Discussing Roman genealogies

[Symmachus]

This thread is intended to discuss various issues of the Roman genealogies. To start, I will post three initial questions:

Pope Gregory the Great is said to be member of the Anicii, but how exactly was he related to them?

Same goes for Boethius's mother - we know that she also belonged to the Anicii, but her exact relationship to members of this family is not given among the sources I read.

• [x] And finally, are there any sources discussing ancestors and descendants of Zenobia? She is currently descending from Emesene dynasty (which is accepted by some scholars), while her later descendant is Empress Theodora (which look like a pure fantasy).

[Symmachus]

That Theodora to Zenobia connection was proposed by David Hughes and doesn't seems to be very reliable. It was discussed here: https://groups.google.com/g/soc.genealogy.medieval/c/rrvq5YlEUJo?pli=1

[Symmachus]

Here is my suggestion for Zenobia situation - I will cut off her connection to empress Theodora and add her real descendant, Theodora of Emesa. Diogenes, father of this Theodora, can be made the count of Emesa. Also, I plan to add the whole Sampsigeramid dynasty to create historical connections between various characters. In this case, it will also be necessary to add some Palmyrene characters such as Odaenathus.

Just one question - what dynasty names should be used for Odaenathus and Zenobia? We could apply Roman names as the dynastic ones (i.e Septimius for Odaenathus and Julius Aurelius for Zenobia), but they wasn't actually used by their earlier ancestors. I might as well create fictional dynasty from the name of the earliest ancestor (it will Nasorid for Odaenathus and Malchid for Zenobia, but IMHO it wouldn't look very well). And what dynasty should have empress Theodora?

[Symmachus]

I would be very grateful if someone could get a book called Continuité gentilice et continuité familiale dans les familles sénatoriales romaines à l'époque impériale: mythe et realité by Christian Settipani - I only have some parts of it. I don't personally agree with all theories presented by Settipani, but he is the only one who had been researching Roman genealogies so deeply. Full access to his book would allow me to improve Roman family trees a lot.

BTW, if someone wants to work on later Roman/Byzantine or Greek genealogies, I have two other books by Settipani, which I can send to them. First one is Continuité des élites à Byzance durant les siècles obscurs (Byzantine and Caucasian genealogies showing overall continuity) and second one is Les pretentions généalogiques à Athènes sous l'Empire romain (Greek genealogies showing descent of 5th century nobles from various ancient statesmen like Pericles and Themistocles - up to the Argonauts, including Nestor of Pylos). In 476, there are several groups of people who descend from that bloodline - Nikagoras iunior, Afranii Syagrii, family of Neoplatonist Plutarch and descendants of empress Aelia Eudocia.

[Abian36]

https://docplayer.fr/33223520-Christian-settipani-continuite-gentilice-et-continuite-familiale-dans-les-familles-senatoriales-romaines-a-l-epoque-imperiale-mythe-et-realite.html There you go.

[LMaquiel]

To define the dynasty to which Theodora would belong, it should be clarified that there is not enough academic consensus about her origins to allude to a place or city in the name of her dynasty (she was born in Cyprus or Syria?). In the case of a patriarchal culture such as the greco-roman one, we could assign empress Theodora the "Acacius" dynasty, alluding to her father's name in an eponymous way. Another option would be to leave Theodora and her family as "lowborn" characters, but this does not seem to be convincing...

[Symmachus]

https://docplayer.fr/33223520-Christian-settipani-continuite-gentilice-et-continuite-familiale-dans-les-familles-senatoriales-romaines-a-l-epoque-imperiale-mythe-et-realite.html There you go.

Thanks, but this is just an addition to the original book, which have about 600 pages.

To define the dynasty to which Theodora would belong, it should be clarified that there is not enough academic consensus about her origins to allude to a place or city in the name of her dynasty (she was born in Cyprus or Syria?). In the case of a patriarchal culture such as the greco-roman one, we could assign empress Theodora the "Acacius" dynasty, alluding to her father's name in an eponymous way. Another option would be to leave Theodora and her family as "lowborn" characters, but this does not seem to be convincing...

Yeah, I think I will go with Acacius.

[Symmachus]

• [x] In the mod, Lucius Sergius Paullus (consul of 169) is said to be connected to the Octavii Laenates (relatives of Nerva and descendants of Tiberius and Drusus Caesar) through pretty obscure Sergius Octavius Laenas Paullus. However, most of sources list him as direct descendant of another Lucius Sergius Paullus, governor of Cyprus under Claudius, who converted to Christianity according to legend. It seems like that Octavii Laenates connection also comes from David Hughes book "The British Chronicles", but he is not a reliable source.

[LMaquiel]

Tonantius Ferreolus and his descendants have been included in Syagrius's family, however, shouldn't they be assigned to a proper dynasty named "Ferreolus"?

[Symmachus]

Tonantius Ferreolus and his descendants have been included in Syagrius's family, however, shouldn't they be assigned to a proper dynasty named "Ferreolus"?

Yeah, they should, but that's an another issue (see Erik W's bloodlines).

[LMaquiel]

1. Pope Gregory the Great is said to be member of the Anicii, but how exactly was he related to them?

Maybe you have already solved this, otherwise know that I just saw a genealogy for the family of pope Gregory the great in the last pages of PLRE III B.

[Symmachus]

1. Pope Gregory the Great is said to be member of the Anicii, but how exactly was he related to them?

Maybe you have already solved this, otherwise know that I just saw a genealogy for the family of pope Gregory the great in the last pages of PLRE III B.

I'm aware about this tree, but it doesnt show the exact connection to the Anicii. I would like to know if any scholar ever researched Gregory's family tree and his relationship to the Anicii.

[Symmachus]

• [x] In the mod, certain Thermantia, niece of Theodosius I and sister of Serena, is said to be mother of Aelia Eudoxia. Are there any sources for that other than Geni? This connection seems to be pretty dubious to me, so I plan to remove it (especially considering that there are way too much kin marriages among the ancestry of Anicia Juliana and I'm afraid that her possible children could be already inbred, although I don't know how inbreeding mechanic work in CK3.)

Upd: The marriage between Bauto and Thermantia is certainly fictitious. Claudian says that Thermantia married a Roman dux, but doesn't mention his name. Ralf Sharf had suggested that her husband was Flavius Abundatius, consul of 393.

[Symmachus]

• [x] Anicia Faltonia Proba is said to be married to Valerius Adelphius for the second time. That looks like an error to me because Proba was 30 years older than Adelphius and she barely could gave a birth to children during her marriage to him. Their daughter Adelphia would later marry to Flavius Anicius Probus, in this case her own half-nephew, which, I believe, was actually forbidden by the Imperial laws. So, I would like to ask, are there any sources on Proba's marriage to Adelphius? This guy is a postulated character invented by Settipani to create an intermediate generation between Valerius Adelphius Bassus and Valerius Faltonius Adelphius. Unfortunately, I don't have access to his Anician trees, but in stemma of the Valerii Settipani didn't mentioned any wife of Valerius Adelphius.

Upd: This connection was removed.

[Symmachus]

Same goes for Boethius's mother - we know that she also belonged to the Anicii, but her exact relationship to members of this family is not given among the sources I read.

Upd: I found out that I have one of the needed pages from Settipani. He says that Boethius was a second cousin to his wife Rusticiana. There were two postulated Anicii siblings, Probus (b. 420) and Proba (b. 425/430). Probus fathered Anicia (b. 460), who became mother of Boethius and Proba in turn married to Quintus Aurelius Symmachus and had Quintus Aurelius Memmius Symmachus from him.

Unfortunately, their exact Anician connection wasn't shown there. Names Probus and Proba clearly indicate that they descended from Sextus Claudius Petronius Probus, likely through one of his three sons. Given the estimated birth dates, these two siblings should be great-grandchildren of Probus.

[Symmachus]

In the mod, Lucius Sergius Paullus (consul of 169) is said to be connected to the Octavii Laenates (relatives of Nerva and descendants of Tiberius and Drusus Caesar) through pretty obscure Sergius Octavius Laenas Paullus. However, most of sources list him as direct descendant of another Lucius Sergius Paullus, governor of Cyprus under Claudius, who converted to Christianity according to legend. It seems like that Octavii Laenates connection also comes from David Hughes book "The British Chronicles", but he is not a reliable source.

That connection was deleted in my PR and to compensate it I've added a link between Anicians and Julio-Claudians through the Domitii Ahenobarbi. To see how unreliable Hughes's work is, let me quote Settipani, although google translated:

With David Hughes, we enter a curious world populated by a priori very serious genealogies which link together without any gap thousands of known characters. Charlemagne is closely related to a series of Roman popes, sovereigns of all countries and Byzantine emperors and descends directly from Constantine the Great. What is even more curious is that a good part of the Roman and Byzantine genealogies are obviously taken directly from my works on the Roman senatorial families or the Byzantine-Caucasian elites. But David Hughes has added a whole series of alliances that are not there. I have not been able to find from what sources or what reasoning he was able to fill in these gaps. I deduce that only an extremely fertile imagination is at the origin of these additions, which to tell the truth I would have liked so much that they were based on some unpublished source. from a submerged library (for D. Hughes, all these lineages go back to a few Atlantean princes who set foot in Europe or America after their continent sank).

[Symmachus]

Could someone please explain me what "Krion" is? Based on its position, Krion should be shortened name of a deme (for example Peir - Peiraeus), but I can't find anything of that name.