Catiline as Portrayed by Cicero and Sallust

Abstract

The documentary evidence we have of Catiline has "been written chiefly by Sallust, Cicero and Plutarch. The last named mentions him in his lives of Caesar and Cicero.|All of these men have failed to give us a true portrayal of Catiline's character for they were not historians in the true sense. Cicero is striving to prove the conspiracy and to save the republic, Sallust to write a history but he has not annalyzed(sic) the causes and Plutarch merely mentions Catiline where his life crosses the paths of the two above mentioned.