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Lucius Nonius Asprenas (fl. 1st century AD) was a Roman Senator who was appointed suffect consul in AD 6.

Biography

Asprenas was the son of Lucius Nonius Asprenas, an intimate friend of the emperor Augustus, and Quinctilla, a sister of Publius Quinctilius Varus.[1]

In 4 BC, Nonius Asprenas served as a military tribune in Syria under his uncle, Publius Quinctilius Varus.[2] In AD 6, he was appointed suffect consul, replacing Lucius Arruntius the Younger.

In AD 9, Nonius Asprenas was serving as a consular legate in Germania again under Varus. When Varus and his legions perished at the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, Asprenas was holding two legions at Moguntiacum.[3] Hearing news of the disaster, he took his two legions and hurried down the River Rhine to protect the winter camps and rescue the survivors of the battle. However, he was then accused of helping himself to the property of the dead officers.[4]

The accusation did not hurt his career as in AD 14/15, Nonius Asprenas served as the proconsular governor of Africa.[5] The historian Tacitus reported that while governor, he sent soldiers to kill Sempronius Gracchus on the orders of Tiberius.[6] In AD 20, Asprenas questioned in the Senate the omission of Claudius from an official vote of thanks for the imperial family’s pursuit of justice on behalf of the recently deceased Germanicus.[7]

Nonius Asprenas married a daughter of Lucius Calpurnius Piso and they had at least one son, Lucius Nonius Asprenas, suffect consul in AD 29.[8]

Sources

• Smith, William, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, Vol I (1867)
• Syme, Ronald, "The Augustan Aristocracy" (1986). Clarendon Press. Retrieved 2012-11-01 – via Questia (subscription required)