person
Quintus Lutatius Catulus (consul 78)
Catulus the elder of Cicero's day
Roman consul 78 BC, censor 65; \textit{princeps senatus} from c. 67. The chief honourer of Cicero on the Catilinarian conspiracy: gave him the title \textit{parens patriae} in the senate.
Reading notes
- Ad Atticum 4.5 §1 the villa which had been Catulus's
Q. Lutatius Catulus (cos. 78 BC) had owned property on the Palatine adjoining the site of Cicero's house. Optimates resented Cicero's acquisition of it, on which he had built; he retorts that he bought it lawfully from Vettius.
- Ad Familiares 9.15 §3 You bring up Catulus to me, and those times.
Q. Lutatius Catulus (consul 78 BC), the leading optimate and princeps senatus who hailed Cicero as parens patriae after the Catilinarian conspiracy; Paetus had invoked Catulus's era as a precedent for Cicero's staying engaged in politics. Cicero replies that the times are no longer comparable now that Caesar holds sole power.