Cicero

Marcus Tullius Cicero, commonly known as Cicero, lived from 3 January 106 BC to 7 December 43 BC and was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, orator and writer who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises of the late Roman Republic; his extensive writings include treatises on rhetoric, philosophy and politics, and he is considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists, the innovator of what became known as Ciceronian rhetoric. Educated in Rome and Greece and born to a wealthy equestrian family, he served as consul in 63 BC, and greatly influenced both ancient and modern reception of the Latin language, adapting the arguments of the chief schools of Hellenistic philosophy into Latin and coining a large portion of Latin philosophical vocabulary through neologisms such as evidentia, humanitas and qualitas, almost 150 of which translated Greek philosophical terms. Although an accomplished orator and lawyer, Cicero considered his political career his most important achievement: during his consulship he suppressed the Catilinarian conspiracy, was exiled in 58 BC for having executed conspirators without trial, was recalled the next year, took a governorship in Cilicia in 51 BC, supported Pompey in Caesar's civil war and was pardoned after Caesar's victory, then led the Senate against Mark Antony after Caesar's assassination before being proscribed and executed in late 43 BC. Petrarch's rediscovery of Cicero's letters is often credited with initiating the fourteenth century Renaissance in public affairs, humanism and classical Roman culture, and his influence peaked again during the eighteenth century Enlightenment on thinkers such as John Locke, David Hume, Montesquieu and Edmund Burke; his works remain among the most important primary sources for the history of the late Roman Republic.