PugJesusThis is true and a core foundation of Roman law
https://piefed.social/c/historymemes/p/1951837/this-is-true-and-a-core-foundation-of-roman-law
Explanation: The image is from a famous (if not entirely accurate) 19th century painting depicting the Roman conspirator Catiline (pictured) being harangued by the politician and famed orator Cicero.
Catiline was accused (almost certainly correctly) of attempting to overthrow the Roman Republic… but Cicero’s oratory is infamous amongst Latin students for taking forever to place the verb and stop filling up space with nested statements. DRAMATIC EFFECT
If Cicero doesn’t reach the damn verb in the next 15 minutes, Catiline’s coup is perfectly legal!
It’s the only way Roman law could stop Cicero from going on indefinitely. 😔
blarghlyI got curious what that would even sound like and tried to look it up. Is it the First of the four Catilinarian Orations?
Okay then, this is wild
Mark Twain wrote a piece about German with the exact sentiment!