Sallust

This chapter shows how Sallust developed the motif of language change during civil conflict in his Bellum Catilinae and his Histories . Sallust emerges as an author deeply concerned by conceptual loss, trying to preserve traditional means of moral evaluation as the Roman Republic collapsed. The chapter starts by exploring Sallust’s understanding of moral language; it then dissects the analysis of transvaluation in Cato’s speech, before showing how Sallust himself sets out to preserve moral language through his own work. The chapter finishes with a discussion of Lepidus’ and Macer’s speeches in Sallust’s Histories .