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Hello everyone!
Does anyone of you have an insight in Roman law at Cicero's time?
I wonder about the circumstances of Cicero's exile from 696-697. Clodius brought forth a rogatio/bill which said qui civem Romanum indemnatum interemisset, ei aqua et igni interdictum sit – this was clearly aimed at Cicero who had the Catilinarians executed without a trial during his time as a consul. From what I gather, Cicero fled shortly before the law was passed (he had already left Rome for a month by then and was in Southern Italy) and received the aquae et ignis interdictio later when he was already gone. --- Do I get this right? Or had the law already been passed when Cicero was still in Italy? I don't know if the following passage from Cicero refers to the Clodian law or a law concerning Cicero in particular:
miseriae nostrae potius velim quam inconstantiae tribuas quod a Vibone quo te arcessebamus subito discessimus. adlata est enim nobis rogatio de pernicie mea; in qua quod correctum esse audieramus erat eius modi ut mihi ultra quingenta milia liceret esse, illuc pervenire non liceret. statim iter Brundisium versus contuli ante diem rogationis, ne et Sicca apud quem eram periret et quod Melitae esse non licebat. nunc tu propera ut nos consequare, si modo recipiemur. adhuc invitamur benigne, sed quod superest timemus. me, mi Pomponi, valde paenitet vivere; qua in re apud me tu plurimum valuisti. sed haec coram. fac modo ut venias.
(Cic. Att. 3,4)
(from what I gather, it was changed from 500 to 400 miles a few days later)
There was some debate by Cicero and his friends (and later by scholars) whether his decision to flee was right or whether he should have stayed and resisted.
My actual question(s) regard(s) the legal procedure:
- If he had stayed, would he have been tried? And if so, why didn't he wait for the trial first before going into exile?
- Could it be argued that the senatus consultum ultimum that Cicero had could have been seen as a damnatio and that the conspirators were therefore in fact not indemnati?
- Did the Roman principle of law nulla poena sine lege already apply in Cicero's time? If so, convicting Cicero for killing the Catalinarians would have been unlawful anyway, right?!
Does anyone of you have an insight in Roman law at Cicero's time?
I wonder about the circumstances of Cicero's exile from 696-697. Clodius brought forth a rogatio/bill which said qui civem Romanum indemnatum interemisset, ei aqua et igni interdictum sit – this was clearly aimed at Cicero who had the Catilinarians executed without a trial during his time as a consul. From what I gather, Cicero fled shortly before the law was passed (he had already left Rome for a month by then and was in Southern Italy) and received the aquae et ignis interdictio later when he was already gone. --- Do I get this right? Or had the law already been passed when Cicero was still in Italy? I don't know if the following passage from Cicero refers to the Clodian law or a law concerning Cicero in particular:
miseriae nostrae potius velim quam inconstantiae tribuas quod a Vibone quo te arcessebamus subito discessimus. adlata est enim nobis rogatio de pernicie mea; in qua quod correctum esse audieramus erat eius modi ut mihi ultra quingenta milia liceret esse, illuc pervenire non liceret. statim iter Brundisium versus contuli ante diem rogationis, ne et Sicca apud quem eram periret et quod Melitae esse non licebat. nunc tu propera ut nos consequare, si modo recipiemur. adhuc invitamur benigne, sed quod superest timemus. me, mi Pomponi, valde paenitet vivere; qua in re apud me tu plurimum valuisti. sed haec coram. fac modo ut venias.
(Cic. Att. 3,4)
(from what I gather, it was changed from 500 to 400 miles a few days later)
There was some debate by Cicero and his friends (and later by scholars) whether his decision to flee was right or whether he should have stayed and resisted.
My actual question(s) regard(s) the legal procedure:
- If he had stayed, would he have been tried? And if so, why didn't he wait for the trial first before going into exile?
- Could it be argued that the senatus consultum ultimum that Cicero had could have been seen as a damnatio and that the conspirators were therefore in fact not indemnati?
- Did the Roman principle of law nulla poena sine lege already apply in Cicero's time? If so, convicting Cicero for killing the Catalinarians would have been unlawful anyway, right?!