During his lifetime Atticus allowed people to read his collection of Cicero’s correspondence. Probably at some time during the first century AD, this was published alongside other collections of letters to Quintus, Brutus and various other recipients (the so-called Letters to His Friends). Some collections—regrettably, his correspondence with Julius Caesar and his heir—have not survived.
The Emperor Augustus assiduously cultivated the memory of his adoptive father. The assembly hall in Pompey’s theater was walled up, the fifteenth of March was named the Day of Parricide and the Senate resolved never to meet on that date again. However, the “heaven-sent boy” remembered with admiration one of the Dictator’s greatest critics, in whose murder he had colluded. Many years later he happened to pay a visit to one of his grandsons. The lad was reading a book by Cicero and, terrified of his grandfather, tried to hide it under his cloak. Augustus noticed this and took the book from him. He stood for a long time reading the entire text. He handed it back with the words: “An eloquent man, my child, an eloquent man, and a patriot.”
A Reader’s Guide
CICERO
ANTHONY EVERITT
To print out copies of this or other Random House Reader’s Guides,
visit us at www.atrandom.com/rgg
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
1. Discuss the nature of Caesar’s relationship with Cicero. Did the two men genuinely like and respect one another, or did Caesar cynically use Cicero to his own advantage? In return, how did Cicero play off of Caesar?
2. One of ancient Rome’s most remarkable features is its small ruling class that governed an extensive empire without many of the usual mechanisms of government—a permanent civil service, a police force, a standing army, a professional judicial system, rapid communications and so forth. How did the Romans manage to accomplish so much with so little?
3. Evaluate Cicero’s relevance for us today. The founding fathers of the United States Constitution were influenced by his political ideas—especially the notion of the “mixed constitution,” which comprises elements of monarchy, aristocracy and democracy. But is such thinking relevant in a democratic political system?
4. After his suicide following the battle of Utica, Cato won a reputation as a heroic idealist and defender of political freedom, which has echoed down through the ages. In your opinion, does Cato deserve this heroic reputation, or was he simply an obstinate reactionary who got what he deserved?
5. Pompey the Great was an outstanding general but a mediocre politician, and Cicero helped him several times by supporting legislation that was favorable to him and his troops. Do you feel Pompey let Cicero down in the 50s BC? Why did Pompey choose not to use Cicero’s political acumen to negotiate with Caesar in 49 BC?
6. Cicero is often criticized for speaking and writing so much about himself. Today, what media does a middle-class person with no family history in politics use to promote him- or herself? Are there similarities?
7. Everitt emphasizes Cicero’s inability to hold a grudge and his eagerness to mentor younger men. In light of this characterization, discuss why, in your opinion, Cicero did not simply forgive Mark Antony and try to work with him.
8. When the early Italian Humanist Francesco Petrarch found Cicero’s letters to Atticus, which had been virtually unknown since antiquity, he lamented that the ideal picture of Cicero conveyed in the speeches and philosophical works was forever shattered by the revelation of how Cicero acted in his daily life. Compare Cicero the lawyer and politician to the man who emerges in his letters.
For Dolores and Simone
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book would not have seen the light of day without the advice and support of Christopher Sinclair-Stevenson and the generous temerity of Grant McIntyre at John Murray in taking on a greenhorn. A special debt of gratitude goes to Antony Wood, with whose kindly but ruthless editorial support a shapeless bundle of pages was put into good order, and to Joy de Menil of Random House, whose sharp-eyed enthusiasm refocused the biography for the American reader. However, whatever is flawed in my study of Cicero is nobody’s responsibility but my own.
I am deeply indebted to D. R. Shackleton Bailey for permission to reproduce passages from his translation of Cicero: Letters to Atticus and to His Friends in the Penguin Classics edition.
I am grateful to the Publishers and Trustees of the Loeb Classical Library for their kind permission to reprint passages from Cicero, vol. XVI, Loeb Classical Library Volume L213, translated by Clinton Walker Keyes, pp. 167, 245, 317, 345, 347, 361, 367, 373, 375, 499, 503, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1928. (The Loeb Classical Library is a registered trademark of the President and Fellows of Harvard College.)
I should also like to thank Penguin Books, Ltd., for permission to reproduce passages from the following translations of works by Cicero which appeared in Penguin Classics: Letters to Atticus and to His Friends, Copyright © D. R. Shackleton Bailey, 1978; Selected Political Speeches, Copyright © Michael Grant Publications, Ltd., 1969; Sallust, The Jugurthine War; Conspiracy of Catiline, Copyright © the Estate of S. A. Handford, 1963; and Plutarch, Fall of the Roman Republic, Copyright © Rex Warner, 1958.
For the illustrated reconstruction of the Roman Forum, I am indebted to John E. Stambaugh, The Ancient Roman City, p. 112. © 1988 [Copyright holder]. Reprinted with permission of the Johns Hopkins University Press.
SOURCES
GENERAL
By classical standards the sources for the period of Cicero’s life are voluminous, although many histories written within a generation or so of his time are lost. Much has been translated and, for the reader who would like to know more at firsthand about Cicero and the fall of the Roman Republic, some accessible literature is cited below. Titles of classical works are given in translation; see under Abbreviations for original Latin titles.
The most important documentary sources are Cicero’s own writings (all of which are available in Latin alongside translations in the Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press). Many of his speeches, which he revised and issued himself, survive, as do his books on philosophy and oratory. So do about 900 letters; some were designed for publication or for judicious circulation by the recipient, but others, a large proportion of the correspondence with Atticus, were not. They are organized into a number of different collections: the so-called Letters to His Friends and Letters to Brutus and Letters to Quintus are mainly, but not entirely, communications to politicians and public figures; they include letters from Julius Caesar and Pompey and other politicians of the day. They were probably published before the Letters to Atticus, which appeared some time in the first century AD. The complete correspondence was edited and translated in the 1960s by D. R. Shackleton Bailey; he reordered the letters in one continuous sequence, which is cited first in the references below (followed by the traditional numbering).