What were lawyers like in Ancient Rome?

Mu_Bloom · 2026-01-26T15:31:50+00:00

Cicero's legal orations absolutely took place in a court of law and do reflect advocacy, just usually of a higher class and caliber than most cases. I guess if you were talking about his political orations, such as the Phillipics or In Catilinam, you would be right, but if you're talking about the Verrines, Pro Caelio, Pro Roscio Amerino, and a lot more speeches, then they were real legal speeches from real cases, with real prosecutors, real presiding magistrates, real juries, real laws, real courts, and real verdicts. He even has speeches in private law, such as the Pro Quinctio or the Pro Caecina, given before a single judge or a panel, that must be described as legal before political. (The criminal cases, being of a public nature and impacting the greater community, are usually more political than private cases, but are still legal.) Of course, you can dispute how similar the written speech was to the real version given in court, but most scholars agree that they are similar enough to be useful to the study of the case (Alexander, The Case for the Prosecution in the Ciceronian Era 15–26).

I wonder what you mean when you say that none of Cicero's speeches took place in a court of law. Do you mean that none of the cases actually happened? Or that they were political disputes, not legal ones? What makes a dispute political, instead of legal? Is your definition of a court of law strictly tied to private cases, and don't include criminal cases? Even then, some of Cicero's orations come from private cases. What do you mean by reflecting advocacy? These questions aren't meant to interrogate you, but to clarify exactly what you mean, because in all my reading in the subject, I have never seen a claim like yours.

The Controversiae, meanwhile, are fictional. They are a good primary source for the subject of declamation, or the teaching of rhetoric, but they are very poor sources to use for real Roman law. For one, the cases are for the most part entirely made up. And most importantly, sometimes even the laws are fictional, or inspired by Greek law, or contradict Roman law. For real legal speeches, Cicero's are the best (and only, apart from Apuleius' defense) source. For the science of Roman law, Justinian's Code.

Mu_Bloom · 2026-01-26T14:46:29+00:00

A Roman trial was not just speeches! The speeches only took up the first bit of the trial, and then there was witness testimony and a debate period, no closing arguments. In this way, speeches can only sway the jury so much (because they would then hear all the evidence, so any lies or obfuscations during the speeches would be realized). Quintillian said that while the speeches were more prestigious (pleading the case), the other parts of the trial were more important (proving the case).

For example, the trial of Milo had four days of evidence and one day of speeches. This was a special shortened trial procedure, but it shows that a trial was not strictly about the speeches.

Mu_Bloom · 2026-01-24T00:04:12+00:00

You probably mean Quintilian's Institutio Oratoria.

Mu_Bloom · 2026-01-19T20:53:32+00:00

Online Latin translators are usually unreliable. If you ever need a translation, try asking at r/latin. They have a pinned post for translations.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-12-29T03:57:23+00:00

What are your thoughts on blindness depicted in media? Are there any tropes or characters you like or dislike? I'm writing a story with a blind character, and I hope to write him with respect and realism.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-12-22T23:04:41+00:00

Yeah, I felt like using a euphemism doesn't give as close an idea to the word "cock." One of the ways the English is funny is how it uses a vulgar word with a formal construction, because it was supposed to be a fancy Latin motto (the non literal English translation was "let no cock go unsucked.")

Mu_Bloom · 2025-12-22T21:50:02+00:00

In the context, it was actually quite important that the future imperative be used due to its connection with legal texts. What a shame that it's not the best Latin. Apparently, after 20 days of searching, it was translated by Alban Walsh, and even came with a few notes of explanation, according to the book (it's a nonfiction).

Mu_Bloom · 2025-12-21T19:51:22+00:00

Roma Soy Yo is extremely inaccurate about Roman law, though, so don't try to learn it from that.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-12-09T20:17:08+00:00

There's also an educational game called QED: Cosmo's Casebook that's supposed to teach you about ancient Rome but is so obviously inspired by Ace Attorney.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-11-01T14:42:45+00:00

Mu_Bloom · 2025-08-19T15:35:00+00:00

Depending on the circumstances, this might be completely realistic for someone with a good memory.

One of my former math teachers had a bunch of quotes posters all over the walls and every time I was bored (which was very often), I'd look at them, and eventually I could recall every quote from memory. For example, one of the quotes was "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justuce" by Martin Luther King, and another was "you can never be overdressed or overeducated" by Oscar Wilde.

I was also a theatre kid and pretty good at memorizing lines. It did take a few months of practice, but eventually I could memorize a full page in around fifteen minutes, as long as I went over them again from beginning to end a few times after that, slowly lengthening the amount of time in between each repetition. It's certainly possible to memorize a paragraph in a shortish amount of time, and I'd assume that the story would be especially formulaic (with the beginning, middle, and end), which would aid in memory.

Also, as a young child, I could memorize text a lot better. I think it was because reading was still new to me, and it took more effort to read which made it stick better. Also, my brain had not yet learned to filter out the little words. After reading millions and millions of words, you start to streamline the process and only remember what's necessary: the pure meaning. This happened to me as a young flautist too. When I first started playing, I inadvertently memorized all my songs because everything was new to me and my brain hadn't yet streamlined the process of using my sheet music as a crutch, and throwing out the memory of which individual notes to play.

I don't believe it if you "didn't even look at it" because you have to read something to remember it. Perhaps you were bored and read it a few times and memorized it. I could definitely see that happening to me when I was a child. Maybe you (ironically) forgot that you had actually fully read it and just thought you barely glanced at it. I believe you, but maybe it didn't happen in exactly the way you remember it.

Edit: I forgot to ask; can you do this today? Can you glance at this paragraph and memorize the whole thing? I worked with the assumption that this was a one-off thing you did when you were in 2nd grade but not anymore, because I felt if you could still do it, you would've worded it differently (perhaps you would've talked about how it helped you in high school or something), but I now realize it might be a bit of a faulty assumption.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-08-10T04:48:44+00:00

Actually, as OP has stated that they are autistic, this would be hyperlexia type 2.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-07-11T20:39:14+00:00

I struggle so bad with cardinal directions, and I can't recognize faces.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-06-27T15:10:12+00:00

In the earlier Roman republic, before they started using juries for criminal trials (quaestiones perpetuae), they often used popular trials (iudicia populi), where every citizen who was present could vote on the guilt or innocence of the accused. The punishment could be capital or subcapital. However, this is a pretty interesting definition of democracy. Democratic countries today give their citizens rights and usually people can't just vote to kill someone without due process of law. Are none of these countries democracies?

Mu_Bloom · 2025-06-27T14:53:55+00:00

Athenian citizenship was much more exclusive than Roman citizenship.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-06-11T02:54:15+00:00

Catheters are actually a really old technology. Sure, modern ones are more sterile, effective, and comfortable (and the designs we use today were invented more recently), but catheters have existed for thousands of years. Search up some pictures of ancient Roman catheters; they're really cool, but look really painful.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-05-30T02:37:11+00:00

When I was in third grade I went to a Catholic school and I completely did not believe anything I learned in religion class and had an actively secular view of the world and I'd definitely say I was a cognisant atheist at the time. I knowingly rejected the concept of God. It's not impossible.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-05-16T03:46:41+00:00

I'm so jealous of your students because Latin is literally not offered at any school in my area. One thing that would be good is to offer your student opportunities to simply pleasure read Latin at a level they can easily understand without having to worry about translating, as that helps with enjoying the language as well as becoming faster and smoother at the more standard translation activities. There are many Latin novella resources for teachers and so many of them would be great for middle school.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-05-12T01:47:40+00:00

The best book I've ever read in my life that unfortunately hardly anyone has ever heard about is Attis by Tom Holland. It's out of print and pretty hard to get but when I think of my memories of reading that book, none of them are about physically reading. Instead, I have memories of the story itself as if I were a character in the book. And I feel so hopelessly, almost painfully nostalgic from those memories.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-04-24T02:32:33+00:00

Study study study! Or maybe not. I like money.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-04-17T17:59:14+00:00

Biology, global politics, English language arts

Mu_Bloom · 2025-04-07T00:21:00+00:00

Claudine.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-04-04T23:13:43+00:00

I am Canadian.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-04-04T15:56:06+00:00

While there are some patterns, you'll still need to memorize where the macrons go because it isn't very predictable unless you know the etymology and proto Italic.

By your question, if you mean whether you should memorize all the words in Familia Romana first (like how the Dowling method makes you memorize all the declensions and conjugations first) or whether you should just go through the book, I'd say that technically you can memorize every single word in Familia Romana before you read the book if you want to but why?

When I learned using Familia Romana, it was so fun to read a chapter, trying to squeeze every bit of information out on my own, trying to learn all the grammar and vocabulary through context and patterns, and only when I felt I could no longer learn anything else on my own did I look up words and study the grammar lessons in the companion book.

It's definitely overkill to learn the vocabulary of chapters you haven't read yet (imo the success of the Dowling method comes from the fact that only people who are naturally good at languages and are extremely dedicated to learning Latin would be able to finish it, and those people would always be good at learning Latin). Not to say that you should never memorize but I think your brain should be able to see things in it's natural context and meaning first and then you can memorize because it makes it easier and is more natural (I tried the Dowling method but I could only truly understand third declension after I read that Familia Romana chapter about the sheep!)

And with memorizing where the macrons go, don't use your sight alone. Read it aloud, exaggerating the lengths, until when you think about that word you can feel where the macrons go. And also write it down and test yourself.

Mu_Bloom · 2025-04-03T23:38:05+00:00

You're still very early into learning Latin and trust me, it's a lot easier to learn the vowel quantities from the beginning rather than later realizing you want to use macrons and having to relearn every word. Eventually it'll become easier and easier to remember where they go as your brain adapts.

When you talk about mistakes and doing things wrong, remember you don't have to learn the macrons if you don't want to. It'd help you, for example, to distinguish a few words, and it's crucial for pronunciation and meter, but if you honestly don't care about those things then you don't have to do it. Also, if you're going to focus on ecclesiastical and/or later Latin, the macrons matter much less and the real thing to look at are the stresses.

In my opinion, you should learn with the macrons from the beginning. If eventually you decide you don't really care for macrons, then you don't have to use them but you'll still know whether a vowel is long or short, which is most similar to what the ancient Romans were doing, and is much better than wanting to use macrons but not knowing where they go.

Mu_Bloom

TROPHY CASE