Our History…Pupo side of our family
The most remote times…
By Delio
Emmanuel Mir Pupo precious research and contribution of Antonio
Pupo , from Francica, Italy
Our origin is italian and, as far as we can trace it, belongs to the first century before
Christ, at the end of the republican period of the
Roman History, with information about the existence of a certain Marcus Pisone Calpurnianus Pupius , who had been been one of the two consuls (a kind of prime-minister) in 61 b.C. Marcus Pisone Calpurnianus Pupius had belonged originally to a gens (a clan) called Calpurnia and passed, trough adoption, to the gens Pupia.
At that time,
Rome was in an extreme social, political and military agitation period: most of its population (the plebeians) had empoverished; its lands were lost due to debts with the agricultural aristocracy (the patricians or optimates ) and due to slavery there were jobs neither in the country, nor in the city; with no access to the politic power and having no part of the wealth that came from military conquests, the poor ones joined a faction called
Popular Party where a few plebeians enriched due to war or commerce was trying to breach the political monopoly of optimates by force (many military heads were originary men of the common people, what gave them a reasonable power to maneuver the people and the army). These things were happening since the beginning of the second century before
Christ, but started to be really serious on 133 b.C., when Tiberius Gracus presented the
Senate (the main political
Roman agency) a species of agrarian reform. This resulted in a civil war between the partisans of Tiberius Graco (leant on the
Popular Party) and the optimates (representing the senatorial interests in the Aristocratic Party). Tiberius was killed in this civil war and, ten years later, his brother Caius Gracus tried to do the same thing, rushing in another war against optimates and commiting suicide at the end of it. The land trouble kept still problematic.
After all of this,
Rome passed trough a short and uncertain period of relative stability till a plebeian general called
Marius became consul , opposing the optimate's will, on 107 b.C.: for the first time a plebeian assumed that rank. Marius, illegally, remained consul for lots of years, re-elected many times by military force, until optimates initiate a reaction promoting and fortifying another general, Syllas, from 95 b.C. ahead, trying to take the power away from the hands of the
Popular Party. Once more a civil war began, and the violence lasted up to 86 b.C., when
Marius died. His son (
Marius the Young), however, continued to fight against Syllas up to 82 b.C., when, defeated, committed suicide. Syllas became then absolute master of politics and military power and controlled
Rome until his death in 78 b.C., protecting the optimates interests and trying to fortify them.
The civil wars, however, had fortified the army; the control of the optimates in
Rome was precarious and they knew that. The death of Syllas had created a blank which had to be fulfilled according to the will of
Senate, there should be no chance for another remained member of the
Popular Party. So, the optimates decided to support another general called Pompeu, who was a member of aristocracy, distinguished when suffocating, in 72 b.C., a revolt in Hispania (current Spain) against the
Roman domain. Pompeu became consul in 70 b.C. and made an alliance with Crasso, the other consul and general, too. For this time, Marcus Pisone Calpurnianus Pupius , who probably had participated in Pompeu's military operations in Hispania, was a governor of that province and was received in triumph (a commemoration that represented the public recognition of the
Senate to the benefactors of
Rome) in 69 year b.C. Some time later, he was the legacy of Pompeu in the war against king MitrÃade, who in the East had stood up against
Rome since 74 b.C. The victory of Pompeu on MitrÃade in 62 b.C. extended his power even more: Pompeu commemorated a triumph "over entire world" in 61 b.C., when the
Senate , represented by
Cicero, declared that he " extended the roman empire until the limits of the world " . This year of 61 b.C. is considered as being the apogee of political and military influence of Pompeu in
Rome, and that's the year which Marcus Pisone Calpurnianus Pupius occupied the consul position, appointed by Pompeu; it's reasonable to admit, therefore, that he was a representative of the aristocracy of optimates .
The next consulate occupant (whose mandate time was officially of two years) was
Julius Cesar (59 to 57 b.C.), who controlled
Rome as a master until being assassinated on March, 15, 44 b.C.