Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius

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Coin of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius
Coin of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius

Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius (ca 130 BC or 127 BC – 63 BC) was a pro-Sullan state figure. He was named Pius because of his 99 BC petition to return his father from exile [1] and made justice to his cognomen for the constance, frontality and inflexibility with which he allways fought for his father's rehabilitation and return to Rome.

Barely left out of teenagehood, he was made Pontifex Maximus, which office he later held again in 81 BC, Quaestor in 97 BC, Tribune in 92 BC, and Consul in 80 BC, having been a Praetor in 89 BC [2]. He withdrew from Rome during the civil fights between Marius and Sulla, returning afterwards with the latter.

As a military figure, he had his first commands in the war in 109-107 BC, when he accompanied his father Quintus Caecilius Metellus Numidicus in Numidia during Jugurthine War, where his father took him as a simple cadet. [3]. He later revealed to be one of the best subordinates of Sulla, but without any other objective than the one of fighting the demagogy with which Marius threatened Rome, never participating in the atrocious violence which marked such a troubled phase of the History of Rome. He was one of the Roman commanders in the Social War in 88 BC. A Proconsul at that time, Pius stormed Venusia and killed the leader of Marsi Quintus Poppaedius Silo [4]. In 87 BC Pius by the order of Senate tried to make peace with the Samnites.

Made a Consul in 80 BC, he was then sent to Spain to combat Quintus Sertorius, where he and Marcus Perpenna Vento faced the roman power, establishing his bases in Metellinum (today Medellín) Castra Caecilia (today Cáceres), Viccus Caecilius, at the Sierra de Gredos, and at Caeciliana, near Setúbal. After eight years of resistance, the rebels were forced to cede to the military ability of Metellus Pius, who had as a companion, in the final phase of the war, the valuable Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, with whom, despite his greater merit, he shared the glories of the Triumph after the death of Sertorius, marked in the end of 71 BC [5].

He married Licinia Crassa Secunda or Minor, daughter of Lucius Licinius Crassus Orator, and wife Mucia Secunda, from whom he had no children, for what he adopted his nephew by marriage and son of his second cousin Publius Cornelius Scipio, renamed Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius Scipio Nasica, son of his sister in law's marriage Licinia Crassa Prima or Major to Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Serapio, in turn a son of Publius Cornelius Scipio Nasica Serapio and Caecilia Metella, daughter of Quintus Caecilius Metellus Macedonicus.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Cic. P. Red. 37; Ad Quir. 6; Arch. 6; Vell. II 15, 3
  2. ^ Cic. Arch. 6—7, 9, 31
  3. ^ Sall. Iug. 64, 4; Plut. Mar. 8, 4
  4. ^ Diod. XXXVII 2, 9—11; App. BC I 53; Auc. Vir. Ill. 63, 1
  5. ^ Sall. Hist. I 110—121; II 28, 59, 68—70; III 45 M; IV 49 M; Liv. Per. 91—93; Strabo III 4, 13; Val. Max. VIII 15, 8; IX 1, 5; Vell. II 30, 2; Plut. Sert. 12—13; 19—22; 27; Pomp. 18—19; App. BC I 108—112, 115, 121; Ib. 101; Auc. Vir. Ill. 63, 2; Flor. II 10; Eutrop. VI 1, 3; 5, 2; Oros. V 23; Frontin. Str. I 1, 12; II 1, 2—34 3, 5; 7, 5

[edit] Further reading

  • Manuel Dejante Pinto de Magalhães Arnao Metello and João Carlos Metello de Nápoles, "Metellos de Portugal, Brasil e Roma", Torres Novas, 1998

[edit] See also

Preceded by
Marcus Tullius Decula, Gnaeus Cornelius Dolabella		 Consul
80, with Lucius Cornelius Sulla		 Succeeded by
Publius Servilius Vatia Isauricus, Appius Claudius Pulcher