Barbula

the name of a family of the patrician Aemilia gens.

1. Q. Aemilius Barbula, Q. F. L. N., consul in B. C. 317, in which year a treaty was made with the Apulian Teates, Nerulum taken by Barbula, and Apulia entirely subdued. (Liv. 9.20, 21; Diod. 19.17.) Barbula was consul again in 311, and had the conduct of the war against the Etruscans, with whom he fought an indecisive battle according to Livy. (9.30-32; Diod. 20.3.) The Fasti, however, assign him a triumph over the Etruscans, but this Niebuhr (Rom. Hist. iii. p. 278) thinks to have been an invention of the family, more especially as the next campaign against the Etruscans was not opened as if the Romans had been previously conquerors.

2. L. Aemilius Barbula, Q. F. Q. N., son of No. 1, was consul in B. C. 281. The Tarentines had rejected with the vilest insult the terms of peace which had been offered by Postumius, the Roman ambassador; but as the republic had both the Etruscans and Samnites to contend with, it was unwilling to come to a rupture with the Tarentines, and accordingly sent the consul Barbula towards Tarentum with instructions to offer the same terms of peace as Postumius had, but if they were again rejected to make war against the city. The Tarentines, however, adhered to their iormer resolution; but as they were unable to deiend themselves against the Romans, they invited Pyrrhus to their assistance. As soon as Barbula became acquainted with their determination, he prosecuted the war with the utmost vigour, beat the Tarentines in the open field, and took several of their towns. Alarmed at his progress, and trusting to his clemency, as he had treated the peisoners kindly and dismissed some without ransom, the Tarentines appointed Agis, a friend of the Romans, general with unlimited powers. But the arrival of Cincas, the chief minister of Pyrrhus, almost immediately afterwards, caused this appointment to be annulled; and as soon as Milo landed with part of the king's forces, he marched against Barbula and attacked the army as it was passing along a narrow road by the sea-coast. By the side of the road were precipitous mountains, and the Tarentine fleet lay at anchor ready to discharge missiles at the Roman army as it marched by. The army would probably have been destroyed, had not Barbula covered his troops by placing the Tarentine prisoners in such a manner that they would have become the first object of the enemy's artillery. Barbula thus led his army by in safety, as the Tarentines would not injure their own countrymen.

Barbula continued in southern Italy after the expiration of his consulship as proconsul. He gained victories over the Samnites and Sallentines, as we learn from the Fasti, which record his triumph over these people, as well as over the Etruscans, in Quinctilis of 280. (Zonar. 8.2; Ores. iv. I; Appian, Samn. p. 58, &c., ed. Schw.; Dionys. Exe. p. 2342, &c., ed. Reiske; Frontin. Strat. 1.4.1, where Aemilius Paullus is a mistake.)

3. M. Aemilius Barbula, L. F. Q. N., son of No. 2, was consul in B. C. 230, and had in conjunction with his colleague the conduct of the war against the Ligurians. (Zonar. 8.19.) Zonaras says (l.c.), that when the Carthaginians heard of the Ligurian war, they resolved to march against Rome, but that they relinquished their design when the consuls came into their country, and received the Romans as friends. This is evidently a blunder, and must in all probability be referred to the Gauls, who, as we learn from Polybius (2.21), were in a state of great ferment about this time owing to the lex Flaininia, which had been passed about two years previously, B. C. 232, for the division of the Picentian land.

4. Barbula purchased Marcus, the legate of Brutus, who had been proscribed by the triumvirs in B. C. 43, and who pretended that he was a slave in order to escape death. Barbula took Marcus with him to Rome, where he was recognized at the city-gates by one of Barbula's friends. Barbula, by means of Agrippa, obtained the pardon of Marcus from Octavianus. Marcus afterwards became one of the friends of Octavianus, and commanded part of his forces at the battle of Actium, B. C. 31. Here he had an opportunity of returning the kindness of his formermaster. Barbula hadserved under Antony, and after the defeat of the latter fell into the hands of the conquerors. IIe, too, pretended to be a slave, and was purchased by Marcus, who procured his pardon from Augustus, and both of them subsequently obtained the consulship at the same time. Such is the statement of Appian (App. BC 4.49), who does not give us either the gentile or family name of Marcus, nor does he tell us whether Barbula belonged to the Aemilia gens. The Fasti do not contain any consul of the name of Barbula, but he and his friends may have been consuls stffecti, the names of all of whom are not preserved.