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Extracted from H. Baltussen (ed) Greek and Roman Consolations. Eight

Studies of a Tradition and its Afterlife (Swansea 2013) 67–92 [uncorrected
proofs]

CICERO’S CONSOLATIO AD SE: CHARACTER,

PURPOSE AND IMPACT OF A CURIOUS TREATISE *

Han Baltussen

In March 45 BC Cicero made a remarkable claim in a letter to his friend

Atticus not long after the tragic death of his daughter Tullia, informing
him that he had done something unprecedented, that is, write a consolation
to himself (Att. 12.14.3): ‘I will send you the piece as soon as the copyists
have finished it. I can assure you there is no consolation like it’ (Quem librum
ad te mittam, si descripserint librarii. tibi adfirmo nullam consolationem esse talem).1
What did he mean by nullam...consolationem talem? And can we interpret such
a claim, when we have very limited access to the content of a work
surviving only in fragments? 2 In this chapter I will revisit the excellent but
much neglected analysis of the fragments by the Polish scholar Kumaniecki
(1968) to raise the profile of the Consolatio and give it a meaningful place
within Cicero’s response to his loss. I will argue that we may be able to
answer these questions by identifying the stages of Cicero’s grief and
correlating them to the relevant writings. An improved insight into the
correlation between Cicero’s grief and how he expressed himself about it,
will, I believe, enhance our understanding of the claim he makes about the
Consolatio and its possible effect on recovery. His own offhand evaluation
of the therapeutic value of writing – a standard element of modern grief
management – is a signal that the ancient perspective has a different focus
from ours.
I will first give a summary of our knowledge of the text and the
reconstruction by Kumaniecki (sections 1–2) on the content and structure
of the Consolatio. Here I will emphasise the importance of chronology of the
main sources for Cicero’s grief, of which there are three: the letters, the
Consolatio and the Tusculan Disputations 3 (hereafter Tusc.). His letters from
48–44 BC give us very regular updates on the progression of his mental
state and moods in his correspondence with his friend Atticus (and a few
others). They will be used to contextualise the Consolatio (section 3). The
letters and the fragments have been undeservedly overshadowed by the
more easily accessible philosophical discussion of emotions in Tusc. I do

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not dispute the importance of Tusc. for the history of philosophy or

Cicero’s thought, but maintain that the work does not inform us
sufficiently about Cicero’s personal reaction to grief, but rather about his
considered views about grief. Another question to reflect on is whether
Cicero’s use of the Greek and Roman consolatory traditions influenced
his claim that there is nullam...talem (and did he mean unparalleled,
unequalled or both?). I will conclude (section 4) that the remarkable claim
Cicero makes about the work should not solely be taken as hyperbole, but
as the statement of someone regaining his confidence in the face of
adversity and attempting to outdo the traditional grief responses in Greek
and Roman writings up to his day. What I hope will emerge from my
analysis is a better understanding of the efficacy of (consolatory) writing for
a man mustering all his intellectual and emotional powers in order to
survive a storm of personal and political adversity.

1. Cicero’s Consolatio ad se: status quaestionis

The reconstruction of the Consolatio was given new impetus when
Kumaniecki gave a critical assessment of the flaws of earlier reconstructions
and provided a plausible argument for the structure and content of the
work. Kumaniecki’s analysis has remained very much underused in recent
research.3 His analysis and reconstruction are valuable, but it should be
noted that his objective was mostly literary and polemical: to refute
previous (flawed) reconstructions of the fragmented text and to reassess
the evidence as he knew it. My analysis will extend Kumaniecki’s work by
placing the Consolatio in its intellectual and social context and by assessing
Cicero’s consolatory strategy with the help of some modern insights.
I believe that the role the Consolatio played for Cicero’s recovery may have
been more significant than has been acknowledged.
Much of the scholarly attention has understandably gone to Cicero’s
philosophical discussions of emotions in the Tusc. There he tries to clarify
emotions within the framework of the Greek philosophical tradition (grief
is mostly treated in book 3). The problem with the work is that it reveals
his personal experience of grief only sparingly, in some references to his
earlier Consolatio.4 The philosophical account written from hindsight (Tusc.)
will not allow us to grasp fully the way in which Cicero managed to cope
with his grief.5 If we focus on the Tusc. we are reading Cicero’s grief
backwards. In order to interpret Cicero’s grief we should keep to the
chronology of his writing activity.
The natural order of the stages of his grief is reflected in his writing
chronologically (with some overlap): the letters, the Consolatio, Tusculan
Disputations. In focussing on the first and second stage we maintain the

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close relation between the experience and the way in which it was
expressed. In this way we view grief first and foremost as an emotional
problem (not just a literary or philosophical one), which in Cicero’s case
was dealt with in different ‘registers’, while he was trying to cope with
multiple experiences of loss.6 To put it in another way, this approach more
fully appreciates that the most relevant texts chart the stages of his
bereavement.7 The Consolatio, I suggest, marks a halfway house between
unresolved and resolved grief.8 This point about grief stages in the Ciceronian
sources becomes important, if we want to reach a more realistic
interpretation of his bereavement process.9 Asking about the nature and
evolution of Cicero’s grief therefore requires analyzing its progression and
how this unfolded in his writings.
Let us briefly consider the nature of the sources before we look at the
content of his Consolatio ad se (section 2). To have access to someone’s
personal as well as philosophical views is quite special in the study of
ancient authors.10 Their different purpose and context should make us
sensitive to the author’s self-presentation. The letters assist in contextualising
Cicero’s mood, political relevance, and priorities of the moment. His
philosophical reflections in Tusc., written while in a more balanced state of
mind, are not merely produced for ‘self-centered grief-management’
(Gildenhard 2007, 69), but are part of a broader strategy, so they do not
apply exclusively to his personal situation.11
It is also of interest how Cicero himself refers to his Consolatio. His
comments raise questions about format and genre. In some places he refers
to the work as ‘consolation’ (Tusc. 3.76; Att. 12.14.3) or a ‘book on
diminishing mourning’ (Att. 12.20, librum de luctu diminuendo), elsewhere he
calls it ‘written work’ ( per litteras, Att. 12.14.3).12 Lössl points out that
Augustine thought Cicero’s work was little more than ‘a speech’, which
emphasises its rhetorical nature.13 The various descriptions suggest that its
form cannot easily resolve questions about content.14
Kumaniecki’s useful reconstructive work on the Consolatio ad se has given
us a credible foundation for the text and arrangement of the fragments.
Kumaniecki also managed to eliminate certain misunderstandings from
previous studies.15 In particular he rejects the idea that the important
comment in Cicero on his approach in the Consolatio (Crantorem sequor,
fr. 7 Mueller = fr. 4 Vitelli) should be read as indicating that he slavishly
followed Crantor in his consolation.16 Crantor did write a consolation,
regarded as the first philosophical consolation, but it is more likely that
this work was a general guide for Cicero’s approach, not a template to be
copied.17 Another reason to believe Cicero did not just rely on Crantor is
the fact that he mentioned many other authors, some more recent than

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Crantor. In combination with Ps. Plutarch’s Consolatio ad Apollonium (itself

supposed to reproduce parts of Crantor’s work),18 this led to misguided
notions about Cicero’s consolation. The preferable approach, Kumaniecki
argues correctly, should include the wider tradition, which is why we need
to revisit both the internal and external evidence.
The Consolatio was written in March, 45 BC, most likely between March
6 and 22.19 As noted, there are some references to his Consolatio in his Tusc.,
written after his acute grief had subsided and he had started a more
ambitious programme to create a body of philosophical works in Latin.
From hindsight this activity can be viewed as a welcome distraction as well
as a good way to focus his energy and skills to cope with the collapse of his
political and private life.20 To a modern reader at least his letters suggest
how both philosophical ideas and writing are the main therapeutic tools.
Cicero himself only names the former, when he writes, some eighteen
months after the event: ‘For my part, my endurance of this and all other
evils that can befall a human being, makes me feel profoundly grateful to
philosophy which not only distracts my thoughts from anxiety, but also
arms me against all the slings and arrows of fortune’ (Fam. 12.23.4, Oct.
44 BC).21 Clearly he has regained his faith in philosophy, while he rejected
philosophical advice early on in his grief.
Kumaniecki revises the common view about the chronology of the
work’s genesis (1968, 29). When Cicero writes to Atticus on March 7
‘I will send you a copy as soon as the clerks have made a fresh version’
(Att. 12.14.3), we might think he finished the work in full draft, as
Philippson maintained. However, Cicero asked Atticus for further
materials on March 15 (Att. 12.20.2), March 18 (12.22.2) and March 20
(12.24.2).22 So Kumaniecki is probably right to suggest March 11 as a more
likely date for the preliminary draft completed (Att. 12. 18. 1), and a date
of March 20, or shortly after, for the final version (Att. 12. 24).23

2. Structure of the work

To recapture the structure of the work in greater detail is more problematic,
but the main outline can be established and discrepancies with Vitelli’s
edition are not substantial.24 Cicero can be seen to follow some traditional
arguments and familiar sources. A more complete version of Cicero’s
Consolatio would no doubt have given us greater insight into the Greek
tradition which he was familiar with, given his claim that he had read
everything he could find. He also soon developed an interest in Latinizing
the rich set of stock arguments (so-called solacia). Cicero mentions other
philosophers, including Poseidonius, the polymath of the late second
century BC. Not all sources would have counted as consolations in the

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strictest sense (see Scourfield’s chapter in this volume). Kumaniecki

plausibly surmises that the whole work could not have been very long,
perhaps 20–40 pages.25 He distinguishes three broader sections. It will be
worthwhile to highlight his main arguments, because the article is rather
dense and not easily available, and because the details will show we know
more than is often assumed.
For part 1, the praefatio, he considers several fragments (Lactantius, ps.
Plut., Crantor, Cicero). In what is a likely opening section of the Consolatio
(Inst. III.14, 20 = fr. 2 V.; paraphrased at III.18,18 = fr. 1 V.) the Christian
writer Lactantius is seen to accuse Cicero of a contradiction, but
Kumaniecki is surely right to argue that this is a misreading of the passage
and context.26 Cicero’s comment expresses a general feature of human
beings (indicated by the modest plural nos), when he says that philosophy
is magistra vitae (III.14, 6), while all of us are maintaining erroneous thinking,
miserably ignorant of the truth (nescio qui nos teneat error ac miserabilis ignoratio
veri ). His ensuing rhetorical question might suggest he is presenting
Cicero’s opinion: ‘What role does Philosophy have as a teacher or what
did she teach you as life-giver, when you suffer from a deplorable
ignorance?’ Kumaniecki argues that this is not necessarily Cicero’s own
view. In his polemic Lactantius has transferred the general point (nos) to
Cicero himself (repeated at III. 18, 18). We should ask how this kind of
comment would function at the start of the Consolatio: one possible reading,
based on Tusc. 3.1–6, sees philosophy or reason as medicine for the mind
(3.6, est profecto animi medicina philosophia). Cicero may also be alluding to the
Stoic view on how humans have difficulty living ‘in accordance with
nature’, because we are given only ‘small sparks’ of spiritual insight (parvos
igniculos) which are liable to quick decay as a result of poor beliefs (malae
opiniones).27 Consequently we are deprived of ‘nature’s light’ to live the right
life. Yet Cicero also believes we humans possess seeds of virtues (semina
virtutum), but erroneous beliefs occur from birth – a point reminiscent of
the fragment under discussion. Cicero almost seems to suggest that babies
ingest these beliefs with the mother’s milk.28
A second passage for this part expresses the notion that humans are
born in order to make up for mistakes in a previous life. This idea may well
come from Crantor’s Περὶ πένθους, as is suggested by the surviving passage
in ps.Plutarch 115b with reference to ‘many wise men’, possibly Orphic
philosophers.29
Three further passages may be allocated to this part of the work. The
first concerns the short phrase: Crantorem sequor.30 As discussed earlier,
Kumaniecki rightly proposes that the statement should not be read as
saying that Cicero’s translations of Greek materials were very close to the

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original (suggested, some thought, by Pliny’s comment preceding that on

Crantor, NH 22 transcriptum ad verbum). We know that Cicero did not do
literal translations.31 Jerome’s comment that Cicero has simply followed
Crantor’s work (Ep. 60.5.2 = fr. 4a* V.) repeats the mistake. Jerome’s
access to Crantor’s work is far from certain. What he does provide, by
showing off his knowledge of Cicero, is the names of many more authors,
all probably found in Cicero’s work. Some of these lived after Crantor,
which also proves that Cicero’s knowledge is based on his broader reading
of these authors (e.g. Clitomachus, Posidonius), not on Crantor alone.32
These considerations suggest that Cicero most likely followed Crantor
in his philosophical position on emotion, that is, he did not support the
Stoic position of ἀπάθεια, but that of (Peripatetic) µετριοπάθεια. This
doctrine allowed humans (including philosophers) to give in to emotion,
so long as it was done with some measure (e.g. ps.Plut. 102d). Cicero’s
clearest expression of this view can be found at Tusc. 3. 12, which translates
Crantor’s comments on ‘impassivity’ (i.e. not being affected) and how he
prefers to experience ‘medical intervention’:
I do not wish to be ill. But if I am, and if some part of my body is to be cut
open or even amputated, let me feel it. This absence of pain comes at a high
price: it means being numb in body, and in mind barely human.33
This stance of µετριοπάθεια is also clear from the letter of March 24 (Att.
12.28 maerorem minui, dolorem nec potui, nec, si possem, vellem), and does not
dismiss this attitude of Crantor even in his Tusc. indiscriminately (3.13 nec
absurde Crantor ille), where he does speak from the Stoic perspective of
apatheia (extirpation of emotion). A further passage at Tusc. 4.63 shows how
Cicero admits to ignoring Stoic advice to let the most acute grief
pass before he tries to deal with it. We know this was Chrysippus’
recommendation (quoque vetat Chrysippus), who used a well-known medical
analogy between mind and body to support the injunction not to treat the
‘wound’ too early. Lactantius Inst. III.28, 9 (= fr. 13 M. = fr. 3a V.) is also
probably part of the praefatio, a passage in which Cicero expresses defeat
against fate, which he claims to have fought successfully in the past.34
Thus Kumaniecki’s reconstruction of the introductory parts shows that
the work contained (i) a personal admission that fate has now beaten him
(fr. 13), (ii) his failed search for consolation in philosophy (fr. 1) and
admission that nothing helps (Att. 12.14.3; 12.18.1), (iii) his decision to
write a consolation to himself as a form of ‘soul-care’ (psycho-therapy),
ignoring Stoic advice to wait (Tusc. 4.63; cf. reply to Sulpicius below, Section
3), thus also shifting from the Stoic apatheia to the more moderate
µετριοπάθεια as found in Crantor (fr. 7). The highly personal tone and the

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claim that he was doing something unusual, possibly unique, is supported

by the fragments and his awareness of traditional (literary) means to deal
with grief and mourning, as some of the parallels have already shown.
The reconstruction of parts 2 and 3 is complicated by the more
problematic state of the evidence, in which passages contain relevant
material, but without explicitly attributing it to the Consolatio. Several
passages reveal that Cicero gave elaborate attention to the misery of human
fate (Tusc. 1.75, 83; Lactantius Inst. III.19,13; Augustine De Civ. Dei XIX 4, 2).
This theme can be paralleled in the pseudo-Platonic Axiochus 366d–68e,
but is absent in some of the more well-known consolations (Plutarch,
Seneca, ps.Plutarch). However, when it does occur, it tends to be located
in an earlier part. His treatment of this theme was probably quite eloquent,
as the passages in Tusc. and Augustine indicate
Why should I now deplore human life?... I did this in the book, in which I
have consoled myself to the best of my ability (quid ego nunc lugeam vitam
hominum? vere et iure possum...fecimus hoc in eo libro, in quo nosmet ipsos, quantum
potuimus, consolati sumus). [Tusc. 1.83 = fr. 6 V.]35
For what flood of eloquence can suffice to explain the miseries of this life?
Did not Cicero lament in his Consolation concerning the death of his
daughter as much as he could, but how much was his effort going to
achieve? (quis enim sufficit quantovis eloquentiae flumine vitae huius miserias explicare?
Quam lamentatus est Cicero in Consolatione de morte filiae, sicut potuit, sed quantum
est, quod potuit? [De Civ. Dei XIX 4, 1 = fr. 6a V.]

It is likely that this traditional argument of the misery of human life was
followed by that of premature death.36 In this line of thinking death is
presented as bringing release from our mortal existence, which makes it a
good thing. Kumaniecki proposes to add the first half of fr. 15 M. (Cicero
De div. II.22) to this context; in this passage Cicero refers to his Consolatio
and a set of examples he adduced there about the terrible death of famous
individuals (e.g., Priam of Troy). This last point presumably intends to
show that the individuals he chose (Crassus, Pompey and Caesar) would
have preferred to die earlier than they did. In the Consolatio Caesar could of
course not be mentioned, as he was still alive at the time of writing. The
most probable inference is that Cicero would have wanted a premature
death for himself, so that it could be a happy one. To go at the height of
his power and success would have given him fame and respect, while
avoiding the misery of losing his daughter.37
The middle part of the Consolatio is the hardest to recover. Possibly
fr. 14 M. (= fr. 16 V.) was part of this section, the gist of which can be
retrieved on the basis of the important passage in Tusc. 3.76. Here Cicero

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outlines the tasks of consolers and refers to his Consolatio; after enumerating
the ‘comforter’s responsibilities’ (four approaches ranging from removing
to restraining grief) and giving each school connected to them, he states:
Finally, there are those who bring together all these types of consolation,
since different methods work for different people. In my Consolation, for
instance, I combined virtually all these methods into one single act of
consolation (ut fere nos in Consolatione omnia in consolationem unam coniecimus). For
my mind was swollen (erat in tumore animus) and I was trying out every
remedy I could. (transl. Graver 2002a, 33–4, slightly modified)
In this passage Cicero clearly acknowledges different types of grief and thus
the need for variety in treatment (similar comment in ps.Plut. 102b quoting
Euripides fr. 492 Nauck); moreover, it strongly suggests that his Consolatio
incorporated most ( fere...omnia) of the known tropes or ‘commonplaces’ –
a method also found in other authors. His own motivation is that he tried
everything and anything in view of his miserable mental state. It is unclear
what the success of this strategy was, but in at least one of his letters he
suggests there was some effect (Att. 12.28; March 24, 45 BC): ‘For the
consolation I have sought in writing, I am not discontented with my
measure of success (quantum profecerim). It has made me show my grief less;
but the grief itself I could not lessen, nor would I, if I could’.38 It is clear
that he is talking about social expectations, while still holding on to his
grief (more on this in section 3). A cynical reading would be to say that the
effect is limited to establishing a socially acceptable presentation, not to
reducing grief.
Finally, the second part of fr. 15 M. stands in close connection to the
Chrysippean view that grief is based on a misguided belief that something
bad has happened, that is, emotion is defined as the result of rational
judgment. It emphasises the point that men should not give in to sadness
and tears. Cicero adduces several famous Romans who bore their sorrow
bravely (cf. Jerome Ep. 60, 5); such exempla are also part of his correspondence
with Atticus (see n. 38). Cicero was clearly not capable of this kind of control
at the time, reminds his readers of Tusculans implicitly of this difficulty (3.79),
but has nonetheless by this time accepted Chrysippus’ position.
For part 3 Kumaniecki uses materials found in fragments 10–12 M.
Lactantius Inst. III.19,3 ff.39 (fr. 10 M. = fr. 22 V.) relates the view that the
human soul is made of the fifth element as was postulated by Aristotle,
which, unlike the other four elements, is of divine origin and hence
immortal.40 The arguments used here show a close resemblance to those
in Plato’s Phaedo: they recount the rewards and punishments for good and
bad souls respectively (cf. Phd. 107d; 113b). This parallelism also supports
the assumption that an account of the afterlife followed the argument on

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the soul’s immortality (cf. also Tusc. 1.71–2), i.e. F 12 should follow fr. 10;
on the other hand, fr. 11 should probably (pace Kumaniecki) go last in this
section (Lactantius Inst. I.15.16 = fr. 23 V.). It contains the notion of
humans becoming divine after death (daughter of Kadmos, Hercules,
Castor and Pollux) and the claim that Tullia deserves the same reward:
When truly, he says, we see that several men and women are among the
gods... I shall make you the best and most learned of all [women], placed in
the company of the approving immortal gods and shall consecrate you in the
opinion of all mortals (Cum vero, inquit, et mares et feminas complures ex hominibus
in deorum numero esse videamus. [...] quod quidem faciam teque omnium optimam
doctissimam 41 adprobantibus deis immortalibus in eorum coetu locatam ad opinionem
omnium mortalium consecrabo.)
No doubt several exempla of immortalised men and women preceded this
passage. His scientific argument about the non-physical nature of the fifth
element is thus followed by a non-scientific, traditional argument, such as
the one he recounts in Tusc. 1.27–8, where the belief in the immortality of
good humans is claimed as an ancient view (illud erat insitum priscis). Here too
he gives examples, identical to those in the Consolatio (Hercules, Castor and
Pollux). The evidence for his motive to offer Tulia this reward must lie in
the claim that she is ‘the best and most learned of all [women]’ (teque omnium
optimam doctissimamque). The Platonic perspective clearly offers justification
for the idea that the ‘best and most learned’ deserve an immortal fate after
death (Phd. 107d; 108a, c), but it is possibly further supported by Hortensius
fr. 97, where Cicero stated that those who ‘live a life of philosophy’ have
the greatest chance of reaching the heavens (in philosophia viventibus magna
spes est...hoc ibis faciliorem ascensum et reditum in caelum fore).
In sum, we end up with the following components for the Consolatio.42
Part 1 ( praefatio)
– Cicero declares himself beaten, laments that human fate is miserable, and
hence early death not an evil
– he follows Crantor’s approach (Crantorem sequor) and he looks for consolation
in previous, mostly philosophical writings (not religion), yet is unable to
control his grief; human nature is weak and the road to the truth difficult
– he decides to do what no one has done: write a work to console himself
(a medicine for his sick soul, cf. Tusc. 3. 1–5)
– he admits that he has ignored advice of the Stoic Chrysippus to wait for
the first phase to pass, but he says he needs ‘medicine’ now
Part 2
– the four tasks of the consoler listed
– the many methods of consoling (known types)
– general thoughts on human fate as miserable

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Part 3
– immortality of the soul (much like Plato in the Phaedo) and death as a
release of earthly toils
– Tullia declared worthy of apotheosis adprobantibus deis immortalibus (cf. Pliny
pref. NH 22, see Scourfield, this volume, p. 22, n. 10)
In outline, then, we can infer that five major themes were incorporated
into the Consolatio: (i) the importance of philosophy, (ii) the value of
exempla, (iii) the awareness of different arguments, (iv) the general reflection
on the human condition, and (v) belief in the immortality of the soul
and deification of Tullia. The exact sequence of these parts cannot be
recovered with certainty on the basis of the extant evidence. Kumaniecki’s
reconstruction is highly plausible, yet still speculative in parts.
In his analysis Kumaniecki refrained from commenting in detail on
Cicero’s decision to address himself (his p. 43) or what the end product was
supposed to represent, so I will add one point on the work’s purpose.
I want to suggest that, by ending with an apotheosis, the Consolatio seems to
have transformed into an unusual means to memorialise Tullia. The initial
plan to commemorate Tullia was strongly expressed in a letter of March 11,
45 BC (Att. 12.18.1):43
I shall use all the opportunities of this enlightened age to consecrate her
memory by every kind of memorial borrowed from the genius of all the
masters, Greek and Latin. Perhaps I will only gall my wound (quae res forsitan
sit refricatura vulnus meum): but I consider myself pledged by a kind of vow or
promise [...] while I was engaged on the essay I mentioned before, I was, to
some extent fostering my grief (fovebam dolores).
This was to lead to a shrine, but it was never built. However, the quoted
passage leaves open the possibility for another form of commemoration:
the eulogy can function as a memorial in words.44
The use of traditional arguments here can be confirmed on the basis of
familiar sources (e.g., ad Apollonium, Axiochus). The incomplete text of
Cicero’s Consolatio only gives us a glimpse of the rich set of stock arguments
since Crantor. Cicero’s philosophical allegiance in these matters emerges
slowly from the later parts of the Consolatio as well as from certain passages
in his philosophical works. Crudely put, he adheres to a Platonist stance
(indicated by the immortal soul, implanted on a star as a form of apotheosis)45
combined with certain Stoic views when limiting the expression of emotion.46

3. Interpreting Cicero’s grief

My summary of Kumaniecki’s reconstruction of the main parts of the
Consolatio has given us some idea of the content and structure of the work.
But questions remain as to how this work was in any way effective for the

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resolution of Cicero’s grief. The motivation for, and efficacy of, this work
is never really put to the test, since the work is often either declared lost or
considered insufficient evidence. We now know that the letters and
fragments offer significant pieces of information.
In this section I propose to show how a chronological reading of the
evidence will lead to the best understanding of these written records of
Cicero’s grief. It is here that some insights of recent grief analyses and
practices are used as tools for clarification and plausible speculation. The
social sciences have made great inroads into clarifying causes and
symptoms of grief since 1944 and, as we shall see, their new insights can
assist our understanding of responses to emotions.
The difference between Cicero’s self-evaluation and the modern
perspective is instructive here. The evidence seems to tell us that Cicero
saw his writing activities not as helpful in the resolution of his grief (Att.
12.16; Att. 12.26; discussed below). In modern practices grief counsellors
have for some time been using reading and writing as tools for recovery
(e.g., bibliotherapy).47 Emotions are certainly culturally embedded, in
particular in the way in which they are valued and expressed, but the
process of recovery from grief seems broadly similar across cultures: the
stages of denial, anger, negotiation and acceptance can be identified in
many accounts of grief.48 One suspects therefore that social codes and
expectations about grief management play a role in Cicero’s self-
assessment, that is, his interpretation of this process depends on his
addressees or potential audience (in his case, social peer pressure). Cicero’s
response is that of an intellectual, seeking solace in a familiar activity,
reading and writing, which acts as a ‘comfort zone’ and provides shelter
and a kind of empowerment to deal with the emotional turmoil brought on
by such an event.49 But it was not an average response.
We may clarify his grief in a way that allows us to extend Cicero’s own
interpretation of the process by paying attention to the stages or phases
reflected in his writings. In modern approaches grief is seen as a process;
which is why it makes sense to study Cicero’s grief in its progression. Modern
clinical research indicates that the earliest stages of grief include denial and
difficulty with ‘letting go’ as significant features of mourning; moreover, the
loss of a child is (still) considered the most traumatic of all.50 We can trace
the deterioration of Cicero’s mental stability as soon as Caesar rose to
power, but especially from 49 BC onwards. Caesar’s politics went against
Cicero’s Republican instincts and his resistance brought him little gain and
much grief (political isolation, separation from his family and friends).51
In the first stage of his grief (‘acute grief’) which starts with the death of
his daughter in early Feb. 45 BC, Cicero is seen to slip into depression.

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But the symptoms were already there in the preceding years: apathy, tears
(Fam. 14.1.1; Att. 12.15), sleeplessness, irritability, tendency to exaggerate
(3.8.2), sense of failure (3.15.8), even suicidal moodiness (letters to his
brother Quintus, ad Quint. 1.4; cf. 1.3). His precarious situation had now
gone from bad to worse. Tullia’s death after giving birth to her second
child broke Cicero.52 He declares himself inconsolable and he is not afraid
to say so (Att. 12.14.3 omnem consolationem vincit dolor; 12.18.1 nunc omnia respuo
nec quicquam habeo tolerabilius quam solitudinem). The loss of his political
standing, the subsequent divorce from his wife and death of his daughter
seem to justify his remark that ‘my grief is exceptional’.53
Moreover, the silence in the correspondence until March 6, 45 BC is a
telling one.54 For the first six weeks he sees no way out of his grief. As we
saw, his first report reveals how he has read everything he could get his
hands on, again a response typical for Cicero the intellectual – an intensified
form of the common reaction to find help, guidance or relief anywhere
(Att. 12.14.3):
Every word that has been written by anyone on the subject of assuaging
grief (de maerore minuendo) I read at your house. But my sorrow is beyond any
consolation. Why, I have done what no one has done before, tried to
console myself by writing a book ( per litteras).
Cicero’s reaction represents a typical primary response: when unexpectedly
confronted with the end of human life, we are often at a loss for words.
Familiar primary responses are lament, isolation and sadness. The intellectual
and writer will seek solace and comfort in words, which can assist in
defusing the sense of powerlessness.55 But Cicero’s preoccupation, or
rather obsessive interest, in finding a piece of land on which to build a
monument for Tullia suggests to me that the first and most extreme outlet
of his grief was indeed an overwhelming and intolerable experience of loss,
in which the range of psychological and physical states include ‘sadness,
loss of interest, anxiety, anger, questions about self-worth, altered states
of appetite, sleep disturbance, agitated or depressed motor functions, and
withdrawal’.56 In modern research this is called ‘maladaptation to loss’
(Jacobs 1995). Clearly Cicero’s writing reveals a number of these symptoms
including frequent references to distress, grief and the need for, or lack of,
consolation.
The second stage of bereavement is when he searches for a way to deal
with his grief and takes up writing a Consolatio ad se, a ‘self-consolation’, in
which he extols his beloved daughter, to whom in one letter to his wife he
referred as lux nostra (Fam. 14.5). It is possible that this new approach came
about after he had to abandon the plan to build a monument about which
he continuously besieged Atticus, who seems to have played along

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reluctantly until the idea was quietly dropped.57 His denial that there is any
value to writing about his grief (which he did, first in letters, then also in
the consolation) is somewhat surprising, seeing how much time he is
spending on doing just that. As I indicated earlier, it may in part be caused
by the social pressures of his peer group: would it not make sense to try and
convince Atticus that he realizes he should not be wasting his time or admit
that writing in this manner could be of any help? In one letter to Atticus
Cicero confesses that he is writing all day, but fails to see that it makes a
difference (Att. 12.16; March 10, 45 BC): ‘Writing and reading do not soften
my feelings, they only disturb them’ (me scriptio et litterae non leniunt, sed
obturbant).58 And in similar vein he writes (Att. 12.18) ‘while I was engaged
on the essay mentioned before I was to some extent fostering my grief
(fovebam dolores)’ (March 11, 45 BC). In yet another letter we get a sense of
the social (peer) pressure Cicero must have felt:
You exhort me and say others want me to hide the depth of my grief
(ut dissimulem me tam graviter dolere). Can I do so better than by spending whole
days in writing? Though I do it, not to hide, but rather to soften and to heal
my feelings, still, if I do myself little good, I certainly keep up appearances.
(Att. 12.20; March 15)
Our best example to illustrate that his behaviour during his bereavement
is far from standard and outside of what was expected of him is a letter
from Servius Sulpicius, then governor in Greece (Fam. 4.5; reply in 4.6)
who wrote a consolatory letter to Cicero. Cicero’s grief tells us much about
aristocratic expectations in this situation, but even more so given the
difficult times they lived in. Servius’ letter, probably the most famous letter
of consolation to survive from Antiquity, seems to invoke the old Roman
virtues (see below), and strikes us as a rather harsh advisor. His opening
lines, though, show some empathy, expressing his sadness experienced
upon hearing the news (4.5.1, graviter molesteque tuli, communemque calamitatem
existimavi ). He also emphasises that he would have wanted to be with
Cicero in person, if he could have (meum dolorem tibi declarassem). But he goes
on to justify his letter by imagining that Cicero will be probably so ‘blinded
by grief’ that he will not have the appropriate thoughts that have occurred
to Sulpicius.59 The implication is that Sulpicius’ greater distance from the
event and from the deceased helps him to play the role of the stern
consoler, even if he is saddened by Tullia’s death.
Sulpicius’ comments reveal how he lets public and political considerations
prevail over personal agony. They contain some of the tried-and-tested
consolatory tropes familiar from other texts. Thus he speaks of public and
private interests (‘Why is it that a private grief should agitate you so
deeply?...(we lost) country, honour, rank, every political distinction’), self-control

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(we are all mortal), and the notion of heal thyself (‘do not forget that you are
Cicero, ...and do not imitate bad physicians, who in the diseases of others
profess to understand the art of healing, but are unable to prescribe for
themselves’). His most important comment conveys the message ‘count
your blessings’:
You, too, withdraw soul and thought from such things, and rather remember
...that she lived as long as life had anything to give her; that her life outlasted
that of the Republic; that she lived to see you – her own father – prætor, consul,
and augur; that she married young men of the highest rank; that she had enjoyed
nearly every possible blessing; that, when the Republic fell, she departed from life.
(my italics)
This style of consolation reminds us of the exhortatory approach found in
tragedy, Seneca or ps. Plutarch’s ad Apollonium.60 Servius admonishes Cicero
to be strong, act like a man, and not wallow in his grief, because in the
present historical context he should realize that his smaller grief stands in
no comparison to that of the state (and its protagonists).61 This male
perspective is not highly sympathetic. Cicero’s reply shows he remains
aware of the public eye, yet not capable of following the advice. He defends
himself by the use of exempla from Republican times: ‘those consolations
fail me, which were not wanting in a similar misfortune to those others,
whose examples I put before my eyes...[examples follow]’ (April 45, Fam.
4.6.1–2).62 The extreme response he exhibits was compounded by a sense
of guilt about his daughter, esp. her marriages ( pace Sulpicius), the last of
which was to Dolabella who had been cause for some embarrassment.63
It is not impossible that both guilt and grief were clouding his judgment.
Thus two reasons suggest themselves as to why Cicero felt forced into
writing a self-consolation: (1) he found the general and generalized tropes
unsatisfactory regarding his specific misfortune – realising that he wanted
to give a more personal context to his grief; (2) his personal life was at a
point that his sense of self-worth and influence could only be improved
through his intellectual activities. These points suggest that the unique
nature of his work does not lie simply in the fact that he wrote it, but, as he
saw it, in the manner in which he used the material, whereas to us it also lies
in the combination of self-consolation and commemoration.64
With regard to the efficacy of the consolation, it seems that Cicero has
given it little thought that his chosen method of coping with grief – writing
– could be the therapeutic tool, at least not one that is patently effective in
his eyes. The dates of the letters may be significant, but there is clearly no
expectation that writing would help.65 According to modern approaches in
grief counselling he used an effective method. That he fails to see the effect
of his own routine is due to the historical and cultural context: his focus on

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content (arguments) rather than strategy (reflective journalling) shows how

he cannot disentangle himself from the constraining forces of political
disaster, personal misfortune and the social conventions of the Roman
elite. His use of other comparative materials requested from Atticus
(examples in which parents have lost a child, Att. 12.20.2; 12.22.2; 12.24.2)
looks almost like a historical exercise of self-justification for his extended
grieving, and the work as a whole, culminating in a kind of apotheosis of
Tullia, now looks like a eulogy to commemorate her, a replacement ‘shrine’
which he initially planned to build for her. With a gap in the evidence for
an important period of the year 45 (esp. August), we are forced to speculate
as to when Cicero emerged from his grief: did he give himself a form of
therapy, almost unwittingly, by writing, which he called a distraction? What
he was doing fits the modern notion of ‘grief-work’, which encourages
mourners to be actively involved in dealing with their grief, for instance, by
writing journals or diaries, undertaking physical activities, or doing
extensive reading.66 Cicero’s ‘grief work’ consists of extensive reading and
writing, which is his attempt to share his grief and channel it into action.
This, rather than philosophy, was the more effective cure.67

4. Conclusions
My examination of the chronology of Cicero’s grief has revealed how his
grief had a significant impact on his modus operandi in responding to this
sad event. By making use of our privileged access to his letters and the
intriguing fragments of his self-consolation, we were able to adjust the
usual neglect of the Consolatio and the incomplete picture of Cicero’s
personal grief that came with it.
The different degrees of privacy found in the three types of evidence
show that reading his progression in the proper order illuminates the grief
process. The day-to-day thoughts in his letters on his own mental state, its
causes and proposed solutions should not be ignored: they show how he
struggles with a desperate situation and moves through a progression
towards acceptance of his loss. Even if his letters to Atticus are rhetorical in
the sense that they are influenced by customary considerations of social
and political interaction, they are not to be interpreted in the same way as
any of his writings from before his personal misfortune. When he next
started to write a self-consolation (in parallel to the correspondence and his
first philosophical treatises), he was seeking an unusual solution for unusual
circumstances: in this sense his consolation is unparalleled.
In view of his status Cicero would have been expected to mourn for his
daughter publicly, but in the context of the breakdown of the Republic he
did not have the opportunity to do so in a dignified way. As a result he

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resorted to ‘performing’ his duties in his writing.68 His strategy to deal with
the loss of his daughter is in one sense typical for a Roman male of the
upper classes in the first century BC, determined by social pressures to
restrain emotions and rationalise the meaning of the event.69 Less typical
are his admission that he is not coping well, his limited use (or explicit
rejection) of philosophical ideas, and his decision to find a way out of his
grief by writing about it in a work addressed to himself. Once he did this,
Cicero clearly moved past his debilitating early grief, to the transitional
stage of his bereavement in his letters, in particular those to his life-long
friend Atticus, while emotions were still raw and his grief unresolved.70 In
modern terms, the Consolatio is part of the ‘grief work’ Cicero undertakes,
whilst Tusc. 3–4, expressed in more generalized and reflective form, relay
his later thoughts and do not give a highly personal account of grief.71 Thus
we not only gain a more accurate appreciation of Cicero’s emotional states
and how he describes them, but we are in a position to recognize the gap
between his actual procedure and his lofty ambitions written from hindsight.
On this reading Cicero’s Consolatio also emerges as playing an important
role in his intellectual endeavours. Apart from commemorating his daughter
the treatise itself suggests that his strategy was new and the product unique:
firstly, because of the simple fact that he tried to console himself, and
secondly, because of the new arrangement of tropes and materials, which
transformed the Greek material into Roman form.72 On this point his
consolation may be called unequalled. His self-consolation serves the
immediate purpose of alleviating his grief, but became much more than
that. We cannot be sure when its final content was decided upon, but since
the work is also a laudatio culminating in a deification of Tullia, it is tempting
to consider it a replacement for his initial plan to build a physical
monument. Once the treatise gained momentum, he also began to see it as
a kind of ‘pilot project’, a way to regain the respect of his fellow citizens and
to make it the start of his program to educate his fellow Romans in Greek
thought. Thus Cicero’s work, largely motivated by personal grief, acquired
a new significance, which straddled Greek and Roman cultures and had a
considerable impact on the Latin West ( Jerome is a good example, see
Scourfield’s chapter in this volume).
If this is correct, Cicero may well be right to claim another literary
creation as his own: the self-consolation – but one that had few successors
(in this form). In it Cicero managed to transcend his personal misery and
to write a work which harnessed important traditional elements into a new
synthesis. It made a personal experience public and communal and offered
a new consolation to his contemporaries.73 Roman political and social
codes continued to play a role in everything he did.

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The Consolatio ad se may stand alone as a unique case of self-consolation.

Yet it also remains problematic as a document charting the personal
struggle of an intellectual coming to grips with the desperate times,
personal grief and the ruin of everything he had worked for professionally
(Fam. 4.6.2). Cicero seems to have succeeded – albeit without realising it –
in writing himself out of his misery, thereby finding a way to regain some
of his self-worth by applying his intellectual and scholarly qualities to this
‘problem’. The renewed energy he poured into his elaborate philosophical
writings shows that he had found himself a new mission.74 Thus Cicero’s
self-consolation emerges not only as an act of emotional recovery, but also
as a starting point for his social and intellectual rehabilitation.

APPENDIX TO CH. 3: CICERO’S CONSOLATIO AD SE

Concordance Mueller – Kumaniecki – Vitelli (F = Fragment; T = Testimonium)

M. K. V.
F1 F1a T
F2 F1b T
F3 F2 F18
F4 F5 F6
F5 F6 F5
F6 F7a F6a
F7 F3 F4. F4*
F8 F1d T, F1, F7, F2–2a
F9 F7b F9
F10 F12 F21
F11 F14 F23, T
F12 F13 F22
F13 F1c F3
F14 F10 F16
F15 F8, F11 F15, F19–19a*
F16 F9 T
F17 F10*

Notes
(1) K. numbers are mine; they reflect the sequence in K. (see his p. 45).
(2) For Vitelli see his p. 53.

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Notes
* I gratefully acknowledge the financial support from the Australian Research

Council (Discovery Grant 2007–2009, DP 0770690) which made the research for this
chapter possible, as well as the help of my former assistant Benjamin Madden.
1 Shackleton-Bailey overstates the case by translating ‘as effective as this’. See

section 3 below.
2 For a recent edition see Vitelli (Milan 1979, testimonia and fragments). The work

is still described as lost in standard handbooks: e.g. OCD 2, 1970, s.v. ‘Cicero’, 237
‘two lost works probably came first: the Consolation...’; OCD 3, 1996 (repr. 2003), s.v.
‘Tullius Cicero, Marcus’, 1563 ‘Several lost works probably came first: a De gloria...; the
Consolatio, an attempt to console himself for the loss of Tullia’. Such statements are
easily misleading as to the quantity and value of the extant materials.
3 Apart from Scourfield’s mention in his important study of Jerome’s letter of

consolation (1993), the dense and even-handed article is rarely mentioned in the
literature. The same neglect holds for the recent edition by Vitelli (n. 2 above), which
makes use of, and adds a few passages to, the discussion of Kumaniecki. The latter’s
article was first published in German in the obscure journal Acta Classica of the
University of Debrecen (Hungary) and later in the Annales de la Faculté des Lettres et
Sciences humaines d’Aix (in French). See also n.5.
4 References to the Consolatio occur in Tusc. 1.65, 76, 115; 3.71, 76; 4.63. See Appendix.
5 Graver 2002 offers a very useful analysis of Tusc. 3–4, but seems unaware of either

Vitelli or Kumaniecki. The same seems to hold for Gildenhard 2007.

6 Many different sources provide information and quotations. Kumaniecki (1968)

mentions the following works as directly relevant: Cicero Tusculanae disputationes, De

divinatione, De republica, Hortensius, Epistulae ad Atticum, Epistulae ad Familiares; Lactantius
De ira, Institutio divina; Jerome Ep. 60 [Consolation to Heliodorus]; Augustine [various works].
Kumaniecki uses Mueller’s fragment edition (for a concordance with Vitelli 1979 see
my appendix at the end of this chapter).
7 Exceptions to the neglect of the work are Kumaniecki 1968, White 1995 and

Erskine 1997, but the latter two are very recent and focus more on Tusc. and the
personal motivation of Cicero while writing about grief as an abstract concept (see for
instance Erskine 1997, 40).
8 For these (‘resolved’, ‘unresolved’) and other technical terms I draw on some

modern studies of grief: the first modern empirical study of grief, Lindemann 1944, a
broad study by Stern 1985, and the widely praised handbook by Worden 2010.
Classicists have also applied modern psychological categories to Cicero’s grief, with
varying results: Jaeger 1986, Koch 2006. For other relevant comments see Erskine
1997 [previous n.], and Graver 2002a ‘Introduction’, n.15.
9 Modern psychologists prefer this notion of process, see Worden 2010 with further

literature. The recent criticism of Kübler-Ross’ ‘stages theory’ in Walter 1999, 160–4
is different from the role I give to chronology in my analysis, which is confined to a
reading of the sources determined by their date.
10 Treggiari 1998, cf. Baltussen 2009a. Wilcox 2005b, 278 n. 30 justly warns against

taking Cicero’s ‘intimate’ thoughts as innocent representations of his feelings, since

they are ‘de facto rhetorical’. But ‘rhetorical’ should not always be understood to mean
‘disingenuous’.
11 The role of Tusc. lies outside the scope of this analysis: I have great sympathy for

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Gildenhard’s view (2007, 68), when he presents the Tusc. as an outreach exercise for
(re-)educating the Romans. Here I am trying to draw lessons from such an interpretive
stance for the analysis of the self-consolation. Erskine 1997 does see the work as a self-
consolation, but uses different considerations.
12 Shackleton-Bailey translates ‘literary composition’ (1966, 87). See also Scourfield’s

chapter in this volume, n. 12.

13 As Lössl notes (see chapter 7 in this volume), Augustine called it ‘a mere speech’

(De civitate Dei 19.4) insisting that ‘eloquence did not help Cicero overcome his grief.
More is needed, in Augustine’s view, than mere consolatory rhetoric in order to tackle
grief.’ Lactantius, on the other hand, is full of praise (Inst. I, 15.16): ‘the whole of that
speech, which was perfect both in learning and in its examples, and in the very style
of expression, gave no indications of a distempered mind, but of constancy and
judgment’.
14 For the range of texts involved see Scourfield’s chapter in this volume.
15 He argues against Wageningen 1917 and Buresch 1886, who had gone beyond the

evidence in their conclusions (Kumaniecki 1968, 27–8), and reviews other attempts
at reconstruction by Philippson RE 1917, and Büchner 1964.
16 Apparently Panaetius called it a ‘golden book’ and advised his students to learn

it by heart: Est enim non magnus, verum aureolus et, ut Tuberoni Panaetius praecipit, ad verbum
ediscendus libellus (Cic. Acad. ii. 44).
17 Graver 2002a, 187 for a more nuanced view: ‘this means, probably, that he

imitated the format of Crantor’s work and at least some of its language and content’.
Sage 1910, 2 already took the view that ‘Cicero in his Consolatio only used Crantor as
a general guide’.
18 There are clear references to Crantor at Apoll. 102d, 104c, 114c, 115b. Crantor’s

περὶ πένθους is the first attested consolation, though probably not the first consolation.
See Scourfield’s chapter in this volume, Kassel 1958, 35, Kumaniecki 1968, 32 and
Boys-Stones in this volume.
19 First mention of the work is on March 6 (Att. 12.14.3), with hints about further

additions on March 7, 11, 15, 18, 20 (asking for Roman examples in the last three); see
Kumaniecki 1968, 28–9.
20 Cf. Koch 2006, Baltussen (2011a,b) and below.
21 Distraction is also a well-known component in modern grief therapy, so long as

it does not lead to denial (Walter 1999, 161). Note, however, the late date of this letter.
22 Kumaniecki 1968, 28.
23 Graver 2002, xxxii, n. 13 thinks he finished it ‘by mid-May’, together with the

Academica, but it is unclear how she concludes this from the same evidence (Att.
12.14.3; 12.20.2).
24 A sentiment also expressed by Vitelli himself (1979, 10). He largely follows

Philippson and Kumaniecki in the order of fragments, even if it is tentative (ibid.

9–10, italics mine: ‘quod autem ad seriem fragmentorum attinet, etsi haud firmissima
videbantur quae Robertus Philippson et Casimirus Kumaniecki coniecerant, horum
nihilominus secutus plerumque vestigia...’).
25 Kumaniecki 1968, 30 establishes this by analogy, comparing the ad Apollonium

(45 Teubner pages), Seneca’s consolations ad Marciam (29 pp.), ad Polybium (19 pp.),
ad Helviam matrem (24 pp.), Hieronymus’ Consolation to Heliodorus (28 pp.), and the
ps.-Platonic Axiochus (11 pp. in OCT).

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26 Kumaniecki 1968, 30 contra Philippson 1917, 1124. Vitelli 1979 reverses the

order of the two.

27 Kumaniecki 1968, 31.
28 Tusc. 3. 2: nunc autem simulatque editi in lucem et suscepti sumus, in omni continuo pravitate

et in summa opinionum perversitate versamur, ut paene cum lacte nutricis errorem suxisse videamur
(Kumaniecki 1968, 31). The singular example of the perfect infinitive suxisse (L&S,
s.v. sugo, ‘to suck’, lit. of young animals suckling: Cic. ND 2, 47, 122; Varro R.R. 2, 1,
20) suggests that the figurative usage is unusual. Evidence to suggest that this passage
belongs to the Consolatio is perhaps Tusc. 3. 70–2 where grief is described as an
misjudgment.
29 According to Kumaniecki 1968, 31, pointing to Aristotle Protrept. 10b Walzer.

The same thought is found in Cicero’s Hortensius fr. 95.

30 On this point Kumaniecki 1968, 32 agrees with Philippson 1917, 1124.
31 Cf. his translation of Plato De rep. (noted by Kumaniecki 1968, 32); see also

Scourfield 1993, 12–13 and Baltussen 2011b with further literature.

32 Scourfield 1993, 115–16.
33 Ne aegrotus sim; si sim, qui fuerat sensus adsit, sive secetur quid sive avellatur a corpore. Nam

istuc non nihil dolere non sine magna mercede contingit, immanitatis in animo, stuporis in corpore.
On the body-soul analogy see also Tusc. 3. 76 and Kassel 1958, 20–1.
34 cedo et manum tollo, a metaphor from the military or gladiatorial fights (Kumaniecki

1968, 34, who, however, does not comment on the metaphor).

35 A response to this idea as expressed in the Consolatio is given by one of the

interlocutors at Tusc. 1.76. The theme that it is better not to be born is also found in
ps. Plut. 107d.
36 Also found in ps. Plut. 110e–111a and 113c–114c (Kumaniecki 1968, 37).
37 Kumaniecki 1968, 37.
38 It is not impossible, as Kumaniecki suggests (1968, 43), that the plethora of

consolatory types (cf. Tusc. 3. 32–78) was also intended as a way of familiarizing the
Romans with these views. But this aspect cannot be treated in detail here (see my
conclusion and Gildenhard 2007 [above, n. 11]), White 1995, 224 and Baltussen 2011b
for contributions on this point).
39 Kumaniecki 1968, 40 prints ‘V. 19. 3 sq.’, but this must be a typographical error.
40 A view paralleled in this form only in his Somnium Scipionis (Kumaniecki 1968, 39,

who mentions other passages where Cicero allows for soul to be either mortal or
immortal, e.g. Hortensius fr. 97; Lael. 4, 13; Tusc. 1.76).
41 doctissimamque in some mss (PV), see Vitelli 1979, 52.
42 See Kumaniecki 1968, 41–45.
43 See also Att. 12.19.1 (March 14); 12. 23. 3 (March 19); cf. Kumaniecki 1968, 38,

n. 19 and Boyancé 1944, 181–3.

44 I owe this point to a comment from Marcus Wilson when I presented an early

version of this paper.

45 Note that he only uses the Greek term for this (see also Att. 12.36 quam ut maxime

adsequar ἀποθέωσιν); apparently he is basing this view on Crantor. See Carcopino 1969,
169.
46 Epicurean views are absent, as is to be expected (unlike Tusc., which has them at

least for the sake of comprehensiveness; cf. Graver 2002a, xxvi); perhaps his comment
that bad memories are plaguing him (Att. 12.18), is a further indication that he would

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not easily accept Epicurus’ approach of using memories to soften his misery, as is the
case in Plutarch’s Consolation to his Wife (see Baltussen 2009a).
47 My first attempt to analyse Cicero’s grief using a modern angle was offered in

Baltussen 2009b. On writing as one fruitful form of expressing and processing grief
see e.g. the collection edited by Bertmann 1999 Grief and the Healing Arts: Creativity as
therapy, and the handbook for grief practitioners by Worden 2010. Witness also the
steady stream of autobiographical documents in the modern age since C.S. Lewis’
groundbreaking A Grief Observed (1961), especially in recent decades: Crider 1996,
Ironside 1997, Kellehear 2001, Didion 2005, Horne 2008, Carter 2009. For an
evolutionary perspective on grief, see Archer 2009.
48 They are present in the Gilgamesh epic, Iliad 23–4, and Aeneid 6, to name a few.
49 See e.g. Baltussen 2009b which compares Cicero with C. S. Lewis, and n. 5 above.
50 On the role of denial in terminal patients Kübler-Ross (1969) is still worth

reading; for the loss of a child, see Sprang and McNeil 1989, ch. 9; this kind of grief
is sometimes referred to as ‘maladaptation to loss’ (Jacobs 1993, Worden 2010, ch. 2).
51 Cf. Gildenhard 2007, 63–7.
52 See his reply to Sulpicius Severus (below). Graver (2002a, xiii) seems to think

that it was the first grandchild, but the evidence from Att. 10.18 (May 19/20, 49 BC)
seems to suggest it is the second (the first child did not survive).
53 Wilcox 2005a, 248.
54 Cf. White 1995, 223: ‘The gap in Cicero’s correspondence is eloquent.’
55 See next note.
56 Jansen 1985, 19. Further useful comments in Jaeger 1986, Worden 2010, ch. 3.
57 See Att. 12.18.1 (March 11, 45 BC); 12.19.1 (March 14); 12.23.3 (March 19), 14.20

(May 11, 44 BC). David Scourfield has made the interesting suggestion (personal
communication) that the protracted negotiations on the land to be purchased support
a view that there might be an issue of letting go: that is, buying the land would have
represented an admission that Tullia was really dead.
58 Similar sentiments are found in Att. 12.20 (quoted below).
59 quod forsitan dolore impeditus minus ea perspicias. While the sentence on thoughts

offered by Sulpicius (quae in praesentia in mentem mihi venerunt ), has the rather neutral
quae, I infer ‘appropriate’ from the preceding sentence, which mentions duty of the
consoler to others (suum officium praestare). For an excellent discussion of this letter see
Wilcox 2005b. An interesting modern parallel is that of the nineteenth-century
architect Sir John Soane, who also got told by his friends that he was over-indulging
in grief over the death of his wife (Walter 1999, 128).
60 See also the chapters by Chong-Gossard, Wilson and Boys-Stones in this

volume. The latter stresses that paramuthia refers to stern admonishing, not endless
empathy.
61 Wilcox 2005b, 275 points out that Cicero formulates a similar belief in De off.

1.160. A more balanced approach is found in Lucceius’ letter to Cicero (Fam. 5.14, May
9, 45 BC) which gives Cicero latitude on his withdrawal, so long as he is doing work
(cum scribas et aliquid agas eorum, quorum consuesti). Cf. next note and n. 65.
62 Cf. Treggiari 1998 on ‘life-work balance’ and esp. Wilcox 2005b, 268–70 who

clarifies Cicero’s defence by exempla with reference to Hutchinson 1998, 76, who in
turn argues that this ‘robust self-assertion’ is meant to prove the uniqueness of Cicero’s
grief. Kumaniecki 1968, 45 points out that there were two examples of women (one

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of whom, Rutilia, may have been borrowed by Seneca, ad Helviam matrem 16, 7). See
also Wilson’s chapter in this volume (esp. text to n. 22).
63 Even if Cicero speaks highly of him in the same context that he alludes to these

problems, Fam. 6.11.

64 Kumaniecki 1968, 44–45 does make the former point, but not the latter.
65 But in specific contexts he is willing to bow to pressure from his esteemed

colleague Lucius Lucceius, when he writes (Fam. 5.13): ‘it was your intention, I know,
to raise me from my depression (nos levare aegritudine voluisti) by making me think about
certain things; well, it soothes me to talk about them too (earum etiam commemoratione
lenimur).’
66 See esp. Worden 2010 on the change of attitude towards the Freudian idea of

grief; cf. Bertmann 1999. In Att. 12.35 (May 3, 45 BC) Cicero gives the impression he
has almost recovered (ipse prope modum collegi); at Tusc. 3.5 he considers the mind capable
of healing itself; and at Fam. 4.13.4 (46 BC) he assumes the viability of the notion of
self-consolation, attributing it to Nigidius Figulus.
67 Gildenhard 2007, 59 agrees: ‘for Cicero philosophy as grief-management was

only second best’.

68 Cf. Wilcox 2005b, 272–3 who gives a perceptive account of the role of ritual in

mourning.
69 For a similar case see Leigh 2004, 122–140 (esp. p. 140 on Aemilius Paullus and

Quintilian).
70 In modern terms: stage 1 represents grief first experienced, hardly articulated

and private; stage 2: ‘acute grief’ [Lindemann 1944], articulation starts for oneself and
others; it is semi-public; stage 3: grief represented in a generalizing way to others with
didactic intent; it is fully public.
71 As argued in Baltussen 2009a. Compare Gildenhard 2007, 62, who describes

Cicero’s writing activity as ‘elevating his philosophia Latina above the level of private
grief management’. ‘Grief work’ is here used in a general sense; in modern theories it
refers to focusing on the pain of loss (Walter 1999, 160–1). See also previous n.
72 Kumaniecki takes a similar view (1968, 47; cf. 46) when he says: ‘Am wichtigsten

ist jedoch, daß er bei Inanspruchnahme einer umfangreichen Literatur zweifellos ein
neues und originelles Werk schuf, ‘das es bisher nicht gab’.’ Cf. n. 61 above.
73 White 1995, 224 n. 7 points out that Cicero later did state that helping others

was one of his aims (Tusc. 5.121; Div. 2.3). If my line of argument is accepted, it is
unlikely that this objective was part of his initial motivation.
74 On the notion that this activity was an educational mission see Gildenhard 2007.

For a more detailed argument on grief, translation and the philosophica see Baltussen
2011b.

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