Pro Milone

Pro Milone

The "Pro Tito Annio Milone ad iudicem oratio" (Pro Milone) is a speech made by Marcus Tullius Cicero on behalf of his friend Titus Annius Milo. Milo was accused of murdering his political enemy Publius Clodius Pulcher on the Via Appia. The speech was written by Cicero in 52 BC.

Events surrounding the case

Milo was a praetor at the time, attempting to gain the much-vaunted post of consul; Clodius was a former tribune standing for the office of praetor. The charge was brought against Milo for the death of Clodius following a violent altercation on the Via Appia outside Clodius' estate in Bovillae. After the initial brawl, it seems that Clodius was wounded during the fight started by his own slaves as well as those of Milo.

This was the sequence of events described by the prosecution and the commentary of Asconius, an ancient world commentator who analyzed several of Cicero's speeches and had access to various ancient documents which are no longer extant. The absence of a summary of the chain of events in Cicero’s speech may be attributed to their incriminating evidence against Milo. Presumably, Cicero realized that this was the primary weakness, and as the trial unfolded it turned out to be so. We can assume from the fact that the jury did indeed convict Milo, that they felt that although Milo may not have been aware of Clodius's initial injury, his ordering of Clodius’s butchering warranted punishment.Fact|date=October 2007

When initially questioned about the circumstances of Clodius’s death, Milo responded with the excuse of self-defense, that it was Clodius who laid a trap for Milo in which he might kill him. Cicero had to fashion his speech to be congruent with Milo's initial excuse, restraint which probably affected the overall presentation of his case. In order to convince the jury of Milo’s innocence, Cicero used the fact that following Clodius's death, a mob of his own supporters, led by the scribe Sextus Cloelius, carried his corpse into the Senate house ("curia") and cremated it using the benches, platforms, tables and scribes' notebooks as a pyre. In doing so they also burnt down much of the "curia"; [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 33C] the Clodian supporters in their fury also launched an attack on the house of the then "interrex", Marcus Lepidus; and therefore Pompey ordered a special inquest to investigate this as well as the murder of Clodius. Cicero refers to this incident throughout the "Pro Milone", implying that there was greater general indignation and uproar at the burning of the "curia" than there was at the murder of Clodius. [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 33C]

Due to the violent nature of the crime as well as its revolutionary repercussions (the case had special resonance with the Roman people as a symbol of the clash between the "populares" and the "optimates"), the special inquest set up by Pompey included a hand-picked panel of judges. This was in order to avoid the corruption that was rife in the political scene of the late Roman Republic). In addition, armed guards were stationed around the law courts to placate the violent mobs of each side's supporters.Fact|date=October 2007

The first four days of Milo’s trial were dedicated to opposition argument and the testimony of witnesses. On the first day Gaius Causinius Schola appeared as a witness against Milo and described the deed in such a way as to portray Milo as a cold-blooded murderer. This worked up the Clodian crowd who in turn terrified the advocate on Milo's side, Marcus Marcellus. As he began his questioning of the witnesses, the Clodian crowd drowned out his voice and surrounded him. [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 40C] This action taken by Pompey prevented too much furore from the vehemently anti-Milonian crowds for the rest of the case. On the second day of the trial the armed cohorts were introduced by Pompey. On the 5th and final day, Cicero delivered the Pro Milone in the hope of reversing the damning evidence accrued over the previous days.

Content of the speech

Throughout the duration of his speech Cicero does not attempt to convince the judges that Milo did not kill Clodius, but that the killing of Clodius was committed lawfully in self-defense. Cicero even goes as far as to suggest that the death of Clodius was in the best interests of the republic. Clodius as a tribune was a popularist, a "populares" leader of the restless plebeian mobs that plagued the political scene of the late Roman Republic. Possibly Cicero's strongest argument was that of the circumstances of the assault: its convenient proximity to Clodius' villa, and the fact that Milo was leaving Rome on official business (nominating a priest for election in Lanuvium). Clodius, on the other hand, had been distinctly absent from his usual rantings in the popular assemblies ("contiones"). Milo was encumbered in a coach, with his wife, a heavy riding cloak and a retinue of harmless slaves (though his retinue also included slaves and gladiators as well as revellers for the festival at Lanuvium, to whose presence Cicero only implicitly refers). Clodius, however, was on horseback, without a carriage, his wife or his usual retinue but with a band of armed brigands and slaves. If Cicero could convince the judges that Clodius had laid a trap for Milo, he could postulate that Milo murdered out of self-defense (Roman law at the time had no distinction between murder and manslaughterFact|date=October 2007). Not once does Cicero mention the possibility that the two met by chance (which was the conclusion of both Asconius [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 41C] and Appian [Appian, "The Civil Wars", II.21)] ).

Clodius is made out repeatedly in the Pro Milone to be a malevolent, invidious, effeminate character; craving power and organizing the ambush on Milo. In his speech Cicero gives Clodius a motive for setting a tr
Bona Dea incident in 62BC; involving Clodius stealing into the abode of the Pontifex Maximus of the time, Julius Caesar, during the ritual festival of the Bona Dea, to which only women were allowed. It is said that he dressed up as a woman in order to gain access and pursue an illicit affair with Pompeia, the wife of Caesar. [Plutarch, "Roman Lives: Life of Caesar", 9-10] Clodius was taken to the law courts for this act of great impiety, but escaped the punishment of death by bribing the judges, most of whom had been poor (according to Cicero, who was the prosecutor during the case). Earlier in his career Lucullus had accused Clodius of committing incest with his sister, then Lucullus's wife; this too is often referred to in order to blacken Clodius's reputation.

Milo, on the other hand, is perpetually depicted as a 'saviour of Rome' by his virtuous actions and political career up until that point. Cicero even goes as far as to paint an amicable relationship with Pompey. Asconius, as he does with many other parts of the Pro Milone, disputes this fact, claiming that Pompey was in fact "afraid" of Milo, "or else pretended to be afraid", [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 36C] staying in the upper parts of his property in the suburbs and employing a constant body of troops to keep guard. His fear was attributed to a series of public assemblies in which Titus Munatius Plancus, a fervent supporter of Clodius, stirred up the crowd against Milo and Cicero, casting suspicion upon Milo by shouting that he was preparing a force to destroy him. [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 37C-38C] However, in the view of Plutarch, a first century AD writer and biographer of notable Roman men, Clodius had also stirred up enmity between Pompey and himself, along with the fickle crowds of the forum he controlled with his malevolent goading. [Plutarch, "Roman Lives: Life of Pompey", 48-49]

The early part of the refutation of the opposition's arguments ("refutatio"), contains the first known exposition of the phrase "silent enim leges inter arma" [Cicero, "Pro Milone", 11] ("in times of war, the laws fall silent"). This has since been rephrased as "inter arma enim silent leges" . At this point in the speech this phrase is integral to Cicero's argument. In the context of the Pro Milone the meaning behind the phrase remains the same as its use in contemporary society. Cicero was asserting that the killing of Clodius was admissible so long as it was an act of self-defence; postulating that in extreme cases, where one's own life is immediately threatened, violence without proper regard to the laws is justifiable. Indeed, Cicero goes as far as to say that such behaviour is instinctive ("nata lex": [Cicero, "Pro Milone", 10] "an inborn law") to all living creatures ("non instituti, sed imbuti sumus": "we are not taught [self-defence] through instruction, but through natural intuition". This argument of the murder of Clodius being in the public interest is only presented in the written version of Pro Milone, as, according to Asconius, Cicero did not mention it in the actual version delivered). [Cicero, "Pro Milone", 10]

Outcome and aftermath of the case

In the account of later writer and Ciceronian commentator Asconius, the actual defense failed to secure an acquittal for Milo for three primary reasons. Firstly, Cicero’s intimidation by the Clodian mob present on the final day, [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 41C] the political pressure exerted implicitly by Pompey for the judges to convict Milo, and finally, the sheer number of testimonies against Milo over the course of the case. Milo was condemned for the murder by a margin of 38 votes to 13 [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 53C] and was ostracized to the Gallic town of Massilia (Marseille). During his absence, Milo was prosecuted for bribery, unlawful association, and violence, for all of which he was successfully convicted. As an example of the volatile, contradictory and confusing political atmosphere of the time, the superintendent of Milo's slaves, one Marcus Saufeius, was also prosecuted for the murder of Clodius shortly after the conviction of Milo. The team of Cicero and Caelius defended him, and together, managed to acquit Saufeius by a margin of one vote. Furthermore, Clodian supporters did not all escape unscathed. The associate of Clodius, Sextus Cloelius, who supervised the cremation of Clodius's corpse, was prosecuted for the burning down of the "curia" and was convicted by an overwhelming majority of 46 votes. [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 56C] Following the trial, violence raged unchecked in the city between supporters of Clodius and Milo. Pompey had been made sole consul in Rome during the violent troubled times after the murder but before the legal proceedings against Milo had begun [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 36C] and he quelled the riots following this string of controversial cases with brutal military efficiency, regaining stability in Rome - for a while.

The Pro Milone which survives to date is a rewritten version published by Cicero after the trial. Despite its failure to secure an acquittal, the surviving rewrite is considered to be one of Cicero's best works: thought by many to be the "magnum opus" of his rhetorical repertoire. Asconius describes the Pro Milone as "so perfectly written that it can rightly be considered his best". [Asconius, "Pro Milone", 42C]

The speech is full of deceptively straightforward strategies. Throughout his speech Cicero explicitly seems to follow his own rhetorical guidelines published in his earlier work "De Inventione", but on occasion subtly breaks away from these stylistic norms in order to emphasise certain elements of his case and use the circumstances to his advantage. As example, he places his refutation of the opposition's arguments ("refutatio") far earlier in the speech than expected, and pounces on the opportunity to disprove quickly the plethora of evidence collected over the first four days of the trial). His arguments are interwoven with one another and coalesce during the conclusion ("peroratio"). There is heavy use of pathos throughout the speech, starting with his assertion of fear for the guards posted around the courts by Pompey in this special inquisition (the very first word of the speech is "vereor" - "I fear"). However, Cicero ends his speech fearless, becoming more emotive with each argument, and finally finishing by the beseeching of his audience with tears to acquit Milo. Irony is omnipresent in the speech, along with continual appearances of humour and constant appeals to traditional Roman virtues and prejudices, all of these tactics designed solely to involve and persuade his jury.Fact|date=September 2007

In many ways the circumstances surrounding the case were apposite for Cicero, forcing him back to his own oratorical foundations. The charge of "vis" ('violence') against Milo not only suited a logical and analytical legal framework with evidence indicating a specific time, date, place and cast for the murder itself, but generally concerned actions that affected the community. This allowed Cicero ample maneuvering room to include details of the fire in the "curia", as well as the attack on Marcus Lepidus' house and the Bona Dea incident.Fact|date=September 2007

Milo, having read the later published speech whilst in exile, humorously commented that if Cicero had only spoken that well in court, he would "not now be enjoying the delicious red mullet of Massilia". [Dio, 40.54.3]

References

Bibliography

*MacKendrick, P. The Speeches of Cicero, London, 1995
*Rawson, B. The Politics of Friendship: Pompey & Cicero, Letchworth, 1978
*Berry, D.H. Pompey's Legal Knowledge - or Lack of it, Historia 42, 1993 (article: pp.502-504)
*Clark, M.E. & Ruebel, J.S. Philosophy & Rhetoric in Cicero's Pro Milone, RhM 128, 1985 (article: pp.57-72)
*Ruebel, J.S. The trial of Milo in 52BC: a chronological study, TAPA 109 , 1979 (article: pp.231-249)
*Stone, A.M. Pro Milone: Cicero's second thoughts, Antichthon 14, 1980 (article: pp.88-111)
*Tatum, W.J. The Patrician Tribune. Publius Clodius Pulcher, Chapel Hill 1999.
*Fezzi, L. Il tribuno Clodio, Roma-Bari 2008

External links

* [http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/cicero/milo.shtml Pro Milone in Latin] , at The Latin Library
* [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Cic.+Mil.+1 Pro Milone in English] , translated by C.D. Yonge, at perseus.tufts.edu


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Нужно сделать НИР?

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Pro Milone — Pour Milon Pour Milon, en latin, Pro Milone est une plaidoirie de Cicéron (52 av. J. C.) en faveur de Milon, accusé de l assassinat de Publius Clodius Pulcher. Bien que Cicéron perdît le procès, son discours n en reste pas moins un modèle d… …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Cicero, Marcus Tullius — born 106 BC, Arpinum, Latium died Dec. 7, 43 BC, Formiae Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, and writer. Born to a wealthy family, he quickly established a brilliant career in law and plunged into politics, then rife with factionalism and… …   Universalium

  • Liste de locutions latines — Cet article contient une liste de locutions latines présentée par ordre alphabétique. Pour des explications morphologiques et linguistiques générales, consulter l article : Expression latine. Sommaire  A   B … …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Ciceron — Cicéron Pour les articles homonymes, voir Cicéron (homonymie). Cicéron Marcus Tullius Cicero Naissance …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Cicérion — Cicéron Pour les articles homonymes, voir Cicéron (homonymie). Cicéron Marcus Tullius Cicero Naissance …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Cicéron — Pour les articles homonymes, voir Cicéron (homonymie). Cicéron …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Marcus Tullius Cicero — Cicéron Pour les articles homonymes, voir Cicéron (homonymie). Cicéron Marcus Tullius Cicero Naissance …   Wikipédia en Français

  • A Dialogue Concerning Oratorical Partitions — – (also called De Partitione Oratoria Dialogus, Partitiones Oratoriae, or De Partitionbus Oratoriae, translated to be “On the subdivisions of oratory”) is a rhetorical treatise, written by Cicero. According to the method of the Middle Academy,… …   Wikipedia

  • Cicero — For other uses, see Cicero (disambiguation). Marcus Tullius Cicero Marcus Cicero Born January 3, 106 BC Arpinum, Italy, Roman Republic Died December 7, 43 BC …   Wikipedia

  • Titus Annius Milo — Papianus was a Roman political agitator, the son of Gaius Papius Celsus, but adopted by his maternal grandfather, Titus Annius Luscus. In 52 BC he probably murdered Publius Clodius Pulcher and was later unsuccessfully defended by his friend… …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”