HKB
8 passages · search this phrase →
Often appears with: conspiracy and assassination · crime and punishment · equity, mercy, and pardon · counsel and advisers to rulers · conquest, plunder, and captives · assemblies, councils, and senates · tribunes' power · terentia · sylla's laws · senate decrees · senate and public corn distribution · roman senate debate
Usually: detachment (4) · commentary or gloss (3) · narrative (3) · injustice endured (3) · indignation (3) · crisis of belief (2) · argument (1) · reflection (1) · ambition and its cost (1) · betrayal (1)
“But when danger showed itself, envy and pride were laid aside.” Sallust (Gaius Sallustius Crispus), Conspiracy of Catiline and the Jurgurthine War · insight
“Fulvia, having learned the cause of his extravagant behavior, did not keep such danger to the state a secret; but, without naming her informant, communicated to several persons what she had heard and under what circumstances, concerning Catiline's conspiracy.” Sallust (Gaius Sallustius Crispus), Conspiracy of Catiline and the Jurgurthine War · observation
“Terentia, therefore, as she was otherwise in her own nature neither tender-hearted nor timorous, but a woman eager for distinction, told him these things, and excited him against the conspirators.” Plutarch, Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans · observation
Sallust narrates how Quintus Curius’s affair and boasting to Fulvia lead her to inform others about Catiline’s conspiracy, influencing citizens to elect Marcus Tullius Cicero and driving the plot forward.
enormity of guilt to the conspirators who had suffered death. The evidence which I have obtained, in support of this charge, is not at all in proportion to its magnitude. XXIII. Among those present at this meeting was Quintus Curius,[131] a man of no mean family, but immersed in vices and crimes, and whom the censors had ignominiously expelled from the senate. In this person there was not less levity than impudence;…
The commentary identifies details behind Sallust’s references to Catiline’s alleged plots, associates named conspirators and their backgrounds, and explains Roman political and legal contexts.
objecit in orationibus, quas in eum scripsit. Nomina harum mulierum nondum inveni." Plutarch, too (Life of Cicero, c. 10), says that Catiline was accused of having corrupted his own daughter. [82] With a priestess of Vesta--*Cum sacerdote Vestae*. This priestess of Vesta was Fabia Terentia, sister to Terentia, Cicero's wife, whom Sallust, after she was divorced by Cicero, married. Clodius accused her, but she was ac…
The translator’s notes explain Sallust’s phrasing about Rome’s senate decrees, tribunes’ restored powers, and related events, including references to legal punishments and political procedures during Catiline’s conspiracy.
in his Life of Cicero, says that there were then at Rome *two deputies* from this Gallic nation, sent to complain of oppression on the part of the Roman governors. [201] As Brutus was then absent from Borne--_Nam tum Brutus ab Româ, aberat_. From this remark, say Zanchius and Omnibonus, it is evident that Brutus was not privy to the conspiracy. "What sort of woman *Sempronia* was, has been told in c. 25. Some have t…
Plutarch discusses the Catiline conspiracy, Crassus’s alleged suspicion, Cicero’s accusations, and Caesar’s intervention to reconcile Crassus and Pompey so that their combined power makes Caesar greatest.
insomuch that he put himself into mourning when he was accused, and induced the other young men to do the same. And at last he reconciled him to his father. Caesar now returning from his command, and designing to get the consulship, and seeing that Crassus and Pompey were again at variance, was unwilling to disoblige one by making application to the other, and despaired of success without the help of one of them; he…
Cato supports Cicero in handling Catiline’s conspiracy, sharply attacks leniency toward Caesar’s proposed imprisonment plan, and helps turn the senate to decree death for the conspirators.
and severe as to matters of justice, in the senate, and at the bar, yet after the thing was over, his manner to all men was perfectly friendly and humane. Before he entered on the office of tribune, he assisted Cicero, at that time consul, in many contests that concerned his office, but most especially in his great and noble acts at the time of Catiline's conspiracy, which owed their last successful issue to Cato. …
After the conspirators are put to death, Caesar pursues public support, while Cato persuades the senate to distribute corn to the poor; Metellus seeks armed Pompey to enter Italy to save the city.
Cato, who himself also assisted at the marriage. This was done at a later time, but since I was speaking of women, I thought it well to mention it now. Lentulus and the rest of the conspirators were put to death, but Caesar, finding so much insinuated and charged against him in the senate, betook himself to the people, and proceeded to stir up the most corrupt and dissolute elements of the state to form a party in h…
Cicero’s resolve against Catiline’s plot is urged by Terentia after a miraculous flame in sacrifices, leading to senate debate where Caesar proposes confiscation and confinement instead of execution, narrowly moderated into a mixed sentence.
of audacity, while he himself, whose character for courage already did not stand very high with the multitude, would be thought guilty of the greatest cowardice and want of manliness. Whilst Cicero was doubting what course to take, a portent happened to the women in their sacrificing. For on the altar, where the fire seemed wholly extinguished, a great and bright flame issued forth from the ashes of the burnt wood;…
The text links profligacy and debt to political conspiracies such as Catiline, claims Caesar was involved, and portrays Caesar’s ambition and motives as paving the way from civil conflict to tyranny.
soon after, observes, that luxury and dissipation had encumbered almost all so much with debt, that they beheld with a degree of complacency the prospect of civil war and confusion. The extreme degree of profligacy at which the Romans were now arrived is in nothing more evident, than that this age gave birth to the most horrible conspiracy which occurs in the annals of humankind, viz. that of Catiline. This was not…