Annia Faustina

See also: Faustina

Annia Aurelia Faustina
Spouse	1. Pomponius Bassus 2. Elagabalus
Father	Tiberius Claudius Severus Proculus
Mother	Annia Faustina
Born	about 201
Died	after 222

Annia Aurelia Faustina (about 201–after 222) was an Anatolian Roman noblewoman. She was an Empress of Rome and third wife of Roman Emperor Elagabalus briefly in 221.

Ancestry and family

Annia Aurelia Faustina is an ancient Roman noblewoman that has been scarcely notice in ancient Roman history and by ancient, modern historians. She was an extremely beautiful woman; in her character she was virtuous, charming who share of principle and prudence was greatly shown in her that her female ancestors. She was of noble descent; was the daughter and only child of noblewoman and wealthy heiress Annia Faustina and the Roman Senator, consul Tiberius Claudius Severus Proculus. Her parents were maternal second-cousins.

Her paternal grandparents were the Pontian Greek Roman Senator and Peripatetic Philosopher, Gnaeus Claudius Severus and his second wife, the Roman Princess Annia Aurelia Galeria Faustina. Her maternal grandparents were wealthy Roman heiress Ummidia Cornificia Faustina and an unnamed Roman Senator. Her paternal half-uncle was Marcus Claudius Ummidius Quadratus, who had been adopted by the Roman Consul Marcus Ummidius Quadratus Annianus, the nephew of the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius. She was of Pontian Greek and Italian Roman ancestry.

Her paternal great-grandparents were the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius; Roman Empress Faustina the Younger; the Roman Senator, Philosopher Gnaeus Claudius Severus Arabianus and his unnamed wife. Her maternal great-grandparents were Marcus Aurelius’ sister, the noblewoman Annia Cornificia Faustina and Gaius Ummidius Quadratus Annianus Verus a Roman Senator who served as a suffect consul in 146. Thus she was a descendant of the former ruling Nerva–Antonine dynasty of the Roman Empire. Although by birth, Annia Aurelia Faustina was of the Claudia (gens), she was not named after her father; instead she was named in honor of her parent’s relations to the gens Aurelia, the gens Annia and the Nerva–Antonine dynasty.

Early life

Annia Aurelia Faustina was born and raised on her mother’s estate in Pisidia, one of a number in that area called the Cyllanian Estates. These estates were very large properties, established from the time of the Roman Dictator of the Roman Republic, Lucius Cornelius Sulla (c. 138 BC-78 BC).

By 218, her parents had died. Annia Aurelia Faustina had inherited her mother’s estate and the fortune of both parents; she had become a very wealthy heiress. On the site of the estate inscriptions have survived proclaiming her inheritance of the property from her parents and that she was its owner.

About 216, her father may have made a political alliance with a Roman Senator who was a member of the Pomponia (gens). This resulted in her marrying the Roman Politician Pomponius Bassus.

First marriage

Between 216-218, Annia Aurelia Faustina married the Roman Politician Pomponius Bassus. Upon her marriage, they settled at her Pisidian Estate. Pomponius Bassus treated Annia Aurelia Faustina well and they both lived in domestic tranquility. She bore him at least two known children; a daughter Pomponia Ummidia (born 219) and a son, Pomponius Bassus (born 220).

Second marriage to Elagabalus

In the year 221, Roman Emperor Elagabalus desired Annia Aurelia Faustina to be his wife. It was her beauty and her high prominent imperial ancestry that attracted the Roman Emperor Elagabalus to her. In order to marry her, he ordered the execution of Pomponius Bassus. After the death of Pomponius Bassus, Elagabalus forbade her to mourn her first husband. In July 221, Elagabalus took Annia Aurelia Faustina as his third wife (her second marriage). Roman society was more accepting of his marriage to her than of his second marriage to the Vestal Virgin Julia Aquilia Severa.

Through her marriage to Elagabalus, she became Empress of Rome. Annia Aurelia Faustina through her humble, high born noble descent was is her own right a Roman Princess and could have claimed the Roman throne for herself. When she married Elagabalus, it seemed for a time that the Nerva–Antonine dynasty rule had returned to Rome.

He gave her the title of Annia Faustina Augusta and added the Latin name Julia to her name. Numismatic and other evidence that have survived of her, date from her second, brief marriage, to Elagabalus.

Elagabalus had hoped she would bear him an heir, so that his maternal cousin Alexander Severus, would not inherit the throne; however, she bore him no children. Towards the end of 221, Elagabalus divorced her; it is not known why. Due to her second brief marriage, there are no surviving sources stating how Annia Aurelia Faustina ruled when she was a Roman Empress. Elagabalus returned to Julia Aquilia Severa and re-married her, as his fourth wife.

Life after Elagabalus

When her marriage to Elagabalus ended, Annia Aurelia Faustina returned with her children to the Pisidian Estate. She spent the final years of her life there. When she died, her daughter Pomponia Ummidia inherited the estate. After her death, her descendants had become various distinguished nobles and politicians in Roman Society.

Sources

• Descriptive Catalogue of a Cabinet of Roman Imperial Large-brass Medals; by William Henry Smyth, 1834
• Septimius Severus: the African emperor; by Anthony Richard Birley; 2nd ed. Routledge, 1999
• Marcus Aurelius; by Anthony Richard Birley, Routledge, 2000
• The Cities and Bishoprics of Phyrgia: being an Essay of the Local History of Phrygia from the Earliest Times to the Turkish Conquest; Volume One, Part One; by William M. Ramsay, 2004
• Elagabal
• Dirty Old Coins
• http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-bio/1249.html
• http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-bio/0482.html
• Annia Faustina Forum Ancient Coins

External links

• Coinage of Annia Faustina, the third of Elagabalus

Royal titles
Preceded by Aquilia Severa	Empress of Rome 221	Succeeded by Aquilia Severa