Julia the Younger

Julia Minor ("Minor" Latin for "the younger") or Julilla (little Julia) (Classical Latin: IVLIA•MINOR, [Aut|E. Groag, A. Stein, L. Petersen - e.a. (edd.), "Prosopographia Imperii Romani saeculi I, II et III" (PIR), Berlin, 1933 - I 635] 19 BC-28 or early 29) was the eldest daughter of Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa and Julia the Elder and as such Emperor Augustus' granddaughter through her mother. Agrippina the Elder (Germanicus' wife) was her younger sister. Vipsania Agrippina (Tiberius' and later Gaius Asinius Gallus' wife), also a daughter of Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, was their half-sister.

Life

About 5 BC or 6 BC, Augustus arranged her to marry Lucius Aemilius Paullus (consul 1). [Suetonius, "The Twelve Caesars", "II. Augustus", LXIV] Paullus had a family relation to her as her first half-cousin, as both had Scribonia as grandmother: Julia's mother was a daughter of Scribonia by Augustus; Paullus' mother, Cornelia Scipio, was a daughter of Scribonia resulting from her earlier marriage to Publius Cornelius Scipio Salvito.

Paullus and Julia had a daughter, Aemilia Lepida and a son, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus. According to Suetonius, she built a large pretentious country house. Augustus disliked large overdone houses and had it demolished. [Suetonius, "The Twelve Caesars", "II. Augustus", LXXII]

In 8, according to ancient historians, Julia was exiled for having an affair with Decimus Junius Silanus, a senator. She was sent to Trimerus, a small Italian island, where she gave birth to a child. Augustus rejected the infant and ordered it to be exposed, [Suetonius, "The Twelve Caesars", "II. Augustus", LXV] or left on a mountainside to die. Silanus went into voluntary exile, but returned under Tiberius' reign. [Tacitus, "Ann." III, 24]

Sometime between 1 and 14, her husband Paullus was executed as a conspirator in a revolt. [Suetonius, "The Lives of Caesars", Life of Augustus 19] Modern historians theorize that Julia's exile was not actually for adultery but for involvement in Paulus' revolt. [Norwood, Frances, "The Riddle of Ovid's Relegatio" "Classical Philology" (1963) p. 154] Livia Drusilla plotted against her stepdaughter's family and ruined them. This led to open compassion for the fallen family. Julia died on the same island where she had been sent in exile twenty years earlier. [Tacitus, "Ann." IV, 71] Due to the adultery that Julia committed, Augustus stated in his will that she would never be buried in Rome. [Suetonius, "The Twelve Caesars", "II. Augustus", CI] . She was survived by her son and daughter and by several grandchildren.

Variants of her name

Julia is also mentioned under following names:
* Vipsania Julia (Agrippina);
* Iulilla;
* Julia, Augustus' granddaughter
* Julia (Caesaris) minor.She was not Julia Caesaris by birth: being the daughter of a Vipsanius Agrippa makes her a "Vipsania Agrippina" by birth, although there are no contemporary sources that show that that name would have been used for her. She came to belong to the household of the Julio-Claudian dynasty as she was raised and instructed by her maternal grandfather Augustus. [Suetonius, "The Twelve Caesars", "II. Augustus", LXIV – note that Augustus was member of the Julii Caesares gens through (posthumous) adoption by the (maternal) uncle of his mother Atia - that maternal uncle was of course Julius Caesar; Augustus was an Octavius by birth (hence his name Octavianus "after" that posthumous adoption had taken place).] Further Augustus adopted Tiberius as his son (and heir), and while Tiberius was remarried to Julia the Elder, Augustus sort of became "paternal" grandfather to Julia the Elder's children too, including Julia the Younger. A "formal" adoption "in the family of the Caesars" among the offspring of M. Vipsanius Agrippa and Julia the Elder is however only recorded regarding Vipsania Julia's brothers Gaius — hence Gaius Caesar — and Lucius — hence Lucius Caesar. [Tacitus, "Ann." I, 3] Her youngest sister (Agrippina the Elder) and brother (Agrippa Postumus) are usually called after their natural father. Likewise, her eldest half-sisters (Vipsania Agrippina and Vipsania Marcella) were named after their father Vipsanius (Agrippa). Her youngest half-brother, unnamed in contemporary sources, was later sometimes dubbed Tiberillus, after his father Tiberius.

Note that also the youngest of the two sisters of Julius Caesar is sometimes named Julia (Caesaris) minor by historians.

ee also

*Julio-Claudian family tree

Notes

External links

* The Archeological museum of the University of Innsbruck displays a sculpted head that is presumably Vipsania Julia's: [http://www.uibk.ac.at/c/c6/c614/Museum/raum3-1-1.html#julia Inv. Nr. I/506 – Image at the university's website] .