Roman noblewoman (36 BC- AD 37)
Antonia Minor
[a]
(31 January 36 BC ? 1 May 37 AD) was the younger of two surviving daughters of
Mark Antony
and
Octavia Minor
. She was a niece of the
Emperor
Augustus
, sister-in-law of the Emperor
Tiberius
, paternal grandmother of the Emperor
Caligula
and Empress
Agrippina the Younger
, mother of the Emperor
Claudius
, and maternal great-grandmother of the Emperor
Nero
. She outlived her husband
Drusus
, her oldest son, her daughter, and several of her grandchildren.
Biography
[
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]
Birth and early life
[
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]
She was born in Athens, and after 36 BC was taken to Rome by her mother with her siblings. She was the youngest of five. Her mother had three children, named
Claudia Marcella Major
,
Claudia Marcella Minor
, and
Marcus Claudius Marcellus
, from her first marriage and another daughter, named
Antonia Major
, by the same father (Mark Antony). Antonia never knew her father; Mark Antony divorced her mother in 32 BC and committed suicide in 30 BC.
She was raised by her mother, her uncle, and her aunt,
Livia
Drusilla. Having inherited properties in
Italy
,
Greece
, and
Egypt
, she was a wealthy and influential woman, who often received visitors to Rome. She had many male friends, including
Lucius Vitellius
, a consul and the father of
Aulus Vitellius
, a future emperor.
Marriage and family
[
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]
In 16 BC, she married the Roman general and future consul (9 BC)
Nero Claudius Drusus
. Drusus was the stepson of her uncle Augustus, second son of Livia Drusilla, and brother of future Emperor
Tiberius
. They had many children, but only three survived: the famous general
Germanicus
,
Livilla
, and the Roman Emperor
Claudius
.
[1]
A poem by
Crinagoras of Mytilene
mentions Antonia's first pregnancy, which may be of a child before Germanicus who must have died in infancy or early childhood.
[1]
[2]
[3]
Drusus died in June 9 BC in
Germany
, due to complications from injuries he sustained after falling from a horse. After his death, although pressured by her uncle to remarry, she never did.
Antonia raised her children in Rome. Tiberius adopted Germanicus in 4 AD.
[4]
Germanicus died in 19 AD, allegedly poisoned through the handiwork of
Gnaeus Calpurnius Piso
and
Munatia Plancina
. Tacitus suggests but does not outright say in
Annals
3.3 that, on the orders of
Tiberius
and Livia Drusilla, Antonia was forbidden to go to his funeral. When Livia Drusilla died in June of
29 AD
, Antonia took care of her younger grandchildren Caligula, Agrippina the Younger,
Julia Drusilla
,
Julia Livilla
, and later
Claudia Antonia
.
[
citation needed
]
Conflict with Livilla
[
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]
In 31 AD, a plot by her daughter
Livilla
and Tiberius’ notorious Praetorian prefect,
Sejanus
, to murder the Emperor Tiberius and Caligula and to seize the throne for themselves, was exposed by
Apicata
, the estranged ex-wife of Sejanus. Livilla allegedly poisoned her husband, Tiberius' son,
Drusus Julius Caesar
(nicknamed "Castor"), in 23 AD to remove him as a rival.
Sejanus was executed before Livilla was implicated in the crime. After Apicata's accusation, which came in the form of a letter to the emperor, several co-conspirators were executed while Livilla was handed over to her formidable mother for punishment.
Cassius Dio
states that Antonia imprisoned Livilla in her room until she starved to death.
[5]
Succession of Caligula and death
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When
Tiberius
died,
Caligula
became emperor in March 37 AD. Caligula awarded her a senatorial decree, granting her all the honors that
Livia Drusilla
had received in her lifetime. She was also offered the title of
Augusta
, previously only given to Augustus's wife Livia, but rejected it.
Antonia died on 1 May 37. Suetonius and Cassius Dio claim she was driven to suicide by Caligula. According to Barrett,
[6]
But since he had not reached Rome until 28 March, and was absent from the city for much of April, collecting the remains of his mother and brother, there would hardly have been much time to drive Antonia to her death by insulting behaviour. It is also difficult to imagine that he would have paid her no honours on her death, as Suetonius implies. She died at a time when the euphoria of the beginning of his reign was still rampant, and quite apart from any question of personal affection, a public slight at this time to the most respected woman in Rome, whose death was marked in local Fasti, would have been politically unimaginable.
When Claudius became emperor after his nephew's assassination in 41 AD, he gave his mother the title of
Augusta
. Her birthday became a public holiday, which had yearly games and public sacrifices held. An image of her was paraded in a carriage.
Cultural depictions
[
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]
She is remembered in
De Mulieribus Claris
, a collection of biographies of historical and mythological women by the
Florentine
author
Giovanni Boccaccio
, composed in 1361?62. It is notable as the first collection devoted exclusively to biographies of women in Western literature.
[7]
Antonia is one of the main characters in the novel
I, Claudius
. In the 1976
television adaptation
of the book she is portrayed by
Margaret Tyzack
. She is a loyal wife deeply in love with her husband Nero Claudius Drusus. However, she is unloving towards her son Claudius, whom she regards as a fool. Furthermore, after finding evidence that Livilla murdered her husband
Drusus Julius Caesar
and rightfully believing she was also poisoning her daughter for the same reason, she kills Livilla by locking her in her room until she starves to death. During the reign of Caligula she is so disgusted by the state of Rome that she commits suicide.
She is a leading character in the novel by Lindsey Davis,
The Course of Honour
(1997), where she guides and advises Claudius and his supporters.
In the 1968
ITV
historical drama
The Caesars
, Antonia was indirectly mentioned by Tiberius (played by
Andre Morell
), who noted that Germanicus was a blood relative of Augustus on his mother's [Antonia] side.
Colleen Dewhurst
portrayed Antonia opposite
Susan Sarandon
as Livilla in the 1985 miniseries
A.D.
Isabelle Connolly (adult) and Beau Gadsdon (child) portrayed Antonia in British-Italian historical drama television series
Domina
(2021).
Notes
[
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]
- ^
Also known as
Antonia the Younger
or simply
Antonia
.
References
[
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]
- ^
a
b
Kokkinos, Nikos (1992).
Antonia Augusta: Portrait of a Great Roman Lady
. Psychology Press. p. 11.
ISBN
9780415080293
.
- ^
Hemelrijk, Emily Ann (2004).
Matrona Docta: Educated Women in the Roman Elite from Cornelia to Julia Domna
. Psychology Press. p. 109.
ISBN
9780415341271
.
- ^
Ypsilanti, Maria (2003).
An Edition with Commentary of the Selected Epigrams of Crinagoras
(PDF)
(Thesis). University College London.
- ^
(Suetonius Tiberius 15, Gai. 1., Div. Claudius 2)
- ^
Cassius Dio Histories 58.11.7
- ^
Barrett, A. A., 1989,
Caligula. The Corruption of Power
, 62. The date is derived from the
Fasti Ostienses
which states that Antonia died on the Kalends of May, 'K. Mais Antonia diem suum obit', supplied by Smallwood, E., 1967,
Documents Illustrating The Principates of Gaius, Claudius and Nero
, Cambridge University Press, no. 31, p. 28.
- ^
Boccaccio, Giovanni
(2003).
Famous Women
. I Tatti Renaissance Library. Vol. 1. Translated by Virginia Brown. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. p. xi.
ISBN
0-674-01130-9
.
Sources
[
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]
Ancient
[
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]
Secondary
[
edit
]
- E. Groag, A. Stein, L. Petersen - e.a.
(edd.),
Prosopographia Imperii Romani saeculi I, II et III
, Berlin, 1933 - . (
PIR
2
)
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