Marcus Atius Balbus (105 – 51 BC) was a 1st-century BC Roman who served as a

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 disch ...

in 62 BC; he was a cousin of the general

Pompey Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (; 29 September 106 BC – 28 September 48 BC), known in English as Pompey ( ) or Pompey the Great, was a Roman general and statesman who was prominent in the last decades of the Roman Republic. ...

on his mother's side and a brother-in-law of the Dictator

Julius Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (12 or 13 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC) was a Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in Caesar's civil wa ...

through his marriage to Caesar's sister Julia Minor. Through his daughter, Atia, he became the maternal grandfather of

Augustus Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus (born Gaius Octavius; 23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14), also known as Octavian (), was the founder of the Roman Empire, who reigned as the first Roman emperor from 27 BC until his death in A ...

the first Roman Emperor.

Early life

Balbus was born and raised in Aricia into a political family and was the son and heir of the elder Marcus Atius Balbus (148 – 87 BC). His mother was Pompeia, the sister to consul Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, father of Pompey Magnus, a member of the

First Triumvirate The First Triumvirate was an informal political alliance among three prominent politicians in the late Roman Republic: Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, Marcus Licinius Crassus, and Gaius Julius Caesar. The republican constitution had many veto points. ...

with

and

Marcus Licinius Crassus Marcus Licinius Crassus (; 115–53 BC) was a ancient Rome, Roman general and statesman who played a key role in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. He is often called "the richest man in Rome".Wallechinsky, Da ...

. The family of the elder Balbus came from a Roman senatorial family of

plebs In ancient Rome, the plebeians or plebs were the general body of free Roman citizens who were not patricians, as determined by the census, or in other words "commoners". Both classes were hereditary. Etymology The precise origins of the gro ...

status from Aricia (modern Ariccia,

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

). "Balbus" in Latin means '' stammer''.

Career

During the consulship of Julius Caesar in 59 BC, Balbus was appointed along with Pompey to a board of commissioners under a Julian Law to divide estates in

Campania Campania is an administrative Regions of Italy, region of Italy located in Southern Italy; most of it is in the south-western portion of the Italian Peninsula (with the Tyrrhenian Sea to its west), but it also includes the small Phlegraean Islan ...

among the commoners.

Cicero Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, orator, writer and Academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises tha ...

stated that Pompey would say as a joke about Balbus, that he was not a person of any importance.

Personal life

He married Julia Minor, the younger of the two elder sisters of the dictator

. Julia bore him two or more daughters and possibly a son named Marcus Atius Balbus. One of the daughters married Gaius Octavius and became the mother of Octavia Minor (fourth wife of triumvir

Mark Antony Marcus Antonius (14 January 1 August 30 BC), commonly known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman people, Roman politician and general who played a critical role in the Crisis of the Roman Republic, transformation of the Roman Republic ...

) and of the first Roman emperor

. A younger daughter married Lucius Marcius Philippus and became the mother of Marcia. Another Atia, who was married to a Gaius Junius Silanus, has been speculated to have existed by Madvig and Syme. This Atia may have been a granddaughter of Balbus and Julia through their son and his marriage to a Claudia. (Limited Previes
"Atia, wife of Marcius Philippus (suff. 38 BC)"
an
"A daughter (Atia) would supply a wife for C. Silanus"
of this page in

Google Books Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical charac ...

)

Death

Balbus died in 51 BC.

References

Sources

Suetonius Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus (), commonly referred to as Suetonius ( ; – after AD 122), was a Roman historian who wrote during the early Imperial era of the Roman Empire. His most important surviving work is ''De vita Caesarum'', common ...

, ''The Lives of the Twelve Caesars'', Augustus * https://web.archive.org/web/20060511155339/http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-bio/0464.html

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Atius, Marcus Roman Republican praetors 1st-century BC Romans 105 BC births 51 BC deaths Balbus, Marcus Family of Augustus