Vettius Agorius Basilius Mavortius ( 527–534) was a Roman aristocrat who lived during

Ostrogothic The Ostrogoths ( la, Ostrogothi, Austrogothi) were a Roman-era Germanic people. In the 5th century, they followed the Visigoths in creating one of the two great Gothic kingdoms within the Roman Empire, based upon the large Gothic populations who ...

rule. He was appointed

consul Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states throug ...

for 527.

Biography

Mavortius was probably the son of

Caecina Mavortius Basilius Decius Caecina Mavortius Basilius Decius ( 486–510) was a Roman politician under Odoacer's rule. He was consul and ''Praefectus urbi'' of Rome in 486 and Praetorian prefect of Italy from 486 to 493. Life Decius was the son of Caecina Decius Basiliu ...

, consul in 486, and related to

Vettius Agorius Praetextatus Vettius Agorius Praetextatus (ca. 315 – 384) was a wealthy pagan aristocrat in the 4th-century Roman Empire, and a high priest in the cults of numerous gods. He served as the praetorian prefect at the court of Emperor Valentinian II in 384 until ...

, an influential aristocrat of the late 4th century. In 527, Mavortius held the positions of ''

Comes domesticorum The origins of the word ''domesticus'' can be traced to the late 3rd century of the Late Roman army. They often held high ranks in various fields, whether it was the servants of a noble house on the civilian side, or a high-ranking military pos ...

'' (Commander of the Imperial Guard) and consul. Subscriptions in three manuscripts containing the works of

Horace Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 – 27 November 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his ' ...

state that Mavortius emended one text of that poet in the sixth century. The scholar Vollmer believed Mavortius' copy was the archetype of the entire tradition, but R. J. Tarrant argues that the subscription was copied from Mavortius' manuscript into an unrelated book, then found its way into the three surviving manuscripts – which otherwise belong to different branches of the manuscript transmission. A subscription with Mavortius' name also appears in a sixth-century manuscript of

Prudentius Aurelius Prudentius Clemens () was a Roman Christian poet, born in the Roman province of Tarraconensis (now Northern Spain) in 348.H. J. Rose, ''A Handbook of Classical Literature'' (1967) p. 508 He probably died in the Iberian Peninsula some ti ...

.Paris lat. 8084, f. 45.

Biography

Notes

Further reading