Brutus (Cicero)

Cicero's Brutus (also known as De claris oratoribus) is a history of Roman oratory. It is written in the form of a dialogue, in which Marcus Junius Brutus and Titus Pomponius Atticus ask Cicero to describe the qualities of all the leading Roman orators up to their time. Cicero then attempts to propose a reconstruction of Roman history.^[1] Although it is written in the form of a dialogue, the majority of the talking is done by Cicero with occasional intervention by Brutus and Atticus. The work was probably composed in 46 BC, with the purpose of defending Cicero's own oratory. He begins with an introductory section on Greek oratory of the Attic, Asiatic, and Rhodian schools, before discussing Roman orators, beginning with Lucius Junius Brutus, "The Liberator", though becoming more specific from the time of Marcus Cornelius Cethegus.^[2]