A Volscian Mafia? Cicero and his Italian Clients in the Forensic Speeches

Abstract In the aftermath of the bitter Social War between ancient Rome and the Italians, ending in the extension of Roman citizenship to all Italians, the competing claims of existing local loyalties and the new demands made by integration into the Roman State, created an intense debate amongst the Italian nobility about the nature of regional identity and how to reconcile this with the profound changes in the relationship of Italian states to Rome. This chapter examines two interconnected themes: first, the Italians who were defended by Cicero or otherwise appear prominently in his forensic speeches, their background and the municipalities from which they originated, and Cicero's connections with them; second, how the Italian clients are characterised in the speeches, the role they play, and what this implies about Roman and Italian identity in the generation after the Social War.