Sallust's Bellum Catilinae: Translated with Text and Commentary Hardcover – August 16, 2025

The particulars of the Catilinarian Conspiracy against the Roman Republic in 63 B.C.—the character of Catiline, the veracity of the sources, and the reliability of the historians who wrote about the affair, including Sallust himself—ought not to be the student’s first concern.The most important thing is to read the text of Sallust’s Bellum Catilinae in Latin for oneself. This cannot be overemphasized, for it is foundational: what is flawed at the base will be flawed in the superstructure. Other sources—most notably Cicero’s In Catilinam I–IV, along with later accounts by Cassius Dio and Dionysius of Halicarnassus—are essential for a fuller understanding of the conspiracy. But the study must begin here.This volume is designed to make that beginning possible. It presents a new English translation of Sallust’s Bellum Catilinae with the Latin text printed in parallel, accompanied by more than 700 annotations explaining grammatical constructions and points of interpretation. Read more