Quintus Minucius Thermus (Consul 193 BC)

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Quintus Minucius Thermus († 188 BC ) came from a plebeian branch of the Roman Minucier family . He made a career as a follower of Hannibal's conqueror Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus , was born in 201 BC. Chr. Tribune , 196 BC Chr. Praetor , reaching 193 v. The consulate , in which, as in the two following years , he waged a moderately successful guerrilla war against the Ligurians . After the Roman victory over Antiochus III. he traveled 189 BC To the east to participate in the reorganization of Asia Minor , and was in 188 BC. Killed during an attack in the army of last year's consul Gnaeus Manlius Vulso in Thrace while marching back.

Early career

According to the filiation information of the Fasti Capitolini , the father of Quintus Minucius Thermus also carried the prenomen Quintus and his grandfather the prenomen Lucius .

For the first time Thermus appears in the sources 202 BC. In which year he served as the war tribune of Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus during the last campaign in the Second Punic War in North Africa. However, it only appears in reports that pass on the warlike events of that time in a falsified manner. According to this, Thermus attacked a transport with food supplies destined for Hannibal , killing 4,000 Punic escort soldiers and taking another 4,000 prisoners. In the battle of Zama he was then commissioned by Scipio to provide support to the Roman left wing, which had fallen on the defensive, with an extremely combat-ready army.

201 BC Thermus officiated as a tribune of the people and, with his colleague Manius Acilius Glabrio, ensured the continuation of Scipio's command in North Africa. The two tribunes prevented the consul Gnaeus Cornelius Lentulus , who was striving to take over military command against Carthage , from being allowed to cross to Africa, and they were then able to thwart Lentulus' attempts to have the Senate refuse to grant the peace negotiated by Scipio with the Puners.

198 BC Thermus became a curular aedile , with Tiberius Sempronius Longus as his official colleague, who also supported the Scipions politically. Together with Longus, Thermus was founded in 197 BC. BC also one of the triumvirs who were responsible for the establishment of five colonies on the Italian coast, whereby their period of office extended until 194 BC. Chr. Extended. These colonies should be created in Volturnum , Liternum , Puteoli , Salernum and Buxentum .

196 BC Thermus held the praetur and was sent to the Iberian Peninsula with Quintus Fabius Buteo , who was elected to the same office . Thermus should head the province of Hispania citerior and Fabius Buteo of the province of Hispania ulterior . They had to go to Spain as quickly as possible, because a great uprising of Iberian tribes was taking place there. During the fight against it, the previous praetors Gaius Sempronius Tuditanus , who had administered Hispania citerior , died after a military defeat due to a serious injury, while at the same time his colleague Marcus Helvius was seriously ill and now both provinces until the arrival of Thermus and Fabius Buteo had to direct. This is probably why the imperial historian Appian says inaccurately that Thermus took over the praetor's office from Tuditanus and Helvius, and the pre-Livian Roman annalist Valerius Antias that Thermus succeeded Helvius, although the former was supposed to administer Hispania citerior , but the latter in 197 BC. Chr. Hispania Ulterior had received as a province.

Thermus and Fabius Buteo had a reinforced military force of one legion of soldiers each, as well as 4000 infantrymen and 300 cavalrymen from their allies to cope with their warlike tasks. Thermus subsequently won a victory at Turda over the Iberian military leaders Budares and Baesadines. According to the exaggerated loss of information by the historian Titus Livius , allegedly 12,000 insurgents fell in this battle; the Romans captured Budares and drove the rest of the opponents to flight. 195 BC Chr. Was Publius Manlius new Praetor of Hispania Citerior and Thermus in the same year the holding of a triumph granted.

194 BC The triumvirs who had been appointed to found the five colonies mentioned three years earlier completed their task. Thermus was involved as a member of this three-man committee and Tiberius Sempronius Longus, as this year's consul, was responsible for the top management.

Consulate and fighting against the Ligurians

193 BC Thermus went through a high point of his cursus honorum when he reached the consulate , which he held together with Lucius Cornelius Merula . Last but not least, the new consuls owed their choice to the support of their predecessors, who included Longus and Scipio Africanus. Thermus and Merula received Liguria and Gallia cisalpina , respectively, to their respective provinces, both of which were in northern Italy .

Thermus had to take action against the Ligurians, who rebelled and devastated the area around Luna and the coastal area as far as Pisae . Therefore, the consul initially made considerable armor and then marched with his armed forces via Arretium (today's Arezzo) to Pisae, which was besieged by numerous Ligurians. He was able to move into this city despite the nearby enemy positions and thus save it from being captured. Subsequently, Pisae served him as the main base for his military operations.

Thermus fought the Ligurian War in northern Italy for three years, but could not achieve any major victories. The exact course of the eventful minor war is difficult to reconstruct from the not very reliable report of Livius; only individual occurrences of the fighting are described in more detail.

In the first year of the war 193 BC Because his newly recruited soldiers were still very inexperienced, Thermus did not dare a major battle, but only tried to shield the territory of allied peoples from hostile devastation. Due to the dangerous situation, he did not lead the consular elections for the next year as planned, because this would have required his personal presence in Rome, for which purpose he would have had to leave the war zone beforehand. Instead, at his suggestion, the Senate ordered the other consul, Merula, to travel to the capital to hold the elections.

Late 193 BC Thermus also had to master two very threatening situations for him. At first he was only able to repel an attack on his camp with difficulty. However, this episode, only briefly described by Livius, could be a duplicate of a similar event that took place two years later and was described in more detail by the same historian. As Thermus then at the end of 193 BC. BC was on the march through a bottleneck with his army, he was again in danger because of his encirclement by Ligurian contingents. Livy reports in detail, but without mentioning place names, that the consul's auxiliary troops included 800 Numidians on horseback who managed to break out of the gorge, whereupon they set fire to the nearby Ligurian settlements. They therefore left their strategically favorable position to come to the aid of their relatives threatened by the fires, with which Thermus and his army were saved.

192 BC Thermus was able to remain in his province with an extended empire and an increased number of troops. This year he fought successfully in a battle near Pisae against the Ligurians, whose camp fell into his hands after they had left. Afterwards he is said to have haunted them in their own territory as well as conquered and looted several of their villages.

191 BC As mentioned above, Thermus had to fend off a night attack on his camp. Until daybreak he confined himself to defending it. Afterwards he had a sortie carried out through two camp gates, but was only able to drive the enemy to flight after serious clashes, in which more than 4,000 Ligurians were allegedly killed. Otherwise nothing is known about Thermus' military ventures in his third year of the war. The then consul Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica , who had successfully fought against the Boier in northern Italy , is said to have said on his return to Rome that he was convinced that Thermus would soon succeed in the complete conquest of the Ligurians and would be granted a triumph for it.

Thermus divided at the beginning of the following year 190 BC BC in writing that his entire province was now subject. As requested by the Senate, he went to the Boiern, on whose territory his troops were taken over by Nasica. Then he traveled to Rome, where Manius Acilius Glabrio arrived at the same time, who met the Seleucid king Antiochus III. had beaten and was now able to celebrate a triumph for it. Thermus was not allowed to do this, although he also demanded it. This fact, mentioned by Livy without further explanation, is illuminated in more detail by several fragments of speeches by the important Roman politician and Scipion opponent Cato the Elder, handed down by the grammarians Sextus Pompeius Festus , Priscian and Nonius Marcellus as well as the colored writer Aulus Gellius . The latter therefore denied the credibility of the statements of Thermus 'campaign reports and dealt in one of his speeches Thermus' alleged brutal torture and killing of ten leading Ligurians who had not provided him with sufficient food supplies. Cato was presumably largely responsible for not granting the triumph requested by Thermus.

Mission to Asia Minor and Death

189 BC Thermus was appointed by the Senate as one of the ten commissioners who were to reorganize Asia Minor . In the following year, 188 BC BC, the commission went to Apamea Kibotos to negotiate the peace treaty with Antiochus III with the proconsul Gnaeus Manlius Vulso . to swear. Thermus and the brother of the proconsul, Lucius Manlius Vulso , then traveled to the Seleucid ruler, because he too was supposed to swear the treaty before them. Thermus then rejoined Gnaeus Manlius Vulso when he made his way back to Italy with his armed forces. In Thrace he came in 188 BC. BC in a raid of local residents who were after the rich booty of the Romans, killed.

literature

Remarks

  1. ↑ Appian , Libyca 36; Frontinus , Strategemata 1, 8, 10.
  2. ^ Appian, Libyca 44.
  3. ↑ Titus Livius 30, 40, 9ff. and 30, 43, 1-4.
  4. ↑ Livy 32, 27, 8.
  5. ↑ Livy 32, 29, 3f .; Velleius Paterculus 1, 15, 2.
  6. ↑ Livy 33:24 , 2; 33, 26, 1-4; 33, 43, 8.
  7. ↑ Livy 33:25 , 9.
  8. ↑ Appian, Iberica 39; Valerius Antias in Livius 34, 10, 5; on this Friedrich Münzer : Minucius 65). In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XV, 2, Stuttgart 1932, Col. 1967 f.
  9. ^ Livy 33, 26, 3.
  10. ↑ Livy 33, 44, 4f.
  11. ↑ Livy 34, 10, 6f .; Acts of triumph; among others
  12. ↑ Livy 34, 45, 2.
  13. ↑ Fasti Capitolini ad annum 193 BC Chr .; Livy 34, 54, 1 and 34, 55, 1; Cornelius Nepos , Hannibal 8, 1; among others
  14. ↑ Livy 34:55, 5; 34, 56, 3.
  15. ↑ Livy 34, 56, 2-7 and 35, 3, 1f.
  16. ↑ Livy 35, 3, 3--4, 1.
  17. ↑ Livy 35: 6, 1-7.
  18. ↑ Livy 35, 11, 1f.
  19. ↑ Livy 36:38, 1-4; on this Friedrich Münzer: Minucius 65). In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XV, 2, Stuttgart 1932, Sp. 1969 ..
  20. ↑ Livy 35:11, 2-13; Frontinus, Strategemata 1, 5, 16 (after Livius); Orosius 4, 20, 17 (also after Livius).
  21. ↑ Livy 35:20 , 6.
  22. ↑ Livy 35:21, 7-11.
  23. ↑ Livy 36:38, 1-4.
  24. ↑ Livy 36:40 , 2.
  25. ^ Livius 37: 2, 5.
  26. ↑ Livy 37, 46, 1f.
  27. ↑ Aulus Gellius, Noctes Atticae 10, 3, 17 and 13, 25, 12.
  28. ^ Friedrich Münzer: Minucius 65). In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XV, 2, Stuttgart 1932, Sp. 1970. Matthias Gelzer : Porcius 9). In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume XXII, 1, Stuttgart 1953, Col. 119 f.
  29. ↑ Livy 37, 55, 7.
  30. ↑ Polybios 21, 46, 1f .; Livy 38, 39, 1.
  31. ↑ Livy 38:41, 3; 38, 46, 7; 38, 49, 8.
personal data
SURNAME Minucius Thermus, Quintus
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Thermus, Quintus Minucius
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman consul 193 BC Chr.
DATE OF BIRTH 3rd century BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 188 BC Chr.