Publius Licinius Crassus (Consul 171 BC)

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Publius Licinius Crassus came from the Roman plebeian family of the Licinier and was 171 BC. Chr. Consul . He fought unsuccessfully against the Macedonian king Perseus .

Life

According to the testimony of the Fasti Capitolini , the father of Publius Licinius Crassus carried the prenomen Gaius and his grandfather the prenomen Publius . The first known station of his cursus honorum is the praetur , which he wrote in 176 BC. Clad. He was given the task of going to the Iberian Peninsula and administering the Roman province of Hispania citerior there. Like his colleague Marcus Cornelius Scipio Maluginensis , who was supposed to be the governor of the other province in Spain ( Hispania ulterior ), he swore an oath before the popular assembly that he was obliged to make solemn sacrifices in Rome and therefore not go to his province could. Both praetors were then allowed to stay in the capital, but it later emerged that Scipio Maluginensis had only been an excuse.

Five years after the praetur, 171 BC BC, Crassus reached the consulate, where he received Gaius Cassius Longinus as a colleague. Both consuls thus came from the class of the plebeians, a constellation that had already existed the previous year (172 BC) - for the first time in the history of the Roman Republic - when Gaius Popillius Laenas and Publius Aelius Ligus held the highest office of the state . Cassius Longinus wished to be entrusted with the war against the Macedonian king Perseus and pointed out that his co-consul could now just as little leave Rome as praetor because of religious obligations; otherwise he would violate his oath at the time. Despite these objections, Crassus was given supreme command to combat Perseus, while Cassius Longinus was given Italy as the area of ​​authority.

Now Crassus carried out extensive recruiting for the impending war, for which he also had his allies mobilized. During the preparations for war, a Macedonian delegation came to Italy with proposals for a peaceful settlement, but the consul, after a brief hearing, ordered them to leave the country immediately. After completing the armor, he went to his troops in Brundisium (now Brindisi ) and sailed with them to Apollonia . Then he advanced through Epirus and Athamania to Gomphoi , until he set up camp near Larissa in Thessaly . Military contingents from the Greek states allied with the Romans came there as well as the Pergamene King Eumenes II , who sent further auxiliary troops to the consul.

In the first military confrontation, which developed as a cavalry battle on Peneios near the hill Kallinikos , Perseus clearly defeated the consul and his allies. The course of this battle is presented in great detail by the Roman historian Titus Livius, based on the lost report of the Greek historian Polybius . Perseus continued to be willing to bring peace, but Crassus appeared extremely self-confident in spite of the great losses he had to take due to his defeat and demanded that the Macedonian king must surrender unconditionally. He was still in Thessaly and was able to save a detachment of troops that was attacked while foraging with his main force. Some sources available to Livy exaggerated this small success of the consul very much in the pro-Roman sense.

Crassus had his soldiers wintered scattered across Thessaly and Boeotia and took up quarters in the latter region himself. In a large, lost section of the 43rd book of his history, Livy stated that Crassus would do so in the next year, 170 BC. In the position of proconsul, he initially stayed at the battlefield and plundered various Greek cities and had their populations enslaved. The Senate disagreed with this practice and imposed a fine on Crassus.

For the last time Crassus is 167 BC. Mentioned when he traveled to Asia Minor on a diplomatic mission in order to mediate there, together with Attalus II , the brother of Eumenes II, in a military conflict between Pergamon and the Galatians . His further living conditions and the year of his death are unknown.

literature

Remarks

  1. ↑ Titus Livius 41:14, 5; 41, 15, 9f .; 41, 27, 2; 42, 32, 1ff.
  2. ↑ Fasti Capitolini ad annum 171 BC. Chr .; Livy 42:28, 5; 42, 29, 1; among others
  3. ^ Livy 42, 32, 1-5.
  4. ↑ Livy 42, 32, 6-35, 6.
  5. ↑ Livy 42, 36, 1-8; Appian , Macedonica 11.9 .
  6. ↑ Livy 42, 49, 10.
  7. ^ Livy 42, 55, 1-10.
  8. ↑ Livy 42, 57, 1-62, 2; Much shorter mentions are given by Iustinus (33, 1, 4), Plutarch ( Aemilius Paullus 9, 2) and others.
  9. ↑ Polybios 27, 8, 1-15; Livy 42, 62, 3-15; Justin 33, 1, 5; Appian, Macedonica 12; among others
  10. ↑ Livy 42, 64, 1-66, 10.
  11. ↑ Livy 42, 67, 6-12.
  12. ↑ Cf. Livius, periochae 43.
  13. ↑ Zonaras 9:22 .
  14. ↑ Polybios 30, 3, 7f .; Livy 45, 34, 10-14.
personal data
SURNAME Licinius Crassus, Publius
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Crassus, Publius Licinius
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman consul 171 BC Chr.
DATE OF BIRTH 3rd century BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH after 167 BC Chr.