Nobody has seriously questioned the proposition that the enmity between Clodius and Cicero dated from their clash over Clodius' impeachment for sacrilege at the Bona Dea Festival of 62 B.C., nor has anyone seriously doubted that the basic evidence on which an assessment of these events must rest is contained in the five letters of Cicero, ad Atticum i 12-16. The treatment of this evidence however has produced very divergent results; the purpose of this paper is to argue that the story told by these letters is clear, coherent and comprehensible, and that the conflict which developed was not based on psychological motivations (deep or otherwise) but on a conflict of dignitas.