12-17-2011, 06:23 AM
In his account of Pompey's siege of Jerusalem, Flavius Josephus mentions a legate named Piso ("So Pompey sent his lieutenant Piso with an army, and placed garrisons both in the city and in the palace": AJ 14.4.2).
I am wondering who this Piso is, because it may be L. Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus: quaestor in 70, aedile in 64, praetor in 61, consul in 58 and colleague of Aulus Gabinius, who was certainly one of Pompey's deputies. He was also the son-in-law of Caesar and the owner of the Villa of the Papyri. We don't know his whereabouts in 63, so he may have been with Pompey in Jerusalem.
Question: was it normal for a former aedile to become legate? Under the Empire, it was something you did after you had been praetor, but what do we know about the Republic?
I am wondering who this Piso is, because it may be L. Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus: quaestor in 70, aedile in 64, praetor in 61, consul in 58 and colleague of Aulus Gabinius, who was certainly one of Pompey's deputies. He was also the son-in-law of Caesar and the owner of the Villa of the Papyri. We don't know his whereabouts in 63, so he may have been with Pompey in Jerusalem.
Question: was it normal for a former aedile to become legate? Under the Empire, it was something you did after you had been praetor, but what do we know about the Republic?