Interrogators of Cicero:

Christina, Kat, Brian, Gillian, Susie, Erica

Caroline M., Kristina, Tim, Margo, Alison, Roz

Elizabeth, Teresa, Caroline, Kimberley, Jane, Ethan

You are a survivor. Your name is Lucius Caecilius Metellus Macedonicus, a (fictitious) member of the Senate, one of Rome's elite, a former consul and commander of one of Rome's great armies, and a "player" in the highest levels of government. Your family is the old patrician family of the Caecilii Metelli, great defenders of Rome, many of whom gave their lives for the Respublica. It is the Kalends of January in the 466th year of the Respublica (44 BC). Caesar has been dead for more than nine months now, and in that time his grandnephew the young Octavian (the future Augustus) has returned to Rome, your sworn enemy Mark Antony is in command of troops in Northern Italy, and you have heard some of Cicero's attacks against Antony in a series of speeches delivered in the Senate (the Philippics, modelled on public attacks by the great Athenian orator Demosthenes against Philip II, father of Alexander the Great). Soon Rome will be engulfed in yet another phase of a civil war that began nearly 100 years ago with the Gracchi brothers' attempts to "reform" the system. You have come down to the Forum on the Kalends to offer a New Year's sacrifice to Jupiter, Juno and Minerva, praying for a safer year than the one just ended. You hear a commotion at the Rostra, the Forum's platform for public speaking, and see that Cicero is mounting the platform. He has just concluded a speech you have heard before, in which he proclaims the dangers that threaten Rome in this dire hour. He has offered his services to you and your fellow citizens at this critical juncture in Rome's history. You run through in your mind his curriculum vitae ("the course [or career] of his life"). You raise your hand in order to question Cicero about his career, his behavior in the past, and the promises he might offer to enhance Rome's future.