Note 1383 — Chapter VI · THE SENATE
Reading edition
In the later Republic these periods of thanksgiving had reached the inordinate length of fifteen, twenty, and even fifty days (Caes. Bell. Gall. ii. 35; iv. 38; Cic. Phil. xiv. 11, 29). At this period the supplicatio was considered the usual preliminary of a triumph; but Cato explains to Cicero that this was not always the case (ad Fam. xv. 5, 2 “Quodsi triumphi praerogativam putas supplicationem et idcirco casum potius quam te laudari mavis, neque supplicationem sequitur semper triumphus,” etc.).