HermitshCicero by Claude

Letter · 29 January 49 BC · Calibus

Ad Atticum 7.16

Ad Atticum 7.16

Headnote

Cicero to Atticus, written from Cales on the fourth day before the Kalends of February in 49 BC (the manuscript dateline: Scr. Calibus iv K. Febr. a. 705 (49)). Cicero is on the road back from the Pompeian headquarters at Capua to his Formian villa, and has stopped at Cales — about midway — where Atticus’s latest letter has just caught him at the ninth hour. He dashes off a short reply on the spot.

Section 2 is the news. Pompey is writing optimistically: a sound army in a few days, and if he himself can reach Picenum, “we shall be returning to Rome.” Labienus, having just deserted Caesar, is at Pompey’s side and tells him Caesar’s forces are weaker than they look; on the strength of that, Cicero notes, Gnaeus noster multo animi plus habet — “our friend Gnaeus has a great deal more spirit.” The consuls have summoned him back to Capua for the Nones (five days off), and he registers his itinerary exactly: out of Capua on the third day before the Kalends, into Cales the same day, letter dispatched at once. The final brisk paragraph is a domestic instruction: Terentia and Tullia, if they have not yet left Rome, should sit tight until they see how matters stand.

All your letters, I think, have been delivered to me — but the first ones out of order, the rest in the sequence in which they were sent by way of Terentia. About Caesar’s instructions and the arrival of Labienus and the replies of the consuls and of Pompey I wrote to you in the letter I gave at Capua on the fifth day before the Kalends, and I gathered up a good deal else besides into that same letter.
omnis arbitror mihi tuas litteras redditas esse sed primas praepostere, reliquas ordine quo sunt missae per Terentiam. de mandatis Caesaris adventuque Labieni et responsis consulum ac Pompei scripsi ad te litteris iis quas a. d. v Kal. Capua dedi pluraque praeterea in eandem epistulam conleci.
For the moment we have these two things to look forward to: first, what Caesar will do when he has received what was given to Lucius Caesar to take back to him; second, what Pompey will do. Pompey, for his part, writes to me that in a few days he will have a sound army, and gives me to hope that, if he himself comes into the Picenum country, we shall be returning to Rome. He has Labienus with him — a man who has no doubt about the weakness of Caesar’s forces; and on his coming our friend Gnaeus has a great deal more spirit. We were ordered by the consuls to come to Capua on the Nones of February. I set out from Capua for Formiae on the third day before the Kalends. That day, when I had received your letter at Cales at about the ninth hour, I dispatched this one at once. As to Terentia and Tullia, I agree with you.
nunc has exspectationes habemus duas, unam quid Caesar acturus sit cum acceperit ea quae referenda ad illum data sunt L. Caesari, alteram quid Pompeius agat. qui quidem ad me scribit paucis diebus se firmum exercitum habiturum spemque adfert, si in Picenum agrum ipse venerit, nos Romam redituros esse. Labienum secum habet non dubitantem de imbecillitate Caesaris copiarum; cuius adventu Gnaeus noster multo animi plus habet. nos a consulibus Capuam venire iussi sumus ad Nonas Febr. Capua profectus sum Formias a. d. iii Kal. eo die cum Calibus tuas litteras hora fere nona accepissem, has statim dedi. de Terentia et Tullia tibi adsentior.
I had written to them to take you for direction. If they have not yet set out, there is no reason for them to stir until we can see how matters stand.
ad quas scripseram ad te ut referrent. si nondum profectae sunt, nihil est quod se moveant, quoad perspiciamus quo loci sit res.

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Ad Atticum 7.16

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