Lucius Calpurnius Piso Frugi ( – 112 BC) was a Roman politician and historian. He created the first permanent jury court in Rome (quaestio perpetua) to try cases related to provincial corruption during his plebeian tribunate in 146 BC. He also fought, not entirely successfully, in the First Servile War. He was consul in 133 BC and censor in 120 BC.
Later in life, he wrote the Annales, a history of Rome from its foundation through to at least 146 BC and probably his own time; only 49 fragments of the Annales survive, preserved in other works. Consisting of seven or eight books, it was the first history to split up Roman history into a year-by-year account.
Family
Piso belonged to the plebeian gens Calpurnia, which emerged during the First Punic War and was of Etruscan descent. The Pisones were the most important family of the gens and remained on the fore of Roman politics during the Empire; their first member was Gaius Calpurnius Piso, praetor in 211, also grandfather of this Piso. The praetor of 211 had two sons, Gaius, the first consul of the gens in 180 who also earned a triumph for his successful command in Spain in 186, and Lucius, only known as ambassador to the Achaean League in 198; the latter was the father of the historian. The next generation of the Calpurnii Pisones had an impressive number of consuls – four in 16 years – as in addition to Piso's own consulship in 133, his cousins Lucius Caesoninus, Gnaeus, and Quintus were also consuls, respectively in 148, 138 and 135. Piso was likely born between 182 and 179.
This Piso had a homonymous son, who was later praetor in 112 BC. The son's line eventually produced the Gaius Calpurnius Piso who was the husband of Cicero's daughter Tullia.
Career
Tribunate and lex Calpurnia
Piso probably did his ten-year military service between 165 and 152. Piso is first mentioned in the sources as plebeian tribune in 149. The previous year, the propraetor Servius Sulpicius Galba had slaughtered eight or nine thousand Lusitanians through treachery. After accepting their unconditional surrender in good faith, he rounded up entire Lusitanian communities, disarmed them, and then massacred their male populations en masse before enslaving the remainder.
When Galba returned to Rome in 149, he was sued before the people by Lucius Scribonius Libo, Piso's colleague as tribune of the plebs; despite Cato the Censor's vehement support of the accusation, Galba was acquitted. Both Cato and Piso had clients in Spain who were worried by Galba's exactions; they asked their patrons to protect them. Piso therefore brought the lex Calpurnia de repetundis, which established the first permanent criminal court to judge Roman governors' provincial misdeeds. Before 149, governors were judged by an ad hoc court which was only sometimes created for that purpose.
The lex Calpurnia provided that the peregrine praetor directed the court and chose the jurors from the senate; governors found guilty had to repay the sums extorted. The law was a milestone in Roman criminal law – it "provided the model for other permanent criminal tribunals" in the future – and reflected the concern in the senate that unchecked gubernatorial avarice and disregard for norms of war would alienate provincial populations and harm Rome's foreign reputation.
Praetorship
Piso was certainly praetor before 135 BC, as the lex Villia required a three-year wait between holding two magistracies (and Piso was consul in 133). The dominant opinion among modern scholars is that Piso served as praetor in Sicily in a year between 138 and 136, and he was defeated by the revolted slaves of Eunus during the First Servile War. However, knowledge of this war is very poor, and mostly comes from epitomes deriving from the lost books of Livy's Ab Urbe Condita. The only mention of Piso as praetor in ancient sources is found in the epitome of Florus (dating from the 2nd century AD), who says that "The camps even of praetors (the utmost disgrace of war) were taken by him [Eunus]; nor will I shrink from giving their names; they were the camps of [Manlius], Lentulus, Piso, and Hypsaeus". From there, it has been assumed that Florus gave the names of the successive Sicilian praetors in reverse chronological order between 138 and 135.