Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (consul 187 BC)

Although he was only 15 at the time of the Battle of Cannae in the 2nd Punic War, it was then that Lepidus first distinguished himself. If not at Cannae itself, then in one of the battles closely following it, Lepidus saved the life of one of his countrymen by killing his assailant. For this act of gallantry, the Senate ordered an equestrian statue of the young man erected on the Capitoline to commemorate the deed.[6] It was a remarkable honour for one so young and one that marked Lepidus out for the future greatness he would achieve.

Later that year, 216 BC, Lepidus' father, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, who had been an augur and twice consul, died and Marcus and his two brothers staged funeral games for three days in his honour.[7]

In 201, Lepidus and two colleagues were sent as ambassadors by the Senate to king Ptolemy V of Egypt, both to announce Rome's victory over Carthage and ensure that Rome's alliance with Egypt would continue through the coming war with Philip V of Macedon, which the Romans were preparing for.[8] Ptolemy was still only a young boy at this time and there is a tradition that Lepidus for a time acted himself during his stay in Egypt as the king's guardian and for a time governed the country. This appeal to Rome for the Senate to send a regent to them was, according to Justin, made by the Egyptians themselves.[9]

At this time also, while in Alexandria, Lepidus sailed to meet personally with Philip while the king was besieging Abydus, in an attempt to persuade him to lift the siege and abandon his attacks on Pergamum and the Rhodians, who had appealed to Rome.[10] Lepidus delivered a message from the Senate that Philip of Macedon must cease from making war on any other Greeks and agree to pay compensation to Attalus I of Pergamum and Rhodes for any damage caused. If Philip would not agree to these terms then he and Macedon would soon find themselves at war with Rome.[11] Rejecting the demands and saying that he was ready for war, Philip took the city and Lepidus departed. The result of the king's refusal of these terms was the outbreak of the Second Macedonian War.

In 193 Lepidus served as curule aedile along with his kinsman Lucius Aemilius Paullus, during which time the two Aemilii constructed two new porticoes, or arcades, in Rome, one of them being the Porticus Aemilia.[12]

Elected as Praetor in 192, Lepidus served his term from 191 and into 190 as the governor of Sicily.[13] Due to the ongoing war between Rome and Antiochus in the East, Lepidus was charged with the defence of the island from attack as well as ensuring that one-fifth of all the corn produced was sent to support the armies campaigning in Greece.[14]

In 190 Lepidus left Sicily early before his term as governor had expired without first asking the permission of the Senate to do so and hastened back to Rome in order to stand in the consular elections.[15] This, however, counted against him and made him unpopular with the people as he was accused of abandoning his province and responsibilities in order to satisfy personal ambition. Following the vote, only one candidate, Marcus Fulvius Nobilior, a rival of Lepidus, had achieved the required majority, but that still meant that the other consulship was vacant. However, the following day, Nobilior co-opted the candidate who had come second, Gnaeus Manlius Vulso, as his colleague and the two assumed the Consulship for 189. Lepidus had polled third out of the four candidates, behind Manlius but ahead of Marcus Valerius Messalla.[16] This humiliating defeat for the aristocratic patrician Lepidus, who likely saw the consulship as his birthright, further embittered a hatred that had already existed between him and Nobilior.

The following election, held later in 189, Lepidus again stood as a candidate for the consulship. Nobilior, however, returned to Rome to conduct and oversee the elections and he used his position to prevent any votes being cast for Lepidus, his personal enemy. As a result, although this time unfairly, Lepidus once more suffered the humiliation of defeat in the elections and could justly blame Nobilior. Instead, Marcus Valerius Messalla, who the previous year had polled behind Lepidus, and Gaius Livius Salinator were elected consul.

For the third successive time, Lepidus stood as a consular candidate in 188, and this time he was successful and was elected consul with Gaius Flaminius as his colleague.[17]

In 187 Lepidus was at last consul, and, as he and Flaminius assumed office, word reached the Senate that the Ligurians were preparing to make war on Rome. The threat of attack so close to Rome made the Senate take the matter seriously and it quickly decreed that both Consuls should have Liguria assigned as their joint-province and command.[18] Lepidus opposed this, protesting that Nobilior and Manlius were still acting like kings in the East even though their terms had expired and yet the Senate still intended to confine both consuls to Liguria without recalling or replacing either of the two Eastern commanders. Either Nobilior and Manlius should be replaced, or their armies should be disbanded and they return to Rome.[19] The Senate agreed to recall Nobilior and Manlius from the East, but reiterated its decision that both Lepidus and Flaminius were to take command in Liguria.

From 180 onwards, he was elected pontifex maximus and from 179, he was princeps senatus. That same year he was also elected censor along with his great rival Marcus Fulvius Nobilior. In 175, he was elected consul for the second time.[20] He oversaw construction of the Via Aemilia in 187, a Roman road from the town of Placentia to Ariminum, still in use and one of the most important roads in Northern Italy. He established the Roman colonies of Parma and Mutina and gave his name to the Roman castrum of Regium Lepidi (today Reggio Emilia).

• Livy. Periochae
• Ronald Syme. The Augustan Aristocracy. Oxford, 1986