Georgius the Peasant

The Temple of Wealth

Friday, 5. December 2008, 13:11:22

Those seven hundred million sesterces, recorded in the account-books of the Temple of Ops - where are they now? The origins of that treasure store were tragic enough. Nevertheless, if the money was not going to be returned to its rightful owners, it could be used to save us from property-tax. But how do you account for the fact, Antony, that whereas on the fifteenth of March you owed four million sesterces, you had ceased to owe this sum by the first of April?

- Marcus Tullius Cicero,
The Second Philippic Against Mark Antony,
translated by Michael Grant for Penguin Books.

Dexter, season 1The fortunes of individuals

Comments

Georgius the Peasant # 5. December 2008, 13:23

Some notes for better understanding of this quote:
- Caesar died on the Ides of March - i.e. the fifteenth - meaning that was when Antony, as one of the two consuls under the dictator, took over.
- Caesar had apparently stored the giant sum of 700 000 000 sesterces in the Temple of Ops (Roman divine personification of Wealth), separate from the official treasury (which was in the Temple of Saturn).

This series of quotes will conclude Monday, with a quote from the last pages of the speech.

Georgius the Peasant # 5. December 2008, 13:41

I love how he suddenly gets all taciturnly implicit and quasi-polite on the actually relevant recent crimes against the state after raving and screaming insults about the man's personal life and morality for several scores of pages.