Isobel K. Köster, University of Colorado
In this talk, I use Cicero’s Catilinarians as a case study for the applicability of recent scholarship on conspiracies and religion to ancient rhetoric. Cicero repeatedly accuses the conspirators of engaging in secret religious rites (see especially Cat. 1.16; 1.24; 2.13). At Catiline’s domestic shrine, they dedicate a dagger for murder and keep a perverted legionary standard. Their rites do not recognize traditional gods, and any blood spilled is that of humans. I argue that this picture offers rich parallels with how modern conspiracy theorists imagine their enemies’ religious life. These correspondences reveal how Cicero tries to curb popular support for the conspiracy by presenting it as the locus of dark, secret rituals that aim at violence (for the connection between secrecy and violence, see Urban).
After a brief overview of the Catilinarians and the context for the passages focusing on the perverted shrine, I explore three intersections between Cicero’s speeches and modern conspiracy rhetoric. First, there is the idea of a singular secret mission. In Ciceronian Rome and the modern world, conspirators are seen to aim at the overthrow of the political and moral fabric of society. Secret and violent religious rites reveal what is actually at stake in the conspiracy. It follows that anyone who can describe those rituals can inform and warn the public about the danger presented by the conspirators. In the Catilinarians, Cicero takes on the role of the interpreter.
Secondly, we have the portrayal of conspiratorial rites as a deviant bricolage of recognizable religious rituals (Robertson, Asprem, and Dyrendal). The rites that conspirators engage in are not just strange and threatening, but also unique. Catiline’s activities combine elements recognizable from magic and the worship of underworld deities into a religious cult for murder and bloodshed. His religious practices are therefore ultimately unrecognizable.
Finally, there is the rhetoric of the half-revealed secret (Robertson). In the modern world, conspiracy theorists spread their message through cryptic clues such as exhortations to remember a certain individual (a presumed victim of the conspirators) or event (allegedly caused by the conspirators). Their audience is then exhorted to investigate with the guidance of the conspiracy theorists. Cicero, too, takes his audience on a mystery quest. In his description of the religious rites of the conspirators, he repeatedly claims not to understand their purpose. Rhetorical questions and expressions of ignorance abound. His audience is asked to participate and speculate and thereby assimilate to his perspective.
While I am not suggesting a one-to-one correspondence between Cicero’s presentation of Catiline’s conspiracy and the imaginings of modern conspiracy theorists, reading the Catilinarians against this background brings out a previously unrecognized dimension of the speeches. The descriptions of religious rites are an attempt to rob Catiline and his followers of their potential power. Catiline uses religion to grow and unite his movement, but by exposing his secrets and presenting them as strange and perverted, Cicero undercuts his enemy’s efforts.