He looks as if he knew a great deal that can never be any use to him

[sovay]

Signs of Incipient Geekdom #1381: A friend signs an e-mail "SC" and your first thought is, "Who signs an e-mail 'scilicet'?"

I suppose it should follow without saying that I spent this afternoon researching Roman laws on citizenship and resident aliens for no project of my own, except that someone asked me a question to which I did not know the answer and I was curious. The process turned out to involve rather more Cicero than I had bargained for. Why does no one ever ask me questions that involve rather more Anakreon, or Lucan, or even Lykophron?

Miniver coughed, and called it fate,
And kept on drinking.

Comments

[lesser-celery.livejournal.com]

If anyone asks you what Cicero had to say about the timing of the consular elections of 63 BC, you can turf that to me.

[sovay]

about the timing of the consular elections of 63 BC

Alas, this was about the lex Papia of 65. But I will keep your offer in mind.

ObIrrelevant

[larryhammer]

I think Colleen McCollough is onto something in her reconstruction of the order of events around Cataline.

---L.

[sovay]

I have not read Colleen McCullough on Catiline; only Steven Saylor. Enlighten me?

[larryhammer]

Oy -- it's been a few years since I read the novel in question, but essentially, she notes that he's the only authority for some of the things during his consulate, and that the reactions to a trial that he implies happened before Cataline only make sense if it happened afterward. (Or possibly the other order around -- as I said, it's been a few years.) OTOH, Cicero's blowing a lot of cuttlefish ink to distract from how badly he mishandled the crisis.

I think this was in Caesar's Women. She devotes an appendix to her argument.

---L.

Re: ObIrrelevant

[lesser-celery.livejournal.com]

I'm sure.

If you ever have trouble getting to sleep, try my scintillating account, "Catiline and the Date of the Consular Elections of 63 B.C.," Studies in Latin Literature and Roman History IV (Collection Latomus, vol. 196), 1986:234-246. "Without coming to some conclusion, however, tentative, about when Catiline finally lost all hope of coming to power by constitutional means, it is impossible to assess the degree to which he was involved in the conspiracy that bears his name." This was my only journal article in ancient history before I started my new career, in survey research.

Re: ObIrrelevant

[larryhammer]

If I have occassion to track that down, I will. I've always been curious what the professionals thought of the hypothesis.

---L.