9 IN TOGA CANDIDA

This speech was delivered by Cicero dressed in the traditional whitened garb of a candidate for office (cf. T 5). Though formal speeches did not ordinarily play a part in Roman electoral politics, this example is an exception (cf. Tatum 2013, 134–35). In the run-up to the elections of 64, bribery was so rife that the senate attempted to pass a decree sharpening the penalties for improper canvassing. This was vetoed, however, by the plebeian tribune Q. Mucius Orestinus, who may have been a relation of Catiline’s wife Aurelia Orestilla (so RE s.v. Mucius 12). The previous day, whether in a public assembly or in the senate, by way of explaining his veto, Orestinus had declared Cicero unworthy of the consulship (F 27; cf. Tatum 2013, 149). Catiline spoke in a similar vein, whether on that or another occasion, emphasizing his own high standing (as a born patrician) and expressing his contempt for Cicero (as a “new man”): F 6, 20; cf. T 3. When the matter was brought up for discussion in the senate the next day, Cicero was called on to speak and delivered this oration, a passionate denunciation of his two leading rivals, Catiline and Antonius, not without aspersions cast on the tribune Orestinus (F 27). The speech was not extemporaneous (Cicero