(Caecina) Decius Marius Venantius Basilius (fl. 484) was a Roman official under Odoacer's rule.
Biography
[edit]He was the son of Caecina Decius Basilius and the brother of Caecina Mavortius Basilius Decius and Caecina Decius Maximus Basilius, all Roman consuls. Basilius Venantius, consul in 508, was probably his son.
Venantius was Praefectus urbi and consul in 484, working in the post-Roman Kingdom of Odoacer and thence Kingdom of the Ostrogoths, with Theodoric the Great as colleague.
He financed the restoration of the damages made by an earthquake[which?] to the Colosseum of Rome; two inscriptions are still extant, reading (CIL VI, 1716 b and c):
DECIVS MARIVS VENANTIVS |
Decius Marius Venantius Basilius, vir clarissimus and inlustris, Praefectus urbi, Patricius, Consul ordinarius restored at his own expenses the arena and the podium, destroyed by a terrible earthquake |
Bibliography
[edit]
- A. H. M. Jones, John Robert Martindale, John Morris (1992), "Decius Marius Venantius Basilius 13", Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire. Vol. II, p. 218. ISBN 0-521-07233-6