Opimius
- the name of a Roman gens.
- 1 L. Opimius, consul A. U. C. 633, Cic. Brut. 83, 287; id. Cat. 1, 2, 4.—
- 2 Q. Opimius, consul A. U. C. 600, Cic. de Or. 2, 68, 277.—In fem.: Opimia, a Vestal, Liv. 22, 57.—Hence, adj.
- A Ŏpī-mĭus, a, um, of or belonging to an Opimius: basilica Opimia, Varr. L. L. 5, 32, § 156. —
- B Ŏpīmĭānus, a, um, of or belonging to an Opimius, Opimian: Opimianum vinum; and absol. as subst.: Ŏpīmĭānum, i, n., very celebrated wine of the vintage of A. U. C. 633, when Opimius was consul, Mart. 3, 82, 24; 9, 87, 1; 10, 49, 2; Petr. 34, 6; cf. Cic. Brut. 83, 287; Plin. 14, 4, 6, § 55; 14, 14, 16, § 94.
1. C. Opimius Pansa, quaestor B. C. 294, was killed in the quaestorium or quaestor's tent, in an attack made by the Samnites upon the Roman camp. (Liv. 10.32.)
2. Q. OPIMIUS Q. F. Q. N., was consul B. C. 154, with L. Postumius Albinus. Opimius in his consulship carried on war with the Oxybii and Deciatae, Ligurian tribes on the northern side of the Alps, who had attacked the territory of the people of Massilia, the allies of the Roman people, and had laid, waste the towns of Antipolis and Nicaea, which belonged to Massilia. Opimius subdued these people without any difficulty, and obtained in consequence the honour of a triumph. (Plb. 33.5, 7, 8; Liv. Epit. 47; Fasti Capit.; Obsequ. 76.) This Opinmius seems to have been a man of as little principle as his son, and was notorious in his youth for his riotous living. Lucilius described him as "formosus homo et famosus" (Nonius, iv. s. u. Fame, p. 658, ed. Gothofred.), and Cicero speaks of him as "qui adolescentulus male audisset." (De Orat. 2.68, ed fin.) In the same passage Cicero relates a joke of Opimius.
3. L. Opimius Q. F. Q. N., son of the preceding, was praetor B. C. 125, in which year he marched against Fregellae, which had risen in revolt, in order to obtain the Roman franchise. The town was betrayed to Opimius by one of its citizens, Q. Numitoritis Pullus, and severe vengeance was taken upon the inhabitants. (Liv. Epit. 60; Cic. De Invent. 2.34; Ascon. in Pison. p. 17, ed. Orelli ; Vell. 2.6; Plut. C. Gracch. 3.) Opimius belonged to the high aristocratical party, and possessed great influence in the senate. He was one of the most violent and, at the same time, one of the most formidable opponents of C. Gracchns; and accordingly when he first became a candidate for the consulship, C. Gracchus used all his influence with the people to induce them to prefer C. Fannius Strabo in his stead. (Plut. C. Gracch. 11.) Gracchus succeeded in his object, and Fannius was consul in B. C. 122; but he was unable to prevent the election of Opimius for the following year, and had only rendered the latter a still bitterer enemy by the affront he had put upon him. Opimnius's colleague was Q. Fabius Maximus Allobrogicus. The history of the consulship of Opimius, B. C. 121, is given at length in the life of C. Gracchus. It is only necessary to state here in general, that Opimius entered, with all the zeal of an unscrupulous partisan and the animosity of a personal enemy, into the measures which the senate adopted to crush Gracchus, and forced on matters to an open rupture. As soon as he was armed by the senate with the well-known decree, "That the consuls should take care that the republic suffered no injury," he resolved to make away with Gracchus, and succeeded, as is related in the life of the latter. Opimius and his party abused their victory most savagely, and are said to have killed more than three thousand persons. [For details see Vol. II. pp. 197, 198, and the authorities there quoted.]
In the following year, B. C. 120, Opimins was accused by Q. Decius, tribune of the plebs, of having put Roman citizens to death without a trial. He was defended by the consul, C. Papirius Carbo, who had formerly belonged to the party of Gracchus, but had gone over to that of the aristocracy. Although the judices now belonged to the equestrian order by one of the laws of Gracchus, they were too much terrified by the events of the preceding year to condemn the person who had been the prime mover in them, and accordingly acquitted the accused. (Liv. Epit. 61; Cic. de Orat. 2.25.) Opimius thus escaped for the present, but his venality and corruption brought him before the judices again a few years afterwards, when he met with a different fate. He had been at the head of the commission which was sent into Africa in B. C. II 2, in order to divide the dominions of Micipsa between Jugurtha and Adherbal, and had allowed himself to be bribed by Jugurtha, to assign to him the better part of the country. This scandalous conduct had passed unnoticed at the time but when the defeat of the Roman army, through the misconduct of Albinus, in B. C. 109, had roused the indignation of the Roman people, the tribune, C. Manilius Limetanus, brought forward a bill for inquiry into the conduct of all those who had received bribes from Jugurtha. By this law Opimius was condemned along with many others of the leading members of the aristocracy. He went into exile to Dyrrhachium in Epeirus, where he lived for some years, hated and insulted by the people, and where he eventually died in great poverty. He richly deserved his punishment, and met with a due recompense for his cruel and ferocious conduct towards C. Gracchus and his party. Cicero, on the contrary, who, after his consulship, had identified himself with the aristocratical party, frequently laments the fate of Opinmius, and complains of the cruelty shown towards a man who had conferred such signal services upon his country as the conquest of Fregellae and the destruction of Gracchus. He calls him the saviour of the commonwealth, and characterises his condemnation as a blot upon the Roman dominion, and a disgrace to the Roman people. Further Information
Sal. Jug. 16, 40; Veil. Pat. ii 7; Plut. C. Gracch. 18; Cic. pro Planc. 28, Brut. 34, in Pison. 39, pro Sest. 67; Schol. Bob. pro Sest. p. 311, ed. Orelli. Vinum Opimianum
The year in which Opimius was consul (B. C. 121) was remarkable for the extraordinary heat of the antumn, and thus the vintage of this year was of an unprecedented quality. This wine long remained celebrated as the Vinum Opimianum, and was preserved for an almost incredible space of time. Cicero speaks of it as in existence when he wrote his Brutus, eighty-five years after the consulship of Opimius (Brut. 83). Velleius Paterculus, who wrote in the reign of Tiberius, says (2.7) that none of the wine was then in existence ; but Pliny, who published his work in the reign of Vespasian, makes mention of its existence even in his day, two hundred years afterwards. It was reduced, he says, to the consistence of rough honey; and, like other very old wines, was so strong, and harsh, and bitter, as to be undrinkable until largely diluted with water. (Plin. Nat. 14.4. s. 6; Dict. of Ant. s. u. Vinum.)
4. L. Opimius, served in the army of L. Lutatius Catulus, consul B. C. 102, and obtained great credit by killing a Cimbrian, who had challenged him (Ampelius, 100.22).
5. Q. Opimius L. F. Q. N. was brought to trial before Verres in his praetorship (B. C. 74), on the plea that he had interceded against the Lex Cornelia, when he was tribune in the preceding year (B. C. 75); but, in reality, because he had in his tribunate opposed the wishes of some Roman noble. He was condemned by Verres, and deprived of all his property. It appears from the Pseudo-Asconius that Opimius had in his tribunate supported the law of the consul C. Aurelius Cotta, which restored to the tribunes the right of being elected to the other magistracies of the state after the tribunate, of which privilege they had been deprived by a Lex Cornelia of the dictator Sulla. (Cic. Ver. 1.60; Pseudo-Ascon. in Verr. p. 200, ed. Orelli.)
6. Opimius, is mentioned as one of the judices by Cicero (Cic. Att. 4.16.6) in B. C. 54. The word which follows Opimius, being either his cobgnomen or the name of his tribe, is corrupt. (See Orelli, ad loc.) This Opimius may be the same as the following.
7. M. Opimius, praefect of the cavalry in the army of Metellus Scipio, the father-it-law of Pompey, was taken prisoner by Cn. Domitius Caliis, B. C. 48. (Caes. Civ. 3.38.)
8. Opimius, a poor man mentioned by Horace (Sat. 2.3. 124), of whom nothing is known.
(1) Quintus, consul B.C. 154, when he subdued some of the Ligurian tribes north of the Alps, who had attacked Massilia. He was notorious in his youth for his riotous living.
(2) Lucius, son of the preceding, was praetor in B.C. 125, in which year he took Fregellae, which had revolted against the Romans. He belonged to the high aristocratic party, and was a violent opponent of C. Gracchus. He was consul in 121, and took the leading part in the proceedings which ended in the murder of Gracchus. Opimius and his party abused their victory most savagely, and are said to have killed more than 300 persons. (For details, see Gracchus.) In the following year (120) he was accused of having put Roman citizens to death without trial; but he was defended by the consul C. Papirius Carbo, and was acquitted. In 112 he was at the head of the commission which was sent into Africa in order to divide the dominions of Micipsa between Iugurtha and Adherbal, and was bribed by Iugurtha, to assign to him the better part of the country (Sall. Iug. 16, 40). Three years after he was condemned under the law of the tribune C. Mamilius Limetanus, by which an inquiry was made into the conduct of all those who had received bribes from Iugurtha. Opimius went into exile to Dyrrhachium in Epirus, where he lived for some years, hated and insulted by the people, and where he eventually died in great poverty. He richly deserved his punishment, and met with a due recompense for his cruel and ferocious conduct towards C. Gracchus and his party. Cicero, on the contrary, who, after his consulship, had identified himself with the aristocratic party, frequently laments the fate of Opimius. The year in which Opimius was consul (121) was remarkable for the extraordinary heat of the autumn, and thus the vintage of this year was of an unprecedented quality. This wine long remained celebrated as the vinum Opimianum (Cic. Brut. 83, 287).