Titus is one of the Thirty Tyrants, a list of Roman usurpers compiled by the author(s) of the often unreliable Historia Augusta . Titus was said to have revolted against Maximinus Thrax, a Roman Emperor who ruled 235–238, after the revolt of Magnus. It is now believed that his biography is fictitious, [1] and that he may be based on person named Quartinus mentioned by the historian Herodian. [2]
According to the Historia Augusta, Titus was a tribune of the Moors, who had been deposed by Maximinus and transferred to a civilian position. After the revolt of Magnus had been crushed, Titus, fearing for his life, reluctantly seized the power, having the purple compelled on him by his soldiers. [3] He ruled for six months, and the Historia stated he deserved praises both home and abroad, but in the end Maximinus suppressed the revolt and killed Titus.
Also noteworthy is Titus's equally fictitious wife, Calpurnia of the gens Caesonia , and who it was claimed had been a priestess, whose statue, in marble and golden bronze, was located in the Temple of Venus. She reportedly owned the pearls that had belonged to Cleopatra VII of Egypt, and a famous one hundred-pound silver platter, with the histories of her noteworthy family - the implication being that she was a descendant of Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, the Roman consul of 148 BC, and a distant relation of Calpurnia, the wife of Julius Caesar. [4] This link is further developed in two ways; firstly, her statue is described as being placed in the Temple of Venus Genetrix, where Caesar had once placed a statue of Cleopatra. [5] Secondly, her possession of Cleopatra's pearls also reinforces her role as a female figure representing traditional Romanitas, compared against the previous owner who was traditionally represented as everything that was contrary to Roman values. Her possession of Cleopatra's pearls is also fictitious, as Pliny the Elder recounts that one of Cleopatra's pearls was dissolved in vinegar and drunk by Cleopatra in front of Marc Antony, while the other was made into earrings for the statue of Venus that stood in the Temple of Venus Genetrix. [6]
There is no evidence that the family of the Pisones still existed in the third century, and this Calpurnia is most likely an invention of the author's, due to his desire to pepper his work with great names. [7]
Venus is a Roman goddess, whose functions encompassed love, beauty, desire, sex, fertility, prosperity, and victory. In Roman mythology, she was the ancestor of the Roman people through her son, Aeneas, who survived the fall of Troy and fled to Italy. Julius Caesar claimed her as his ancestor. Venus was central to many religious festivals, and was revered in Roman religion under numerous cult titles.
Year 46 BC was the last year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Caesar and Lepidus. The denomination 46 BC for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.
Cleopatra VII Philopator was queen of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt from 51 to 30 BC, and its last active ruler. A member of the Ptolemaic dynasty, she was a descendant of its founder Ptolemy I Soter, a Macedonian Greek general and companion of Alexander the Great. After the death of Cleopatra, Egypt became a province of the Roman Empire, marking the end of the second to last Hellenistic state and the age that had lasted since the reign of Alexander. Her native language was Koine Greek, and she was the only Ptolemaic ruler to learn the Egyptian language.
Ptolemy of Mauretania was the last Roman client king and ruler of Mauretania for Rome. He was a member of the Berber Massyles tribe of Numidia; via his mother Cleopatra Selene II, he was also a member of Egypt's Ptolemaic dynasty.
Ptolemy XV Caesar, nicknamed Caesarion, was the last pharaoh of ancient Egypt, reigning with his mother Cleopatra from 2 September 44 BC until her death by 12 August 30 BC, then as sole ruler until his death was ordered by Octavian.
Gordian I was Roman emperor for 22 days with his son Gordian II in 238, the Year of the Six Emperors. Caught up in a rebellion against the Emperor Maximinus Thrax, he was defeated by forces loyal to Maximinus, and he committed suicide after the death of his son.
The Historia Augusta is a late Roman collection of biographies, written in Latin, of the Roman emperors, their junior colleagues, designated heirs and usurpers from 117 to 284. Supposedly modeled on the similar work of Suetonius, The Twelve Caesars, it presents itself as a compilation of works by six different authors, written during the reigns of Diocletian and Constantine I and addressed to those emperors or other important personages in Ancient Rome. The collection, as extant, comprises thirty biographies, most of which contain the life of a single emperor, but some include a group of two or more, grouped together merely because these emperors were either similar or contemporaneous.
Annia Galeria Faustina the Younger was a daughter of Roman Emperor Antoninus Pius and Roman Empress Faustina the Elder. She was a Roman Empress and wife to her maternal cousin Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius. She was held in high esteem by soldiers and her husband as Augusta and Mater Castrorum and was given divine honours after her death.
The Temple of Caesar or Temple of Divus Iulius, also known as Temple of the Deified Julius Caesar, delubrum, heroon or Temple of the Comet Star, is an ancient structure in the Roman Forum of Rome, Italy, located near the Regia and the Temple of Vesta.
Calpurnia was either the third or fourth wife of Julius Caesar, and the one to whom he was married at the time of his assassination. According to contemporary sources, she was a good and faithful wife, in spite of her husband's infidelity; and, forewarned of the attempt on his life, she endeavored in vain to prevent his murder.
The Temple of Venus Genetrix is a ruined temple in the Forum of Caesar, Rome, dedicated to the Roman goddess Venus Genetrix, the founding goddess of the Julian gens. It was dedicated to the goddess on September 26, 46 BCE by Julius Caesar.
The Forum of Caesar, also known by the Latin Forum Iulium or Forum Julium, Forum Caesaris, was a forum built by Julius Caesar near the Forum Romanum in Rome in 46 BC.
Appius Claudius Censorinus was a fictional usurper against Roman Emperor Claudius II, according to the unreliable Historia Augusta. He is included in the list of the Thirty Tyrants.
The Esquiline Venus, depicting the goddess Venus, is a smaller-than-life-size Roman nude marble sculpture of a female in sandals and a diadem headdress. It is widely viewed as a 1st-century AD Roman copy of a Greek original from the 1st century BC. It is also a possible depiction of the Ptolemaic ruler Cleopatra VII.
The Venus Genetrix is a sculptural type which shows the Roman goddess Venus in her aspect of Genetrix, as she was honoured by the Julio-Claudian dynasty of Rome, which claimed her as their ancestor. Contemporary references identify the sculptor as a Greek named Arcesilaus. The statue was set up in Julius Caesar's new forum, probably as the cult statue in the cella of his temple of Venus Genetrix. Through this historical chance, a Roman designation is applied to an iconological type of Aphrodite that originated among the Greeks.
Julius Caesar, the Roman dictator, was assassinated by a group of senators on the Ides of March of 44 BC during a meeting of the Senate at the Curia of Pompey of the Theatre of Pompey in Rome. The senators stabbed Caesar 23 times. They claimed to be acting over fears that Caesar's unprecedented concentration of power during his dictatorship was undermining the Roman Republic, and presented the deed as an act of tyrannicide. At least 60 senators were party to the conspiracy, led by Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus. Despite the death of Caesar, the conspirators were unable to restore the institutions of the Republic. The ramifications of the assassination led to the Liberators' civil war and ultimately to the Principate period of the Roman Empire.
Gaius Julius Verus Maximinus "Thrax" was Roman emperor from 235 to 238.
Roman Republican art is the artistic production that took place in Roman territory during the period of the Republic, conventionally from 509 BC to 27 BC.