Marcus Calidius
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Marcus Calidius (fl. 64–47 BC) was a Roman politician and orator.
Jerome, in his Chronicon under the year 64 BC, notes that Calidius studied oratory under Apollodorus of Pergamum.[1] He was one of the earliest Atticists in Rome.[2] In 64, he prosecuted Quintus Gallius for ambitus, even accusing Gallius, who was defended by Cicero, of trying to poison him. Gallius was acquitted.[3] As a praetor in 57, he helped Cicero return from exile and recover his house.[1][4] This was probably the occasion on which he delivered his speech De domo Ciceronis, cited by Quintilian in his Institutio Oratoria.[4][5]
In 52, Calidius defended Titus Annius Milo for the murder of Clodius Pulcher.[1][4] He was twice an unsuccessful candidate for the consulship,[2] in 51–50[4] or 50–49.[1] After his first failed candidacy, he unsuccessfully prosecuted one of the winners, Gaius Claudius Marcellus.[1] He was himself prosecuted for ambitus in 51 by two Gallii, perhaps sons of Quintus Gallius.[3]
At the start of the civil war in 49, Calidius sided with Julius Caesar.[4] He spoke eloquently in favour of Caesar and against Pompey on the floor of the Senate, arguing that the latter should leave Rome with his troops for his own province.[6] In his Commentary on the Civil War, Caesar recounts how he appointed him governor of Cisalpine Gaul that same year.[4] He probably held the title of legate.[1] He died in Gaul at Placentia in 48 or 47.[4][2]
Calidius had a high reputation as an orator. Cicero, in a letter to Brutus, expresses dislike of him but admiration for his oratory skill.[1][4] In the Middle Ages, he received a one-sentence entry in the Lives and Manners of the Philosophers, describing him as an "orator [who] flourished in the time of Pompey".[7]