Stele of Quintus Aemilius Secundus

Last updated

The Stele of Quintus Aemilius Secundus is a first-century Roman tombstone bearing a notable funerary inscription. [1] It records how the dedicatee served in Roman Syria under Publius Sulpicius Quirinius, who was governor of Syria at the time, and there oversaw a census in the town of Apamea. [2] [3]

Contents

Text

Funerary inscription of Q. Aemilius Secundus, Venice National Archaeological Museum CIL III 6687, ILS 2683 Iscrizione funeraria di Quinto Emilio Secondo, seconda meta del I sec. d.C..JPG
Funerary inscription of Q. Aemilius Secundus, Venice National Archaeological Museum CIL III 6687, ILS 2683

The inscription reads as follows:

Quintus Aemilius Secundus son of Quintus, of the Palatine tribe, decorated with honours in the service of the deified Augustus under Publius Sulpicius Quirinius, legate of Caesar in Syria. He was prefect of cohors I Augusta and prefect of cohors II Classica. At the command of Quirinius, I carried out a census of the district of Apamea involving 117,000 citizens. Likewise when sent by Quirinius against the Itureans, I captured their fort on the Mount Lebanon. Before being involved in military service as a commander of a core of engineers, I was appointed by the two consuls as treasurer, and in the colony I was treasury secretary to the aedile twice, duumvir a second time and was as a priest. Quintus Aemilius Secundus son of Quintus of the Palatine tribe, his son and Aemilia Chia his freedwoman were placed there. This monument is excluded from the inheritance. [5]

Discovery

The stele was apparently brought from Beirut to Venice in the 17th century, possibly as part of a ship's ballast, and there was transcribed by the antiquary Ursatus Patavinus in 1674. [6] Pavatinus' transcript was published posthumously in 1719. The stele was subsequently lost, and the transcript was suspected to be a forgery until the lower part of the original was rediscovered in 1880 on Giudecca, where it had served as a window sill in a private house. [3]

Significance

The stele has been discussed in the context of the census in Judea mentioned in the Gospel of Luke, which was conducted under Quirinius's supervision.

The information that the population of the district around Apamea stood at 117,000 is of particular interest to historians, as data on the Syrian demographics of the period is otherwise very scanty. [7]

Related Research Articles

This article concerns the period 19 BC – 10 BC.

Sextus Varius Marcellus was a Roman aristocrat and politician from the province of Syria. He was father of the emperor Elagabalus.

The gens Sulpicia was one of the most ancient patrician families at ancient Rome, and produced a succession of distinguished men, from the foundation of the Republic to the imperial period. The first member of the gens who obtained the consulship was Servius Sulpicius Camerinus Cornutus, in 500 BC, only nine years after the expulsion of the Tarquins, and the last of the name who appears on the consular list was Sextus Sulpicius Tertullus in AD 158. Although originally patrician, the family also possessed plebeian members, some of whom may have been descended from freedmen of the gens.

Mamercus Aemilius Scaurus was a Roman rhetorician, poet and senator. Tacitus writes that Scaurus was "a man of distinguished rank and ability as an advocate, but of infamous life." He was suffect consul from July to the end of the year AD 21, with Gnaeus Tremellius as his colleague.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Judaea (Roman province)</span> Province of the Roman Empire (6–135 CE)

Judaea was a Roman province from 6 to 132 CE, which incorporated the Levantine regions of Judea, Samaria and Idumea, extending over parts of the former regions of the Hasmonean and Herodian kingdoms of Judea. The name Judaea was derived from the Iron Age Kingdom of Judah.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roman Syria</span> Roman province located in modern-day Turkey, Syria, and Lebanon

Roman Syria was an early Roman province annexed to the Roman Republic in 64 BC by Pompey in the Third Mithridatic War following the defeat of King of Armenia Tigranes the Great, who had become the protector of the Hellenistic kingdom of Syria.

Marcus Lollius was a Roman politician, military officer and supporter of the first Roman emperor Augustus. His granddaughter Lollia Paulina would marry the emperor's great-grandson Caligula and become empress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Apamea, Syria</span> Ancient city in Al-Suqaylabiyah, Syria

Apamea, on the right bank of the Orontes River, was an ancient Greek and Roman city. It was the capital of Apamene under the Macedonians, became the capital and Metropolitan Archbishopric of late Roman province Syria Secunda, again in the crusader period.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Census of Quirinius</span> Census of Judea taken by Publius Sulpicius Quirinius in 6

The Census of Quirinius was a census of the Roman province of Judaea taken in 6 CE, upon its formation, by the governor of Roman Syria, Publius Sulpicius Quirinius. The census triggered a revolt of Jewish extremists led by Judas of Galilee.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lucius Volusius Saturninus (consul 12 BC)</span> Roman senator, proconsular governor of Africa and governor of Syria

Lucius Volusius Saturninus, also known as Lucius Volusius was a Roman Senator from the powerful plebeian Volusia gens, or family. He was a cousin of emperor Tiberius.

The gens Aelia, occasionally written Ailia, was a plebeian family in Rome, which flourished from the fifth century BC until at least the third century AD, a period of nearly eight hundred years. The archaic spelling Ailia is found on coins, but must not be confused with Allia, which is a distinct gens. The first member of the family to obtain the consulship was Publius Aelius Paetus in 337 BC.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lycia et Pamphylia</span> Roman province located in modern-day Turkey

Lycia and Pamphylia was the name of a province of the Roman empire, located in southern Anatolia. It was created by the emperor Vespasian, who merged Lycia and Pamphylia into a single administrative unit. In 43 AD, the emperor Claudius had annexed Lycia. Pamphylia had been a part of the province of Galatia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gaius Caristanius Fronto</span> 1st century Roman soldier, senator and consul

Gaius Caristanius Fronto was a Roman soldier and equites whom Vespasian promoted to the Roman Senate for his loyalty to the latter in the Year of Four Emperors. He was appointed suffect consul in AD 90 as the colleague of Quintus Accaeus Rufus.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Quirinius</span> Roman legate, consul and governor of Syria (c. 51 BC-AD 21)

Publius Sulpicius Quirinius, also translated as Cyrenius, was a Roman aristocrat. After the banishment of the ethnarch Herod Archelaus from the tetrarchy of Judea in AD 6, Quirinius was appointed legate governor of Syria, to which the province of Judaea had been added for the purpose of a census.

The Cohors I Asturum et Callaecorum was a Roman auxiliary unit.

The gens Saturia was an obscure plebeian family of equestrian rank at ancient Rome. Members of this gens are first mentioned in the time of Cicero, and a number of them had distinguished military careers, but none of them attained any of the higher offices of the Roman State.

The gens Urseia or Ursia was an obscure plebeian family at ancient Rome. The only member of this gens known from Roman literature is the first-century jurist Urseius Ferox, but a few others are known from inscriptions.

References

  1. ↑ CIL III, 6687
  2. ↑ Schäfer 2000, p. 100-101.
  3. 1 2 Marucci 1996, p. 2197.
  4. ↑ Lendering 2019, p. 2197.
  5. ↑ Zeichmann 2018.
  6. ↑ Cumont 1934, p. 190.
  7. ↑ Cumont 1934, p. 187.

Bibliography

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.