Titus is one of the

Thirty Tyrants The Thirty Tyrants (, ''hoi triákonta týrannoi'') were an oligarchy that briefly ruled Classical Athens, Athens from 404 BC, 404 BCE to 403 BC, 403 BCE. Installed into power by the Sparta, Spartans after the Athenian surrender in the Peloponnesian ...

, a list of

Roman usurper Roman usurpers were individuals or groups of individuals who obtained or tried to obtain power by force and without legitimate legal authority. Usurpation was endemic during the Roman imperial era, especially from the crisis of the third centu ...

s compiled by the author(s) of the often unreliable ''

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 ...

''. Titus was said to have revolted against

Maximinus Thrax Gaius Julius Verus Maximinus "Thrax" () was a Roman emperor from 235 to 238. Born of Thracian origin – given the nickname ''Thrax'' ("the Thracian") – he rose up through the military ranks, ultimately holding high command in the army of th ...

, a Roman Emperor who ruled 235–238, after the revolt of

Magnus Magnus, meaning "Great" in Latin, was used as cognomen of Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus in the first century BC. The best-known use of the name during the Roman Empire is for the fourth-century Western Roman Emperor Magnus Maximus. The name gained wid ...

. It is now believed that his biography is fraudulent, and that he may be based on person named

Quartinus Titius Quartinus (died 235 AD) was a Roman usurper. After the death of Alexander Severus and the usurpation of Maximinus Thrax, a unit of archers from Osrhoene in Mesopotamia, proclaimed Quartinus, a former provincial governor and friend of emp ...

mentioned by the historian

Herodian Herodian or Herodianus () of Syria, sometimes referred to as "Herodian of Antioch" (c. 170 – c. 240), was a minor Roman civil servant who wrote a colourful history in Greek titled ''History of the Empire from the Death of Marcus'' (τῆς με ...

. According to the ''Historia Augusta'', Titus was a tribune of the

Moors The term Moor is an Endonym and exonym, exonym used in European languages to designate the Muslims, Muslim populations of North Africa (the Maghreb) and the Iberian Peninsula (particularly al-Andalus) during the Middle Ages. Moors are not a s ...

, who had been deposed by Maximinus and transferred to a civilian position. After the revolt of Magnus had been quelled, Titus, fearing for his life, reluctantly seized the power, having the purple compelled on him by his soldiers. He ruled for six months, and the ''Historia'' stated he deserved praises both home and abroad, but in the end Maximinus suppressed the revolt and killed Titus. Also noteworthy is Titus's equally fictitious wife, Calpurnia of the '' gens Caesonia'', and who it was claimed had been a priestess, whose statue, in marble and golden bronze, was located in the Temple of Venus. She reportedly owned the pearls that had belonged to

Cleopatra VII of Egypt Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator (; The name Cleopatra is pronounced , or sometimes in both British and American English, see and respectively. Her name was pronounced in the Greek dialect of Egypt (see Koine Greek phonology). She was ...

, and a famous one hundred-pound silver platter, with the histories of her noteworthy family - the implication being that she was a descendant of Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, the

Roman consul The consuls were the highest elected public officials of the Roman Republic ( to 27 BC). Romans considered the consulship the second-highest level of the ''cursus honorum''an ascending sequence of public offices to which politicians aspire ...

of 148 BC, and a distant relation of Calpurnia, the wife of

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 ...

. This link is further developed in two ways; firstly, her statue is described as being placed in the Temple of Venus Genetrix, where Caesar had once placed a statue of Cleopatra. Secondly, her possession of Cleopatra's pearls also reinforces her role as a female figure representing traditional ''Romanitas'', compared against the previous owner who was traditionally represented as everything that was contrary to Roman values. Her possession of Cleopatra's pearls is also fictitious, as

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 ...

recounts that one of Cleopatra's pearls was dissolved in vinegar and drunk by Cleopatra in front of

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

, while the other was made into earrings for the statue of Venus that stood in the Temple of Venus Genetrix. There is no evidence that the family of the Pisones still existed in the third century, and this Calpurnia is most likely an invention of the author's, due to his desire to pepper his work with great names.''Historia Augusta'', ''The Lives of the Thirty Pretenders'', Loeb Classical Library (1932), note 124

Notes

References

Tyranni Triginta xxxii
{{DEFAULTSORT:Titus 230s deaths Thirty Tyrants (Roman) Year of birth unknown