Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/510

Rh 492 BLASIO. also his son, of the priestly offices which he held. Hia life, however, was spared for the time; but when Tiberius, in 36, conferred these offices upon other persons, Blaesus and his son perceived that their fate was sealed, and accordingly put an end to their own lives. (Tac. Ann. v. 7, vi. 40.) 2. The son of the preceding, was with his father in Pannonia when the legions mutinied in a. d. 1 4, and was compelled by the soldiers to go to Tiberius with a statement of their grievances. He was sent a second time to Tiberius after the arrival of Dru- 8US in the camp. He also served under his father in 22 in the war against Tacfarinas in Africa; and he put an end to his own life, as mentioned above, in 36. (Tac. Ann. i. 19, 29, iii. 74, vi. 40.) 3. Probably the son of No. 2, was the governor of Gallia Lugdunensis in a. d. 70, and espoused the party of the emperor Vitellius, whom he sup- plied when in Gaul with everything necessary to support his rank and state. This liberality on the part of Blaesus excited the jealousy of the emperor, who shortly after had him poisoned on the most trumpery accusation, brought against him by L. Vitellius. Blaesus was a man of large property and high integrity, and had steadily refused the so- licitations of Caecina and others to desert the cause of Vitellius. (Tac. Hist. i. 59, ii. 59, iii. 38, 39.) BLAESUS, PE'DIUS, was expelled the senate in A. D. 60, on the complaint of the Cyrenians, for robbing the temple of Aesculapius, and for corrup- tion in the military levies ; but he was re-admitted in 70. (Tac. A7in. xiv. 18, //«/. i. 77.) BLANDUS, a Roman knight, who taught elo- quence at Rome in the time of Augustus, and was the instructor of the philosopher and rhetorician, Fabianus. (Senec. Controv. ii. prooem. p. 136, ed. Bip.) He is frequently introduced as a speaker in the Suasoriae- (2, 5) and Controversiae (i. 1, 2, 4, &c.) of the elder Seneca. He was probably the father or grandfather of the Rubellius Blandus mentioned below. BLANDUS, RUBE'LLIUS, whose grand- father was only a Roman knight of Tibur, married in A. D. 33 Julia, the daughter of Drusus, the son of the emperor Tiberius, whence Blandus is called the progener of Tiberius. (Tac. An7i. vi. 27, 45.) Rubellius Plautus, who was put to death by Nero, was the offspring of this marriage. [Plautus] There was in the senate in A. d. 21 a Rubellius Blandus, a man of consular rank (Tac. -4««. iii. 23, 51), who is probably the same as the husband of Julia, though Lipsius supposes him to be the father of the latter. We do not, however, find in the Fasti any consul of this name. There is a coin, struck under Augustus, bearing the inscription c. rvbellivs blandvs iiivir A. A. A. F. F., that is, Auro Argenio Aeri Flando Feriando, which is probably to be referred to the father of the above-mentioned Blandus. (Eckhel, V. p. 295.) BLA'SIO, a surname of the Cornelia and Hel- via gentes. I. Cornelii Blasiones. 1. Cn. Cornelius L. f. Cn. n. Blasio, who is mentioned nowhere but in the Fasti, was consul in B. c. 270, censor in 265, and consul a second time in 257. He gained a triumph in 270, but we do not know over what people. 2. Cn. Cornelius Blasio, was praetor in Sicily in B. c. 194. (Liv. xxxiv. 42,43.) 3. P. Cornelius Blasio, was sent as an ara- BLASTARES. bassador with two others to the Carni, Istri, and lapydes, in B. c. 170. In 168 he was one of the five commissioners appointed to settle the disputes between the Pisani and Lunenses respecting the boundaries of their lands. (Liv. xliii. 7, xlv. 13.) There are several coins belonging to this family. The obverse of the one annexed has the inscription Blasio Cn. F., with what appears to be the head of Mars : the reverse represents Dionysus, with Pallas on his left hand in the act of crowning him and another female figure on his right. (Eckhel, V. p. 180.) II. Helvii Blasiones. 1. M. Helvius Blasio, plebeian aedile in B. c. 198 and praetor in 197- He obtained the pro- vince of further Spain, which he found in a very disturbed state upon his arrival. After handing over the province to his successor, he was detained in the country a year longer by a severe and tedious illness. On his return home through nearer Spain with a guard of 6000 soldiers, which the praetor Ap. Claudius had given liim, he was attacked by an army of 20,000 Celtiberi, near the town of Illiturgi. These he entirely defeated, slew 12,000 of the enemy, and took Illiturgi. This at least was the statement of Valerius Antias. For this victory he obtained an ovation (b. c. 195), but not a triumph, because he had fought under the auspices and in the province of another. In the following year (194) he was one of the three com- missioners for founding a Roman colony at Sipon- tum in Apulia. (Liv. xxxii. 27, 28, xxxiii. 21, xxxiv. 10, 45.) 2. Helvius Blasio, put an end to his own life to encourage his friend D. Brutus to meet his death firmly, when the latter fell into the hands of his enemies, in B. c. 43. (Dion Cass. xlvi. 53.) BLA'SIUS, BLA'TIUS, or BLA'TTIUS, one of the chief men at Salapia in Apulia, betrayed the town to the Romans in B. c. 210, together with a strong Carthaginian garrison that was stationed there. The way in which he outwitted his rival Dasius, who supported the Carthaginians, is related somewhat differently by the ancient writers. (Ap- pian, Annib. 45 — 47 ; Liv. xxvi. 38; Val. Max. iii. 8, extern. 1.) BLA'STARES, MATTHAEUS, a hieromo- nachus, or monk in holy orders, eminent as a Greek canonist, who composed, about the year 1335 (as Bishop Beveridge satisfactorily makes out from the author's own enigmatical statement) an alphabetical compendium of the contents of the genuine canons. It was intended to supply a more convenient repertory for ordinary use than was furnished by the collections of Photius and his connnentators. The letters refer to the leading word in the rubrics of the titles, and under each letter the chapters begin anew in numerical order. In each chapter there is commonly an abstract, first of the ecclesi- astical, then of the secular laws which relate to the subject; but the sources whence the secular laws ai'e cited are not ordinarily referred to, and