Prayer to Minerva

Cicero before the college of pontiffs, at the end of his speech about his demolished house. The address to Minerva is part of a single long period covering five deities (jupiter-003, vesta-001); the governing precor atque quaeso, I pray and beseech, stands here and applies to them all. Grammatically the whole prayer hangs on this card.

Custos urbis, Minerva is not a generic epithet. On going into exile Cicero carried a statue of Minerva out of his own house and dedicated it on the Capitol as Minerva Guardian of the City. He is addressing his own dedication: the statue he himself put there — and asking it now to give him back the house he carried it out of.

Adiutrix consiliorum meorum, testis laborum — helper of my counsels, witness of my labours. The words are exact: consilium is what he devised during his consulship, labores what it cost him. The goddess is called not the protectress of Rome in general but a participant in his personal service.

And testis, witness, is not ornament. The case being argued is one of sacred law, and the deity is called in exactly the capacity in which one calls a witness.