The main praenomina of Baebii during the Republic were Quintus, Gnaeus, Marcus, and Lucius, all of which were common names throughout Roman history. In addition to these, they occasionally used Gaius and Aulus. Other names occur under the Empire.
The cognomina of the Baebii are Dives, Herennius, Sulca, and Tamphilus. The last, borne by the oldest family of the Baebii appearing in history, is the only surname which appears on coins, where it is written Tampilus. All of the consuls and most of the praetors of this gens during the Republic belonged to this branch of the family.[1][3] Chase describes their surname as one of considerable curiosity, suggested by some scholars to be of Greek origin, but perhaps an Oscan name sharing a common root with the Tampia gens, who may have been of Sabine origin.[4] Certainly Herennius, borne as a surname by one of the Baebii, was originally an Oscan praenomen.[5] In imperial times, one family of the Baebii settled around Saguntum, the Spanish town over which the Second Punic War had begun.[6]
Quintus Baebius (Tamphilus), tribune of the plebs in 200 BC, opposed a motion to declare war on Philip V of Macedon, and accused the Senate of warmongering; perhaps the eldest brother of the consular Baebii.[10][11]
(Marcus) Baebius (Tamphilus), tribune of the plebs in 103 BC, attempted to veto the agrarian law of his colleague, Saturninus, who had proposed that veterans should be granted parcels of land in the province of Africa. Baebius was stoned and forced to flee. He may be the same Marcus Baebius who was put to death by Marius in 87 BC.[18][19][20][21]
Gaius Baebius Tamphilus, appears on a coin of uncertain date.[1]
Marcus Baebius, one of the three commissioners sent into Macedonia in 186 BC, to investigate the charges brought by the Maronitae and others against Philip.[30][31]
Lucius Baebius, one of three commissioners sent into Macedonia in 169 BC, to inspect the state of affairs there, before Lucius Aemilius Paullus invaded the country.[35][36]
Aulus Baebius, a prefect under the command of Lucius Aemilius Paullus in 167 BC. He was left in command of a garrison at Demetrias, and became involved in the internal political struggles of the Aetolian League. He used Roman soldiers to surround a meeting of the Aetolian Senate, and allowed Aetolian soldiers to massacre five hundred and fifty attendees. Proscriptions and exiles followed. Paullus may have been complicit, for he received complaints circumspectly, took no action against the Aetolian leaders, and censured Baebius only for allowing Roman soldiers to take part. Baebius was afterwards condemned at Rome.[37][38][39]
Marcus Baebius, put to death by Marius and Cinna when they entered Rome in 87 BC. Instead of being killed by any weapon, Baebius was literally torn to pieces by the hands of his enemies.[44][45]
Baebius, a senator who served under Publius VatiniusinIllyria. On the murder of Caesar, in 44 BC, the Illyrians rose against Vatinius, and cut off Baebius and five cohorts which he commanded.[48]
Gaius Baebius Atticus, eques and governor of Noricum.[49]
Baebius Massa, formerly governor of Baetica, for the maladministration of which he was condemned in AD 93. He avoided punishment through the favour of the emperor Domitian, under whom he became a notorious informer.[50][51][52]
Baebius Marcellinus, aedile in 203 AD, was unjustly condemned to death under Septimius Severus, because by his baldness and senatorial rank, he vaguely resembled a man reported to have heard about a dream that the nurse of a certain Apronianus had once had, to the effect that Apronianus had become emperor.[57]
Lucius Baebius Juncinus, an equestrian officer, perhaps the father or grandfather of Lucius Baebius Aurelius Juncinus.[58]
Baebius Macrinus, a rhetorician, mentioned along with Julius Frontinus and Julius Granianus, as one of the teachers of the emperor Alexander Severus.[59]
Lucius Annaeus Florus, Epitome de T. Livio Bellorum Omnium Annorum DCC (Epitome of Livy: All the Wars of Seven Hundred Years).
Appianus Alexandrinus (Appian), Bellum Civile (The Civil War); Bella Illyrica (The Illyrian Wars).
Lucius Cassius Dio Cocceianus (Cassius Dio), Roman History.
Aelius Lampridius, Aelius Spartianus, Flavius Vopiscus, Julius Capitolinus, Trebellius Pollio, and Vulcatius Gallicanus, Historia Augusta (Lives of the Emperors).
Elizabeth Rawson, "Sallust on the Eighties?" in Classical Quarterly, vol. 37 (1987).
P.A. Brunt, "The Settlement of Marian Veterans", in The Fall of the Roman Republic and Related Essays, Clarendon Press, Oxford (1988, 2004)
John D. Grainger, The League of the Aitolians, Brill (1999).
Cambridge Ancient History, 2nd ed., vols. 8: "Rome and the Mediterranean to 133 B.C."; 9: "The Last Age of the Roman Republic, 146–43 B.C."; 11: "The High Empire A.D. 70–192", Cambridge University Press.
Françoise Des Boscs-Plateaux, Un parti hispanique à Rome?: ascension des élites hispaniques et pouvoir politique d'Auguste à Hadrien, Casa de Velázquez (2005).
C. J. Smith, The Roman Clan: The gens from Ancient Ideology to Modern Anthropology, Cambridge University Press (2006).
Jane D. Chaplin, Livy: Rome's Mediterranean Empire: Books Forty-One to Forty-Five and the Periochae, Oxford University Press (2007).
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Smith, William, ed. (1870). "Baebia Gens". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Vol. 1. p. 452.
