The gens Galeria 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 Roman civilization
*Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...
family of
Imperial times. The family first rose to prominence under the
Julio-Claudian dynasty
The Julio-Claudian dynasty comprised the first five Roman emperors: Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero.
This line of emperors ruled the Roman Empire, from its formation (under Augustus, in 27 BC) until the last of the line, Emper ...
, but the most illustrious person of the name was the
emperor
The word ''emperor'' (from , via ) can mean the male ruler of an empire. ''Empress'', the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife (empress consort), mother/grandmother (empress dowager/grand empress dowager), or a woman who rules ...
Galerius
Galerius Valerius Maximianus (; Greek: Γαλέριος; 258 – May 311) was Roman emperor from 305 to 311. He participated in the system of government later known as the Tetrarchy, first acting as '' caesar'' under Emperor Diocletian. In th ...
, one of the heirs of
Diocletian
Diocletian ( ; ; ; 242/245 – 311/312), nicknamed Jovius, was Roman emperor from 284 until his abdication in 305. He was born Diocles to a family of low status in the Roman province of Dalmatia (Roman province), Dalmatia. As with other Illyri ...
, who reigned from AD 305 to 311, although he cannot have been a direct descendant of the earlier family.
Branches and cognomina
The only surnames associated with the early Galerii are ''Fundanus'' and ''Trachalus'', but it is not known whether they were personal cognomina, or whether they instead represented distinct families within the gens.
Members
*
Galeria Copiola, a dancer during the late Republic. She made her debut in 82 BC, and was retired by 55, but was still living in AD 9, at the age of 104.
*
Gaius Galerius,
prefect of Egypt
During the Roman Empire, the governor of Roman Egypt ''(praefectus Aegypti)'' was a prefect who administered the Roman province of Egypt with the delegated authority ''(imperium)'' of the emperor.
Egypt was established as a Roman province in con ...
from AD 16 to 31, during the reign of
Tiberius
Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus ( ; 16 November 42 BC – 16 March AD 37) was Roman emperor from AD 14 until 37. He succeeded his stepfather Augustus, the first Roman emperor. Tiberius was born in Rome in 42 BC to Roman politician Tiberius Cl ...
; he was the brother-in-law of
Seneca the Elder
Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Elder ( ; – c. AD 39), also known as Seneca the Rhetorician, was a Roman writer, born of a wealthy equestrian family of Corduba, Hispania. He wrote a collection of reminiscences about the Roman schools of rhetoric, ...
.
*
Galeria Fundana
Galeria Fundana ( – aft. 69) was a Roman empress and the second wife of Roman emperor Vitellius.
Biography Early life
Suetonius tells us that Galeria was the daughter of an ex-praetor and bore two children during her marriage: a son and a dau ...
, of a praetorian family, was the second wife of the emperor
Vitellius
Aulus Vitellius ( ; ; 24 September 1520 December 69) was Roman emperor for eight months, from 19 April to 20 December AD 69. Vitellius became emperor following the quick succession of the previous emperors Galba and Otho, in a year of civil wa ...
, who died in AD 69.
*
Publius Galerius Trachalus
Publius Galerius Trachalus was a Roman senator, who was active during the middle of the first century AD. He was consul for the year 68 as the colleague of Silius Italicus and a noted Roman orator praised by Quintilian.
Hailing from Ariminum, Trac ...
, a respected orator, he was
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 thro ...
in AD 68, and subsequently advisor to the emperor
Otho
Otho ( ; born Marcus Salvius Otho; 28 April 32 – 16 April 69) was Roman emperor, ruling for three months from 15 January to 16 April 69. He was the second emperor of the Year of the Four Emperors.
A member of a noble Etruscan civilization, ...
. During the reign of Vitellius, he was protected by his relative, Galeria Fundana, the emperor's wife; he may have been
proconsul
A proconsul was an official of ancient Rome who acted on behalf of a Roman consul, 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 ...
of
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...
under
Vespasian
Vespasian (; ; 17 November AD 9 – 23 June 79) was Roman emperor from 69 to 79. The last emperor to reign in the Year of the Four Emperors, he founded the Flavian dynasty, which ruled the Empire for 27 years. His fiscal reforms and consolida ...
.
*
Galerius Valerius Maximianus, emperor from AD 305 to 311.
[''Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology'' vol. II, pp. 981, 982 (" Maximianus II").]
*
Galerius Valerius Maximinus Daza, emperor from AD 310 to 313.
See also
*
List of Roman gentes
The gens (plural gentes) was a Roman family, of Italic or Etruscan origins, consisting of all those individuals who shared the same '' nomen'' and claimed descent from a common ancestor. It was an important social and legal structure in earl ...
References
Bibliography
* Gaius Plinius Secundus (
Pliny the Elder
Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/24 79), known in English as Pliny the Elder ( ), was a Roman Empire, Roman author, Natural history, naturalist, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the Roman emperor, emperor Vesp ...
), ''
Historia Naturalis'' (Natural History).
*
Publius Cornelius Tacitus
Publius Cornelius Tacitus, known simply as Tacitus ( , ; – ), was a Roman historian and politician. Tacitus is widely regarded as one of the greatest Roman historiography, Roman historians by modern scholars.
Tacitus’ two major historical ...
, ''Historiae''.
* Marcus Fabius Quintilianus (
Quintilian
Marcus Fabius Quintilianus (; 35 – 100 AD) was a Roman educator and rhetorician born in Hispania, widely referred to in medieval schools of rhetoric and in Renaissance writing. In English translation, he is usually referred to as Quin ...
), ''Institutio Oratoria''.
*
Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus
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'', commonl ...
, ''
De Vita Caesarum
''De vita Caesarum'' (Latin; "About the Life of the Caesars"), commonly known as ''The Twelve Caesars'' or ''The Lives of the Twelve Caesars'', is a set of twelve biographies of Julius Caesar and the first 11 emperors of the Roman Empire writte ...
'' (Lives of the Caesars, or The Twelve Caesars).
* Lucius
Cassius Dio
Lucius Cassius Dio (), also known as Dio Cassius ( ), was a Roman historian and senator of maternal Greek origin. He published 80 volumes of the history of ancient Rome, beginning with the arrival of Aeneas in Italy. The volumes documented the ...
, ''Roman History''.
* Aelius Lampridius, Aelius Spartianus, Flavius Vopiscus, Julius Capitolinus, Trebellius Pollio, and Vulcatius Gallicanus, ''
Historia Augusta
The ''Historia Augusta'' (English: ''Augustan History'') is a late Roman collection of biographies, written in Latin, of the Roman emperors, their junior colleagues, Caesar (title), designated heirs and Roman usurper, usurpers from 117 to 284. S ...
'' (Augustan History).
* ''
Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology
The ''Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology'' is a biographical dictionary of classical antiquity, edited by William Smith (lexicographer), William Smith and originally published in London by John Taylor (English publisher), Tayl ...
'',
William Smith William, Willie, Will, Bill, or Billy Smith may refer to:
Academics
* William Smith (Master of Clare College, Cambridge) (1556–1615), English academic
* William Smith (antiquary) (c. 1653–1735), English antiquary and historian of University C ...
, ed., Little, Brown and Company, Boston (1849).
* Alan K. Bowman, ''Egypt After the Pharaohs, 332 BC-AD 642: From Alexander to the Arab Conquest'', University of California Press (1986, 1996).
* ''The Oxford Companion to Classical Civilization'', Simon Hornblower, Antony Spawforth, Esther Eidinow, eds., Oxford University Press (1998).
{{Refend
Roman gentes