Flavia Julia Titi (13 September
64Year 64 was a leap year starting on Sunday of the Julian calendar.-Roman Empire:* July 18—Great fire of Rome: A fire begins in the merchant area of Rome and soon burns completely out of control, while Emperor Nero allegedly plays his lyre and sings as he watches the blaze from a safe distance...
– 91) was daughter and only child to the Emperor
TitusTitus Flavius Vespasianus, commonly known as Titus , was a Roman Emperor who briefly reigned from 79 until his death in 81...
from his second marriage to the well-connected
Marcia FurnillaMarcia Furnilla was a Roman woman that lived in the 1st century. Furnilla was the second and last wife of the future Roman Emperor Titus.-Family:...
. Her parents divorced when Julia was an infant, due to her mother's family being connected to the opponents of
Roman EmperorThe Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman State during the imperial period . The Romans had no single term for the office: Latin titles such as imperator , augustus, caesar and princeps were all associated with it...
NeroNero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus , born Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, also called Nero Claudius Caesar Drusus Germanicus, was the fifth and last Roman emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Nero was adopted by his great uncle Claudius to become heir to the throne...
. In 65 after the failure of the
Pisonian conspiracyThe conspiracy of Gaius Calpurnius Piso in AD 65 represented one of the major turning points in the reign of the Roman emperor Nero . The plot signified the growing discontent among the upper social strata of the Roman state with regards to Nero's increasingly despotic leadership, and as a result...
, the family of Marcia Furnilla was disfavored by Nero. Julia's father, Titus considered that he didn’t want to be connected with any potential plotters and ended his marriage to Marcia Furnilla.
Flavia Julia Titi (13 September
64Year 64 was a leap year starting on Sunday of the Julian calendar.-Roman Empire:* July 18—Great fire of Rome: A fire begins in the merchant area of Rome and soon burns completely out of control, while Emperor Nero allegedly plays his lyre and sings as he watches the blaze from a safe distance...
– 91) was daughter and only child to the Emperor
TitusTitus Flavius Vespasianus, commonly known as Titus , was a Roman Emperor who briefly reigned from 79 until his death in 81...
from his second marriage to the well-connected
Marcia FurnillaMarcia Furnilla was a Roman woman that lived in the 1st century. Furnilla was the second and last wife of the future Roman Emperor Titus.-Family:...
. Her parents divorced when Julia was an infant, due to her mother's family being connected to the opponents of
Roman EmperorThe Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman State during the imperial period . The Romans had no single term for the office: Latin titles such as imperator , augustus, caesar and princeps were all associated with it...
NeroNero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus , born Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus, also called Nero Claudius Caesar Drusus Germanicus, was the fifth and last Roman emperor of the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Nero was adopted by his great uncle Claudius to become heir to the throne...
. In 65 after the failure of the
Pisonian conspiracyThe conspiracy of Gaius Calpurnius Piso in AD 65 represented one of the major turning points in the reign of the Roman emperor Nero . The plot signified the growing discontent among the upper social strata of the Roman state with regards to Nero's increasingly despotic leadership, and as a result...
, the family of Marcia Furnilla was disfavored by Nero. Julia's father, Titus considered that he didn’t want to be connected with any potential plotters and ended his marriage to Marcia Furnilla. Julia was raised by her father. Julia had been born in
RomeRome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated municipality , with over 2.7 million residents in , while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat to be 3.46 million. The metropolitan area of Rome is estimated by OECD to have a population of 3.7 million...
and Titus
conquered JerusalemThe Siege of Jerusalem in the year 70 AD was a decisive event in the First Jewish-Roman War. It was followed by the fall of Masada in 73 AD. The Roman army, led by the future Emperor Titus, with Tiberius Julius Alexander as his second-in-command, besieged and conquered the city of Jerusalem, which...
on Julia's sixth birthday.
When growing up, Titus offered her in marriage to his brother
DomitianTitus Flavius Domitianus , known as Domitian, was a Roman Emperor who reigned from 14 September 81 until his death...
, but he refused because of his infatuation with
Domitia LonginaDomitia Longina was an Empress and wife to the Roman Emperor Domitian. She was the youngest daughter of the general and consul Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo. Domitia divorced her first husband Lucius Aelius Lamia in order to marry Domitian in 71...
. Later she married her second paternal cousin
T. Flavius SabinusSee also Titus Flavius Sabinus for other men of this name.Titus Flavius Sabinus, son of Titus Flavius Sabinus and brother to Titus Flavius Clemens, was consul of the Roman Empire in 82...
, brother to consul
T. Flavius ClemensTitus Flavius Clemens was a great-nephew of the Roman Emperor Vespasian. He was the son of Titus Flavius Sabinus , brother to Titus Flavius Sabinus and a second cousin to Roman Emperors to Titus and Domitian.-In classical sources:...
, who married her first cousin
Flavia DomitillaFlavia Domitilla was daughter of Domitilla the Younger by an unknown father. She married her cousin, the consul Titus Flavius Clemens.-In Roman literature:Quintilian reports that he had been entrusted with the tutelage of two of Domitian's grandsons...
. By then Domitian had seduced her.
When her father and husband died, in the words of Dio, Domitian:
- "lived with [her] as husband with wife, making little effort at concealment. Then upon the demands of the people he became reconciled with Domitia, but continued his relations with Julia nonetheless."
JuvenalThe Satires are a collection of satirical poems by the Latin author Juvenal written in the late 1st and early 2nd centuries A.D.Juvenal is credited with sixteen known poems divided among five books; all are in the Roman genre of Satire, which, at its most basic in the time of the author, comprised...
condemns this liaison as follows:
- "Such a man was that adulterer [i.e. Domitian] who, after lately defiling himself by a union of the tragic style, revived the stern laws that were to be a terror to all men – ay, even to Mars and Venus – just as Julia was relieving her fertile womb and giving birth to abortions that displayed the likeness of her uncle."
Falling pregnant, Julia died of what was rumored (though unlikely) to be a forced abortion. Julia was deified and her ashes were later mixed with Domitian's by an old nurse secretly in the
Temple of the FlaviansThe Temple of Vespasian and Titus is located in Rome at the western end of the Roman Forum between the Temple of Concordia and the Temple of Saturn. It is dedicated to the deified Vespasian and his son, the deified Titus. It was begun by Titus in 79 A.D. after Vespasian's death and Titus's...
.
Further reference
- Suetonius
Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, commonly known as Suetonius , was an equestrian and a historian during the Roman Empire. His most important surviving work is a set of biographies of twelve successive Roman rulers, from Julius Caesar until Domitian, entitled De Vita Caesarum...
, The Twelve Caesars – Titus & Domitian 17, 22.
- Dio Cassius
Lucius Cassius Dio Cocceianus , known in English as Cassius Dio, Dio Cassius, or Dio was a Roman consul and a noted historian writing in Greek...
, lxvii. 3.
- Pliny
-Persons:*Pliny the Elder , ancient Roman nobleman, scientist and historian, author of Naturalis Historia, "Pliny's Natural History"*Pliny the Younger , ancient Roman statesman, orator, and writer; nephew and adopted son of Pliny the Elder...
, Ep. iv. 11. § 6.
- Philostratus
Philostratus, was the name of four Greek sophists of the Roman imperial period:# "Philostratus I": Very minor author, known only for a dialogue Nero, possibly written by Philostratus II....
, Vit. Apoll. Tyan. vii. 3.