Gnaeus Claudius Severus was a

Roman senator The Roman Senate ( la, Senātus Rōmānus) was a governing and advisory assembly in ancient Rome. It was one of the most enduring institutions in Roman history, being established in the first days of the city of Rome (traditionally founded in ...

and philosopher who lived in the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterr ...

during the 2nd century AD.

Life

Severus was the son of the senator and philosopher

Gnaeus Claudius Severus Arabianus Gnaeus Claudius Severus Arabianus (113 – after 176) was a senator and philosopher who lived in the Roman Empire. Life Severus was the son of the consul and first Roman Governor of Arabia Petraea, Gaius Claudius Severus, by an unnamed mother. Se ...

by an unnamed mother. Severus was of Pontian Greek descent. He was born and raised in

Pompeiopolis Pompeiopolis ( el, Πομπηιούπολις, city of Pompeius) was a Roman city in ancient Paphlagonia, identified in the early 19th century with the ruins of Zımbıllı Tepe, located near Taşköprü, Kastamonu Province in the Black Sea Region ...

, a city in the

Roman province The Roman provinces (Latin: ''provincia'', pl. ''provinciae'') were the administrative regions of Ancient Rome outside Roman Italy that were controlled by the Romans under the Roman Republic and later the Roman Empire. Each province was rule ...

Galatia Galatia (; grc, Γαλατία, ''Galatía'', "Gaul") was an ancient area in the highlands of central Anatolia, roughly corresponding to the provinces of Ankara and Eskişehir, in modern Turkey. Galatia was named after the Gauls from Thrace (c ...

. His paternal grandfather,

Gaius Claudius Severus Gaius Claudius Severus was a Roman senator who lived in the second half of the 1st century AD and the first half of the 2nd century AD. Life Part of a family of Pontian Greek descent, Severus was born and raised in Pompeiopolis, a city in the Rom ...

, was a consul and the first Roman governor of

Arabia Petraea Arabia Petraea or Petrea, also known as Rome's Arabian Province ( la, Provincia Arabia; ar, العربية البترائية; grc, Ἐπαρχία Πετραίας Ἀραβίας) or simply Arabia, was a frontier province of the Roman Empi ...

in the reign of the

Emperor An emperor (from la, imperator, via fro, empereor) is a monarch, and usually the sovereignty, sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife (empress consort), ...

Trajan Trajan ( ; la, Caesar Nerva Traianus; 18 September 539/11 August 117) was Roman emperor from 98 to 117. Officially declared ''optimus princeps'' ("best ruler") by the senate, Trajan is remembered as a successful soldier-emperor who presi ...

, 98–117. Like his father, Severus was a follower of

peripatetic philosophy The Peripatetic school was a school of philosophy in Ancient Greece. Its teachings derived from its founder, Aristotle (384–322 BC), and ''peripatetic'' is an adjective ascribed to his followers. The school dates from around 335 BC when Aristo ...

. Although Severus held no major political influence, he was considered as an influential figure in the intellectual and philosophical circles 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 ...

. Like his father, Severus was a friend and had a great influence on the Emperor

Marcus Aurelius Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (Latin: áːɾkus̠ auɾέːli.us̠ antɔ́ːni.us̠ English: ; 26 April 121 – 17 March 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 AD and a Stoic philosopher. He was the last of the rulers known as the Five Good ...

(161-180). It was probably Severus that introduced Marcus Aurelius to the

rhetoric Rhetoric () is the art of persuasion, which along with grammar and logic (or dialectic), is one of the three ancient arts of discourse. Rhetoric aims to study the techniques writers or speakers utilize to inform, persuade, or motivate parti ...

ian Cornelianus and recommended

Galen Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus ( el, Κλαύδιος Γαληνός; September 129 – c. AD 216), often Anglicized as Galen () or Galen of Pergamon, was a Greek physician, surgeon and philosopher in the Roman Empire. Considered to be one of ...

to him as his personal physician. Severus and his father accompanied Marcus Aurelius on a philosophical visit to

Athens Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...

in 176. Severus served as a

suffect consul A consul held the highest elected political office of the Roman Republic ( to 27 BC), and ancient Romans considered the consulship the second-highest level of the ''cursus honorum'' (an ascending sequence of public offices to which politic ...

in 167 and an ordinary consul in 173. In the year of his second consulship, Severus became a patron and was made an honorary citizen of Pompeiopolis. That same year, an honorific inscription, which survives to this day on a statue base, was dedicated to Severus in his birth city: : For the good fortune of Gnaeus Claudius Severus who was consul twice,

pontifex A pontiff (from Latin ''pontifex'') was, in Roman antiquity, a member of the most illustrious of the colleges of priests of the Roman religion, the College of Pontiffs."Pontifex". "Oxford English Dictionary", March 2007 The term "pontiff" was late ...

, son-in-law of the Emperor Caesar Marcus Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, patron of the city, the metropolis Pompeiopolis of the province of Paphlagonia put this up in the 178th year of the province through the work of Publius Domitius Augureinus Clodius Kalbeinus the chief

archon ''Archon'' ( gr, ἄρχων, árchōn, plural: ἄρχοντες, ''árchontes'') is a Greek word that means "ruler", frequently used as the title of a specific public office. It is the masculine present participle of the verb stem αρχ-, mean ...

Wives and children

Severus married twice: * An unnamed noblewoman, with whom he had a son: ** Marcus Claudius Ummidius Quadratus Annianus Verus. His birth name other than Claudius is unknown and he is known by his adopted name. Claudius was adopted by the other ordinary consul of 167, Marcus Ummidius Quadratus Annianus Verus, who was a cousin and a maternal nephew of Marcus Aurelius. In 182, he was involved in a failed plot to kill the Emperor

Commodus Commodus (; 31 August 161 – 31 December 192) was a Roman emperor who ruled from 177 to 192. He served jointly with his father Marcus Aurelius from 176 until the latter's death in 180, and thereafter he reigned alone until his assassination. ...

(180-192), which led to the former's execution. * After 159 he married

Annia Galeria Aurelia Faustina Annia Galeria Aurelia Faustina (c. 151/153Birley, Anthony. ''Marcus Aurelius'', revised edition (London: Routledge, 1993), p. 108. - after 165) was a daughter of Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife, Faustina the Younger. Her sister was emp ...

, the second daughter and fifth child born to Marcus Aurelius and

Faustina the Younger Annia Galeria Faustina the Younger (born probably 21 September AD, – 175/176 AD) was Roman empress from 161 to her death as the wife of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, her maternal cousin. Faustina was the youngest child of Emperor Antoninus Pius an ...

. They had a son called: **

Tiberius Claudius Severus Proculus Tiberius Claudius Severus Proculus (about 163-by 218) was a Roman Senator. Via his mother he was a grandson of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, but he played only a limited role in dynastic politics. Descent and family Severus Proculus was of noble desce ...

, who served as an ordinary consul in 200 and married his maternal second cousin Annia Faustina.

Sources

Anthony Richard Birley Anthony Richard Birley (8 October 1937 – 19 December 2020) was a British Ancient history, ancient historian, Archaeology, archaeologist and academic. He was the son of Margaret Isabel (Goodlet) and historian and archaeologist Eric Birley. Ear ...

, ''Marcus Aurelius'' London: Routledge, 2000 * Anthony Richard Birley, ''Septimius Severus: the African emperor'', second edition (1999) *

Albino Garzetti Albinism is the congenital absence of melanin in an animal or plant resulting in white hair, feathers, scales and skin and pink or blue eyes. Individuals with the condition are referred to as albino. Varied use and interpretation of the term ...

, ''From Tiberius to the Antonines: a history of the Roman Empire AD 14-192'' (1974) * Alan K. Bowman,

Peter Garnsey Peter David Arthur Garnsey, (born 22 October 1938) is a retired classicist and academic. Born in Australia, where he studied classics at the University of Sydney as a member of St Paul’s College, he has spent most of his career at Cambridge. H ...

, Dominic Rathbone, ''The Cambridge ancient history: The High Empire, A.D. 70-192'', vol. 11, second edition (2000) * William M. Ramsay, ''The Cities and Bishoprics of Phyrgia: Being an Essay of the Local History of Phrygia from the Earliest Times to the Turkish Conquest'', Volume One, Part One (2004) * https://www.livius.org/fa-fn/faustina/faustina_ii.html * http://thecorner.wordpress.com/2006/06/21/chapter-two-septimius-and-the-cursus-honorum/ * Marcus Aurelius, ''

Meditations ''Meditations'' () is a series of personal writings by Marcus Aurelius, Roman Emperor from AD 161 to 180, recording his private notes to himself and ideas on Stoic philosophy. Marcus Aurelius wrote the 12 books of the ''Meditations'' in Koine ...

'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Claudius Severus, Gnaeus 2nd-century Romans 2nd-century philosophers Imperial Roman consuls Roman-era Peripatetic philosophers Severus, Gnaeus