Constitution Thursday

In 44bce, following the death of Julius Cæsar, Mark Anthony wasn't really impressing people in Rome with his leadership and management. Despite his inspiring speech at Cæsars funeral pyre, he was basically making a pigs breakfast of things. Opposing him was Cicero. Here was a Constitutionalist, a leader and a man of words. And it was to words which Cicero turned in his very public condemnation and criticism of Anthony. He delivered a series of fourteen speeches, known as the Phillipics, in which he rips Anthony for everything from his management to his dalliances with women (even one beneath his station) and even implies that Anthony might be, just possibly, at least once or maybe twice, homosexual. For his impertinence and speeches, Cicero will be killed by Anthony. Well... not Anthony himself, he was busy. But some of his men took Cicero's head and hands, and nailed them to a wall in Rome. There Anthony's current wife (#3 of at least 4, maybe 5), pulled out his tongue and drove a needle through it. It