A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

or PETI'LIA GENS, plebeian. This name is frequently confounded with that of Poetelius, as for instance by Glandorp in his Onomasticon. The Petillii are first mentioned at the beginning of the second century B. C., and the first member of the gens, who obtained the consulship, was Q. Petillius Spurinus, B. C. 176. Under the republic the only cognomens of the Petillii are those of CAPITOLINUS and SPURINUS : a few persons, who are mentioned without a surname, are given below. On coins Capitolinus is the only

cognomen that occurs. The following coin of the Petillia gens must have been struck by a Petillius Capitolinus, as the reverse is nearly the same as the obverse of the coin figured in Vol. I. p. 605, and seems to have reference to the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus.