Olga Lyubimova

The article deals with the statement of Plutarch (Crass. 13. 5), according to which Crassus began to hate Cicero after receiving the anonymous letters warning about the Catiline conspiracy. The letters were delivered to Crassus under strange circumstances, transferred by him to Cicero and gave grounds for the passing of the senatus consultum ultimum. The hypothesis proposed here is that Crassus considered Cicero himself to be the author of the letters, and regarded the whole episode as his provocation with the aim of driving a wedge between Crassus and the conspirators and getting extraordinary powers from the senate.