Quintus Lutatius Catulus

For the more famous Latin poet, see Catullus.

Quintus Lutatius Catulus (d. 87 BC) was a general and consul of the Roman Republic in 102 BC, and the leading public figure of the gens Lutatia of the time. His colleague in the consulship was Gaius Marius, but the two feuded and Catulus sided with Sulla in the civil war of 88–87 BC. When the Marians regained control of Rome in 87, Catulus committed suicide rather than face prosecution.

As general

In the war against the Cimbri and Teutones Catulus was sent to defend the passage of the Alps but found himself compelled to retreat across the Po River, his troops having been reduced to a state of panic. But the Cimbri were defeated on the Raudine plain, near Vercellae, by the united armies of Catulus and Marius. Despite their joint success, the two commanders regarded each other as bitter rivals and after the war built competing temples to demonstrate divine favor.^[1]

When the chief honour for victory over the Cimbri was given to Marius, Catulus turned vehemently against his former co-commander and sided with Sulla to expel Marius, Cornelius Cinna, and their supporters from Rome. When Cinna and Marius regained control of the city in 87, Catulus was prosecuted by Marius's nephew, M. Marius Gratidianus. Rather than accept the inevitable guilty verdict, he committed suicide.^[2]

As author

Catulus was distinguished as an orator, poet and prose writer, and was well versed in Greek literature. He wrote a history of his consulship (De consulatu et de rebus gestis suis) in the manner of Xenophon. A non-extant epic on the Cimbrian War, sometimes attributed to him, was more likely written by Archias.^[3] Catulus's contributions to Latin poetry are considered his most significant literary achievements. He is credited with introducing Hellenistic epigram to Rome and fostering a taste for short, personal poems that comes to fruition with the lyric oeuvre of Valerius Catullus in the 50s BC. Among his circle of literary friends, who ranged widely in social position and political sympathies, were Valerius Aedituus, Aulus Furius, and Porcius Licinius.^[4]

Pliny lists him among distinguished men who wrote short poems that were less than austere (versiculi parum severi).^[5] Only two epigrams by Catulus have been preserved, both directed at men. Cicero preserves two of Catulus's couplets on the celebrated actor Roscius, who is said to make an entrance like a sunrise: "though he is human, he seems more beautiful than a god."^[6]

The other epigram, modeled directly after Callimachus, is quoted by Aulus Gellius and may be paraphrased in prose as follows:^[7]

"The willingness of a member of the highest Roman aristocracy to toss off imitations of Hellenistic sentimental erotic poetry (homosexual at that)," notes Edward Courtney, "is a new phenomenon in Roman culture at this time."^[9]

As builder

Catulus was a man of great wealth, which he spent in beautifying Rome. Two buildings were known as "Monumenta Catuli": the temple of Fortuna Huiusce Diei, to commemorate the day of Vercellae, and the Porticus Catuli, built from the sale of the Cimbrian spoils.

Marriage and descendants

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Three wives are attested for Catulus, and he may have had more.

1. Domitia of the Ahenobarbi, who was mother of his homonymous son Quintus Lutatius Catulus (consul 78, censor 65 BC).
2. Servilia of the Caepiones, who was mother of his daughter Lutatia Q. Hortensi, the wife of the great orator Q. Hortensius Hortalus (consul 69 BC).
3. Claudia, of uncertain family but probably of the line of Claudii Pulchri and directly descended from Appius Claudius (consul suffectus 130 BC). Claudia may have been Catulus's longest marriage (ca. 103-87 BC) if, as seems likely, he wed her to secure Marian support for his election as a consul, which he only belatedly achieved at the comitia in 103 for 102 BC. However, she is only attested at the time of his death at the end of 87 BC, and there is no record of any children by this match.

Catulus is misidentified as "Catulus Caesar" by novelist Colleen McCullough, owing to a misunderstanding of his relationship as frater ("brother") to L. Julius Caesar (consul 90, censor 89) and C. Julius Caesar Strabo (curule aedile 90). They were his uterine brothers by the same mother, Popillia of the Laenates, but his father was not of the gens of the Iulii Caesares. Catulus was, however, great uncle of Mark Antony and a very distant relative of Julius Caesar.

Ancient sources

• Plutarch, Life of Marius and Life of Sulla
• Appian, Bellum Civile i. 74
• Velleius Paterculus ii. 21
• Florus iii. 21
• Valerius Maximus vi. 3, ix. 13
• Cicero, De Oratore iii. 8 and Brutus 35

References

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.