Javascript must be enabled to continue!

DID CICERO ‘PROSCRIBE’ MARCUS ANTONIUS?

View through CrossRef

Pliny's celebration of Cicero's consular achievements contains a striking anomaly, namely the assertion that Cicero proscribed Marcus Antonius(HN7.117). That statement turns Cicero, the victim of Antonius’ murderous vendetta, into the one who wielded the executioner's axe, and it abruptly shifts the focus of the passage from 63 to 43b.c.Two slight corrections to the Latin text can eliminate the intrusion of the proscriptions by substituting a reference to the control Cicero exercised in 63 over Gaius Antonius, his consular colleague and an old ally of Catiline. In hisIn Pisonem(§5), Cicero takes credit for combatting the threat posed by his colleague, and it is highly probable thatHN7.117 mentioned Gaius (not Marcus) Antonius as well, since Pliny's summary of Cicero's consular deeds and honours is nearly identical to the one found inPis. 4–6. The beauty of the emended text is that it restores both historical fact and a logical progression to the overall structure of Pliny's encomium.

Cambridge University Press (CUP)

The Classical Quarterly

Title: DID CICERO ‘PROSCRIBE’ MARCUS ANTONIUS?

Description:

Pliny's celebration of Cicero's consular achievements contains a striking anomaly, namely the assertion that Cicero proscribed Marcus Antonius(HN7.

117).

That statement turns Cicero, the victim of Antonius’ murderous vendetta, into the one who wielded the executioner's axe, and it abruptly shifts the focus of the passage from 63 to 43b.

c.

Two slight corrections to the Latin text can eliminate the intrusion of the proscriptions by substituting a reference to the control Cicero exercised in 63 over Gaius Antonius, his consular colleague and an old ally of Catiline.

In hisIn Pisonem(§5), Cicero takes credit for combatting the threat posed by his colleague, and it is highly probable thatHN7.

117 mentioned Gaius (not Marcus) Antonius as well, since Pliny's summary of Cicero's consular deeds and honours is nearly identical to the one found inPis.

4–6.

The beauty of the emended text is that it restores both historical fact and a logical progression to the overall structure of Pliny's encomium.

Related Results

Religion, Platonist Dialectics, and Pragmatist Analysis: Marcus Tullius Cicero’s Contributions to the Philosophy and Sociology of Divine and Human Knowing

Whereas Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Augustine are probably the best known of the early Western philosophers of religion, Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BCE) also played a particu...

Cicero's Rhetorical Works

Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 bce) rose to prominence in the state during the final decades of the Roman Republic. Blessed with a goodly measure of natural ability, an extraordinar...

The “Cicero”/“Cicero” Puzzling Case

AbstractThis paper aims to solve the following twofold problem. Suppose that a rational speaker, Ralph, mistakenly takes (for some reason) the Roman orator Cicero and the World War...

Cicero’s Philosophical Works

Cicero (106–43 bce) was a Roman statesman, orator, and philosopher. As well as speeches, letters, and rhetorical treatises, Cicero wrote numerous philosophical works. These can be ...

Cicero, Greek Learning, and the Making of a Roman Classic

The Roman statesman, orator, and author Marcus Tullius Cicero is the embodiment of a classic. His works have been read continuously from antiquity to the present, his style is cons...

Marcus tullIus Cicero’s works in the textbook on eloquence “The Mohyla Speaker” (1636)

The article analyses which works of Marcus Tullius Cicero are mentioned and (or) quoted in the textbook on the rhetoric of the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy “Orator Mohileanus” (1636) by Jos...

Linking the natural man to the res publica in the works of Marcus Tullius Cicero

AbstractThere is no consensus on the importance of Cicero's doctrine of the state (res publica) among the prominent figures and scholars of political theory. In our view, the main ...

MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO’S ECOPHILOSOPHY OF EDUCATION: EDUCATION IN THE CITY AND FOR THE CITY

In the writings of the Ancient Roman philosopher, politician and orator Mark Tullius Cicero, the necessity to relate the nature of statehood, the nature of man, the nature of law, ...