text | Gu Xuan's history
editor | The History of Guxian
Quintus most likely wrote the Commentary on Petitions, the "Manual of Petitions for Magistrates," for his brother, the famous orator Marcus Tullius Cicero, when he wanted Mark to be elected to the highest office in the Roman Republic, the consulship.
Although the authorship of this work, written in letter form, is disputed in the literature, it still seems acceptable to us that its author was Quintus Tullius Cicero, to his famous brother and orator Marcus.
The importance of the consuls (two consuls elected each year) in Roman political life cannot be underestimated, as these elections had a significant impact on the fate of the empire for the following year, a testament to the fact that campaigns tended to have a sharp and decisive tone.
Marcus Tullius Cicero as the "new man" (homono vus) began to fight to conquer this position. ), that is, as a person whose ancestors did not occupy a higher position in the governance of the republic.
Marcus should have tried to make full use of the means at his disposal - chiefly his reputation as an orator - to defeat his rivals, who were nobles of lesser birth but notorious for their corrupt lifestyles and evil deeds.
The ancient author Quintus Tulius Cicero lius Cicero advises that in order to successfully run for office, candidates should not shy away from any subterfuge, false promises, lies, or pretense.
It is unknown to what extent Marcus Tullius Cicero used his brother's advice, which pointed to unbridled opportunism and manipulation in the manner of Machiavelli . The fact is, however, that he reached the ideal position.
in total In Rome during the Roman Republic, there were four parliaments.
In the last century, these parliamentary republics operated only a council of centurions, which elected the high magistrates and consuls, and the tributes of the inferior magistrates.
According to tradition, the Centurion Congregation was founded by King Servius Tullius, but its existence is only confirmed in sources in the mid-5th century.
In its early days, this parliament was led by a military unit Bits of composition, however, over time, the basis of this military organization has been lost. According to the censor's property assessment, the citizens were divided into 193 centurions - riders and pedestrians, as shown below.
The cavalry gave eighteen centurions whose property review was higher than a hundred thousand aces.
The infantry were divided into five grades according to the census of property: the first grade, where the fortune exceeded one hundred thousand, was given to the eighty-centurion;
the second grade, when the census exceeded seventy thousand Five thousand gave 20;
The third census with more than 50,000 trumps, twenty;
The fourth census with more than 25,000 trumps were also twenty;
And the fifth class with assets above 11,000 trumps gave thirty centurions.
To these classes were added five more centurions of citizens without property: two centurions each of the craftsmen (fabri) and the blowers (cornices), and one by the proletarian ( proletariat ) The number of centurions provided in the first grade was reduced from eighty to seventy centurions, and these centurions were divided into thirty-five young citizen centurions, aged eighteen to forty-six, thirty-five, and forty-seven to sixty.
Before the election begins, they will select the first person to vote (centurion) through the cube, thereby handing this centurion to this centurion to some extent, affecting the final outcome of the vote. possibility of fruition.
The voting started with centurions, the richest people, then the poor, and finally - centurions, the theoretically most numerous citizens without property.
Although the vote of each citizen has the same value, since the vote takes place within each centurion in order to form a majority vote - for or against - it is important to note that this equation is only formal, that is, the counting of votes does not take place after the vote has ended, but while the vote is still in progress.
This may seem strange to us, but it serves the political interests of the ruling class that voting only continues until the vote exceeds fifty percent of the centurion total.
Therefore, victory at ibor is guaranteed if the total number (one hundred and ninety-three centurions) is slightly more than half of the vote.
In the "proper" way: eighteen centurions and eighty first-class centurions have cast more than half of the votes.
Later, when the number of first-grade centurions fell to seventy, enough to join them in voting, and another twenty second-grade centurions, the first nine groups of eight centurions represented only a small portion of the total citizens, so the vote did not express the decision of the majority of the citizens.
Furthermore, the entire citizenry did not take part in the elections, since the voting took place on the Martian field, where seventy thousand citizens were acceptable, and in the 2nd century their total number exceeded this number many times.
The poorer classes living around Rome did not usually show up to vote, especially since consul elections were held.
It was the second half of July, the time to harvest the barley and harvest the beans. This situation also affects the decisions made by the richest people.
The citizen who leads the voting opens the vote with his speech (contio), then announces the names of the candidates and prays to the gods, before sitting on a kuru chair (sellacurulis).
is next to the voting bridge. Voters voted in centurions, they would receive a wax-coated table on which they would write the initials of the preferred candidate, which would then be inserted into an urn (cyst) at the end of the wooden bridge.
After the voting, some centurions would count the votes in a separate room, and the centurions' decisions would be recorded with dots next to the candidates' names.
Once two candidates receive more than fifty percent of the Centurion votes, the vote is declared successful and the election is over, with electoral corruption and wild ambitions.
It is known that at the beginning of the second century there were two laws regarding the scope of sanctions: the Law of Cornelia Bebbia in 181.
However, their contents are unknown. Between the Guerra brothers and Sulla perpetuity was already common.
There is a record of a real dispute about ambitus from this period: that is, 116 AD. and Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, a newcomer, was elected consul.
His opponent P.Rutilius Rufus filed an election lawsuit against him.
Scaurus responded by prosecuting Roof for the same reasons—after all, both defendants (who were also prosecutors) were acquitted.
Sulla's Law, lexCorneliadeambitu is controversial in some respects because our knowledge of LegesCorneliae is incomplete.
That is, we know these laws from two sources: it is Cicero 's speeches and fragments of late classicist lawyers preserved in the Digest.
Cicero only spoke of these laws in the context where the interest of the case required it, and if he could use it in a speech, he would not seek to do so.
while giving a comprehensive introduction to the law, as this was not his task, the classical lawyer, on the other hand, dealt only with Sullivan's laws, which were still valid after the Augustus reforms.
However, the existence of the Code of Civil Procedure can be established based on the following points: in the past, those convicted of deviant crimes were subject to prohibited punishments, and in time they were campaigning for a master's degree. Speaking of campaigns, the first preserved documents on campaign strategy should definitely be mentioned.
In this document, Quintus Tullius Cicero, the younger brother of Marcus Tullius Cicero, gave his brother advice on how to win the consulship in 63 AD.
rose to the top of the blitz roman tail, the genre of Latin commentarius derived from Greek .
This type is used for writing reminders (mimnéskesthai), recording archival data, such as lists and accounts recording business transactions.
It is also used for works of private figures that are not intended for publication. Furthermore, the genre – hypomnémá, due to its breadth, can be used in other contexts, such as describing significant events, recording biographies or practical consulting data.
From the Hellenistic period onwards, hypomnémá mainly denotes an analytical review of a literary text : quoted fragments are accompanied by commentary and differing opinions.
Later, especially in the last centuries of the Roman Republic, commentary meant a simple description of facts, which historians expounded as: annals or historical books.
However, even at this time it did not stop comments being used for private purposes, i.e. for comments not intended for publication.
In summary, the question is, what genre does "Petition Commentary" belong to? The abbreviation of the title, the review shows that its author was not trying to treat the subject as a whole, but rather to present his views on the nomination for public office in the form of a shortened annotation that he wanted to present.
The petition comment begins with a greeting to Mark Tullius, Cicero which indicates that the author intended this document to be sent like a letter.
In the first lines of the work, as in the last paragraphs, Quintus Tullius Cicero expresses his imprint directly in a brotherly manner, however, at the end of the letter he invites him to refine his observations, so that the work was later published as a true commentary.
With this Quintus, it is shown that his work in sent form could not yet be considered a true commentary, but after his brother's correction he wished to publish it, in fact most of the manuscript "Commentary on Petitions" is part of a collection of letters written by Marcus Tullius Cicero with relatives and friends, written by Quintus.
Tullius Cicero (Volume 9-16). This passage cannot be considered in the true sense of the word as a letter, nor because its structure, introduction and conclusion, and then details suggest that a work by its author that was to be published later was essentially already written.
If we ignore personal moments and references to Mark, we can conclude that this work, or most of it as a review, is ready for publication.
The question, however, is whether Quintus was published after Mark's correction, or whether he was able to publish his work describing the organization and implementation of the campaign as he described the battle for voice with ruthless honesty.
Günter Laser summarizes Quintus's work: Candidates who aspire to win a consular post must not hesitate to do any mischief, false promises, lies, conversions and become members of the group that leads to the goal, that is, to suck up.
Finding such obvious opportunism and manipulation did not suit the ruling class of the late Republic, and Marcus Tullius Cicero in particular would have found himself in a very awkward position, as he had no way of dispelling the suspicion that, as a newcomer, he had become consul only because he had applied all these means in his own case.
In summary, we can conclude that the Commentariolum petition originated mainly from Quintus's private letters to Mark, in which Quintus hoped to help Mark and pointed out important moments and means in the campaign that would win the election of the consul.
There are differing opinions as to who authored the petition's commentary. Henderson raised the question of the originality of this work at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, however, this has no particular resonance in the literature - it remains unsupported and controversial.
Mincer considered the text to be original in an article about QuintusCicero. It was not until Watt published the Commentary in the mid-20th century that he expressed surprise that the work could be considered a letter from Quintus Cicero to Mark.
However, in the author's opinion, Laser, the latest publisher of this work, rejects this critical view, first of all, that it is the work of Quintus Cicero. Against Quintus's authorship, the argument was cited that it was childish for Quintus, as a younger brother, to write instructions to his older brother, Mark, on what strategies to adopt when running for office.
