My own self

Very next sentence? Starts with "And first I ask you, Clodius, infatuate lunatic that you are".




He's holding this speech to the most honoured Roman collegium of priests, you know!

Ole writes:

I just have to ask: to what degree is Cicero regarded as an objective historical source?

Also - Teehee.

Glad you enjoyed!


As for his status as a source... Kind of depends on what you're reading out of it. This, for instance, is a relatively objective source on his having lost his house, on populism being considered bad by the religious and political elite alike, on Cicero's really not liking Clodius and trying to get on Pompey's good side (the food-thing he's accused of being populist with was Cicero suggesting Pompey was given control of the grain-import to make things work again), on the Pontificial Collegium being the place to apparantly appeal religious differences, etc, etc. Of course, if you're reading out of it that Clodius was an unprincipled madman devouring the republic like a spot of plague, not so much. (Though it should be mentioned that most historians think he was, which probably says a lot about how one talks a good critical attitude but in the end go with the only thing the sources say...)


What's helpful in this, though, is the sheer scope of how much of Cicero's production is still around. We might not really have any other contemporary sources whatsoever (not quite true - there's Cæsar, for instance), but we have a very varied selection of Cicero's stuff. There are a score of private letters from him (and a few to him, as well), but there are also political speeches he did as a senator. There are defense-speeches he did as a lawyer, and a few ditto attacks. There are intellectual treatises that he wrote on politics and the affairs of state, as well as on rhetoric. Also, there are many treatises on a very wide range of contemporary philosphical issues. Finally, though none are to my knowledge still around in their entirety, he fancied himself a poet, and I believe some of his poems still exist as quoted fragments in other texts.

Now, I've obviously not read all of this, but I can only imagine that to the people who have, you get a rather textured image of the person and his opinions, and would be relatively well equipped to judge the objectivity of the different claims he makes.

Terje writes:

Awesome, as always, Loki! Thanks for sharing. And for adding those nifty footnotes.

As for historians/classicists and Cicero, I've gotten the impression they're all marvellously grateful to have all his writings (I don't. fpr example, think I've ever read an article or book on Rome that doesn't quote Cicero -- unless strictly imperial stuff, of course), but no one really like him. I believe I have previously quoted one historian's uncalled-for and superfluous mention of Cicero and his Greek exile on my blog, but since then I have encountered no end of historians pointing out what a pompous, self-important windbag he was.

Not that they like Clodius any better, of course, seeing as we hardly know any of him except what Cicero has told us, but Cicero is definitely one of the primary punchbags of classical studies.

Well, he's not an easy man to like. In this speech, for instance, he spends a dozen pages talking about how much awesome stuff he's done for the Republic in the past, and then another dozen explaining why this doesn't count as singing his own praises because the situation requires him to, so there.

An interesting point on the Cicero-dislike, by the way, is that almost everybody seems to adore Cæsar. Which is intruiging, as Cicero was exiled for a year and temporarily lost his house for killing a half-dozen rebellious Roman citizens, while Cæsar of course slaughtered them by the thousands during the civil war without any real punishment (The assassination was much more about his politics after the war than a punishment for the war itself). Intriguingly, historians seem to think that being a pompous windbag is a lot more annoying and unlikeable than being a mass-murderer.

(Now, I count myself in that group, by the way, but I know I have an absolute lack of morals in this regard, I just expected more from the phD-community. ;D)


Speaking of Cicero's unlikeableness, he sucks so much up to Pompey in this particular speech (who, not being a pontifex, likely wasn't even there!) it kind of makes me a little bit uncomfortable. Sort of echoes the crazed fangirls and -boys of the modern age's popstars and the like.

Historians and philologists favouring Caesar but loathing Cicero might just be connected to Caesar's mass-murdering being undercommunicated or repackaged into something a bit less gruesome in his writings, whereas Cicero's a pompous, self-important bastard in just about every phrase of his own. And their writings is, after all, what modern scholars spend the most time with.

Not to mention that Caesar, as the supposed first of the Emperors, was something of a holy cow for over one and an half millenium here in the west. And these things tend to die hard, as I'm sure you're aware. Republican Cicero, on the other hand, could more easily (not to say safely) be treated as a dangerous radical or some variant of this.

Really? Wasn't Cicero named a "righteous pagan" or somesuch by the Catholic Church? Thought that'd make him very much of a holy cow as well, if maybe to theologians and lawyers more than to kings and generals.

*digging through mental Medieval scholarship records for stuff on which to cook conjecture*

Umm, yeah. You're right. I guess I kinda went with the flow a bit too far, there. I believe I was thinking about how Medieval Imperial jurists picked up the Codex Justinianus and other Imperial laws during the Investiture Controversy in order to justify Imperial/Royal control of the church in his own country. Somehow I ended up connecting this to the view usually held on Caesar (cited above), and drew a few lines a few yards too far in relation to Cicero.

Perhaps the dislike of Cicero is a much more modern phenomena, then, dateable perhaps to the turn of the 19th century or so, and more of a reaction to the old guard's love-affair with "Old Tully" than with the pompous ass himself. Just to embroil myself in further conjecture, I mean.

Hmm. Perhaps this could have been a topic for my Master's Thesis..?

That would be a highly interesting read, so please do write that.

Maybe it has to do with his letters vs his speeches and treatises, with the former being read mainly in the modern day and giving a much more human and less elated look into his personality? Or am I misremembering my facts now?

One of the only letters of his I can remember without looking it up is one he wrote Caesar to ask if his brother could please be granted an augusticlavi position or something like that. And I think maybe one where he recommended his brother (poor Quintus...) not to punch insolent slaves in the mouth with his fist, but rather wait until a fitting cane was at hand, as one's hands tended to break against the slave's teeth.

Pity about that last one, though; can't remember where I found it.

Anyway, haven't really read all that many of his letters. A whole bunch of short extracts from and references to them, of course, but nothing substantial.

Me neither, but I seem to recall hearing they're largely discovered by modern researchers and weren't too widely known in the Middle Ages?

Hmmm, I skimmed through the parts of "Scribes and Scholars" I have in a compendium (S&S is, as far as I recall, the current standard work on the transmission of Classical texts through the Middle Ages), and what I found supports your recollection:

"Though a recent foundation (764), the monastery of Lorsch, in Hesse, enjoyed the special patronage of Charlemagne (...) and it possessed copies of Cicero's Letters, which were a rarity at the time."

A more thorough search would probably yield more, say on the state of affairs in Byzantium up until the Latin conquest in 1204, when the transmission of the Greek and Latin authors started to pick up real speed, or on the situation in the West in the later Middle Ages. Unfortunately, I am way too lazy to read through some 200 pages right now, as I am sure you'll understand. (Although the texts are among the most interesting I've ever had to read for a course, and will probably be reread at some later point in time.)

Cool, I remembered correctly! SCORE!

Indeed. According to a more or less randomly opened page in a fragment of a book, that is.

Details, details. The point is that I was so right that if I'd been driving in Britain, I'd have gotten quite the feisty ticket.

You didn't play the bibliomancy card? I applaude Thee, goode Sire!

Didn't occur to me, actually. I feel ashamed.

Ah. I see. Well, then. Still.

Yes, absolutely, credit me VASTLY for my restrain in areas I have not realised lay open.