A major historical source for the Roman Republic, especially for those periods where the account of the Roman historian Livy is missing, are Plutarch's biographies. Plutarch was a Greek writer from Chaeronaea in Boeotia (Greece) who composed his 'Parallel Lives of Eminent Greeks and Romans' in the first decades of the second century AD (note that this is about two and a half centuries after the main events of Cato's life).
Cato the Elder's life (from 230s to 149 BC) spanned one of the most important phases in the development of the Republic, from the second war with Carthage, against the Carthaginian general Hannibal, through the great post-Hannibalic changes in the Roman and Italian society and economy. Since Cato was a rising 'new man' (novus homo) in the power elite of the Roman ruling order, in many ways he is a particularly good example of these changes as they were experienced by one person at the heart of Roman society.
Some Questions: What major themes are found in this life of Cato in terms of economic and cultural changes affecting Roman society of the time? How is Cato's life seen as exemplifying a Roman response to these changes? How do tradition and innovation play roles in his own rise to power, and in the maintenance of his social position? If this is a biography, how is it different from many biographies we might read today? Why?
Discussion and Questions Copyright 2000/2001, Prof. Brent D. Shaw.