Cicero's Letters to Atticus. Volume I: 68–59 B.C., letters 1–45 (books I and II) [1]

Table of contents :
Title page
Foreword
Contents
Abbrevaitions
Introduction
A. Atticus and Cicero
B. Fata epistularum
C. Manuscripts
TEXT AND TRANSLATION
Index siglorum
1
10
20
30
40
45
COMMENTARY
1
10
20
30
40
45
Addendum (1)
Appendix: Points concerning Caesar's legislation in 59 BC
Concordance
Indices
I. Index nominum
II. Index verborum
A. Latinorum
B. Graecorum
III. Index rerum

Citation preview

ATTICUS D. R. BAILEY VOLUME I (BOOKS I-II)

CAMBRIDGE CLASSICAL TEXTS AND COMMENTARIES

CICERO’S LETTERS TO ATTICUS 68-54 B.C. BOOKS I AND XI EDITED BY V D. R. SHACKLETON BAILEY

These two volumes form the first part of Dr Shackleton Bailey’s long-awaited edition of the Atticus letters. The introduction

(printed in

volume i only) deals successively with the historical background and Cicero’s relations with Atticus, the transmission of the text, and the reliability of the’ manuscripts. The text, with selective apparatus, is printed with Dr Shackleton Bailey’s translation on facing pages. The volumes end with commentaries, appendices and indices.

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1965

11.

liailey, David Roy Shackleton, ed.

876.1

Library of Congress

(3j

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1700 65-18929

CAMBRIDGE CLASSICAL TEXTS AND COMMENTARIES EDITORS

C. O. BRINK

D. W. LUCAS

F.H. SANDBACH

3 CICERO’S LETTERS TO ATTICUS VOLUME I

CICERO’S LETTERS TO ATTICUS EDITED BY

D. R. SHACKLETON BAILEY VOLUME I

68-59 B.C. 1-45 (BOOKS I AND II)

CAMBRIDGE AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS

1965

PUBLISHED BY THE SYNDICS OF THE CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS

Bentley House, 200 Euston Road, London, N.W. 1 American Branch: 32 East 57th Street, New York, N.Y. 10022 West African Office: P.O. Box 33, Ibadan, Nigeria

© CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS

1965

v.l

Francisco

Public Librat j

Printed in Great Britain at the University Printing House, Cambridge {Brooke Crutchley, University Printer) LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGUE card number:

65-18929

DONO DONORVM AELVRO CANDIDISSIMO

FOREWORD My thanks are pre-eminently due to Professor C. O. Brink, who has read in manuscript both the volumes now appearing, and whose vigilance, acuteness, and learning are responsible for many corrections and improvements. In his capacity of general editor he has been prodigal of time and trouble at every stage. I am also much indebted to his co-editors, Mr F. H. Sandbach and Mr D. W. Lucas, for their contributions to the correction of the proofs, and to Mr J. A. Crook for comments on the historical parts of the Commentary. Among literary debts a special mention is due to Miinzer’s prosopographical articles in the Realencyclopadie, on which my own notes of this kind largely rely. Although his work needs no praise of mine, I hope that occasional corrections and differences of opinion will not suggest that I undervalue it. A. E. Housman scarcely concerned himself with Cicero’s letters, but I would willingly believe that something of what I owe him is reflected in this edition. I have to thank the Faculty Board of Classics in this Univer¬ sity for financial help and the Council of the Cambridge Philological Society for permission to reproduce or adapt passages from the volume in their Transactions entitled ‘To¬ wards a Text of Cicero, ad Atticum’ and from various articles pubhshed in their Proceedings.

Once more I must acknow¬

ledge the despatch and efficiency of the Cambridge University ■^ress‘

D. R. Shackleton Bailey

CAMBRIDGE

December

1964

CONTENTS

page vii

Foreword

xi

Abbreviations INTRODUCTION

3

A

ATTICUS AND CICERO

B

FATA EPISTULARVM

59

C

MANUSCRIPTS

77

TEXT AND TRANSLATION

105

COMMENTARY

277

Appendix,

points concerning caesar’s

LEGISLATION IN 59 B.C.

Concordance

406

409

Indices INDEX NOMINVM

411

II

INDEX VERBOR V M

415

III

INDEX RERVM

419

I

at end of volume

Map of Southern Italy

IX

ABBREVIATIONS The following may be noted: Broughton = T. R. S. Broughton,

The

Magistrates

of the

Roman Republic (New York, 1951-60). References unless otherwise stated are to Vol. n. Drumann-Groebe = K. W. Drumann

and

P. Groebe,

Ge-

schichte Roms. 2nd edition (Leipzig, 1899-1929). K. -S. = R. Kiihner

and

C. Stegmann,

Ausfuhrliche

Gram-

matik der lateinischen Sprache: Satzlehre. 3rd edition (Lever¬ kusen, 1955). Lehmann, de Cic. ad Att. = C. A. Lehmann, De Ciceronis ad Atticum epistulis recensendis et emendandis (Berlin, 1892). Lehmann, Quaest. = C. A. Lehmann,

Quaestiones Tullianae

(Prague and Leipzig, 1886). L. -S.-J. = Liddell-Scott-Jones, Greek-English Lexicon, 9th edition. Mommsen, St. = Th. Mommsen

Romisches Staatsrecht, 3rd

edition (Leipzig, 1887-8). Mommsen, Str. = Th. Mommsen, Romisches Strafrecht (Leip¬ zig, Otto,

1899).

Sprichworter = A. Otto, Die Sprichworter und sprich-

ivortlichen Redensarten der Romer (Leipzig, 1890). Propertiana = D. R. Shackleton

Bailey,

Propertiana

(Cam¬

bridge, 195b). RE. = Pauly-Wissowa, Realencyklopadie. Sjogren, Comm. Tull. = H. Sjogren, Commentationes Tullianae (Uppsala, 1910). Thes. = Thesaurus Linguae Latinae. xi

ABBREVIATIONS

Towards a Text = D. R. Shackleton Bailey, Towards a Text of Cicero, ad Atticum (Cambridge, i960). T--P* = R. Y. Tyrell and L. C. Purser, The Correspondence of Cicero, third and second editions (Dublin, 1904-33). The Letters to Quintus and to M. Brutus are cited from W. S. Watt’s Oxford Text, Asconius by line and page from that of A. C. Clark.

INTRODUCTION

A.

ATTICUS AND CICERO

As a schoolboy, setting a shining and stimulating example to his fellows,1 T. Pomponius made friends with M. Tullius Cicero, some three years his junior.2 Three years count for a lot at that time of hfe, and it is a point worth remembering that the friendship began with Pomponius as senior partner. Cicero too excelled in the class-room, and socially as well as intellectually they were well adjusted.

Both were of wealthy equestrian

family, not without tenuous aristocratic connections.3 Ex silentio it may be inferred that their parents were not well acquainted, but there were doubtless common family friends in the capital.4 One difference was personally and socially significant: the Ciceros were a country family, from Arpinum, whereas Atticus, to give him his later surname,3 was Roman born, ab origine ultima stirpis Romanae genitus.6 Nobody could call him peregrinus;7 and not for him the suburban and country mansions where Cicero loved to lead Itahan leisure, only two modest farms.8 When in Italy Atticus preferred to stay in Rome. From boyhood on, says his biographer, Atticus hved on the closest terms with Cicero.9 But after his father’s death (88 or 1 Nep. Att. i. 3. 2 Atticus was bom about November no (see R. Feger, RE. Suppl. vm. 503. 47), Cicero on 3 January 106. 3 Atticus’ cousin Anicia, herself possibly of consular family, married a patrician, Ser. Sulpicius Rufus, brother of the Tribune of 88 (Nep. Att. 2. 2). Cicero had a similar link with the consular Aelii Tuberones (Gelzer, RE. vn A. 825. 17), not to mention his connection with the Marii (Miinzer, RE.

xrv. 1825. 41). 4 The Augur and Consular Q. Mucius Scaevola, to whom Cicero was presented by his father on coming of age (Leg. 1. 13; Amic. 1), was also well known to Atticus (cf. 89 (iv. 16). 3). 5 Cf. Sen. 1; Fin. v. 4. 6 Nep. Att. 1. 7. 7 Cf. Sull. 22 ff. 8 Nep. Att. 14. 3. He occasionally thought of buying other properties in Italy: cf. 79 (iv. 8). 1; 176 (ix. 9). 4. 9 Nep. Att. 5. 3 cum quo a condiscipulatu vivebat coniunctissime.

3

1-2

INTRODUCTION

earlier),1 though not before the autumn of 86,2 3 T. Pomponius left Italy for Athens, where he made his home for the next twenty years,3 thus escaping civil war and its aftermath. Cicero’s Wanderjahre, from 79 to 77, also included six months in Athens, where, along with his brother and cousin, Q. and L. Cicero, and another future Consul, M. Pupius Piso, he and Pomponius studied philosophy together.4 5 During the rest of the latter’s residence in Greece they will have met only on his, admittedly frequent, 5 visits to Rome. Their relationship in those days can hardly have been so intimate as it was later to become. That is the impression conveyed by the few surviving letters of this period (68-66), easy and amicable but comparatively jejune in matter and style. The match between Quintus and Pomponia had probably been made only a little while before the opening of the extant correspondence, according to Nepos by Cicero himself.6 Though not a success for the principals it seems to have served what was perhaps its main, purpose, to strengthen the ties between their brothers. We have no letters for the years 64-62, during nearly all of which time Atticus was presumably in Rome. Thereafter, until the Civil War of 49, he paid frequent and lengthy visits to Epirus, where in 68 he had acquired an estate near Buthrotum on the coast opposite Corcyra. Business occasionally took him even further afield. 1 Nep. Att. 2. i. 1 Drumann-Groebe, v, p. 12. 3 Nepos (Att. 4. 5) puts the ‘remigration’ in 65, but doubtfully (ut opinor). Atticus was in Greece throughout at any rate the latter part of that year (11 (1. 2). 2). He doubtless had this step in mind when he bought his Buthrotian property in 68 (1 (1. 5). 7) and thought of buying a house in Naples (2 (1. 6). 1). 4 Gelzer, l.c. 838. 47. 5 I see no sufficient reason to discredit, with Feger, l.c. 507. 12, Nepos’ statements in Att. 4. 3 f. v 6 Ibid. 5. 3.

4

ATTICUS AND CICERO

In early days the two had chosen their ways of life: Cicero advocacy and the cursus honorum, Atticus honestum otium,1 fdled by the attentive cultivation of a large fortune and numerous friendships, not to speak of hterature, art, and Athenian civic affairs. Neither mode required apology. The Senate contained plenty of ex-equestrian novi homines who had climbed one or more stages of the official ladder. A man with Cicero’s ad¬ vantages could reasonably reckon upon reaching the Praetorship. The Consulship was a very different matter. Generally monopohzed by the nobility,2 it went now and then to other senatorial families; but Cicero was to be the first consular novus for thirty years.

On the other hand men of Cicero’s and

Atticus’ class—a Papirius Paetus, a M. Seius, a L. Saufeius, a Cn. Sallustius—often preferred to keep out of the race for office. Their decision was perfectly respectable.3 Pubhc emergencies might arise, as Atticus recognized in 63, from which no citizen had the moral right to exclude himself. But in the normal run of things the choice was a man’s to make. The prizes of active pohtics would not after all go a-begging—locus, auctoritas, domi splendor, apud exteras nationes nomen et gratia, toga praetexta, sella curulis, insignia, fasces, exercitus, imperia, provinciae,4 Atticus, however, was no average eques Romanus locuples honestusque. Few if any such could compare with him in two connected points, his interest and flair for backstairs pohtics and the quahty of his social circle. He was a politician by nature, so Cicero once told him,3 and the correspondence amply corrobo¬ rates Cicero’s opinion. Even in his Athenian days he would 1 17

(1.17)- 5-

2 I.e. direct descendants in the male line of a Consul or equivalent dignitary. 3 minime reprehendenda ratio (17 (1. 17). 5): cf. Cluent. 153 ffi That will represent the ordinary Roman view. As a philosopher C. held otherwise (cf. Rep. 1. 10 f., etc., and E. de Saint-Denis, Rev. de Phil. 3e S. 12 (1938), pp. 193 ff.). 4 Cluent. 154.

5 83 (iv. 6). 1.

5

INTRODUCTION

come to Rome at election times, to oblige his friends among the candidates,1 but also, it is fair to assume, to keep himself au courant. At that period he spent a good deal of time and money on the state affairs of his all but adoptive countrymen,2 reaping surely a reward in amusement and experience as well as in such honours as Athens had to offer.3 Domiciled in Rome, he kept abreast of the news, with a keen scent for what lay underneath the rose.4 During Cicero’s absences from the capital it was upon Atticus he most relied for news of the town, and not news merely, but shrewd forecast and opinion. Atticus’ letters, vivid and meticulous, gave him the sense of knowing what was toward better than the people on the spot. 5 When, for our illumination too seldom, their positions were reversed, Cicero did as much for Atticus, whose avidity for political intelligence was quite equal to Ins own.6 His letters to Epirus are the most informative and entertaining of the series. But on the whole the other side of the correspondence might, as rapportage, have been even better worth posterity’s while. For Atticus’ wide interests and easy manners, good sense and lively wit, made him a man of many contacts—the ideal lobby correspondent.

Nepos7 makes much of his adaptability in

personal relations; it extended even to his wealthy, ‘extremely difficult uncle Caecilius.^ With the dynasts of the fifties, it is true, he had httle directly to do, though he was on terms of 1 Ncp. Att. 4. 4 (see above, p. 4, n. 5). Ibid. 4. 3. 3 pjU 3. i fp.

2

4 Cf. 88 (iv. 14). 2 soles enim tu haec festive odorari. 33 (u. ii)* 1 dies enim nullus erat, Atiti cum essem, quo die non melius scirem Romae quid ageretur quam ii qui erant Romae, eteilim litterae tuae non solum quid fieret verum etiam quid Juturum esset indicabant.

Cf. 38 (n. 18). 1 intellexi quam suspenso animo et sollicito scire averes quid esset novi. 7 Att. 16. 1 adulescens idem seni Sullae fuit iucundissimus, senex adulescenti M. Bruto sqq.: cf 92 (iv. 18). 2 nemo enim in terris est mihi tam consentientibus sensibus. 8 Nep. Att. 5. 1.

6

ATTICUS AND CICERO

nominal friendship with Pompey.1

But he cultivated their

intimates, Varro, Terentius Culleo, Theophanes, and Deme¬ trius in Pompey’s case, Q. Arrius perhaps in Crassus’, as later Balbus, Oppius and others in Caesar’s. Naturally he had a large acquaintance among his own class and the less elevated Senators. But friendships with the optimate aristocracy were his speciality, closest of all with Q. Hortensius Hortalus (Cos. 70), whose chequered relations with Cicero, a rival in love of Atticus as in leadership of the Roman bar, he was sedulous to smooth.2 Perhaps it was to Hortensius, whose daughter married Cato’s half-brother, that Atticus owed his entree into the Catonian circle. Cato himself he loved, admired, and assisted in matters of business.3 Cato’s half-sister, the influential Servilia, was his familiaris,4 and her son Brutus, twenty-five years Atticus’ junior, became his and later Cicero’s closest friend among the following

generation.

With L. Lucullus

(Ponticus),

who

married Servilia’s sister, Atticus had ties of long standing. A literary conversation, probably dating back to 77 or 76, is incidentally recorded,5 and Lucullus was not only the friend and benefactor but also the prospective heir of Atticus’ uncle Caecilius.

History does not tell Lucullus’ reactions to the

scandalous discovery in 58 that Caecilius had in fact left his 1 Too much must not be made of half or more than half ironical expressions like tuus ille amicus, ille noster amicus, etc.; and the momentous political inter¬ view with Pompey on his return to Italy in December 62 (cf. H. Ziegler, Atticus als Politiker (Munich, 1926), pp. 13 ff.) is a figment of O. E. Schmidt’s (Briefe Ciceros und seiner Zeitgenossen, 1, p. 25). But private conversations in 58 and 50 are on record (53 (in. 8). 3; 125 (vii. 2). 5). There is little trace of personal contact with Caesar (see below, p. 49, n. 8—88 (iv. 14). 2 and 115 (vi. 1). 25 can be discounted: see notes, and below, p. 26, n. 1), none of any with Crassus. 2 Nep. Att. 5. 4, confirmed in the correspondence. 3 Cf. 17 (1. 17). 9 heros ille noster Cato; 21 (n. 1). 8 Catonem nostrum non tu plus amas quam ego; Nep. Att. 15. 3 (see below, p. 8, n. 8). 4 389 (xv. 11). 2: cf. 97 (v. 4). 1. 5 19 (1. 19). 10. 7

INTRODUCTION

millions (and name) to his nephew instead of to his noble patron.1 But in 60 he, and very likely his brother Marcus, will have been included among Atticus’ ‘fish-fancying friends’.2 Atticus presumably had some acquaintance with Hortensius’ brother-in-law Catulus (Cos. 78), and he was certainly on a friendly footing with Hortensius’ nephew, the patrician M. Valerius Messalla Rufus (Cos. 53).3 Ties with the patrician Manlii Torquati were particularly close, Lucius (Cos. 65), his son (Pr. 49), and their distant kinsman Aulus (Pr. 70(F)). The elder Lucius was another school friend, bracketed as such by Nepos with Cicero and the younger Marius;4 he and his son, a spokesman in the de Finibus, had congenial interests in the fashionable philosophy of Epicurus? and, perhaps, the no less fashionable composition of erotic verse.6 That excellent

person?

A. Torquatus was one of a

number whose affairs Atticus as procurator managed in their absence,8 one of those too whom he befriended after Philippi^— all the Torquati were firm optimates. Val. Max. vn. 8. 5. Public reprobation of Caecilius’ duplicity was such that they dragged his body through the streets. Cf. 19 (1. 19). 6 beatos homines, hos piscinarios dico amicos tuos. 3 As shown by a number of references from 85 (rv. 9). 1 of April 55 onwards. 4 Nep. Att. 1. 4 quos consuetudine sua sic devinxit ut nemo his perpetuo fuerit carior. 3 Atticus (unlike, e.g., Cassius) was anima naturaliter Epicurea, but the flippant, sometimes contemptuous (e.g. 104 (v. n). 6 barones), tone in which C. writes to him on this theme shows that his membership of the sect was not taken seriously. He may be supposed to have professed it partly to be in the fashion and partly because as a devotee of things Hellenic he had to have a philosophy and Epicureanism suited him better than any other. The younger Pliny’s Torquatum, immo Torquatos (Ep. v. 3. 5) is likely to include at any rate the younger Lucius, the bridegroom probably of Catullus’ Epithalamium. 7 94 (v. 1). 5 optimum virum. Nep. Att. 15. 3 quo fiebat ut omnia Ciceronum, Catonis Marci, Q. Hortensi, A. Torquati, multorum praeterea equitum Romanorum negotia procuraret. For the meaning of the last two words cf. Fam. xii. 24. 3. 9 Nep. Att. xi. 2. 8

ATTICUS AND CICERO

Atticus also had his place in another aristocratic group of a different pohtical complexion—the Metellus brothers and their Claudian relatives. The original link was probably Q. Metellus Celer1 (Cos. 60), always an optimate at heart.2 With his brother Nepos (Cos. 57), the firebrand Tribune of 62, Atticus had influence to use on Cicero’s behalf.3 Through Celer’s wife Clodia, the (3ocottis whom Cicero could not abide,4 * Atticus at one time kept in touch with P. Clodius Pulcher himself. 5 There is evidence in 54 of amicable relations with Publius’ elder brothers, Appius6 (Cos. 54), whose daughter married Brutus, and Gaius? (Pr. 56). With many other nobles besides these groups Atticus had more or less of acquaintance.

He must have known and

mourned with Cicero that great and good man L. Lentulus Niger, Flamen Martialis, of whom history has so little to tell.8 * He clearly knew P. Lentulus Spinther (Cos. 57) well.9 In 48 he needed consolation for the supposed death of C. Fannius10 (Pr. 54(F)). One way of fostering aristocratic friendships for a man of letters, an antiquary, was to write family histories. Atticus had so obliged Metellus Scipio (Cos. 52) and Q. Fabius Maximus (Cos. Suffi 45) in 58, and did the same for C. Claudius Marcellus (Cos. 50) and M. Brutus many years later.11 It stands to reason that Atticus did not lack opportunities to join behind the scenes in the political game of which he was a privileged spectator. But the indications are that he used them 1 Cf. 20 (1. 20). 5 Metellus tuus. 2 21 (n. 1). 4 consul qnAovorrpis et, ut semper iudicaoi, natura bonus. 3 67 (hi. 22). 2; Fam. v. 4. 1. 4 21 (n. 1). 5. 5 See below, p. 17. Direct contact with Clodius is indicated, though hardly proved, by the ironical istum tuum sodalem Publium of 29 (n. 9). 3. 6 Cf. Q.Fr. n. 11. 2. 7 Cf. 90 (rv. 15). 2. 8 Cf. 83 (rv. 6). 1. 9 Cf. 67 (m. 22). 2; 69 (hi. 24). 2—though amicissimo homini in the latter probably relates to Cicero rather than to Atticus. Spinther is often Lentulus noster in the letters of 50-49. 10 217 (xi. 6). 6. 11 Nep. Att. 18. 3 f.: see Miinzer, Hermes, 40 (1905), pp. 93 ff.

9

INTRODUCTION

sparingly and seldom, nearly always for private purposes. One such occasion arose in 64. With an excitement visible in his letters1 Cicero approached the electoral campaign for which his whole previous career had been a preparation; for in the story of his uninterrupted rise I believe it idle to look for any more abstract aim. The powers that were after Sulla, a coterie com¬ posed from, though by no means coextensive with, the nobility, could not be expected to find room voluntarily for a novus homo from Arpinum who would be nobody’s Sancho. That fact enforced a semblance of opposition, temperamentally uncongenial, to the exclusive ‘few’.

Cicero’s first major

political manifesto, the Verrine speeches of 70 (the juvenile pro Roscio Amerino hardly qualifies), presents him as the spokesman of a Roman people at the limit of its patience with corrupt senatorial courts and governors. Not, to be sure, as an out-andout improbus; that role never flattered Cicero’s instincts or ambitions. As a senatorial advocate before a senatorial jury he testifies regard and respect for the Order. Even so, the tone of militant menace,2 even of class rancour,3 is sufficiently acrid. Sulla and his institutions come in for rough handling/* The other important political speech from the pre-consular period, the pro lege Manilia, gives quite a different impression. Unrestrained panegyric of Pompey is primary of course, but Lucullus gets his due and the leading opponents of the bill, Hortensius (so scathingly assailed in the Verrines) and Catulus, are treated with notable respect. Times had changed. The opti¬ mate leaders,5 chastened by events, might not after all be im10 (1. 1; especially §4) and 11 (1. 2). 2 Especially in n. 2. 77, 174, 3. 207 f., 5. 126 f., 173 ff. 3 Cf. ii. 3. 7 ff. (n.b. ceterorumque hominum magnorum atque nobilium), 4. 81. Cf. 11. 1. 123 (sympathy for the children of the proscribed), 2. 77 (vraeclarae leges Corneliae) 3.81. 5 Cf. Ascon. 60. 20 dixerunt.. .principes duitatis qui plurimum in senatu poterant, Q. Hortensius, Q. Catulus, Q. Metellus Pius, M. Lucullus, M\ Lepidus. L Lucullus, being outside the city with imperium in 66, could not appear in the list. 10

ATTICUS AND

CICERO

placably obstructive. In favouring circumstances, perhaps even in 66 to be approximately envisaged, Cicero might yet find himself where his inmost sentiments and hopes tended to place him, beside old adversaries in defence of established institutions. That at any rate was to happen. Menaced by a revolutionary patrician, the principes consented1 to the pollution2 * of the Con¬ sulate by a new-comer, a self-proclaimed consul popularis,3 and Cicero was elected by unanimous vote of the Centuries.4 * But the possibility of such a denouement was only embryonic when he wrote to Atticus about his prospects in midsummer 65. Not that they were by any means bad. His probable competitors were blackguards or nonentities, and he could draw on a vast store of gratia zealously accumulated through the years. Cato’s brother-in-law5 Domitius Ahenobarbus, already in 70 adules¬ cens clarissimus ac princeps iuventutis,6 was a mainstay.7 Cicero had cause for uneasiness on two sides.

But

Pompey’s

intentions were dubious, and Atticus is facetiously8 asked to let him know that he will be forgiven if he does not come back from the East to attend the election; and the nobility had not yet shown their hands.9 A subsequent letter expresses more concern on the second count. Referring to a strongly current belief that Atticus’ noble friends would oppose his candidature, Cicero appeals to him to return to Rome, where he could be of the greatest service in winning them over. The fluidity of the 1 Plut. Cic. 10.

2 Cf. Sail. lug. 63. 7.

3 Leg. Agr. n. 6, etc. 4 Off. n. 59. 5 Later at all events. The date of Domitius’ marriage to Porcia is uncertain. 6 Verr. n. 1. 139. On Cicero’s interest with the younger nobles cf. Comm. Pet. 6, 33 (the authenticity of this tract is sub iudice and likely to remain so). 7 10 (1. 1). 4 in quo uno maxime ambitio nostra nititur. 8 Ibid. 2. This whole passage about Pompey, including the admonition to Atticus (illam manum cura ut praestes sqq.), ought not to be taken literally: see note ad loc. 9 Ibid, cum perspexero voluntates nobilium, scribam ad te. II

INTRODUCTION

writer’s position at the time appears in a hint that an electoral compact with Catihne was on the cards. Atticus did come home, probably in January 64,1 and Cicero was elected—how far propter hoc is a matter of speculation. It is fair at least to assume that friends so old and devoted as Hor¬ tensius and L. Torquatus, neither of them very warmly disposed towards Cicero in the past,2 now heard much in his favour; fair even to suspect that Atticus was authorized to offer certain reassurances, later to be reflected in Cicero’s attitude to such matters as Rullus’ land bill and the rehabilitation of the children of Sulla’s victims.3 His anxiety in 61-60 that Cicero should stand firm on his optimate ground‘d would be the more intelli¬ gible if he had made himself in some degree a guarantor for his friend’s good behaviour, like Q. Cicero in 58-57.5 Atticus seems to have spent the next three years in Rome, and since for the first two of them at least Cicero can have had small leisure for country vacations the lapse of correspondence is explained in the main. It says something for both men that neither Cicero s consular rank nor his immense accession of prestige from the events of 63 s had any effect on their relations except to strengthen them. By the year 60 and no doubt sooner Atticus held a place all his own among the host of Cicero’s amici and familiares: Those brilliant, worldly friendships of mine may make a pretty fair show in public, but at home they are barren tilings. My house is crammed of a morning, I make my way down to the Forum sur¬ rounded by droves of friends, but in all the multitude I cannot find 1 Cf. 11 (1. 2). 2. Cicero s pointed exclusion from Torquatus’ confidence in 66-65, despite friendship with his son, remained a sore point (cf. Sull. 11). 3 Cf. 21 (11. 1). 3 n. 4 see below, pp. 15 f. 5 Cf. Fam. 1. 9. 9. Witness among other signs his choice as first speaker in the Senate over the heads of senior aristocrats like Catulus and Hortensius (13 (1. 13). 2 n.). 12

ATTICUS AND

CICERO

one with whom I can pass an unguarded joke or fetch a private sigh. That is why I am waiting and longing for you, why I now fairly summon you home.1 2 The collection ad Familiares stands in confirmation. To none of his correspondents, except his brother, does Cicero reveal him¬ self as to Atticus—who, for his part, had other strings to his bow. No perceptive reader can fail to reahze that in the friend¬ ship between the famous Consular and the eques Romanus the emotional advantage lay with the latter; a compensation which helps to explain its equilibrium. ‘Friendships are made with the object of furthering the joint interests of the parties by services rendered to one another’, said Cicero at 26.3 The offices and amenities exchanged between the two men in the years that followed are abundantly illustrated in the letters of one. A catalogue is unnecessary. Not the least of those rendered by Atticus to Cicero3 concerned him as author. As a litterateur himself Atticus was ever ready with preliminary stimulus and subsequent applause, also criticism.4 5 Later he became in a certain sense Cicero’s publisher. That is to say, having an unusually large staff of literary slaves, he would employ them in multiplying copies of Cicero’s works for general circulation.3 His extensive library was at Cicero’s dis¬ posal on request.6 So no doubt was his knowledge of financial matters,? though his general supervision of Cicero’s affairs only 1 18 (1.18). 1. Rose. Am. hi. Later (or as a philosopher) he knew better (cf. Amic.

2

30 ff.; Fin. n. 82 ff.). 3 More numerous, as Cicero himself acknowledged in 58 (see below, p. 19), than the converse. But that was only natural in the circumstances. 4 Cf. 14 (1. 14). 3 meis orationibus quarum tu Aristarchus es. 13 (1. 13). 5 pro¬ vides the earliest example. 5 Cf. Feger, l.c. 517 ff. 21 (n. 1). 2 shows that even in 60 Cicero looked to Atticus to arrange for the circulation of a Greek composition in Greece, but similar evidence as to his Latin writings is lacking until after the Civil War. 6 Cf. 88 (iv. 14). 1.

7 Cf. 73 (iv. 1). 3.

13

INTRODUCTION

began after the Civil War.1 In certain delicate, private negotia¬ tions, as with C. Antonius in 6i,2 Atticus made a willing and suitable intermediary. But above all Cicero valued his advice, especially political advice: auctorem consiliorum meorum,3 con¬ silium quo tu excellis,4 * omnium meorum sermonum et consiliorum particeps5 are phrases belonging to the years 61-60. The political advice that Atticus had to offer was naturally coloured by his own sympathies, which, notwithstanding his early connection with the Tribune Sulpicius6 * and friendship with the younger Marius, were steadily conservative.7

For

improbi, disturbers of pohtical and economic peace, the intimate of Sulla and Brutus had no theoretical kindness. The first and last overt pohtical action of his hfe was to take his place of leadership among the Knights whom Cicero posted on the Capitol for his own and the Senate’s protection on the immortal Nones of December.8 9

So Cicero writes throughout as one

bonus to another, and at times finds it necessary to apologize for certain aberrations of his own. By the end of 61 he had become anxious and exasperated at threats to the concord between Rome s political and financial elite which he believed himself to have cemented1^ and which Cato, followed by the majority of the Senate, was in his view now lightly10 sacrificing on an 1 The transactions mentioned in 24 (11. 4). 1, 26 (11. 6). 2, 27 (n. 7). 5 concern Pomponia and the absent Quintus, for whom Atticus will have been acting as procurator (see above, p. 8, n. 8) as, doubtless, for Cicero in 51-50 and 49-47 (cf. Fam. xiv. 5. 2). During the exile of 58-57 he presumably did what he could for the wreck of Cicero’s fortune. 2 Cf. 12 (1. 12). r. 3 16 (1. 16). 1; cf. 44 (n. 24). 5.

4

5 18 (1. 18). 1.

6 See above, p. 3, n. 3.

,

17 (1. 17). 6.

7 Cf. Ncp. Att. 6. 1 in re publica ita est versatus ut semper optimarum partium et esset et existimaretur, neque tamen se civilibus fluctibus committeret. In the Laws (tn. 37) Atticus is made to say mihi vero nihil umquant populare placuit. 8 Cf. 21 (u. i). 7. 9 17 (i* 17)- 10 illam a me conglutinatam concordiam. 19 (i-19)- 6 vidi nostros publicanos facile a senatu disiungi\ cf. 21 (n. 1). 8, etc.

H

ATTICUS AND CICERO

altar of unseasonable and utopian rigour. For like some of his modern admirers, Cicero could not or would not1 recognize that the alliance between Senate and Knights in 63, as in 100, was the product of a temporary stress and could not be expected long to outlast its cause. He was not the man to deflate his own slogan: they, with less excuse, condone the lack of any practical design for linking the basic interests of property and business with the maintenance of Sullan political machinery—a lack not to be made good by attention to day-to-day expediencies, Asiatic tax contracts and so forth.

Blinkered against many

realities, Cato was not to be deflected by shadows. He went his way, which was not Cicero’s; and Cicero the realist, still more perhaps Cicero the disillusioned parvenu, sensitive to fishfancying spite and hauteur and ‘ingratitude’,2 looked about him again for new allies. Pompey, now back in Italy, balked by senatorial obstruction of land for his veterans and confirmation of his Eastern acta, was approachable. Close relations between Cicero and Pompey would pay dividends in public good and personal security.3 Letters to Epirus give no sign that Atticus’ advice at this juncture went much further than Calliope’s: auge famam laudesque bonorum.4 Truck with Pompey was dangerous.5 Atticus’ mistrust of him more than matched Cicero’s.6

,7

February 60, answering an adumbration of the new ratio

In he

warned his friend against any abandonment of the high position he had taken up, any unguarded venture into enemy lines. 1 Not, at least, till after ten years of painful experience: cf. 130 (vn. 7). 5 nisi eos timere putas ne sub regno sint qui id numquam, dum modo otiosi essent, recusarunt. 2 Cf. 19 (1. 19). 6, etc.

3 Cf 20 (1. 20). 2; 21 (11. i). 6.

4 23 (11. 3). 45 Cf. 17 (1. 17). 10 video quid dicas, cavebo quae sunt cavenda. 6 13 (1. 13). 4 in particular could never have been written to a real friend of Pompey. inquies.

Cf. also 40 (n. 20). 1 Pompeius amat nos carosque habet, ‘credis?’ 7 17 (J• W)- I0-

15

INTRODUCTION

Z-TrdpTccv eAaxes, tocutccv Koapsi: fate, not without a little help from Atticus himself, had arranged for Cicero to become the champion of the ‘ honest men ’. Let him so remain.1 And Cicero in an elaborate apologia promises that he will so remain, spite of all. A few months later a further gentle scolding for familiarity with Pompey2 ehcited another defence, with some forthright criticism of ‘our doughty champion Cato’.3 A hint that even Caesar might not be beyond amendment is proffered with due diffidence.4 Atticus, who in years to come did not share incipient illusions about Octavian,5 will not have been beguiled by the vision of Pompey led tactfully up the via optimas, with Caesar at beckoning distance in the rear. In 60, as in 43, the insubstan¬ tiality of Cicero’s conceptions was soon and ruthlessly to be exposed. As Octavian joined Antony and Lepidus, so Pompey joined Caesar and Crassus. Atticus’ first response to the new dispositions seems to have been a retreat into reticence. So cool an observer, now back in Rome, must have been conscious of the realities of power and the risks in disregarding them. But in Caesar’s Consulship it was not easy to applaud Bibulus6 and at the same time counsel Cicero to make terms. Of Atticus’ hearty dislike of the new regime there can be no question; it is imphcit in almost every letter of the period. By April 59 the thieves appeared to be falling out.

Atticus hinted darkly at

murmurings in one of their strongholds, Caesar’s Agrarian Commission.'7 The ‘spoiled and licentious youth’8 who would 1 20 (1. 20). 2 f. 21 (11. 1). 6 quod me quodam modo molli bracchio de Pompei familiaritate obiurgas.

3

heros ille noster Cato (17 (1. 17). 9).

4 21 (11. i). 6 quid? si etiam Caesarem.. .reddo meliorem, num tantum obsum rei publicae? 5 See below, p. 55.

6 Cf. 35 (n. 15). 2.

7 27 (u. 7). 4 iam etiam ex ipsis quinqueviris loqui quosdam.

8 19 (x. 19). 8.

16

ATTICUS AND

CICERO

willingly have avenged Catiline had now turned against the ‘Triumvirs’, disappointed perhaps by the survival of their creditors. P. Clodius Pulcher in particular was supposed to be at loggerheads with his late patrons.1 Cicero implores Atticus to ‘stoke him up as much as possible’,2 not so much apparently in order to avert Clodius’ designs against himself, which at this period he did not take too seriously, as to exploit fissures in the ruling coalition.3 Through Clodia (pocoms) Atticus took his soundings.4 But nothing came of it, and in May, opining that Pompey might settle his difficulties by recourse to violence,3 he left once more for Epirus. But he left advice behind him. The evidence lies in a letter written nearly ten years later (162 (vm. 12). 5), in which Cicero recalls certain counsels of expediency as contrasted with duty (ojficium) proffered by Atticus in the days before his exile. Had he hstened, he would not have had to go through ‘ the sorrow of those times’:

T

remember the advice you gave me then

through Theophanes and through Culleo, and I have often remembered it with bitter regret.’ The advice therefore was not given directly but through two of Pompey’s friends. That would not have happened if Cicero and Atticus had been together at the time, nor is Atticus likely to have written from abroad asking Theophanes and Culleo to convey his views to Cicero. Furthermore, the tone of Letter 37 (11. 17) of early May, the last in the series before Atticus’ departure, as well as of those preceding, virtually precludes the possibility that this advice had already been received. What occurred can be in¬ ferred from the end of the letter. Atticus is requested to ‘fish 1 Cf. 27 (n. 7). 2 £ Atticus’ reports were borne out by Curio filius (28 (n. 8). 1; 30 (n. 12). 2). 2 27 (n. 7). 3 incende hominem, amabo te, quoad potest. 3 Cf. ibid, una spes est salutis istorum inter ipsos dissensio. 4 Cf. 29 (n. 9). 1; 30 (n. 12). 2; 34 (11.14). x (n.b. cum has actiones EuavaTpexrtous videbit). 2

5 37 (n. 17)- 1.

17

SBC I

INTRODUCTION

out’ from Theophanes, inquiring as a relative of Cicero’s,1 Pompey’s sentiments towards him, and to get ‘a doctor’s prescription, as it were’2 on how he should behave. If, as is otherwise probable,3 Atticus did not have the opportunity to report the result personally, it would be natural for him to ask Theophanes (and Culleo, if he also was consulted) to speak to Cicero and at the same time to convey his own views—the gist of them being presumably that Cicero had better make terms while he could and accept the offer of a post on Caesar’s staff or a libera legatio:4 The failure of negotiations with Clodius and the prospect of a lengthy absence, as well as what Pompey’s friends had had to say, will have brought him so far. But it may well be imagined that he felt a certain embarrassment in offering such recommendations, paulo salubriora rather than gloriosa,5 and was not sorry to let them reach Cicero at second hand. It may also be doubted whether he really committed himself quite so definitely and emphatically as Cicero’s words in February 49 suggest.

Cicero had at that time a psychological interest in

representing Atticus as a counsellor of expediency, ha his letters to Epirus of June-September 59, only a hint or two, ad¬ mittedly significant, attest the change.6 What is more remark¬ able, to anticipate a little, the letters from exile, containing as they do plenty of self-reproach and some reproach of Atticus,7 have never a word of this advice nor any sign that Atticus on his side ever recalled it.8

1 1

koctoc t6 Kf|5e|ioviK6v, a phrase long misunderstood: see note. quasi UTTO0riKas: again, see note.

3 There is nothing to show that Atticus saw Cicero before he left, a proposed visit to Arpinum having fallen through: see note on 32 (ix. 11). 2. * Cf. 38 (n. 18). 3; 39 (n. 19). 5. 5 162 (vm. 12). 5. In 39 (11. 19). i (Juiy) dices fortasse ‘ dignitatis ctXis tamquam 8puos. saluti, si me amas, consule.' me miserum! cur non ades? nihil profecto te praeteriret, ego fortasse TuipAcbTTCO et nimium too koA TTpoorrETrovSa; ibid. 4 ad istam ipsam acrcpoAEiav. 7 See below, pp. 20 f. On other possible allusions in the correspondence after C.’s return see p. 24, n. 8. 8 See below, p. 20, n. 8.

I8

ATTICUS AND CICERO

Definite or not, it was rejected.1 But as the summer months went by, Clodius’ threats grew louder and Pompey’s assurances, though Cicero did not choose to doubt their sincerity,2 failed to reassure. Longing for the ‘advice, encouragement, indeed protection’3 which only Atticus’ presence could afford, Cicero appealed more and more urgently for his friend’s return. But Atticus was in no great hurry, all the less so perhaps because so much was expected of him. His monitory role was awkward. Favouring prudent courses, how could he press them hard to the neglect of‘fame and good men’s praise’? His behaviour in the five months or so between his return to Rome4 and Cicero’s flight in March 58 can only be inferred from later references. In May 58 Cicero writes that Atticus must now see who was the villain (meaning Hortensius, no doubt) who had led him on and betrayed him, and wishes he had seen it sooner instead of surrendering, like Cicero himself, to grief.5 Some three months later he enlarges on this theme in a long passage which begins with an acknowledgement of past sins against friendship, at least of omission, on his own part.6 Neither here nor later are these specified.7 The pre-consular letters show Atticus as sometimes less than satisfied with his friend’s good offices in private matters.8

A quarrel with

1 162 (vm. 12). 5 ad illos calculos revertamur quos tum abiecimus. 2 Cf. 39 (11. 19). 4; 40 (11. 20). 1 f., etc. 3 41 (11. 21). 6 plurimum consili, animi, praesidi denique mihi, si te ad tempus videro, accesserit: cf. 42 (n. 22). 4 nunc mihi et consiliis opus est tuis et amore et fide, qua re advola. 4 Exactly when he got back is uncertain. The last extant letter to him before his return probably belongs to September. 5 53 (m. 8). 4. 6 60 (m. 15). 4 meaque officia et studia quae parum antea luxerunt (fatendum est enim).. .si quid in te peccavi ac potius quoniam peccavi, ignosce.. .meo non tuo scelere.... 7 Cf 65 (m. 20). 2 quod secus a me erga te commissum aut praetermissum videretur and the difficult phrase in 73 (iv. 1). 1 propter meam in te observantiam (see note). 8 Cf 1 (1. 5). 4 f; 8 (1. 3). 3. Perhaps he thought that more might have been done in the matter of the Sicyonian loan (cf 19 (1. 19). 9; 20 (1. 20). 4).

19

2-2

INTRODUCTION

Quintus in 61, for which Cicero blamed Pomponia,1 may possibly have been a source of grievance, though that is cer¬ tainly not the impression given in the relevant letters.2 3 How¬ ever, Cicero’s admissions are suspect as a dialectical gambit. The passage is in fact a masterpiece of crimination dehcately disengaged from the chrysalis of self-reproach ;3 if only he had better deserved Atticus’ affection, he would have got more help from him in the hour of need. The gravamen of the charge is that Atticus had fallen short in his prime office as adviser;4 5 he had not really set his mind, dies ac nodes, to the problem. Specifically, he had allowed Cicero to be persuaded that Clodius’ law de collegiis would be to his advantage; and when Cicero s own nerve gave way after Pompey’s refusal to come to the rescued Atticus, who had no personal fears to distract his judgement, sat idly by6 * while Cicero, misled by traitors under his own roof,7 committed the cardinal blunder of taking to his heels instead of waiting until attacked by name and fighting it out. This reproach is not just the ebullition of a man under strain; it is repeated, with brevity and restraint but without compromise, a year later, immediately after the triumphal restoration.8 What are we to think of it? Atticus seems to have made no 1 17 (1.17). 33 Cf. 17 (1. 17). 1-7;

19 (x. 19).

xi; 20 (1. 20).

I.

3 177 (ix. 10). 2 if. is a specimen of the same technique. 4 60 (m. 15). 4 numquam esses passus me quo tu abundabas egere consili. 5 Ibid, quod si non modo tu sed quisquam fuisset qui me Pompei minus liberali responso perterritum a turpissimo consilio revocaret, quod unus tu maxime potuisti, (aut honeste occubuissemus'} aut victores hodie viveremus. Ibid. 7 inspectante et tacente te, qui, si non plus ingenio valebas quam ego, certe timebas minus. Cf. 55 (m. 10). 2 nisi intra parietes meos de mea pernicie consilia inirentur, and similar expressions aimed especially at Hortensius. 73 (rv. 1). 1. Had Atticus fully and freely advised Cicero to think of safety m 59 (see above), this would surely have been the time to say so; but in that case Cicero could hardly have written as he did. 20

ATTICUS AND CICERO

defence, but merely to have countered with a denial that his own sentiments had been at all affected by Cicero’s real or imaginary shortcomings.1 The allusion to Clodius’ law de collegiis must be left as it stands in the lack of further informa¬ tion. But the second and main specific complaint looks on the face of it eminently unreasonable. In advising Cicero to retire when he did Hortensius and the rest probably spoke in good faith; certainly Atticus continued so to maintain.2 To tell a demorahzed man5 to stand his ground is not easy; Cato may have done something hke this,4 but there were not many Catos. Atticus himself was a timid man, sometimes an alarmist.5 What Cicero ought to have done in those harrowing days will always be an open question. But as he himself wrote on another occa¬ sion, quid debet qui consilium dat praestare praeter fidem?

And

Atticus’ good faith he never doubted.6 True, he does not tax Atticus with advising him badly but with failing to advise him at all; he was just there.7 But what could he have advised? An arrangement with Caesar at that late stage was probably impossible—at any rate Cicero does not contemplate the possibility. The choice lay between fight and flight, and it was not Atticus’ to make. And yet it would be unwise to pronounce Cicero wholly unjust in his feeling that Atticus’ response to the first great test of their friendship had been inadequate, though the failure may have been emotional rather 1 65 (in. 20). 3.

2 60 (in. 15). 2 fin.

3 Cicero as good as admits this: cf. 57 (m. 13). 2 ut me paulum inclinari timore viderunt; 60 (m. 15). 4 me Pompei minus liberali responso perterritum; ibid. 7 certe timebas minus. 4 Unless he did it is difficult to account for Cicero’s regret that Cato’s honesty had not weighed more with him than the deceit of others (60 (in. 15). 2). Plutarch, however, says that Cato advised retreat (Cat. Min. 35). Did he perhaps misunderstand the passage? 5 Cf. Fam. xvi. 23. 2 (to Tiro in 44) et hercle, quod timidus ipse est, 0OpU|3o7TOlEl. 6 60 (in. 15). 7. 7 Ibid, te nihil plus mihi debere quam ut praesto esses. 21

INTRODUCTION

than practical. There was always a certain sobriety1 in Atticus’ attitude to Cicero, and, it may be added, to the rest of mankind. In any case, as Cicero later acknowledged,2 Atticus’ conduct after the disaster more than made up for earlier insufficiencies. It was Atticus above all others who held him back from suicide.3 According to Nepos4 he made Cicero a present of 250,000 sesterces. The correspondence does not attest this, but it does preserve Atticus’ promise, given after inheriting his uncle Caecilius’ fortune in September 58, to devote his means as far as might be necessary to the campaign for Cicero’s restoration.3 To Terentia and to Quintus, threatened with a prosecution after his return from his province of Asia, he was a tower of strength.6 He did not comply with Cicero’s appeals tojoinhimin Southern Italy in April 58; but the instability of Cicero’s own plans may be blamed for that.

He did extend a pressing invitation to

Buthrotum,7 where he was proposing to go himself;8 but the visit was postponed^ and finally, for the time being, abandoned.10 Letters, affectionate, patient, heartening, reached the despon¬ dent exile in Thessalonica, exhibiting every germ of hope com¬ patible with veracity.11 With others, notably Quintus, Cicero’s son-in-law C. Piso Frugi, and P. Sestius,12 Atticus worked 1 ‘Eine gewisse imbeteiligte Niichternheit’ (Feger, l.c. 523. 44). 2 73 (iv. 1). 1. 3 Cf. 49 (m. 4); 52 (in. 7). 2; 54 (in. 9). i fm.

4 Att. 4. 4. Financial help to the exiled or politically victimized was in Atticus style. The younger Marius, Brutus, and Fulvia were notable bene¬ ficiaries. 5 65 (hi. 20). 2. Cf. 50 (iii. 5); 53 (hi. 8). 4; 54 (iii. 9). 3; 62 (hi. 17). 3. It is noteworthy, however, that Atticus is not mentioned in the contemporary letters to Terentia; cf. especially Fam. xiv. 4. 3 f. The omission may reflect Cicero’s sense of grievance. 7 Cf. 52 (hi. 7). 1. J Cf. 54

(hi.

9). 3-

* ibid, and §3. 10 Cf. 57 (m. 12). 3.

Cf. 53 (iii. 7). 3 de re publica video te colligere omnia quae putes aliquam spem mihi posse adferre mutandarum rerum, and note on 55 (m 10) 1 13 Cf. Q.Fr. 1. 4. 2. 22

ATTICUS AND

busily for Cicero’s recall.

CICERO

How much his personal ‘activity,

advice, and influence’1 helped to keep the campaign alive Cicero’s letters stand in evidence. We hear of conversations with L. Domitius2 (now Praetor), with Culleo3 (now Tribune), with Pompey4 himself, on whom Atticus could also work through Varro3 and, apparently, Plautius Hypsaeus.6 It fell to Atticus to smooth the hackles of alienated optimates, Horten¬ sius? or the elder Curio,8 and to mollify the long-standing hostility of Metellus Nepos.9 As a matter of course he wrote letters in Cicero’s name as needed.10 More than once in 58 and early 57 these efforts seemed on the verge of success, only to be thwarted by political manoeuvring and street violence, backed by cold winds from Gaul.11 The bloody fiasco of 23 January, when a tribunician bill was blocked by Clodius’ roughs,12 seems temporarily to have made even Atticus lose heart.13 Even before this he had decided to join Cicero in Greece, feeling perhaps that gang warfare was not his element and that the issue now lay with Caesar.14 The correspondence halts at the beginning of February, leaving a natural though not certain deduction that the two spent the next five to six months together in Epirus.13 When Cicero returned to Italy early in August Atticus stayed behind, so missing the triumphal progress up Italy and the entry into Rome. Mafficking was hardly in his way, and he preferred, we may suppose, to celebrate his friend’s ‘second birth’ in the tranquillity of Buthrotum. I 56 (hi. ii). 2: cf. 73 (rv. 1). 1.

3 60 (m. 15). 6.

3 Ibid. 5. 4 53 (ni. 8). 3. 5 Ibid., also 60 (in. 15). 1, 3; 63 (m. 18). 1. 7 Cf. Q.Fr. 1. 3. 8: cf. Jottrn. Rom. Stud. 45 (1955), p. 35. 8 57 (hi. 12). 2: cf 60 (hi. 15). 3; 65 (hi. 20). 2.

6 53 (in. 8). 3.

9 See above, p. 9, n. 3. 10 66 (in. 21). II Cf 63 (in. 18). 1 an adversatae sunt Caesaris litterae?

12

Sest. 75 ff 14 Cf Fam. 1. 9. 9.

13 Cf. 72 (hi. 27). 15 See note on 72 (ni. 27) cito videbo. 23

INTRODUCTION

Three long letters1 from the returned exile, informative as they are, throw no light on Atticus’ views. Cicero was again anxious for him to come back; his own public and private position called for the advice which only Atticus could supply.2 Soon afterwards Atticus did return, to remain until May 54. His marriage to Piha in February 56 did not loosen the bonds of friendship. His wife was well liked by Cicero and his family, though he came to entertain a poor opinion of her brother (?), Pilius Celer.3 The letters of the period show Atticus still busily in touch with politics, and certainly imply no change in his basic sympathies. He remained as always a lover of old ways,4 whose only traceable political idea was a hostility in principle to change and change-makers.5 But with a smaller personal and emotional stake in the res publica than a Cato or a Cicero he found pragmatical adjustments easier. When Cicero in 57—56 thought to pick up his mantle of princeps civitatis and carried anti-‘ trium viral ’ or at any rate anti-Caesarian displays to a point which provoked a sharp warning from Pompey,6 Atticus signified disapproval. His advice was to ‘play the safe game’ and keep out of the limelight,? at the same time cultivating both Pompey and Caesar privately.8 In the summer of 56 Cicero 1 73-5 (iv. 1-3). ' 73 (iv. 1). 3, 8; 74 (iv. 2). 5; 75 (iv. 3). 6. 3 Cf. 187 (ix. 18). 2; 191 (x. 1 a); ad Brut. 5. 3. 4 Nep. Att. 18. 1 moris etiam maiorum summus imitator fuit antiquitatisque

amator. 3 neque aliud quicquam TroAmuopoct nisi odisse improbos et id ipsum nullo cum stomacho (26 (n. 6). 2) is a better description of Atticus’ position than it ever was of Cicero’s. 6 In April 56, just after Luca (Fam. 1. 9. 9). 1 82 (IV- 8 a)- 4 (October 56) de eo quod me mones, ut et ttoAitikgos me geram et Tijv ectco ypccpnijv teneam, ita faciam; 91 (iv. 17). 3 (October 54) dices ‘tamen tu

non quiescis?’ Cf. 80 (iv. 5). 2 f. (June 56) demus operam ut ab iis qui possunt diligamur, dices vellem iam pridem’, scio te voluisse et me asinum germanum fuisse; ibid. 1 vix aliquando te auctore resipivi; 83 (iv. 6). 2 (April 55) cui utinam semper paruissem!; 124 (vn. 1). 2 (October 50) videsne ut te auctore sim utrumque complexus? ac 24

ATTICUS AND CICERO

had felt ashamed to send a copy of his ‘palinode’ (probably the

),1 doubting whether Atticus’ counsels

de Provinciis Consularibus

of expediency would extend to public panegyric of Caesar. But ten months later, in the second Consulship of Pompey and Crassus, it was clear that mere passivity and private amenity on Cicero’s part would not suffice; now he must follow the camp in which he might have commanded.2 The ‘Sparta’ he has to adorn is no longer the via optimas but subservience to the dynasts—and this by Atticus’ advice. When in 54 he had to submit to reconciliations with Gabinius and Vatinius and then defend them in the courts, some might call him the ficklest of turncoats,3 but not Atticus. Yet even Atticus may have felt a little disconcerted4 by the sudden efflorescence of friendship between Cicero and Caesar promoted by Quintus’ service in Gaul from 54 to 51. After November 54 follows another lapse of almost three years in the extant correspondence. Presumably Atticus was in Rome, but Cicero’s absences in the country can hardly have been infrequent, and it is difficult to account for the lacuna except by an accident of some sort. The resumption in May 51 finds Cicero in the initial stages of his journey out to Cilicia, the province that had been thrust upon him unwanted and un¬ expected, haec ingens molestia.5 The changed pohtical climate, Crassus dead and Pompey aligned with the optimates against vellem a principio te audisse amicissime monentem.. .sed aliquando tamen persuasisti ut alterum complecterer quia de me erat optime meritus, alterum quia tantum valebat. Cicero may also be thinking of the advice conveyed through Theophanes and Culleo in 59 (see above, pp. 17ff.), but in the last passage optime meritus must refer to 57. 1 Cf. 80 (rv. 5). in. 2 83 (iv. 6). 2 ergo erimus oiraSoi qui Tayoi esse noluimus? sic faciendum est. tibi enim ipsi (cui utinam semper paruissem!) sic video placere. 3 Cf. Ps.-Sall. Invect. 7 levissime transfuga. 4 Cf. 89 (iv. 16). 8 Caesaris amici, me dico et Oppium dirumparis licet; 93 (iv. 19). 2 hunc tu non ames? quem igitur istorum? 5 95 (v. 2). 3. 25

INTRODUCTION

his surviving associate, is reflected in Atticus’ suggestion that the time had come to repay a substantial loan from Caesar.1 But there were now other things to think about than politics. As long as he himself remained in Rome Atticus attended to his friend’s affairs, business and domestic—choice of a third husband for Tullia and difficulties between Quintus and Pomponia are recurrent themes; but help of a different kind is more often and urgently solicited. The reluctant Proconsul was concerned above all else to prevent any extension of his year of office, and for that he professed to rely mainly on Atticus’ ‘assiduity, expert knowledge, and influence’,2 his ‘tactical skill, influence, and zeal’.3 When Atticus was inconsiderate enough to leave for Epirus before the crucial Kalends of March 504 (he stayed there for the first eight months of the year), Cicero does not disguise his measure of grievance. 5 There were other public matters too in which Atticus could make himself useful. In May 51 he is found in touch with the Consul C. Marcellus over some point to do with Cicero’s state grant as governor; Atticus will get the thing done, by senatorial decree or otherwise.6

An official

report to the Senate is commended to Atticus to read before¬ hand (if in Rome) and decide whether it should be transmitted.7 Atticus influence would be, or would have been, valuable in obtaining the honour of a supplicatio,8 and later a Triumph.9 Of course Cicero wrote to others on such points, the younger 98 (v. 5). 2, 106 (v. 13). 3 (read quant in cupiditatem). The notion that Atticus himself had financial dealings with Caesar rests on a misunderstanding of 115 (vi. 1). 25, where vos = Athenienses. 2 m (v. 18). 3. 3 114 (v. 21). 3. Cf. 108 (v. 15). 1 perfacile resisti potest, tu modo Romae sis; ibid. 3 modo.. .adsis tu ad tempus ut senatum totum excites. It was particularly important to get Hortensius firmly behind the cause: cf. 95 (v. 2). 1; 102 (v. 9). 2; no (v. 17). 5.

4 "3 (v. 20). 7.

5 114 (v. 21). 1.

97 (v. 4)- 2. The passage is usually misunderstood.

7 in (v. 18). 1. 118 (vi. 4). 2 quod enim tu afuisti, vereor ut satis diligettter actum in senatu sit de litteris meis. 9 cf. 125 (vh. 2). 6.

26

ATTICUS AND

CICERO

Curio for example and Caelius Rufus—about the supplicatio according to his own statement he wrote to every member of the Senate except two.1

But the testimony to Atticus’ hold on

senatorial wires is striking. Even with Pompey he was ready to try his hand, at any rate exploratorily.2 Now too, as eight years ago, it is Atticus who with the aid of common friends can placate an influential enemy, in this case Pompey’s relative, Lucilius Hirrus.3

His advice is still sought on all kinds of

personal and official subjects—on the troublesome question of an acting-governor,4 on a projected benefaction to the city of Athens,5 on the advisability of seeking a Triumph,6 on how to deal with an ungrateful freedman.7 Naturally certain Tittle affairs’8 of Atticus are handled in return—advice, to judge from this correspondence, not being a commodity he much required. One counsel he offered with an emphasis? and persistence10 that could seem less than flattering to its recipient: the Pro¬ consulate must be a model of probity and propriety.11 koct6c to kt|8e|jovik6v it was natural for Atticus to be anxious, as Cicero was when his brother went out to govern Asia,12 that there should be no loss, access rather, of reputation.

As a new

Scaevola Pontifex Cicero might win unmilitary laurels. But it does look as though Atticus thought it needful to drive the point home rather hard, not surely from any misgivings about Cicero’s personal rectitude (though he may have considered him ‘unbusinesslike’), but from the fear lest his staff might take I 124 (vn. i). 8. 3 124 (vn. 1). 8.

3 Cf. 125 (vn. 2). 5. 4 Cf. 115 (vi. 1). 14, etc.

5 Ibid. 26. 7 125 (vn. 2). 8; cf. 128 (vn. 5). 3.

6 124 (vn. 1). 8. 8 106 (v. 13). 2.

9 115 (vi. 1). 8 flens mihi meam famam commendasti. 10 Cf. 102 (v. 9). 1 ut saepe tu me currentem hortatus es; 113 (v. 20). 6 quod me maxime hortaris.. .in quo laboras ut etiam Ligurino Mobpicp satis faciamus. II Cf 96 (v. 3). 3 continentia et diligentia; 102 (v. 9). 1 summa modestia et summa abstinentia et sim.

12 Cf 15 (1. 15). 1, etc. 27

INTRODUCTION

advantage of their notoriously easy-going chief.1 This fear at any rate Cicero is at pains to allay.2 Of his own conduct he cannot speak too highly, and the artlessness of his boasting guarantees sincerity. Fame (not philanthropy or the beauty of virtue) was his spur, and it never occurs to him to pretend otherwise.3 The shorter his tenure the better, not only because he dislikes the whole concern but because the sooner he gets away the less chance of any tarnish to his fire-new reputation— witness Scaevola, who only spent nine months in his province.4 Who can doubt the good intentions of a governor who wel¬ comes a famine for the scope it offers his administrative talents ?5 True, he finds to his evident surprise that ‘the thing itself’ gives him even more pleasure than the resulting reclame; he had never realized his own capabilities in this line.6 But as for the beneficiaries, ‘what will happen to them when Paulus comes along’7 does not seriously worry him. Still less does he ever think of questioning an imperial system under which such conspicuous credit accrued to a governor who did not rob and bully.8 Cicero with his gloria iustitiae et abstinentiae is a child with a new toy, and to suspect him of surreptitiously perse¬ cuting the cat is the naivete of cynicism. Certainly it would be interesting to hear in detail how the 2,200,000 sesterces which he deposited at Ephesus ‘came to him legally’.9 But the Corn¬ 'S!

quisquam est facilis hic est, said Caesar of Cicero (355 (xrv. 1). 2).

2 Cf. 103 (v. 10). 2, etc. But Atticus’ worry persisted: cf. 115 (vi. 1). 20. 3 Cf. e.g. 115 (vi. 1). 2 qui me idcirco putent bene audire velle ut ille male audiat, et recte facere non meae laudis sed illius contumeliae causa. 4 I IO (v. 17). 5. 5 II4 (v. 2I). 8. 6 113 (v. 20). 6.

7 115 (vi. 1). 7.

8 Not that Cicero was unique. Most of his fellow-governors were behaving ‘very creditably’ (115 (vi. 1). 13). But it was lucky, as he might himself have put it, that so black a sheep as Appius Pulcher had been his predecessor. 7 Fam. v. 20. 9 pecuniam quae ad me salvis legibus pervenisset: cf. 211 (xi. 1). 2, etc. All or most of the money may have been saved from his vasarium. L. Piso received 18 millions as vasarium in 58: cf. Mommsen, St. 1, p. 296. Some may have come from praeda.

28

ATTICUS AND CICERO

plete insouciance with which he mentions this sum to a tem¬ porarily not over-friendly Quaestor is proof enough of a placid conscience. If Cicero’s conception of his provincial responsibilities lacked ethical height and political depth, the embarrassing affair of Brutus and the Salaminian loan at least shows him in a better hght than his mentor. His letters may be left to tell the story.1 The outcome, by any reasonably sympathetic standard, was to his credit. True, he gave some ground in face of strong personal and social pressures, and academic persons to whom such con¬ cessions are barely thinkable can afford to censure him; but the remarkable thing is that he gave so little. For Atticus, on the other hand, it was a matter of course that ‘ Greeks’ should go to the wall where there was a friend, an influential young noble¬ man as it happened, to be obliged.2 In this case too, no doubt, Cicero had Jama in mind, but the note of moral revulsion in his protests is unmistakably authentic.

‘Der eine fragt, “Was

kommt danach?”, der andre, “1st es recht?”’

At ultimate

moments there was always something in Cicero which at any rate asked the second question. Such were imminent. As Cicero made his leisurely way back to Rome in the autumn of 50, the news which met him, Atticus’ 1 Cf. 114 (v. 21). 10-12; 115 (vi. 1). 5-8; 116 (vi. 2). 7-9. 2 Even suppose he had not received Cicero’s explanations in 114 (v. 21) when he solicited a troop of horse for Scaptius (cf. 116 (vi. 2). 8), the request was none the less in flagrant contradiction to his former maxims, and was so felt by Cicero. Brutus’ conduct is hardly relevant to my theme, but to him also it is possible to be unjust. A semi-Stoic playing Shylock is an unpleasing spectacle; but the appeal of Stoicism to Romans like Brutus lay in its rigidity. The Salaminians had made their bargain, which by contemporary standards was not so iniquitous as it now appears (cf. Gelzer, RE. x. 977. 29), and literal respect for the sanctity of a bargain was the centre of the tough old Roman core (of the excesses committed by his agent Brutus may not have been informed). No such plea can be made for Atticus, since he evidently did not make it himself. For him it was a personal matter, as Cicero’s complaint implies: nimis, nimis inquam, in isto Brutum amasti, dulcissime Attice, nos vereor ne parum (116 (vi. 2). 9).

29

INTRODUCTION

included, promised worse and worse. From Athens, in October, he made a full-dress appeal for guidance1 now that a clash seemed imminent between the two dynasts whose friendship he had on Atticus’ advice successfully courted. He had after all himself used influence in favour of Caesar’s claim to stand in absentia for a second Consulship,2 and wished to act in the spirit of Caesar’s kindness towards himself and his brother. 3 But public opinion, and Atticus’ in particular, would expect him to back Pompey.4 He was right there. Hints, few but enough, show Atticus’ attitude to the steadily mounting crisis as that of the average Roman conservative, hopeful that Caesar would give way,5 relying on, but still mistrusting, Pompey.6

His

advice now, followed up by more in the same strain, was once again Calhope s—the cards of power were not so obviously stacked on the other side as in 57-53. No bonus, he wrote, no sat bonus even, doubted where Cicero would stand." Cicero need only call to mind his statuette of Minerva custos urbis, dedicated on the Capitol in 58, and its patriotic inscription.® And after all Caesar might have been more generous.9 It was 1 124 (vh. 1). 1-5. 3 Ibid. 4 nam ut illi hoc liceret adiuvi rogatus ab ipso Ravennae de Caelio tribuno pi. ^ Ibid. 7 quo artificio tueamur benevolentiam Caesaris. The verb does not mean ‘keep’ but ‘act up to’. I lbld- 4 fm5 Cf. 113 (v. 20). 8 (end of 51). Cf. 115 (vi. 1). 11 (February 50). 7 130 (vii. 7). 5. Cf. 126 (vn. 3). 3 de animo autem nostro erga rem publicam bene facis quod non dubitas. 8 126 (vii. 3). 3. The wording of the inscription is unknown. 9 Ibid. Cicero agreed; cf. 126 (vn. 3). 3 illud probe iudicas nequaquam satis pro meis officiis, pro ipsius in alios effusione ilium in me liberalem fuisse, which suggests —even though we cannot be quite sure that he had money in mind—a readiness to accept financial favours from Caesar. Cicero would no doubt have argued that if his officia helped in any small degree to ‘ foster’ Caesar, they only contributed to a policy already decided by Pompey and that such collaboration had been forced upon him by optimate faithlessness and spite. Victorian moral judgements and post-Victorian cynicism are equally unhelpful here. It may be more appropriate to think of seventeenth-century English patriots like Robert Cecil or Somers taking money from Spain or ‘insuring’ with St Ger-

30

ATTICUS AND CICERO

to be hoped that Cicero would not be influenced by his rene¬ gade young friend Caelius Rufus.1 Let him watch those two reputable elders Vulcatius Tullus and Ser. Sulpicius.2 It might however be safer and better for him to stay outside the capital, keeping his imperium in respect of his claim to a Triumph. The comfortable banality of all this is suggestive. It could suggest a Roman bourgeoisie listening with a frightened look in its eyes to some such announcement as this: ‘Speaking in Naples this afternoon, Cn. Pompeius Magnus expressed his confidence that the country’s military resources were fully adequate to any emergency that might arise.3 There must be no yielding to threats of force. Caesar, in his opinion, had missed the bus Atticus was not as yet faced with a personal decision. Cicero was. That, and absence from Rome, and deeper political emotions, and livelier nerves, quickened his intelligence against this barrage of party-patriotic cliche. It was all very fine for Atticus to put unquestioning faith in his, Cicero’s, loyalty to the Republic, but the coming contest was really one for power between two individuals.4 Victory would only produce mains—-or of Cicero’s own words to Atticus in a not dissimilar connection: ‘nutn igitur peccamus?’ minime vos quidem; sed tamen signa conturbantur quibus voluntas a simulatione distingui posset (189 (vm. 9). 2). 1 Ibid. 6. 2 Ibid. 3. These two were mentioned, not assuredly because of their subse¬ quent ‘neutrality’ which Atticus could not foresee, but as coeval Consulars, Sulpicius being about Cicero’s age and Vulcatius somewhat older, and good if not fanatical republicans. The only other surviving Consular whom Atticus might have named in this connection was M’. Lepidus. Perperna and Servilius Isauricus would be discounted as too old, L. Cotta as a relative (uncle?) and L. Caesar as a Legate of Caesar’s. C. Antonius was in exile. When Cicero says that Minerva and her inscription would not allow him to imitate the two proposed models, he means that for him the role of an ordinary bonus was inadequate. Something independent and exceptional in the patriotic way would be appropriate—if only circumstances allowed. But for that, he goes on to show, it is late in the day. 3 ‘ I have only to stamp my foot ’, etc.: cf. 131 (vn. 8). 4. Pompey had been making confident noises since the start of the crisis: cf. 100 (v. 7). 4 126 (vn. 3). 4.

31

INTRODUCTION

a despot.1 It was late in the day to start saying no to Caesar,2 whose strength was really formidable.3 Who in fact were the

boni?4 As commonly understood the term included many who favoured Caesar.3 5 In South Italy at least people were all for peace.6 He himself felt (though he would not pubhcly say) that anything was preferable to war.7 Privately he would exhort Pompey to compromise;8 in public he would support him as he was morally bound to do in such a crisis, considering the debt of gratitude he owed for his restoration—and that too was a political calamity, for it tied his hands.9 He would follow the boni viri, or whoever were called by that name, as an ox follows the herd. To sum up: Dic, M. Tulli.’ ‘Adsentior Cn. Pompeio,

.’10

id est T. Pomponio

The last two letters11 prior to his return

to the neighbourhood of Rome reflect what it is difficult not to call a pep-talk from Pompey; but he is still on the rack.12 On 4 January 49 Cicero arrived outside Rome, plunging ‘into the very furnace of civil strife, or rather war’.13 His lastminute efforts to save peace failed,1* and on the 18 th he and his laurelled lictors were heading south again, part of the general republican exodus13 which followed news of Caesar’s penetra¬ tions beyond the Rubicon. Atticus stayed. For the third time the two guiding principles of his civic career, optimate pohtics and avoidance of active 1 128 (vn. 5). 4. 2 126 (vn. 3). 4; 129 (vn. 6). 2; 130 (vn. 7). 6. 3 126 (vn. 3). 5; 130 (vii. 7). 6.

“ Ibid. 5.

5 Ibid.; 128 (vn. 5). 4.

6 126 (vn. 3). 5; cf. 128 (vn. 5). 4. 8 126 (vn. 3). 5.

129 (vn. 6). 2.

9 Such I believe to be the sense of 129 (vn. 6). 2 fin. (reading esse for est cf. cf. Towards a Text, pp. 33 fi). ” 130 (vn. 7). 7. 11 131-2 (vn. 8-9). 132 (vn. 9). 4 equidem dies noctesque torqueor. *3 Fam- xvi- n. 2. 19 Ibid, and iv. 1. 1. 5 Cf. 136 (vn. 13). 3 in communi bonorum fuga.

32

ATTICUS AND

CICERO

commitment,1 were in conflict. As a young man in Athens he had begged to be excused from participation in the recovery of Italy; he could plead Marian connections, and a benevolent Sulla had commended the propriety of his sentiments.2 In 63 a loyal demonstration cost nothing. But in 49, after Pompey’s announcement that to remain in Rome would be regarded as tantamount to service in Caesar’s army,3 something had to go. He availed himself, says Nepos,4 of the privilege of his years, which were about sixty. His health too was not of the best.5 But the combatant republicans were in no mind to consider such pleas; as Cicero was later to find out for himself, their sentiments towards lingerers in general and Atticus in particular were ferocious.6

Caesar’s intentions were a source of more

immediate anxiety.

Atticus, who knew more of Caesar’s

entourage, the vskuicx as he called it,7 than of Caesar himself, feared a reign of terror in the capital.8 But he preferred to keep indoors^ and take his chance. The shock of Pompey s irrational 10 abandonment of Rome, the revelation of his

military in¬

competence’,11 sufficed. It was as though the sun had fallen out of the sky.12 I Cf. Nep. Att. 6. 1. 2 Ibid. 4. 2. Caes. B.C. 1. 33. 2, etc. 4 Att. 7. 1 usus est aetatis vacatione. 5 In September 50 he had returned to Rome with a fever (123 (vn. 1). 1), presumably the quartan which troubled him until May (207 (x. 15). 4). He

3

also had attacks of Sucroupla and catarrh (201 (x. 10). 3; 208 (x. 16). 6). None the less he could project a trip to Epirus in March (see below), and neither Cicero nor Nepos suggests ill-health as a reason for passivity. 6 217 (xx 6). 2 numquam enim de te ipso nisi crudelissime cogitatum sensi. Cf. §6 de Fannio consoler te? perniciosa loquebatur de mansione tua. 7 Cf. C/. Quart. N.S. 12 (1962), p. 163.

8 135 (vn. 12). 2 (21 January) istum cuius 90cAccpicrp6v times; 141 (vn. 22). 1 (8 February) tu caedem non sine causa times. 9 135 (vn. 12). 6 domesticis te finibus tenes; cf. 161 (vm. 11). 7

equidem te

in publicum non prodire. 10 177 (ix. 10). 4 ut urbem dAoyicrrcos reliquit (from Atticus’ letter of 23 January). II 136 (vn. 13). i quorum dux quam aoTpaTijyriTos tu quoque animadvertis. 12 177 (ix. 10). 3 sol, ut est in tua quadam epistula, excidisse mihi e mundo videtur. 3

33

SBC I

INTRODUCTION

Not that his mind was finally made up. Cicero at any rate was uncertain of his friend’s intentions during the days following the evacuation.1 On the 23rd he essays a gentle admonition: Atticus and Sex. Peducaeus (a like-minded friend, son of Cicero’s old Praetor in Sicily) should consider what they them¬ selves were going to do; their standing being what it was, people expected as much from them as from the highest in the land.2 On 2 February, cheered by an encouraging letter from Pompey and reviving hopes of peace, he ventures a mild joke on the subject.3 With the breakdown of negotiations and Pompey’s withdrawal to Luceria inquiries and hints begin again.4 But by the middle of the month the boni were drifting back to Rome,5 as Cicero says he would himself but for ‘these confounded lictors’.6

Henceforward Atticus’ neutrality is

assumed, and on 22 April or thereabouts it is justified ;7 Cf. 133 (vn. 10) of 17—18 January tibi vero quid suadeam cuius ipse consilium exspecto?; 135 (vn. 12). 4 of 22 January etsi te eadem sollicitant; 136 (vn. 13). 3 of 23 January see above; 137 (vn. 13 a). 3 of 24 January et quid acturus sis ipse scribas-, 138 (vn. 14). 3 of 25 January tu ipse cum Sexto scire velim quid cogites de exeundo. 2 136 (vn. 13). 3 is enim splendor est vestrum ut eadem postulentur a vobis quae ab amplissimis civibus. Miinzer’s idea (RE. xix. 49 f.) that the Sex. Peducaeus in this and several subsequent passages is the father (Pr. 77), whose death he would place in March, not the son, must be rejected. The elder Peducaeus is spoken of as already dead in Fin. n. 58, a dialogue set in the year 50 (cf. Philippson, RE. viia. 1136). Besides there would be no point in bracketing Atticus with a praetorius in this context. By the same token it is improbable that this Peducaeus had been Tribune in 55 (Miinzer, l.c. 50.27; cf. Broughton, P-2I7), since that too would make him a Senator. The Caesarian governor of Sardinia in 48 (ibid. p. 277) will have been another man. 3 141 (vii. 17). 1 tu ipse cum Sexto etiam nunc mihi videris Romae recte esse posse, etenim minime amici Pompeio nostro esse debetis, nemo enim umquam tantum de urbanis praediis detraxit, videsne me etiam iocari?

4 144 (vn. 20). 2 of 5 February etsi te ipsum istic iam calere puto; 146 (vn. 22). 2 of 8-9 February si quid in mentem venit velim scribas et ipse quid sis acturus; 147 (vn. 23). 1 of 9-10 February et non omnes nostra corpora opponimus? in quo tu quoque ingemiscis, sed quid faciamus? victi, oppressi, capti plane sumus.

5 Cf. 151 (vm. 1). 3; 152 (vm. 2). 3. 151 (vm. 1). 3 quo ego in numero essem si hos lictores molestissimos non 7 198 (x. 7). 1.

haberem.

34

ATTICUS AND

CICERO

Why certainly I approve of Apulia and Sipontum1 and this fence¬ sitting of yours, and I look upon your position as different from mine—not that right is not right for both of us as citizens of the Repubhc, but the Repubhc is not at issue. This is a fight for a throne. The expelled monarch is the more moderate, upright, and clean¬ handed, and if he does not win the day the name of Rome must inevitably be blotted out; but if he does win, his victory will be after Sulla’s fashion and example. In such a contest you should support neither side openly and trim your sails to the wind. My case is not the same, because I am bound by an obligation and cannot be ungrateful. But this conception of the Civil War and his own place in it was not Cicero’s whole mind, which indeed changed from day to day. There were moments, on the contrary, when an under¬ standable irritation with the stay-at-homes came uppermost, especially when he felt himself lectured or criticized for some failure in patriotic spirit, as on 4 March:2 Philotimus says the optimates are tearing me to shreds. What sort of optimates, for heaven’s sake? Look at the way they are running to meet Caesar and currying favour with him ! On 10 March:3 As for your optimates, I don’t trust them, I’m not even any longer studying their good opinion. I see how they are kow-towing to Caesar, and mean to go on that way. On 23 March:4 I am not offering too many apologies to the honest men. Sextus has written to me about the dinner-parties they’re giving and going to— what smart occasions and how early in the evening ! But they may be as ‘honest’ as you please, they are no more so than I. I should pay them some attention if they were braver. 1 With reference to a proposed visit to Epirus. 2 166 (vm. 16). 1. 3 171

(ix.

5).

3-

4

35

180 (IX- I3)- 63-2

INTRODUCTION

Atticus, who a few days later went out himself to congratulate Caesar on his return to the capital,1 must have felt such strictures rather near the bone. His defence of the boni (‘ they are afraid’)2 might be taken as self-defence. He will not have overlooked the implications of laments like ‘Poor creatures that we are! Why did we all not follow him [Pompey] to his doom?’3 Plainer yet :4 You don’t seem to realize the magnitude of this disaster [the evacua¬ tion of Rome], You are still in your own house—but you can only stay there on sufferance of ruffians.... All you honest men are in your own homes and mean to stay there. Who but professed himself ready to me back in Rome? And who is reporting present now, in this war, as we must call it by this time? At the end of March, in reply to some criticism from Atticus of his letter to Caesar:5 I should be perfecdy willing to have that letter read out at a public meeting... considering also that two men of your standing [i.e. Atticus and Peducaeus] are going five miles out of town to meet Caesar, Caesar who is at this very moment promising and doing and about to do we all know what. Don’t you suppose he will be ten times as bold and confident in his cause when he sees you two and others like you in large numbers and, what is more, smiling con¬ gratulations? Well, are you wrong to do it? Not a bit. Still this sort of tiling blurs the signs that distinguish sincerity from pretence. And the Senate s decrees in prospect! But I am writing more frankly than I intended. This was indeed pounding on delicate places, and a few days later comes the emollient assurance that Atticus (Peducaeus too) has

maintained the standard of dignity (gravitas) which he

1 See below. Z.171 (IX‘ ?}’ 4 'timent' inquies; cf. 176 (ix. 9). 1 de optimatibus sqq., a passage which is waiting to be correctly interpreted. 3 179 (rx* 12). 1 (20 March). 5 188 (vm. 9). 2.

4 151 (vm. 2). 3 (17 February).

36

ATTICUS AND

CICERO

inculcates.1 Yet on 7 April Cicero cannot refrain from another innuendo:2 ‘They say you have been seen at the Palace^—not that I criticize you, having failed to escape similar criticism myself. ’ Atticus’ sensitivity to this sort of thing comes out in his agitation about Cicero’s innocent (so he says) reference to a Caesarian passport for Greece.4 Atticus would have liked to get away. At the beginning of March he was or professed to be contemplating ‘flight’ to Epirus5 and kept up the idea until mid-May.6 Since Epirus would be under Pompey’s control such a move, even though sanctioned by Caesar, would seem to have political implications. As an alternative perhaps, he considered buying a residence at Lanuvium.7 Whether seriously proposed or not, the ‘flight’ did not materialize.

Caesar appreciated Atticus’ ‘quiescence

so

highly that after his victory he did not trouble him with one of his ‘requests’ for financial help;8 whereas friends who did go to join Pompey had their needs supplied by Atticus prudent generosity, sic vetere instituto vitae effugit nova periculaf The delicacy of his own position did not inhibit him in his usual role, and demands upon him for advice were never more clamant than in the four months after the evacuation of Rome. Cicero spent them in one or other of his villas, mostly at Formiae or Cumae. His responsibility for the defence of the coast, whatever exactly it amounted to, weighed among the lightest of his cares. The problem of his wife and children was 1 191 (x. 1 a). 1.

2 194 (x- 3

2_4_

certe enim, ut scribis, deseremur ocius a re publica quam a re i 6 e),

15 (to Plancus) cum tanta res aqatur Attici nostri nunc

vero etiam existimatio; 407F (xvi. permagna res agitur, Attici.

i6f).

17 (to Capito) hominis familiarissimi

7 377 (xv. 1). 2 cum Antonio autem sic agemus ut perspiciat, si in eo negotio nobis satisfecerit, totum me futurum suum. 8 Cf. 413 (xvi. 3). 1. 9 420 (xvi. ii). 5 0 qualis tu semper istos!

54

ATTICUS AND CICERO

Caesarian history;1 but Cicero’s exhortation at the end of May ‘Do please think hard about your own position’2 was surely superfluous. Atticus was still thinking hard in November, when for once he turned to Cicero for his advice—which was to keep quiet as long as might be.3 Thus preoccupied he had less time than usual to spare for Cicero’s case. At least the surviving correspondence implies httle in the way of counsel on high politics. Two counsels, however, he did offer, both fully endorsed by Cicero at the time but later disregarded.

One, in October, was to be incon¬

spicuous—a republican supporter, but neither leader nor laggard.4 5 The other, in November, was to ‘go slow’ with regard to Octavian, whose advent had injected a new and to Atticus, as to Brutus, profoundly suspect ingredient into the pohtical cauldron.3 They were justified by the event; but neither Brutus nor Atticus had charged himself with the main¬ tenance of the Repubhc in Italy. That role was Cicero’s, voluntarily assumed, supported without a waver of compro¬ mise until final and redeeming failure. There is dramatic irony in his last extant words to Atticus: adsum igitur.6 Little as he thought it when he wrote, he was indeed ‘reporting present’, returning to Rome for his long-delayed pohtical apiorsicx. And 1 Cf. 368 (xiv. 14). 5; 371 (xrv. 17). 6; 413 (XVI. 3). 1. 2 385 (xv. 8).

de te, quaeso, etiam atque etiam vide.

3 423 (xv. 13). 4.

4

416 (xvi. 13). 1

adsentior tibi ut nec duces simus nec agmen cogamus, faveamus

tamen. 5 Cf. 425 (xvi. 14). 1 valde tibi adsentior, si multum possit Octavianus, multo firmius acta tyranni comprobatum iri quam in Telluris, atque id contra Brutum fore... quod me mones ut pedetemptim, adsentior; 426 (xvi. 15). 3 his litteris nihil pru¬ dentius. quamquam enim -\posteaf in praesentia belle iste puer retundit Antonium, tamen exitum exspectare debemus (quamquam... debemus need not be attributed to Atticus). Already in May Atticus had condemned certain of Octavian s activities (cf. 379 (xv. 2). 3). As for Brutus, cf. his letters of June-July 43 (ad Brut. 24, 25). 6 426 (xvi. 15). 6.

55

INTRODUCTION

not political only: the fourteenth Philippic is the monument not only of the repubhcan dead at Mutina but of the Cicero who might have made a Demosthenes. Nothing could have been less consonant with Atticus’ pre¬ cept. Of his relations with Cicero we have no further record. It is quite possible that his lack of sympathy for the fight a outrance may have damaged them, but the final cessation of the correspondence in November 44 cannot safely be assigned to this or any other cause. It is probable that Cicero was one of a number of optimates’ mentioned by Nepos1 who repro¬ bated his hero’s humane concern for the family and friends of Mark Antony in Rome—a piece of benevolence which in due course removed Atticus’ name from the proscription list and enabled him to save several of his friends. We do not know whether or not he made any forlorn attempt to save Cicero. Atticus’ ship, to use Nepos’ well-worn metaphor,2 was now in harbour, and for him the turbulent decade that followed provided a tranquil, prosperous old age. With both of the two temporary partners in empire he came to be on friendly, even affectionate, terms (mainly epistolary) 3 symbolized and con¬ firmed by the marriage of his daughter to M. Agrippa, with Antony as broker ;4 had her grandson lived he would have been Rome’s third Princeps. Atticus did not survive to see the final round. Death, voluntarily anticipated, removed him the year before Actium. His familiarities with his old friend’s executioners do not seem to have scandalized contemporary sentiment.

Nepos

merely invites admiration for the wisdom ’ which could retain the amity of two such rivals.5 Damon and Phintias did not five ' Att. 9. 7 sed sensim is a nonnullis optimatibus reprehendebatur, quod parum odisse malos does videretur. 2 Ibid. IO. 6. 3 20, i-4. 4 Ibid. 12. I f. 5 Ikil 20i 5

56

ATTICUS AND CICERO

in the first century

b.c.,

and perhaps Cicero, who courted

Dolabella after Tulha’s divorce and death, would not have complained. Causes apart, his hfe was after all fair forfeit; no mercy would have been shown to Antony had the tables been turned. As for Octavian—laudandus, ornandus, tollendus.1 It is easy to be less than fair to a man who made so bland a success of safe living in troubled times and who, unlike Mon¬ taigne, has left no self-portrait to engage posterity in his favour. There was more in Atticus than ‘the quintessence of prudent mediocrity’.2 The basis of his many friendships must have been a singularly attractive personality. Its hallmark was the humanitas which Cicero so often associates with him, that untranslatably Roman amalgam of kindness and culture, width of mind and tact of manner.3 Atticus never quarrelled with Pomponia in his hfe4 and spoke Greek as though Athenian bom.5 A dehghtful talker,6 who hked to walk as he talked,7 he loved sparkle in others8 and doubtless evoked it.

Many a

Roman frown, even Brutus’ ‘solemn old countenance’, will have relaxed when Atticus thought it time to say dAis aTrouSqs .9 Intellectually omnivorous, he was as ready to take an interest in a treatise on Greek accentuation10 as in the latest city scandal. His social quahties were finished by a palatable salt of idiosyn¬ crasy—some quaint turns of speech,11 his rich man s nearness excused by good taste,12 his exaggerated cult of antiquity and I 3

Fam. xi. 20. i. 3 T.-P. i, p. 54humanitas tua is a recurrent phrase in the letters: cf. Nep. Att. 16. i.

^ Ibid. 17. i. 5 Ibid. 4- I6 Ibid, tanta autem suavitas erat sermonis Latini ut appareret in eo nativum quendam leporem esse, non ascitum: cf. 17 (1. 17)- 6 sermonis communicatio quae mihi suavissima tecum solet esse. 7 Cf. 18 (1. 18). 1 unius ambulationis sermone et sim. 8 Cf. 251 (xn. 14). 3 perierunt illa quae amabas, interpreted by 281 (xn. 40). 3 hilaritatem illam.. .amisi. 9 Cf. 21 (u. 1). 8. 10 Cf. 306 (xn. 6). 2. II The quaeso that amused Caesar will not have been unique: cf. 243 (xn. 6 a). 2.

12

Cf. Nep. Att. 13 and Cicero’s jokes on the subject (24 (n. 4). 1, etc.).

57

INTRODUCTION

mos maiorum.1 Moving much among his social superiors, he deferred to no man’s arrogance.2 There was a formidable side to Atticus, and Nepos’ testimony3 that his friends respected (vererentur) quite as much as they loved him can be read between the lines of many a letter. ‘He never told a he and could not tolerate lying in others’:4 that too we can believe, though Atticus’ conception of lying did not include prudent dissimula¬ tion^ The reader of Cicero’s correspondence needs no pious biographer to tell him that Atticus was a man of his word, indefatigable in pursuit of whatever he undertook. His moral code, however limited, was steadily and strictly observed: ‘In the things that really matter—uprightness, integrity, con¬ scientiousness, fidelity to obhgation—I put you second neither to myself nor to any other man.’6 Cicero could flatter, but this does not sound like flattery. That deficiency in ‘noble rage’,7 which in modern estimates has tended to discount so many virtues, might have gone unnoticed in a smaller epoch. But greatness had not yet deserted the air that fed Roman blood and made Latin speech. All evasions notwithstanding, Cicero had his portion, which no Mommsenian spleen shall take away; in the end he ran his risks and glaubte an Glauben’. Atticus, with his comity and learning, his business morals and sagacious benevolence, his warm heart and cool head, represents a meaner species. So in death they were divided.

Executioners and a few

faithful slaves watched Cicero’s slaughter. 1 2

Nep.

3

Att- IS- 1.

Att.

Atticus’ planned

18. i.

Cf. 117 (vx. 3). 7 tibi autem valde solet in ore esse ‘Granius autem / non contemnere se et reges odisse superbos416 (xv. 13). 3 de libertate retinenda qua certe nihil est dulcius, tibi adsentior. 5 As in placere.

the

4 Ibid.

case of Quintus junior: cf.

342 (xm. 39). 2 ctkoAiq:

617 (1.17). 5.

7

Strachan-Davidson, Cicero,

p. 76:

cf.

58

T.-P. 1, p. 54.

enim tibi video

ATTICUS AND CICERO

withdrawal from a lenient world was witnessed by a few intimates—Sex. Peducaeus, with whom he had congratulated a victorious Caesar, Cornelius Balbus, old in wiles and pleasure, son-in-law Agrippa, bearing no doubt a message of solicitude from the Consul Suffect of 43. The funeral, on the deceased s instructions as unpretentious as his dinner-parties, was attended by all the boni and a great crowd of ordinary folk. Many must have seen Cicero’s hands and head nailed to the Rostra ten years before. At the fifth milestone on the Appian Way Caecilius’ sepulchre opened to receive the ashes.1

B.

FATA EPISTULARVM

Near the end of his hfe Cicero had in mind to publish a small selection of his letters. Answering a question from Atticus in July 44 he writes (410 (xvi. 5). 5): mearum epistularum nulla est CTUvaycoyfi; sed habet Tiro instar septuaginta, et quidem sunt a te quaedam sumendae,

eas ego oportet perspiciam, corrigam; tum

denique edentur. A letter to Tiro himself (Fam. xvi. 17. 1), probably written about a year earlier, hints at the same purpose. It begins: video quid agas: tuas quoque2 epistulas vis referri in volumina. Clearly the project had been discussed between them. There is much plausibility in Gurlitt’s suggestion that the 78 epistulae commendaticiae of Fam. xiii mainly represent this o-uvocy coyiy3 They would serve well enough to illustrate Cicero’s literary skill, and that, as the context of his words to Tiro suggests,

was his principal object.

But other letters of a

1 Nep. Att. 21 f. 2 I.e. ‘like mine’. There is nothing here to show that Cicero contemplated publishing letters addressed to him as K. Buchner is inclined to think (RE. VIIA. 1221. 26).

3 Cf. ibid. 1217.

59

INTRODUCTION

‘literary’ kind, such as the ‘very pretty’ one to L. Lucceius (Fam. v. 12; cf. Att. 83 (iv. 6). 4) or that to Marius in dispraise

of Games (Fam. vn. 1) may have occurred to him in this con¬ nection, even if the idea of future pubhcation was not vaguely present when he was composing them. It would not be easy to choose letters from the series to Atticus which would fit quite harmoniously into such a collection; but after all Cicero might himself have come to that conclusion if he had followed the matter up. As it turned out, the rest of his hfe was too short and too busy for him to carry out his plan. His words to Atticus show that he did not keep copies of his own side of their correspondence, nor from its nature should we expect him to have done so. Atticus’ letters he stored and bound in rolls:1 cf. 177 (x. 10). 4 of March 49 cum ad hunc locum venissem, evolvi volumen epistularum tuarum quod ego (sub) signo habeo servoque diligentissime. Atticus on his side kept most at any

rate of those he received. In his biography Cornelius Nepos refers as follows to his collection (16. 2-4): quamquam eum praecipue dilexit Cicero, ut ne frater quidem ei Quintus carior fuerit aut familiarior, ei rei sunt indicio, praeter eos libros in quibus de eo facit mentionem qui in vulgus sunt editi, xi volumina epistularum, ab consulatu eius usque ad extremum tempus ad Atticum missarum: quae qui legat, non multum desideret historiam contextam eorum temporum, sic enim omnia de studiis principum, vitiis ducum, mutationibus rei publicae perscripta sunt ut nihil in eis non appareat et facile existimari possit prudentiam quodam modo esse divinationem, non enim Cicero ea solum quae vivo se acciderunt futura praedixit sed etiam quae nunc usu veniunt cecinit ut vates. Nepos wrote this hi Atticus lifetime, probably in 35—34.3 His contrast of the letters with certain pubhshed works in which Atticus is mentioned (e.g. de Finibus), shows that the former were still unpublished at that time. The date and circumstances Cf. RE. vn a. 1211. 38.

2 Schanz-Hosius,

60

Rom. Lit.

1, p. 356.

FATA EPISTULARVM

of their publication remain an open question. Who had their custody after Atticus’ death it is impossible to say with cer¬ tainty, but if he did not bequeath them otherwise they pre¬ sumably passed to his only child, Caecilia Attica, wife of Agrippa. Agrippa remarried in 28, whether in Attica’s lifetime or not we do not know. If the letters remained in Atticus’ family they would go to their daughter Vipsania, first wife of the future emperor Tiberius. Through her son Drusus Caesar they might find their way into the imperial archives, or they may have passed into the family of her second husband, Asinius Gallus. It is accepted that the younger Seneca knew them in published form, since he quotes a passage from 16 (1. 16). 5 under the heading Ciceronis epistularum ad Atticum I in a letter to Lucilius of about a.d. 63 (97. 5).1 When Karl Buchner wrote on the subject in 19392 the reign of Nero was generally regarded as the most probable period. Subsequently, J. Carcopino beheved himself to have proved that the correspondence was already public property in Augustus’ day.3 The evidence stands thus: Quintilian (Inst. vi. 3. 109) cites from Domitius Marsus treatise on Vrbanitas a saying taken from Art. 155 (vm. 7). 2, habeo 1

His other citations and references (cf. Ep. 97. 6,118. i, 2) might have been

drawn from a private collection to which he had access. 2 In his useful article on Cicero’s letters in RE. viia. 1192 ff. 3 In his book Les Secrets de la Correspondance de Ciceron (1947)- In Carcopino’s contention (n, pp. 347 ff-) Nepos wrote the passage above cited to pave the way for the publication of the letters, which, as he believes, took place in 33 b.c. (n, p. 376). Why then does Nepos say nothing to indicate that publica¬ tion was impending? And why, in the second edition of his work which appeared between 32 and 27, does he say nothing to correct his implied state¬ ment that the letters were unpublished? Carcopino stands this argument on its head (n, p. 363): ‘Sous peine de sombrer dans le ridicule, il aurait du remanier alors son chapitre xvi, pour, soit en faire disparaitre, soit y attenuer une anticipation toujours decjue, si, dans l’intervalle, la publication des xi volumina ne l’avait pas verifiee.’ As though there was any such ‘anticipation’ outside Carcopino’s imagination!—For literature prior to Carcopino see Buchner, l.c. 1213 ff.

6l

INTRODUCTION

quem fugiam; quem sequar non habeo—except that Cicero wrote ego vero quem fugiam habeo. The same sententia appears in Plutarch (Apophth. p. 205 c) and Macrobius (Sat. m. 3. 7), who quotes it correctly. Marsus was probably dead by

a.d.

14 (c£

Ov. ex Pont. iv. 16. 5). It must be granted to Carcopino that the shght discrepancy is of no importance. On the other hand the citation should go for nothing as evidence of pubhcation. Marsus very likely got it, as F. Leo, who first drew attention to the matter, suggested,1 from the collection of Ciceronian dicta which Quintilian ascribes (though doubtfully) to Tiro (Inst. vi. 3. 5: cf. Macr. Sat. n. 1. 12; Schol. Bob. p. 140.16). Nothing however proves that Marsus had not read it privately in the collection or heard it from someone who had.

Nepos’ en¬

thusiastic description may well have aroused interest, and both in Atticus’ lifetime and thereafter access need not have been difficult. A similar consideration invalidates another of Carcopino’s arguments,2 from Valerius Maximus who wrote his collection of Memorable Deeds and Sayings in Tiberius’ principate. One of his anecdotes relates an incident in the theatre during Caesar’s first Consulship (vi. 2. 9): Diphilus tragoedus, cum Apollinaribus ludis inter actum ad eum versum venisset quo haec sententia contineretur, 'miseria nostra magnus est d derectis in Pompeium Magnum manibus pronuntiavit, revocatusque aliquotiens a populo sine ulla cunctatione nimiae illum et intolerabilis potentiae reum gestu perseveranter egit, eadem petulantia usus est in ea quoque parte: ‘virtutem istam veniet tempus cum graviter gemes.’

1

Ausgewahlte kleine Schriften, 1, pp. 305 f.

2 It would also cover Livy, if his use of the letters could be proved; but as Carcopino admits (1, p. 50) it cannot. Fenestella likewise (see below, pp. 66 f.). As regards Valerius Carcopino seems to have been anticipated by W. Thormeyer (cf. Biichner, l.c. 1214. 18), whose dissertation (Gottingen, 1902) I have not seen.

3 est (not es) is read in Valerius’ MSS and Paris’ epitome. 62

FATA EPISTULARVM

It is likely enough that Cicero’s account of the same incident in Att. 39 (n. 19). 3 is the source, not necessarily immediate, of Valerius’ narrative. That leaves several possibilities open. The least probable (on internal evidence) is that Valerius drew it up from a pubhshed copy of the letter. In the first place he gets the quotations wrong, more seriously than Carcopino chooses to say.1 In the second, he adds to Cicero’s report in a way that suggests that he either never read it in its original form or had forgotten what he had read. Otherwise he would have known, unless he was singularly inadvertent,2 that Pompey, whom he represents as pointed at by the actor in the theatre, was in fact at Capua

(tulit Caesar graviter,

litterae ad Pompeium volare

dicebantur). Valerius may have read the story hastily in the archives; but more probably he took it from some earlier writer who had done so.3 The strongest point against any theory which places the pub¬ lication of the letters to Atticus prior to the Neronian period is the silence of Asconius.4 This commentator on Cicero’s speeches, writing c.

a.d.

55, nowhere in the 94 pages of the

Oxford Text—fragments of a much larger original—makes any mention of his letters or (except at one point; see below) shows any acquaintance with their contents. Asconius was a diligent researcher who often mentions his sources, and the letters to Atticus might have been expected to supply grist to 1 1, p. 53 * Valere-Maxime n’a altere de la lettre a Atticus que les citations qu’elle comporte: il a inverse nostra miseria en miseria nostra, dans la premiere; et il a omis le premier terme de la seconde: eamdem.' 2 As inadvertent as Carcopino, l.c. :‘I1 a developpe l’idee contenue dans le verbe image invectus est in en braquant contre Pompee les mains tendues de l’acteur.’ s Val. Max. ix. 1.7 may also be thought to have owed something to Att. 16 (1. 16). 5. 4 This also applies, though with far less force, to the rest of the correspon¬ dence. On that I will only point out that for a reason parallel to those already given the quotation from Cassius’ letter to Cicero in the elder Seneca s Suasoriae (1. 5. 5) of c. a.d. 38 is not conclusive evidence of prior publication even of the correspondence with Cassius, still less of the whole corpus. 63

INTRODUCTION

his mill if they had been at his disposal. In his commentary on the pro Scauro, would he not have quoted Cicero’s own remark about the speech, cum ego partem eius ornatissime defendissem (91 (iv. 17). 4) ? Would not his description of Cicero’s competi¬ tors for the Consulate (82) have taken account of 10 (1. 1) ? Asconius has a lengthy discussion (13 ff.) of Cicero’s claim in Pis. 52 to be the first man in history for whom the Senate had decreed that his house should be built at the pubhc expense. Would not a careful student of the letters have pointed out from 74 (iv. 2). 5 and 7 that Cicero did not state the facts as to his own case quite accurately ? ^Vhat the Senate decreed in 57 was that the Consuls should estimate the value of his former house and make him a grant accordingly. The grant was in¬ adequate, and he had to cover a substantial part of the cost out of his own pocket.1

Asconius tells us (54. 20) that Milo’s

property sold for a twenty-fourth part of its value.2 Would he not have added the interesting detail, if he had known of it, that Cicero himself (through his agent Philotimus) was a co¬ purchaser (cf. 101 (v. 8). 2 f.) ?

It may be answered that

Asconius was not obliged to mention any of these points, hi two other places it has been maintained that his failure to cite the correspondence cannot reasonably be ascribed to anything but ignorance. On Cicero’s statement in his defence of Milo (37) that he had recently come near to being murdered by Clodius near the Regia (nuper quidem ut scitis (me) ad Regiam paene confecit) Asconius comments as follows (48. 4): quo die periculum hoc adierit, ut Clodius eum ad Regiam paene confecerit, nusquam inveni; non tamen adducor ut putem Cicero¬ nem mentitum, praesertim cum adiciat ‘ut scitis’, sed videtur mihi j Cf. Ascon. 13. 24 quia. ..Ciceroni domus.. .publico sumptu aedificata sit. rhere is no need to take semuncia with Lewis and Short as ‘for a trifling sum qs. for a mere song’. J * ’ 64

FATA EPISTULARVM

loqui de eo die quo consulibus Domitio et Messala qui praecesserant eum annum cum haec oratio dicta est inter candidatorum Hypsaei et Milonis manus in via Sacra pugnatum est, multique ex Milonianis ex improviso ceciderunt, de cuius diei periculo suo ut putem loqui eum facit et locus pugnae (nam in Sacra via traditur commissa, in qua est Regia) et quod adsidue simul erant cum candidatis suffraga¬ tores, Milonis Cicero, Hypsaei Clodius. Following earlier commentators Leo argued1 that Cicero alluded to a brawl in the Via Sacra on 11 November 57 of which he gives a lively description to Atticus in 75 (iv. 3). 2 £; hence Asconius’ perplexity is held to show that he was unacquainted with this letter. Two of Carcopino’s three counter-arguments2 are quite worthless. When he says that in the one affray Clodius very nearly succeeded in murdering Cicero, while in the other Cicero had Clodius at his mercy, he ignores the difference in context. Defending Milo it suited Cicero to make the most of his own danger. Yet even as the passages stand, there is no inconsistency. It appears from the letter that his danger was, or at any rate may have been, considerable when Clodius first set on him in the street (cf. § 3 periculi mei). It was only after he had taken shelter in Tettius Damio’s house that the tables were turned; Clodius’ assault was easily repelled and he might him¬ self have been killed if Cicero had chosen. Secondly, ‘si l’une et 1’ autre melees ont eu pour theatre la Voie Sacree qui traverse le Forum, elles se localisent neanmoins en deux sections dif¬ ferentes de son parcours: celle de la lettre se livre a la descente du Palatin ou logeait Ciceron, par consequent tout pres du croisement avec la Via Sacra du Clivus Palatinus, sur 1 emplace¬ ment de la Veha ou s’erigera plus tard l’Arc de Titus’.

So

Carcopino, but not so Cicero, who simply says cum Sacra via descenderem, i.e. ‘ as I was going down (to the Forum) along the via Sacra’. The verb is normally used thus, e.g. in Sest. 78 ut 1 Op. cit. 1, pp. 41 ff5

2 Pp- 22

65

SBC I

INTRODUCTION

civis Romanus aut homo liber quisquam cum gladio in forum descenderit ante lucem; it tells us nothing about Cicero’s where¬ abouts in the street except that he was on the Palatine side of the Forum (the Regia stood near its entrance from that direc¬ tion). Carcopino s third objection, that the time-references in the pro Milone passage, nuper and longo intervallo, mle out an incident which happened in 57, is of very different weight. The view later put forward by Leo had already been rejected by Manutius for that reason. Leo himself defends it by pleading the elasticity of such phrases, but his answer, ignored by Car¬ copino, is not really convincing. Manutius and Carcopino were therefore probably right to distinguish between the two affrays. That obviously weakens Leo’s point, but does not obhterate it altogether. Considering the stress Asconius lays on the locality, we should expect him to have referred to the affair of 57, assuming he had read the letter, if only to save his readers from Leo’s mistake—if mistake it was. The second passage concerns Cicero s alleged defence of Catiline de repetundis in 65. It occurs in Asconius’ commentary on the speech in Toga Candida (85. 10): ante annum quam haec dicerentur Catilina, cum redisset ex Africa Torquato et Cotta coss., accusatus est repetundarum a P. Clodio adulescente, qui postea inimicus Ciceronis fuit, defensus est Catilina, ut Fenestella tradit, a M. Cicerone, quod ego ut addubitem haec ipsa Ciceronis oratio facit, maxime quod is nullam mentionem rei habet, cum potuerit invidiam facere competitori tam turpiter ad¬ versus se coeunti: praesertim cum alterum competitorem suum Antonium in eadem hac oratione sua admoneat suo beneficio eum ex ultimo loco praeturae candidatum ad tertium pervenisse. Two pages of further argument to the same effect follow. Asconius case seems unanswerable.

Fenestella, who drew

up his Annals not earher than the last years of Augustus,1 was Cf. Plin. N.H. vm. 195. See Schanz-Hosius, 11, pp. 595 ff. 66

FATA EPISTULARVM

apparently mistaken. His error may or may not have been a deduction from Cicero’s words to Atticus in n (i. 2). i:1 hoc tempore Catilinam competitorem nostrum defendere cogita¬ mus.

iudices habemus quos volumus (voluimus v.l.), summa

accusatoris voluntate, spero, si absolutus erit, coniunctiorem illum nobis fore in ratione petitionis; sin aliter acciderit, humaniter feremus. At first blush this looks very much like a confirmation of Fenestella’s statement. If, as Cicero plainly implies, the reiectio iudicum had already taken place,2 he must have undertaken the defence, as the first persons habemus and volumus suggest. Apparently he withdrew at the last moment, for what reason or on what pretext no one can say. That he should have even thought of defending Catiline without any illusions as to his guilt (cf. 10 (1. 1). i Catilina, si iudicatum erit meridie non lucere, certus erit competitor) horrifies Carcopino, but will not surprise anyone acquainted with ordinary forensic practice in Cicero’s time or ours.3 If Asconius knew that Fenestella or his authority had been misled by Cicero’s letter, he would have been bound in com¬ mon honesty to refer to it and to show how he himself evaded what might appear the only natural conclusion.

From his

silence however we can be sure that Fenestella had not quoted the passage as his evidence (which suggests that he too had not seen it). Even so its relevance to Asconius’ elaborate argument is so obvious that I find it very hard to believe he deliberately passed it by. Nor could he possibly have overlooked it if the correspondence had been generally available when he wrote. 1 If it was it proves nothing as to publication. See above, p. 62. 2 Cf. Ascon. 87. 14 reiectio iudicum ad arbitrium rei videbatur esse facta. 3 Cf. 91 (iv. 17). 5 ‘ quid poteris’ inquies ‘pro iis dicere?’ ne vivam (si) scio; in illis quidem tribus libris quos tu dilaudas nihil reperio. ‘ On ne songe pas a prendre en mains une cause dont on proclame 1’injustice’ (1, p. 46). But a letter to Atticus was not a proclamation.

67

5-2

INTRODUCTION

In this part of his commentary he was at pains to assemble the facts relating to Cicero s candidature, and the first two letters of the Atticus collection would have been the most obvious of sources. A point on the other side has recently been made by Mr R. S. Stewart in his paper,

The chronological order of Cicero’s

earliest Letters to Atticus’.1 If the text of 2 (1. 6). 2 is sound Cicero s father died in 68.

Asconius says he died during

Cicero s candidature for the Consulship.2 The discrepancy, which has caused a great deal of trouble, is simply and con¬ vincingly explained by Stewart s supposition that Asconius is in error and that the cause of his error is to be looked for m the chronological disorder of the first eleven letters in our collection. The first two in the series are mainly concerned with Cicero’s candidature. They were written in July 65. The following nine belong to 68-66; but they bear no annual dates, so that the reader’s first assumption would be that the Kalends of December mentioned m 2 (1. 6). 2 belonged to 65T Hence Stewart con¬ cludes that ‘it would be perverse any longer to maintain the view that.. .Asconius had not seen the Epistulae ad Atticum in their edited form’. Here he goes too fast. Asconius’ error does not show that he himself had seen the letters (still less, of course, that they had been published when he wrote). He may have got this piece of misinformation at second hand. All it can be held to prove is that some time before

a.d. 55

or thereabouts the

collection existed in the form in which we now have it. Where does that take us ? Trans. Am. Phil. Ass. 93 (1962), p. 469, n. 17. P. 82. 10 atque in petitione patrem amisit. 3 Stewart points out that ‘Professor William Ramsay, of the University of Glasgow, in the article he wrote on M. Tullius Cicero pater for Smith’s Dictionary oj Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, 1 (London, 1844) 708 made exactly the same error [as to the date of death], and cited the same source .

68

FATA EPISTULARVM

In the passage of his biography cited above Nepos tells us two things about the letters which, as he clearly implies, he had read in Atticus’ house. They were grouped in eleven1 rolls (volumina); and they dated from Cicero’s Consulship. Neither statement is true of the collection as it has come down to us. That is in sixteen books; and the first two letters belong to 65, the following nine to 68-66. Even irrespective of Nepos’ in¬ formation it can fairly be inferred that neither Atticus nor any¬ one in contact with him was responsible for the collection as it stands in our MSS: tanta stat praedita culpa.

Chronological

sequence is evidently intended, and in general maintained. But the departures are such as could hardly have occurred if Atticus had done the work himself or been available for consultation. Moreover most at any rate of the graver ones have this in common: the letters concerned are of a nature which easily explains their omission from an original corpus formed by Atticus.2 First there are the two books xn and xm, covering 1 Aldus’ correction xvi, found in some modern texts, obliterates evidence. 2 Carcopino’s view {op. cit. n, pp. 354-63) that Atticus’ eleven rolls have survived in the eleven books of the fourteenth-century abridgement called Excerpta Ambrosiana (E: see below, pp. 77 f.) is full of anomalies.To begin with, it contradicts his own contention, advanced immediately beforehand, that the sixteen libri of the other MSS simply represent these eleven volumina rearranged in codex form. That apart, E’s abridgement shows the same chronological ignorance as the full series. It contains letters to Quintus and a book of letters to Brutus about which Nepos says nothing. Lehmann (pp. 22 f.) rightly regards the explicit at the end of E together with its correction by a later hand as evidence that its copyist was the original excerptor. On this Carcopino (p. 357); ‘notons d’abord qu’elle [i.e. cette opinion] repose sur le postulat que les gloses ajoutees au texte de YAmbrosianus emanent du copiste de ce manuscrit. Or rien n’est moins sur. Ce n’est, a tout prendre, qu’une impression: il a semble a Lehmann que les notes marginales etaient de la meme main que le corps du texte.... S’il a erre dans son expertise d’ecriture, c’est toute sa con¬ struction qui s’ecroule.’ Either Carcopino did not know that m means ‘manus secunda’ or his eyes were as bad as his logic. The truth is precisely contrary. Lehmann’s argument, which must be sought in his book, demands that the ‘glosses’ were by a later hand; and he states that this is or appears to be so. Petrarch in his Life of Caesar (xxvi. 32) quotes Caesar’s remark about

69

INTRODUCTION

(very unevenly) the years 46-45. The MS arrangement, though clearly aiming at chronological sequence, is a jumble which once seemed hopeless and has only been sorted out in modem times by a vast amount of detective effort on the part of Schiche, O. E. Schmidt and others—and even now there is more to do. The majority of them are brief notes of no lasting importance, largely concerned with obscure matters of private business; Atticus motive in excluding them, or most of them, is obvious. Similar disorder rules in the first eleven letters of Book 1, and here again only the first two would interest the general reader. Two other letters consist almost entirely of enclosures, letters written by Cicero to third parties in connec¬ tion with the Buthrotian Affair:1 xv. 14 of the MSS should have been placed after xv. 24, and xvi. 16 after xv. 27. These too make tedious reading; and Atticus may not have particu¬ larly cared to put examples of wire-pulling on his own behalf in a collection which was in fact, and was probably designed to be, read by others. Possibly he did not include such enclosures anyway. The case of 188 (vm. 9. 1-2) is especially noteworthy. Written at the end of March 49 it should follow ix. 18 of the MSS, which place it in the wrong book and in combination with another letter, written about a month previously. It is Brutus in 355 (xiv. 1). 2 (vilely mistranslated by Carcopino, p. 359) as from the tenth book of the letters; and in E’s arrangement this letter actually comes in Book x. Wherefore Carcopino (p. 360): ‘II est temps de revenir au bon sens, et de se soumettre a la leton des faits: comme les excerpta Ambrosiam, qui en procedent plus ou moins directement, le Veronensis avait rassemble la Correspondance de Ciccron en xi livres ou les lettres a Atticus s’intercalaient entre les lettres a Quintus et celles a Brutus.’ How comes it then that Petrarch quotes freely from letters and parts of letters which are omitted in the Excerpts, as can be verified from Moricca’s ‘Textimonia’ (sic) ? Or that twice elsewhere in this same life of Caesar he cites by the ordinary book-references and not according to E (see items

xli

and

xlii

in Moricca) ? Lehmann’s hypothesis that

E is an abridgement prepared on Petrarch’s instructions covers the facts well enough. Finally, the clumsy and haphazard character of the abridgement (cf. Lehmann, p. 23) is enough to ridicule the notion of Atticus as its author. 1 See above, p. 54. 70

FATA EPISTULARVM hardly a coincidence that this letter shows Atticus as purposing an excursion from Rome to congratulate Caesar on his return from Brundisium—not an edifying picture,1 as Cicero all too plainly hints. The case of Book iv is more complicated. Three long letters of autumn 57 in their right order are followed by thirteen shorter ones (eleven in the MSS)—iv. 4-14, dating from January 56 to May 54. The first and the last two are correctly placed, the rest badly jumbled.

Of the eleven dis¬

ordered letters (iv. 4^1-12) six are brief personal notes, of little value and full of obscurities, such as Atticus would naturally not want to include. The other five are mostly longer; they contain much of historical interest and nothing obviously ob¬ jectionable from Atticus’ standpoint.

If the order adopted in

this edition is correct2 they should be arranged 5, 8 a,

6, 10, 9.

As for 4, 13 and 14 (correctly placed), though short they are straightforward (apart from textual corruption in 13), and 13 is of definite political interest. Finally we have five letters, all long except the last, belonging to the latter part of 54. The first two have changed places, and a large tract of text from 16 and 17 has found its way into 19. The beginning of 18 seems to be missing.

But these troubles may be of later origin.

Possibly

then Book iv was represented in Atticus’ collection by 1-3, 5,

6, 8 a-10, 13-19. The inversions of 8 a and 6, 10 and 9, 16 and 15 may be accidental errors of his own.3

But it would also be

understandable if Atticus chose to omit 4-19, thus leaving a gap of five and a half years (from iv. 1-3, which form a pendant to the letters of exile, to the beginning of the ‘ proconsular’ series in May 51), because he felt that the surviving correspondence was 1 See above, p. 36. 2 See vol. 11, Appendix 1. 3 Such minor errors on Atticus’ part are quite credible, though some of the small displacements too are likely to be due to the later redactor. 173 (ix. 4), which ought to follow ix. 6, may have been left out originally because almost all of it is in Greek, 386 (xv. 6), which should follow xv. 8, because it mainly consists of a copy of Hirtius’ letter to Cicero.

71

INTRODUCTION

too thinly spread to be worth including. Two other serious displacements are those of the last three letters of Book xi, which should be distributed among the preceding four, and of 416-17 (xv. 13 and 13 a), which

should follow xvi. 7.

There is no obvious reason why Atticus should have excluded these, except that 416 (xv. 13) presents him as custodian of the Second Philippic. The foregoing assumes (for this is what the evidence suggests) that Atticus eleven volumina were a selection made by himself for friends like Nepos and other persons interested to read. The letters which for one reason or another he did not include he preserved1 (many of them anyway), but did not trouble about their arrangement. Later, some time after his death, these re¬ jected letters were incorporated to make the sixteen books which we now have. It should be noted that while serious chronolo¬ gical misplacement can fairly be regarded as evidence that the letters involved were not in the series assembled by Atticus, the converse is by no means true. The second redactor will not have blundered every time, and letters which stand in their right positions may none the less have been added by him. It may be doubted whether Nepos ever read the story of the Scaptius affair,' in which Atticus cuts so sorry a figure, or his views about Octavian hi 44 as expressed in 379 (xv. 2). 3 and 425 (xvi. 14). 1. When was the enlarged series formed? It may seem natural to regard it as an immediate preliminary to publication, when¬ ever that took place; but this would be a quite unwarranted assumption. Anyone who came into possession of the corres¬ pondence may have arranged it as a whole for the same reason as Atticus made his original selection, in order to show it to friends or inquirers

the reasons for suppressing certain por-

It is quite possible that some may later have been lost: cf. Buchner, l.c. 1215. 20. 2 See above, p. 29.

72

FATA EPISTULARVM tions having ceased to operate.1 The collection could then have been published as it stood, perhaps long afterwards. Mr Stewart2 argues that Nepos must have seen the letters as assembled in the MSS from his statement that the correspondence dated from Cicero’s Consulship. He was thinking, so the argument runs, of the first two letters of Book i, which though actually written in 65, are mainly concerned with the candidature, and did not know that the following nine really belong to earlier years. The reasoning is faulty. What Nepos may be supposed to have seen was not Book 1 as we have it, but its first two letters followed immediately by what is now the twelfth. To return to Asconius. It is now clear that the existence of the later redaction in his day, as shown by his mistake about Cicero’s father, tells us nothing as to the time of its publication. The only pointers of any value to that are Seneca’s citation and Asconius’ silence. wholly conclusive.

As often, the ex silentio argument is not It may be thought odd in any case that

Asconius, who must have known where the letters were, should not have found means to investigate them.

Still, access in his

time may not have been easy, especially if, as the known dates make quite possible, the project of publication was already in being when he worked. All in all the evidence such as it is, and it falls distinctly short of proof, supports a date about half-way through Nero’s reign.

Reasons why the letters might have

attracted interest at that period are not difficult to imagine.3 But a priori argument in any direction is pointless where so many special factors lie beyond knowledge.4 1 Letters regarded by Atticus as unimportant ephemera might not appear in quite that light to some pious descendant or antiquary. 2 L.c. p. 470. 3 Cf. Buchner, l.c. 1214. 4 Carcopino’s monstrously silly theory that Atticus, in collaboration with M. Cicero the Younger and Tiro, published the whole correspondence to subserve Octavian’s propaganda relies on assumptions as to the date of publi¬ cation which have been proved groundless. I trust that a piece-by-piece demolition of the superstructure will be considered unnecessary. But as I do

73

INTRODUCTION

On the later fortunes of this correspondence I shall be verybrief.

Seneca, Quintilian, Pliny the Younger, Suetonius, and

Gellius cite and refer to it, likewise the fourth-century gramnot propose to waste any more notice on this worthless and malignant book, it may be as well to add a few more specimens of its quality, taken from less than five small pages of vol. n (p. 245): ‘Ciceron, on s’en souvient, aurait voulu que Lucius Lucceius composat une histoire de son consulat, et pour l’y determiner, il lui avait ecrit, d Antium, une belle lettre dont il n’etait pas peu fier. Mais il n en avait point garde la copie; et au lieu d’en transmettre le texte a Atticus, il avait du prier Atticus de se rendre chez Lucceius, a Rome, et de se le faire communiquer par son destinataire. Or cette lettre se retrouve au livre v des Familieres. Forcement, elle y a ete introduite par Atticus.’ Cicero (23 (iv. 6). 4) says nothing about not having kept a copy. Why should he send one when Atticus could easily ask his friend Lucceius to let him see the original? That he did not keep one in the case of a letter ‘dont il n’etait pas peu fier’ h inherently most improbable. I note that the English translation of Carcopino’s book by E. O. Lorimer (in general no better than it deserves) runs ‘ but he had not kept a spare copy ’ (my italics). (P. 246) ‘ A quoi j’ajouterai, pour finir, les deux lignes abominables qu’il fait porter a L. Minucius Basilus a la nouvelle de 1 assassinat de Cesar et dont on est sur, en les lisant, qu’elles furent ecrites dans la fievre et sans temoin.’ The popular belief that the note to Basilus (Fam. vi. 15) refers to Caesar’s murder has been challenged (seeT.-P. ad loc.), and ought to be abandoned. Cicero would surely have written vobis gratulor...vestra tueor, not tibi...tua. Note the fatuity of ‘sans temoin’. Carcopino proceeds: ‘Il est necessaire que ces textes soient revenus de chez leurs destinataires entre les mains de Marcus Ciceron: et l’on ne voit personne qui ait etc plus capable de les y apporter qu’Atticus lui-meme, avec l’etendue de ses relations, sa perpetuelle curiosite et ses hardiesses de collectionneur.’ The said ‘destinataires’ are C. Cassius, Q. Cornificius the Younger, Volumnius Eutrapelus, and Basilus. All but the third met their deaths in 43-42, when the younger Cicero had other things to think about than collecting his father’s correspondence. The evidence for Atticus’ ‘hardiesses de collectionneur’ is Carcopino’s assertions, reiterated d la Goebbels. (P. 248) ‘Ses hens avec Cornificius etaient plus anciens, et au moins aussi forts que ceux qui unissaient Cornificius et Ciceron: quand ces derniers furent mis aux prises par une question d’argent, c’est Atticus que Ciceron pria de s’entremettre pour la resoudre.’ In 45 (cf. 251 (xn.14). 2; 255 (xn.

17); 257

(xn. 19). 2) Cicero asks

Atticus, who was at that time looking after his business affairs, to see Cornifi¬ cius procurators about an old claim. For all we know Atticus never spoke to Cornificius in his life. (Ibid.) ‘... et lorsque, a Brindes, en novembre 48 av. J.-C., Ciceron, tremblant dcvant la colere du vainqueur de Pharsale, songea a implorer 1 assistance de Basilus pour obtenir le pardon de Cesar, il n’a pas ose s’adresser

directement a cet intercesseur, et il a demande a Atticus de vouloir bien entreprendre pour lui cette demarche.’ The passage here referred to (216 (xi. 5). 3)

74

FATA EPISTULARVM

marians and Macrobius. That medieval authors show no such acquaintance is not surprising—those who read it must have found much of it incomprehensible. Petrarch’s discovery of a MS (also containing the Letters to Quintus, Brutus (6-18), and the spurious Letter to Octavian) at Verona in 1345 introduced it to the men of the Renaissance; MSS and, from 147° on_ wards, printed editions quickly multiplied. In the sixteenth century some of the best minds in scholarship were busy cor¬ recting and interpreting the Letters to Atticus—Victorius, Corradus, Lambinus, above all Paulus Manutius whose com¬ mentary can even now be consulted with profit. Since then it has been otherwise. J. F. Gronovius’ lecture notes make a marginal contribution, but no first-rate and few even secondrate intellects brighten the dusty procession of editions, com¬ mentaries, and monographs that trails from Lambinus to Mommsen and Madvig. Mommsen s direct contribution was, of course, small, though remarkable.1 Indirectly there is no scholar to whom students of the Letters to Atticus, as of so many other things, owe more. In his Adversaria Madvig gave says nothing about Caesar’s anger or about winning his pardon. Atticus is asked to write to Basilus, Servilius, and any others he thinks proper in Cicero’s name’ (meo nomine), i.e. as though the letters were from Cicero him¬ self (cf. my note on 60 (in. 15)- 8), simply to save Cicero the trouble {ego propter incredibilem et animi et corporis molestiam conficere pluris litteras non potui; iis tantum rescripsi a quibus acceperam). The object may have been to obtain Caesar’s permission to return to Rome (cf. §2). Carcopino proceeds: ‘Quant a la peinture de la fete galante chez Volumnius Eutrapelus, nous avons deux raisons d’admettre que c’est, encore et toujours, a Atticus que nous la devons.’ The first reason is that Papirius Paetus, the recipient of C.’s account (Fam. ix. 26) ‘etait un familier d’Atticus, epicurien comme lui’, which is no reason at all. As for the second ‘ nous devons nous rappeler qu’au festin chez Volum¬ nius, Atticus etait couche a la droite de Ciceron; que Ciceron n a done pu saisir ses tablettes sans en eveiller l’attention; et que sans doute Atticus a ete le premier a savourer, par-dessus la tete de son voisin, le regal litteraire dont, grace a lui, nous pouvons apprecier l’agrement aujourd’hui’. 1 Principally analysis of the textual dislocations in Book iv in 1845 (Ges. Schr. vii, pp. 28 ffi).

75

INTRODUCTION

them 28 pages which inevitably contain some excellent pro¬ posals and observations, but hardly convey a fair idea of his genius. As much as the poetry of Lucretius or Manilius these documents require a special knowledge of subject-matter for their elucidation, lacking which a critic, however keen-sighted, operates in blinkers. How much more Madvig might have accomplished here if only his equipment in this respect had matched his capacity!

Something of the same kind may be

said of his countryman and pupil, A. S. Wesenberg, in natural gifts perhaps the ablest editor of the Letters since Lambinus. But he wanted Griindlichkeit, and moreover his edition (1885) came before the revolution effected by C. A. Lehmann, whose collations and conclusions first put recension on a solid footing —though when he tried his hand as critic or interpreter he generally fell below mediocrity. C. F. W. Muller’s edition of 1898 took account, if somewhat fitfully, of Lehmann’s work; it has plenty of all-round good sense, httle originality or pene¬ tration.

Meanwhile O. E. Schmidt was labouring manfully

and often with profit, especially on chronological problems. To him, as to Wilhelm Stemkopf a httle later, more gratitude would be due if he had published less. Sjogren’s edition, beginning m 1916, was long regarded as standard. That was unfortunate, since any critical judgement he may have possessed was stifled by his misapprehension of an editor’s functions. But to him belongs the credit of applying and even improving upon Lehmann’s results,1 and his apparatus remains an essential tool. Subsequent to Sjogren, L.-A. Constans’ unfinished Bude edi¬ tion deserves mention for a few brilliant corrections and, within the limits of contemporary exegesis, an admirable translation.3 1 Lehmann showed that the Mediceus has rivals, Sjogren that it has superiors. In the matter of Lambinus margin on the other hand Sjogren was retrograde (see below, p. 95).

2 His part ends at 115 (vi. 1). 24.

76

INTRODUCTION

C.

MANUSCRIPTS

Q Apart from a few fragments, no MS of the Letters to Atticus earlier than the fourteenth century has survived. Those extant, all copied in Italy and also containing the three books ad Quintum Fratrem and one book ad M. Brutum, belong to two families,

2

and A, deriving from an archetype O.1 Besides the

major dislocations of text in Q.Fr. n and Att. iv, numerous lacunae and other blemishes shared by all these MSS put their common ancestry beyond question.2 The corruptions attribut¬ able to this archetype show it to have been a minuscule MS which, if not in scriptura continua,3 at any rate lacked clear and systematic word division. Constans4 wished to identify it with the lost Veronensis, which Petrarch discovered in 1345. But the division between the two families probably goes much further back.5 2

includes a relatively small number of MSS, only two (RP)

of which are now complete (apart from minor lacunae): E = Ambrosianus E 14 inf., probably written in the first half of the fourteenth century and the oldest of the surviving MSS, sometimes called ‘Excerpta Ambrosiana’. It is divided into eleven books, of which the last consists of the letters to Brutus, Book 1 (formerly so 1 A conclusion due to C. A. Lehmann, whose treatise De Ciceronis ad Atticum epistulis recensendis et emendandis (1892) is fundamental to modern recensions. Also of importance are Sjogren’s Commentationes Tullianae (1910) and the prefaces to his and Constans’ editions. W. S. Watt’s preface to his Oxford Text of the Letters to Quintus, etc. (1958), is a convenient sum¬ mary. 2 Lehmann, op. cit. pp. 123 ff. 3 Ibid. p. 177; Constans, 1, p. 35, n. 2 (‘sans separation de mots, en scriptura continua’ goes too far). 4 1, P- 36. 5 Cf. Sjogren, Comm. Tull. pp. 43, 60.

77

INTRODUCTION

called), complete. The other ten are a series of extracts, amounting to little over half of the full text, and becoming particularly meagre near the end; Att. xm-xvi take up only a single book of E. The unique division into eleven books seems to have been due to the editor of the Excerpts,1 2 who probably got the idea from Nepos’ Life of Atticus.3 G = Parisinus ‘Nouveau Fonds’ 16248 (Bibliotheque Nationale), of date not later than the beginning of the fifteenth century.3 The 2 tradition is represented up to vi. 1. 8 (probari), after which the hand changes and the text is copied from a MS of the A family. G has numerous lacunae. H = Landianus 8 (Library of Piacenza), roughly contemporary with and closely akin to G, containing Att. i-vn. 22. 2, also x. 8 b (Caesar to Cicero). The text is somewhat inferior to G and more lacunose. N = Laurentianus ex Conv. Suppr. 49, of like date. Contains Att. 1-vn. 21. 1 (conquisitores). The text is inferior to that of GH, with which N stands in an affinity much looser than that linking the other two. GHN form a sub-group (TT) within the 2 family, deriving, so Lehmann4 * tentatively conjectured, from a copy discovered at Pistoia (?)5 by Bartolomeo Capra, bishop of Cremona, in 1409.6 V = Palatinus Lat. 1510 (Vatican), of the late fifteenth century. Contains Att. i-m and portions ofiv (1-4a; 14; 16. 1-4 (intellegat curo); 17. 1-3 (magis in ocio); 18. 2 (amisimus) to end of letter; 19. 1 (dictatura) to end of letter), v (1-8; 10), and ix (2-4; 6. 4-7; 6a). 1 Lehmann, p. 23. On Petrarch’s possible connection with E see ibid. p. 172 and Constans, 1, pp. 30 f. (who, however, mis-states Lehmann’s conclusions). 2 See above, p. 69. 3 See A. C. Clark, who first brought this MS to notice, in Cl. Rev. 10 (1896), pp. 321 ff. 4 P. 145. Constans holds it probable that the Pistoriensis was none other than Petrarch’s Veronensis (i.e. as he supposes, Q) after it had suffered mutila¬ tion (1, p. 37). Yet he too dates G (clearly not a direct copy of the archetype) ‘de la fin du XIVe siecle ou du debut du XVe’ (p. 33). 3 Pavia, according to Sabbadini (Scoperte, 1, p. 7). 6 Or possibly a little earlier: see L. Bruni’s letter in Lehmann.

78

MANUSCRIPTS

O = Taurinensis Lat. 495, of the early fifteenth century, closely related to V.

Originally complete, this MS was injured by a

library fire in 1904 so that the last four books from xiii. 2 b (item ad te) onwards were totally destroyed while in the remainder ‘vi atque impetu flammarum codex laesus contractusque est, ut non omnia legi possint’.1 Some of its readings in xm-xvi are however preserved by Lehmann, who collated it intact, in his monograph of 1893 and his critical appendix to Andresen’s selections.3 O contains many corrections (O2) derived from a A source. R = Parisinus Lat. 8538 (Bibliotheque Nationale), dated 1419, and P = Parisinus Lat. 8536 (Bibliotheque Nationale) of the same period are basically similar, the main difference being that while both are interpolated, P has suffered far more than R. A visible sign of R’s superior fidelity is its numerous contractions, doubtless deriving from earher copies. VO and RP form together a sub-group (O) of 2, which also includes a twin brother of V, the mid-fifteenth-century codex Ravennas

(Biblioteca Classense: no complete collation has

been published).

L. Malaespina in his Emendationes ac Suspi¬

ciones of 1564 cites readings from two lost MSS of the same family, the codex Antonianus (Ant.), formerly in the Venetian library of that name, and a codex (F) belonging to G. Faemus, also cited in the notes of F. Ursinus appended to the 1584 (Lyons) edition of Lambinus. Ant. stands closer to VO, F to RP, but with a number of peculiarities, probably conjectural in origin. On corrections from I sources in the Mediceus (M) see below. The stemma of I therefore stands as shown in the diagram on the following page.3

1 2

Sjogren, praef. p. vi. Moricca’s statement that Purser collated O is baseless, the O readings in his

Oxford Text of 1903 being a rather haphazard selection from those published by Lehmann: see my edition of ix-xvi, pp. xi f. Sjogren did not examine it (l.c. p. xxviii ‘multis locis inspexi’) until after the fire: cf. Gnomon, 33 (1961), P- 4713 Cf. Sjogren, Comm. Tull. p. 15.

79

INTRODUCTION

n

E

A

G

H

V

N

Rav. O (Ant.)

R

P (F)

In the second (A) family M — Mediceus 49* 18 has a unique position.

Long believed to be Petrarch’s own copy of his

Veronensis and the mainstay of the text, it was in fact tran¬ scribed in 1392—3 from a MS in Milan which was certainly not the Veronensis.1 Although Sjogren’s contention for the general superiority of the

5! tradition is now beyond argument, the

independence of A is equally unquestioned, and M for reasons to appear is its only reliable witness. This MS teems with cor¬ rections, many of which cannot be assigned to any hand with certainty.

But besides those due to the original scribe, the

hands of three correctors have been distinguished,2 successive owners of the volume: = Coluccio Salutati (1331-1406). His additions derive from inferior MSS of the A family apart from a number, prefixed ‘al.’, which come from a source akin sometimes to N, sometimes to E. M = Niccolo Niccoli (c. 1364-1437). He drew from a source close to GH and accordingly his contributions cease at vn. 24. ^ = Lionardo Bruni jectures of his own.

2

(1370-1444).

His corrections are con¬

Lehmann, pp. 4 f.; Sjogren, op. cit. pp. 39 fjf. Sjogren, ibid. pp. 43 If.

80

MANUSCRIPTS

Inferior fifteenth-century MSS of this family are plentiful. Sjogren chose the following four, of which fairly full collations appear in his apparatus: b = Berolinensis (ex bibl. Hamiltoniana) 168. A lavishly corrected MS written apparently towards the middle of the century.1 d = Laurentianus (ex bibi, aedilium) 217. m = Berolinensis (ex bibl. Hamiltoniana) 166, copied by Poggio

in 1408. s = Vrbinas 322 (Vatican).

To construct a stemma for these MSS, which were certainly not copied from M or from one another, and for others like them, seems a hopeless task. Sjogren professes no confidence in his own: ‘etenim ex archetypo A tam numerosa proles propa¬ gata est tamque multiplex varietas codicum exorta, inter quos diu erat vicissitudo et commercium dandi accipiendique, ut contorta sane atque implicata evaserit ratio.’2 m is closest to M at the beginning, d at the end; s farthest away, with many peculiarities of obviously interpolative origin.

Sjogren also

noticed Mms, ms, and bds as frequent allies, especially in the first book. M is often found in agreement with I against bdms, which I have called 5, or most of them, and the converse is also common. The practical question, how much attention we should pay to 5, in alliance with 2 or in isolation, as witness to the A archetype, has not been faced by editors hitherto (in¬ cluding myself) quite squarely.

Certain observations may

assist. M and m share a long lacuna in Book 1, from 18. 1 (reperire)

1

See my edition of 1961, p. vi. Whatever their provenance, no authority

can attach to these corrections. Sjogren nowhere, I think, discusses them and hardly ever notices them in his apparatus, except in the last twenty pages of its final instalment (published posthumously in i960) where they are cited quite plentifully. Except in Books xm-xvi, where I have collated b myself, they are ignored in this edition. 2 Comm. Tull. p. 36. Similarly Lehmann, p. 156.

6

8l

SBC I

INTRODUCTION

to 19. ii [qualem). A glance through Sjogren’s apparatus will show that bds do not in this passage represent the A tradition (it was presumably missing in the A archetype) but depend upon a MS very close to GH. That, plus the general tendency of bds to agree with GH noticed by Sjogren,1 points to direct contamination in the former; presumably the contaminating MS broke off like GH (and N) before the end of Book vn and shared most of their smaller lacunae, bds therefore can be of value only where they disagree with GH or where GH is not available.

On the other hand the large lacuna in M and m

indicates freedom from direct contamination; if their copyists had had to hand a MS of the Z family or a contaminated one from the A family it would have furnished the missing text. A second major lacuna in M extends from xvr. i6b. 8 [magnam) to the end. This passage was also originally missing in d, where it is added in a different hand. Here the 8 text (in¬ cluding that of the supplement in d, which has no special character of its own) clearly goes back to a source independent of Z,2 presumably the A archetype. Apart from the obvious inferences that Md stood at more than one remove from this archetype and that d stands closer than its fellows to M in this part of the text, the unfilled lacuna is further evidence agamst contamination in M. Contamination by a T7 source will not account for dis¬ crepancies between M and m, or for anything after Book vn. Yet M is often in conflict with 6 throughout the text,3 and no Praef. p. xvii ‘Porro est consensus quidam M3bdGH vel M3bdsGH dubiae originis; forsitan archetypum librorum bds ex Pistoriensi vel consimili aliquo libro non nulla adsumpserit.’ 2 Here represented by RP and, in places, E. 3 As a sample take the following from the first four pages of Book xiv in my edition of 1961 (R = RP except where otherwise stated): 213. 3 perditius PM2bdm2s: -tus ERMhn1, 6 haud R5: out EM1, 9 ist{h)ec E6 (-hue d): ista et M (?), 16 cum 6: tum ERM1,18 quicque ERMd: quicquam bins, 21 cum ER6: que M1; 214. 8 publilium M:publiumR5, i6tamsim RMdm2: tamsum mh: sum tarn b,

82

MANUSCRIPTS

one will maintain that all or most of the 5 variants, whether right or wrong, are ‘honestly’ derived from the A archetype. Many have all the appearance of conjectural corrections. The case of Sex. Cloelius1 lends itself to demonstration. His name crops up nine times in the Atticus correspondence and once in the Letters to Quintus (n. 5. 4). This last occurrence is uninstructive, all the MSS presenting celio vel sim. except GHM3 with c{p)ecilio. The behaviour of those available in the ad Atticum passages can be tabulated thus:

clolius or

cloelius cloelius clelius2 x. 8. 3 xiv. 13. 6 XIV. 13 A. 2 XIV. 13 A. 3 XIV. 13 B. 3 XIV. 14. 2 XIV. 19. 2 XIV. 19. 2 XV. 13. 3

Mdm E E E ER EOR R R RM

ce(l)lius

RP —

—

—

—

—

M1 M1 M1 M1 M

— —

P P d(?)

—

RPM1 RPM1 — — — —

ds —

clodius 02bs M2S M2S RPM(corr.)S PM(corr.)5 PM(corr.)8 M(corr.)5 bm Pbms

Obviously the name appeared as cloelius (or the almost identical cloelius) in the I archetype in all nine places. M usually corrupts it slightly, and the A archetype may well have done so too. But the Falschverbesserung (?) clodius, which has established itself in all books down to the year i960, is exclusive to P8, apart from one appearance in R, and regular in 8, the archetype showing through only three times in d and once apiece in ms. 17 qui R: quin M1: cum S, 18 inimicissimum RMd: amic- bms; 215. 3 tue quidem RFMd2s: q-1- Pbdhn, 22 numquam ER6: nunc quam M1; 216. 3 ipsos OM1: se iER6, 4 reliqu(a)e 6: -qua ERM1, 5 ego ERMm: om. bds, 16 quas anius (annis) bms: qua san(n)ius RMd: qua P (spat. rel). 1 See Cl. Quart. N.S. 10 (i960), pp. 41 f. 2 Sometimes not easily distinguished.

83

6-2

INTRODUCTION

The natural conclusion is that at some stage or stages the A group apart from M were exposed to a deluge of interpolation, which also strongly affected P and, more slightly, R. Some of the interpolations may have come from a I source, perhaps close to E,1 but many are doubtless medieval or Renaissance conjecture.2 It follows in practice that the consensus of M with the E tradition is not merely permagni momenta but conclusive in determining the archetypal reading: EM = Q. Only when the I evidence is divided or insufficient or in favour of 6 against M can we concede the possibility (leaving unlikely coincidence out of account) that a A reading corrupted in the latter has been preserved in the former. Even then we cannot be sure. The main function of 8, a very modest one, is to corroborate M: since we have no reason to suspect contamination between M and 8 their agreement can be regarded as establishing the A archetype. Mention may here be made of a mutilated fragment of iv. 16. 8-9 discovered at Engelberg and published in 1955 by Mr P. W. Haffner.4 Assigned by him to the ninth century it has the dis¬ tinction of being the oldest MS of these letters of which any¬ thing is known to survive. Its provenance is unknown, though two of its readings suggest Italian ancestry. Unfortunately the remaining scraps of text throw scarcely any hght on the Q tradition, beyond supplying superfluous confirmation of the unreliability of 8.5 In the later books at any rate E(P)8 are quite often found in combination against the rest: e.g. (in my apparatus of 1961) p. 216. 3 ipsos OM1: se ipsos ER8, 220. 25 curtius E8: cutius (tut-) RFM1; 221. 21 qu(a)e tum E8: quantum RM1; 226. 15 periculum .RM1: -li E8, 26 utique ORM1: om. E8; 227. 1 aquilia EPS: -Ilia RM1; 231. 4 libere EPS: -rare CPRM1. There can hardly be any question of their deriving from a tradition outside I and A. 3 Sjogren, praef. p. xvii. 4 jn Mus. Helv. 12, pp. 50 ff. 5 According to Haffner they enable us to recognize with certainty ‘daB unser Fragment der italienischen Gruppe angehort, und zwar der Klasse A,

84

MANUSCRIPTS

Greek words and phrases are omitted in EHNV and some¬ times in the inferior A copies. Where preserved they are often badly distorted by copyists ignorant of the language; for critical purposes AAA, IT, HN,

00

can be regarded as inter¬

changeable. Where the MSS give them in Roman script it is often impossible to say whether Cicero himself wrote them so.

Y Under the symbol Y are grouped readings representing an older and superior ‘Transalpine’ tradition distinct from the ‘Italian’1 tradition of Q.

Common errors show that both

derive from a majuscule archetype (X).2 Y is now represented as follows: (1) Five double leaves survive from a MS (W) of the late eleventh or early twelfth century, used as binding material for account-books in a monastery near Wurzburg. They contain pieces from Books vi (i. 17-2. 1; 3. 4-4. 1), x (11. 1-15* 4), and xi (4. 16. 2; 7. 4-12. 1; 20. 2-23. 3); also four fragments of five lines each from Book xv. (2) Readings in the margin of A. Cratander’s Basel edition of 1528 (C) together with the new readings in his text (c),3 which apart from these is mainly a copy of I. B. Ascensius’ second edition (Paris, 1521-2). The MS providing the Y material probably came from Fulda.4 wobei die Ubereinstimmung mit dem Mediceus auffallend ist ’. I can see no evidence for the second supposition. It is very doubtful whether the division between 2 and A already existed in the ninth century. 1 The geographical division is convenient and accords with the facts now accessible but its validity is questionable since our knowledge of the ‘ Italian ’ side only goes back to 1345. 2 Cf. Lehmann, p. 126; Sjogren, praef. p. x. 3 Our only source for ad Brut. 1—5, found, according to his statement, in vetusto codice’. In the present edition c = new readings only. 4 From Lorsch, as earlier supposed; but cf. Sabbadini, Storia e critica di testi latini (1914), p. 6; A. C. Clark ap. How, Select Letters (1926), p. 19.

85

INTRODUCTION

(3) Readings attributed in various sources to the codex Tomesianus (Z), a MS belonging to Jean de Toumes, printer at Lyons, who died in 1564. It vanishes from knowledge after 1580. Unlike Cratander’s Y codex, Z did not contain the letters to Quintus and Brutus, a fact proved by the absence of citations.

In A. C. Clark’s opinion,1 ignored by Sjogren, Constans, Moricca, Watt, and (I am sorry to add) myself, the concord between W and Cratander’s readings is such that ‘it can hardly be doubted that in W we have the poor remains’ of his MS—as earlier maintained by R. Halm2 3 * and G. Schepss.3 Lehmann on the other hand, citing seven discrepancies of which three are false reports, had concluded that there is no reason to think Cratander used Wd Re-examination of the evidence has con¬ vinced me that the old view was right. The following list of agreements between W and Cc takes no account of those5 shared by some or all of the extant MSS. Also, as Lehmann himself pointed out, it should be borne in mind that Cratander had no cause to cite obvious errors, such as would be especially useful in proving identity. hi. 88. 196 7 Q. (que W)7 Axius WC: qu[a)e anxius Cl 89. 12

nam WCZb:8 non Q

89. 13 92. 2

tempora sunt ut WcZb: om. Q quicquid WC: quid Q

92. 10

tubes de WC: iubes enim de Cl

93. 16

ut WC: om. Q

93. 16

suppeditabimur WC: -mus Q

hi. 3

subita re quasi WC: subi vel sim. Q

1 Ap. How, Select Letters, p. 19. 1 Rhein. Mus. 18 (1863), pp. 460 ff. 3 Blatter/, d. Bayer. Gymn. 20 (1884), pp. 12 f.

* P. 127.

5 According to my count in Sjogren’s apparatus these number 28 in all- in 22 C = W, in 6 c = W. I quote by fascicule, page, and line of Sjogren’s edition. 7 A. 9 non om. Mms. Ep. 7] I, 11 legatio QZ®); all-i. 15 significarim c. 16 idem vulg.: eidem Q.

Il8

15

TRANSLATION

6 (i. IOJ 6

not only been present but responsible for any success that may come my way. So you will find and so you will hear from others. Little Tullia is putting you into court, without calling on the surety.

7 (i. ii) Rome, August 67 CICERO TO ATTICUS

1 I had been active of my own accord before, but your two very sedulous letters to the same purpose were a powerful stimulus. Add to that constant exhortation from Sallustius to do my utmost with Lucceius for the restoration of your old friendship. But after all I could do I have failed, not only to re-establish his former sentiments towards you but even to get out of him why his sentiments have changed. To be sure he flourishes that arbi¬ tration business of his and other grievances which I knew existed even before you left, but there must surely be some¬ thing else which has taken deeper root in his mind, something that cannot so easily be removed either by your letters or by my ambassadorial effort as by yourself in person—not only what you say but your old familiar face; that is, if you think it worth the trouble, as you certainly will if you take my advice and don’t wish to belie your own good heart. You may think it odd that I seem so pessimistic now after writing to you earlier that I expected him to do as I told him. The fact is, you can hardly believe how much stiffer I find his attitude and more obstinate in this dudgeon. But your return will cure it, or else whichever is to blame will be the sufferer.

2

When you wrote in one of your letters that you supposed I was already elected you little knew the worries of a candidate

2,

18 obfirmatior s': aff- QA. 1 me iam te scripsi (te iam me Lambinus): me iam Q.

II9

TEXT

7 (i. Il) 2

quam candidatos omnibus iniquitatibus nec quando futura sint comitia sciri, verum haec audies de Philadelpho.

3

Tu vehm quae nostrae Academiae parasti quam primum mittas, mire quam illius loci non modo usus sed etiam cogi¬ tatio delectat, hbros vero tuos cave cuiquam tradas; nobis eas, quem ad modum scribis, conserva,

summum me eorum

studium tenet, sicut odium iam ceterarum rerum; quas tu 5 incredibile est quam brevi tempore quanto deteriores offensurus sis quam rehquisti.

8 (i. 3) Scr. Romae ex. an. 6y (§2) ^CICERO ATTICO SAL.)

1 Aviam tuam scito desiderio tui mortuam esse, et simul quod verita sit ne Latinae in officio non manerent et in montem Albanum hostias non adducerent, eius rei consolationem ad te L. Saufeium missurum esse arbitror. 2

Nos hic te ad mensem Ianuariam exspectamus ex quodam rumore an ex htteris tuis ad ahos missis; nam ad me de eo nihil scripsisti. Signa quae nobis curasti, ea sunt ad Caietam exposita, nos ea non vidimus; neque enim exeundi Roma potestas nobis fuit. 5 misimus qui pro vectura solveret, te multum amamus quod ea abs te diligenter parvoque curata sunt.

3

Quod ad me saepe scripsisti de nostro amico placando, feci, et expertus sum omnia, sed mirandum in modum est animo abalienato; quibus de suspicionibus, etsi audisse te arbitror, tamen ex me cum veneris cognosces. Sallustium praesentem 3, 1 nostrae ac(h)ad-1: a- n- A. Ep. 8]

epistulam separavit M corr., cum 10-11 (1. 1-2) coniungitCl.

120

TRANSLATION

7 (i. Il) 2

in Rome at the present time, with all kinds of injustices to plague him. No one knows when the elections will take place. But you’ll hear all this from Philadelphus. 3

Please send the things you have got for my Academy as soon as possible. The very thought of the place, let alone the actual use of it, gives me enormous pleasure. Mind you don t hand over your books to anybody. Keep them for me, as you say you will. I am consumed with enthusiasm for them, as with disgust for all things else. It’s unbelievable in so short a tune how much worse you will find them than you left them.

8 (i. 3) Rome, end of 67 CICERO TO ATTICUS

1 I have to tell you that your grandmother has died of missing you, and also because she was afraid the Latin Festival might not come up to scratch and bring the animals to Mt Albanus. I expect L. Saufeius will be sending youfan essay of condolence. 2

lam expecting you back by January, from a current rumour or it may be from letters of yours to other people—you have written nothing on the subject to me. The statues you acquired for me have been disembarked at Caieta. I have not seen them, not having had an opportunity of leaving Rome. I have sent a man to pay the freight. I am most grateful to you for taking so much trouble and getting

them cheaply. 3 You often write to me about mollifying our friend. I have made the attempt and tried all I know, but he is amazingly estranged. The suspicions which have made him so you shall learn from me when you get back, though I expect you have heard what they are. I could not induce him to get back to his old friendly footing with Sallustius, though he is on the spot. 121

TEXT

8 (i. 3) 3

restituere in eius veterem gratiam non potui, hoc eo ad te

5

scripsi quod is me accusare de te solebat, in se expertus est illum esse minus exorabilem, meum studium nec tibi defuisse. Tulliolam C. Pisoni L. f. Frugi despondimus.

9 (1. 4) Scr. Romae an. 66 parte priore CICERO ATTICO SAL.

1 Crebras exspectationes nobis tui commoves, nuper quidem, cum te iam adventare arbitraremur, repente abs te in mensem Quintilem reiecti sumus, nunc vero censeo, quod commodo tuo facere poteris, venias ad id tempus quod scribis, obieris Quinti fratris comitia, nos longo intervallo viseris, Acutilianam

5

controversiam transegeris, hoc me etiam Peducaeus ut ad te scriberem admonuit, putamus enim utile esse te aliquando iam rem transigere, mea intercessio parata et est et fuit. 2

Nos hic incredibili ac singulari populi [de] voluntate de C. Macro transegimus, maiorem

fructum

cui cum aequi fuissemus, tamen multo ex populi

existimatione

illo

damnato

cepimus quam ex ipsius, si absolutus esset, gratia cepissemus.

3

Quod ad me de Hermathena scribis per mihi gratum est. est ornamentum Academiae proprium meae, quod et Hermes commune est omnium et Minerva singulare est insigne eius gymnasi. qua re velim, ut scribis, ceteris quoque rebus quam plurimis eum locum ornes, quae mihi antea signa misisti, ea nondum vidi; in Formiano sunt, quo ego nunc proficisci cogi¬ tabam.

illa omnia in Tusculanum deportabo.

3, 5 eo S: om. A. 7 tibi nec Mm. Ep. 9]

1, 2 te iam 2: iam te A.

3 censeo Latnbinus: sentio Q. 5 Acutilianam vulg.: ac upil- vel sim. Q. 2, 1 voluntate bd: de vol- Q.

122

Caietam, si

5

TRANSLATION

8 (i. 3) 3

I tell you this because Sallustius used to tax me with failing you. He has found in his own case that our friend is not so easily placated, and that my efforts have not been wanting on your behalf any more than on his. Tullia is engaged to C. Piso Frugi, son of Lucius.

9 (1. 4) Rome, first half of 66 CICERO TO ATTICUS

1 You keep on raising my hopes of your return. Recently I thought you were on your way, only to be suddenly put off until July. As things are, I think you should come back by the time you say, if you can do so conveniently. You will then be here for Quintus’ elections, you will see me after a long break, and you will settle your dispute with Acutilius. Peducaeus too has asked me to say this. We think it would be desirable for you to settle the business at long last. I am and have been at your disposal as intermediary.

2

Here in Rome my handling of C. Macer’s case has won popular approval to a really quite extraordinary degree. Though I was favourably disposed to him, I gained far more from popular sentiment by his conviction than I should have gained from his gratitude if he had been acquitted.

3

I am very grateful for what you say about the Hermathena. It’s an appropriate ornament for my Academy, since Hermes is the common emblem of all such places and Minerva special to that one.

So please beautify it with other pieces, as you

promise, as many as possible. I have not yet seen the statues you sent me earlier. They are in my house at Formiae, which I am now preparing to visit. I shall take them all up to Tusculum, 3, 1-2 est. est Wesenberg: est etQ {pm. E) c. 3 commune ’st A: -ne Q. est insigne HZb'. est Mbd. otn. ms. 123

9 (i.

4) 3

TEXT

quando abundare coepero, ornabo, libros tuos conserva et noli desperare eos (me) meos facere posse, quod si adsequor, supero Crassum divitiis atque omnium vicos et prata contemno.

10

io (i. i) Scr. Romae paulo ante xvi Kal. Sext. an. 6$ (§i) CICERO ATTICO SAL.

1 Petitionis nostrae, quam tibi summae curae esse scio, huius modi ratio est, quod adhuc coniectura provideri possit, prensat unus P. Galba, sine fuco ac fallaciis more maiorum negatur, ut opinio est hominum, non aliena rationi nostrae fuit illius haec praepropera prensatio, nam illi ita negant vulgo ut mihi 5 se debere dicant, ita quiddam spero nobis profici, cum hoc percrebrescit, plurimos nostros amicos inveniri,

nos autem

initium prensandi facere cogitaramus eo ipso tempore quo tuum puerum cum his htteris proficisci Cincius dicebat, in campo comitiis tribuniciis a. d. xvi Kal. Sext.

competitores,

10

qui certi esse videantur, Galba et Antonius et Q. Cornificius, puto te in hoc aut risisse aut ingemuisse, ut frontem ferias, sunt qui etiam Caesonium putent, nam Aquilium non arbitramur, qui et negavit et iuravit morbum et illud suum regnum iudiciale opposuit. Catilina, si iudicatum erit meridie non lucere, certus erit competitor, de Aufidio et de Palicano non puto te exspec¬ tare dum scribam.

2

De his qui nunc petunt Caesar certus putatur. Thermus cum Silano contendere existimatur, qui sic inopes et ab amicis et 3, 9 me add. Lambinus. Ep. io] i, 4 opinio est (’st) sk: -o si (-osi, -o se) Q. 8 tempore quo ms: te quo GNM: quo te VR. 13 putent, nam Aquilium scripsi: -t nam qui illum N: -t iaquillum G: putant qui illum VR: potentia qui i- A. arbitramur I (-antur N): -abamur A. 14 et negavit Z: denegant O. 2, 1 his GNOM: hijs NR: iis Vms. 2-3 et ab exist- P.

iuravit GZl: iurant I: curavit A. caesar Vms: -ri GNORM.

124

15

TRANSLATION

9 (i. 4) 3

and decorate Caieta if and when I begin to have a surplus. Hold on to your books and don’t despair of my being able to make them mine. If I manage that, I am richer than Crassus and can afford to despise any man’s manors and meadows.

10 (1. 1) Rome, shortly before 17 July 65 CICERO TO ATTICUS

1 The position as regards my candidature, in which I know you are deeply interested, is as follows, so far as can be foreseen up to date: Only P. Galba is canvassing, and he is getting for answer a good old Roman ‘No’, plain and unvarnished. It’s generally thought that this premature canvass of his has rather helped my prospects, for people are commonly refusing him on the ground that they are obligated to me. So I hope to draw some advantage when the word goes round that a great many friends of mine are coming to light. I was thinking of starting my canvass just when Cincius says your boy will leave with this letter, i.e. 17 July, at the tribunician elections in the Campus. As apparently certain rivals I have Galba, Antonius, and Q. Cornificius. When you read this last I fancy you will either laugh or cry. Now get ready to slap your forehead: some folk think Caesonius may stand too ! As for Aquilius, I don’t expect he will. He has both said he won’t and entered a plea of ill health and alleged his monarchy over the law courts in excuse. If Catiline’s jury finds that the sun doesn’t shine at midday, he will certainly be a candidate. I don’t think you will be waiting for me to write about Aufidius and Palicanus. 2

Of the present candidates Caesar is regarded as a certainty. The other place is thought to he between Thermus and Silenus. They are so poorly off for friends and reputation that it doesn’t 125

IO (i. i) 2

TEXT

existimatione sunt ut mihi videatur non esse dSuvorrov Turium obducere; sed hoc praeter me nemini videtur, nostris rationi¬ bus maxime conducere videtur Thermum fieri cum Caesare, 5 nemo est enim ex his qui nunc petunt qui, si in nostrum annum reciderit, firmior candidatus fore videatur, propterea quod curator est viae Flaminiae, quae tum erit absoluta sane facile, eum libenter nunc Caesari consuh accuderim. petitorum haec est informata adhuc cogitatio.^ nos in omni munere candi¬

io

datorio fungendo summam adhibebimus diligentiam; et for¬ tasse, quoniam videtur in suffragiis multum posse Gallia, cum Romae a iudiciis forum refrixerit, excurremus mense Septem¬ bri legati ad Pisonem, ut Ianuario revertamur,

cum perspexero

voluntates nobilium, scribam ad te. cetera spero prolixa esse, his dumtaxat urbanis competitoribus,

15

illam manum tu mihi

cura ut praestes, quoniam propius abes, Pompei, nostri amici, nega me ei iratum fore si ad mea comitia non venerit.

3

Atque haec huius modi sunt, sed est quod abs te mihi ignosci pervelim.

Caecihus, avunculus tuus, a P. Vario cum magna

pecunia fraudaretur, agere coepit cum eius fratre Caninio Satyro de iis rebus quas eum dolo malo mancipio accepisse de Vario diceret,

una agebant ceteri creditores, in quibus erat 5 Lucullus et P. Scipio et is quem putabant magistrum fore si bona

venirent,

L. Pontius—verum

magistro, nunc cognosce rem. sem contra Satyrum,

hoc

ridiculum

est

de

rogavit me Caecilius ut ades¬

dies fere nullus est quin hic Satyrus

2, 3 turium Z: Torium Zb: eurum M: carum ms.

4 nie nemini Ns: me me- V: nemini me G: mei (me O) ne minime ORMm. 6 liis GOA: liijs NR: iis V. 7 candidatus fore s: -taim ore Q. 8 tum HVRZ: cum GNOA.

videatur Vs: -ebatur Q.

9 nunc Caesari Manutius (n- C- consulem): nunciteri GVRZ1 (mint- G): mun cit- Zb: nunc ceteri A: nuntiari N. consuli fi: consili Zb: concili Zl. accuderim Bosius: acciderim fi: -erunt Z. 10 informata adhuc Z (adhuc om. R) A: a- i- A. 3, i atque s: ad qu(a)e vel sim. fi. 126

TRANSLATION

10 (i. i) 2

seem to me an absolute impossibility to put Turius in their light, but I am alone in thinking so. From my point of view the best result would seem to be for Thermus to get in with Caesar, since he looks like being as strong a candidate as any of the present lot if he is left over to my year; the reason being that he is Curator of the Flaminian Way, which will easily be finished by then. I should be happy to tack him on to Consul Caesar now. Such in outline is my present idea of the position as to candidatures. For my part I shall spare no pains in faithfully fulfilling the whole duty of a candidate, and perhaps, as Gaul looks like counting heavily in the voting, I shall run down to join Piso’s staff in September, in the dead period after the courts have closed, returning in January. When I have made out the attitudes of the nobles I shall write to you. I hope the rest is plain sailing, at any rate as far as these local competitors are con¬ cerned. You must answer for the other phalanx, since you are not so far away, I mean our friend Pompey’s. Tell him I shall not be offended if he doesn’t turn up for my election ! Well, that’s how it all stands. But I have something to tell you for which I very much hope you will forgive me. Your uncle Caecihus, having been defrauded by P. Varius of a large sum of money, has taken proceedings against Varius’ cousin, Caninius Satyrus, for articles alleged to have been fraudulently conveyed to him by Vanus. The other creditors are joined with him, including Lucullus, P. Scipio, and L. Pontius, who they expect will be receiver if it comes to a distraint. But this talk of a receiver is ridiculous. Now for the point. Caecihus asked me to appear against Satyrus. Well, hardly a day passes without 2 cum bd: et in GVR: ecino NMms. 3 fratre s’ • erat re Q. caninio 2: a can- Mtns. 4 iis NVRbm: his GPM(in ras.)ds. 5 diceret (-re G) 2: -re et A.

6 8

et is Hs: ei is G: is VR: eius NA. cognosce, rem Turnebus'. -cerem c. -cereO. 127

IO (i. i) 3

TEXT

domum meam ventitet, observat L. Domitium maxime, me

10

habet proximum, fuit et mihi et Quinto fratri magno usui in 4

nostris petitionibus,

sane sum perturbatus, cum ipsius Satyri

familiaritate tum Domiti, in quo uno maxime ambitio nostra nititur, demonstravi haec Caecilio, simul et illud ostendi, si ipse unus cum illo uno contenderet, me ei satis facturum fuisse; nunc, in causa universorum creditorum, hominum praesertim

5

amplissimorum, qui sine eo quem Caecilius suo nomine perhi¬ beret facile causam communem sustinerent, aequum esse eum et officio meo consulere et tempori, durius accipere hoc mihi visus est quam vellem et quam homines belli solent, et postea prorsus ab instituta nostra paucotum dierum consuetudine

io

longe refugit. Abs te peto ut mihi hoc ignoscas et me existimes humanitate esse prohibitum ne contra amici summam existimationem miserrimo eius tempore venirem, cum is omnia sua studia et officia in me contulisset, quod si voles in me esse durior, am¬

15

bitionem putabis mihi obstitisse, ego autem arbitror, etiam si id sit, mihi ignoscendum esse, ‘ensi oux fsprpov ouSs posiriv’. vides enim in quo cursu simus et quam omnis gratias non modo retinendas verum etiam acquirendas putemus,

spero tibi me

causam probasse, cupio quidem certe.

5

Hermathena tua valde me delectat et posita ita belle est ut totum gymnasium eius dv6c9r||ia videatur, multum te amamus. 3, io veniret Mm. L. om. NMms. 11 prius et om. Mms. 4,2 domiti GA: -tio NV. 13 ne contra om. A. amici S: a viciis vel animis vel sim. 1: animum Mms. 18 simus Lambinus: sumus Q. 5, 2 eius Schiitz: eliu vel eluiQC. dvd6rma vel simillima GRbd: anaQma M (varie corrumpunt NPms): onaohma C.

128

20

TRANSLATION

this Satyrus calling on me.

IO (i. i) 3

L. Domitius comes first in his

attentions, I next. He made himself most useful both to me 4 and to my brother Quintus when we were candidates. I was naturally most embarrassed in view of my friendship not only with Satyrus but with Domitius, on whom my hopes of success depend beyond any other man. I explained all this to Caecilius, making it clear at the same time that had the dispute been solely between himself and Satyrus I should have met his wishes. As it was, seeing that the whole group of creditors was involved, men moreover of the highest station who would easily maintain their common cause without help from anyone Caecilius might bring in on his own account, I suggested that it would be reasonable for him to make allowance for my obliga¬ tions and my present position. I had the impression that he took this less kindly than I should have wished or than is usual among gentlemen, and from that time on he entirely dropped our friendly contacts which had begun only a few days previously. May I ask you to forgive me over this, and to believe that it was good feeling that prevented me from appearing against a friend in great trouble, who had given me every support and service in his power, in a matter most gravely affecting his good name? If however you like to take a harsher view, you may assume that the exigencies of my candidature made the stumbling-block. I consider that even if it were so I might be pardoned, ‘since for no hide of bull nor slaughtered beast. You know the game I am playing and how vital I think it not only to keep old friends but to gain new ones. I hope you now see my point of view in the matter 5

I am certainly anxious that

you should. I am quite delighted with your Hermathena.

It’s so

judiciously placed that the whole hall is like an offering at its feet. Many thanks.

9

129

S BC I

II (i. 2)

TEXT

II (i. 2) Scr. Romae paulo post superiorem ^CICERO ATTICO SAL.)

L. Iulio Caesare C. Marcio Figulo consulibus filiolo me auctum scito, salva Terentia, abs te iam diu nihil litterarum, ego de meis ad te rationibus scripsi antea diligenter, Catilinam,

competitorem

nostrum,

hoc tempore

defendere

cogitamus,

iudices habemus quos volumus, summa accusatoris voluntate, spero, si absolutus erit, coniunctiorem illum nobis fore in ratione petitionis; sin ahter acciderit, humaniter feremus. Tuo adventu nobis opus est maturo, nam prorsus summa hominum est opinio tuos familiaris, nobilis homines, adver¬ sarios honori nostro fore, ad eorum voluntatem conciliandam maximo te mihi usui fore video, qua re Ianuario ineunte, ut constituisti, cura ut Romae sis.

12 (1. 12) Scr. Romae Kal. Ian. an. 61 (§4) (CICERO ATTICO SAL.)

Teucris illa lentum sane negotium, neque Cornelius ad Teren¬ tiam postea rediit, opinor, ad Considium, Axium, Selicium confugiendum est, nam a Caecilio propmqui minore centesi¬ mis nummum movere non possunt,

sed ut ad prima illa

redeam, nihil ego illa impudentius, astutius, lentius vidi. Ep. ii] novam ep. fecit Malaespina (ante filiolo M corr.), superiori iungunt codd. 1, 2 iam Boot: etiam Q. 3 ad te rat- Z: detract- Mms. ad te H.

antea GNVR: ante Mms: ad te E: antea

5 volumus ENVRb: -uimus GA. 6 illum NA: nullum VR: om. EG. 2, 4 ineunte Z: mense A. Ep. 12]

novam ep. fecerunt vulg.; cum 7 (1. 11) coniungunt codd.

TRANSLATION

II (i. 2)

II (i. 2)

Rome, shortly after 10 (1. 1) CICERO TO ATTICUS

1 I have the honour to inform you that I have become the father of a httle son, L. Julius Caesar and C. Marcius Figulus being Consuls. Terentia is well. It’s a long time since I had a line from you. I have already written to you in detail about my prospects.

At the moment I am proposing to defend my

fellow-candidate Catiline. We have the jury we want, with full co-operation from the prosecution. If he is acquitted I hope he will be more inclined to work with me in the campaign. But should it go otherwise, I shall bear it philosophically.

2

I need you home pretty soon. There is a decidedly strong belief abroad that your noble friends are going to oppose my election. Clearly you will be invaluable to me in gaining them over. So mind you are in Rome by the beginning of January as you arranged.

12 (1. 12)

Rome, 1 January 61 CICERO TO ATTICUS

I That Teucris is an infernal slow-coach, and Cornelius has not

been back to Terentia since. I suppose I must resort to Considius or Axius or Selicius—as for Caecilius, his own blood rela¬ tions can’t prise a sesterce out of him at less than 1% per month. But to go back to what I was saying, for impudence, tricki¬ ness, and stickiness I have never met her like. ‘ I am sending a i, i Terentiam Victorius: te remQ. 2 postea RC: post eam (eum N) Q. 3 minore Q: -ris nonnulli (cf. Seneca, Ep. 118. 2). 5 lentius s: lentulus Q.

I3I

9-2

12 (i. 12) I

TEXT

‘libertum mitto’. ‘Tito mandavi.’ orcriyeis atque &va(3oAcd. sed nescio an tccuto porro v f)pcov. nam mihi Pompeiani prodromi nuntiant aperte Pompeium acturum Antonio succedi oportere, eodemque tempore aget praetor ad populum, res eius modi est ut ego nec per bonorum nec per popularem existimationem

10

honeste possim hominem defendere, nec mihi hbeat, quod vel maximum est. etenim accedit hoc, quod totum cuius modi sit

2 mando tibi ut perspicias. libertum ego habeo, sane nequam hominem, Hilarum dico, ratiocinatorem et chentem tuum, de eo mihi Valerius interpres nuntiat Thyillusque se audisse scribit haec, esse hominem cum Antonio; Antonium porro in cogen¬ dis pecuniis dictitare partem mihi quaeri et a me custodem

5

communis quaestus libertum esse missum, non sum medio¬ criter commotus, neque tamen credidi; sed certe aliquid ser¬ monis fuit, totum investiga, cognosce, perspice et nebulonem illum, si quo pacto potes, ex istis locis amove, huius sermonis Valerius auctorem Cn. Plancium nominabat,

mando tibi

10

plane totum ut videas cuius modi sit. 3

Pompeium nobis amicissimum constat esse, Muciae vehementer probatur.

divortium

P. Clodium Appi f. credo te

audisse cum veste muliebri deprehensum domi C. Caesaris cum sacrificium pro populo fieret, eumque per manus servulae servatum et eductum; rem esse insigni infamia, quod te moleste ferre certo scio. 4

Quid praeterea ad te scribam non habeo, et mehercule eram in scribendo conturbatior, nam puer festivus, anagnostes noster Sositheus, decesserat meque plus quam servi mors debere 1, 6 scepsis (vel sim.) atque anabol(a)eQ. 7 prodromi s': prudr- vel sim. Q. 12 est I: sit A. accedit Otto: accidit Cl. 13 mando s': -dat (-da N) ClCZ1 2 3.

2, 3 Thyillusque Baiter: thyali usque, thyrliusque al. codd. 10 piandum ZC: plaucium vel sim. A. 3, 4 populo Q: -li Z. servule ms: seprullae Q (vel sim. sed -ule PM) CZ. 132

5

TRANSLATION

12 (i. 12) I

freedman ’, ‘I have sent word to T itus ’. Nothing but excuses and put-offs. But maybe there is a silver lining. Members of Pompey’s advance guard tell me openly that Pompey is going to move for Antonius’ supersession, and a Praetor will simul¬ taneously make a proposal to the Assembly. The case is such that I caimot defend the fellow without loss of credit; pubhc opinion, better-class and popular alike, would not stand it. Nor should I care to, which is the main thing. And there is some¬ thing else—I must ask you to look into it for me thoroughly. 2 I have a freedman, a thorough scoundrel—I refer to your accountant and chent Hilarus. Valerius the interpreter sends word of him, and Thyillus too writes that he has heard, as follows: that the fellow is with Antonius; and that Antonius, when levying money, is in the habit of saying that part of it is for me and that I have sent my freedman to keep an eye on our joint profits. I was a good deal disturbed, though I didn t beheve it. But there has certainly been some talk. Investigate the whole thing and find out just what has been going on; and if you can manage it, get that scamp out of the country. Valerius gives Cn. Plancius as his authority for the talk. I leave the whole thing entirely in your hands. See what’s in it. It’s generally agreed that Pompey is very much my friend.

3

His divorcing Mucia is warmly approved. I imagine you will have heard that P. Clodius, son of Appius, was caught dressed up as a woman in C. Caesar s house at the national sacrifice, and that he owed his escape alive to the hands of a servant girl a spectacular scandal. I am sure it distresses you. 4

I have nothing else to tell you. As a matter of fact I am writing in some distress of mind.

My lecteur Sositheus, a

charming lad, has died, and it has affected me more than the death of a slave perhaps ought to do. I hope you will write to

6 4,

certo GA: -te EHNVR. 1 ad te scribam Q: adscr- c.

133

12 (i. 12) 4

TEXT

videbatur commoverat, tu velim saepe ad nos scribas, si rem nullam habebis, quod in buccam venerit scribito. Kal. Ian. M. 5 Messalla M. Pisone coss.

13

(1. 13)

Scr. Romae vi Kal. Fehr. an. 61 (§5) CICERO ATTICO SAL.

1 Accepi tuas tris iam epistulas, unam a M. Cornelio quam a Tribus ei Tabernis, ut opinor, dedisti, alteram quam mihi Canusinus tuus hospes reddidit, tertiam quam, ut scribis, iam ora soluta de phaselo dedisti; quae fuerunt omnes, (ut) rheto¬ rum pueri loquuntur, cum humanitatis sparsae sale tum insignes 5 amoris notis, quibus epistulis sum equidem abs te lacessitus ad rescribendum, sed idcirco sum tardior quod non invenio fide¬ lem tabellarium, quotus enim quisque est qui epistulam paulo graviorem ferre possit nisi eam perlectione relevant ? accedit eo quod mihi non, ut quisque in Epirum proficiscitur, (ita ad te 10 proficisci videtur), ego enim te arbitror caesis apud Amal¬ theam tuam victumeis statim esse ad Sicyonem oppugnandum profectum, neque tamen id ipsum certum habeo, quando ad Antonium proficiscare aut quid in Epiro temporis ponas, ita neque Achaicis hominibus neque Epiroticis paulo liberiores litteras committere audeo. 2

Sunt autem post discessum a me tuum res dignae htteris nostris, sed non committendae eius modi periculo ut aut interire aut aperiri aut intercipi possint, primum igitur scito primum me non esse rogatum sententiam praepositumque Ep. 13] I, 1 posterius a om. Mms. 2 ei ante dedisti A.

3- 4 iam ora A. Dahlman (ora iam Casaubon): anc(h)oraQ. 4- 5 ut rh- pueri Madvig: rh- pure Q. 7 rescribendum GOcodd.Mal.Ac: scr- HNVR.

134

15

TRANSLATION

12 (i. 12) 4

me often. If you lack a topic, just put down whatever comes into your head. Kalends of January, M. Messalla and M. Piso being Consuls.

13- (l 13) Rome, 25 January 61 CICERO TO ATTICUS

1 Three letters from you have now come to hand, the first by M. Cornelius, given him I think at Tres Tabernae, the second forwarded to me by your host at Canusium, the third dispatched from the boat ‘as they loosed the cable’: all of them, to speak euphuistically, not only sprinkled with the salt of courtesy but also distinguished by tokens of affection. In them you chal¬ lenged a reply, but I have been rather slow in making one because I can’t find a trustworthy carrier. There are so few who can carry a letter of any substance without lightening the weight by perusal. And then, I don’t feel sure that any and every traveller to Epirus is on his way to you. For I imagine that no sooner had you sacrificed at the altar of your Amalthea than you set off for the siege of Sicyon, though even that I am not sure about, I mean when you are going to join Antonius or how much time you are spending in Epirus. Accordingly I dare not trust letters of a more or less confidential sort to either Achaeans or Epirotes. 2 Since you left me there are things that well deserve a letter of mine, but I must not expose such to the risk of getting lost or opened or intercepted. First then you may care to know that I have not been given first voice in the Senate, the pacifier of the 9 pellectione Malaespina: -nemQ. 10-11 ita.. .videtur addidi exempli causa. 11 c(a)esis Hbs: cessis IMdm. 12 victumeis (-m eis) Q: victimis O2.

135

TEXT

I3(l. 13) 2

esse nobis pacificatorem Allobrogum, idque admurmurante

5

senatu neque me invito esse factum, sum enim et ab observando homine perverso liber et ad dignitatem in re publica retinendam contra illius voluntatem solutus, et ille secundus in dicendo locus habet auctoritatem paene principis, voluntatem non nimis devinctam beneficio consulis, tertius est Catulus, quartus, si

10

etiam hoc quaeris, Hortensius, consul autem ipse parvo animo et pravo tamen, cavillator genere illo moroso quod etiam sine dicacitate ridetur, facie magis quam facetiis ridiculus, nihil agens in re publica, seiunctus ab optimatibus, a quo nihil speres boni rei pubhcae quia non vult, nihil metuas mah quia non audet, eius autem collega et in me perhonorificus et partium studiosus ac defensor bonarum, qui nunc leviter inter se dissident, sed

15

vereor ne hoc quod infectum est serpat longius, credo enim te audisse, cum apud Caesarem pro populo fieret, venisse eo muliebri vestitu virum, idque sacrificium cum virgines instaurassent, mentionem a Q. Cornificio in senatu factam (is fuit princeps, ne tu forte aliquem nostrum putes); postea rem

5

ex senatus consulto ad virgines atque pontifices relatam idque ab iis nefas esse decretum; deinde ex senatus consulto consules rogationem promulgasse; uxori Caesarem nuntium remisisse, in hac causa Piso amicitia P. Clodi ductus operam dat ut ea

10

rogatio quam ipse fert, et fert ex senatus consulto et de religione, antiquetur. Messalla vehementer adhuc agit (et) severe, boni viri precibus Clodi removentur a causa, operae comparantur, nosmet ipsi, qui Lycurgei a principio fuissemus, cottidie de¬ mitigamur. instat et urget Cato, quid multa ? vereor ne haec 2, 9 et voluntatem VMms. non nimis s': nominis Q (non minus N). 12 tamen QA: tantum E. 14 in G: cum ENVRMmsh. 15 metuas

2:

speres A.

audet

2b:

videt A.

3, 7 virgines etiam Zl.

atque GMA: atque ad EHVRMd. 10 clodi (i) EHNms: claudi (i) GVRMbd.

11 et fert ERMtn: et eff- GV: et ferent (om. fert loco priore) N.

136

15

TRANSLATION

13 (i. 13) 2

Allobroges being put in front of me—at which the House murmured but I myself was not sorry. I am thereby relieved of any obhgation to be civil to a cross-grained individual and left free to maintain my pohtical standing in opposition to his wishes.

Moreover the second place carries almost as much

prestige as the first, while one’s inclinations are not too much fettered by one’s sense of the consular favour. Catulus comes third, Hortensius, if you are still interested, fourth. The Consul himself is of petty and perverse mentahty, given to the sort of peevish sneer that raises a laugh even in the absence of any wit. His moue is funnier than his mot. He is politically inactive and stands aloof from the optimates, having neither will to make him politically useful nor courage to make him dangerous. His colleague however is most complimentary to me per3 sonally and a zealous champion of the right side. At present their differences are shght enough, but I am afraid that a certain infected spot may spread. I expect you have heard that at the national sacrifice in Caesar’s residence a man in woman’s clothes got in, and that after the Vestals had repeated the ceremony Q. Cornificius (he took the lead, in case you think it was one of us) raised the matter in the Senate. It was then referred back by senatorial decree to the Vestals and College of Pontiffs, who pronounced that the occurrence constituted a sacrilege. Then by senatorial decree the Consuls promulgated a bill.

And

Caesar sent his wife notice of divorce. Such being the position, Piso out of friendship for P. Clodius is working for the rejection of the bill which he is himself proposing, and proposing more¬ over under a senatorial decree on a matter of religion. Mes¬ salla is so far taking a strong and stringent line. The honest men are yielding to Clodius’ pleas and dropping out.

Gangs of

roughs are in formation. I myself, though I was quite a Lycur¬ gus to start with, am softening every day. Cato presses and 12 et add. Lamb. marg.

137

TEXT

13 (i. 13) 3

finiectaf a bonis, defensa ab improbis magnorum rei publicae malorum causa sit.

4

Tuus autem ille amicus (scin quem dicam ? de quo tu ad me scripsisti, postea quam non auderet reprehendere laudare coepisse) nos, ut ostendit, admodum diligit, amplectitur, amat, aperte laudat, occulte, sed ita ut perspicuum sit, invidet, nihil come, nihil simplex, nihil

ev toTs ttoAitikoIs

illustre, nihil

5

honestum, nihil forte, nihil liberum, sed haec ad te scribam ahas subtihus. nam neque adhuc mihi satis nota sunt et huic terrae filio nescio cui committere epistulam tantis de rebus non audeo.

5

Provincias praetores nondum sortiti sunt, res eodem est loci quo reliquisti.

totto6ectiocv

includam orationi meae. animadverteram,

quam postulas Miseni et Puteolorum a. d. m Non. Dec.’ mendose fuisse

quae laudas ex orationibus, mihi crede,

valde mihi placebant, sed non audebam antea dicere, nunc 5 vero, quod a te probata sunt, multo mihi’Attikcotepcc videntur, in illam orationem Metellinam addidi quaedam,

hber tibi

mittetur, quoniam te amor nostri quod maxime cupio, ut quam primum venias. Non. Dec. 18 (1. 18)

Scr. Romae xi Kal. Febr. an. 60 (§5) CICERO ATTICO SAL.

i Nihil mihi nunc scito tam deesse quam hominem eum quocum omnia quae me cura aliqua adficiunt una communicem, qui me amet, qui sapiat, quicum ego cum loquar nihil fingam, nihil dissimulem, nihil obtegam, abest enim frater cccpsAEOTaTos et amantissimus. fMetellusf non homo sed ‘litus atque aer’ et 5 9, 14 qui (QA) seclusi.

10, 3 tam (tum R) infirma EVR: tamen f- GA: tam f- H: f- Ns. 11, 6 post tempus lacunam indicavit IVescnberg. EHNVRAC: mole- G. Ep. 18] 1, 1 eum EH6: meum GNVRM.

te om. NMms.

modeste

3 ego cum loquar Orelli: ego collo- EGVR: ego colo- M: ego (om. bds) etiam (et m) lo- NS. y

TRANSLATION

17 (i. 17)

9

the only opposing voice being Consul-Designate Metellus. Our doughty champion Cato was to have been another, but darkness fell before his turn came. 10

Thus, in maintenance of my settled policy, I am defending as best I can the alliance I myself cemented. But as this is all so unreliable, I am building another road, a safe one I hope, to protect my influence. I can’t very well explain what I mean in a letter, but a small hint will show: I am on the friendliest terms with Pompey. Yes, I know what you will say. I shall watch the dangers; and later on I shall write to you more at length con¬

cerning my pohtical plans. 11 You may be interested to learn that Lucceius has it in mind to stand for the Consulship straight away. Only two prospec¬ tive candidates are talked of, Caesar (he plans to make a pact with him through Arrius) and Bibulus (he thinks he might join forces with him through C. Piso). That makes you laugh? These are no laughing matters, beheve me. What else can I tell you, I wonder? There are lots of things, but another time. Please see that I get word when to expect you. I now ask of you with all diffidence what I desire very much indeed—come home as soon as you can. Nones of December.

18 (1. 18) Rome, 20 January 60 CICERO TO ATTICUS

i I must tell you that what I most badly need at the present time is a confidant—someone with whom I could share all that gives me any anxiety, a wise, affectionate friend to whom I could talk without pretence or evasion or concealment. My brother, the soul of candour and affection, is away.

* is not a

person at all—only ‘sea-shore and air’ and ‘mere solitude’. 171

l8 (i. 18) I

TEXT

‘solitudo mera’, tu autem qui saepissime curam et angorem animi mei sermone et consilio levasti tuo, qui milii et in publica re socius et in privatis omnibus conscius et omnium meorum sermonum et consiliorum particeps esse soles, ubinam es ? ita sum ab omnibus destitutus ut tantum requietis habeam quan¬

10

tum cum uxore et filiola et mellito Cicerone consumitur, nam illae ambitiosae nostrae fucosaeque amicitiae sunt in quodam splendore forensi, fructum domesticum non habent, itaque cum bene completa domus est tempore matutino, cum ad forum stipati gregibus amicorum descendimus, reperire ex

15

magna turba neminem possumus quocum aut iocari hbere aut suspirare familiariter possimus,

qua re te exspectamus, te

desideramus, te iam etiam arcessimus, multa sunt enim quae me sollicitant anguntque, quae mihi videor auris nactus tuas unius ambulationis sermone exhaurire posse. 20 2 Ac domesticarum quidem sollicitudinum aculeos omnis et scrupulos occultabo neque ego huic epistulae atque ignoto tabellario committam, atque hi (nolo enim te permoveri) non sunt permolesti, sed tamen insident et urgent et nullius amantis consiho aut sermone requiescunt; in re pubhca vero, quam¬

5

quam animus est praesens, tamen vulnus etiam atque etiam ipsa medicina efticit. nam ut ea breviter quae post tuum discessum acta sunt colligam, iam exclames necesse est res Romanas diutius stare non posse,

etenim post profectionem tuam

primus, ut opinor, introitus fuit fabulae Clodianae, in qua ego, nactus, ut mihi videbar, locum resecandae libidinis et coercen¬ dae iuventutis, vehemens flavi et omnis profudi viris animi atque ingeni mei, non odio adductus alicuius sed spe non cor¬ rigendae sed sanandae civitatis. 1, 6 mera s': mea QC. 15 forum Q: eorum Zl 2.

ex.. .et talis (19 (1. 19). n) carent Mm (v. praef.

pp. 81 ff.).

19 anguntque quae Zl : -tque vel -t qu(a)e I. 2, 6 vulnus (vol-) Stcrnkopf: voluntas 2. 172

10

TRANSLATION

18 (i. 18) i

And you whose talk and advice has so often hghtened my worry and vexation of spirit, the partner in my pubhc hfe and intimate of all my private concerns, the sharer of all my talk and plans, where are you ? I am so utterly forsaken that my only moments of relaxation are those I spend with my wife, my little daughter, and my darling Marcus. My brilliant, worldly friendships may make a fine show in pubhc, but in the home they are barren things. My house is crammed of a morning, I go down to the Forum surrounded by droves of friends, but in all the multitude I cannot find one with whom I can pass an unguarded joke or fetch a private sigh. That is why I am writing and longing for you, why I now fairly summon you home. There are many things to worry and vex me, but once I have you here to listen I feel I can pour them all away in a single walk and talk. 2

Of private worries with all their pricks and pains I shall say nothing. I won’t commit them to this letter and an unknown courier. They are not very distressing (I don’t want to upset you), but still they are on my mind, nagging away, with no friendly talk and advice to set them at rest. As for the state, I am ready enough to do my part, but time and again the medi¬ cine itself injures the patient. I need only summarize what has taken place since your departure for you to cry out perforce that Rome is doomed. I beheve it was after you left that the Clodian drama came on to the stage. I thought I saw there a chance to cut back licence and teach the young folk a lesson. So I played fortissimo, put my whole heart and brain into the effort, not from any personal animus but in the hope, I won’t say of reforming our society, but at least of healing its wounds. 7 medicinam Zb. io fuit fabul(a)e ENVP: fabule fuit R: fuit in causam fab- G. 12 flavi C: favi GNd: fui EVRbs. 13 spe non ENER- non G: animo s', spero non Z^ 1 spere Zb ( non, ut falso

tradit Lambinus, spero corrigendae’). 14 sed IZl: et s. sanand(a)e EHNVRbds: seda- G.

173

18 (i. 18) 3

3

TEXT

Adflicta res publica est empto constupratoque iudicio. vide quae sint postea consecuta, consul est impositus is nobis quem nemo praeter nos philosophos aspicere sine suspiritu posset, quantum hoc vulnus ! facto senatus consulto de ambitu, de iudiciis, nulla lex perlata; exagitatus senatus, alienati equites

5

Romani quod erat qui ob rem iudicandam’. sic ille annus duo firmamenta rei pubhcae per me unum constituta evertit; nam et senatus auctoritatem abiecit et ordinum concordiam disiunxit. instat hic nunc annus egregius, eius initium eius modi fuit ut anniversaria sacra Iuventatis non committerentur; nam M. 10 Luculli uxorem Memmius suis sacris initiavit. Menelaus aegre id passus divortium fecit,

quamquam ille pastor Idaeus

Menelaum solum contempserat, hic noster Paris tam Mene¬ laum quam Agamemnonem liberum non putavit. 4

Est autem C. Herennius quidam, tribunus pl., quem tu fortasse ne nosti quidem; tametsi potes nosse, tribulis enim tuus est, et Sextus, pater eius, nummos vobis dividere solebat, is ad plebem P. Clodium traducit idemque fert ut universus populus in campo Martio suffragium de re Clodi ferat, hunc ego accepi in senatu ut soleo, sed nihil est illo homine lentius.

5

5

Metellus est consul egregius et nos amat, sed imminuit auctoritatem suam quod habet dicis causa promulgatum illud idem de Clodio. Auli autem filius, o di immortales! quam ignavus ac sine animo miles! quam dignus qui Palicano, sicut

6 facit, os ad male audiendum cottidie praebeat! agraria autem promulgata est a Flavio, sane levis, eadem fere quae fuit Plotia. 3, 1 constupratoque ENVR: st- Gd: stuprato bs. 2 is nobis ENVRb: nobis is Gds. 3 suspiritu Zb: sis- Z\: suspirio 2. 6 qui (quidem H) 2: 'om. bds. 10 Iuventatis Lambinus: -tutis (-tuti H) Q. 4, 4 fert G: ref(f)ert ENVR. 5 Clodii s': C. 2.

9 nunc fle annus G.

5, 2 dicis causa Lambinus: d- causam EPZl: d- tamen R: dicit causam GV: dicere causam N.

174

5

TRANSLATION

3

18 (i. 18) 3

Then came the calamity of a bought, debauched trial. Mark what followed.

A Consul was thrust upon us whom only

philosophers like you and me could look at without a sigh. There was a blow ! The Senate passed a decree on electoral bribery and another on the courts, but no law was carried through. The Senate was abused, the Knights estranged because of the provision ‘whoever as juror...

Thus the year

saw the overthrow of the two foundations of the constitution which I (and I alone) had established. The authority of the Senate was thrown to the winds and the harmony of the orders dissolved. Now this fine new year is upon us. It has begun with failure to perform the annual rites of the Goddess of Youth, Memmius having initiated M. Lucullus’ wife into rites of his own. Menelaus took this hard and divorced the lady—but the shepherd of Ida in olden days only flouted Menelaus, whereas our modern Paris has wiped his boots on Agamemnon as well. 4

There is a Tribune called C. Herennius, whom perhaps you don’t even know, though you may know him because he belongs to your tribe and his father Sextus used to disburse your gratuities. He is trying to make a plebeian out of P. Clodius and proposing that the assembly of the whole people should vote on Clodius’ matter in the Campus Martius. I gave him my usual warm reception in the Senate, but he is a complete pachyderm.

5

Metellus is an excellent Consul and a good friend of mine, but he has lost face by having promulgated the same proposal about Clodius, as a matter of form. As for Aulus’ son, gods above, what a lazy, poor-spirited warrior ! All he is fit for is to offer himself as a daily butt for Palicanus’ abuse, which is what

6 he does. An agrarian law has been promulgated by Flavius, an irresponsible affair, pretty much the same as the Plotia. But all

3 Auli autem s': anti(i) a- vel auti a- I: autumat C.

175

18 (i. 18) 6

TEXT

sed interea ttoAitikos dvrjp ou6’ ovap quisquam inveniri potest, qui poterat, familiaris noster (sic est enim, volo te hoc scire) Pompeius, togulam illam pictam silentio tuetur suam. Crassus

5

verbum nullum contra gratiam, ceteros iam nosti; qui ita sunt stulti ut amissa re publica piscinas suas fore salvas sperare vide-

7 antur. unus est qui curet, constantia magis et integritate quam, ut mihi videtur, consilio aut ingenio, Cato; qui miseros pub¬ licanos, quos habuit amantissimos sui, tertium iam mensem vexat neque iis a senatu responsum dari patitur, ita nos cogimur reliquis de rebus nihil decernere, ante quam publicanis respon- 5 sum sit. qua re etiam legationes reiectum iri puto. 8

Nunc vides quibus fluctibus iactemur; et si ex iis quae scripsi¬ mus tanta etiam a me non scripta perspicis, revise nos ahquando, et, quamquam sunt haec fugienda quo te voco, tamen fac ut amorem nostrum tanti aestimes ut eo vel cum his molestus pervenire velis, nam ne absens censeare curabo edicendum et 5 proponendum locis omnibus; sub lustrum autem censeri germani negotiatoris est.

qua re cura ut te quam primum

videamus, vale, xi Kal. Febr. Q. Metello L. Afranio coss. 19 (1. 19)

Scr. Romae Id. Mart. an. 60 (§11) CICERO ATTICO SAL.

i Non modo si mihi tantum esset oti quantum est tibi, verum etiam si tam brevis epistulas vellem mittere quam tu soles, facile te superarem et in scribendo multo essem crebrior quam 6, 4 hoc scire te A. 5 togulam C: teg- R: leg- EGNV 7, 6 reiectum s': relec- GV: relic- ENRbds. 8, 2 tanta etiam A. perspicis revise P: perspicis (percipis VR) crevisse ENVR: -ci scire visse G. 5 perfrui Bosius ‘auctoribus libris antiquis’.

Ep. 19]

1, 2 epistula a(d) me mitteretur VR. EGN. quam P: quem N: quod EGVR.

3 facile Manutius: facere 2.

vellem Emesti: velim

scribendo Muretus: scripto 2. 176

TRANSLATION

18 (i. 18) 6

the while, not so much as the shadow of a statesman is to be found. The man who might have been one, my friend—for so he is, let me tell you—Pompey, lives up to that lovely em¬ broidered toga of his by holding his tongue. From Crassus not a word that might lose him popularity. The others you know. They seem fools enough to expect to keep their fish-ponds after 7

losing constitutional freedom. The one man who cares for that, with more resolution and integrity, it seems to me, than judge¬ ment or intelligence, is Cato.

He has now been over two

months tormenting the unfortunate tax-farmers, who were his devoted friends, and won’t let the Senate give them an answer. So we are unable to pass any decrees on other matters until the tax-farmers are given their answer, which I suppose will mean that the deputations will be put off. 8

You see now what heavy seas we are in, and if between these lines such as they are you read other things which I leave unwritten, rejoin us at long last. The conditions here to which I am asking you to return are such that anyone might wish to run away from them, but I hope you value my affection enough to want to get back to that, even with all the accom¬ panying disagreeables. As to being registered in your absence, I shall see that a notice is published and displayed everywhere. But registration at the very end of the census period is real businessman’s style. So let us see you as soon as may be. Keep well. 20 January, Q. Metellus and L. Afranius being Consuls.

19 (i. 19) Rome, 15 March 60 CICERO TO ATTICUS

I If I had as much time as you, or even if I were willing to send

letters as short as yours generally are, I should get the better of you easily enough and be far the more assiduous correspondent. 12

177

SBC I

19

tu.

(i.

19)

TEXT

I

sed ad summas atque incredibilis occupationes meas

accedit quod nullam a me volo epistulam ad te sine aliquo 5 argumento ac sententia pervenire, et primum tibi, ut aequum est civi amanti patriam, quae sint in re publica exponam; deinde, quoniam nos amore tibi proximi sumus, scribemus etiam de nobis ea quae scire te non nolle arbitramur. Atque in re publica nunc quidem maxime Gallici belli ver¬

2

satur metus, nam Haedui, fratres nostri, pugnam nuper malam pugnarunt, et (Helvetii) sine dubio sunt in armis excursiones¬ que in provinciam faciunt, senatus decrevit ut consules duas Gallias sortirentur, dilectus haberetur, vacationes ne valerent, 5 legati cum auctoritate mitterentur qui adirent Galliae civitates darentque operam ne eae se cum Helvetiis coniungerent. legati sunt Q. Metellus Creticus et L. Flaccus et, to eiri Trj 9co PP- 281 ff-)- C- s point has to be sacrificed in English. Macrobius (Sat. n. 3. 11) records a rather similar jest: cum ab hospite suo P. Mallio rogaretur ut decurionatum privigno eius expediret.. .dixit ‘Romae, si vis, habebit; Pompeis difficile est’. 2,2-3 municipio... civitas Probably just township ... commu¬ nity ’. The technical meaning of these terms is not appropriate here: cf. Reid, Hermath. 13 (1905), pp- 370 ff. M. Alford (Cl. Rev. 41 (1927). PP- 217 f.) has an ingenious explanation of C.’s reason for using them, but I doubt whether he had any technicalities in mind. 4 Vatinium P. Vatinius P. fi, a novus homo, grandson (?) of a homo rusticus of Reate (Nat. Deor. 11. 6, in. 11; Val. Max. 1. 8. 1). Quaestor in 63, he was now Tribune and a noted popularis, closely attached to Caesar. His later career, which brought a Praetorship (55), Consulship (47) and Triumph (42), was consistent with these beginnings. The Ciceronian portrait of a coarse, unscrupulous demagogue is in no way inconsistent with unquestion¬ able political and military capacity or with the good nature which prompted kindness to C. (now reconciled) in 48: cf. 216 (xi. 5). 4 and their

363

2 6 (ii. 6) 2

COMMENTARY

correspondence in Fam. v. 9-11. He married well, first a sister of Mark Antony, second a Pompeia, perhaps sister of Magnus. 5 viginti viris The agrarian Board of Twenty, set up to distribute land under Caesar’s law: cf. Broughton, pp. 191 f. vivum et salvum velit Cf. Plaut. Pseud. 309 atque ego te vivotn salvomque vellem; Ter. Hec. 464 illum vivom et salvorn vellem; Fin. n. 33 ut se ipse diligat, ut integrum se salvumque velit; 176 (ex. 9). 2 qui eum maxime salvum volebant. The expression should mean, not that the Antiates were indifferent to Roman politics, but that they all hated the powers in being, all that is, says C. ironically (but perhaps, with Pompey in mind, not altogether so), except himself. 7 taedet licebat.

Cf. 27 (n. 7). 4 iam pridem gubernare me taedebat, etiam cum

&v€k8ot