* 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 to say in the language of the
Stoic school, " Nero can kill me, but cannot injure me." He did not, however, court his fate.
During the next three years he retired almost entirely from public life, and was hardly ever
seen in the senate. but Nero could neither forget nor forgive him; and accordingly, after he
had put to death so many distinguished men on occasion of Piso's conspiracy, he resolved, to
use the words of Tacitus (Tac. Ann. 16.21), to murder Virtue
herself, by the execution of Thrasea and his friend Barea Soranus. The accusation,
condemnation, and death of Thrasea, are related by Tacitus, with more than his usual power and
we must refer our readers for the details of the tragic scene to the masterly pages of the
great historian. The accusation against Thrasea was placed in the hands of his old enemy
Cossutianus Capito, and of Eprius Marcellus. One of his friends, Arulenus Rusticus, who was
then tribune of the people, offered to put his veto upon the decree of the senate, but Thrasea
would not allow him thus to sacrifice his life. On the day of his impeachment the temple of
Venus, where the senate assembled, was surrounded by soldiers, and bodies of troops were
stationed in all the public buildings and open places of the city. The senators had no
alternative but submission or death. They gratified the wishes of the emperor by condemning
Thrasea and Barea Soranus to death, and Helvidius Priscus, Thrasea's son-in-law, to
banishment. Thrasea was allowed the choice of his own death. It was late in the day when the
senate pronounced its sentence; and the consul forthwith sent his quaestor to carry the fatal
news to Thrasea. He was in his gardens conversing with his friends, and was at that moment
more particularly engaged in conversation with the Cynic philosopher Demetrius; and the
subject of their discussion, as far as could be gathered from the few words that were
overheard, appeared to be the immortality of the soul. The conversation was interrupted by the
arrival of Domitius Caecilianus, one of Thrasea's most intimate' friends, who informed him of
the senate's decision. Thrasea forthwith dismissed his friends, that they might not be
involved in the fate of a condemned person ; and when his wife wished to follow the example of
her mother, and die with her husband, he enrtreated her to preserve her life for the sake of
their daughter. He then went into a colonnade, where he awaited the arrival of the quaestor.
When the latter had delivered to him the decree of the senate, he retired into his chamber
with Demetrius and Helvidius Priscus, and there had the veins of both his arms cut. As the
blood gushed forth, he said " Let us offer a libation to Jupiter the Deliverer," and their,
addressing a few words to the quaestor, he calmly awaited the approach of death. His last
words were spoken to Demetrius, but these, unfortunately, are not preserved, as the existing
MSS. of the Annals of Tacitus break off at this point. Thrasea perished in A.
D. 66, two years before the death of Nero. His panegyric was written by his friend and
admirer, Arulenus Rusticus, who was in consequence put to death by Domitian. (Tac. Ann. 13.49, 14.12, 481, 49, 15.20_22, 16.21_35, Hist. 2.91, 4.5, Agric. 2 ;D. C. 61.15, 62.26; Suet. Nero 37, Dom. 10 ;Plin. Ep. 7.19, 8.22; Plut.
Praccep. Reip. Gerend. 100.14, p. 810a.; Arrian, Dissert. 1.1.26; Mart. 1. 9 ; Juv.
5.36.)