Gaius Cassius Longinus was a Roman

jurist A jurist is a person with expert knowledge of law; someone who analyses and comments on law. This person is usually a specialist legal scholar, mostly (but not always) with a formal qualification in law and often a legal practitioner. In the Uni ...

and politician from the first century AD. A grandnephew of

Servius Sulpicius Rufus Servius Sulpicius Rufus (c. 105 BC – 43 BC), was a Roman orator and jurist. He was consul in 51 BC. Biography Early life He studied rhetoric with Cicero, accompanying him to Rhodes in 78 BC, though Sulpicius decided subsequently to pursue lega ...

, he was also a nephew or great-grandson of

Gaius Cassius Longinus Gaius Cassius Longinus (c. 86 BC – 3 October 42 BC) was a Roman senator and general best known as a leading instigator of the plot to assassinate Julius Caesar on 15 March 44 BC. He was the brother-in-law of Brutus, another leader of the cons ...

, one of

Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman people, Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in Caes ...

's assassins. Longinus was suffect consul of the second half of the year 30 as the colleague of

Lucius Naevius Surdinus The gens Naevia, occasionally written Navia, was a plebeian or patrician family at ancient Rome. Members of this gens are first mentioned at the time of the Second Punic War, but the first of the Naevii to obtain the consulship was Lucius Naev ...

. Cassius, a pupil of Sabinus, was head of the legal school called the

Sabinians The Sabinian school was one of the two important schools of Law in Rome during the 1st and 2nd centuries CE. The Sabinians took their name from Masurius Sabinus but later were known as ''Cassians'' after Sabinus' student, Cassius Longinus. Sabini ...

or Cassinians. His principal works are the ''libri (commentarii) iuris civilis'' in at least ten volumes, which only survive in quotes by later authors such as Iavolenus. After completing his term as suffect consul, Longinus served as

proconsul A proconsul was an official of ancient Rome who acted on behalf of a consul. A proconsul was typically a former consul. The term is also used in recent history for officials with delegated authority. In the Roman Republic, military command, or ' ...

ar governor of

Asia minor Anatolia, tr, Anadolu Yarımadası), and the Anatolian plateau, also known as Asia Minor, is a large peninsula in Western Asia and the westernmost protrusion of the Asian continent. It constitutes the major part of modern-day Turkey. The re ...

in 40–41, then governor of the imperial province of

Syria Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...

in 41–49. He was exiled by

Nero Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus ( ; born Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus; 15 December AD 37 – 9 June AD 68), was the fifth Roman emperor and final emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, reigning from AD 54 un ...

Sardinia Sardinia ( ; it, Sardegna, label=Italian, Corsican and Tabarchino ; sc, Sardigna , sdc, Sardhigna; french: Sardaigne; sdn, Saldigna; ca, Sardenya, label=Algherese and Catalan) is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after ...

in 65, but returned to Rome when

Vespasian Vespasian (; la, Vespasianus ; 17 November AD 9 – 23/24 June 79) was a Roman emperor who reigned from AD 69 to 79. The fourth and last emperor who reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors, he founded the Flavian dynasty that ruled the Empi ...

acceded to the purple.

Tacitus Publius Cornelius Tacitus, known simply as Tacitus ( , ; – ), was a Roman historian and politician. Tacitus is widely regarded as one of the greatest Roman historiography, Roman historians by modern scholars. The surviving portions of his t ...

includes a speech of Cassius, when he was a senator in the time of Nero, on the debate that arose when there had been mass protests in Rome when 400 innocent slaves were to be executed because they belonged to the household of

Lucius Pedanius Secundus __NoToC__ Lucius Pedanius Secundus (d. AD 61) was a Roman senator of the first century. In AD 43, during the reign of Claudius, he was consul ''suffectus'' from the Kalends of March to the Kalends of July, together with Sextus Palpellius Hister. ...

who had been murdered by his slave. It is open to question as to what extent the speech we have reflected what Cassius actually said, and to what extent it represents Tacitus's views, though it is at least possible that Tacitus made use of the Senate's records; the hard line expressed is in line with what we know about Cassius. In the speech Cassius conceded that the execution would be unjust. He also conceded it violated the rights of private interests but justified it on the grounds of the public good. The private interests that concerned him did not include any right to life for the slaves but the loss to the heirs.''Fear of slaves, fear of enslavement in the ancient Mediterranean'', Anastasia Serghidou, pp. 151-2 Modern commentators side with those who protested at the time in regarding the law as inherently unjust. He married

Junia Lepida Junia Lepida (c. AD 18 - 65) was a Roman noblewoman who lived in the first century. Life She was the second daughter of Aemilia Lepida and Marcus Junius Silanus Torquatus, one of the Junii Silani. Her maternal grandparents were Julia the Younger, ...

, a descendant of

Augustus Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian, was the first Roman emperor; he reigned from 27 BC until his death in AD 14. He is known for being the founder of the Roman Pri ...

. They had two children: Cassia Longina (born c. AD 35), who married the general

Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo (Peltuinum c. AD 7 – 67) was a popular Roman general, brother-in-law of the emperor Caligula and father-in-law of Domitian. The emperor Nero, highly fearful of Corbulo's reputation, ordered him to commit suicide, which ...

, and Cassius Lepidus (born c. AD 55). The latter married an unknown woman by whom he had a daughter, Cassia Lepida (born c. AD 80). She married

Gaius Julius Alexander Berenicianus Gaius Julius Alexander Berenicianus ( el, Γαίος Ιούλιος Αλέξανδρος Βερενικιανός, about 75 – about 150) was a Cilician Prince and second-born son to King Gaius Julius Alexander and Queen Julia Iotapa of Cetis. ...

consul in AD 116 and proconsul of

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...

in AD 132.

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Cassius Longinus, Gaius 69 deaths 1st-century Roman consuls 1st-century Roman governors of Syria 1st-century writers Ancient Roman exiles Ancient Roman jurists Longinus, Gaius Imperial Roman praetors Roman governors of Asia Suffect consuls of Imperial Rome

See also

References