Mucia Tertia


Mucia Tertia was a Roman matrona who lived in the 1st century BC. She was the daughter of Quintus Mucius Scaevola, the pontifex maximus and consul in 95 BC. Her mother was a Licinia who divorced her father to marry Quintus Caecilius Metellus Nepos, in a scandal mentioned by several sources. Her name, Mucia Tertia, would suggest that she was a third daughter, according to the Roman naming convention for women, though it is believed that the choice of name was to differentiate her from her two aunts. Mucia had also two younger half-brothers from her mother's second marriage, Quintus Metellus Celer, consul in 60 BC, and Quintus Metellus Nepos, consul in 57 BC.

Marriages

Following the victory of Lucius Cornelius Sulla over Gaius Marius the Younger, Sulla, as dictator, needed to secure Pompey's loyalty and to do that, he arranged the latter's marriage to Mucia around 79 BC. This marriage resulted in three children: elder son Gnaeus Pompeius, daughter Pompeia Magna and younger son Sextus Pompey. She had the misfortune to outlive all three of her children.
Between 76 and 61 BC, Pompey spent most of the time away from Rome, campaigning in Hispania against Sertorius, in the Mediterranean Sea against the pirates, and in the East fighting King Mithridates VI of Pontus. On his return in 61 BC, Pompey sent Mucia a letter of divorce. According to Cicero's personal correspondence, the motive was adultery. Imperial biographer Suetonius stated that Pompey often referred to Caesar as "Aegisthus", the name of a Greek mythological character who was known to have seduced a king's wife. Mucia next married Marcus Aemilius Scaurus, a stepson of the dictator Sulla, with whom she had another son named Marcus. In 39 BC, Mucia, at the earnest request of the Roman people, went to Sicily to mediate between her son Sextus Pompey and triumvir Octavian. She was living at the time of the battle of Actium, 31 BC. Octavian treated her with great respect.