Scaurus, Aemi'lius
6. MAMERCUS AEMILIUS SCAURUS, the son of No. 5, was a distinguished orator and poet, but of a dissolute character.
He was a member of the senate at the time of the accession of Tiberius, A. D. 14, when he offended this suspicious emperor by some remarks which he made in the senate.
He is mentioned as one of the accusers of Domitius Corbulo in A. D. 21, and likewise as one of the accusers of Silanus, in A. D. 22.
He was himself accused of majestas in A. D. 32, but Tiberius stopped the proceedings against him.
He was, however, again accused of the same crime in A. D. 34, by Servilius and Cornelius Tuscus, who charged him with magic, and with having had adultery with Livia; but his real ground of offence was his tragedy of Atreus, in which his enemy Macro had interpolated some verses reflecting upon the emperor.
He put an end to his own life at the suggestion of his wife Sextia, who killed herself at the same time (
Tac. Ann. 1.13,
3.31,
36,
6.9,
29;
D. C. 58.24; Senec.
Suas. 2,
de Benef. 4.31; Meyer,
Orat. Rom. Fragm. pp. 558, 559, 2d ed.). Both Tacitus (
Tac. Ann. 3.66) and Seneca (
de Benef. 4.31) call him a consular, but the year of his consulship is not known. Besides Sextia, who was his wife at the time of his death, he had also been married to Lepida, by whom he had a daughter, and who was condemned in A. D. 20 (
Tac. Ann. 3.23).
In the following year he is called the paternal uncle (
patruus) and stepfather (
vitricus) of Sulla (
Tac. Ann. 3.31), and therefore it would appear that, after the death of Lepida, he had married his brother's widow. Seneca says (
Suas. 2) that this Scaurus was the last of his family.
All the ancient authorities respecting the Aemili Scauri are given by Drumann. (
Geschichte Roms, vol. i. pp. 25-33.)
