Themistocles in Cicero’s Letter to Lucceius

After a brief introduction to modern literature on Cicero’s famous letter to Lucceius (Fam. V, 12 [SB 22]) and its importance for Cicero’s idea of history, the paper focuses on the two mentions of Themistocles in the letter. In both instances, the correctness of Cicero’s statements is hard to defend, and previous attempts to explain this have been unpersuasive. It is possible that Cicero was simply mistaken, but on balance it seems more likely that his mistakes were intentional, made to provoke Lucceius to correct him. Had Lucceius done so, Cicero could have claimed that Lucceius was rude, and used it as further leverage on Lucceius to deliver the laudatory monograph on Cicero’s conduct from his consulship up to his return from exile.

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