Orbilia gens explained

The gens Orbilia was an obscure plebeian family of ancient Rome. None of its members are known to have held any magistracies. Its most famous representative may have been the grammarian Lucius Orbilius Pupillus, who operated a school at Rome, and was the master of Horace.^[1]

Origin

The nomen Orbilius belongs to a class of gentilicia formed from other names, in this instance the Latin nomen Orbius, using the diminutive suffix Latin: -ilius.^[2] Orbius is derived from the cognomen Orbus, a waif or orphan.^{[3] [4]}

Members

• Lucius Orbilius Pupillus, the grammarian, was a native of Beneventum, opened a school at Rome during the consulship of Cicero, in 63 BC. He was well-reputed, but obtained the surname Plagosus from his students due to his frequent floggings. He was fifty when he came to Rome, and lived almost to one hundred. He wrote a treatise which has been lost.^{[5] [6] [7] [1] [8]}
• Orbilius L. f., son of the grammarian, who followed in his father's footsteps and operated a school at Rome.^{[6] [1] [8]}
• Lucius Orbilius L. l. Hilario, a freedman buried at Rome.^[9]

See also

• List of Roman gentes

Bibliography

• Quintus Horatius Flaccus (Horace), Epistulae.
• Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus, De Illustribus Grammaticis (The Illustrious Grammarians).
• Ambrosius Theodosius Macrobius, Saturnalia.
• Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, William Smith, ed., Little, Brown and Company, Boston (1849).
• Notizie degli Scavi di Antichità (News of Excavations from Antiquity, abbreviated NSA), Accademia dei Lincei (1876–present).
• George Davis Chase, "The Origin of Roman Praenomina", in Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, vol. VIII (1897).
• Paul von Rohden, Elimar Klebs, & Hermann Dessau, Prosopographia Imperii Romani (The Prosopography of the Roman Empire, abbreviated PIR), Berlin (1898).
• D.P. Simpson, Cassell's Latin and English Dictionary, Macmillan Publishing Company, New York (1963).

Notes and References

1. Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, vol. III, p. 41 (Orbilius Pupillus).
2. Chase, p. 122–123.
3. Chase, p. 131.
4. Cassell's Latin and English Dictionary, s. v. orbus.
5. Horace, Epistulae, ii. 1. 71.
6. Suetonius, De Illustribus Grammaticis, 9, 19.
7. Macrobius, ii. 6, 4.
8. PIR, vol. II, p. 437.
9. https://archive.org/stream/notiziedegliscav20realrich#page/374/mode/1up NSA 1923, 374