A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

4. BARBULA purchased Marcus, the legate of Brutus, who had been proscribed by the triumvirs in B. C. 43, and who pretended that he was a slave in order to escape death. Barbula took Marcus with him to Rome, where he was recognized at the city-gates by one of Barbula's friends. Barbula, by means of Agrippa, obtained the pardon of Marcus from Octavianus. Marcus afterwards became one of the friends of Octavianus, and commanded part of his forces at the battle of Actium, B. C. 31. Here he had an opportunity of returning the kindness of his formermaster. Barbula hadserved under Antony, and after the defeat of the latter fell into the hands of the conquerors. IIe, too, pretended to be a slave, and was purchased by Marcus, who procured his pardon from Augustus, and both of them subsequently obtained the consulship at the same time. Such is the statement of Appian (App. BC 4.49), who does not give us either the gentile or family name of Marcus, nor does he tell us whether Barbula belonged to the Aemilia gens. The Fasti do not contain any consul of the name of Barbula, but he and his friends may have been consuls stffecti, the names of all of whom are not preserved.