Publius Cornelius Lentulus Spinther

Reading notes

• Ad Atticum 3.22 §2 Lentulus

  P. Cornelius Lentulus Spinther, consul-elect for 57 BC and the chief champion of Cicero's recall; his goodwill is Cicero's best lever on Pompey.

• Ad Atticum 9.11 §1 our Lentulus is at Puteoli

  P. Cornelius Lentulus Spinther, consul of 57 BC and Cicero's old benefactor in his recall from exile, had been captured at Corfinium and released by Caesar; he is now lying low at the seaside resort of Puteoli, uncertain whether to follow Pompey.

• Ad Atticum 11.13 §1 Publius Lentulus the father is said to be at Rhodes, his son at Alexandria

  P. Cornelius Lentulus Spinther, consul of 57 BC who had helped recall Cicero from exile, was a leading Pompeian now stranded in the eastern Mediterranean; his son of the same name was with Caesar at Alexandria. The scattered movements of these exiles measure the collapse of the Pompeian cause.

• Ad Familiares 5.4 §1 your colleague

  P. Cornelius Lentulus Spinther, Nepos's fellow consul in 57 BC and the chief mover of Cicero's recall from exile. Cicero writes from Dyrrachium hoping Nepos, his old enemy, will not obstruct what Spinther is driving.

• Ad Quintum Fratrem 2.3 §1 The young son changed his dress

  When C. Cato moved to strip Lentulus Spinther of his command (and so of the Egyptian commission), Lentulus's son put on mourning dress (mutare vestem) --- the conventional Roman gesture of public distress to win sympathy.

• Brutus §268 avenger of my wrongs, author of my restoration

  P. Cornelius Lentulus Spinther, consul 57 BC, who as consul proposed and carried the law recalling Cicero from exile; Cicero repeatedly hails him as the author of his restoration.