Nonius
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Nonium Proper-name adjective: neuter vocative singular, Proper-name adjective: masculine genitive plural, Proper-name adjective: masculine accusative singular, Proper-name adjective: neuter genitive plural, Proper-name adjective: neuter nominative singular, Proper-name adjective: neuter accusative singular of Nonius
- the name of a Roman gens. So M. Nonius Suffenas, Cic. Att. 6, 1, 13.— Nonius Marcellus, a Roman grammarian, whose treatise De Proprietate Sermonis is extant in a very mutilated form.
1. A. Nonius, a candidate for the tribuneship of the plebs for B. C. 100, was murdered by Glaucia and Appuleius Saturninus, because he was opposed to their party. (Appian, App. BC 1.28; Plut. Mar. 29; Liv. Elit. 69.)
2. NO'NIUS, a friend of Fimbria, in whose army he was in B. C. 84, when Sulla was preparing to attack him; but when Fimbria wished his soldiers to renew their military oath to him, and called upon Nonius to do so first, he refused. (Appian, App. Mith. 59.)
3. Nonius Struma was raised to one of the curule magistracies by Julius Caesar, but appears to have been unworthy of the honour. Hence Catullus exclaims (Carm. 52):--
" Quid est, Catulle, quid moraris emori ? Sella in curuli Struma Nonius sedet."
4. Nonius, the son of Nonius Struma [No. 3], was proscribed by AI. Antonius in consequence of his possessing an opal stone of immense value. He was the grandfather of Servilius Nonianus [Nonianus]. (Plin. Nat. 37.6. s. 21.)
5. Nonius, a centurion of the soldiers, was murdered by his comrades in the Campus Martius, B. C. 41, because he endeavoured to put down some attempts at disorder and mutiny. (Appian, App. BC 5.16.)
6. Nonius had the charge of one of the gates of Rome in what is called the Perusinian war, B. C. 41, and admitted L. Antonius into the city. (Appian, B. C.5.30.)
7. Nonius Asprenas had the title of proconsul in B. C. 46, and served under Caesar in the African war, in that year, and also in the Spanish war, B. C. 45. (Auct. B Afr. 80, Hisp. 10.)
8. C. Nonius Asprenas, probably a son of the preceding, was accused, in B. C. 9. of poisoning 130 guests at a banquet, but the number in Pliny is probably corrupt, and ought to be thirty. The accusation was conducted by Cassius Severus, and the defence by Asinius Pollio. The speeches of these orators at this trial were very celebrated in antiquity, and the perusal of them is strongly recommended by Quinctilian. Asprenas was an intimate friend of Augustus, and was acquitted through the influence of the emperor. (Plin. Nat. 35.12. s. 46; Suet. Aug. 56; D. C. 4.4; Quinct. 10.1.23.) In his youth, Asprenas was injured by a fall while performing in the Ludus Trojae before Augustus, and received in consequence from the emperor a golden chain, and the permission to assume the surname of Torquatus, both for himself and his posterity. (Suet. Aug. 43.) The Torquatus, to whom Horace addresses two of his poems (Carm. 4.7, Sat. 1.5), is supposed by Weichert and others, to be the same as this Nonius Asprenas, since all the Manlii Torquati appear to have perished, which was the reason probably why Augustus gave him the ancient and honourable surname of Torquatus. Some modern writers have supposed that the C. Asprenas, who was accused of poisoning, was the same as the proconsul of this name in the African war [No. 7]; but Weichert has brought forward sufficient reasons to render it much more probable that he was his son. (Weichert, De Lucii Varii et Cassii Parmensis Vita, &c., Grimae 1836, pp. 197-199, and Excursus I."De C. Nonio Asprenate," p. 301, &c.; comp. Meyer, Orator. Roman. Fragm. p. 492, &c., 2nd ed.) For the other persons of the name of Nonius Asprenas, see Asprenas.
9. Nonius Receptus, a centurion, remaining firm to Galba, when his comrades espoused the side of Vitellius, A. D. 69, was thrown into chains by them and shortly after put to death. (Tac. Hist. 1.56, 59.)
10. Nonius Actianus, an infamous delator under Nero, was punished at the beginning of Vespasian's reign, A. D. 70. (Tac. Hist. 4.41.)
the grammarian. [Marcellus.]