A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

28. L.CalpurniusPiso, was characterised by the same haughtiness and independence as the rest of his family under the empire. He is first mentioned in A. D. 16, as complaining of the corruption of the law-courts, and threatening to leave the city and spend the rest of his life in some distant retreat in the country; and he was a person of so much importance that the emperor thought it advisable to endeavour to soothe his anger and to induce his friends to prevail upon him to remain at Rome. In the same year he gave another instance of the little respect which he entertained for the imperial family. Urgulania, the favourite of the empressmother, owed Piso a certain sum of money; and when she refused to obey the summons to appear before the praetor, Piso followed her to the palace of Livia, and insisted upon being paid. Although Tiberius, at the commencement of his reign, had not thought it advisable to resent the conduct of Piso, yet he was not of a temper to forgive it, and only waited for a favourable opportunity to revenge himself upon his haughty subject. Accordingly, when he considered his power sufficiently established, Q. Granius appeared in A. D. 24, as the accuser of Piso, charging him with entertaining designs against the emperor's life; but Piso died just before the trial came on (Tac. Ann. 2.34, 4.21). He is probably the same as the L. Piso, who came forward to defend Cn. Piso [No. 23] in A. D. 20, when so many shrunk from the unpopular office. (Tac. Ann. 3.11.)