Quintus Volusius Saturninus (born AD 25[1]) was a Roman Senator who lived in the Roman Empire during the Principate. He was consul in the year 56 with Publius Cornelius Scipio as his colleague.[2]

Family background

The Volusii, according to Tacitus, were an ancient and distinguished Senatorial family who never rose above the praetorship until Saturninus' grandfather, Lucius Volusius Saturninus, achieved that distinction.[3] Saturninus' father, also named Lucius Volusius Saturninus, not only acceded to that office, but received a state funeral under the Emperor Nero and Cornelia Lentula.[4] Saturninus is known to have an elder brother, Lucius Volusius Saturninus, and a sister, Volusia Cornelia.[5]

He inherited the great Villa dei Volusii near Lucus Feroniae which had been in the family since the 1st c. BC and was probably acquired by the emperor after his death.[6]

Political career

Surviving inscriptions indicate that a burial club of his slaves and freedmen operated a columbarium on the Appian Way.[7] Tacitus describes Saturninus as a man of aristocratic status.

The political career of Saturninus is only known from the point he achieved the consulate. In 61–63, he carried out a census in Gaul, together with Titus Sextius Africanus and Marcus Trebellius Maximus. Saturninus and Africanus were rivals; however, they both hated Maximus, who took advantage of their rivalry to get the better of them.[8] Based on inscriptions, the Horrea Volusiana was either built by his paternal grandfather Lucius Volusius Saturninus, suffect consul of 12 BC, or Saturninus himself.[9]

An inscription attests that Saturninus was also a member of several Roman priesthoods.[10] These were the sodales Augustales, the sodales Titii, and the enigmatic Arval Brethren. Another inscription attests to Saturninus' presence at their ceremonies in the year 63.[11]

Family and issue

Saturninus married a woman called Torquata; her name is known to us from the tombstone of one of her slaves.[12] Torquata bore Saturninus the following children:[13]

References

  1. ↑ As inferred from the fact his father was born in 38/37 BC, and sired Saturninus at the age of 63. (Pliny the Elder, Natural History, VII.62)
  2. ↑ Tacitus, Annales xiii.25
  3. ↑ Tacitus, Annales, iii.30
  4. ↑ Joyce Reynolds, "Roman Inscriptions 1966-1970", Journal of Roman Studies, 61 (1971), pp. 142-144
  5. ↑ Barbara Levick, Tiberius the Politician (London: Routledge, 1999), p. 53
  6. ↑ Boenzi, Giuliana et al. (1997). Terra di Fiano : ricerche di storia, arte, archeologia. Quasar p. 59
  7. ↑ Susan Treggiari, "Family Life Among the Staff of the Volusii", Transactions of the American Philological Association, 105 (1975), pp. 393-401
  8. ↑ Tacitus, Annales xiii. 19, xiv. 46
  9. ↑ Rickman, Roman Granaries and Store Buildings, p.169
  10. ↑ AE 1975, 175
  11. ↑ CIL VI, 2043
  12. ↑ CIL VI, 7297
  13. ↑ Rudolf Hanslik, "Saturninus (20)", Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft, Supplement 9A, col. 1863
  14. ↑ CIL VI, 31726

Sources

  • Tacitus - The Annals of Imperial Rome
  • G. Rickman, Roman Granaries and Store Buildings, CUP Archive, 1971
  • Susan Treggiari, "Family Life among the Staff of the Volusii", Transactions of the American Philological Association, 105 (1974-1975)
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