Cicero to Atticus, written at Rome shortly before 18 October 59 BC, dictated as he walked — the first letter, he notes, that Atticus has ever read in another’s hand. The voice needs rest. The letter introduces two of the cipher names that will mark the late-59 correspondence: Sampsiceramus for Pompey (the dynastic title of the petty king of Emesa whom Pompey had patronized in the East — a private joke at Pompey’s expense for setting himself up as an oriental potentate); and Ox-Eyed Hera [Greek: Bo\=opis] for Clodia, the elder of the three Clodian sisters and wife of Q. Metellus Celer (consul 60 BC), whose consanguineus (kinsman — and, in the gossip, more than that) is Clodius himself.

The political picture: Pompey is sick of his condition, longing to be restored to where he fell from, seeking medicine that Cicero cannot give. The triumviral side, with no enemy in the field, is growing old before time; the unanimity of public opinion against them has never been greater. Yet Clodius is making his threats: denying them to Pompey, parading them to everyone else. The closing imperative is the most-quoted line of late-59 correspondence: si dormis expergiscere, si stas ingredere, si ingrederis curre, si curris advola — “if you are asleep, wake; if you are standing, step out; if you are stepping, run; if you are running, fly.” The matter is the elections (postponed to October by Bibulus’s obstruction): if Atticus cannot make the elections, he must at least be at Rome when “the man” — Clodius — is declared tribune.