Publius Quinctilius Varus

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Coin of the city of Achulla in the province of Africa with a portrait of Varus

Publius Quinctilius Varus (* 47/46 BC in Cremona ; † 9 AD in Germania) was a senator and general of the Augustan period. His name is primarily associated with the Roman defeat in the Varus Battle named after him , during which three Roman legions under his leadership found their downfall when they were attacked by Teutons under the Cheruscan prince Arminius . Varus took his own life on the battlefield.

Life

Early years

Varus was born the son of the quaestor Sextus Quinctilius Varus († 42 BC) and came from one of the most distinguished and oldest families of the Roman nobility , who traced their ancestry back to the kings of Alba Longa . His father was a staunch Republican, was on the side of Gaius Julius Caesar's opponents during the civil war and was pardoned by him. After his murder he fled to Greece with the Caesar killers and committed suicide after the defeat of Philippi . However, this parentage did not harm his son. He seems to have enjoyed a good upbringing and has been part of Augustus' inner circle since the beginning of his political career .

Already at 21/20 BC BC Varus was publicly honored as one of his personally chosen quaestor Augusti on Tenos . He received another honor in Pergamon .

Together with Tiberius , who was about five years his junior and who was also quaestor at the time, Varus accompanied Augustus on his trip to the Orient (22-19 BC). A few years later he will have held the praetur . Presumably it was during the conquest of the Alpine region in 15 BC. BC praetorical legacy of the Legio XIX , which later perished with him in Germania , as a new reading of the inscription on a lead disk found in the Dangstetten legionary camp shows . Here, too, he would have worked in the environment of Tiberius. Contrary to what was assumed for a long time, he was therefore familiar with the conditions in the Celtic-Germanic area even before he became governor. Hans Ulrich Nuber also suspects that Varus died in the following year 14 BC. BC was praetorical governor of a province before taking over the consulate, possibly of the newly conquered Raetia .

Consulate and governorship in Africa and Syria

Varus' important position and his affiliation to the circle of patricians promoted by Augustus illustrates the presumably age-appropriate ( in suum annum ) takeover of the consulate in 13 BC. He also exercised this office together with the later Princeps ("Emperor") Tiberius, which was an additional distinction. Possibly he is depicted next to Tiberius on the Ara Pacis frieze . Varus was (probably in his second marriage) with Vipsania, the daughter of Agrippa and Claudia Marcella the elder , and after their death in third marriage with Claudia Pulchra , the daughter of Marcus Valerius Messalla Appianus and Claudia Marcella the younger , both married Were great nieces of Augustus. One of Varus' sisters married Lucius Nonius Asprenas, who was a close friend of the emperor. Another sister was probably the wife of Sextus Appuleius (consul 29 BC) , a nephew of Augustus, and a third sister was married to a Cornelius Dolabella.

In one of the following years (between 13 and 2 BC) Varus was senatorial governor ( proconsul ) of the province of Africa , probably in the year of office 8/7 BC. Little is known about his time in office there, but Africa was the most important senatorial province after Asia and of great importance for the grain supply of Rome. Varus' position as governor is evidenced by undated coins on which he was depicted together with Augustus and his grandchildren and designated successors Gaius and Lucius Caesar . This address of loyalty to Augustus could be seen as an indication of a possible estrangement from Tiberius before or during the seven-year exile from 6 BC. Read BC, into which he withdrew from disappointment at the resetting by his stepfather Augustus.

  • Roman province of Africa

  • Roman province of Asia

  • Roman province of Syria

Probably from 7/6 BC Until 5/4 BC Varus was the imperial governor of Syria (legatus Augusti pro praetore provinciae Syriae) , where he commanded one of the strongest army units in the empire with three legions . He replaced Gaius Sentius Saturninus . In Syria, Varus was confronted with the special challenges of the Near Eastern world. As governor of Syria, Varus also exercised a control function over the neighboring kingdom of Judea, where Herod the Great ruled. When the Jewish king in 4 BC Died, there was serious unrest because of his succession. The situation became even more explosive due to the growing Roman influence in Judea. The polytheistic cult of gods contradicted the Jewish ban on images and the strict, monotheistic beliefs. Varus was judge when Herod accused his son Antipater of attempted parricide. After Herod's death, Varus settled the inheritance dispute between his three sons by sending all three to Rome so that Augustus could personally make the decision. Meanwhile, he forbade the procurator Syriae Sabinus to confiscate Herod's treasury until the legal situation was clarified. The accusation later made by Velleius Paterculus that Varus had unlawfully enriched himself in Syria (as a poor man he entered rich Syria, as a rich man he left poor Syria) , is therefore assessed by Ralf-Peter Märtin and other researchers as implausible. But it escalated when the Roman tax officer Sabinius traveled to Jerusalem despite orders to the contrary from Varus. There Sabinius confiscated Herod's property, looted the temple treasures and set fire to the halls on the holy Temple Mount. When Sabinius and his troops were besieged by angry Jews, Varus had to rush to help him militarily. With two legions he went to Jerusalem and took many of the besiegers prisoner, so he was able to put down the general uprising through energetic military action within six months. At the ringleaders statuierte Varus an example: In Varus' command 2,000 Jews were to the Kreuz struck a penalty with which Rome serious crimes such as rebellion or treason in peregrines punished.

Governor in Germania

From 7 to 9 AD Varus was then legatus Augusti pro praetore in Germania , although it is disputed whether the area up to the Elbe at that time, as Werner Eck assumes, already had provincial status. In this role, Varus was also in command of the five legions stationed on the Rhine. Obviously, as an administrative specialist, he was supposed to organize the territory that was apparently subject to military action. He continued the process of provincialization, for example, by building forts, pacifying the country, administering justice and collecting taxes. It can be assumed that in particular the Roman jurisprudence as well as the tax collection in the form of natural products caused increasing displeasure among the Teutons. It is possible that Varus behaved particularly undiplomatically.

In the early summer of 9 AD, Varus moved with the three legions XVII , XVIII , XIX - a total of around 15,000 to 20,000 legionaries and auxiliary troops - from Vetera (Xanten) along the Lippe to the Weser in the summer camp in order to establish a Roman presence further east demonstrate. The other two legions stayed in Mogontiacum (Mainz). For the way back, Varus chose a different route in autumn at the instigation of Arminius and Segimer , after Arminius had reported to him about an alleged uprising and asked to put it down on the way. Segestes and a few others are said to have warned Varus of a betrayal by Arminius, but Varus decided to follow Arminius' suggestion. Varus probably hoped to easily achieve military fame in this way and thus crown his career.

On the way to the southwest, the three legions, who believed they were in a pacified area, were attacked in an ambush with their entourage by Germanic fighters under the leadership of Arminius. The battle ended after four days of fighting with the extensive annihilation of all three legions and is referred to in modern history as the Varus Battle . Varus himself - according to Velleius Paterculus following the example of his father and grandfather - ultimately committed suicide on the battlefield along with his highest officers. When Augustus learned of the defeat of Varus in Germania on October 6th, according to the biographer Suetonius , he is said to have exclaimed: Quintili Vare, legiones redde! ("Quintilius Varus, give the legions back!").

Arminius supposedly sent the head of Varus to Marbod , the king of the Marcomanni , for the purpose of an alliance offer against the Romans , who however refused such an alliance. Rather, Marbod sent the head of Varus on to Augustus. The head was buried with honor in a family mausoleum, whether it was that of the Quinctilians or that of Augustus is disputed.

Judgment of the science of history

The failed Varus . Sculpture by Wilfried Koch in Haltern am See .

Modern history primarily discusses the way in which the Roman leadership portrayed Varus as the sole culprit. The majority of researchers take the position that Varus only served as a scapegoat for defeat in later historiographical tradition. The honorable burial of Varus' head and the fact that his family suffered no disadvantages shows that Augustus did not consider Varus to be responsible; rather, the treacherous behavior of the Teutons was cited as the reason for the defeat. By Suetonius cited exclamation of Augustus were regarding the legions of Varus probably only part of a staged act to the public.

It was only as a result of the high treason trials under Tiberius, of which Varus' widow Claudia Pulchra was one of the victims, that Varus was portrayed negatively in Roman journalism and historiography. The devastating criticism of Velleius Paterculus , which damaged the reputation of Varus for a long time, was particularly powerful . Now the defeat of Varus was seen as a just punishment for hubris and culpable neglect, although Tacitus and Cassius Dio judged more differently.

Werner Eck, however , regards the Roman allegations that Varus drove the Teutons to revolt through his "arrogant behavior" as legitimate, since in his opinion Germania was already a provincial area within the Roman Empire at that time. The governor's allegedly clumsy and undiplomatic behavior ultimately cost Rome a province. However (if the area was already organized as a province) a governor was expected to collect appropriate funds, especially since Varus was evidently by no means an incompetent administrator; otherwise, after Africa and Syria, where he acted quite reliably, he would hardly have been entrusted with another province. It is also pointed out that Rome only decided to give up the area years after the Varus Battle - there can be no question of a turning point in the Roman politics of Germania as a direct consequence of the Varus Battle. Only years later, after the sobering results of the Germanic campaigns of Germanicus , Tiberius decided to move the borders of Rome back to the Rhine.

Testimonies

As of the series Lugdunum I with counterstamp of the Varus ("VAR").

As indirect evidence of Varus' tenure as Legatus Augusti pro praetore of the Gallic provinces, 18 coins from holders with the striking mark VAR can be assessed: one coin from the Nemausus series I and 17 aces from the first Lyon altar series . Until the 1980s, only two other coins with the counterstamp VAR were known as individual finds between the Rhine and Elbe.

Since 1987 around 360 copper coins have been unearthed in Kalkriese , 90% of which are As-type "Altar I" (RIC 230), minted between 8 and 3 BC. In Lugdunum . About 90% of the aces have a counterstamp with the inscriptions AVC, IMP with Lituus, VAR (= P. Quinctilius Varus) and C.VAL (= C. Numonius Vala). The finds from Kalkriese are kept on site . This ensures that the fighting at Kalkriese at least not before 7 BC. May have taken place.

In the simultaneous camps on the Rhine, coins counter-marked with the VAR stamp are more frequently represented than on the Lippe (Lippia) . The coins marked with a counterstamp are usually interpreted as personal monetary gifts from Varus to the legionaries.

Due to the excavations in Kalkriese, the Varus-Kurier has been published since 1994 .

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literature

  • Peter S. Wells: The battle in the Teutoburg Forest. Artemis & Winkler, Düsseldorf / Zurich 2005, ISBN 3-7608-2308-4 .

Web links

Commons : Varus  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ↑ Fundamental: Walther John: P. Quinctilius Varus. In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XXIV, Stuttgart 1963, Col. 907-984. See a. Reinhard Wolters: The battle in the Teutoburg Forest. Arminius, Varus and Roman Germania. Munich 2017, p. 75f.
  2. ↑ Hermann Dessau , Inscriptiones Latinae selectae , no. 8812 = Inscriptiones Graecae 12, 5, no. 940 : ὁ δῆμος / Πόπ [λ] ιον Κοϊνκτιλιον / ορον τὸν τααμίαν ατοῦ / στωτν τααμίαν σατω στω ίοτβραταν σο ω Αὐίοτβράτανατοθ / Αὐοτβράτατοτω στω στατανατατω στω σταταντατω στω νταταν σατω στω σταντατατω καὶ εὐεργέτην] “the people [honors] Publius Quintilius Varus, the quaestor of the Emperor Caesar Divi f. Augustus, the patron [and benefactor] ”.
  3. ^ Athenian communications . Volume 29, 1904, p. 175, No. 18 . See new trace of a lost Varus inscription  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.archaeologie-online.de  
  4. ↑ a b Hans Ulrich Nuber : P. Quinctilius Varus won… In: 2000 Years of Varus Battle: Imperium . Theiss, Stuttgart 2009, ISBN 978-3-8062-2278-4 , pp. 106-113.
  5. ^ John Pollini: Ahenobarbi, Appuleii and some others on the Ara Pacis. In: American Journal of Archeology. Volume 90, 1986, No. 4, pp. 453-460, especially pp. 459-460.
  6. ↑ Reinhard Wolters: The battle in the Teutoburg Forest. Arminius, Varus and Roman Germania. Munich 2017, p. 77.
  7. ↑ On Varus sisters see Ronald Syme : The Augustan Aristocracy. Clarendon Press, Oxford 1986, pp. 315-318.
  8. ↑ Inscriptions from Kyme 18 . Cf. Werner Eck : Quinctilius 30a. In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Supplementary volume XIV, Stuttgart 1974, Sp. 582.
  9. ↑ Tacitus , Annales 4.66 ; either a son of the consul from 44 BC Chr. (Such as Ronald Syme: . The Augustan aristocracy Clarendon Press, Oxford 1986, p 316) or Suffektkonsul 35 v. Chr. See Patrick Tansey: The Perils of Prosopography: The Case of the Cornelii Dolabellae. In: Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik , Volume 130, 2000, pp. 267-271 ( online ).
  10. ↑ Bengt E. Thomasson : Fasti Africani. Senatorial and knightly officials in the Roman provinces of North Africa from Augustus to Diocletian. Paul Åström, Stockholm 1996, ISBN 91-7042-153-6 , p. 22 f.
  11. ↑ Walther John: P. Quinctilius Varus. In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XXIV, Stuttgart 1963, Col. 909-911.
  12. ↑ Walther John: P. Quinctilius Varus. In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XXIV, Stuttgart 1963, Col. 909.
  13. ↑ Reinhard Wolters: The battle in the Teutoburg Forest. Arminius, Varus and Roman Germania. Munich 2017, p. 82.
  14. ↑ Walther John: P. Quinctilius Varus. In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XXIV, Stuttgart 1963, Col. 911ff.
  15. ↑ On the activity of the Varus cf. the report of Flavius ​​Josephus , Jüdischer Krieg 1,617 ff .; 2.1 ff .; Same, Jewish Antiquities 17.89 ff.
  16. ↑ Karoline Resch: Modern approaches to questions of the loss of control of an occupying power - Rome and Judea. Austrian Military Journal, 6/2013, pp. 3–14 ( online ).
  17. ↑ Velleius Paterculus, Historia Romana 2,117,2 .
  18. ↑ Werner Eck: Augustus and his time. Munich 2003, p. 97; Werner Eck: A Roman province. The Augustan Germania left and right of the Rhine. In: 2000 Years of the Varus Battle. Imperium (catalog for the exhibition of the Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe in Haltern am See, May 16 - October 11, 2009). Stuttgart 2009, pp. 188-195.
  19. ↑ Velleius Paterculus, Historia Romana 2,119,3.
  20. ↑ Sueton, Augstus 23.3; but see the following remarks below. It was probably a staged act, cf. Reinhard Wolters: Varus. In: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde 32, Berlin / New York 2006, here p. 84.
  21. ↑ Velleius Paterculus, Historia Romana 2,119,5.
  22. ↑ For example, Dieter Timpe spoke in favor of the family grave of the Quinctilians: Arminius studies. Winter, Heidelberg 1970, p. 121 note 13, also Ralf-Peter Märtin : The Varus Battle. Rome and the Teutons. S. Fischer Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2008, p. 211; Ernst Hohl argued for the Augustus mausoleum : the alleged "double burial" of Antoninus Pius. In: Klio . Volume 31, 1938, pp. 169–185, here p. 180 note 1; Walther John, for example, left the question open: P. Quinctilius Varus. In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XXIV, Stuttgart 1963, column 943.
  23. ↑ Reinhard Wolters: The battle in the Teutoburg Forest. Arminius, Varus and Roman Germania. Munich 2017, pp. 145f.
  24. ^ Suetonius, Augustus 23.3.
  25. ↑ Reinhard Wolters: Varus. In: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde 32, Berlin / New York 2006, here p. 84.
  26. ↑ Reinhard Wolters: The battle in the Teutoburg Forest. Arminius, Varus and Roman Germania. Munich 2017, p. 146.
  27. ↑ Reinhard Wolters: The battle in the Teutoburg Forest. Arminius, Varus and Roman Germania. Munich 2017, pp. 146–149.
  28. ↑ Reinhard Wolters: Varus. In: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde 32, Berlin / New York 2006, here p. 84.
  29. ↑ Werner Eck: Augustus and his time. 3rd edition, CH Beck, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-406-41884-8 , p. 97.
  30. ↑ See Reinhard Wolters: The battle in the Teutoburg Forest. Arminius, Varus and Roman Germania. Munich 2017, p. 78ff.
personal data
SURNAME Varus, Publius Quinctilius
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Quintilius Varus, Publius; Quinctilius Varus, Publius
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman consul and general
DATE OF BIRTH 47 BC BC or 46 BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 9