L. Munatius Plancus by Thomas H. Watkins

Author:Thomas H. Watkins
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis (CAM)
Published: 2018-06-13T16:00:00+00:00

6  Plancus the Antonian: late 43–mid 32

Prominent Antonians

From the autumn of 43 Plancus was an adherent of Antony and by 36 his chief subordinate. Three of Antony’s highest-ranking affiliates in these years were nobiles of much greater dignitas than the novus et municipalis Plancus. Two were patricians, which opened the consulship to them at age 33 or 34: Paullus Aemilius Lepidus (suff. 34, nephew of the triumvir Marcus) and M. Valerius Messalla Corvinus (cos. 31). The third, Cn. Domitius Ahenobarbus, was consul in 32, a few years early for a plebeian.1 Antony and Plancus were very close to the same age, born about 84, and were more than a decade senior to the others, but Antony as the leading triumvir and a consular was, of course, the superior. From 42 Plancus was also a consular. The three nobles illustrate how political alliances shifted throughout this volatile period and put Plancus in perspective: all abandoned Antony for Octavian. A brief survey of their careers reveals their high standing. Equally to be remembered, however, is that these nobles socially far outranked Plancus, so his career ought not to be compared with theirs and found wanting. Plancus belongs to the next tier down, but a search for approximate equals, say among former Caesarian partisans and legates, fails to turn up anybody. As this chapter will demonstrate, Plancus stands alone; his success and prominence are without parallel.

Ahenobarbus was born about 70 into a family which had produced consuls in consecutive generations since 192, alternating Lucius and Cnaeus as the chosen praenomen for the oldest son. His father Lucius, an unrelenting enemy of Caesar, died at Pharsalus in 48; his mother Porcia was Cato’s sister. An improbable ally of Antony by parentage, Ahenobarbus ultimately came to prefer Antony to Octavian as the lesser of the two evils; many other senators felt the same. A Republican at first, two years after Philippi he joined Antony. Marriage to an Aemilia tied him to the Aemilii Lepidi. A later betrothal cemented the political affiliation, as Cnaeus pledged his son Lucius, a boy of twelve, to Antony’s daughter, then a toddler of one or two, in 37. He governed Bithynia from 40 to 34 and was consul in 32. He has been characterized as “arguably Antony’s most distinguished supporter, [a] proud Republican … resolute and incorruptible … as straight-spined as Plancus was invertebrate.”2 He hated Cleopatra but stayed with Antony until shortly before Actium and died soon after switching allegiance. In 22 his son sought to humiliate Plancus, then censor, and became consul in 16.3

Paullus Aemilius Lepidus was likely three years younger than Domitius and for a time his brother-in-law. His uncle was the triumvir Marcus Lepidus, Plancus’ consular colleague in 42 but out of power from 36, so Paullus got little help from him. His father Lucius was consul in 50 and had been won to a benevolent neutrality by Caesar’s money. It is not known when he changed and went over to Octavian, but his descent alone guaranteed him the suffect consulship in 34.

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