Marcus Tullius Cicero, Pro Caelio [On Behalf of Caelius]

Thomas Wilfred Hillard (Macquarie University)

Ed. by William John Dominik, University of Otago
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.1.2: Ancient Roman Writing and Culture (Republic and Empire), -750-476.
Vol. editors: William John Dominik (University of Otago), Giacomo Fedeli (University of Exeter), Thomas Habinek (University of Southern California), Emily Kneebone (University of Nottingham), Elodie Paillard (University of Sydney), Sophia Papaioannou (National and Kapodistrian University of Athens), Jula Wildberger (American University of Paris)

Domains

Rhetoric and Oratory

Dates

First circulation or publication 56

Places

Ancient Rome (Republic & Empire) (Country of Origin)

Resources

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On April 4th, 56 BCE, Cicero delivered his defense of Marcus Caelius Rufus before an unusually large crowd in the Roman forum, and it was probably published soon afterwards. It was a sparkling performance, and the speech as it survives is considered one of Cicero’s finest. Quintilian, the celebrated rhetorician and teacher of rhetoric, writing around a century and a half later, cites the oration twenty-odd times in appreciation of its strategies, its figures of speech and its prose rhythms.

Caelius had been accused of some manner of crime against the property of a woman called Palla, causing a civil disturbance in Naples, assaulting ambassadors from Alexandria in Puteoli (Pozzuoli), the murder of the chief ambassador (the philosopher Dio), receiving gold under false pretenses to finance

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4662 words

Citation: Hillard, Thomas Wilfred. "Pro Caelio". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 08 March 2008 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=20494, accessed 24 April 2024.]

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