Hvem daterede Marcus Antonius?

Marcus Antonius (født 20. april 83 f.Kr., død august 30 f.Kr.) var en romersk politiker og general, medlem af det andet Triumvirat. Når vi i dag ved, at hans fødselsdag var 20. april, skyldes det, at romerne senere erklærede dagen for nefastus (= ulykkesdag). Han betragtede sig som efterkommer af Anton en søn af halvguden Herkules og var også høj og muskuløs. Cicero syntes, han lignede en bokser og slagter.

Han tilhørte en politisk indflydelsesrig plebejerfamilie og var en vigtig støtte for Julius Cæsar som militær leder og administrator. Ved mordet på Cæsar 44 f.Kr. var Antonius hans medconsul og tog straks ledelsen af popularerne. Han vendte stemningen imod cæsarmorderne og sikrede popularernes indflydelse. Han blev udsat for voldsomme personlige angreb fra Cicero, som beskyldte ham for at søge diktatormagt.

Efter en kort uheldig krig mod sin rival, Cæsars grandnevø Octavian (senere Augustus), slog Antonius om, allierede sig med ham og ryttergeneralen Lepidus og dannede det andet triumvirat 43 f.Kr.. Sammen med dem stod Antonius for de voldsomme udrensninger blandt senatorerne som fulgte alliancen. Han menes at være ansvarlig for Ciceros død. Det var Antonius, som ledede Folkepartiets hær i det endelige opgør med cæsarmorderne Brutus og Cassius, som blev knust i slaget ved Philippi 42 f.Kr.

Den næste halve snes år var Antonius og Octavian Romerrigets herrer og ledede styret i øst. Antonius blev som led i alliancen gift med Octavians søster, men han traf den egyptiske dronning Kleopatra VII, som blev hans elskerinde og samleverske, og som han fik tre børn med: tvillingerne Alexander Helios (Solen) og Cleopatra Selene (Månen) samt Ptolemaios Philadelphus. Forholdet til Octavian blev dårligere, og det andet triumvirat sluttede i 33 f.Kr. og det kom til åben krig. Octavian besejrede Antonius i søslaget ved Actium i 31 f.Kr., og Antonius og Kleopatra begik selvmord.

Antonius er blevet både rost og kritiseret af historikerne: han roses som en dygtig general med stort personligt mod, men kritiseres for drikfældighed, brutalitet og ustabilitet. Ved sin slægtsskabsforbindelse til Augustus blev han stamfader til tre romerske kejsere: Caligula, Claudius og Nero.

Volumnia Cytheris (fl. 1st-century BC) was an ancient Roman actress and mimae dancer. She is foremost known as the mistress of several famous Romans.

Possibly born around 70 B.C., she was originally a slave of Publius Volumnius Eutrapelius but later became a freedwoman. On stage, she was normally referred to only as Cytheris. The name derived from "Cythera" a nickname for Aphrodite. She had relationships with Brutus and Mark Antony, which attracted a lot of attention in contemporary ancient Rome. She is mentioned as the companion of her aristocratic lovers in social occasions when the presence of a courtesan was otherwise not common, and considered shocking.

Cicero's letters recount how embarrassed he was to go to a party that she also attended, and how offensive it was for Mark Antony to give her a place of dignity in his litter:

"The tribune of the people was borne along in a chariot, lictors crowned with laurel preceded him; among whom, on an open litter, was carried an actress; whom honourable men, citizens of the different municipalities, coming out from their towns under compulsion to meet him, saluted not by the name by which she was well known on the stage, but by that of Volumnia. A car followed full of pimps; then a lot of debauched companions; and then his mother, utterly neglected, followed the mistress of her profligate son, as if she had been her daughter-in-law. O the disastrous fecundity of that miserable woman! With the marks of such wickedness as this did that fellow stamp every municipality, and prefecture, and colony, and, in short, the whole of Italy."

Later, Cicero's wife asked Cytheris to help mend the relationship between her husband and Cytheris' lover Mark Antony, so that he could return from exile in Brundisium.

Her rejection of Cornelius Gallus reportedly provided the theme for Virgil's tenth Eclogue. Gallus refers to her in his work under the name Lycoris, which alludes to one of the names "Lycoreus" the god Apollo, Greek god of music.

She is one of few free influential Roman courtesans mentioned by her contemporaries, others being Praecia and Chelidon. Cytheris' fate is unknown and she is not mentioned in any sources after a certain point.

Glaphyra (Greek: Γλαφύρα) was a hetaera, a form of courtesan, who lived in the 1st century BC. Glaphyra was famed and celebrated in antiquity for her beauty, charm and seductiveness. Her marriage to Archelaus the elder of Cappadocia gave her political power. Her later affair with Mark Antony occasioned a vulgar poem from Octavian Caesar.