previous next




ille, i.e. Clodius.

fuerit impositurus: indir. quest. for -turus fuit = imposuisset; § 517, d (308, d and N.); B. 304, 3, b, 322, b; G. 597, R5, a; H. 582, 2 (511, 2, N.); H-B. 581, b, 2.

Clodi: Sex. Clodius, client and confidential agent of the demagogue Clodius.

librarium, i.e. the "budget" of laws which Clodius had on hand to propose. Cicero humorously speaks as if these filled a whole librarium or book cabinet.

eripuisse e domo, i.e. from P. Clodius's house, in the riots that followed his death.

Palladium: the image of Pallas, kept in the citadel of Troy, and taken thence by a nocturnal enterprise of Ulysses and Diomed. The sanctity and adventures of this portfolio suggest the comparison.

si nactus esses, if you could find him.

per: the words of adjuration are either intentionally omitted or lost.

hujus legis: a proposed law of Clodius by which the freedmen were to be distributed among all the thirty-five tribes (see note, sect. 25, p. 181, 1.26). Sex. Clodius, the son of a freedman, is shrewdly hinted at as author of the law.

de nostrum omnium: such a rhetorical break is called aposiopesis. Cicero would have said something like proscriptione or caede, but he affects to be alarmed at the threatening look with which Sex. Clodius hears his allusion (aspexit me illis oculis).

lumen curiae, a pun: Cicero calls Sex. Clodius a light of the senate-house, meaning (1) sarcastically, that he was a distinguished Senator, and (2) that he was the incendiary who, by burning Clodius's body, had set the curia on fire (see note on sect. 12, p. 176, l. 1).

poenitus [= punitus] es (often deponent in Cicero): nothing was more horrible to the ancients than the loss of due funeral rites. The burning of Clodius's body by the mob deprived him of all the honors to which he was entitled.

erat: § 522, a (311, c); B. 304, 3, a; G. 254, p.1; H. 583 (511, N.1); H-B. 582, 3, a.

imaginibus: a Claudius should have a long line of most distinguished images.

infelicissimis, ill-omened, as obtained by riotous violence.


Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide References (4 total)
  • Commentary references from this page (4):
    • Cicero, For Milo, 12
    • Cicero, For Milo, 25
    • A. A. Howard, Benj. L. D'Ooge, G. L. Kittredge, J. B. Greenough, Allen and Greenough's New Latin Grammar, 517
    • A. A. Howard, Benj. L. D'Ooge, G. L. Kittredge, J. B. Greenough, Allen and Greenough's New Latin Grammar, 522
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: