Pro Milone - Outcome and Aftermath of The Case

Outcome and Aftermath of The Case

In the account of later writer and Ciceronian commentator Asconius, the actual defense failed to secure an acquittal for Milo for three primary reasons. Firstly, Cicero’s intimidation by the Clodian mob present on the final day, the political pressure exerted implicitly by Pompey for the judges to convict Milo, and finally, the sheer number of testimonies against Milo over the course of the case. Milo was condemned for the murder by a margin of 38 votes to 13 and was ostracized to the Gallic town of Massilia (Marseille). During his absence, Milo was prosecuted for bribery, unlawful association, and violence, for all of which he was successfully convicted. As an example of the volatile, contradictory and confusing political atmosphere of the time, the superintendent of Milo's slaves, one Marcus Saufeius, was also prosecuted for the murder of Clodius shortly after the conviction of Milo. The team of Cicero and Caelius defended him, and together, managed to acquit Saufeius by a margin of one vote. Furthermore, Clodian supporters did not all escape unscathed. The associate of Clodius, Sextus Cloelius, who supervised the cremation of Clodius's corpse, was prosecuted for the burning down of the curia and was convicted by an overwhelming majority of 46 votes. Following the trial, violence raged unchecked in the city between supporters of Clodius and Milo. Pompey had been made sole consul in Rome during the violent troubled times after the murder but before the legal proceedings against Milo had begun and he quelled the riots following this string of controversial cases with brutal military efficiency, regaining stability in Rome - for a while.

The Pro Milone text which survives to date is a rewritten version, published by Cicero after the trial. Despite its failure to secure an acquittal, the surviving rewrite is considered to be one of Cicero's best works: thought by many to be the magnum opus of his rhetorical repertoire. Asconius describes the Pro Milone as "so perfectly written that it can rightly be considered his best".

The speech is full of deceptively straightforward strategies. Throughout his speech Cicero explicitly seems to follow his own rhetorical guidelines published in his earlier work De Inventione, but on occasion subtly breaks away from these stylistic norms in order to emphasise certain elements of his case and use the circumstances to his advantage. As example, he places his refutation of the opposition's arguments (refutatio) far earlier in the speech than expected, and pounces on the opportunity to disprove quickly the plethora of evidence collected over the first four days of the trial. His arguments are interwoven with one another and coalesce during the conclusion (peroratio). There is heavy use of pathos throughout the speech, starting with his assertion of fear for the guards posted around the courts by Pompey in this special inquisition (the very first sentence of the speech contains the word vereor - "I fear"). However, Cicero ends his speech fearless, becoming more emotive with each argument, and finally finishing by the beseeching of his audience with tears to acquit Milo. Irony is omnipresent in the speech, along with continual appearances of humour and constant appeals to traditional Roman virtues and prejudices, all of these tactics designed solely to involve and persuade his jury.

In many ways the circumstances surrounding the case were apposite for Cicero, forcing him back to his own oratorical foundations. The charge of vis ('violence') against Milo not only suited a logical and analytical legal framework with evidence indicating a specific time, date, place and cast for the murder itself, but generally concerned actions that affected the community. This allowed Cicero ample maneuvering room to include details of the fire in the curia, as well as the attack on Marcus Lepidus' house and the Bona Dea incident.

Milo, having read the later published speech whilst in exile, humorously commented that if Cicero had only spoken that well in court, he would "not now be enjoying the delicious red mullet of Massilia".