Cicero - Anthony Everitt [46]
“Today the eyes of the world are upon you,” Cicero told the jurors, fearing that they would allow themselves to be suborned. “This man’s case will establish whether a jury composed exclusively of Senators can possibly convict someone who is very guilty—and very rich. Let me add that because the defendant is the kind of man who is distinguished by nothing except his criminality and his wealth, the only imaginable explanation for an acquittal will be the one that brings the greatest discredit to you. No one will believe that anybody likes Verres, or that he is related to any of you, or that he has behaved well in other aspects of his life, no, nor even that he is moderate in his faults. No such excuses can extenuate the number and scale of his offenses.”
It was crucial that Cicero finish his presentation before the court went into recess with the opening of Pompey’s games on August 16. In the event, he managed to set out his material expeditiously as well as comprehensively. On August 13 he rested his case.
Cicero’s coup was devastating for the defense and had immediate consequences. Clearly, it was no longer feasible for Verres and his friends to try to keep the trial going indefinitely. Far more serious, though, was Hortensius’s reaction. He was appalled by what he had heard and his sense of having been ambushed by Cicero magnified the impact of the evidence. He withdrew from the case without saying a word in response. Verres drew the inevitable conclusion and left at once for Massilia (in Transalpine Gaul) and a lifetime of exile. He was able to take his fortune with him, for he was as yet unconvicted, and so did not have to sacrifice his extorted comforts.
On the following day the jury, despite having been heavily bribed, had no choice but to bring in a guilty verdict. A fine of 3 million sesterces was levied—a derisory figure but probably the maximum that could be legally claimed. Hortensius was persuaded to return to court and speak in mitigation. AS a reward Verres gave him an ivory figurine of a sphinx. In the course of his own address, Cicero made some enigmatic remark and Hortensius interrupted: “I am afraid I’m no good at solving riddles.” “Oh, really,” snapped Cicero. “In spite of having a sphinx at home?”
Although Cicero had done little more than call witnesses and examine them, he had been able to display his eloquence, or at least his wit, in a number of heated exchanges. He had no hesitation in delivering brutal and sometimes tasteless put-downs. When a Jewish freedman named Caecilius (his name suggests he was an ex-slave of the Metelli) tried to push himself forward instead of the Sicilian witnesses, Cicero remarked scornfully: “What can a Jew have to do with a pig?”—“Verres” meaning “uncastrated boar” in Latin. At another point in the proceedings, when Verres attacked Cicero for not having the most virile or healthy of constitutions, he replied: “Virility is something you would do better to discuss with your boys at home.” (One of Verres’s sons was supposed to be promiscuously homosexual.)
Even though their property was not restored, the Sicilians were delighted by the verdict. Cicero’s routing of Hortensius was a professional turning point. He was now beyond dispute the leading advocate of his day. Not wanting to waste the results of his researches, he worked up the documentation