Undergraduate Course: The Catilinarian Conspiracy (LATI10027)
Course Outline
| School | School of History, Classics and Archaeology |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 3 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course will provide an opportunity to study in detail one of the best-documented episodes of ancient history, the Catilinarian conspiracy of 63-62 BC, within its historical (political and social) context. The course will also involve literary study of the principal sources. |
| Course description |
The Catilinarian conspiracy was the attempted seizure of power at Rome by the disaffected aristocrat Catiline; it was suppressed by the consul Cicero, who controversially executed five of the ringleaders. The sources (to be read partly in Latin and partly in English translation) consist of Cicero's speeches to the senate and people during the crisis, his later defence of an alleged conspirator P. Sulla, and the historian Sallust's account of the conspiracy written twenty years afterwards. In addition to supplying historical information, these sources also represent the best and most exciting oratory and historiography of the late republic. The course will be particularly valuable in enabling Latin students who may previously have studied little or no Roman history to become expert in a tightly defined historical period (the mid-60s BC) through close study of the literary sources.
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Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | Visiting students should usually have at least 3 courses in Classics related subject matter (at least 2 of which should be in Latin) at grade B or above (or be predicted to obtain this) for entry to this course. We will only consider University/College level courses but Elementary or Intermediate Latin courses will not count. Students beyond Intermediate level but with less Latin than the prerequisite should consider taking either Latin 2a/2b. |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- demonstrate, by way of coursework and examination as required, command of the body of knowledge considered in the course;
- demonstrate, by way of coursework and examination as required, an ability to read, analyse and reflect critically upon relevant scholarship;
- demonstrate, by way of coursework and examination as required, an ability to understand, evaluate and utilise a variety of primary source material;
- demonstrate, by way of coursework and examination as required, the ability to develop and sustain scholarly arguments in oral and written form, by formulating appropriate questions and utilising relevant evidence
- demonstrate independence of mind and initiative; intellectual integrity and maturity; an ability to evaluate the work of others.
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Reading List
W.W.Batstone, "Cicero's construction of consular ethos in the First Catilinarian", Transactions of the American Philological Association 124 (1994), 211-66
W.W.Batstone, "Catiline's speeches in Sallust's Bellum Catilinae", in D.H.Berry and A.Erskine (eds), Form and Function in Roman Oratory (Cambridge, 2010), 227-46
D.H.Berry, Cicero's Catilinarians (New York, 2020)
D.H.Berry, Cicero: Political Speeches (Oxford, 2006)
D.H.Berry, Cicero: Pro Sulla (Cambridge, 1996)
A.Drummond, Law, Politics and Power: Sallust and the Execution of the Catilinarian Conspirators (Historia Einzelscriften 93; Stuttgart, 1995)
A.R.Dyck, Cicero: Catilinarians (Cambridge, 2008)
B.M.Levick, Catiline (London, 2015)
J.T.Ramsey, Sallust's Bellum Catilinae, ed. 2 (New York, 2007)
R.J.Seager, "The first Catilinarian conspiracy", Historia 13 (1964), 338-47
D.L.Stockton, Cicero: a Political Biography (Oxford, 1971)
R.Syme, Sallust (Berkeley etc., 1964)
T.P.Wiseman in J.A.Crook et al. (eds), The Cambridge Ancient History ix2 (Cambridge, 1994), 346-61
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Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Not entered |
| Special Arrangements |
In order for a student from outwith Classics to be enrolled, contact must be made with a Course Secretary on 50 3580/3582 in order for approval to be obtained. |
| Keywords | Catilinarian Conspiracy |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Dominic Berry
Tel: (0131 6)50 3590
Email: d.h.berry@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Katherine Perry
Tel:
Email: kperry2@ed.ac.uk |
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