Ships were lost during these dark voyages, and said to have had their wrecks, with their bodies, consumed by the sea or devoured by beasts in the desert.' Pompey had, since the beginning of his career, been something of a freebooter in the classical sense, and Pompey's father was himself governor of Sicily at the time of his death, so it is likely that the story at least includes a degree of truth. It was Pompey's fortune to be one of the very few successful Republican generals to die at home in old age. He had just returned from defeating Pharnaces at Zela when he was attacked in the night by four assassins in the garden of his house in Rome. At the age of 64, Pompey was only five months short of his 70th birthday, and yet his wounds were so severe that in the aftermath of his death the Senate was able to find no consoling words to speak of his life, and no terms of elegiac praise to speak of his death. Pompey was dead, and there seemed nothing more that the Senate could do for his memory. The Senate sent a dispatch to the people of the province of Sicily, announcing the death of one who had been 'the benefactor of the city of Rome' and praising the achievements of the man who was described in the brief dispatch as 'a truly great man'. But the people of Rome were more interested in the affairs of their own household than in those of their sister city in the south, and, despite the efforts of the Senate, they received the message of condolence with derision. 'For what reason can a state declare that a man has done nothing when he was killed as a result of his own folly?' asked Cicero. 'The gods had him in their power, but this is a strange opinion that he was destroyed because he was killed by his own deeds. It seems to me that he died as a result of folly, because he would not permit himself to be taken captive.' Cicero believed that it was folly – folly, perhaps, but also hubris and pride – that had undone Pompey. When he was recalled from exile, Pompey had believed that he was being restored as a great power in the Roman political world, but Cicero suggested that Pompey had been like the king of the Bacchants in Bacchylides' poem of the same name, who had become a slave to his own desire and who now found himself punished by the gods for his folly. As a result of Pompey's pride he had destroyed himself, 'like a pine, one of whose shoots grows tall on the mountain, while all the rest are torn away; when the whole of its body is destroyed, it at last also comes to an end'. It was unfortunate that Pompey had been forced into exile and exile that had led him to his death. 'Wicked are the gods and inhuman, who have thus deprived a citizen of Rome of life when he was returning home in peace.' The assassination of Pompey was a great shock to the Romans and much mourned, and soon after, Sulla had the body of Pompey, which had been prepared for burial in the customary manner for a dictator, but he did not allow his body to be buried in the manner normally accorded to a mortal man. Sulla announced that it would be better to have Pompey's body consumed by flames rather than to leave it for the vultures. Later, some people even claimed that it was Sulla himself who had ordered the body to be burnt, though it was more likely that he had permitted it. No public display was permitted, for although Caesar's body had been burnt after his death, Pompey was not allowed a similar honour. The body was allowed to rest, it was said, at the base of Pompey's library in the portico of the Theatre of Pompey. This had originally been used as a tavern, but Pompey had converted the portico into a dining room after dining there one day, as he walked past the tables. Pompey had been the first foreigner to be admitted to the Roman pantheon, which had gradually expanded over the course of the previous century to include all the great figures of the Roman past. In the years following Pompey's death, it had been as though a curtain was now drawn aside for an age in which Romans could identify themselves with other Greeks, and Romans from the Greek colonies overseas, such as Egypt, came to be regarded as Greeks. Pompey was the first of a long line of illustrious Romans from overseas to be accepted into the ranks of the elite of Rome. His name appears in the dedications at the Temple of Venus Genetrix in 46 BC, and Cicero could now look upon his statue as a source of pride. 'This has always seemed to me the most distinguished tomb of anyone in Rome, the most honourable to those who visit it.' The statue had arrived in Rome from Naples in October 46, when the praetor Marcus Octavius sent a message to Cicero: 'I have brought a statue of Pompey to you. I know how you would like to see it.' Octavius also sent a consignment of marble which would help to complete a statue of Cicero himself, still languishing in progress in the shops of artisans. In this Roman world that Cicero had now entered he was able to feel confident and to know that he was important, despite the fact that his political skills had failed him and that Octavius was now the consul. 'When I visited Caesar as his son-in-law, I gave him reason to feel a measure of fear,' he explained. 'My speech in the Senate may have seemed to be the work of a drunken man, but its contents – and the way I expressed them – did not escape Caesar's notice. It gave him no pleasure, but I was able to observe that I had brought him to feel fear. Later, when I was consul, I proved my ability to command respect in my own right, and so I was able to demonstrate that fear was the one thing which I had been wrong to imagine might have intimidated me.' Cicero was happy to be identified with one of the great men of the past, and his writings contained a great many references to Pompey, whose name he never failed to invoke with some degree of awe. The following year Cicero's family gathered to celebrate the dedication of his new temple, which was situated in the heart of the city, in the area that was the centre of his power. 'Not only the nobility, but those who had once been citizens were present, as well as citizens and foreigners who were known for their literary attainments,' the author of the _Vatican Tablet_ wrote of the audience. 'The most famous of the present citizens were Cicero and his son.' Cicero, of course, was now far from alone in his glory. At the dedication of the temple Cicero had Cicero's fellow orator Caelius Rufus to keep him company, and he was able to express his delight to Caelius: 'It is a great good fortune for you that you have taken up your residence at our temple. We have now begun to do so regularly.' ## 9. Lictors and Consuls While Cato served as consul four times, he never served two consecutive terms. From 59 BC onwards he received permission to step down, and in 58 he was assigned to the lesser magistracy of 'city praetor', which involved the organisation of the games and rituals for Saturnalia. He would also have become consul in 59, if he had not had to preside over the trial of Julius Caesar's alleged murderers, but this was one consulship that Caesar would not be able to command. In the summer of 54 BC, when Caesar was in Cisalpine Gaul, Cicero decided to put out a fire that was raging among the vineyards, and in his work as one of the town councillors he was accompanied by a number of _vilici_ , 'vine-dressers', who were part of Caesar's army. In June 54 Caesar was once again elected for the post of urban praetor, which he would take up in the autumn. He would not serve his term in office until the summer of 52 BC, so it seemed that he was going to be away from Rome for a few months, but this was not to be. Caesar would never leave Rome again, not even for a visit to Baiae. Instead, he would remain in Rome for the next seven years, until the second year of his governorship of Gaul, when he was felled by that fatal arrow. Caesar was one of the small number of men who became a consul without having served as a praetor, and in his consulship, when he was 53 years old, he would preside over one of the most important assemblies of his time, when he gave a famous speech. In the meantime, Caesar's consulship was to have a rather different flavour, for in 52 BC Caesar was forced to find a way to win the favour of Cato. To ensure his support, Caesar had to offer him something, and so, at the suggestion of Servilius Isauricus, who was a friend of Cato's, he proposed a 'public distribution of grain', to relieve the pressure on the city's food supply during a time of financial crisis. In this and every other matter, Caesar was still closely linked to Cato, as he had been throughout the period when he