Quintus Lutatius Catulus
For a poet, see CatullusQuintus Lutatius Catulus Caesar was a
Roman general of the
gens Lutatius and was a
consul with
Gaius Marius in
102 BC. His son, Quintus Lutatius Catulus, figured prominently in Roman politics as a consul and
censor near the end of the
Republic. His name was originally Sextus Julius Caesar, and he was Gaius Julius Caesar's father's first cousin.
In the war against the
Cimbri and
Teutones he 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 Caesar and Marius. When the chief honour was given to Marius, Catulus Caesar became his bitter opponent. He sided with
Lucius Cornelius Sulla in the
civil war, was included in the
proscription list of 87, and when Marius declined to pardon him, committed
suicide.
He was distinguished as an
orator,
poet and
prose writer, and was well versed in
Greek literature. He is said to have written the history of his consulship and the
Cimbrian War after the manner of
Xenophon; two
epigrams by him have been preserved, one on
Quintus Roscius the celebrated actor (
Marcus Tullius Cicero,
De Nat. Deorum, I. 28), the other of an erotic character, imitated from
Callimachus (
Aulus Gellius xix. 9).
Catulus Caesar 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. See
Plutarch, Marine, Sulla;
Appian, B.C. i. 74; VeIl. Pat. ii. 21; Florus iii. 21; Val. Max. vi. 3, ix. 13; Cicero,
De Oratore, iii, 8,
Brutus, 35.
