These next posts constitute my note taking on SPQR- A History of Ancient Rome, by Mary Beard. 

1 Cicero’s Finest Hour
Cicero vs Catiline 63 BC

Lucius Sergius Catilina
Catiline’s family was from the time of Rome’s founding centuries earlier. His grandfather fought against Hannibal. Catiline himself was near bankruptcy in 63BC, from trying to get elected as one of the two consuls, the highest positions in the political system. Facing bankruptcy, he plotted, with others that had failed to win elections and who were deeply in debt, to overthrow the system with a series of assassinations.  

Marcus Tullius Cicero
Cicero’s family was wealthy, but from 70 miles outside Rome. Yet he assiduously curried favor and used his talents as an orator to gain influence. His fame as a celebrity orator had won him the consulship in 64BC, defeating Catiline.  

Cicero got wind of Catiline’s plots through a tip-off by a friend of Catiline’s. Cicero obtained a set of letters directly implicating Catiline and he convened the Senate to expose Catiline. Catiline was actually outside the city trying to muster his forces, when the plot was exposed. Arrests of conspirators followed and without even as much as a show trial, they were executed. Catiline was killed fighting to the last with his army a few weeks later.

Cicero’s victory saw him named pater patriae, or father of the fatherland. But his success didn’t last long. On his last day of consulship, he was denied the opportunity to speak because “Those who have punished others without a hearing ought not to have the right to be heard themselves”. In 58BC, a Roman law was passed expelling anyone who put to death a Roman citizen without trial, and Cicero was singled out for exile.

The Roman people of the time numbered probably a million. Just how much power they had is under dispute, since it hinged on how many turned up for elections. But officials were elected in Rome and they didn’t get to be officials otherwise. The Roman people made the laws and Cicero could not just ignore them at his will. He spent a year in exile in Greece until he was voted back. But by then his house had been destroyed and a statue to liberty erected in its place. 

Some of what we know about Cicero and Catiline comes from Gaius Sallustius Crispus, or Sallust, in his narrative Bellum Catilinae (The War Against Catiline). In Sallust’s view, “the moral fiber of Rome had been destroyed by its success, and the wealth, greed, and lust for power that had followed its conquest of the Mediterranean and the crushing of all its serious rivals”.  

Trying to see things from Catiline’s view, what reasons might he have had for rebellion? There was clearly some sort of credit crunch at the time. While Catiline was certainly close to bankruptcy, the fact that the shortage was affecting lots of people, might have given his rebellion traction among many.  

There have been lots of attempts to understand Catiline, but we have to acknowledge there is too much we don’t know. What the author seeks here is to understand how Cicero saw “Rome”. Why were their origins important to them?