Laudator Temporis Acti

Cicero, Pro Murena 13 (tr. C. MacDonald):

Cato calls Murena a dancer. Strong language from a forceful prosecution, if there is any truth in it; slanderous abuse, if it is false. A man of your stature, then, Marcus Cato, should not pick a piece of dirt from the street corner or from parasites' invective or lightly abuse a consul of the Roman people in this way. You should look around for the other vices with which a man must be tainted before you can sustain this charge. Hardly anyone dances except in his cups, either by himself or at any respectable party, unless of course he is out of his mind. Dancing comes at the end of a seasonable meal, in attractive surroundings and after a wealth of sensuous enjoyment. You are seizing upon this climax of debauchery but leave out those attendant vices without which it cannot exist. You do not produce any disgraceful party, any love-making, riotous behaviour, loose and extravagant living, and since there is no sign of behaviour that goes by the name of pleasure but is really vice, do you think that you can find the shadow of debauchery where you cannot find the substance?

Saltatorem appellat L. Murenam Cato. Maledictum est, si vere obicitur, vehementis accusatoris, sin falso, maledici conviciatoris. Qua re cum ista sis auctoritate, non debes, M. Cato, adripere maledictum ex trivio aut ex scurrarum aliquo convicio neque temere consulem populi Romani saltatorem vocare, sed circumspicere quibus praeterea vitiis adfectum esse necesse sit eum cui vere istud obici possit. Nemo enim fere saltat sobrius, nisi forte insanit, neque in solitudine neque in convivio moderato atque honesto. Tempestivi convivi, amoeni loci, multarum deliciarum comes est extrema saltatio. Tu mihi adripis hoc quod necesse est omnium vitiorum esse postremum, relinquis illa quibus remotis hoc vitium omnino esse non potest? Nullum turpe convivium, non amor, non comissatio, non libido, non sumptus ostenditur, et, cum ea non reperiantur quae voluptatis nomen habent quamquam vitiosa sunt, in quo ipsam luxuriam reperire non potes, in eo te umbram luxuriae reperturum putas?

Elaine Fantham ad loc.:

[I]t is most unlikely that Servius and his subscriptores had produced the charge of being a "dancer" out of the blue. Did it spring from allegations (not acknowledged by Cicero) of bad behavior or debauchery committed by Licinius Murena after returning from military service? Did his antagonists depict him as a party animal like Verres and his associates or Catiline's cronies, who danced nudi (not naked but clad only in a tunic or subligaculum); cf. Verr. 2.3.23; Cat. 2.23; Pis. 22? Our locus classicus for dancing as ill-becoming a consul is Gabinius, against whom Cicero's chief sources of mockery were his carefully curled hairstyle and his dancing (saltatrix calamistrata, Red. Sen. 13), and Nepos, who introduced his Lives of Foreign Generals with an expression of surprise that Greek biographers praised Epaminondas of Thebes for his skillful dancing and flute-playing. Roman gentlemen did not dance: hence Demea's mockery of Micio dancing with a skipping rope between his daughter-in-law and a sex-slave (Ter. Ad. 752) and Cicero's report that the orator Titius pranced so much as he spoke that his name was given to a kind of dance (Brut. 225). However, we need to distinguish such solo performance from dancing in a religious rite and note the changing associations of saltare with the coming of pantomime under Augustus. Cicero maintains that no one dances unless drunk, nemo fere saltat sobrius. But such behavior may have been pretty common in the parties of the younger generation. And what form did this dancing take? We are not talking about dancing with a sexual partner or as part of a male group. Perhaps the best evidence is the Ionic solo number performed by Plautus's Pseudolus (Ps. 1274), a staggering display of teetering pyrotechnics. For ladies dancing, cf. Sempronia in Sall. Cat. 25 saltare elegantius quam necesse est probae and Horace Od. 2.12.19 on Licymnia dancing (ludere) ceremonially with other women.