Editing Cicero (section)

=== Catilinarian Conspiracy ===
{{Rhetoric}}
{{Main|Catilinarian conspiracy}}

Most famously{{snd}}in part because of his own publicity{{Sfn|Wiedemann|1994|p=42}}{{snd}}he thwarted a conspiracy led by [[Lucius Sergius Catilina]] to overthrow the [[Roman Republic]] with the help of foreign armed forces. Cicero procured a ''[[senatus consultum ultimum]]'' (a recommendation from the senate attempting to legitimise the use of force){{Sfn|Wiedemann|1994|p=42}} and drove Catiline from the city with four vehement speeches (the [[Catilinarian orations]]), which remain outstanding examples of his rhetorical style.{{Sfn|Krebs|2020}}  The Orations listed Catiline and his followers' debaucheries, and denounced Catiline's senatorial sympathizers as roguish and dissolute debtors clinging to Catiline as a final and desperate hope. Cicero demanded that Catiline and his followers leave the city. At the conclusion of Cicero's first speech (which was made in the [[Temple of Jupiter Stator (3rd century BC)|Temple of Jupiter Stator]]), Catiline hurriedly left the Senate. In his following speeches, Cicero did not directly address Catiline. He delivered <!--maybe; some scholars think not all the Catilinarians were actually delivered, but were rather published-->the second and third orations before the people, and the last one again before the Senate. By these speeches, Cicero wanted to prepare the Senate for the worst possible case; he also delivered more evidence, against Catiline.<ref>Cicero, Marcus Tullius, ''Selected Works'', Penguin Books Ltd, Great Britain, 1971.</ref>

Catiline fled and left behind his followers to start the revolution from within while he himself assaulted the city with an army of "moral and financial bankrupts, or of honest fanatics and adventurers".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Abbott |first1=Frank Frost |title=A History and Description of Roman Political Institutions |date=1901 |publisher=Ginn |location=United States |page=110}}</ref> It is alleged that Catiline had attempted to involve the [[Allobroges]], a tribe of [[Transalpine Gaul]], in their plot, but Cicero, working with the Gauls, was able to seize letters that incriminated the five conspirators and forced them to confess in front of the [[Roman Senate|Senate]].<ref>{{harvnb|Cic. ''Cat.''|loc=3.2.4–4.9}}; {{harvnb|Sall. ''Cat.''|loc=40–45}}; {{harvnb|Plut. ''Cic.''|loc=18.4}}.</ref> The senate then deliberated upon the conspirators' punishment. As it was the dominant advisory body to the various [[legislative]] assemblies rather than a [[judicial]] body, there were limits to its power; however, martial law was in effect, and it was feared that simple house arrest or exile&nbsp;– the standard options&nbsp;– would not remove the threat to the state. At first [[Decimus Junius Silanus (consul)|Decimus Junius Silanus]] spoke for the "extreme penalty"; but during the debate many were swayed by Julius Caesar, who decried the precedent it would set and argued in favor of life imprisonment in various Italian towns. [[Cato the Younger]] then rose in defense of the death penalty and the Senate finally agreed on the matter, and came down in support of the death penalty. Cicero had the conspirators taken to the [[Tullianum]], the notorious Roman prison, where they were strangled. Cicero himself accompanied the former consul [[Publius Cornelius Lentulus Sura]], one of the conspirators, to the Tullianum.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Shapiro |first1=Susan O. |title=O Tempora! O Mores! Cicero's Catilinarian orations; a student edition with historical essays |date=2005 |publisher=University of Oklahoma Press |location=Norman, OK |isbn=9780806136622 |page=193}}</ref>

Cicero received the honorific "''[[pater patriae]]''" for his efforts to suppress the conspiracy,{{sfn|Everitt|2001|p=112}} but lived thereafter in fear of trial or exile for having put Roman citizens to death without trial.<ref>{{cite book |last=Stockton |first=David |title=Cicero: A Political Biography |year=1971 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn= |pages=174–175}}</ref> While the ''senatus consultum ultimum'' gave some legitimacy to the use of force against the conspirators,{{Efn|Wiedemann describes the senatus consultum ultimum by the late republic as "little more than a fig-leaf by those who could muster a majority in the senate ... to legitimate the use of force".{{sfn|Wiedemann|1994|p=44}} }} Cicero also argued that Catiline's conspiracy, by virtue of its treason, made the conspirators enemies of the state and forfeited the protections intrinsically possessed by Roman citizens.{{Sfn|Wiedemann|1994|p=44}} The consuls moved decisively. Antonius Hybrida was dispatched to defeat Catiline in battle that year, preventing [[Crassus]] or Pompey from exploiting the situation for their own political aims.{{Sfn|Wiedemann|1994|p=46}}

After the suppression of the conspiracy, Cicero was proud of his accomplishment.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Gwatkin |first=W. E. |date=1942 |title=Catilinarian conspiracy, the aftermath of the. |url=https://www.proquest.com/docview/1296296031 |journal=The Classical Bulletin |volume=18 |issue=15 |id={{ProQuest|1296296031}} |quote=This city and commonwealth has been preserved from destruction by me. |access-date=8 February 2023 |archive-date=19 June 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240619065428/https://www.proquest.com/docview/1296296031 |url-status=live }} {{ProQuest|1296296031}}</ref> Some of his political enemies argued that though the act gained Cicero popularity, he exaggerated the extent of his success. He overestimated his popularity again several years later after being exiled from Italy and then allowed back from exile. At this time, he claimed that the republic would be restored along with him.<ref>{{Cite encyclopedia |title=Cicero (106–43 BC) |encyclopedia=Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy |url=http://www.iep.utm.edu/cicero/#H2 |access-date=21 October 2013 |last=Clayton |first=Edward |archive-date=22 February 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220222161508/https://iep.utm.edu/cicero/#H2 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Shortly after completing his consulship, in late 62&nbsp;BC, Cicero arranged the purchase of a large townhouse on the [[Palatine Hill]] previously owned by Rome's richest citizen, Marcus Licinius Crassus.{{Sfn|Wiedemann|1994|p=47}} To finance the purchase, Cicero borrowed some two million [[sesterces]] from [[Publius Cornelius Sulla]], whom he had previously defended from court.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Platts |first1=Hannah |last2=DeLaine |first2=Janet |chapter=Housing |url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781118300664 |title=A companion to the city of Rome |date=2018 |publisher=Wiley |isbn=978-1-4051-9819-6 |editor-last=Holleran |editor-first=Claire |doi=10.1002/9781118300664 |editor-last2=Claridge |editor-first2=Amanda |page=301 |s2cid=162821882 |access-date=26 November 2023 |archive-date=26 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231126071332/https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781118300664 |url-status=live }}</ref>{{sfn|Wiedemann|1994|p=47}} <!-- It cost an exorbitant sum, 3.5&nbsp;million [[sesterces]], which required Cicero to arrange for a loan from his co-consul Gaius Antonius Hybrida based on the expected profits from Antonius's proconsulship in Macedonia.{{sfn|Everitt|2001|pp=115–16}}<ref name="Dustan, William, 163-164">Dunstan, William (2010). ''Ancient Rome''. Rowman and Littlefield Publishers. pp. 163–164. {{ISBN|0-7425-6834-2}}.</ref> --> Cicero boasted his house was ''"in conspectu prope totius urbis"'' ("in sight of nearly the whole city"), only a short walk from the [[Roman Forum]].<ref name="cicero_house">{{Cite news |last=Steven M. Cerutti |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/1104 |title=The Location of the Houses of Cicero and Clodius and the Porticus Catuli on the Palatine Hill |publisher=American Journal of Philology |year=1997 |issue=3 |volume=118 |page=417 |access-date=21 June 2018 |archive-date=21 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180621143314/https://muse.jhu.edu/article/1104 |url-status=live }}</ref>