Marcus Porcius Cato 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 lette ...

senator active during the

Principate The Principate is the name sometimes given to the first period of the Roman Empire from the beginning of the reign of Augustus in 27 BC to the end of the Crisis of the Third Century in AD 284, after which it evolved into the so-called Dominate. ...

. He was suffect consul in the latter half of AD 36 as the colleague of Gaius Vettius Rufus. Although he shares the identical name of several members of the Republican

Porcii The gens Porcia, rarely written Portia, was a plebeian family at Ancient Rome. Its members first appear in history during the third century BC. The first of the gens to achieve the consulship was Marcus Porcius Cato in 195 BC, and from then un ...

Ronald Syme Sir Ronald Syme, (11 March 1903 – 4 September 1989) was a New Zealand-born historian and classicist. He was regarded as the greatest historian of ancient Rome since Theodor Mommsen and the most brilliant exponent of the history of the Roman ...

expressed reservations that he is related to that famed family. Stephen Dyson has cataloged 56 people living in the provinces of

Roman Spain Hispania ( la, Hispānia , ; nearly identically pronounced in Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, and Italian) was the Roman name for the Iberian Peninsula and its provinces. Under the Roman Republic, Hispania was divided into two provinces: Hispania ...

who took on the ''

gentilicium The (or simply ) was a hereditary name borne by the peoples of Roman Italy and later by the citizens of the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire. It was originally the name of one's (family or clan) by patrilineal descent. However, as Rome expand ...

'' "Porcius", who were either '' clientes'' or descendants of ''clientes'' of

Cato the Elder Marcus Porcius Cato (; 234–149 BC), also known as Cato the Censor ( la, Censorius), the Elder and the Wise, was a Roman soldier, senator, and historian known for his conservatism and opposition to Hellenization. He was the first to write his ...

while he was

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 ...

of Spain, which makes Syme's suspicions plausible.

Life

The historian

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

mentions Cato in his ''

Annales Annals are a concise form of historical writing which record events chronologically, year by year. The equivalent word in Latin and French is ''annales'', which is used untranslated in English in various contexts. List of works with titles contai ...

''. At the beginning of the year 28, during the ascendancy of the powerful prefect of the

Praetorian Guard The Praetorian Guard (Latin: ''cohortēs praetōriae'') was a unit of the Imperial Roman army that served as personal bodyguards and intelligence agents for the Roman emperors. During the Roman Republic, the Praetorian Guard were an escort fo ...

Sejanus Lucius Aelius Sejanus (c. 20 BC – 18 October AD 31), commonly known as Sejanus (), was a Roman soldier, friend and confidant of the Roman Emperor Tiberius. Of the Equites class by birth, Sejanus rose to power as prefect of the Praetorian Gua ...

, Titus Sabinus, an eques of the highest rank, was imprisoned due to his friendship with Germanicus. "He had indeed persisted in showing marked respect towards Germanicus' wife and children," writes Tacitus, "as their visitor at home, their companion in public, the solitary survivor of so many clients." Cato, along with three other ex-

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 vari ...

s -- Latinus Latiaris, Petitius Rufus, and Marcus Opsius -- managed to elicit treasonable comments from Sabinus, which they then passed on to

Tiberius Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus (; 16 November 42 BC – 16 March AD 37) was the second Roman emperor. He reigned from AD 14 until 37, succeeding his stepfather, the first Roman emperor Augustus. Tiberius was born in Rome in 42 BC. His father ...

. The emperor accepted the evidence at face value, and had Sabinus executed. Apparently in the lost books of his ''Annales'' Tacitus recounts Cato's execution, for, at the conclusion of a passage about the condemnation of Titus Sabinus, Tacitus admits to wanting to describe the deaths of those who had informed against him. The historian remarks that some were executed after Caligula came to power, while others perished at Tiberius' command. After noting how these informants mattered so little to Tiberius that "he frequently, when he was tired of them and fresh ones offered themselves for the same services, flung off the old", Tacitus promises to describe their fates at the appropriate section. None of these men are mentioned again in the surviving portions of his work, yet

Frontinus Sextus Julius Frontinus (c. 40 – 103 AD) was a prominent Roman civil engineer, author, soldier and senator of the late 1st century AD. He was a successful general under Domitian, commanding forces in Roman Britain, and on the Rhine and Danube ...

reports that Cato was ''cura aquarum'' in the year 38, so it is safe to conclude that Caligula had Porcius Cato executed between that year and the year of his own death (AD 41). While the name of his wife is not yet known, Cato was survived by a daughter, Porcia, a cousin of Gellius Rutilius Lupus.Steven Rutledge, ''Imperial Inquisitions: Prosecutors and informants from Tiberius to Domitian'' (London: Routledge, 2001), p. 260

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Porcius Cato, Marcus (consul 789 AUC) 30s deaths 1st-century Romans Cato, Marcus (consul 789 AUC) Suffect consuls of Imperial Rome Year of birth unknown

Life

See also

Notes