Marcus Popilius

, a consul who was informed, as he was offering a sacrifice, that a sedition was raised in the city against the senate. Upon this he immediately went to the populace in his sacerdotal robes, and quieted the multitude with a speech. He lived about the year of Rome 404. Livy , bk. 9 , ch. 21 .— Valerius Maximus , bk. 7 , ch. 8 .――Caius, a consul, who, when besieged by the Gauls, abandoned his baggage to save his army. Cicero , Rhetoric a ad Herennium , bk. 1 , ch. 15 .――Lænas, a Roman amba ador to Antiochus king of Syria. He was commi ioned to order the monarch to abstain from hostilities against Ptolemy king of Egypt, who was an ally of Rome. Antiochus wished to evade him by his answers, but Popilius, with a stick which he had in his hand, made a circle round him on the sand, and bade him, in the name of the Roman senate and people, not to go beyond it before he spoke decisively. This boldne intimidated Antiochus; he withdrew his garrisons from Egypt, and no longer meditated a war against Ptolemy. Valerius Maximus , bk. 6 , ch. 4 .— Livy , bk. 45 , ch. 12 .— Paterculus , bk. 1 , ch. 10 .――A tribune of the people who murdered Cicero, to whose eloquence he was indebted for his life when he was accused of parricide. Plutarch. ――A pretor who banished the friends of Tiberius Gracchus from Italy.――A Roman consul who made war against the people of Numantia, on pretence that the peace had not been firmly established. He was defeated by them.――A senator who alarmed the conspirators against Cæsar, by telling them that the whole plot was discovered.――A Roman emperor. See: Nepotianus .