Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/934

Rh 922 STRABO. nius also proposed a lex sumtuaria (Gell. ii. 24 ; Macrob. Sat. ii. 13 ; Plin. H. N. x. 50. s. 71). 2. C. Fannius C. f. Strabo, the son of the piJeceding, was consul b. c. 122 with Cn. Domitius Ahenobarbus. In his tribuneship of the plebs he had followed the guidance and advice of Scipio Africanus senior. Fannius owed his election to the consulship chiefly to the influence of C. Grac- chus, who canvassed the people on his behalf^ as he was anxious to prevent his enemy Opimius from obtaining the office. But as soon as Fannius entered upon the consulship, he supported the aristocracy, and took an active part in opposing the measures of Gracchus. He published a proclama- tion commanding all the Italian allies to leave Rome, and he spoke against the proposal of Grac- chus, who wished to give the Roman franchise to the Latins. This speech was preserved and was reofarded as a master-piece in the time of Cicero. Many persons questioned whether it had been composed by Fannius himself, as he had the repu- tation of being only a middling orator ; but Cicero assigns it to him. It continued to be read by the grammarians (Cic. Brut. 26 ; Plin. H. N. ii. 32 ; Plut. a Gracch. 8, 11, 12; Cic. de Orat. iii. 47; Jul. Vict, de Art. Met. p. 224, ed. Orelli ; Meyer, Orat. Rom. Fragm. p. 191, &c., 2d ed.) 3. C. Fannius M. f. Strabo, the son-in-law of Laelius, is frequently confounded with C. Fan- nius C. f. [No. 2.] In his youth he served in Africa, under Scipio Africanus, in B. c. 146, and along with Tib. Gracchus, was the first to mount the walls of Carthage on the capture of the city. He afterwards served in Spain with distinction, in B. c. 142, under Fabius Maximus Servilianus. (Plut. Tib. Gracch. 4 ; Appian, Hisp. 67.) Fan- nius is introduced by Cicero as one of the speakers both in his work De RepuUica, and in his treatise De Amicitia. At the advice of his father-in-law Laelius, Fannius had attended the lectures of the Stoic philosopher, Panaetius. His style of speak- ing was harsher than that of his namesake, C. Fannius C. f., and none of his orations are men- tioned by Cicero. He owed his celebrity in literature to his History, which was written in Latin, and the style of which is described by Ci- cero as '' neque nimis infans neque perfecte di- serta." We have no information respecting the extent of this History ; we only know that it treated of contemporary events ; and that it pos- sessed some merit appears from the fact of Brutus making an abridgment of it. Sallust likewise praises its truth. (Cic. de Rep. i. 12, Lael. 1, Brut. 26, 31, comp. 21, c?e Leg. i. 2, ad Att. xii. 5 ; Sail. ap. Victorin. p. 57, ed. Orelli ; Krause, Vitae et Fragm. Hist. Rom. p. 171, &c.; Orelli, Onom. Tull. pp. 24P, 250.) One of the difficulties respecting this C. Fannius M. f. arises from a letter of Cicero, in which he writes to Atticus to ask him under what consuls C. Fannius M. f. was tribune of the plebs, adding that he believed that it was daring the censorship of P. Africanus and L. Mummius, that is, in b. c. 142 (Cic. arf^«. xvi. 13, c). Pighius therefore concluded from this passage, that the C. Fannius M. f. who was tribune of the plebs in B. c. 142, must have been a different person from the son-in- law of Laelius, who was serving that year in Spain, as we have already seen ; and he accord- ingly supposes that there were three contemporaries of the name of C. Fannius, namely, 1. C. Fannius, STRABO. C. f. consul B. c. 122 ; 2. C. Fannius, M. f. tribune B. c. 142, and 3. C. Fannius, M. f., the son-in-law of Laelius and the historian. But the creation of another person of the same name in order to get out of a chronological difficulty, is always suspi- cious ; and if there were three C. Fannii, who were contemporaries, Cicero would hardly have omitted to mention them, especially since he speaks of the two C. Fannii in such close connection. Orelli supposes {Onom. Tull. I. c.) that C. Fannius, the son-in-law of Laelius, was tribune of the soldiers in Spain in B. c. 142, and that Cicero confounded this tribuneship with the tribuneship of the plebs. But this supposition of Orelli cannot be correct, if Cicero {de Rep. i. 12) is right in his statement that the son-in-law of Laelius was only of quaes- torian age in B. c. 129, that is, not more than thirty, since in that case he would not have been old enough to have been tribune of the soldiers in b. c. 142. It is much more probable that Cicero con- founded C. Fannius, M. f., the son-in-law of Lae- lius, with C. Fannius, C. f., and that the latter was tribune of the plebs in B. c. 142. It is, how- ever, quite impossible to reconcile all the state- ments of ancient writers respecting this C. Fannius. According to his own statement, as preserved by Plutarch {Tib. Gracch. 4), he was one of the first to mount the walls of Carthage in B. c. 1 46, but if he was thirty in B. c. 129, he could only have been thirteen in the former vear ! STRABO, C. JU'LIUS CAESAR. [Cae- sar, No. 1 0.] STRABO, M. LAE'NIUS, of Brundisium, a Roman eques and a friend of Varro, was the first person who introduced the use of the aviaries, in which birds of various kintfs were kept. (Varr. R.R. iii 5. § 8 ; Plin. H. N. x. 50, s. 72, where he is erroneously called M. Laelius Strabo.) STRABO, CN. POMPEIUS. [Pompeius, No. 21.] STRABO, SEIUS, a Roman eques, was com- mander of the praetorian troops at the latter end of the reign of Augustus and the commencement of that of Tiberius. He was subsequently sent by the latter emperor to govern Egypt, and was then succeeded in the sole command of the prae- torian troops by his son, the notorious Sejanus, who had shared with him the command from the first year of the reign of Tiberius. (Tac. Ann. i. 7, 24, iv. 1 ; Dion Cass. Ivii. 19.) [Sejanus.] STRABO, TI'TIUS. 1. C, belonged to the republican party on the death of Caesar. (Cic ad Fam. xii. 6.) 2. L., a Roman eques, whom Cicero introduced to M. Brutus {ad Fam. xiii. 14). STRABO, L. VOLTEIUS, known only from coins, a specimen of which is annexed. The obverse represents the head of Jupiter, the reverse Europa carried away on the bull. (EckheL voL v. p. 345.) COIN OP 1. VOLTEIUS STRABO,