The gens Salonia was a
plebeian family at
ancient Rome. Members of this
gens are first mentioned as early as the fourth century BC, but few of them attained any of the higher offices of the Roman state, until the latter part of the first century AD, when they married into the imperial family.[1]
Origin
The
nomenSalonius belongs to a large class of gentilicia formed from words ending in -o, using the suffix -onius. The root of the name is salo, a salt-dealer, from sal, salt, and indicates that an ancestor of the Salonii was probably a dealer in salt, one of the most important commodities of antiquity.[2]
Members
This list includes abbreviated
praenomina. For an explanation of this practice, see
filiation.
Publius Salonius,
military tribune in 342 BC, had been either tribune or
centurionprimus pilus for several consecutive years. The
dictatorMarcus Valerius Corvus, in settling a mutiny, agreed to the soldiers' demand that nobody who had been military tribune should subsequently become a centurion, as Salonius had opposed their actions. The
senate initially rejected this concession, but agreed when Salonius himself urged its passage in the interests of harmony.[3][4]
Gaius Salonius, one of the commissioners appointed to establish a
colony at
Tempsa in
Bruttium in 194 BC. In 173, he was a member of another commission, this time to apportion unoccupied land in
Liguria and
Cisalpine Gaul to new settlers.[5][6]
Quintus Salonius Sarra,
praetor in 192 BC, was assigned the province of
Sardinia.[7]
Marcus Salonius, one of
Cato's subordinates, whose daughter's hand in marriage Cato sought, when he was an old man.[8]
Salonia, a Roman matron whose son, Matidius, perhaps the brother-in-law of
Trajan, was appointed to the senate by
Claudius during the emperor's
censorship.[10]
Salonia Palestrice, the wife of Marcus Ulpius Hermia, a freedman of Trajan, who was buried at
Ampelum in
Dacia, aged fifty-five, with a monument from his wife and his freedman, Diogenes, dating to the first half of the second century.[11]