Quintus Caelius Honoratus was a

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

senator A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

of the early

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 ...

, who flourished under the reign of

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 ...

. He was

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 the ''

nundinium Nundinium was a Latin word derived from the word '' nundinum'', which referred to the cycle of days observed by the Romans. During the Roman Empire, ''nundinium'' came to mean the duration of a single consulship among several in a calendar year. S ...

'' of July to August 105 AD as the colleague of

Gaius Julius Quadratus Bassus Gaius Julius Quadratus Bassus (70 – 117) was a Roman senator and general. He rose from provincial aristocratic origins to occupy the highest offices of Rome. He served as a legionary commander and as imperial governor of Judea, Cappadoccia, Gal ...

, replacing the suffect consul Gnaeus Afranius Dexter, who had been murdered by his slaves. Honoratus is known from inscriptions. The inscription on the base of a statue erected in

Kourion Kourion ( grc, Koύριov; la, Curium) was an important ancient Greek city-state on the southwestern coast of Cyprus. In the twelfth century BCE, after the collapse of the Mycenaean palaces, Greek settlers from Argos arrived on this site. In ...

Cyprus Cyprus ; tr, Kıbrıs (), officially the Republic of Cyprus,, , lit: Republic of Cyprus is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Its continental position is disputed; while it is geo ...

provides information on the first part of his ''

cursus honorum The ''cursus honorum'' (; , or more colloquially 'ladder of offices') was the sequential order of public offices held by aspiring politicians in the Roman Republic and the early Roman Empire. It was designed for men of senatorial rank. The '' ...

''. Honoratus served as ''

legatus A ''legatus'' (; anglicised as legate) was a high-ranking Roman military officer in the Roman Army, equivalent to a modern high-ranking general officer. Initially used to delegate power, the term became formalised under Augustus as the officer ...

'' to two different

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 governors: the governor of

Sicilia (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

, and the governor of

Bithynia and Pontus Bithynia and Pontus ( la, Provincia Bithynia et Pontus, Ancient Greek ) was the name of a province of the Roman Empire on the Black Sea coast of Anatolia (modern-day Turkey). It was formed during the late Roman Republic by the amalgamation of the ...

; the inscription does not mention his election to

praetor Praetor ( , ), also pretor, was the title granted by the government of Ancient Rome to a man acting in one of two official capacities: (i) the commander of an army, and (ii) as an elected '' magistratus'' (magistrate), assigned to discharge vario ...

, which Terence Mitford dates to the year 97, but completion of that office was a prerequisite to one that is mentioned, ''prefectus frumenti dandi'', the prefect responsible for the distribution of Rome's free grain dole. Once Honoratus stepped down from his praetorship, the

sortition In governance, sortition (also known as selection by lottery, selection by lot, allotment, demarchy, stochocracy, aleatoric democracy, democratic lottery, and lottocracy) is the selection of political officials as a random sample from a larger ...

awarded him governorship of

Roman Cyprus Roman Cyprus was a small senatorial province within the Roman Empire. While it was a small province, it possessed several well known religious sanctuaries and figured prominently in Eastern Mediterranean trade, particularly the production and trad ...

. This is dated by a second inscription from Kourion to 101/102. A third inscription from Kourion records that he supervised the reconstruction of the baths of the Sanctuary of Apollo in the city.Mitford, ''Inscriptions of Kourion'', inscription 110, pp. 214f His life is a blank after he completed his term as consul.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Caelius Honoratus, Quintus 1st-century Romans 2nd-century Romans Suffect consuls of Imperial Rome Roman governors of Cyprus Honoratus, Quintus