piso

[Tagalog, from Spanish peso, peso, piece of eight. See peso.]

1. Lucius Calpurnius Piso Caesonīnus, at Rome, consul in 58 BC; his daughter Calpurnia married Julius Caesar. He refused to support Cicero against Clodius, and was rewarded by the latter with the governorship of the province of Macedonia. His administration there (57–55) was attacked by Cicero in two speeches, De provinciis consularibus and In Pisonem (see CICERO (1) 4). After Caesar's assassination in 44 BC he tried to prevent civil war, but died within a short time. He was an Epicurean and a friend and disciple of the Greek Epicurean philosopher Philodemus, whom he very probably made a resident of his own magnificent villa at Herculaneum. The villa excavated there which contained charred rolls of Philodemus' writings may be Piso's.

2.

Gaius Calpurnius Piso

(d. AD 65), the figurehead of the great conspiracy against the emperor Nero. Exiled during the reign of Caligula (AD 37–41), consul under his successor Claudius, Piso was a rich and popular figure at Rome, and a great orator. The conspiracy to assassinate Nero and to put Piso on the throne was betrayed and he was executed.

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