Flavius Anicius Olybrius was a Roman politician. He was appointed to the post of

consul Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states throug ...

for the year 526, which he held without a colleague.

Biography

Olybrius, most certainly a westerner, was a member of the prestigious Anicius family. Following his tenure as consul, which was recognised both in the East and in the West, he held the rank of '' patricius''. He was in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

when the Ostrogothic king Totila captured the city. Olybrius,

Anicius Maximus (Anicius) Maximus (died 552) was a Roman senator and patrician during the Ostrogothic kingdom, who celebrated the last games in the Flavian Amphitheater. Biography Maximus was a descendant of Roman emperor Petronius Maximus, and of the noble An ...

(who had been consul in 523), Rufius Gennadius Probus Orestes (who had been consul in 530) and other ''patricii'' sought refuge in Old St. Peter's Basilica. Captured and sent to

Campania Campania (, also , , , ) is an administrative Regions of Italy, region of Italy; most of it is in the south-western portion of the Italian peninsula (with the Tyrrhenian Sea to its west), but it also includes the small Phlegraean Islands and the i ...

, he was still there when

Narses , image=Narses.jpg , image_size=250 , caption=Man traditionally identified as Narses, from the mosaic depicting Justinian and his entourage in the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna , birth_date=478 or 480 , death_date=566 or 573 (aged 86/95) , allegi ...

conquered Rome in 552; the senators were preparing to return to Rome, but the Goths who guarded them, enraged by the death of Totila, killed them all. Procopius (6th century).
De Bello
' VIII.34.5-6. Translated by H.B. Dewing. Cambridge:

Loeb Classical Library The Loeb Classical Library (LCL; named after James Loeb; , ) is a series of books originally published by Heinemann in London, but is currently published by Harvard University Press. The library contains important works of ancient Greek and L ...

, 1928, vol. 5 p. 399ff.

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Olybrius, Anicius 6th-century Italo-Roman people 6th-century Roman consuls Imperial Roman consuls