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Catiline
Lucius Sergius Catilina ( 108 BC – January 62 BC), known in English as Catiline (), was a Roman politician and soldier. He is best known for instigating the Catilinarian conspiracy, a failed attempt to violently seize control of the Roman state in 63 BC. Born to an ancient patrician family, he joined Sulla during Sulla's civil war and profited from Sulla's purges of his political enemies, becoming a wealthy man. In the early 60s BC, he served as praetor and then as governor of Africa. Upon his return to the city, he attempted to stand for the consulship but was rebuffed; he then was beset with legal challenges over alleged corruption in Africa and his actions during the proscriptions. Acquitted on all charges with the support of influential friends from across Roman politics, he stood for the consulship twice in 64 and 63 BC. Twice defeated in the consular ''comitia'', he concocted a violent plot to take the consulship by force, bringing together poor ...
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Catilinarian Conspiracy
The Catilinarian conspiracy (sometimes Second Catilinarian conspiracy) was an attempted coup d'état by Lucius Sergius Catilina (Catiline) to overthrow the Roman consuls of 63 BC – Marcus Tullius Cicero and Gaius Antonius Hybrida – and forcibly assume control of the state in their stead. The conspiracy was formed after Catiline's defeat in the consular elections for 62 (held in early autumn 63). He assembled a coalition of malcontents – aristocrats who had been denied political advancement by the voters, dispossessed farmers, and indebted veterans of Sulla – and planned to seize the consulship from Cicero and Antonius by force. In November 63, Cicero exposed the conspiracy, causing Catiline to flee from Rome and eventually to his army in Etruria. The next month, Cicero uncovered nine more conspirators organising for Catiline in the city and, on advice of the senate, had them executed without trial. In early January 62 BC, Antonius defeated Catiline in battle ...
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Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the establishment of the Roman Empire. His extensive writings include treatises on rhetoric, philosophy and politics, and he is considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the Roman equestrian order, and served as consul in 63 BC. His influence on the Latin language was immense. He wrote more than three-quarters of extant Latin literature that is known to have existed in his lifetime, and it has been said that subsequent prose was either a reaction against or a return to his style, not only in Latin but in European languages up to the 19th century. Cicero introduced into Latin the arguments of the chief schools of Hellenistic philosophy and created a Latin philosophical vocab ...
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Marcus Marius Gratidianus
Marcus Marius Gratidianus (c. 125 – 82 BC) was a Roman praetor, and a partisan of the political faction known as the populares, led by his uncle, Gaius Marius, during the civil war between the followers of Marius and Lucius Cornelius Sulla. As praetor, Gratidianus is known for his policy of currency reform during the economic crisis of the 80s. Although this period of Roman history is marked by the extreme violence and cruelty practiced by partisans on each side, Gratidianus suffered a particularly vicious death during the Sullan proscriptions; in the most sensational accounts, he was tortured and dismembered by Catiline at the tomb of Quintus Lutatius Catulus, in a manner that evoked human sacrifice, and his severed head was carried through the streets of Rome on a pike. Family and career Born ''Marcus Gratidius'', Gratidianus was the son of Marcus Gratidius of Arpinum and Maria, the sister of Gaius Marius. After his father's death, he was adopted by his uncle, Marcus Ma ...
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Sallust
Gaius Sallustius Crispus, usually anglicised as Sallust (; 86 – ), was a Roman historian and politician from an Italian plebeian family. Probably born at Amiternum in the country of the Sabines, Sallust became during the 50s BC a partisan of Julius Caesar (100 to 44 BC). He is the earliest known Latin-language Roman historian with surviving works to his name, of which ''Conspiracy of Catiline'' (on the eponymous conspiracy), ''The Jugurthine War'' (on the eponymous war), and the ''Histories'' (of which only fragments survive) remain extant. As a writer, Sallust was primarily influenced by the works of the 5th-century BC Greek historian Thucydides. During his political career he amassed great and ill-gotten wealth from his governorship of Africa. Life and career Sallust was probably born in Amiternum in Central Italy,.. though Eduard Schwartz takes the view that Sallust's birthplace was Rome. His birth date is calculated from the report of Jerome's '' Chronicon ...
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Bellum Catilinae
''Bellum Catilinae'' (''War of Catiline''), also called (''Conspiracy of Catiline''), is the first history published by the Roman historian Sallust. The second historical monograph in Latin literature, it chronicles the attempted overthrow of the government by the aristocrat Catiline in 63 BC in what has been usually called the Catilinarian conspiracy. The narrative of the monograph was seized upon as illustrating the moral and social decadence of the ruling Roman classes, particularly the Roman Senate. Sallust continually critiques Roman corruption throughout his narration. Summary The history begins with a brief preface on the nature of man, history, and a brief autobiography of Sallust himself. Afterwards, Sallust launches into a character description of Catiline, who is portrayed as at once heroic and immoral, and then a description of Catiline's intention to gain kingship at any cost. However, Sallust tells his readership that Catiline's political ambitions were thwar ...
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Sergia Gens
The gens Sergia was a patrician family at ancient Rome, which held the highest offices of the Roman state from the first century of the Republic until imperial times. The first of the Sergii to obtain the consulship was Lucius Sergius Fidenas in 437 BC. Despite long and distinguished service, toward the end of the Republic the reputation of this gens suffered as a result of the conspiracy of Catiline.''Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology'', vol. III, p. 787 ("Sergia Gens"). Origin The Sergii claimed descent from Sergestus, one of the Trojans who came to Italy with Aeneas, a tradition mentioned by Vergil in the Aeneid. The etymology of the nomen ''Sergius'' is problematic. Chase hesitantly suggests a connection with the praenomen '' Servius'', probably from an old Latin root meaning to preserve or keep safe. He classifies the nomen with other gentilicia that either originated at Rome, or cannot be shown to have come from anywhere else. However, the cognom ...
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Cesare Maccari
Cesare Maccari (; 9 May 1840 – 7 August 1919) was an Italian painter and sculptor, most famous for his 1888 painting ''Cicerone denuncia Catilina'' (usually translated as ''Cicero Accuses Catiline'' or ''Cicero Denounces Catiline''). Early life Maccari was born in Siena, in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. He was a student of the Institute of the Fine Arts in Siena together with Tito Sarrocchi, working in sculpture and helping complete the Monumento Pianigiani in Siena. He later worked in the atelier of Luigi Mussini in Florence. There in 1864 he was commissioned by an English society to copy works of Bernardino Pinturicchio found in the Cathedral of Siena. Some of his first patronage came from works the Marquis Pieri-Nerli, who also commissioned him to paint frescoes of the four evangelists for a private chapel in his home in Quinciano, a hamlet in the comune of Monteroni d'Arbia. Maccari soon won a stipend to study in Rome, that also allowed him to travel through Italy. Mat ...
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Pistoia
Pistoia (, is a city and ''comune'' in the Italian region of Tuscany, the capital of a province of the same name, located about west and north of Florence and is crossed by the Ombrone Pistoiese, a tributary of the River Arno. It is a typical Italian medieval city, and it attracts many tourists, especially in the summer. The city is famous throughout Europe for its plant nurseries. History ''Pistoria'' (in Latin other possible forms are ''Pistorium'' or ''Pistoriae'') was a centre of Gallic, Ligurian and Etruscan settlements before becoming a Roman colony in the 6th century BC, along the important road Via Cassia: in 62 BC the demagogue Catiline and his fellow conspirators were slain nearby. From the 5th century the city was a bishopric, and during the Lombardic kingdom it was a royal city and had several privileges. Pistoia's most splendid age began in 1177 when it proclaimed itself a free commune: in the following years it became an important political centre, ...
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Marcus Sergius Silus
Marcus Sergius was a Roman general during the Second Punic War (218 to 201 BC). He is famed in prosthetics circles as the first documented user of a prosthetic hand. The metal hand was constructed to allow him to hold his shield in battle. A description of Marcus Sergius is found in the seventh book of Pliny's ''Natural History'', published in AD 77: :''Nobody - at least in my opinion - can rightly rank any man above Marcus Sergius, although his great-grandson Catiline shames his name. In his second campaign Sergius lost his right hand. In two campaigns he was wounded twenty-three times, with the result that he had no use in either hand or either foot: only his spirit remained intact. Although disabled, Sergius served in many subsequent campaigns. He was twice captured by Hannibal - no ordinary foe- from whom twice he escaped, although kept in chains and shackles every day for twenty months. He fought four times with only his left hand, while two horses he was riding were sta ...
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Roman Republic
The Roman Republic ( la, Res publica Romana ) was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kingdom (traditionally dated to 509 BC) and ending in 27 BC with the establishment of the Roman Empire, Rome's control rapidly expanded during this period—from the city's immediate surroundings to hegemony over the entire Mediterranean world. Roman society under the Republic was primarily a cultural mix of Latin and Etruscan societies, as well as of Sabine, Oscan, and Greek cultural elements, which is especially visible in the Roman Pantheon. Its political organization developed, at around the same time as direct democracy in Ancient Greece, with collective and annual magistracies, overseen by a senate. The top magistrates were the two consuls, who had an extensive range of executive, legislative, judicial, military, and religious p ...
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Quintus Lutatius Catulus Capitolinus
Quintus Lutatius Catulus Capitolinus (c. 121 – 61 BC) was a politician in the late Roman Republic. His father was the like-named Quintus Lutatius Catulus, consul in 102 BC. He gained the agnomen "Capitolinus" for his defense of the capital in 77 BC against Lepidus. Biography Catulus inherited his father's hatred of the leading statesman and general Marius, and was a consistent though moderate supporter of the aristocracy. During Sulla's proscription, Catulus avenged the death of his father with the assistance of Catiline, who tortured and killed Marcus Marius Gratidianus at the tomb of the senior Catulus. During Sulla's dictatorship, he was involved in the reconstruction of the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus which had been destroyed by fire in 83, also giving his name to the new temple. In 78 BC, he was consul with Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, who after the death of Sulla proposed the overthrow of his constitution, the re-establishment of the distribution of grain, the recal ...
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Quintus Lutatius Catulus
Quintus Lutatius Catulus (149–87 BC) was a consul of the Roman Republic in 102 BC. His consular colleague was Gaius Marius. During their consulship the Cimbri and Teutones marched south again and threatened the Republic. While Marius marched against the Teutones in Gaul, Catulus had to keep the Cimbri from invading Italy. In this he failed; the Cimbri succeeded in invading the Po Valley. In 101 BC Catulus, as proconsul, continued the war against the Cimbri. Marius, elected consul for the fifth time, joined him and together they campaigned against the Germanic invaders in the Po Valley. At the Battle of Vercellae Marius and Catulus decisively defeated the Cimbri and ended the Germanic invasion. After Vercellae the two feuded, and Catulus consequently committed suicide following Marius's victory in the civil war of 87 BC. As a General During Catulus' consulship, the Romans found out the wandering Cimbri and Teutones were planning to invade Italy. Catulus, as junior consul, was ...
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