The Latin Letters of Pseudo-Brutus (Cic. Brut. 1.16 and 1.17)

This chapter looks at two letters attributed to Marcus Iunius Brutus (Cicero, Ad M. Brutum 1.16 and 1.17), the dubious authenticity of which has attracted much critical attention. Following a summary of earlier scholarship, the contribution steers the debate in a different direction by arguing that these letters are instead pseudepigrapha, fictional impersonations of Brutus, composed around the first century CE. To this end, it highlights the elements of the text which betray a learned and creative author: dexterous allusions and imitations of Ciceronian style; a deep knowledge and manipulation of Brutus' own writings and of a wide range of other sources about his person and philosophical ideas; echoes of the hostile biographical tradition developed against Brutus in later times; and self-conscious meta-literary games with the conventions of epistolarity.