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Epistulae ad Familiares, Bk. Ltt.

XVIII

Cicero to Quintus Lepta[1]

Rome, January, 45 B.C.

1 As soon as I received your letter from the hand of your freedman Seleucus, I at once sent a note to Balbus, asking him what was in the law.[2] His answer was that while those who were actually in business as auctioneers were forbidden to be municipal councillors, those who had retired were not so forbidden. So your friends and mine must be of good heart; for it would be intolerable if, when men who were at this moment practising divination[3] were being elected on the Senate at Rome, men who had at any time practised as auctioneers should not be allowed to be councillors in the provincial towns.

2 There is no news of either of the Spains. It is certain, however, that Pompey[4] has a large army; for Caesar himself sent me a copy of Paciaecus's[5] dispatch, in which the number of legions there is stated to be eleven. Messala[6] also has written to Quintus Salassus that his brother[7] Publius Curtius was executed by order of Pompey before the eyes of the army, for having arranged, as was alleged, with certain Spaniards that, when Pompey had arrived at some town or other to negotiate for supphes, they should arrest him and take him to Caesar.

  1. ↑ Cf. iii. 7.4 and 9. 13. Lepta had been Cicero's praefectus fabrum in Cilicia. He had been a Pompeian, but was now applying to Caesar for some contract in connexion with the public games given by the latter this year. See the next Letter.
  2. ↑ The Lex Iulia Municipalis. Auctioneers were regarded with detestation, like pawnbrokers and usurers with us, as trading on the misfortunes of others, and were therefore excluded from the municipal magistracy and senate.—Tyrrell
  3. ↑ Cicero allused to one Ruspina, a diviner, whom Caesar had made a Roman senator. Haruspices were excluded fom the Roman Senate as being foreigners, and perhaps also as taking money for their services.
  4. ↑ Gnaeus, the elder son of Pompey the Great.
  5. ↑ L. Iunius Paciaecus is mentioned in De bello Hispaniensi as a distinguished and capable man, a native of Spain, whom Caesar sent to relieve Utica when besieged by Pompey.
  6. ↑ M. Valerius Messala, consul in 52 B.C.
  7. ↑ i.e., Q. Salassus's brother.
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