A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

1. M.PubliciusMalleolus, L. F. L. N., consul B. C. 232 with M. Aemilius Lepidus, was sent with his colleague against the Sardinians. (Zonar. viii. p. 401c.) It was this M. Publicius and his brother L. Publicius who built in their aedileship the temple of Flora, instituted the Florales Ludi, and also built the beautiful clivus (Publicius Clivus) which led up the Aventine. They executed these works with the money obtained from the fines which were exacted from the persons who had violated the agrarian laws. Varro and Ovid call them plebeian, but Festus curule aediles. (Tac. Ann. 2.49; Festus, p. 238, ed. Müller; Ov. Fast. 5.279, &c.; Varro, L. L. 5.158, ed. Müller.) Their aedileship must have fallen in B. C. 240, as we learn from Velleius Paterculus (1.14) that the Florales Ludi were instituted in that year. (Compare Pighius, Annal. vol. ii. p. 72.)