Marcus Licinius Crassus

Reading notes

• Ad Atticum 1.4 §3 I outdo Crassus in wealth

  Marcus Licinius Crassus was the proverbially richest man in Rome; Cicero jokes that owning Atticus's library would make him richer still. Crassus would shortly form the so-called First Triumvirate with Pompey and Caesar.

• Ad Atticum 1.16 §5 Calvus of the Nanneian estate

  A coded slur for M. Licinius Crassus, who organized the jury bribery: "Calvus" (baldhead) plus a reference to property he had bought up in the Sullan proscriptions of one Nanneius.

• Ad Atticum 2.3 §3 would give pains to join Crassus with Pompey

  An early signal of the coalition (the so-called First Triumvirate) of Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus, who had long been at odds; Balbus reports Caesar's intent to reconcile them.

• Ad Atticum 2.24 §4 a defendant before Crassus Dives

  M. Licinius Crassus ("Dives," the Rich), the triumvir, here presiding as quaesitor over the standing court on public violence (de vi) before which Vettius was tried. His condemnation would have let Vettius turn approver and trigger further prosecutions.

• Ad Familiares 14.2 §2 I fear Crassus

  Marcus Licinius Crassus, the richest man in Rome and a member of the so-called First Triumvirate with Pompey and Caesar. Cicero distrusted him and feared he would obstruct the recall.

• On the Ends of Good and Evil §2.57 as Marcus Crassus was

  Marcus Licinius Crassus (c. 115-53 BC), the immensely wealthy member of the First Triumvirate, byword for power and riches. Cicero cites him (with Pompey) as an example of a man with the means to do wrong with impunity.

• On the Ends of Good and Evil §3.75 more rightly rich than Crassus

  M. Licinius Crassus, the triumvir famed for his wealth, who crossed the Euphrates 'with no cause for war' and perished at Carrhae in 53 BC. Only the wise man, Cicero argues, is truly rich, because he alone knows how to use all things.

• Against Verres, Second Hearing, Book V §5 rafts joined ... could not pass through the strait

  The Spartacan slaves tried to cross the Strait of Messana on improvised rafts. M. Crassus prevented the crossing in 71 BC; the standing example of Roman generalship Verres claims (and Cicero refuses) for himself.

• Philippica XIV §17 Wide is the field in public life, as Marcus Crassus used wisely to say

  Cicero quotes a maxim of M. Licinius Crassus (the triumvir, killed at Carrhae in 53 BC): the path to glory in politics is open to many, so virtue need not breed envy among good men.

• Tusculan Disputations §3.31 the famous old Marcus Crassus

  Marcus Licinius Crassus (the 'rich' Crassus's grandfather, an early-second-century figure), of whom the satirist Lucilius said he laughed only once in his whole life. Cicero contrasts his grimness with Socrates' calm serenity.