Gaius Cassius Parmensis

Gaius Cassius Parmensis (* around 74 BC; † 31 or 30 BC in Athens ) was a Roman politician and Latin writer of the outgoing Roman Republic , who belonged to the circle of conspirators against Gaius Iulius Caesar .

Life

Cassius Parmensis came from the branch of the Roman Gens Cassia , who founded the city of Parma on the Via Aemilia in the 2nd century BC. Played an important role. The ancient commentators of Horace noted that he was a follower of the teachings of Epicurus .

In the spring of 44 BC Cassius Parmensis participated in the assassination attempt by Roman senators against Caesar. After the murder he was 43 BC. BC Quaestor and set up a fleet that supported Gaius Cassius Longinus against Publius Cornelius Dolabella off the coast of the province of Asia . He wrote a situation report from Cyprus to Cicero , which has been passed down in his correspondence.

In November 43 Cassius Parmensis was the triumvirs Mark Antony , Octavian and Lepidus like many other opponents Caesars proscribed . After the defeat of the party of the Caesar murderers in the Battle of Philippi (autumn 42 BC) he gathered the remaining troops and was able to get to safety with Sextus Pompey in Sicily with the intact fleet . After his defeat in 36 BC He accompanied the fallen "Sea King" as far as Asia Minor, and then joined Antonius during the last battles in Bithynia .

Cassius Parmensis also took part with violent verbal attacks against the heirs of Caesar in the propaganda battle led by Antonius and Octavian, sometimes with savage attacks and slander, which preceded their decisive armed conflict for sole rule in the Roman Empire. He claimed that Octavian was of low descent and only because of a homosexual relationship with Caesar had managed to be determined by him as his heir. Furthermore, Octavian wanted to make his only daughter Julia the wife of the rich but “barbaric” nobleman Koson of Dacia .

On September 2, 31 BC Cassius Parmensis fought under Antony's command in the Battle of Actium . His flight from Octavian's vengeance lasted a total of twelve years, longer than that of all the other conspirators, but after the fall of Antony he finally lost any possibility of escape, since Caesar's adopted son now ruled the entire Roman Empire. After the defeat of Actium, Cassius fled to Athens , where he was no later than 30 BC. BC as allegedly the last living Caesar murderer and was killed by Lucius Varus on behalf of Octavian. This was foretold by a terrible dream.

As a poet, Cassius Parmensis wrote tragedies, satires, elegies and epigrams, which, in Horace's judgment, were not insignificant. Nothing from his work has been preserved. Only the titles of two tragedies, Thyestes and Brutus , are known, the first of which was allegedly stolen by his murderer Varus and then issued as a separate work. The style of his letter to Cicero appears rather complicated and pedantic, especially in its flattery, but it also shows a good military observation. The assertion, often heard with reference to another passage in Horace, that Cassius was burned together with his works, is probably a mix-up.

Marcus Terentius Varro quotes a verse by Cassius:

“Nocte intempesta nostram devenit domum”

"In the dead of night he came to our home"

literature

• William Ramsay: Cassius Parmensis . In: William Smith (Ed.): Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology . tape 1 : Abaeus – Dysponteus . Little, Brown and Company, Boston 1870, p. 626–627 (English, Textarchiv - Internet Archive ).
• Franz Skutsch : C. Cassius 80) Parmensis. In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume III, 2, Stuttgart 1899, Sp. 1743 f.
• Michèle Ducos: Cassius Parmensis (C.). In: Richard Goulet (ed.): Dictionnaire des philosophes antiques. Volume 2, CNRS Éditions, Paris 1994, ISBN 2-271-05195-9 , p. 235.

Web links

• Enyclopaedia Britannica

Remarks

1. ↑ Cicero , ad familiares 12, 13 Archive link ( Memento of the original from October 2, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . 
2. ^ Appian , Civil Wars 5, 139.
3. ^ Suetonius , Augustus 4 .
4. ↑ Michael Grant , Kleopatra , German 1998, ISBN 3-404-61416-X , p. 261.
5. ^ So Velleius Paterculus , Historia Romana 2, 87, 3.
6. ↑ Valerius Maximus , Facta et dicta memorabilia 1, 7, 7.
7. ^ Marcus Terentius Varro, The Latin Language 7, 72 . The same verse is attributed to the poet Lucius Accius by Varro elsewhere , ibid, 6, 7 .