Gaius Valerius Festus

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Gaius Calpetanus Rantius Quirinalis Valerius Festus († 85 or 86 AD) was a Roman politician and senator .

Valerius Festus was the adopted son of Gaius Calpetanus Rantius Sedatus , who had been a suffect consul in 47 . His original name was Publius Valerius Festus and he came from Italy, perhaps from Arretium , as a member of the tribus Pomptina . Whether his biological father already had senatorial rank is controversial, as the family is said to have been related to Vitellius through marriage . In any case, Valerius Festus stayed with Vitellius at the beginning of the civil war in AD 69, before secretly establishing contact with Vespasian .

After the Flavians had prevailed, Valerius Festus - he was at that time legate of the legio III Augusta and thus de facto governor of the province of Numidia - ensured that the proconsul Lucius Calpurnius Piso was killed. Tacitus reports on this in great detail, although the content of the negotiations was kept secret: the proconsul had opposed an uprising and resolutely refused to be proclaimed emperor. After the murder of Pisos, Valerius Festus began to "punish and reward", as Tacitus put it, and drove out the Garamanten who had been called to help by the numerically weaker Oeensians in the dispute between the inhabitants of Oea and Leptis Magna .

Valerius Festus was awarded the dona militaria by Vespasian for his deeds in Africa . Since he then held the suffect consulate with his son Domitian in 71 , it can be assumed that he was in closer contact with him. In 73 he was curator riparum et alvei Tiberis . Thereafter, Valerius Festus held the legacies in the provinces of Pannonia (73-78?) And Hispania Tarraconensis (79-81). In the year 85 or 86 he took his own life. Valerius Festus was sodalis Augustalis (imperial priest) and pontiff .

literature

  • Bengt E. Thomasson : Fasti Africani. Senatorial and knightly offices in the Roman provinces of North Africa from Augustus to Diocletian . Paul Aström Förlag, Stockholm 1996, ISBN 91-7042-153-6 , p. 134, L 3.

Remarks

  1. ↑ Tacitus , Historien 4,49,1.
  2. ↑ Tacitus, Historien 4,49f.
  3. ↑ CIL 6, 1238 .
  4. ↑ Numerous milestones mention Valerius Festus' full name as the legacy of the Tarraconensis, e.g. B. AE 1974, 400 .
personal data
SURNAME Valerius Festus, Gaius
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Festus, Gaius Valerius
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman suffect consul 71
DATE OF BIRTH 1st century
DATE OF DEATH 85 or 86