consul in B. c. 6 with D. Laelius Balbus; and as he lived to see both his sons consuls, he must have been alive at least as late as A. D. 28. (Dion Cass. lv. 9; Vell. Pat. ii. 43.) He was a friend of Velleius Paterculus, from whom we learn (l. c.) that Vetus was a pontifex.

4. C. ANTISTIUS VETUS, son of No. 3, was consul A. D. 23 with C. Asinius Pollio. (Vell. Pat. ii. 43; Dion Cass. Index, lib. lvii.; Tac. Ann. iv. 17; Frontin. Aquaed. 102.) 5. I. ANTISTIUS VETUS, consul suffectus A. D. 28. Fasti.)

son of No. 3, was (Vell. Pat. ii. 43;

6. C. ANTISTIUS VETUS, probably son of No. 4, was consul under Claudius A. D. 50 with M. Suilius Nerulinus. (Tac. Ann. xii. 25.)

7. L. ANTISTIUS VETUS, probably also a son of No. 5, was consul with the emperor Nero in the first year of his reign, A. D. 55. Three years afterwards, A. D. 58, Vetus commanded a Roman army in Germany, and as he had no war to carry on, he formed the project, in order that his soldiers might not remain idle, of connecting the Mosella (Moselle) and the Arar (Saone) by a canal, by which means a water communication would be established between the Mediterranean and the Northern Ocean, as troops could be conveyed down the Rhone and the Sacne into the Moselle through the canal, and down the Moselle into the Rhine, and so into the Ocean. The daughter of Vetus was married to Rubellius Plautus; and when Nero resolved upon the death of the latter in A. D. 62, his father-inlaw pressed him to take up arms against the emperor. [PLAUTUS, p. 411, b.] Plautus was put to death, but Vetus escaped for a time. Three years later, A. D. 65, the tyrant resolved upon his death, and Vetus accordingly anticipated his sentence by opening his veins in the bath. His mother-in-law Sextia and his daughter Pollutia likewise opened their veins and perished along with him. (Tac. Ann. xiii. 11, 53, xiv. 57, 58, xvi. 10, 11.)

8. C. ANTISTIUS VETUS, consul with C. Manlius Valens in the last year of the reign of Domitian, A. D. 96. (Dion Cass. lxvii. 14.)

9. ANTISTIUS VETUS, consul under Trajan, A. D. 116, with Aelianus. (Fasti.)

10. ANTISTIUS VETUS, consul under Antoninus Pius, A. D. 150, with Gallicanus. (Fasti; Cod. 2. tit. 13. s. 1.)

VIBENNA CAELES or CAE'LIUS. [CAELES VIBENNA.]

VIBIA GENS, plebeian. No Romans of this name are mentioned till the latter end of the republic; but we meet with several persons of the name among the Italian nations in the second Punic war. [See below, VIBIUS, Nos. 1, 2; VIBIUS VIRRIUS.] The first of the gens, who obtained the consulship, was C. Vibius Pansa in B. C. 43; and several Vibii appear in the Consular Fasti under the empire. Two of the Roman emperors, TREBONIANUS GALLUS and VOLUSIANUS, bore the name of Vibius. The coins of the Vibia gens have on them the surnames of Pansa and Varus. [PANSA; VARUS.]

VIBI'DIA, the eldest of the Vestal virgins, besought the emperor Claudius to spare Messalina. (Tac. Ann. xi. 32, 34.)

VIBIDIUS VARRO. [VARRO.]

C. VIBIE'NUS, a senator, lost his life in the riots which took place at the burial of Clodius in

B. C. 52. (Cic. pro Mil. 14; Ascon. in Mil. p. 33, Orelli.)

VIBILIUS or VIBI'LLIUS, king of the Hermunduri, expelled Catualda from his dominions at the beginning of the reign of Tiberius, and subsequently united with Vangio and Sido in expelling Vannius, king of the Suevi, from his country, in the reign of Claudius. (Tac. Ann. ii. 63, xii. 29.) [CATUALDA; VANNIUS.]

VIBIUS. 1. VIBIUS ACCUAEUS, apparently so called from the town of Accua, was a commander of a Pelignian cohort in the Roman army in B. C. 212, and distinguished himself by his bravery. (Liv. xxv. 14; Val. Max. iii. 2. § 20.) 2. VIBIUS, one of the Bruttii, the brother of Paccius, B. c. 209. (Liv. xxvii. 15.) [PACCIUS, No. 2.]

3. VIBIUS, bore such a striking resemblance to Pompeius Magnus, that he was frequently mistaken for the latter. (Val. Max. ix. 14. §1; Plin. H. N. vii. 10. s. 12.)

4. L. VIBIUS, a Roman eques, was magister or manager of the company, which farmed the customs at Syracuse. (Cic. Verr. ii. 74.)

5. SEX. VIBIUS, of Larinum, slain by Oppianicus. (Cic. pro Cluent. 8.)

6. VIBIUS CAPPADOX, of Larinum, said to have been poisoned by A. Cluentius. (Cic. pro Cluent, 60.) The cognomen Cappadox is suspicious, but it is found in all the best MSS.

7. VIBIUS, from whom Cicero received the books of the poet Alexander Lychnus (Cic. ad Att. ii. 20), is probably the same person as Vibius Curius. [CURIUS, p. 904, a.]

8. C. Vibius, one of the accusers of Libo Drusus, A. D. 16. (Tac. Ann. ii. 30.)

VI'BIUS, the engraver of a precious stone, namely, a carnelion engraved in intaglio, representing an Othriad, on whose buckler the artist's name is inscribed thus, VIBIUS F. (Caylus, Recueil, iii. pt. xxi. No. 5, pp. 83, 84; R. Rochette, Lettre à M. Schorn, p. 158, 2d ed.) [P.S.] VIBIUS CRISPUS. [CRISPUS.] VIBIUS CURIUS. [CURIUS.] VI'BIUS FRONTO. [FRONTO.] VIBIUS MARSUS. [MARSUS.] VI'BIUS PACIACUS. [PACIACUS.] VI'BIUS PANSA. [PANSA.] VIBIUS PO'STUMUS. [POSTUMUS.] VI BIUS RUFUS. [RUFUS.] VI'BIUS SECUNDUS. [SECUNDUS.] VI'BIUS SEQUESTER. [SEQUESTER.] VI'BIUS SERE'NUS. [SERENUS.] VI'BIUS TREBONIA'N US.

ANUS.]

[TREBONI

VI BIUS VARUS. [VARUS.] VI BIUS VI'RRIUS, of Capua, induced his countrymen to revolt from the Romans and to espouse the cause of Hannibal after the battle of Cannae, B. C. 216. When Capua, after its long siege by the Romans, could hold out no longer, B. C. 211, Vibius recommended the senators to put themselves to death, rather than fall into the power of the Romans. Twenty-seven of the senators re solved to follow his advice, and accompanied him to his house, where after a sumptuous banquet they all took poison. (Liv. xxiii. 6, xxvi. 13, 14.)

VIBULA'NUS, the name of the most ancient family of the Fabia gens. It was so powerful in the early times of the republic that three brothers | of the family held the consulship for seven years

resolved to quit Rome altogether, where they were regarded as apostates by their own order. They determined to found a settlement on the banks of the Cremera, a small stream that falls into the Tiber a few miles above Rome. According to the legend, the consul Kaeso went before the senate and said, that the Fabii were willing to carry on the war against the Veientes, alone and at their own cost. Their offer was joyfully accepted, for the patricians were glad to see them expose themselves voluntarily to such dangers. The departure of the Fabii from the city was celebrated in Roman story. On the day after Kaeso had made the proposal to the senate, 306 Fabii, all patricians of one gens, assembled on the Quirinal at the house of Kaeso, and from thence marched with the consul at their head through the Carmental gate. They proceeded straight to the banks of the Cremera, where they erected a fortress. Livy and the writers who follow him speak of the 306 patrician Fabii as departing alone to the Cremera; but other authorities with more probability represent them as accompanied by their wives, children and clients. The latter were undoubtedly very numerous; and Dionysius says that the Fabii with their dependants amounted to 4000 persons. It seems nearly evident, as has been already stated, that the Fabii intended to form a settlement, which might become a powerful Latin town on the borders of the Etruscan territory; and that they ought not to be regarded as simply an advanced guard occupying a fort in the enemy's territory, for the purpose of ravaging the country. Even if it had not been stated that the Fabii had left Rome with their families and clients, it might fairly have been inferred from the unanimous tradition that only one of the family, who had remained at Rome, survived the entire destruction of the gens. As soon as the Fabii had fortified their settlement on the Cremera, they commenced their inroads and continued to lay waste the Veientine territory without cessation. The Veientes collected a powerful army from the Etruscan states and besieged the fortress, but the Romans sent an army to their relief under the command of the consul L. Aemilius Mamercus, who defeated the Etruscans, B. c. 478. Thereupon a cruce was concluded for a year; but at its expiration the Etruscans again took up arms, and the Fabii were all destroyed in the consulship of C. Horatius Pulvillus and T. Menenius Lanatus, B. C. 477. The manner of their death is variously related by the ancient writers. According to one tradition, preserved but rejected by Dionysius, the Fabii set out from the Cremera on a certain day in order to offer up a sacrifice in their sanctuary on the Quirinal at Rome: trusting to the sanctity of their mission, they went without arms, as in a time of peace, but on their road they were attacked by a great army which had been placed in ambush and perished by the darts of the enemy, for although unarmed none of the Etruscans dared come near the heroes. According to another tradition the Fabii, who had repeatedly gained victories in the open field, were enticed to follow some cattle, which were purposely driven under a weak escort into the mountains, and they thus fell into an ambush, where many thousand men had been placed. Although scattered when the enemy attacked them, the Fabii made an heroic resistance and only feil after a long struggle overwhelmed by superior numbers. This account of the death of

the Fabii has been followed by Dionysius who has worked up the tale in his usual manner, as well as by Livy, Ovid, and other ancient writers. The fortress on the Cremera must have been taken immediately afterwards, and the whole of the settlement have been put to the sword. In whatever way the Fabii may have perished, it seems clear that they might have been saved, for the consul Menenius Lanatus was in the neighbourhood with an army, and was condemned in the following year as the guilty cause of the disaster. [LANATUS, No. 2.] (Liv. ii. 48—50; Dionys. ix. 14— 22; Gell. xvii. 21; Ov. Fast. ii. 195, foll.; Dion Cass. Fragm. No. 26, ed. Reim.; Festus, 8. v. Scelerata porta.) Ovid says (l. c.) that the Fabii perished on the Ides of February; but all other authorities state that they were destroyed on the day on which the Romans were subsequently conquered by the Gauls at the Allia, that is, on the fifteenth before the Kalends of Sextilis, June the 18th (Liv. vi. 1; Tac. Hist. ii. 91; Plut. Camill. 19): hence Niebuhr supposes that Ovid mistook the day of their departure for that of their destruction (Hist. of Rome, vol. ii. note 441).

It is unanimously stated by the ancient writers that all the Fabii perished at the Cremera with the exception of one individual, the son of Marcus, from whom all the later members of the gens were descended. The same accounts relate that he was left behind at Rome on account of his youth; but this could not have been the reason, if we are correct in the supposition that the Fabii migrated from the city with all their families, and it is moreover refuted by the fact that this Fabius was consul ten years afterwards,

From the fact of his being raised to the consulship, and from the opposition which he then offered to the tribunes, it is probable, as Niebuhr supposes, that he maintained the former opinions of his gens, when the latter changed their sentiments and refused to leave Rome with them. (Niebuhr, Hist. of Rome, vol. ii. p. 194.)

3. M. FABIUS K. F. VIBULANUS, the brother of the two preceding, was consul B. c. 483 with L. Valerius Potitus. He resisted the efforts of the tribunes to carry the Agrarian law of Sp. Cassins into effect; and as they in consequence impeded the levy of troops, the consuls removed their tribunals outside the city, where the power of the tribunes did not extend, and by heavy punishments compelled the citizens to enlist. The consuls then carried on war against the Volscians, but without any decisive result. (Liv. ii. 42; Dionys. viii. 87, 88.) In B. c. 480 M. Fabius was consul a second time with Cn. Manlius Cincinnatus. The two consuls marched against the Veientes, but did not venture at first to attack the enemy, lest their own soldiers should desert them as they had done K. Fabius in the preceding year. They accordingly kept their troops in their intrenchments, till the soldiers, roused at length by the taunts and scoffs of the enemy, demanded to be led forth to battle, and swore that they would not leave the field except as conquerors. The bravery of the Fabii in the battle which followed has already been related in the life of Kaeso, who fought under his brother. The Romans gained the victory, but bought it dearly. The consul Cincinnatus and Q. Fabius were killed; and the surviving consul, on account of the loss which he had sustained, re

fused the triumph which the senate offered him. The care which M. Fabius showed for the wounded and his reconciliation to the plebeians have been related above [No. 2]. Dionysius says that Fabius resigned his consulship two months before the expiration of his year, because his wounds prevented him from discharging the duties of his office. (Liv. ii. 43-47; Dionys. ix. 5-13; Frontin. Strat. i. 11. § 1; Val. Max. v. 5. § 2.) In the following year, B. c. 479, M. Fabius accompanied the rest of his gens to their fatal settlement on the Cremera and perished along with them two years afterwards. Dionysius (ix. 15) represents Marcus as the leader of the Fabii in their migration from Rome, but Livy (ii. 49) undoubtedly follows the genuine legend in making the consul Kaeso head his gens on that occasion.

4. Q. FABIUS M. F. K. F.VIBULANUS, the son of No. 3, is said to have been the only one of the Fabii who survived the destruction of his gens at the Cremera, but he could not have been left behind at Rome on account of his youth, as the legend relates. [See above, No. 2, sub finem.] He was consul in B. c. 467 with Ti. Aemilius Mamercus, when he supported the patrician party against the tribunes. The latter, having the cooperation of the other consul, made a vigorous effort to carry the agrarian law; but Fabius effected a compromise by proposing that a colony should be founded at Antium, which had been conquered by the Romans in the preceding year. He subsequently marched against the Aequians, who sued for peace, which was granted them; but they soon afterwards broke it and made an inroad into the Latin territory. (Liv. iii. 1; Dionys. ix. 59.) In B. c. 465 Fabius was consul a second time with T. Quintius Capitolinus Barbatus. He was appointed to carry on the war with the Aequians, which had been continued ever since his first consulship. The ambassadors whom he sent to the Aequians were treated with contempt, at which the Romans were so much enraged that Quintius marched out of the city with another consular army to support his colleague. According to Livy the consuls defeated the Aequians, who withdrew from Mount Algidus into their own territory; but Dionysius says that the battle was not decisive, which is more in accordance with Livy's subsequent narrative, in which it is stated that the Aequians made incursions into the Roman territory for plunder, which were avenged by Fabius devastating the lands of the Aequians. (Liv. iii. 2, 3; Dionys. ix. 61.) Three years afterwards, B. C. 462, Fabius was appointed Praefectus Urbi, while the two consuls were absent from the city. The tribune C. Terentillus Arsa took advantage of the absence of the consuls to propose a rogation for appointing five commissioners, who might draw up laws to limit the power of the consuls. Thereupon Fabius called together the senate and inveighed with such vehemence against the rogation and its author, that even both the consuls could not have inspired greater fear. On the advice of his colleagues Terentillus withdrew his proposal. (Liv. iii. 9; Dionys. ix. 69.)

In B. C. 459 Fabius was consul a third time with L. Cornelius Maluginensis. In this year he defeated the Volscians, who had laid siege to Antium, and also the Aequians, who had taken Tusculum, and on account of these victories celebrated a triumph on his return to Rome. In the

following year, B. c. 458, when the two consuls marched with their two armies against the Sabines and Aequians, Fabius was left behind with a third for the protection of Rome. This is the account of Dionysius, but Livy simply says that he was one of the three ambassadors sent in that year to Cloelius Gracchus, the leader of the Aequians. (Liv. iii. 22—25; Dionys. x. 20-22.)

In B. C. 450 Fabius was elected a member of the second decemvirate, and along with his col leagues continued illegally in power in the fol lowing year. Ap. Claudius and Fabius were the two leading members of the second decemvirate, and Fabius supported his colleague in all his tyrannical acts. When the war with the Aequians and Sabines broke out Fabius was appointed to the command with two colleagues, while Appius remained in the city. Fabius must have ordered the murder of L. Siccius [SICCIUS], who was serving in the army against the Sabines, but his name is not mentioned in connection with this foul deed. This probably arose from Livy and Dio. nysius having the Annals of Fabius Pictor before them, in which the virtues of the Fabii were extolled and their faults omitted. After the abolition of the decemvirate and the death of Ap. Claudius and Oppius, Fabius shared the fate of his remaining colleagues; he went into exile and his property was confiscated. (Liv. iii. 35, 41, 58; Dionys. x. 58, xi. 23, 46.)

Q. Fabius is said to have married the daughter of Numerius Otacilius of Maleventum on account of her wealth, with the condition that his first child should receive the praenomen of its maternal grandfather; and it is stated that it was in this way that Numerius became a praenomen in a patrician gens, which it had not been before. (Festus, s. v. Numerius, pp. 170, 173, ed. Müller.) We find however that the elder of his two sons bore the praenomen Marcus, and the younger that of Numerius [Nos. 5 and 6]; but it has been conjectured that the elder may have been a son by a former marriage.

5. M. FABIUS Q. F. M. N. VIBULANUS, eldest son of No. 4, was consul B. c. 442 with Postumus Aebutius Elva Cornicen, in which year a colony was founded at Ardea. In B. c. 437 he served as legatus of the dictator Mam. Aemilius Mamercinus in the war against the Veientes and Fidenates. In B. c. 433 he was one of the consular tribunes; and in B. c. 431 he served as legatus of the dictator A. Postumius Tubertus in the great war against the Aequians and Volscians. He lived till the capture of Rome by the Gauls, B. c. 390, where he is spoken of as pontifex maximus, and is said to have rehearsed the solemn formula, which was repeated after him by the aged senators who had resolved to await the entrance of the Gauls into the city, and who accordingly dedicated themselves to death. (Liv. iv. 11; Diod. xii. 34; Liv. iv. 17, 19, 25; Diod. xii. 58; Liv. iv. 27, 28, v. 41.)

6. N. FABIUS Q. F. M. N. VIBULANUS, second son of No. 4, was consul B. c. 421 with T. Quintius Capitolinus Barbatus. He carried on war against the Aequians, whom he put to flight without any difficulty: he was refused a triumph, but received the honour of an ovation. It was in this year that the consuls proposed that in addition to the two city quaestors, two others should be appointed to attend upon the consuls in time of war. This proposal gave rise to great contests, as the tribunes

insisted that some of the quaestors should be chosen from the plebeians. In B. c. 415 Fabius was one of the consular tribunes, and again in B. c. 407. (Liv. iv. 43, 49, 58; Diod. xiii. 24, xiv. 3.)

7. Q. FABIUS Q. F. M. N. VIBULANUS, third son of No. 4, was consul B. c. 423 with C. Sempronius Atratinus, consular tribune for the first time B. C. 416 (omitted through accident by Livy, iv. 47), and for the second time B. c. 414. (Liv. iv. 37, 49; Diod. xiii. 9, 38.) At the beginning of the following year he was interrex. (Liv. iv. 51.) 8. Q. FABIUS M. f. Q. n. VibulanUS AMBUSTUS, son of No. 5, was consul B. c. 412 with C. Furius Pacilus. (Liv. iv. 52.) He was the last Fabius of the name of Vibulanus. Ambustus now became the name of the family. [AMBUSTUS.]

VIBULE NUS AGRIPPA. [AGRIPPA.]

L. VIBU'LLIUS RUFUS, a senator and an intimate friend of Pompey, is mentioned on one or two occasions by Cicero before the breaking out of the civil war. He was a man of resolution and energy, and was much trusted by Pompey, who made him Praefectus Fabrûm in the civil war. When Caesar marched into Italy at the beginning of B. C. 49, Pompey sent Vibullius into Picenum to strengthen his cause in that quarter, but he was unable to effect any thing, as all the towns declared in favour of Caesar, and he accordingly threw himself into Corfinium, which was held by Domitius Ahenobarbus. Vibullius was one of the senators who fell into Caesar's hands on the surrender of Corfinium, and was along with the others dismissed uninjured by the conquerors. A few days afterwards Pompey sent him into Spain to assist Afranius and Petreius in carrying on war against Caesar. He was again taken prisoner by Caesar on the conquest of Pompey's troops in that country, and was again pardoned. When Caesar landed in Greece in B. c. 48, he despatched him to Pompey with offers of peace, and Vibullius made the greatest haste to reach Pompey, not from any desire to favour the views of Caesar, but in order to give Pompey the earliest intelligence possible of the arrival of his enemy in Greece. (Cic. ad. Q. Fr. iii. 1. § 5, ad Att. vii. 24, viii. 1, 2, 11, 15; Caes. B. C. i. 15, 23, 34, 38, iii. 10, 11.)

VICA POTA, that is, "the Victor and Conqueror (quae vincit et potitur), was a Roman divinity of victory, whose temple was situated at the foot of the hill Velia. (Liv. ii. 7; Cic. de Leg. ii. 11.) [L. S.]

VICTOR, an abandoned man, whom it was supposed that M. Antonius would recall from exile in B. C. 44. (Cic. ad Fam. xiv. 14.)

VICTOR, SEX. AURELIUS, who is commonly ranked among the Latin historians, flourished in the middle of the fourth century under the emperor Constantius and his successors. According to his own account (de Caes. 20), that is, supposing the work from which we quote to be a genuine document, he was born in the country of very humble parents, but rose to distinction by his zeal in the cultivation of literature. Having attracted the attention of Julian when at Sirmium, he was appointed by that prince governor of one division of Pannonia. At a subsequent period, he was elevated by Theodosius to the high office of city praefect, and there seems no good reason to doubt that he is the Sex. Aurelius Victor, who was consul along with Valentinian in A. D. 373. With regard to the period of his death, nothing is

The following works, which present in a very compressed form a continuous record of Roman affairs, from the fabulous ages down to the death of the emperor Theodosius, have all been ascribed to this writer, but the evidence upon which the determination of authorship depends, is very slender, and in all probability the third alone belongs to the Sex. Aurelius Victor whom we have noticed above.

I. Origo Gentis Romanae, in twenty-three chapters, containing the annals of the Roman race, from Janus and Saturnus down to the era of Romulus. We here find many curious tales and traditions derived apparently from ancient sources, and it may be regarded as a valuable contribution towards the legendary history of the city. Joannes Metellus, Ausonius Popma, and others, have assigned this tract to Asconius Pedianus, influenced chiefly by some expressions in which they conceived that the author spoke of Livy and Virgil as his contemporaries, but the passages in which these occur (xxiii. § 7, iii. § 7, vii. § 4), do not fairly admit of any such interpretation, while the general tone of the phraseology certainly bears no resemblance to that of the Augustan age. On the other hand, it seems certain, from the total dissimilarity in style, that it cannot have proceeded from the same hand with the two pieces which we shall next describe; and for this and other reasons Arntzenius has pronounced it to be the production of some of the later grammarians who were desirous of prefixing a suitable introduction to the series. The Origo was first printed at Antwerp, 8vo. 1579, with the commentary of Andreas Schottus in a volume, containing also the three following:

II. De Viris illustribus Urbis Romae, in eightysix chapters, commencing with the birth of the twin sons of Mars and Ilia, and concluding with the death of Cleopatra. The whole, or nearly the whole of the MSS. attach the name of Plinius to this piece: by some scholars it has been given to Cornelius Nepos, by others to Aemilius Probus. The numerous mistakes with which it abounds forbid us to fix upon any one belonging to the brighter epochs of Roman literature. It was first printed at Naples, by Sixtus Riesinger, about 1470, and again by Jac. de Ripoli, at Florence, in 1478.

III. De Caesaribus, in forty-two chapters, exhibiting short biographies of the emperors, from Augustus to Constantius. This, as we have stated, may reasonably be regarded as the work of Sex. Aurelius Victor, who was praefect of the city under Theodosius. It was first printed at Antwerp, 8vo. 1579, with the commentary of Schottus.

IV. De Vita et Moribus Imperatorum Romanorum Excerpta ex libris Sex. Aurelii Victoris, or as it is frequently styled Sex. Aurelii Victoris Epitome de Caesaribus, in forty-eight chapters, commencing with Augustus and concluding with Theodosius. These lives agree for the most part almost word for word with the preceding, but variations may here and there be detected, some points being lightly passed over, or altogether omitted, in the one collection, which are dwelt upon at considerable length in the other. This will be seen clearly by comparing the