Sergius Catilina, a noble and a patrician: ‘quod non dignos homines honore honestatos videbam’ (BC 35, 3); ‘M. […] Noble families determined the history of the Republic, giving their names to its epochs. […] The noble was a landed proprietor, great or small. […] Of the forces that lay behind or beyond it, next to the noble families the knights were the most important. […] Neutrality was repugnant to a noble and a man of spirit: but kinship might be invoked in excuse.