Parrhêsia in Cassius Dio

The story of how parrhêsia (“freedom of speech” or “frank speech”) went from a political liberty under the Republic to an indulgence under the Principate is one of the underexplored themes of the Late Republican and Imperial books of Dio’s Roman History. The theme was an old one as Tacitus and others had discussed the decline of libertas and eloquentia following the triumph of Augustus. But the scope of Dio’s work allowed him to explore the use (and abuse) of parrhêsia from the Late Republic to the Imperial period through his characterisation of individuals such as Cicero, the Younger Cato, and Helvidius Priscus, in a way that was not without originality. This paper addresses the questions of how Dio interpreted this ostensibly classical Athenian concept of parrhêsia and how he applied it to his understanding and representation of constitutional change at Rome. Furthermore, it examines the notion of parrhêsia as a component of Dio’s self-fashioning as a critical historian of his own times.