Septimius Severus
Lucius Septimius Severus was Roman emperor from 193 to 211. He was born in Leptis Magna, Libya in the Roman province of Africa. As a young man he advanced through the customary succession of offices under the reigns of Marcus Aurelius and Commodus. Severus was the final contender to seize power after the death of the emperor Pertinax in 193 during the Year of the Five Emperors.
After deposing and killing the incumbent emperor Didius Julianus, Severus fought his rival claimants, the Roman generals Pescennius Niger and Clodius Albinus. Niger was defeated in 194 at the Battle of Issus in Cilicia. Later that year Severus waged a short punitive campaign beyond the eastern frontier, annexing the Kingdom of Osroene as a new province. Severus defeated Albinus three years later at the Battle of Lugdunum in Gaul. Following the consolidation of his rule over the western provinces, Severus waged another brief, more successful war in the east against the Parthian Empire, sacking their capital Ctesiphon in 197 and expanding the eastern frontier to the Tigris. He then enlarged and fortified the Limes Arabicus in Arabia Petraea. In 202, he campaigned in Africa and Mauretania against the Garamantes, capturing their capital Garama, and expanding the Limes Tripolitanus along the southern desert frontier of the empire.
With his second wife, Julia Domna, Severus had two sons; the elder, Caracalla, was proclaimed Augustus, or co-emperor, in 198, and the younger, Geta, in 209. Severus travelled to Britain in 208, strengthening Hadrian's Wall and reoccupying the Antonine Wall. In 209, he invaded Caledonia with an army of 50,000 men but his ambitions were cut short when he died of an infectious disease in early 211 at Eboracum. His sons, advised by Julia Domna, succeeded him, thus founding the Severan dynasty. It was the last dynasty of the Roman Empire before the Crisis of the Third Century.
Early life
Family and education
Born on 11 April 145 at Leptis Magna as the son of Publius Septimius Geta and Fulvia Pia, Septimius Severus came from a wealthy and distinguished family of equestrian rank. On his mother's side, he descended from the Italian Fulvii's and on his father side, Publius Septimius Geta, hailed from a family of Punic origin. He was described as "Libyan by race", by the Roman historian and senator Cassius Dio. Due to his family background he is considered the first provincial emperor, as he was the first emperor not only born in the provinces but also into a provincial family of non-Italian origin. Severus's father, an obscure provincial, held no major political status, but he had two cousins, Publius Septimius Aper and Gaius Septimius Severus, who served as consuls under the emperor Antoninus Pius. His mother's ancestors had moved from Italy to North Africa; they belonged to the gens Fulvia, an Italian patrician family that originated in Tusculum.Septimius Severus had two siblings: an elder brother, Publius Septimius Geta; and a younger sister, Septimia Octavilla. Severus's maternal cousin was the praetorian prefect and consul Gaius Fulvius Plautianus. Septimius Severus grew up in Leptis Magna and was a native Punic speaker, but he was also educated in Latin and Greek, which he spoke with a slight accent. Little else is known of the young Severus's education but, according to Cassius Dio, the boy had been eager for more education than he actually received. Presumably, Severus received lessons in oratory: at the age of 17, he gave his first public speech.
Public service
Severus sought a public career in Rome in around 162. At the recommendation of his relative Gaius Septimius Severus, the emperor Marcus Aurelius granted him entry into the senatorial ranks. Membership in the senatorial order was a prerequisite to attain positions within the cursus honorum and to gain entry into the Roman Senate. Nevertheless, it appears that Severus's career during the 160s met with some difficulties.It is likely that he served as a vigintivir in Rome, overseeing road maintenance in or near the city, and he may have appeared in court as an advocate. At the time of Marcus Aurelius, he was the State Attorney. However, he omitted the military tribunate from the cursus honorum and had to delay his quaestorship until he had reached the required minimum age of 25. To make matters worse, the Antonine Plague swept through the capital in 166.
With his career at a halt, Severus decided to temporarily return to Leptis, where the climate was healthier. According to the Historia Augusta, a usually unreliable source, he was prosecuted for adultery during this time but the case was ultimately dismissed. At the end of 169, Severus was of the required age to become a quaestor and journeyed back to Rome. On 5December, he took office and was officially enrolled in the Roman Senate. Between 170 and 180 his activities went largely unrecorded, in spite of the fact that he occupied an impressive number of posts in quick succession. The Antonine Plague had thinned the senatorial ranks and, with capable men now in short supply, Severus's career advanced more steadily than it otherwise might have.
The sudden death of his father necessitated another return to Leptis Magna to settle family affairs. Before he was able to leave Africa, Mauri tribesmen invaded southern Spain. Control of the province was handed over to the emperor, while the Senate gained temporary control of Sardinia as compensation. Thus, Septimius Severus spent the remainder of his second term as quaestor on the island of Sardinia.
In 173, Severus's cousin Gaius Septimius Severus was appointed proconsul of the province of Africa Proconsularis and chose Severus as one of his two legati pro praetore, a senior military appointment. Following the end of this term, Septimius Severus returned to Rome, taking up office as tribune of the plebs, a senior legislative position, with the distinction of being the candidatus of the emperor.
Marriages
About 175, Septimius Severus, in his early thirties at the time, contracted his first marriage, to Paccia Marciana, a woman from Leptis Magna. He probably met her during his tenure as legate under his uncle. Marciana's name suggests Punic or Libyan origin, but nothing else is known of her. Septimius Severus does not mention her in his autobiography, though he commemorated her with statues when he became emperor. The unreliable Historia Augusta claims that Marciana and Severus had two daughters, but no other attestation of them has survived. It appears that the marriage produced no surviving children, despite lasting for more than ten years.Marciana died of natural causes around 186. Septimius Severus, now in his forties, childless and eager to remarry, began enquiring into the horoscopes of prospective brides. The Historia Augusta relates that he heard of a woman in Syria of whom it had been foretold that she would marry a king, and so Severus sought her as his wife. This woman was an Emesene Syrian named Julia Domna. Her father, Julius Bassianus, descended from the Arab Emesene dynasty and served as a high priest to the local cult of the sun god Elagabal. Domna's older sister, Julia Maesa, would become the grandmother of the future emperors Elagabalus and Alexander Severus.
Bassianus accepted Severus's marriage proposal in early 187, and in the summer the couple married in Lugdunum, of which Severus was the governor. The marriage proved happy, and Severus cherished Julia and her political opinions. Julia built "the most splendid reputation" by applying herself to letters and philosophy. They had two sons, Lucius Septimius Bassianus and Publius Septimius Geta.
Rise to power
In 191, on the advice of Quintus Aemilius Laetus, prefect of the Praetorian Guard, emperor Commodus appointed Severus as governor of Pannonia Superior. At around this time he is described by the classicist Kyle Harper as being "a middling senator of modest physical stature and unexceptional accomplishment". Commodus was assassinated the following year. Pertinax was acclaimed emperor, but he was then killed by the Praetorian Guard in early 193. In response to the murder of Pertinax, Severus's legion XIV Gemina acclaimed him emperor at Carnuntum on 9 April. Nearby legions, such as X Gemina at Vindobona, soon followed suit. Having assembled an army, Severus hurried to Italy.Pertinax's successor in Rome, Didius Julianus, had bought the emperorship in an auction. Julianus was condemned to death by the Senate and killed. Severus took possession of Rome without opposition. He executed Pertinax's murderers and dismissed the rest of the Praetorian Guard, filling its ranks with loyal troops from his own legions.
The legions of Syria had proclaimed Pescennius Niger emperor. At the same time Severus felt it reasonable to offer Clodius Albinus, the powerful governor of Britannia, who had probably supported Didius against him, the rank of Caesar, which implied some claim to the succession. With his rear safe, he moved to the East and crushed Niger's forces at the Battle of Issus.
While campaigning against Byzantium, he ordered that the tomb of his fellow-Carthaginian Hannibal be covered with fine marble.
He devoted the following year to suppressing Mesopotamia and other Parthian vassals who had backed Niger. Afterwards, Severus declared his son Caracalla as his successor, which caused Albinus to be hailed emperor by his troops and to invade Gaul. After a short stay in Rome, Severus moved north to meet him. On 19February 197 at the Battle of Lugdunum, with an army of about 75,000 men, mostly composed of Pannonian, Moesian and Dacian legions and a large number of auxiliaries, Severus defeated and killed Clodius Albinus, securing his full control over the empire.
Upon returning to Rome, Septimus had 29 senators executed for treason over their support of Albinus, despite having previously taken an oath promising not to put any senators to death.