Gaius Bruttius Praesens

Who was Gaius Bruttius Praesens?

Lucius Fulvius Gaius Bruttius Praesens Laberius Maximus Polyonymus was a prominent Roman senator and twice consul during the reigns of Roman emperors Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius and Commodus. His career is largely known from inscriptions. The epithet Polyonymus appears on his grave inscription but should not itself be understood as a name, like some aristocratic Romans of the period he had ten or twelve names in all.

Praesens was the son and the only child to Roman consul and senator Caius Bruttius Praesens Lucius Fulvius Rusticus and from his second marriage to rich Roman heiress Laberia Hostilia Crispina, daughter of the general and twice consul Manius Laberius Maximus. He was born and raised in Volceii, Lucania, Italy. To judge by the presumed dates of his first offices, Praesens must have been born in or around the year 119. He served as a military tribune in Legio III Gallica in Syria, probably about 136 when his father was governing the province. At the beginning of Antoninus Pius’ reign the family evidently stood in high favour: the father took his second consulship in 139 as colleague of the new emperor, and the son was elevated to patrician status about the same time. He went on to fill the coveted position of quaestor augusti to Antoninus.