person
Lucius Licinius Crassus
Crassus (the orator)
also: L. Crassus
The supreme Roman orator of Cicero's youth (140-91 BC); consul 95, censor 92, princeps senatus. Speaker in De Oratore; his death of pleurisy ten days after the Ides of September 91 BC frames Book 3 as elegy. Not to be confused with M. Licinius Crassus the triumvir.
Reading notes
- Ad Atticum 12.49 §2 by the eloquence of his grandfather Lucius Crassus
L. Licinius Crassus (140--91 BC), consul 95 and the greatest orator of his generation, whom Cicero made a chief speaker in the De Oratore. The petitioner claimed Crassus as his grandfather to strengthen his appeal.
- Ad Atticum 14.8 §1 the grandson of Lucius Crassus
The impostor claimed descent not only from Marius but from the great orator L. Licinius Crassus (cos. 95); Cicero, an admirer of Crassus, says he is "sorry" for the abuse of that illustrious name. The grandson here is the pseudo-Marius himself, who has no registry entity.
- On Duties §2.47 Lucius Crassus
Lucius Licinius Crassus (consul 95 BC), the foremost orator of his generation and one of Cicero's models in the De Oratore. As a very young man he won fame by prosecuting Gaius Carbo.
- Against Verres, Second Hearing, Book III §3 Lucius Crassus
L. Licinius Crassus the orator (cos 95, cens 92 BC); in his youth, prosecuted Gaius Carbo (cos 120 BC) and convicted him in 119 BC. The anecdote of his subsequent regret --- because he reckoned the prosecutor lives henceforth under stricter watch than other men --- is the framing self-discipline of Book III.
- Stoic Paradoxes §41 Rescue us from slavery
A famous appeal from a speech of the orator L. Licinius Crassus (consul 95 BC). Cicero parses its words to argue that Crassus sought only to change masters, not to be truly free in the Stoic sense.