The Catiline Conspiracy

In 63 BC, Rome faced a conspiracy that threatened to tear the Roman Republic apart. At its centre stood two figures: Marcus Tullius Cicero, the grand old orator of Rome and Lucius Sergius Catilina, accused of plotting violence, rebellion and the overthrow of Rome’s political order. But was the danger as great as Cicero claimed? In this episode of The Ancients, Tristan Hughes is joined by Professor Catharine Edwards to uncover the truth behind the Catiline Conspiracy. Did Cicero save the Roman Republic in his finest hour, or did he exaggerate the threat to destroy a political rival? Join us to discover the story behind one of ancient Rome’s most notorious political crises. ORATOR by Catharine Edwards is published in hardback, eBook and audio by Hutchinson Heinemann, 23rd July. MORE: Cicero Listen on Apple https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-ancients/id1520403988?i=1000641853472 Listen on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/episode/3CdmAod10lyn66OAZJeTHr?si=dUFXXLckTaaTaKcAxf8rhQ Battle of Mutina: Cicero's Fight for the Roman Republic Listen on Apple https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-ancients/id1520403988?i=1000631484836 Listen on Spotify https://open.spotify.com/episode/3PGmo45PpTi2By3CjIOClf?si=MP878zOvTJuSPz1NYTH-ow The Ancients is now on YouTube! Watch here: @TheAncientsPodcast https://www.youtube.com/@TheAncientsPodcast Presented by Tristan Hughes. Audio editor is Tim Astall. Produced by Joseph Knight. The senior producer is Anne-Marie Luff. All music courtesy of Epidemic Sounds The Ancients is a History Hit podcast. Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week, PLUS early access, ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

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• 0:00Tristan Hughes?

  Ever wondered why the Romans were defeated in the Teutoburg Forest? What secrets lie buried in prehistoric Ireland? Or what made Alexander truly great? With a subscription to History Hit, you can explore our ancient past alongside the world's leading historians and archaeologists. You'll also unlock hundreds of hours of original documentaries with a brand new release every single week, covering everything from the ancient world to World War II. Just visit historyhit.com/subscribe. Marcus Tullius Cicero, the grand old orator of Rome.

• 0:36Tristan Hughes?

  And in the year 63 B.C., he achieved his lifelong ambition: the consulship, Rome's highest elected office. But before the year was over, his career, and perhaps his life, hung by a thread. Rome was gripped by what became known as the Cataline Conspiracy, so-called after its most prominent ringleader, Lucius Sergius Catalina. According to Cicero, it was an existential threat to the Republic: violence in the streets, unrest across Italy, and an insurrection plot to overthrow the Roman state. But was it really? Or did Cicero exaggerate the danger to cement his own legacy?

• 1:23Tristan Hughes?

  Today, I'm joined by renowned classicist Professor Catherine Edwards to sift through the facts and the fiction. Was this Cicero's finest hour? Did he save Rome and its famed republican institutions from the uncertain collapse? Or has Catalina been the subject of one of history's most brutal, posthumous hit jobs? This is the story of one of Rome's most famous political conspiracies.

• 2:03Tristan Hughes?

  Catherine, it is such a pleasure to have you on the show.

• 2:06Speaker 01

  Well, thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to be here.

• 2:09Tristan Hughes?

  I'm very excited to have you here. I can't believe we haven't had you on the show before. But better late than never. And you've got a new book all about Cicero. And this particular event from Cicero's life, the Catalinarian conspiracy, or the Catiline Conspiracy, it feels like it has it all. It's got backstabbing, brilliant speeches, schemings, unrest. And this larger-than-life figure of Cicero right at its heart. It's a fascinating episode of Roman history.

• 2:35Speaker 01

  It is indeed a completely fascinating episode. And it's kind of a, it's a sort of, in some ways, the high point of Cicero's own life. But it's also, it lays the seeds for terrible things that happened to him later. It's a moment of crisis, it seems, for the Roman Republic. And it's not just, you know, the sort of larger-than-life figure of Cicero whom we meet in this year, dominating events. There's also, of course, the man after whom the conspiracy is named, its leader Catalina. And then we also have as significant contributors to the debate Julius Caesar and Cato. So, you know, a lot of major republican figures here.

• 3:18Tristan Hughes?

  So it's a big cuss. And this is Cato the Younger, not Cato the Elder.

• 3:22Speaker 01

  It is indeed Cato the Younger, who is descended from Cato the Elder and very proud of that fact. But absolutely, Cato the Younger.

• 3:29Tristan Hughes?

  He's not shouting Carthage must be destroyed. Anyways, and why is this episode in 63 B.C.? Why is this such a big event in Cicero's story?

• 3:41Speaker 01

  This is a big event in Cicero's story for a variety of reasons. Partly because Cicero himself never shut up about it. He was the most kind of eloquent, wordy man of his time. And he left an enormous legacy of his own speeches, as well as other writings, his letters, treatises. So he chose to preserve the speeches that he gave as consul for the year 63 B.C.E., who is kind of Rome's chief executive officer, or one of the two. And a couple of years after his consulship, he deliberately kind of wrote up these speeches and put them into circulation as models for young orators in years to come.

• 4:25Speaker 01

  So he was kind of setting himself up as a kind of a model speech maker. And that was a tremendously successful move because he's actually had that role kind of for hundreds of years, thousands of years indeed, since his lifetime. And the speeches of Cicero have been studied, particularly the Catalinarian orations, by, you know, aspiring orators of many stripes.

• 4:49Tristan Hughes?

  I didn't realise that Cicero put his speeches into public circulation as well. It gives you more of an insight into the man and how he wanted to be remembered.

• 4:59Speaker 01

  Absolutely. Now, it wasn't unheard of for Roman politicians to put their speeches into circulation. The elder Cato indeed had done the same thing, also a man of somewhat similar background to Cicero in some ways. But it was, it was a very deliberate move on Cicero's part. He was really curating his legacy from very early on. You know, he made comparisons between himself and the Athenian orator Demosthenes.

• 5:27Tristan Hughes?

  Yes.

• 5:28Speaker 01

  He made those comparisons repeatedly. And then, you know, fortunately for Cicero, the kind of comparison was then picked up on by Plutarch. When he did his parallel lives of Greeks and Romans, you know, 100-plus years later, he paired Cicero and Demosthenes. So, you know, that aspiration on Cicero's part was, you know, kind of pursued and embedded in the tradition by Plutarch.

• 5:52Tristan Hughes?

  And you mention how, I'm going to read from here, so I don't butcher the quote either. Of those who lived in Roman antiquity, Cicero is the one about whom most is known. And is that largely because of his own work surviving? You mentioned Plutarch as well, but is it largely because he wrote so much and it has survived down to us?

• 6:13Speaker 01

  Yes, I mean, that's the sort of two factors there. There's the profusion of his writings, many speeches. But also, really unusually and interestingly, Cicero's letters. He was a great letter writer. I mean, letter writing was an enormously important part of the lives of the Rome's political elite at a time when they're governing a huge empire. Kind of staying in touch with one another is really important. Cicero is a kind of master letter writer. He is, he is absolutely brilliant at writing letters. And after he died, a collection was made of his letters, in fact, multiple collections. There was a collection of his letters to his friend Atticus, who was a close friend for, you know, really throughout his adult life.

• 6:57Speaker 01

  Although the letters to Atticus didn't really get going until the 60s. So earlier on, we don't have letters between Cicero and Atticus. So there's like 450-odd of those letters. Then there's another collection, which is Cicero's letters to friends. They're sometimes called ad familiare. That also includes letters to family members and indeed, very interestingly, to his secretary, his sometime slave, and then freed man Tyro.

• 7:25Tristan Hughes?

  Tyro, right.

• 7:26Speaker 01

  And many people think that it was Tyro himself who edited these letters after Cicero's death. So there's those two big collections. And the collection of letters to friends also includes some letters addressed to Cicero by other people, people like Julius Caesar, Cato, you know, we've got their letters to Cicero. And then there's a smaller collection of letters that Cicero wrote to his brother Quintus, who was an important figure in his life. And then some fragments. In antiquity, there were other collections of letters by Cicero in circulation. So we know that he wrote letters to Octavian, who later became Augustus. Very little of those has survived.

• 8:11Speaker 01

  Probably everybody involved wanted to suppress those, if one can imagine. And actually, there are also some letters to Brutus, one of the men who was responsible for the death of Julius Caesar, who is a good friend of Cicero. Letters to Marcus Brutus. Some of those are, you know, of dubious authenticity, but others are kind of more securely attributed to Cicero. So this huge corpus of Ciceronian letters that really lets us see a man embedded in all these different social networks. And particularly in the letters to Atticus, we get Cicero's kind of in-the-moment reflections on everything that's going on in Rome. And that includes a huge range of things.

• 8:54Speaker 01

  And we get Atticus looks after Cicero's finances. So we get Cicero's money worries. We get family anxieties because Atticus's sister is married to Cicero's brother. So they have all this kind of family stuff they talk about as well. But... I suppose the most striking thing is the the kind of the constant speculation gossip reflection on what's going on in the political arena, trying to work out, you know, what other people's motives are. Um Cicero shares his anxieties about all sorts of things in in the letters to Atticus. And I think that's one of the things that really has always drawn people to Cicero is that we get, yes, we get these sort of rather bombastic speeches,

• 9:38Speaker 01

  um which are powerful in their own way, and Cicero's been pretty consistently admired as a as a successful orator. But we also get this other side of Cicero in the letters, which is so fascinating. Um and sometimes people kind of have criticised Cicero's character. Um when Cicero's fortunes were were kind of, I suppose, he much of Cicero's writing was um kind of not really known in in the kind of later um Middle Ages. But um with Petrarch and the sort of beginnings of the Italian Renaissance, you get this kind of rediscovery of Cicero. And Petrarch found a a manuscript of Cicero's letters in the Library of of the Cathedral Chapter in Verona. And he was so thrilled because

• 10:23Speaker 01

  he was a big fan of Cicero. He thought, fine, I'm gonna read Cicero's letters, amazing. He read these letters and he thought, oh, my God, I can't believe it. Here's this guy, I really admired him, I've been reading his moral philosophy, and now I'm reading his letters, and he keeps changing his mind about everything.

• 10:37Tristan Hughes?

  He's human.

• 10:37Speaker 01

  You know, he's very human. And on the one hand, you know, he then goes down massively in Petrarch's estimation, and Petrarch actually writes these letters to Cicero, going, why on earth did you support Julius Caesar and, you know, taking him to task? Or why did you support Mark Antony? Oh, sorry, why did you, why did you get into conflict with Mark Antony? But at the same time, there is this sort of almost this recognition of of Cicero's humanity, his kind of human failings, which I think have made him, I mean, he provokes a lot of criticism for his character, if you like, but there's a strong sense that we kind of can, you know, have access to his character.

• 11:13Tristan Hughes?

  I mean, absolutely. And in regards then to the Catiline conspiracy event, which we're going to focus on. So we have those big bombastic speeches, which we'll no doubt explore with the story. But I'm guessing another source, do you get him mentioning Catiline in the letters that he has as well? So you get a bit of an interesting, different side that we can also explore that, you know, Cicero in the letters versus Cicero in the bombastic speeches.

• 11:36Speaker 01

  Well, one of the things that's quite interesting about the year sixty three, and a bit frustrating in some ways, is that we don't have any letters between Cicero and Atticus for that year, when Cicero was consul, and very likely Atticus was in Rome. So they didn't need to write to one another. At other times, Atticus was often away for for long periods, and that's when we get these these kind of very detailed, regular exchanges of of correspondence. Not that we ever hear from Atticus, I might say. But to rephrase, we don't have letters from sixty three B C E when Cicero actually is consul. However, we do have quite a lot of kind of later reflections on the events of that year in Cicero's letters to Atticus, and particularly his worries about how other people are judging his actions.

• 12:20Tristan Hughes?

  Right. So it sounds like we do have a bit of a bias problem regardless, though, in that if our main source for this event, Cicero is our main source for this story.

• 12:28Speaker 01

  Cicero is our main source for this story, but we do also have another quite detailed and um pretty much contemporary account, which is Salus's account of the war against Catiline. Now, Salus was a generation younger than Cicero, but he was very familiar with many of the key players in um in the events of sixty three. He was a a close associate of Julius Caesar for a while. Um so he was, he too was a kind of, you know, a senior Roman politician, although he'd stepped back from politics by the time he wrote this account of the Catalinarian conspiracy in the forties B C E. Um and he gives us a rather different take on the events of sixty three from the version that we get in Cicero.

• 13:11Speaker 01

  So that's quite interesting.

• 13:15Tristan Hughes?

  And you mentioned, of course, so sixty three B C B C E is the year that we're going to be focusing on. And this is the year when Cicero becomes consul. And the position of consul, basically the highest position that an elite Roman could get to in in the late Roman Republic at that time. Um can you briefly explain, I know it's a massive story, but Cicero's road to that point, has he been active in the political sphere a long time to get to this big moment in his story?

• 13:45Speaker 01

  It's hard to gauge exactly when Cicero set his sights on the consulship, but he was very clearly an ambitious young man and um wanted to make a name for himself in the law courts at an early age. He is clearly a talented orator. Um he had some challenges to overcome because, you know, when he was in his late teens, early twenties, Rome was riven by the civil war between Marius and Sulla, and then Sulla's dictatorship, which meant that, you know, there wasn't a lot going on in the forum and and law courts. But um after the the the sort of restoration of order, um Sulla's dictatorship and then

• 14:25Speaker 01

  and it's the restoration of of sort of traditional government forms largely, um in the wake of that, yes, Cicero does manage to pursue a a pretty standard political career in some ways. I mean, one of the things that's it really important to appreciate about Cicero is that he doesn't come from a grand senatorial family. He has no senatorial ancestors. And that marks him out as different from the vast majority of the Senate and from virtually everybody who gets elected to be consul. So um that road from a a family with no senatorial ancestors, I mean, they were clearly very wealthy, the Ciceroes, and quite well connected,

• 15:06Speaker 01

  as far as new influential people in Rome. Um Cicero was sort of apprenticed, Cicero and his brother indeed, were apprenticed to some of Rome's leading orators in their youth. Um so we have, uh, you know, Cicero, who's clearly very talented, um and a persuasive speaker who kind of, and also a keen student, not just of oratory, but also philosophy. Um and he stands for election to the office of Quista, the sort of most junior office that entitles you to a seat in the Senate. And once he's been elected Quista, that's a role that only lasts for one year. He's Quista, serving in Sicily, um where he gains

• 15:49Speaker 01

  valuable experience, but he also, you know, has got this seat in the Senate. And then um that kind of, it really makes him part of that hugely influential body that kind of um uses its authority, if you like, in theory at least.

• 16:05Tristan Hughes?

  He's got his first step on the ladder.

• 16:06Speaker 01

  He's got his first step on the ladder, exactly. So um and, you know, later on, he's he's elected um Preeta, you know, he makes a real name for himself with his speeches um in the law courts. So the speech that he gives prosecuting Gaius Varies in seventy B C E is is an absolutely crucial moment for kind of making his name uh as an orator. But it it's really interesting that, you know, that there had been other men of, I suppose, non senatorial background, making it to the top of the tree um previously. And one of those came from the same small town as Cicero, Arpenum, Gaius Marius. Um but

• 16:46Speaker 01

  Marius had, you know, a a generation earlier, Marius had made his fortune as a hugely successful general in the military sphere. Cicero was, I mean, he did have military experience in his youth. He'd he'd um served under um Pompeius Strabo, um fighting in the in the kind of civil war, first of all, the war against the allies, and then um civil war period. But that was not really the sphere in which he excelled. And instead, he really asserted the um importance of the role of the orator in society and the orator as someone who um provides leadership and provides ethical leadership um for this and guidance

• 17:29Speaker 01

  for the state. So that's, that was how he kind of, you know, presented what his his contribution and what qualified him to hold highest office in Rome.

• 17:40Tristan Hughes?

  He's a brilliant speaker. He's worked his way up the ladder. Yeah, as you say, Quista, uh, Preeta, all of these positions. And as you say, that also thing, he's not from a senatorial background, he's rich, but he's a a new man, a novus homo, as they say. So getting the consulship then in sixty three B C, I mean, that's a big deal for him to have and and the power of his words, rather than the power of money by other thing, like the actual crassus. But we've painted the scene for Cicero at that time.

• 18:07Tristan Hughes?

  But let's introduce this figure of Catiline. So who is this big rival Catiline?

• 18:11Speaker 01

  Okay, so Catiline is pretty much contemporary with Cicero, maybe a couple of, probably a couple of years older, we don't know for sure. He comes from quite a different background. He comes from a really old patrician family, and the patricians in Rome were people who claimed that their ancestors had been in the Senate in the time of Romulus, Rome's mythical founder. And they went back a long way. And they have, you know, there are various, you know, special religious roles, particularly that patricians are entitled to hold, that other people aren't. So he's fancy, he's very grand. He's also very ambitious. And

• 18:51Speaker 01

  he holds various offices. However, he also gets himself into hot water in various ways. So he has, you know, after he'd been praetor, he went off to be a Rome provincial governor in Africa, and the Roman province of Africa. But he was, there were various embassies that came from the provincial subjects, they're complaining about his behaviour as governor. And he was prosecuted for extortion on his return to Rome. And that wasn't by no means the only court case that brought against him. There was also a scandal about, you know, had he or had he not seduced one of the Vestal Virgins, which was hugely scandalous.

• 19:32Speaker 01

  Now, he was prosecuted for a variety of different crimes, and always acquitted. So, and now prosecution, Roman, Roman politicians prosecuted one another constantly, as it's a very litigious society. So, you know, in some ways, it's not hugely unusual, but Catiline does perhaps stand out as someone who got, you know, attracted a lot of scandal. And he seems to have been quite a spendthrift. Now, so by the time we get to sixty-three, Catiline appears to have enormous debts. He is by no means the only Roman politician to be in this situation.

• 20:13Speaker 01

  Julius Caesar had huge debts by this date as well. So, and we can perhaps come back later to the issue of debt. But Catiline was someone who had, well, he'd wanted to stand for the consulship previously, but because he was about to be, in the process of being prosecuted, he'd not really been able to be a candidate. So he stood for the consulship in the summer of sixty-four against Cicero. So he was one of the seven candidates for the consulship. Cicero, a guy called Gaius Antonius, and Catiline were the three favourites, if you like.

• 20:51Tristan Hughes?

  Okay, right.

• 20:52Speaker 01

  So Catiline seems to have spent a lot more money trying to get himself elected. But there were various doubts about Catiline's reliability and his interest in using violence to gain his ends, and the possibility that he might actually want to pass some rather radical measures, such as the abolition of debt. And in the end, it seems that Cicero was able to get the support of senior senators for his own candidature. So Cicero was elected, came top of the ballot. Gaius Antonius came second by a, you know, fairly significant

• 21:34Speaker 01

  distance. And then Catiline was third, and third gets you nowhere in Roman politics. So he spent a load of money, which he didn't have, which he'd borrowed. And he was really in a difficult situation. So Catiline is, he's a failed Roman politician. He's one of the conspicuous failures. But he's by no means the only one. There were quite a lot of people around who had spent a lot of money trying to get elected and been unsuccessful. And because they were unsuccessful, that meant they would not go on to hold a provincial governor position following their year of office, which was often regarded as an excellent means to make a fortune back again, with which you can then repay all the people you borrowed money from to get elected.

• 22:19Tristan Hughes?

  Gosh, pulling no punches as well by labelling him a failed politician. And do you think even in sixty-four B.C., I don't, I guess we don't know much about Cicero's previous relationship with Catiline, but during that election campaign, can you imagine that Cicero was actively pushing others who weren't voting for him to vote for Gaius Antonius, to make sure that Catiline did not get the consulship?

• 22:44Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, actually Cicero attacks Gaius Antonius as well.

• 22:49Tristan Hughes?

  Okay.

• 22:50Speaker 01

  And he really plays on everyone's anxieties after the slave rebellion led by Spartacus.

• 22:58Tristan Hughes?

  Spartacus, okay, yeah.

• 22:59Speaker 01

  Which kind of rumbled on for quite some time between seventy-three and seventy-one. There's a lot of anxiety. So the sense that Catiline and perhaps Gaius Antonius too might result, might resort to violence or something, that Cicero seems to have, have kind of played on in his speech. But he, it was really Catiline he went for. He seems to have brought up all sorts of stories about, you know, incest with his sister, murder of family members, the appalling way he'd behaved during the sullen prescriptions, when Catiline was on the side of Sulla and actually carried out various executions, supposedly.

• 23:41Speaker 01

  Now, how much we should believe of any of this is not entirely clear. We also have the problem that this speech that Cicero made as a candidate for the consulship survives only in fragments, or reports that other people, references in other writers. So, you know, we're not entirely sure what he said. And what he did say may not be entirely, you know, a lot of that may be kind of embroidered, fabricated. I think we do need to bear in mind, when we think about Roman oratory, it is also about kind of entertaining your audience and evoking these extraordinarily vivid vignettes of, you know, the terrible, conveying the terrible character of your opponent. The kind of strict truth is quite

• 24:26Speaker 01

  often a casualty, one suspects, in these situations. So, you know, the extremely toxic family situation of Catiline may be a significant exaggeration on Cicero's part.

• 24:37Tristan Hughes?

  Well, we'll now delve into what happens the next year and Catiline coming back, right after this.

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• 25:27Tristan Hughes?

  What's this big moment in sixty-three B.C. that sets it all off again?

• 25:33Speaker 01

  It's interesting to speculate exactly when Cicero starts to kind of get a sense of something funny going on. But clearly, it's important that Catiline is having another go at standing for the consulship. So he puts himself forward as a candidate in the summer of sixty-three, hoping to secure election for the consulship of sixty-two. So, you know.

• 25:58Tristan Hughes?

  So he tries again?

• 25:59Speaker 01

  He tries again. He tries again. However, there are all sorts of stories about how Catiline is going to resort to violence, even in the course of the elections. And the elections themselves are postponed. There are stories going around about what Catiline's been saying to his supporters. He has a rally in his house, where he says, you know, the wealthy governing class of Rome are kind of, you know, choking everyone else to death. You know, we're all laden with debt, and there they are, living in their grand houses. And, you know, it's got to stop. So there are these stories going around about Catiline planning, you know, if he doesn't get elected consul, what's he going to do? There are all these stories going around. Now, partly these stories

• 26:43Speaker 01

  must play a role in Catiline failing to get elected, because his name is being tarnished with all sorts of stories. But the consequence of his not being elected is that he is in a completely desperate situation. He's taken on even more debt. And what is he going to do now? And now, according to Cicero and Sallust as well, you know, this is the point at which, so he's, he's already kind of tried to use violence to affect the outcome of the elections. That hasn't worked. Instead, we have the elections of Silanus and Morena, who are now consuls-elect for the year sixty-two. And at this point, we get Catiline

• 27:29Speaker 01

  Clearly, well, according to Cicero, turning to violence, you know, to get his way. So he's staging a coup to make himself consul in the place of these men who've been elected. So, um, but exactly what's going on is really, really hard to work out because we have Cicero's very tendentious account of it in the first speech against Catiline, which he delivers in possibly, probably the eighth of November. Um, and he kind of gives us a summary of what's happened in previous months. And then we also have Salus' account of what's going on. But again, you know, the, the sources that Salus is drawing on are not necessarily very clear.

• 28:13Speaker 01

  Now, some historians would say, um, actually, maybe Catiline didn't even think of turning to violence until he's attacked in the Senate by Cicero in early November.

• 28:21Tristan Hughes?

  So much later on, several months after his failure, failing in the elections in the summer.

• 28:25Speaker 01

  Well, the, the elections themselves had been because of the, the, the potential violence, the stories around violence associated with the elections. The elections normally happen in July, they may have been postponed to September. Even that is not entirely clear. But the elections finally happen, Catiline is defeated. And then, you know, he seems to have these supporters and Cicero claims he's got a network of informants all over Italy who are feeding back to him, you know, accounts of, of what's going on. And the most worrying and obvious thing is sort of gathering of, of armed men in Faisulae in Etruria. Um, and these men are under the command of a man called Manlius,

• 29:08Speaker 01

  who had been a centurion in the army of Sulla. Um, he's an experienced military man and is himself, you know, a bit desperate. So we have this sort of quite complicated situation of a whole number of different groups of people who are feeling really disaffected and ready for revolt because they're so desperate, one way or another. Now, some of these groups are people whose lands were taken from them by Sulla in order to give land allotments to his veteran soldiers. Some of them are veteran soldiers who've kind of failed to make a success of their farming. Um, we have another group who are descendants of individuals who were proscribed by Sulla.

• 29:53Speaker 01

  That's to say, you know, they were made outlaws, they could be killed with impunity and they, they and their descendants lost the right to participate in politics in Rome. So the, the prescribed are feeling this huge sense of resentment and really wanting some kind of revolution to turn things around and offer them a way back into Roman politics. And that had been a kind of a real issue for some time. And the, the resentment of the sons of the prescribed was something that Cicero and others were aware of to a degree.

• 30:26Tristan Hughes?

  And had, and had, and so had those people been the ones who had been championing Catiline in the previous election? Or are these people who are disillusioned off their own back and they're kind of, they're gathering together regardless?

• 30:37Speaker 01

  It's hard to say exactly who Catiline supporters were in the, um, elections that took place in sixty four and, um, and indeed in, in sixty three, obviously had some supporters, but not enough to get him over the line. Um, the prescribed are not able to vote because they're, you know, they're still suffering from this ban. Um, but they're, you know, itching to get back into, um, it, it, it, to reclaim their rights, reclaim their property and all the rest of it. So there are, there are all sorts of people who are feeling disaffected. And the urban populace of Rome is a, is a really important group as well. I mean, we have, you know, Roma has this growing population, lots of people. Salus talks about all the people who come in to Rome, um, looking for work

• 31:22Speaker 01

  because they, that their farm has failed in the, in the countryside or they've, they've lost their, their farm. They come to Rome looking for work and there's not very much work in Rome or it's very seasonal. It's very hard to make a living. Um, so there's a lot of people who are feeling very, um, precarious in one way or another. And people, many of these people have debts. Um, so Catiline's proposal to cancel debts is an enormously appealing one for many different groups for different reasons. So it's appealing to those aristocratic politicians who've really got themselves into debt, trying to get elected to high office. But it's also really appealing to, um, people much kind of lower down the, the social scale, if you like,

• 32:07Speaker 01

  who, um, you know, have maybe got into debt, you know, just to get enough to eat. So it's, it's kind of, you know, a whole lot of different people who are looking for big changes. And there, there are rumours that Catiline too may bring about prescriptions where you confiscate the lands of your, of your outlawed enemies and redistribute them to your supporters. Um, so, you know, that could be further opportunities for people who are feeling very marginalised and resentful. I mean, one of the things we have to remember about Rome in this period is the massive, massive inequality that is becoming ever more conspicuous. And that's one of the things that's so interesting about Salus' account of the Catalinarian conspiracy

• 32:48Speaker 01

  is that there's actually quite a lot of similarity between the kinds of observations that Catiline makes about, you know, the terrible situation that they're in, uh, in Rome with these rich people with their huge houses and their fish ponds and everything else. So Catiline gives a speech in Salus, kind of drawing attention to, you know, the houses of the rich on the one hand, and then the wretched living conditions of the poor on the other. But also Salus himself, in his introduction to his account of the conspiracy, makes the same point. So there's a, there's a recognition in Salus, and this is why I think Salus' account is such an interesting kind of compliment to Cicero's speeches.

• 33:29Speaker 01

  In Salus' account, there's a recognition of the serious problems of inequality um, and the justified resentments of many different groups. I mean, Salus is also critical and he does talk about, you know, all the dregs of the countryside are finding their way to Rome and that kind of thing. But at the same time, you know, he is very critical of the, the kind of Roman, I suppose, the successful members of the Roman elite and how they have just enriched themselves and, um, are concerned about nothing beyond kind of, you know, their, their own, um, fortunes.

• 34:06Tristan Hughes?

  So although Catiline loses the election, as you mentioned, his policies are popular with lots of people. And as he mentioned, you have that massing together of a group of armed men north of Rome in Tuscany in Etruria, Faisulae. As this is happening over the summer and in the autumn of sixty three B.C., do you think, uh, Catiline is seeing this? And do you think he's involved with this build up? Is he thinking this is actually a good show of force to show the people that my policies are actually popular? Or, I mean, I mean, what do you think? Is he actually planning an insurrection with these men? What do you think?

• 34:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's, it's a really interesting question. It's kind of at what point do Catiline and Manlius really kind of, um?

• 34:48Tristan Hughes?

  Because we think they are working, we think they are working together, well, yes.

• 34:51Speaker 01

  Cicero clearly thinks they're working together. Um, and he sort of, you know, intercepted some messages in October that, uh, suggest, oh, they're, they're kind of anonymous messages saying, there's an anonymous message to Crassus saying, you know, get out of Rome because, you know, Catiline's planning to, to bring about a revolution. So, you know, how reliable is this? Who knows? Um, but certainly that fuels Cicero's suspicion that, um, Catiline and Manlius are, are kind of collaborating. And there are stories about armed gatherings elsewhere in Italy as well. So it all feels quite uncomfortable, but I, I think one of the,

• 35:32Speaker 01

  the challenges or one of the frustrations for Cicero is trying to find some actual proof that Catiline is really linked to these armed gatherings elsewhere in Italy. Um, and it's not until quite late on that he actually, you know, achieves that. Um, when, when he manages to get the, the, these Gauls, the Alibroges, who's, um, they're on an embassy to Rome. And of course, the Gauls as well are really suffering from debt. They've borrowed loads of money in order to pay their taxes to Rome. And the reason these Gauls have come, come to visit to the Senate is that they want remission of, of their debt.

• 36:09Tristan Hughes?

  And when we're talking about the Gauls here, we're not talking across the Alps in modern day France. These are Gauls who are in northern Italy, who have come under the control of the Romans? Or are we talking a bit further afield and they're being forced to pay money almost as tribute to Rome?

• 36:23Speaker 01

  Yes, so these are, the, the Alibroges are the other side of the Alps.

• 36:26Tristan Hughes?

  Oh, they are the other side, okay, my apologies, yeah.

• 36:27Speaker 01

  Yes, yes, because at one point Cicero says, you know, the conspiracy has spread over the Alps. So the, um, the Alibroges then have, have sent their embassy to Rome. They want support from the Senate because they are feeling really up against it. They've got an oppressive governor and these Roman money lenders are oppressing them as well. So they want, you know, the idea of cancelling debts is very appealing for them. And initially, they are quite drawn to support Catiline. And they think, oh, that could work out quite well for us to have debts cancelled. Um, but they also have cold feet and, um, they, in the end, um,

• 37:08Speaker 01

  someone who is kind of connected to one of the Gallic ambassadors persuades them to help with a plot to secure written evidence of the complicity of Catiline. Then we get the letters, the, so these Alibroges, the, the Gauls are persuaded to get some letters, um, that they, they can then take home to, um, to their compatriots and say, look, we've got a guarantee from Catiline. And then there's also a letter from the conspirators in Rome to Catiline, who's by then in Etruria. And by this point, then, then Cicero actually has this written evidence.

• 37:49Speaker 01

  But when he makes his first speech to the Senate, at that point, he doesn't have written evidence of Catiline's involvement with, um, these, with these other armed groups. So, you know, that's, I think, where.

• 38:04Speaker 01

  Scholars can take quite different views about whether, how far Catiline really was working with Manlius and other groups elsewhere in Italy.

• 38:14Tristan Hughes?

  Because Catiline leaving Rome, I mean, that feels like an important moment. And can we get to how that that happens? Because is there a couple of events before this where Cicero is getting more rumblings, more thoughts that actually Catiline could be involved with these these armed men, or at least what we hear in the surviving sources? Because what's this mention of a woman called Fulvia being an informant?

• 38:34Speaker 01

  Yes, okay, so Fulvia is a key, plays a key role really in the discovery of the conspiracy. She is an aristocratic Roman woman. She's having a relationship with a man called Quintus Curius, who had once been a senator, but like quite a few others, had been expelled from the Senate in the year seventy for a variety, I mean, senators were expelled for a variety of reasons, but it was, might be to do with not having sufficient wealth to support their position in the Senate, or it might be to do with their poor moral behaviour. But it was, you know, a bit catastrophic, actually, for a Roman politician to be expelled

• 39:15Speaker 01

  from the Senate. So Quintus Curius is a slightly desperate man. He's lost status, and he's part of the conspiracy. He's really drawn to Catiline's conspiracy. So Fulvia is having this relationship with him, and her suspicions are aroused because according to Sallust and other sources, previously Curius had been very mean and kind of never bought her presence. But then he started getting much more generous. And so she gets suspicious. It's curious, what is going on? And Curius reveals to her, you know, everything's going to change. It's all going to be so much better because we're going to have this revolution. And, you know, these awful upstarts like Cicero are going to be got rid of. And we're

• 39:56Speaker 01

  going to have, you know, Catiline's going to be consul, and it will all be great. And so Fulvia is a bit doubtful about this. And she communicates this information via intermediaries to Cicero. And gradually Fulvia picks up more and more about what the conspirators are planning. And one of the things that she seems to be the source for is a plan to assassinate Cicero. So the news leaks out that there's a gathering in the house of a man called Laica, in the Saevemakers Street in Rome, of Catiline and his supporters. And a plan

• 40:35Speaker 01

  is made for two men to go to Cicero's house, pretending to be about to offer him, you know, greetings of the morning, a sort of standard Roman practice. But they're going to kill him. And but Cicero gets wind of this, and he prevents these two men from entering his house the next morning, and foils their plot. But this is, you know, one of the things that he describes in very vivid detail in his speech, in his first speech against Catiline in the Senate, about how he's been dodging multiple attempts on his life by Catiline. Now, quite possibly, Catiline did plan to kill Cicero. I mean, in a way, if he wanted

• 41:19Speaker 01

  to secure the consulship for himself, then that would be, you know, a plausible thing to do. And we should remember that political murder was by no means uncommon in the decades, in the previous decades, we've, you know, we've had the prescriptions of Sulla, you know, we've had all sorts of terrible things happening in the city of Rome.

• 41:39Tristan Hughes?

  But to kill a consul, Catherine, that's quite a big step.

• 41:41Speaker 01

  To kill a consul, well, it is a big step to kill a consul. And who knows exactly what would have happened had the consul been killed. But he wasn't. He foiled the attempt, if there was an attempt. But Cicero also started to make these really broad claims about how Catiline wanted to kill everybody in Rome, or, you know, so that he paints the picture of Catiline as planning a sort of complete bloodbath, as a way to convince the rest of the Senate that proper action against Catiline and his supporters needs to be taken.

• 42:13Tristan Hughes?

  And at that time, Catiline is still in Rome. He hasn't left the city.

• 42:16Speaker 01

  Yes, now that is the key thing.

• 42:18Tristan Hughes?

  That's interesting. That's interesting, yes.

• 42:19Speaker 01

  Well, and that, and I think the fact that Catiline is still in Rome is one of the reasons that that some scholars will say, well, you know, was Catiline really, you know, planning violence at this point? So there's this meeting of the Senate in the Temple of Jupiter Stata, probably on the eighth of November, where Catiline is there in attendance. And Cicero gives, you know, this sort of searing speech, which is then known later as, or the version that survives is known as the first speech against Catiline. And he really lays into him, you know, how long will you abuse our patience, Catiline? And goes on and on to him about how everyone knows that he is planning terrible things,

• 43:02Speaker 01

  and planning violence against the city, planning to set fire to the city, all these claims are made about what Catiline's planning. And yet you still, you know, have the effrontery to carry on sitting here, see how, you know, you've been isolated, everyone's moved away from you. And so he paints this really vivid picture of Catiline sitting isolated on a bench in the Senate, and everyone else is kind of, you know, shrinking away from this terrible man, who is, you know, one of their own, and yet is allegedly planning a coup against the Roman state. So what Cicero says is, you know, I have the authority to have you executed, which is, you know, rather a dubious claim. And he says, if I

• 43:42Speaker 01

  were you, Catiline, I would just go into exile. So in some ways, I know, Catiline's retreat from Rome, which he, you know, he seems to leave the night after that speech is given. And he goes off to Etruria and joins up with Manlius at that point.

• 43:58Tristan Hughes?

  Okay, now they finally have that.

• 44:00Speaker 01

  Okay, so now he's out in the open. I mean, in some ways Cicero said, you know, we'll see you leave the city, and then we'll really know that you're in this conspiracy. And so in some ways, Catiline does kind of show he's right. Except that, you know, we could also tell a bit of a different story about Catiline. If we, if we think about Catiline as someone who feels actually completely scandalized that this jumped up new man from Arpenum has been elected consul, when he feels it's, you know, he is a patrician, and it's, you know, almost his entitlement to be elected consul. Catiline is, you know, one thing we should shouldn't forget about Catiline, he was actually a very successful

• 44:38Speaker 01

  military man. So he was, you know, admired for his incredible talents as a military leader. He was sort of tireless at the head of an army. He, you know, and he, we get these quotations, or speeches attributed to Catiline, in Sallust's account particularly, where, you know, he, he communicates to some of the other, you know, old established aristocrats in the Senate, and says things like, you know, my dignity has been affronted, you know, I am, you know, this is, I'm claiming what is my right, you know. So that sort of sense

• 45:19Speaker 01

  that he deserved to be consul, and Cicero didn't, and that he's, he's kind of wants to right that wrong. But then he's also presenting himself as the champion of the oppressed, which is somewhat kind of, you know, curious combination.

• 45:37Tristan Hughes?

  Right, well, we'll get to the grand climax of this conspiracy now that he's left Rome, right after this.

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• 46:29Tristan Hughes?

  So we've kind of covered the story of those earlier months in sixty-three, you know, these groups of armed men outside of Rome, Manlius, for instance, in Tuscany, and these groups who support what Catiline was backing. The big question of how involved he was in wanting an insurrection. But now with that damning speech by Cicero, and Cicero very much thinks he is keen on insurrection, Catiline has left Rome. And he has, for the first time, he's now met up with Manlius and these forces north of Rome. And for Cicero, is this the proof that he was looking for? I mean, what happens next?

• 47:13Speaker 01

  Well, it seems that there are still some doubters in the Senate about what Catiline's intentions really are. And Catiline did have some supporters in the Senate, although Cicero would like us to believe he didn't. But he's, he's kind of in touch with some of the more conservative figures like Catullus. He writes to Catullus to kind of, you know, talk about his, Catiline writes to Catullus, justifying his actions. That's where we get this thing about his dignity being.

• 47:39Tristan Hughes?

  And he's a conservative senator.

• 47:40Speaker 01

  Yes, he's a conservative senator. And there are all kinds of stories, actually, about senators who are quite in favour of, of Catiline potentially, and certainly at an earlier stage, that perhaps even Crassus, you know, the richest man in Rome had been backing Catiline, partly to get back at Pompey, one of those complicated bits of Roman politicking behind the scenes. And who knows whether Crassus was ever really a backer of Catiline. But we now have this situation where, in a way, Cicero, Cicero himself is apparently absolutely convinced that Catiline is a massive threat to Rome. And he, in his, even

• 48:24Speaker 01

  in his first speech against Catiline, he aligns him with other individuals who've been seen as, you know, wanting to overturn the Roman state.

• 48:36Speaker 01

  Um, although, you know, historians might dispute Cicero's version of events, but, you know, he says, oh, it's, you know, he's like Gaius Cracus, or um, he, you know, he'd been a revolutionary, supposedly revolutionary tribune back in one hundred and twenty one B C E and ended up being killed by um, by conservatives. And that, that was a very kind of controversial situation at the time. Uh, so Cicero, you know, having, Cicero claims that Catiline poses this terrible threat, but there's still plenty of people who are not totally convinced. And this is really why Cicero needs to get that written evidence that, you know, really is going to be damning. So, uh, you know, when he's finally, you know, he's hatched this plot with the um,

• 49:20Speaker 01

  the, the Gallic envoys, um, and they have, you know, got these letters, um, the, he's then able to use, um, use the letters to implicate not just Catiline, but also various other individuals, some of whom are actually in the Senate.

• 49:38Tristan Hughes?

  Oh, interesting.

• 49:39Speaker 01

  And that, and the most senior of those is Lentulus Sura, who is actually praetor for the year sixty three.

• 49:46Tristan Hughes?

  So quite high up, not consul, but still quite high up, yeah.

• 49:48Speaker 01

  Well, um, Lentulus Sura is a really interesting character. He had been expelled from the Senate in seventy. He'd managed to kind of claw his way back. So he, this is his second time as praetor. He'd, he'd got to be, you know, got to be praetor before and then been, you know, sort of got, got up the ladder and then like a snake of, of, of being kind of expelled from the Senate, you had to kind of go back and start again. So he'd managed to get back to being praetor, but clearly wasn't, you know, wasn't happy with uh, the, the situation in Rome. Uh, and so he's the most senior of those who are, uh, suppose, who are allegedly involved in the conspiracy, who are, who stayed in Rome. So Catiline's left and gone to join Manlius, but there are these other guys who are in the city.

• 50:30Speaker 01

  Um, and so while Catiline is off, you know, with his armed force in um, in Tuscany, um, Cicero now has the issue of these letters that implicate these guys. Um, and they are, um, the letters are kind of opened in the Senate in front of, in front of these individuals. Um, and so Cicero describes how guilty they look, you know, you can see they're guilty just by looking at their faces. Um, and then he also says that they confessed. Now, what they confessed to is not entirely clear. But, um, you know, we have these other guys, you know, including Roman senators, who are, where there's written proof

• 51:15Speaker 01

  that they are involved in Catiline's conspiracy. So, you know, this is a very kind of scary situation, um, and a complicated situation.

• 51:24Tristan Hughes?

  Complicated situation, but Cicero gets his way in that they are, uh, does he get his way that they are, they're evidently found guilty of being conspirators?

• 51:35Speaker 01

  Well, found guilty is an interesting way to put it because they don't have a trial. And that is part of what makes this whole episode so problematic. We've got Roman citizens who are accused of um, involvement in a conspiracy. But these men in Rome have not been, you, you know, they've not been caught red-handed in, in anything like, you know, they, you know, they're, they're not kind of at the head of, of an armed force, you know, in Tuscany. That's, that's Catiline. They are in the city and are allegedly one of them's found with a whole load of weapons in his house. But I mean, it, you know, they, but they don't have a proper trial. They are treated as if they are manifestly guilty by Cicero.

• 52:16Speaker 01

  And then we have this sort of big debate in the Senate about what to do with these manifestly guilty men.

• 52:23Tristan Hughes?

  So Roman citizens is manifestly guilty, accused of treason. And so Cicero, he go, he goes big on this. He wants the worst penalty possible.

• 52:35Speaker 01

  Cicero wants the worst penalty possible, but he's by no means the only one. And I think one of the things that we need to appreciate about this, this debate in the Senate is that there are plenty of people expressing different opinions. Um, the majority of people are in favor of killing these guys.

• 52:53Tristan Hughes?

  Oh, okay.

• 52:54Speaker 01

  So, um, we have Cato the Younger, for instance, who gives a very strong speech in favor of putting them to death. Now, there are voices that speak in favor of, you know, not rushing into things. And most prominent among those, at least according to Salus' account of the conspiracy, is Julius Caesar. And Julius Caesar says, this is going to set a really dangerous precedent, and we should really think very hard before we do something as drastic as this. Let's put them in prison for a while instead. I mean, I think part of, part of the problem is normally when um, aristocratic Romans are found guilty, they are allowed to retreat into exile rather than facing capital punishment.

• 53:40Speaker 01

  So, um, but in this case, to allow these men to leave Rome, uh, it would, would be almost, you know, to give them an obvious opportunity to just go and join forces with Catiline in Tuscany. So that's not really an option here. Imprisonment is not a standard punishment in ancient Rome. So, um, but it's not entirely clear why it's not possible to, you know, keep them in prison at least until Catiline's been defeated in the field. That, you know, and that seems to be the kind of thing that, that Julius Caesar's talking about. Um, but the strongest voices in the Senate are in favor of executing these men. And the, uh, Cicero does speak in favor of this, but he's not the only one.

• 54:25Speaker 01

  What really puts Cicero on the spot is that he's the consul. So the Senate can make a decision, but in a way that doesn't make it law. So the Cicero takes it upon himself to execute what he, what, what, or to, to carry out what is the decision of the Senate. But he kind of carries the can for that. So he, as consul, um, oversees, there are five men in total who um, are in this, this category. So they are in custody temporarily and then, um, he oversees their being marched up to the Mametan Prison on the Capitoline Hill. And then they go down into this horrible dank prison, which Salus describes very vividly, and then they're strangled to death.

• 55:11Tristan Hughes?

  And so these powerful Romans, you know, who have been in the Senate, are infamously strangled to death. And Cicero is the one who effectively gave the orders for that to happen.

• 55:22Speaker 01

  He gave the orders for that to happen, and not only that, but he himself accompanied these men on their walk to the prison. And he put his hand on Lentulus's shoulder. Lentulus is the most senior of the um, of the group, uh, the one who's praetor for sixty three. Cicero puts his hand on his shoulder and ba, you know, so he's basically, you know, got him under arrest, marches him up to the, to Mametan Prison. And, you know, witnesses the, the execution of the conspirators.

• 55:53Tristan Hughes?

  Wow, Cicero, there you go. Um, so that is what happens to the conspirators. They're executed and Cicero is the man very much behind it. Um, we must wrap up also, though, the story of Catiline, because he is not there. He is out of Rome with Manlius and these armed men in Tuscany. Wha, wha, they've got to figure out what to do with these guys as well.

• 56:14Speaker 01

  Yes, they have. And I mean, one of the, you know, one of the complicating factors, I think, with Cicero's speeches against Catiline is that, you know, the, the, most of his anger is directed against Catiline himself. But as you say, Catiline is not among the group who get executed in Rome. He's off in Tuscany with his troops. And Cicero's colleague as consul, Gaius Antonius, is put at the head of an armed force and he goes off to Tuscany. And actually, Gaius Antonius himself has, um, is indisposed, so it's his deputy who leads, who leads the forces. And they, you know, Catiline's forces are massively outnumbered. Nevertheless, you know, it is really striking.

• 56:54Speaker 01

  No one defeat, no one deserts Catiline's cause. They fight on, um, they fight until, you know, they're, they're basically all dead on the battlefield. And at the forefront is Catiline himself. So in Salasica, which concludes with the death of Catiline, we have this really almost tragic situation of Catiline, in many ways, a very talented, albeit kind of, um, uh, you know, aristocrat gone wrong character, who's, you know, has this incredible capacity for leadership that he's put to perverted ends. But we see an almost redemptive moment for him at the end because we can see how he's inspired loyalty in his followers. Um, and, you know, they, that they have followed him to their deaths on the battlefield.

• 57:38Tristan Hughes?

  They believed in his cause of insurrection, whether it was largely just because you clear our debts, you might give us a new life or, or for more, for whatever other reason. It's probably his military background as well. You know, he was able to kind of continue with the loyalty of those figures, even when it was very much against them. The whole state was against them, that idea.

• 57:57Speaker 01

  No, absolutely, absolutely. So, uh, he, he's obviously quite charismatic and it's quite interesting. Many years later, when Cicero is defending, um, a, a young friend of his, Cilias. Um, it, it turns, turns out that Cilias himself had been for a while a follower of Catiline. And in a, in that speech in defense of Cilias, uh, in the mid fifties, um, Cicero actually says, well, of course, Catiline was terribly charming and charismatic and kind of, because he's trying to make excuses for, for Cilias, but, but, but the fact that Cilias had actually followed Catiline for a while. So we don't get quite such a sort of, um, you know, Catiline as a, as a, you know, evil incarnate in that, in that particular context.

• 58:40Tristan Hughes?

  Oh, the, the, yes, the veil is a, a nice glimpse behind the curtain. Uh, they're interesting. Um. So that is the story of the Catiline conspiracy. Doesn't end well for Catiline. And of course Cicero is the figure who, you know, is, is the man at the top during it and oversees the execution of these, these five conspirators, which is such a big moment. Um.

• 59:01Tristan Hughes?

  How does this, how does this affect Cicero's career after that point? Is he hailed as a hero, the man who stopped this potential insurrection? Um, or is it less favorable for him?

• 59:14Speaker 01

  It's a pretty complicated story, what happens afterwards, because some people hail Cicero as a hero. He is, you know, after the execution, he's, he's kind of escorted by cheering crowds. He's hailed as father of the fatherland, you know. Um, he's rescued Rome and he presents himself as being Rome's savior. He saved Rome from the threat of arson, whether Catiline ever really meant to burn down Rome is a moot point. Um, he, you know, he saved Rome, the Roman state. Um, but already, you know, even before the end of December, he's being challenged. Um, one of the tribunes, uh, prevents Cicero from making his

• 59:55Speaker 01

  Speech that a consul normally makes on laying down office. Um, on the grounds that Cicero has executed Roman citizens without trial. And that is a breach of the liberties of the Roman people. So, uh, and it is of course the Tribune's job particularly to protect the liberties of the Roman people. Um, and clearly there are plenty of people criticizing Cicero at the time.

• 1:00:19Speaker 01

  And in subsequent years, Cicero spends an inordinate amount of time defending what he did in sixty three. So boasting about how he saved the state, but in such a way that, you know, makes it clear he is constantly under.

• 1:00:35Tristan Hughes?

  He has to defend himself, yes.

• 1:00:37Speaker 01

  He has to defend himself. Um, and, you know, later commentators say things like, well, you know, Cicero, um, praised his consulship. Um, not, uh, not wrongly, but too much kind of thing. That, you know, he just went on and on about it and that made him a bit of a figure of fun in some ways. But in some, he was absolutely right to be anxious about his reputation because. Um, a few years later, in, in fifty eight BCE, um, Tribune Publius Claudius, whom Cicero had been at odds with. For a variety of reasons.

• 1:01:12Speaker 01

  But Claudius engineered, he really sort of made the most of all these criticisms of Cicero kind of. Going against Roman citizen rights and, uh, enacted a piece of legislation. It, it making, obliging Cicero to go into exile.

• 1:01:30Tristan Hughes?

  Ah.

• 1:01:31Speaker 01

  So, and Cicero was furious, also absolutely devastated. He was in exile for sixteen months, absolutely horrifying experience for him because he had no idea if he'll ever get back to Rome. He had no idea what would happen next. It was terrible for his family, you know, it was, it was an absolute disaster. And that was, you know, in a sense, the cause for that, if you like, or at least the excuse for that that Claudius. Used was, was the execution of the Catalinarian conspirators.

• 1:02:01Tristan Hughes?

  Right, so that's the reason that gives the, the motivation for Cicero's exile. Um, Catherine, this has been a fascinating chat insight into the, the Castanarian conspiracy. And how complex it is, especially when you explore the character of Castan and how involved, how much he actually wanted an insurrection. How much of this is Cicero kind of just being convinced?

• 1:02:20Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 1:02:21Tristan Hughes?

  Um, in Castanin's involvement from the beginning, when Castan really gets involved in it. My last question is from Cicero's own viewpoint. Do you think at the end of his life, would he have viewed the Catalin, his defeating the Catalinarian conspiracy in his eyes? Do you think he would have viewed it as his finest hour, his greatest achievement?

• 1:02:44Speaker 01

  Well, we can say for sure that he viewed it as his finest.

• 1:02:48Tristan Hughes?

  He did.

• 1:02:48Speaker 01

  We, he definitely viewed it as his finest achievement. We can see that from the speeches that he makes. In the last year of his life, where he's attacking Mark Antony. And he presents himself as entitled to attack Mark Antony, whom he accuses of having. Um, you know, ambitions to take over Caesar's position. Because this was after the assassination of Julius Caesar, Mark Antony was Caesar's deputy.

• 1:03:16Speaker 01

  And Cicero comes up with a, a series of blistering speeches against Mark Antony, known as the Philippics. And in those, he is really almost reprising his role in attacking Catalin. And he presents Mark Antony as, you know, here is a new Catalin.

• 1:03:31Tristan Hughes?

  A new was Catalin.

• 1:03:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, exactly. He was posing a very similar devastating threat to the Roman state. And in fact, he attacked Claudius in similar terms as well. So, so he kept sort of, you know, in aligning all his personal enemies with the attacks on the Roman state. You know, he, he was kind of constantly reinforcing this idea of himself as the savior of Rome in sixty three. Um, whether other people were quite so convinced, uh, who, who can say, uh, you know, that, that, that he was. He, he never returned to the position that he'd had as consul. He, um, yes, people wanted to get him on their side to have his powerful oratory back them up. But, you know, if, if he got on the wrong side of Caesar in the mid fifties, that was, that was not going to go well.

• 1:04:15Tristan Hughes?

  Well, that's another story entirely. I mean, Catherine, this has been absolutely brilliant. What a story. Um, and it features in your new book, All About the Life of Cicero, it is called.

• 1:04:26Speaker 01

  Indeed, it is. Orator, The Life of Cicero and the End of the Roman Republic.

• 1:04:30Tristan Hughes?

  And that is out soon. That is out in July.

• 1:04:32Speaker 01

  Out on the twenty third of July.

• 1:04:34Tristan Hughes?

  Brilliant. Catherine, it just goes to me to say thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show.

• 1:04:38Speaker 01

  It's been a pleasure. Thank you.