3 April 58 BCE: From Cicero (at Vibo?) to Atticus (in Rome)

The 400 Mile Cicero Exclusion Zone

Cicero greets Atticus.

Please attribute it to my misery rather than inconsistency that I summoned you to Vibo and then left suddenly. For the proposed law about my ruination reached me, containing the correction I had heard about: that I am permitted to exist more than 400 miles away; that I am not permitted to get there.¹

I immediately changed direction towards Brundisium² before the day the law would take effect, so that Sicca (whose house I was staying at) would not be ruined, and because I am not permitted to stay in Malta.³

So now please hurry to catch up with me—if I will even be welcome anywhere. So far, I still receive polite invitations, but I fear for what is to come. My Pomponius,⁴ it hurts me very much to be alive, and on this matter I found your influence was strongest. But more of this in person. Only please do come.

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Latin text of Cic. Att. 3.4 | Glossary

1. A Roman mile was about 1.48 kilometres, and so Clodius’ law forbade Cicero from coming within almost 600 kilometres from any part of Italy. The law also forbade anyone from helping Cicero in any way, which would make the journey out of Italy very difficult.

2. Brundisium was a port from which Cicero could travel to Greece or Macedonia. He had considered going to Sicily, but now could not due to the distance provision of Clodius’ law.

3. Sicca could be punished for helping Cicero once the law was passed. Cicero could not go to Malta as it fell within the Cicero Exclusion Zone.

4. Atticus’ full name was Titus Pomponius Atticus. Frank Frost Abbot notes: ‘Cicero rarely addresses his correspondent by name in a letter. In the 397 letters to Atticus, Atticus is addressed by name only 28 times: mi Attice nineteen times, mi Tite once, and mi T Pomponi once, otherwise as in this letter. The omission of the praenomen, as Tyrrell remarks, indicated intimacy.’