Cicero, Agrarian Speeches
Introduction, Text, Translation, and Commentary
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Oxford University Press
Published:8th Feb '18
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
The Agrarian Speeches (Orationes de lege agraria) were delivered in January 63 BCE, just after Cicero had entered office as consul; they are his inaugural orations and therefore the first element of his consular activity. They not only provide valuable testimony for approaches to agrarian legislation in the late Republic, but also show how the new consul presented himself before the Senate and the People at the beginning of his consular year, a significant political event for which very few extensive sources remain. These speeches are also significant in demonstrating Cicero's rhetorical virtuosity and the sophistication of his political tactics in arguing against a proposal for a grand scheme of buying, selling, and allocating land put forward by the Tribune of the People, P. Servilius Rullus. Delivered in the same year as his arguably more famous orations against Catiline, they have nevertheless found less attention in modern scholarship. This edition offers a comprehensive introduction, a revised Latin text alongside a new English translation, and the first detailed commentary on the corpus, which, besides addressing numerous linguistic and textual issues, also explains the complex legal and historical situation and illustrates Cicero's sophisticated argumentative techniques. Drawing on the contemporary resurgence of academic interest in political oratory, it aims to bring these neglected speeches to a wider audience and will be particularly suitable for both scholars and students interested in Cicero, oratory, Roman law, or the history of the Roman Republic.
In this masterful study, Manuwald (Univ. College London, UK) translates, comments on, and analyzes an often-overlooked corpus of speeches stemming from Cicero's consulship. Though far less renowned than his Catilinarian speeches, Cicero's orations on agrarian laws (De Lege Agraria 1-3) provide today's readers with not only a detailed view into the historical and social context of the fascinatingly volatile late republic, but also a primer in the art of political persuasion... Though many of the entries in the commentary deal with details of Latin language and grammar, others explain a wide variety of historical and cultural concepts for the benefit of less-experienced readers. Manuwald's thorough edition of Cicero's agrarian speeches will prove useful to scholars in a variety of disciplines (e.g., Latin language, rhetoric, political science) and with a variety of backgrounds. * CHOICE *
Any scholar setting out to write a scholarly commentary will be well advised to adopt Manuwald's edition as the gold standard. She demonstrates a deft touch in deciding what to include and what to pass over. Rarely does she leave the reader wanting more, and there is never a display of learning merely for learning's sake. This work is destined to be the definitive edition of these three consular speeches for the foreseeable future. * John T. Ramsey, Gnomon *
It should be emphasized that Manuwald has provided a much-needed tool that students of these speeches will return to with profit again and again. * Andrew R. Dyck, Bryn Ma wr Classical Review *
Philologists and historians of the ancient world as well as scholars from neigh-bouring disciplines will be grateful for an excellent addition to the growing number of modern commentaries on Cicero's orations. With interest in rhetoric and argumentation as well as in the dissemination of political ideology through speech and literature reviving in recent years (cf. V), Cicero's Agrarian orations have finally received their due: Manuwald's fine opus will enable its readers to understand the orations De lege agraria better and to appreciate them more deeply than before. * Marc Steinmann, Arctos *
ISBN: 9780198715405
Dimensions: 240mm x 162mm x 38mm
Weight: 946g
536 pages