Titus Junius Montanus

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Titus Junius Montanus was a Roman of the first century and suffect consul in AD 81 with Lucius Julius Vettius Paullus as his colleague. An inscription found in Alexandria Troas indicates that was his hometown, making Montanus the first person from the Greek portion of the Roman Empire admitted to the Roman senate. [1] [2]

Roman Empire period of Imperial Rome following the Roman Republic (27 BC–395 AD)

The Roman Empire was the post-Roman Republic period of the ancient Roman civilization. It had a government headed by emperors and large territorial holdings around the Mediterranean Sea in Europe, North Africa, and West Asia. 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 divided between a Western Roman Empire, based in Milan and later Ravenna, and an Eastern Roman Empire, based in Nicomedia and later Constantinople, and it was ruled by multiple emperors.

Roman consul High political office in ancient Rome

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.

Alexandria Troas human settlement in Turkey

Alexandria Troas is the site of an ancient Greek city situated on the Aegean Sea near the northern tip of Turkey's western coast, a little south of Tenedos. It is located southeast of modern Dalyan, a village in the Ezine district of Çanakkale Province. The site sprawls over an estimated 400 hectares ; among the few structures remaining today are a ruined bath, an odeon, a theatre, gymnasium complex and a recently uncovered stadion. The circuit of the old walls can still be traced.

Syme further identifies Montanus with "the slow fat senator of Juvenal 4.107", [3] and suggests that he may be the Montanus mentioned in another passage (4.137). [4]

Juvenal ancient roman poet

Decimus Iunius Iuvenalis, known in English as Juvenal, was a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century AD. He is the author of the collection of satirical poems known as the Satires. The details of the author's life are unclear, although references within his text to known persons of the late first and early second centuries AD fix his earliest date of composition. One recent scholar argues that his first book was published in 100 or 101. Because of a reference to a recent political figure, his fifth and final surviving book must date from after 127.

Life

The inscription from Alexandria indicates his father's name was Gaius, and he was a member of the Roman tribe Aniesus. [1] According to Ronald Syme, his ancestor is "patently" the homonymous Titus Junius Montanus, an equestrian officer of the same tribe as he, who served in the late Augustan period. [5] [2]

Ronald Syme New Zealand-born historian and classicist

Sir Ronald Syme, was a New Zealand-born historian and classicist. Long associated with Oxford University, he is widely regarded as the 20th century's greatest historian of ancient Rome. His great work was The Roman Revolution (1939), a masterly and controversial analysis of Roman political life in the period following the assassination of Julius Caesar.

The equites constituted the second of the property-based classes of ancient Rome, ranking below the senatorial class. A member of the equestrian order was known as an eques.

Montanus began his career in the Imperial service likely in his teens as a tresviri aere argento auro flando feriundo , a prestigious position usually allocated to patricians. [6] His next office was as a military tribune in Legio V Macedonica. As quaestor, Montanus was assigned his home province of Bithynia et Pontus. [1] Montanus held these posts, as well as the subsequent offices of plebeian tribune and praetor, under Nero, who apparently favored the young senator. [7]

A military tribune was an officer of the Roman army who ranked below the legate and above the centurion. Young men of Equestrian rank often served as military tribune as a stepping stone to the Senate. The tribunus militum should not be confused with the elected political office of tribune of the people (tribunus plebis) nor with that of tribunus militum consulari potestate.

Legio V Macedonica Roman legion

Legio quinta Macedonica was a Roman legion. It was probably originally levied in 43 BC by consul Gaius Vibius Pansa Caetronianus and Octavian. It was based in the Balkan provinces of Macedonia, Moesia and Dacia. In the Notitia Dignitatum records from beginning of the fifth century, the legion was still stationed in Dacia, with detachments stationed in the east and Egypt.

Quaestor type of public official in Ancient Rome

A quaestor was a public official in Ancient Rome. The position served different functions depending on the period. In the Roman Kingdom, quaestores parricidii were appointed by the king to investigate and handle murders. In the Roman Republic, quaestors were elected officials who supervised the state treasury and conducted audits. It was the lowest ranking position in the cursus honorum. However, this means that in the political environment of Rome, it was quite common for many aspiring politicians to take the position of quaestor as an early rung on the political ladder. In the Roman Empire, the position, which was initially replaced by the praefectus (prefect), reemerged during the late empire as quaestor intra Palatium, a position appointed by the emperor to lead the imperial council and respond to petitioners.

Vespasian had a different opinion of Montanus, for the only office he held under that emperor was praetorian proconsul of Sicily at an undetermined date. [8] Syme also speculates that Montanus was obtained the suffect consulate due to "special favour from Titus". [9] Jones agrees that Titus' "assessment, it is clear, differed substantially" about Montanus, speculating that "perhaps Montanus and Titus had known each other from Nero's court, for they were about the same age." [7] Jones notes he retained imperial favor after Titus' death "for his conviviality rather than for any other discernible quality." [7]

Vespasian Emperor of Ancient Rome, founder of the Flavian dynasty

Vespasian was Roman emperor from 69–79, the fourth, and last, in the Year of the Four Emperors. He founded the Flavian dynasty that ruled the Empire for 27 years.

His inscription also attests that Montanus was a member of the Titii sodales, and was appointed patron of an unnamed city. [1]

Titii

The Titii was a college (sodalitas) of Roman priests.

Patronage (clientela) was the distinctive relationship in ancient Roman society between the patronus and their cliens. The relationship was hierarchical, but obligations were mutual. The patronus was the protector, sponsor, and benefactor of the client; the technical term for this protection was patrocinium. Although typically the client was of inferior social class, a patron and client might even hold the same social rank, but the former would possess greater wealth, power, or prestige that enabled them to help or do favors for the client. From the emperor at the top to the local municipal person at the bottom, the bonds between these groups found formal expression in legal definition of patrons' responsibilities to clients.

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References

  1. 1 2 3 4 AE 1973, 500
  2. 1 2 Syme, Some Arval Brethren (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1980), p. 90
  3. ↑ Syme, Arval Brethren, p. 57 n. 14
  4. ↑ Syme, Arval Brethren, p. 35 n. 1
  5. ↑ AE 1938, 173
  6. ↑ The role of the office itself is discussed by J. R. Jones, "Mint Magistrates in the Early Roman Empire", Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, No. 17 (1970), pp. 70-78. The role of the vigintivirate in a senatorial career is discussed by A.R. Birley, The Fasti of Roman Britain (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981), pp. 4-8
  7. 1 2 3 Brian W. Jones, The Emperor Domitian (London: Routlege, 1993), p. 54
  8. ↑ Werner Eck, "Jahres- und Provinzialfasten der senatorischen Statthalter von 69/70 bis 138/139", Chiron, 13 (1983), p. 203
  9. ↑ Syme, Arval Brethren, p. 90 n. 12
Political offices
Preceded by
Marcus Roscius Coelius, and
Gaius Julius Juvenalis
as suffect consuls		 Suffect consul of the Roman Empire
81
with Lucius Julius Vettius Paullus 		Succeeded by
Gaius Scoedius Natta Pinarius,
and Titus Tettienus Serenus
as suffect consuls
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