Varrones Murenae.

Ver.3.2, Oct 2008, M. K. Passehl

Stemma 1. Terenti Varrones & Licini Murenae

C.Terentius C.f.M.n.Varro
(c.250s-190s) cos.216
|
_________________________|____________________________________
| | |
C.Terentius Varro M.Terentius Varro A.Terentius Varro
(c.233-216) (b.c.228) pr.184 (b.c.224)
| | |
x ___________|__________ |
| | |
C.Terentius Varro M.Terentius Varro |
(b.c.204) (b.c.206) A.Terentius Varro
| | q.c.170 (b.c.197)
L.Licinius Murena | | Xvir leg.Paullo 168
(b.c.200) pr.c.160 C.Terentius Varro | |
Xvir leg.Mummio q.154 (c.181-154) | |
| | | |
M.Iunius Silanus | x | |
IIIvir mint c.145 | 138 ca.150 | A.Terentius Varro
\ (b.c.180) | L.Metellus Calvus(2) = (2)Sempronia (1) = M.Terentius Varro q.c.148 (b.c.175)
/ | | cos.142 cens.115 | Tuditani f. | (b.c.175) Xvir leg.Mummio 146
\ | | (c.185-c.110) | b.c.170/65 |_________________ |
/ | | | | | |
\ | | | M.Varro eques R. | |
/ [Iunia] = L.Licinius Murena | ca.122 b.c.148 | |
\ b.c.145 | pr.120s (b.160s) Metella = L.Lucullus \ | ca.120 |
110s | b.c.137 | (c.145-80s) \ Paulla = A.Terentius Varro
/ | | pr.104 testament. Terentia | (c.150/45-90s)
\ | | ca.105 b.c.140 |
/ | | \ |
\ ___|______________________ __|___________________ / |
/ | | | ca.106 | | | \ |
M.Silanus Murena P.Murena L.Murena = Licinia L.Lucullus M.Terentius M.f. |
q.100/97 (b.127/4) historicus (c.130-81)|c.121-p.63 (118-57) Varro Lucullus |
(Gaius natus) (c.120s-82) pr.88 | cos.74 (116-55) cos.73 |
| | |
? | |
| |
_____________|_____________________________ |
| 66/5 | | c.81 |
L.Licinius L.f.L.n.Murena = (3)Sempronia C.Murena Licinia = A.Terentius A.f.Varro
q.74 cos.62 (105-c.61) | Tuditani f. (103-47/6) b.c.100 | (c.119-60s) q.c.89
| (c.98-p.52) aed.cur.66 | pr.77 leg.Murenae 87-81
| \ |
| testament.47/6 |
| / |______________
| \ | | 50s
| A.Terentius Varro Murena Terentia A.f. = Seius of
| \ q.49 aed.cur.45 cos.23 b.70s | Volsinii
| / (c.80-23) | | b.c.80
| plenary c.25 | |
| / | |
| \ ca.42 | |
L.Licinius Murena / C.Maecenas = Terentia A.f. |
(A.Terentius Varro Murena) (60s-8 BC)| “Terentilla” L.Seius Strabo
(c.62-22) advocate | (c.58-p.16) (50s BC-20CE)
| ? m.1 Iunia Blaesa
x m.2 Cosconia Gallitta
 Stemma 2. Terentian propinquitas with Semproni Tuditani, Hortensi & Servili Caepiones

Cn.Servilius Caepio L.Hortensius C.Sempronius Tuditanus

aed.cur.179 cos.169 (210s-c.150s) pr.c.160 (200s-c.140)
(217/16-150s) pr.170 Xvir leg.Mummio 146-5
| | |
| | ______|________
ca.155 | ca.130 | ca.154 | | ca.150
ignota = (1)Cn.Servilius Caepio(2) = ignota (L.)Hortensius = ignota C.Sempronius Tuditanus Sempronia = M.Terentius Varro
b.c.170| cos.141, cens.125 | b.c.145 (c.180s-130s) | b.c.170 q.145 cos.129 (b.172) b.170/65 | (b.c.180/75) eques
| (c.184-c.123) | [pr.140s?] | |
| | | |
| |_______________________ | ____________ |
| | | |
_______________|____ ___________________ | ___________ | _____________________________|
| | ca.128 | ca.120 | | ca.109 | ca.120
Cn.Caepio Cn.f. Q.Servilius Cn.f.Caepio = (1) Terentia Varronum (2) = L.Hortensius Servilia = (2)Q.Catulus Paulla Terentia = A.Varro
(c.152-122) cos.106 pont.max. | b.c.144(ordo equester) | cos.des.108 120s-p.70| (149-87) b.c.140 | b.140s
q.c.122 (149-87) | | (b.c.153/51) | cos.102 |
| | | |
_______________________________|__ | | |
| | | 101-97 |_____________ | |
Servilia maior Servilia minor Q.Caepio = (1)Livia | | 93/2 | A.Terentius A.f.Varro
m.Metellus Celer(105) m.M.Drusus(101) q.100 | b.c.120 L.Hortensius Q.Hortensius = Lutatia (c.119-60s) q.c.89 pr.77
m.Q.Scaevola(96) m.Ap.Claudius(95) | (c.119-82) orator cos.69| b.c.108 leg.Murenae 87-81
| q.c.89 (114-50) | |
_________| | |
| | ______________| |
M.Brutus = Servilia Q.Caepio | | |
(117-77) | b.c.100 /(98-67) Hortensia oratrix Q.Hortensius Q.f. A.Terentius Varro Murena
| / q.67 (c.90-p.43) (ca.85-42) pr.45 q.49, aed.c.45, cos.23
| / | “theios” of (c.80-23)
| / | 63-61 Caepio Brutus |
Q.Servilius Caepio Brutus Servilia = (2)L.Lucullus | |
(85-42) pr.44 b.c.77 | (118-57) cos.74 | |
| | |
| | |
M.Lucullus Hortensius Corbio C.Maecenas = Terentia A.f.
(62-42) the invert (b.c.60) (60s-8BC) (c.58-post 16)
 Stemma 3. Semproni Tuditani , Hortensi, Licini Murenae, Valeri Messallae

M.Sempronius
b.c.350
|
|_________________________________________
| |
C.Sempronius Tuditanus Sempronius Longus
b.c.310s b.c.320s/300s
|
____________|___________________
| |
C.Tuditanus M.Tuditanus C.f.M.n.
b.c.285 cos.240, cens.230
| (c.280-c.220)
___________|____________ |
| | |?
M.Tuditanus P.Tuditanus C.f.C.n. |
leg.Scipioni 209 cens.209, cos.204 C.Sempronius Tuditanus
(b.c.240s) (c.240s-c.180s) pr.197 (c.230s-197)
| | |
| | |
| | |
M.Tuditanus M.f.C.n. P.Sempronius | L.Hortensius
pr.189, cos.185 praef.soc.194 C.Sempronius Tuditanus pr.170 (b.210s)
(c.220-174) (c.220-194) pr.c.160 (200s-c.140) |
| | Xvir leg.to Mummius 146 |
? x | |
| |
___________________________________________|___ |
| 138 | ca.150 (L.)Hortensius
C.Tuditanus C.f.C.n. L.Metellus Calvus(2) = (2)Sempronia(1) = M.Terentius Varro (180s-130s/20s)
q.145 cos.129 cos.142 cens.115 | b.c.170/65 | (b.c.180/75) eques R. [pr.140s?]
(172-c.110) (c.185-c.110) | | |
| | |_______________________ |
| | | | | ca.120 |
| ca.122 | Paulla M.Varro Terentia(2) = L.Hortensius
(C.)Sempronius L.Licinius Lucullus = Caecilia Metella Terentia (c.148-c.105) (b.c.144) | cos.des.108
Tuditanus (c.145-90s) pr.104 | b.c.137 b.c.140 eques R. m.1 Q.Caepio| (b.c.153/51)
the imbecile | |
(c.130-70s) | |
| | ______________________|___________________
| | ca.106 ca.103 | ca.92 | |
| Licinia = L.Murena M.Messalla = Hortensia Lutatia = Q.Hortensius L.f. L.Hortensius
| (c.121-p.63)| (130/28-81) legatus 90 | b.c.117 b.c.108 | Hortalus orator (c.119-c.82)
| | pr.88 (c.140s-80s)| | cos.69 (114-50) q.c.89
| | | |
| | | |
___|_____________ | _________|______ |
| | 66/5 | | | |________________
Sempronia minor Sempronia maior(3) = L.Murena M.Messalla Rufus Valeria | |
(b.c.85) (c.98-p.52) | (105-c.61) augur pr.62 cos.53 b.c.100 Hortensia Q.Hortensius Hortalus
m.1 Proculeius m.1 Pinarius | cos.62 (102-26/23) m.1 ignotus b.c.90 pr.45 (c.85-42)*
m.2 Pomponius m.2 M.Fulvius | | m.2 Sulla Felix |
| | | |
| | | |
| M.Messalla Barbatus Cornelia Postuma |
| IIIvir mint 53, q.41 (78-?) |
| cos.suff.32 (b.c.72) |
| | |
L.Licinius Murena | (Q.)Hortensius Corbio
(A.Terentius Varro Murena) | ca.37 (c.60-c.20s)
(62/1-22) advocate Valeria = (1)M.Messalla Corvinus [VM iii.5.4]
(Messallina)| cos.31 (64BC-8CE)
b.c.52 |
|
| *Catullus 65:
M.Messalla Messallinus Etsi me assiduo confectum cura dolore
cos.3 (36BC-c.15CE) sevocat a doctis, Ortale, virginibus
 Stemma 4. Sisters Semproniae & the three fratres Proculeius, Scipio and Murena.

(C.)Sempronius Tuditanus
the imbecile (c.130-70s)
|
|
___________|______________________________________
ca.83 | 66/5 |
Pinarius = (1)Sempronia (maior)(3) = L.Murena |
c.105-81 | (c.98-p.52) |(105-c.61) ca.70 | 50s
| (2)= M.Fulvius | cos.62 Proculeius = (1)Sempronia (minor)(2) = Pomponius
| | Tusculanus | b.c.90s | (b.c.85) | b.90s/80s
L.Pinarius Natta | | | |
pont.(c.82-56) | | | |
Fulvia P.Clodii | | |
(c.79-40) | | |
| C.Proculeieus |
| (c.68-10s) |
L.Licinius Murena eques R. |
(c.62-22) advocate |
P.Cornelius Scipio Pomponianus
cos.16 (59/49-2 BC)

Stemma 5. The marriages of Sempronia Pinari and Fulvia P. Clodi

ca.83 ca.80
Pinarius Natta = (1) Sempronia Tuditani f. (2) = M.Fulvius “Bambalio”
b.c.110 | (c.98-p.53) | of Tusculum
| (3) = L.Licinius Murena | (c.100s-70/66)
| (105-c.61) cos.62 |
L.Pinarius Natta |
pont.58-56 |
(c.82-56) |
|
|
54 40 46 | 66/65
C.Claudius = Octavia = M.Antonius (3) = (3) Fulvia M.f.(1) = P.Clodius Pulcher
Marcellus | (68-10) | (86-30) | (c.79-40) | (93-53) tr.pl.58
cos.50 | | cos.suf.44 | (2) = C.Curio |
| | | | (90-49) |____________
| two Antoniae | | | |
| b.30s | | Claudia P.Claudius Pulcher
| | | b.c.54 augur, pr.(b.c.60)
| ____________| C.Curio IV
| | | (c.50-30)
Marcella (2) = Iullus Antullus |
maior Antonius (45-30) x
cos.10 |
(43-2) x
 5

Evidence & Comments.

The fact of the interlacing of the 2nd century Terenti Varrones with the newly consular Licini Luculli is attested
clearly enough by the adoption of M. Lucullus cos.73 around 100 BC, by which he was renamed M. Terentius
M. f. Varro Lucullus (e. g. ILS 26 = ILLRP 474, from about 75 BC). But the details are unknown and have to be
guesstimated. The arrangement worked out here follows the implications of some curious information in the 4th
century epitomizer Eutropius. Although the consular Luculli brothers were fratres germani separated only by
two years in their births, Eutropius (VI 7.1) oddly and uniquely calls M. Lucullus “M. Licinius Lucullus” (in
the context of his consulate, when he was co-author of the lex Terentia Cassia and is attested epipgraphically as
M. Terentius Varro Lucullus) and also describes him as consobrinus of L. Licinius Lucullus the cos.74. This
may well reflect authentic knowledge (from the detailed epitome of Livy which was undoubtedly Eutropius'
main source) of M. Lucullus' birth name and also his theoretical relationship to his brother after his “adoption”,
which appears to have been testamentary and therefore was not a true adoption but acceptance of an inheritance
with a condicio nominis ferendi. The term consobrinus (classical Ciceronian and first century BC short-hand for
frater consobrinus) denotes a maternal side first cousin, and the mother of the Luculli brothers was Caecilia
Metella the sister of Q. Metellus Numidicus (Plutarch Lucullus 1.1, cf. Cicero Verr.II iv.147: L. Lucullum sororis
virum, Cicero post reditum in senatu 37: Luculli, Servilii, Scipiones, Metellarum filii). However (as also argued
below in the case of Hortensia oratrix and her brother's relationship to Caepio Brutus), it is dubious in the
extreme to argue the endurance and meaningfulness of a relationship between a man and a woman (i. e. as
legally son and mother) which is only created by a testamentary adoption by the woman's deceased husband, and
thereby after the end of the marriage.
It follows then that the testamentary adoption of M. Lucullus did not involve another Metella as wife of the
adopting Varro, but a M. Terentius Varro who was a brother of Caecilia Metella Luculli. I. e. a uterine brother
and their mother in common would be the second wife of Metellus Calvus. This second wife is evident from the
generational chronology of Calvus' children, and their children.
L. Caecilius Metellus Calvus (ca.185-ca.110, cos.142 cens.115) accompanied the Aemilian Scipio Africanus and
Spurius Mummius on the wide-ranging eastern legation of 139-8 BC which visited Ptolemy Euergetes II at
Alexandreia, the Seleukid court at Seleukeia-in-Pieria and on the Phoenician coast in the midst of its struggle
against Diodotos Tryphon (while Demetrios II was contending with the Arsakid empire-builder Mithradates I for
control of Mesopotamia), and during the homeward leg Attalos II at Pergamon shortly before his death, as well
as Rhodes and Greece. At Rhodes they must have met the young Antiochos Sidetes shortly before he launched
his expedition into Syria (contrary to the rights of his brother the king) in spring 138 and proclaimed himself
king as Antiochos (VII) Euergetes.
According to the lex Villia annalis Metellus Numidicus as cos.109 was born in or before 152, and he was
younger brother of L. Metellus Delmaticus (cos.119 born in or before 162, i. e. when Metellus Calvus the father
was 23 or younger). Since the birth of Caecilia Metella mother of the Luculli brothers ought to belong after
Metellus Calvus' return home from the eastern legation in 138 (even on the likely assumption that their sister
Licinia L. Murenae was an elder sister born about 121), and since the wife he married as an adulescentulus in the
mid 160s would have been between forty and fifty when Caecilia Metella was born ca.137, it is likely that
Metella's mother was a second wife of Metellus Calvus. Similarly it was her second marriage: she must have
previously been wife of one Terentius Varro and mother of the M. Varro who adopted M. Varro Lucullus
(cos.73).

On the other hand it must be conceded that Eutropius may have become confused and slipped into several errors.
The organization of Terenti Varrones in stemmata 1 & 2 assumes that he got it right. This requires that M. Varro
(born ca.148) adopted his nephew (uterine sister's younger son) as the heir to carry his name, which is quite ok.
The full reconstruction also requires that in doing so he overlooked other nephews who were sons of his full
sisters Terentiae. Two of these were probably only-sons, Q. Servilius Caepio (q.urb.100, born 127) and A.
Terentius Varro (pr.77, born ca.119), best left to carry on their own fathers' names. But there were two Hortensii
brothers, Lucius (born ca.119) and Quintus (born 114) whose births bracketed the two Luculli, born 118 and 116,
 6

so that the preference shown to a son of the half-sister over the sons of the full sister Paulla Terentia requires
some explanation. Apart from the details of personalities and personal relationships among these relatives, which
unfortunately do not survive, several plausible reasons can be suggested.
While both the fathers of these two sets of brothers found themselves disgraced by conviction in the criminal
courts, it is possible and perhaps likely that the death of M. Varro the eques (born ca.148), and hence the
drawing up of his testament, took place before the trial and conviction of L. Lucullus pater (102 BC), whereas L.
Hortensius pater's great disgrace of losing the consulate to which he had been elected by his conviction for
electoral bribery while designatus was seven years earlier in autumn or December 109. It is as likely as anything
else that M. Varro the eques perished in the Arausio disaster (Oct. 105) serving in the army of his brother-in-law
the pontifex maximus Q. Caepio (cos.106). There is also the blunt fact that the uterine sister Caecilia Metella
belonged to one of the most successful and powerful noble families presently enjoying its greatest floruit (whole
second half of the 2nd century BC, and especially the last quarter). Both her elder half-brothers were consuls (119
and 109) and among the most important and influential princes of the day. So that her sons had much the better
chances of success and fame than the Hortensii brothers. The fact that Quintus Hortensius rose to become
Rome's greatest orator (until eclipsed by Cicero in the 60s) and the equal in fame and achievement of his
propinqui and close friends the Luculli could not have been predicted when M. Varro made out his final will in
the last decade of the 2nd century, when Q. Hortensius was still a small child.

The earliest explicit connection of Terenti Varrones with Licini Murenae is as fellow members of the Xviral
commission of senatorial legati to advise L. Mummius in the settlement of Greece (Achaia), 146-5 BC, when
they are also associated with Semproni Tuditani and Mummius' command staff, who included his own highly
cultured younger brother Spurius. It is worth quoting Cicero's relevant letters because they reveal a good deal of
information about the care of his prosopographic work when preparing his dialogues, the sources available to
him, and some important information about careers under the lex Villia annalis in the 2nd century.

On the order of these letters see E. Badian “Cicero and the Commission of 146 B.C.”, Collection Latomus 101
(1969), 54-65.

The Decemviri legati to advise L. Mummius, 146-45 BC.

Cicero ad Atticum XIII 30 (Tusculum, 28 May 45)

Will you dig out for me, if you can from anywhere, who the ten legates to Mummius were? Polybius doesn't
name them. I recall Albinus the consular and Sp. Mummius. I seem to have heard of Tuditanus from Hortensius.
But in Libo's Annal Tuditanus became praetor fourteen years after Mummius consul. It really doesn't square. I
want some πολιτικον συλλογον at Olympia, or wherever you will, in the manner of your buddy Dicaearchus.

Torquatus was the (extant) 1st book of de Finibus wherein L. Manlius Torquatus pr.49 (slain at sea in Metellus
Scipio's company after the battle of Thapsus) is represented as spokesman of Epicurean doctrines. Cicero's
philosophical works had begun with the Hortensius, soon followed by Catulus and Lucullus. In each of these
books the chief interlocutors were the three close friends and optimate princes Q. Catulus (cos.78), L. Lucullus
(cos.74) and Q. Hortensius (cos.69). Cicero later decided to revise and couple Catulus and Lucullus as an
account of recent and current Academic (or Peripatetic) philosophy in a new text called Academica, completed at
this time in May 45 BC. But the following month he determined to abandon the idea and write a separate work
in four books called Academica dedicated to the principal interlocutor the polymath M. Terentius Varro. But the
revised editions of Catulus and Lucullus persisted in circulation, with their new prefaces mentioned in the letter
below, sometimes under their own names, sometimes as Academica Prior bks.I and II. The Catulus is lost but
Lucullus survives and is alternatively referred to as Academica Prior II.
 7

ad Atticum XIII 32 (Tusculum, 29 May 45)

(2) Please send me Dicaearchus' two books On the Soul and the volumes of his Descent (I can't find the
Tripoliticus and his Letter to Aristoxenus). I should particularly like those three books at the moment, as they
would be useful for what I have in mind. (3) Torquatus is in Rome. I have sent it to be delivered to you. I think I
sent you Catulus and Lucullus earlier. New prefaces have been added to these books eulogizing them both. I
want you to have these compositions, and there are some other things. You don't quite understand what I wrote to
you about the ten legates, no doubt because I used abbreviations. I was inquiring about C. Tuditanus who, I had
heard from Hortensius, was one of the ten. I see in Libo that he was praetor when P. Popilius and P. Rupilius
<were consuls> [132R]. How could he have been a legate fourteen years before he became praetor? - unless he
became praetor very late, which I do not think likely as he seems to have gained the curules magistracies at the
legally permitted years (legitimis annis) without the least difficulty. As for Postumius, whose statue at the
Isthmus you say you remember, I did not know that he was <Aulus>. That is, the man who was <consul> with
<L.> Lucullus [151R]. I owe to you a highly appropriate accession to my conference. So please see about the
others if you can, so that my personae may add to the general éclat.
(transl. D. R. Shackleton-Bailey, with minor changes)

ad Atticum XIII 33 (Tusculum, 2 Jun 45)

(2) [. . .] I have received Dicaearchus' book and am awaiting the Descent. (3) [..loc.desp..] should you give him
the task, he will find out from the book in which the Resolutions are preserved when Cn. Cornelius and L.
<Mummius> were consuls. As for your thoughts about Tuditanus, since he was at Corinth (Hortensius indeed
did not comment carelessly),¹ yours is a good contribution that he was either quaestor <or> tribune of soldiers,
and the latter I suppose for preference. You will be able to find out from Antiochus. Also look into the year when
<Spurius> was quaestor or tribune of soldiers. If neither works then whether he was one of the praefecti or
contubernales, or indeed took part in that war.

¹ Q. Hortensius Hortalus the orator (cos.69). His almost photographic memory is referred to in the opening of the
Lucullus (s.2: Habuit [L. Lucullus] enim divinam quandam memoriam rerum, verborum maiorem Hortensius,
sed quo plus in negotiis gerendis res quam verba prosunt, hoc erat memoria illa praestantior, etc.). However,
Hortensius was also Cicero's chief informant regarding the Fannii (another family of relatives of the Iunii Bruti
and Servilii Caepiones) and the details he published in the extant Brutus on Hortensius' authority were partly in
error, albeit in an unusually difficult and complex confusion over contemporary homonyms (cf. ad Att.XII 5B,
June 45 BC), which took a lot of sorting out (and still does!).

ad Atticum XIII 5 (Tusculum, ca.3 Jun 45)

I had thought that Sp. Mummius was one of the ten legati, but of course (a good contribution indeed) he was one
to his brother. He was definitely at Corinth. I have sent you Torquatus.

ad Atticum XIII 6 (Tusculum, ca.4 Jun 45)

I have never heard of the Tuditanus you speak of, Hortensius' great grandfather, and I thought that his
son was the legate, which at that time he could not have been. I feel sure that Mummius [i. e. Spurius] was at
Corinth. Our contemporary, the late Spurius, used to recite to me letters in elegant verse sent to his friends from
Corinth. But I do not doubt that he was legate to his brother, not one of the ten. Indeed I have been told that it
was not the custom in the old days to appoint relatives of the commanders in the field to such legations, in the
way that we in our ignorance, or rather neglect, of those superb regulations sent M. Lucullus, L. Murena and
other of his closest connections to L. Lucullus. And it is eminently logical that Spurius should have been one of
his brother's principal legates. What a busy life you have of it! You attend to this sort of thing, you arrange my
affairs for me, and you are almost as conscientious about your own business as you are about mine!
(transl. D. R. Shackleton-Bailey, with minor changes)
 8

The Latin text of XIII 6:

Tuditanum istum proavum Hortensi plane non noram et filium qui tum non potuerat esse legatus fuisse
putaram. Mummium fuisse ad Corinthum pro certo habeo. Saepe enim hic Spurius, qui nuper est, epistulas mihi
pronuntiabat versiculis facetis ad familiaris missas a Corintho. Sed non dubito quin fratri fuerit legatus non in
decem. Atque hoc etiam accepi, non solitos maiores nostros eos legare in decem qui essent imperatorum
necessarii, ut nos ignari pulcherrimorum institutorum aut neglegentes potius M. Lucullum et L. Murenam et
ceteros coniunctissimos ad L. Lucullum misimus. Illudque ευλογωτατον illum fratri in primis eius legatis
fuisse. O operam tuam multam qui et haec cures et mea expedias et sis in tuis non multo minus diligens quam in
meis!

It is surely no accident that Cicero cites the recent example of the ten legati sent to L. Lucullus in this context.
Several other provinces were annexed during Cicero's term in the Senate (e. g. Bithynia and Cyrenaica in 74,
Crete in 66-5). But the Xviri to Mummius included many of the families in the Lucullan orbit.
This text is also the nearest thing we have to a statement of the relationship between L. Murena (cos.62)
and L. Lucullus (cos.74) under whom he served as legatus during the Third Mithradatic War (Cicero pro L.
Murena passim, Plutarch Lucullus 15, 19, 25, 27, etc.). Unfortunately the precise connection is not given because
Atticus knew it very well. But it may safely be deduced that Murena was son of a sister of Lucullus, first because
of the closeness of their relationship, next because other men close enough to be termed coniunctissimi are not
named, while only Murena and the frater germanus M. Lucullus are. In this context a nephew is far the most
plausible solution, and this matches the generational chronology anchored independently in the dates of public
offices very well (i. e. L. Lucullus and his brother and sister were between one and two decades older than L.
Murena and his).

ad Atticum XIII 4 (Tusculum, 5 Jun 45)

I have your carefully researched gift of the ten legati: and I certainly think <the same about Tuditanus>. Because
his son was quaestor in the year after Mummius was consul.

So two of the ten legati sent to Mummius emerge from Cicero's exchange with Atticus:
A. Postumius Albinus cos.151
C. Sempronius Tuditanus [pr.ca.160],
father of the homonymous cos.129 (also q.145, pr.132), great-grandfather of Q. Hortensius (cos.69).

A group of inscriptions from Olympia associated with L. Mummius cos. attest the same two names, and add two
more.
Dittenberger & Purgold, eds., Ins.von Olympia nos.320-324 (“Five blocks from the Bekrönung[crowning
work?] of a large pedestal of grey limestone”, found 1878 in the Byzantine east wall, south of the terrace wall of
the Temple of Zeus, thought to be a 1st century CE reconstruction)

ΛΕΥΚΙΟΣ ΜΟΜΜΙΟΣ Ο ΥΠΑΤΟΣ (320)

[Α]ΥΛΟΣ ΠΟΣΤΟΥΜΙΟΣ ΑΛΒΕΙΝΟΣ (322)
Λ. ΛΙΚΙΝΙΟΣ ΜΟΥΡΗΝΑΣ (321)
Γ. ΣΕΜΠΡΩΝΙΟΣ ΤΥΡΤΑΝΟΣ (323)
Α.ΤΕΡΕΝΤΙΟΣ [ΟΥΑΡΡΩΝ] (324)

L. Licinius Murena was probably proavus of the cos.62, the first of the family to hold senior office in Rome
(pr.ca.150s).
A. Terentius Varro was probably vir quaestorius, grandfather of the praetor 77.
 9

Cicero's brief account of the Licini Murenae (pro L. Murena 15) mentions three successive generations of viri
praetorii before Lucullus' legate managed his consulate in the fourth.
Delivered Nov 63(R) and written out a year or two later, this speech provides contrasting personal and political
opinions compared to after P. Clodius' vicious personal onslaught in winter 59-58 BC. Thus L. Pinarius Natta,
the young pontifex (newest member of the college) who performed the unholy rite of dedicating the site of
Cicero's destroyed urban mansion, is mentioned in glowing terms (Mur. 73: L. Natta, summo loco adulescens,
qui et quo animo iam sit et qualis vir futurus sit videmus). It also contains information about the career of the
defendant's father, in particular his commands and activities in the east during the First and Second Mithridatic
Wars. It attests the father's triumph as concluding a single command extending ex praetura, so that office and
triumph can be securely dated to 88 and 81 respectively (Mur.11-12, 15: pater cum amplissime atque
honestissime ex praetura triumphasset). Cf. also Granius Licinianus (31-32 ed. Flemisch) synchronizing
Murena's triumph “ex Asia” with that of C. Valerius Flaccus “ex Celtiberia et Gallia”.

The Mithridatic Wars are also the next context after the Mummian settlement of Achaia where we find close
association of the Murenae with Terenti Varrones.
L. Licinius Murena pater (pr.88) went east in early 87 as Sulla's principal deputy, along with L. Cornelius
Lentulus (pr.urb.88). Sulla's province was Asia as well as the bellum Mitridaticum supreme command, while the
ex praetura viri pro consule Lentulus and Murena seem to have been assigned the Macedonian and Cilician
commands respectively. But the dramatic events of the Pontic invasions of Asia, Thrace, Macedonia and Greece
involved Sulla and his deputies in drawn out and difficult campaigning before they could resume control of the
lost provinces and even begin to exercise their command powers in their properly allotted spheres.
The situation after they did so is reflected in the extant lower half of a Rhodian statue-base titulus from 83 or 82
BC. In this document a certain Dionysios son of Lysanias commends a name-lost Rhodian benefactor to the
Gods after recounting various (lost) benefactions and public services which conclude with a legation to a series
of Roman officials who constitute the top echelon of the Roman high command in the east subsequent to Sulla's
successful expulsion of the Pontic king and armies from Asia province, and his destruction of the Marian
commander C. Flavius Fimbria and assimilation of his élite army of “Fimbriani” (autumn 85 BC).

SIG ³ 745 = IG XII,1 48 (Rhodes, in Doric Grk.):

[- - - ΠΡΕΣΒΕΥΣΑΝΤΑ - - -]
ΚΑΙ [ΠΟΤΙ] ΛΕΥΚΙΟΝ ΚΟΡΝΗΛΙΟΝ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΥ [Υ]ΙΟ[Ν ΣΥΛΛΑΝ]
ΣΤΡΑΤΑΓΟΝ ΑΝΘΥΠΑΤΟΝ ΡΩΜΑΙΩΝ
ΚΑΙ ΠΟΤΙ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΝ ΚΟΡΝΗΛΙΟΝ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΥ ΥΙΟΝ
ΛΕΝΤΕΛΟΝ ΑΝΘΥΠΑΤΟΝ
ΚΑΙ ΠΟΤΙ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΝ ΛΙΚΙΝΙΟΝ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΥ ΥΙΟΝ ΜΟΥΡΗΝ[ΑΝ]
ΙΜΠΕΡΑΤΟΡΑ ΠΡΟΞΕΝΟΝ ΚΑΙ ΕΥΕΡΓΕΤΑΝ ΤΟΥ ΔΑ[ΜΟΥ]
ΚΑΙ ΠΟΤΙ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΝ ΛΙΚΙΝΙΟΝ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΥ ΥΙΟΝ ΛΕΥΚΟ[ΛΛΟΝ]
ΑΝΤΙΤΑΜΙΑΝ
ΚΑΙ ΠΟΤΙ ΑΥΛΟΝ ΤΕΡΕΝΤΙΟΝ ΑΥΛΟΥ ΥΙΟΝ ΟΥΑΡΡΩΝ[Α]
ΠΡΕΣΒΕΥΤΑΝ ΡΩΜΑΙΩΝ
ΠΡΟΞΕΝΟΝ ΚΑΙ ΕΥΕΡΓΕΤΑΝ ΤΟΥ ΔΑΜΟΥ
ΔΙΟΝΥΣΙΟΣ ΛΥΣΑΝΙΑ
ΕΥΝΟΙΑΣ ΕΝΕΚΑ ΚΑΙ ΕΥΕΡΓΕΣΙΑΣ
ΤΑΣ ΕΙΣ ΑΥΤΟΝ
ΘΕΟΙΣ.
[ΠΛ]ΟΥΤΑΡΧΟ[Σ] ΗΛΙΟΔΩΡΟΥ ΡΟΔΙΟΣ ΕΠΟΙΗΣΕ
 10

Thus five senior Roman commanders:

L. Cornelius L. f. [Sulla] pro cos. and commander in chief
L. Cornelius L. f. Lentulus pro cos.
L. Licinius L. f. Murena imperator, official public guest and benefactor of the Rhodian people
L. Licinius L. f. Lucullus pro quaestore
A. Terentius A. f. Varro legatus of Romans, official public guest and benefactor of the Rhodian people

This is among the latest documents from Asia province and the Aegaean region which still uses the Roman
ethnic and it notably does so only with regard to A. Varro's legatio (the formal title of which was legatus populi
Romani) and in its attempt to express Sulla's overarching command.
Two statue tituli set up by the koinon of the Ainianes at the federal capital Hypata in autumn 88 BC honouring L.
Lucullus as quaestor (SIG ³ 743; AE 1974, 603) are the earliest such records without the ethnic appended to
an official Roman title, and they are soon followed by another from Thespiai in Boiotia (IG IX, 2 613)
honouring the legatus Q. Braetius Sura immediately after he was superseded there by Lucullus (Plutarch Sulla
11.4-5) and sent back north to his commander C. Sentius in Macedonia province for the winter (88-87 BC).
None of the many tituli honoring Lucullus in the east as quaestor and pro quaestore append the ethnic to his title,
so it is evident that it was he (an enthusiastic philhellene, fluent in Greek from youth) who first encouraged
Greek civic authorities to drop the ethnic and treat Romans as fellow Hellenic-speakers. This is an important
issue for dating honorific inscriptions, which can conveniently be divided into those with the ethnic (80s
BC and previously) and those without (80s and subsequently).
In office in 88 and afterwards as privatus vir pro quaestore in the east (87-80 BC) Lucullus is generally thought
to have been Sulla's quaestor. This may be the case in 88 itself but not necessarily so, and was certainly not so
subsequently. In spring 84 when Sulla took the bulk of his army and Lucullus' fleet back to Greece he left
Murena in charge of Asia and Cilicia provinces, with instructions to raise another fleet and assist the Rhodians
tackle piracy and the bandit dynasts infesting the hinterland who had both been significantly sponsored under the
belligerent and predatory administration of the Pontic king (Appian Mith.92). Lucullus remained in Asia
province as acting quaestor to Murena and de facto provincial commander while Murena and his legate A.
Terentius Varro undertook operations in the south by land and sea, before Murena instigated the second war with
Pontus in 83 (the less glamorous campaigning in 84 tends to be neglected, see further below and Cicero Lucullus
2: qui adulescentiam in forensi opera, quaesturae diuturnum tempus Murena bellum in Ponto gerente in Asia
pace consumpserat). Meanwhile L. Manlius Torquatus (the later pr.79) appears as Sulla's acting quaestor striking
coinage for him in Greece (Crawford RRC no.367). There is every reason to suppose that Torquatus (born 119 or
earlier) was also quaestor in 88 and went out east pro quaestore to Sulla in 87, while Lucullus was officially
quaestor to L. Murena during the latter's praetura in 88 and remained officially the senior deputy on his brother-
in-law's command staff until 81 BC when Murena was ordered to return to Rome and replaced in charge of Asia
and Cilicia by the special commander (praetor in office) M. Minucius Thermus. The main additional evidence
reinforcing this proposition is the rebellion of some of the Peloponnesians against Roman hegemony in 88 when
they sided with Archelaos' invasion of Greece (Appian Mith.29, and the Photian epitome of Memnon, ed.Jacoby
FGrH 434 F1.22.10: both mention Lakedaimonians), combined with Plutarch's notice (Lucullus 2.2) that during
the siege of Athens in 87 Sulla sent Lucullus into the Peloponnese to strike coinage, where he minted the silver
currency called Luculleian by the Greeks after him, and with a titulus from Messene in the far SW Peloponnese
honouring Murena, yet again as imperator translitterated as in the Rhodian inscription from several years later.

IG V, 1 1454 (Messene):
[Α Π]ΟΛΙΣ
ΛΕΥΚ[ΙΟ]Ν ΛΙΚΙΝΙΟΝ [Λ]ΕΥΚΙΟΥ
[Υ]Ι[Ο]Ν ΜΟΥΡΗΝΑΝ ΙΜΠΕΡΑΤΟΡΑ
ΤΟΝ ΑΥΤΑΣ ΕΥΕΡΓΕΤΑΝ
 11

Clearly then Plutarch's extreme summarizing and biographic slant has obscured the proper background that in 87
Sulla sent Murena and his brother-in-law acting quaestor south to suppress the pro-Pontic governments in the
Peloponnese, which they rapidly accomplished with the assistance of those remaining pro-Roman, such as
Messene with its ancient tradition of hostility towards Sparta. Murena was evidently first hailed imperator for
these successful operations, and the fines exacted in punishment from the pro-Pontic polities were melted down
and struck as Greek-style coinage by Lucullus, perhaps at Korinth and Argos.
The pressures of events of the Pontic war when the two subordinate commanders, with their own command
staffs and iura imperii, had to spend several years huddled together with Sulla and his army in the same
encampments and military operations, seem to have resulted in a good deal of misunderstanding about the
technical command structure of the time. Some Hellenistic specialists (e. g. Chr. Habicht JRS 65, 1975, 74) have
even thought Murena to have been a legate under Sulla, apparently ignorant of the Roman constitution which
only permitted commanders with their own command rights to be hailed imperator or awarded the triumph.

In winter 82-81 while preparing and then beginning his dictatorship, Sulla organized the despatch of four
special commanders to take over all the more important and largest provinces. These huge agglomerated
commands were apparently designed to last just the one year until the senior magistrates of 81 could complete
their offices in Rome and begin a regular succession of provincial commanders ex consulatu and ex praetura in
80. These stop-gap, specially tasked commanders were carefully chosen and given large élite armies in order to
mop up residual Marian opposition as quickly as possible. C. Annius was sent to Spain to get rid of Sertorius and
given Gallia Transalpina in addition, whence C. Valerius Flaccus (cos.93) was called home after the longest
continuous provincial command in the whole history of the Republic, to have a triumph for various successful
operations against the Gauls, and previously in the highlands of Celtiberia (but above all for refusing to deploy
his veteran army in the civil war on the side of the Marians). Pompeius was sent to Sicily and Africa to take on
Papirius Carbo and Cn. Ahenobarbus, P. Gabinius (pr.89) to Macedonia and Achaia to permit L. Lentulus to
return home. Murena too was summoned home to celebrate a triumph for his successes in the First Mithradatic
War and as a reward for his belated obedience in finally putting a stop to the second one (83-82), begun on his
own initiative and contrary to Sulla's express instructions and likely strategic planning, which presumably
required the east to remain an unencumbered safe-haven in case the civil war in Italy went pear-shaped.
One of the new praetors in office, M. Minucius Thermus, former Marian legate to L. Valerius Flaccus
(cos.suff.86) had apparently defected to Sulla in 85 following Fimbria's assassination of the consul, and was now
sent out to replace Murena in Asia and Cilicia. He was also tasked to besiege Mytilene, whither recalcitrant
Fimbrian officers had fled and lain low, later inciting the local authorities to declare for the Marians (about
summer 83) once the civil war had got underway in Italy and Murena had committed himself to the second
Pontic war. Just to be sure that Thermus remembered which side he was on (Marius' nephew, the creepy young
Caesar whom Sulla had recently and reluctantly pardoned, joined his staff) Sulla instructed Lucullus to remain in
Asia for a further year as Thermus' acting quaestor and to command the sea-borne operations against Mytilene
(Plutarch Lucullus 4.2-3 and Suetonius DIulius 2 deal with the same operations, but neither biographic source
tradition manages to mention the other commander in the joint effort to reduce Mytilene).
L. Murena pater probably died in Rome in 81 BC soon after his triumph, otherwise with Sulla's help and the
éclat of the recent triumph he would surely have gained a consulate. Cicero is explicit that the consulate of the
son was already due the family as owed to the father (Mur. 15: et pater cum amplissime atque honestissime ex
praetura triumphasset, hoc faciliorem huic gradum consulatus adipiscendi reliquit quod is iam patri debitus a
filio petebatur). More than likely Sulla had planned to install him as consul in 80 with Metellus Pius, but with
those plans upset at the eleventh hour by Murena's death late in the year he decided to improvise and take the
other consulate himself - contrary to the old laws recently reinforced by his own leges Corneliae regulating the
cursus honorum, which required a decade between repeated consulates. The likelihood that this was indeed an
improvisation, and that he had just about had enough of imperia when he set the limit of 29 December 81(R) to
his dictatorship, is shown by his refusal to take up the command of Gallia Cisalpina in 79 which was voted to
him during his second consulate according to the normal procedure (cf. Granius Licinianus 32 ed.Flemisch:
Data erat Sullae prov<inci>a Gallia Cisal<pina>).
 12

A. Terentius Varro was probably legatus on L. Murena's staff for the entire period of his eastern command (87-
81), and it was either during this time or in 81 after their return to Rome that he wed Murena's daughter. The
marriage is not on record but may be safely assumed as providing the propinquitas which occasioned the
eventual adoption of Varro's homonymous son by a Murena, who should be C. Murena the aedilis cur.ca.66 and
second son of L. Murena pr.88 (and of the Lucullan Licinia). Oddly A. Varro legatus does not appear anywhere
in the surviving literature on the Mithradatic Wars but is better represented in the contemporary epigraphy than
any other senior officer of the time, with the exception of Sulla and possibly Lucullus (e.g. IGR I 843 = IG XII,8
260; SIG ³ 745 = ILS 8772 = IGR IV 1118; and the bilingual dedication Ins.Délos 1698 = ILS 866 = ILLRP 369
= CIL I² 738) which all give his filiation A. f. in addition to his legatio title. Two of these tituli are remarkably
unusual.

ILS 8773 (round statue base from Selimiye, thought to be taken there from Euromos, Karia) registers his
mother's name and her presence in the east (no doubt among the numerous noble men and women who fled
Rome and Italy during and immediately subsequent to the bellum Octavianum), Paulla Terentia.

[Ο Δ]ΗΜΟΣ
ΠΩΙΛΛΑΝ(sic) ΤΕΡΕΝΤΙΑ[Ν ΑΡ]ΕΤΗΣ
ΚΑΙ ΕΥΝΟΙΑΣ ΕΝΕΚΕΝ ΤΗΣ ΕΙΣ <αυτον>
ΑΥΤΗΝ ΤΕ ΚΑΙ ΤΟΝ ΥΙΟΝ ΑΥΤΗΣ
ΑΥΛΟΝ ΤΕΡΕΝΤΙΟΝ ΑΥΛΟΥ ΥΙΟΝ
ΟΥΑΡΡΩΝΑ ΠΡΕΣΒΕΥΤΗΝ
The bilingual text from Delos appears to be the latest known which includes the Roman ethnic, which is missing
from the statue titulus for his mother, as also from IG XII, 8 260 = IGR I 843 a stele thought to have been set
up at Samothrace. This document lists all the officers, specialist crew and marines who served aboard a
quadrireme (tetreres) from Kos under the ships captain (trierarchos) Kleonikos and the, evidently Rhodian,
admiral (nauarchos) Eudamas. At the very top of the list A. Terentius A. f. Varro legatus appears as commander
of the entire fleet (or perhaps “expedition”): ΤΟΥ ΣΤΟΛΟΥ ΠΑΝΤΟΣ.
In combination with the Rhodian titulus (SIG ³ 745, above) in which he and Murena imperator are singled out
from the other three senior officials as public proxenoi and benefactors of the Rhodian damos, this document
demonstrates that A. Varro was Murena's principal fleet commander in the joint land and sea operations with the
Rhodians in 84. Appian entirely omits these in his account of the Mithradatic Wars (Mith.64ff.), but briefly
alludes to Murena's anti-piracy campaign in the later context of the famous Pompeian bellum Piraticum
(Mith.93. See also Cicero Verr.II i.89-90 on the new fleet Murena was obliged to order built in 84 to combat
piracy: Decem enim navis iussu L. Murenae populus Milesius ex pecunia vectigali populo Romano fecerat, sicut
pro sua quaeque parte Asiae ceterae civitates. [. . .] in ea classe quae contra piratas aedificata sit). In his extant
geography Strabo (XIII 4.17 = 631 ed.Casaubon) briefly alludes to Murena overrunning the Milyas and deposing
the last tyrant of Kibyra, Moagetes. He no doubt covered these events in detail in his (lost) Historiai.
Among the main beneficiaries from these expeditions were the Karians, who set up an unusual number of statues
with honorific tituli in this period. As well as A. Varro and his mother Paulla Terentia the honorands include L.
Murena the commander and his younger son Gaius.

AE 1974, 630 (Kaunos, on a white marble base with cuttings for an equestrian statue)
Ο ΔΗΜΟΣ Ο ΚΑΥΝΙΩΝ ΕΠΑΙΝΕΙ ΚΑΙ ΣΤΕ-
ΦΑΝΟΙ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΝ ΛΙΚΙΝΙΟΝ ΛΕΥΚΙΟΥ
ΥΙΟΝ ΜΟΥΡΗΝΑΝ ΑΥΤΟΚΡΑΤΟΡΑ
ΕΥΕΡΓΕΤΗΝ ΚΑΙ ΣΩΤΗΡΑ ΓΕΓΕΝΗ-
ΜΕΝΟΝ ΤΟΥ ΔΗΜΟΥ ΧΡΥΣΩΙ ΣΤΕΦΑ-
ΝΩΙ ΤΙΜΑΙ ΔΕ ΚΑΙ ΕΙΚΟΝΙ ΧΑΛΚΗΙ ΕΦΙΠΠΩΙ
ΑΡΕΤΗΣ ΕΝΕΚΕΝ ΚΑΙ ΕΥΝΟΙΑΣ ΤΗΣ ΕΙΣ ΕΑΥΤΟΝ
 13

AE 1974, 631 (Kaunos, on a circular white marble base with cuttings for a standing statue)
Ο ΔΗΜΟΣ Ο ΚΑΥΝΙΩΝ ΕΠΑΙΝΕΙ
ΚΑΙ ΣΤΕΦΑΝΟΙ ΓΑΙΟΝ ΛΙΚΙΝΙΟΝ
ΛΕΥΚΙΟΥ ΥΙΟΝ ΜΟΥΡΗΝΑΝ ΕΥΕΡ-
ΓΕΤΗΝ ΚΑΙ ΣΩΤΗΡΑ ΓΕΓΕΝΗΜΕ-
ΝΟΝ ΤΟΥ ΔΗΜΟΥ ΧΡΥΣΩΙ ΣΤΕΦΑΝΩΙ
ΤΙΜΑΙ ΔΕ ΚΑΙ ΕΙΚΟΝΙ ΧΑΛΚΗΙ ΑΡΕΤΗΣ
ΕΝΕΚΕΝ ΚΑΙ ΕΥΝΟΙΑΣ ΤΗΣ ΕΙΣ ΕΑΥΤΟΝ

Probably both sons departed Rome with their father early in 87 and remained with him throughout. Cicero
ignores Gaius and only mentions young Lucius' service to his father at this time, as well as his participation in
the father's eventual triumph (Mur. 11-12). But Gaius' foot-statue erected along with the mounted ikon of their
father, indicates that he was already 15 turning 16 in 87(R) and thus (just) old enough for a position on his
father's staff. Gaius Murena's participation in this long period of eastern service in company with his own
family and his adfinis Aulus Varro is significant to the history of Varrones Murenae, since it was most
likely Gaius who made the son of his father's long-serving legatus his heir by testamentary adoption, thus
creating the name Terentius Varro Murena for the first time (in 47 or 46 BC).

L. Murena pater's legatus in the east A. Terentius Varro (quaestor ca.89 and born ca.119) is the only plausible
candidate for identification with the Terentius Varro prosecuted for extortion from Asia province in 75, and again
the following year (the forename is lost in a lacuna at one locus and by textual corruption at the other).
These dates are fixed by the name of the presiding praetor of the quaestio de repetundis at the second trial, P.
Lentulus Sura (pr.74, cos.71), which should mean a praetura in 77 followed by a one year provincial command
(76-75). The dates of the command year are in turn fixed by the independently dated tenure of Asia province by
Varro's predecessor M. Iunius D. Silanus in 76 BC (Pliny HN II 100 for the spectacular celestial phenomenon
witnessed by the proconsul Silanus and his staff, dated by the consuls, and I.Mylasa 109 = LeBas-Waddington
409 for Silanus' province and full name with filiation).
The retrial was occasioned by a notorious piece of judicial corruption alluded to in passing by Cicero and Horace
and the details appear in the ancient scholia on those authors, above all the Ps.Asconius or Sangallensia
commentary on Cicero's Verrine corpus. This work describes Varro as consobrinus frater of his successful
chief advocate Q. Hortensius orator (p.193 ed.Stangl), i. e. Hortensius' mother was a sister of either Varro's
mother or his father, and both of Varro's parents were Terentii, as revealed by the inscription from Euromos.
There is little to help decide between these two choices, but since there is evidence that the family of Hortensius'
mother remained in equestrian status (see below) while the line of Auli Varrones were consistently senatorial this
reconstruction prefers a resolution making the mothers of Q. Hortensius and A. Varro sorores germanae. It is
also possible, but unlikely, that they were uterine or others types of sisters.

Besides Hortensius' defense at the trial, the prosecutor was young Appius Claudius (97-49, cos.54; Ps.Asconius
193S: Appio Claudio adulescente nobili), who did it collusively. A. Varro's acquittal was organized by his
friends and relatives L. Lucullus and Q. Hortensius. Lucullus (pr.78, cos.74) seems to have held his African
command for the biennium 77-75, returned to Rome the same year as A. Varro from Asia and promptly wed
Appius' youngest sister, not only forgoing a dowry but additionally handing over a significant inheritance of his
own to get the girl. She was surely a girl worth getting, since she is almost certainly the remarkable Claudia of
the Pulchri celebrated as Lesbia in Catullus' extant libellus. The relative poverty of the family at the time
(Appius marked their return to decent circumstances from the inheritance passed on to him by Lucullus, and then
loyally served on his brother-in-law's staff during the Third Mithradatic War) indicates that the recently deceased
Appius pater (cos.79, died campaigning in the Rhodope mountains in 76) had been too honest to profiteer in the
wake of Sulla's civil war victory, when less scrupulous characters like Marcus Crassus and Gaius Curio made
enormous fortunes from the properties of destroyed and murdered political foes.
 14

M. Varro Rust.III 16.1: Appius nobis, “Verum dicit”, inquit. (2) “Nam cum pauper cum duobus fratribus et
duabus sororibus essem relictus, quarum alteram sine dote dedi Lucullo, a quo hereditate me cessa primum et
primus mulsum domi meae bibere coepi ipse, cum interea nihilo minus paene cotidie in convivio omnibus
dare<tur> mulsum.”
The relationship between Appius and A. Varro's family endured. The homonymous eldest son of the praetor 77
(later the first Varro Murena) became one of Appius' closest personal friends (Cicero ad Fam.III 7.4:
familiarissimus).

The intermarriage of Terenti Varrones with Servili Caepiones

is worked out on the basis that the mother of Q. Hortensius orator (cos.69) was a Terentia, sister of Paulla
Terentia the mother of A. Varro pr.77, combined with the evidence of a statue-base titulus from Delos that
Hortensius' son, Q. Hortensius Hortalus pr.45 (Macedonian commander 44) could be described as uncle (theios)
of Caepio Brutus, ILS 9460 = Ins.Délos 1622:

Ο ΔΗΜΟΣ Ο ΑΘΗΝΑΙΩΝ ΚΑΙ ΟΙ ΤΗΝ ΝΗΣΟΝ ΟΙΚΟΥΝΤΕΣ

ΚΟΙΝΤΟΝ ΟΡΤΗΣΙΟΝ ΚΟΙΝΤΟΥ ΥΙΟΝ ΤΟΝ ΘΕΙΟΝ ΚΑΙΠΙΩ-
ΝΟΣ ΔΙΑ ΤΑΣ ΕΞ ΑΥΤΟΥ ΚΑΙΠΙΩΝΟΣ ΕΙΣ ΤΗΝ ΠΟΛΙΝ ΕΥ-
ΕΡΓΕΣΙΑΣ ΑΠΟΛΛΩΝΙ.

Although it is perhaps possible that ΚΑΙΠΙΩΝΟΣ here is vague enough to introduce some uncertainty, and
might be identified as C. Fannius Caepio (the honorand of Ins.Délos 1623), since the document is clear that
Hortensius filius was being honoured not for his own attentions to the Athenians but those of his nephew, it has
always been considered that Caepio Brutus was in a position to confer benefactions on sufficient scale to warrant
honours by proxy for his relatives, but not Fannius Caepio. The fairly trivial benefactions cited in Ins.Délos 1623
support this conclusion.
The traditional solution has been to suppose that the honorand's sister, Hortensia oratrix, was wife of Q. Servilius
Caepio (q.67) the maternal uncle and adoptor of his nephew M. Brutus (e. g. Münzer RA Table 27, Ridley
translation 318). This requires that the informal title of aunt for an uncle's wife (socially realistic enough) could
be extended to confer the title uncle on the wife's brother, which is highly dubious. Otherwise that the adoption
made the aunt-wife the lawful mother, and hence her brother an uncle by law. This may be permissible where a
plenary adoption took place, but in this case many factors converge to indicate that plenary adoption would not
have been proper or permitted, and therefore that it was testamentary (Brutus seems to have been an only son,
plus the way Brutus' birth names continued to be used and even predominate after the adoption, thirdly the
uncle's youth when he died: adulescentes were not normally permitted to make plenary adoptions since they
were considered still willing and able to sire their own sons). This would in turn mean that the adopted man
became the principal heir but not the son of the adoptor, and furthermore that the marriage of the adoptor was
ended (by his death) before the testament appointing his heir even came into effect. For the same reasons I have
already suggested above that the relationship of the Luculli brothers after a testamentary adoption expressed as
M. Varro Lucullus becoming consobrinus of L. Lucullus should best be resolved by supposing that their mother
Caecilia Metella was uterine sister of the M. Varro who adopted M. Lucullus, thereby appointing his nephew as
his heir with the condicio nominis ferendi.
So too in the case of Q. Hortensius filius being called an uncle of Caepio Brutus, it is better to suppose a blood
relationship described loosely than a dubious legalistic propinquitas. Especially since the marriage of Hortensia
oratorix to Q. Caepio is not attested but itself assumed to meet the assumed legalistic criteria. Since the mother
of Q. Caepio (q.67) and his sister Servilia is known to have been Livia of the Drusi, but their paternal
grandmother is not attested (i. e. the wife of Q. Caepio cos.106 pont.max. and mother of Q. Caepio q.urb.100) it
could well be that she was the same woman (Terentia) as the mother of Hortensius orator (and his elder brother
 15

and sister). Such a scenario matches the generational and career chronology of all three families extremely well
(Caepiones, Hortensi, and Varrones). In particular it would set back the putative birthdate of Terentia Hortensi
(as mother of an eldest son L. Hortensius, born ca.119) from the mid 130s BC (which clashes with the birthdate
of her younger uterine sister Caecilia Metella, mother of the Luculli) to the mid 140s because the eldest son of
Q. Caepio cos.106 was urban quaestor 100 and still a iuvenis when slain in battle in early 90 BC and therefore
born 127 and not yet turned 37 at his death.
This would make Q. Hortensius orator uterine brother of Q. Caepio q.100 and their children first cousins, or
fratres patrueles in the Latin. So that Brutus would strictly be second cousin of Q. Hortensius filius, but the latter
as “frater” (really frater patruelis) of Brutus' mother Servilia could be loosely described as Brutus' uncle,
particularly in social parlance where the technical and more complicated terminology of more distant relations
tended to be dropped in favour of simplicity and the appearance of closer relationship than was properly the
case. The context of a civil war (when the Delian titulus was set up, and when the entire future of the Roman
state was at stake, including the welfare and lives of the leading participants), would also tend to favour the use
of such social pleasantries. In his post as Macedonian commander Q. Hortensius filius played an active and
important role in helping to build up his relative Caepio Brutus to a position whence he could seriously
challenge the Caesarian Party's control.
This interpretation of theios on the Delian titulus also works in well with the political career of the urban
quaestor of 100, who was initially extremely close with M. Livius Drusus (tr.pl.91) but later turned bitterly
against him to serve the interests of the ordo equester and its publican chiefs, ultimately an extreme and dramatic
departure from his own father's politics (championing senatorial authority) which Drusus continued to follow.
This personal hatred seems to have arisen initially from a trivial dispute over a beautiful and expensive ring at a
public auction, when some harsh words were exchanged about lineage and the rings symbolic of the ordo
equester. This involved hair-splitting at an advanced level. The Servili Caepiones were as nobilissimi as anyone,
generally speaking. And yet not quite, if you were one of the nobilissimi and interested in all the political and
social nuances stalking about the Roman Olympus. Careful attention to senatorial rankings and precedence
reveals not just a well known differentiation between patres and conscripti, but some residual privileges
reserved for the five patrician Greater Clans. The position of First Lord of the Senate (princeps senatus)
seems to have been the exclusive preserve of the gentes maiores, as witness the remarkable appointment of the
consul in office Aemilius Scaurus in 115, and that of the consular P. Lentulus (cos.suffectus 162) in 125.
Certainly no Servilius ever held the position, including Cn. Servilius Caepio (cos.141) who was so well placed to
advance his own claims when jointly presiding over the lectio senatus as censor in 125. Livius Drusus was of
patrician Aemilian stock, probably in the most senior extant line, and on his immediate maternal side son of a
Cornelia of the Scipiones. Phew! One of the sources which deals with their rivalry expressly reports that Drusus
had the advantage in birth and wealth (Cassius Dio fr.96.2). So on the one hand the family of Caepio's mother
must have been acceptable enough (which means high born and wealthy enough) to marry into an important and
successful patrician family with three successive generations of consuls (soon to be four), yet relatively
insignificant in comparison to the most powerful Aemilian and Cornelian lines of the day, and with long standing
or recent but important integration into the equestrian circles that managed and controlled the imperial-revenues
companies. During the 2nd century only the Auli Varrones descended from the praetor 184 seem to have
maintained a place in the Senate each generation. A line of the consular noble Terenti Varrones which had
remained in equestrian status since the 2nd Punic War fits these parameters required for the wife of Q. Caepio
pontifex maximus very well. It is exactly the milieu in which Cicero found himself a wife, and pursued a
consistent line throughout his political career of favouring nobilitas at every turn while paying serious and
obliging attention to all the interests and concerns of the top echelons of the ordo equester.

The mother of L. Murena cos.62 still alive at the time of his election in 63 (Cic.Mur.88) is not named, so that
Licinia sister of the Luculli brothers living beyond that time is not independently attested but depends upon
identifying her as mother of the cos.62 (see the comments above on Cicero ad Att.XIII 6).
 16

The death of L. Murena cos.62 may be estimated as the year after his consulate because he vanishes from all
record after his consulate. In combination with Cicero's mention of the chronically bad state of his health a
couple of months before he entered the highest office (pro Murena 86: cum corporis morbo tum animi dolore
confecti, L.Murenae.....confectus morbo), this would indicate that he did not live too much longer. It is possible
that he died overseas (e. g. in command of Cilicia province 61-60) but there is no indication of his death in office
nor of any suffectus in 62. It appears that Varro Murena the advocate executed in 22 BC was his son by
Sempronia, and he should have been born in 62 or 61 because the recent family bereavement Cicero alludes to
(in contrast to the nova lamentatio his conviction would cause - Mur.86) is best interpreted as a deceased infant
or failed pregnancy in 64 or 63.

Aelius Sejanus' paternal grandmother Terentia A. f. Seii (ILS 8996, Volsinii) may be identical with Terentia
Maecenatis (Imp. Caesar's long-term girlfriend “Terentilla”), if Maecenas was her second husband. Or she could
equally be that woman's elder sister, or her paternal aunt (younger sister of the cos.23) as here in stemma 1,
which the generational data tends to favour. Sejanus was old enough for a place on the staff of the prince C.
Caesar in 1 CE, and so born ca.20/15 BC. His mother Iunia Blaesa's eldest known child was Sex. Aelius Catus
(cos.4 CE), suitably named by a father prestigious as an historian, as well as in the law (Q. Aelius Tubero the
annalist, born ca.70). Tubero's first wife Sulpicia gains fleeting mention in the pro Murena. Before launching
into one of the clearest and most emphatic demonstrations of the worthlessness of the legal profession one may
have the pleasure of reading in western literature (Mur. 24-29), Cicero began with some gentle mockery of the
insufferable pride taken by Murena's prosecutor, Servius Sulpicius, in his legal expertise.
But sir, since you seem to be slobbering over the legal erudition thing as though over your own little daughter!
et cetera optime (Mur. 23: Et quoniam mihi videris istam scientiam iuris tamquam filiolam osculari tuam). The
little miss who clearly did have some value, in contrast to legal studies, was perhaps five at the time, but at any
rate a few years younger than her future husband. Aelius Catus on the other hand must have arrived in or before
30 BC to conform with the lex Iulia annalis, and his mother Iunia Blaesa, Tubero's second wife after Sulpicia,
some time in the 50s. So too then, or older than her, Iunia's second husband L. Seius Strabo of Volsinii.
Consequently the latter's mother can hardly have been born after 70 BC and Tubero the annalist, and more likely
a few years earlier. This is appropriate enough for a sister of A. Terentius Varro Murena (q.49, cos.23) born about
80 BC as the eldest child of Murena pater's legate and his daughter.

The Varro whose name survives in an inscription from Volsinii was probably a relative of Terentia A. f. Seii,
CIL XI 2800: “--]M[--] / [--]IA[--] / [--]VARRO[--] / [--]ITIMIV[--”

It is interesting and probably significant that the survival is “Varro” rather than Murena. This conforms with the
clear and striking patterns, presented below, of how the two Varrones Murenae are named in the extant sources.

For quite a different arrangement to Stemma 3, above, see Fr. Münzer's chart (RE s. v. Sempronius, nos.89ff.,
cols.1439-40). Münzer does not include P. Sempronius praefectus socium when killed in battle in 194, and does
not connect C. Tuditanus pr.197 to M. Tuditanus cos.240, leaving his paternity unresolved.
Münzer also prefers to create a Sempronia Hortensii (no.100), sister of the imbecile, daughter of the cos.129, and
wife of L. Hortensius pr.111 (cos.des.for 108) to account for the fact that C. Tuditanus Xvir legatus to Mummius
146 was proavus of Q. Hortensius orator (Cicero ad Att.XIII 6, see above). This is possible but perhaps the least
likely solution. Since Hortensius' mother was sister of a Terentia, she was more likely a Terentia herself and it
would be better to trace Hortensius orator's line to his proavus through a Sempronia Hortensii wife of his
grandfather or, better yet, to dispense altogether with the notion of a Sempronia Hortensii, and identify
Hortensius' maternal grandmother as a Sempronia M. Varronis, mother of the M. Varro who adopted M. Varro
Lucullus and (by a second marriage to L. Metellus Calvus in 138) mother of the Caecilia Metella who became
mother of the Luculli brothers. This propinquitas with the Luculli (as well as Servilii Caepiones and Licinii
Murenae) would better help to account for the twists and turns in Hortensius' career and political life, such as
his heading the prosecution of P. Clodius for incestus and treason in 61, to please Lucullus, and subsequently, to
 17

please himself, his collaboration with Clodius (husband of Fulvia, son-in-law of Sempronia, step-son of L.
Murena) in 59-58 to ruin Cicero. In this arrangement the second, Servilian, marriage of L. Lucullus and the
Sempronian marriage of Lucullus' nephew Murena also acquire the context of turning to existing propinqui for
brides.
The array of late 2nd and 1st century aristocrats in stemmata 2 & 3, which constitutes the posterity of C.
Sempronius Tuditanus Xvir legatus 146 (and praetor ca.160), is quite remarkable. While some elements cannot
be proved directly, all parts are consistent with a significant evidential diversity and fit together well in terms of
career and generational chronology. Many interesting issues and nuances will probably continue to emerge when
other material is reviewed with these reconstructions in mind. One which springs to mind now is the evident role
played by propinquitas in Messalla Rufus crossing the threshold of (and viewing the atrium stemma in) the
home of Scipio Pomponianus (cf. Pliny HN XXXV 8), also the considerable use he made in his own religious and
constitutional work de auspiciis of the careful investigations into auspicium and imperium by his earlier
propinquus C. Sempronius Tuditanus cos.129 (cf. Gellius NA XIII 15).

The first Varro Murena (q.49 cos.23), son of A. Terentius Varro praetor 77

Stemmata 1 & 2 illustrate the principal families which produced the Varrones Murenae. It is argued here that
there were two known and significant men named A. Terentius Varro Murena.
The first was born A. Terentius Varro (homonymous eldest son of the pr.77), and appears to have been a nephew
of the brothers Murenae, made principal heir with the condicio nominis ferendi by his maternal uncle C. Licinius
Murena (aed.cur.ca.66, apparently died in 47/46 BC) and subsequently bore the name A. Terentius Varro
Murena, as aed.cur. (ca.45 with L. Trebellius) and consul (23 with Imp. Caesar XI) until his death in the early
weeks of his consulate aged about fifty six. Thus taken by age and the well attested unhealthiness of that year in
Rome, rather than Caesarian malevolence. Profound and active though the latter was, it seems to have been
directed at the other Varro Murena, the consul's much younger frater consobrinus and adopted son.

He is probably the Varro who served under Cicero in the early stages of the latter's Cilician command in 51 BC.
His position on Cicero's staff is not given, but he is referred to as a close friend of Appius Pulcher cos.54 (ad
Fam.III 7.4: Varronem, tuum familiarissimum).

Probably identical with the Varro who struck coinage for Pompeius in 48 BC pro quaestore.

(M. Crawford RRC no.446)

Obv. legend: CN. PISO PRO Q.
Rev. legend: MAGN. PRO COS

(and Crawford RRC no.447)

Obv. legend: VARRO PRO Q.
Rev. legend: MAGN. PRO COS.

The use of the simple cognomen shows similar arrogance to Pompeius' use of MAGN., and is not out of place
among the friends of Appius Claudius. The latter's death in Greece in 49 perhaps contributed to his joining
Caepio Brutus in surrendering to Caesar after Pharsalus. His colleague in striking the Pompeian coinage, Cn.
Piso, is the ferocious Republican of that name who succeeded him as consul in 23 BC.
His quaestura is not on direct record, but he seems to have been invested with some official posting before late
January 49(R) when Cicero in a letter to his personal secretary Tullius Tiro mentions that his friend A. Varro
(amantissimum mei), to whom he had recently recommended Tiro's welfare when he spoke with him (in Italy),
was devoted to Tiro and his well being, and would be in a position to assist and protect him in his return voyage
 18

to Italy (ad Fam.XVI 12, Capua, a. d. IV Kal. Feb. 49R). These details serve to prove that this is the same Varro
who had recently served on Cicero's staff in Cilicia, when the quaestors were Mescennius Rufus (51) followed
by Coelius Caldus (50), and, in conjunction with his title striking the coinage in 48, that he should have been
quaestor in 49 (while 50 remains a technical possibility, he was probably too far from Rome in summer 51 to
have been elected in 51 for 50).
Judging from Cicero's letter to Tiro his initial province as quaestor in 49 was some communications or ports and
coast-guard province in the context of Caesar's invasion of Italy.

In 48(R) he also made himself notable for his involvement in a 12th hr. attempt (with Caesar's legate P. Vatinius)
to open some form of negotiation or conciliation talks between Pompeiani and Caesarians after the troops of
both sides had been fraternizing at the banks of the River Apsus (Caesar BC Memoirs iii.19, naming him as A.
Varro without giving his post as acting quaestor). Caesar scrupulously avoids conceding any tributes to his
enemies, so the mention of Varro's involvement in this fairly honourable attempt to avoid civic blood shed was
probably written after A. Varro had joined Caesar's cause in Italy.

The date of the adoption is established approximately by the above references to the names Varro and A. Varro
down to 48 and by the earliest appearance of the name Varro Murena, in a letter of recommendation from
Cicero to Servius Sulpicius pro cos. in Achaea in 46 BC (ad Fam.XIII 22). It was written in favour of T.
Manlius, a businessman resident at Thespiai in Boeotia: a friend of Cicero but more so of "Varro Murena" who
was writing his own letter of recommendation to Servius but wanted Cicero to send one too, so that Cicero felt
obliged: me quidem cum Manli familiaritas tum Varronis studium commovit.
Since Cicero calls him first Varro Murena then simply Varro a few lines later, it seems clear that he was a
Terentius Varro adopted by, or principal heir of, a Murena. Just as Caepio Brutus continued to be named, for
preference, Brutus after a similar testamentary adoption two decades earlier.

This letter to Servius, combined with the one to Tiro and A. Varro's service under Cicero in Cilicia strongly
suggest that Cicero's wife Terentia was a close relative of A. Varro, perhaps a younger cousin (soror patruelis)
of his father the pr.77. Also Terentia Ciceronis seems too closely coeval to her “sister” Fabia the Vestal and
Fabius Maximus Sanga to have been a uterine sister and was perhaps rather a first cousin.
Fabius Sanga (aed.cur.55, cos.suff.45) was born about 92, with his spendthrift father disinherited by the urban
praetor in 91 upon petition from relatives and presumably in favour of his new son. These relatives probably
included Terentia's branch of the Varrones. Terentia married Cicero in 77 or 76 after his return from his eastern
tour of Greece and Asia province, and their first child Tullia was born about 75. But there is room for error
here, and Terentia may have been born as early as 100/95.
It is annoying that Terentia's family and lineage remain unrecorded, but typical of the patchy and quirky nature
of the extant evidence in general, even with so much of it deriving from Cicero himself. A great deal of
important social information is missing, and so lost to us, from the private correspondence because it is too
intimate from the historical perspective, which is to say a great deal of interest and importance to us was too well
known to the correspondents to require stating.
From the same social circle belongs the admiration of one of Appius' sisters Claudiae for Cicero and her attempt
to supplant Terentia as his wife during his consulate (Plutarch Cicero 29). This was probably the youngest,
Claudia Quinta Luculli, who had been divorced by her husband for adultery and incest upon his return to Rome
from the east in 66 (Claudia Tertia Regis is called “Tertia” rather than Claudia by Plutarch in the same passage,
and she was still married until her husband's death in 61. Likewise Claudia Quarta Metelli's marriage endured
until her husband's death at the beginning of 59).
Another complicating issue is the families and adoption, or not, which created the name of Cicero's cousin (and
C. Murena's colleague as aed.cur.ca.66) C. Visellius Varro of the Quirina tribe. The original family of Terentii
Varrones were Sabine without a doubt (like the patrician Claudi, cf. the unusual, i. e. non-Latin origin,
cognomina Varro and Nero) but entered the full Roman citizenship much later than the Claudii and so remained
 19

in the main Sabine tribe of Quirina (no doubt from when the ius suffragi ferendi was granted to the Sabines en
bloc in the consulate of Appius Claudius Russus: and probably by Russus in an effort to secure Sabine support
for his attempted monarchic coup d'état).
The Viselli Varrones are examined in some detail by D. R. Shackleton-Bailey in Two Studies in Roman
Nomenclature (American Classical Studies monograph no.3, American Philological Association, New York,
1976) pages viii + 135, non vidi, reviewed in good detail by G. V. Sumner CP 73 (1978) 159-64.

Aedilitas curulis with the name Varro Murena is attested epigraphically,

CIL VI 1324 = CIL I ² 2514 = ILLRP 704 = ILS 6075 (Rome):
Varro Murena / L. Trebellius aed.cur. / locum dederunt / L. Hostilius L. l(ibertus) / Philargurus / A.
Pomponius / A. l. Gentius / A. Fabricius / A. l. Buccio / M. Fuficius / (mulieris) l(ibertus) Aria /
mag(istri) veici / faciund(um) coer(averunt) / ex p(ondo) L

Consul alter with Imp. Caesar XI prior, AVC 730 = 23(R).

The extant notice of Varro Murena's office, death and replacement in the fasti Capitolini reads as follows on
three successive lines (Degrassi 1963: 58-59):
A. T[erentius -f. - n. Var]RO MVREN[a]
[in mag. mortuus] EST IN E.L.F.E. (= in eius locum factus est)
[Cn. Calpurni]VS CN.F. CN.N. PI[so]

Degrassi supplements the lacuna on the second line as “in mag(istratu) damn(atus)”, which is constitutionally
impossible since no holder of command rights could be indicted or coerced. Arguably it was possible under the
monarchy, but it is not on record in any other case and as a constitutional first (and enormity) must have caused a
sensation and been noted in the extant records because Cassius Dio's full annalistic text is extant. Instead Dio
does not even mention his consulate (indicating he died in the first few weeks of his year), while the summary
arrest and execution of the other Varro Murena appears more than a year later in Dio's text, and without the name
Varro Murena or any indication that he held office at the time.
He certainly held office because he is attested in office independently and epigraphically, CIL IV 5192
(Pompeii): AVG(usto) [xi] TERENT[i]O MVR.COS.

The prevailing opinion of modern scholarship that the consul of 23 and the advocate executed more than a year
later were the same man and that Dio put the trial of M. Primus and the conspiracy of Fannius Caepio in the
wrong year (and the wrong book of his history) faces the most serious evidential obstacles and is difficult to take
seriously. It is certainly an oddity that the cos.23 is missing from all other fasti except the Capitolini, including
the index of consuls to Cassius Dio's 53rd book, which pairs Augustus XI with Cn. Piso. But Varro Murena's
presence in the fasti Capitolini rules out any possibility that his name was suppressed by the regime as the
murdered conspirator of 22 BC, while the simplest and most obvious constitutional explanation, that he died
designatus before assuming office, is refuted by the inscription from Pompeii.

Two other tituli recording patrocinia in Nearer Spain and the Cyrenaica are attributable to him although the
second is so heavily restored that it could belong to any of the Murenae, while the first could equally be
attributed to the second Varro Murena as this first.
 20

A bilingual dedication in his honour by clients from Cyrene, found at Lanuvium (patria of the Licinii Murenae)
ILS 897 = CIL XIV 2109 = IG XIV 1122:
A.TERENTIO A.F.VARR.
MVRENAE
PTOLEMAIEI CYRENENS.
PATRONO
ΔΙΑ ΠΡΕΣΒΕΥΤΩΝ
ΙΤΘΑΛΛΑΜΜ<ω>ΝΟΣ ΤΟΥ ΑΠΕΛΛΑ
ΣΙΜΩΝΟΣ ΤΟΥ ΣΙΜΩΝΟΣ

These Cyrenaian clients were perhaps gained through intimate involvement in the affairs of L. Lucullus and
Appius Pulcher, both of whom had unusually close connections with Kyrene, the latter through his uncle Caius
(the cos.92). On the other hand this document could apply to services in the (Antonian) Cyrenaic province
during the 30s BC, in which case it would better be attributed to the second Varro Murena, who seems to have
been an Antonian who lost his property through confiscation after Actium.

AE 1990, 660b (Emporiae, Hispan.citerior)

[A.Terentio A. f.] / [Varr.] MV[renae] / [p]ATR[ono]

The three fratres Proculeius, Murena and Scipio.

Following the sudden death of his son-in-law and heir M. Marcellus in the unhealthy year of 23 BC, Imp. Caesar
took his time in the search for his daughter's next husband. Perhaps to underline the new political solidarity
between the two upper Orders (as instruments of his house and rule in equal measure), he initially wished to give
her to a Horseman and considered influential counsellors like Gaius Proculeius who kept strictly out of the lime-
light. In time he changed his mind and gave her to his most important and sycophantic deputies, first Agrippa
and later Tiberius Nero (Tacitus Ann.IV 40). But the old idea died hard (Suetonius DAug.63):
When Agrippa had also died, after carefully and for a long time considering many marriage arrangements, even
in the Equestrian Order, he chose his step-son Tiberius.

Horace addressed the 2nd Ode in bk.II to one of the Caesar's most important advisers, Sallustius Crispus.
Immediately after this dedication he sings the praise of Sallustius' fellow eques in the imperial privy council
(lines 5-8):

vivet extento Proculeius aevo

notus in fratres animi paterni;
illum aget penna metuente solvi
Fama superstes.

The association of Proculeius and Sallustius in Horace's mind may well reflect ties closer and more personal than
secure places in the decision making council of the Caesarian state. They may have been relatives, very probably
they shared business interests and the concerns of patronizing the arts. Perhaps they were great friends.
In lieu of any firm evidence in this direction we are at least told of Proculeius' place in the society of the nobility.
This is in the ancient scholia on line 5 of Horace' carmen (the first line above).
 21

Porphyrion' commentary notes (ed.Hauthal):

Proculeius, a Roman Horseman, friend of Augustus, possessed the dearest piety for his brothers Scipio and
Murena - to such an extent as to have divided his own property with them in equal parts because they had been
despoiled in civil war.

The Pseudo-Acron varies little:

He is praising the Roman Horseman Proculeius, friend of Augustus, who was so pious in regard to his brothers
Scipio and Murena as to divide with them, despoiled in civil war, his own patrimony afresh, which he had
already divided with them before.

This makes it clear, and no surprise, that it was great wealth which gave the Proculei admittance to the society of
the Scipiones and Murenae. But how were these men, from three different clans, brothers?
Susan Treggiari justly observes (in her paper on Varrones Murenae, Phoenix 27, 1973, 254):
"Fratres could mean cousins, half-brothers, or full brothers adopted into other families, or any combination of
these."
That's not all. While Proculeius was brother of the other two, Scipio and Murena were not necessarily brothers.
But it is better to start with a simple model, modifying it as evidence indicates, than to fail to begin through
despair at the overgrowth of possibilities. The simplest explanation of their three different clans is that all three
were uterine brothers. Three different marriages for one lady is well within the bounds set by Domitius Corbulo's
mother Vistilia and her six husbands, and her children by all six. It is also possible, although a little difficult to
make such a model work, in the context of the known successive marriage of Sempronia Tuditani filia to first a
Pinarius, then M. Fulvius of Tusculum (during which marriage her father died and made Fulvius his principal
heir) and then L. Licinius Murena cos.62. Five marriages might be organized thus, with her own birth around 98
BC to allow her sufficient youth and health to bear her youngest son Scipio in the early/mid fifties (she is
attested alive as late as Annius Milo's trial in 52):

Pinarius ca.83-81 (proscribed?)

M. Fulvius ca.80-72
Proculeius ca.70-67
L.Murena 66/5-ca.61
Scipio or Pomponius in the 50s

However the brevity of the Proculeian marriage seems a little forced, and since she did not have any brothers
who survived their father, the details of the father's testament don't make much sense if she were an only child.
So it is better to suppose that she had a younger sister who was the mother of Proculeius and Scipio as well.
Thus Proculeius and Scipio would be uterine brothers, and fratres consobrini of the son of Sempronia maior and
L. Murena. Proculeius was evidently the eldest of the three brothers, and certainly the richest. He first appears in
a significant role during the Sicilian war against Sextus Pompeius in 36 BC (Pliny HN VII 138), and so should
have been born in the decade 75/65 BC, perhaps five or so years older than the self-Augustified Caesar.
Treggiari interprets Acron to mean that Scipio and Murena were twice on the losing side, and twice despoiled by
civil war. But he does not say this and Porphyrion omits the earlier property division altogether. So it is probably
better to suppose that Proculeius received a vast inheritance and gave substantial shares of this to his brothers,
that subsequently Scipio and Murena were ruined by wholesale confiscations after one civil war and Proculeius
then intervened to make the grand equal division of his property which made his generosity famous and paternal
like. Most likely Scipio and Murena were partisans of Antonius, ruined by the Actium War, in the wake of
which the Caesar was obliged to discharge an enormous number of veteran troops, and the property of wealthy
Antoniani must have been circled in red among the first round of essential confiscations. Even as it was he kept
too many legions in the permanent standing army of the new monarchy (30 to start with), and in consequence a
permanent expense which was beyond the resources of the empire to sustain and quickly bankrupted it.
 22

One of the main points to emerge from the relations of the three brothers is their number. While the Varrones
Murenae consul in 23 BC and advocate of Primus in 22 were certainly two different men, they cannot have been
fratres in such a way that both were fratres of Proculeius and Scipio. Most likely they were first cousins of
dramatically different birth dates occasioned by the youthful marriage of Licinia (paternal aunt of the advocate)
to the father of the cos.23, and the middle aged marriage and paternity of L. Murena cos.62 the father of the
advocate. So that they were fratres through shared blood of the Licinii Murenae, while it was the common
Sempronian mothers of Murena the advocate, Proculeius and Scipio which defined their fraternity to the
exclusion of the cos.23.

Husbands and children of Sempronia maior, and of her daughter Fulvia P. Clodii

Fulvia M. f. was successively wife of P. Clodius (d.53), C. Curio (d.49) and M. Antonius – Cicero Philip.II 11,
113, also (more obliquely) V 11: mulier sibi felicior quam viris.
She was the daughter of M. Fulvius of Tusculum (Cic.Philip.II 90, III 16) and of Sempronia daughter of the
crazy C. Sempronius Tuditanus (Cic.Philip.III 16). This Tuditanus died without sons in the 70s BC and left his
son-in-law Fulvius as his principal heir, a testament challenged by his nearest gentile relatives the Semproni
Longi, but confirmed by the Centumviral court (see below).

The pontifex who dedicated Cicero's Palatine mansion on behalf of P. Clodius in early 58 BC was L. Pinarius
Natta, the newest member of the college, who had not yet held public office (Cicero dom.sua 118: quis erat
minus peritus quam is qui paucis illis diebus in conlegium venerat?). The family was patrician (cf.Cic.Mur.73:
L.Natta, summo loco adulescens), and Pinarius was frater of Clodius' wife of Jan 58(R) (Cic.dom.sua 118), i. e.
of Sempronia's daughter Fulvia M.f.

Nb. Natta's co-option to the college in Jan 58(R), further defines the terminus ante quem for the decease of P.
Mucius Scaevola pontifex (son of the cos.95 pont.max.), which must have been in or before 59 BC, thus closer
than ever to the similar sudden decease of Metellus Celer (both probably murdered by Pompeius Magnus for
turning against him after his divorce of Mucia Tertia in winter 62-1).

Sempronia and Fulvia were wont to act together, in Clodius' behalf. Both gave their plaintive testimonies against
Annius Milo on the second last day of his trial (a. d. VII Id. Apr.) in 52(R), Asconius 45G: Ultimae testimonium
dixerunt Sempronia Tuditani filia, socrus P. Clodii, et uxor Fulvia, et fletu suo magnopere eos qui assistebant
commoverunt. And Pinarius Natta's dedication of Cicero's house was not something the young man did
exclusively, or even primarily, at the behest of Clodius: soror rogavit mater coegit, insists Cicero (dom.sua 118).
Therefore Pinarius was uterine brother of Fulvia and the eldest of Sempronia's children, born ca.82 BC.

As consul-designate in late 63 L. Murena was step-father of Pinarius (Cic.Mur.73: eius vitrico, cf.dom.sua 134),
and when Clodius went to Gallia on Murena's staff in 64 they were adfines (Cicero dom.sua 117-18, 134). More
specifically, Murena was step-father of Clodius' wife (Cicero har.resp.42). This puts the marriage of Clodius and
Fulvia in 66/65 (shortly after Clodius' return from the east with his brother-in-law Q. Marcius Rex pro cos.), and
pushes her date of birth back to ca.80/79.
So it looks like Sempronia's first husband Pinarius perished in the civil wars and she wed Fulvius of Tusculum
soon after the year of Sulla's dictatorship, a marriage which lasted a decade or so (possibly as long as 81-66).
Thus Lucius Murena was the late, third, husband of Sempronia maior.

Cicero's vague reference to Murena's recent bereavement (Mur. 86, recent to Nov 63) probably refers to the death
of an infant child by Sempronia, so that the homonymous son should have been born 62 or 61, perhaps even
posthumously. In pro L. Murena Cicero already refers to Murena's health as shattered by illness (86: confectus
morbo), and he probably died in 61, if not in the last weeks of his consulate.
 23

M. Fulvius of Tusculum is called Bambalio (“Stammerer”) by Cicero (Philip.II 90: per obsidem puerum
nobilem, M. Bambalionis nepotem, III 16: tuae coniugis bonae feminae, locupletis quidem certe Bambalio
quidem pater, homo nullo numero) in conspicuously derisive references when his daughter Fulvia was Antonius'
wife, and so was a hostile nickname at best, not a formal cognomen. The great houses of Fulvii Flacci and
Nobiliores persisted, mainly in equestrian status, into the 1st cent. BC to provide duces for opposing bands of
thugs in the streets of Rome in the 50s. M. Fulvius Nobilior was convicted on an uncertain charge in late 54 BC
(Cicero ad Att.IV 18), perhaps for murder (as seems likeliest from context). But it is also possible that he had
held public office in 55 (or even 56) and was tried on charges relating to maladministration, in which case he
would have to have been born in the 90s or 80s. While Q. (Fulvius) Flaccus was a gangster chief who supported
Annius Milo against Clodius in 57 (Cicero ad Att.IV 3). Even so, Fulvia's father cannot have belonged to the
Nobiliores or Flacci because Cicero could not have described one of their descendants, even the father-in-law of
his enemy, as a man of no rank (homo nullo numero). Indeed he represents Antonius objecting to this with a tacit
acknowledgment, appealing instead to the nobility of his wife's grandfather Tuditanus (Philipp.III 16: At avus
nobilis!, etc.), for which there was no need if her father been a nobilissimus Flaccus or Nobilior.

Valerius Max.VII 8.1 (on testaments which remained valid despite reasons they could have been rescinded):
How certain, how notorious even, was the insanity of Tuditanus! - to the extent that he scattered coins among the
populace, made a spectacle of himself in the market-place by dragging his toga about like a tragic custome, amid
roars of laughter from the by-standers, and did many other similar things. In his testament he appointed Fulvius
his heir, which Ti. Longus, closest to him by blood, attempted in vain to overturn in the Spear-Court (hastae
iudicio). For the Hundred Men decided that more consideration should be accorded what had been written in the
tablets than to the man who had written them.

Fulvius' name in this passage (acc. Fulvium) is an emendation by Perizonius. The best mss. have filium while
u.filiam (= aut filiam?) was written in the margin of one of them from the epitome by Julius Paris. Lipsius
wanted “Ofilium”. Perizonius' change must stand for the following reasons:
a) a son (filium of the mss.) cannot be right because his inheritance rights would be above any challenge;
b) a daughter (filiam) of a wealthy family could only inherit minor portions of any estate e lege Voconia (not
more than 25,000 denarii worth), except for a Vestal or a daughter who was a sole child, in which case she could
inherit the lot. But Sempronia Pinari probably had at least one other sister (see below),
c) both son and daughter would have been far closer “by blood” than the next closest agnate kinsman
Sempronius Longus.

Also at issue is the actual judgment of the Centumviri. Inheritance disputes were usually settled by the urban
praetor and only referred to The Hundred when the circumstances were especially difficult (or the praetor was
overburdened with cases). In other words, while everyone knew about Tuditanus' insanity (and this was
sufficient grounds for overturning any testament) his bequest must have been typical of a sane man: in the
absence of a son or of any other male Tuditanus he appointed his son-in-law M. Fulvius as principal heir - his
closest living male relative, although adfinis rather than agnate or cognate.

The Semproni Longi would have challenged the will on the grounds of insanity rendering Tuditanus effectively
intestate, in which case property devolved on the clan or the nearest clan relatives. Fulvius must have argued that
the will was composed in more lucid moments since its obvious intent was to benefit Tuditanus' grandchildren
(through his daughter).
So, this last male Tuditanus seems to have died in the mid-late 70s BC when his elder daughter was already in
her second marriage, and it emerges that the Tuditani and Longi had the most recent common ancestor of the
many noble Sempronia clan ramifications. This re-emergence of the Semproni Longi puts them in similar light
as the Fulvian consular families - no consul since the 190s and evidently languishing in equestrian status (or
only minor senatorial positions) since the 2nd century.
 24

Tuditanus presumably by-passed his eldest grandchild, L. Pinarius Natta, because the latter had already inherited
from his father, while Fulvius was the current son-in-law. Also as eldest child of Sempronia Pinari, Natta would
not have been overlooked among de facto beneficiaries of the bequest, so that all in all this was the best means
of passing his property on to his posterity by his eldest daughter.
The only loser was the younger daughter Sempronia and her children, but e lege Voconia multiple daughters
could only inherit small portions of a large estate (to a value of HS 100, 000 each), and all the rest would default
to the nearest clan relatives. Besides, the requisite younger daughter Sempronia Proculei had probably not
married or produced children yet, whereas Sempronia Pinari had at least two already, Pinarius Natta and Fulvia.
The stories of C. Proculeius' generosity in twice dividing his property among his two fratres have no meaning
unless he was heir to a very substantial fortune. So that assuming the younger daughter had already been
betrothed to Proculeius pater but was as yet a few years too young to marry, she and her potential children had
been amply provided for already, and although Fulvius of Tusculum was probably quite well-to-do, it is unlikely
that he enjoyed wealth on a similar level as the Proculeii, before the Tuditane inheritance.

L. Murena and P. Clodius both returned to Rome from the eastern wars in 66 BC. Murena had distinguished
himself as a soldier but was otherwise untrustworthy and apparently something of crook, while Clodius was in
deep trouble, having stirred up mutiny in Lucullus' army before fleeing to Antioch and, after a brief period of
captivity in pirate hands, had joined the army of another brother-in-law, Q. Marcius Rex, in Cilicia.
He was thus guilty of desertion and high treason (not in any technical fashion but in the midst of a dangerous
war in face of the enemy, further from home than Roman arms had yet been carried) - approximately the most
serious crimes on the books of the day. Then there was the little matter of his incestuous relations with his sisters
to harden the resolve of their husbands, and sundry interested persons and politicians. It appears that Cicero's
adfinis Fabius Maximus Sanga was committed to an adulterous connection with Claudia Metelli, and quite as
offended as any husband at having to share his girl with her brother (cf. Cic.ad Att.II 1.5). Although Clodius had
probably done the worst of what he did at the instigation of (and with promises of protection from) Pompeius
Magnus (husband of his soror consobrina Mucia Tertia), the latter remained in the East to complete the
Mithradatic War (66-63) while Lucullus also returned home in 66 BC.
Thus upon his own return Clodius needed protection from the powerful Luculli brothers, and fast. His marriage
to the daughter of Murena's domineering wife Sempronia must be seen in this light. The relative chronology is
not certain, whether Clodius married Fulvia after Sempronia's 3rd wedding, or Sempronia only after her daughter
precisely to protect her ambitious and daring new son-in-law. In any case the point was evidently to mollify
Lucullan anger through the services of L. Lucullus' influential nephew, and Clodius did not content himself with
a nominal connection but actively cultivated Murena. Nor did he hang about Rome making his bad smell worse.
He served abroad again very quickly, on Murena's staff when the latter commanded Gallia post praeturam (64-3),
and was planning another sojourn in the provinces as quaestor in 61. The marriage strategy seems to have
worked until his uncontrollable appetite for misadventure got the better of him once again. In the winter of 62-1,
he entered the Regia in his finest saffron drag, during the Bona Dea rites, to have a fiddle with the wife of the
pontifex maximus. Lucullus put his foot down and pulled all his weight. Which outweighed even all the
advantages of Clodius' Sempronian connections. Hortensius organized a full blow capital prosecution in an ad
hoc criminal trial for incestus and treason. From the Lucullan point of view the wait had been worth it. Owing
to the seriousness of the religious transgression, a conviction would probably not have been commuted to exile
as was normally the case. Caesar the pontifex maximus would probably have been obliged to flog Clodius to
death in public view in the comitium. The eventual acquittal through the vigorous defense of Gaius Curio pater
and en masse bribery of the judges by Marcus Crassus was the first step in a new round of political intrigue
which culminated in the establishment of the Gang of Three some eighteen months later.

Clodius and Fulvia had at least two children,

Claudia the first (if nominal) wife of the young Caesar, and Publius filius. Publius was probably not Pulcher
Claudius (despite T. P. Wiseman, HSCP 74 [1970], 207-221), who is better identified with Appius Claudius
“maior” (Caius natus) the eldest son of C. Pulcher pr.56 adopted by his uncle Appius (cos.54). Nevertheless his
 25

degenerate life and death, and his parentage, is explicit in a passage of Valerius Maximus (III 5.3), while the
titulus on an alabaster vase from Egypt gives his full filiation and official career (ILS 882 = CIL VI 1282):
P. CLAVDIVS P. F. AP. N. AP. PRON. PVLCHER Q. QVAESITOR PR. AVGVR

As step-daughter of M. Antonius Triumvir, Claudia was married to the young Octavian Caesar sometime in 42
but quickly divorced, without the marriage's consummation, at the outbreak of the Perusine War (Suet.DAug.62,
Plutarch Antonius 20). It is generally presumed that the marriage was not consummated because the girl was too
young - therefore born ca.54 shortly before her father's death. Publius filius may have been born in 64 or any
time 62/55 (Clodius was away on Murena's staff in Gallia in 64-63) and most likely got his augurate and praetura
in the 30s under the triumvirs, with the praetura close to the year of Actium.

Fulvia and C. Curio filius had a son

despite the brevity of their marriage (51-49) ended by Curio's defeat and death fighting King Iuba in Africa. This
boy was born 50/49, remained in Antonius' household after his mother's third marriage, and was executed by the
Caesar in Egypt in 30 (Cassius Dio LI 2.5), apparently ending the consular family of Scriboni Curiones.
However late in Antonius' reign young C. Curio was married to Memmia C. f. of the newly consular Menenian
Memmii (JHS 1954, 89 nos.23-24, from Kaunos). Their betrothal was probably arranged by Antonius and C.
Memmius cos.suff.34 around the time of the latter's consulate. The two families were already closely tied
propinqui. It is possible that the couple produced a son or daughter before the young husband's death.

Fulvia and M. Antonius the Triumvir

were married in the longest and last year of the old calendar (46), and had at least two sons, Antullus (45-30),
executed with his elder uterine brother Curio, and Iullus Antonius (43-2 BC) who was still a child in the year of
the invasion of Egypt and so spared the fate of his adult brothers.
Fulvia died at Sikyon in the Peloponnese in 40 BC while fleeing Italy for Athens, on her way to join her husband
in the east after losing the Perusine War (Plutarch Antonius 30). Because Antonius' next wife was the Caesar's
sister Octavia minor, and Iullus, barely three when his mother died, had mostly been raised in his step-mother's
house, he was treated well under the monarchy and eventually granted all the senior offices right up to the
consulate (10 BC). His step-mother died the same year, removing his greatest support in the inner court circle,
and subsequently he got into serious trouble joining the gay circle of party-goers which gathered around the
Caesar's electric daughter Julia, especially after her morose husband Tiberius Nero departed the scene into
voluntary exile at Rhodes in 6 BC. When the storm broke four years later the Caesar's ballistic rage at
discovering the number of men enjoying his daughter focused on the most senior of her lovers, but above all on
Iullus, who took his own life to evade execution, or worse, and was written off as a model ingrate towards the
generous ruler (the comments of Velleius, II 100, probably faithfully reproduce the official version). However
whether Iullus was directly involved or not, Julia seems to have been up to something rash, and serious. The
ruler's banishment of her, an only child he had previously doted upon, and refusal to pardon her in subsequent
years, which grew long before his death (15 in all), are strong indications of the Caesar's conviction that she and
her lovers had been plotting his downfall, and that it was based on solid evidence (cf. Pliny HN VII 149,
recounting the misfortunes of the long life and reign: adulterium filiae et consilia parricidae palam facta).

The second Varro Murena, L. Licinius Murena natus

Probably L. Licinius Murena (62/1-22 BC), late born son and heir of the homonymous cos.62 by Sempronia of
the Tuditani, uterine brother of L. Pinarius Natta pontifex (died 56 BC) and Fulvia P. Clodii by his mother's
earlier marriages, and frater consobrinus of his mother's sister's sons C. Proculeius and Scipio Pomponianus.
Little is known of him apart from his relatives and controversial advocacy of M. Primus in 22 BC, implication in
Fannius Caepio's subsequent conspiracy the same year and execution without proper trial, apparently in
retribution for the bold and even harsh language he had been prepared to use in public against the Caesar at
 26

Primus' trial. Just as the first Varro Murena was A. Terentius Varro by birth, and was sometimes called simply
“Varro” in reflection of that original and more familiar name, the same applies in reverse to the second man to
bear the name, who is called Varro Murena only in two passages of Suetonius but everywhere else “Murena”,
“Licinius” or “Licinius Murena”.

Cassius Dio (LIV 3), who fails to mention the cos.23 altogether, has Λικινιος Μουρηνα once and simply
Μουρηνα for the rest of his account of the trial of Marcus Primus and the conspiracy of 22 BC.

Strabo (Geogr.XIV 5.4) has Μουρηνα when recounting his flight from Rome in company with the Peripatetic
philosopher Athenaios.

Horace dedicated one Ode to a Licinius (Carm.II 10) and mentioned the augurate of a Murena in another (III
19), both from the mid 20s. And in the well known account of the trip from Rome to Brundisium in 38 or 37 BC
(Satura I 5) the band of friends stayed at Murena's house in Formiae (l.38: Murena praebente domum, Capitone
culinam). Capito was Fonteius Capito, the one man omitted in Livy's account of the journey according to the
scholium on Horace. He was close to Antonius but also the Claudii, whose connections Antonius largely
inherited through his third wife Fulvia. Others in the company included Maecenas, Cocceius Nerva, and the
poets Plotius, Varius, Vergil. It is also worth mentioning the Jew Apella who pops up near the end as a type of
the religiously gullible (l.100). Same name and possibly the same man, or perhaps his father or uncle, appears in
the filiation of one the envoys from Kyrene (ILS 897, above p.20), while the name of the other, Simon son of
Simon, was patently Jewish.

The scholia on Horace, already quoted above, similarly employ the simple and bare “Murena”.

Velleius Paterculus (II 91.2) initially calls the alleged conspirator “L. Murena”, and then simply “Murena”. This
is of particular importance in attesting a forename at variance with A. Terentius.

Cicero mentions “Murena” without gentilicum or forename in ad Att.XI 13.1 (47R), and ad Att.XIII 50 (Sextilis
45R), in the latter as the owner of an elaborate house or villa at Alsium on the Tuscan coast.

It is only in Suetonius, twice, that the name Varro Murena is applied to the advocate and alleged conspirator.
DAug.19.1: coniurationesque . . . Lepidi iuvenis, deinde Varronis Murenae et Fanni Caepionis, etc.

Tiberius 8, in the formal context of the (kangaroo court) trial of Fannius Caepio:
Civilium officiorum rudimentis regem Archelaum, Trallianos et Thessalos, varia quosque de causa, Augusto
cognoscente defendit; pro Laodicenis Thyatirenis Chiis terrae motu afflictis opemque implorantibus senatum
deprecatus est; Fannium Caepionem qui cum Varrone Murena in Augustum conspiraverat, reum maiestatis apud
iudices fecit et condemnavit. Interque haec dulpicem curam administravit annonae, quae artior inciderat, et
repurgandorum tota Italia ergastulorum, quorum domini in invidiam venerant quasi exceptos supprimerent non
solum viatores sed et quos sacramenti metus ad eius modi latebras compulisset.

However Suetonius also has the simple Murena form common everywhere else;
DAug. 56.4: Unum omnino e reorum numero ac ne eum quidem nisi precibus eripuit, exorato coram iudicibus
accusatore, Castricium, per quem de coniuratione Murenae cognoverat.

DAug.66.3: Desideravit enim nonnumquam, ne de pluribus referam, et M. Agrippae patientiam et Maecenatis

taciturnitatem, cum ille ex levi <f>rigoris suspicione et quod Marcellus sibi anteferretur, Mytilenas se relictis
omnibus contulisset, et hic secretum de comperta Murenae coniuratione uxori Terentiae prodidisset.
 27

L. Licinius Murena was evidently the name of birth, and throughout his life until near the end, so that when
writing of events of that year authors (especially contemporary authors who knew him much longer and better as
Lucius Murena) preferred those names. Most likely he was adopted plenary by his frater patruelis A. Terentius
Varro Murena in 25/24 BC shortly before the latter's consulate and death. By a plenary adoption he would have
become, in legal terms, the brother of Terentilla (Terentia Maecenatis), who was evidently his second cousin by
birth (daughter of his first cousin).

He could be the non-consular “Varro” who was in charge of Syria province in ca.23 BC (Josephus Arch.XV 345)
presumably as a legatus of Agrippa pro cos. the titular Syrian commander resident at Mytilene 23-21 BC. But
this man could equally be a Visellius Varro, and he corresponded directly with the Caesar despite a likely
technical subordination to Agrippa.

The modern tradition which identifies Varro Murena the consul with Varro Murena the advocate (and
perforce must re-date the trial of M. Primus and the subsequent conspiracy to early 23 BC when the consul died
in office) overlooks a number of anomalies which refute the notion. Above all it necessarily repositions the trial
and conspiracy before the death of the son-in-law nephew M. Marcellus (autumn 23), which it is not easy to
reconcile with the course of events, especially the non-appearance of Marcellus at the trial of Primus (because he
was dead), and the Caesar's initial preference to replace Marcellus as Julia's husband with C. Proculeius. It is
quite clear that the ultimate decision against Proculeius and in favour of Agrippa was taken as a result of the
trials in 22 BC, which also cost Maecenas his position of influence and trust in the inner court. The modern
tradition requires that Proculeius became the preferred candidate for son-in-law only after the trials and
execution of his frater Murena for conspiracy. Unacceptable on its own, and further compromised by removing
the reason for the shelving of Proculeius as son-in-law. Fortunately for its proponents and supporters this sort of
historical rewrite can be done in journal articles and isolated there from the broader context and sequence of
events. Not the only situation to challenge modern scepticism regarding traditional narrative history and
preference for thematic analysis. What if good analysis which looks fine in isolation produces nonsense when
attempts are made to integrate the results into a coherent narrative? (a warning for the way genealogical studies
are done as much as any other topic).

Cassius Dio liv.3 (under 22 BC, first year of bk.54)

Although in these measures he showed himself, in form as well as in name, both law-giver and arbitrary ruler, in
his behaviour generally he was moderate, to such a degree, in fact, that he even stood by some of his friends
when their official conduct was under investigation. (2) And when a certain Marcus Primus was accused of
having made war upon the Odrysae while he was governor of Macedonia, and declared at one moment that he
had done it with the approval of Augustus and at another with that of Marcellus, Augustus came of his own
accord to the court-room; and upon being asked by the praetor whether he had instructed the man to make war,
he denied it. (3) And when the advocate of Primus, Licinius Murena, in the course of some rather
disrespectful remarks that he made to him, enquired: "What are you doing here, and who summoned you?"
Augustus merely replied: "The public weal." ¹
For this he received praise from the people of good sense and was even given the right to convene the Senate as
often as he pleased; but some of the others despised him. (4) At all events, not a few voted for the acquittal of
Primus,² and others formed a plot against Augustus. Fannius Caepio was the instigator of it, but others also
joined with him. Even Murena was reported to be in the conspiracy, whether truly or by way of calumny, ³ since
he was immoderate and unrestrained in his outspokenness toward all alike. (5) These men did not stand trial,
and so were convicted by default, on the supposition that they intended to flee; and a little later they were slain.
Murena found neither Proculeius, his brother, nor Maecenas, his sister's husband, of any avail to save him,
though these men were most highly honoured by Augustus. (6) And inasmuch as some of the jurymen voted to
acquit even these conspirators, the emperor made a law that in trials at which the defendant was not present
 28

the vote should not be taken secretly and the defendant should be convicted only by a unanimous vote.⁴ Now
that he took these measures, not in anger, but as really conducive to the public good, he gave very strong proof;
(7) at any rate, when Caepio's father freed one of the two slaves who had accompanied his son in his flight
because this slave had wished to defend his young master when he met with death, but in the case of the second
slave, who had deserted his son, led him through the midst of the Forum with an inscription making known the
reason why he was to be put to death, and afterwards crucified him, the emperor was not vexed. (8) Indeed, he
would have allayed all the criticism of those who were not pleased with what had been done, had he not gone
further and permitted sacrifices to be both voted and offered as for a victory.⁵
(transl. E. Cary, Loeb edition of Cassius Dio, Vol.VI, 1917)

¹ In Latin: res publica. The phrase was ambiguous from the beginning. During the period of the free state (also
res publica) the standard phrases e re publica and rei publicae causa had meant in, or for, the public interest.

² The issue seems to have been whether he had campaigned against a Roman ally with or without permission
from the Caesar. He evidently believed that he did have such permission, having received it from Marcellus (his
friend, possibly relative if he was M. Atius Primus) after Agrippa's departure for Mytilene, in circumstances now
unknown but in which he had no particular reason to doubt Marcellus' word (perhaps taking one side in a messy
internal dynastic war among the Odrysae). The Caesar's personal testimony refuted his defense politically and
legally but by no means subverted the moral element that he genuinely thought that he had received authentic
permission, which created enough ambiguity for a good number of the judges to acquit. The key to a full
understanding of the case would probably lie in the motivation for the prosecution in the first place, which was
probably instigated by Agrippa from Mytilene in spring 22 when Primus returned home, after an exchange of
letters with the Caesar during the winter of 23-22 concerning events in the east and including nearby Macedonia
and Thrace under the command of Marcellus' man.
In any case the trial makes much better sense in 22 BC after Marcellus' death, aimed at destroying a man who
had been appointed at Marcellus' behest (Macedonia was normally a province for consular commanders, which
Primus was not) and undertaken operations in coordination with Marcellus rather than the Caesar, or Agrippa.

³ Clear evidence of a widely held belief that Murena was framed, i. e. as a trial of Agrippa's new strength, against
that of Murena's supporters Proculeius (hitherto the prospective son-in-law) and Maecenas.

⁴ During the free state all trials other than for domestic violations of the patria potestas had to be held in public,
and the presence of the defendant at his own trial was a fundamental civic right. The reported generosity over
trivia helps to disguise the seriousness of what had been taken away. The pervasiveness of the tyranny is evident
from the beginning.

⁵ I. e. formal days of supplicatio (thanksgiving) at the city temples, previously voted by the Senate in celebration
of military victory or some other significant public achievement. This ugly grey area of supplicationes for the
victors in internal civic strife was first edged into when the Senate voted them for the suppression of the
Catilinarian conspiracy in December 63(R).

Macrobius Saturn.I 11.21 (recounting stories of slaves who saved the lives of their masters):
Then there is the story of Caepio. He had been minded to kill Augustus, and, after the discovery of his crime and
his subsequent condemnation, he was conveyed by a slave to the Tiber in a chest, taken to Ostia, and brought
thence by night to his father's country house near Laurentum. Later, when the pair were ship-wrecked at Cumae,
the slave hid Caepio secretly at Naples; and when captured by a centurion, neither bribes nor threats could
induce him to betray his fugitive master.
 29

Murena's flight, in the company of his friend the Peripatetic philosopher Athenaios of (Kilikian) Seleukeia, is
mentioned in Strabo's Geography (XIV 5.4 = 670 ed. Casaubon).

Although Dio's account is a little unclear, it appears that after Murena and Athenaios were arrested and brought
back to Rome, Murena was summarily executed while Fannius Caepio was formally tried (with young Ti. Nero
prosecuting) but not allowed to appear in person. Presumably because the evidence against Fannius was clear
enough for exhibition in a piece of public political theatre, while Murena's involvement was a bogus concoction,
based on so little (the evidence of a Castricius) and nothing of substance.

Events of 23-21 BC are a little complicated by overlapping events and court intrigues, and by uncertainty over
several matters which are reported differently. Thus for example Agrippa's departure from Rome in 23 BC, and
subsequent two years at Mytilene with the face-saving proconsular rank and a titular command of Syria, is
represented as his own choice in two subtly diverging traditions (Dio and Suetonius) while a third openly calls it
a “shameful banishment” (Pliny HN VII 149: pudenda Agrippae ablegatio). Dio's more official account of
Agrippa's profound modesty and desire to avoid further conflict with Marcellus mirrors Tiberius' later
reinterpretation of the motivation behind his own departure to Rhodes (from a desire to avoid conflict or even
competition with the adopted grandsons Caius and Lucius Caesares), and may be dismissed. It is possible to
reconcile the more realistic versions in Suetonius and Pliny, namely that Agrippa initially lost his temper over
disputes with Marcellus and the Caesar's refusal to openly back him against the youth's inexperience (but strong
will), and left Rome in a huff, but that subsequently after cooling down and beginning to worry about his future,
the Caesar refused to let him return, so that the self-imposed exile did become a form of banishment which was
not concluded until events surrounding the Fannius Caepio conspiracy made his services indispensable once
more.
It would be a long bow to suppose that Agrippa inspired the conspiracy since Fannius appears to have been an
enthusiastic young Republican, eager to emulate Caepio Brutus' tyrannicide, and with close ties to the families
related to Scribonia and the Libones, whose fortunes were on the rise. But there is good reason to suppose that
Agrippa engineered co-ordinated attacks on the friends and court faction of Marcellus after his death, including
the trial of Primus, which developed into a serious contest for influence with Maecenas and Proculeius.

These events developed one from another in the course of 23-22 BC. Agrippa was probably doomed until it was
discovered (or manufactured in the fashion of Castrician testimony?) that Marcellus had made vows or votary
offerings contrary to the Caesar's interests, perhaps praying for his death during his most serious illnesses (cf.
Pliny HN VII 149: tot seditiones militum, tot anticipes morbi corporis, suspecta Marcelli vota, pudenda
Agrippae ablegatio).

But there seems to have been a wider and earlier struggle of wills going on at the court between the Caesar and
his wife, apparently dating from his first serious illnesses in Spain, which repeated with greatest severity in
Rome in spring and early summer 23 BC. Livia Drusilla may have been suspected of, or caught out (by
Maecenas or Proculeius?) making perhaps too rapid and too detailed plans for the future in case of the Caesar's
premature death, to the advantage of her sons and at the expense of Julia and her betrothed Marcellus. Perhaps
she directly sounded and even consulted the chief privy councilors (Maecenas, Agrippa, Sallustius,
Proculeius, Statilius Taurus) looking for support. In any case beginning with Varro Murena and his successors in
23 BC (Cn. Piso and Sestius Quirinalis), the Caesar seems to have instituted a new policy of promoting
abnormally old candidates to the consulate which endured until at least 18 BC. They were either closely
tied or related to the family of Scribonia (including some vigorous and recalcitrant Republicans, like Piso and
Sestius) or old Caesarians hitherto considered insufficiently committed to the cause to have deserved the highest
offices. That is, insufficiently close to or approved of by Livia Drusilla. Both types of men were similar only in
their alienation from the evil empress, and could be relied upon now to look to the interests of Julia and her
children in any succession strife with Livia and her children. It became his insurance policy to make sure that
such men were holding the chief office and executive powers each year, and explains why during his own most
 30

serious and apparently fatal illness he divided the key symbols and documents of power between Agrippa and
the consul Gnaeus Piso (Dio LIII 30). Varro Murena had been first in line for this division of authority, but he
died early in the year from the same unhealthy season (combined with advanced age) which almost destroyed the
Caesar, and did kill the nephew son-in-law later in the year. Varro Murena was probably an old Caesarian aedilis
ca.45, and perhaps a former Antonian out of favour with Livia.

Other elderly consuls in the period 23-18 BC are:

Cn. Calpurnius Piso cos.suff.23 (q.49, born 80),

L. Sestius Quirinalis cos.suff.23 (q.44/43, born ca.75, devoted to the memory of Brutus),

M. Marcellus Aeserninus cos.22 (q.48, born ca.79, old Caesarian, relative of Lentuli Marcellini),

L. Arruntius cos.22 (proscript 43 – Appian R.Em.IV 46, so probably already vir quaestorius or older, born 80/74.
There is also evidence he was the third husband of Fausta, born 85, so most likely born 85/80. The Arruntii
father and son who were both proscribed and perished, Appian R.Em.IV 21, were probably his brother and
nephew, born ca.80 and 60 BC respectively),

Q. Lepidus Barbula cos.21 (son of a consul 45 years earlier, Manius, so almost certainly elderly, as observed by
Syme, Aristocracy 43. Also an Antonian officer at Philippi and commander at Actium, Appian R.Em.IV 49, so
certainly born in the period 75/65. His mother Cornelia could well be a younger sister of P.Marcellinus q.75 and
Gnaeus cos.56, born early 90s, or a sister of Cn. and P. Scipiones, the grandsons of P. Scipio cos.111)

M. Lollius pr.25 cos.21 (proscript 43 when serving as an officer under Brutus and later consul with “Barbula”,
Appian R.Em.IV 49, so either a young military tribune like Horace and Cicero filius, both born 65, and Messalla
Corvinus, born 64, or a little older. Most likely born in 65 and aged sixty-four when he went to the east as rector
to C. Caesar in 1 CE, dying there in 2 or 3)

Q. Lucretius Vespillo cos.19 (Another proscript 43 and son of the homonymous advocate and lawyer proscribed
by Sulla in winter 82-1, so born 81 or earlier: Cicero Brutus 178, Appian R.Em.IV 44. Appian is explicit that he
later held a consulate),

C. Sentius Saturninus cos.19 (old enough for passive role in orgy for the magistrates of 52R, Val.Max.IX 1.8, so
at least 13 or 14 and born 65 or earlier, more likely ca.70: probably a nephew of, but at any rate certainly closely
related to Scribonia's mother, Julia's grandmother, Sentia Libonis),

P. Lentulus Marcellinus cos.18 (q.48, born 80/79, old Caesarian and first cousin of Scribonia's children by her
second husband Cn. Lentulus Marcellinus cos.56: Cn. Marcellinus filius and Cornelia Paulli Lepidi, the uterine
brother and sister of Julia. Only possible adoptor of P. Dolabella tr.pl.47, cos.suff.44, born 79).

There were 15 consuls in this sexennium, including suffecti, one of whom was the Caesar, so of the remaining
14, the ten abnormally elderly ones (including Varro Murena) make a two-thirds majority.
Of the four who might have been young or normal aged (43 or younger, in a period when it was already possible
to hold a consulate as young as 32 turning 33), one was the Caesar's nephew, M. Appuleius cos.20, no likely
adherent of the rights of Livia's sons.
Cn. Lentulus L.f. cos.18 was probably grandson of Lentulus Clodianus and born about 65/60 BC, so quite
possibly consul at 42 turning 43 in office. There is very little to date the births of P. Silius Nerva (cos.20) or M.
Vinicius (cos.suff.19), so that they too may belong to the elderly category. Perhaps none and probably only the
monarch's nephew were in the more youthful age group (32-41) permitted by the new rules of the lex Iulia
annalis.
 31

The new policy of keeping the chief executive in the hands of princes at least unattached to Livia and for
preference related to Scribonia and Julia, is probably the context in which one of the two praefecti urbi when
the consuls were absent from the urbs during the Feriae Latinae in 23 was a youngster reported as younger than
an adulescens by Cassius Dio (LIII 33). Younger than the whole range of adulescentia would mean a child,
which cannot be right. Dio probably meant that one of the praefecti was still an extreme youth
(adulescentulus, younger than 27), i. e. Julia's elder uterine brother Cn. Lentulus Marcellinus (born about
49 BC to Scribonia and the cos.56 shortly before the latter's death).
The Latin Festival was held abnormally late this year too (CIL VI 2014, fragment of the fasti of the feriae
Latinae): late June or early July rather than the normal late April or early May. The same source indicates that
the delay was occasioned by the Caesar's illness. While still ill he appears to have been conveyed to the Alban
hills and abdicated from his eleventh consulate soon after, requiring another suffectus to partner Piso. The man
chosen was Lucius Sestius, former quaestor of Caepio Brutus, who persisted still in elaborate devotions to the
latter's memory (Dio LIII 32.3-4). Thus a consular pairing with strong Republican credentials who presided
over the Senate's voting of the constitutional basis for the self-Augustifier's monarchy in July or August: the
tribunicia potestas (and sacrosanctity) for life, and a specially defined form of proconsulate, also in perpetuity,
which really amounted to a supernumerary consulate for life (see Dio LIII 32.5). This was clever politics indeed.

Nb. this perpetual proconsulate marks the beginning of the special quaestorian province quaestor Caesaris, first
held in 23 by Tiberius Nero, who had began the year as a traditional quaestor consulis to Imp. Caesar cos.XI.
Cf. E. Badian “The Quaestorship of Tiberius Nero”, Mnemosyne 27.2 (1974), 160-172.

To the same period as the constitutional and legalistic redefinition of the monarchy belongs the falling out
between Agrippa and the son-in-law Marcellus, and Agrippa's departure to Mytilene. It was probably during the
Caesar's illness that Marcellus had given Marcus Primus authorization to attack the Odrysae. In any case at the
death-bed allocation of powers to Agrippa and Cn. Piso the assembled party men and leading public officials
were surprised that he had failed to mention Marcellus or nominate a successor (Dio LIII 30).
But upon recovering Imp. Caesar learned that this preference extended to Agrippa had turned Marcellus against
the latter. Desiring to avoid conflict between the two, we are told, he arranged for a special proconsular Syrian
command for Agrippa. The standard summarizing Caesarian history explains how Agrippa left at once for the
East but did not fulfill his mission, and attributes this to an excess of modesty or tact. Dio LIII 32.1:
And Agrippa straightway set out from the city, but did not reach Syria; instead, acting with even more than his
usual moderation, he sent his lieutenants thither, and tarried himself in Lesbos. (E. Cary translation).

The ascendancy of Maecenas and Proculeius belongs to the six months or so between Marcellus' death in autumn
23 and the trial of Primus. This is the period when Proculeius emerged as the favoured candidate as Julia's next
husband (Tacitus Ann.IV 40). The interests of Agrippa and Livia began to converge. The Primus trial and stories
of Marcellus' prayers were probably their doing. But the evil empress could not avoid suspicions which were
perhaps becoming legitimized by the Caesar's consular policy, which reeked of suspicion and was persisted with
well beyond the crises of 23-22 BC. Dio LIII 33.4:
Livia, now, was accused of having caused the death of Marcellus, because he had been preferred before her sons;
but the justice of this suspicion became a matter of controversy by reason of the character both of that year and
of the year following, which proved so unhealthful that great numbers perished during them.
(E. Cary translation)

Old Messalla Rufus might have lived on to die amid the general malaise in 23 BC, his eightieth year. Depending
upon whether his 55-years as an augur are deemed to have begun with the Sullan dispensation of 81 (before his
sister married Sulla) or, more likely, in 78 in succession to the vacated augurate of the deceased brother-in-law.
 32

Meanwhile Agrippa was being watched, perhaps even prohibited from moving on to Syria from Mytilene. The
trusted nephew M. Appuleius cos.20 was a younger brother. The elder was Sextus cos.29. The command years
for Asia province (effectively summer to summer) were decided early in the calendar year, with the new
proconsuls generally leaving Rome in the spring. It can be estimated that the first ever biennium of an Asian
proconsul under the new regime was decided upon in January 22 BC during the period of Agrippa's continuing
banishment and before the trial of Marcus Primus.
Many theories concerning Cornelia Paulli Lepidi (Propertius IV 11) and P. Scipio cos.16 as children of P.
Cornelius the cos.suffectus 35 (attested by fragments of the fasti of the vicorum magistri since the 1930s), have
collapsed under the weight of fasti fragments found at Tauromenion (AE 1988, 626 = AE 1991, 894 = AE 1996,
788), revealing that the suffectus of 35 was a Dolabella.
Consequences include identifying this man with the Asian commander P. Cornelius Dolabella (IGR iv.422 =
OGIS 451, Pergamon) who presided over an unusually difficult murder trial of a woman of Smyrna, which he
passed on to the Council of the Areopagus in Athens (Val.Max.VIII 1,amb.2, Gellius NA XII 7 with forename
Cn., and Ammianus Marcellinus XXIX 2.19). Previously this proconsul has, largely tralaticiously, been
identified with P. Dolabella the urban praetor 69 (RE s. v. Cornelius 140), thus assigned Asia province for the
command year 68-67 BC (e. g. MRR 2.139, 142; Dittenberger the OGIS editor, citing Waddington; Cagnat the
IGR editor citing Waddington, Dittenberger, and Münzer's article in RE).

However the formulation of the statue-base titulus from Pergamon is typically Augustan, lacking filiation and
ethnic, and with the definite article preceding the command title (in the accusative: ΤΟΝ ΑΝΘΥΠΑΤΟΝ = the
proconsul), so the discovery of the Augustan consular with the same name removes all justification for persisting
with the anomalous attribution of the inscription to the 60s BC. Questions also arise about the date Lucullus was
replaced in Asia province during the Third Mithradatic War (cf. Cassius Dio XXXVI 2.2), and the identity of his
successor, who should probably be the L. Quinctius attested as praetor in 68, identified simply enough with the
L. Quinctius L. f. Rufus pro cos. recorded by an inscription from Tenos (IG XII, 5 924).
In any case, we now have the full list of the first nine commanders of Asia province under the monarchy, in
order of their consulates (not necessarily strictly followed);

30-29 C. Norbanus Flaccus (cos.38)

29-28 P. Cornelius Dolabella (cos.suff.35)
28-27 M. Herennius Picens (cos.suff.34)
27-26 L. Volcacius Tullus (cos.33)
26-25 L. Vinicius M. f. (cos.suff.33)
25-24 M. Valerius Messalla (Barbatus) (cos.suff.32)
24-23 M. Tullius Cicero (cos.suff.30)
23-21 Sex. Appuleius (cos.29)
21-19 Potitus Valerius Messalla (cos.suff.29)

The biennia of Sextus Appuleius and Potitus Messalla are both attested epigraphically (inscriptions from Klaros
and Rome, respectively). They would appear to have been successive, and covered the periods when Agrippa
was resident on Lesbos as Syrian proconsul, and the subsequent two years of Imp. Caesar's travels about the
eastern provinces.
This sheds further light on Agrippa's position at the time. Sex. Appuleius was Julia's cousin. The first granting
of a command extension in Asia at precisely this time in favour of the nephew Sextus was surely related to the
purpose of keeping Agrippa under close and reliable supervision.
Evidently nothing untoward was discovered, and the Caesar became convinced that it was Marcellus who had
exceeded his authority, and perhaps worse. He decided to allow Primus to be brought to trial, and was
presumably shocked by the violence and liberty of the language used against him by the younger Varro Murena.
 33

A few months later the conspiracy of Fannius Caepio was detected, inspired in part by the result of the Primus
trial and the discontent it fostered. Probably not any seriously planned coup d'état rather than an assassination
attempt. Agrippa was not well placed to have done the detective work. There may have been a further active
hand in all this, deciding that his own interests and influence would be better served in combination with
Agrippa, if that was the price of bringing down Maecenas and Proculeius. All that was needed to connect the
dots for a big broom to sweep through the privy council was the implication of the hot-headed Varro Murena,
beloved frater of Proculeius, frater of Maecenas' wife, in the Fannian conspiracy. It was probably Sallustius
Crispus who introduced Castricius to the Caesar with a well drilled, concocted story.

The slaying of Varro Murena was harsh, and more than enough as a demonstration. There was no need to push
the removal of Proculeius and Maecenas from power any further. There was too much personal history there
anyhow. Imp. Caesar owed his life to both of them separately, and perhaps more than once. Besides he still
couldn't keep his hands off the great beauty Terentilla and as late as 16 BC, when she was probably past forty,
took her away to Gallia (Dio LIV 19) while leaving Livia in Rome. That was the year that the youngest frater
of the younger Varro Murena held the consulate, P. Scipio Pomponianus, in partnership with the formidable
young Lucius Domitius. The latter turned into one of the most important generals of the regime, holding the
fort in the years of Tiberius Nero's desertion, and pushing Roman arms as far into Germania as they were ever to
reach, out beyond the other side in fact, across the Elbe where a nice trophy was erected. Meanwhile Scipio,
with the less impressive adoptive agnomen revealing his true ancestry elided from the fasti, joined hands with
Iullus Antonius in giving Julia filia perhaps the best time in her life (6-2 BC). She had earned it too after fifteen
grueling years bound fast in wedlock with her father's repellent chief lieutenants, also the chief supporters of
Livia Drusilla, one in succession to the other.

It would be worth knowing whether the noted occasion when Marcus Cicero filius the consular threw a goblet in
Agrippa's face was in connection with the campaign to destroy Primus and his advocate Murena and the
supporters of the deceased Marcellus. Like his eminent family before him, the young Marcellus had been an
admirer of Ciceronian literature and rhetoric. But high culture was not a special requirement at the new court,
especially after 22 BC. The next year Agrippa was triumphantly recalled from Lesbos to take charge of the urbs,
and to marry Julia (Dio LIV 6).