Cicero - Anthony Everitt [20]
Strings were successfully pulled. One of Marcus and Quintus’s maternal uncles, Caius Visellius Aculeo, a legal expert, knew Crassus well and arranged a placement for them. The boys spent a good deal of time at the great orator’s house, an elegant building at an excellent address on the Palatine Hill, where there were columns of Hymettan marble and shade-giving trees—rare features in this city of tufa and brick. They often listened to him discussing contemporary politics and studied with his scholars-in-residence. Marcus was also much impressed by the pure, traditional Latin spoken by Crassus’s wife. In return, the brothers would doubtless have been expected to join the daily crowd of clientes who accompanied leading men when they appeared in public. The larger the following, the greater the prestige.
Cicero also became a pupil of Crassus’s father-in-law, Quintus Mucius Scaevola, then in his eighties and one of the earliest and greatest of Roman jurists. On Scaevola’s death Cicero transferred to a younger cousin of the same name, who was Chief Pontiff, the leading official of the state religion, and had shared the Consulship with Crassus in 95.
His father entrusted him to the care of an older fellow student, Marcus Pupius Piso, who acted as a kind of mentor and kept an eye on him. Later the historian Sallust, a near contemporary, presented this arrangement as a homosexual affair in a lampoon against Cicero: “Didn’t you learn your unbridled loquacity from Marcus Piso at the cost of your virginity?” But this was the kind of insult that Roman public figures routinely exchanged with one another and while something of the sort may have briefly occurred, it is just as likely that it did not.
It was during these years that Cicero’s ambition to become a famous advocate crystallized. He found he had a gift for writing and public speaking. He was swept along by the almost unbearable excitement of the trials in the Forum and the glamour of the lawyer’s job, very much like that of a leading actor.
There were a number of jury courts, specializing in different kinds of crime—treason, murder, extortion and so on. Temporary stands and seating were set up to accommodate those taking part in the proceedings. A Praetor usually presided and between thirty and sixty jurors were appointed by lot for each case, who voted in secret. They were originally Senators, but one of Caius Gracchus’s reforms transferred the right of jury service to equites. This was a highly disputatious issue, especially in cases where Senatorial or commercial interests were in any way at stake. Jurors voted by rubbing off either an A (for absolvo) or a C (for condemno) on either side of voting tablets. Verdicts were often biased and bribery of jurors was common.
Court procedures in ancient Rome are known only in broad outline. Prosecutors opened with a long speech, which the defense sought to rebut, at equal length. Addresses by supporting counsel followed. A water clock ensured that everyone kept to time. Witnesses for either side were then cross-examined. At some stage, the opposing advocates entered into a debate between themselves (altercatio). The case was then adjourned, probably resuming after a day’s interval. There were further speeches by either side and the calling of additional evidence was allowed. The verdict then followed.
Civil cases were heard in two parts; the first before a Praetor who defined the issues in question, and the second, for decision, before a judge or a jury to whom the Praetor had passed his opinion.
Cicero was amazed by the sensational impact a leading advocate could have on his hearers and looked upon his skills as being akin to those of an actor. Despite the fact that the theater was not regarded as a respectable profession, Cicero was fascinated by it and later became a close friend of the best-known actor of his day, Quintus Roscius Gallus. Although he always insisted that oratory and drama were different arts, he modeled his style on Roscius’s performances and those of another actor he knew, Clodius Aesopus (who once became