TY - CHAP
T1 - Leadership through letters
T2 - Cicero and Cassius' correspondence in 44-43 BC
AU - van der Blom, Henriette
PY - 2022/2/10
Y1 - 2022/2/10
N2 - In the ancient world, letters formed the main means of long-distance communication, while most political negotiation and action took place in face-to-face meetings and institutions. The civil wars of Rome in the first century bce challenged the position of the City of Rome as the locus of political action; during the civil wars of the 40s and 30s bce, much political power and leadership was communicated and negotiated through letters rather than in person. Cicero’s correspondence with friends, senatorial colleagues and political connections provides a major corpus of such political communication, negotiation and leadership. This chapter applies modern management theory on leadership, specifically “transformational leadership” theory, to Cicero’s correspondence with C. Cassius Longinus (one of the murderers of Julius Caesar), in order to assess the nature of Cicero’s (attempted) epistolary leadership and to understand the more characteristic features of this leadership through letters.
AB - In the ancient world, letters formed the main means of long-distance communication, while most political negotiation and action took place in face-to-face meetings and institutions. The civil wars of Rome in the first century bce challenged the position of the City of Rome as the locus of political action; during the civil wars of the 40s and 30s bce, much political power and leadership was communicated and negotiated through letters rather than in person. Cicero’s correspondence with friends, senatorial colleagues and political connections provides a major corpus of such political communication, negotiation and leadership. This chapter applies modern management theory on leadership, specifically “transformational leadership” theory, to Cicero’s correspondence with C. Cassius Longinus (one of the murderers of Julius Caesar), in order to assess the nature of Cicero’s (attempted) epistolary leadership and to understand the more characteristic features of this leadership through letters.
UR - https://brill.com/view/title/61945
U2 - 10.1163/9789004511408_011
DO - 10.1163/9789004511408_011
M3 - Chapter (peer-reviewed)
SN - 9789004511392
T3 - Mnemosyne, Supplements, History and Archaeology of Classical Antiquity
SP - 271
EP - 294
BT - Leadership and Initiative in Late Republican and Early Imperial Rome
A2 - Frolov, Roman M.
A2 - Burden-Strevens, Christopher
PB - Brill
ER -