Brutus
16. D.
Junius Brutus, D. F. M. N., son of the preceding, distinguished himself by his opposition to Saturninus in B. C. 100. (Cic.
pro Rabir. perd. 7.)
He belonged to the aristocratical party, and is alluded to as one of the aristocrats in the oration which Sallust puts into the mouth of Lepidus against Sulla. (Sall.
Hist. i. p. 937, ed. Cortius.)
He was consul in B. C. 77, with Mamercus Lepidus (
Cic. Brut. 47), and in 74 became security for P. Junius before Verres, the praetor urbanus. (
Cic. Ver. 1.55, 57.)
He was well acquainted with Greek and Roman literature. (Cic.
Brut. l.c.) His wife Sempronia was a well-educated, but licentious woman, who carried on an intrigue with Catiline; she received the ambassadors of the Allobroges in her husband's house in 63, when he was absent from Rome. (
Sal. Cat. 40.) We have no doubt that the preceding D. Brutus is the person meant in this passage of Sallust, and not D. Brutus Albinus, one of Caesar's assassins [No. 17], as some modern writers suppose, since the latter is called an adolescens by Caesar (
Caes. Gal. 3.11) in 56, and therefore not likely to have had Sempronia as his wife in 63; and because we know that Paulla Valeria was to marry Brutus Albinus in 50. (Caelius,
ad Fam. 8.7.)
