Quintus Dellius

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Quintus Dellius was an important Roman politician in the second half of the 1st century BC. Chr.

Life

Dellius was called by Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus a "change rider of civil wars" ( desultor bellorum civilium ) because he was 43 BC. From Publius Cornelius Dolabella to Gaius Cassius Longinus , from this 42 BC. To Mark Antony and from him in time (31 BC) to Octavian .

For more than ten years, Dellius was a confidante of Antonius, who used him primarily for diplomatic services. So he traveled on behalf of the Triumvir 41 BC. BC to Alexandria to summon Cleopatra VII. Because of the money she allegedly had given Cassius in the Roman civil war (between the Caesar killers and Caesarians) to Tarsus in Cilicia to answer her questions. 40 (or 39) BC AD Antony sent him to Judea to help Herod the Great in driving out the usurper Antigonus . 36 (or 35) BC He negotiated that Herod should give the young Aristobulus , brother of Herod's wife Mariamne , the high priesthood. In the same year he took part in the Parthian campaign of Antonius, after which he failed in 34 BC. He was supposed to persuade King Artavasdes II of Armenia to marry his four year old daughter to the son of Antonius, the six year old Alexander Helios . How seriously this diplomatic mission was meant is questionable, as the triumvir soon cunningly seized the Armenian king and his family.

Dellius liked to make mocking remarks and allegedly often played the middleman for Antonius in order to satisfy his erotic passions. Allegedly Cleopatra couldn't stand him.

Dellius also took part in Antony's last campaign against Octavian. When the situation became more and more unfavorable for Antonius, he recruited 31 BC. Chr. Still reinforcement troops in Macedonia and Thrace , but ran over to Octavian shortly before the battle of Actium, to whom he revealed important information about the opposing war plans. As a reason for his last change of sides, he stated that he had learned from a doctor that Cleopatra wanted to have him murdered because he had ironically expressed during the worsening siege conditions in front of Actium that he now had to drink sour wine while Octavian's page was in Sarmentus Italy could feast on the best wines. He enjoyed a lot of respect with the new sole ruler of the Roman Empire. Horace addressed him an ode (2, 3), as his commentator Porphyrio emphasizes.

Dellius also worked as a historian. In his work he described Antony's Parthian War, whose eyewitness he was; therefore it was often assumed that he was the source of Plutarch and Strabons for their depictions of this campaign.

literature

Remarks

  1. ↑ Seneca the Elder , suasoriae 1, 7.
  2. ↑ Plutarch , Antonius 25, 2f.
  3. ↑ Flavius ​​Josephus , Jüdische Altertümer 14, 394; Jewish War 1, 290.
  4. ↑ Josephus, Jewish Antiquities 15:25 .
  5. ^ Cassius Dio 49, 39, 2f.
  6. ^ So W. Huss (see Lit.), pp. 738f .; different Christoph Schäfer , Cleopatra , 2006, p. 175f.
  7. ↑ Bonmots from him in Seneca, suasoriae 1, 7; Plutarch, Antonius 59.
  8. ↑ Plutarch, Antonius 25; Josephus, Jewish Antiquities 15, 25.
  9. ^ Plutarch, Antonius 59.
  10. ^ Cassius Dio 50, 13, 8.
  11. ↑ Cassius Dio 50, 23, 1.3; Velleius Paterculus 2, 84, 2.
  12. ^ Plutarch, Antonius 59.
  13. ↑ Seneca , de clementia 1, 10, 1.
  14. ↑ Strabo 11, 523; Plutarch, Antonius 59.
personal data
SURNAME Dellius, Quintus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman politician and confidante of Mark Antony for a long time
DATE OF BIRTH 1st century BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 1st century BC Chr.