Cicero's Pro L. Murena Oratio

233 Pages·2013·1.033 MB·English

by  Elaine Fantham

Cicero’s Pro L. Murena Oratio
AMERICAN PHILOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION
TEXTS AND COMMENTARIES SERIES
Series Editor
Sander M. Goldberg
Sallust’s B ellum Catilinae , Second Edition
J. T. Ramsey
A Commentary on Demosthenes’ P hilippic I: With Rhetorical
Analyses of Philippics II and III
Cecil Wooten
Cicero’s Pro L. Murena Oratio
Elaine Fantham
Cicero’s P ro L. Murena Oratio
Introduction and Commentary by
Elaine Fantham

1
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Fantham, Elaine, author.
Cicero’s Pro L. Murena oratio / Elaine Fantham.
pages cm — (American Philological Association texts and commentaries series)
ISBN 978-0-19-997453-5
1. Cicero, Marcus Tullius. Pro Murena. I. Title. II.
Series: American Philological Association texts and commentaries series.
PA6279.M8F36 2013
875 ′ .01—dc23 2013021156
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Map 2
Introduction: Pro Murena 3
Pro L. Murena Oratio 33
Commentary 83
Appendix: R elated Texts 197
Bibliography 219
Index of Persons and Places 223
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Acknowledgments
After writing three commentaries on Latin poets I thought I knew
how and what to write about Cicero’s Pro Murena , a speech I have
always loved. But I hadn’t taken on board all the disciplines
necessary to do justice to Cicero’s wit and manipulation of argu-
ment (and facts!) so as to make the speech enjoyable to modern
students who are far more sophisticated in political thinking, but
rather less comfortable in Latin than I was at their age. Any student
interested in modern democratic politics in North America or the
United Kingdom will recognize how little the standards of career-
ists have changed or improved.
This commentary would never have reached the press without
the unstinting and tactful-but-truthful help of two distinguished
scholars and good friends, Bob Kaster and Sander Goldberg, at
different stages. I owe them an immense debt of gratitude for the
labor and judgment they applied to making it a better piece of
work and, I hope, a better teaching tool.
In addition I had most useful help and advice from Kevin
Lawson, whose recent experience of teaching introductory and in-
termediate Latin to university students alerted him to the kind of
grammatical comment that would be appropriate; Kevin also read
meticulously through my draft text, and I am most grateful to him.
I was also able to benefi t from the detailed reports and sugges-
tions of the series’ referees, Bob Cape and Jon Hall, both experts
in Ciceronian rhetoric, and Francis X. Ryan’s scrupulous and
helpful comments on senatorial careers and procedure.
I hope I have done justice to their suggestions; any errors per-
sisting are my own, whether inadvertent or perverse.
Elaine Fantham May 2012
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Cicero’s Pro L. Murena Oratio