Gaius Porcius Cato (consul 114 BC)
Gaius Porcius Cato
Initially a friend of the
Family background
Gaius Cato belonged to the
Career
Early career
Gaius is first mentioned in the sources as a supporter of Tiberius Gracchus, the famous social reformer and tribune of the plebs in 133.[6][4] Gaius probably met him within the Scipionic Circle—the literate court of Scipio Aemilianus—as Tiberius was also Scipio's brother-in-law.[7] Gaius first recorded position was as triumvir monetalis in 123, the year of the first tribunate of Gaius Gracchus, which suggests he also supported Tiberius' younger brother.[8] It seems that he deserted the cause of the Gracchi soon after though, as he was later prosecuted by a Gracchan court.[9] Cicero describes him as a "mediocre orator".[10][11]
Nothing is known of his activities until his consulship in 114,[12] but Gaius was surely praetor by 117, as the Lex Villia required a three-year wait between holding magistracies.[13] His province was likely Sicily, as Cicero tells that Gaius' baggage was confiscated by the Mamertines, the inhabitants of Messina.[14] The reason is unknown, but Gaius was likely either on his way to or from his post in Syracuse.[15] Before an article published by Ernst Badian in 1993, the academic consensus was that Gaius lost his baggage c.110 on his way to serve as legate in Numidia during the Jugurthine War, but former consuls serving as legates are extremely rare, and it is more likely that Gaius was praetor in Sicily in 117.[16][17][18]
Consulship (114 BC)
Gaius was elected consul in 114, alongside the other plebeian
Gaius was assigned Macedonia as his province, which was normally given to a praetor, but a war against the Scordisci—a Celtic or Illyrian tribe from east Serbia—had broken out and a consul was needed.[23][24] During the summer Gaius nevertheless suffered a crushing defeat against the Scordisci in northern Thrace, who then could enter Roman territory as far as Delphi and the Adriatic. It was the first major Roman defeat in a generation.[25]
The disaster triggered a "religious hysteria" at Rome, with a return to human sacrifice for the last time in Roman history.
Trials and exile (113–109 BC)
As was customary with defeated commanders, Gaius was not prorogued in his province and returned to Rome in 113.
Apparently, Gaius did not suffer from this conviction. He kept his seat in the Senate and remained politically active, as he was sued again in 109 by the Mamilian commission—named after the tribune of the plebs Gaius Mamilius Limetanus.[36] Officially, this special court was set up to investigate the bribes received by Roman politicians from Jugurtha, the King of Numidia, against whom Rome had been at war since 112.[37] However, the jurors were all equites and the targeted individuals were men associated with the demise of the Gracchi (the equites had been made jurors in the criminal courts by Gaius Gracchus).[38] The first man prosecuted was therefore Lucius Opimius, the consul who in 121 had ordered the murder of Gaius Gracchus and his supporters.[39] Then followed Lucius Calpurnius Bestia (consul in 111), Gaius Sulpicius Galba, Spurius Postumius Albinus (perhaps the consul of 110), and thus Gaius Porcius Cato—who all can be linked to the Gracchi, as enemies or turncoats.[40] Cicero makes it clear that they owed their condemnation to the Gracchan background of the jurors.[41][42] Gaius may have not even waited for the result of the trial and went into exile.[11]
Unlike most other exiled Romans, Gaius did not move to another city in Italy or the Greek East, but went instead to the less civilised
Gaius was possibly the grandfather of
Footnotes
- ^ His name is hereafter shortened to Gaius, as this praenomen was particularly rare among the Porcii.
References
- ^ Crawford, Roman Republican Coinage, pp. 294, 295.
- ^ Elimar Klebs, RE, vol. 1, cols. 590, 592, 593; Franz Miltner, vol. 43, cols. 167, 168. Friedrich Münzer may have written the RE article, cf. Badian, "The Legend of the Legate Who Lost His Luggage", pp. 203, 204.
- ^ Sumner, Orators in Brutus, p. 63.
- ^ a b Gruen, Roman Politics, p. 66.
- ^ Broughton, Magistrates, vol. I, p. 527.
- ^ Cicero, De Amictia, 39.
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, p. 126.
- ^ Crawford, Roman Republican Coinage, p. 75.
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, p. 146.
- ^ Cicero, Brutus, 108.
- ^ a b c Miltner, RE, vol. 43, col. 105.
- ^ Badian, "The Legend of the Legate Who Lost His Luggage", p. 204.
- ^ Broughton, Magistrates, vol. I, p. 529.
- ^ Cicero, In Verrem 2, iv. 10.
- ^ Brennan, The Praetorship, p. 477, suggests Gaius stole something from the Mamertines.
- ^ Broughton, Magistrates, vol. I, p. 544, as example of the former view.
- ^ Badian, "The Legend of the Legate Who Lost His Luggage", p. 210.
- ^ Brennan, The Praetorship, pp. 477, 704.
- ^ Broughton, Magistrates, vol. I, p. 533.
- ^ Taylor & Broughton, "The Order of the Two Consuls' Names", p. 6.
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, pp. 126–127.
- ^ Broughton, "Candidates defeated", p. 9. Caprarius was finally elected consul in 113.
- ^ Wilkes, The Illyrians, pp. 82, 83.
- ^ Brennan, The Praetorship, p. 522.
- ^ Eckstein, "Human Sacrifice", p. 73.
- ^ a b Eckstein, "Human Sacrifice", pp. 71–73.
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, pp. 127–131.
- ^ Eckstein, "Human Sacrifice", p. 71.
- ^ Champion, Peace of the Gods, p. 168.
- ^ Brennan, The Praetorship, pp. 522, 892 (note 81). Gaius' successor in Macedonia was Metellus Caprarius.
- ^ Alexander, Trials, p. 23 (n°45). The mention of "exile" is likely an error, coming from a confusion with Gaius' second trial. [cf. correction by Kelly, Exile, p. 171.]
- ^ Rosenstein, Imperatores Victi, p. 142, says the fine was "ludicrously small".
- ^ Brennan, The Praetorship, p. 522, writes "a minor fine".
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, pp. 126, 127.
- ^ Rosenstein, Imperatores Victi, p. 142.
- ^ Sherwin-White, "The Extortion Procedure Again", pp. 44, 45 (note 11).
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, pp. 142, 143.
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, pp. 90, 91 (equites' control of the courts), 144 (real motivation of the trials).
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, pp. 145–147.
- ^ Gruen, Roman Politics, p. 144. There is some doubt on the identity of Postumius though.
- ^ Cicero, Brutus, 128, "[They] were all condemned by their judges, who were of the Gracchan party."
- ^ Kelly, Exile, p. 170.
- ^ Badian, Foreign Clientelae, p. 318.
- ^ Knapp, "The Origins of Provincial Prosopography", p. 199.
- ^ Kelly, Exile, pp. 77, 78, 81, 82.
- ^ Cicero, Pro Balbo, 28.
- ^ Miltner, RE, vol. 43, col. 106.
Bibliography
Ancient sources
- Cicero, Brutus, Laelius De Amictia (translation on Wikisource), In Verrem (translation by C. D. Yonge on Wikisource), Pro Balbo.
Modern sources
- Michael C. Alexander, Trials in the Late Roman Republic, 149 BC to 50 BC, University of Toronto Press, 1990, ISBN 9780802057877.
- ISBN 978-0198142041.
- ——, "The Legend of the Legate Who Lost His Luggage", Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte, 1993, Bd. 42, H. 2, pp. 203–210.
- ISBN 9780195114607.
- T. Robert S. Broughton, The Magistrates of the Roman Republic, American Philological Association, 1951–1952.
- ——, "Candidates Defeated in Roman Elections: Some Ancient Roman "Also-Rans"", Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, New Series, 1991, Vol. 81, No. 4, pp. i–vi+1–64.
- Craige Brian Champion, The Peace of the Gods: Elite Religious Practices in the Middle Roman Republic, Princeton University Press, 2017, ISBN 978-0691174853.
- ISBN 9780521074926.
- A. M. Eckstein, "Human Sacrifice and Fear of Military Disaster in Republican Rome", in American Journal of Ancient History, 1982, n°7, pp. 69–95.
- ISBN 0-674-28420-8.
- Gordon P. Kelly, A History of Exile in the Roman Republic, Cambridge University Press, 2006, ISBN 9780511584558.
- Robert C. Knapp, "The Origins of Provincial Prosopography in the West", Ancient Society, 1978, Vol. 9, pp. 187–222.
- Realencyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft(abbreviated RE), J. B. Metzler, Stuttgart, 1894–1980.
- Nathan Rosenstein, Imperatores Victi, Military Defeat and Aristocratic Competition in the Middle and Late Republic, Berkeley, University of California Press, 1990, ISBN 978-0520069398.
- A. N. Sherwin-White, "The Extortion Procedure Again", The Journal of Roman Studies, 1952, Vol. 42, Parts 1 and 2, pp. 43–55.
- Graham Vincent Sumner, The Orators in Cicero's Brutus: Prosopography and Chronology, (Phoenix Supplementary Volume XI.), Toronto and Buffalo, University of Toronto Press, 1973, ISBN 978-0802052810.
- Lily Ross Taylor and T. Robert S. Broughton, "The Order of the Two Consuls' Names in the Yearly Lists", Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome, 1949, 19, pp. 3–14.
- ISBN 978-0631198079.