Quintus Caecilius Metellus (consul 206 BC)

Quintus Caecilius Metellus (c. 250 BC – 175 BC) was a

He served as a legate in the army of Gaius Claudius Nero and fought in the war against Hannibal.^[11] He was a political ally of Scipio Africanus, the man who eventually defeated Hannibal.^[12] He was also distinguished as an orator, the funeral sermon he pronounced at his father's funeral being counted amount his best speeches.^[13]

He was the father of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Macedonicus and Lucius Caecilius Metellus Calvus.^[14]

Family background

Quintus Caecilius Metellus was the son of Lucius Caecilius Metellus, a successful general who defeated Hasdrubal at Panormus in the First Punic War.^[15] Both father and son were members of the famed gens Caecilia, a powerful plebeian family of the late Republic.

Early career

Caecilius Metellus first appears in the historical record in 221 BC, delivering a panegyric at the obsequies of his father, Lucius, who died that year. Quintus declared that "his father had achieved the ten greatest and highest objects in the pursuit of which wise men pass their lives". Among these he included being a "brave commander", "supreme orator", and "eminent member of the senate".^[13] Cicero comments that Caecilius Metellus was considered "a good speaker" by his contemporaries, alongside the likes of the famed Quintus Maximus Verrucosus.^[16]

In the disastrous year of 216 BC, after the grave Roman defeat at the Battle of Cannae, Metellus, alongside Quintus Fabius and Quintus Fulvius Flaccus, were all made pontiffs, to replace Publius Scantinius, Lucius Aemilius Paullus, and Quintus Aelius Paetus, all of whom had fallen at the previously mentioned battle.^[2]

Caecilius Metellus then, in 209 BC, is recorded by Livy as having become an Aedile of the Plebeians, alongside Gaius Servilius Geminus.^[3]

Metellus was accordingly made

Rise to prominence during the Second Punic War

Several of the

Accordingly, appointed by Salinator, Caecilius Metellus served as consul in the year 206 BC, alongside the previously mentioned Lucius Veturius Philo.^[6][19] Both new consuls were appointed to the province of Bruttium, "to carry on the war with Hannibal".^[5] Nothing much of note is said to have taken place in the area during Metellus' consulship, although Livy does recount some happenings.^[18] Before leaving Rome, the two new consuls were instructed by the senate to return to their lands plebeians who had been displaced during earlier years of the war in the ravaged and desolated province. The senate also commanded this due to complaints they had received from inhabitants of the province concerning neighboring Gauls, who, taking advantage of the wartime confusion, laid waste to many areas therein. The two consuls preemptively, before heading to Bruttium, published an edict that required the citizens of Cremona and Placentia to return to their homes, giving a deadline for them to do so. The consuls found that many had returned to their homes upon their arrival in the province at the beginning of that spring, and, presumably to drive away the roving Gauls and still-present Carthaginian-aligned forces that yet held control in parts of Bruttium traitorous to Rome, ravaged the district of Consentia, taking much loot with them. Despite being ambushed on their way towards Lucania after the looting by Bruttians and Numidian javelin-men, there was more confusion than real danger, and the plunder, as well as most of the men, were saved. Lucania thereafter returned its allegiance to Rome without resistance.^[20]

During his time as consul, before having departed Rome for the campaign in Bruttium, it is also known that Caecilius Metellus came into dispute with the poet Gnaeus Naevius, who, upon the accession of Metellus to the consulship, pronounced "It's fate that makes the Metelli consuls at Rome", to which Metellus responded "The Metelli will make the poet Naevius rue it", in reference to his witty remark.^[21] Naevius was later driven out of Rome by a Caecilius Metellus-led group of nobles and imprisoned at Utica, where St. Jerome states that he perished.^[22][23][24]

The next year, 205 BC, Metellus' consular army was disbanded as he was appointed dictator by Publius Licinius Crassus Dives, the consul serving in Bruttium that year, with the stated purpose of holding the year's consular elections. Metellus made Veturius Philo, with whom he seemingly would have been close after years of service together, his magister equitum, before successfully overseeing the election of Marcus Cornelius Cethegus and Publius Sempronius Tuditanus to the consulships of 204 BC. Metellus duly abdicated his office as dictator upon the conclusion of the elections.^{[7][8][19][25]}

Metellus then served as a proconsul with command over two legions in Bruttium, the province in which he had served as a consul, during the following year of 204 BC, with orders to continue the fight against Hannibal, alongside one of that year's consuls, Publius Sempronius Tuditanus.^[9] Tuditanus defeated Hannibal in 204 BC at the Battle of Crotona, presumably with the assistance of proconsul Metellus.

In 203 BC, Metellus and other allies of Scipio Africanus made sure Scipio's command in Africa was prorogued.^[12] This led to Hannibal and Scipio facing each other at Zama in 202 BC.^[12]

After the completion of the Second Punic War, in 201 BC, Metellus, appointed decemvir, was sent along with nine other prominent Romans by the praetor of Rome, Marcus Junius Pennus,^[26] to Samnium and Apulia to organize the redistribution of public lands to veterans returning from the victorious campaign against Hannibal in Africa.^[27] Before leaving on this mission, while still in Rome, Caecilius Metellus spoke before the Senate, saying that "he did not look upon its [the war's] termination as a blessing to Rome, since he feared that the Roman people would now sink back again into its former slumbers, from which it had been roused by the presence of Hannibal."^[28][18]

Later career

In 193 BC, Metellus is mentioned by Livy as delivering a speech to the

Later, in 185 BC, Caecilius Metellus was sent as an ambassador alongside

Caecilius Metellus, along with Baebius Tamphilus and Sempronius Gracchus, returned to Rome in 184 BC, reporting on the state of affairs in Macedonia and the Peloponnesus. Envoys from the Achaeans were also present in Rome at the time, and argued to the senate that their magistrates, in treating with Caecilius Metellus, had done nothing wrong, according to Achaean law, which dictated that the assembly was under no obligation to gather at the command of Roman ambassadors unless they came with a direct commandment from the senate to do so. Hearing this, Caecilius Metellus, stood up, accusing the Achaeans again of mismanagement of affairs in the Peloponnesus, whereupon the senate, after ensuring that the Achaeans would not make the same excuse again by clarifying the duty of the popular assembly to gather for Roman ambassadors, decided to send a new commission to the Achaeans.^[33][34]

In 179 BC, Caecilius Metellus addressed the two