Cicero medicus: medical imagery in Cicero's Catilinarians.

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2021-06-28
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en
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Abstract
In his work The Deaths of the Republic: Imagery of the Body Politic in Ciceronian Rome (2020), Brian Walters demonstrates that medical imagery was a frequently used rhetorical instrument in the first century BC. Although Cicero’s Catilinarian speeches have been shown to contain many instances of medical imagery, the exact function of these instances within the rhetorical and political context of the speeches remains unclear. This thesis examines the main forms of medical imagery in the Catilinarians in an attempt to answer the following research question: “How does Cicero use medical imagery to contribute to achieving his rhetorical and political objectives in the Catilinarians?” The analysis presented in this thesis suggests that Cicero mainly used medical imagery to attack the ethos of his political enemy Catiline and to enhance and protect his own ethos as a trustworthy head of state.
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Faculteit der Letteren