[*](* The gentile name of Thrasea is not mentioned by any ancient writer, and has given rise to some dispute. Lipsius (ad Tac. Ann. 16.21) suspected that it might be Valerius, because we find in an inscription, a L. Valerius Messalla Thrasea, who was consul in A. D. 196, but we have no evidence that this person was a descendant of Thrasea Paetus, and the name of Thrasea occurs in other gentes. It has been conjectured, with more probability, by Haase (ia Ersch and Gruber's Encyklopädie, art. Pätus), that Fannins was the gentile name of our Thrasea, since his daughter was called Fannia, and not Arria, like her mother and grandmother.), one of those distinguished Romans in the reign of Nero who were disgusted with the tyranny and corruption of the times in which they lived, and endeavored to carry into practice the severer virtues of the Stoic philosophy. He was a native of Patavium (Padua), and was probably born soon after the death of Augustus. Nothing is related of his early years, and we only know that he was of a noble family, and inherited considerable wealth from his ancestors. In his youth he devoted himself with ardour to the study of the Stoic philosophy, and he appears at an early period of his life to have made the younger Cato his model, of whose life he wrote an account. (Plut. Cat. Min. 25, 37.) At what period he settled at Rome, is uncertain, but there he became acquainted with the best spirits of his age. His house and gardens were the place in which the lovers of liberty and virtue were accustomed to assemble, and he himself became the counsellor and friend of them all, and was regarded by them with the utmost veneration and love. In his marriage he sought a wife of congenial principles. He married Arria, the daughter of the heroic Arria, who showed her husband Caecina how to die [ARRIA] ; and his wife was worthy of her mother and her husband. At a later period he gave his own daughter in marriage to Helvidius Priscus, who trod closely in the footsteps of his father-in-law. Thus he was strengthened in his pursuit of high and noble objects by his domestic connections as well as by the friends with whom he constantly associated.
The first time that the name of Thrasea is mentioned in connection with public affairs, is in A. D. 57, when he had already acquired considerable reputation. In that year he gave the most active support to the Cilicians, in their accusation of their late governor Cossutianus Capito, who, in consequence, gave up his intention of defending himself, and was condemned, and who thus became one (of Thrasea's bitterest enemies. (Comp. Tac. Ann. 13.33, with 16.21, sub fin.) In the following year (A. D. 58) Thrasea spoke in the senate on a matter trifling in itself, but which is recorded by the historian (Ann. 13.49) on account of the censure which Thrasea received in consequence from the friends of the court. Shortly after this, in March, A. D. 59, Thrasea acted in a manner far more offensive to the emperor. In this year the tyrant had killed his mother Agrippina, to whom he owed the throne, and sent a letter to the senate, informing them that she had conspired against his life, and had received the punishment that was her due. The obsequious senators forthwith proceeded to vote to the matricide all kinds of honours. This was more than the noble spirit of Thrasea could endure. He had been accustomed to give his assent in silence or with a few words to the former acts of adulation displayed by the senate towards their imperial master; but now, as soon as he had heard the emperor's letter, he rose from his seat and quitted the house without waiting till it came to his turn to give his opinion. Nero took no public notice of the conduct of Thrasen at the time, but he did not forget it, and only waited for a convenient opportunity to gratify his revenge.
In A. D. 62 Thrasea gave another instance of courage in the senate. The praetor Antistius had been accused of writing libellous verses against Nero, and the consul elect, to please the emperor, had proposed that the offender should be put to death. Thrasea, on the contrary, maintained that this punishment was too severe, and proposed in its place confiscation of property and banishment to an island. The freedom of Thrasea broke the spell of slavery. The majority of the senate voted in favour of his proposition; and although Nero expressed his displeasure at the sentence, Thrasea would not yield, and the senate followed his noble example. In the course of the same year Thrasea spoke in the senate on occasion of the trial of Claudius Timarchus, of Crete, with great applause, denouncing some of the causes of the evils of the provincial administration, and pointing out their remedy.
In A. D. 63 Thrasea received a public expression of Nero's hatred. At the beginning of that year the senate went in a body to Antium, to congratulate Nero upon his wife Poppaea having recently given birth to a daughter; but Thrasea alone was forbidden to enter the imperial presence, an intimation of his approaching fate which he received with his usual calmness, for he had often been accustomed