Political Speeches (Oxford World's Classics) (55 page)

the job of city praetor
: the most prestigious and important of the praetorships.

those rods and axes
: the
fasces
(see Glossary).

to take refuge in a war against fugitives
: in this translation
fugitivi
is normally rendered ‘runaway slaves’, but here ‘fugitives’ is preferred in order to preserve Cicero’s (very characteristic) play on words.

the setback at Tempsa
: nothing is known about this incident beyond what Cicero goes on to say in §§40–1. Clearly there was a minor slave rising in 71 at Tempsa in Bruttium (on the west coast of Italy in the extreme
south), and Verres rejected the request of the people of Vibo Valentia (30 miles south of Tempsa) to take military action against the slaves.

you wore a workman’s smock and a Greek cloak
: he should of course have been wearing a toga. The suggestion is that he had gone native in Sicily and so disgraced his office by appearing in Greek dress; moreover, the casual and banausic nature of his outfit compounded the offence. Cicero’s audience would have been shocked that Roman culture and authority should be compromised in this way. Cf. the governor Lucius Metellus’ rebuke to Cicero for addressing the Syracusans in their native Greek (
Ver
. 2.4.147).

his behaviour when he was leaving for his province
: see the penultimate sentence of §34.

for the sake of something
: i.e. wearing clothes of his own preference.

the temple of Bellona
: Bellona was the goddess of war, and her temple was situated in the Campus Martius. Since it was outside the city boundary, the senate often met there when it needed to consult with generals, whose command would be forfeited if they entered the city (cf. note on
Ver
. 45 above). Note that Cicero’s argument here undermines his earlier view (implied at §§39 and 40) that Verres should have acceded to the request made of him by the people of Vibo Valentia. Given that it was not the wish of the senate that Verres take action against the slaves, he clearly did right in refusing to do so (in any case it would have involved exceeding his powers, which did not extend outside his province).

Velia
: 20 miles south of Paestum, roughly halfway between Sicily and Rome.

The laws which forbid this
: the
lex Claudia
(218
BC
) restricted the size of ship which a senator or his son might own to a maximum capacity of 300 amphorae. The purpose was to prevent senators engaging in trade, an activity considered unworthy of their status. The law was carried despite near-unanimous opposition from the senate, and it is doubtful whether it was ever observed.

you are not permitted to travel anywhere at all
: senators were not permitted to leave Italy except on public service. In practice, however, if they wished to travel abroad, they invented an excuse (such as the necessity to fulfil a vow), and obtained an unrestricted legateship (
legatio libera
). This allowed them to travel as they pleased, at public expense.

Even the temple on the Capitol
: for this temple, see first note on §36 above. It had originally been built in 509
BC
, but was destroyed by fire in 83. At the time of Verres’ trial the rebuilding (to which Cicero refers in this sentence) was almost complete; the new temple was dedicated the following year.

the fetials
: a college of twenty priests who represented Rome in its dealings with other nations, particularly with regard to treaties and declarations of war.

impaired the defences of the state
: Cicero conveniently overlooks the fact that, though Messana had been let off having to provide a ship, Tauromenium, which did not normally provide one, had been made to do so, and so the overall defences of the state were in fact unchanged.

the strait
: i.e. of Messina, separating Sicily from Italy.

they had recently done us good service
: in 264
BC
Messana appealed to Rome for help against Carthage and Syracuse, thus starting the process by which Rome became master of Sicily (the First Punic War, 264–241
BC
). The treaty was agreed after 241.

a senatorial decree and the Terentian-Cassian law
: the decree was passed at the beginning of each year, and laid down what the funds allotted to provincial governors were to be spent on. The
lex Terentia Cassia
, on the other hand, was a law carried by the consuls of 73, Marcus Terentius Varro Lucullus and Gaius Cassius Longinus. This provided for the compulsory purchase of grain from Sicily each year, since the tribute (a tithe, i.e. 10 per cent of their produce) which was demanded of most of the Sicilian states (all those without independent status or a treaty exempting them) was inadequate to Rome’s needs.

stipulated in the censors’ law
: land that was classed as public land (typically land originally taken in war) belonged to the Roman people and was let to tenants on terms laid down by the censors.

stipulated by the law of Hiero
: when the Romans gained control of Sicily in 241
BC
, they saw no need to alter the existing system of tax collection, that of Hiero II of Syracuse (
c
. 271–216
BC
), based on tithes. In the first century
BC
the same system was still in operation.

the law
: not the
lex Terentia Cassia
, since that dated only from 73, but an earlier one which made similar provision.

taken from his own notebook
: it is questionable whether Cicero really had access to such a document; he may be inventing evidence for the published speech that he could not have used in the trial.

Here are our interpreters … in religion!
: the implied contrast is with the fetials (see note on §49 above).

Gaius Sacerdos and Sextus Peducaeus
: Verres’ two immediate predecessors, Gaius Licinius Sacerdos (governor in 74) and Sextus Peducaeus (governor in 76–75).

in the days when they provided us with auxiliary troops
: i.e. before they were granted Roman citizenship under the
lex Iulia
in 90
BC
, during the Social War. Once they had Roman citizenship, they served in the legions and not the auxiliary units.

Publius Caesetius and Publius Tadius
: Caesetius was Verres’ quaestor at Lilybaeum in 72 and 71, Tadius one of his legates (they are referred to as ‘his quaestor and his legate’ below). Both were senators.

very good looking young men
: to be sold as domestic slaves, and worth a great deal of money.

Megaris
: i.e. the site of Megara Hyblaea, a city destroyed by Marcus Claudius Marcellus in 213
BC
, but at this date still with some inhabitants.

Publius Servilius
: Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus, consul of 79, governor of Cilicia in 78–74, and later censor in 55. As governor he suppressed the Cilician pirates before going on to fight against the mountain tribes; he was rewarded with a triumph in 74 and the
cognomen
‘Isauricus’ (from his capture of Isaura Vetus, where an inscription naming him has been found). He was one of the jurors in this trial, so Cicero takes the opportunity to praise him.

the quarries at Syracuse
: most famous as the place where the Syracusans imprisoned their 7,000 Athenian and allied captives after the defeat of the Athenian expedition against Sicily in 413
BC
, as memorably described by Thucydides (7.87). It is slightly surprising that Cicero should claim that most of the jury had seen the quarries; probably he is simply flattering them as well-travelled and educated men.

this man who was only masquerading as the pirate captain
: the subject of Verres’ substitution of the fake pirate in place of the real one had already cropped up in the first hearing (§73).

Centuripae
: a hill town 17 miles south-west of Mt Etna. Verres might well counter that a remote town well away from the sea was an eminently sensible place to imprison a pirate. But Cicero ingeniously argues that the man he imprisoned was not the real pirate, and that he chose an inland place of imprisonment only because the people there would have no knowledge of what the real pirate looked like, and so would not detect his substitution of a different person.

Apronius
: Quintus Apronius, a tithe-collector, and crony of Verres.

tied all the remaining pirates to the post
: for flogging, prior to crucifixion (as at §10).

soldiers from the army of Sertorius
: Quintus Sertorius was a Marian who held Spain against the central government from 82
BC
; he used pirates for naval support. Pompey was appointed to the command against him in 77, and arrived in Spain in 76; but progress was slow until Sertorius was assassinated by his jealous ally Marcus Perperna Veiento in 72. Perperna was then defeated and executed by Pompey in the same year.

Marcus Annius
: a Roman
eques
resident at Syracuse.

two pirate captains
: we hear nothing elsewhere about this second pirate captain—an uncharacteristic loose end. Even more than usual, one senses here that more was going on than Cicero chooses to tell us about.

the necessary measures for their own safety
: Verres was a danger to the Roman people, having illegally executed Roman citizens.

Manius Glabrio
: Manius Acilius Glabrio, the presiding magistrate (see note on
Ver
. 4 above).

Publius Servilius
: see note on §66 above. Nico is otherwise unknown.

a separate court
: the treason court. It was an act of treason to harbour or release a public enemy.

that might have resulted in more plunder for himself
: because he might have captured some more pirate ships.

his own royal residence
: the governor’s residence had formerly been the palace of Hiero II of Syracuse, as Cicero has told us at § 30 (the same information is repeated in the manuscripts here, spoiling the effect of ‘royal’; this must be an interpolation, and is therefore not translated).

the Island at Syracuse
: Ortygia; see first note on §30 (the passage to which Cicero has just referred) above. The spring of Arethusa was (and still is) about two-thirds of the way along the island on the side facing inside the harbour, so a point which was ‘beyond the spring’ would be towards the extremity of the island, at the mouth of the Great Harbour.

the freedman Timarchides
: a freedman who looked after Verres’ financial affairs and connived in his thefts.

the daughter of Isidorus the pantomime actor
: Tertia (see first note on §31 above).

what about the legates
: after this the manuscripts add, ‘what about the grain valued at three denarii a measure [a reference to Verres’ swindling of the Sicilian farmers, whom he forced to pay him for the privilege of not being required to sell him grain at an inflated price], what about the mules, what about the tents, what about the plentiful and varied equipment authorized and entrusted to the magistrates and legates by the senate and people of Rome.’ I have omitted these words as an interpolation: Cicero cannot be suggesting that Verres should have put mules and tents in charge of the fleet in preference to Cleomenes.

their kinship with us
: Segesta was traditionally said to have been founded by Aeneas, in myth the original founder of Rome, on his journey from Carthage to Italy. We know nothing of any supposed kinship between Centuripae and Rome.

Marcus Marcellus
: Marcus Claudius Marcellus (consul in 222, 215, 214, 210, and 208), one of the leading generals during the Second Punic War, most famous for his capture of Syracuse from the Carthaginians after a two-and-a-half-year siege in 211. Despite what Cicero goes on to say, the city was looted and its artistic treasures shipped to Italy.

Herbita
: location unknown.

the short distance to Pachynum
: the distance was 30 miles, and should have taken less than a day.

wild palms
: the plant is now known as the dwarf palm, and is still common in Sicily.

Cleomenes … to tell the others to follow
: we naturally assume that Cleomenes is heading to Odysseae to attack the pirates; but it will quickly
become apparent that he has in fact fled in the opposite direction, towards Helorus (back in the direction of Syracuse).

But their crew were men of courage
: the Sicilian allies were Cicero’s clients, and he is careful to place all the blame for the disaster on Verres and Cleomenes.

Locri
: i.e. Epizephyrian Locri in Bruttium (on the east coast of the toe of Italy). We do not know why the people of Locri did this; Phylarchus must have had some connection with the place.

What a miserable, sickening moment for the province of Sicily!
: there is an excellent discussion of this passage (down to § 95)—one of the finest passages of narrative in Latin literature—by R. G. M. Nisbet in A. J. Woodman and J. G. F. Powell (eds.),
Author and Audience in Latin Literature
(Cambridge, 1992), 1–17.

The crowd then made a full onslaught on his residence
: this crowd consisted of Roman citizens (as is made clear at the end of the paragraph), the only people allowed to live on Ortygia (§§84–5, 98).

the danger he had faced at Lampsacus
: at
Ver
. 2.1.63–9 Cicero recounted how in 80
BC
Verres, while passing through Lampsacus on his way to Asia to serve as a legate under Gnaeus Cornelius Dolabella, had nearly been burnt alive by an outraged mob in the house in which he was staying.

the precedent … with Hadrianus
: in
c
. 83
BC
the repressive governor of Africa, Gaius Fabius Hadrianus, was burnt alive in his residence at Utica by the Roman citizens of the province (
Ver
. 2.1.70).

throughout a great many Punic and Sicilian wars
: only two, in fact: the First and Second Punic Wars. There is a great deal of exaggeration for rhetorical effect in this paragraph.