Publius Licinius Crassus (

fl. ''Floruit'' (; abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for "they flourished") denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indicatin ...

176 to 171 BC) was

Roman 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 polit ...

for year 171 BC, together with

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 ...

. He was the son of Gaius Licinius Varus, possibly related to the Gaius Licinius Varus who was consul in 236 BC and who was still alive in 219 BC. Crassus's brother (probably his younger brother) was Gaius Licinius Crassus (consul 168 BC), and his nephew was Gaius Licinius Crassus, tribune of the plebs about 145 BC. However, his relationship to the consuls Licinius Varus and the Pontifex Maximus Publius Licinius Crassus are not known. He was elected as praetor for 176 BC and assigned to the province of Hither Spain, but he got himself excused from this duty by swearing an oath that his religious duties did not allow him to go.Livy, 42.32 Licinius adopted as his son and his heir, his sister Licinia's second son, Publius Licinius Crassus Dives Mucianus. This son was born a Mucius Scaevola, son of another consul, Publius Mucius Scaevola, who attained the consulship in 175 BC, and who was the brother of another consul (174 BC) and son of a praetor who had died in the

Second Punic War The Second Punic War (218 to 201 BC) was the second of three wars fought between Carthage and Rome, the two main powers of the western Mediterranean in the 3rd century BC. For 17 years the two states struggled for supremacy, primarily in Ital ...

. The adoptive son who also became a Pontifex Maximus and who was a political ally of the

Gracchi The Gracchi brothers were two Roman brothers, sons of Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus who was consul in 177 BC. Tiberius, the elder brother, was tribune of the plebs in 133 BC and Gaius, the younger brother, was tribune a decade later in ...

References

2nd-century BC Roman consuls Crassus, Publius Licinii Crassi 2nd-century BC diplomats {{AncientRome-politician-stub