Spurius Cassius Viscellinus - Trial and Execution

Trial and Execution

The following year, after laying down his consulship, Cassius was accused of aiming at royal power, probably by the quaestors Caeso Fabius Vibulanus and Lucius Valerius Potitus. He was tried and sentenced to death by his fellow patricians, who regarded him a traitor for siding with the plebeians. Cassius was scourged and beheaded; his house razed to the ground, and the spot where it stood, in front of the temple of Tellus, was left waste. Both Livius and Dionysius erroneously report that Cassius was condemned by the tribes, and for this reason, Dionysius states that he was hurled from the Tarpeian Rock. A further tradition stated that Cassius was condemned and his sentence carried out by his own father, although Niebuhr argues that it was impossible that a man who had been thrice consul and twice triumphed should still be in his father's power.

Although the injustice of Cassius' condemnation today appears obvious, his guilt was accepted by most ancient historians. The chief exception is Cassius Dio, who expressed his belief in the consular's innocence. So universal was the belief in his guilt, that a statue of him erected on the spot of his house by one of his descendants was melted down by the censors in 159 BC. In the temple of Ceres stood a brazen statue of the goddess, with the inscription, ex Cassiana familia datum, believed to have been donated by Cassius' family. Some seem to have called for the execution of Cassius' sons also, but according to Dionysius, they were spared by the senate.