A Fatal Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum: Murder in Ancient Rome

by Emma Southon

The point of the sack is outlined for us by Cicero in a defence speech. It was not for pure sadistic pleasure, but to prevent the profane and polluted body of the murderer from contaminating the earth, sky and water that it would otherwise touch. The point was to protect the very elements from contact with something so obscene and defiling as the body of a parricide. At the same time, the person themselves would be deprived of those base things which represented freedom and goodness and purity: the fresh air, the life-giving earth and the cleansing water. Even their bones, says Cicero, would be denied the support of the shore when they washed up. They would never receive the veneration given to the dead in their afterlife. They were, for eternity, isolated from every good and natural thing because of the all-encompassing horror of their deed.