An excellent commentary on The Conspiracy of Catiline.
Sallust's "Catiline": Date and Purpose
Author(s): L. A. MacKay
Source: Phoenix, Vol. 16, No. 3 (Autumn, 1962), pp. 181-194
Published by: Classical Association of Canada
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1086814
[...] Some scholars, disheartened by the variety and inadequacy [of] explanations, have renounced the search for a topical explanation entirely; they are content with a literary justification: the theme offered a promising field for the display of Sallust's literary talent, for criticism of a regime that had not given him the recognition he felt he deserved, and for playing the moralist at a time when he had nothing to lose by it. This seems a frivolous explanation. Whatever one may think of Sallust's intellectual qualifications and achievements, he saw himself as a serious and devoted patriot, whose writings were a valuable service to the community. He was not composing belles lettres. The subjects he chose were not indifferent; they were intimately relevant to the problems of Roman political society that were particularly occupying his mind at the time he wrote. We are justified in asking, rather we are obliged to ask, what particular aspects of the contemporary situation dominated his thinking at the time of writing.
[...] To what particular situation was the Catiline relevant? In the search for an answer, Sallust offers us little explicit help. He chose the theme, he says, because he thought it in primis memorabile sceleris atque periculi novitate. What are we to understand by this? read all
