Lucius Volusius Saturninus (Pontifex)

Inscription from the tomb of Volusii Saturnini with Pontifex Lucius Volusius Saturninus

Lucius Volusius Saturninus (before 25 AD - around 60 AD) was a senator and pontiff from the Roman Imperial Era of the 1st century AD.

His grandfather Lucius Volusius Saturninus (around 60 BC - 20 AD) was named Homo novus 12 BC. . AD under Emperor Augustus to Suffektkonsul ascended. His father Lucius Volusius Saturninus (38 BC - 56 AD) also became a consul consul in 3 AD. In his honor, several statues were erected in public places in Rome after his death. The country residence of the Volusii Saturnini family was the Villa dei Volusii near Lucus Feroniae .

An inscription on the altar from the tomb of Volusii Saturnini proves that Volusia Stratonice breastfed her own son L. Volusius Zosimus and, as a nurse ( Nutrix ), the pontiff L. Volusius Saturninus. In the inscription her son is referred to as the fatherly friend ( Patruus ) and milk brother ( Collactius ) of Lucius. Apparently, Volusia Stratonice is a former slave who, as a freedman , has now taken over the gentile name of her former masters, Volusia . Accordingly, her son bears the first and gentile names Lucius Volusius . The Cognomen Stratonice and Zosimus are likely to have been their earlier slave names.

Lucius Volusius Saturninus had a brother, Quintus Volusius Saturninus (around 25 AD - after 70 AD), who lived in 56 BC. Was appointed consul . Since Lucius had received the father's name, he was the older of the two brothers and was therefore born before AD 25. Since Lucius, unlike his younger brother, did not become consul, it can be assumed that Lucius died early. The earliest possible date to be appointed consul was between 32 and 35 years of age.

Quintus Volusius Saturninus, the brother of Lucius, did not call his son Quintus again, as would have been the custom in many Roman families, but Lucius . Presumably this is due to the fact that the pontiff was unmarried and without descendants and that the line of firstborns had been named Lucius for several generations.

family tree

Quintus Volusius Saturninus (Prefect)

Claudia

Lucius Volusius Saturninus (suffect consul 12 BC)

Nonia Polla

Lucius Volusius Saturninus (suffect consul 3 AD)

Cornelia

Volusia

Lucius Volusius Saturninus (Pontifex)

Quintus Volusius Saturninus (consul 56 AD)

Nonia Torquata

Lucius Volusius Saturninus (consul 87 AD)

Licinia Cornelia Volusia Torquata (?)

Quintus Volusius Saturninus (consul 92 AD)

Volusia Torquata (?)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum CIL 06, 07393
2. ↑ Christer Bruun, JC Edmondson (ed.): The Oxford Handbook of Roman Epigraphy. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2015, ISBN 9780195336467 , p. 576.
3. ↑ Stephen Wilson: The Means Of Naming: A Social History. UCL Press, London 1998, ISBN 1857282450 , p. 18.

literature

• Werner Eck : The family of the Volusii Saturnini in new inscriptions from Lucus Feroniae . In: Hermes . Vol. 100, No. 3 (1972), pp. 461-484.