Cicero to Q. Minucius Thermus, propraetor of Asia, written from Laodicea between the third day before the Ides of February and the month of April (between 11 February and April) 50 BC (the manuscript dateline: Scr. Laudiceae inter a. d. iii Id. Febr. et m. Apr. a. 704 (50)). One of the recommendation-letters that fill book 13 of Ad Familiares: the proconsul of Cilicia writing to a neighbouring provincial governor on behalf of the son of his interpreter Marcilius.

Cicero has already commended young Marcilius to Thermus once; this letter circles back to thank him for his generous reception of the man at Laodicea, and to ask him to go a little further — to take care, “so far as your honour permits,” that the boy’s mother-in-law not be made the defendant in some pending case. The elder Marcilius, who has served on Cicero’s staff in Cilicia, gets the closing accolade: singularis et prope incredibilis fides, abstinentia modestiaque.