Lucius Duvius Avitus

Last updated April 20, 2019

Lucius Duvius Avitus was a Roman senator, who held several offices in the emperor's service. He was suffect consul in the nundinium of November-December 56 with Publius Clodius Thrasea Paetus as his colleague.^[1] Avitus is the only known member of his family known to have held the consulship.

The Roman Empire was the post-Roman Republic period of the ancient Roman civilization. Ruled by emperors, it had large territorial holdings around the Mediterranean Sea in Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, and the Caucasus. From the constitutional reforms of Augustus to the military anarchy of the third century, the Empire was a principate ruled from the city of Rome. The Roman Empire was then ruled by multiple emperors and divided in a Western Roman Empire, based in Milan and later Ravenna, and an Eastern Roman Empire, based in Nicomedia and later Constantinople. Rome remained the nominal capital of both parts until 476 AD, when Odoacer deposed Romulus Augustus after capturing Ravenna and the Roman Senate sent the imperial regalia to Constantinople. The fall of the Western Roman Empire to barbarian kings, along with the hellenization of the Eastern Roman Empire into the Byzantine Empire, is conventionally used to mark the end of Ancient Rome and the beginning of the Middle Ages.

A consul held the highest elected political office of the Roman Republic, and ancient Romans considered the consulship the highest level of the cursus honorum.

Nundinium, a Latin word derived from the word nundinum signifying the cycle of days observed by the Romans, which came to be used under the Empire to indicate a period of consulship. When, under the Empire, several pairs of consuls were created in one year, the period of a single consulship was called a nundinium.

Prior to becoming consul, Avitus is known to have been governor of the imperial province of Gallia Aquitania, in an unknown year. However, his tenure as governor of Germania Inferior is better known, which he held from 58 to the year 60. Tacitus records his military activities in the year 58. After the Frisii unsuccessfully attempted to migrate into the province and settle on some uninhabited lands, the Ampsivarii, one of the Germanic tribes, likewise attempted to relocate there. Avitus' official response was to command them to submit to Roman rule; unofficially he told their king Boiocalus, an old personal friend, that he was willing to cede to them the lands to live on. However, the Ampsivarii took offense to this response, and called to their old allies to aid them to invade Germania Inferior. Avitus responded to this threat by writing to Titus Curtilius Mancia, governor of Germania Superior, and asking him to campaign on the further side of the Rhine. This demonstration of force cowed the allies Boiocalus had called on, and the Ampsivarii were forced to retreat to the lands of the Usipii and the Tubantes. These tribes did not provide them shelter for long, and the Ampsivarii were forced to seek shelter from other peoples. Tacitus relates that "after long wanderings, as destitute outcasts, received now as friends now as foes, their entire youth were slain in a strange land, and who could not fight were apportioned as booty."^[2]

Gallia Aquitania, also known as Aquitaine or Aquitaine Gaul, was a province of the Roman Empire. It lies in present-day southwest France, where it gives its name to the modern region of Aquitaine. It was bordered by the provinces of Gallia Lugdunensis, Gallia Narbonensis, and Hispania Tarraconensis.

Germania Inferior was a Roman province located on the west bank of the Rhine and bordering the North sea.

PubliusCornelius Tacitus was a senator and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories—examine the reigns of the emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero, and those who reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors. These two works span the history of the Roman Empire from the death of Augustus, in 14 AD, to the years of the First Jewish–Roman War, in 70 AD. There are substantial lacunae in the surviving texts, including a gap in the Annals that is four books long.

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References

↑ Paul A. Gallivan, "Some Comments on the Fasti for the Reign of Nero", Classical Quarterly , 24 (1974), p. 291, 309
↑ Tacitus, Annales , XIII.54-56

Political offices
Preceded by Publius Sulpicius Scribonius Rufus, and Publius Sulpicius Scribonius Proculus as Suffect consuls	Suffect consul of the Roman Empire 56 with Publius Clodius Thrasea Paetus	Succeeded by Nero II, and Lucius Calpurnius Piso as Ordinary consuls

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[1] Paul A. Gallivan, "Some Comments on the Fasti for the Reign of Nero", Classical Quarterly , 24 (1974), p. 291, 309

[2] Tacitus, Annales , XIII.54-56