The names of Rome

“My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the army of the north, general of the Felix legions, loyal servant of the one true emperor Marcus Aurelius.”

Who remembers these words that Russell Crowe pronounces in the movie Gladiator?
The gladiator who is in front of the emperor Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus, begins his speech with this presentation because in ancient Rome to know who was in front of him they used the system of “tria nomina”.

Three names that told of each citizen, the civis romanus, his origins and the branches of his original family or acquisition, so as to be a real means of social identification and social class to which he belonged.

The first name pronounced by Russell Crowe is Maximus.
This is equivalent to our baptismal name and was imposed by the parents on the child on the day of birth as Aulus, Appius, Gaius, Marcus, Publius, Servius, Titus.

Often, all the firstborn of a family carried the same “praenomen” so both the grandfather, father and son.

Females, however, usually did not have it and were called with the “nomen” of the “gens” to which they belonged, sometimes softened by a vezzeggiativo:
the daughter of Marcus Tullius Cicero was called Tulliola (from the name Tullius).

The second name Decimus is the “nomen gentilizio” that indicated the members of a gens, or the lineage to which they belonged.
The initial Roman gentes were about 100, among the most famous were the gens Julia, the gens Cornelia, Claudia, Cassia, Domitia just to name a few.

It was expressed with an adjective ending in -ius, which indicated belonging to a lineage:
Marcus Cornelius meant “Marcus of the gens Cornelia”, Caius Julius Caesar was clearly of the gens Julia.

This was used mainly to identify the social position to indicate the prestige and antiquity of the family, but it was also worn by some plebeian families.

The third is Meridio that represents the cognomen, a nickname added to the noble nomen.

Initially it was individual and could also be a popular nickname. Meridio, even if it is a fictional name, actually in Latin indicated who likes to sleep in the afternoon.

Who knows if the director Ridley Scott did not come up with this name referring to the moment that the Romans today call “pennichella”.

That sleepiness that often assails us after a good lunch and a few glasses of wine.

Many were the names used for cognomen such as Lentulus which comes from lentil or Cicerone from chickpea.

Lepidus instead indicated a joking person and Rufus a person with red hair.

Over the years this name became hereditary and served to distinguish the various branches of the same gens:
for example, the Corneli Cathegi were thus distinguished from the part of the Corneli Scipiones.

Finally there were the “cognomina trionfali“, conferred to the winners: as Scipio of the family of Corneli who became “Africanus” after his victory over Carthage.

The slaves instead had only the nomen, but if they were freed assumed the cognomen and often the praenomen of their former master.

It was still difficult to remember the names of all … it was not enough to say only Maximus …

The Romans had solved this problem with the “nomenclatur“, which was a slave or freedman, a free slave, who helped his master remember the names of the people to greet.

Now you also know a little more about the names you hear of emperors or famous people of ancient Rome.

Moreover, some names had special meanings such as Hadrian, which means the one who comes from the Adriatic Sea.

Augustus on the other hand the one who deserves fame, the revered.

Octavius indicated that he was the eighth son of the family.

For women then the name Aurelia refers to a woman who is of great value, like gold, while Flavia to the color “tawny” indicating women with hair with a reddish blond color.

The name Celia indicated a woman who came down from the sky while the name Livia was indicated a person who had to be remembered or worthy of memory.