Marcus Licinius Crassus (consul 30 BC)


Marcus Licinius Crassus the Younger, grandson of the triumvir Marcus Licinius Crassus, was a Roman Consul in the year 30 BC as the colleague of Octavian. He was best known for his successful campaigns in Macedonia and Thrace in 29–27 BC, for which he was denied customary military honors by Octavian.

Family

The younger Crassus was the son of another Marcus Licinius Crassus, possibly by his wife Caecilia Metella Cretica, daughter of the consul Quintus Caecilius Metellus Creticus ; his mother's tomb is visible on the Appian Way. The father was a quaestor to Julius Caesar, and a son, possibly the eldest son, of the triumvir Marcus Licinius Crassus possibly by his first wife. Crassus the Younger apparently had no surviving sons by his wife. It is believed that Crassus adopted the future consul Marcus Licinius Crassus Frugi from the Calpurnius Piso family.

Military career

Crassus was a Roman general, who fought first with Sextus Pompey and Mark Antony before defecting to Octavian. Octavian then appointed him as his colleague as consul for 30 BC, even though Crassus had not been praetor, the office that was traditionally a prerequisite for the consulship. Dispatched to Macedonia in 29 BC, he moved against the Bastarnae, a tribe of mixed ethnicity who had crossed the Danube and threatened Roman allies in neighboring Thrace. He drove them back toward the Danube and finally defeated them in pitched battle, killing their King Deldo in single combat. By Roman tradition, he was thus entitled to the Spolia opima, but Octavian blocked the privilege, apparently wishing to downplay the successes of individual generals in favor of his own prestige. Crassus likewise did not receive the agnomen of Scythicus to commemorate his victory. However, Octavian eventually did grant him a triumph upon his return to Rome.
Notably Octavian had left Rome to travel round the Western provinces of the Empire by the time the triumph took place and history does not record any further deeds of Crassus.