Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Contributors
- List of Abbreviations
- A Note on Translations
- 1 Introduction
- Part 1 On Law
- Part 2 On Lawyers
- 5 Cicero and the Small World of Roman Jurists Yasmina Benferhat
- 6 ‘Jurists in the Shadows’: The Everyday Business of the Jurists of Cicero's Time
- 7 Cicero's Reception in the Juristic Tradition of the Early Empire
- 8 Servius, Cicero and the Res Publica of Justinian
- Part 3 On Legal Practice
- Postscript
- Index
5 - Cicero and the Small World of Roman Jurists Yasmina Benferhat
from Part 2 - On Lawyers
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Contributors
- List of Abbreviations
- A Note on Translations
- 1 Introduction
- Part 1 On Law
- Part 2 On Lawyers
- 5 Cicero and the Small World of Roman Jurists Yasmina Benferhat
- 6 ‘Jurists in the Shadows’: The Everyday Business of the Jurists of Cicero's Time
- 7 Cicero's Reception in the Juristic Tradition of the Early Empire
- 8 Servius, Cicero and the Res Publica of Justinian
- Part 3 On Legal Practice
- Postscript
- Index
Summary
INTRODUCTION
What does it take to be number one? What did it take in Rome in the late Republic to be the best among the politicians and senators? How did one go about achieving the most brilliant career? These were questions that the young Cicero had in mind, without any doubt, as he started his cursus studying law, rhetoric and philosophy. Similarly, these are questions we need to keep in mind when attempting to understand his judgement of the Roman jurists of his time: Q. Mucius Scaevola, Servius Sulpicius Rufus, Gaius Trebatius Testa. It explains why his testimony, though valuable as can be considering that we do not have that many clues about them, must be considered cautiously: he is not objective, not because of his well-known pride, but because he sees law through the prism of his ambition and determination to achieve immortal glory.
For him it was clear that law was not enough and jurists could not expect to have a brillant career merely because of their knowledge. Cicero was an advocate, the greatest advocate Rome had in the late Republic from 70 Bc onwards. He had studied law with the best, but law alone, in his view, was not sufficient to reach the top. Thus modern scholars must apply this filter when attempting to reconstruct the lives of those jurists he knew and assessing their importance in Roman society of the late Republic. The same caveat applies to his views on generals. Cicero considered it useful for the state to have great officers who won battles and wars, but he was convinced that it was not enough to pretend to be the best, and we can assume it was not only because he knew he could never compete with a Pompey or a Caesar. It was also because he believed that a leader had to be more than a victorious general, just as he believed that a jurist could not be a leader with a knowledge only of law.
Once we bear this in mind, we can study the main jurists who lived in or around Cicero's time. Mucius Scaevola was his master in the study of law, until he died; then Cicero had to study with another member of this family.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Cicero's LawRethinking Roman Law of the Late Republic, pp. 71 - 87Publisher: Edinburgh University PressPrint publication year: 2016