Cicero to Atticus, written from Astura on the fifth day before the Kalends of April 709 AUC — 28 March 45 BC (the manuscript dateline: Scr.\ Asturae v K.\ Apr.\ a.\ 709 (45)). The opening paragraph is the most personal in the cluster. After a few lines on the Silius negotiation — Egnatius is now the preferred channel, and the Silius deal looks dead — Cicero shifts (“this part to you in my own hand”) to the Publilia question. His young second wife has written to say that her mother and Publilius (her brother) propose to come to him at Astura, with Publilia in the party, if he will allow it. Cicero suspects the letter was not really hers; he has written back firmly that the visit is impossible. The one way to prevent their coming, he tells Atticus, is to leave Astura himself: “I would rather not, but it is necessary.” He asks Atticus to find out how long he can safely stay. The text carries a long-standing crux at cum Publilio loqueretur , preserved here.

Section 2 turns to the practicalities of young Marcus’ Athens studies. The expenses are to be capped at the rents from the Argiletum and Aventine properties — enough, Cicero promises, to keep his son at the level of Bibulus, Acidinus, or Messalla, the other young aristocrats then at Athens. Atticus is asked to vet the tenants, secure prompt payers, and budget travel-money and outfit. A characteristic Ciceronian detail closes the letter: no horse will be needed at Athens, and as for the road, the household has more mounts than it ever required.