Note 8 — CICERO AGAINST CATILINE

: quae—est? “what stain of domestic infamy has not been branded on your life?” Distinguish: nŏtă, nōtă, nŏtā. The expression nota domesticae turpitudinis differs in meaning from privatarum rerum dedecus: the former relates to moral or immoral domestic life, the latter to all private actions as opposed to those that affect a man’s public character. Nota is applied (1) to the brand on cattle; Virg. Georg. 3, 158: (2) to the mark placed on a fugitive slave when retaken: (3) to the mark placed by the censor (nota censoria) on revising the list of citizens, opposite the name of the person degraded. According to Plutarch, Catiline had slain his own brother and murdered his own son that there might be no obstacle to his marrying Aurelia Orestilla.