Are they and welcome to Emperor's of Rome, a Roman history podcast from Latrobe University.

I'm your host Matt Smith and with me today is

Rianna Evans, an associate professor in classic and ancient history at

Latrobe University. This is episode C.C.

X. and the start of the Catalan conspiracy. Part 1, a disordered mind.

Shout out to Sullist for that quote.

Catalan is a notorious figure of the Roman Republic, a long time rival of Cicero who, after repeated

attempts at the consulship, decided to push the matter by force.

In this episode we look at his character, his role in the Social Wars of Rome,

and his early attempts at office. Here's Rianna Nevins.

The conspiracy of Catalan is an event that takes place in what we call the

late republic. We're in the 60s BC although we might well go back a bit further

to look at the antecedents and a lot of Roman historians both ancient and modern see this as

evidence of a Senate and a Republican system that's not functioning anymore. But then they had thought that for a

while and this is just one of the more dramatic moments. I should say at the

outset some people question the word conspiracy. So we'll get into the weeds of that but whether it was a kind of coherent

conspiracy or not is up for grabs in the scholarship.

And as we'll be discussing, the evidence we have is very partial and that's

pertinent to whether you call it a conspiracy or it was just part of the rumblings that happened towards the end of the Republic.

Okay, so why is it a noteworthy event or was it just so terrible the events of it?

Well, it results in battle between Romans and Romans so it's a

type of civil war it doesn't tend to get put under that label. One of the reasons

...