I. Family Background

Born in January of 106 BC in Arpinum, the same home town from which Marius, another novus homo and the first of the great warlords, rose to power.
Cicero's father had been commended by the consul Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, indicating family connections with the power center in Rome.
Habicht, Cicero the Politician, pp. 18-19: "Cicero did not bear a famous name; he had to make a name for himself, and since military glory was not for him, the only other approach that suited him was to become known to the public as an attorney."

II. Early Career

Cicero serves under the consuls for 89 and 88 BC in the Social War.
Cicero delivers the pro Quinctio in 81 and the pro Roscio Amerino in 80 BC.
Cicero studies abroad from 79-77 BC (Athens, Rhodes, and Asia Minor).
Cicero quaestor in western Sicily in 75 BC; in this year the lex Aurelia restores powers to the tribunes.
Cicero delivers the orations against Verres, governor of Sicily, in 70 BC, thereby establishing himself as the premier orator at Rome.

III. The Tumultuous Sixties

Cicero is aedile in 69 BC.
Cicero delivers the de lege Manilia in support of Pompey's command against King Mithridates of Pontus.
Cicero is consul for the year 63 BC; uncovers the conspiracy of Catiline; delivers In Catilinam.
Cicero becomes primus rogatus of the Senate: January 1, 62 BC.
Formation of the First Triumvirate in 60 BC (Pompey, Crassus, Caesar).

IV. The Rise of Caius Julius Caesar

Cicero exiled in 58 BC; returns to Rome in September of 57 BC.
Cicero in semi-retirement from politics; writes de Oratore in 55 BC.
Cicero co-opted into the college of augurs in 53 BC.
Cicero governor of Cilicia in 51 BC; writes de Re Publica.
Cicero pardoned by Caesar in 47 BC for having supported Pompey in the civil war.
Cicero writes Brutus in 46 BC; Cato (lost) in 45 BC.

V. Cicero's Last Stand

Cicero writes de officiis and de divinatione in 44 BC; estranged from M. Antony; forms a pact with the adoptive son of Caesar, Octavian.
Cicero acts as unoffical leader of Senate.
Cicero's Philippics against Antony as an enemy of Rome in 43 BC.
Octavian reconciled with Antony; formation of Second Triumvirate (Octavian, Antony, Lepidus).
Proscriptions. Murder of Cicero: 7 December 43 BC.

Chr. Habicht, Cicero the Politician, pg. 99: "Cicero has laid the foundations of the survival of the republican spirit in the history of mankind....Cicero did so...through his words, but in the end also through his political engagement."