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LUCAN'S CICERO: DISMEMBERING A LEGEND

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 November 2021

Y. Baraz
Y. Baraz*
Affiliation:
Princeton University
*
[email protected]
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Abstract

This paper proposes a new synthetic account of the presence of Cicero as both character and source in Lucan's Bellum Ciuile. Lucan's treatment is derived primarily from Virgil's technique for creating intertextually complex characters, but further builds on Sallust's displacement of Cicero in his narrative of the Catilinarian conspiracy and on the declamatory practice of reducing the orator to a few prominent and recognizable traits. Cicero the character, as he briefly appears at the opening of the seventh book, is not simply an ahistorical caricature: he is constructed through a careful series of allusions designed to indict his use of violence in the suppression of Catiline. Other prominent aspects of Cicero in the tradition are displaced and transferred to other characters more important to Lucan's design, Cato and Pompey. Lucan's depiction of Pompey, especially his death and decapitation, draws on the language and affect of the tradition associated with Cicero, using Cicero's own words and the obituary of Cicero in the lost historical epic of Cornelius Severus. Finally, the language of Cicero's peace-making efforts in his correspondence, suppressed in Lucan's depiction of him as a warmonger, forms an important part of the narrator's own emotional evocations of the impending catastrophe of civil war. The combination of models Lucan uses is more broadly reflective of his technique in composing a historical epic.

Keywords

LucanCiceroPompeyCatointertextualityhistorical epiccharacter
Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 71 , Issue 2 , December 2021 , pp. 721 - 740
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Classical Association

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Footnotes

A version of this paper was first presented at the conference Ritratti di Cicerone–Portraying Cicero, held in Rome in May 2019, and later versions to a workshop for graduate students at the University of Athens and to audiences at Cambridge University and the University of Oslo. I am grateful for all the feedback I received. My thanks also to my colleagues Denis Feeney and Robert Kaster and to this journal's anonymous reader and the editor for their comments and suggestions.

References

1 Cic. Fam. 9.18.2 in acie non fui. See Esposito, P., ‘Cicerone a Farsàlo’, Ciceroniana on line 2 (2018), 39–54Google Scholar, at 40–3 for a recent synthesis of the evidence. On Lucan's distortion, N. Lanzarone, M. Annaei Lucani Belli Civilis liber VII (Florence, 2016), 148 on 7.62–7: ‘La scelta di Lucano viola gravemente la vericidità storica’; cf. a sequential overview in Esposito (this note), 45–8, to which can be added Rambaud, M., ‘L'apologie de Pompée par Lucain au livre VII de la Pharsale’, RÉL 33 (1955), 258–96Google Scholar, at 263–4; D. Gagliardi, M. Annaei Lucani Belli Civilis liber VII (Florence, 1975), 20 on 7.63, and his summary, 49–50; and Lounsbury, R., ‘History and motive in Book Seven of Lucan's Pharsalia’, Hermes 14 (1976), 210–39Google Scholar, at 213.

2 Caricature: E. Malcovati, ‘Lucano e Cicerone’, Athenaeum 41 (1953), 288–97, at 291; E. Narducci, ‘Cicerone nella “Pharsalia” di Lucano’, in id. (ed.), Aspetti della fortuna di Cicerone nella cultura latina (Florence, 2003), 78–91, at 82–4; M. Fucecchi, ‘Partisans in civil war’, in P. Asso (ed.), Brill's Companion to Lucan (Leiden, 2011), 237–56, at 247; G. La Bua, Cicero and Roman Education: The Reception of the Speeches and Ancient Scholarship (Cambridge, 2019), 106. Esposito (n. 1), 49–50 connects Lucan's disapproval to the split between ‘ammirazione letteraria e riserve etico-politiche’ seen in Sen. Breu. 5.1–3. A. Gowing, ‘Tully's boat: responses to Cicero in the Imperial period’, in C. Steel (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Cicero (Cambridge, 2013), 233–50, at 244 sees the portrait as on balance a positive one.

3 Rambaud (n. 1), 263–6, followed by Lanzarone (n. 1), 148 on 7.62–7, sees the episode as part of a more general effort to absolve Pompey of responsibility for the defeat; similarly, Gagliardi (n. 1), 20; Lounsbury (n. 1), 213–14; E. Narducci, Lucano: un'epica contro l'impero (Rome, 2002), 299–302; id. (n. 2), 83. This interpretation does not account for the choice of Cicero in particular nor for the negative portrayal of the orator. P. Roche, Lucan De Bello Ciuili Book VII (Cambridge, 2019), 84 places the emphasis on Pompey in a more nuanced way: ‘Lines 62–85 widen the scope of responsibility for Pharsalus without exonerating Pompey’; he follows the scholarly tradition in which Cicero here stands for the authority of the Senate. I. Meunier, Le De bello ciuili de Lucain, une parole en mutation: de la rhétorique républicaine à une poétique de la guerre civile (Diss., Paris, 2012), 181–204 moves beyond the focus on Pompey and stresses the importance of critique of unscrupulous oratory, but in treating Cicero simply as a stand-in for eloquence de-emphasizes other aspects of the passage. Most recently, A. Baertschi, ‘Cicero, Lucan, and rhetorical role-play in Bellum Civile 7’, in L. Zientek and M. Thorne (edd.), Lucan's Imperial World: The Bellum Civile in its Contemporary Contexts (London, 2020), 51–70 offers a reading of Cicero's speech as a self-consciously fictional suasoria, ‘deliberate rhetorical role-play’ (at 52).

4 This general technique is a model for all later Latin epic poets, not only Lucan. For the Flavian epicists’ deployment of ‘combinatorial imitation’ in relation to Virgil's own text, see Hardie, P., ‘Flavian epicists on Virgil's epic technique’, Ramus 18 (1989), 3–20CrossRefGoogle Scholar, with examples from Ovid and Lucan at 4–5.

5 An extreme case, perhaps, but a useful illustration; cf. N. Horsfall, A Companion to the Study of Virgil (Leiden, 1995), 133: ‘In despair, attentive readers of Aen. 4 are reduced to drawing up lengthy lists of Dido's mythical and literary analogues.’

6 On the Homeric characters, see G. Knauer, Die Aeneis und Homer. Studien zur poetischen Technik Vergils mit Listen der Homerzitate in der Aeneis (Göttingen, 1964); the fold-out charts at the end of the book serve as an excellent visual representation of the splitting technique; on Apollonius, D. Nelis, Vergil's Aeneid and the Argonautica of Apollonius Rhodius (Cambridge, 2001); on tragedy, e.g. V. Panoussi, Vergil's “Aeneid” and Greek Tragedy: Ritual, Empire, and Intertext (Cambridge, 2009); cf. Baraz, Y., ‘Euripides’ Corinthian princess in the Aeneid’, CPh 104 (2009), 317–30Google Scholar; on Catullus, P. Oksala, ‘Das Aufblühen des römischen Epos: Berührungen zwischen der Ariadne-Episode Catulls und der Dido-Geschichte Vergils’, Arctos 3 (1962), 167–97; on Cleopatra, A.S. Pease, Publi Vergili Maronis liber quartus (Cambridge, MA, 1935), 24–8; cf. A. Keith, Engendering Rome: Women in Latin Epic (Cambridge, 2000), 118–19.

7 Mediated through the analogous similes in Apollonius: Nelis (n. 6), 82–6, 133. For an analysis of Virgil's recasting of the Nausicaa–Artemis simile, considered inappropriate by Probus, see, for example, West, D., ‘Multiple-correspondence similes in the Aeneid’, JRS 59 (1969), 40–9Google Scholar, at 43–4; M.K. Thornton, ‘The adaptation of Homer's Artemis–Nausicaa simile in the Aeneid’, Latomus 44 (1985), 615–22. V. Pöschl, Die Dichtkunst Virgils (Wiesbaden, 1950), 113 briefly considers the tragic implications of the two related similes.

8 On Camilla as Cleopatra, Viparelli, V., ‘Camilla: a queen undefeated, even in death’, Vergilius 54 (2008), 9–23Google Scholar, at 15–23.

9 One reason often given in the scholarship is bias (for overview, see P. McGushin, C. Sallustius Crispus. Bellum Catilinae: A Commentary [Leiden, 1977], 154–5 on Cat. 22.3), but see the effective rebuttal and discussion of reasons for omitting the Catilinarians in R. Syme, Sallust (Berkeley, 1964), 105–6, 110–11. See also Gowing (n. 2), 234–5; La Bua (n. 2), 102–3.

10 Cf. Syme (n. 9), 111: ‘he [Cicero] has to yield prominence at once to Caesar and to Cato.’

11 Cat. 43.1, with McGushin (n. 9), 218 ad loc.

12 See T. Keeline, The Reception of Cicero in the Early Roman Empire: The Rhetorical Schoolroom and the Creation of a Cultural Legend (Cambridge, 2018); R.A. Kaster, ‘Becoming “CICERO”’, in P. Knox and C. Foss (edd.), Style and Tradition: Studies in Honor of Wendell Clausen (Stuttgart, 1998), 248–63; Roller, M., ‘Color-blindness: Cicero's death, declamation, and the production of history’, CPh 92 (1997), 109–30Google Scholar; R. Degl'Innocenti Pierini, ‘Cicerone nella prima età imperiale’, in E. Narducci (ed.), Aspetti della fortuna di Cicerone nella cultura Latina (Florence, 2003), 3–54. Cf. La Bua (n. 2), 100–12; Gowing (n. 2), 236–7; L. Canfora, ‘Immagine tardoantica di Cicerone’, in E. Narducci (ed.), Cicerone nella tradizione europea: dalla tarda antichità al Settecento (Florence, 2006), 3–16, at 3–6.

13 Accounts of the Early Imperial historians generally follow the declamatory patterns. See Keeline (n. 12), 118–30 on Velleius Paterculus, Valerius Maximus and Pliny the Elder, and Degl'Innocenti Pierini (n. 12), 31–7 on Velleius and Valerius; cf. Gowing (n. 2), 237–8 on Velleius.

14 Cicero's eloquence is at the centre of his declamatory reception; see the studies listed in note 12 above.

15 References in Lanzarone (n. 1), 153 ad loc. Meunier (n. 3), 181–204 reads the episode as primarily a critique of oratory, for which Cicero is a vehicle.

16 passus tam longa silentia alludes to Cicero's own references to extended silence as constraint, most famously in the first sentence of the Pro Marcello (1): diuturni silenti, patres conscripti, quo eram his temporibus usus—non timore aliquo, sed partim dolore, partim uerecundia—finem hodiernus dies attulit, idemque initium quae uellem quaeque sentirem meo pristino more dicendi. See Narducci (n. 2), 82.

17 Att. 7.14.3 sums up his view of the matter: equidem ad pacem hortari non desino, quae uel iniusta utilior est quam iustissimum bellum cum ciuibus. For the correspondence, see n. 58 below.

18 On the importance of this framing, cf. Meunier (n. 3), 189–91, with different emphases.

19 N. Horsfall, Virgil, Aeneid 11. A Commentary (Leiden, 2003), 242 ad loc., the only commentator to note this appearance of the word, describes it as a ‘metrically convenient substitute for facundia’. It should be noted, however, that facundia does not occur in Republican poetry other than once in Terence (discussed below), and Virgil himself never uses it (nor does Cicero). Aside from Terence, the earliest attested poetic usage is in Horace (four times). Furthermore, neither Cicero nor Virgil uses the adjective facundus.

20 For the unmilitary Cicero, Livy, Per. 111 says it all: uir nihil minus quam ad bella natus.

21 Luc. 1.685–6 hunc ego, fluminea deformis truncus harena | qui iacet, agnosco and 8.698–9 truncusque uadosis | huc illuc iactatur aquis, alluding to Verg. Aen. 2.557–8 iacet ingens litore truncus, | auulsumque umeris caput et sine nomine corpus. See E. Narducci, ‘Il tronco di Pompeo (Troia e Roma nella Pharsalia)’, Maia 25 (1973), 317–25, at 321–4; cf. Mebane, J., ‘Pompey's head and the body politic in Lucan's De bello ciuili’, TAPhA 146 (2016), 191–215Google Scholar, at 209–10; A. McClellan, Abused Bodies in Roman Epic (Cambridge, 2019), 72–3.

22 Horsfall (n. 19), 215: ‘a contemporary, political, even specifically Sallustian flavor to V's remarkable invention’; cf. 216 on 338 and Drances’ wealth: ‘Dr., after all, is a late-republican politician’, citing Sall. Cat. 3.4.

23 Meunier (n. 3), 189–90 emphasizes the Ovidian usage, referring to prose as opposed to poetic eloquence.

24 The passage makes clear that the skill belongs to an orator as opposed to an actor, and the context which it invokes is forensic (Ter. Haut. 11–15): oratorem esse uoluit me, non prologum: | uostrum iudicium fecit; me actorem dedit. | sed hic actor tantum poterit a facundia | quantum ille potuit cogitare commode | qui orationem hanc scripsit quam dicturu’ sum?

25 K. Vretska, C. Sallustius Crispus: De Catilinae Coniuratione, 2 vols. (Heidelberg, 1976), 2.631 on Sall. Cat. 53.3. Vretska also suggests that the word has poetic colouring, but it is difficult to assert that with any confidence, given the lack of any other attestations between Terence and Sallust.

26 Greek: Cat. 53.3, Iug. 63.3, Hist. 2.47.4; Memmius: Iug. 30.4; Sulla: Iug. 102.4.

27 canina eloquentia, ut ait Appius, exercebatur. See the summary of various assignments of the fragment in J.T. Ramsey, Fragments of the Histories. Letters to Caesar (Cambridge, MA, 2015), 419 (inc. 33). The connection to Cicero comes from a quotation in Lactant. Diu. inst. 6.18.26, which led Maurenbrecher to assign it to Hist. 4.54. Lactantius uses the quotation in the course of criticizing Cicero, but there is nothing to indicate definitively that his source referred to Cicero; moreover, Quintilian's use of the same phrase, attributed directly to Appius, in reference to behaviour of which he highly disapproves (pure abuse), makes it unlikely that the phrase was known to have been used against Cicero.

28 Editions with commentary: E. Courtney, Fragmentary Latin Poets (Oxford, 1993), 325–7 (fr. 13); A. Hollis, Fragments of Roman Poetry c.60 bc–ad 20 (Oxford, 2007), 358–67 (fr. 219). See also S. Feddern, Die Suasorien des Älteren Seneca (Berlin, 2013), 465–79. The only study devoted to the poet is H. Dahlmann, Cornelius Severus (Wiesbaden, 1975).

29 The lines are a rewriting (and, according to Sen. Suas. 6.27, an improvement) of a line of Sextilius Ena, deflendus Cicero est Latiaeque silentia linguae. See Hollis (n. 28), 338–9 (fr. 202).

30 See Volk, K. and Zetzel, J., ‘Laurel, tongue, and glory (Cicero, De Consulatu Suo, fr. 6 Soubiran)’, CQ 65 (2015), 204–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 215 on its use by Pliny the Elder in his praise of Cicero's eloquence: HN 7.117 facundiae Latiarumque litterarum parens.

31 For discussion, see Meunier (n. 3), 203–4; cf. Esposito (n. 1), 48. On the tone and the occasion of Catullus’ poem there is no agreement; for discussion of the issues, see D. Selden, ‘Ceueat lector: Catullus and the rhetoric of performance’, in R. Hexter and D. Selden (edd.), Innovations of Antiquity (New York, 1992), 461–512, at 464–7 and L. Roman, Poetic Autonomy in Ancient Rome (Oxford, 2014), 84–8; see D.F.S. Thomson, Catullus (Toronto, 1997), 323–4 for earlier bibliography.

32 De Consulatu Suo fr. 6 Soubiran = FPL 4 11 = Courtney (n. 28), 172 (fr. 12). The second half of the line is reported differently in different sources; see Volk and Zetzel (n. 30).

33 See L.M. Fratantuono and R.A. Smith, Virgil, Aeneid 8 (Leiden, 2018), 686 on 8.668 for discussion of possible hostility on Virgil's part. In drawing on this passage Lucan splits the two descriptors, taking Catiline's fear to the introduction of Cicero and keeping the threatening Catiline for the passage that parallels Virgil's, the account of the Underworld given by the corpse in Book 6 (6.793–4). There Catiline is also mentioned near Cato (6.789–90) and is characterized as minax.

34 Cf. Gowing (n. 2), 235: ‘Virgil has done what the historian Sallust could not or would not do, write Cicero out of Catiline's story.’

35 Contra Narducci (n. 2), 81 (cf. id. [n. 3], 359 n. 86), who reads Lucan as correcting Virgil and accepting legitimate use of violence.

36 Cf. La Bua (n. 2), 106.

37 Sallust highlights the contrast between Cato and Caesar in competing speeches in the Senate debate on the fate of the conspirators, followed by a syncrisis, Cat. 51–4, while writing Cicero's Fourth Catilinarian out of his account.

38 On Cicero's contribution to the formation of the myth of Cato, see J. Hall, ‘Serving the times: Cicero and Caesar the dictator’, in W.J. Dominik, J. Garthwaite and P.A. Roche (edd.), Writing Politics in Imperial Rome (Leiden, 2009), 89–110, at 94–9; H. Wassmann, Ciceros Widerstand gegen Caesars Tyrannis: Untersuchungen zur politischen Bedeutung der philosophischen Spätschriften (Bonn, 1996), 139–59; cf. R. Stem, ‘Cicero and the legacy of Cato Uticensis’ (Diss., University of Michigan, 1999).

39 E. Narducci, ‘Cicerone poeta in Lucano’, MD 7 (1982), 177–84, at 177–8 discusses the relationship between 9.199 and 7.63–4 as polar opposites. For 9.199 in relation to 8.813–14, see C. Wick, M. Annaeus Lucanus: “Bellum Civile”, Liber IX. Kommentar (Munich, 2004), 74 ad loc.

40 See Volk and Zetzel (n. 30), 209–11 on Cicero's response to Piso's interpretation of his line in this vein in Pis. 74.

41 Sen. Suas. 6.26. For the fragment and its later intertexts, see Dahlmann (n. 28), 74–119.

42 Dahlmann (n. 28), 74–119 comments on the general similarity in tenor between the Severus passage and the two eulogies of Pompey in the Bellum Ciuile (Dahlmann [n. 28], 77–8) and discusses many of the verbal echoes.

43 Another intertext that foreshadows Pompey's death and mistreatment of his corpse here is to Virgil's Hector, raptatus bigis ut quondam, aterque cruento | puluere perque pedes traiectus lora tumentis (Aen. 2.272–3), squalentem barbam et concretos sanguine crinis (2.277): see McClellan (n. 21), 76–7.

44 An emotional account of Pompey's death given by his son, 9.125–45, similarly emphasizes the dismemberment and the ignominious treatment of the general's head.

45 It is there inserted among achievements more commonly associated with Pompey's military achievements, 8.553–5 non domitor mundi nec ter Capitolia curru | inuectus regumque potens uindex senatus | uictorisque gener …

46 A. Richlin, ‘Cicero's head’, in J.I. Porter (ed.), Constructions of the Classical Body (Ann Arbor, 1999), 190–211 explores the meaning of decapitation in Roman culture.

47 T. Biggs, ‘Cicero, quid in alieno saeculo tibi? The “Republican” rostra between Caesar and Augustus’, in S. Rebeggiani, M. Loar and S. Murray (edd.), The Cultural History of Augustan Rome: Texts, Monuments, and Topography (Cambridge, 2019), 27–44, at 39–43 connects spirantia ora here to spirantia aera in Anchises’ speech in Verg. Aen. 6.847 in a productive reading of the imago of Cicero and others in Cornelius Severus in relation to statues on the rostra.

48 As far as we know; it is possible that, if we had more of the De Consulatu Suo, we could see more of it in Lucan as well.

49 Cic. Rep. 2.51 with J. Zetzel, Cicero De Re Publica: Selections (Cambridge, 1995), 205–6 ad loc. J. Zarecki, Cicero's Ideal Statesman in Theory and Practice (London, 2014) is a recent treatment that argues for the importance of the concept to Cicero's practice; he makes a case (69–76) for the influence of Pompey's sole consulship on Cicero's ideal statesman.

50 Cf. F.M. Ahl, Lucan: An Introduction (Ithaca, 1976), 162, who assumes that Pompey is the model for Cicero's rector.

51 Cf. Narducci (n. 2), 89–90.

52 For a detailed discussion of Pompey's death, funeral and laments over him in the poem, see McClellan (n. 21), 120–43, with 68–78 on decapitation; cf. M. Erasmo, Reading Death in Ancient Rome (Columbus, 2008), 109–27 with an emphasis on Lucan's manipulations of Roman funerary ritual.

53 The only other mention of Cordus is in [Aur. Vict.] De uir. ill. 77.9. See Santini, C., ‘Scenari temporali alternative per il Bellum Civile di Lucano’, Prometheus 33 (2007), 37–48Google Scholar, at 39; Fucecchi (n. 2), 254–5. Brennan, D.B., ‘Cordus and the burial of Pompey’, CPh 64 (1969), 103–4Google Scholar suggests that the name is a homage to Cremutius Cordus, a historian whose death notice for Cicero is among those cited in the sixth suasoria of Seneca the Elder. A. Ambühl, Krieg und Bürgerkrieg bei Lucan und in der griechischen Literatur (Berlin, 2015), 281 n. 249 derives the name from cor, on analogy with Sophocles’ Antigone, and R. Scarcia, ‘Morte e (in)sepoltura di Pompeo’, in G. Brugnoli and F. Stok (edd.), Pompei exitus: variazioni sul tema dall'antichità alla controriforma (Pisa, 1996), 125–48, at 135 n. 25 locates the source of his position, quaestor, in his search for Pompey's body (quaesitum 8.719).

54 Cordus’ pietas overcomes his fear, Luc. 7.717–19 ille per umbras | ausus ferre gradum uictum pietate timorem | conpulit; his actions substitute for the filial pietas the Romans owe Pompey, 7.732 ut Romana suum gestent pia colla parentem; and pietas recurs as motivation at the end of the ceremony, 7.785–6 cogit pietas inponere finem | officio.

55 In the cycle of twelve epitaphs within the Symposium XII Sapientes, Lamia is mentioned three times—Sap. 114.6 (= Anth. Lat. 608), Sap. 117.6 (= Anth. Lat. 611) and Sap. 120.1 (= Anth. Lat. 614)—and referred to as amicus at 109.1 (= Anth. Lat. 603), the first line of the cycle. See A. Friedrich, Das Symposium der XII sapientes (Berlin, 2002), 213–16; for what we know about Lamia, see H.H. Davis, ‘Cicero's burial’, Phoenix 12 (1958), 174–7; Treggiari, S., ‘Cicero, Horace, and mutual friends: Lamiae and Varrones Murenae’, Phoenix 27 (1973), 245–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 246–53.

56 Treggiari (n. 55), 249.

57 Lamia's pietas: Sap. 120.1 Cicero est Lamiae pietate sepultus; it is implicit in all the mentions. Cordus’ pietas: 8.756–7, with N. Coffee, ‘Social relations in Lucan's Bellum Civile’, in P. Asso (ed.), Brill's Companion to Lucan (Leiden, 2011), 417–32, at 422.

58 D. Galli, ‘Lucano lettore di Cicerone’, in P. Esposito and C. Walde (edd.), Letture e lettori di Lucano (Pisa, 2015), 73–84; cf. E. Malcovati, ‘Lucano e Cicerone’, Athenaeum 41 (1953), 288–97; V. Holliday, Pompey in Cicero's “Correspondence” and Lucan's “Civil War” (The Hague, 1969). See also Baertschi (n. 3), 58–61 for an overview of Cicero's attitudes to peace and the competing generals in the correspondence of the early 40s.

59 Discussed by Galli (n. 58), 75.

60 Instability: Galli (n. 58) cites Att. 7.1.3 (= SB 124) tanta erat illorum coniunctio, nunc impendet, ut et tu ostendis ego uideo, summa inter eos contentio; for the inevitability of the clash, see I. Gildenhardt, ‘Reckoning with tyranny: Greek thoughts on Caesar in Cicero's Letters to Atticus in early 49’, in S. Lewis (ed.), Ancient Tyranny (Edinburgh, 2006), 197–209 for the letters from early 49 b.c.e.; cf. Holliday (n. 58), especially 29–31 on ‘Pompey as dynastēs’; see also A. Casamento, La parola e la guerra: rappresentazioni letterarie del Bellum Civile in Lucano (Bologna, 2005), 24–37 on Lucan's portrayal of Caesar and Pompey with a focus on connections to the conflict between Marius and Sulla.

61 See S. McConnell, Philosophical Life in Cicero's Letters (Cambridge, 2014), 93–6 for the philosophical foundations of this letter. McConnell reads Cicero as positioning himself as the moderator in light of the others’ failure. See also McConnell (this note), 96–100 on the centrality of concordia in letters from this period in relation to Plato's Seventh Letter.

62 H.I. Flower, The Art of Forgetting: Disgrace and Oblivion in Roman Political Culture (Chapel Hill, 2006), 101–2.

63 See especially 2.320–2 nec, si fortuna fauebit, | hunc quoque totius sibi ius promittere mundi | non bene conpertum est. 2.318, regnare uolenti, is Ciceronian not only in spirit but also in expression. I thank the journal's anonymous reader for drawing my attention to the speech.

64 Cf. J. Henderson, Fighting for Rome: Poets and Caesars, History and Civil War (Cambridge, 1998), 183: ‘This narrator loathes the progress of his story of Caesarian triumph, loves mora, delay, obstruction, diversion.’ For the peculiar temporality that results as Lucan, from the future, looks forward to Pompey's defeat and the death of the Republic, see E.V. Mulhern, ‘Lucan's nostalgia and the infection of memory’, in L. Zientek and M. Thorne (edd.), Lucan's Imperial World: The Bellum Civile in its Contemporary Contexts (London, 2020), 209–28.

65 On dismemberment and violence in Lucan, see S. Bartsch, Ideology in Cold Blood: A Reading of Lucan's Civil War (Cambridge, MA, 1997); M. Dinter, Anatomizing Civil War: Studies in Lucan's Epic Technique (Ann Arbor, 2012); McClellan (n. 21), 120–42 and 115–69; in Neronian literature, G. Most, ‘Disiecta membra poetae: the rhetoric of dismemberment in Neronian poetry’, in R. Hexter and D. Selden (edd.), Innovations of Antiquity (New York, 1992), 391–419.

66 The image of poetic text as a body, dismembered when its unity is disturbed, goes back to Arist. Poet. 8.1451a30–5 and receives its definitive Latin formulation in Horace's disiecti membra poetae (Sat. 1.4.62); for the critical tradition underlying Horace's image, see K. Freudenburg, The Walking Muse: Horace on the Theory of Satire (Princeton, 1993), 145–50; on the Horatian textual body in the Sermones and the Odes, see J. Farrell, ‘Horace's body, Horace's books’, in S.J. Heyworth, P.G. Fowler and S.J. Harrison (edd.), Classical Constructions: Papers in Memory of Don Fowler, Classicist and Epicurean (Oxford, 2007), 174–93.