
[393] Prof. Tyrrell brackets porticum. But I do not understand his difficulty, especially as he saw none in the last letter. Cicero (de Domo, § 102) certainly implies that Clodius had, at any rate, partly pulled down the porticus Catuli, in order to build something on a larger scale, which was to take in some of Cicero's site. This was now to come down, and so leave Cicero his area, and, I presume, the old porticus Catuli was to be restored.
[394] Cicero had given Crassus 3,500,000 for it (about £28,000). See Letter [XVI].
[395] I.e., my modest reserve. There does not seem any reason for Tyrrell's emendation of num for nam.
[396] I have translated Klotz's text. That given by Prof. Tyrrell is, to me at any rate, quite unintelligible. Cicero's legatio under Pompey appears to have been, in fact, honorary, or libera, for he doesn't seem to have done anything. He wishes to reserve the right of resigning it to stand for the censorship (censors were elected in the following year), or of turning it into a votiva legatio, to visit certain sacred places on the plea of performing a vow, thus getting the opportunity, if he desired it, of retiring temporarily from Rome in a dignified manner. The force of prope seems to be "almost any, I care not what." It was not likely that a man with his stormy past would do for the delicate duties of the censorship, and he would save appearances by going on a votiva legatio. See Letter [XLIV].
[397] Facile careo, others read non facile, "I don't like being without a suburban residence."
[398] The thing which brought him "nothing but dishonour" was his quitting Rome, and the consequent expenses connected with winning over friends, or paying for Milo's bravoes to face those of Clodius. In the last part of the sentence he seems to mean that, had his supporters backed him properly, he would have got everything necessary to make good his losses from the liberality of the senate. Others explain that defensores really means Pompey only.
[399] This and the omission of his wife in the next clause, as the similar hint at the end of the last letter, seem to point to some misunderstanding with Terentia, with whom, however, a final rupture was postponed for nearly twelve years (B.C. 46.)
[400] See [last letter]. The porticus Catuli had been, at any rate, partly demolished by Clodius to make way for his larger scheme of building, which was to take in part of Cicero's "site." See pro Cæl. §79.
[401] Next door to Cicero's own house.
[402] He would avoid prosecution de vi by getting elected to the ædileship for B.C. 56, for actual magistrates were rarely prosecuted; but he, in this case, actually avoided it by getting a consul and tribune to forbid it by edict (pro Sest. § 89).
[403] Designatorem. This may mean (1) an official who shewed people to their places in the theatre; (2) an undertaker's man, who marshalled funerals. To the latter office a certain infamia was attached. We know nothing more of Decimus (see pro Domo, § 50). Gellius was an eques and a stepson of L. Marcius Philippus. He afterwards gave evidence against Sestius for vis (see pro Sest. § 110). Cicero calls him the mover of all seditions (in Vatin. § 4), and one of Clodius's gang (de Har. Resp. § 59). See [next letter].
[404] Perhaps by M. Antonius. See 2 Phil. § 21; pro Mil. § 40.
[405] Lit. "made all Catilines Acidini." Acidinus was the cognomen of several distinguished men. In Leg. Agr. ii. § 64, Cicero classes the Acidini among men "respectable not only for the public offices they had held, and for their services to the state, but also for the noble way in which they had endured poverty." There does not, however, seem any very good reason known for their becoming proverbial as the antithesis to revolutionaries.
[406] A slope of the Palatine. Milo's other house (p. [196]).
[407] P. Cornelius Sulla, nephew of the dictator. Cicero defended him in B.C. 62, but he had taken the part of Clodius in the time of Cicero's exile.
[408] Cn. Cornelius Lentulus Marcellinus, the consul-designate for the next year. In that capacity he would be called on for his sententia first.
[409] Q. Cæcilius Metellus Nepos, the consul. Though he had not opposed Cicero's recall, he stood by his cousin, P. Clodius, in regard to the threatened prosecution. Appius is Appius Claudius, brother of P. Clodius.
[410] P. Sestius, the tribune favourable to Cicero, afterwards defended by him.
[411] Mr. Purser's reading of nisi anteferret before proscripsit seems to me to darken the passage. What happened was this. Marcellinus's sententia was never put to the vote, because Metellus, Appius, and Hortensius (Cicero seems to mean him) talked out the sitting. Accordingly, Marcellinus published it, i.e., put it up outside the Curia to be read: and under it he (or some other magistrate whose name has dropped out of the text) put a notice that he was going to "watch the sky" all the dies comitiales, so as to prevent the election being held. But this had been rendered inoperative by Clodius's amendment of the lex Ælia Fufia (see 2 Phil. § 81)—or at any rate of doubtful validity—and, accordingly, the only thing left was the obnuntiatio by a magistrate, which Milo proceeded to make. The rule, however was that such obnuntiatio must be made before the comitia were begun (2 Phil. ib.), which again could not begin till sunrise. Hence Milo's early visit to the campus. For the meaning of proposita see Letter [XLVII].
[412] After which the comitia could not be begun.
[413] P. Clodius, his brother Appius, and his cousin Metellus Nepos.
[414] Metellus means that he shall take the necessary auspices for the comitia in the comitium, before going to the campus to take the votes.
[415] Generally called inter duos lucos, the road down the Capitolium towards the Campus Martius, originally so called as being between the two heads of the mountain. It was the spot traditionally assigned to the "asylum" of Romulus.
[416] On the nundinæ and the next day no comitia and no meeting of the senate could be held.
[417] Candidate for the ædileship, of whom we know nothing.
[418] Apparently a poor lantern, whose sides were made of canvas instead of horn.
[419] Quintus Cicero was in Sardinia as Pompey's legatus as superintendent of the corn-supply, to which office he had been appointed in August. The letter is written not earlier than the 10th of December, for the new tribunes for B.C. 56 have come into office, and not later than the 16th, because on the 17th the Saturnalia began. Perhaps as the senate is summoned and presided over by Lupus, it is on the 10th, the day of his entrance upon office.
[420] "Full," that is, for the time of year. A "full house" is elsewhere mentioned as between three and four hundred.
[421] P. Rutilius Lupus, one of the new tribunes.
[422] This refers to Cicero's attempts to exempt the ager publicus in Campania from being divided (see Letter [XXIV], p. [55]); and not only to his speeches against Rullus. It was because Cæsar disregarded the ancient exception of this land from such distribution that Cicero opposed his bill, and refused to serve on the commission.
[423] Nihil vos moramur were the words used by the presiding magistrate, indicating that he had no more business to bring before the senate. If no one said anything, the senate was dismissed; but any magistrate, or magistrate-designate, could speak, and so continue the sitting up to nightfall, when the house stood adjourned.
[424] Because consul-designate. L. Racilius, one of the new tribunes.
[425] The sortitio iudicum was performed by the prætor drawing out the required number of names from the urn, which contained the names of all liable to serve. The accused could, however, challenge a certain number, and the prætor had then to draw others.
[426] The formula whereby the senate declared its opinion that so and so was guilty of treason. It had no legal force, but the magistrates might, and sometimes did, act on it.
[427] C. Porcius Cato, distant relation of Cato Uticensis, one of the new tribunes.
[428] I.e., Marcellinus (Cn. Cornelius Lentulus).
[429] The senators not in office only spoke when called on (rogati). The consuls-designate (if there were any) were always called first, and then the consulars in order. To be called first was a subject of ambition, and an opportunity for the presiding magistrate to pay a compliment or the reverse.
[430] They went and sat or stood near the speaker they wished to support. It was not, however, a formal division till the speeches ended, and the presiding magistrate counted. Still, it made the division easier.
[431] A platform outside the senate-house, where representatives originally of Greek and then of other states were placed. It was apparently possible to hear, or partly hear, the debates from it. It was a locus substructus (Varro, L. L. v. 155). There is no evidence that it was a building to lodge ambassadors in, as Prof. Tyrrell says.
[432] The year of this letter has been inferred from the mention of Lentulus's augural banquet. For P. Cornelius Lentulus Spinther, son of the consul of B.C. 57, was in this year elected into the college of augurs. Yet as we know that Cicero's Tusculan villa was dismantled by Clodius, and was advertised for sale (though not sold), it seems rather extraordinary that Cicero should have gone there for his health. The Fadii Galli were a family of Cicero's native place, Arpinum.
[433] There were several sumptuary laws. Those which may possibly be referred to here are (1) the lex Licinia (? B.C. 103), which defined certain foods as illegal at banquets, but excepted quod ex terra vite arbore ve sit natum (Macrobius, Sat. iii. 17, 9; Gell. ii. 24, 7); (2) the lex Æmilia (B.C. 68), which also defined both the quantity and quality of food allowable at banquets (Gell. ii. 24, 12).
[434] C. Anicius, a senator and intimate friend of Cicero's.
[435] Consul of B.C. 57, who had gone at the end of his consulship to be governor of Cilicia.
[436] When Ptolemy Auletes first appealed to the senate (B.C. 57) to restore him to the throne of Egypt, it appears that a resolution was passed authorizing the proconsul of Cilicia to do so; but as Pompey wished to have the business, the senate found itself in a difficulty, not wishing to put him in military command, or daring to offend him by an open refusal (Dio, xxxix. 12). The tribune C. Cato found up a Sibylline oracle forbidding the employment of an army for the purpose, which served the senate as a decent excuse. The commission to Lentulus was eventually withdrawn by an auctoritas senatus, and Lentulus did not venture to do it. Ptolemy, finding that he could not succeed in getting Pompey commissioned, retired to Ephesus, and afterwards succeeded by an enormous bribe in inducing Gabinius, the proconsul of Syria, to do it (B.C. 55).
[437] Of having been induced by greed or ambition to undertake the restoration of Ptolemy.
[438] Reading tibicini for the unmeaning tibi. It is not certain, but it makes good sense. Ptolemy was called Auletes (flute-player), of which the Latin tibicen is a translation, meant, no doubt, somewhat jocosely.
[439] I.e., before going to the senate on the Ides of January (13th). See [next letter].
[440] The Sibylline oracle forbade restoring the king "with a multitude."
[441] Pompey had at this time imperium as curator annonæ.
[442] Because it was on Lentulus's motion that Pompey had been made curator annonæ, and so in possession of imperium with naval and military forces.
[443] The proposal of Bibulus to send "three legates" implied a concession to the Sibylline verse, in not sending "an army." It was therefore to be voted on as two questions—(1) Shall the Sibylline verse be obeyed, and an army not sent? (2) Shall three legates be sent?
[444] That is, the debate went off on the side issue as to who had the prior right of dividing the house. Lupus said he had, because the proposal of Volcatius was really made before the others, i.e., in the previous day's debate (see [last letter]). The consuls were only too glad thus to avoid having the main question brought to a vote, and let this technical point be spun out in a languid debate.
[445] Because they had magistrates ready to stop the comitia by declaring bad omens, and tribunes ready to veto any proposal.
[446] A senatus consultum vetoed by a tribune was written out, with the names of its proposers and backers, and a statement at the end as to the tribunes vetoing it. It was thus on record as an auctoritas senatus, "resolution of the senate," not a senatus consultum. A perfect specimen is given in Letter CCXXIII. This auctoritas was to the effect that no one was to undertake the restoration. See Letter [CXIII].
[447] This is a specimen of the short letter of introduction to a provincial governor which were given almost as a matter of course by men of position at Rome. We shall have many of them in the course of the correspondence: and Cicero elsewhere warns the recipient of such letters not to pay attention to them unless he expressly indicates his wish by some less formal sentence (see Letter [CXIV]). T. Ampius was the predecessor of Lentulus in Cilicia.
[448] I.e., no meeting of the senate for ordinary business. During the month of February the senate usually devoted all its time to hearing and answering deputations from the provinces or foreign states. The lex Pupia forbade the meeting of the senate on dies comitiales, and after the 14th the days in January were all comitiales: but another law (lex Vatinia) ordered it to meet every day in February for the business of the legations. If this business was concluded or deferred it remained a moot point whether a magistrate was not still bound or, at least, allowed to summon it for other business (ad Q. Fr. ii. 13).
[449] That of the tribune C. Cato for the recall of Lentulus.
[450] A money-lender, and friend of Lentulus Spinther.
[451] Pompey.
[452] Agent or steward of Atticus.
[453] The architect. See Letter [XXVIII], p. [68].
[454] Clodius, who was ædile this year.
[455] For commissioning Pompey with two lictors to restore Ptolemy.
[456] Milo impeached by Clodius before the comitia tributa for his employment of gladiators. Dio (xxxix. 18) says that Clodius thus impeached Milo, not with any hope of securing his conviction against the powerful support of Cicero and Pompey, but to get the chance of insulting these latter. Marcellus was one of the candidates for the ædileship with Clodius. See Letter [XCI].
[457] In B.C. 129, after making a speech in favour of the claims of the Italians for exemption from the agrarian law of Gracchus, Scipio Æmilianus, the younger Africanus, was found dead in his bed. The common report was that he had been assassinated by Carbo, or with his privity, but it was never proved (see de Orat. ii. § 170). Cicero does not here assume the truth of the story, he merely repeats Pompey's words.
[458] M. Tullius Albinovanus. It was on this charge de vi that Cicero defended Sestius in the extant speech. The charge of bribery does not appear to have been proceeded with.
[459] Adlegatos, probably commissioners named to receive and report on a deposition of an informer before the senate acted.
[460] L. Calpurnius Piso Bestia, a candidate in the last election of ædiles.
[461] Cn. Domitius Calvinus, consul B.C. 53. In the Civil War he sided with Pompey, and perished at sea after Thapsus (B.C. 46).
[462] Ad lucum Pisonis. The place is not known, but there is not sufficient reason for the change to ad lacum Pisonis, a place equally unknown.
[463] A part of Rome on the slope of the Mons Oppius.
[464] I.e., get out of it as soon as you can.
[465] Ptolemy was at Ephesus.
[466] The famous C. Asinius Pollio.
[467] The postponement of the Egyptian commission.
[468] ἐξ ἀπαλῶν ὀνύχων, i.e., "from your earliest youth." Others explain it to mean "from the bottom of your heart," or "thoroughly," from the idea that the nerves ended in the nails. ἔξ αὐτῶν τῶν ὀνύχων, "thoroughly," occurs in late Greek, and similar usages in the Anthology.
[469] L. Æmilius Paullus, prætor B.C. 53, consul B.C. 50, a strong Optimate and friend of Cicero's.
[470] P. Vatinius, the tribune of B.C. 59, who had supported Cæsar and proposed the law for his five years' command in Gaul. Cicero spoke against him for perjury; but afterwards we shall find them ostensibly reconciled.
[471] A Greek grammarian and geographer, of whom we have heard before, and shall hear of again in connexion with Cicero's library.
[472] P. Furius Crassipes. Tullia's first husband, C. Calpurnius Piso Frugi, died, it seems, before Cicero returned from exile in B.C. 57. This second marriage (or, perhaps, only betrothal) was shortly ended by a divorce.
[473] I.e., on which the sponsalia could not take place.
[474] Not going the right way to work to get it.
[475] At the end of the next letter he says that, pending Quintus's arrival, he has stopped some of his building.
[476] On some alleged informality the feriæ Latinæ were held a second time (instauratæ), really, Cicero implies, in order to bar some additional days for public business, and prevent legislation, as later on the election of Pompey and Crassus was prevented (Dio, xxxix. 30).
[477] At the end of B.C. 57, or the beginning of 56, fifteen days of supplicatio were decreed in consequence of Cæsar's success in Gaul (Cæs. B. G. ii. 35).
[478] Gaius Cato the tribune, who proposed to recall Lentulus.
[479] A scriba or public clerk, and a client of the patrician Clodii.
[480] Unknown. Cicero's words seem to imply that he nearly got convicted, but not quite.
[481] In B.C. 357 a "college" was established for celebrating the ludi Capitolini, in celebration of the failure of the Gauls to take it. It consisted of men living on the Capitoline (Livy, v. 50). The Mercuriales were a "college" or company of merchants who celebrated the fête of the consecration of the temple of Mercury (B.C., 495) on the Ides of May (Livy, ii. 27; Ov. F. v. 669; C. I. L. i. p. 206).
[482] It was on this journey that Pompey visited Luca tomeet Cæsar and Crassus.
[483] The name of a property of Quintus at Arpinum.
[484] Another property of Quintus near Mintumæ.
[485] The recently married wife of Atticus. See p. [216].
[486] παλινφδία—something he had apparently written and sent to Pompey or Cæsar, giving in his adhesion to the policy of the triumvirs. It can hardly have been the speech de Provinciis Consularibus or the oratio pro Balbo, which had probably not yet been delivered, for the arrangement recommended in the former speech was not that of the conference of Luca, while in the latter, though he speaks respectfully of Cæsar, there is nothing in the shape of a palinode in general politics.
[487] That is, the dowry and expenses of Tullia's betrothal to Crassipes.
[488] Tullia de via recta in hortos, for tu, etc., and ad te postridie. This may not be right, but no other suggestions as to the meaning of these abrupt clauses have been made which are in the least convincing. We must suppose that Atticus has asked Tullia to stay with him and his wife Pilia, and Cicero is describing her journey from Antium.
[489] L. Lucceius, of whom we have heard before, as having some quarrel with Atticus. His work has not survived. No letter of the correspondence has brought more adimadversion on Cicero, and yet log-rolling and the appealing to friends on the press to review one's book are not wholly unknown even in our time.
[490] Cicero appears by a slip to have written Themistocles instead of Aristeides. The dramatic return of the latter just before the battle of Salamis is narrated in Herodotus: whereas the former never returned, though his dead body was said to have been brought to Athens.
[491] Reading communi fueris nomine. After all, the meaning is very doubtful.
[492] Philoxenus, who, having been sent to the quarries by Dionysius of Syracuse, for criticising the tyrant's poetry, was given another chance. After reading a few lines he turned away silently. "Where are you going?" said Dionysius. "Back to the quarries," said Philoxenus. For Σπαρταν ἔλαχες, ταύτην κοσμεῖ, see p. [59].
[493] Ferrei. The true meaning of the word here seems to me to be shewn by de Am. § 87, quis tam esset ferreus, qui eam vitam ferre posset, cuique non auferret fructum voluptatum omnium solitudo? There is an intentional play on the words ferreus and ferre. Others have altered it to servi, and others have explained it as an allusion to the iron age, in both cases spoiling the antithesis—he died, we remain—and in the latter using the word in a sense not elsewhere found. Lentulus is L. Cornelius Lentulus. See Letter [L].
[494] A money-lender.
[495] οὐχ ὁσίη φθιμένοισιν, leaving Atticus, as often, to fill in the words ἐπ' ἀνδράσιν εὐχετάασθαι (Hom. Od. xxii. 412, where the word is κταμένοισιν). Terentius is some eques who has stopped payment.
[496] Because Clodius was attempting to pull down Cicero's new-built house on the ground that the site was still consecrated. He was prevented by Milo (Dio, xxxix. 20).
[497] Something that Quintus had done, perhaps about water, on his estate which annoyed his fellow townsmen.
[498] ὁ δ' οὐκ ἐμπάζετο μύθων (Hom. Od. i. 271).
[499] We must suppose Atticus to have mentioned some money loss (see [last letter]), and to have added that, though a ruinous one, his tastes were simple, and he could live on simple fare. Cicero laughs at the affectation of the rich Atticus. Raudusculum, "a piece of bronze," was the ancient term for the piece of bronze money used in sales, per æs et libram (Varro, L. L. v. 163).
[500] μήπω μέγ' εἴπης πρὶν τελευτήσαντ' ἴδῃς, "Do not boast till you see a man dead"—a well-known line from a lost play of Sophocles, containing a sentiment elsewhere often repeated, especially in Herodotus's account of the interview of Solon and Crœsus.
[501] εἴη μοὶ οὖτος φίλος οἶκος, according to a probable restoration of the Greek words (instead of εἴη μισητὸς φίλος οἶκος, "I might even hate my town house in comparison"); cp. Hor. Od. ii. 6, 7.
[502] Fratris. The mother of Clodius, Cæcilia, was a daughter of Q. Cæcilius Metellus Balearicus (consul B.C. 123), father of the writer of this letter.
[505] Joined to the province of Cilicia by Cato in B.C. 58-57. What Cicero is recommending is a clear evasion. Lentulus is not to take Ptolemy back, but to go to Egypt and make it ready for him.
[506] Cicero says elsewhere that he supported this (pro Balbo, §61; de Prov. Cons. §28; cp. Dio, xxxix. 25).
[507] The law of Gaius Gracchus (B.C. 123) enacting that the senate should name before the elections the provinces to be held by the next consuls.
[508] Paludatum, lit. dressed in the paludamentum, the military dress in which provincial governors left Rome with imperium.
[509] Notam, some cipher, which he had agreed upon with Valerius to indicate that the commendatio was not to be looked upon as a mere matter of course.
[510] One of the tribunes. He was convicted of vis in B.C., 54. Gabinius was governor of Syria B.C. 57-54. He had been engaged in some warlike affairs in Iudæa, for which, or for some successes over the Arabs, he claimed the supplicatio.
[511] εἰλικρινές, "pure," "clear."
[512] Mihi aqua hæret, "there's a stoppage in my water course."
[513] The letter appears to be from Tusculum, because Cicero asks for a letter every day, which he could hardly expect if he were farther off. This year Cicero was much away from Rome, and yet his correspondence is meagre compared with other years. So far as this is not due to accident in the preservation of his letters, it may be accounted for by the fact that he was working at his de Oratore—so hard, that even his brother Quintus had scruples in breaking in upon him.
[514] This may refer to the laws of Trebonius, giving Pompey and Crassus Spain and Syria respectively, and Cæsar an additional five years in Gaul, or to some of Pompey's own legislation.
[515] L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, a candidate for the consulship of B.C. 55, but whose election had never come off. By various contrivances the comitia were prevented, so that the new year opened with an interregnum; and Pompey and Crassus were elected under the presidency of an interrex (Dio, xxxix. 31).
[516] Pompey.
[517] L. Natta, a brother-in-law of Clodius, a pontifex who had presided at the consecratio of Cicero's house. He seems to have just died.
[518] A friend of Pompey's. I think "your guest" must be Pompey himself, whom Atticus is about to entertain at dinner.
[519] The extreme Optimates, such as Cato.
[520] Against the predatory and piratic inhabitants of Cilicia.
[521] His poem "On his own Times."
[522] In his poem de Consulatu suo, the second book of which (Urania) ends with a speech of Iupiter, who recommends his leaving politics for literature.
[523] A statue in the temple of Tellus.
[524] Brogitarus was a Galatian and connexion of Deiotarus. Clodius, as tribune, had done some services to Byzantium, and had also got Brogitarus the office of high priest of Cybele. He wants now to go and get his money for these favours.
[525] The prætorian elections, like the consular, had been put off till February. Those elected would therefore enter on their office at once, and so escape prosecution, to which they would have been liable if, as in ordinary years, they had been "prætors-designate" from July to January. Afranius's motion seems to have been for suspending the bribery laws pro hac vice. Cato had been beaten: if there had been an opportunity of impeaching his rivals he might have got in.
[526] Son of the dictator Sulla, who is known to have brought back from Athens a famous Aristotelian library.
[527] Pompey and Crassus, the consuls.
[528] Pompey, as the context shews. In the next clause ambulatio has a double meaning of physical walking and of a political course of conduct.
[529] Philotimus, a freedman of Terentia's, seems to have been engaged at Rome in the reconstruction of Cicero's house. The Spartan bath (Laconicum) was a hot-air bath, like a Turkish bath.
[530] The tribunes had no veto against the censors, they could only hinder them by the indirect method of obnuntiatio, declaring that the omens were bad, and so preventing business.
[531] This also is Phocylides's.
[532] In Pompey's new theatre.
[533] Some bore, unknown to us.
[534] The two boys seem to be receiving their education together at this time in the house of Quintus.
[535] It is all but impossible to explain these words. Some editors transfer them to the sentence after de Republica. But they are scarcely more in place there. The Greek quotation is not known.
[536] M. Marius, to whom Letter [CXXVI] is addressed.
[537] C. Anicius, a senator, seems to have obtained from Ptolemy Auletes, by gift or purchase, his state sedan and its attendants.
[538] The Pompeianum.
[539] An unintellible word, meant apparently for Greek (perhaps arce Ψυρίᾳ, see Att. xvi. 13), is in the text. The most probable conjecture refers it in some way to Arpinum, Cicero's hardy mountain birthplace.
[540] The de Oratore.
[541] The ruin of his country.
[542] For us to walk and converse in. It hardly refers to a supply of vegetables, as some suggest.
[543] A learned freedman of Atticus's.
[544] See p. [250]. Censors were elected this year, but the powers of the censorship had been much curtailed by a law of Clodius in B.C. 58.
[545] Apius Claudius (brother of Clodius) was a candidate for the consulship of B.C. 54.
[546] Clodius, a revolutionary, like Appuleius Saturninus. The feminine gender is an insult.
[547] Either his poem "On his own Times," or the notes of events which he had promised in Letter [CVIII], p. [231].
[548] A treatise on union (περὶ ὁμονοίας). The rhetorician Dionysius of Magnesia had been with Cicero during his tour in Asia.
[549] L. Egnatius, who owed Q. Cicero money.
[550] C. Aquilius Gallus, Cicero's colleague in the prætorship, and a busy advocate. See p. [13].
[551] Apparently a money-lender.
[552] Perhaps at his sponsalia, as he was married towards the end of the year.
[553] C. Arrianus Evander, a dealer in statues, it seems, from whom Fadius had bought some for Cicero. He offers to let the debt for them (and so the interest) run from any day Cicero pleases.
[554] A well-known connoisseur, mentioned by Horace, Sat. ii. 3, 64, seq.. He seems to have offered to take the bargain off Cicero's hands.
[555] That is, for his palæstra or gymnasium, as he calls it, in his Tusculanum. See Letters [I], [II], [VII].
[556] An ornamental leg or stand for table or sideboard (abacus). See picture in Rich's Dictionary of Antiquities.
[557] On the via Appia, where the canal across the marshes began. Cicero stops there a night between Formiæ and Pomptina Summa (Att. vii. 5).
[558] One who professes to be an amateur of art like Damasippus.
[559] As in Letter [CVI], Tullia, not Terentia, seems to be in Cicero's confidence and presiding in his house. Terentia must already have been on bad terms with him, and perhaps was residing on her own property.
[560] Half-sister of Gaius Cassius.
[561] Communis, which is not satisfactory. But neither is the emendation proposed, cominus. For communis, "common," "vulgar," see de Off. ii. § 45.
[562] Whom Pompey employed to select the plays to be exhibited in his new theatre.
[563] Pliny (N. H. viii. § 21) says that the people were so moved that they loudly cursed Pompey.
[564] L. Caninius Gallus (see p. [210]). What he was accused of does not appear.
[565] I do not like to think this letter a mere rhetorical exercise, as has been suggested, rather than a true account of Cicero's feelings as to the theatre and amphitheatre. He often expresses his want of interest in the latter. The vulgar display in the theatre, unlike the severe simplicity of Greek art, was an old evil (see Polyb. xxx. 14).
[566] Ego, ut sit rata, Schutz's reading, which seems the best for the unintelligible ergo et si irata of the MSS. It would mean, "though I regret not having been back for Domitius's election (if it has taken place), I am glad to have been away from the previous wrangling in the senate."
[567] Crassus starts for Syria; he compares him to L. Æmilius Paullus starting for the war with Perses (B.C. 168). Paullus was, like Crassus, sixty years old, and in his second consulship. Paullus set out with good omens, Crassus with a curse, denounced by the tribune C. Ateius Capito (de Div. i. § 29; Plutarch, Crass. 16).
[568] By his librarii. Atticus was again acting as his publisher.
[569] The date has been lost.
[570] Lit. "has been beheaded with the axe of Tenes," mythical founder and legislator of Tenedos, whose laws were of Draconian severity. A legatio from Tenedos, heard as usual in February, had asked that Tenedos might be made a libera civitas.
[571] Some publicanus who had made a charge on the Magnesians which they considered excessive.
[572] Lucretius seems to have been now dead, according to Donatus 15 October (B.C. 55), though the date is uncertain. I have translated the reading multæ tamen artis, which has been changed by some to multæ etiam artis. But the contrast in the criticism seems to be between the fine poetical passages in the de Rerum Natura and the mass of technical exposition of philosophy which must have repelled the "general reader" at all times. It suggests at once to Cicero to mention another poem on a similar subject, the Empedoclea of Sallustius, of which and its writer we know nothing. It was not the historian.
[573] Retaining populi convicio, and explaining populus to have the general meaning of the crowd, including senators and spectators. Cicero uses populus in this vague way elsewhere.
[574] Zeugma I take to mean the "territory of Zeugma," a town on the Euphrates, part of the Roman province of Syria, and close to the frontier of Commagene. Antiochus had asked that some stronghold should be reckoned as his rather than as belonging to the province.
[575] Appius, he insinuates, hoped to make money by granting the request of Antiochus, left king of Commagene by Pompey, for some special privileges, among which was the right of wearing the toga prætexta, which symbolized some position with a shadow of Roman imperium, while at the same time conveying a compliment to the Roman suzernainty. See Polyb. lib. xxvi.; xxx. 26; Suet. Aug. 60.
[576] Some petty prince of Bostra (Bozra), in Arabia, of whom we know nothing.
[577] Quintus was expecting, what he got, the offer of serving under Cæsar as legatus. Cæsar was preparing for his second invasion of Britain.
[578] Which will prevent meetings of the senate, and so give me no news to send you.
[579] There is a double entendre. Cold weather will prevent the meetings of the senate actually, but metaphorically politics will be also cold and dull, and that dullness will probably be nowhere so evident as in the deserted state of the consul Appius's house, which in all probability will miss its usual bevy of callers. This explanation—put forward by Prof. Tyrrell—is not wholly satisfactory, yet it is the best that has been given.
[580] Pompey had two functions at this time: he was governor of Spain and præfectus annonæ. The latter office, as being extraordinary, might be, perhaps, held with the other without an actual breach of law, but it was certainly against the spirit of the constitution. Cicero knows that Pompey's staying in Italy and governing his province by legati will not be acceptable to Cæsar, and he alludes to it in carefully guarded terms. He had been named his legatus when Pompey first undertook the care of the corn-supply, but it does not seem as if he ever seriously contemplated going on actual service.
[581] L. Cornelius Balbus, whom Cicero defended, and who acted as Cæsar's agent.
[582] The name of the person jocosely referred to by Cæsar is uncertain, from corruption of the text. Q. Lepta is Cæsar's præfectus fabrum.
[583] We cannot tell the allusion, not having the letter of Quintus. But he seems to have used the expression for something incongruous either in politics, or in regard to his contemplated services with Cæsar.
[584] I.e., the day he had to appear for trial, usually fixed by the prætor on the tenth day from the notice of prosecution. Cælius had been acqiuitted in B.C. 56, when Cicero defended him; this second trial appears to have in some way fallen through. The prætor Domitius is said to be Cn. Domitius Ahenobarbus, son of Lucius, but he was much too young to have been prætor this year. The former trial of Cælius (B.C. 56) had been before Cn. Comitius Calvinus, hence a difficulty about this passage. For the prætor Domitius of this year is not known. Domitius Calvinus was prætor B.C. 56.
[585] The publicani of Syria were enraged with Gabinius for neglecting his province while going to Egypt, thus allowing the pirates so to plunder that they could not collect enough dues to recoup them for their bargain to the state (Dio, xxxix. 59).
[586] L. Ælius Lamia, an eques, appears to have been one of the deputation of publicani who attended the senate to accuse Gabinius.
[587] The prætorian elections were again postponed from the previous year to the early months of B.C. 54. Appius Claudius found means to put them off till March by holding meetings of the senate each day—the electoral comita not being able to meet on the same day as the senate.
[588] The tribune C. Memmius was prosecuting Gabinius (Letter [CXLVII]). The judicial comita could meet, though not the electoral.
[589] Callisthenes of Olynthus wrote (1) a history of the Trojan war; (2) an account of Alexander the Great. Philistus of Syracuse (1) a history of Sicily; (2) a life of Dionysius the elder; (3) a life of Dionysius the younger. He imitated Thucydides (de Orat. § 17).
[590] Trebatius is going to join Cæsar, who is about to sail to Britain; hence the jest about the essedarii, drivers of Gallic and British war-chariots. Letter [CXXXIII] recommended him to Cæsar. The lines quoted are from the Medea of Ennius, adapted or translated from Euripides. I date these two letters from Cumæ, because he speaks of writing to Balbus, who was at Rome (p. [267]).
[591] A banker at Puteoli.
[592] The six books on the Republic.
[593] A municipium of Campania nine miles from Naples.
[594] Vacerra, Manilius, Cornelius, well-known lawyers or jurists of the day.
[595] We shall afterwards see that Trebatius did not go to Britain.
[596] At Luca in the year B.C. 56.
[597] Comitia habendi causa. No such had been appointed since B.C. 202, and the irregular dictatorship of Sulla in B.C. 82 made the idea distasteful. Pompey was understood to wish for the appointment, now and later on. See pp. [326], [335].
[598] τοιαῦθ' ὁ τλήμων πόλεμος ἐξεργάζεται (Eur. Supp. 119).
[599] For the nature of this compact, see p. [300].
[600] That is, as an interlocutor in the dialogue "On the Republic," which Cicero was engaged in writing.
[601] A law re-enacting the lex Didia, and enacting under penalties that no law was to be brought forward without due publication beforehand.
[602] A law which enabled the magistrates and tribunes to stop legislation by obnuntiatio.
[603] Procilius had been condemned de vi (p. [280]). The rumours, I suppose, were as to the jury having been corrupted.
[604] The consul L. Domitius Ahenobarbus and C. Lucceius Hirrus, the latter a warm partisan of Pompey, who was supposed to be agitating for a dictatorship.
[605] L. Æmilius Paullus (consul B.C. 50) restored the basilica built by his ancestor M. Æmilius Lepidus in B.C. 179, and appears to have added largely to it, or even built a new one.
[606] These works seem to have been contemplated by the censors and senate, and Cicero speaks of himself and Oppius as doing them because they supported the measure. They were partly carried out by Cæsar but not completed till the time of Augustus.
[607] Because the tribunes stopped it—the formal act at the end of the Censor's office—by obnuntiationes.
[608] The name of the law mentioned here is uncertain. The lex Cincia de munuibus forbade advocates taking fees for pleading.
[609] M. Nonius Sufenas and C. Cato were charged with bribery and other illegal proceedings during their tribuneship: Procilius for riot (de vi) when some citizen was killed.
[610] Q. Hortensius, the great orator.
[611] This refers to the famous waterfall of Terni. An artificial cutting drained the River Velinus (which otherwise covered the high valley as a lake) into the Nar, which is in the valley below. What was good for the people of Reate was, of course, dangerous for the people of Interamna living below. M. Curius Dentatus was consul B.C. 290.
[612] σἠμα δἐ τοι ἐρέω (Hom. Il. xxiii. 326).
[613] Because Atticus lent money.
[614] For the death (in September) of his daughter Iulia, wife of Pompey.
[615] A nickname, it is said, of Vacerra (perhaps because he stuttered), who had been a teacher of Trebatius.
[616] To Ptolemy Auletes, who had agreed to pay large sums to certain persons for supporting his interests in the senate.
[617] In the "Banqueters" (σύνδειπνοι) of Sophocles, Achilles is excluded from a banquet in Tenedos. Some social mishap seems to have occurred to Quintus in camp.
[618] Sending coals to Newcastle.
[619] ῥαθυμότερα.
[620] That is, to get them seats at the games. See Letter [XXVI], p. [63].
[621] The porticus is a kind of cloister round the peristylium or atrium.
[622] Calventius is said to stand for L. Calpurnius Piso Cæsoninus, the consul of B.C. 58, against whom Cicero's speech was spoken in B.C. 55 in the senate. He calls him Calventius from his maternal grandfather, and Marius because—as he had said, in the speech, § 20—he had himself gone into exile rather than come to open fight with him; just as Q. Metellus had done in B.C. 100, when, declining to take the oath to the agrarian law of Saturninus, rather than fight Marius, who had taken the oath, he went into exile. This seems rather a roundabout explanation; but no better has been proposed, and, of course, Quintus, who had lately read the speech, would be able better to understand the allusion.
[623] I.e., with money.
[624] This tragedy of Quintus's never reached Cicero. It was lost in transit. Perhaps no great loss.
[625] Milo was ædile and had just given some splendid games.
[626] Maiestas. He would be liable to this charge, under a law of Sulla's, for having left his province to interfere in Egypt.
[628] Apparently referring to the death of his daughter Iulia.
[629] δευτέρας φροντίδας from Eurip. Hipp. 436, αἱ δευτέραι πως φροντίδες σοφωτέραι.
[630] Or, "as kindly and critical at once as Aristophanes (of Byzantium)," as though Quintus had written a Caxtonian criticism of his son's style.
[631] γυῶθι πῶς ἄλλω κέχρηται.
[632] Of his poem "On his own Times." Piso in Macedonia, where he had been unsuccessful with border tribes: Gabinius in going to Egypt to support Ptolemy. He left many of his soldiers there.
[633] The object of the existing consuls in making such a bargain was to get to their provinces without difficulty, with imperium, which had to be bestowed by a formal meeting of the old comitia curiata. But that formality could be stopped by tribunes or other magistrates "watching the sky," or declaring evil omens: and just as these means were being resorted to to put off the elections, so they were also likely to be used in this matter. If it was thus put off into the next year, Domitius and Appius, not being any longer consuls, would have still greater difficulty. Corrupt as the arrangement was, it seems not to have come under any existing law, and both escaped punishment. Appius went as proconsul to Cilicia, in spite of the lex curiata not being passed, but Domitius Ahenobarbus seems not to have had a province. The object of Domitius Calvinus and Memmius in making the compact was to secure their own election, which the existing consuls had many means of assisting, but it is not clear what Memmius's object in disclosing it was. Perhaps anger on finding his hopes gone, and an idea that anything that humiliated Ahenobarbus would be pleasing to Cæsar. He also seems to have quarrelled with Calvinus. Gaius Memmius Gemellus is not to be confounded with Gaius Memmius the tribune mentioned in the next letter.
[634] There is considerable uncertainty as to the exact nature of iudicium tacitum, here rendered "a trial with closed doors," on the analogy of the senatus consultum tacitum described by Capitolinus, in Gordian. ch. xii. It is not, I think, mentioned elsewhere (iudiciis tacitis of 2 Off. § 24, is a general expression for "anonymous expressions of opinion"), and the passage in Plutarch (Cato min. 44) introduces a new difficulty, for it indicates a court in which candidates after election are to purge themselves. Again, quæ erant omnibus sortita is very difficult. Cicero nowhere else, I believe, uses the passive sortitus. But, passing that, what are the consilia meant? The tense and mood shew, I think, that the words are explanatory by the writer, not part of the decree. I venture, contrary to all editors, to take omnibus as dative, and to suppose that the consilia meant are those of the album iudicum who had been selected to try cases of ambitus, of which many were expected. There is no proof that the iudices in a iudicium tacitum had to be senators, and the names in the next sentence point the other way. The senate proposed that the law should allow this selection from the album to form the iudicium tacitum, which would give no public verdict, but on whose report they could afterwards act.
[635] M. Æmilius Scaurus was acquitted on the 2nd of September on a charge of extortion in Sardinia. The trial had been hurried on lest he should use the Sardinian money in bribing for the consulship. Hence he could not begin distributing his gifts to the electors till after September 2nd, and his rivals Domitius and Messalla got the start of him. See Asconius, 131 seq.
[636] He means that Atticus—as a lender of money—would be glad of anything that kept the rate of interest up (see p. [286]). He is, of course, joking.
[637] Antius is not known. Favonius was a close imitator of Cato's Stoicism. He was now opposing both Pompey and Cæsar strenuously, but on the Civil War breaking out, attached himself strongly to Pompey. He was put to death by Augustus after the battle of Philippi (Suet. Aug. 13). He had a very biting tongue. See Plut. Pomp. 60.
[638] Drusus was probably Livius Drusus, the father of Livia, wife of Augustus; he was accused by Lucretius of prævaricatio, "collusion."
[639] This time for ambitus.
[640] The de Oratore.
[641] C. Memmius, a tribune of this year, not the same as the C. Memmius Gemellus of the last letter.
[642] Referring to the fact that Gabinius, on his arrival outside Rome, without the usual procession of friends which met a returning proconsul, skulked about till nightfall, not venturing to enter Rome (the city of his enemies!) in daylight. By entering Rome he gave up his imperium and could no longer ask a triumph.
[643] Cæsar was accustomed to come to North Italy (Gallia Cisalpina) for the winter to Ravenna or Luca, and there he could be communicated with and exercise great influence.
[644] That is, he would go to his province of Cilicia on the strength of his nomination or allotment by the senate. There was some doubt as to the question whether such allotment did not give imperium even without a lex curiata. Besides, the consul had already imperium, and he might consider it to be uninterrupted if he left Rome immediately. However, as there was always an interval between the end of the consulship and the quitting Rome paludatus, the lex curiata had generally been considered necessary (Cæs. B. C. i. 6). After B.C. 52 the lex Pompeia enacted a five years' interval, when, of course, a law would be necessary.
[645] θετικώτερον. From θέσις, a philosophical proposition or thesis. In Paradox. præf. he uses θετικά of subjects suited to such theses.
[646] Pompey was outside the pomœrium (ad Romam) as having imperium.
[647] Two gladiators, one incomparably superior to the other.
[648] A proverbial expression, cp. "snapped my nose off."
[649] C. Pomptinus, prætor in B.C. 63 (when he had supported Cicero), was afterwards employed against the Allobroges as proprætor of Narbonensis (B.C. 61). He had been, ever since leaving his province (? B.C. 58), urging his claim to a triumph. He obtained it now by the contrivance of the prætor Serv. Sulpicius Galba, who got a vote passed by the comitia before daybreak, which was unconstitutional (Dio, 39, 65).
[650] P. Servilius Vatia Isauricus (consul B.C. 48) was an admirer of Cato. See p. [112].
[651] Ἄρη πνέων.
[652] Cicero gives him this title, by which he had been greeted by his soldiers after some victory over the predatory tribes in Cilicia. This letter is Cicero's most elaborate apology for his change of policy in favour of the triumvirs.
[653] Cicero has been variously supposed to refer to C. Cato (who proposed the recall of Lentulus), to Appius the consul, and finally to Pompey. The last seems on the whole most likely, though the explanation is not without difficulties. In that case the "disclosure" will refer to Pompey's intrigues as to the restoration of Ptolemy Auletes, of which he wished to have the management.
[654] I.e., to keep in with the Optimates, who were at this time suspicious of, and hostile to Pompey.
[655] At the trial of Sestius.
[656] B.C. 59, when Vatinius proposed the law for Cæsar's five years' rule in Gaul.
[657] B.C. 56.
[658] Pompey is only speaking metaphorically. Quintus had guaranteed Cicero's support. Pompey half-jestingly speaks as though he had gone bail for him for a sum of money.
[659] Q. Cæcilius Metellus Numidius, expelled from the senate and banished B.C. 100 for refusing the oath to the agrarian law of Saturninus, but recalled in the following year. Cicero is fond of comparing himself with him. See Letter [CXLVII].
[660] M. Æmilius Scaurus, consul B.C. 115 and 108, censor 109, and long princeps senatus. Cicero comments elsewhere on his severitas (de Off. § 108).
[661] Plato, Crit. xii.
[662] Like the character in the play (Terence, Eun. 440), if the nobles annoyed Cicero by their attentions to P. Clodius, he would annoy them by his compliments to Publius Vatinius.
[663] The beginning of the letter is lost, referring to the acquittal of Gabinius on a charge of maiestas.
[664] γοργεῖα γυμνά, "mere bugbears."
[665] Antiochus Gabinius was tried, not for treason (maiestas), but under the lex Papia, for having, though a peregrinus, acted as a citizen; but he says "will not acquit me of treason," because he means to infer that his condemnation was really in place of Gabinius, whose acquittal had irritated his jury; therefore he was practically convicted of maiestas instead of his patron Gabinius. I have, accordingly, ventured to elicit the end of a hexameter from the Greek letters of the MS., of which no satisfactory account has been given, and to read Itaque dixit statim "respublica lege maiestatis οὐ σοί κεν ἄρ' ἶσα μ' ἀφείη (or ἀφιῇ)." The quotation is not known. Antiochus Gabinius was doubtless of Greek origin and naturally quoted Greek poetry. Sopolis was a Greek painter living at Rome (Pliny, N. H. xxxv. §§ 40, 43).
[666] Pomptinus had been waiting outside Rome for some years to get his triumph (see p. [309]). The negant latum de imperio must refer to a lex curiata originally conferring his imperium, which his opponents alleged had not been passed. The insulse latum refers to the law now passed granting him the triumph in spite of this. This latter was passed by the old trick of the prætor appearing in the campus before daybreak to prevent obnuntiatio. The result was that the tribunes interrupted the procession, which led to fighting and bloodshed (Dio, 39, 65).
[667] Because he wanted to go to his province himself in spite of having failed to get a lex curiata (p. [324]).
[668] I.e., without waiting for the senate to vote the usual outfit (ornare provinciam).
[669] B.C. 129. The Novendialia was a nine days' festival on the occasion of some special evil omens or prodigies; for an instance (in B.C. 202), see Livy, 30, 38. The book referred to is that "On the Republic."
[670] I.e., a mere theorist like Heraclides Ponticus, a pupil of Plato's, whose work "On Constitutions" still exists.
[671] Hom. Il. vi. 208.
[672] Reading qui omnia adiurat debere tibi et te valere renuntiat. The text, however, is corrupt.
[673] Hom. Il. xvi. 385.
[674] By Livius Andronicus or Nævius. Tyrrell would write the proverb in extremo sero sapiunt, "'tis too late to be wise at the last." There was a proverb, sero parsimonia in fundo, something like this, Sen. Ep. i. 5, from the Greek (Hes. Op. 369), δειλὴ δ' ἐν πυθμένι φειδώ.
[675] In Gallia Belgica, mod. Amiens.
[676] There are some words here too corrupt to be translated with any confidence. They appear to convey a summary of news already written in several letters as to the bribery at the elections, the acquittal of Gabinius, and the rumour of a dictatorship.
[677] A legacy of a twelfth left by a certain Felix to Cicero and Quintus had been rendered null by a mistake as to the will. See the letter to Quintus, p. [338].
[678] Cicero means, "the substantial gain to be got from your serving under Cæsar in Gaul is the securing of his protection in the future: all other gains, such as money etc., are merely to be regarded as securing you from immediate loss in thus going to Gaul: they don't add anything fresh to our position and prospects."
[679] Quintus had his winter quarters among the Nervii, in a town near the modern Charleroi. In this winter he was in great danger from a sudden rising of the Nervii and other tribes (Cæs. B. G. v. 24-49).
[680] Twenty days of supplicatio had been decreed in honour of Cæsar's campaigns of B.C. 55 (Cæs. B. G. iv. 38).
[681] His gladiators, which he kept in training for the games he was going to give in honour of a deceased friend.
[682] I.e., rather than defend him. τότε μοι χάνοι (εὐρεῖα χθών), Hom. Il. iv. 182.
[683] ὁ δὲ μαίνεται οὐκ ἔτ' ἀνεκτῶς (Hom. Il. viii. 355). The numerals seem doubtful. According to some MSS. the amount would be 10,000,000, i.e., £80,000.
[684] The tragedy written by Quintus and lost in transit.
[685] He seems to refer to the rising of the Nervii against the Roman winter quarters (Cæs. B. G. v. 39 seq).
[686] Andabatam, a gladiator with a closed helmet covering the face, who thus fought without seeing his adversary.
[687] A title granted to the Hædui by the senate (Cæs. B. G. i. 33; Tac. Ann. xi. 25).
[688] Terence, Heautont. 86.
[689] Cicero perhaps means that Valerius's "opinions" are too right to suit such a set as are to be found in the province. Valerius will not mind people there thinking him a bad lawyer. "At Rome you are considered a good lawyer, in Cilicia they don't think so!"
[690] Cognosces tuorum neminem.. Others read cognoscere tuorum nemini, "you will not be recognized by any of your friends," which agrees better with Homer's account of the return of Ulysses. But perhaps the exact comparison is not to be pressed.
[691] The younger Curio was now quæstor to C. Clodius, brother of Publius and Appius, in Asia. He was tribune in B.C. 50, when he suddenly changed sides and joined Cæsar, who purchased his adhesion by paying his immense debts.
[692] Curio had supported Cicero against Clodius, and had worked for his recall. He seems to have attended at Cicero's house for the study of rhetoric or legal practice, as was the fashion for young men to do. He presently married Fulvia, the widow of Clodius, who after his death in Africa (B.C. 48) married Antony.
[693] The interregna lasting this year till July. No legal business could be done, as the law courts were closed during an interregnum. But Cicero jestingly says that he advises clients to apply to each interrex (who only held office for five days) for two adjournments, whereby he would get his case postponed indefinitely: for if each adjournment was to the third day, the two would cover each interregnum. Of course he is only jesting, for in any case the cause would not come on.
[694] There is a play on the double meaning of signa, "signs" and "statues." Cicero did not like the statues in his Tusculanum. See Letter [CXXV].
[695] Samobriva (Amiens), where Trebatius was, or had been, in Cæsar's camp. Cæsar spells it Samarobriva.
[696] Laberius is a rival jurisconsult, Valerius a writer of mimes. Though Cicero jests at the supposed comic character, "a lawyer in Britain" (as we might say, "a lawyer among the Zulus"), it does not appear that Trebatius went to Britain with Cæsar.
[697] A freedman and agent of Curio's. The question is of funeral games and an exhibition of gladiators in honour of Curio's father. Curio gave them, and involved himself in huge debt in consequence.
[698] C. Vibius Pansa had been in Gaul, and was now home to stand for the tribuneship, which he obtained for B.C. 52-51.
[699] Where he would have been in luxury.
[700] A follower of the new academy, with which Cicero was more in sympathy than with the Epicurean ethics, but apparently only partly so. The leading doctrine was the denial of the possibility of knowledge, and, applied to ethics, this might destroy all virtue.
[701] All these jesting objections to a lawyer being an Epicurean are founded on the Epicurean doctrine that individual feeling is the standard of morals, and the summum bonum is the good of the individual. The logical deduction that a man should therefore hold aloof from politics and social life, as involving social obligations and standards, was, of course, evaded in practice.
[702] For the Epicureans believed the gods to exist, but not to trouble themselves with the affairs of men. In taking an oath by Iupiter lapis the swearer took a stone in his hand and said, "If I abide by this oath may he bless me: but if I do otherwise in thought or deed, may all others be kept safe, each in his own country, under his own laws, in enjoyment of his own goods, household gods, and tombs—may I alone be cast out, even as this stone is now." Then he throws down the stone. This passage from Polybius (iii. 25) refers to treaties, but the same form seems to have been used in suits about land.
[703] Ulubræ—like other municipia—had a patronus at Rome to look after its interests. If Trebatius (who was its patronus) would take no part in politics, he would be of no use to the Ulubrani. πολιτεύεσθαι, "to act as a citizen," "to act as a member of a political body."
"I will make fast the doors and gild myself
With some more ducats."—Shakespeare..
[705] Ennius, Ann. 275. The phrase manum consertum in legal language meant to make a joint claim by the symbolical act of each claimant laying a hand on the property (or some representation of it) in court. But it also meant "to join hands in war." Hence its equivocal use in this passage. Consertum is a supine, and some such word as eunt must be understood before it.
[706] Reading at tu non soles. I cannot explain Prof. Tyrrell's reading et tu soles in connexion with what follows.
[707] This elaborate joke is founded on a pun upon the name of the Gallic Treviri and the commissioners in Rome: (1) the III viri capitales, who had charge of prisons, executions, etc.; (2) the III viri auro argento æri flando feriundo, "the commissioners for coining gold, silver, and bronze." Also there is a reference to the meaning of capitalis, "deadly," "affecting the life or citizenship."
[708] Græculam tibi misi cautionem chirographi mei. Various interpretations have been given to this: (1) "a truly Greek security," i.e., "not to be depended on"; (2) referring to a poem in Greek, perhaps the one in praise of Cæsar's achievements, mentioned before (p. [338]), in which some compliment to Trebatius was introduced; (3) Prof. Tyrrell would make it refer to this letter itself, which he supposes to have been written in Greek, and afterwards translated by Tiro. But this letter does not read like a translation, and, after all, is not of a nature to shew as a "commendation." It is conceived in too jocular a vein. I have taken it to refer to some inclosure written in Greek which he might use in this way, and the mention of his "own handwriting" to refer to the fact that he would naturally have employed a Greek secretary to write Greek. The diminutive Græculam I take to be apologetic for the Greek. But it is not at all certain.
[709] On his journey along the via Appia to one of his seaside villas Cicero has put up at a friend's house (a freedman of Lepidus), near the Pomptine marshes, as was his wont (Att. vii. 5). It was near Ulubræ, of which he was deputy patronus in the absence of Trebatius, and he jestingly pretends that the frogs which he hears croaking in the marshes are frogs of Ulubræ turning out to do him honour, as though they were the citizens of the town. Ulubræ was a very dull and decaying town.
[710] The great rising in Gaul in B.C. S4-53, and the second expedition across the Rhine.
[711] The friendship between Trebatius and Matius remained as long as we know anything about them. Cicero afterwards acknowledges (F. ii. 27) the great services Matius had done him with Cæsar, to whom Matius remained attached to the end.
[712] In these vague though ominous sentences Cicero is referring to the constant and violent hindrances to the election of magistrates, that is, to the orderly working of the constitution, which were occurring. No consuls were elected till September.
[713] Milo. His full name is T. Annius Milo Papianus; originally of the gens Papia, he had been adopted by his maternal grandfather, T. Annius.
[714] Pompey was præfectus annonæ B.C. 57-52. As such he had a number of legati, of whom this Titus Titius was one; but there is nothing to shew in which of the corn-supplying countries he was employed. Avianius is a corn merchant, and wants concessions as to the importation of his cargoes.
[715] The letter in some MSS. is inscribed to Sextius or Sestius. Of P. Sittius of Nuceria we hear in the speech pro Sulla, §§ 56, 58. Sulla (who was accused of assisting Catiline) had sent P. Sittius on a mission to Spain, as it was alleged, to raise a rebellion there in support of Catiline. It does not, however, appear that his condemnation took place then. It seems to have been just previous to Cicero's return from exile (August, B.C. 57), and it is suggested that it was after his ædileship of the previous year, when a scarcity of corn had contributed to his unpopularity. The date of the letter is uncertain.
[716] P. Sulla. Sittius was not, it seems, brought to trial with Sulla, but his journey to Spain formed part of the allegations against Sulla.
[717] Titus Fadius Gallus had been a quæstor in Cicero's consulship (B.C. 63), and a tribune in B.C. 58, when Cicero reckoned him among those on whom he depended to resist Clodius. He also, among others, had a motion prepared for Cicero's recall, of which Cicero speaks with approbation (p. [178]). We do not know on what charge he had been condemned, but a number of prosecutions followed the death of Clodius and Pompey's legislation as to violence and corruption of juries.
[718] Pompey. He uses the word potentia, as he generally does, in an invidious sense of "tyrannical, or, unconstitutional power," as opposed to auctoritas, "legitimate influence."
[719] Brother of Cicero's enemy, P. Clodius. He had been consul in B.C. 54, and was now proconsul in Cilicia, in which government Cicero was to succeed him. His relations with Cicero had been varied, and though Cicero speaks warmly to him, he does not do so often of him, and his compliments are evidently not really sincere.
[720] "I shall, in compliment to your accomplishments, call the goddess of learning and wisdom 'Appias,'" i.e., the "Appian Goddess." But the meaning of the elaborate and dull joke or compliment is far from clear, especially the phrase si forte de tuis sumpsero. Was Cicero expecting a present of a bust of Minerva, or intending to purchase one from Appius's collection? Or does he allude, as has been suggested, to the Minerva he had himself dedicated before his exile, and which had probably fallen into the hands of the Appian family?
[721] The condemnation of T. Munatius Plancus Bursa, who, being tribune in B.C. 52, had promoted the riots following the death of Clodius, especially in regard to burning his body in the Curia, and had, after his office terminated (10th December), been prosecuted de vi by Cicero successfully. Bursa, with others, had supported Pompey's wish for the dictatorship, as well as his legislation, and accordingly, in attacking him, Cicero had against him the weight of Pompey's influence. He therefore looks upon it as a great triumph.
[722] The condemnation of Bursa was a point in favour of Milo, whereas Milo's murder of Clodius only brought his ultimate condemnation and exile. Milo's trial had taken place in April.
[723] Pompey and his friends.
[724] The new laws introduced by Pompey de vi, de magistratibus, de pecunia ob iudicium.
[725] The intercalary month was inserted between the 23rd and 24th of February. Whether it was to be inserted or not depended on the pontifices, who kept their secret jealously. If it is inserted, Cicero will be kept all the longer in town with senatorial and legal business, and so be prevented from seeing Marius, who lived near his Pompeian villa.
[726] It is to be observed that at this time Pompey is reckoned as inclined to the populares. His legislation in B.C. 70 had been somewhat in their favour; but he had not, as a fact, ever declared himself either way.
[727] C. Antonius, impeached by Cæsar for plundering Macedonia, appellavit tribunos iuravitque se forum eiurare, quod æquo iure uti non posset (Ascon. § 84). His offences in Macedonia, where he had been left by Sulla, were in B.C. 83-80; his impeachment, B.C. 76; his expulsion from the senate, B.C. 70.
[728] M. Marius Gratidianus (Ascon. § 84). These denunciations of Antonius and Catiline seem to be taken from the oration in toga candida.
[729] Cælius, consul B.C. 94 with Cn. Domitius Ahenobarbus.
[730] Cicero, of course, was now a senator, but he was the first of his family who had been so. The others who came forward for the consulship were two patricians, P. Sulpicius Galba, L. Sergius Catilina; four plebeians, C. Antonius, L. Cassius Longinus, whom Asconius calls nobiles, i.e., members of families who had held curule office; and Q. Cornificius and C. Licinius Sacerdos, whose families had only recently risen to this position, tantum non primi ex familiis suis magistratum adepti erant (Asc.)
[731] He hints, I think, at Cæsar, who supported Antonius and Catiline, and also the Luculli, who were opponents of Pompey.
[732] C. Fundanius, defended by Cicero B.C. 66, fr. p. 216. Q. Gallius, defended by Cicero on ambitus B.C. 64, fr. p. 217 (Brut. § 277). C. Cornelius, quæstor of Pompey, tr. pl. B.C. 67, defended by Cicero B.C. 65 (Ascon. § 56 seq.) C. Orchivius, Cicero's colleague in prætorship B.C. 66 (Or. § 160). We don't know on what charge Cicero defended him. The passage in pro Cluent. § 147, does not mean that he was accused of peculatus, but that he presided over trials of peculatus as prætor.
[733] Manilius, tr. pl. B.C. 66, proposed the law for appointing Pompey to supersede Lucullus in the East. After his year of office he was accused of maiestas, and later on of repetundæ, but apparently neither case came on. C. Cornelius, tr. pl. B.C. 57, was accused of maiestas in B.C. 55, and defended by Cicero. He had become alienated from the senate by its opposition to his legislation against usury in the provinces, and the case made a great sensation.
[734] From fio, according to Cicero, credamusque quia "fiat" quod dictum est, appellatam fidem (de Off. i. § 23). He is referring to his promise to emancipate Tiro on a particular day.