Monday, September 5, 2016
Marcus Tullius Cicero
Cicero was a man of very lacking political power yet built himself up to eventually become praetor at the earliest age possible. Both his humble ancestry and role in politics in Rome made him the most interesting to me. Cicero masterfully handled the Catiline conspiracy leading to praise as father of the country. More interesting is how this inflated his ego and led him to write poetry as Matyszak comments is glad it did not survive. Both humble yet human Cicero stands out from the over told story of Caesar making him more interesting upon reading about him.
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Cicero's attempts to get himself written into the history books are a bit laughable. In the end, he took to write himself about his discovery and suppression of the Catilinarian Conspiracy, and he did it in the form of a heroic epic poem. Sometimes, his sef-praise went a bit too far, as for example, when he wrote the line, "O fortunatam natam me consule Romam!" (O Rome, fortunate to have been born when I was consul).
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