Ancient Roman family
The gens Sornatia was an obscure plebeian family at ancient Rome. Few members of this gens appear in history, of whom the most famous was a general of Lucullus during the Third Mithridatic War, but several others are known from inscriptions.
Origin
The nomen Sornatius resembles other gentilicia formed using the suffix -atius, usually from cognomina ending in -as or -atis, derived from place names, or participles ending in -atus.[1] However, there are no known corresponding surnames; there was, however, a town called Sornum in Dacia.[2] There was also a rare gentile name Sornius,[i] from which the nomen might have been derived.[3]
Members
- This list includes abbreviated praenomina. For an explanation of this practice, see filiation.
- Sornatius, a physician quoted by Pliny the Elder. Sornatius is given as an authority for the proposition that those using a certain hair dye produced by rotting leeches in a leaden vessel full of vinegar should put oil in their mouths to prevent their teeth from blackening along with their hair.[4][5]
- Gaius Sornatius C. f., a legate of the proconsul Lucius Licinius Lucullus during the Third Mithridatic War. In 72 BC, he inflicted a devastating defeat on the Pontic army, and nearly captured Mithridates. When Lucullus invaded Armenia in 69, he left Sornatius in charge of Pontus, with a force of six thousand soldiers. The following year, his soldiers mutinied, and refused to leave for Armenia, until shamed into doing so by a Roman defeat.[6][7][8]
- Gaius Sornatius C. f., named in an inscription from Castrum Novum in Picenum.[9]
- Gaius Sornatius C. f., a centurion primus pilus in the Legio X Fretensis, buried at Rome, with a monument from Sornatia Phiale.[10]
- Sornatia Arecusa, together with her son, Gaius Sornatius Indus, dedicated a tomb at Rome for her husband of forty-three years, Quintus Lucretius Zeuxis, aged sixty.[11]
- Gaius Sornatius Q. f. Q. n. Indus, together with his mother, Sornatia Arecusa, dedicated a tomb at Rome for his father, Quintus Lucretius Zeuxis.[11]
- Sornatia Phiale, dedicated a monument at Rome to Gaius Sornatius, the centurion.[10]
- Gaius Sornatius Plutus, together with Gaius Norbanus Amianthus, masters of a slave named Cedrus, named in an inscription from Rome.[12]
- Gaius Sornatius Quartio, buried at Rome, with a monument from his sister, Sornatia.[13]
- Titus Sornatius C. f. Sabinus, buried at Rome during the first century, in a sepulchre built by his mother, Anusia Tertia for herself and her son.[14]
See also
Notes
References
- ^ Chase, p. 126.
- ^ Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, vol. II, p. 1023 ("Sornum").
- ^ CIL III, 8757, CIL V, 3427.
- ^ Pliny the Elder, Historia Naturalis, xxxii. 23.
- ^ PIR, S. 550.
- ^ Plutarch, "The Life of Lucullus", 17, 24, 30, 35.
- ^ PW, Sornatius.
- ^ Broughton, vol. II, p. 119, 133, 139.
- ^ CIL IX, 06080,21.
- ^ a b CIL VI, 3633.
- ^ a b CIL VI, 21650.
- ^ CIL VI, 14627.
- ^ CIL VI, 26627.
- ^ CIL V, 116.
Bibliography
- Gaius Plinius Secundus (Pliny the Elder), Historia Naturalis (Natural History).
- Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus (Plutarch), Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans.
- Theodor Mommsen et alii, Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum (The Body of Latin Inscriptions, abbreviated CIL), Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften (1853–present).
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, William Smith, ed., Little, Brown and Company, Boston (1854).
- August Pauly, Georg Wissowa, et alii, Realencyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft (Scientific Encyclopedia of the Knowledge of Classical Antiquities, abbreviated RE or PW), J. B. Metzler, Stuttgart (1894–1980).
- George Davis Chase, "The Origin of Roman Praenomina", in Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, vol. VIII, pp. 103–184 (1897).
- Paul von Rohden, Elimar Klebs, & Hermann Dessau, Prosopographia Imperii Romani (The Prosopography of the Roman Empire, abbreviated PIR), Berlin (1898).
- T. Robert S. Broughton, The Magistrates of the Roman Republic, American Philological Association (1952–1986).
