Author: Gildenhard, Ingo
Title: Reckoning with tyranny: Greek thoughts on Caesar in Cicero’s Letters to Atticus in early 49
Review/Collection: In : Ancient Tyranny. Lewis, Sian (dir.), 297 p.
Place edition: Edinburgh
Editor: Edinburgh University Press
Year edition: 2006
Pages: 197-209
Keywords: Histoire - Storia - History, Politique - Politica - Politics, Sources - Fonti - Sources
Description: [Abstract] The fascination with absolute power in the hands of an individual is a constant in Greek thought. In the wake of the intensified Hellenisation of Roman society in the second and first centuries bc, the figure of the tyrant also became, first, part of Rome’s political discourse and then a dire fact.2 This chapter reviews one episode in this complex and fascinating story of acculturation, exploring how Cicero, in his correspondence with Atticus from the winter and spring of 49, reacted to the outbreak of civil war and Caesar’s rise to power. In these letters he resorts repeatedly to Greek precedents to cope with and to position (and reposition) himself vis-à-vis the everchanging face of Roman Realpolitik. In fact, it is possible to trace the mental trajectory that Cicero underwent in those crucial months, which took him from shock to fear, from indecision to regret, to, finally, accommodation, by looking at the themes, figures and quotations that he drew from the Greek discourse on tyranny.
Works:
Link: http://www.google.fr/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CD4QFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fstopnwo.com%2Fdocs2%2Flewis-sian_ancient_tyranny.pdf&rct=j&q=Gildenhard%2C%20I.Reckoning%20with%20tyranny%3A%20Greek%20thou
Author initials: Gildenhard 2006
Title: Reckoning with tyranny: Greek thoughts on Caesar in Cicero’s Letters to Atticus in early 49
Review/Collection: In : Ancient Tyranny. Lewis, Sian (dir.), 297 p.
Place edition: Edinburgh
Editor: Edinburgh University Press
Year edition: 2006
Pages: 197-209
Keywords: Histoire - Storia - History, Politique - Politica - Politics, Sources - Fonti - Sources
Description: [Abstract] The fascination with absolute power in the hands of an individual is a constant in Greek thought. In the wake of the intensified Hellenisation of Roman society in the second and first centuries bc, the figure of the tyrant also became, first, part of Rome’s political discourse and then a dire fact.2 This chapter reviews one episode in this complex and fascinating story of acculturation, exploring how Cicero, in his correspondence with Atticus from the winter and spring of 49, reacted to the outbreak of civil war and Caesar’s rise to power. In these letters he resorts repeatedly to Greek precedents to cope with and to position (and reposition) himself vis-à-vis the everchanging face of Roman Realpolitik. In fact, it is possible to trace the mental trajectory that Cicero underwent in those crucial months, which took him from shock to fear, from indecision to regret, to, finally, accommodation, by looking at the themes, figures and quotations that he drew from the Greek discourse on tyranny.
Works:
Link: http://www.google.fr/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CD4QFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fstopnwo.com%2Fdocs2%2Flewis-sian_ancient_tyranny.pdf&rct=j&q=Gildenhard%2C%20I.Reckoning%20with%20tyranny%3A%20Greek%20thou
Author initials: Gildenhard 2006
