on from office of the proconsul Caepio, with which was
combined the confiscation of his property (Liv. Ep. 67), was probably
pronounced by the assembly of the people immediately after the battle
of Arausio (6th October 649). That some time elapsed between the
deposition and his proper downfall, is clearly shown by the proposal
made in 650, and aimed at Caepio, that deposition from office should
involve the forfeiture of a seat in the senate (Asconius in Cornel,
p. 78). The fragments of Licinianus (p. 10; -Cn. Manilius ob eandem
causam quam et Caepio L. Saturnini rogatione e civitate est cito [?]
eiectus-; which clears up the allusion in Cic. de Or. ii. 28, 125) now
inform us that a law proposed by Lucius Appuleius Saturninus brought
about this catastrophe. This is evidently no other than the Appuleian
law as to the -minuta maiestas- of the Roman state (Cic. de Or. ii.
25, 107; 49, 201), or, as its tenor was already formerly explained
(ii. p. 143 of the first edition [of the German]), the proposal of
Saturninus for the appointment of an extraordinary commission to
investigate the treasons that had taken place during the Cimbrian
troubles. The commission of inquiry as to the gold of Tolosa
(Cic. de N. D. iii. 30, 74) arose in quite a similar way out of
the Appuleian law, as the special courts of inquiry--further mentioned
in that passage--as to a scandalous bribery of judges out of the Mucian
law of 613, as to the occurrences with the Vestals out of the Peducaean
law of 641, and as to the Jugurthine war out of the Mamilian law of 644.
A comparison of these cases also shows that in such special
commissions--different in this respect from the ordinary ones--even
punishments affecting life and limb might be and were inflicted. If
elsewhere the tribune of the people, Gaius Norbanus, is named as the
person who set agoing the proceedings against Caepio and was afterwards
brought to trial for doing so (Cic. de Or. ii. 40, 167; 48, 199; 49, 200;
Or. Part. 30, 105, et al.), this is not inconsistent with the view
given above; for the proposal proceeded as usual from several tribunes
of the people (ad Herenn. i. 14, 24; Cic. de Or. ii. 47, 197), and,
as Saturninus was already dead when the aristocratic party was in a
position to think of retaliation, they fastened on his colleague.
As to the period of this second and final condemnation of Caepio,
the usual very inconsiderate hypothesis, which places it in 659,
ten years after th