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BOOK OF THE DAY: RONAN SHEEHANreviews LustrumBy Robert Harris Hutchinson 454pp. £12.99
THE HERO of the second novel in Robert Harris’s Roman trilogy is Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC), statesman, orator, lawyer, poet, philosopher, jurist, teacher, master-of-slaves, husband and father. Born at Arpinum in Latium, he was educated in Rome and Greece and died at Formiae in Latium. His country house at Frascati lent its name to many suburban Irish homes of a certain era. Lustrum means variously the den of a wild beast, a brothel, an expiatory sacrifice offered by the censors every five years – and hence a five-year period. The story begins with Cicero’s election as consul in 63 BC and runs to 58 BC when the election of Publius Clodius Pulcher as tribune prompts Cicero to flee Rome.
