Marcia (wife of Catos)

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Marcia (* around 80 BC; † after 49 BC) was a member of the ancient Roman plebeian family of Marcier and the second wife of the late Republican Roman politician Marcus Porcius Cato Uticensis .

Marcia was the daughter of the consul from 56 BC. BC, Lucius Marcius Philippus , and his first wife. His brother Marcias, who was about the same age as his father, was called Lucius Marcius Philippus , dressed in 38 BC. The suffect consulate and was a stepbrother of Octavian (later Emperor Augustus ). No later than 61 BC Marcia got married to Cato, who was about 15 years her senior and who had previously divorced his first wife Atilia . The couple had a son, presumably given the prenomen Lucius, and two daughters named Porcia; the later fates of these children are not known. After Cato 56 BC After returning from Cyprus in the 3rd century BC , Marcia succeeded in clearing up a temporary annoyance between her husband and his good friend Munatius Rufus .

Between about 55 and 52 BC The 60-year-old speaker Quintus Hortensius Hortalus asked his friend Cato to relinquish his young wife to him, because Hortensius was hoping for offspring from such a relationship. Cato had no objection, but made the condition that Marcia's father must also approve the marriage project. After Philip gave his consent, Cato divorced Marcia. Then the young woman married Hortensius and lived with him until he was 50 BC. Chr. Passed. She inherited the great fortune of the deceased and returned to her first husband, Cato. As early as 49 BC When the Roman civil war broke out between Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus and Gaius Iulius Caesar and the latter advanced against Italy, Cato left Rome, leaving Marcia and giving her the supervision of his house and his underage daughters.

This case received a lot of attention from the beginning and made it into the pamphlet literature early on. Caesar attacked his political opponent Cato in the lost Anticato and insinuated that he had only left Marcia to Hortensius so that he could take her back as a rich widow after his death. His stoic sympathizers, such as Seneca , tried to justify Cato's behavior . The case was later made the subject of practice speeches in public speaking schools. Christian authors branded Cato's approach as an example of pagan viciousness.

literature

Overview representations

Investigations

  • Henriette Harich: Catonis Marcia. Stoic coloring of a woman's portrait in Lucan (II 326–350). In: Gymnasium 97, 1990, pp. 212-223

Remarks

  1. ↑ Lucan , Pharsalia 2, 327ff. with Scholien Bern., p. 70f. ed. Usener, Plutarch , Cato Minor 25, 1ff. and 39, 4; Appian , Civil Wars 2, 99; among others
  2. ↑ Plutarch, Cato Minor 37, 1-5.
  3. ↑ Lucan, Pharsalia 2, 327-330 with Scholien Bern., P. 70f. ed. Usener; Plutarch, Cato Minor 25, 1ff. and 52, 3ff .; Appian, Civil Wars 2, 99; Strabon 11, 9, 1, among others
  4. ↑ Plutarch, Cato Minor 52, 4f.
  5. ↑ Seneca, De matrimonio in Hieronymus , Adversus Iovinianum 1, 76.
  6. ↑ Quintilian , Institutio oratoria 3, 5, 11; u. ö.
  7. ^ For example, Tertullian , Apologeticum 39.
personal data
SURNAME Marcia
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Wife of Marcus Porcius Cato Uticensis
DATE OF BIRTH around 80 BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH after 49 BC Chr.