Caecilii Metelli and Sulla – Relations to 89 B.C.

Abstract

This study attempts to reconstruct the relations between the house of Caecilius Metellus and L. Cornelius Sulla. A new look at the problem, which has aroused interest of researchers for decades, is its temporal scope – so far, the
analysis has been started from the year 89 and the joint operations of Sulla and Q. Metellus Pius in the Social War, here this date is not the starting point, but the terminus ante quem. In describing the relationship between the powerful house of the plebeian aristocracy and the impoverished patrician, who stood out thanks to his
successes as an officer of Gaius Marius, it is impossible to escape the role played by the latter, a man who after the Battle of Vercellae was called the “Third Founder of Rome”. Both in the case of Q. Metellus Numidicus and Sulla – they went from his friends to sworn enemies. In the context of these considerations, marriage affinities prevailing within influential families from the period of the decline of the Roman Republic will also prove important.The binder of the alliance between Sulla and Marius was the house of Julius Caesar,from which both received wives at a similar time.The sources give us modest but quite clear indications that the accounts of Sulla and Caecilius Metellus took place before the year 89. The key to understanding the matter is the passage from Plutarch about Sulla’s cooperation with Metellus Numidicus and Q. Lutatius Catulus. It is therefore not accidental that Sulla’s victory in the election for praetor was associated with the recall of Metellus Numidicus from exile, in which friends of both were involved.