person
Marcus Cato
also: M. Cato, M. Catonem
M. Porcius Cato 'the Censor' (234–149 BC), consul 195, censor 184; the model of old Roman gravitas and prosecutorial severity in extortion cases — most famously his trial of L. Minucius Thermus. Cicero invokes him in the Verrines as the founding type of the Roman provincial prosecution (In Verrem 2.2).
Reading notes
- Ad Familiares 4.6 §1 M. Cato, who lost a son of the highest character and the highest virtue
M. Porcius Cato 'the Censor' (234--149 BC) lost his elder son Cato Licinianus, a distinguished jurist who had served with valour at Pydna; the father's dignified mourning was a Roman exemplum. Cicero's point is that all four men had the consolation of an active public life, which the Caesarian dictatorship now denies him.
- For Publius Sulla §23 the elder Marcus Cato
Cato the Censor (234--149 BC), the stern moralist and statesman, was himself from the country town of Tusculum. Cicero cites him, with Coruncanius, Curius and Marius, as a great Roman who came from a municipium yet was never dismissed as a foreigner.