Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/77

Rh OTHO. one of the roj-al judges, was put to death by Carabyses for an unjust sentence, and his skin was stripped off and stretched on the judicial Beat which he had occupied. To this same seat, thus covered, Otanes was advanced as his suc- cessor, and was compelled to exercise his func- tions with a constant memento beneath him of his father's fate. About B.C. 506, being appointed to succeed Megabyzus in the command of the forces on the sea-coast, he took Byzantium, Chal- cedon, Antandrus, and Lamponium, as well as the islands of Lemnos and Imbros. (Herod, v. 25 — 27 ; Larch, and Schweigh. ad loc.) He was pro- bably the same Otanes who is mentioned as a son- in-law of Darelus Hystaspis, and as one of the generals employed against the revolted lonians in B. c. 499. He joined in defeating the rebels near Ephesus, and, in conjunction with Artaphernes, satrap of Sardis, he took Clazomenae, belonging to the lonians, and the Aeolian town of Cume. He is not again mentioned by name in Herodotus, but he appears to have taken part in the subsequent operations of the war till the final reduction of Ionia. (Herod, v. 102, 116, 123, vi. 6, &c.) It seems doubtful whether we should identify either of the two above persons with the father of Pa- tiramphes, the charioteer of Xerxes (Herod, vii. 40), or again with the father of Amastris [No. 1]. (Herod, vii. 61.) [E. E.] OTHO, JU'NIUS. 1. A rhetorician frequently mentioned by the elder Seneca. He was the author of a work on that branch of rhetoric entitled colores (respecting the meaning of which see Quintil. iv. 2. § 88). Through the influence of Sejanus, Otho was made a senator, and by due subservience to the ruling powers, he obtained the praetorship in A. D. 22, in which year he is mentioned as one of the accusers of C. Silanus, proconsul of Asia. (Senec. Controv. i. 3, Declam. iu 1, &c. ; Tac. Ann. iii. QQ.) 2. Tribune of the plebs, A. d. 37, the last year of the reign of Tiberius. He was banished for putting his intercessio upon the question of the reward that was to be given to the accuser of Acutia. (Tac. Ann. vi. 47.) OTHO, L. RO'SCIUS, tribune of the plebs B. c. 67, was a warm supporter of the aristocratical party. When Gabinius proposed in this year to bestow upon Pompey the command of the war against the pirates, Otho and his colleague L. Tre- bellius were the only two of the tribunes that offered any decided opposition. It is related that, when Otho, afraid of speaking, after the way in which Trebellius had been dealt with [Tre- BELLius], held up two of his fingers to show that a colleague ought to be given to Pompey, the people set up such a shout that a crow that was flying over the forum was stunned, and fell down among them (Dion Cass, xxxvi. 7, 13 ; Plut. Pomp. 25). In the same year Otho proposed and carried the law which gave to the equites and to those persons who pos- sessed the equestrian census, a special place at the public spectacles, in fourteen rows or seats {inqimt- tuordecim gradibus sive ordinihus), next to the place of the senators, which was in the orchestra (Veil. Pat. ii. 32 ; Liv. Epit. 99 ; Dion Cass, xxxvi. 25 ; Cic. pro Mur. 19 ; Tac. Ann. xv. 32 ; l-iov.Epod. iv. 15, Ep. i. 1. 62 ; Juv. iii. 159, xiv. 324). For those equites who had lost their rank by not pos- sessing the proper equestrian census, there was a special place assigned {inter decoctores^ Cic. Phil. ii. OTHO. 65 18). This law soon became very Hnpopular ; the people, who were excluded from the seats which they had formerly occupied in common with the equites, thought themselves insulted ; and in Cicero's consulship (b. c. 63) there was such a riot occasioned by the obnoxious measure, that it re- quired all his eloquence to allay the agitation. {Cic.adAtt. ii. 1). This L. Roscius Otho must not be confounded, as he has frequently been, with the L. Roscius who was praetor in B. c. 49. The latter had the cog- nomen of Fabatus [Fabatus]. The Otho spoken of by Cicero in B. c. 45, may be the same as the tribune. (Cic. ad Att. xiii. 29, comp. xii. 37. § 2, 38. § 4, 42. § 1.) OTHO, SA'LVIUS. 1. M. Salvius Otho, the grandfather of the emperor Otho, was descended from an ancient and noble family of the town of Ferentinum, in Etruria. His father was a Roman eques, his mother was of low origin, perhaps even a freed woman. Through the influence of Li via Augusta, in whose house he had been brought up, Otho was made a Roman senator, and eventually obtained the praetorship, but was not advanced to any higher honour. (Suet. Otho., 1 ; Tac. Hist. ii. 50.) 2. L. Salvius Otho, the son of the preceding, and the father of the emperor Otho, was connected on his mother's side with many of the most dis- tinguished Roman families, and stood so high in the favour of Tiberius and resembled this emperor so strongly in person, that it was supposed by most that he was his son. He discharged the various public offices at Rome, was consul suffectus in A. D. 33 (Suet. Galb. 6), obtained the proconsulate of Africa, and administered the affairs of this province, as well as of other extraordinary commands which he held, with great diligence and energy. In a.d. 42 he was sent into lllyricum, where the Roman army had lately rebelled against Claudius. On his arrival he put to death several of the soldiers, who had killed their own officers under the pretext that they had excited them to rebellion, and who had even been rewarded by Claudius for this very act. Such a proceeding, though it might have been necessary to restore the discipline of the troops, gave great umbrage at the imperial court ; but Otho soon afterwards regained the favour of Claudius by detecting a conspiracy which had been formed against his life by a Roman eques. The senate conferred upon him the extraordinary honour of erecting his statue on the Palatine, and Claudius enrolled him among the patricians, adding that he did not wish better children than Otho. By his wife Albia Terentina he had two sons and one daughter. The elder of his sons, Lucius, bore, says Suetonius, the surname of Titianus, but we may conclude from Tacitus {Ann.xn. 52) and Frontinus (Aquaed. 13), that he had the cognomen of Otho as well [see below. No. 3]. His younger son, Marcus, was the emperor Otho. His daughter was betrothed, when quite young, to Drusus, the son of Germanicus. (Suet. Otho, 1 ; Tac. Hist. ii. 50.) 3. L. Salvius Oxho Titianus, was the son of No. 2, and the elder brother of the emperor Otho. He was consul A. D, 52, with Faustus Cornelius Sulla (Tac. Jnn. xii. 52 ; Frontin. Aquaed. 13). In A. D. 63 Titianus was proconsul in Asia, and had Agricola for his quaestor. It is related to the honour of the latter that he was not corrupted by the example of his superior officer, who indulged