Quintus Petillius Spurinus

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Quintus Petillius Spurinus († 176 BC ) came from the Roman plebeian family of the Petillians and died in his consulate in 176 BC. In the fight against the Ligurians .

Origin and early career

According to the testimony of the Fasti Capitolini , Quintus Petillius Spurinus was the son of a Gaius Petillius and grandson of a Quintus Petillius . The first office of his course honorum , the bursary , he held around 190 BC. Chr.

Scipion processes

Petillius Spurinus was probably one of the two related tribunes named Quintus Petillius , who were founded in 187 BC. BC - probably at the instigation of the elder Cato - political attacks on the brothers Lucius Cornelius Scipio Asiaticus and Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus opened. The ancient sources for these so-called scipion processes are very contradictory, so that their course cannot be exactly reconstructed. The tribunes of the people turned against Scipio Asiaticus only superficially, because the attacks were probably actually aimed at his older brother. The occasion was certainly party struggles and the envy of many senators for the war successes and the renewed influence of Scipio Africanus. The younger brother Scipio Asiaticus was accused of embezzling public funds; he should give information about 500 talents that he received from the defeated Seleucid king Antiochus III. had received. Scipio Africanus publicly tore up the account books in question because he was above suspicion, but Scipio Asiaticus did not go to prison only because of the intercession of the tribune Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus . The attacks on the Scipions probably continued for years until Africanus broke out in 184 BC. Moved back to his estate near Liternum in Campania.

Finding of alleged books by Numa

181 BC Petillius Spurinus held the office of Praetor urbanus . He was supposed to set up a new army to support the proconsul Lucius Aemilius Paullus , who had fallen on the defensive in the Ligurian theater of war , but he no longer had to carry out this task due to a victory of Paullus that followed soon afterwards.

Now the two incumbent consuls also went to Liguria . Therefore, Petillius Spurinus was in charge of all important business in Rome. His most spectacular action was the burning of writings found at the time that were supposed to come from the legendary second Roman King Numa Pompilius , who died about 500 years earlier . According to the report of the historian Titus Livius , farm workers found two stone coffins while plowing a field at the foot of the Ianiculum of a scribe named Lucius Petillius . One of them turned out to be empty and, according to its inscription, had once recovered Numa's body, while the second box contained intact writings from this king. There were seven books in Latin on pontifical law and seven books in Greek on philosophy. Livy contradicts the assertion of the annalist Valerius Antias that Pythagorean teachings were communicated and Numa was a pupil of Pythagoras . Furthermore, Livius explains that Lucius Petillius was the scribe of Petillius Spurinus during his bursary and because of the friendship that arose in the process, he let him read the books he found. After reading it, the city praetor said that these works represented a threat to the Roman religion and should therefore be burned, which was carried out publicly in the Comitium by a resolution of the Senate, despite the intervention of the scribe at the tribunes .

An important parallel tradition to Livy is the account of the elder Pliny , which is made up of older annalists and antiquarians . Among other things, he gives an excerpt from the depiction of Lucius Cassius Hemina . This excerpt essentially coincides with the Livian representation, but calls the scribe differently Gnaeus Terentius . Cassius Hemina apparently also did not report anything about an earlier acquaintance of the scribe with the town praetor, so that this detail is probably a later decoration. Varro is in the same tradition as Cassius Hemina . Even Plutarch brings a similar description as Livy, but can not the coffins through Pflügarbeiten but are exposed by heavy rains.

The core of what all sources consistently testified to is that Petillius Spurinus, as city praetor, had the alleged Numa writings surrendered to the fire in the Comitium soon after they were discovered by the Senate.

Consulate and death

Petillius Spurinus was the only representative of his family to reach the consulate during the Roman Republic . Clad. His official colleague was a member of the Scipionenkreis, which he fought as a tribune, namely Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Hispallus . Allegedly the consuls inauguration was overshadowed by unfavorable omina, and Scipio Hispallus died soon after. Under the chairmanship of Petillius Spurinus, Gaius Valerius Laevinus was elected as a suffect consul.

Now Petillius Spurinus wanted to lead the fight against the Ligurians and hurried with his army to the theater of war in northern Italy, where he also took command of the troops of the proconsul Gaius Claudius Pulcher . A few days later, the suffect consul joined them. From the incomplete portrayal of Livius it can be inferred that Petillius Spurinus is said to have been given ominous omina again, that he separated from his counterpart and moved with part of the troops to the mountains Ballista and Letus, which cannot be precisely located near the Macri Campi. In the battle that was unfolding, he ventured too far from the ranks of his soldiers and was killed by a projectile. The Romans continued to fight and won the victory. While Livius partly ascribes the guilt for the consul's death to his careless behavior, the Senate looked more to the soldiers.

literature

Remarks

  1. ↑ Fasti Capitolini: Quintus Petillius Spurinus C. f. Q. n.
  2. ↑ Livy 40, 29, 10.
  3. ↑ Main sources on the Scipion Trials: Polybios 23, 14 (without mentioning the names of the Petillians); Cornelius Nepos in Aulus Gellius , Noctes Atticae 4, 18 and 6, 19; Livius 38, 50-60 (detailed, but largely based on the unreliable account of Valerius Antias ).
  4. ↑ Livy 40, 18, 2f. and 40, 29, 9; Valerius Maximus 1, 1, 12; Lactance , Divinae institutiones 1, 22.
  5. ^ Livy 40, 26, 7 and 40, 28, 9f.
  6. ↑ Livy 40:29, 3-14; then Valerius Maximus 1, 1, 12 and Lactanz, Divinae institutiones 1, 22.
  7. ↑ Pliny, Naturalis historia 13, 84-87.
  8. ↑ Lucius Cassius Hemina in Pliny, Naturalis historia 13, 84-86.
  9. ^ Fragments of Varros et al. In Pliny ( Naturalis historia 13, 87) and Augustine ( De civitate Dei 7, 34).
  10. ^ Plutarch, Numa 22.
  11. ↑ Livy 41:14, 7-15 , 4; Iulius Obsequens 9.
  12. ↑ Fasti Capitolini; Livy 41, 16, 5 and 41, 17, 5.
  13. ↑ Livius 41, 17, 6ff. and 41, 18, 6.
  14. ↑ Fasti Capitolini; Livy 41:18, 8-15; Valerius Maximus 1, 5, 9 and 2, 7, 15; Frontinus , Strategemata 4, 1, 46; among others
  15. ↑ Livy 41, 18, 11.
  16. ↑ Valerius Maximus 2: 7, 15; Frontinus, Strategemata 4, 1, 46.
personal data
SURNAME Petillius Spurinus, Quintus
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Spurinus, Quintus Petillius
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Roman consul 176 BC Chr.
DATE OF BIRTH 3rd century BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 176 BC Chr.