3 ms·

I keep reminding myself that Julius was his last (family) name, and that his first (personal) name was Gaius.

by Koshkin 5y ago

smegsicle 5y ago
where of course his second 'last name' of CAESAR was a 'cognomen', a sort of family nickname
- thaumasiotes 5y ago
  > a sort of family nickname Huh? The cognomen is the individual part of a Roman name. Nothing "family" about it.
  - smegsicle 5y ago
    idk, everything i think i know about it i read on wikipedia earlier today lol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praenomen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praenomen "The praenomen was a personal name chosen by the parents of a Roman child." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomen_(Roman_name) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomen_(Roman_name) "The nomen gentilicium (or simply nomen) was a hereditary name borne by the peoples of ancient Italy" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognomen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognomen "Initially, it was a nickname, but lost that purpose when it became hereditary. Hereditary cognomina were used to augment the second name, the gens (the family name, or clan name), in order to identify a particular branch within a family"
    - thaumasiotes 5y ago
      Hm, fair enough. It seems clear that Caesar's cognomen was hereditary: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaius_Julius_Caesar_(governor_of_Asia) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaius_Julius_Caesar_(governor_... But this is not a general feature of cognomina; compare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovidia_gens#Members https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovidia_gens#Members Looking over some other articles, it looks like hereditary cognomina were an aristocratic feature. This has the funny side effect of more or less ensuring that aristocrats from the same family are very likely to have exactly the same name.
  - goto11 5y ago
    The cognomen was inherited. That is why the "Caesar" name passed to his adoptive son.
xenonite 5y ago
Well, it was "IULIUS", if you like to start nitpicking ;) To elaborate: the character "J" was inexistent in Capitalis, which is the then used font face. Hence, the original way to write his name is with an "I".
- Koshkin 5y ago
  To continue nitpicking, the letter U did not exist, either, so the the name was written as IVLIVS.

I keep reminding myself that Julius was his last (family) name, and that his first (personal) name was Gaius.

smegsicle 5y ago

where of course his second 'last name' of CAESAR was a 'cognomen', a sort of family nickname

thaumasiotes 5y ago
> a sort of family nickname Huh? The cognomen is the individual part of a Roman name. Nothing "family" about it.
- smegsicle 5y ago
  idk, everything i think i know about it i read on wikipedia earlier today lol https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praenomen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praenomen "The praenomen was a personal name chosen by the parents of a Roman child." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomen_(Roman_name) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomen_(Roman_name) "The nomen gentilicium (or simply nomen) was a hereditary name borne by the peoples of ancient Italy" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognomen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognomen "Initially, it was a nickname, but lost that purpose when it became hereditary. Hereditary cognomina were used to augment the second name, the gens (the family name, or clan name), in order to identify a particular branch within a family"
  - thaumasiotes 5y ago
    Hm, fair enough. It seems clear that Caesar's cognomen was hereditary: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaius_Julius_Caesar_(governor_of_Asia) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaius_Julius_Caesar_(governor_... But this is not a general feature of cognomina; compare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovidia_gens#Members https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovidia_gens#Members Looking over some other articles, it looks like hereditary cognomina were an aristocratic feature. This has the funny side effect of more or less ensuring that aristocrats from the same family are very likely to have exactly the same name.
- goto11 5y ago
  The cognomen was inherited. That is why the "Caesar" name passed to his adoptive son.

xenonite 5y ago

Well, it was "IULIUS", if you like to start nitpicking ;) To elaborate: the character "J" was inexistent in Capitalis, which is the then used font face. Hence, the original way to write his name is with an "I".

Koshkin 5y ago
To continue nitpicking, the letter U did not exist, either, so the the name was written as IVLIVS.