0:05

Ave, and welcome to Emperors of

0:07

Rome, a Roman history podcast from La

0:10

Trobe University. I'm your host

0:12

Matt Smith, and with me today is

0:14

Rhiannon Evans, an associate professor in Classics

0:16

and Ancient History from La Trobe University.

0:20

This is episode CCXXI

0:22

and part two of

0:24

the Catiline Conspiracy. I'm

0:26

calling this one an entire for Argo. You

0:29

see, the problem with conspiring against the

0:31

Roman state and starting a civil war

0:33

is that everyone assumes that you are

0:35

involved in every underhanded activity found

0:37

out by the Senate. This

0:40

is what happened with Catiline. There

0:42

was an earlier conspiracy before the conspiracy, and

0:44

in this episode we looked at the role

0:47

he played in it, or didn't play in

0:49

it, or did he? Here's Rhiannon

0:51

Evans. So what we're dealing with

0:53

in this episode is something that might not have

0:55

happened. Yeah. Possibly fictitious

0:58

first Catilinian conspiracy, because

1:01

the famous one, some people

1:03

call the second conspiracy. The

1:06

famous one is when Cicero was consoled in 63

1:08

BCE. But

1:11

possibly, the years leading up to

1:13

that, 65 and 64, there was

1:15

another conspiracy, a first

1:18

conspiracy that he may have been involved

1:20

in. Is it that

1:22

the events of this first supposed

1:25

possible conspiracy get conflated with the

1:27

second conspiracy and the accounts maybe

1:30

just aren't as exact as to

1:32

their timing and get the order of things mixed

1:34

up? Well, it's quite possible

1:36

that because basically got an army together in

1:38

63 and there was a supposed

1:40

attempt to kill Cicero and oust him,

1:43

which I won't give it all away

1:45

before we get there, that that was

1:47

then kind of retrojected back onto some

1:49

conflict in the years 65 and 64

1:53

and that Catilinian's name was wound up in it. Oh,

1:55

so he just gets implicated where he maybe. Maybe.

1:58

Maybe. see what

2:00

you think. Context first, so this

2:03

is 65-64. Yes. The

2:05

first conspiracies, really I

2:07

would say all the evidence we have, because I

2:09

think all of the other ancient evidence draws on

2:11

it, is from a couple

2:14

of chapters of Salas. Now

2:16

this is chapters 18 and 19 of his

2:19

Bellum Catalinae, the War of

2:21

Catiline. Most scholars think

2:24

it's rubbish, but recently one as

2:26

I'll come to has said, well

2:28

you know why don't we take this seriously? So

2:30

let me present. So

2:32

this podcast episode is rubbish, but you might take

2:35

it a little bit seriously. No, I think

2:37

it's interesting that it's there anyway, even

2:39

if everyone decides at the

2:41

end of this that it is an invented

2:43

concept. No, I just want to make sure the

2:45

audience is invested to the

2:47

appropriate level. It's a little bit

2:49

odd the way it appears in Salas

2:52

anyway, because in the chronological narrative, which

2:54

he largely presents the chronology of the

2:56

years leading up to and then the

2:58

conspiracy, is actually a flashback. So

3:01

he's been telling us in chapter 17

3:03

that we are in the consulship

3:05

of Lucius Caesar and Gaius Figulus.

3:07

So we're in 64 BCE now

3:10

when Catiline was sounding various people

3:13

out about a possible conspiracy. Important

3:15

to remember his background is that Pompey is

3:18

out east fighting against Mithridates and he's

3:20

been given amazing amounts of power and

3:22

money to do this. Right, I'll come

3:24

back to that context. Part

3:27

of that context is that it seems like

3:29

a good time to overthrow the Roman fate.

3:32

While everyone's distracted by what's going on. Yeah,

3:34

and also the most powerful man in Rome isn't

3:36

there. Yeah. Fine, we're in

3:38

64 BCE and then Salas goes backwards. He

3:41

says, now even before that time,

3:43

this is a direct quote from chapter 18,

3:45

a few men had conspired

3:47

against the government and among them

3:50

was Catiline. Of that affair,

3:52

I shall give as true an account as

3:54

I am able. Now That's

3:56

the phrase that people grab onto as true an

3:59

account as I Am. The idol? Does

4:01

that mean. I'm not really

4:03

not. relish are on the details? Yeah oh

4:05

I really think this is true. Been. It's

4:07

out there so I'm gonna grab the threads

4:10

together and try and we've something up. Yeah,

4:12

yeah, I don't know if it doesn't necessarily

4:14

mean that though, that see what we think.

4:16

So. He says and I'm going to

4:18

directly for the whole of chapter eighteen.

4:20

So. Inner surface things. They fell

4:22

on his office. and then I'll I'll summarize:

4:25

Sept. nineteen? Yeah, I got. I kept writing.

4:27

In the Consulship of Lucius, Tell

4:29

Us And money as Lapidus I

4:31

sixty six bc. Like I said,

4:34

a couple years preview, you can. Flashback

4:36

to a couple of years earlier. Yeah,

4:38

the council's it'll acts or I said

4:40

the ones we're going to be Consul

4:43

sixty five yep, they are probably us

4:45

are trying Yes and Publius Scylla were

4:47

arraigned under the law against bribery and

4:50

paid the penalties And that means they

4:52

can't be councils Aca. A

4:55

little later counselling was charged with extortion

4:57

and prevented from standing for the Consulship

4:59

sixty Five. So in other words they

5:02

gotta have new elections you have to

5:04

and tries to stand. And Silas says

5:06

he was charged with extortion and prevented

5:08

from founding of the com for ship

5:10

because he been able to. Nancy's kinda.

5:12

the see within the prescribed number is

5:15

this isn't right south next to see

5:17

things appear he was charged with extortion

5:19

but it was clearly that is to

5:21

yeah so already Silas on a bit

5:23

of uneven ground, but I don't know

5:25

whether that matters to the total story.

5:27

And there was at the same time

5:30

a young, noble, cold, nice piece of

5:32

a man of the utmost restlessness, poor

5:34

and given to intrigue. So the package

5:36

of three makes you a conspirator in

5:38

sell a size everything, go to date

5:40

on by the need of sons and

5:43

an evil character to overthrow the government.

5:45

So you've got these two consoles elect

5:47

to been told that can't take that

5:49

magistracy and this piece out who's just

5:51

generally take numbers and needs money and

5:53

he. reveals his plans to pass the

5:55

line and i'll cronus now are trying

5:57

yes is one of the consul who

5:59

can't be a consul. But

6:02

not the other consul who can't be a

6:04

consul. Instead of Sulla, probably a Sulla, we've

6:06

got Cataly. This is what some

6:08

people can't quite put together. What's

6:10

going on here? He's not the aggrieved party,

6:12

or maybe he is because he can't go

6:14

in the rerun election. He says, about the

6:17

5th of December, they all began to make

6:19

preparations to murder the consuls, that

6:22

is the replacement consuls, Lucius Cotta

6:24

and Lucius Torquatus, in the Capitol,

6:27

which is a sacrilegious place to do it, by the

6:29

way, the Temple of Jupiter, on the

6:31

1st of January, so when they take up their

6:33

consulship. They then proposed that

6:35

they themselves should seize the fascades, so these

6:37

are the symbols of power, you know, the

6:40

rods and axles. The literal uses as

6:42

a weapon. Yeah, absolutely. Nice symbolism there

6:44

at all. And send

6:46

Pizzo away with an army, he's the guy

6:48

who needs money, to take

6:50

possession of the two Spanish provinces. Now,

6:53

just note here that Pizzo does go out

6:56

to Spain after this. Okay,

6:58

all right. If we're kind of

7:00

creating some kind of made-up conspiracy,

7:02

then we've woken some facts in there.

7:04

Yeah. Upon the discovery of

7:06

that plot, so we don't get away with

7:09

it, they postponed their murderous designs until the

7:11

5th of February. So the plot is discovered,

7:14

but they'll just put it off. Yeah,

7:17

just starting to pull away at these

7:20

threads, aren't you? At that time, they

7:22

plotted the destruction not merely of the

7:24

consuls, but of many of the senators,

7:26

and had Catalyne not been overhasty in

7:28

giving the signal to his accomplices in

7:31

front of the Senate House, on

7:33

that day, the most dreadful crime since

7:35

the founding of the city of Rome

7:37

would have been perpetrated. It's pretty melodramatic.

7:40

But because the armed conspirators had not

7:42

yet assembled in sufficient numbers, the affair

7:45

came to nothing. Okay, so

7:47

it ran out of steam if it did

7:49

happen. Yeah. I mean, I guess if you're

7:51

going to give Salist or his sources some

7:53

credit, then maybe what you were objecting to,

7:55

which I think is reasonable, That

7:58

it was discovered, so they just put it off. Binder

8:00

is maybe some of the. Lower level

8:02

conspirators got found out or.

8:04

That was just rumors of a conspiracy so the

8:07

her own they might be to Allah. Unassisted January

8:09

let's as wait till I've been in place for

8:11

six weeks and then we'll do it more, get

8:13

rid of the house and as well. Well

8:16

I like in this chapter is not

8:18

even really to do with third possible

8:20

conspiracy but that it would have been

8:23

worse crime since the founding of the

8:25

city of. Rome. That's a very long

8:27

list though of isn't possible. Crimes that

8:29

are worse than this, I'm sure surface.

8:31

I. Think it's referring to Romulus killing.

8:34

Remember there are those I was I also

8:36

would I'm on the he they are those

8:38

ones. Have you met the Greco? As good

8:40

as. A

8:42

similar. Murders Yes. So that conspiracy

8:44

was authentic, proto. a conspiracy that

8:46

didn't get off the grant. and

8:49

that's the one that some people

8:51

don't believe. Just. To

8:53

finish that story off to get back

8:55

to the present and rebel have a

8:57

another think about the evidence or piece

8:59

for and his against that proto conspiracy.

9:01

In chapter nineteen we get along narratives

9:03

of piece of going off to Spain

9:05

and being murdered and whom I have

9:07

done that. Phallus says that the senate

9:09

had sent him Spain's get rid of

9:11

a corrupt politicians but he then suggests

9:13

that may be the local spaniards thought

9:15

he was too harsh and murdered him

9:17

but nobody really knows that says let

9:19

it out or and this story about

9:21

even who killed pisa. And

9:24

what he also suggests, which comes back to

9:26

what I was saying about Pompey is that

9:28

one reason they sent him off to Spain

9:30

was to counter the power of pumping. That.

9:33

They bonded someone out west with power

9:35

while Pompey south east with power near

9:37

her. And certainly what, Barbara Levick. He's

9:39

a really. Important scala on castle

9:42

line keep stressing. is just how

9:44

powerful pompey is and how the rest

9:46

of the center or lot of the

9:48

senate has might have resented fact that

9:51

means they're kind of allies to risk

9:53

still of possible ways in which their

9:55

power might be drawn down as we've

9:57

got these people who are becoming too

10:00

and Pompey's really the first of them

10:02

that is kind of taking hold of

10:04

the imagination. And that means that

10:06

they're alert to possible conspiracies, which means maybe

10:09

this one is made up. And

10:11

they even maybe build up Catiline to be more

10:13

of a risk than he was. Yeah.

10:15

So there's a kind of general atmosphere of fear,

10:18

I guess. Now, if you want some of the

10:20

quotes, Levick, who I just mentioned, Barbara Levick, called

10:22

the thing an entire forago. It's a Latin

10:24

word meaning porridge. It's

10:30

been called a phantom. It's been called a myth. And

10:33

by Ronald Syme, who is a great originally

10:36

New Zealand scholar of the

10:38

Roman Republic, a tissue of

10:40

improbabilities. But,

10:42

you know, Woodman, Tony Woodman, who

10:44

is himself a great scholar of

10:46

Roman historiography, has recently argued

10:49

just in 2021 that there is no

10:51

reason why we should not take solace

10:53

at his word. And he works

10:55

through it and argues for this passage.

10:57

So I don't know. I

10:59

like solace and I like Woodman's work. So

11:03

maybe it did happen. OK. Part

11:05

of me kind of goes, OK, maybe some

11:07

of these events did happen, like Pizzo going

11:09

off to Spain. And maybe,

11:12

you know, some people were caught on

11:14

a conspiracy and we're just going to

11:16

associate Catiline's name with these events because

11:20

he's a rotter and he's around. And

11:22

of course, he'd be involved. And he had

11:24

to have learned his trick somewhere. If

11:27

somebody's going to kill somebody for politics, Catiline's

11:30

going to be there. Yeah. You're

11:32

very much in line with Barbara Leavick

11:34

here, in good company. Yeah. She's arguing,

11:36

which I also find persuasive, pretty much

11:38

what you were saying, that if there

11:40

is a crime happening, it's good

11:43

to attach Catiline's name to it. And

11:45

in a way, we work backwards because

11:47

one of the people who says this

11:50

about Catiline is Cicero. And

11:52

Cicero says it about him when he's

11:54

claiming that Catiline is now conspiring against

11:56

him while he's consul. Yeah. So he

11:58

says, oh, we remember that time. when

12:00

the two consuls had been ousted and

12:02

they tried to come back. And

12:05

he attaches Catiline's name to that. But of course,

12:07

it's absolutely in his interest at that point to

12:09

paint Catiline as a career criminal. Yes, everything gets

12:11

brought up and attached to Catiline at that

12:14

point. The other reason, if I can

12:16

be allowed to just talk about obscure

12:18

authors for a moment, Asconius,

12:20

who wrote a commentary on

12:22

Cicero's work, and

12:24

Cicero wrote that work on standing

12:27

for election, which we don't have,

12:29

but we've got Asconius's commentary, he

12:32

says that there was a general belief

12:34

that Catiline and Gnaeus Piso had formed

12:36

a conspiracy to murder the Senate a

12:39

year before. And people grab

12:41

hold of that word, general belief, the

12:43

word opinion in Latin, and

12:45

say, oh, well, he doesn't believe it either. Okay.

12:48

So it's little things like that. Yeah, that's

12:50

inferring a lot from... It is inferring a lot.

12:54

From one word of a text that can be

12:56

translated a myriad of ways. One

12:59

notable exception, or at least

13:01

different version of this, is

13:04

that Suetonius, because he's

13:06

writing a biography of Julius

13:08

Caesar, says that the suspicion

13:10

fell on Sulla, who's

13:13

that other ousted consul

13:15

who never got to be consul, Crathos

13:18

and Caesar. Okay. They were

13:21

responsible for this unsuccessful

13:23

conspiracy. And he doesn't

13:25

mention Catiline? No. All right.

13:27

And he doesn't mention the other, not

13:29

consul. Rumour of

13:32

a conspiracy, and you attach the name you

13:34

want to it. Sure. Okay. All

13:37

right. I get what you're saying, mate. Yeah. So

13:39

I'm sorry. We can't be very certain about that. I

13:42

end up sitting on the fence, I'm afraid, which is my want. I

13:44

think it's interesting that Woodman has come out in

13:46

defence of it, given that the weight of Roman

13:48

scholarship has said, oh, it didn't happen. It didn't

13:50

happen. Okay. But

13:52

regardless, it's still referred to as the first

13:54

Catiline conspiracy? Yeah. If we refer to it at

13:56

all. We don't have to refer to the next

13:58

one as the second. is the

14:00

conspiracy. It's the one we are going

14:02

to be concentrating on. A big old quotation

14:05

mark around that one. What we're

14:07

going to do now is what leads up

14:09

to it, when Catiline definitely did campaign for

14:11

the Consorship of 63 and how

14:13

he campaigned. Okay, so close

14:16

brackets, paragraph,

14:18

paragraph, paragraph. Let's talk about the

14:21

Catiline conspiracy now. The

14:24

conspiracy. You put the emphasis on these.

14:29

Why are you using capital letters in the episode now? What

14:32

leads up to it? Okay,

14:34

sorry to say, some of this is contested

14:36

too. Yeah. But

14:38

yeah, basically, Catiline clearly expresses the desire to

14:40

be the Consul of 63 and it's going

14:43

to be a three-way race with him

14:46

and Cicero and Antonius.

14:49

Alright, so remember we did

14:51

mention in the last episode

14:53

that Cicero had thought about

14:55

joining ranks with Catiline. Yes. In

14:59

1865, we have evidence from his letters that

15:01

he was thinking about trying to sort of

15:03

edge Antonius out by joining

15:05

with Catiline, but he decided against her.

15:09

What we don't know and what

15:11

we get from some sources is

15:13

that Catiline was already gathering arms

15:15

and supporters. In other words,

15:18

already thinking if I lose, I've got this

15:20

as my backup. Salas says that

15:22

he was in chapter 17 of

15:25

the Catiline War. He

15:27

casts his intentions as

15:29

conspiratorial or criminal right from

15:32

the start. But

15:34

this could be just with the hindsight of

15:36

knowing that he failed in the consulship and

15:38

then there was a battle. I can

15:40

totally believe him already trying

15:43

to set the narrative of

15:45

if I lost, it's because it's been stolen

15:47

from me. Yeah, I'd agree.

15:50

Barbara Leavick says, and this is why

15:52

I really emphasise so much this fear

15:55

of Pompey and kind of general fear,

15:57

that there is an atmosphere of...

16:00

the top senators, the

16:02

optimates. Those senators who

16:04

really want to preserve the power of the

16:06

Senate and not dilute it at all and

16:09

not give way to any kind

16:11

of call for land rights or

16:14

changes in the composition of the

16:16

Senate, they've got this fear of

16:18

opposition and violence. And they worry

16:20

that, I mean, ironically, given that

16:22

Pompey ends up fighting for the

16:24

Senate against Caesar, who's the more

16:26

popular or popularist candidate, in

16:29

this period Pompey is seen

16:31

as someone who might not

16:33

be relied upon to support

16:35

the Senate. Sometimes he calls

16:38

out to the people and

16:40

makes those kind of demagogues

16:42

like speeches. So what they

16:44

think is happening is that

16:46

Cicero gets the backing of

16:48

those optimates to defeat this

16:50

threat from those popular candidates.

16:53

One of the people who's seen as a popular

16:55

candidate is Cataly. It's

16:57

all a bit topsy-turvy if you wanted

16:59

strict kind of columns of who's backing

17:01

who here. All right, we don't really

17:03

get that. This is not party politics.

17:06

It's not even party politics where people

17:08

sometimes change sides. We don't

17:10

really have optimates and

17:12

a popularist party. And

17:15

Cicero would not, you would

17:17

think, be a natural supporter

17:19

of the traditional families

17:22

of the Senate because he hasn't

17:24

had any relative who has been

17:26

consul or even senator before. He's

17:28

come from nowhere, in a way, very rich nowhere,

17:30

but still he's a new man,

17:33

an homo novos, whereas

17:37

Caesar comes from exactly the right kind

17:39

of family, high patrician family. Cicero

17:42

then seems to get in on the backing

17:44

of these people, and then he becomes that

17:46

kind of conservative, or maybe

17:48

he always was, who wants to

17:50

protect the Senate. So

17:52

Levik saying this is kind of the bargain

17:55

that Cicero strikes for the consulship and

17:57

a way that the more conservative developments in

18:00

the Senate want to again counteract Pompey's power

18:02

if we can get someone like Cicero who

18:04

will stand up for them because he is

18:07

the best speaker in Rome at that

18:09

time and that commands a lot of power

18:11

in itself. They see Catiline

18:13

as very much a demagogue calling

18:16

on the people, you know, calling

18:18

on their grievances that they should

18:20

back him because of those grievances

18:23

and the optimates hate that so they

18:25

really want to keep Catiline out. He's

18:28

playing fear politics or something like that. Yeah, that's

18:30

how they see it. Absolutely playing

18:32

on the way people feel

18:35

they've been left out, left behind. And

18:37

that he will help them out, therefore they should

18:39

vote for him. Okay, so it's all grievances then.

18:42

Yeah. Salas then

18:44

depicts the campaign's aim as to

18:46

overthrow the state even if

18:48

Catiline wins the consulship. So

18:51

it's not just that, and if I lose, look,

18:53

I've got this army out here that will rise

18:55

up for me. Even if he

18:57

wins the consulship, he's going to use that

18:59

consulship to overthrow the state. This

19:03

is strange in a way because if you get to be

19:05

consul, you have a lot of power anyway. But

19:08

what Salas has is in Chapter 17,

19:10

he has Catiline gather together other

19:13

senators and elites, the ones who

19:15

are in real strife, as Salas

19:17

says, the neediest and most reckless

19:19

of his acquaintance. And

19:21

he tempts them with riches and luxury. He

19:24

says, you know, you back me and I

19:27

will give you all of this easy life

19:29

and you'll get all of these luxury goods

19:31

and I'll pay you all this money. Basically,

19:33

he's bribing them. Yeah, yeah.

19:36

Salas, I would say is a hypocrite here because

19:38

you could easily argue that Julius Caesar did the

19:40

same thing and Salas is the huge backer of

19:42

Caesar. Anyway,

19:45

he's trying to show us Catiline in a

19:47

bad light pretty much every turn. But this

19:49

idea of the needy and the reckless, a

19:51

lot of Roman authors thought was

19:54

one of the reasons for the downfall

19:56

of the Republic, that you've got all of

19:59

these very powerful. men from rich

20:01

families, but they've spent all that

20:03

money or their families lost it.

20:05

So they've got position and authority

20:07

without having the means to maintain

20:09

that position. I think that's a

20:11

way for them to try and explain why they're willing to

20:14

talk to the masses. Otherwise, why would you

20:16

bother? Some

20:19

people implicate Crassus as well. I

20:21

mentioned Crassus before, at least by

20:23

Suetonius being implicated in the, must

20:25

do the scare quotes first, conspiracy.

20:28

If they think he's involved, it's a way of

20:30

getting back at Pompey, his

20:32

hated rival he's called here because

20:35

Pompey is so powerful. Commentators

20:37

point out, however, that this must be, this

20:40

doesn't really work. It's anachronistic

20:43

because any conspiracy would come

20:45

after Catalyne loses the election of 64. Why

20:49

would you have a conspiracy set in motion if

20:52

you're trying to be consul? Why would

20:54

you want both of those things to happen? You'd be

20:56

overthrowing yourself. So that

20:58

makes us question Salas's account, I must

21:01

admit. What instead

21:03

seems to be happening is that we're getting

21:05

this picture. It's a little bit like Plutarch

21:07

often does when we talked about any of

21:09

Plutarch's biographies, that he gives a

21:11

complete picture of someone's character. And if that

21:13

doesn't always fit the facts, then they might

21:17

exaggerate it or twist it in some way.

21:20

I think that might be what's happening here with

21:22

Salas, but he just wants to show Catalyne as

21:24

a bit of a wrecker from the start. That's

21:27

a very institutional thing to do.

21:30

If you think the institution should all

21:32

be thrown out, why would you

21:35

stand to be one of the

21:37

magistrates in that institution? Conspiring and

21:39

bribery and whatever else is being

21:42

implicated aside, there is general campaigning

21:44

going on. I mean, they can be

21:47

part of the same thing. Oh yeah, okay. They

21:49

don't need to be completely divorced from each other

21:51

as well. So what do we

21:53

know about Catalyne's, you know, vote for me kind of

21:55

shtick? Salas

21:57

gives us a picture of him. appealing

22:00

to people's sense of lost freedom and

22:02

he gives us a speech which you

22:05

know Salas would have written. It might

22:08

encompass what he knows of some of how

22:11

Catiline was trying to appear to the public.

22:13

So I'll just read a section of chapter

22:15

20. We really had to deep dive into

22:17

a few chapters of Salas. But I

22:19

think this is really good as a way of

22:22

at least showing us how Salas portrays

22:24

Catiline and perhaps how he

22:26

was actually acting himself. The

22:28

speech that Salas gives us, that Catiline gives

22:31

us as part of his electioneering, is not

22:33

a typical electioneering speech in some ways because

22:35

it's not too you know the vast masses

22:38

or even... So he's not standing in

22:40

the farm on the rostrum? No, he

22:42

actually says it's in a private

22:44

room and it's to those people

22:46

he's conspiring with because this is part

22:48

of Salas building up. But it

22:50

is also an electioneering type speech because

22:52

it's using the buzzwords of libitas,

22:54

you know liberty, Gloria, or no

22:57

glory and kind of appealing to an

22:59

idea that we don't have access to

23:01

these anymore. Vote for me or support

23:04

me and we'll get it

23:06

back. Okay. So he's using that good

23:08

old Rome used to be greater or

23:10

we used to have more access to its

23:12

greatness and luxuries and riches that

23:14

were available and now that's being

23:16

taken away from us. So there's grievances.

23:18

Alright, so make Rome great again. This

23:21

is how we do it. He says, my

23:23

resolution is fired more and more every day

23:25

when I consider what the condition of our

23:27

lives will be if we do not take

23:29

the initiative to set ourselves free. So he's

23:31

implying that they are in servitude. Forever

23:34

since the state fell under the jurisdiction

23:36

and sway of a few powerful men,

23:38

he's vague but you know

23:41

I guess it's people like Pompey, it

23:43

is always to them that kings and

23:45

petty rulers, nations and peoples pay taxes.

23:48

We're not getting that money. All

23:50

the rest of us, energetic, good, nobles

23:53

as well as nobodies, fine people,

23:56

have been a common herd

23:58

without influence, without prestige. subservient

24:00

to those to whom if the

24:02

state were healthy we would be

24:04

an object of dread. So this

24:06

is a great speech that

24:08

Salas reconstructed or invented that he

24:11

wants people to fear him. Yeah.

24:13

He's implying. Yeah. And

24:16

to fear not just him but his

24:18

little gang. Accordingly, all influence, power, office

24:20

and wealth are in their hands wherever

24:22

those individuals wish them to be. To

24:24

us they have left the threads of

24:26

prosecution, defeats in elections, convictions and poverty.

24:29

How much longer still will you put up

24:31

with this, O bravest of men? Now

24:35

that part at the end is clearly

24:37

a call back to Cicero's first speech

24:40

against Catiline which he starts with

24:42

how long do you intend to test our

24:44

patient's Catiline because Catiline is still sitting there

24:46

and he's telling him he should be out.

24:49

Okay. Gone because he's not worthy of

24:51

being in the Senate. And

24:54

he goes on, I've left a

24:56

little bit out of chapter 20

24:58

but continues, what mortal who has

25:00

a manly disposition can endure that

25:02

our opponents have a surfeit of

25:05

riches to squander in building upon

25:07

the sea and leveling mountains while we

25:09

lack the private means to buy

25:11

the bare necessities of life which

25:13

you can be sure they did

25:15

not. Their

25:17

idea of what poverty was would not

25:19

have been what the vast majority of

25:21

Romans experienced. But when he talks about

25:23

building upon the sea, I think

25:25

he or the Salas version of

25:27

him is referring to Lucullus who

25:29

had been a very successful general

25:31

and politician around the time of

25:34

Sulla and Marius and

25:36

been involved in those civil wars

25:38

who had then just given it

25:40

all up and retired into luxury

25:42

and extravagance and had actually built

25:44

extensions from his villas out to

25:46

the sea at Naples. Oh nice.

25:48

Okay. So these fishponds,

25:50

do you remember that the Romans were

25:53

kind of obsessed with the expenses around

25:55

fishponds and that showed

25:57

how extravagant people were if they

25:59

had... I don't know, a

26:01

fish worth 100,000 sesterces in their fish pond.

26:03

Yeah, yeah. So it's kind of all pointing

26:05

in that direction. We've got all these people

26:08

living in this extreme luxury and why have

26:10

I not got a piece of this? Jealousy

26:13

about wealth by the looks of this, power

26:15

and wealth. And it goes on and

26:17

on and on, talking about debt, talking about,

26:19

I want to put this right as Consul.

26:22

At the end of the speech he says, I

26:24

shall carry out as Consul these

26:26

very enterprises together with you unless

26:28

by chance my mind is self-deluded

26:30

and you are more ready to

26:32

be slaves than to rule. So

26:34

that's the alternative. Either you're going

26:36

to be slaves or you rise

26:38

up with me. Yeah. This

26:40

is what I've been talking about where Salist

26:42

really gives us this idea

26:44

of Catalan as somebody who

26:47

is preparing conspiracy even if he

26:49

is Consul. Okay. I

26:52

mean, that seemed to be rambling even just for

26:54

Salist. I didn't even give you all of it.

26:56

I hate to think what the real speech was

26:58

like. There may be no real speech. Some

27:01

tangents about wind farms and everything going on

27:03

there. What's going on? So

27:05

this amounts to Catalan really making

27:07

a lot of promises to

27:09

get allies. This isn't about

27:12

winning elections at this point. Yeah.

27:14

I mean, I guess you could say you

27:16

need to win over important people to win

27:18

an election at all. And

27:21

he's appealing to those who are in debt.

27:23

He's going to promise the cancellation of debts,

27:25

which came up every now and again. He's

27:28

promising the magistrates in priesthoods. And

27:31

look, I imagine this went on at some

27:33

kind of low key level with every

27:36

election, not just one way you were

27:38

intending to mount a conspiracy that you

27:40

got allies by saying, you know, I'll

27:42

make sure you get this priesthood. Oh,

27:44

of course. If you get you, but not just you,

27:47

obviously all the clients that you've got and you're

27:49

a patron of to vote for me as well.

27:51

Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I'm also in

27:53

this time, I'm sure. He also calls for

27:56

the execution of the rich proscriptions. Wow. You

27:59

would not say that in public. because the memory

28:01

of the bloodshed under the

28:04

regime of Sulla, Marius as well, had carried

28:06

out prescriptions, which is why it's so

28:08

weird that when we get to the next civil

28:10

war outside of the scope

28:12

of 63 BCE, we're going to have

28:15

prescriptions again with Octavian,

28:17

a couple of civil wars

28:19

later actually. The memory would have been alive. If

28:22

Catiline had his way and it spun out even

28:24

more, that prescriptions would have come up at

28:26

some point. Certainly this version of Catiline that

28:28

Sulla gives us, and that is

28:30

our main source for Catiline. In a

28:33

way, what Sulla says though is irrational,

28:35

because he says he's got allies in Spain, he's

28:38

got Piso in Spain, but Piso

28:40

is already dead and Sulla has told us that.

28:43

Maybe Catiline forgot. Maybe he did. Maybe it's

28:45

just more convenient for him to remember him

28:47

as being alive for the sake of this

28:49

argument, that nobody else notices

28:51

in the room. And

28:53

he says, it'll be fine because I'll have

28:56

Gaius Antonius as my colleague as consul. He's

28:58

not going to do anything ironic because of

29:00

Sallustwell knows it's going to be Gaius Antonius

29:02

and Cicero who will be consuls in 63. Very

29:06

much as Catiline is promising in this

29:08

speech, Cicero will manage to keep Antonius

29:10

in check by saying, you can have

29:13

a really good province next year. Just

29:15

do what I want you to do. That's right.

29:17

You be the puppet for the year. Pretty much.

29:20

And we finish off this

29:22

particular chapter of Catiline's attempt

29:25

to grab power where

29:27

Sallust tells us that these

29:30

people, basically Catiline is cronies,

29:33

make an oath together and an

29:35

oath where they drink human blood

29:37

mixed with wine. So we get

29:39

some sort of weird Gothic friezon

29:41

going on here. It makes it

29:43

absolutely outrageous and that shows their

29:45

allegiance to each other, they're drinking

29:47

human blood. Is it the Roman

29:49

equivalent of spitting on your hand and doing a handshake?

29:52

It might have been made up to

29:54

make Cicero's later actions look less outrageous

29:56

that he was dealing with real

29:59

lunatic freaks. here and he had to

30:01

do what he did. I'm not going to tell you

30:03

what he did but when we come to it, remember

30:05

this moment. Yes, okay. So

30:08

really everything that I've spoken about

30:10

in this episode is on

30:12

a little bit of shaky grind but I wanted

30:14

to go through it anyway partly to show the

30:17

way that Salist is setting up Katalyn, but

30:19

also just as a demonstration of how

30:22

we have to read between the lines

30:24

of our ancient sources sometimes and that

30:26

doing that might mean that we get

30:28

conflicting accounts coming from different

30:31

scholars. Yeah. But we are moving on

30:33

to firm aground with the actual

30:35

year of 63 BCE

30:37

and the events of that

30:39

year. There'll still be little arguments

30:42

about what Cicero is exaggerating because

30:44

as we'll see it's in his

30:46

interests to exaggerate what Katalyn's up

30:48

to. But we will now get

30:50

to a conspiracy we don't have to put quote

30:52

marks around and we'll

30:55

see how the Roman Republic deals

30:57

with a real shake that isn't

30:59

about a civil war. It's not

31:01

about two factions within

31:03

the state. It's possibly about someone

31:06

trying to entirely overturn the

31:08

state. A violent precursor

31:10

to what Octavian eventually does and

31:13

of course Octavian comes to power by violence too.

31:16

But it's not by going in and

31:18

murdering everyone in the Senate. It's through

31:20

civil war. Yeah. So this is

31:22

a kind of foreshadowing

31:24

of that conflict that we've got

31:26

between those who want to get

31:29

to power the traditional way and

31:31

those who are prepared to break the institutions of

31:34

Rome to get there. We're

31:51

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31:53

are on What is Left of Twitter. Rhiannon

31:55

is at Dr. Rhiannon Evans. I am at

31:58

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32:00

Rome Podcast. You can

32:02

also get in touch by sending

32:04

us an email, [email protected]. Emperors

32:07

of Rome is produced at La Trobe University

32:09

in Melbourne, Australia, on the traditional lands of

32:11

the Wurundjeri people. In the

32:13

next episode, we'll take a look at how

32:16

Catiline's plot was discovered and foiled. So

32:18

until then, I'm Matt Smith, you've been

32:20

fantastic, and thanks for listening.