2 August 45 BCE: To Atticus (at Rome) from Cicero (at Tusculum)
Cicero corrects a funeral oration
[This is the first of two letters from August 2nd.]
Yesterday, in the midst of the noise, I seem to have caught a remark of yours, that you were coming to Tusculum. Oh, that it may be so! Oh, that it may! I repeat. But only if convenient to yourself.
Lepta begs me to hurry to Rome if he wants me in any way. For Babullius is dead. Caesar, I imagine, is heir to a twelfth—though I don't know anything for certain as yet—but Lepta to a third. Now he is in a fright that he may not be allowed to keep the inheritance. His fear is unreasonable, but nevertheless he is afraid. So if he does summon me, I will hurry to town: if he doesn't, it won't be in any way necessary.*
Yes, send Pollex as soon as you can. I am sending you Porcia's funeral oration corrected: I have been expeditious in order that, if it is by any chance being sent to Domitius's son or to Brutus, it may be this edition that is sent.* If it isn't inconvenient to you I should like you to see to this very carefully; and please send me the funeral orations written by Marcus Varro and Ollius, at any rate that of Ollius. For though I have read the latter, I want to have a second taste of it. There are some things in it that I can scarcely believe that I have read.*
Read Ad Atticum 13.48 in Latin here | Check the glossary here
Notes from the translator, E.S. Shuckburgh:
it won't be in any way necessary—Reading neutiquam. The MSS. have antequam, and Mueller reads non antequam, ‘not till it is necessary.’
it may be this edition that is sent—Porcia, sister of Cato Uticensis, was wife of L. Domitius Ahenobarbus (who fell at Pharsalia) and mother of Cn. Domitius Ahenobarbus, who was afterwards implicated in the plot against Caesar, and played a considerable part in the later civil wars. She was aunt to Brutus's wife Porcia. Therefore Cicero expects a copy of his laudatio to be sent to Brutus as well as to Porcia's son.
There are some things in it that I can scarcely believe that I have read—Apparently because they were so bad.